How To Win Clinches Before They Even Start

In partnership with

To start the year off I want to look back at one of my favorite fighters ever. We’re going to examine Fedor Emelianenko’s clinch fighting to explain why he was so ahead of his time.

For a decade one stoic Russian commanded the respect and fear of the fighting world. He hardly made a sound, other than the thunderous thuds of his punches and throws.

His contemporaries spoke his nickname with reverence and gave him a nickname fit for royalty. ‘The Last Emperor’ had the admiration of a generation. So much so, that everyone knew who you were talking about with only the sound of his first name. Fedor.

When someone says heavyweight champion of the world, what do you picture in your mind’s eye? A force larger than life like Francis Ngannou? A long and lighting quick boxer like Muhammad Ali? Or a compact destroyer, a missle of a man like Mike Tyson?

Fedor is none of those things.

This unassuming Russian stood 6 feet tall on a good day. Fedor often looked disinterested. He could have easily been mistaken for someone’s pudgy uncle that jsut happened to saunter up to watch a fight. But when Fedor walked into the ring, the glaze fell from his bored eyes to two reveal cavernous black holes sucking the life from his foe standing across from him.

Fedor just under 2 years ago at 47. He left the sport with 7 losses across 48 fights and 1 no contest. He fought as a professional for 23 years. 

With such a long, illustrious career you have to comb through thousands of exchanges to analyze and explain why he is the greatest heavyweight fighter of all time. For today’s article we’re going to tighten our focus on one skill from one distinct period of time. We’re reviewing how Fedor weaponized judo in Pride Fighting Championships.

Fedor is a Sambo hall of famer and Russian national judo competitor. His blinding blend of boxing and bouncing into clinches left him in unique positions to throw his opponents and launch submissions.

At times his mechanics looked janky. He’d jump into winging punches like no professional boxer you’d see today. But it was that odd stand-up that allowed him to integrate grappling into striking and dominate opponents.

Judo fundamentals will tell you there are three core elements for a successful throw:

1. Kuzushi: off balancing

2. Tsukuri: setting the throw

3. Kake: executing the throw

Fedor’s entire game is a masterclass on how to off balance opponents as the clinch is starting. One thing to pay attention to is how Fedor rushes his opponents so they push back and give him momentum for a successful throw.

Fedor was a master of opportunistically finding under hooks. He’d create space, hurt opponents, and as they tried to counter Fedor would be blowing through them with a takedown based around an under hook.

Giving ground to draw opponents out and meet them with under hooks was a Fedor special. He would stand just outside of his opponents’ range, hop forward with punches, and crash into a favorable clinch position.

When Fedor and Nogueira fought it was one of the biggest spectacles possible in mixed martial arts. Nogueira was doing everything in his power to box into clinches and drag Fedor into a submission shoot out. Fedor had none of it. Watch how quickly Fedor’s hands find new targets.

When Nogueira did get to Fedor’s hips, his effort only gave momentum for Fedor’s highlight reel.

Fedor was a small heavyweight. If he cut weight he could have made 185 pounds. To combat his bigger opponents, Fedor would use leg hooks and foot blocks to create kuzushi and throw opponents to the floor.

In one of Fedor’s last fights in Pride he took on the mountainous Mark Hunt. For one of the only times in his career, Fedor enjoyed a 2 in height advantage. He did also have a 60 pound deficit though.

Watch how Fedor creates kuzushi by moving Hunt’s head off line.

When Fedor did get Hunt walking, he was able to block his steps to off balance him and take him down.

In perhaps Fedor’s finest fight he took on the Croatian kickboxing sensation Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic. Cro Cop is a legend for his lighting quick left high kick. Going into this fight, 14 of Cro Cop’s 16 wins were finishes.

Fedor pressured him, leaped into clinches, and tossed him around like it was just another day at the office.

And when Cro Cop got desperate towards the end of the fight he was losing he came forward. Fedor was all too happy to meet him head on and throw him around.

What’s past is present. Fedor’s game was ahead of his time and still holds up today. I’d argue the return to judo is the current META in MMA grappling.

What was unique about Fedor for his time was he was not a grappler or striker. He was an all around combat sports athlete that used one to facilitate the other.

The boxing created high amplitude clinches, crashes, and kuzushi so Fedor could launch opponents.

He pushed, they pushed back, he pulled them to the floor, and then he pushed punches through his opponents’ head.

When I watch Fedor’s game, I can’t help but see similarities with Shavkat Rakhmonov. They both built a ferocious finishing style centered on wild boxing, upper body takedowns, and hellacious ground and pound.

Rakhmonov has changed up his game as he’s developed to take advantage of the reach advantage he usually enjoys. That has made him look considerably less and less like Fedor.

But you can’t ignore the obvious similarities between the two. More importantly, if Rakhmonov and Fedor’s games both yielded so many finishes, why aren’t more fighters employing similar strategies?

MMA is about to start up again. That means we have our first UFC card of the year this weekend. One of the brightest, youngest stars in the sport fights on this weekend’s undercard.

Next week we’ll be previewing the most compelling rematch in MMA. Islam Makhachev vs Arman Tsarukyan 2. Come back here next week to read why that fight is going to be so good.