Former UFC light heavyweight champion Forrest Griffin will go down as one of the men responsible for putting the promotion on the map. However, nobody who watched his fight against Anderson Silva, back in 2009 would actually credit him for being the great fighter he was. Funnily enough, Griffin himself laughs when he gets reminded of the embarrassment that Silva unleashed upon him on that night.
An old clip of Griffin from 2010 is going viral, where he is on a podcast. A fan calls on the show and asks if the rumors of him fighting Jon Jones were true. Griffin, without missing a beat, claims he hopes not.
“I hope I am not fighting Jon ‘Bones’ Jones (Laughs). I mean, f*ck it. If I have to, I will do it. But I am not even training right now. That’s a bad dude. That dude will whoop my a**. But f**k it. What the worse… It couldn’t be worse than Anderson Silva. It can’t be worse than that, right?”
At this point, everyone involved in the podcast is losing their absolute mind. And then, Griffin takes it a step further and recaps how the Silva fight actually went. For most fans, it was a one-sided affair and established Silva on the path to GOAThood. Griffin claims he couldn’t go anywhere without people asking what actually happened to him during that fight!
“‘What happened, what happened?’ You know what happened?“, he begins explaining. When one of his co-hosts says, ‘he punched you in the chin’, Griffin hilariously adds, “Repeatedly“!
“And I was very confused. And I tried to punch him.”
Emphasizing that he really tried, Griffin, who could barely hold his laughter at this point, added
“I tried to punch him. He literally moved his head out of the way and looked at me like I was stupid for doing it. He looked at me like, ‘Why would you do such a stupid thing? He looked at me like, ‘Oh, did you really think you are going to hit me! What a stupid thing to think! You slow, slow white boy.'”
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Well, having watched this hilarious commentary, if you are wondering if he was exaggerating… he really wasn’t! That is exactly how the fight went. Griffin just called it play-by-play like a commentator would have.
Wait! That’s not even the end of the story. Griffin had the perfect analogy to wrap it up.
“And then he punched me! And I felt embarrassed for even trying to punch him. I felt like some kid trying to wrestle with his dad.”
But while this clip of Griffin being a clown and making fun of himself has gone viral many a time, it would be an injustice to forget that the UFC wouldn’t be what it is today without him.
Griffin vs Bonnar
Often when fighters retire from the sport, they tend to start podcasts. At least that’s the route the most popular fighters go. But some decide to give back to the sport. They go into coaching, some start martial arts schools. Some even call out Jake Paul for a boxing match.
But Griffin’s history with the sport is literally tied to the inception of the UFC as the global force it is known as today. Without his fight with Stephen Bonnar for the finale of the Ultimate Fighter’s first season, the company could have very likely gone under.
Due to a series of miraculous events, this fight managed to have a viewership, unlike anything the promotion had seen before. However, it all boiled down to Bonnar and Griffin on the night.
The two went at it from the get-go. It wasn’t the most technical fight but it didn’t need to be. It was a brutal striking match with a lot of heart. Neither wanted to give their opponent an inch and by the end of the second round, the whole arena was shaking as fans witnessing the fight live were stomping their feet in approval.
More than three million people actually tuned in to watch them beat each other within an inch of their lives. In the end, Griffin won by unanimous decision. But the fight was so impressive that Dana White awarded both him and Bonnar contracts with the promotion and the rest is history!
