A new era in the middleweight division
Posted by Bryan Belangia on February 9th, 2010
Anderson Silva destroys Chris Leben
Anderson Silva was originally brought into the UFC to bolster the middleweight division and to give it some depth. Fast forward three and a half years later, and while he’s been a certified killer inside the cage, he may have succeeded in killing the division as a whole.
Silva departed PRIDE in 2004 after losing to one of the most dynamic submissions in MMA history- a flying heel hook by Ryo Chonan, and completely reinvented himself as a fighter. Aside from the hiccup loss by DQ to Yushin Okami for an illegal kick, he was dominating fights with amazing accuracy and speed.
In 2004/2005 it appeared the UFC had found their next star with Rich Franklin. He had a solid record and was finishing fights when they put him on the main event of the inaugural season of The Ultimate Fighter against UFC legend Ken Shamrock. He dispatched of Shamrock quickly with a TKO in the first round. Franklin went on to be the middleweight champion with a defeat of Evan Tanner at UFC 53. The problem was that the division was weak. Franklin defended against the likes of Nate Quarry and David Loiseau.
After having little to choose from in terms of title contenders, the UFC looked heavily to add depth in 2006 by adding Marquardt, Okami, Lister, Leites, Kampmann, and also Anderson Silva.
Silva’s brutal display of accuracy and power against Chris Leben earned him an immediate shot at the title where he put on a Muay Thai clinic and ultimately rearranged the nose of Rich Franklin. Aside from Silva’s boring five round decision victory over Thales Leites, he’s demolished all competition. Even when the fight has looked competitive — as was the case when Dan Henderson won the first round of their fight and when Nate Marquardt was showing signs of being competitive — all it took was one mistake for Silva to put them away.
All told Silva has defended his belt five times in the UFC and has done it against the best the division has to offer; and has done it decisively. As Silva gets set for another defense against Vitor Belfort at UFC 112 in Abu Dhabi, you have to wonder how long can this go on? Silva has demolished the division — and essentially forced the top contenders to fight round robin style while they wait for a new development, or for a second title shot. Silva has a tough test with Belfort as he’s the type of striker with such speed and power that Silva hasn’t been tested against, but should Silva notch another victory in that fight I believe it’s time for Silva to move on.
Silva has fought at 205lbs recently in the UFC and had equal success at that weight. There’s the obvious obstacle of his teammate and friend Lyoto Machida being the champion and the two not being willing to fight each other, but aside from that fight there are a number of intriguing fights at 205 for Anderson. Silva has also expressed interest in fighting at heavyweight, specifically against Frank Mir. That thought certainly brings back the circus show act that was present in PRIDE, but if any fighter could make that transition it would be Silva.
It’s time for a new era in the UFC middleweight division and it’s time for newer and bigger challenges for Anderson Silva.
February 10th, 2010 at 12:45 am
Interesting — it wouldn’t surprise me if both Mir & Anderson wanted that fight. I remember Mir picking Forrest to beat Silva. Silva has some beef with Robert Drysdale, who has had a hand in training Mir (it seems like everyone in Vegas trains together)
I’d watch Mir/Silva for sure, but I’m actually not sure that NSAC would even allow it. Mir is huge nowadays.
Do you think Sonnen has anything for Silva? I don’t know. Sometimes it seems like all the UFC champs are so far ahead of their respective packs that they’ll have to fight each other.
February 12th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Now that Vitor is out of the title fight, who knows what they’ll do. I know Sonnen has been medically suspended until the end of March and should he be offered the fight he’d have a very short training camp, but he’d be a fool not to accept. The problem is that he’s as good of a wrestler as Henderson but with worse submission defense so I don’t know how much of a chance he’d have.
Marquardt just lost and Maia looked extremely boring in his win. I’d hate to see another version of Silva/Leites should Maia get a shot.
The match I’d be most interested in watching would be Anderson versus Wanderlei although I’ve been told they’re back to being friends now. I’d like to think that Wanderlei would take the fight and we wouldn’t be subjected to Anderson refusing to fight top guys in both the middleweight and light heavyweight divisions.