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I briefly wrote about fighters from Dagestan on my dumb ol' blog, but I think they deserve an effort thread. Dagestan, Home of the Best Fighters  The republic of Dagestan has been making waves recently in the world of MMA with their high-level, suplex-loving, troll shirt-wearing, combat Sambists tearing up the rankings in major North American promotions What even is a Dagestan? Dagestan is a federal republic of Russia. They like to wrestle (Usually bears) and sambo in a combative fashion. This isn't D&D, so who cares what they feel about Russia or anything else, for that matter. I'm here to talk about the manner in which they punch other people in the face (Spoiler alert: It is both Hard and also Very Well). A brief history on some past Dagestan fighters, and then I'll be talking about the current crop. Magomedkhan "Volk Han" Gamzatkhanov, Ur-Dagestani  Magomedkhan Gamzatkhanov, known the world over as Volk Han (WOLF KHAN), was one of the first Dagestani fighters to make a splash internationally. He fought in RINGS, and by fight, I mean mostly did shoot-wrestling for Team Russia along with Fedor Emelianenko and another guy who also looked like a sentient potato. Han was a sambo-styled grappler (What Dagestan fighter isn't, though?), with about as many submission victories as "N/A" wins. Of those wins, he's got notable ones over Akira Maeda, Tsuyoshi Kohsaka, Kiyoshi Tamura, and Brandon Lee Hinkle, with a decision loss to Big Nog and a draw with Masakatsu Funaki thrown in (That last one taking place a decade after his last fight, in his retirement match, which was probably more worked than not). Han was cool to watch, but it's really tough to sort out what was worked and what wasn't in his fight career.
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Jun 3, 2014 08:07
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Rustam "Tiger" Khabilov UFC Lightweight 17-1, 3-0 UFC Team: Jackson-Winklejohn Twitter: @RustamTheTiger Instagram: Rustam_Khabilov Rustam "Hobby Lobby" Khabilov is a former combat sambo world champion and an actual suplex machine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMlsjlVnpKs Khabilov burst onto the American MMA scene with his tremendous suplex-powered knockout victory over Vinc Pichel at the Ultimate Fighter 16 Finale. He used three German suplexes and just 2:15 to dispatch Pichel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Yrk5G6M9R0 Of course, that wasn't the first time that Khabilov destroyed someone via suplex. Early in his career, Rustam beat Akin Duran by overhead belly-to-belly suplex a blistering 0:28. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6c1E2Nyzw4 When he isn't suplexing dudes to death (Such as the case when he dislocated Yancy Medeiros' thumb with a 'plex), Khabilov likes to spinning wheel kick Jorge Masvidal in the neck. Next fight: versus Benson Henderson at UFC Fight Night 42 on June 7th LobsterMobster fucked around with this message at 17:43 on Jun 3, 2014 |
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Jun 3, 2014 08:07
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Ali "Puncher King" Bagautinov UFC Flyweight 13-2, 3-0 UFC Team: Jackson-Winklejohn Twitter: @AliPuncherKing Ali "Babbystani" Bagautinov is the tiniest of the Dagestan fighters. He was a combat sambo world champion, but was stripped of all awards and titles after testing positive for nasal spray in 2012. Bagautinov is also the head judge of the Russian insanity-variety hour, HiP Show Arena Combat. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8ahFyzo_X4 In the UFC, Bagautinov had an impressive debut, knocking out Marcos Vinicius in the third round. Since then, he had an impressive performance against hairy troll-man Tim Elliott.  Ali has also followed in his Dagestani countryman's footsteps of wearing a shirt mocking his opponents at weigh-ins because Dagestanis are better than you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRaXgHAxAgE Before he got to the UFC, you might recall Ali as "dude what ripped another man's ear off his skull".  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OL9KQjL05M While he is known as "Puncher King" sometimes he likes to take things slow, to give the fans a better look at him. Next fight: Flyweight title fight versus Demetrious Johnson, June 14th.
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Jun 3, 2014 17:41
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i am a fan of the dagestani tradition of wearing shirts that mock your opponent at weigh ins also wrestling bears
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Jun 3, 2014 18:03
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LobsterMobster posted:Magomedkhan "Volk Han" Gamzatkhanov, Ur-Dagestani Didn't realize he was from that region. Also, a lot of his fights (like all but 10) were works. He's so goddamn amazing to watch though.
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Jun 3, 2014 18:09
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Sprecherscrow posted:Didn't realize he was from that region. Also, a lot of his fights (like all but 10) were works. He's so goddamn amazing to watch though. Volk Han was the reason I accidentally started watching MMA I was looking up Ring of Honor shows on some tracker and got RINGS matches instead and saw this russian dude doing his grapple stuff and bang, hooked
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Jun 3, 2014 18:11
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Yuriy posted:Volk Han was the reason I accidentally started watching MMA These are almost exactly the circumstances that first interested me in MMA as well, eerie. I didn't know Volk was Dagestani though, that's cool as hell.
