At PRIDE 25, he would defend his belt against Emelianenko, the young Russian Sambo expert who had become known as one of the best heavyweight fighters in the world.
Fedor came into the fight with only one loss on his record, a questionable TKO due to a cut suffered in the King of Kings 2000 tournament—a tourney that Nogueira later won. If Fedor hadn't been eliminated due to the cut, there is a distinct possibility that he would've faced Nogueira for the championship.
And so Nogueira defended his belt against Fedor, and for only the second time in his career, and the first time in PRIDE competition, he would lose. Emelianenko won by unanimous decision due to his ferocious ground and pound, and he would continue to hold the PRIDE Heavyweight title until the company was purchased by Zuffa in 2007 and folded into oblivion.
Nogueira went on another winning streak, scoring submission victories over Mirko Cro Cop, Hirotaka Yokoi, and Heath Herring, and moved on to face Fedor again at PRIDE Final Conflict 2004. The fight was halted in the first round when Emelianenko accidentally head-butted Nogueira and opened a cut over his own eye.
The rematch was scheduled for December at PRIDE Shockwave 2004, and there Fedor would once again best Nogueira. The story of the fight, however, is not Nogueira's loss, but the fact that Emelianenko simply could not finish him.
Fedor landed strike after strike and tried submission after submission, but the kid from Brazil simply would not, could not, give up. He'd been through too much, survived so many horrific things, that quitting in a fight simply was not an option to be considered.
In the middle of 2007, PRIDE had been purchased by Zuffa, and the UFC was in the process of signing former PRIDE superstars to compete against the top fighters under UFC contract.
Another stellar PRIDE heavyweight, Mirko Cro Cop, had come into the company with unprecedented hype. Cro Cop beat journeyman Eddie Sanchez in the first round of his UFC debut, and the hope was that the Croatian policeman would face heavyweight champion Randy Couture in August.
Gabriel Gonzaga had other plans, however, and he knocked Cro Cop out in the first round of their April 2007 fight with a nasty right high kick to steal his title shot and throw a wrench into the UFC title plans.
In July, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira made his UFC debut. Perhaps sensing that hyping PRIDE superstars wasn't a wise idea on the off chance that the same thing that happened to Cro Cop would happen to them, Nogueira's debut was understated and under-promoted.
He faced Heath Herring, a man that he'd already beaten twice while in PRIDE. This was an easy win which could set up Nogueira for a title shot later in the year.
Herring nearly disrupted those plans, however, knocking Nogueira down in the first round.
Like so many times in his career, Nogueira fought back from the brink of elimination and won a unanimous decision. This wasn't the first time Nogueira's steel heart had been on display, but it was the first time it had been exposed to the massive audience that Zuffa had built on the back of Chuck Liddell knockouts and The Ultimate Fighter.
Nogueira was scheduled to face Randy Couture late in 2007, but Couture decided he wanted more money, and quit the company, leaving Antonio holding the bag.
By December, it was apparent that Couture wasn't interested in fighting Nogueira. He wanted to fight Emelianenko, and used that desire as a cover for his absence from the company that made him a star.
After months of offering Couture a fight with Nogueira, Joe Silva and Dana White finally relented and created the Interim UFC Heavyweight Championship. Couture had to remain the title-holder on paper. Keeping the belt on Couture, at least in the public eye, forced the "champion clause" in Couture's contract to activate.
As long as "Captain America" held the UFC title, he was bound by law to fight for them until he lost the belt. For legal purposes only, Zuffa continued to recognize Couture as the heavyweight champion, but decided to match Antonio up with Tim Sylvia, the hated former champion, to determine an interim champion.
Nogueira met Sylvia on Feb. 2, 2001 in the main event of a card that had major hype due to the UFC debut of former NCAA Heavyweight champion and WWE superstar Brock Lesnar.
The fight took place in a different country, on a different continent, in a new company, and in front of new fans, but the end result was the same.
For almost three rounds, Sylvia beat Nogueira mercilessly, landing strikes at will. Nogueira was backed against the wall, and as the clock ticked down to the final moments of the fight, it was obvious that Sylvia would win a decision.
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