Sherdog’s Top 10: Greatest Fighters of the 1990s

8. Maurice Smith

This list is filled with extraordinary stories, careers, and men who evolved the entire sport, and yet, even among them, Smith is the most incredible and unlikely. Smith was a very good if not quite world-class kickboxer in the 80s who started MMA in 1994 at age 32. Initially, he had no success. Between the Pancrase and Rings promotions in Japan, he managed a record of just 2-8 in his first 10 fights. Not only was he easily submitted by skilled grapplers of the day like Ken Shamrock, Tsuyoshi Kosaka and Kiyoshi Tamura, but fellow striker Bas Rutten dominated him in two different meetings, beating him up on the feet before submitting him. Even a journeyman like Yoshihisa Yamamoto, whom we discussed under Rickson Gracie's entry on this list, defeated Smith.

However, Smith wasn't discouraged and continued steadily improving. He became the Battlecade Extreme Fighting heavyweight champion when he defeated Marcus Silveira, current head coach of American Top Team, with a head kick in Round 3. To my knowledge, it's the first such finish in a significant MMA bout. Nevertheless, Smith's record was still only 5-11 and he was coming off a second loss to Yamamoto, this one by submission, when he challenged heavyweight champion Mark Coleman at UFC 14. I've written an entire article on that incredible bout, which is not only by far the biggest upset in MMA history, but one that will never be matched. At that point in the sport’s history, a kickboxer had never defeated a good wrestler. Fans didn't even have a clue what such a victory would look like. And the undefeated Coleman was a golden god back then, seen as a perfect fighter who simply couldn't be stopped. Not only was he a world-class wrestler but his ground-and-pound was devastating, especially with headbutts being legal. How in the world was a kickboxer with a losing record going to have any chance against him? But Smith had been training with The Alliance, a team composed of former foe Kosaka as well as Frank Shamrock, and had a plan. What unfolded was sheer magic, as Smith employed many techniques we regularly see today, but which were completely new to the MMA world at the time. He managed to survive and even get up repeatedly against Coleman, and when the mighty wrestler began tiring, Smith took over, battering him with kicks on the feet while defending takedowns. In the end, Smith had done not just the unthinkable, but the truly unimaginable; a Cinderella story to surpass all others. Smith would defend his title once, defeating “Tank” Abbott by stoppage. After that, wrestlers showed that they were evolving too, as Randy Couture defeated Smith by decision to win the UFC heavyweight championship, and then future heavyweight champion Kevin Randleman accomplished the same feat. Nevertheless, Smith had changed MMA as we know it, expanding what we thought was possible.

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