Results tagged “Brazil” from MMA Explosion

That third one looked like a closed fits, but hey, it's machida, he can take it.

From Antonio Inoki's wiki:
During one visit to a school in the 80's, Inoki was punched twice by a student. Inoki slapped the student across the face, knocking him down. The student, who later turned out to be an Inoki fan, then rose, bowed deeply, and thanked Inoki for the slap. The incident became very famous as the then live clip of the binta (slap in the face) was shown many times on Japanese television. Now various celebrities and even common people in Japan ask Inoki to slap them to install courage or even as some sort of strange blessing. The slap's name is the "Fighting Spirit (or Toukon) Slap."

photo from sherdog.com

I blogged about the upcoming light-heavyweight title fight between champion Lyoto Machida and Mauricio "Shogun" Rua recently, saying it should be interesting to see if/how they alter their styles in the fight.

from mmajunkie.com:
"I know Lyoto very well," Rua said. "I have studied his game a lot. I know his style. I trained my strategy for the fight for three months in a row, focusing on that.

"I hope to be able to keep up with the strategy for the whole fight because we know what to expect, and we don't plan on getting frustrated and changing the plan. We worked on that, and we'll follow the plan."

The 2005-era Rua was an aggressive, wild foe. But in facing Machida's patient, karate-based counter-striking style, Rua believes his own patience will be key.

It may prove a test of the mind as much as an examination of Rua's physical form.

"We can only know for sure what's going to happen when the fight starts," Rua said. "You never really know what's going to happen in a fight. You can try to predict something, but anything can happen. Anything can change at any given moment during a fight.

"I trained for something. I plan and hope on doing what I trained and the strategy I prepared for, but a fight is a fight. Let's wait and see."

I know Machida has said he adapted his style to please the fans - becoming more aggressive - but with the ultra-aggressive Shogun coming at him, we might see Machida revert back to the elusive, patient counter-striker. Either way, we're in for a good one. These are two of the most exciting and talented LHWs out there and so I don't see this one getting out of maybe the second round.

I know it's not MMA, but Gatti vs. Micky ward - the first war of the their trilogy - was one of the best fights of all time, one even an MMA fan can appreciate.

Here's the story from USAToday:
By Stan Lehman, Associated Press Writer
SAO PAULO -- Police in Brazil say former boxing champion Arturo Gatti has been found dead in a hotel room in the northeastern state of Pernambuco.
Police investigator Edislon Alves told The Associated Press that the body of the former junior welterweight champ was discovered Saturday morning in the posh seaside resort of Porto de Galinhas, where he arrived on Friday with his wife and 1-year-old son.

Alves said police were investigating. It was unclear how the 37-year-old Canadian died.

A spokeswoman for the public safety department said Gatti's wife and son were unhurt.

"There were no bullet or stab wounds on his body, but police did find blood stains on the floor," the spokeswoman said.

Gatti retired in 2007 with a record of 40-9 and 31 knockouts.

The latest video from Wand Fight Team. Wand - fresh from his fight with Franklin (cuts on his nose and ear) trains his team and gives them a heartfelt psych-up, complete with a classic Chute Boxe-like cheer at the end.

The real fight goes down tonight on Showtime.

Former friends, now enemies: W. Silva and A. Silva

from Fighters Only:
Wanderlei Silva has told Anderson Silva to put his money where is mouth is ahead of his UFC 99 fight with Rich Franklin.

The two Silvas have had a war of words outside the Octagon since Anderson stated his thoughts about Wanderlei dropping to the 185lbs category on Sensei SporTV, calling the move "pretentious". Since then both have created a tough environment and speculation about a match has grown as they fire verbally at one another.

The latest episode of the series was the announcement of an Anderson Silva/Rich Franklin camp ahead of Franklin's fight with Wanderlei at UFC 99.

The Axe Murderer today shot back: "If Anderson believes in Franklin so much, bet U$ 50,000 and let's see who takes the money".

Thanks to profighting-fans.com for the pics.

For those who don't know, Anderson Silva and Wanderlei Silva were longtime teammates on the Brazilian MMA team known as Chute Boxe. Apparently, they were cool with each other for many years, but now that Wanderlei has announced he will be moving down to middleweight, where A. Silva is king, there's reportedly some bad blood brewing. Of course, the other interesting thing is that A. Silva beat Franklin twice - really, destroyed him twice _ the first time taking Franklin's UFC middleweight belt.

The rivalry between former Chute Boxe teammates heats up. Here's what happened before this video.

Could we see this before A. Silva retires? For now, we have Anderson Silva taking on Thales Leites at UFC 97 and Wanderlei Silva fighting Rich Franklin at UFC 99.

By Marcelo Alonso, sherdog.com:
They have the same surname, grew up in the same Brazilian city and trained together for years at Chute Boxe. But things have changed, and destiny has put Wanderlei Silva and Anderson Silva on different sides.

"I always helped Wanderlei in training," Anderson explained in a November 2007 interview with Tatame magazine. "We were really close."

Anderson eventually left Chute Boxe, though, and in the Tatame interview he said that the team's coach, Rudimar Fedrigo, forbid him from fighting in Pride, where Wanderlei was a champion.

"Wanderlei didn't say anything to help me," Anderson said. "He even knew that I had four children to raise. If it were not for 'Minotauro' putting pressure and bringing me to Pride, I would certainly be retired."