The Doggy Bag: Readers Write, We Respond

To say that [Anderson] Silva's decision was a masterpiece, comparing it to a 12-round boxing decision, is the most insane thing I have ever heard. For perhaps the best striker in the world to not even attempt to end the fight on his feet is downright shameful. It was not even close to a dominating performance either; there was so little action that Silva only won the fight 48-47 on one card. Leites actually fought the much smarter fight...Why try to stand and trade with Silva when you are at a huge disadvantage on your feet? His only hope was to try and make it a war of attrition and try to get lucky. Silva on the other hand, was at a huge advantage with almost the entire fight on its feet and he couldn’t capitalize. Everyone in the world knew he could finish the fight and he didn’t even think about pulling the trigger. I put all the blame on Silva for this fight... for those with more talent, more is expected.
-- Adam Kampman

Jordan Breen, radio host and columnist: Well, let's deal with the first problem with this quackery.

First of all, saying "Judge X had this fight close, so it was," is about as flimsy and asinine of a rationale as you can get. A judge gave Marcus Aurelio a 29-28 scorecard against Clay Guida in a fight in which he lost about 14 minutes and 59 seconds of, it doesn't make it close. Nelson Hamilton -- normally a fantastic judge for the sport and a legitimate asset to the kinds of judging crews with Dalby Shirley and Glenn Trowbridge still frequent -- turned in a trash scorecard. Simple as that.

Let's look at the numbers (courtesy of my pal Rami Genauer, proprietor of the always fantastic FightMetric): in the total fight, Anderson Silva landed 104 strikes, and Thales Leites landed a whopping 17. FightMetric's tracking HiPer Strikes (think power punches in boxing) has Silva landing 41 to Leites' three. Their formula for overall effectiveness between striking and grappling gives Silva a score of 222 to Leites' 29, and adjusted on a per-round basis, gives Silva the fight 50-45.

But, these are soulless computers, unable to truly "perceive" fighting, so maybe the math doesn't tell the whole story. Let's throw out the last three rounds, in which Leites' wheels flew off on the fight turned into a debacle, and focus on the first two rounds which Nelson Hamilton had given to Leites.

In the first round, Leites cleanly connected with literally one strike, a leg kick, which was more than answered when Silva kickstanded him onto his posterior. In the second round, Leites finally got his takedown, couldn't move past half guard, and despite having top position, landed only eight LoPer strikes by FightMetric count. Over the first ten minutes combined, Silva nearly triples Leites' landed strikes, with only the first-round leg kick being of any substance.

Is this outright domination? No, this isn't 10-8 fodder. But kept in the context of what was to come, it certainly apropos to say that Silva dominated Leites.

And, the less mathematical side. First, you write:

"Leites actually fought the much smarter fight ... Why try to stand and trade with Silva when you are at a huge disadvantage on your feet? His only hope was to try and make it a war of attrition and try to get lucky."

Firstly, I would say Leites' best chance was to get on top, pass guard, and go for a submission, him being one of the best grapplers in the division out of arguably MMA's best BJJ-for-MMA academy, Nova Uniao. He tried that, and he failed. There was no way Leites was ever going to prevail in a "war of attrition" since Silva is a devout counterfighter, and Leites was going to have to constantly commit energy to making Silva work, which is a recipe for tiring out first, which is exactly what happened.

Secondly, there is inherent hypocrisy in saying that Leites is smart for trying to minimize his own personal risk by not trading with Silva. Where then, is the acceptance for Silva's prudence? He fought as smart as could be asked: he counterstruck cleanly and effectively, giving Leites no ability to generate offense, ultimately tiring himself out and precluding himself from generating any further offense.

Consider the further ridiculousness of an absolute statement like "Everyone knew he could finish the fight" and "He didn't even think about pulling the trigger." I don't feel horribly qualified to discuss Anderson Silva's innermost thoughts, nor should anyone else until he makes them explicit.

And on that note, Silva did make some of his thoughts explicit. He said repeatedly following the fight that he had worked incredibly hard to become champion, and didn't want to lose it -- a tacit admission of not wanting to blow it against a fighter who, regardless of how inert he looked late in the fight, could still add another checker to his past. I doubt that if Silva was more aggressive, he would've ended up in a submission, but as far as wackiness going in the pantheon of MMA, that's hardly an incident to bat an eye at.

Anderson Silva's performance against Thales Leites was his most unenthralling in several years. It's not a fight I'll likely ever watch again, unless some specific kind of film research requires it. But this rubbish that Silva has something be ashamed of, something to be repentant for, is idiotic. If Silva concentrated his dominance into a five-second flurry which earned him a perfunctory stoppage late in the fight, would it really have made the fight that much "better"? Would it have made the 20-some minutes beforehand "worthwhile"?

Whether or not Silva forced Yves Lavigne into action doesn't change the fact that he completely dummied a top-10 fighter and made him look amateurish. It is perfectly fine that fans and pundits alike weren't galvanized by his performance, but to expect an apology is revoltingly backwards. Their job is to collect purses and put scalps on their resumes, not to enthrall you, although it's often a welcomed side effect. If you are going to "expect more" from great prizefighters, prepare to have your expectations go unmet, and don't feel you deserve anything when it happens, because you don't.

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