The real #2 LHW contender... IMO could be UFC LHW champion

Virtually unstoppable TD's, best eva' toothpick-leg crushing leg kicks, arguably best eva' technical MMA grappling, best eva' top control, arguably best eva' pure athelete in MMA

= Best eva' answer to the current UFC LHW champion.





Ricardo Arona vs Dan Henderson - PRIDE 20

Would love to see him make a return to MMA.

IM going to disagree with you on this , he was one oif the greats back in the day. He is however a lil on the boring side but hius style would work perfect in ufc however, like the others he has aged. The arona of 2013 will not be the arona of 2005. Keep that in mind.

edit: I guess he could wrestle fuck jones but that wouldnt mean much to me.

PRIDE NEVER DIE wrote:IM going to disagree with you on this , he was one oif the greats back in the day. He is however a lil on the boring side but hius style would work perfect in ufc however, like the others he has aged. The arona of 2013 will not be the arona of 2005. Keep that in mind.

edit: I guess he could wrestle fuck jones but that wouldnt mean much to me.

I guess my point was more prime-Arona and that he 'could' be UFC LHW if he made a 4 or 5+ comeback like Mark Hunt. I don't know quite where he's at today. He looks in great shape in any vids I've seen of him in the past few years. He teaches and still rolls a lot. He seemed to stay pretty healthy in PRIDE though he did have one knee surgery in the late 00's.


Boring Arona/LnP Arona

I just don't get this. Not even one bit. The guy is arguably the greatest no-Gi submission Grappler & real wrestler (my definition/IMO the right one... not by the confines of specific other wrestling competitions). All of Arona's MMA performances had the highest level of technical grappling/wrestling maybe ever seen in the sport.

Arona really gets screwed by the MMA community for being portrayed by way to many as a boring top control kinda-wrestler BJJ guy with not many subs and KO's. If you closely watch all his fights he never lays in the guard endlessly. He's really active and strikes a lot. He most always gets top control and rarely is it taken away. A lot of the time postures up, even standing, and throws huge punishing bombs from the top. I mean a lot. This is no GSP on top kinda crap.

Arona's sweeps and his almost always coming out on top during scrambles... was awesome. The guy beat people up punishing them for the whole fight when he won by decision. He took guys down spectacularly throwing and smashing many down too. IMO - Fedor is the only guy to have as good extremely technical TD's. GSP's are more fundamental in my mind.


Boring = Static

Arona = Explosive, Super Technical, & Dynamic (TD's, leg kicks, scrambles, ground positioning, top control, big bombs downward & with knees)


People can say they don't like Arona's style of fighting... but if they say he's a boring lay'n'prayer... then explosive technical fighting just isn't for them. He never was a point fighter who ran out the clock. He was always trying to get his opponents into his realm and give them a beating, which he did very often. And he did so at such a high technical level that he only has a few peers in that respect.

I wonder if Arona is still coming back or not ?

I would love to see him make a comeback.

Junkyard Log wrote:I wonder if Arona is still coming back or not ?

I would love to see him make a comeback.

The whole Arona thing after PRIDE is really a sad thing. IDK why the UFC never offered him a good contract like many other PRIDE stars.

I know Arona took some time off til 2009-2010 for recuperation... but he seemed very open to coming back & fighting in the UFC. I think he thought anything less was below him. I think anything less was below him too. From what I gathered the UFC wanted him to go and fight a number of fights in smaller shows at the time to prove he's worthy. Big time BS in my opinion.

If he did make a comeback and did it right, Arona could be a force in the UFC... his skills and fighting style are custom made for the cage & unified rules. He has all the ability to out do latter day GSP's game against the LHW's but way more spectacularly. Maybe even more technically overall on the ground.

Junkyard Log wrote:I wonder if Arona is still coming back or not ?

I would love to see him make a comeback.

I don't think he'll ever be coming back. He's living to good now to come back for mediocre paydays. I could maybe see it if they gave him the right amount of money, but unfortunately, I don't see anyone doing that nowadays.

As for Arona being boring, the only fights of his being a chore to watch were him against other higher level grapplers. Especially the Lister fight, where there's just too much respect and standing off going on.