We’re pulling double duty on this edition of the aftermath since we were lucky enough to have been witness to two fantastic MMA cards in less than 24 hours.  Due to higher than normal market activity, instead of our regular 3 stocks in each category, this time around we’re going to look at 4 guys who are rising, steady and falling as a result of their performances on Saturday.  Aftermathing for FLD today are Matt Bremner and Brad Taschuk.  Time to do some investing, folks!

Rising:

Mamed Khalidov

Matt Bremner: To look at Khalidov's record, you'd think he was a world beater, then when you looked closer, you'd see how wrong you'd be to think that. However, what he did to Jorge Santiago, the champion of the promotion, was something straight up out of UFC's video game for Dreamcast (I broke a few controllers throwing them when I'd get KO'd from a punch off the guy's back). However, Khalidov showed that it could be done and silenced 15 year old me. I expect a rematch for the strap that could go either way, but with Khalidov's power and Santiago's chin that is so suspect I may call William Petersen, he'd be at worst, an incredibly live underdog.

Brad Taschuk: While Mamed didn’t really show us anything we didn’t already know about him or his opponent, Jorge Santiago (who we’ll discuss later), the facts are the facts: he just beat a top 5 MW, and put his name on the map.  Possibly the most impressive thing about Khalidov’s performance is not that he was able to turn the fight on an embarrassingly soft punch from the bottom, but that he was able to nullify a very solid grappler in Santiago on the ground, and when the chance arose to snatch the fight from Jorge, he jumped all over it.  It’s a shame for Khalidov that this was a non-title bout, since it creates some confusion in the Sengoku MW division now, but that’s the only downside to a performance which otherwise resulted in the biggest rise of any fighter this weekend.  Presumably his next fight would be a rematch with Santiago, this time for the title.

Michihiro Omigawa

Matt Bremner: Omigawa is the little engine that could, no doubt about it. Eight months ago he was well below .500 for his winning percentage, and he was walking face first into the Sengoku Featherweight Grand Prix, where he was guaranteed to chalk up another loss to LC Davis.  The only problem, is that didn't happen. Nam Phan? Omigawa TKO' d him. He went on to lose the Featherweight finals to Kanehara, but he should have fought Hioki, who was unable to continue. In a “should have been” fight, once again Omigawa won a, shall we say, contentious decision over Hioki. Omigawa's stock is rising because no matter how you choose to view it, the guy keeps winning. He is 4-1 in his last 5 and he hasn't fought one guy who you could consider a slouch. I wouldn't be shocked to see a Marlon Sandro rematch in the future.

Brad Taschuk: This is a weird pick for a guy on the rise, since most people are in agreement (including Omigawa himself), that Michihiro didn’t actually win this fight.  Even still, it makes sense, and here’s why.  Hatsu Hioki is one of the top grapplers in the FW division, and was expected to handle Omigawa with ease.  Omigawa had other plans, and gave Hioki a very tough fight, proving that he does in fact belong up towards the top of the division (but not quite at the top, as evidenced by both this fight and the Sandro fight).  Who knows what’s next for him, Matt may be right about a Sandro rematch, but I think Sengoku might want to slip him into a rematch with Kanehara instead.

Jake Shields

Matt Bremner: The powers that be in the cosmos favoured Shields on Saturday night. He was only seconds from going to bed from a Mayhem-induced rear naked choke, when the round ended. With just a few more seconds, Miller would have the strap, but there wasn't and he doesn't. Shields used his wrestling and slick jiu jitsu game to control Mayhem for almost the entire fight and earn the vacant Strikeforce Middleweight belt. Next up is likely a showdown with Cung Le if he's not too busy making mediocre movies. One thing's for sure, Shields had better improve his hands or prepared for a painful night.

Brad Taschuk: People don’t like Jake Shields.  They don’t like his attitude, his one (or now, two) dimensional game, and they especially don’t like that he’s incredibly effective with it.  Shields is one of the best grapplers in MMA though, that much cannot be denied.  In his bid for the Strikeforce MW title, he took another extremely good grappler in Jason Miller, and aside from a few fleeting moments, made him look amateurish.  Interestingly enough, Shields next opponent could very likely be Jacare, who performed a similar feat against Mayhem, and is a seemingly horrible match up for Shields.  Jake is the type of guy who is going to ride the horse that got him here, no matter what, so I don‘t think we‘re going to be seeing much striking out of Jake even if he is outmatched on the ground against Jacare.  At any rate, Shields is on the rise for now.

Fabricio Werdum

Matt Bremner: Werdum did just enough to take a decision from “Bigfoot” Silva, and this puts him on a collision course with Fedor. I was blown away by his performance, he still doesn't explode into his shots, his hands still aren't great and he struggles holding the Thai plumb when he goes for knees. All that said, he beat a guy in Silva who is really no joke in any area and I am certainly interested in seeing Werdum in a grapplefest with Fedor. Though, I fear Fedor puts him to bed with a big right when Werdum can't get the fight to the floor.

