Wanderlei Silva In Pride's Open Weight Grand Prix

Fedor Emelienenko has been forced to withdraw from the upcoming second round for the Open Weight Grand Prix. Doctors are not going to remove the steel rods from his hand until June at the earliest. This will not give him enough time to prepare for the tournament in July.

Pride found a suitable replacement naming the "Axe Murderer" Wanderlei Silva to take his spot. Wanderlei has been rumored to be close to signing with the K-1 promotion, so this has come as a surprise to the MMA community. This is official so Silva will join perhaps the greatest tournament lineup ever with Antonio Nogueira, Josh Barnett, Fabricio Werdum, Mirko Cro Cop, Kazuyuki Fujita, Mark Hunt, and Hidehiko Yoshida.

Soon Pride will announce the fight card and we'll see who fights whom.