MMAVu

Some intense dudes.

Poor Thiago Silva.

First he gets his first loss by emphatic knockout at UFC 94, then he gets the rug pulled out from under him in the Forrest Griffin fight, now he gets the 2-dollar-steak-tough, Keith Jardine. Let’s look at the three duds one at a time.

KO loss to Machida: Silva was on an absolute tear. He exemplified the fierce, aggressive Chute Boxe style to a tee, like a young Wanderlei Silva. The Brazilian Buzzsaw ran into an enigma he couldn’t solve though, in the ghost-like Lyoto Machida. Machida danced and hit, and danced some more, eventually connecting on a clean shot, flooring Silva, and adding a second punch when Silva was horizontal on the ground, turning his lights out. Suffering your first loss is bad enough, but to lose in such a fashion…ouch.

For his comeback fight, Silva was offered up Forrest Griffin, the former Light heavyweight Champion. This was to be the highest profile fight of Silva’s career, as the stars don’t get much bigger than Griffin in the UFC. A win would have put him in line for a title shot…until Griffin got pulled out for Anderson Silva.

Finally, he gets an almost-as-tough opponent in Jardine, but with 1/4 the star power of Griffin. A win over Jardine puts Silva up a few notches, but still about 2 wins from a title shot.

You win some, you lose some, huh Thiago?

Dave Meltzer over at Yahoo! Sports has a great write up about the upcoming UFC 96 main event, pitting Quinton Jackson vs Keith Jardine.

In a nutshell, this is an odd, odd bout at this point in time. The UFC usually books its fights for two possibilities. For example, if Fighter A wins, they book “A” into the next fight and the plan plays itself out. If Fighter B wins, they insert “B” into the same slot and away they go. Not so for this fight.

If Jackson wins, the UFC has a blockbuster main event this summer, pitting Jackson against Rashad Evans for the 205lb title. However, if Jardine wins, the UFC is stuck. Jardine and Evans have stated on multiple occaisons that they would never fight eachother, and the UFC can’t give the loser a title shot.

*** It should be noted that the UFC has Lyoto Machida waiting in the wings for a 205lb title shot as well, but it’s obvious they would rather put Jackson in the slot, while they build up Machida a bit more. As well, Jardine was not their first choice to fight Jackson, but the other top 205′ers were all tied up in other bouts.

Tune in this Saturday to see how the fight shakes down, because it seems the UFC is betting on Jackson and putting all their eggs in his basket. Incidentally, I pick Jackson by R1 TKO.