Jim Ross via his website on UFC 117: "UFC 117 was one of the best, if not THE best, MMA PPV that I've ever seen, from start to finish. The live crowd in Oakland was well mic'ed and made plenty of noise thanks to the action that they were seeing in the Octagon."

"Chael Sonnen deserves massive credit for verbally selling this fight either by making himself more of a fan favorite/underdog can survive type of fighter or by turning himself villain for daring to speak negatively of the celebrated, MMA legend and arguably the best pound for pound mixed martial artist in the world, Anderson Silva."

"Without an emotional investment being clearly made by the participants and the promotion, fans on limited discretionary income cannot or will not make the investment to buy a PPV when they may need the cash for groceries, etc instead. Sonnen and UFC created a must see/must buy environment for UFC 117. Silva's lack of English hurts him but Sonnen more than made up for that matter by selling this fight like a maestro directing a symphony."