Going into 2013 the two fighters many felt could be on the cusp of challenging for a world title were Luke Rockhold and Costa Philippou. Rockhold had been the Strikeforce title, held a win over a number of tough outs in the division and was set up to be the next title contender with a fight against Vitor Belfort in Brazil. Philippou had been an elite middleweight who trained with Chris Weidman, the one who had finished Tim Boetsch and was positioned to be one fight away from a title shot of his own.
And then both were promptly dismantled, Rockhold by KO and Philippou by an emphatic decision loss, throwing the whole division into further chaos. By the end of 2013 both fighters were far from where they started; Wednesday night will be the end of title hopes for one of them for a long period of time.
FB – The nice part about this fight is that for people who HATE the ground game this isn’t likely to become a grappling session as both guys like to stand and trade. It’s in how they do it that separates them.
Philippou has a heavy boxing stance and background, not known for using a ton of kicks but throwing some terrific combinations. He’s not known for his ground game but has a good sprawl and brawl that he works fairly effectively. His background at Serra/Longo dictates he should have a decent ground game but he showed against Francis Carmont that working off his back might be a significant weakness.
His game plan is probably going to be to outbox Rockhold, use his distance and prevent him from landing big kicks. He needs to keep this fight standing because he hasn’t shown an ability to get off his back. It’s what the Carmont fight exposed; Philippou is good with advantage but isn’t good enough to get off his back against someone with a good top game. He needs to keep the fight standing, get some dirty boxing in and make this as ugly as possible. Rockhold isn’t known for being a grinder, needing space for the fluid nature of how he strikes, and that’s how he’ll lose this fight. Philippou needs to get him against the cage and slowly work from there.
He can’t let Rockhold find his distance needed; Costa has to make this an awful, awful fight to get the win unless he can land something big and work from there.
Rockhold is much more fluid with a kickboxing game, not known for power but really good at putting together combinations using all four limbs. He’s also never really credited for his ground game, which isn’t spectacular but quite good.
The key to the fight will be where Rockhold is able to contest the fight. If he can stay in the middle of the cage, find his range early with his kicks and use movement he can outpoint his way to a win. If he can get top position on a takedown consistently he can win. The key is that he needs to be the one dictating where the fight takes place.
WIM – A win here and someone remains in the title mix. A loss here and someone’s back to the end of the line in the division, simple as that. Both fighters were maybe a win or so away from a title shot (most likely two in the New Jersey native’s case) and the division is shallow enough at the top that a win here gets them back into the hunt. A win here, particularly a finish, and conceivably we could be looking at a title elimination fight with someone like Jacare Souza (depending on how the division shakes out in the next two months).
P – Rockhold
