Former UFC heavyweight champion Frank Mir has experienced remarkable highs and crushing lows as he’s endured a roller coaster of a career that has led him to Friday night’s main event at Bellator 231.
Once considered the most dangerous heavyweight on the planet, Mir captured the UFC heavyweight title but was cut down in his prime after a motorcycle accident left him with a twice-broken femur and a completely torn knee. His journey back to the octagon was a long one, but he made it, and went on to become one half of one of the heavyweight division’s biggest rivalries.
He held championship gold in the UFC, shared the cage with a who’s who of heavyweight legends and now hopes to add another chapter to his career with another title, this time with Bellator.
This weekend Mir returns to action against fellow heavyweight veteran Roy Nelson at Bellator 231 and, ahead of the fight, we take a look back at seven of the fights that have brought Mir to Friday night’s main event in Uncasville, Conn.
****
Tim Sylvia at UFC 48 – Jun. 19, 2004
The fight that not only saw Mir capture the UFC heavyweight title, but also guaranteed he would be a staple of gut-wrenching submission montages on YouTube for years to follow.
Mir conceded a significant height and weight advantage to defending champion Sylvia, who, but those physical differences had little effect on Mir’s performance, as he locked up a straight armbar and applied the pressure to the “Maineiac” who refused to tap.
Eagle-eyed referee Herb Dean was on top of the action and saw exactly what we all saw watching on television, as Mir’s pressure forced a noticeable pop halfway down Sylvia’s arm. After uttering a rare, but understandable, audible expletive, Dean stepped in and stopped the fight after just 50 seconds, awarding the win, and the heavyweight title, to Mir.
Sylvia protested the stoppage, but X-rays later showed his arm had been broken in FOUR places by Mir’s armbar, with two breaks in his ulna and two in his radius.
The win earned 25-year-old Mir the UFC heavyweight title, his BJJ black belt, and a reputation for being a clinical, devastating submission threat.
Brock Lesnar at UFC 81 – Feb. 2, 2008
Three months after his win over Sylvia, a motorcycle accident sent Mir into an enforced injury hiatus that robbed him of his UFC title and two years of his fighting career. His return was a less-than-auspicious one, as he struggled to find the form that took him to the title. He alternated losses (to Marcio Cruz and and Brandon Vera) and wins (over Dan Christison and Antoni Hardonk) before landing himself a high-profile fight with former WWE superstar Brock Lesnar.
The matchup pitted Lesnar’s prodigious physical frame and collegiate wrestling background with Mir’s grappling excellence and, after the opening few seconds, it looked as if the raw, but aggressive, Lesnar might overwhelm the former champion.
But Mir kept his composure under fire and, despite taking some damage on the mat, laced his legs through Lesnar’s and locked up a tight kneebar that forced the big-name debutant to tap after just 90 seconds. It was the biggest win of Mir’s career since his return from his accident and propelled him back into the upper echelon of UFC heavyweights once again.
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 92 – Dec. 27, 2008
Former PRIDE heavyweight champion Antonio Rodrigo Nogueria was considered a major threat to the UFC heavyweight title when Mir faced the Brazilian legend at UFC 92 and produced something of a shock.
The fact that Mir won wasn’t a huge surprise, given his return to form against Lesnar, but the manner of his victory certainly was. Heading into the matchup, Nogueira’s only losses came to the great Fedor Emelianenko (twice), Dan Henderson and Josh Barnett, but all four of those losses all came on the scorecards, with only Fedor doing enough to earn unanimous verdicts in those bouts.
So when Mir stepped into the octagon in Las Vegas and finished “Big Nog” with strikes to capture the interim UFC heavyweight title, the MMA world sat up and took notice. The former heavyweight champion had not only reclaimed UFC gold, he’d done so by handing one of MMA’s heavyweight royalty the first stoppage loss of his career.
Brock Lesnar at UFC 100 – Jul. 11, 2009
Mir’s stoppage of Nogueira meant a return matchup with Lesnar was inevitable, and the pair were matched in a heavyweight title unification battle at the UFC’s landmark event, UFC 100, with Lesnar putting his newly-won title on the line against interim champ Mir.
Having used his grappling acumen to stop Lesnar in their first meeting, Mir was confident heading into the rematch, but came up against a man possessed as Lesnar used his wrestling skills to bulldoze Mir en route to a second-round TKO finish.
It was a one-sided battering from Lesnar, who had evolved his game sufficiently to dominate Mir, who left the octagon bloodied and bruised as Lesnar famously foamed at the mouth as he shouted through the fence to the TV cameras.
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira at UFC 140 – Dec. 10, 2011
Mir bounced back with victory over Cheick Kongo, but then lost an interim title challenge against Shane Carwin as he dropped down the ladder again. It meant he needed another big win, and he got one in arguably the finest performance of his MMA career.
Matched once again with Nogueira, Mir went toe to toe with the Brazilian in a thrilling contest and was badly dropped by the former PRIDE champion, who followed his man to the mat, looking for the finish.
What followed was one of the most memorable grappling sequences in UFC heavyweight history as Mir recovered, then rallied, as he brilliantly turned the tables on the BJJ black belt and applied a Kimura. Nogueira steadfastly refused to tap, forcing Mir to take the hold even further as he broke the Brazilian’s arm and claimed the win in gruesome fashion.
After the fight, Mir told reporters: “I had a strong inclination that he Nogueira was not going to tap, so I took a deep breath and you guys saw what happened… He wanted to play jiu-jitsu with me. I’m pretty good on the ground.”
It meant that Mir became the first man to submit “Big Nog” after becoming the first man to finish him with strikes earlier in their respective careers.
Antonio Silva at UFC Fight Night 61 – Feb. 22, 2015
After the high point of his submission win over Nogueira, Mir’s form went into a tailspin as he suffered four successive defeats to Junior Dos Santos, Josh Barnett, Daniel Cormier and Alistair Overeem. Many expected a fifth when he traveled to Brazil to take on Antonio Silva in Porto Alegre.
But Mir bounced back with a superb performance as he finished the Brazilian with strikes after just 100 seconds to claim a much-needed victory.
Mir followed up with another first-round finish, against Todd Duffee at UFC Fight Night 71 five months later as his career began to build momentum once again.
But two more losses, to Andrei Arlovski and Mark Hunt, followed by a failed drug test, proved to be his final moments as a UFC fighter as he was released by the company in July.
Fedor Emelianenko at Bellator 198 – Apr. 28, 2018
Mir went on to sign for Bellator and returned from a two-year hiatus in the promotion’s heavyweight grand prix, where he faced Russian legend Emelianenko.
Mir briefly dropped “The Last Emperor” early in the bout, but Emelianenko quickly regained his feet before slamming the former UFC champion to the canvas.
When the action returned to the feet, Mir went on the offensive with a flurry of punches, but Emelianenko backed away before landing a huge uppercut on the American and following up with ground strikes to score the finish after a crazy 48-second encounter.
Mir went on to suffer another defeat to Javy Ayala in his next fight, and heads into his bout with Nelson on Friday looking to capture his first win under the Bellator banner.
