M.I.A: Mirko Cro Cop's Left High Kick KO

This new feature -- which I've wanted to do for quite some time -- will look at fighters who have not recently utilized the techniques and/or strategies which they became best known for. 

This inaugural edition focuses on Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic.      

By the time UFC 103 rolls around, it will have been over three years since Cro Cop last knocked out an opponent with what has been his signature move, the Left High Kick.

Cro Cop built his reputation as a devastating striker on the the heels of dominating performances in K-1 and Pride.  His brutal knockouts of Igor Vovchanchyn, Aleksander Emilianenko and Wanderlei Silva -- all via LHK -- will go down as some of the absolute best in MMA history. 

It was those types of knockouts that Zuffa brass were expecting to see when they signed Cro Cop to the UFC in a huge money deal at the end of 2006.  Coming on the heels of his Pride Open-weight Grand Prix Championship performance, Cro Cop's first UFC opponent, Eddie Sanchez was brought in as the sacrificial lamb whose role was to serve as fodder for Cro Cop's future UFC highlight reel.  Cro Cop won the match handily, and at one point did land a glancing LHK, but due to the fact that his opponent spent most of the fight backpedaling and circling away, he was not able to finish impressively.

Almost three years and four UFC bouts later, the only impressive high kick we have seen involving Cro Cop was the one he was on the receiving end of. See: Gonzaga, Gabriel.

In order for Cro Cop to make another run at the top of the Heavyweight division he has to finish a worthy opponent and if he can do it with a vintage LHK we could see him jump to the front of the line for a title shot. 

So what must Cro Cop do to land that vaunted high kick and add a true highlight to his UFC reel?  At this point Cro Cop seems to be comfortable fighting in the cage as opposed to the ring that in the past he's said he prefers.  Opponents, more than ever, are wary of the high kick and circle away from it, making it difficult for Cro Cop to land.  In recent years he has also lacked the intimidation factor that used to give him an edge before the opening bell had even rung. 

In the Al-Turk fight we saw an aggressive Cro-Cop continually coming forward and that's been the style that has served him well in the past.  But as Gonzaga, Cheick Kongo and Alistair Overeem have demonstrated, coming right at Cro Cop and bullying him seems to be the best way to neutralize his once-feared striking game.  Going forward, Cro Cop will need to maintain distance in order to effectively throw those deadly kicks, as well as get back to being the aggressive stalker he was in Pride.

Cro Cop once famously said, "Right kick, hospital.  Left kick, cemetery."  Now the question is when -- and if -- we will see him land another spectacular LHK knockout. 

Could it be in less than two weeks against Junior Dos Santos?