This Saturday Anderson Silva will once again step into the octagon. He will face one of the men that helped catapult the UFC into the quasi-mainstream several years ago — Stephan Bonnar.
On April 9th, 2005 Bonnar faced Forrest Griffin in the TUF Finale on Spike TV. Bonnar lost that slugfest. However, since that night, Bonnar has gone 8-5 in the octagon. It’s not bad. But it’s not great either. It’s almost like Dana White has kept Bonnar relevant as a massive “thank you’ gift. Based on record alone, Bonnar is basically the Pete Caroll of the UFC. He’s just hanging on, but just like Carroll, his plus attitude gives him an extra boost.
The man everyone really wants put in front of Anderson Silva is Jon Jones. Even Dana has talked about the potential of such a super fight publicly. He’s in. However, Silva and Jones are not.
“Anderson and Jones are saying, ‘hey, we’re buddies,’ or ‘we don’t want to fight’ or whatever the deal is,” White said in September. “But [Jones] didn’t want to fight Rashad either, and that happened.”
Hopefully we see that superfight at some point. Jon Jones isn’t on the best of terms with the UFC executives after refusing to fight Chael Sonnen (on short notice). I’d say that this fight would happen at some point, except for one emerging issues. Anderson Silva is 37 years old. He no longer has a long career ahead of him. These super fights need to happen, and happen fast.
But back to reality.
There isn’t much hype to be spread regarding this main event. Even the UFC seems to be admitting this. The promo spot for the event says either we will see a spectacular knockout or a historic upset.
At this point Silva is a massive -1100 favorite.
That means it will take $1,100 to net $100 profit. Take out a loan. Sell your car. Forget it; sell your baby. Put it all on Anderson, because no matter how much everyone loves to see a massive upset — it ain’t happening.
That’s not the biggest problem, though.
What is the spectacular knockout doesn’t happen? Anderson can sometimes get disinterested when he isn’t that “into” a fight. This fight is the perfect candidate for this. If that’s the case, the UFC has a significant chance of having a snoozefest main event this Saturday.
I truly am happy for Bonnar to get another main event fight. However, that respect for a tremendous fighter doesn’t necessarily get fight fans to open up their wallets and shell out $60 for the PPV.
Maybe I should have called this “UFC 153 Fight Unhype.”
