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This weekend sees the UFC return to Brazil – the city of Sao Paulo, to be exact – for UFC Fight Night 170, and while the novelty of seeing the UFC in one of the world’s hotbeds for MMA is now gone – the promotion visits the country multiple times per year and have put on events in 13 different locations – every time the Octagon makes a visit, a hot crowd is guaranteed.
Since the UFC returned to Brazil in 2011 for the first time in well over a decade, we’ve seen some classic fights and unforgettable events take place there, with some of the promotion’s most memorable moments happening in the South American country.
Here are the UFC’s 5 most memorable moments in Brazil.
#5 Miocic wins gold – UFC 198
Back in 2016, Stipe Miocic wasn’t even supposed to get the first shot at then-UFC Heavyweight champion Fabricio Werdum; the Brazilian had submitted the seemingly unbeatable Cain Velasquez to win the title at UFC 188 in 2015, and the UFC had granted the former champion an immediate rematch. But when Velasquez was sidelined with an injury, Miocic – who had won his last 2 fights impressively – was granted his opportunity.
The only problem for him? The fight was booked to take place in Curitiba’s huge Arena da Baixada, meaning a huge crowd of around 45,000 people would be firmly behind the champion. And throughout the build-up to the event, Werdum appeared to be in party mode, reveling in his role as the returning hero and seemingly confident in his ability to win.
Unfortunately for the Brazilian crowd, Werdum was apparently too confident. Rather than look to rough Miocic up in the clinch as he’d done to Velasquez, he seemed happy to strike with the challenger from the outside. And when Miocic hit him with a clean right hand, the champion got angry – and too sloppy for his own good. He came charging forward with a flurry of punches, and walked right into a perfect right hook that knocked him senseless, sending him to the ground face-first.
The fight was over in a single punch, and even Miocic seemed unable to believe it – shouting over and over “I’m the world champ!” as the crowd were stunned into silence. It was a huge upset at the time, but Miocic has gone onto become one of the greatest Heavyweight champions in UFC history – and it all started in Brazil.
#4 Nogueira’s big comeback – UFC 153
October 2012’s UFC 153 was one of those seemingly cursed shows that just wouldn’t go right for the promotion, at least not at first. The initial main event was to see Jose Aldo defend his UFC Featherweight crown against Erik Koch, while the co-main was supposed to be a Light-Heavyweight clash between ‘Rampage’ Jackson and Glover Teixeira.
Both fights fell apart; first Koch withdrew with an injury and was replaced by Frankie Edgar, but soon after Aldo picked up an injury himself, scrapping the main event altogether. Meanwhile, ‘Rampage’ also withdrew, wrecking the co-main event. All seemed lost, until two Brazilian legends stepped in to save the day.
Suddenly, we had a main event of UFC Middleweight champion Anderson Silva facing veteran Stephan Bonnar in a Light-Heavyweight fight, and in the co-main? Ageing hero Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira made a surprising return to take on journeyman Dave Herman.
Both fighters won, but it was Nogueira’s victory that was more memorable; sure, Herman wasn’t the same caliber of opponent that ‘Minotauro’ had once beaten in PRIDE, but this wasn’t the same Nogueira, either. The former champion was returning from nearly a year on the shelf rehabbing a broken arm suffered at the hands of Frank Mir.
So to see ‘Minotauro’ looking fit and healthy again – taking punches like he’d once been able to before staging a comeback to submit Herman with a second round armbar – was pretty stirring, and when ‘Pee Wee’ finally tapped, the crowd in Rio De Janeiro threatened to blow the roof off the arena.
Little did the fans know that it would turn out to be the final win of Nogueira’s legendary career; ‘Minotauro’ retired in 2015 after 3 more losses, marking out the Herman victory as an even more noteworthy moment.
#3 Rousey conquers Brazil – UFC 190
Perhaps the most notable thing about the UFC’s shows in Brazil is the level of support that any fighters to hail from the country get from the crowd. Fighters that aren’t recognized as stars at all in the US – names like Francisco Trinaldo, Fabio Maldonado and Warlley Alves – regularly get huge reactions from the Brazilian crowd, while even popular foreign fighters tend to be booed out of an arena – or told they’re about to die, in Portuguese of course.
That’s why it was so fascinating to see the crowd reactions in Brazil when then-UFC Women’s Bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey came to town for her title defense against Bethe Correia at UFC 190. Most people had expected Rousey to play the role of the foreign villain, with Correia acting as the plucky local challenger – but instead the script was flipped.
