Anderson offered to fight at 151

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/8/24/3264703/ufc-151-anderson-silva-offered-fight-white-mma-news

Quote :

UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva has taken some heat lately for apparently turning down a title defense against top prospect Chris Weidman. But according to Dana White, Anderson will still show up when he's needed. The champ offered to step up and fight at UFC 151 to save the event, but it was too late by then. MMA Fighting has the scoop:

Anderson Silva was close to saving UFC 151.

According to UFC president Dana White, Silva, the middleweight champion, personally called him just moments after he announced on Thursday that UFC 151 was canceled after Jon Jones turned down a fight against Chael Sonnen. Silva, who admitted he wasn't in the best shape, volunteered to fight on eight days' notice in Las Vegas against another light heavyweight fighter. Unfortunately, he was a few hours late as the promotion had already decided to scrap the event.

White said he never expected Silva to offer his services and appreciated the offer.

Anderson's camp has said that he'd prefer not to fight at 205 anymore, but it's pretty cool that he'd offer to step up either way. Who could he have possibly faced at light heavyweight? Jones was out of the question due to the mutual respect between the two men. It's a moot point now that the event has been cancelled, but imagine the possibilities. Jones will now meet Vitor Belfort for the UFC light heavyweight title at UFC 152.

props to Anderson, ears a LOT of respect from me and most of the MMA community IMO.

Wtf?

He would've earnt more respect of he said he'd fight Jones.

Shut up freak, shits getting old lol

Props to the GOAT of MMA!

Weidman and Chael are higher up in my book..they actually wanted to fight Jones.

If Jones wouldn't fight Sonnen then for damn sure he isn't fighting Anderson.

Ninja wrote:

Weidman and Chael are higher up in my book..they actually wanted to fight Jones.

this

killerofchicken wrote:

props to Anderson, ears a LOT of respect from me and most of the MMA community IMO.

See now I see it very differently. Anderson Silva can fight at LHW on 8 days notice but he is too good to fight Chris Weidman? He is taking the rest of the year off at MW, he is obviously healthy enough to fight, because he is uninterested in fighting the current #1 contender. Bullshit. Get your ass in the cage and fight Weidman, you could do it around the same time GSP fights so your "superfight" can still happen next.

Weidman offered to fight Jon Jones and Anderson offered to fight any LHW. So they should have just used that opportunity to make Weidman vs Spider, go ahead and make it a LHW fight because of the short notice. Show goes on and Anderson is in the fight he should be in.

freakzilla wrote:

He would've earnt more respect of he said he'd fight Jones.

Cu Bu wrote:

Ninja wrote:

Weidman and Chael are higher up in my book..they actually wanted to fight Jones.

this

OU wrote:

Weidman offered to fight Jon Jones and Anderson offered to
fight any LHW. So they should have just used that opportunity to make
Weidman vs Spider, go ahead and make it a LHW fight because of the short
notice. Show goes on and Anderson is in the fight he should be in.

Jones refused to fight at 151 so why would he ask to fight Jones? Ha contacted Dana right after the announcement was made that the event was cancelled to offer to help if he could so they could save the show..

OU wrote:

killerofchicken wrote:

props to Anderson, ears a LOT of respect from me and most of the MMA community IMO.

See now I see it very differently. Anderson Silva can fight at LHW on 8 days notice but he is too good to fight Chris Weidman? He is taking the rest of the year off at MW, he is obviously healthy enough to fight, because he is uninterested in fighting the current #1 contender. Bullshit. Get your ass in the cage and fight Weidman, you could do it around the same time GSP fights so your "superfight" can still happen next.

Do you think he could be prepared to fight at 185 as easily as he could 205 on the amount of notice given?

And who is the #1 contender at MW, really? Weidman? No way.

GDPofDRC wrote:

OU wrote:

killerofchicken wrote:

props to Anderson, ears a LOT of respect from me and most of the MMA community IMO.

