Slaying the Minotaur: Can Anyone in the UFC Defeat Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira?
What is a fighter to do when they have been ranked as the No. 2 heavyweight in the world for the past four years? This is a question that fans of submission master Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira have been asking themselves ever since the Brazilian’s second loss to the apparently unbeatable Fedor Emelianenko.
A dominant fighter in Japan, Nogueira became the PRIDE organization’s first heavyweight champion by systematically dismantling his opponents with some of the most impressive submissions ever seen.
His uncanny ability to absorb absurd amounts of punishment, as witnessed in a memorable outing against Bob Sapp (Nogueira weighed 150 pounds less than “The Beast,” whom he defeated via armbar), proved that Nogueira was unlike any jiu-jitsu practitioner in the short but prestigious history of MMA.
Following a series of victories against MMA veterans such as Gary Goodridge, Mark Coleman, Heath Herring, Semmy Schilt, and Dan Henderson (the very man who had defeated Nogueira several years previously in RINGS), it appeared as if Nogueira would rule PRIDE’s heavyweight division with an iron fist.
Yet, unfortunately, this proved not to be the case for Nogueira, who was relentlessly assaulted by relative newcomer Fedor Emelianenko in a three-round war that resulted in Nogueira losing the PRIDE heavyweight championship.
Still, despite the fact that he would never regain the title, in the years to come, Nogueira would go on to defeat nearly every top-ranked heavyweight in the world, except Fedor, whom he would lose to for a second time in late 2004.
Highly successful, but never able to regain his position as king of the heavyweight mountain, Nogueira would not be able to escape Fedor’s shadow until the UFC bought, and subsequently closed down, PRIDE FC.
Immediately signed by Dana White, Nogueira instantly found himself a top contender in the UFC’s heavyweight division; a division that, as of July 2007, was seeing its talent disappear at an alarming rate.
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