I wonder if Dana White regrets not promoting UFC 139 harder during the UFC on Fox. In the chaos around the network debut and Brock Lesnar’s return next month, this show seemed to get lost in the shuffle. It’s a shame really, as it was one of the best cards in terms of action in quite some time and it provided one of the greatest and most brutal fights of all-time in its main event.
Dan Henderson and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua waged an absolute war against each other. It was the type of fight that has to rank highly in the pantheon of great fights in the sport’s history; the heart, damage taken, and brutality unleashed by each man would have been enough to stop another fighter in their tracks. Instead, this went a full twenty-five minutes and set the bar for five round non-title main events impossibly high for any others to follow.
The fact that Henderson won a unanimous decision or that I and many others scored it a draw is immaterial. When two fighters put on the type of performance displayed in their bout, no one really loses. Both men really gain in the eyes of the fans. They each took the best of what the other had to offer and were still standing at the end, albeit with the help of their respective cornermen.
My fiancee’s brother often watches the fights with us and while he doesn’t seem to mind them, this had to be the first fight that I ever heard him openly state he enjoyed. If I recall correctly, he said it was the best he had seen and it seemed to make him a fan of both men. That is the essence of a great fight. For me, I’ve watched hundreds of fights over the years and I would be hard pressed to name more than a few fights that are in the same class as this one. There are fights with big knockouts, submissions, or comebacks, but in terms of fights that go the distance or close to it, you can’t do much better than this one.
In the first round, Shogun looked like he was dead meat after reeling from one of Hendo’s massive right hands. Somehow he responded by dropping Henderson. In the second round, Shogun looked to be on weary legs as he fought his way through more of Hendo’s massive bombs. By the halfway point of the fight, Shogun was on the ground in the turtle position in an attempt to avoid having his skull plastered to the mat from Hendo’s hammerfists. It was at this moment I thought the fight was going to be stopped, but somehow Rua responded with a heel hook that nearly caught Hendo. In the fourth round Shogun caught Henderson with a right that put him on spaghetti legs, but somehow he couldn’t get the finish. In the fifth, it was a stunning display of dominance as Shogun had Henderson mounted and rained down blows for the entirety of the round. It was a tremendous display of strength by the obviously gassed Henderson to avoid a TKO or submission loss in the last two rounds after spending so much energy and power pounding on Shogun through the first three. For Shogun the fact he made it to the end, much less finished strongly after taking an absolute beating in the beginning of the fight was just unbelievable. I said it already, but the onslaught both men dished out would have finished any other fighter. This isn’t an exaggeration either. I don’t care if you’re Jon Jones or Anderson Silva. No human being could endure the punishment they went through. If you haven’t seen this fight you need to do so immediately.
I wrote last week that I was looking forward to this fight and expected it to be great. I certainly didn’t expect to witness the best fight I’ve ever seen live. It was reminiscent of the wars both men were capable of in PRIDE, the only difference being that PRIDE ended five years ago and Henderson is now 41, while Shogun has been fighting on bad knees for years. I didn’t think that Shogun was capable of having a fight on par with the one he had against Little Nogueira in 2005 and I didn’t think any human being could survive the barrage Rua lets fly when he goes for the kill like Hendo did.
People calling for an immediate rematch between the two are crazy. After this fight, they shouldn’t face off again unless it is for a title. Besides, there is no way that a second fight can possibly top this one. Fans should just appreciate this fight and what they went through rather than expect more. Of course, it appears that even Shogun wants to do it again, so shows what I know. With that being said, what should come next for Hendo and Rua?
Dan Henderson: Has Hendo’s value ever been higher? And has he ever enjoyed a better twelve month span in his career? He’s gone from being considered done as an elite fighter after losing to Jake Shields in his Strikeforce debut to having a legitimate claim as the number two light heavyweight in the world. It is clear that 205 lbs. is where Hendo should be. I’ve heard some people calling for him to take on Rashad Evans in a title eliminator, but I think that Henderson’s next fight should be for the title. Evans was unable to compete at UFC 140 due to an injury, but wants to fight again rather than wait for the title shot. He’ll be ready in the next few months to fight, but Hendo certainly won’t. No one knows what is going to happen with Jones/Machida either, so pitting Henderson and Evans against each other could create a situation where there are not enough viable contenders for a large portion of the year. Besides, Dan is getting to the age where he won’t have very many runs at the title left in him. A fight between the crafty veteran with the nuclear right hand coming off a legendary fight and either the dominant young champ or the enigmatic karate master seems like it would be an easy fight to sell people on. While he would have to be considered an underdog against both men, after the year he’s had I wouldn’t count him out against any opponent.
Mauricio “Shogun” Rua: I think that Shogun proved a lot in this fight, mainly that he was clearly nowhere near physically ready for the Jon Jones fight this past March. In that fight, his body betrayed his heart and he could barely move. In the Henderson fight, he kept coming forward and fighting. He even showed some of the grappling that I discussed before the Jones fight, utilizing great trip takedowns and working for a rear naked choke and nearly ending the fight with a heel hook. Rampage Jackson originally wanted to fight Rua at UFC 144 in Japan this February, but Shogun looks like he is going to be too busted up to fight that soon. It’s a shame, as I would really like to see that fight. The fight I would go with is against the winner of Tito Ortiz and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira. I originally thought that the winner of that fight should go against Stephan Bonnar, but it appears there is another fight in the works for “The American Psycho.” Putting Shogun against Nogueira or Ortiz provides him a resilient name opponent that he should be able to defeat while the rest of the top level fighters in the division sort themselves out. Other than that, there aren’t really any other interesting fights available to him. It seems like everyone else around him in the rankings has an upcoming fight.
That’s it for Part 1 of the UFC 139 recap. I’ll discuss the rest of the card and its winners tomorrow.
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