411’s Fighter Of The Month: November

Posted by Dan Plunkett on 12.03.2009

Fedor knocked Brett Rogers out in front of 25 million people, Jose Aldo destroyed Mike Brown to win the WEC featherweight title, Dan Hardy earned a welterweight title shot, Randy Couture became the oldest competitor to win a UFC fight, Josh Koscheck choked out Anthony Johnson, and Forrest Griffin edged Tito Ortiz, but which man took home the crown of 411's Fighter of the Month? Check out the full column for details.

It seems that MMA promoters thought the entire month of November was Thanksgiving. In the 30 days of November, MMA fans were treated to five major events on free TV. Strikeforce Challengers 4 & 5 were free with a subscription to Showtime, while Strikeforce: Fedor vs. Rogers was free to all on CBS. Zuffa was well represented as well, with UFC 105 on Spike and then WEC 44 on Versus not even a week later. To cap it all off, UFC presented UFC 106, whose prelims aired on Spike as well. As you can tell, the 411 MMA staff had plenty of fighters to choose from this month. Here's the format:


How It Works

Each staff member picks five fighters and ranks them. I'll assign a point value to those rankings. Points are determined as:

1st - 5
2nd - 4
3rd - 3
4th - 2
5th - 1

The fighter with the most points is our Fighter of the Month and then new points are assigned that will go towards Fighter of the Year. Those points are:

1st - 15
2nd - 12
3rd - 9
4th - 6
5th - 3
6th - 1

The Voting

Samer Kadi

1) Jose Aldo
DOMINATED Mike Brown to capture the WEC featherweight title. Aldo simply outclassed the champ, putting together lethal combinations and eventually finishing him on the ground with some ground and pound. Jose Aldo is here to stay.

2) Dan Hardy - Surprised a lot of people by defeating Mike Swick. With the win, "The Outlaw" became the number one contender for the UFC welterweight title. Hardy showed superior striking and seemed to hurt Swick everytime he landed a punch. He also showed much improved takedown defense, which is going to be vital for him in his fight with Georges St. Pierre.
3) Fedor Emelianenko - Another one bites the dust. Brett Rogers shared a similar fate to Andre Arlovski as he was knocked out by a Fedor overhand right.
4) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - Wow. That was some display by Little Nog. Nogueira turned in one of the best performances of his career, knocking out Luiz Cane (a man with a granite chin) in the first round.
5) Josh Koscheck - Despite the shenanigans, Kos still turned in a very impressive performance, submitting the highly touted Anthony Johnson in the second round.

Jeffrey Harris

1) Jose Aldo
Aldo cemented his status as the world's top featherweight and possibly one of the world's best pound for pound fighters with his devastating win over Mike Brown to capture the WEC Featherweight Title. The only thing that comes close to the impressiveness of Aldo's victory is his amazing run to the top. He debuted in the WEC the same night as Mike Brown and won five straight fights by TKO.

2) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - Little Nog's UFC debut was nothing less than amazing. He absolutely flattened the rising light heavyweight star Luis Cane, destroying Cane's title aspirations for now. Nog's now won like 6 straight fights and has not lost since the Sokoudjou fight. The only problem is that he's arguably a top contender but the champion of his division is his friend, Lyoto Machida.
3) Josh Koscheck - Koscheck embraced his inner-Ric Flair and gained an impressive win over Anthony Johnson. Koscheck for once actually went back to his wrestling and used it to secure a rear naked choke and submission win over Johnson. While Koscheck definitely is not the #1 contender yet, if he can pull of another victory like this, he makes a good argument for himself.
4) Jake Shields - Shields is now the new Strikeforce Middleweight Champion joining the elite class of fighters that have won titles in two different weight classes. While some bemoaned Shields' technique, he pulled off an impressive show of BJJ and grappling on the ground on the way to his title win. People are also in denial that he finishes most of his fights against tough opponents.
5) Ben Saunders - I feel bad for Davis since he's a super cool dude and we had a great interview for the site. But man, this was a great fight for TV as well as an impressive rebounding victory for Saunders who now goes 4-1 in the UFC. Saunders kickboxing looked amazing and used some sick Thai clinches followed by some even sicker knees to the head. When you lose a fight badly, this is how you need to show up to your next fight.

