To celebrate VXRSI’s new ‘Villains’ collection that was released a few days ago, we assembled a list of the top ten villains in MMA history, presented by VXRSI. We know that many of you are going to endlessly complain that guys like Mayhem Miller and Aleksander Emelianenko were left out. Well, take a chill pill, man. Life isn’t that difficult. There’s enough things to be stressed about on this planet — don’t let this list be one of them.
Now check out The Top Ten Villains in MMA History, presented by VXRSI and don’t forget to check out VXRSI’s Villain Series. Here are a few pieces from the new collection below.
A list of the top ten villains in MMA would be nothing without former Strikeforcer, Paul Daley. Ever since he made his debut in the UFC at UFC 103 he was greeted with an array of boos from the Dallas crowd after he knocked out Martin Kampmann in an absolutely devastating fashion. Perhaps it was his brash smack talk leading up to the event, or simply that he was fighting in the city that senselessly killed John F. Kennedy.
Of course the event that secured Paul Daley’s villain status was at UFC 113 when he hit Josh Koscheck after their welterweight contender fight ended. However how can we blame Paul Daley? The dude said in his pre-fight interview ‘When Josh feels my right hook the fight will be over.’
There’s not really one incident that secures Nick Diaz’s villain status. Even before Diaz gave the finger to Frank Shamrock at the Strikeforce press conference back in 2009, his days in Pride FC, Elite XC, and UFC enabled him to build up a reputation — and that little incident when he fought Joe Riggs inside of his hospital room didn’t hurt either.
Nick Diaz has always been a villain in MMA, and judging from fan reactions towards him over the years, people love to hate Nick. While we can’t nail down one incident, we can warn you that Nick Diaz simply can’t tolerate not having his shoes available at all times.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zT5vKLrVyJw
Lesnar was an MMA villain before he even entered MMA due to his stint as a WWE wrestler from 2000-2004. What really set it off for Brock Lesnar was just after UFC 100 when after putting one of the worst beatdowns in MMA history, Brock got into Frank Mir’s face to tell him something (probably warning him to stop stealing his strawberries) and then completely ripped into Bud Light, one of UFC’s main sponsors at the time. Check it out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ot20oc-4tQ
Go ask 1,000 MMA fans and you will be hard pressed to find one of them that’s an actual Josh Koscheck fan. The guy has been a villain ever since he stepped foot inside The Ultimate Fighter house in 2005 and started to mix it up with fellow TUFer Chris Leben
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnDEO5JIz0Y
Koscheck didn’t stop at TUF 1. Many of you remember after he defeated Paul Daley at UFC 113, he got on the microphone and said he hoped the Pittsburgh Penguins would be Montreal in the NHL playoffs that year. Of course how can we forget when Koscheck made another appearance on TUF, this time as a coach opposite of Georges St. Pierre, he got into it with the infamous ‘male nurse.’
I’ve never met Chael Sonnen but I just have a feeling that he would be vehemently against teaching evolution in public schools. Dude seems like the kind of guy that would be for punishing children in the middle of class with a paddle. Sonnen is a throw-back to the old-school where people used to get burned at the stake for believing the earth is round. Leading up to Chael Sonnen’s first fight against Anderson Silva, he completely transformed from a somewhat docile middleweight to a smack-spewing effigy that stopped at nothing to rip apart Anderson Silva. Check out what Sonnen manifested in the pre-fight media call just days before UFC 117.
Ah, Michael Bisping — where do we even start.
You’ve seen UFC 127, read the innumerable amount of comments about it on the internet and you probably remember Michael Bisping denying that he spit on Jorge Rivera’s corner after he TKOd Jorge Rivera. Well, this video will undoubtedly change your perception, but only if you think Bisping did not eject saliva from his mouth towards someone connected to Jorge Rivera.
While Bisping was a notorious villain in MMA prior to February 2th 2011, this video sort of sealed his status.
People need to realize that before this plastic-surgery, overly-friendly incarnation of Wanderlei Silva recently emerged in UFC, Wand was vehemently hated in Pride FC, especially when he competed against Japanese fighters. In fact Pride FC used to refer to Wanderlei as the devil. Mark Coleman wasn’t a big fan of Wand either, as illustrated in the crowd brawl that broke out after Coleman submitted Shogun Rua back in Pride FC.
If you want to get fans to spill their beers and hop out of their seat, all a fighter needs to do is Gilbert Yvel on someone and you’re guaranteed to have screaming fans and an unconscious ref. Whenever Gilbert Yvel fights, its like he shoves explosive sticks of ‘IDontGiveADamnamite’ in his gloves and ignites it right on his opponent’s face. It’s an understatement that Gilbert Yvel has as temper. The dude’s temper has a temper. Yvel is one of the few if not the only MMA fighter who was disqualified due to knocking the referee out cold and then kicking him afterwards. It’s straight violent…ly hilarious. Gilbert Yvel wasnt born. He just ripped through his mother’s womb and started ground and pounding the doctor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYj5BdSLuJE
You could live for the next ten thousand years, travel the earth barefoot, climb the highest mountain and master every religion on this planet and you will not find a single reason why this story of Vyacheslav Datsik can not be classified as ‘baller.’ If God truly exists, then Datsik undoubtedly bullied him in highschool. Stolen lunch money, sporadic wedgies at recess, The Almighty had it hard back in those days and all fingers should be pointed in Vyacheslav Datsik’s general direction.
In Pankration, Datsik faced off against Vitali Shkraba where he repeatedly kicked and stomped on his testicles as Shkraba rolled around in pain. The referee had to restrain Datsik with a forearm choke that nearly killed him. After losing his last six fights, his former training partner and alleged gay lover, Oleg Titov, spread rumors that Datsik died in a train wreck. The rumors were deemed false when St. Petersburg police arrested Viacheslav Datsik for a string of robberies at mobile phone stores across Russia. Since 2007, Datsik has been incarcerated in a high security psychiatric clinic but was transferred to a low-security facility in 2010. Vyacheslav Datsik then managed to escape the psychiatric ward using his bare hands.
“He tore a hole in a chain-link fence with his bare hands and fled. We immediately informed police about his escape”
The next day, a St. Petersburg mobile phone store notified the police that someone raided the store and made off with 7000 rubles and a Nokia phone. When the police arrived, a salesman identified the phone thief as none other than your boy, Viacheslav Datsik. The guy is too raw for humanity and if, in the infinite possibilities of this vast universe, he somehow makes it on the next season of The Ultimate Fighter, I would raid a string of mobile phone stores in Datsik’s honor (and you should too).
Lee Murray, undoubtedly MMA’s most notorious villain.
Sure we could talk about how Murray orchestrated the biggest bank heist in history and got away with it, but that would just be entirely too easy. We all know what Murray is capable of and the fact that he tops our list of The Top Ten Villains in MMA History shouldn’t surprise you at all. Now let’s take a short trip through time and space and arrive during the Cage Rage weighins when he faced off against Anderson Silva, and all hell broke loose.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q253IzQ0cLs
