Middleweight Contenders Maia and Marquardt to Meet at UFC 102
Demian Maia
Middleweight contenders Demian Maia and Nate Marquardt will meet at UFC 102 on August 29th in Portland, Oregon with a shot at 185-pound title-holder Anderson Silva likely on the line.
The bout was confirmed on Maia’s website on Wednesday.
Regarded as one of the best jiu-jitsu practitioners in the world, Maia (10-0) has backed up the hype in compiling an unblemished 10-0 professional MMA record, including five-straight submission victories in the UFC over Ryan Jensen, Ed Herman, Jason MacDonald, Nate Quarry, and Chael Sonnen. Maia has received “Submission of the Night” honors in all but one of his fights inside the octagon.
Marquardt (28-8-2) has been defeated just twice in ten bouts inside the octagon. After four-straight victories to start his UFC career, Marquardt challenged Silva for the title but suffered a first-round TKO defeat. He’s since gone 3-1 with victories over Jeremy Horn, Martin Kampmann, and Wilson Gouveia as well as a controversial loss to Thales Leites to again emerge as a top threat at 185-pounds.
UFC 102 is rumored to be headlined by Randy Couture vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira and is also expected to include Keith Jardine vs. Thiago Silva, Junior dos Santos vs. Justin McCully, Chris Leben vs. Jake Rosholt, Chael Sonnen vs. Wilson Gouveia, and Matt Hamill vs. Brandon Vera.
For the latest UFC 102 news stay tuned to MMAFrenzy.com.
Tags: Demian Maia, Nate Marquardt
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I hope nate pulls this one out. I’m lookin for nate v. anderson 2 in the future. Hopefully after forest beats mr silva..ya no in my perfect world.
This will definitely be a clash of styles, but two very good fighters. Looking forward to this one.
I’ve been asking for this since Nate beat up Wilson and Maia thankfully destroyed Sonnen, hell it only makes sense, really….. Nate v Maia for the #1 contender, Hendo v Bisping for the next shot after that….. So not only does the Anderson Silva v Forrest Griffin make the LHW division a little more exciting (especially if Lyoto loses and Anderson wins), that match now allows for this great fight to happen… good stuff imo
Yup, this matchup makes a ton of sense, especially with Silva moving up to fight Forrest, and should be a really good fight. It’ll be interesting what they do with the Henderson-Bisping winner since they’ll actually have fought before this fight. I’m not sure who they’ll give the first shot at Silva to. Maybe if Silva beats Forrest he gets a title shot or another light heavyweigh fight and the winners of the two middleweight contender fights meet first? So many interesting matchups booked in the last few days.
I like this fight, but I didnt want to see it happen because it eliminates a top contender leading to a guy like leites getting a title shot. maia is sick on the ground we all know that and marquardt’s weakest ability is the ground. maia will not be afraid to stand and bang, but if this fight goes to the ground maia will add another sick sub to his resume. I like both fighters and I was really looking to see maia challenge silva. I think maia has the best chance of the guys at 185 to beat silva. please dont start the maia is like leites comments, maia is more talented and a smarter fighter than leites.
I really dont want to see hendo-silva again, and I dislike bisping, I think he is a bit overrated. he stole that win from hamill in their fight, and hasnt fought a top guy at 185. thats just me. so with this fight happening in august maybe silva would defend his title in december? I would rather see silva vacate the title and move to 205 full time. FR I gots a question. when does silva’s contract run out? A rumor is starting to gain steam that silva wants to fight fedor once his contract expires in the ufc.
Silva’s contract has four fights left, but there’s this nice little clause in the UFC contract that it automatically extends if you’re champion. Therefore Silva either has to keep fighting for the UFC, retire from fighting altogether, or lose the belt. If he loses the belt, it dims the luster in a fight with Fedor or RJJ.
Also, I’m not exactly sure about Maia being willing to stand and bang, it looked to me like he took all his fights to the ground as quickly as possible.
Definetly. Chael Sonnen was kicking Maias ass on the feet before it went to ground and I consider Marquardt to be a fractionaly better striker than Sonnen . Im taking Marquardt via good ol’ ground and pound and im even going to stick my neck out and say in the 1st round also
finally someone who can hang with maia, i dont think this is going to be much of a war thow. either maia gets the sub early or gets beat up.
