Thursday, August 23, 2012

Fantastic Finishes - Shlemenko vs McDaniel

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s less coherent than Wanderlei Silva.

This Fight is pretty Rad, but it's only four years old, so it doesn't meet the requirement of being from Yesteryear.  So, I decided to create another sub-category of "Here's a non-recent fight that I enjoy, and now I'll talk about it".  Fantastic Finishes are about fights that are fairly unremarkable up until those last few seconds that ends the whole thing.  Not every KO or submission is a fantastic finish, it takes something special and memorable.



Who Are These Jerks?

Alexander Shlemenko is a kickboxer and a military combatives guy and probably a sambo dude, too, because which Russians aren’t?  Robert McDaniel is a guy nicknamed Bubba, with fewer total fights now than Shlemenko’s fight tally at the time of this bout.

What's Going On, Why Should I Care About This Dumb Thing?


This fight turned me into a Shlemenko fan, even though he doesn’t really do much.  McDaniel gets a takedown early in round one, and some fun grappling ensues.  Shlemenko briefly threatens with a kimura and even gets a sweep, but for the most part, McDaniel controls the grappling.  He gets both full front and back mount, fishes for a rear naked choke, but is unable to secure the submission.  Shlemenko gets back to his feet very late in the round, tries a spinning backfist (Which has since become one of his signature moves), misses, gets taken back down, but manages to get up again.  With seconds remaining in the first, Shlemenko feints, then lands a flying knee, dropping McDaniel to the canvas as the round ends.

Shlemenko raises his arms in victory while the referee tries to roll the obviously hurt McDaniel onto his back.  McDaniel briefly rests his hands on his stomach, which convinces the ref that Shlemenko’s knee hit below the belt.  McDaniel’s corner enters the cage and everyone huddles around Bubba, trying to sort out where exactly he got hit.  Did I mention that McDaniel is groaning in severe pain the entire time?  He totally is, and it’s pretty disturbing and haunting to hear.  McDaniel finally manages to moan that his ribs are hurt, the ref stops the fight for good, and Bubba continues trying to not die.  Shlemenko is officially announced as the victor while a replay shows his knee hit McDaniel right below the heart, probably detaching the Xiphoid Process and dropping it into McDaniel’s stomach (Which I totally heard from a friend’s cousin’s friend’s uncle’s cousin who is a Special Forces guy that is totally a Special Forces Death Move, which probably means Shlemenko is totally Spetsnaz/KGB/SMERSH).


What Did We Learn?
  • If you’ve been outwrestling a guy for an entire round and he gets up with seconds left in the round, take your time getting back to your feet
  • Flying knees to the body are pretty rad
  • HURGH OH GOD ARGH MY RIBS BLEARGH URGH OH GOD BLORG

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