Music: Deathstep - DeathRage

Name: Pride 20
Title: Armed and Ready
Date: Apr 28, 2002
Location: Yokohama Arena, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan
Organization: Pride Fighting Championships

This is a badass fight between two badasses. Two legends of MMA both in their prime.

Wanderlei Silva has a great quote during his interview before the fight: “My strategy? It’s a street fight, that’s all.” Under Pride fighting rules, you can get away with saying this (not like UFC’s watered down rules.) Silva bulked up for this fight and there is about a 7 lb weight difference between the two, Cro Cop at 222 lbs and Silva at 215.

Mirko Cro Cop was a big star in K-1 kickboxing and was just making the transition to MMA at this time (K-1 was huge in Japan and it is just stand up fighting. Guys who fight in K-1 take huge shots to the head almost every fight. If you can knock someone out in K-1, then you are a special striker, and Cro Cop was doing that.) Cro Cop got his nickname because he is in the anti-terrorist special police forces in Croatia.. He just all around seems like a killer. This was only Cro Cop’s fourth MMA fight.

свернуть