This is a match up that makes sense, i cant see maia being able to take down nate the guy is massive at MW absolutely huge, he has good wrestling and good jui jitsu which i do believe is under rated, i just cant see maia winnging. As for hendo bisping in a brit and really want bisping to win, i dont think hendo is the same fightr his striking is poor but has big power but his wrestling is so good hell and will points bisping out i think
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This fight is going to be sick. It’s the fight that made the most sense after UFC 95. I think Nate has a good chance of surviving Maia, but we’ll have to wait until August to find out. I think the winner of this fight should get the crack at the title before Hendo or Bisping. That being said; especially if Bisping wins, as that will be his first legit top fighter win at 185.
wow…this just became a very interesting card. To me, the Hamill v. Vera fight should be the most interesting. I couldn’t begin to tell you I think that’ll go. I predict Hamill getting caught with a kneee or something.
I don’t understand why no one outside of England like Bisping.
and everyone harps on about how Hamill was robbed when Bisping won.
Bisping won because he was a better striker and had octagon control.
Hamill took him down once or twice but couldn’t do anything.
Bisping dominated the stand-up game. that’s why he won.
Plus, its not like the judges were biased towards him. the two that gave him the win were american, the one that chose Hamill was British.
I’m desparate to see him fight some top contenders, and after he dominates Hendo, he will be taking on A.Silva. No one will be able to call him overated when he walks away with a TKO victory in the 3rd or 4th.
I don’t want to turn this into a thread about Bisping, but on my score count, I couldn’t believe Bisping was given the decision in that fight. In the end he did get it, and it still counts as a W, regardless of the fact that most fight fans think he shouldn’t have gotten it. Likewise, however I personally feel a bit like in the Bisping v. Rashad fight that the judges kind of did a “make up call” in giving that one to Rashad.
As far as Bisping v. Henderson, I doubt Bisping will dominate, I think he has a chance to win, but I doubt he’ll dominate, and I don’t think he would beat Silva if he got the chance to fight him.
ya i realy dont see bisping beating henderson unless he brings his running shoes and jabs for 15 minutes. kinda like the leben fight, but i doubt hendo wont be able to score some takedowns.
now back to maia and nate
Good match up but Marquardt already had a shot and lost. Maia deserves a shot at the title now, not later. Instead of Silva fighting Forrest, he should be fighting Maia. Henderson had his shot and lost. Bisping if he beats Henderson should get a shot at him also.
Nate has tremendously improved since the last Silva fight. I think just like everyone else Maia has taken to the ground Nate will be in trouble even though I believe Marquardt is stronger than Maia’s past competition. Marquardt’s striking will definitely play a part in this fight if Maia cant get him to the ground I’m afraid it will be a short night. I know Maia’s jits is unbelievable but he needs to work especially on striking and defense if he wants a good shot at beating him.
Both fighters will give silva trouble. But i think if the fight can’t go to the ground (as in the thailes* fight) i think nate will have teh best chance. I mean nate was doing pretty well until the end of the fight against silva. I would like to see maia fight anderson but i think it would only be a little better version of the silva/leites fight basically producing the same result. I realy think the winner of this fight should maybe fight the winner of the hendo/bisping fight if they can get enough time, all the while silva fighting griffen. I think that would be a great fight for title contention what does everyone else think!???????????????????
Yo dude i think you’re right. Maia vs anderson would be a better version of leites vs anderson. Nate has fought his way back to be a top contender and is he beats maia he should definately get a shot. Marquardt imo besides hendo, has the best chance at getting that belt from anderson. I honestly thought it was going to be a jitz dude who was going to give silva the most trouble but after the leites fight i’m not so sure. I like both fighters but i hope marquardt wins because i think marquardt vs silva or hendo would be an awesome match(hendo is going to beat bisping and get the first shot @ the title).
Maia should have got Silva but after the Leites fight another Brazilian BJJ guy probably wasn’t the best idea for the bottom line.Maia is like a boa,once he get’s ahold of you you’re pretty much done.Takedowns into triangles,that’s just sick.Maia is a threat to anybody he fights and is probably one of the few people that could beat Silva right now.He’ll probably get his shot if he get’s past Marquardt.
I agree completely Jaymz, with that being said i think the idea of this match winner fighting the winner of hendo-bisping winner and then that winner gets the title shot is dumb. say that happens, who gets the next shot? that just eliminated 2 solid contenders. I would like bisping to fight at least one more top contender before he even gets mentioned for a title shot after the hendo fight. who has bisping fought for people to say he is a top contender to silva? the leites fight with silva happened when leites beat marquardt on a controversial point deduction. we all saw that title fight. by bisping getting a shot at silva if he were to beat hendo I dont think its right.
