Mir's Victory Over Nogueria Gone to His Head?

Frank Mir has said in numerous interviews this week that he is intending to "stand and trade" with the French kick boxer, Cheick Kongo in their upcoming bout at UFC 107.

Mir is a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter with limited striking, is under the illusion that he is the reincarnation of Bruce Lee after becoming the first person to stop Antonio Rodrigo "minotauro" Nogueira at UFC 92.

Reports surfaced that Nogueira was in the hospital just a few weeks prior to the bout with Mir due to a severe staph infection. Nogueria refused to cancel the bout and in doing so, lost the fight to Mir early in the 2nd round. While this was a good showing for Frank, beating up on a staph hampered, sluggish Nogueira is a completely different prospect to standing and trading with a bigger, stronger and better striker such as Kongo.

In my view, Mir should win the fight due to Kongo having a horrendous ground game, but Mir will struggle on the feet. This isn't the first case of a fighter suddenly discovering the wonder of striking part way through a career and then relying on it, despite being much better at a different aspect of the sport. Sean Sherk and Josh Koscheck are two examples that have both lost bouts because of their reliance on striking when they would have been much better off with a wrestling based victory.

The problem with this trend could be to do with the fact that the UFC in particular tends to reward entertaining rather then just successful fighters. Fighters who grind out boring decisions are often left on the waiting list for title shots and higher fight purses while exciting fly or die, in your face fighters are put on the fast track. All this could be Mir's ploy to try and throw off Kongo's preparation, or it could be that his ego is just getting out of check. I feel that Mir's will soon realize that his striking isn't half as good as his mouth and after a minute or two against Kongo will do the sensible thing and look for a submission.