See now I see it very differently. Anderson Silva can fight at LHW on 8 days notice but he is too good to fight Chris Weidman? He is taking the rest of the year off at MW, he is obviously healthy enough to fight, because he is uninterested in fighting the current #1 contender. Bullshit. Get your ass in the cage and fight Weidman, you could do it around the same time GSP fights so your "superfight" can still happen next.

Do you think he could be prepared to fight at 185 as easily as he could 205 on the amount of notice given?

I'm just saying if cutting weight was an issue, which on short notice it could be, they could have had that fight at LHW. Obviously if they could both make MW and have it a title fight that would be ideal. But they could have went at LHW. Anderson Silva has earned the right to an immediate rematch if he ever loses in the UFC. So Weidman winning and not getting the belt isn't that big of a deal since his next fight would more then likely be a Spider rematch anyways.

Now if Dana wanted to let Chris fight him at 205, go for it absolutely. Sounds like the deal was done though by the time he spoke with Silva.

I just don't see the criticism for Silva being anything more than petty for this situation. He wants time off yet still decided t0 reach out and offer his services when they were needed most, can't knock him for that.

GDPofDRC wrote:

Now if Dana wanted to let Chris fight him at 205, go for it absolutely. Sounds like the deal was done though by the time he spoke with Silva.

I just don't see the criticism for Silva being anything more than petty for this situation. He wants time off yet still decided t0 reach out and offer his services when they were needed most, can't knock him for that.

Just annoys the shit out of me that he is able to take a fight but he doesn't think Chris is deserving so he is taking a break and pretty much trying to force Chris to take another fight. When he is perfectly capable of defending the title again this year and still be on track to fight GSP in his "super fight". It could very well be a year between his Chael fight and his GSP fight. A year long layoff with no injury involved. Very realistic at this point with the information we have.

GDPofDRC wrote:

Now if Dana wanted to let Chris fight him at 205, go for it absolutely. Sounds like the deal was done though by the time he spoke with Silva.

I just don't see the criticism for Silva being anything more than petty for this situation. He wants time off yet still decided t0 reach out and offer his services when they were needed most, can't knock him for that.

+1

Annoys the shit out of me. You have a worthy contender sitting right there but you and your manager don't think he is worthy. The president of the company thinks he is worthy. Other top ranked fighters think he is worthy. Plenty of fans and media think he is worthy. He is begging for it. Maybe he should go on the radio and twitter and do his best WWE impersonation and "earn" his shot.

Quote :

"He goes, 'Well dude, tell Dana I haven't been training and I'm not in the best shape. I wouldn't be able to make 185 pounds, but if he could find another 205-pound fighter willing to take the fight on eight days' notice, I'd be willing to take the fight to save the event. I don't want to see the other fighters on the card not be able to fight and the fans and all of it. I don't know if that will make a difference.'"

"But Anderson has a big heart. I was really bummed out yesterday to hear the UFC had to cancel an entire event. That was a kick in the stomach to, I think, every fighter in the organization.

Quote :

“You have a whole camp preparing to fight a specific athlete,” Silva replied. “When the opponent changes, the preparation changes a bit. I thought he could have fought Chael, but it’s his decision. He prepared to fight Dan Henderson. The whole team thought it was best not to fight.”

“When I heard the event might be canceled, I called [UFC President] Dana White and said I would fight in the light heavyweight division against someone who also wasn’t training for the event,” explained Silva. “Besides the main fight, the event had many other fighters who depended on it. I worried about that, because I have lived through situations like this in smaller events.”

“I didn’t refuse anything,” Silva answered when asked if he turned down a fight against Weidman. “I’m here to fight! He’ll get his chance sometime. You have to ask Dana White about this.”

Anderson would smoke Weidman anyways.

Weidman has the skillset to give him fits to be honest. Takedowns on the way above average level, great speed, striking that's coming along but easily better than Chael's right now. Plus he's not easily submitted.

Ludo wrote:

Weidman has the skillset to give him fits to be honest. Takedowns on the way above average level, great speed, striking that's coming along but easily better than Chael's right now. Plus he's not easily submitted.

Im just talking shit. I do believe Anderson would KO him though.

timthebim wrote:

Anderson would smoke Weidman anyways.

Let's see it.