Forrest Griffin will guarantee Silva an opportunity to show his skills.
Written by Paul Delos Santos
If Anderson Silva isn’t getting tired of constantly being asked about his lackluster performances, his manager Ed Soares just might be.
Soares said the amount of criticism that Silva receives for his fights against Patrick Cote and Thales Leites is unjustified.
“He puts on a show,” Soares said during a UFC 101 media teleconference. “The way I look at it, if you’re a challenger you have to take (the title away). … You can’t call a guy into your guard. If you want to take him to the ground, take him to the ground and then take the champion’s belt.”
Whatever frustrations that are constantly being felt, one thing remains certain, Silva will have a stern test when he takes on Forrest Griffin at UFC 101.
It will be Silva’s second foray into the UFC’s deepest division and faces arguably one of its most potent challengers and fan favorites.
That doesn’t seem to concern Silva, who looks at this fight as another opportunity for experience.
“Every fight is a great experience,” Silva said in Portugese and was translated through Soares. “Moving up and fighting a great challenger (is another one). All the experiences I’ve had in my life is going to help, especially fighting the former light heavyweight champion. I’m anxious and ready to get this fight going.”
Silva (24-4) was given the fight against Griffin by UFC president Dana White, when he produced his second questionable performance against Leities.
Some said that Silva might have been bored with the lack of real challengers in his division, and that a fight with Griffin would spark and produce the Silva that many thought was the world’s best fighter.
Per his answering of the same question over and over again, Silva remains insistent that it was Leites’ strategy that produced a boring fight, and that Silva was just doing what his job entailed.
“I’m in there to do my job,” Silva said. “At the end of the day, I’m here for the fans, but I’m putting my life and body on the line. I feel like I did my job and if people are booing, then it comes from lack of understanding of the sport. I executed the game plan. It’s just unfortunate that the opponents didn’t fight back.”
Regardless of whose fault it is, Silva faces a man known for accomplishing the near impossible in Griffin.
It was Griffin, who choked out, the then top-ranked light heavyweight, Maurcio “Shogun” Rua, and proceeded to beat Quinton “Rampage” Jackson for the light heavyweight title.
Though Silva has slipped in many pound-for-pound rankings, Griffin considers him to be the best fighter in the world, and he is looking to hand Silva his first loss in the UFC.
There will be a slight weight difference when fight night comes, but Silva isn’t concerning and gave another stock response.
“I train with a lot of guys of different sizes,” Silva said. “The biggest challenge is fighting a guy like Forrest, who’s aggressive and has been a champion. My main focus is training hard and getting ready for this fight.”
He doesn’t expect there to be any issues in terms of cutting weight for a 205 pound fight like there would be in a 185 pound fight. Silva normally walks around 210 and 215 pounds, and said both take their own type of time.
“People talk about moving up and down in weight is difficult,” Silva said. “For me to cut to 185, is that I have to eat a different diet and do a different type cardio. At 205, I eat differently and don’t have to cut too much weight. Both work fine for me.”
The question is, assuming Silva gets past Griffin, what would be next for the middleweight kingpin?
Soares stepped in to answer a question for Silva.
“He wants to be involved with the biggest fights possible. He wants to be in historic title fights,” Soares said. “It doesn’t make a difference. He’s there to defend his title when a valid contender steps up. If it’s 205 great, if it’s 185 even better.”
Paul Delos Santos is an associate editor at MMAMadness.com. You can e-mail him at paul@mmamadness.com. Follow the entire MMA Madness team at Twitter.com/MMA_Madness.
im excited for this fight,war.leg icks will be used alot in this.silva i can see cutting forrest with elbows.
In any event…it’s gonna be a WAR…Forrest is NOBODY”S BITCH!!!
you pumped for this cota?keeny vs bj is going to be a good fight too,bj is pissed at kenny,he wants to teach him a lesson.
forrest was horrible,he looked scared.
DAMN!!! Did silva even break a sweat? I knew Forrest was gonna get ko’d just not that fast!! Forrest has always been scared of Anderson, if you go back and read some of his interviews he talk about him like as if to say “damn I don’t want to fight this guy!” and it showed tonight! I would love to see silva vs rampage!! That would be interesting! What was up with that bs that Forrest pulled, running out like a bitch!! Did he go cry in the back or what? Anyway the question is- who’s next?
Cisco,
The reason Forrest ran out of the ring is because he had a dislocated jaw and couldn’t hear out of one ear. He knew he needed medical attention, so that’s why he took off.
But ya, there aren’t a lot of guys that look like they could beat Silva at 180 or at 205. The dude is just amazing, he has the best striking bar none. I would like to see what a fighter with speed and good boxing like Vitor Belfort could do against him. That’s about the only 180 fighter that I think could hang with him.
Cisco, I agree, in fact I said the same thing to my son last night after the amazing kO…
It was brutal… I got paid in full! Both my main pics won.. I’d like to see Silva fight Mirko and drop his hands like that… Vitor will def put up a good fight his hands are faster than Silvas..
belfort beats franklin he will be in and around there.that is the fight id love to see.forrest looked like it was his first fight.i think the first punch must have hurt him.when silva catches the leg and punches people on the chin it really hurts them.i think with them only being on 1 leg means there chin takes most of the impact.
Shiiiiit,just watched it online because I was out partying at the weekend and he made Forrest look like a fucking girl!