Brad Taschuk: FabDoom had me worried the day before the fight at the weigh-ins, as well as during the first 6 minutes or so of his fight against Bigfoot.  Then FabDoom reverted back to Fabricio Werdum, the top 10 fighter he actually is, and showed off many different facets of his game.  He showed that from the bottom, he can sweep a quality grappler, he showed off some semblance of striking (and some head movement to go along with it), some decent takedowns, but most of all I saw some heart and resiliency from Werdum that I wasn’t sure existed after he got uppercutted into the stratosphere by Junior dos Santos.  Fabricio will still struggle against elite HWs, simply because his game is still heavily oriented in grappling, and he doesn’t possess the wrestling to take the top of the line guys down or the striking to survive with them on the feet.  Next up for Werdum appears to be a date with the Emperor, which could end very badly for Vai Cavalo.

Steady:

Fedor Emelianenko

Matt Bremner: He won, he devastated, he's still only holding steady. Why you ask? It is because he is the best, period and no win over Brett Rogers was going to change that, in a fight where the match up seemed so one sided that disaster was bound to strike, Fedor proves once again to be the exception to the rule. A crushing right hand ended doubts about Fedor and the hype behind Rogers... for the next ten minutes. Fedor seems to be up against Werdum next, a fight he should be once again heavily favoured in.

Brad Taschuk: In the heat of the moment, some people may try to say that Fedor wasn’t as impressive as he has been in the past on Saturday and that his stock should fall as a result, but I choose to look at it differently.  Fedor just finished a fighter who was unbeaten - and thoroughly destroying people on the feet - on the feet.  Fedor is still the number one heavyweight in the world, and is still a top three pound-for-pound fighter.  Fedor still cuts easily.  Fedor still moves faster than most HWs can think.  Fedor still takes way less damage than it initially appears.  Fedor would still be the favorite against any other heavyweight fighter in the world.  If ever a fighter has been worthy of having his stock hold steady, that fighter is Fedor.

Gegard Mousasi

Matt Bremner: Mousasi really, really didn't impress me against Sokoudjou. In a fight where almost everyone expected Gegard to blow Thierry's doors off, I had him down a round going into the second stanza where once again Sokoudjou had better takedowns and equal striking. However, as is the story of Sokoudjou's career, he made one mistake too many and Gegard's least impressive show of ground and pound ended the fight. It should be noted that even though Gegard didn't land many shots in the ending flurry, the stoppage was good as Soko had clearly checked out of the fight. Next for Gegard is likely a date with possibly signed legend Dan Henderson, where I'd lean ever so slightly towards Henderson, or a fight with King Mo, where I think Gegard runs a train on Lawal.

Brad Taschuk: Matt talked me into keeping Gegard in the “steady” category, because to be quite honest, he didn’t impress me against Sokoudjou.  If this list was merely based on performance, I’d venture to say that Mousasi’s stock would be falling, but this isn’t only about performance, it’s about perception as well.  And the perception seems to be that Gegard is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  I think in the end, Gegard’s stock stays steady, because a win over Sokoudjou doesn’t tell us much about him that we didn’t already know.  Mousasi is still a well rounded fighter, and is a tough fight for anybody in the LHW division.  Does this fight move him anywhere that he wasn’t already?  Nope.  Gegard is right where he was last week, there was just a few moments of tension during that span.

Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou

Matt Bremner: Despite falling prey to his old demons (see above) “The African Assassin” did pretty well. He reversed a few takedown attempts, landed some nice leg kicks, hit a nice escape from the ground and was probably one of the first to really test Mousasi in a way that we hadn't really seen before. He performed so much better than what was expected that I can't legitimately say his stock is dropping, the problem is, that I think what we saw Saturday is simply as good as Sokoudjou gets. He has skills for days, but he lacks a grittiness and toughness that fighters need to get to the real top of the sport. Next for Sokoudjou is his Super Hulk final against Minowa, which he should win in devastating fashion, if he does not... yikes.

Brad Taschuk:  Once again, we learned nothing new about Sokoudjou in this fight.  Actually, scratch that, we learned one new thing about Sokoudjou: his judo works quite effectively when he uses it.  Aside from that, he still has a terrible ground game (despite one nice escape), he still gets rattled when he gets punched in the face, and he still gasses after one round.  The Cameroonian was very impressive for one round, and showed why he has all the potential in the world to be a top LHW, and then came out in the second round and showed all the reasons why he’s nowhere near that fighter yet.  You can’t even call Sokoudjou an enigma at this point, because you know exactly what you’re going to get.  He either wins in the first round, or loses in the second.  Let’s see if DREAM is going to let Sokky win the Super Hulk GP, or if he will “suffer” the same fate as Sapp and Choi.

Hatsu Hioki

Matt Bremner: What can you say for Hioki? The Japanese judging system just wasn't his friend at 11th Battle. Despite doing what almost everyone (Omigawa included) thought was enough to win, he lost a split decision to Omigawa. Hioki looked good, but not great, as he really should have blown the doors off of the less-skilled Omigawa, but it wasn't to be. Hioki is still a true talent in the division and I assume next time out he'll be ready to go for broke and maybe not leave it up to the judges after he saw first hand why that's so dangerous... and why no judging system is perfect.

