Anderson Silva hits back at Dana White: 'I saved the promotion more than once'

Anderson Silva has fired back at UFC president Dana White after White told Rolling Stone that the former middleweight champion “won’t talk to me to this day” following his release from the promotion in 2020 — and Silva made clear he has not forgotten the slight.

Responding in the comments of an Instagram post, Silva wrote in Portuguese: “The bald guy saying (sh*t). I’ve been out of the organization for many years already, but apparently neither the current fighters nor the bald guy himself can forget my accomplishments. Deep down, the bald guy knows that with me there was no whining, everybody got beat up, and I saved the promotion more than once. And just so we’re clear, it seems like the bald guy doesn’t know how to count.”

That final jab at White’s arithmetic is a direct reference to the UFC president claiming Silva had “lost like 8 or 9 or 10 in a row” before his departure. In reality, Silva lost three consecutive fights to close his UFC career — defeats to Israel Adesanya, Jared Cannonier, and Uriah Hall — with Hall’s stoppage in October 2020 marking his final appearance in the organisation.

White’s Rolling Stone interview acknowledged that Silva was unhappy with how his final chapter in the UFC was handled. White said he told Silva “it’s over” at age 40, a conversation that apparently left a lasting wound.

Silva’s broader record in the UFC gives weight to his frustration. He reigned as middleweight champion with 16 consecutive wins inside the organisation, delivering title defences that remain among the most celebrated in the sport’s history — including victories over Dan Henderson, Chael Sonnen, and Vitor Belfort. He also moved up to light heavyweight and went 3-0 with three first-round knockouts, one of them a widely replayed dismantling of former champion Forrest Griffin.

Since leaving the UFC, Silva has competed exclusively in boxing, defeating Julio Cesar Chavez Jr., Tito Ortiz, and Tyron Woodley, with a loss to Jake Paul the only blemish on that record. He has not competed under MMA rules since parting ways with the promotion.