A. Silva (left) and I. Adesanya (right) faced each other in 2019. Photo: Reproduction/Facebook ufcbrasil
The recent defense of the Israel adesanya with victory over Robert whittaker once again highlighted the discussion about the place occupied by the Nigerian in the history of the middleweight division (up to 83,9 kg). For Michael Bisping, former category champion, this place is still considerably below that occupied by Anderson Silva.
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UFC Hall of Fame member, Michael Bisping stated, on his YouTube channel, that he does not believe that there is a realistic debate between Anderson Silva e Israel adesanya for the position of greatest middleweight of all time.
“I'm going to play here: Anderson Silva He is the greatest middleweight of all time. This is not a provocation to Israel adesanya, let's go. Israel arrived at the UFC and wanted to achieve great things from day one. He always compared himself to others, he wanted to break records, he wanted to reach the title quickly, he wanted to have the most defenses and be remembered as an absolute legend. And he will do it, because he is a legend. He is the guy. He's at the top of the sport right now. But Anderson Silva did more. It’s that simple,” he stated.
Bisping claims that, in addition to the number of belt defenses Anderson Silva be much larger (eleven versus four), the arsenal of Anderson Silva and the way he defended the titles also has weight in his opinion.
“Adesanya has four title defenses, he rose to face Jan Blachowicz for the light heavyweight title and failed to accomplish the mission. There's no shame in that. But when you look at the two and compare the average fight time, Anderson's is much shorter. Anderson was a more varied threat, he had great submissions. He's only managed two in the UFC, but he's still good. He was very dynamic”, praised the Brit.
One of the arguments used by those who defend Adesanya as the greatest middleweight of all time, for example Chael Sonnen, is the Nigerian's direct confrontation with Spider, held in February 2019 and which resulted in a victory for the current champion. For Bisping, however, it is necessary to take into account the advanced age of Anderson Silva In this ocasion.
“I know a lot of people might claim that they've already faced each other and Israel adesanya won. Well, he actually won, but Anderson was 43 years old. It was a competitive fight and Izzy won clearly and fairly, but still, Anderson was not at his peak and we need to remember that,” said Bisping.
Lastly, Michael Bisping tore praises to Israel adesanya and stated that he believes that the Nigerian has the capacity to one day become the greatest of all time, but he needs to go a long way to do so.
“Izzy is fantastic. Izzy is great. Izzy is the world middleweight champion. But is Izzy the GOAT (greatest of all time) in the middleweight division? No he's not. He may be one day, but he has a long way to go,” he concluded.
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