Antonio Silva

Antonio Silva is a Brazilian mixed martial arts athlete. Tall and massive, he wins victories over more agile and athletic opponents thanks to his weight and skillful fighting tactics. There are many failures in his career, but he also has a lot of bright fights, even though in parallel he is forced to fight a serious illness.

Antonio Carlos Silva was born on September 14, 1979 in Brazil, in the city of Campina Grande. In many versions of the fighter's biography, there is a mention that he grew up in a poor family and found the opportunity to train in his youth with difficulty. After school, Silva worked as a car salesman, then as a cash collector, and only after moving with his family to Liverpool was able to start playing sports professionally.

The nickname Bigfoot (Bigfoot) Antonio acquired due to his appearance. The athlete suffers from acromegaly - damage to the anterior lobe of the pituitary gland, due to which the hands, feet and bones of the skull increase disproportionately, and facial features become coarse.

If you compare the photo of Silva with a difference of 5-7 years, you can see how his appearance changes - his chin, nose, ears grow. He is truly a huge fighter, 193cm tall and 120kg in weight, with a 2.03m arm span and 49m foot size. To compensate for the lack of speed and reaction, Silva had to develop a special fighting technique that combines the techniques of karate and jiu-jitsu.

Antonio's fighting career began in 2005. He began performing as a member of the Wolfslair MMA Academy English club. A year after the fight with Tadas Rinkevicius, Silva returned to Brazil.

In 2006 he became a member of the American Top Team. The first partner of Antoniu was the Georgian fighter Tengiz Teodoradze. The victory won by the Brazilian turned out to be very spectacular, and after 3 more successful fights, Silva received the status of Cage Rage champion in the heavy weight category and brought the record to 7 victories in a row, with all fights won ahead of schedule.

After one defeat to Eric Pele, he began a new winning streak of 6 wins in a row: Bigfoot defeated Fabricio Werdum, Andrey Orlovsky and Michael Kyle. The victory over the Russian heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko became a landmark for the fighter. Then Antoniu won by technical knockout - the doctors discovered an extensive hematoma of the eye in the Russian athlete and forbade him to continue the fight.

After the fight, Silva got into a conversation with his former rival at an official reception and subsequently spoke of Emelianenko with warmth and respect. When Fedor announced that he wanted to end his career, the Brazilian wrote to him on Instagram:

In the semifinals of the Strikeforce Grand Prix tournament, after the fight with Emelianenko, Silva was scheduled to meet with Alistair Overeem, but the fight did not take place - Alistair left the competition, citing injury. Instead, Daniel Cormier came out to Antonio. Experts considered Bigfoot the main contender for the championship title, but he was knocked out in the first round and dropped out.

Silva joined the UFC in 2012. He lost his debut fight with Kane Velazquez - the American knocked him out in the final round. Later, Antonio tried to take revenge, but could not, but then he quickly rehabilitated himself, defeating Alistair Overeem and Travis Brown.

In 2013, Antonio entered the ring against Mark Hunt. The aggressive heavyweight fight was the best fight of the evening and formally ended in a draw, but Silva unexpectedly failed the doping tests conducted after the end of the competition. Doctors found in his blood a highly elevated level of testosterone, which indicated the use of anabolic steroids. The fighter was punished, suspended from participation in battles for a year and fined $ 2,500, and the results of the battle with Hunt were canceled.

Manager Antoniu called the athlete's illness the reason for the doping scandal - allegedly Novadex, which belongs to the steroid class, he takes from acromegaly. He stressed that Silva is forced to spend from $ 6 thousand to $ 8 thousand monthly only on medicines to maintain his health.

This defeat marked the beginning of a black streak in Silva's career. When he returned to the ring, out of the next 7 fights he was able to win only one - with Soa Palelei. Having lost to Frank Mir, he worried for a long time and took a break to rethink what had happened and start his career anew.

Soon, the athlete decided to leave the UFC. He was offered a contract with the Russian promotion of Fight Nights, which Silva was very happy about: this promised not only new career, but also financial prospects. As for the illness, Bigfoot said he felt great after a successful operation, and in the new organization, the fighter received permission to use TRT - testosterone replacement therapy, which was banned for his UFC members.

In 2016, Silva, as part of the contract, competed in Yekaterinburg, where he fought Ivan Shtyrkov. The audience fervently supported the Brazilian, but the victory still remained with the Russian. However, it was given to him at a high price: after the fight, Ivan remained lying in the ring, where he received medical assistance for about half an hour. In the press conference after the battle, Shtyrkov was also unable to participate.

In 2017, Antoniu took part in a professional kickboxing tournament in China. The fight with heavyweight champion Rico Verhoeven was unsuccessful: the opponent was far superior to Bigfoot in agility and speed, so that most of the blows of the UFC veteran were "blank". Under the pressure of Verhoeven, he repeatedly lost his balance, and in the last round he missed a blow to the head and lost.

Antonio Silva is married. His wife's name is Paula Aranha, together they are raising three children.

According to the athlete, he rarely sees his loved ones because of the intense training regimen - Bigfoot has not yet finished his contract with Fight Nights, and he is forced to stay in Russia, while his wife, daughters and son live in Brazil. Antonio misses them very much and hopes that in the near future he will be able to devote more time to his personal life and raising children.

Today, the fighter continues to engage in mixed martial arts and, according to him, intends to hold out for about 2 more years. In early 2018, Silva suffered a knee injury and took more than six months to recover, but he has now resumed training.

The end of his career is just around the corner, and Antoniu is thinking about what to do after leaving the ring. The Brazilian plans to open his own gym, where he is going to teach children the art of jiu-jitsu.

2005 - Elite Xtreme Combat Champion 2013 - UFC Heavyweight Title Contender

Antonio Silva 's estimated Net Worth, Salary, Income, Cars, Lifestyles & many more details have been updated below.

Let's check, How Rich is Antonio Silva in 2020?

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2021

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.8M in 2021. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $845.1K - $1.9M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2020

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.2M in 2020. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $542K - $1.4M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2019

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.3M in 2019. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $662.5K - $1.8M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2018

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.7M in 2018. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $658.3K - $1.1M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2017

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.7M in 2017. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $748.1K - $1.4M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2016

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.5M in 2016. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $519.8K - $1.2M.

Antonio Silva Net Worth 2015

Antonio Silva 's revenue is $1.4M in 2015. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Antonio Silva and could vary in the range between $828.2K - $1.5M.

It is an overall forecast for the net worth of Antonio Silva. The evaluation covers the latest 5 years and an approximation for next year. See above to learn how much money does Antonio Silva makes a year.

The range above shows an estimation based on evaluation generated by public information about sponsorships or other sources found on the internet. It's summarized data from Antonio Silva's projects existing in AidWiki's repository. It's an approximation of the revenue compiled by AidWiki and may not correspond with the real amount.