Dan Miller: The Quiet Storm Coming

When the elite submission games of the 185 pound division come up, the names are familiar to most die-hard MMA fans: Anderson Silva, Paulo Filho, Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza, and even Thales Leites.

There’s one thing that all of the dominant submission grapplers of the recent 185 pound rennaissance have in common, they’re not from around here. The truth is, America has never been the source of great submission fighting, and that’s not a surprise, given that the preeminent style in the Western hemisphere is Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

There is a name, though, that is going to surprise a lot of people, a name that is not only unknown, but almost entirely unrecognizable, even to most MMA critics: Dan Miller.

The sensation from Jersey holds a title that is almost cringe inducing, the IFL middleweight title, and doesn’t hold a BJJ blackbelt, which is an anomaly for anyone generally referred to as a top submission fighter. What’s different about him isn’t a special technique, but the speed that he goes catches submissions with is impressive.

The standing rear naked choke that he caught on Rob Kimmons in his UFC debut was impressive, and a record with a pretty diverse variety of submissions all in the first round, this guy is a warrior, and he’s going to be dangerous in a division that could use a few more solid submission fighters.

His brother, Jim Miller, may very well be a substantial lightweight, since he won his UFC debut against David Baron with a rear naked choke after controlling the fight for three rounds. The Dan and Jim hold records of 8-1 and 12-1, respectively, and both promise an impressive level of technical grappling.

While it remains to be demonstrated whether these guys are going to be substantial grapplers, especially with Jim coming up in a division rife with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu blackbelts, but they should be talked about.

The folding of the IFL didn’t mean much in terms of loose talent, but these guys are certainly a part of what slim pickings there were, and Dan Miller’s second go in the UFC this weekend may very well be an indicator of how well these fighters are going to do in the future.

Perhaps, though, what impresses me most about Dan is not simply that he’s a Renzo Gracie student establishing himself in a division with a handful of good submission fighters, where he can make himself dangerous and reputable. It’s that this is his second fight in a little over a month. His victory over Rob Kimmons was only on the seventeenth of September, and he decided to fight again.

Fighters who want to fight, regardless of competition, are exciting, even if only in conceptualization, and that shows me that Dan will fight anybody, which is what we all like to see.

While not an immediate title contender, this is a fighter who has the ability to be a long term force in teh division, and that makes him more valuable than many of these flash-in-a-pan fighters. While he’s still relatively untested, I expect success from this guy.