He returns! On Feburary 12th, Fedor Emelianenko is set to take on Antonio Silva in a heavyweight main event from the Izod Center in East Rutherford, N.J.

The world has reacted in a number of ways towards the once pound for pound king since his June, 26th 2009 loss to Fabricio Werdum. Some say he was exposed, some say it was luck and he got caught, but no matter what they say he has plummeted from the tops of many if not all the rankings and is in a position to where he has to prove himself again.

Prove himself? Really? The man who was once deemed a machine has somehow made he way into the view of skeptics.

While easily being the number one topic in MMA (Fedor's credibility that is) he has remained one the most humble men in all of sports. And when I say his credibility is in question I mean IN QUESTION. Normally when a legend of his sport loses its a big deal, even more so if he has never tasted defeat before, but in Fedor's situation he has been bombarded with negative comments since the June loss.

Many are reluctant to give Fedor credit because he's not in the UFC. Therefore he comes off as scared to some of the public eye due to his own reluctance to join the quote unquote "big leagues" of MMA. Many new MMA fans have only been exposed to the UFC, and are not familiar with the way Fedor dominated the world of MMA over in Japan. Many don't know that he destroyed many of the best heavyweights to ever compete in the prime of their careers. Finally, one thing that people fail to realize, maybe their lust to see Fedor in the UFC shadows reality or whatever reason that may apply. The fact of the matter is we don't know what happened in those negotiations and probably never will and if we did we are only going to believe what we want and interpret it the way we want anyways.

When Anderson Silva loses is he no longer good? Now that B.J. is no longer the champ is he washed up? The answer to both of those questions are easily replied no by 99% of the MMA world. So why is it that with one loss has "The Last Emperor" went from the best ever to a never was? 

MMA fans are like any other professional sports fans, outside of the die hards their going to like what the masses like until they get upended by the next underdog.

For more on Fedor's return stay logged into Buddhasport.com