Larry Csonka

1) Jose Aldo
Jose Aldo was easily the biggest winner of the month. Mike Brown seemed unstoppable, and in my opinion was on his way to becoming the "fighter of the year" and would have had he defeated Aldo. But nobody told Aldo that he was a stepping-stone. He walked into the cage and dominated the champion, finished the champion and now HE hold the title. The young Mr. Aldo is a scary fighter, scary good fighter…

2) Jake Shields - Jake Shields via decision to win the Strikeforce Middleweight Title. While it wasn't the flashiest victory or the best fight of the night, Shields survived near disaster at the end of the third round, implemented his gameplan and did what he said he would do, ground Miller and outwork him.
3) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - Antonio Rogerio Nogueira made an excellent UFC debut at UFC 106, destroying Luiz Cane. The scary thing is, he didn't even show off the sick ground game.
4) Fedor Emelianenko - Fedor Emelianenko survived the early onslaught of Brett Rogers and not only won, but also added another victim on his hit list. He's still the man until someone beats him.
5) Tyron "T-WOOD" Woodley - The welterweight prospect picks up his fifth victory, his fifth submission victory at the Strikeforce Challengers event and keeps on rolling.

Daniel Bonnizzio

1) Jose Aldo
When Mike Brown beat Faber the first time, they called it a fluke. But when he manhandled Leonard Garcia and then outstruck Faber a second time, he was deemed a monster. Then came in Aldo on his flying knees of death and outclasses the champ for a full round before finally taking him down and pounding him out for the win. Winning over Mike Brown alone would get him the spot here but to do it in that dominant fashion and making Mike seem slow as a mummy is incredible.

2) Jake Shields - He won a hard fought decision over always game Mayhem Miller at Strikeforce to win the vacant Strikeforce Middleweight Championship. Excluding the scare at the end of round three where he was caught in a deep rear naked choke, Shields took the fight where he wanted it and controlled Mayhem in all parts of the fight.
3) Fedor Emelianenko - He's just fighting cans. He's padding his record. He's not taking any serious - GOOD LORD HE KNOCKED BRETT ROGERS'S HEAD OFF. Fedor finally shut his critics up when he took the Rogers fight, and he did it in style. Sure he may have lost the first round, but Fedor was fighting in a cage under Strikeforce rules for the first time, so he may have felt a tad uncomfortable, but after that first round Fedor turned it up and sent Rogers tumbling with a huge right hand that gave him yet another stellar win to his long line of victims.
4) Antonio Rogerio Nogueria - Luiz Cane has a chin made of vibronium and it has never been cracked, until UFC 106. Lil Nog came in and outboxed Cane for a few minutes before dropping the high-rising prospect with a nice left. And the best part is that while Lil Nog is great on the feet, his real strength is in his grappling skills and that is going to give the UFC Light Heavyweight division fits.
5) Forrest Griffin - Sure it may not have been the greatest fight, but it gave us what we needed to see out of the original Ultimate Fighter: he still has the skills to fight. Sure the first round is debatable, but after that Forrest went to town on Tito. Easily getting a 10-9 in round 2 and an easy 10-8 in round 3, Forrest rebounded nicely from that loss to Silva and reminded us that he is still a player in the Light Heavyweight division, and if he keeps putting wins together he could go back up the rankings he once reigned over.

Jonathan Solomon

1) Jose Aldo
What can you say? The man appears to be the most unstoppable force in the sport. Between his amazing hands and great grappling skills, he has it all. He made Mike Brown look like a guy who couldn't inflict any damage. He's so young, he may be making appearances on lists like this one for many years to come.

2) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - He made his UFC debut by destroying Luiz Cane in explosive fashion. Lil Nog has the goods, too.
3) Josh Koscheck - He burned any thoughts that he had been declining with a great victory over Anthony Johnson. Best yet, his great wrestling made it's return into his strategy.
4) Fedor Emelianenko - The best heavyweight of all-time ran into some trouble (as he usually does) against Brett Rogers, but smashed him into dust on national television.
5) Tyron Woodley - Arguably the best welterweight prospect in the sport, he had another impressive performance on Strikeforce Challengers. Ironically, he won again with an arm triangle submission.

