This Day in MMA History: Oct. 17
It was meant to be a slaughter, but UFC owners miscalculated just
who would do the demolishing.
Eleven years ago to this day, in a tent propped up on the great Mississippi’s bank outside the Casino Magic gambling hall in Bay St. Louis, eternal underdog Randy Couture battered and broke favorite Vitor Belfort at UFC 15 to cement one of the sport’s greatest upsets.
Belfort, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt with lightening-fast power punches to match at the ripe age of 20, was the UFC’s next great star, and Couture --- a two-week replacement who’d won the heavyweight tournament at UFC 13 -- was the sacrificial lamb. The problem is somebody forgot to tell the 33-year-old newcomer that.
Bouncing around the Octagon in wait for Belfort, who’d come down with a bad case of jitters and didn’t appear for 20 minutes after the intros, Couture waved off the delay with a smile.
“Ten minutes later, Belfort was on the ramp, nervousness washed all over his face. He just had that look in his eyes,” Couture wrote in his New York Times best-selling autobiography “Becoming The Natural – My Life In and Out of the Cage.” “He was fidgeting with his hands and had this deer-in-the-headlights expression. It only fed the fire of my belief that I was going to win the fight.”
And win Couture did, clipping the Brazilian at the top with a staunch jab to his cheek, and then an uppercut in the clinch before the Greco-Roman wrestler swept Belfort off his feet at the 7:43 mark. The toasted youngster retreated to his knees, but Couture pursued and finished with a flurry of fists that convinced referee “Big” John McCarthy to intervene.
“I was told later that UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz screamed, ‘No, no!’ in the production trailer because I ruined his plans,” wrote Couture.
Couture would have a knack for spoiling many best-laid plans over the next eleven years, and remind the sport time and again that age is only a number for those strong in will and mind.
And the dynamic pair’s first encounter –- which they’d reprise two more times in 2004 -- would do nothing to hamper a mutual respect and friendship that has developed rapidly over the last couple of years. Belfort joined Xtreme Couture Mixed Martial Arts in 2007, and the old man played training partner and confidante to the ingénue in his victory over Terry Martin at Affliction “Banned” on July 19.
Eleven years ago to this day, in a tent propped up on the great Mississippi’s bank outside the Casino Magic gambling hall in Bay St. Louis, eternal underdog Randy Couture battered and broke favorite Vitor Belfort at UFC 15 to cement one of the sport’s greatest upsets.
Belfort, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt with lightening-fast power punches to match at the ripe age of 20, was the UFC’s next great star, and Couture --- a two-week replacement who’d won the heavyweight tournament at UFC 13 -- was the sacrificial lamb. The problem is somebody forgot to tell the 33-year-old newcomer that.
Bouncing around the Octagon in wait for Belfort, who’d come down with a bad case of jitters and didn’t appear for 20 minutes after the intros, Couture waved off the delay with a smile.
“Ten minutes later, Belfort was on the ramp, nervousness washed all over his face. He just had that look in his eyes,” Couture wrote in his New York Times best-selling autobiography “Becoming The Natural – My Life In and Out of the Cage.” “He was fidgeting with his hands and had this deer-in-the-headlights expression. It only fed the fire of my belief that I was going to win the fight.”
And win Couture did, clipping the Brazilian at the top with a staunch jab to his cheek, and then an uppercut in the clinch before the Greco-Roman wrestler swept Belfort off his feet at the 7:43 mark. The toasted youngster retreated to his knees, but Couture pursued and finished with a flurry of fists that convinced referee “Big” John McCarthy to intervene.
“I was told later that UFC owner Bob Meyrowitz screamed, ‘No, no!’ in the production trailer because I ruined his plans,” wrote Couture.
Couture would have a knack for spoiling many best-laid plans over the next eleven years, and remind the sport time and again that age is only a number for those strong in will and mind.
And the dynamic pair’s first encounter –- which they’d reprise two more times in 2004 -- would do nothing to hamper a mutual respect and friendship that has developed rapidly over the last couple of years. Belfort joined Xtreme Couture Mixed Martial Arts in 2007, and the old man played training partner and confidante to the ingénue in his victory over Terry Martin at Affliction “Banned” on July 19.
