Anderson Silva

The reign

Anderson "The Spider" Silva held the UFC middleweight championship from June 2006 to July 2013 — a 2,457-day reign that remains the longest in UFC history. He defended the title ten times, defeating Rich Franklin (twice), Dan Henderson, Patrick Cote, Thales Leites, Forrest Griffin (at light heavyweight in a 195-pound catchweight), Demian Maia, Chael Sonnen (twice), Vitor Belfort, Yushin Okami, and Stephan Bonnar (light heavyweight). His streak of sixteen consecutive UFC wins is also a promotional record.

Silva lost the title to Chris Weidman by knockout at UFC 162 in July 2013 — the famous "hands down, head movement" finish — and lost the immediate rematch at UFC 168 in December 2013 by TKO after his left tibia and fibula broke against a Weidman check kick. The fight was the most graphic injury in mainstream MMA broadcasting history.

The striking system

Silva's striking was a synthesis of Muay Thai, capoeira footwork, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (black belt under Antonio Mendes), and boxing-school evasion. His genius was in the setup work that preceded the strike — feints, half-feints, body-feints, and the kind of distance management that lured opponents into committing to punches he had already begun slipping.

The signature techniques:

• Front kick KO (vs Vitor Belfort, UFC 126): a lead-leg front kick to the chin after a long exchange of jabs, modeled directly on the Joe Lewis-style kick Silva had drilled in the gym with Steven Seagal in the months leading up to the bout.
• Lead-leg side kick to the body: borrowed from Cung Le and the Korean tae kwon do tradition, used to slow down opponents and dictate the pace.
• Matrix slip + Superman counter: the trademark backward lean that produced famous finishes of Forrest Griffin and James Irvin.
• Clinch knees: from a Thai plum (double collar tie), Silva drove knees into the body and head with the kind of timing that made it look like the opponent had walked into them. The Rich Franklin finishes (UFC 64 and UFC 77) showcased this.
• The Muay Thai sweep: in the closed guard, Silva would sweep opponents to their feet with a foot to the hip and an upkick — a sequence that bewildered grapplers who expected ground work and instead found themselves disengaged on the feet.

The Sonnen fights

The two Chael Sonnen bouts were the defining matchups of Silva's late prime. In the first fight at UFC 117 in August 2010, Sonnen took Silva down in round 1 and proceeded to land more strikes on a UFC champion than anyone before him — 320 significant strikes across four-and-a-half rounds. With less than two minutes left in round 5, Silva caught Sonnen in a triangle armbar from his back and forced the tap. It was one of the great comebacks in title-fight history.

The rematch at UFC 148 in July 2012 went the opposite direction. Silva weathered Sonnen's opening pressure, broke his nose with a clinch knee in round 2, and finished him with strikes from top position.

The decline

Silva's post-Weidman career was uneven. He returned at UFC 183 in January 2015 against Nick Diaz, winning a unanimous decision that was overturned to a No Contest after both fighters tested positive (Silva for steroids drostanolone and androstane, Diaz for marijuana). He fought five more times in the UFC with mixed results — losses to Daniel Cormier (light heavyweight) and Israel Adesanya, a win over Derek Brunson, and a TKO loss to Uriah Hall in his final UFC bout in October 2020.

After leaving the UFC, Silva had a successful boxing career — wins over Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Tito Ortiz (Triller boxing) — before transitioning to celebrity boxing exhibitions in 2023 and beyond.

What he changed

Before Anderson Silva, the dominant model of MMA striking was Muay Thai pressure plus boxing combinations. After Silva, every middleweight had to account for front-kick KOs, lead-leg side kicks, Matrix-style head movement, and the possibility that the most dangerous striker in the cage was the calm one in the back-foot stance.

His influence on modern striking is visible in Israel Adesanya's game plans (Adesanya was candid about studying Silva film for years), in Lyoto Machida's karate-distance work, and in the proliferation of front-kick attempts at middleweight and welterweight. He set the ceiling for what a striker could accomplish in the cage, and a generation of fighters has been chasing that ceiling ever since.