UFC legends Anderson Silva and Tito Ortiz will lace up the gloves and take to the boxing ring on September 11. Both men recently had an intense face-off leading into the bout and there appears to be some heat between them. Chiefly, for anyone following the build-up between the fight, it’s clear why there’s some beef between both icons.
The bout is slated to take place at 195-pounds, a weight class that Tito Ortiz reluctantly agreed to fight at. ‘The Huntington Beach Bad Boy’ resents the fact that Silva is making him cut down well past his preferred weight class, 205-pounds. However, ‘The Spider’ made his terms of the fight clear and made it explicitly known that Tito Ortiz needs to be on weight.
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“When you come to fight, you don’t cut the weight, you don’t make the weight, don’t come fight,” Silva said to MMA junkie about Ortiz. “That’s the point, I have nothing to talk about that, there’s no excuse.” [h/t BJPenn.com]
Silva’s comments come after Tito Ortiz publicly stated that he might consider forfeiting some amount of his fight purse to intentionally come in overweight. However, Anderson Silva has made it known that in order for the fight to take place, Ortiz needs to properly step on the scale.
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The stage is set for a banger
The aforementioned narrative of making the weight limit for the fight has driven a wedge between both competitors. Ortiz believes that Anderson Silva is forcing him to cut the extra 10 pounds because he’s afraid of his power. He backed up his statement by reminding fans that Silva did indeed fight other UFC fighters on six separate occasions at 205-pounds back in the day.
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However, from Silva’s point of view, his previous opponent also missed weight and he has clearly had enough. Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. who was Anderson Silva’s previous opponent failed to make weight successfully. He ended up giving up $100,000 of his purse to Silva, a fate that may befall Ortiz as well.
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Only time will tell if Tito Ortiz is able to sweat off the last few pounds and step on the scale at the agreed-upon weight limit.
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