Back in 2010, Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen faced off for the first time at UFC 117 in what was already a controversial fight. UFC President Dana White famously declared that if Silva fought against Sonnen like he did in his previous fight, he would expel him from UFC, middle heavyweight champion or not. In their fight, Sonnen dominated Silva for the first four rounds, before Silva flipped the script and caught him in a triangle arm bar to force the submission.

Soon after, it was revealed that Sonnen had tested positive for elevated testosterone, so White suspended him for a year. Since then, Silva has been quite clear about how he plans to approach this fight. And Silva’s “mentor” Steven Seagal believes that this fight won’t even be close.

Meanwhile, Tito Ortiz has the chance to retire (sort of) on top, as he and Forrest Griffin will finally close the book on their rivalry. Ortiz defeated Griffin at UFC 59 in 2006 and Griffin took the victory at UFC 106 in 2009. The last time Ortiz won was one year ago at UFC 132, making him a depressing 1-6-1 in his last 8 fights. Fingers crossed for a storybook ending for the guy who made an honest duck woman out of Jenna Jameson.

Join us tomorrow night at 8 PM ET for the preliminary fights on FX, and at 10 PM ET for the pay-per-view event. Share this discussion with your senseis and pupils on Facebook and Twitter tomorrow night, and unlock the mystical Steven Seagal “TEACHER” badge.

If Anderson Silva finally getting mad and threatening to break every bone and tooth in Chael Sonnen’s body didn’t get you excited for Silva vs. Sonnen II at UFC 148 next month, maybe THE SILVER SPIDER VS. THE AMERICAN GANGSTA will.

That’s the comic series UFC is using to promote their next event, with a new panel showing up every day on Facebook. If you’re like most people your first reaction will be, “why didn’t they call him the ‘Silva’ spider and put the hard ER on the end of ‘gansta’? Would Chael Sonnen call himself a ‘gangsta’?” Your second reaction will be to scroll down a little and laugh out loud at Steven Seagal’s cameo.

They’re updating the comic every day until July 7, so check out what we’ve got so far. Keeping my fingers crossed for a Booster Gold crossover at some point.

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Over the past few months, all of our Anderson Silva updates have been ridiculous — like watching him dress up as Michael Jackson for Rolling Stone Brazil, fight Steven Seagal over terrible beer or judge gigantic South American asses. UFC 148: Silva vs. Sonnen II is coming up on July 7, so the big question has been, “When is Anderson going to flip the switch from Bieber-hugging Burger King spokesperson to monster UFC Middleweight Champion and rage the shit out of this guy who’s been trying to piss him off for two years?”

That question has been answered: the UFC 148 conference call.

“First of all, Chael is a criminal. He’s been convicted of crimes. He doesn’t deserve to be inside the Octagon. And when the time is right, I’m going to break his face and break every one of his teeth in his mouth.”

Go on.

“The playtime is over. I’m gonna beat Chael like he’s never been beat before. There’s no more talking. I know he’s on the line listening, and the game’s over. I’m going to beat his ass out of the UFC. He’s never gonna want to fight again after I’m done with him.”

If that’s not enough to make you want to cut a piece of posterboard into the shape of a tombstone, write “R.I.P. SONNEN” on it and bring it to UFC 148, may Silva’s extended thoughts will be. In addition to breaking his teeth and beating him so badly he’ll never want to fight again, Silva promises which bones he’llbreak, from what angle he’ll break them and how badly he wants Sonnen to know it. I know these guys are professional fighters and everything, but if Silva ever said this about me I’d just jump off a bridge and be done with it:

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UFC’s Middleweight Champion and longest reigning champion Anderson Silva is on the cover of Rolling Stone Brazil, and Rolling Stone’s only two ideas for photos are “take off your clothes” and “do something stupid”. Thankfully Anderson Silva is awesome and could make either of those great, and since he’s already taken off his clothes, here’s him doing something stupid.

Silva wears two different Michael Jackson outfits — Thriller era Jackson with his red leather coat of zippers and post-Moonwalker Smooth Criminal-ish fedora-and-kneesocks Jackson. He really goes for it, too, doing a solid job of spinning and kicking and fey hand gesturing and yelling. You can check out the video below, before Chael Sonnen’s head explodes and blood gets all over it:

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“In the future, we should each get a beer.”
“Bitch, you don’t have a future.”

(h/t to Lobster Mobster)

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A rematch between Middleweight Champion Anderson Silva and challenger Chael Sonnen has been formally set and scheduled for June 23 at 50,000ish-seat Joao Havelange Stadium in Rio de Janeiro.

If you don’t remember the first fight from UFC 117 back in 2010, Sonnen “dominated”. I put dominated in quotation marks because he controlled the fight for five rounds and submitted to a triangle armbar with a minute to go, but when you write about it you have to say he DOMINATED~. Apparently Sonnen’s spent the last two years only reading the first half of sentences, because he’s responded to Silva’s suggestion that he quit talking and start training with the most hilarious amount of talking ever.

A partial transcript, courtesy of Cage Potato:

I’m not fighting you in Brazil, I’m not fighting you in Chicago, I’m not fighting you in Florida. I’m fighting you in the Octagon. And when you get in there and I get in there, I’m gonna stomp you this time the same as I did last time. You can complain about your rib. I’m sure your rib *did* hurt. Your rib is inside of a coward. That’s the problem your rib’s got. It’s got the same problem your hands and feet have — they’re attached to *you*, dummy! I’m gonna be attached to you too, for 25 minutes or until you give up.

At this point, Sonnen’s “heel” gimmick is starting to sound a little too much like a Will Ferrell character trying to be threatening. YOUR RIB HURT BECAUSE YOUR RIB IS INSIDE OF A COWARD is the kind of thing you say when you’re wearing a fake mustache and trying to make someone laugh.

Video of Sonnen’s comments is after the jump.

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