Quoteworthy: Fabricio Werdum Banking On Alistair Overeem's Cardio For The Win

by Kelvin Hunt on Jul 15, 2009 8:00 AM EDT in News

Werdum speaks to Tatame.com:

Sure, I’ll bring to my area, but is that thing: the fight starts standing. I’ll train standing as on the ground, but I’ll give more emphasis to the ground. I like to train and fight standing, and it hasn’t that thing of taking the fight directly to the ground. It’s difficult to take Overeem to the ground. In the other time that we fought, I couldn’t give him any takedown, and he took me down five times, so I was forced to fight standing with him. The strategy is this, take to the ground as soon as possible and submit. three years have passed and much has changed. As I changed, he changed too. I know he’s heavier and stronger, but there is one thing: the stronger and heavier, the guy can get tired fast. In our other fight, he gave me a heat in the first round and began to get tired in the second. I can use this strategy too, just wait for him to get tired, but if I have how to finalize before, I will.

This is an interesting fight as Werdum stated, both guys have changed a lot in the games since they last fought 3 years ago. Werdum has improved his standup game, while Overeem has just gotten more powerful as time has passed. Both are versed in submissions, but Werdum has the edge there as he was able to defeat Overeem 3 years ago via kimura. I don't know if banking on Overeem tiring is the right strategy, as he went the distance in K-1 against Remy Bonjasky at a pretty good pace and was still packing a punch near the end. So it'll be interesting to see how this one goes down. Who you got?

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I’m starting to lean towards Werdum… if he comes in shape, granted Dos Santos was probably much better than many gave him credit for at the time they fought, but that was a fight he simply shouldn’t have lost…

This guy was able to weather Gonzaga, which is pretty impressive to me.

Bloody hell.

by 3PA on Jul 15, 2009 8:03 AM EDT reply actions

Sometimes a guy gets knocked out. Is GSP any less good because he got knocked out? Not really. He was immediately given a shot at contention after he lost. Werdum on the other hand was deserving of a title shot even before he fought dos Santos. The matchmakers knew there was a chance of Fabricio going down in that fight, and in fact they were hoping that he would lose so that they could cut him. The last thing the UFC want is Werdum beating up their champion (which he very well could).

I do agree that Werdum physically looked like shit in that fight but I think that was just his way of compensating for the huge motherfuckers he was going to have to fight, dos Santos included.

Werdum wins against Overeem 8 out of 10 times. Overeem could KO him in the first 3 minutes before he gasses but I don’t see that being the case.

by Ahhhoki on Jul 15, 2009 2:32 PM EDT up reply actions

correction#1-gsp had to beat josh koshcheck, a top 3 contender at the time, to get his title shot back. werdum showed up grotesquely out of shape and whined beforehand about not getting an immediate title shot (which he proved he did not deserve after the dos santos fight) gsp was/is a superstar and werdum had just finally started to come into his own in the the ufc. correction-#2, wedrum was never “cut”, just asked to take a paycut which he brought onto himself with his actions. with all that said i too think if werdum shows up in good shape, like the old pride werdum (there’s that phrase again) i would pick him to win and think he will win if, a BIG IF he comes in physically and mentally ready.

by bdw on Jul 15, 2009 9:55 PM EDT up reply actions

While I’m willing to grant that ANYONE can catch an “unlucky” KO loss… I’d say that GSP’s came from being unfocused, Werdum’s from being slow and out-of-shape

Bloody hell.

by 3PA on Jul 16, 2009 6:01 AM EDT up reply actions