5 traditional grapplers who became dangerous strikers in the UFC

#2 Fabricio Werdum

Fabricio Werdum used his improved striking to win a UFC title

Another success from Rafael Cordeiro; prior to joining with the former Chute Boxe head, Fabricio Werdum was always well-respected as arguably the best grappler at Heavyweight in all of MMA. After all, this was a man who was able to submit the great Fedor Emelianenko – from his back too – after nobody else had really come close.

Unfortunately for Werdum, for the majority of his early career his striking lagged way behind his incredible grappling skills. In PRIDE he was easily outstruck by Sergei Kharitonov; the same happened when he fought Andrei Arlovski in his initial UFC run, and of course, that end came to a run when he was violently knocked out by Junior Dos Santos in late 2008.

Four years later though, Werdum was back in the UFC and this time he was an entirely different animal. Gone was the awkward striking style that saw him throw swiping punches and in its place was a violent Muay Thai assault – the kind that allowed him to knee his way to a win over Roy Nelson and destroy vaunted striker Travis Browne on the feet over five rounds.

Werdum’s improvement culminated when he largely outstruck Cain Velasquez in the clinch before submitting him to win the Heavyweight title in 2015. And although he’s since lost the title, recent wins over Browne in a rematch and Marcin Tybura show that he’s still one of the best strikers at Heavyweight – a massive improvement from the sloppy kickboxer he once was.