Very upsetting news has come out of the UFC recently regarding Rashad Evans, the former UFC light heavyweight champion.
Evans has been out of action since November 2013 and it looks like he’ll be missing for some time longer after his body rejected a cadaver ACL, ruling the New Yorker out for a further six months.
In light of this injury setback, we look at the ten fighters whose careers could have been so different if they had managed to avoid being plagued with injuries.
10. Nate Quarry
Back in 2005, mixed martial arts was still somewhat in its infancy and there were very few professionals who were considered truly world-class.
Nate “The Rock” Quarry was the first TUF alumnus to be awarded a title shot when he met Rich Franklin at UFC 56 for the middleweight title. He lost that bout via knockout but was still viewed as a genuine contender at 185lbs.
Prior to this, Quarry competed on the first season of The Ultimate fighter but was forced to withdraw due to an ankle injury sustained in sparring.
An athletic fighter with no visible holes in his game, Quarry was considered one of the favourites for the season but injury prevented him becoming a Forrest Griffin or Diego Sanchez.
Niggling back injuries kept Quarry from breaking into the elite-level group of fighters and it was facial injuries that forced him to retire in 2010, after a TKO loss to Jorge Rivera.
9. Anthony Pettis
The reason why Pettis is so low down on this list is because it looks like he’s beginning to rebound from his reputation as an injury-prone fighter who was incapable of fighting more than twice a year.
Pettis’ progress in the UFC’s lightweight division failed to gather the momentum it ought to have after he fought just once in 2012 due to a number of injuries.
There was an 11-month layoff for the Wisconsin native before he beat Donald Cerrone in January 2013. Admirably, Pettis then revealed he wanted to drop down to 145lbs to challenge for featherweight gold, rather than wait around for a shot at Benson Henderson.
But a knee injury sidelined Pettis ahead of that featherweight bout and his title shot finally arrived in August 2013, when he beat Henderson for 155lb glory.
Another knee injury, though, took Pettis out of competition until December 2014, when he successfully defended his belt against Gilbert Melendez.
Hopefully the lightweight champion can fight his way off this list by staying injury-free as he looks ahead to his upcoming defence against Rafael dos Anjos.
8. Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua
Shogun will undoubtedly go down as one of the greatest fighters in the history of mixed martial arts but he truly could have dominated the UFC’s light heavyweight division five years ago if he had managed to keep himself free from injury.
After making the move to the UFC after a very successful and ridiculously active stint with PRIDE, that momentum was halted in his promotional debut which was a loss to Forrest Griffin.
A knee injury ruled Rua out for well over a year after that fight but, after corrective ACL surgery, he rebounded with two victories.
He then lost a unanimous decision to Lyoto Machida in his first attempt at the UFC’s 205lb strap in controversial circumstances as many saw the fight in Shogun’s favour.
It took Rua 9 months to get back into the octagon but the time off served him well and he avenged the dodgy judges’ call by winning the title against his fellow Brazilian.
Rua was struck down again with the same knee injury during that fight, though, and he didn’t fight again for a year.
At 33, it’s unlikely that Rua will make any serious title run which makes it so unfortunate that he couldn’t avoid injuries at 28, in his prime, when he could have gone down as the best light heavyweight of all time.
7. Thiago Alves
This is not calling Thiago Alves pitiful by any means but his career will go down as one of the biggest pities of all time.
A pity because his previously consistent momentum was stunted by a knee injury (those damn knees) in 2010 which took 7 months to rehab.
After that, he essentially became a “one fight a year” kind of fighter thanks to an arteriovenous malformation (or a brain injury for people not as clever as us).
He didn’t fight at all between March 2012 and April 2014 and two years is a hell of a lot of time to spend out of the octagon.
It looked like “The Pitbull” had become a distant memory of the man who fought for the welterweight championship in 2009 but, to be fair, he’s 2-0 since his return to fighting last year so here’s hoping he can make another title run.
Unbelievably, the man is still only 31 so there’s still a chance for him to redeem himself if he can keep himself fit.
6. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira
It’s safe to say there was a fair bit of pressure on Little Nog based on the success of his twin brother, heavyweight legend Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira.
Sharing a similar skillset as Big Nog, namely technical boxing and black belt-level Jiu-Jitsu, Nogueira was expected to tear up the UFC’s light heavyweight division.
Everything was going swimmingly for the Brazilian since he signed for the UFC. He fought five times between 2009 and 2011, going 3-2 against some of the best guys at 205lbs.
Little Nog was slated to face perennial light heavyweight contender Alexander Gustafsson in 2012 but withdrew from the biggest fight of his career with a knee injury.
The withdrawal got under the skin of UFC president Dana White so much that he said: “The fight isn’t for four months, and he’s already determined he’s hurt. I don’t understand that. The guy is always hurt. Every time you call him, he’s hurt.”
His next fight, against Rashad Evans in 2012, proved a success as he claimed a unanimous decision but he pulled out of another bout after beating Evans, a rematch against “Shogun” Rua.
In his last outing, he was knocked out viciously by current number one contender Anthony Johnson which puts his record over the last four years at a terribly unimpressive 1-1, far from what was anticipated when he first signed a UFC contract.
5. Cain Velasquez
It’s hard to make a case for saying that the career of the current UFC heavyweight champion and number 6 in their p4p rankings has been hindered by injuries, but it’s the truth.
Last month, I compiled a list of the greatest fighters of all time and left Velasquez in the honourable mentions section which got a lot of flack from you lovely, opinionated readers but the fact of the matter is that Velasquez has struggled to maintain any level of consistency in recent years.
We haven’t seen Velasquez fight since October 2013 and it’s fairly difficult to understand why the UFC aren’t more pissed off with the fact that one of their biggest draws has competed just five times since 2010. That’s a whole lot of lost dollars.
