LAS VEGAS – After six years of near misses and strange twists and turns in

negotiations, Chuck Liddell and Wanderlei Silva finally faced each other in a

mixed martial arts bout Saturday.

It was worth the wait.

MMA fans had been teased for years by the prospect of a showdown between two

men who rank among the greatest light heavyweights in the sport’s history.

There was the time when Liddell traveled to Japan to meet Silva in a bout in

a Pride Fighting Championship tournament. One round before they were

scheduled to meet, Liddell was beaten by Quinton Jackson.

And then there was the time when Pride officials brought Silva to Las Vegas,

where UFC officials were so confident they had a deal in place that they

brought Silva into the cage to face Liddell during one of its biggest

pay-per-views in its history to that point. But the fight didn’t occur when

negotiations crumbled.

There were many other snags in negotiations, both before and after, that at

times it seemed the bout would never occur.

On Saturday, though, Liddell and Silva showed in a shootout for the ages why

fans had been salivating at the prospect of seeing the sluggers locked in a

cage together.

“Wasn’t that incredible?” a bug-eyed UFC president Dana White exclaimed as he

hugged just about everyone he bumped into in Liddell’s joyous locker room.

It was perhaps fitting that in a battle between two men where the unexpected

always ruled, the unexpected occurred in their finest hour Saturday when the

bout went to a decision instead of ending in the predictable knockout.

Liddell won a unanimous verdict and regained much of the mojo he’d lost in

back-to-back defeats, to Jackson at UFC 71 and Keith Jardine at UFC 76.

Judges Adalaide Byrd and Dave Hagen each had it 30-27, giving all three

rounds to the 38-year-old former champion. Tony Weeks scored it 29-28, giving

Silva the second round.

In a fight that was one of the best of recent times, Liddell had just a

little more of everything and pulled out a victory in a bout that had the

sellout crowd of 11,075 roaring from start to finish. And it was a Liddell

not seen much in recent years.

The one-time collegiate wrestling star at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo had become

one-dimensional in recent years, eschewing his wrestling and ground skills,

instead relying upon his vaunted power. But he took Silva down twice – “It

was easy. Really easy,” Liddell said – and worked the former Pride champion

over from the ground. One of the benefits of the takedown was that he was

able to dole out punishment as Silva was getting up.

It was, Liddell said, a way to give Silva more to worry about than just

defending the right. The plan worked to perfection, as Silva was never able

to open up on Liddell like he’d done on so many opponents en route to

becoming one of the biggest names in the history of the now-defunct Pride

Fighting Championship.

Liddell applied the cherry on top of the sundae late in the third when he

unleashed a spinning back fist that caught Silva on top of the head. Though

the punch didn’t land flush, it seemed to startle Silva. He backed to the

cage and Liddell landed three rights that nearly put him out on his feet.

Silva was bleeding, from his ear from a cut above his eye, and barely kept

his balance.

“I’ll tell you what, he takes a lot better shot than I thought he could,”

Liddell said. “I hit him with a lot of right hands and I kept thinking he’d

go (down), but he recovered fast. He was right there. That was really

impressive.”

Silva, who was taken to a local hospital after the fight, hit Liddell with

punches that most times would have ended the fight. But Liddell, who is known

for the strength of his chin, stood up to them repeatedly and came back

firing.

Liddell said he was never in danger of going down, but said he was quite

aware of the danger Silva posed.

“I was never what I would say was buzzed,” Liddell said, sitting on a bench

in his locker room moments after the win. “But he hit me with a couple of

really good shots where I’d say, ‘Damn, this guy can punch.’ I couldn’t just

rush in there on him.”

The win was among the sweetest of Liddell’s illustrious career. He had been

angry at many of the Pride fans who had taunted him for not having fought

Silva.

Liddell had always wanted the fight, desperately, but because the men were in

different organizations it couldn’t be made. The taunts finally got to the

normally unflappable Liddell after a while.

“I never had anything against Wanderlei, but it was those Pride fans who got

me,” Liddell said. “They’re getting on me about not fighting the guy. I’m

like, ‘I’m in UFC and he’s in Pride. What do you want me to do?’ I would have

fought him in the backyard if I could have.”

But MMA fans are fortunate it happened before a sellout crowd and what

figures to be a large pay-per-view audience, despite the competition from the

New England Patriots’ bid for a perfect record on free television.

If it’s not the fight of the year, the fight that beats it out for that honor

will clearly have been one for the history books.

An exuberant Liddell, who had been derided for his partying ways, proved

conclusively he’s back in the mix.

“I want my title back,” Liddell said, grinning.

If he fights Jackson, who has beaten him twice, like he fought Silva on

Saturday, he’ll give himself a great opportunity to get it back. But this

night was not so much about one man’s quest for the belt as it was a

celebration of what the sport can be at its best.

“That,” White said, “is why I worked like a dog for seven years to get this

fight made. That was absolutely unreal.”
Kevin Iole covers boxing and mixed martial arts for Yahoo! Sports. Send Kevin

a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.