At UFC 160 on May 25th, 2013, Junior dos Santos broke free of his boxing norm and opted to throw a brilliantly timed spinning heel kick targeted right at the head of his opponent, Mark Hunt. The audience certainly didn’t see it coming. Neither did Hunt—his body collapsed to the canvas shortly after dos Santos’ heel impacted the rather sensitive portion of his skull.
Not long thereafter, Cain Velasquez squared off against Antonio Silva and—within a time frame even shorter than most had predicted—dropped the challenger to the canvas with a left-straight/right-hook combo. He followed up with some perfunctory ground-and-pound, leaving Silva wondering how he hadn’t managed to survive a full two minutes.
It becomes clear, then, that Velasquez and dos Santos are always competing—whether directly or indirectly.
With their respective knockouts, both men served to elevate the No. 1 and No. 2 heavyweight ranking onto a rather lofty pedestal—one that will likely remain out of reach for most of their peers.
Curiosity arose as to exactly when the world would witness their trilogy fight. During the post-fight press conference, UFC president Dana White delivered the exact message fans yearned to hear:
If there was ever a trilogy, that’s it right there. Junior destroys him in the first fight. Cain destroys him in the second fight. I can’t wait to see this third fight.They’re the two best heavyweights in the world. That’s the fight.
Let’s examine a few of the factors involved in this historic rubber match.