A Walk Through Gegard Mousasi’s Legendary 58-fight Resume
Gegard ‘The Dreamcatcher’ Mousasi continues to add to his incredibly extensive, legendary resume, still at 36 years old, as he just defended his Bellator middleweight championship this past weekend at Bellator 275.
This appearance showed him victorious via TKO just 85 seconds into the first round.
Now, we get into what he’s done throughout his career; why he’s one of the best, and most underappreciated mixed martial arts fighters of all-time.
Record Breakdown:
- 49-7-2
- Wins: 28 knockouts, 12 submissions, 9 decisions
- Losses: 1 knockout, 3 submissions, 3 decisions
The Dutch talent started off his combat sports career with Judo at the age of eight. He then began boxing at age 15, later transitioning to kickboxing, and then MMA.
Mousasi competed in each of these sports as well, claiming a national championship in amateur boxing, before trying his hand in kickboxing competition.
Other Combat Accomplishments:
- Judo black belt
- 12-1 in boxing
- 8-0 in kickboxing
He began his mixed martial arts journey in the middle of his kickboxing tenure, and quickly went unbeaten throughout his first six appearances (5-0-1).
His first defeat would follow, before winning his next eight-straight fights.
Next would come his second professional defeat, where he was submitted by Akihiro Gono.
By this point, Mousasi was 13-2-1; both defeats came via submission (armbar) in round two, and all 13 of his victories came via finish.
Mousasi would then claim the first decision victory of his career, where he unanimously beat future multi-time world champion Hector Lombard under the PRIDE banner.
‘The Dreamcatcher’ then won his next seven bouts, along with the Cage Warriors middleweight championship, before winning just his second decision victory.
At this point he was under the DREAM banner with a record of 22-2-1.
Next came a bout against fellow professional kickboxer Melvin Manhoef, who he handily submitted (triangle choke) in round one, before winning the DREAM middleweight championship against Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza via KO.
A first round submission (armbar) victory over another fellow professional boxer and kickboxer, Mark Hunt, soon followed. Mousasi has literally taken on all challengers possible, this time an incredibly dangerous heavyweight.
For instance, Hunt defeated Wanderlei Silva and Mirko Cro Cop in just his third and fourth professional bouts. He’s the one that ended Silva’s legendary 16-fight win streak. No big deal.
Mousasi ran right through him.
‘The Dreamcatcher’ would change promotions again, this time ending up in Strikeforce, where he took the light-heavyweight championship from Renato Sobral via knockout in just 60 seconds of his promotional debut. He’d win his next two bouts, also via knockout, before being upset by the undefeated Muhammed ‘King Mo’ Lawal, losing his crown in a massive upset.
This brought his record to 28-3-1, before he returned to DREAM, securing back-to-back submission victories, as well as the DREAM light-heavyweight championship.
Mousasi then battled to a draw against UFC legend Keith Jardine, a fight he was deducted one point in for landing an illegal upkick. That means, he out-pointed Jardine more or less, and had he not landed an illegal strike, he would’ve gotten the victory.
That being said, this wasn’t Mousasi’s best night at the office.
Three more victories would follow, one of which coming over Ovince Saint Preux, as well as another defense of his new DREAM title, before he’d finally come over to the UFC with a record of 33-3-2.
It’s crazy, we waited what seemed like forever for him to come to the big show, but he was still just 27 years old at the time.
Mousasi was expected to face Alexander Gustafsson in his promotional debut, however, the Swede was forced to withdraw via injury and was replaced by Gustafsson’s teammate Ilir Latifi.
Mousasi handily out-pointed Latifi to a unanimous decision victory, before losing a unanimous decision to former UFC light-heavyweight champion Lyoto Machida.
A submission (rear naked choke) victory would follow over top contender Mark Munoz, before he was mauled and submitted (guillotine choke) by ‘Jacare’ Souza in round three of their rematch.
Mousasi followed this up by defeating multi-time and multi-weight world champion Dan Henderson (TKO), and 
then another top contender in Costa Philippou via unanimous decision.
Next came a TKO defeat to Uriah Hall, someone he was absolutely smashing early on. With the way that fight was looking, many of us believed it would be over before the first round was up.
However, Hall survived the initial onslaught and knocked Mousasi out with a spinning back kick, followed by a flying knee and punches, finishing the Dutchman off 25 seconds into round two.
Hall is still to this day the only man to finish Mousasi via strikes.