‘Rowdy Ronda’ was treated just as she was in the US – like a beloved rock star – and somehow, the fans in Rio de Janeiro were more behind her than they were ‘The Pitbull’. More than any other moment in Rousey’s UFC career, this felt like a tipping point for her – the moment in which she crossed the boundary from UFC superstar to cultural phenomenon.
And sure enough, the champion lived up to the billing; Correia came out to brawl and Rousey obliged her before turning her lights out with a right hand in an exchange in just 34 seconds. It was an unbelievable knockout worthy of winning any fight, and after a somewhat disappointing under card, it was the perfect way to end a big show for the promotion.
UFC 190 ended up drawing 900,000 buys on pay-per-view – cementing her as arguably the biggest draw in MMA at the time – and incredibly, although nobody would’ve guessed it at the time, it turned out to be Rousey’s final win inside the Octagon. 18 months later she’d be gone for good – after becoming one of the few foreign fighters to truly conquer Brazil.
#2 Aldo heads into the crowd – UFC 142
When the WEC’s roster – chock-full of the best lighter weight fighters in the world – was absorbed into the UFC at the start of 2011, everyone – UFC President Dana White included – predicted stardom for the Featherweight champion, Brazilian striker Jose Aldo. But while ‘Junior’ did win his first two Octagon outings, he didn’t quite catch on with the crowds like people had hoped.
Aldo never did get over as a true superstar with the crowds in the US, but his third UFC fight – the headliner of January 2012’s UFC 142, from Rio De Janeiro – saw him become an absolute superstar in Brazil after one wild moment of celebration. The 145lbs kingpin was faced with his toughest test to date in the form of unbeaten wrestler Chad Mendes, and many people questioned how he’d fare against arguably the best grappler in the division.
As it turned out, he had no problems whatsoever. A relatively low-key first round seemed to be petering out when Mendes grabbed hold of a rear waist lock, but his attempt to drag Aldo to the ground failed, and moments later, the Brazilian spun around into his opponent and uncorked a huge knee strike that sent him crashing down. A few follow-up punches landed, and the fight was over just a second before the buzzer sounded to end the round.
It was an incredible knockout, but it was what followed that really cemented Aldo’s rise to stardom. Rather than celebrate in the Octagon, Aldo vaulted the fence – and sprinted into the crowd to celebrate with the rabid Brazilian fans, scaring the UFC’s security team in the process. It was a classic moment, completely unplanned and completely unforgettable.
‘Junior’ would go onto have a further three title defenses in Brazil, winning two of them – but none were as memorable as this one.
#1 Anderson comes home – UFC 134
The UFC’s first visit to Brazil since 1998, August 2011’s UFC 134 was always going to be a momentous event, and throughout an epic card – which was chock-full of incredible submissions and knockouts and stands as one of the best shows the promotion has ever put on – things seemed to be building to a crescendo to mark the return to the country of arguably its biggest ever MMA superstar – Anderson Silva.
The reigning UFC Middleweight champion, Silva had held the title since October 2006, had defended it successfully on 8 occasions, and was widely recognized as the best pound-for-pound fighter on the planet, as well as one of the sport’s biggest drawing cards. He also hadn’t fought in Brazil since December 2003 – years before his UFC debut, let alone his rise to true stardom.
Silva was faced with top contender Yushin Okami, the last man to hand him a loss in MMA – albeit a questionable one; ‘The Spider’ had been disqualified for knocking out the Japanese fighter with illegal up-kicks. But ‘Thunder’ was much-improved from that fight, and had put together an impressive 10-2 record in the UFC, winning his last three bouts.
Nobody really expected an upset to happen, but stranger things had happened and you could’ve forgiven Silva if he’d come in looking overconfident. But of course, he didn’t, and instead, he delivered a virtuoso performance up there with the best of his career.
The crowd were deafening from the moment his theme song Ain’t No Sunshine hit, treating him like a conquering hero, and Okami appeared to be simply swallowed by the spotlight. He had no chance against Silva’s pinpoint accuracy on the feet, and the champion put him down twice before finally finishing things off midway through the second round.
The UFC had seen plenty of perfect endings to their shows before, but this was definitely up there with the best; Brazilian heroes like Mauricio ‘Shogun’ Rua and Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira also picked up big wins at UFC 134, but the fans in Rio had really paid to see Anderson Silva – and their hero delivered in every possible way, giving the promotion an unforgettable moment for their first trip to the country in over a decade.
