Two months ago it was announced that Chael Sonnen has hired Vinny Magalhaes to help him prepare for UFC Middleweight champion Anderson Silva. When some Brazilian fans expressed indignation, Vinny responded with indignation – “Shut the f— up” he explained.

“I do have all these responsibilities, so If you’re going to question why I’m going to train with Chael, why don’t you just pay me to sit at home and not go to Oregon, I will do that for you without a problem, but if you are not willing to do that, sometimes is just better not give your opinion and shut the f— up before you get all your facts straight.” “Also, I’m Not sure if it was noticed, but on the title of the thread it clearly says “HIRES”, I guess that makes it pretty clear that I’m not going there as a favor. And I guarantee that neither was Chael expecting me to leave my job and family just to help him as a favor.”

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Two months later, Magalhaes offered a kinder, gentler explanation.

“I like the guy, but I’m not friends with Anderson [Silva]. I’ve never trained with Anderson. I don’t have any of Anderson’s friends. So I had no problem training with Chael. I’ve talked to him [Silva] maybe like once or twice, and it was ‘Hey, what’s up?’ Nothing else. It’s not like we’ve had a serious conversation. It’s not like we’re really close friends. I haven’t been to Brazil in six or seven years. I haven’t had any kind of friendship with Anderson whatsoever. So I have no problems about training Chael, no problems whatsoever.” “Chael makes fun of a lot of things. … But he picks stuff up really fast. And the stuff that we worked on, I can guarantee you if he has the chance to use it in the fight, he will do it. If it’s a submission, if it’s a guard pass, whatever, I guarantee you he can do it. If he gets the chance, he can catch Anderson with something. “Chael’s a pretty good grappler. Even though he’s made mistakes in his fights, overall Chael’s a good grappler. He just makes mistakes in submission defense, so pretty much that’s what we worked on. And of course some attacks, control, some of that basic stuff.”

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