Vitor Belfort out of UFC 112, Enter Demian Maia
By: Reverend Turk Vangel Posted On: February 12, 2010 at 11:06pmThe card for UFC 112 has been bit by the injury bug this week. It was announced by the UFC that Fighters.com eighth-ranked “The Phenom” Vitor Belfort ( 18-8) had to pull out of his title fight with UFC middleweight champion “Spider” Anderson Silva (25-4)in Abu Dhabi.
Vitor injured his shoulder training for the fight and when the news hit the social media sites were on fire trying to pick the next opponent for Silva. Twitter lit up with many thinking the only viable solution was for Silva to move to the light heavyweight division. The problem with that was that many of the top guys in the division were booked with other fights or injured.
That led us back to the middleweight division. The current number one contender is now Chael Sonnen (24-10-1) after his dominant win over fourth-ranked “The Great” Nate Marquardt (29-9-2). Sonnen however is currently under a medical suspension after his fight at UFC 109. So what was the UFC to do in order to keep Silva on the card?
They stunned the MMA world by announcing today that sixth-ranked Demian Maia (11-1), who was also on the UFC 109 pay-per-view, will now get his shot at the title. Maia is a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt that may just have the best set-ups and submissions in all of mixed martial arts. He was on track to get a title shot until his plan was derailed by Nate Marquardt at UFC 102 by brutal first round knock out.
He rebounded at UFC 109 by beating hardcore fan favorite Dan Miller (11-3) by unanimous decision using a new found stand up game. That striking game will not work so well against Silva who has pin point accuracy with his Muay Thai based striking.
Demian Maia now has the chance of a lifetime and it is up to him to make the best of it against a man some are calling unbeatable.
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Comments
Bah! The UFC should let Anderson Silva move up to Light – Heavy and make Bisping vs Wandy for the vacant strap. No one wants to pay to see Silva KO Maia
@griff
You think Michael Bisping and Wanderlei Silva are the two top 185-pound contenders?
Why would you not want to watch a fight between the sports best grappler and the sports best striker?
So let me think there only 3 fights left on Silva contract I believe. This is a waste of time on the contract of Silva… its BS. I thought the UFC was all about making good fights, this is not one of them. Maia is going to get knocked out…So dumb. Move Silva up to light heavy and make something happen.
agree completely. It sucks that Marquardt lost to Sonnen.. he was the guy I wanted to fight Silva, he’s the only person I could see in the Middleweight division at this point giving Silva a hard time, and by putting people who don’t even stand in Silva’s shadow is a complete waste of his time. Silva timed Forrest’s one-two and knocked him out, Marquardt timed Maia’s leg kick and knocked him out. No way Maia’s going to last with Silva.