Keith Jardine: The Hardest Working Man in MMA, Part Two

In Part One of this article, I detailed the first half of Keith Jardine's UFC career, including his gritty battles with Stephan Bonnar and Wlson Gouveia, and his shocking win over future champion Forrest Griffin.

Coming off that huge win, the UFC made a surprising move, and put Jardine up against newcomer Houston Alexander, who was making his debut with the promotion.

In retrospect, this was somewhat telling of the UFC management's feelings toward Jardine, as anyone else in his situation may have been groomed for title contention, but Keith's supposed lack of marketability simply put him right back into the fray.

Admittedly, there is always another side to the story; scheduling conflicts with champions, the chaotic nature of the light heavyweight division in general, and the fact that Jardine had made a habit of fighting as often as possible, may have caused this matchup.

However, it was made clear by the commentators that Jardine felt somewhat slighted by this "demotion."

Nearly anyone who watches the UFC knows what happened next.

Whether it was nerves, the surprise of fighting an unknown commodity, or that Jardine truly did take Houston lightly, we may never know.

What we do know is that after being dropped in the opening seconds of the fight, Houston exploded, bull rushing Jardine into the fence, and, taking advantage of Keith's over-eagerness to finish the fight quickly, launched one of the most brutal clinch assaults ever seen.

Jardine hung in as best he could, but it was clear he was on the losing end of the barrage. Houston appeared to land an illegal knee in the flurry, but the outcome was very likely academic at that point: Jardine had been felled by a fighter few had ever heard of, and much of his hard work up to that point had been dashed away.

Down but not out, Jardine did what he always does after a loss. He went back to the drawing board, and on to the next opponent.

Ironically, he got what he had wanted a few months back; a shot at longtime light heavyweight champion and UFC legend Chuck Liddell. Unfortunately, the shot came at a time when Liddell had just lost the championship to Quinton Jackson, and the fight was seen by many as a way to get Liddell back on the fast track to a title rematch.

The loss to Alexander had severely damaged his credibility, even though Houston had notched another brutal knockout over Alessio Sakara only weeks before the Liddell fight. Houston would later show to have holes in his ground game, but his ability to deal damage on the feet was becoming solidified.

Once again, the buzz was against Jardine.

And once again, “The Dean of Mean” showed why he is not only the UFC's resident "spoiler," but one of the toughest competitors in the division. He did something that very few people had been willing to do in years; he stood with Chuck Liddell for three rounds, and took the decision win.

It was a bloody, brutal fight, in which Jardine absorbed huge amounts of punishment, but through fantastic evasive movement, an array of punishing leg and body kicks, and pure guts, Keith outworked, out-landed, and even managed to knock down the supposedly superior striker in Liddell.

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