Anderson Silva did a little too much clowning and not enough fighting and defending, and the price he paid was his UFC middleweight belt. Chris Weidman took advantage of Silva's taunting tactics, delivering a knockout blow as Silva pretended to be stunned by a previous punch.
Silva wasn't even really ahead in the fight at the time, having probably lost the first round. But he assumed he had taken Weidman's best shot—on the ground—and began his taunting soon thereafter. The end came just over a minute into the 2nd round.
Weidman's win will cause a big shakeup in next month's SportsRatings MMA Power Ratings, starting with the overall or "pound-for-pound" rankings, where Silva was formerly #2:
Projected August 1st Pound-for-pound MMA Rankings
| July Rank |
Aug Rank |
Fighter | WC | Rating | Rated Record | UFC 162 Results |
| 1 | 1 | Georges St. Pierre | WW | 95.74 | 22-2-0 | |
| 3 | 2 | Jon Jones | LH | 86.38 | 12-1-0 | |
| 4 | 3 | Cain Velasquez | HW | 74.26 | 9-1-0 | |
| 5 | 4 | Benson Henderson | LW | 72.07 | 11-1-0 | |
| 25 | 5 | Chris Weidman | MW | 69.06 | 6-0-0 | Beat #2 Anderson Silva |
| 2 | 6 | Anderson Silva | MW | 61.91 | 30-5-0 | Lost to #25 Chris Weidman |
| 6 | 7 | Fabricio Werdum | HW | 55.66 | 16-5-1 | |
| 7 | 8 | Lyoto Machida | LH | 53.96 | 16-3-0 | |
| 8 | 9 | Daniel Cormier | HW | 53.15 | 9-0-0 | |
| 9 | 10 | Johny Hendricks | WW | 49.29 | 11-1-0 | |
| 10 | 11 | Jose Aldo | FW | 47.30 | 14-1-0 |
Weidman (now 10-0-0 overall, 6-0-0 in rated fights) will take a huge jump from #25 to #5, one spot ahead of Silva, who falls to #6 with his 5th career loss.
And of course, Silva also loses the top Middleweight spot to Weidman, though he only falls to #2. The two fighters are miles ahead of the rest of the field, as Silva was before the bout.
Middleweight - 185 lb. limit - August 1st projection
| July Rank |
Aug Rank |
Fighter | WC | Rating | Rated Record | UFC 162 Results |
| 3 | 1 | Chris Weidman | MW | 69.06 | 6-0-0 | Beat #1 Anderson Silva |
| 1 | 2 | Anderson Silva | MW | 61.91 | 30-5-0 | Lost to #3 Chris Weidman |
| 2 | 3 | Vitor Belfort | MW | 30.76 | 22-10-0 | |
| 4 | 4 | Ronaldo Souza | MW | 25.64 | 13-2-0 | |
| 5 | 5 | Costas Philippou | MW | 25.02 | 5-1-0 | |
| 6 | 6 | Yushin Okami | MW | 24.77 | 19-6-0 | |
| 7 | 7 | Tarec Saffiedine | MW | 24.00 | 4-1-0 | |
| 13 | 8 | Mark Munoz | MW | 23.72 | 8-2-0 | Beat #11 Tim Boetsch |
| 8 | 9 | Alexander Shlemenko | MW | 23.15 | 14-2-0 | |
| 9 | 10 | Ronny Markes | MW | 21.55 | 3-0-0 |
Mark Munoz's impressive win should put him back in the top 10 in the division. If Silva's post-fight vow to not rematch Weidman or fight for the belt again is true (we'll see what Dana White thinks of that), then Vitor Belfort might be Weidman's next opponent (licensing issues withstanding).
In any case, the middleweight division—probably the weakest and least competitive in the UFC—just got a whole lot more interesting.