Will we see Fedor Emelianenko vs Fabricio Werdum 2
Looked at by the majority of MMA fans, "The Last Emperor" Fedor Emelianenko is the G.O.A.T. Or at least the sports greatest heavyweight. There's not too many hiccups in his 20 year professional career.
His one slide of three losses in a row started with tapping in the 1st round to a Fabricio Werdum triangle. That ended a 27 fight win streak. He then went on to lose via KO's to Antonio Silva and Dan Henderson. It all happened under the Scott Coker Strike Force banner.
And now in Bellator with Fedor ready to wrap up his illustrious career for good, once again it's Scott Coker in charge. That was one of the biggest reasons the legendary Russian came out of his retirement, he liked and trusted Coker deeply.
Before that slide he only lost once. In his 5th fight for RINGS against Tsuyoshi Kosaka. And since those three he's only lost twice. Once to Matt Mitrione, and the other in the heavyweight grand prix finale to Ryan Bader.
You can bet he'd like to get all those losses back, but the one that sticks out most is to Werdum. Fabricio just finished his UFC contract by tapping Alexander Gustafsson in his heavyweight debut. He's said he's done with the UFC and although 43 years old wants to keep fighting.
Fedor, who's in Connecticut as his pupil Vadim Nemkov goes after Ryan's light heavyweight strap plans on talking in detail about this with Coker. Scott has already said if that's what Fedor wants as part of his retirement tour, he will try his hardest to make it happen.
Now that there isn't the lure of UFC dollars, should be the biggest and easiest hurdle to clear. If the company can sign Werdum there's more than just that fight on the table for him. In his return to the UFC from Strike Force, Fabricio beat Roy Nelson who's now in Bellator as well, so that can be run back also. He lost as well to Sergei Kharitonov in PRIDE back in 2005. Perhaps a fight he'd like to get back.
So it could be a minimum three fight deal of rematches. Add in Josh Barnett and even a streaking Timothy Johnson and Werdum can have quite a run. And perhaps make a title run while he's at it.
As far as Emelianenko goes, despite winning so many accolades the likelihood of a Bellator championship seems like a long shot now. Without fans being there to watch him fight live and in person bothers him, but can look past it. He's not in a rush per se to end his career, but he doesn't want to wait too much longer.
The devoutly religious and family man wears many hats in Russia, so he will be busy. Of course the other scenario with him is like passing ships at night, a fight with Daniel Cormier to decide the true best in the weight class.
The Fedor retirement tour is said to have 3 fights to it. Now with the global pandemic still raging it may play the final decision on locations. But the original hope was the US, Japan, and Russia. But if Fabricio is in fact one of them, perhaps Mitrione, and Ryan are the other two. Fans in attendance or not.