THE PATH OF ANDERSON SILVA: FEAR THE KNEE STRIKE
By: Jack Slack, FIGHTLAND
"PRIDE didn't have a one hundred and eighty-five pound weight class when Carlos Newton and Anderson Silva stepped into the ring together. This was unfortunate because as Bas Rutten and Stephen Quadros speculated, Newton and Silva could well have made the perfect fight to debut a belt. But this was March 2003 and nobody gave a damn.
"Fedor Emelianenko and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira were deciding the best heavyweight in the world in the main event, and Quinton Jackson, Kevin Randleman, and Kazushi Sakuraba were providing excitement on the same card in the people's favourite division, 205lbs. Moreover, Carlos Newton had just come from the UFC where he had been a champion at 170lbs, and Anderson Silva had only recently won the Shooto 168lbs title. For some reason, nowhere was offering belts at their most natural weight.
"The Ronin
"Carlos Newton was fast accumulating a reputation as a submission machine both on the Japanese circuit and in the U.S. With no particular allegiance to one style, method, or teacher, Newton came to be nicknamed The Ronin (a ronin being a masterless samurai). After an unremarkable beginning to his MMA career, going 0-2, Newton found himself in a fight against the great former Shooto champion, Erik Paulson. Newton surprised everyone in the know by effortlessly taking down and armbarring the MMA pioneer in under a minute."
