It appears that current UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva is contemplating retirement within the next year.
In a recent interview with Brazilian television channel SporTV scheduled to be broadcast this Saturday, Silva suggests he is almost finished fighting:
I’ll retire next year, I already gave my all. I don’t need to prove anything for anyone and within one year I’ll put my gloves aside.
According to the segment editor who leaked the information, Silva referenced retiring several times during the interview.
To hear Silva mention retirement at the height of his career is surprising, but not the first time an MMA athlete has done so. And if “The Spyder” truly does retire, don’t be surprised if and when Dana White and Co. convince him to return.
[HT: InTheGuard.tv]
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I agree with your first point Kansas, i think hes leveraging for more money, which he deserves if anyone does. Hes going about it in a good way too, not fighting with lawyers or breaching contracts, etc..
From what ive read, he has wanted to fight alot more and the UFC keeps most of their fighters on the sidelines fighting maybe twice a year, max 3 times. Anderson would probably like to fight 5-6 times a year so he is getting kind of bored of sitting around with nobody to really challenge him (this is what i read). On top of the boredom thing, hes looking to settle down and get deeper into coaching and training younger fighters.
I dont think hes worried about getting KOed or anything like that, atleast i hope thats not the case.
You cannot make money sitting in a training room.. the problem is the UFC doesn’t want to pay out for the most expensive contracts, because it would cost the bank too much.. therefore, they build cards on ONE big fight and stack the rest with small contracts.. when a fighters contract worth exceeds their profit margin interests, they slow down the fights as they come to renewal hoping the fighter gets ko’ed before a contract is up for renewal. If the fighter makes it to the next renewal without a loss or ko.. then they get a raise, but their amount of fights goes down, it evens the money margin, and really gives a person little motivation to move up because you are making less than 1 mil a year for most fighters no matter how good they are.
Like BJ penn.. has a great per fight worth, but how many fights per year does he get to exhaust that contract? Not many, so he is not earning while he is in the training room waiting for next year to come.. and that sucks.. especially on an exclusive contract.. for a boxer that is fine, because they earn millions per fight, so 1 a year or 2 a year is okay, but for a UFC champ.. it just wont do..
I wish Silva the best in negotiations.. I noticed the same antsyness in Silva to fight, he wants as many as he can get so he can build income.. and that is not happening.. he made MILLIONS per year in Pride FC.. now he is earning about half a million a year with the UFC if that.. this year he has earned around 200k with the UFC … thats small taters compared to Big Timmeh’s one fight loss to Fedor of over $800k..
i say bull if he retires be prepared for a quick come back,he has the heart of a warrior and warrior’s dont “retire” i think a loss will bring the fire back under his azzzz{by the way i also think cote is going to ko silva}
Headline should read like this “ANDERSON SILVA GETS RECORD CONTRACT IN 2009″… lol
IF this is a business move its a good one on Andersons part, imagine if he walks away right now and the UFC wants him to fight GSP or they sign Cung Le or anything like that, he would probably fetch some big cash to continue fighting. if its not the case of leverage over contract negotiations and hes quitting because he feels like he has nothing left to prove and he is the best in the world, then its still good for him… you cant tarnish his legacy if he wont fight you, in 5 years from now there will be a great middleweight killing everyone and some will call him the best and others will say “your just lucky Anderson walked away” and you’ll never get to see if the new kid could beat Anderson. its sort of like the debate about whos better Tyson or Ali, we will never ever find out but it keeps there names in your mind and help there legend grow. i will not be a happy camper if i dont get to watch Anderson Silva fight for much longer, but i can understand and will forgive him as a fan if he does leave.
Update on Anderson Silvas retirement guys..
According to his manager, Anderson plans to retire when hes 35, which is in another 18 months. Apart from that Anderson has 6 fights left in his UFC contract and he plans to complete that contract in full.
Wow, thats alot of fights left, i had no idea there were that many left. That means he would have to fight every 3 months for his next 6 fights. Im sure hes up to the challenge, but will the UFC give him those fights?
So it looks more like hes retiring in 2010 which is kind of bad news because it strikes me more as a true retirement and not a negotiating tactic. Ofcourse that doesnt mean he wont come back a few times for some single fight paydays which is pretty common for fighters these days.