Missed Fists: Vadim Rolich escapes leglock with backfist knockout, more

Welcome to the latest edition of Missed Fists where we shine a light on fights from across the globe that may have been overlooked in these hectic times where it seems like there’s an MMA show every other day.

One of the best parts about giving time to lesser known promotions and fighters is that every week you’re pretty much guaranteed to see something you’ve never seen before. Case in point, we’re starting off this session with a unique leglock escape that has to fall under the “don’t try this at home” category.

Vadim Rolich vs. Ivan Bukhtoyarov
Artem Babashko vs. Rustam Serbiev
Evgeny Manko vs. Azamat Dzhamkhatov

AL: Our pals at Belarusian Fighting Championship are keeping the good times rolling with this show that took place in Minsk on Thursday. Here’s light heavyweight Vadim Rolich kicking things off on the right note, scoring a knockout off of his back while fighting a submission.

Sure, Francis Ngannou has power, but does he have backfist his way out of a leg lock power?

JM: You know, call me crazy, but I’d say yes. Yes he does. Francis has all the kinds of power that exist. In the MMA world, Francis Ngannou holds the Power Stone. But Rolich is obviously no slouch himself. That wasn’t even a big time haymaker. Impressive stuff.

AL: Perhaps this was the key to beating Ryan Hall all along?

JM: Homie tapped B.J. Penn. Ryan Hall isn’t going to drop down on a sub-par straight ankle lock.

AL: Hey, remember when Hall styled on Artem Lobov to win The Ultimate Fighter 22? That’s as good a transition as any to this fast finish by Artem Babashko.

JM: More like BabashTKO, amirite?

AL: I can’t believe you give these nicknames away for free.

And now for two cats that were recently featured in Missed Fists, Evgeny Manko and Azamat Dzhamkhatov. Undoubtedly fighting for our favor, it was Manko who chopped Dzhamkhatov with a disgusting leg kick that essentially nerfed him for the remainder of the fight.

JM: Not to take credit away from Manko, who clearly deserves tons of it, but I will say that the leg kick doesn’t seem like it was really the cause of the problems here. The leg kick slapped, not thudded. But as Dzhamkhatov was shuffling away he basically rolled his own ankle, Michael Chandler-style and was done. A win is a win though.

Sergio Alfredo Chirino Sanchez vs. Gustavo Alan Pina

AL: Sorry MMA, the best KO of the week may have come from the boxing world.

JM: To be fair, that’s a statement you can reasonably make just about any weekend.

AL: But “boxing is dead” tho.

That’s Sergio Alfred Chirino Sanchez ending Gustavo Alan Pina’s world with an on-point uppercut at a boxing match in Mexico City this past Saturday.

JM: Any time a body gets frozen in time, you know the punch landed was both clean and powerful. Tremendous uppercut and definitely the finest KO this week.

Dariusz Rutkiewicz vs. Arkadiusza Jakobczyka
Konrad Konkel vs. Dawid Sadowski
Dariusz Wilk vs. Wojciech Makowski
Oliwier Filipiak vs. Patryk Cedro

AL: And if that wasn’t enough, our top two spots on the Missed Fists knockouts this list come from non-MMA competition. Here’s Dariusz Rutkiewicz blasting Arkadiusza Jakobczyka in a bare-knuckle bout at Krwawy Sport 1 in Gdansk, Poland, also from Saturday.

JM: Oof. You don’t often see true starchings in bare-knuckle but that was one hell of a shot. I’ll still take the boxing KO though, if only because a stretcher wasn’t involved so it causes me less inner turmoil.

AL: Next, we have heavyweight Konrad Konkel just wailing on David Sadowski.

Konkel has such a great name. If you just showed me this clip and asked me to guess what his name was, I would definitely get “Konrad Konkel” in three tries or less.

JM: Ref took his sweet time there, didn’t he? That fight was over at the start of the clip but didn’t end until seven seconds and one unconscious Sadowski later.

AL: Dariusz Wilk showed off some impressive offense, scoring a KO where it doesn’t even look like he’s throwing that hard at first glance. Regardless, he found the button and it was a wrap for Wojciech Makowski.

JM: Now this one is the only KO that really is in the running for Best of the Week. The way he threw that while completely stepped off to the side means that poor Makowski stood a snowball’s chance in hell of not getting pine-boxed.

But enough with the KOs. Let’s talk about some funky submissions.

Oliwier Filipiak starts out trying to D’Arce choke Patryk Cedro but then it kind of ends up being an arm-in north-south choke. I think?

AL: I beg your pardon?

JM: I’m honestly not entirely sure what this counts as (other than bad defense) but it definitely counts as dope.

AL: That submission was so mystifying, I don’t think Cedro went to sleep because he was trying to be tough, he just didn’t realize how much danger he was in.

Oleg Popov vs. Denis Arkhireev
Ilya Freymanov vs. Alexey Ilyenko

AL: Woo, that’s Oleg Popov doing big boy thangz, just destroying Denis Akhireev’s ribcage with this slam. Poor Akhireev could hardly stand after experiencing that impact.

JM: In defense of Arkhireev, if a dude that size slammed all his weight on me, I too would be done fighting. That just looks unfortunate.

AL: I don’t know what was going on at MMA SERIES-7 in Taganrog, Russia, but remind me never to go there because I value my internal organs.

Ilya Freymanov? He ain’t got time for ‘em.

JM: This was not a fair fight. Just look at all the kinesio tape on Freymanov! That has to be at least as bad as trace elements of a PED. The man is half-machine!

Jovan Zdelar vs. Stanislav Krofak
Slavoljub Mitic vs. Adrian Radovanovic
Nemanja Kovac vs. Milan Nakic

AL: We end with some Adventures in Officiating, but the good kind! Dare I say these referees at Serbian Battle Championship 28 last Friday were as impressive as the fighters themselves?

Check out what happens here after Jovan Zdelar forces the tap from Stanislav Krofak.

Nice submission by Zdelar and an excellent job by the ref to not flinch even as Zdelar threw a post-fight haymaker in his direction.

JM: I seriously thought this ref was about to get decked. That would have been absolutely hilarious in the worst way.

AL: Would have been the lede this week, for sure. Not that we encourage that sort of thing.

Ben Fowlkes recently wrote a feature about the decline of the once-ubiquitous Superman Punch and I can safely say that it’s efforts like this one from Adrian Radovanovic that might convince fighters to leave that tool in the shed.

He just whiffs here and Slavoljub Mitic happily serves him a crisp two-piece. And speaking of Superman, here’s the ref to save the day!

JM: Dude jumps in there like a 12-year old trying to photobomb his sister’s prom pics. Now that’s how you referee!

AL: And he wasn’t satisfied with just one save. Here he is again to bail Milan Nakic out of trouble.

I’m not sure if this ref is doing an outstanding job or if he’s just overzealous and has issues with his equilibrium.

By the way, you may have noticed in that clip that Nakic’s standup… leaves something to be desired.

JM: Don’t get me wrong, I love this ref’s enthusiasm. But this was a late stoppage. I’d have stepped in as soon as I saw Nakic holding his hands like that. Ain’t no need to see anymore.

AL: Believe it or not, this wasn’t Nakic’s first fight. It was his 14th.

Fourteen fights into his pro career, and our man is breaking out moves like this.

Bless him.

JM: As I said, The Flying Referee should’ve called this one after the opening bell.

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If you know of a recent fight or event that you think may have been overlooked, or a promotion that could use some attention, please let us know on Twitter – @JedKMeshew and @AlexanderKLee – using the hashtag #MissedFists.