Anderson Silva’s Teammate From Knockout Video Says Footage Was Edited
Check out the strange Anderson Silva vine that’s circling the web……
Former UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva will look to get back on track at UFC 183, as he is preparing to face Nick Diaz in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 31st. The bout will mark the first time Silva has competed in the octagon since his crushing injury against Chris Weidman at UFC 168.
That was way back in December of 2013, and “The Spider” is apparently back up to 100% in training. In a recently posted Anderson Silva vine, you can see what appears to be a brutal knockout against a sparring partner, check it out:
Silva appears to land a big flying knee, that puts his man down, before a rather unnecessary flurry of 10 punches to his downed foe. The video made it’s way to training partners Alexander Gustafsson and Phil Davis at Alliance MMA, and they seem rather sceptical of the footage, courtesy of MMAFighting.com:
“He didn’t look knocked out to me,” Davis said. “He looks maybe hurt. People when they get knocked out look stiff and he doesn’t look stiff anywhere.”
“And if he is knocked out, why is he still hitting him?” Davis said. “That’s what you do to a training partner? You don’t just knock him out like Hendo and follow up on him like Bisping. It’s your training partner. What’s wrong with you?”
“[Silva] probably gave him a hundred bucks after practice,” Gustafsson quipped.
Head coach and co-owner of Alliance MMA, Eric Del Fierro, gave his two cents on the alleged beat down in training:
“I would have quit that gym right then and there,”
So what’s the story with this Anderson Silva vine? Is he really beating the life out of a seemingly helpless sparring partner, or perhaps some mind games are being played by the former champion. Given his illustrious highlight reel, you could argue that “The Spider” doesn’t really need to try and strike fear in the heart of his opponents.
Real or fake?
*UPDATE*
We may have found out that the footage was exaggerated, as Silva’s training partner in the video, Douglas Moura, told MMA Fighting that he wasn’t knocked out in the video at all:
“I wasn’t out, I was just dizzy. I wasn’t out,” Moura said. “Right after that, I recovered, got back up and we continued training. Nothing happened. No big deal.”
According to Moura, Globo edited the footage to make it appear that Silva knocked him out and continued to hit him:
“They didn’t do a good job with the editing. That’s not what happened. We’re fighting, it happens, but when (Silva) realized I was dizzy, he didn’t punch for real. He was just touching his hand on me, giving me time to recover. There was 2:30 minutes left in the round, and we continued training after that, but they didn’t show that on TV. It happened to me, but it also happened to him before. It’s completely normal”
“The way they edited, looked like he was trying to hurt me. That’s not what happened. During the other part of the training, they said Wendres ‘Godzilla’ (da Silva) gave up during his sparring session with Anderson, but that’s not true. The round simply ended and he was resting. Globo did a poor job with the editing.”
Moura reaffirmed his support for Silva, clarifying that there were absolutely no hard feelings between he and “The Spider”:
“This is not the first time I’m part of Anderson’s training camp. He always helped me a lot,” Moura said. “He’s not only a teammate, but he’s also a friend. He always helped me, gave me good advice. He’s a great athlete and a great person.”
