The MMA Hall of F@#$%&G Awesome: Mirko Filipovic

Headquartered in scenic Woodloch, Texas, the Mixed Martial Arts Hall of F@#$%&g Awesome (HOFA for short) commemorates the achievements of those fighters who, while they might not be first-ballot selections for a traditional hall of fame, nonetheless did remarkable things in the cage or ring, and deserve to be remembered. The HOFA enshrines pioneers, one-trick ponies and charming oddballs, and celebrates them in all their imperfect glory. While the HOFA selection committee’s criteria are mysterious and ever-evolving, the final test is whether the members can say, unanimously and with enthusiasm, “____________ was f@#$%&g awesome!”

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“Right leg hospital, left leg cemetery.”
—Mirko Filipovic
The Filipovic quip which opens this article is a classic MMA one-liner — succinct, funny and memorable — yet it almost sells the man short. “Cro Cop” was much more than a one-dimensional purveyor of head kicks, even if those became his signature weapon for good reason. In his mid-2000s prime in Pride Fighting Championships in particular, the stone-faced Croatian possessed a blend of speed, power and aggression that, when coupled with his nearly impregnable takedown defense, made him the most feared striker in the sport and one of its biggest stars.

By the time of Filipovic’s MMA debut in late 2001, he was already one of the top heavyweight kickboxers in the world and a two-time K-1 grand prix runner-up. He initially fought under K-1’s MMA banner, but dissatisfaction with pay led him to sign with rival organization Pride after just one bout. It was a fortuitous pairing, as Pride’s blend of footloose matchmaking and stellar production values provided the canvas upon which he would proceed to paint his unmatched highlight reel. Not that he necessarily needed the matchmaking: “Cro Cop” was an equal-opportunity distributor of naps to the worthy as well as unworthy. For every lucha-masked Alberto “Dos Caras Jr.” Rodriguez who had no business being in a ring with him, he laid out a fellow knockout artist like Igor Vovchanchyn or Wanderlei Silva. While even as a smallish 6-foot-2, 225-pound heavyweight he loomed over opponents like Vovchanchyn and Kazushi Sakuraba, he also absolutely destroyed much larger foes such as Heath Herring, Josh Barnett and Aleksander Emelianenko — memorably head-kicking the 6-foot-5 Emelianenko as if just to prove he could.

Filipovic’s most important fight of the era, of course, was against the other Emelianenko brother, Pride heavyweight champion Fedor. It would be nearly impossible to explain to a fan who came to MMA after 2010 or so just what an enormous, all-consuming deal “Fedor vs. Cro Cop” was. Delayed for years by a litany of injuries to the champ and by Filipovic’s shocking upset loss to Kevin Randleman, by the time they finally met at Pride “Final Elimination 2005,” the matchup had lost none of its sheen. The fight itself delivered; it was practically every news outlet’s top fight of the year if not the decade, with “Cro Cop” acquitting himself well in a loss against the greatest heavyweight the sport had ever seen.

He would not get another crack at “The Last Emperor” or the belt. Filipovic’s greatest achievement, winning the 2006 Open-Weight Grand Prix, occurred after Emelianenko withdrew due to injury, and while “Cro Cop” eagerly jumped to the Ultimate Fighting Championship months ahead of Pride’s final collapse, Emelianenko and the UFC never were able to come to terms.



Filipovic made his Octagon debut at UFC 67 in February 2007 as the most hotly anticipated free-agent signee in UFC history, and after running through Eddie Sanchez, he faced Gabriel Gonzaga in a heavyweight title eliminator. With incumbent champ Randy Couture in attendance for the expected face-off and photo op with his next challenger, “Cro Cop” suffered his most infamous and bitterly ironic defeat, as he was knocked out cold by a right head kick from the Brazilian grappler. He would recover from the loss, going on to spend the next several years as a Top 10 heavyweight in the UFC, but much of the magic seemed to be gone.



Released by the UFC in 2010 after a string of knockout losses, Filipovic experienced something of a resurgence. He returned to K-1, finally winning his first grand prix in 2012, and strung together 10 straight wins in MMA, though some of those achievements were marred by a positive test for performance-enhancing drugs late in his career. After a February 2019 bout with Roy Nelson in Bellator MMA, Filipovic suffered a stroke — from which he made a quick and complete recovery, fortunately — and announced his retirement.

SIGNATURE MOMENTS: Even after Emelianenko withdrew from the Pride 2006 grand prix with a broken hand, the tournament field was an impressive one, especially once the promotion replaced “The Last Emperor” with Silva, perhaps Pride’s second-greatest export. The final two rounds of the grand prix took place on Sept. 10, 2006 — Filipovic’s 32nd birthday, incidentally — and in order to win, he would have to get past “The Axe Murderer” in a rematch of their 2002 draw, and then the winner of the other semifinal between Josh Barnett and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira.

The image of “Cro Cop” and “The Axe Murderer” facing off as referee Yuji Shimada gave final instructions is indelible. Silva, in what might be charitably called his “Pride final form” — the middleweight champ was actually the heavier man in the ring that night — snarled and bounced from one foot to the other, while Filipovic remained as still and expressionless as a statue. This time it would not end in a draw, and while a trademark head kick sealed the deal, a vicious left hook and left body kick seconds before had set up the finishing blow. It was another example of the subtlety behind Filipovic’s brutality, and it gave him perhaps his best single win in Pride.

After splattering “The Axe Murderer” in the semifinals, facing a fighter in Barnett whom he had already beaten twice was almost an anti-climax, but Filipovic left nothing to chance, battering the former UFC champion once again and hoisting the grand prix trophy. Though nobody could have known at the time, he would never again reach quite the same heights under such bright lights.

THE HOFA COMMITTEE SAYS: In his prime, Filipovic carried a mystique that very few fighters in MMA history can rival. Perhaps the best way to sum up the awesomeness of “Cro Cop” is to say that more than any other fighter, he delivered what we had always hoped it would look like when a great kickboxer crossed over to mixed martial arts.

It is with great pleasure that we say: Mirko Filipovic, you are f@#$%&g awesome.