Whether you’ve been watching MMA your entire life or you’ve just started watching the sport, you know that Anderson Silva is a legend. A very easy case could be made that he is the greatest fighter of all time.
When Silva’s manager, Ed Soares, proclaimed that the reigning middleweight champion only had four fights left, everyone had an immediate opinion as to who those four fights should be against.
Since Soares’ proclamation, Silva has separated himself from his manager and stated he plans on fighting for at least seven more years. Either way, it is pretty clear that Silva isn’t going to fight forever.
Given all that he has achieved, Silva could retire today and be called one of the top three fighters of all time and the undisputed greatest middleweight to ever live. That’s why it is very important for each of his next fights to have significance—to remove all doubt that he is the best ever.
If Silva wants to cement this legacy, a move to light heavyweight appears imminent. That means that many of the fights that we don’t want to see would occur at his current weight class, where his dominance has been proven over and over again.
Here are the fights that we would rather not take up Silva’s remaining fights in his career.