Why Chuck Liddell Will KTFO Shogun Rua and Anderson Silva Will Retain His Gold

The next official UFC event will be held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and it's named UFC 97: Redemption.

The last time the UFC was in Montreal, history was made as the fans sold out the Bell Center in no time, and saw their hero Georges St-Pierre win back his welterweight title from Matt "The Terror" Serra.

Although Georges will not be featured in the next event to drop by my home town of Montreal, the fans will be pleased to see the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world, Anderson Silva, and former UFC poster boy Chuck Liddell compete.

The first man to fight that night will be former UFC light-heavyweight champion Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell, his opponent...former PRIDE star Mauricio "Shogun" Rua.

Liddell was the man back in 2005 and 2006 but when he lost the title to Quinton Jackson at UFC 71, his career went crumbling down. Next thing you know, Chuck loses to underdog Keith Jardine at UFC 76, before getting KO'd by Rashad Evans at UFC 88.

The man everybody thought was unstoppable, was on a serious downward spiral and was about to hit rock bottom.

Mauricio "Shogun" Rua is just 27-years-old. He fought the top competition back in PRIDE and earned key victories over the likes of Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Quinton Jackson, Alistair Overeem and Kevin Randleman.

Coming off an impressive first round KO victory over Alistair Overeem at PRIDE 33, "Shogun" signed with the UFC.

Highly considered by most to be the best 205 fighter at the time, Rua made his UFC debut against Forrest Griffin at UFC 76, the same night Liddell lost to Jardine.

In what was a huge surprise to many fans, Rua's tank was empty after the first round and Forrest went on to choke him out in the third round. Many considered it an upset and left wondering what had happened to Shogun?

At UFC 93, Mauricio Rua had the chance to show that his first UFC fight was a bad night when he fought arch nemesis Mark Coleman. Rua went on to win the fight by TKO in the third round, but his performance was less then impressive as he got tired very early in the fight again.

At UFC 97, both these men are looking to get back on track in what could possibly be a "loser leaves town" fight. Another loss for either men at this point could mean the end. Rua hasn't shown any cardio in his fights and didn't even look impressive when he won over Coleman. A lot of people say that Chuck is at the end of the roll and should retire.

One thing is for sure, both men need to bring it.

Shogun has 14 KO wins in a total of 17 fights, but most of those wins were due to kicks to his opponents head, something you can't do in the UFC.

Chuck Liddell seems to be focused for the fight, he really wants to be a champion again, is it possible? I don't know but I think that Chuck wants the fight so bad and with Rua's crappy cardio, I can't see this fight ending with anything else then Chuck KTFO over Shogun.

The main event that night, will feature the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world and the current UFC middleweight champion Anderson "The Spider" Silva.

That night, Silva will try to set not one but two all-time UFC records. He will try to break Royce Gracie's record of most consecutive wins, which is eight, and he will try to retain his title for a record fifth time, something that has never been done.

His opponent is a BJJ black belt named Thales Leites. Leites lost his first UFC fight but he's perfect after that with five consecutive wins.

Many people consider this to be an easy fight for the middleweight champion but Thales Leites has a very good ground game, one of the best in MMA today and that could possibly pose a problem to Anderson.

Silva is known for his outstanding striking ability and pin-point accuracy but his only losses (counting out his DQ loss and debut) are by submission. Many people were unimpressed with Silva's performance against Patrick Cote at UFC 90. Even the champion was unhappy with his performance and decided to go two more rounds with his training partners in his locker room right after the fight.

If the same Anderson Silva shows up at UFC 97 in Montreal, Thales Leites just might have the chance to take out the dominant champion and win the gold.

But it's probably not the best time to fight Anderson Silva considering he was disappointed with his last performance and wants to bring the pain at UFC 97. Silva has also been working a lot on his BJJ skills since his two submission losses with the Nogueira brothers.

It's hard to imagine Anderson Silva losing to Thales Leites, not saying Leites is not a good fighter, but Silva is on a level all his own.

If you guys want to bet on an outcome for this one, put money on Anderson Silva with a TKO win in the first round.