Remember Matt Serra?
Posted by Alan Conceicao on January 10th, 2009
On December 27th of 2008, Frank Mir, a noted BJJ expert, shocked the world by mowing down the man generally considered to be second best in the world at heavyweight, Antonio Minotauro Noguiera. He did so primarily with his standup game, easily nullifying the boxing of Noguiera and instead punching straight through him with repeated right hand leads and combinations before finally stopping the former PRIDE champ. In gaining the Interim UFC Heavyweight title, many fans were quick to annoint Mir’s success as proof that he wasn’t “finished” and was in fact a clear elite level heavyweight.
The reason I preface an article about Matt Serra with that is fairly obvious: an underdog grappler winging bombs and beating a man he was favored to lose to isn’t exactly a new story line as far as the UFC goes. The most recent example of such fleeting success was Matt “Terra” Serra, who went from 155/170lb gatekeeper to world champion almost overnight.
Since his shocking victory almost two years ago against George St. Pierre, Matt Serra’s career has anything but taken off. A recent compilation of polls from Bloody Elbow illustrated that when the numbers were crunched, the man who hasn’t fought since losing the Welterweight crown in Q1 2008 was now ranked 9th in the world at 170lbs. Our own TOM isn’t nearly as nice, placing him a (perhaps accurate) 32nd in the world. Serra perhaps can draw one more decent house against Matt Hughes at some point in 2009, as is being reported will finally occur, but beyond that, its hard to see where Serra falls into the welterweight picture. He’s simply not big or talented enough at his age to even be competitve with the Thiago Alves’ of the world, and its hard to even see how he might beat a Anthony “Rumble” Johnson. Mind you, this was a fighter who was #1 in the world only 16 months ago.
Serra simply isn’t big enough to compete with an even more stacked welterweight division than the one he left, and even if he beats Matt Hughes (something I would certainly bet against), its tough to imagine MMA fans rallying behind him for more big fights. Its also a cautionary tale about the future for Frank Mir. Like Serra, Mir has been prone to injury in the past, and also like Serra, has a career filled with almost as many lowlights as there have been highlights in recent years. Will we continue to talk about the resurrected Mir for years to come, or are we just a short time away from realizing where he truly stands in the heavyweight pantheon?
January 11th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Well, I think their cases are a bit different, as Serra has never been that great and Mir showed flashes of brilliance a few years ago, then flashes of shit. He is still pretty young (has 5 - 6 years on Serra) and could turn himself into a top level heavyweight. I am not a fan, but I am also not against it.