Anderson Silva's manager, Ed Soares, says "The Spider" has no intentions of vacating his UFC middleweight title. Following Silva's victory over Forrest Griffin at UFC 101 on Saturday, Yahoo! Sports' Dan Wetzel wrote, "With his arm wrapped around [Dana] White's shoulder, Soares leaned in and delivered a proposition. "Spider" Silva would move permanently to light heavyweight, even if it meant the unorthodox move of giving up his middleweight belt."
On Tuesday, Soares told FanHouse that he "never had that conversation" with White. FanHouse contacted Wetzel, and he stood by his report, noting that he witnessed the exchange after the event.
Regardless, Soares said Silva will not be dropping the title to permanently compete as a light heavyweight.
"That's not how Anderson feels, and that's not how we feel," he said. "We're not giving up the belt.
" ... We're not going to give up the belt, no. He has the 185-pound belt, Lyoto has the 205-pound belt, and that's how it's going to stay. Anderson is not going to fight Lyoto, and that's it."
White has hinted that Silva will defend his title against Dan Henderson next, but Soares said he doesn't consider Henderson to be the top contender in the UFC's middleweight division.
"If he wants to be a valid contender, I think he should fight the winner of Nate Marquardt against Demian Maia [at UFC 102], and that will provide a true No.1 contender."
When asked what he plans to do if or when the UFC offers a Henderson title fight, Soares quickly replied that, "We're going to explain to them our situation," and that he thinks White "will listen."
Silva defeated Henderson at UFC 82 in March 2008 via second-round rear naked choke submission in a UFC-PRIDE middleweight title unification bout. Since then, Henderson has won his last three fights in a row.
Soares said he believes Silva's next fight will be contested in the 205-pound weight class, unless the UFC can offer a "valid contender.""We'll fight super-fights at 205 [pounds] until a valid contender comes up," he said.
"We just want to fight the best guys that are possible to fight."
However, fans can forget about ever seeing Silva compete against current 205-pound champion Lyoto Machida, as both fighters are good friends and train together.
"I feel pretty confident that's not going to happen," Soares said.
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