At this point, ‘The Dreamcatcher’ was 4-3 inside the UFC octagon, which, when you consider he had three losses total in nearly 40 fights prior to joining, it was a bit of a rocky start.
However, he’d win his next five straight over the likes of Thales Leites (UD), Thiago Santos (KO), Vitor Belfort (TKO), Uriah Hall (TKO) in their rematch, and Chris Weidman (TKO).
As you see, there’s a former-future No. 1 contender there (Santos), two former world champions (Belfort & Weidman), and he avenged his latest defeat (Hall).
Mousasi would leave the UFC after this, on a five-fight win streak, to join Bellator.
It’s almost too bad, he was so close to a title shot upon leaving.
Nonetheless, he’d defeat former Bellator middleweight king Alexander Shlemenko via unanimous decision in his promotional debut.
This was followed up by him claiming the Bellator middleweight championship via first round TKO against then champion Rafael Carvalho. He then defended the title against fellow Bellator champion (welterweight) Rory MacDonald, who he also dispatched of (TKO), this time in round two.
Mousasi then ran into a man named Rafael Lovato Jr, who dethroned him via majority decision in an upset.
It’s too bad we never got to see this rematch, as Mousasi has defeated three of the last four men to defeat him. The only one he missed was Lovato, who was forced to retire following their bout.
Click the link above to see that story!
However, he rebounded by avenging his defeat to Lyoto Machida (SD) in his next bout, who was on a four-fight win streak coming in, before recapturing the Bellator middleweight crown in a vacant title fight against another fellow Bellator champion (welterweight) in Douglas Lima.
Mousasi has since defended his throne twice against the likes of John Salter and Austin Vanderford, both via TKO.
Salter, a fellow UFC veteran, was 10-1 in his last 11 bouts coming in, having finished nine of those wins, with the only defeat coming to Lovato himself. And then Vanderford, who was 11-0 coming in (5-0 in Bellator).
If there’s one kryptonite Mousasi has had in his career, it’s big, strong wrestlers.
That’s what Vanderford is.
Mousasi’s timing and takedown defense was on point at Bellator 275 however, and he picked up another dominant victory to add to his lengthy resume.
Winning Streaks & Promotional Records:
- 15-fight win streak from 2006-2009
- 8-fight win streak from 2016-2019
- 28-2-1 throughout first 31 fights
- 4-1-1 in Strikeforce
- 2-1 in PRIDE
- 8-0 in DREAM
- 7-1 in Bellator
- 9-3 in UFC
- 10-2 in world title fights
- 12-1 in last 13 bouts
- Current 4-fight win streak
Gegard Mousasi has been upset before, as you see. It appears he has motivation lapses at times, and with as experienced as he is, who can blame him? The defeat to Machida, he lost to the better fighter that night, and it was just his second appearance in the UFC.
The rematch with Souza, he didn’t show up and Souza was on point that night. The defeat to Hall, he lost focus for a split second and it cost him dearly, and it appeared he didn’t really show up against Lovato either. But, maybe that’s a credit to how good Lovato was.
King Mo, whilst the bigger man of the two, also defeated him while he was just 6-0 coming in. Lovato was just 9-0 going into their fight as well. But hey, Anderson Silva lost to a 9-0 Chris Weidman, right?
Not to mention, when you’ve got 60 fights to your name, that’s bound to happen a time or two, to say the least.
Nonetheless, Mousasi is still improving in his mid-30’s, and he may just be the very best middleweight in the world.
Now that he just handed Vanderford his first defeat, Mousasi has won five Bellator championship fights, going 5-1 in them.
Mousasi’s technical striking is really something to behold, but when you mix that with his offensive wrestling and especially his ground-and-pound, it’s hard to find him a match. He’s just that good. His offensive and defensive submissions are great too.
Remember, the only man to submit him in the last 14 years is Jacare Souza, a 6th-degree black belt in BJJ, and a multi-time world champion in the art, as well as MMA.
He learns from his mistakes and corrects them the second time around, if given the chance.
Very few have a more impressive resume. Hell, most don’t have as impressive of one.
My Collection…. pic.twitter.com/XwIa5fQvy8
— Gegard Mousasi (@mousasi_mma) May 27, 2018
List of titles won:
- Cage Warriors (185 lbs) – not shown in picture
- DREAM two-division champion (185 lbs & 205 lbs)
- Strikeforce (205 lbs)
- Bellator (185 lbs)
- Again, left UFC on five-fight win streak. Would he have won that belt too?
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