5 dirtiest fighters in UFC history
Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) is a beautifully violent sport. From spinning elbows to flying knees, MMA has it all. Although MMA may be one of the most brutal sports in the world, it is still considered to be a form sporting competition and accorded as much respect as is given to any other sport.
However, from time to time, we get to witness the ugly side of our otherwise beautiful sport. Moments of disagreement, tweaking rules, sneaking in an eye poke, staying a bit longer on the stool, greasing up to avoid grappling, steroid usage, etc.
MMA has its fair share of dirty fighters that provide us with some not-so-sportsmanlike exhibitions. The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) being the world’s biggest MMA promotion is no different. Here’s a brief look at some of the UFC’s dirtiest fighters.
#5 Josh Koscheck
Josh Koscheck is one of the best wrestlers to have competed in the UFC’s Welterweight (WW/170 pound) division. He has excellent grappling and also went on to develop a decent striking game in his time at the American Kickboxing Academy, under Crazy Bob Cook and Javier Mendez.
He is also a former UFC WW world title challenger. Although he boasts a great resume with wins over a few notable MMA veterans, his career has been overshadowed by his unsportsmanlike conduct towards his opponents.
On November 21st 2009, Koscheck scored a controversial submission win over fearsome striker Anthony ‘Rumble’ Johnson. In the first round of their fight, Koscheck appeared to have been struck by two knees while he was on the ground.
With him being a grounded opponent, Johnson was warned for the apparently illegal knees to Koscheck’s head. Now, although that seemed to be the case in real time, the TV replays clearly showed that the couple of knee strikes thrown by Johnson didn’t connect with Koscheck’s head.
In other words, Koscheck was faking an injury in order to catch a break in the middle of the 1st round. Prior to this incident, Johnson was getting the better of Koscheck in the striking exchanges and seemed to be on his way to finishing Koscheck with his powerful striking game.
However, Koscheck’s fake injury gave him time to recover from ‘Rumble’s’ striking onslaught. Furthermore, in the 2nd round Koscheck went on to poke Johnson in the eye, more than once. This prompted the referee to step in and give Johnson time to recover from the eye pokes.
However, the damage was already done. Johnson had issues with his vision and Koscheck capitalized on this. He went on to submit Johnson and secure the victory by way of rear-naked choke at the end of the second round.
On re-watching the fight, it was evident that Koscheck’s eye pokes were clearly intentional. Besides, when probed about the injury-feigning incident in the post-fight interviews, Koscheck claimed innocence and played the victim.
Yet another example of Koscheck’s terrible sportsmanship is his fight against British striking specialist, Paul ‘Semtex’ Daley. In his UFC 113 fight against Daley, Koscheck once again faked a knee impact just like he did in the fight against Johnson.
This served to enrage Daley who fought emotional and got taken down and out-wrestled throughout the duration of the fight. Koscheck outpointed Daley, however, Daley struck Koscheck after the fight was over and when Koscheck had his back turned on him.
This led to the release of Daley from the UFC and a PR statement from UFC President Dana White that Paul Daley will never fight in the UFC again. Koscheck’s cheap tricks destroyed Daley’s UFC career. As of today, Daley still dukes it out in smaller MMA promotions, but MMA fans would never know how far Daley could have gone in the UFC, thanks to Josh Koscheck.
In addition to the aforementioned in-cage antics, Koscheck is also no stranger to disrespectful behavior outside the Octagon. His disrespectful antics on UFC’s popular reality show The Ultimate Fighter (TUF), his constant mouthing of profanities toward Georges St. Pierre and his coaches, his extensive usage of eye pokes, and many other ‘charming’ habits; have landed Josh Koscheck at number 5 on our list.