“Live by the sword, die by the sword.” A phrase by which both Vitor Belfort and Dan Henderson have founded their two decade long MMA careers on. Their last seven combined fights have all ended in the first round – win or lose, all by knockout.
The two living legends collided one final time on UFC Fight Night 77 in the UFC’s return to Sao Paulo, Brazil and saw Belfort knock Hendo out a second consecutive time. At 38 and 45, respectively, Belfort and Henderson are the last UFC fighters still active from the 1990s. The landscape of the MMA world has transformed dramatically since then.
The UFC began as a tournament that pitted one style martial arts fighters against each other in 1993. Cable TV was all the rage and UFC women’s bantamweight champion “Rowdy” Ronda Rousey was six. The notion of women competing in a sport considered to be taboo and barbaric was a shameful fantasy and nothing more.
Eventually, it grew to showcase the dawn of the first wave of true mixed martial artists: fighters who possessed more than one style of fighting and who had more than one method of finishing fights. But this was still the early days of MMA, akin to the “wild wild west” of the sport. Technique was put on the backseat in favour of brute force and intricate game plans were not as popular as the classic strategy: hit the other guy until he stops fighting.
Belfort debuted in the UFC as “Victor Gracie” way back in UFC 12 in 1997 where he polished Scott Ferrozzo and David “Tank” Abbott in blistering fashion. Belfort was known as Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt but gained notoriety with his quick hands and vicious knockout power. A deadly combination that has the Phenom winning 72 per cent of his wins by knockout with over 83 per cent of those wins ending in the first round. Among many of his victims were Wanderlei Silva, Rich Franklin and Michael Bisping. At his peak, Belfort defeated Randy Couture to win the UFC light heavyweight championship.
Belfort left the UFC after two consecutive losses and bounced around other MMA circuits including Pride and Cage Rage compiling a middling record, a positive PED test and being all but a diminishing memory from the MMA world. But Belfort was far from finished. A shot with Affliction and consecutive highlight reel knockouts led to a career revival and a return to the UFC for the first time in four years.
The Phenom would dust former champion Rich Franklin in under three minutes and face Anderson Silva for the middleweight title though he would lose in spectacular fashion. Not to be deterred by the loss, Belfort would still win six of his next seven fights all by knockout on the heels of a controversial TRT-fuelled run including another positive drug test that fell on deaf ears (right before his title shot against Jon Jones). After having lost his third title shot, however, Belfort may be riding off into the twilight of his UFC career.
Hendo debuted in the UFC around the same time as Belfort in, but his tenure with them has been more or less in and out. Henderson was a decorated wrestler but came to be loved by the fans for his iron will and the incalculable destructive ability of his fists most notably his right, which Pride announcer Mauro Ranallo dubbed the “H Bomb.” Among many fighters buried by his fists include a who’s who list of MMA icons: Wanderlei Silva, Mauricio “Shogun” Rua and Fedor Emelianenko.
Hendo became a two-division Pride champion and a Strikeforce champion and only the UFC title has eluded his grasp. His latest run has yielded more losses than wins. His best performances both came against Rua when his 2011 five-round Fight of the Year barnburner earned him a title shot against Jon Jones, which he would forfeit one week prior to the fight due to an injury.
He would lose three in a row surrendering his first knockout loss to Belfort before rebounding against the aforementioned Rua and then getting knocked out again by Gegard Mousasi. Even Hendo’s once legendary iron chin has now been debilitated.
For twenty years the sport of MMA has gone from one-dimensional rock ’em sock ’em fighters to multi-disciplined athletes with elaborate game plans. Cable TV is all but dead and Ronda Rousey, now in her late twenties, is the face of the company and the sport’s biggest star.
But both Belfort and Hendo are still headlining events with their star quality intact, still fighting the same reckless, high-risk, high-reward style. As Saturday proved, regardless of the result, both will still be regarded as living legends and a reminder to MMA fans of the classic days of MMA. Belfort and Hendo are the last of their ilk.
