That's Why He's the Campeão!

Either you are or you aren't!
Either you have heart or you don't!
Either you have balls or you don't!
Either you win or you don't?

There's no faking being a champion (campeão) and in the amazing world of MMA, look no further than Anderson Silva to understand what the word "campeão" means and see how he epitomizes the essence of that. Also, look no further than the 5 round classic battle between "The Spider" and motormouth Chael Sonnen to fully understand why the sport of MMA is so special. To his credit, Sonnen talked more bullshit to hype this fight than anyone in the short history of the sport, but he completely backed it up with determined action. He came as close as anyone can come to winning a title without actually winning a title. That ever elusive strap was all but wrapped around Chael's waist when the "campeão" finally woke up, showed his true colors, and snatched it back into his ever so greedy clutches. And he did it with only 2 minutes left in a 25 minute fight that he was badly losing!

That's Why He's the Campeão!

Let's look at some of the numbers connected to this fight.

•The most obvious was the 4 and a half rounds that were totally dominated by Chael. No one has ever done to Anderson what Chael did. EVER! Even in fights that Anderson has lost, he wasn't as thoroughly dominated and controlled as he was by Chael.

•The CompuStrike stats completely back this up. According to CompuStrike, Chael outlanded Anderson by an astounding 289 total strikes to 29. Incredibly, Anderson was hit with only a TOTAL of 208 strikes in all of his previous 11 UFC fights combined! That's absolutely INSANE!

•This was only the 3rd time a UFC championship fight was won in the 5th round!

•Anderson also set two records on that historic evening, including 7 consecutive UFC title defenses and 12 straight UFC victories. That's what you would call a productive, successful night's work, no?

That's Why He's the Campeão!

Then there's the other number$ that are sure to put a smile on Anderson's newly goateed face. He was awarded 2 separate $60K bonus$ checks for Fight of the Night and Submission of the Night. There's no arguing that those are more than deserved. Both the fight itself and the highly technical submission finish immediately became legendary moments in MMA folklore.

As Anderson pointed out in both his post fight in-cage interview and at the press conference afterward, he accomplished all this with a bad rib injury that occurred last week. He was advised by his doctor to pull out of the fight. Champions don't do that! In Anderson's words, "I was thinking about my home, my family, my kids and my grandmother who passed away three weeks ago." The injury would help explain why he looked as flat as he did for the majority of the fight. Chael's relentless attack deserves some credit as well. He was also thinking of his jiu-jitsu coach, saying, "out of respect to Nogueira, I wanted to win by submission." Mission accomplished with that super slick double-sub, a wickedly combined armbar-triangle choke. He basically "Werdumed" Sonnen with the same technical mastery that "Vai Cavalo' shockingly finished Fedor Emelianenko with. It was a beautiful thing to watch. I'm sure Big Nog was extremely proud of his student. Its that kind of selflessness that's ingrained in the fiber of all true champions.

That's Why He's the Campeão!

Say what you want about Anderson's performances in the Demian Maia and Thales Leites fights. They were more about him being bored with the lack of quality competition than anything else. He wasn't showing ANY disrespect to his opponents, his employers or the sport. Its like the kid with a genius level IQ who is bored at school because there's no challenge. Special people are sometimes hard to understand. Anderson Silva is one of those special, complicated, incredibly talented people. It must be quite a burden to be considered the absolute best in the world at what you do. We shouldn't judge unless we are in the same position.

That's Why He's the Campeão!

So what's next for the world's best pound-for-pound MMA fighter? According to Dana White, no decision has been made about who Anderson will defend his belt against next. The two options are an immediate rematch with Sonnen or Vitor Belfort getting the shot he was already given before having to pull out due to injury. I'd actually prefer seeing Vitor get the nod. Its a more interesting fight and I actually think a healthy Anderson walks through Sonnen the second time around. Interestingly, Dana compared Anderson's war with Chael to the classic first fight between Hughes and Trigg, a fight that he has previously called his favorite in UFC history. I guess that will greatly improve their strained employer/employee relationship. When asked if he was willing to grant Chael an immediate rematch, Anderson responded the way any real champion would, saying he would fight anyone that Zuffa puts in front of him. Let's see what Ed Soares has to say about that.

That's Why He's the Campeão!