Vitor Belfort: Fast Hands, Maturity and Motherly Love Defy Critics

By Ben Turner

In the blistering yellow sky that sneaks past yet another cold, steel-gray desert night in Las Vegas, the air feels different here. Grown men are crying this morning, but unlike most nights, the tears are not just shed over squandered bank accounts or the unrequited love of exotic dancers. With the Ultimate Fighting Championship behind them, warriors of martial combat awake to cry, quite literally, over utter defeat, or alternatively, splendid victory.

At UFC 43, just moments after a dominating win over his opponent, one such fighter, flustered and teary-eyed amidst a career-changing victory that took mere seconds, cried out, "We did it momma!"

In barely one minute, a young but seasoned ultimate fighter from Brazil, Vitor Belfort, had dispatched his opponent in a seemingly incessant flurry of knees, punches, and primordial human fury. The 25 year old former champion threw his hands into the air to celebrate a blindingly fast victory that shocked both ultimate fighting fans and press pundits alike, who have offered constant, if misguided, criticism, analysis, and hackneyed editorial copy.

While commentary about Vitor's new hairstyle and religious beliefs dominated much of the pre-fight press coverage, Vitor himself demonstrated a far greater maturity than the armchair psychologists who consistently question Vitor's own mindset. With deadpan, Vitor bore into an Ultimate Fighting interview camera to address his much criticized fight record. "Sport is that way. Sometimes the best lose."

The press, and even Ultimate Fighting's own hired hands, are quick to categorize Vitor's varied fighting styles as either the "Old Vitor" or the "New Vitor." Yet such tersely described, unimaginative commentary simply does not foot to an ultimate fighter, who in the course of a nearly decade-long career, has defeated opponents through an evolving fighting style that perfectly matches Belfort's own strengths to his opponent's weaknesses. To the detestation of short-sighted pundits, such a fighting style results in unpredictable battles, in which Belfort might alternatively thrash his opponents in a flurry of strikes-to the lauding of expectant fans-or alternatively dominate his opponents through a methodical and carefully timed synthesis of striking, wrestling, and jiu-jitsu.

Such incongruous and unpredictable behavior leaves most pundits scratching their heads and falling back to the"old Vitor" and "new Vitor" taxonomies, for these pundits lack the analytical skills necessary to deal with a fighter who does not obediently obey expectation and prediction.

Further, as in any sport, even the best athletes, with the most strategic of plans, will lose, as Belfort himself was quick to point out during a pre-fight interview. The difference in Belfort's situation, however, is that defeat was consistently tinged with injury.

Belfort's unpredictable fighting style and varied, cross-trained strengths has typically spelled misfortune for opponents who entrench themselves in the belief that Vitor is simply either a quick-fisted puncher inclined to tire himself within the first minute, or a sodden ground and pound brute seeking a judge's decision. Rather, Belfort's sublime combination of boxing, wrestling, Muay-Thai, and jiu-jitsu typically leaves fans and opponents equally stunned, from Heath Herring, to most recently, Marvin Eastman.

Upon replay of Vitor's dominating victory over Eastman, Ultimate Fighting commentator Joe Rogan exclaimed, "He deson't give you a chance to recover!"

Indeed, after a perfectly timed series of knees from the clinch, Belfort unleashed a barrage of punches that left Eastman dazed and defenseless, before the referee flew into the mix to separate the fighters from further carnage. The most tangible and graphic consequence of the seconds long bout was a deep gash that stretched across Eastman's forehead. During a close-up of the wound that prompted some of loudest fan reaction of the night, Rogan aptly noted that the wound appeared to have been left by an axe, rather than any knee or punch.

In the aftermath of Belfort's dominating victory, pundits will undoubtedly lead with predictable and obedient exclamations that Vitor is "back." But fans hoping to predict Belfort's next fight need not crane their memory to search for some disparate silhouette of a 19 year old Vitor smashing his opponents in a 30 second long fury of wild punches. The "old Vitor" never left-those fast hands have only merged with a brilliant aptitude for wrestling, Muay-Thai, and Jiu-Jitsu.

In fact, anticipation over Belfort's next fight will prove to be a just-in-time relief to fans weary of a never-ending soap-opera of lawyers, agents, and deal negotiations that overshadow the battles within the octagon. Now armed with a healthy Vitor Belfort, Zuffa should hope that such unnecessary drama and the fighters who prompt them will fade away as a cautionary footnote in the annals of Ultimate Fighting history.