UFC Middleweight Champion Anderson “The Spider” Silva is the greatest Mixed Martial Artist ever, bar none, according to many in the MMA world—including UFC President Dana White—and even with the many Mixed Martial Artists that you could argue for in retaliation to Silva being pound-for-pound best fighter in the sport, the argument for “The Spider” is a difficult one to ignore.
He made a name for himself in the UFC by facing Chris Leben at the fifth UFC Fight Night event, and the shockingly thorough destruction of The Crippler is where it really all began for him.
From there, The Brazilian Ballet of Violence dethroned Rich Franklin at UFC 64, and the majority of us know the road he’s traveled to get to the HSBC Arena as he return home to Brazil for his UFC 134 vie for vengeance against Yushin “Thuder” Okami in Rio.
This rematch from Rumble On The Rock 8 has all the tools needed for another possible Fight of The Year candidate from The Spider, who hopes to go 9-0 in his UFC Middleweight title run while maintaining an unblemished 13-0 UFC record and improving to 31-4 in his MMA career, but Okami has other plans.
Speaking of other plans, former UFC Light Heavyweight Champions Forrest Griffin and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua have plans for the other, as Forrest wants to defeat the critics that chalked up his UFC 76 win over Rua to Rua’s notorious knee injuries, while Rua wants to avenge the loss in front of his countrymen in what might be one of the most enthralling co-headliners of the UFC’s 2011.
Also on this card is arguably one of the UFC’s top Heavyweight prospects taking on one of MMA’s most revered Heavyweights.
Antonio “Minotauro” Nogueira knows that Brendan “The Hybrid” Schaub claimed a common foe at UFC 128 in Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic, and Schaub wants to score the biggest win of his young career in Rio de Janeiro with a knockout of Nogueira.
However, only Frank Mir and Cain Velasquez have found success in doing so, and Nogueira has no intent in allowing Schaub to be the third man to knock him out.
In addition, Edson Barboza’s undefeated tenure faces its hardest-hitting test to date in TUF 9 Winner Ross Pearson in a battle of fast-rising Lightweight standouts that is sure to electrify, and Luis Cane looks to carry the momentum of a crushing UFC 128 win over Eliot Marshall over in a successful taking of the “0” of undefeated 11-0 Bulgarian grappling wizard Stanislav Nedkov.
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