Dan Plunkett

1) Jose Aldo
Mike Brown is a great fighter with skills in every area. It turns out; Jose Aldo has even better skills. The 23-year-old Aldo is scary good for such a young fighter. I don't know who can beat him at featherweight.

2) Dan Hardy - In just his fourth UFC fight, Hardy earned a shot at becoming Georges St. Pierre's next victim (though he'll probably win now that I wrote that) by defeating Mike Swick at UFC 105. Despite not being ready for a title shot, in my opinion at least, Hardy was the right man to get the shot, since Koscheck lost to Paulo Thiago earlier this year.
3) Fedor Emelianenko - Had his fight been on Showtime, I would have ranked him lower. However Fedor introduced himself to America with a bang with his knockout of Brett Rogers on national TV.
4) Antonio Rogerio Nogueira - Lil Nog completely destroyed Luiz Cane in a very impressive UFC debut. Look for him in a more high profile match-up next time around.
5) Jake Shields - Defeated Mayhem Miller in a fight that was entertaining for the first three rounds. With the win, Shields won the vacant Strikeforce Middleweight Championship.

The Results

Honorable Mention: Josh Koscheck

5th Place - Dan Hardy (8 points)

Defeated Mike Swick to earn the right to challenge Georges St. Pierre for the welterweight title.

4th Place - Jake Shields (11 points)

It wasn't pretty, but he defeated Mayhem Miller to capture Strikeforce's middleweight title.

3rd Place - Fedor Emelianenko (13 points)

Knocked out Brett Rogers in front of 25 million worldwide viewers.

2nd Place - Antonio Rogerio Nogueira (17 points)

Lil Nog made a splash in his UFC debut with the thunderous knockout of Luiz Cane.

Fighter of the Month for November- Jose Aldo (30 points)



Completely destroyed the number 1 ranked featherweight in the world.

2009 Fighter Of The Year Standings

Lyoto Machida - 30 points
Mike Brown - 30 points

Georges St. Pierre - 27 points

Jose Aldo - 21 points
Fedor Emelianenko - 21 points

Jake Shields - 15 points
Benson Henderson - 15 points
Paul Daley - 15 points
Anderson Silva - 15 points
Brian Bowles - 15 points
Brock Lesnar - 15 points
Diego Sanchez - 15 points
Nick Diaz - 15 points
Miguel Torres - 15 points
Demian Maia - 15 points

Antonio Rogerio Nogueira – 12 points
Bibiano Fernandes - 12 points
Cain Velasquez - 12 points
Mauricio "Shogun" Rua - 12 points
Vitor Belfort - 12 points
Cristiane "Cyborg" Santos - 12 points
Dan Henderson - 12 points
Brett Rogers - 12 points
Joe Warren - 12 points
Shane Carwin - 12 points
Nate Marquardt - 12 points

Junior dos Santos - 9 points
Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira - 9 points
Marius Zaromskis - 9 points
Frank Edgar - 9 points
Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal - 9 points
Paulo Thiago - 9 points

Gray Maynard - 6 points
Tyson Griffin - 6 points
BJ Penn - 6 points
Eddie Alvarez - 6 points
Tatsuya Kawajiri - 6 points
Toby Imada - 6 points
Martin Kampmann - 6 points
Quinton "Rampage" Jackson - 6 points

Dan Hardy – 3 points
Shinya Aoki - 3 points
Tyron Woodley - 3 points
Gegard Mousasi - 3 points
Mark Coleman - 3 points
Krzysztof Soszynski - 3 points
Hayato "Mach" Sakurai - 3 points
Matt Hamill - 3 points
Jorge Santiago - 3 points

Bobby Lashley - 2 points

Josh Koscheck – 1 point
Mackens Semerzier - 1 point
Efrain Escudero - 1 point
Tom Lawler - 1 point
Sarah Kaufman - 1 point
Hideo Tokoro - 1 point
Scott Smith - 1 point
Anthony Johnson - 1 point
Satoru Kitaoka - 1 point