Michael Bisping took a unanimous decision vs. Anderson Silva at UFC Fight Night 84 in London this weekend. Bisping won the first two, in the opinion of most. Silva won the 3 and 5 in the opinion of everyone including Stevie Wonder. All the judges and many fans saw Bisping narrowly taking the fourth.
The most spectacular action took place at the close of the third. Bisping got his mouthpiece knocked out, and pointed it out to referee Herb Dean. As he is supposed to under the Unified Rules, Dean collected the mouthpiece, and waited for a break in the action so that he could return the mouthpiece to the fighter.
There was no break, and Bisping again pointed to where the mouthpiece had been, and looked at it. There’s rules in life, and one of them is “don’t take your eyes off of Anderson Silva in the middle of a fight.” ‘The Spider’ might for example launch a flying knee knocking you to the ground.
Can we go back to the end of round 3?! #WhatHadHappenedWas https://t.co/VqquhAt4Gn
— UFC (@ufc) February 27, 2016
And then the buzzer sounded ending the round.
Herb Dean is an extraordinary ref, and gave Bisping a split second to respond to the knee knockdown. Silva used that fraction of a second he had not to follow up, but to celebrate. He leapt up on the fence and waved his arms, entirely oblivious to Dean explaining that the fight was not over.
Order was finally restored, and Silva continued to show his extraordinary ability not by knocking out or tapping Bisping, but by continuing to showcase his new found Filipino boxing skills. The Panantukan combinations look like fun, but did not knock Bisping out, or tap him. ‘The Count’ continued an extremely disciplined fight, in which he carefully played the distance, with just enough aggression to take the fourth round, as he had the first and the second.
The Unified Rules do not judge a fight overall. They judge a fight by rounds. A look at the respective fighter’s faces tells who won the fight overall. But that does not matter. Michael Bisping won rounds 1, 2, 4 and therefore he won the entire fight, despite the knee in 3, and despite this front kick in 5.
HE FRONT KICKED HIM IN THE FACE!! (@JoeRogan voice) Replay of #UFCLondon on @UFCFightPass 👉 https://t.co/qU72vroh49 https://t.co/ocdyu1lnZg
— UFC (@ufc) February 28, 2016
It was the greatest fight of Bisping’s under appreciated career, against the greatest fighter in UFC history. Afterwards in the Octagon, but fighters kneeled in respect for each other.
At the UFC Fight Night 84 post-fight show on UFC Fight Pass, president Dana White, who is a huge fan, and not a certified ref, said he thought Silva took the fight, but would have to see it again to be certain.
“I have to watch it again,” said White, as transcribed by Marc Raimondi for MMA Fighting. “There was so much craziness going on here after the flying knee, but I believe I had it even going into the fifth round and whoever wins the fifth round won the fight. I thought that Anderson Silva won, by the same score. I had the same score, but had it the other way.”
“Mike Bisping was way too concerned about his mouthpiece and started trying to stop the action. Anderson Silva pours it on, he hits him with his knee and boom.”
“Walk off knockouts are awesome. Make sure the fight is over. I haven’t seen exactly what happened, but he hit him with the knee, then walked away. Herb Dean didn’t stop the fight and then the bell rang. If he would have jumped on top of him, he could have finished the fight. He did not, he tried to walk away. It’s crazy.”
“Obviously we’ve never seen that happen before. Thank God it held together, but wow. What a weird night.”
“Anderson actually looked pretty good tonight in a five-round fight for a 40-year-old guy who’s only fought once in two years.”
