Luke Rockhold: Anderson Silva Was Never On My Level

Luke Rockhold has been making some extremely bold claims just three days away from his main event against Michael Bisping at this weekend’s (Sat., June 4, 2016) UFC 199 from The Forum in Inglewood, California, and apparently that’s now extended to one of the greatest mixed martial artists of all-time.

Appearing on this evening’s “UFC Tonight,” Rockhold got the trash talk started again when he told show hosts Brian Stann and Kenny Florian that longtime former middleweight champion Anderson Silva, who lost to Bisping in his last bout, kind of took a cheap shot in a fight “The Count” was in control of:

“Bisping has stayed true to who he is. He always fights to the best of his ability no matter who he is, and I saw him go out there and dominate that fight. He make a stupid mistake, and worried about his mouthpiece and that cost him, in a lot of peoples’ eyes, the fight. I mean, a lot of people think that Anderson won, but he dominated up until that point, and it was kind of a cheap shot on Anderson’s move.

“I guess you can’t fault him, he took the knee, he took the opportunity when Bisping wasn’t really engaging himself in the fight, and the whole fight shifted.”

But even though the new champion, who currently sits in a lofty position as the No. 3-ranked pound-for-pound fighter in the world, believes that Bisping was beating Silva thoroughly if not for that third-round knee, he also believes the British veteran is about to find out just how different a challenge he’s in for:

“So Bisping was winning, he was dominating the fight, I respect him, but he’s about to find out that Anderson is not on my level. He never was. And this is a completely different fight. He doesn’t know the jump that I’ve made. It’s a completely different fight.”

The reason why it’s a different fight, according to Rockhold, is simply due to the fact that he’s kept evolving while Bisping, despite fighting well against tough opponents, has stayed the same:

“It’s me that I’ve learned more, I’ve gained more. He’s the same man. He hasn’t lost anything, but he hasn’t gained anything.”

MMA fans everywhere will find out if that’s true in California this Saturday, and while there have been a rash of shocking upsets in the UFC recently, most are picking this as one of the more sure things after Rockhold brutally submitted Bisping in their first match-up in November 2014.

With the champ predicting a “one of a kind” knockout, history could be made at UFC 199. The real history, however, would be if Rockhold could prove that he truly is a better middleweight champion than Silva by breaking his records in the Octagon.

Only then can he say “The Spider” was never on his level.