Which victory of Anderson Silva was the most impressive?

[sdpdude9]

He’s had a lot of memorable and impressive wins. But I’ll go the Griffin fight. Moved up in weight against a guy one fight removed from the belt. Didn’t just beat him soundly, he absolutely embarrassed him and made him look like an amateur.

 

[Snake Fist]

Okami and Bonnar still hold up as good wins, his last 2 clean finish wins.

 

[Gamer2k4]

Griffin or Belfort

Those are my picks as well. Going up a weight class and completely obliterating a former champion (especially in the way he did it) is ridiculously impressive, but so is taking out TRT Vitor in the first round with a front kick to the face.

 

[El Fernas]

Forrest Griffin is probably the most "flashy" and clean win, but to me is the destruction of Rich Franklin, he was the champion, Forrest was a former champion that was on pain meds or something during that fight.

 

[Vil7]

I thought the Vitor fight would be competitive so I'll pick that one.

 

[humperdoo]

Griffin is funny and it shows how agile Silva was during his prime. Its still funny seeing Griffin walkout crying.

 

[barillas]

My man Andy gets so little recognition in this forum nowadays

 

[CasualBot]

Tony Fryklund, then Leben,
then Rich, then Lutter,
then Nate, (rich again),
then Hendo, then Irvin.

All finished. So that answer, was Tony. If you missed it at the time, the answer is Leben.
Don't care for how people shit on Leben, he was 15-2 going into that fight.
That shit was wild.

Right after that elbow on Tony.
He then broke Rich's face.
Lutter, Nate, Rich, Hendo, Irvin

Most impressive streak of finishes (not bullshit wrestling decisions).
Tony, upward elbow.
Leben, 100% accuracy, 0% damage received.
Rich, broke the champs face.
Lutter, losing to bjj guy and chokes him from bottom.
Nate, fuckin round 1.
Hendo, fuckin round 2.
Irvin, round 1.

People can shit on Irvin, but got to spar/train with James and he was an animal on the feet.
Silva went up, and just ended the guy.

These days it is revisionist history about Leben, as if he was not 15-2 and impossible to KO.
He lost 2 decisions, and only seemed to get stronger the harder you hit him.

By the time Silva got to Forrest, he was already cemented in history.

 

[CasualBot]

Leben was this granite jaw brute swinging sledgehammers. He could’ve given Silva problems (and sent him back to Japan where the competition is a bit easier)? Nah, total destruction muay thai style.

In retrospect, this is the answer.

Anyone who lived through the era, knows this fight was a shock.

Even Silva doing the air guitar laughing at how easily he finished the iron head of Leben.

After Tony Frylund... every damn fight was impressive until Patrick Cote.

 

[chardog]

I'll probably go with the Forrest Griffin fight, because that was like watching the matrix, it was unreal. All of those others fights were so impressive as well but I guess they still looked like a fight, but the Griffin one was weird, like the camera was doing those 2 frames per second shots in slow mo as Griffin was trying to hit Anderson.

I will say though the Leben debut fight is probably the best debut ever in UFC, that was wild!! you can't get a better debut than that, it was total destruction in 1 minute.

Rich 1 for me, total destruction of dominant champ, it wasnt much of a fight, a total beatdown.

Griffin close second, however silva had quite a bit of dominance at that time, it was still magical, but expected by many.

 

[chardog]

Tony Fryklund, then Leben,
then Rich, then Lutter,
then Nate, (rich again),
then Hendo, then Irvin.

All finished. So that answer, was Tony. If you missed it at the time, the answer is Leben.
Don't care for how people shit on Leben, he was 15-2 going into that fight.
That shit was wild.

Right after that elbow on Tony.
He then broke Rich's face.
Lutter, Nate, Rich, Hendo, Irvin

Most impressive streak of finishes (not bullshit wrestling decisions).
Tony, upward elbow.
Leben, 100% accuracy, 0% damage received.
Rich, broke the champs face.
Lutter, losing to bjj guy and chokes him from bottom.
Nate, fuckin round 1.
Hendo, fuckin round 2.
Irvin, round 1.

