Affliction: Day of Reckoning saw something done by Fedor Emelianenko that very few MMA fans ever get to actually witness; by that I mean Fedor actually knocked out his opponent.
It is a very rare thing to not see Fedor win a fight by TKO or submission; more often than not he beats an opponent down on the ground and turns their face to meatloaf or pulls off what I would describe as a flawless arm bar.
However, when Fedor stepped into the ring he faced an opponent that many people felt could be his greatest test to date—Andrei Arlovski. Many people, especially some of those on this site, thought that Fedor was a mythical unicorn and by that I mean that he had never fought a true legitimate challenge.
There were questions posed by some of the bleacher creatures that Fedor was falling off after his first Sambo loss and that he had finally shown his weakness.
Well as a known Fedor fan I have to say that I was altogether pleased that he proved all these statements to be fiction.
I had my fingers crossed, I was trying to ignore the criticisms by some of the people on this site, and believe that Arlovski training with Freddie Roach would play no part in this fight. I kept telling myself that Arlovski looked weak off his back when he fought Roy Nelson and that Fedor would simply put him there and pound him out for two rounds and win.
Like Tito Ortiz said that night about having his hands sweating and shaking from anticipation of the fight, I was doing just that. When that bell rang I saw an Arlovski that was beating Fedor on punches and damaging his legs with kicks.
Fedor's looping punches were being countered by the tighter boxing of Arlovski and was making Fedor move backwards.
However, whether this was a game of possum or not it simply didn't matter because in the end Fedor knocked Arlovski out on his face.
Arlovski knocked Fedor backwards and tried to follow up with a very athletic flying knee but Fedor countered with a loopy right knocking Arlovski out in mid-air within the first round.
Actions speak louder than words and Fedor's message last night was that he deserves to be No. 1; Josh Barnett, Brock Lesnar, or whoever come on I'm ready to go.
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