Together with the announcement last month of Mauricio”Shogun” Rua’s powerful shoulder surgery, the Brazilian superstar has continued his legacy of being a mixed martial arts (MMA) medical marvel. It is beyond obvious that Shogun is injury prone. However, with the total amount of punishment he’s received, many might consider it amazing that’s he’s not only still alive to talk about it continues fighting professionally at the maximum level on the biggest point for this day. Throughout Shogun’s storied 30+ struggle MMA career, he’s confronted countless setbacks through the much-maligned MMA Injury Bug. IMG_1702
Picture created by Shayne Smith
Is the shoulder operation the result of the necessary maintainance when it is comes to fighting, or of a washed up fighter? It’s definitely more than just another minor setback to his legendary career, as it is serious enough that won’t see him contend till early 2016. At just 33 years of age, it seems like a normal process on the surface. However, to many fans, this is just one more reason to create a statement that Shogun’s best days as a fighter are clearly behind him. Perhaps even he should retire. The toughest issue concerning the Shogun scenario is that he’s not even that old, although struggle years are a completely different story. IMG_1693 Many pundits accredit the overwhelming accumulation of damage to a combination of both his days sparring with the legendary Chute Boxe Academy and to the grueling losses he’s gathered inside the Octagon. There is no doubt the Shogun’s time as a professional blended Martial Artist has taken it’s toll on him physically. It remains to be seen what the price have been in association with winning those four UFC”Fight of the Night” performance bonuses. Is they to blame for why so many believe Shogun is well past his prime? This article gives a brief lateral synopsis of the harms the former UFC light heavyweight champion has accrued during his times as a professional fighter to further illustrate the ascertaining as to when a fighter is possibly past his prime, and also to prove that a fighter being close retirement isn’t solely dependant on age demographics. Shogun’s knees alone have faced more wear and tear compared to any fighter presently on the UFC roster with the exception of Dominick Cruz. The Brazilian first injured his anterior cruciate ligament training for his struggle with Forrest Griffin at UFC 76. Trying to fight injury, he pulled out the fascia completely during the ensuing fight. The injury required surgery to fix and hundreds of hours of rehab. Upon rehabbing the lame leg for many months, he returned to training and sadly completely blew out his ACL. Another surgery and rehab regimen kept him on the sidelines before his UFC 93 bout with Mark Coleman which was almost a year and a half after the fight with Griffin. While training for a rematch from Lyoto Machida, he once more injured his knee against doctors orders, he went on to fight anyways. Despite winning in convincing fashion, the origin foIMG_1695r celebration was curtailed by Rua’s requirement for immediate operation. As a result it would be just over 10 months afterwards before fans would see him create his Octagon return against Jon Jones. It was a struggle that not only finished his title reign in catastrophic fashion but one in which the fighter seemed to be a shell of his former self for the first time. To put it simply, his knee imploded. And then it happened. And then it occurred once more for good measure. The surgical fix count needed to repair his knees quickly required three big surgeries in less than three decades. However it must be mentioned that history had shown us MMA fans that Shogun can not blame those injuries alone for hindering his dreams of getting a UFC champion. Despite being plagued by the injury bug for a second time, Shogun went on to become UFC winner, however brief the name reign was. Unfortunately, it is doubtful this time around that Shogun will recover his glory days of times ago. As fans, we all hope he gets beyond these newest injury woes to become a contender once more. But as handicappers we must take this as yet another indication that he is no longer capable of contending with the division’s elite.
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