Mir catches flak despite knockout victory

An Ultimate Fighting Championship main event that concludes with a devastating knockout is typically seen by just about everyone involved as a positive conclusion to a card.

That was not the case Saturday night.

Las Vegan Frank Mir has received a great deal of criticism for his performance at UFC 119 in Indianapolis, despite a crushing right knee to the head of Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic that left the Croatian asking Mir in the cage what had happened, several minutes after the knockout.

Mir, the former heavyweight champion, was cautious in his attack against Filipovic, a striker with legendary knockout capabilities. Filipovic didn’t help matters. He looked old and a step slow, rarely pushing the action.

“I guess a (expletive) win is better than a (expletive) loss,” Mir said. “Other than that, I’m really pissed off about my performance.”

The knockout came with just less than a minute to go in the bout, after 14 minutes of little to no action. Mir’s plan appeared to be to pin Filipovic against the cage and use it to get him to the ground, where he is far superior.

It never worked. Filipovic was able to remain standing, with Mir simply leaning against him for long stretches.

“I got really frustrated because, with pushing him against the cage, I drilled so much on what to do from there, and I was making mistakes I wasn’t making a month ago that I thought I had corrected,” Mir said.

Things could have been much worse for Mir. The criticism would have likely increased exponentially had he not landed the knee that put Filipovic out.

“Without a single takedown, I was able to stand up for two-and-a-half rounds with Mirko and get the knockout,” Mir said. “I guess that’s a bonus. That’s the only positive I can take from this.

Unfortunately for Mir, there was no financial bonus to go along with it. Despite recording the only knockout on the card, the UFC decided not to award him a “knockout of the night” check, which would have been $70,000. Instead, the organization chose to award two separate “fight of the night” bonuses.

■ WALKER RETURNS — Former NFL star and Heisman Trophy winner Herschel Walker will fight in another MMA bout, Strikeforce officially announced Monday.

The 48-year-old Walker, who knocked out Greg Nagy in January, will take on a yet-to-be-named opponent on a Dec. 4 card in St. Louis. The event will air on Showtime.

In the main event, Dan Henderson will take on Renato “Babalu” Sobral in a light heavyweight bout. Henderson won a majority decision over Sobral in 2000.

■ WEC IN PHOENIX — When World Extreme Cagefighting announced it would host a card in Phoenix, it seemed logical area resident Ben Henderson would defend his lightweight title.

The organization officially announced Monday that Henderson’s Dec. 16 title defense against Anthony Pettis would be on the WEC 53 card that includes bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz defending his title against Scott Jorgensen.

The event will take place at Jobing.com Arena and will air on Versus (Cable 38).

WEC 51 will air live from Broomfield, Colo., on Versus at 6 p.m. Thursday.

Jose Aldo will defend the featherweight title against Manny Gamburyan in the main event. Former lightweight champion Jamie Varner and Donald Cerrone will try to settle their grudge match, and former champion Miguel Torres, Leonard Garcia and “The Korean Zombie” Chan Sung Jung will also be in action.

Contact reporter Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-224-5509.