One thing that came out of the Strikeforce event this past weekend was the fans reaction to Jake Shields victory over Jason "Mayhem" Miller. The crowd booed the fight several times, and the ratings show that fans actually turned the channel while this fight was on. It's not that Shields isn't a very good fighter, indeed is he, because the guy hasn't lost a fight in almost five years while fighting top level guys. However, my gripe with the fight and with Shields in particular, is that I don't feel as if he tried to finish the fight. I'm still waiting on the stats for the fight to come out, but I remember Shields in the mount position countless times only to do minimal damage at best. Now some of the credit has to go to Jason "Mayhem" Miller for being tough as nails and defending well, so I definitely don't want to discredit him in this instance. I mean the guy has only been finished twice in more than 30 fights. However, Shields had the mount, side control, and back control several times throughout the fight and didn't come close to finishing Miller. A .gif and more is after the jump.
SBN coverage of Strikeforce: Emelianenko vs. Rogers
There were a couple of times that I can remember, where Shields was mounted on top of Miller and tried to rain down some punches. But the punches had very little on them, like he was afraid to commit to them in fear of being swept or bucked off. That's a very reasonable reason against a savvy veteran like Miller. However, at some point in the fight I think Shields should have tried to pound Miller out instead of looking for the submission. Especially considering that he was way ahead on the score cards(ok ok, I know you can't leave it to the judges, which is why I'm advocating him finishing his opponent!) Shields should have been doing this:
I'm all for slick transitions on the ground and achieving dominant positions, but once there you have to inflict damage in my opinion. Otherwise, it becomes a grappling match and not MMA. This was the third time that Shields has fought on CBS in front of millions of viewers, yet he hasn't translated any of that into any 'star' power if you will. I'm not saying go out there and swing for the fences and totally negate his BJJ, but you have to go for the finish when the opportunity presents itself.
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