At UFC 117, the MMA world saw Anderson Silva vulnerable for the first time in his UFC career.
For four and a half rounds, he was dominated from pillar to post by Chael Sonnen, who not only out-wrestled the champion, but out-struck him as well. It was a Hail Mary triangle choke that forced Sonnen to tap and saved Anderson Silva’s title reign. Chael Sonnen’s performance was unfortunately tainted when his post-fight drug test came back for elevated levels of testosterone.
While serving his one year suspension, Sonnen became something of a media darling because of his ability to cut a promo. For an entire year, Sonnen would tell anyone and everyone who would listen about how he was the real middleweight champion and that Anderson Silva would never survive “the mean streets of West Linn, Oregon.”
Finally, after two years of waiting, Chael Sonnen would get another shot at the champion. He’d be traveling to Silva’s backyard and fight in front of a rowdy Brazilian crowd at UFC 147.
The UFC, to their credit, recognized how big of a fight this could be for the South American nation and intended to hold the fight at a soccer stadium.
Unfortunately, plans began to fall through when the United Nations scheduled a conference the very same weekend. Not only would there be a ton of security in town for all of the diplomats, but there were also concerns that the country’s infrastructure wouldn’t be able to accommodate both the UN and UFC.
Following UFC on Fuel 2, UFC President Dana White confirmed to the attending media that the card was in jeopardy.
Rumors of the fight being moved to UFC 148 soon followed.
Today, the UFC confirmed that the fight had in fact been moved to UFC 148 in Las Vegas. The fight will headline one of the deepest cards in recent history which also features a bantamweight title fight between Dominick Cruz and Urijah Faber as well as Tito Ortiz’ last fight ever.
UFC 147 will still go on at a yet to be named venue in Brazil with Vitor Belfort vs Wanderlei Silva in the main event. Jose Aldo is also expected to fight on that card.
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