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Jun 3, 2014 19:46
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Dagestan? Dagestan is a republic and part of the Russian Federation, located in the North Caucasus near Azerbaijan and Georgia (if that helps at all). Russia is made up of a lot of political subdivisions, mostly Oblasts, which are like states or provinces, but also a number of subject republics, which are usually populated by non-Russian minorities and have the right to their own constitutions. How much good this does them in the Putin era is debatable. So these guys are Russian, right? I thought we didn't like Russians. Sort of. They're citizens of the Russian Federation and carry Russian passports, but in the main they're not ethnically Russian. In fact, Dagestan is one of the most ethnically diverse regions in the entire world and has no majority ethnicity. "Dagestani" isn't an ethnic group either, just a regional identifier. Avars make up a slim plurality with a little over 1/5 of the population. From what I can find online, Ali Bagautinov and Khabib Nurmagomedov are Avars, but there's a zillion different kinds of Dagestani so there's not much point in figuring out what to call all these rear end-kickers. Dagestani and/or Russian is acceptable shorthand. But to go on a little bit, actual ethnic Russians are not fond of people from the Caucasus. Racism against people of Caucasian extraction is commonplace, and often intensified since the rise of Islamic radicalism in the region. In 2010 Moscow saw massive anti-Caucasian race riots following a football-related murder (of course). Meanwhile every year a lot of young men very like the fighters in this thread get arrested or killed by Russian security services for dubious reasons, and military operations in Dagestan are ongoing. Dagestan is one of the most unstable and dangerous parts of Russia, which given the reputation of Russia overall, gives you some idea where the Dagestanis in the UFC get their trademark dead-eyed calm in the octagon. Anyway, my perspective is that it would be kind of lovely to hate any of these guys for being Russian just because their home region got colonized by Russia 150 years ago. Okay, fine. But why are they so wrestley? drat! Wrestling is the predominant sport of the Caucasus, and has been since forever. There's probably an anthropological explanation for it that I'm not going to try to get into, but they just traditionally like to wrestle. For some reason you get up in those mountains and everybody is throwing eachother around and grappling on bears. Rates of participation in sport are very high, with most parents encouraging their children to participate in some kind of athletics. In the USA, even in places like the Midwest where wrestling is relatively more popular as a youth sport, it still tends to be much less so than football, basketball, or even baseball. In Dagestan, wrestling is by far the most important sport, and as a result this small region with a population of only a few million supplies a wildly disproportionate share of the world's best wrestlers. Also, as I mentioned above, Dagestan is a pretty dangerous place to be a young man, and excelling in sport is a good way to stay safe and possibly improve your prospects. Here's an article from TIME about the politics of Russian wrestling, with a focus on the Saitiev brothers of Chechnya. Adam Saitiev can be seen here wrestling the poo poo out of Yoel Romero: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeHhKHKyD4M With an excellent base in wrestling, your prospective Dagestani MMA fighter can go on to round out his striking with boxing and his submissions with sambo, which are also popular sports in the region and in Russia generally. Many of the fighters featured in this thread began with a background in amateur wrestling and then excelled in combat sambo, which is a little like MMA except everybody wears a jacket and is kinda bad at striking. But hey, everybody's got to start somewhere. As we've been seeing in the past couple years, altogether that's a skill set that is very, very good for MMA. In short, if you were trying to imagine a place and culture that would produce the perfect wrestleboxer, it would probably look something like Dagestan. Why did all these guys come to the North American MMA scene at nearly the same time? I actually have no idea but I wish I knew!
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Jun 4, 2014 00:13
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EvanSchenck posted:Dagestan is one of the most unstable and dangerous parts of Russia, which given the reputation of Russia overall, gives you some idea where the Dagestanis in the UFC get their trademark dead-eyed calm in the octagon. Didn't one of the Dagestani fighters sometime earlier this year say something like "After living in tents and being shot at by helicopters one guy is nothing" ?
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Jun 4, 2014 00:18
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the yeti posted:Didn't one of the Dagestani fighters sometime earlier this year say something like "After living in tents and being shot at by helicopters one guy is nothing" ? That was Adlan Amagov. http://mmajunkie.com/2014/03/why-mmas-so-called-russian-invasion-may-not-be-as-russian-as-you-think posted:For similar reasons, political instability in North Caucasus regions like the Chechen Republic have probably also played a role. As noted trainer Mike Winkeljohn explained recently, he wasn’t sure what to make of it the first time he cornered Chechen fighter Amagov for a UFC bout. In the locker room before the fight, Amagov was so relaxed he looked nearly catatonic, Winkeljohn told MMAjunkie.