Velasquez tore his rotator cuff during his bout with Brock Lesnar in October 2010 which kept him out of action until November 2011.
He suffered a recurrence of that injury during his first professional loss, when he lost his heavyweight belt to Junior dos Santos which forced a delay of seven months for his next outing.
Velasquez looked to be regaining his head of steam since then though and fought twice in both 2012 and 2013 but, as noted above, he’s been a glaring absentee for a year and a half due to a torn meniscus and sprained MCL.
He’s 32 now so another lay-off of over a year could see his legacy seriously damaged as one of the best heavyweights of all time.
4. Shane Carwin
Another one of the big boys, Shane Carwin is often regarded as the hardest hitting heavyweight to ever wrap his hands and, back in 2010, the heavyweight division looked like it could be dominated for years by both Brock Lesnar and himself.
For the first four years of Carwin’s career he looked like an unstoppable, ludicrously active force after going 12-0 in less than five years.
But then the injury curse came a-knocking.
He claimed the interim heavyweight championship after knocking out Frank Mir which secured Carwin’s record of finishing every one of his opponents.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=No0-DTFifZg
His first defeat came at the hands of the aforementioned Lesnar at UFC 116 but mixed martial arts fans felt that Carwin had so much left to offer the heavyweight division.
But injury struck in late 2010 when Carwin had to pull out of a fight with Roy Nelson to get surgery on his neck.
He came back in the summer of 2011 but was beaten by Junior dos Santos via decision, the only time he required the judges in his career.
That defeat would be the last time we would see Carwin.
In October 2011, he revealed that he had to undergo back surgery which originally took 9 months to rehab.
His big comeback was supposed to be a realisation of the bout with “Big Country” after the pair coached opposite one another on season 16 of The Ultimate Fighter.
But Carwin injured his knee and the bout was scrapped once more before, in May 2013, he announced his retirement from MMA.
A terribly unfortunate end to the fantastic story of the man who was once being pegged as the future of the UFC’s heavyweight division.
3. Rashad Evans
Ah, the man who inspired this very article. Rashad Evans is a bit like the 205lb version of Shane Carwin.
He had all the potential in the world to dominate his weight class but injury has made him something of an “is he still fighting?”
Evans lost just once in his eighteen professional appearances between 2004 and 2010 before he injured his knee after beating long-time rival Quinton “Rampage” Jackson.
That kept him away from the fight game for 15 months but he returned with a victory over Tito Ortiz in August 2011.
A thumb injury was the next stumbling block in Evans’ career and that took him out of the running for a title shot, having to settle for a fight with Phil Davis in January 2012.
From then on, the MMA world was delighted with Evans’ apparent clean bill of health.
He lost his long-awaited attempt at regaining his light heavyweight belt when Jon Jones beat him over five rounds before fighting three times in 2013.
We haven’t seen him since November of that year after a leg injury prevented him from taking on Daniel Cormier in February 2014 and he’s been struggling with that ever since.
Just last week it was revealed that Evans’ body had rejected the cadaver tissue that he was hoping would aid the rehabilitation of his ACL and that he would be out of action for a further 6 months.
Heartbreaking.
2. Brock Lesnar
Brock Lesnar was the fighter that MMA fans loved to hate when he made the transition to real fighting after his stint with professional wrestling.
But nobody would have wished a lack of luck with fitness on the heavyweight behemoth.
Lesnar was the man that Joe Rogan constantly referred to as a freak athlete as he showed unprecedented speed for a 265lber en route to claiming UFC heavyweight championship gold after just four professional fights.
But it was illness, rather than injury, that cost Brock Lesnar his place as a future MMA legend.
The wrestling expert was first struck down with the digestive disease diverticulitis in November 2009 which meant that a year had passed between title defences.
After beating Shane Carwin with a comeback TKO victory, Lesnar lost his title to Cain Velasquez in 2010 but he claimed that his body had never fully recovered from his first bout of the disease.
Lesnar then coached opposite Junior dos Santos on the 13th season of The Ultimate Fighter but had to withdraw from their post-show fight after a recurrence of his diverticulitis .
He underwent surgery in May 2011, getting a large piece of his colon removed and fought next against Alistair Overeem, losing by TKO.
Lesnar retired from mixed martial arts after that fight, citing the struggles with his illness as the primary reason.
Since returning to the WWE, rumours have circled about a possible return to the UFC (possibly in the completion of a trilogy of fights against Frank Mir) but unless he has 100% recovered from diverticulitis, we hope he doesn’t sign any fight contracts.
1. Dominick Cruz
Poor ol’ Dominick Cruz.
Nobody with such talent has had such bad luck with injuries in the history of mixed martial arts.
The former UFC bantamweight champion is widely regarded as the best in the world at 135lbs but we’ve only seen him compete once since October 2011.
The man with the best movement in MMA had looked unstoppable with victories over Urijah Faber, Demetrious Johnson and Joseph Benavidez before injury hit him during his appearance as a coach opposite Faber on TUF 15.
A torn ACL required two surgeries after, in similar circumstances to Rashad Evans, his body rejected the cadaver tissue.
We expected the return of “The Dominator” in February 2014 in a title unification bout against interim champion Renan Barao but Cruz tore his groin which led to Dana White promoting the Brazilian to undisputed champion.
Cruz rehabilitated the tear though and returned in stellar style, finishing Takeya Mizugaki in September 2014. The MMA community rejoiced.
White subsequently stated that the next fight for Cruz would be a bantamweight title fight against current holder TJ Dillashaw but, tearjerkingly, Cruz revealed that he suffered a torn ACL in his other knee.
The injury means we likely won’t see Cruz fight for the entirety of this year which limits the ability of the 29-year-old to cement himself as one of the best of all time.