People can shit on Irvin, but got to spar/train with James and he was an animal on the feet.
Silva went up, and just ended the guy.

These days it is revisionist history about Leben, as if he was not 15-2 and impossible to KO.
He lost 2 decisions, and only seemed to get stronger the harder you hit him.

By the time Silva got to Forrest, he was already cemented in history.

not going to revisionist leben, but he was a solid top 10 guy, not championship material and silva had just fought a solid top 15 guy that would have given leben problems/probably would have beat leben due to style. I thought that was an easy fight to call, franklin on the other hand, was tougher to call.

 

[Spath]

In retrospect, this is the answer.

Anyone who lived through the era, knows this fight was a shock.

Even Silva doing the air guitar laughing at how easily he finished the iron head of Leben.

After Tony Frylund... every damn fight was impressive until Patrick Cote.

I think Rogan has talked about that fight many times… He said something like people had no idea who Anderson Silva was and what level he was on. Rogan thought he’d school Leben, but I think he was almost as shocked as anyone else about how Silva did it

 

[IndyCovaHart]

I srs didn’t think he was human after Bonnar

 

[AmonTobin]

I thought Vitor had a good chance of smashing him (very dangerous on the feet or the ground) and then that kick happened.

 

[Question]

Dan Henderson for me

 

[CasualBot]

I think Rogan has talked about that fight many times… He said something like people had no idea who Anderson Silva was and what level he was on. Rogan thought he’d school Leben, but I think he was almost as shocked as anyone else about how Silva did it

Agreed. Nobody knew him. Rogan barely knew him.
During the time period, very few people had access to MMA worldwide. Footage was bad vhs copies.
We recorded vhs from a live feed on those giant satellite dishes. There was no local cable with foreign tv.
Without the huge dish, no matter how big of a fan of mma, you were not watching it on PPV without a rich buddy who owned that dish. Same time, the internet took off but the footage & live streaming was utter dogshit. VHS copied to computers looked fuct. Apple/Macbook/iPhone gassed the cpu era over-night.

Some, if any, knew the flying heel hook loss to Ryo.
Ryo went on a streak ... and less than a year later, was KO'd by both Baroni & Hendo.
Both in the first round. Knew exactly who Andy was ... prior to Leben.
Which was not the guy who did that to Leben.

Watched Anderson fight Sakurai, Jeremy Horn, Otsuka, Lee Murray to decision.
Lee Murray, a KO striker, lasted to decision with Andy. There was no "Silva" aura.
He was showman, flashy, danced, weird angle kickboxer (like MVP now) but the aura wasn't historic yet.
Andy was not at Fedor level aura, yet.

Alternatively, watched Andy end Carlos Newton and break my heart. Absolutely animal. Terrifying.

Saw Andy caught in that "flying kneebar" from Ryo. Later realizing it was a heel-hook.

His fights were all over the place.
From single strike knockouts, to losing by flying leg locks, to decisions.
Leben's were not. Leben was this brick shithouse.
When Ryo faced brick shithouses, they KO'd him.
Back in early 2000's when MMA math was still tossed around.

Unlike revisionist history... knockout against Leben was NOT on the bingo cards.

Bet Silva by decision at the time, while debating Leben by KO.
Andy completely finishing the guy in round 1 was shocking.
Leben got Newton'd. It was in this moment we knew Anderson Silva Era had arrived.

 

[RoñaCastroJr]

Vitor

This
Or Hendo
TRT Vitor was dangerous af
So was TRT Hendo

 

[CasualBot]

I srs didn’t think he was human after Bonnar

Yeah really. Bonnar and Forrest both got embarrassed. Badly.

 

[Spath]

Yeah really. Bonnar and Forrest both got embarrassed. Badly.

Both were guys who were hard to finish, Bonnar especially. Griffin had been finished a couple times with strikes and Bonnar only via doctor stoppage (”tell ’em docta stoppage!”). Silva not only finished them, but embarrassed them in the process!

Also thanks for the other post, blast from the past.

 

[Nobru]

Sonnen cause his levels of juicing were above what the meter could count
Andy was juiced too but uncle chael had a gas tank for 15 rounds that night