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Jun 4, 2014 00:24
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the yeti posted:Didn't one of the Dagestani fighters sometime earlier this year say something like "After living in tents and being shot at by helicopters one guy is nothing" ? That was a Chechen, Adlan Amagaov I think (I was trying to find the article, which I knew I posted in one of the monthly threads, but loving archives are down) Edit: Beaten terribly because I'm a dumb
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Jun 4, 2014 00:30
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There's been a few pretty amazing quotes from Dagestanis latelyquote:@MikeBohnMMA Jun 2 quote:@guicruzzz · May 31
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Jun 4, 2014 00:34
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how is there not a Dagestan flag thread tag for PSP what the gently caress fatherdog
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Jun 4, 2014 03:37
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I remember reading Chael Sonnen's book a while back. He mentioned that he gave some money to a guy to learn how to wrestle in Russia and to train a bunch of guys using wrestling. I'm wondering if that's within the same concept as all those Dagestani guys learning how to do a wrestle. edit: It was Andy Hrovat http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2014/1/17/3193586/chael-sonnen-paid-wrestler-live-in-russia-olympics-ossetia-hrovat quote:Chael is a big wrestling fan, and I had a rough year in 2009, I had a staph infection in my ankle so i wasn't able to wrestle. I was up a weight at the [World Team] trials, and lost only one match, in the clinch, and it really hurt me. [Sonnen] said he saw an interview afterward where I said I wanted to go to Russia for a year and train, and he said he thought that was a really great idea and he wanted to help contribute, get me over there, and help me out along the way. Dancing Peasant fucked around with this message at 04:00 on Jun 4, 2014 |
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Jun 4, 2014 03:57
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Feel like this is gonna be sad month for Dagestan. And as much as I like Hobby Lobby and Ali, I'll have to be rooting for Bendo and MMMMMDJ.
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Jun 4, 2014 06:39
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Lloyd Boner posted:Feel like this is gonna be sad month for Dagestan. And as much as I like Hobby Lobby and Ali, I'll have to be rooting for Bendo and MMMMMDJ. It won't be too sad there will be tons of people saying Khabilov won when Bendo beats him by split decision. (I reinstate my plea that the GDT be named "UFC Fight Night ___ Your Winner by Split Decision..." It'll be great when it happens, trust me.)
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Jun 4, 2014 06:47
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I actually think Bendo's going to finish him with a guillotine or something to finally get that signature UFC win. I like Khabilov but he wasn't that impressive in the Masvidal fight, which I think he would have lost if it weren't for that last minute spinning back kick to seal up the third round. Granted Masvidal's not exactly an easy fight, so I probably shouldn't hold that too much against him.
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Jun 4, 2014 06:58
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dat single
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Jun 4, 2014 08:13
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He expended too much energy and got tired
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Lloyd Boner posted:I actually think Bendo's going to finish him with a guillotine or something to finally get that signature UFC win. I like Khabilov but he wasn't that impressive in the Masvidal fight, which I think he would have lost if it weren't for that last minute spinning back kick to seal up the third round. Granted Masvidal's not exactly an easy fight, so I probably shouldn't hold that too much against him. I agree. I don't think that Khabilov has the tank to go 5 rounds either. He was totally spent going into the third round of the Masvidal fight. I have Bendo by late round submission.
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Jun 4, 2014 15:00
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Lloyd Boner posted:Feel like this is gonna be sad month for Dagestan. And as much as I like Hobby Lobby and Ali, I'll have to be rooting for Bendo and MMMMMDJ. that's a ban
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Jun 4, 2014 17:44
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-Atom- posted:that's a ban i dont like agreeing with you but by god how can you root for Bendo
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Jun 4, 2014 17:50
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Yuriy posted:i dont like agreeing with you but by god how can you root for Bendo by God, presumably.
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Jun 4, 2014 17:53
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Accidentally quoted a Yuriy post, please disregard.
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Jun 4, 2014 18:20
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Yuriy posted:i dont like agreeing with you but by god how can you root for Bendo Grew up in the same town and also I was a good Korean-American Christian boy. Bendo is the half-black herby cousin I never had. <3
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Jun 4, 2014 19:34
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http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2014/6/4/5781256/report-rustam-khabilov-fight-ali-bagautinov-beating-greg-jacksons-gym-mma-news  quote:News has come in that the two natives of Dagestan, both of whom train at Greg Jackson's camp in Albuquerque, got into a scuffle at the famed gym. Dave Meltzer has the details via Wrestling Observer (subscription required):
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Jun 5, 2014 05:11
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colonel_korn posted:http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2014/6/4/5781256/report-rustam-khabilov-fight-ali-bagautinov-beating-greg-jacksons-gym-mma-news Beating up dudes several weight classes below you is a proud Russian tradition
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Jun 5, 2014 05:21
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Beating up dudes several weight classes below you is a proud Russian tradition [/quote] A more recent Russian tradition is getting straight up mollywopped by fighters two weight classes down.
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Jun 5, 2014 06:05
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LobsterMobster posted:Ali "Puncher King" Bagautinov Looks like he actually slammed his own ear off, which is still really impressive.
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Jun 5, 2014 06:30
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