Few Americans were given the opportunity to experience UFC 134 in Rio de Janeiro, and Sparta's Dan Miller felt every bit of the trip.
Miller came up short in a unanimous decision on Saturday at the HSBC Arena in Rio, falling by decision to Rousimar Palhares in a middleweight bout broadcast on Spike TV.
The main event was also in the division, as Anderson Silva defended his belt with a second-round TKO of Yushin Okami. Felipe Arantes, a Brazilian featherweight who trains at Macaco Gold Team in Newark, was beaten via decision by Yuri Alcantara, as the 23-year-old had difficulty generating offense off his back.
While the raucous crowd, which UFC president Dana White deemed the best to ever attend a UFC event, added flair to an exciting card, it was Miller and Palhares who teamed up to provide the moment of the night.
In the first round, Palhares landed a kick to the side of Miller's head, knocking the Garden Stater to the canvas. Palhares then got on top of Miller and began flailing away with punches. Miller did his best to cover up and referee Herb Dean was ready to step in and hand him the first stoppage loss of his career when Palhares suddenly stood up, began to celebrate and leaped to the top of the cage with his hands raised, thinking he won the fight.
He hadn't. Miller took a moment to recover, fully aware of what was going on. In fact, a nearly identical scenario played out in an EliteXC fight in 2008 with Cristiane "Cyborg" Santos playing Palhares to Shayna Baszler's Miller.
Miller approached Palhares, but Dean did not let him engage, instead ordering the Brazilian back on his feet in the Octagon and restarting the fight from a standing position. Improbably, Miller stuck Palhares with a straight right hand that floored the Brazilian, and it appeared the most unlikely comeback in UFC history was under way.
Palhares survived Miller's ground strikes and was able to get to his feet and drive Miller to the fence in the waning moments of the round. Palhares got Miller to the mat as the bell sounded and unleashed a combination of punches to the head clearly after the bell, but was not penalized.
As the second round started, Palhares eye-poked Miller, but Dean did not see it. Palhares bloodied Miller above the left eye and took advantage, pummeling him by keeping Miller on his back in a dominant round. But his position was aided by grabbing the fence a number of times, again with no penalty.
Miller was losing the fight but gaining fans' respect, if the reaction on Twitter was any judge. He picked apart Palhares on the feet in the third round, which was fought in slow motion compared to the zany antics of the first two stanzas. Despite his efforts, Miller lost on all three judges' scorecards by the curious scores of 30-25, 30-27 and 29-27.
With the Millers, it's always a family affair. Dan had just been to Milwaukee at the beginning of the month to corner his younger and lighter brother, Jim, for his fight with Ben Henderson. As usual, Jim was there to return the favor on Saturday. Holding up Dan's banner during pre-fight introductions were Jim, AMA Fight Club head man Mike Constantino and the Millers' mother.
On Sunday, Constantino, whose gyms are in Whippany and Pompton Lakes, and Dan Miller went to the beach to hand out AMA gear to some locals from the favelas before heading back to North Jersey.
As for the rest of the fight card, it might have been the first time in UFC history that not a single American won a match. Miller had some countrymen as company in the loss column.
Forrest Griffin was knocked out in the first round by Mauricio "Shogun" Rua in a match of former light heavyweight champions. Brendan Schaub was KO'd in the first round by former heavyweight title holder Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira. Thiago Tavares wiped out Spencer Fisher in the second round of their lightweight bout. Welterweight Paulo Thiago cruised to a decision victory over David Mitchell. In the only bout that involved no Brazilians, Canada's Yves Jabouin beat Ian Loveland of Oregon in a decision at bantamweight.
In the other fights, Brazil's Edson Barboza defeated Englishman Ross Pearson via split decision, and Bulgarian Stanislav Nedkov scored a first-round TKO of Brazlian Luiz Cane. In a pair of all-Brazilian matches, Raphael Assuncao topped Johnny Eduardo via unanimous decision, and Erick Silva scored a TKO of Luis Ramos 40 seconds into their fight.
Barboza and Pearson each were awarded a $100,000 bonus for fight of the night, when it appeared Miller and Palhares were destined for the honor.
Instead, Miller will just have to settle for Rio.
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