Brad Taschuk: I have Hioki holding steady because he really did win that fight against Omigawa, which was expected, and even though some of us called for him to sub Michihiro, you can’t be particularly angry at a fighter for not subbing an opponent who had never been subbed before.  The one thing that really sucks coming off of this fight, is how much uncertainty there is in the FW division worldwide now.  Fabiano was #2 and lost, Hioki was top 5 and “lost”.  I thought the Bantamweight division was supposed to be the crazy division, and Featherweight was supposed to settle down.  I guess not.  At any rate, we’ll see Hioki back and subbing fools in no time, and this robbery will only be a distant memory.

Falling:

Jorge Santiago

Matt Bremner: A punch from the bottom. What else is there to say? Santiago's chin continues to be more suspect than OJ and Gary Condit in a Bronco with the Ramsey family in the back. No one doubts Santiago's skills, he is the Sengoku Middleweight champion, but just how far can you go when everything puts you on roller skates or worse? I wouldn't be surprised, as I said before, to see a rematch between Mamed and Jorge for the actual title, and how that ends in anyone's guess.

Brad Taschuk: No brainer here.  A top 5 MW who just lost to an unranked opponent rarely spells good news.  Santiago showed exactly what plagued him in the UFC, and an issue that will never go away.  The guy just does not have a reliable chin.  Not only did Jorge get stopped by strikes, but the strikes that started it were a couple of pretty limp-wrested backfists from the bottom.  There’s not really much else to be said here.  Jorge fought a guy who he should’ve beat, and didn’t.

Satoru Kitaoka

Matt Bremner: Sherdog's Jordan Breen laid Kitaoka's chances out as well as I ever could, essentially saying that if Masvidal could outlast the opening barrage of Kitaoka, that Kitaoka was in deep trouble, and he was correct. After failing to use a leg lock, which was what I believed to be the most likely way for Kitaoka to win, things went from bad to worse, ending with a knock out. Kitaoka's on a not so great slide, having lost the belt and his rebound fight. I expect to see him fight someone who won’t knock him out, like an Eiji Mitsuoka next time out, to try and climb to a place where maybe he can think about the belt again.

Brad Taschuk: So the myth of Satoru Kitaoka continues to fade away.  Satoru should be commended for coming out in the second round of his fight and continuing to be aggressive with his takedowns and ground game, but it was really to no avail.  Perhaps he should work on a little concept known as “control” since in his past few fights that balls to the wall takedown and submission strategy hasn’t quite played out how he would’ve liked.  Masvidal was an extremely beatable opponent for Kitaoka, but he just couldn’t come through.  It will be interesting to see if Satoru can make another run up the LW division after two consecutive losses.

Brett Rogers

Matt Bremner: Rogers isn't here because he lost, because he was supposed to lose. He's here because even though he had the biblical task of taking down Fedor, he'll likely never get another chance to do what he could have done Saturday night. He had a chance that few men get, a chance to beat a legend who has never actually been beaten, and while there's no shame in coming up short to Fedor and even lasting a round doing it, this was Rogers' shot to be top dog, and he came up short. I expect to see him in a fight with someone like Bigfoot Silva next, while Rogers tries in vain to hype a needless rematch.

Brad Taschuk: If this list was based on performance, I’d have Rogers either holding steady or rising.  Nobody expected him to put up that kind of fight against Fedor… not even those who picked him (with no logical backing, I might add).  However, Rogers may have reached the pinnacle of his career on Saturday, and for that reason I see him as falling.  Who knows if he’ll ever get a shot at a championship belt again (even if it is the WAMMA belt)?  Who knows how he’ll bounce back from his first loss?  Brett Rogers has just as many unanswered questions now as he did before the Fedor fight.  They’re different questions, but they still need answers.  Until we get them, I have to say that Rogers’ stock is falling.

Jason Miller

Matt Bremner: Coming into his fight, Brad and I both believed that Miller had the tools to beat Shields, and I still believe that to be the case, however, he was too reckless and let himself get taken down time and time again. He did, however, manage to sink in a choke that almost ended the fight, but it simply wasn't enough. However, he did hit one of the nicest monkey rolls that I have ever seen in a fight, however, he lacked the explosiveness to do it again, and really lacked pop on almost any of his moves. Next for Miller, probably more Bully Beatdown.

Brad Taschuk: Jason Miller had the tools to beat Jake Shields, he really did.  He showed that he was capable of putting Shields in bad positions, and for the brief periods where the fighters were standing, he got the better of the exchanges.  The reason that Mayhem’s stock is dropping is because he had the tools to win, but he refused to fight a smart fight, and it cost him a chance to be a huge star.  The fans at the Sears Center loved Mayhem.  I’m certain that the fans watching at home who didn’t know who he was before Saturday night will remember his entrance if nothing else.  He hosts a TV show on MTV.  Jason Miller only needed to fight a smart fight (even if it wasn’t full of his characteristic scrambles), keep Jake Shields on his feet, and outpoint him for 25 minutes, but Mayhem refused to put any effort into defending takedowns, and in doing so, cost himself the fight, and his shot at stardom.

The entrance was cool though.