Strikeforce: Barnett vs. Kharitonov Parting Shots

Remember when I was lamenting the lack of star power left in the Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix? Well, Daniel Cormier bombed on Antonio Silva in less than a full round and suddenly made the final bout between himself and fellow victor Josh Barnett a lot more intriguing. With three great finishes and an excellent five-round title bout, Strikeforce: Barnett vs. Kharitonov was a great show.

Where’s the grappling?!?

Imagine this: three fights with three extremely high-level grapplers…two of the best jiu-jitsu players ever to don MMA gloves, as well as a former Olympic wrestler. Now imagine that only one of these three fighters ever takes his opponent to the mat, and that individual is only able to do so in short intervals of a five-round bout.

Who would have thought that neither Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza or Roger Gracie would submit their opponents? Or that Daniel Cormier would not even bother with a takedown against the dangerous Antonio Silva?

Now, neither of the two BJJ standouts stood and fought so long by choice- Gracie was turned away on his lone takedown attempt, while Jacare struggled to keep Luke Rockhold on the mat for more than a minute or two at a time- but it all still came down to striking.

Neither Rockhold or Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal took down their BJJ expert opponents because they didn’t need to. Both did very well (though Rockhold had early troubles) in the standup and never needed to turn to their respective strengths on the mat. In the case of Cormier, the reason was the same- Cormier was doing well enough against Silva in the striking that he had no reason to change the location of the fight.

I think we’ve been seeing this a lot lately, where high-level wrestlers and jiu-jitsu players are content to stand and test their striking against their opponents. It correlates well with my Meatloaf Theory, which states that while two out of three ain’t bad, one out of three spells trouble in the higher levels of the sport. In other words, you need to be strong in two of the three basic areas: striking, wrestling or jiu-jitsu. Any less, and you’ll be in trouble.

If Cormier hadn’t worked so well on his striking, he would have been forced to take Silva down, where he may have been submitted by a jiu-jitsu black belt. If Gracie’s striking was better, he could have gotten the best of King Mo standing while making his opponent make the difficult decision of whether to keep getting out-pointed or take the fight to the mat.

In the case of Jacare, I think that cardio was more of a deciding factor, as the striking was fairly even in the first 2 1/2 rounds until Jacare’s output started to seriously drop off. Whether you land the better shots or not, if you’re letting your opponent throw about 2.4 strikes for every one you attempt over a five-round fight, you’re in trouble.

Barnett looks great, talks crazy

So, there’s this guy, Josh Barnett, who you may have heard of. I’m told by my friends on the Strikeforce announcing team that he’s a catch wrestler. He looked outstanding for the most part against Sergei Kharitonov, finishing the fight with an arm triangle choke that looked a lot like Brazilian jiu-jitsu, but which I’m told is very different because it’s catch wrestling. Mauro Ranallo almost pissed himself when he walked in the cage because he was so excited to look knowledgeable by mentioning catch wrestling. Did I mention that Barnett has a background in catch wrestling?

…CATCH WRESTLING!

Six in one hand, half-dozen in the other, if you ask me. At least Ranallo didn’t say that the difference between catch wrestling and jiu-jitsu is that catch wrestlers worry about submissions before positions, even though Barnett is much more methodical than many high-level jiu-jitsu based fighters.

I love arm triangles, and this one was particularly sweet by Barnett, as he knew that when Kharitonov flipped over from stomach to back again that he’d be able to get his head underneath Kharitonov’s tricep and cinch in the arm triangle. Since he was already in the mount, it was academic at that point as he simply stepped over to side mount and got the quick tap.

More concerning was probably Barnett’s distressing tendency to duck his head during exchanges, which Kharitonov noticed and exploited with a couple of nice uppercuts in the short fight, though Barnett downplayed the seeming bad habit later on. Then there was Barnett’s assertion that he would “suplex” former Olympic wrestler in the final tournament bout next year. That’s a special kind of crazy, my friends.

Why You Don’t Bet on MMA

Because the unranked Luke Rockhold won a unflinching, unrelenting unanimous decision over consensus top ten middleweight Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza in what was an example of a great upset. Jacare wasn’t awful, Rockhold just refused to slow down and looked like the guy who wanted it more over the last three rounds.

Adventures in Judging

It’s not the worst example of poor judging ever, but judges haven’t been as awful as usual lately and damn it, I miss complaining, so here goes: Bruce Snell somehow gave Rockhold all five rounds over Jacare. A 50-45 decision in which the winner was rocked and even dropped multiple times in the first two rounds of the fight? I could see it being 48-47 Rockhold (my personal score) or even 48-47 Jacare, but to give all five rounds to Rockhold is pretty poor judging.

Movin’ On Up Award

This has to go to Rockhold, in my opinion. Cormier was also very impressive, but beating a top guy over a five round period is slightly better than landing a few powerful shots that change the bout. Plus as a second tie-breaker, I think Jacare is a better fighter than Bigfoot Silva is, anyway. Both guys have intriguing futures ahead of them, though.

The Bob Seger “Beautiful Loser” Award

This goes almost by default to Jacare, who fought well in the first couple of rounds but found himself against an opponent who couldn’t be shaken up or discouraged. Jacare had Rockhold hurt multiple times early in the fight and showed some good striking, but simply couldn’t get the finish and faded as the fight went on. I still think he’s about where I had him (top five middleweight), but hopefully now any talk of him being someone who could give Anderson Silva a challenge will be silenced. Still, he’ll be back and unless he heads to the UFC, he’ll be Strikeforce’s champ again. With time winding down for Silva, he could be a champ in the UFC in the future, too.

Holy $#!@ Award

This unnecessarily-censored award goes not to Cormier or King Mo for their explosive knockouts in their respective fights, though it could. Instead it goes to Jordan Mein, who absolutely demolished the always-scary Evangelista “Cyborg” Santos with a barrage of standing elbows the likes of which you’ll rarely see on the undercard. Check out the video here, and keep an eye on Mein, who is already 23-7 at just 21 years old with wins over Cyborg, Marius Zaromskis and Joe Riggs.

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Tags: Antonio Silva, Daniel Cormier, Evangelista "Cyborg" Santos, Jordan Mein, Josh Barnett, Luke Rockhold, Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal, Roger Gracie, Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza, Sergei Kharitonov, Strikeforce, Strikeforce: Barnett vs. Kharitonov