Jones vs Stipe compared to Fedor vs Crocop

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Here is a great reason nobody besides casuals gives a shit about Jones vs Stipe.

Fedor and Crocop fought in 2005 so go back and look what they did in 2004 to build to the anticipation of that fight.

Crocop fought 8x in 2004 and 5x in 2005.
Fedor fought 5x in 2004 and 3x in 2005.

Stipe fought 0x in 2022 and 0x in 2023.
Jones fought 0x in 2022 and 1x in 2023.

Even if you remove the 3 fights Fedor and Crocop had in 2005 after their historic title fight you got 16 fights that happened in 1 1/2 years to build the big title fight everyone was pumped for.

Now you have gone from having 16 fights to 1 fight in the 1 1/2 years period before the supposed big title fight everyone should care about.

I hope Jones Stipe never happens, not for a supposed world title to be contested between active fighters.

Pavlovich and Aspinall are the ones competing in the spirit of who is best between fighters actually showing up and competing in this time period.

Crocop had almost as many fights in three years in PRIDE as Stipe has had in his entire UFC career.

Title fights should not be about what someone did three or four years ago but they should instead feature the active competing fighters like Fedor, Crocop, Pavlovich and Aspinall.

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I don’t get the Stipe hype. People call him the best HW etc. Idk, he fought a bunch of old dudes aside from Francis.
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Hunt- 41
Overeem- 36
Arlovski- 37
Werdum-39
JDS- 33
DC- 40-41

All those dudes had a TON of miles on them too.

Id much rather watch Pav/Aspinall

Edit*

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Stipe went 14-4 in the UFC over 12 years in the UFC. He got his title shots off a two fight win streak, a zero fight win streak and is now booked to get a 3rd title shot off yet another zero fight win streak.

Some fighters need nine or ten fight win streaks these days to get title shots in other divisions but for some reason, Stipe needs just two or even zero wins for title shots.

And like you said, he got to fight a bunch of old declining names like Hunt, Arlovski etc…

I’ll never get they way they spin things to pretend Stipe is some GOAT.

By the numbers, he never did half of what Fedor did but Dana markets things to try to rewrite history to trick the casuals into thinking Stipe is some sort of GOAT.

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Fedor, Cropcop, Big Nog, hell Im more impressed by Werdum to be honest

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100%.

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Wow that is insane seeing it broken down like that

Fedor and Cro Cop fought a combined 21 times in 2004-2005 in their Primes!!

Stipe and Jon have only fought 1 time COMBINED over 2022-2023… holding the belt

That has an affect on the build up for sure and just adds to people not being as excited as they should be or could be to see them fight

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See what I mean. What UFC does with HW is a complete joke compared to what PRIDE had going on.

UFC has a women’s 115 lb fight as the 3rd highest placed fight on their 30th anniversary card full of fighters nobody knows.

Meanwhile PRIDE gave fans cards like Shockwave 2006 where the worst fight on the card was with a green Edlar Kurtanidze who was still a world champion in freestyle and had won bronze 2x at the Olympics.

Pride Shockwave 2006 Quick Results

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PRIDE would also give you great HW fights with ten of the “top 15” level fighters of the era all on the same card and sometimes in GP’s they would fight twice.

Plus on top of that you would get to see LHW’s like Overeem, Shogun, Arona and Rampage on the same damn card.

They didn’t chop it up and get three Fight Nights and two PPV’s out of the same amount of big fights like UFC does with their bloated roster.

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If UFC goes through with this Jones vs Stipe title fight then Stipe will be getting a title shot without having a single win in the last four years provided the fight is booked for after August 15th.

No wins in four years? Step right up and get your title shot at the prizefighting circus.

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This is the reason I like the PFL format despite its flaws. At the end of the day it’s be active or someone else gets your spot.

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At least Aspinall wants to fight all the best and be active.

Aspinall has already beat Spivak, Tybura, Volkov and Pavlovich in the first round.

Now he is saying he will fight Stipe right now and then fight Jones once Jones is ready.

If he had control of this situation instead of UFC and Jones…Aspinall might have this entire HW division cleaned out by 2025.

Talks about the bullshit of the “legacy” title fight between Jones and Stipe that is fucking up and slowing down the division.

