Ok this is not one thing. But i don't understand why so many sherdogers keep saying that he used to face mediocre opposition, that he's just a PED user with no respect towards his opponents. Come on guys. First of all, Machida and Belfort's poor answers on the ground (against Rockhold and Weidman) make you realize how good his offensive guard was. I mean even when Lutter mounted him, he pulled out the submission. And when Chael put a beating on him for 5 rounds, he still managed to armbar him while having a bruised rib. He beat Belfort in the striking department, ffs he front kicked him and finished him with two straight punches right on the chin. He moved up to 205, embarrassed the big guy Forrest, who recently defeated both Rampage and Shogun. Against Leben, he had 100% striking accuracy and knocked him out in one round. And the guy was known to be a zombie-coming forward type of fighter. He then had fucked up memory two days after the fight. You know his resume anyway, but i'm still amazed of how short memory is for some people.. We might never see someone that beautiful to watch again. I might sound like a nuthugger (i'm prepared for the shit storm) but you have to admit the guy moved like he was dancing. I've always thought he was the one who really understood the way of fighting and feeling the opponent's weaknesses.
Sherdoggers are a fickle bunch. Just your average internet neckbeard shut in that's never trained a day in their life.
Anderson Silva is one of the goat, I still think He would've beaten Weidman had his leg not gave out.
Nowadays he is a little underrated. Sure his competition wasn't the highest but he was absolutely destroying those guys. He was the first guy to stop Chris Leben and he did it in under a minute. He sent Franklin to Franklinweight after rearranging his face and before losing to The Chris he won against wrestlers, his supposed weakness, three times and won thrice at LW. Still one of the GOATs to me.
This one is easy to deal with: He beat Dan Henderson, Vitor Belfort, Rich Franklin (x2), Chael Sonnen (x2) and Yushin Okami all at 185. These are the best mw's of the era he fought in, and he finished every one of those fights. And this in a career where he also beat the Shooto champ at 168 (Sakurai) and the former UFC champ at 205 (Griffin). Therefore: It is simply nonsense and bullshit to say he faced mediocre opposition. His title reign, like almost every other title reign ever, was composed of dangerous fights vs excellent challengers, and routine fights vs merely decent fighters. No other outlook on this is even valid, it's very clear and any opposition to it reeks of agenda and petty biases.
My opinion is that they always wanted to hate him, just didn't have enough reason before. I think that was because of the way he behaved outside of fights, never giving much of a fuck to the media, not answering questions straight and the fact he spoke practically zero english. What people don't want to see is that even if he was on PEDs his entire career (which he most likely wasn't) he never won a fight because of his strenght, speed or cardio. None of those were his strong suits. He won because of his skills and his strong mind game. Still by far the GOAT at MW.
There have always been more vocal haters of Anderson than there have been true fans, maybe it's in part from how some of his fans can come off, how do I say this, delusional. So people would make fun of him just to troll those fans. He's one of the best fighters to ever grace the sport and has done things that have never been seen before and inspired so many others. I believe Jones said Anderson was his biggest inspiration. If you're going to mention cheating, he was beating a lot of cheaters himself, and in an era where there was no such thing as a blood test, so it's naive not to wonder if everybody at the top was using, and guys still failed the piss test (likely because they didn't think they'd even be tested, as the majority weren't).
Silva, GSP, Fedor.....in any order is fine with me in the GOAT discussion. Jones was well on his way on being a clear #1 in my eyes.
Silva's and Weidman's careers run on very different timelines. It's almost impossible to make a true comparison unless they're both in their prime at the same exact moment. Training and technique are constantly evolving. That's the nature of sports in general. I never understood why people need to act like 7 year old kids arguing over which superhero is the best, when they're talking about MMA fighters.
What are you blabbing on about? He is a PED user. He has shown many times he isn't respectful to his opponent. His competition wasn't mediocre. It might look like that when you compare it to guys like GSP, Aldo and Jones.
Ok i forgive you cause you're an arsenal fan. Sure he used PED (among many others), sure he was not that respectful towards Belfort and Sonnen. But he had arguments with them, and outside the sport he always remains joyful and classy. As for inside the octagon, taunting his opponent does not mean disrespecting him
How many other fights can say they beat top 5 fighters across three different weight classes(Sakurai at WW, Forrest at LHW, Hendo/Franklin at MW)? Not a lot.
He has a few great wins some good and plenty mediocre like every fighter does. He lost to sub par opposition too. Jones has the most ridiculous resume. He was exciting of course and I tuned in, but sadly he is a cheat
