The greatest of all time… It’s a subjective accolade, but survey some of MMA lovers from any age and the huge majority will offer up Georges St Pierre or Anderson Silva as MMA’s theoretical”person to beat.” In late 2016, news of this French-Canadian’s return fueled whispers of UFC president Dana White’s”one that got away” — St Pierre vs Silva — the very best versus the cleverest. Regrettably, the odds of it occurring now are as slender as they ever were. ”Rush” vs.”The Spider” is a fantasy; one of several super fights we’ll probably never see.
\nRegrettably, it’s not the only one. Below are a few other MMA superfights we got to see…
\nFedor Emelianenko vs. Brock Lesnar
\nPartly due to the UFC’s monopolistic advertising power and partly because of his best years being a decade past, Fedor Emelianenko doesn’t always get the respect he deserves from modern-day MMA fans. For those who witnessed his epic rampage through PRIDE’s heavyweight division though, he was the best heavyweight of his age… possibly the biggest ever.
\nWhile Fedor might have become the best fighter in his day, Brock Lesnar was the largest box office attraction. An instant celebrity, ” he polarized an audience that did not know what they wanted more; so watch him humbled in defeat, or glorified in success.
\nPhysically, Lesnar was an animal. Walking round north of the 265-pound heavyweight limit, the NCAA standout moved with the speed and grace of a man half his size. Whether it was right down to fame or notoriety he had been a magnet to the paying public, headlining what was then the UFC’s largest card above the likes of GSP, in what was just his third tilt with the advertising.
\nFollowing years of deriding the Russian while he plied his trade for the competition, White declared that registering Stary Oskol’s favorite son was his”obsession.” Accounts of what happened following differ based on who you listen to them from. Fedor was tied up with M-1; based on White, a bargain offering $2,000,000 per fight, Pay-Per-View points along with a direct title taken against Brock Lesnar was spurned; M-1 wished to co-promote Fedor’s fights, and supposedly wanted Zuffa to fund the construction of a stadium in Russia. M-1 refuted these claims, and talks broke down.
\nFedor’s inventory would fall considerably following three consecutive losses and Lesnar, while a licence to print money, was exposed by greater fighters and abandoned the sport. It could have been the biggest-grossing MMA fight of all-time, but as is so often true, politics ultimately ruined it.
\nKen Shamrock vs. Tank Abbott
\nThrowbacks into a different age, arguably another game, Ken Shamrock and Tank Abbott were the poster children of this UFC’s formative years. While the event was intended as a subversive info-mercial to get Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, you have to believe that the money guys were quietly pulling for a Shamrock victory at UFC 1. He was 220 pounds of chiselled muscle, and the only fighter in the mount with documented”free-fight” experience, Shamrock had the look of an action hero and the ability to back it up.
\nA couple of decades after, David”Tank” Abbott hit the spectacle. Watch MMA reside or at a bar even now, and you’ll find no lack of out-of-shape, beer-swilling loudmouths eager to share their opinion of how they’d mop the floor with all the guys on TV. Abbott was that guy, only he could mop the floor with a few of the men on TV. Fat, cocky and sporting about the exact same amount of teeth since he’d had karate course, Abbott was the manifestation of all a British artist wasn’t assumed to be.
\nThere is a little MMA folklore that states Tank was introduced into shed, thus proving the theory that the martial artist would always succeed over the thug. His (admittedly limited) wrestling background was played and he was branded a’Pit Fighter’ in promotional stuff. When Tank started breaking heads in some of the most visually abusive UFC struggles of the era, a star was born, to the point that the company put him on a monthly wages; something not replicated since.
\nThere was even legitimate bad blood between both parties, together with Shamrock and also his”Lion’s Den” after hunting down Abbott backstage after he had caused trouble. Ken never caught him up either at the parking lot or the cage, together with both finally leaving the business for professions in pro-wrestling. Their surprise early-00’s returns once again sparked hope of a superfight from another creation, but for reasons unknown it was never meant to be.
\nAnderson Silva vs. Jon Jones
\nBefore the controversy that shelved him for what would likely happen to be his fighting prime, few could argue that Jon Jones wasn’t at the absolute pinnacle of mixed martial arts. A world-class athlete, not just skillful, but an expert in all facets of the match, Jones looked insurmountable. In 2011, he finished what was arguably the greatest season’s work of any combat sports athlete, beating Ryan Bader,”Shogun” Rua,”Rampage” Jackson and Lyoto Machida in the space of just 10 months.
\nEven though Jones was painting an image of violence at the light-heavyweight division, Anderson Silva had been making a masterpiece in middleweight. Nobody had previously cleared out such a talent-rich division and seemed so untouchable in doing this. So absolute was Silva’s dominance, he had double moved up a weight class and demolished his resistance. His claim to the title of’best ever’ might be challenged by a scant few.
\nWhite once cited his capacity to generate a Jones vs. Silva superfight occur as something which could define his own legacy as a promoter. Fate, as it is want to do, conspired against him. Silva’s standing plummeted after having a series of reductions and a failed drug test. Jones’ image was tarnished even farther; while he did not falter from the cage, a series of self-inflicted’personal difficulties’ stripped”Bones” of his dignity, credibility and — most importantly — his own ability to compete.
\nSilva is past his prime and threatening retirement. Jones is concentrated firmly on regaining the light heavyweight title he never dropped in the cage. Issues outside the cage have almost certainly deprived us of one of the greatest battles within it.
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