Anderson Silva

Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight champion Anderson Silva has a new, big contract and big, new plans. On the back burner now is his previous plan to try professional boxing, replaced by an ambition to entrench his reputation as the world's top mixed martial arts fighter with a willingness to fight the best opponents possible — from welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre to heavyweight king Brock Lesnar. "I want to go out there and keep putting on great performances," Silva said through Ed Soares, his manager and interpreter.

Forrest Griffin and Tito Ortiz have weathered so much between their first meeting in 2006 and the renewal that came Saturday night. A title won and lost by Griffin. A career-threatening back injury by Ortiz. A bitter contract split between Ortiz and the Ultimate Fighting Championship. A loss that Griffin admitted "broke me" just earlier this year. That's why the UFC put these two in the main event of UFC 106 Saturday night at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, to see who had what left.

At any weight class, Anderson Silva is proving too tough to beat. Silva used an electrifying performance to prove his bump up in weight class was the right one, dropping Forrest Griffin with a devastating right punch and a first-round knockout in a light-heavyweight bout at UFC 101 on Saturday night. Silva (25-4) bobbed his head as he toyed with Griffin (16-6) for the few minutes they were in the cage before putting him away at 3:23. Silva, the UFC middleweight champion, convincingly did his part to stake his claim as the top pound-for-pound fighter in mixed martial arts.

Anderson Silva is the longest reigning champion in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He hasn't lost in five UFC fights, and his most serious challenger in the middleweight division is Temecula's Dan Henderson, whom Silva fights tonight at UFC 82 in Columbus, Ohio. Another victory affirms Silva's status as UFC's best pound-for-pound fighter, and could possibly leave him void of any legitimate competition in a beaten-up middleweight division.