Says create a legacy belt if you want to play those dumb games with the title.

Go to 37:00

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Jones DC was the modern crocop fedor

All due respect to Stipe. But i dont put him on the level of jones or DC.

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DC’s HW resume is not better than Stipe’s, sir. Add to that, DC isn’t even the best LHW of his era. Not sure how you can say that Stipe ain’t on DC’s level when Stipe beat him twice. And DC’s KO of Stipe was due to vicious eye pokes.

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There isnt a single fighter that has ever existed who is better than Jones.

So when you say, not even the best LHW of his era, what are you even saying?

DC during his prime would beat any LHW who has ever fought other than Jones.

And the same is true for HW.

What you dont seem to grasp is DC was 40 against stipe. Far past his prime. Compare him to earlier in his career.

Even that version of DC still gave stipe hell. Outboxed him for 4 rounds in the second fight while only a fraction of the fighter he once was

Comparing their all time status and overall talent, ability, fight iq…just tells me you dont understand mma.

Watch the fights and learn how to assess talent.

DC is an all time great period. Stipe is an all time HW, in a graveyard version of HW.

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You don’t even need to take a look at his record to be able to tell that he is far from being the UFC heavyweight goat let alone heavyweight goat.

The guy moves like a mummy. His skillset is the definition of mediocre. He’s ok at everything but not excellent at anything. His chin and cardio are his best assets, his a hard worker I’ll give him that.

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This. DC kicked Stipes ass for 4 rds and then gassed. Overeem also knocked Stipe on his ass and completely outskilled him before he was once again betrayed by his glas chin. I could probably find more examples but screw rewatching boring ass Stipe fights.

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Fighters now aren’t what they used to be. Now they are athletes who learn technique and then ask to fight for money. Opposed to a natural tough man who learned technique “on the job” and who had a “I don’t give a fuck If I lose, but I’m going in there to scrap” attitude. I.E:

Wanderlei vs Rampage 1
Vitor vs Tank
Badr Hari vs Ray Sefo

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Strong casual vibes from you buddy.

Thank for acknowledging that DC was 2nd best of his era. Think of any other situation in MMA where a guy was the second best. Max Holloway, for example. Beats every other FW, but will never beat Volk. It’s a legacy killer. And in DC’s case, it does nothing for the flimsy argument that he’s a better HW than Stipe.

Remember Strikeforce? I sure do. What was DC’s best win over there? Then, go down the list. Barnett, geriatric Mir, undersized Hendo, Roy Nelson, Bigfoot. How in the actual hell does this resume beat Stipe’s run? JDS, Werdum, Hunt, Reem, Ngannou. You’re in denial son.

Now you want to bring up the age fallacy? These guys are 3 years apart. Almost the same number of pro MMA fights when they first met. Difference is, Stipe fought them all at HW and took more damage. DC had somewhere around 10 fights at LHW, and even had gimme fights with smaller guys like Anderson and Hendo. DC also was exclusively a wrestler, pre-MMA, where he would have accumulated zero head trauma. Stipe boxed. So you tell me, who was more shop worn when they finally met?

At the end of the day, DC cheated his way to the first win, had a sham cherry picked defense against Black Beast, and then proceeded to lose two straight to Stipe. Your whole “he was winning until he wasn’t argument” is garbage. Stipe took DC’s best, and then finished him. That’s what champions do. Only in your mind does Stipe’s Win somehow diminish his case for being better than DC. Talk about mental gymnastics.

Stipe is widely regarded as the best UFC HW ever. Not DC. Your main argument is that according to what you’ve seen, you think that DC is better, while the facts disagree. Again, it’s preposterous to claim that Stipe is not on DC’s level when he beat him twice, hence winning the trilogy.

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Stipe has NEVER come off as the best. He came along at the right time when the division was aging out. Nobody who drops a fight to Struve in their prime is EVER going to be considered the best.

If he had been around during the Pride days, he would have been dropping fights to Alex E, Nog, Sergei, Fedor etc.

He fought JDS who was starting to pick up losses and got beat, he would have never gotten past Cain and Carwin or Overeem of back then. Maybe Lesnar.

If he were more active, he would have a lot more losses.

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You guys actually broke down the stats and the numbers instead of listening to the media hype?
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