Fighter Breakdown: Fedor Emelianenko

Name: Fedor Emelianenko

Nickname: The Last Emperor

Weight class: Heavyweight

Martial arts background: Fedor trained in Judo and Sambo at an early age. He did well, considering his apparent lack of natural skill and strength. He received additional training while in the Russian army, although a lot of it was general combat training and cardio. Prior to and during this time, he also lifted heavily. This gave him a very strong core, which is noticeable in nearly all of his fights. Fedor also trains in Muay Thai and kickboxing, although his primary focus is still Sambo, where he has consistently won gold medals.

Striking breakdown: Fedor uses an orthodox stance when striking, which lends itself well to his powerful overhand right. He likes to throw loopy punches, although his justification for this is that he's slinging his hands to increase the force of impact. It seems to work, since most of the people he hits fold up after one or two shots. Very few fighters have taken flush hits from the Russian without going down or at least backing off. It's also good to note that he is the least hit fighter in MMA; that is, he's hit less than any other fighter per minute in the ring.

Grappling breakdown: While he has strong striking, Fedor's grappling is excellent. He has some of the best throws, scrambles, and submissions in the world. He can consistently take down great grapplers and keep them down. During his fight with Minotauro Nogueira, he threw strikes from within Nog's guard, which was considered one of the most dangerous places to be in MMA. He was also able to reverse Nogueira and other top-tier grapplers, like Kevin Randleman and Mark Coleman with relative ease. His trademark submission is the armbar, from which he has six wins.

Strengths: Fedor has very good core and hip strength, which enables him to scramble and throw much more effectively than other heavyweights. This ties in with his superior grappling; he might have the best overall grappling in the sport. He has great scrambles, submissions, and reversals. Very few fighters can keep Fedor on his back. Due to his smaller size, he also has a slight speed advantage over most of his opponents.

Weaknesses: There are few, if any, fighters that I think have no weaknesses. Fedor is one of them. He has a holistic game and hasn't shown any real vulnerabilities, nor has he lost a round. He has shown that he can be outpointed in striking against Arlovski, although neither fighter was landing flush until the KO. He has also shown that he can be hurt with strikes, but this has only happened once in thirty-one fights.

Gameplan: Fedor is odd in that he doesn't follow the same game plan for every fight. According to him, he doesn't really plan on how he's going to attack an opponent; he fights intuitively and does what he thinks is best in the context of the fight. He does seem to enjoy fighting an opponent at his strength, i.e., striking with Crocop and grappling with Nogueira. It might be a strategy in that his opponents expect him to try to exploit their weaknesses, but he fights at their strong points instead - effectively removing an aspect of their training.

Notable wins and losses:

His first fight against Nogueira was important because it was when he captured the Pride HW belt. He jumped into Nog's guard and threw strikes from within it, shrugging off submission attempt after submission attempt. He was never in trouble during the fight. The significance of the fight was that it showed how dominant Fedor really was. Few knew who he was at that point and even fewer knew that his grappling was so overwhelmingly good.

His wins against Arlovski and Sylvia came at a good time because people were starting to doubt the Russian's claim as the #1 heavyweight in the world. By soundly defeating two top five opponents in a row, he cemented himself as the best fighter in the world.

I already spoke about the fight with Mirko Crocop here. I think it's just as important as the Nogueira fight.

Future: If Fedor comes to the UFC, I think he can become and remain champion for a long time. His biggest challenge will be Brock Lesnar, but right now Lesnar is too green to beat Fedor. He might have a better shot in two or three years, but right now Fedor is just too versatile to be threatened by Brock. There are very few fighters other than Brock that might pose a threat; Kongo is too easy to take down, Velasquez has a suspect chin, Dos Santos is relatively untested, Carwin is dangerous if he connects but he's somewhat slow, and Fedor has already beaten Cro Cop and Nogueira.