I like the winner of this fight getting the first shot, then if hendo wins he gets the next one, if he loses then bisping should fight the loser of maia-marquardt to determine the next title shot. outside of maia-marquardt-hendo who else is in the title picture? cote when he comes back in 9 months, and then who? I also doubt silva will beat forrest, but if he does I think he will stay at 205.
Yeah,The winner should get Silva and the loser should fight the winner of Hendo vs Bisping.And throw The Crippler vs The Axe Murderer in there somewhere.
I am really looking forward to this fight. I think that Damien is a great fighter but I think that Nate is going to be to much for him. We will see though. Good fight none the less.
They should make this for the Interim MW Championship, while A.Silva is off fighting LHW and WW matches. Then we he does come back, he fights whomever has the Interim belt.
If that was the way the UFC was going to play it, then Florian vs. Stevenson would have been the interim LW title, as that belt hasn’t been defended in a year now.
All I’m saying is, let A.Silva fight a few fights that “interest” him, while the MW division figures out who is the one true contender for the division. He has no interest in fighting just anyone the UFC says is the #1 contender at the time. The winner of Bisping/Henderson, gets first dibs at whoever has the Interim belt (Maia or Marquardt), then just let this play out with whoever is the next contender until A.Silva is ready to comeback and unify the titles with whoever has the Interim belt. That way there won’t be anymore Cote or Leites disasters.
To argue against your point, Penn wanted to have both and ACTIVELY defend both, and stressed the fact that his next fight was to be at LW regardless of a win or loss. Anderson Silva wants to defend both, but no one wants to see a heartless 5 round bore fest title defense. Give him a MW title defense where he has a point to prove; when he’s content the division has worked out a standout opponent.
It’s crazy how we all comment on who we feel should get a title shot or not.
Really it al comes down to who the ufc deem worthy and how much money that fight is gonna bring in. So many examples to go with it’s sick. But I too feel Bisping should fight more legit 185ers but who am I.
Like any organization the ufc wants certain fighter to do well and make it. Bisping for Ex.
1. is the Tuff winner after all! Do any of you Know what that means!! (smile)
2. Extrememly marketable and a hero in U.K.
3. U.K.’s poster boy for MMA
4. The new coach of Tuff
5. Openly states A.Silva is at fault for ufc 97 and Says he has the
style to beat him.
Hey give him a shot at title other people have gotten it and didn’t deserve it at all ahhhchoothalesleitesooobrocklesneroooobjpennvsgspoooo!! Wow sorry guys must be that swine flu going around.
But I say Nate the Great take this one!!!
With Silva only having 4 fights left IMO he should only fight super fights. Hey give him what he wants and we’d all would be happy. He said he wants the big fights now!!! Give it to him he is p4p the best right?
If he beat Forrest and if Lyoto Loses hey man give him a crack at LH title after Rampage. I’d pay for that!!
If he loses to Forrest let him fight GSP!! Hey i’d pay for that.
Or have him defend his title no matter the his outcome, against hendo/bisping hey I’d pay for that too!
Wouldn’t yall??
If GSP loses to Alves, why would he still get to fight Silva after Silva (hypothetically) loses to Forrest?
I got a huge laugh out of the swine flu comment OnlyTrue1. very funny. let bisping fight silva, he claims he has the style to beat him which is complete and utter horsecrap. who has the guy beat to be this damn cocky? this guy thinks he should get what he wants when he wants it, give him the fight against silva so silva can destroy him, by him saying he has what it takes to beat silva is the same as me saying that. he has yet to prove he belongs in title contention. If he beats hendo he just beat a once great fighter who is on the downhill, not much gained from it, if he loses to hendo, it just proves that he is all talk. step your game up bisping and take on marquardt or maia, or if you think your ready for silva take on wandy. I doubt he has the chin to take wandy’s shots. maybe I know nothing and bisping is a god who is unbeatable. (I doubt that)
re: “by him saying he has what it takes to beat silva(sic) is the same as me saying that”
Not quite, Bisping is a professional fighter in the UFC that won TUF and only has one loss on his record, you are not. Therefore, there is a huge difference between him saying that and you saying that.
Bisping, would have no chance against Anderson.I’m wondering what this style he claims to have to beat him is? I doubt he even can beat Hendo. I think that Maia fighting Marquardt is perfect for Maia to see just how he will fare against a good technical striker, before he dare to try and take out Silva.
Sweet we can watch a one-dimensional fighter pull guard for an entire fight again. So if Maia wins and fights aSilva at some point.. does that mean we get another 5 rounds of a dude llying on his back and the champion doing his monkey dance all around him?
I mean he does have a good monkey dance..
His monkey dance is second to none.