UFC 97: 'Shogun' blasts Liddell

Written by Jim Murphy   |   Sunday, April 19 2009

'Shogun' Rua put on his best performance since coming to the UFC as he defeated Chuck Liddell by 1st round knockout in the co-main event of UFC 97: Redemption at the Bell Centre in Montreal (Photo: Susumu Nagao)

The UFC returned to Montreal on Saturday for UFC 97: Redemption and, despite drawing a sellout crowd, it was a markedly weaker show than the promotion’s Canadian debut one year ago at UFC 83.  The highlight of a lackluster evening was Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua’s emphatic first round knockout of Chuck Liddell.  ‘Shogun’ looked better than he had since his days in PRIDE and the bout may have marked Liddell’s last appearance in the UFC’s iconic 'octagon'.

Rua was roundly booed by the crowd, while Liddell entered the cage to a thunderous ovation.  Unfortunately for ‘The Iceman’, that was the only part of his evening that even vaguely resembled the dominant performances on which he built his reputation.  ‘Shogun’ was in control from the outset, effectively peppering Liddell’s leg with kicks and knees.  Liddell appeared out of sync and as if he was having difficulty ‘letting his hands go’, while ‘Shogun’ landed several nice combinations and countered any offense that his opponent was able to muster.  Late in the round ‘Shogun’ caught Liddell with a looping overhand left that floored ‘The Iceman’.  A ‘ground and pound’ follow up was a mere formality as the ref quickly stopped in to protect Liddell from absorbing further punishment.  Afterwards, Liddell could be seen asking the ref ‘What happened?’ and ‘Is the fight over?’, a sign that he remembered nothing after Rua’s initial knockdown punch.

Although Liddell gave no conclusive indication of his future plans, there was a grim finality in the tone of Joe Rogan’s postfight interview with him where he thanked him for all he’d given to the sport.  Liddell has been the UFC’s biggest box office and PPV attraction, but with four losses in his last five fights—including three brutal KO’s at the hands of Rua, Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson and Rashad Evans—it’s evident that he’s at the end of the road.  Credit the UFC with all but announcing his retirement for him—clearly they’ve learned from the Ken Shamrock experience, where a onetime dominant fighter refused to hang them up and diminished his reputation and that of the promotion.

The main event of the show was anything but, as Anderson Silva defended his Middleweight Championship by unanimous decision over Thales Leites.  The bout was ‘worst case scenario’ for a matchup of contrasting styles, and both fighters put in downright pitiful performances.  Silva did almost nothing, but Leites did even less allowing ‘The Spider’ to win. 

While Silva deserved the victory, it was an embarrassing effort for a fighter claiming to be the ‘pound for pound’ best in the sport.  A component of the greatness that the best fighters demonstrate is their ability to negate their opponent’s strengths and to ‘impose their will’ in return.  This trait is clearly seen in fighters like Georges St. Pierre, Fedor Emelianenko and Randy Couture but in his most recent bouts has been markedly absent from Silva’s arsenal.  He spent most of his last fight—against Patrick Cote—showboating before getting the victory when his opponent’s tore up his knee and couldn’t continue.  Tonight, once it became apparent that Leites had little interest in exchanging strikes with him it almost appeared that Silva became frustrated at his opponent’s unwillingness to just stand there and become a highlight reel KO.  Both fighter’s performances were borderline insulting, but when you’re the supposed ‘best fighter in the world’ as the UFC has been trying to convince us that Silva is for the length of his title reign you’re held to a higher standard.   Tonight, Silva was essentially a middleweight version Tim Sylvia during his UFC heavyweight title reign where keeping the belt was more important than putting on an exceptional performance.

As the fight progressed, the boos of the live crowd became less of a generalized displeasure with the lack of activity and transformed into a more targeted disdain toward Silva and the UFC’s ‘hard sell’ of his superiority over every other fighter in the sport.  At several points in the bout the crowd started chanting ‘G-S-P’ in reference to Montreal native Georges St. Pierre whom many consider a more legitimate claimant to the mythical ‘pound for pound’ title.  Nevertheless, Joe Rogan and Mike Goldberg soldiered on hawking the ‘party line’ that Silva was simply so good that mere ‘casual fans’ have no hope of appreciating his greatness.   Rogan, who is legitimately very knowledgeable about MMA, started to waiver in his fervor near the bout’s conclusion but the suggestion that Silva was somehow putting on a virtuosic performance that ‘over the heads’ of all but the most insightful aficionados of the sport was downright insulting and embarrassing.  There’s nothing wrong with a promotion trying to ‘accentuate the positive’ of their fighters relative to others in the sport—that’s basically the origin of the word ‘promotion’ in the first place.  There’s a difference, however, in ‘promoting’ certain fighters and trying to convince viewers that they’re not accurately seeing what is happening in the fight.  Fortunately, the live crowd in Montreal wasn’t buying it nor, most likely, will many others in the UFC audience.

Perhaps the most competitive and entertaining fight of the evening wasn’t originally scheduled to appear on the PPV broadcast at all. The bout between Sam Stout and Matt Wiman was originally booked as the opening fight of the entire card.  After seeing the enthusiastic response that Canadian Stout received at the weigh-in, the decision was made to move his fight to the final non-televised preliminary slot.   The other prelims ran long, however, necessitating moving the fight again—this time between the Liddell/Rua fight and the Silva/Leites main event.   All three rounds were fought at a furious pace with both men giving and taking both standing and on the ground.  Eventually Stout would prevail by unanimous decision, giving the Bell Centre crowd a rare opportunity to cheer.

Earlier in the card, Krystoff ‘The Polish Experiment’ Sozynski dominated former WEC light heavyweight champion Brian Stann winning by submission to a kimura in the first round.  Stann, a combat decorated veteran of the US Marine Corps, is tough as nails and possesses good power but is a technically limited fighter.  Sozynski’s technical superiority—particularly on the ground—was glaringly evident throughout the fight.

It wasn’t a good night for WEC alumni, as another former light heavyweight champ from that promotion lost—Steve Cantwell was dominated by power punching phenom Luis Cane en route to a unanimous decision loss.  Also on the card, Cheick Kongo continued to improve his status in the UFC heavyweight class with a lopsided TKO victory over Antoni Hardonk.

Look for more reaction to the Silva/Leites debacle and what it means for the UFC and the ‘pound for pound’ landscape from the SAVSCI staff in the coming days.

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