It’s become obvious that the buildup for UFC 173’s main event title match between Chris Weidman and Vitor Belfort will feature an interesting war of words through the media.
After Weidman’s recent salvo on SiriusXM Fight Club (h/t MMA Mania) about Belfort’s TRT use, the Brazilian is firing back at the UFC middleweight champion. He voiced his opinion on Weidman winning Fighter of the Year at the World MMA Awards.
MMA Mania has the details from Globo: “It was embarrassing. Not that it should’ve been me, but winning the award after just one fight? It’s shameful. He won one fight. The other was [pretty much] accidental.”
Weidman became the first man in the UFC to defeat Anderson “The Spider” Silva at UFC 162 when he landed a knockout blow in the second round. Weidman followed that up with another second-round win in the rematch at UFC 168 when he checked a kick that left Silva’s leg shattered.
Fans were quick to dismiss Weidman’s use of technique as pure luck, but given that he dropped Silva in the first round at UFC 168 and never lost a round to The Spider, I don’t see how anyone can dismiss his victories.
Although Belfort doesn’t believe he should have won fighter of the year, he did have a pretty good case for the honor.
The Brazilian went 3-0 in 2013 with all three wins coming by knockout. He floored Michael Bisping in January, becoming the only man other than Dan Henderson to defeat the Brit by KO. Belfort followed that up with an impressive spinning back kick that knocked out former Strikeforce middleweight champ Luke Rockhold and won him an ESPN Sport Science award.
“The Phenom” capped off 2013 in grand style as he demolished the aforementioned Henderson by first-round KO. It was the first KO loss for Henderson in his illustrious MMA career.
Weidman is set to defend his middleweight title against Belfort on May 24 at UFC 173.
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