GSP is my favourite fighter. I don't tend to name favourites most of the time, but this man has earned it. Nine title defences against a murderer's row the likes of which no other champion has ever faced, a recovery from a devastating shock defeat, unbelievable dominance year on year and fight on fight and all while being the nicest, most real guy in the sport. GSP is a legend in MMA.
As a Brit, I was probably technically supposed to pull for my countryman but I can't pick against the real life Captain America. That said, I did expect Bisping to win this one. For all the shit that he gets, he is one of the best traditional strikers in MMA. He breaks people down with superb striking pressure in which he builds some of the best strings of combined blows you will see in this sport. He has beaten some scary men, and came into this fight as a big middleweight with an undefeated record a weight class higher at light heavy against a middleweight debutant former welterweight coming from a 4 year layoff. Michael Bisping should have had this in the bag. If only his opponent hadn't been the GOAT.
The crazy, ridiculous, still two days later incredible fact of this is that GSP not only defeated the middleweight champion after 4 years out and two ACL injuries, but he looked better than he did when he left. He was rather notorious back in 2013 for sticking behind the jab and using conservative ground pressure to build comfortable decision wins. He came back on Saturday to pick apart the defensive weaknesses of Michael Bisping with diverse punches and kicks, drop him with a left hook (it was a very mindblowing hook-y kind of night) batter him with elbows and choke him unconscious. His last finish was in 2009 when he beat BJ Penn so ferociously he was hopsitalised and didn't remember the last two rounds of the encounter.
It is unreal how good GSP looked in this fight. He should not have been anywhere near the level that he was. Going into it, I and the other GSP fans were concerned that his clean but limited striking game would be outclassed and that he would struggle to put into effect his legendary takedown and control game against the middleweight champion, who has a solid reputation for stuffing wrestlers and an appreciable size advantage. Georges went for the three takedowns in this fight, and got all of them. He rocked Bisping with his world famous superman punch. He threw punches we haven't seen him throw in a long time, and he landed them. It was masterful.
Bisping didn't go down without a fight either. He landed on Georges with a couple of nice right hands, one of which looked like it really hurt him, along with a volley of elbows which shredded his face. When GSP's hands started to drop and we could see his chest heaving, I was concerned. This was another thing that we expected, another thing that had worried us. Would middleweight GSP have the endurance to wrestle a bigger man around for the duration of a championship fight without gassing and getting stuck in a striking battle he couldn't win? The answer to that is still not known, as he went through and stopped Michael Bisping in the third with blood pouring down his face from the cuts The Count had opened on him.
I have no idea what Georges plans to do now. He said he was back for fun fights that would test him, and this certainly qualifies there. He might look to unify the middleweight belts against the fearsome Australian Robert Whittaker, or head down to his old empire to fight Tyron Woodley for the belt he gave up voluntarily back in 2013. Either way, I want to see it. Middleweight needs some order restored to it, and GSP may or may not be the man for the job. Since the long reigning Anderson Silva was knocked out and then maimed in back to back losses against Chris Weidman, things have been turbulent. Weidman was beaten half to death by Luke Rockhold, a man who was held up as an unmatched fighter, before Bisping smashed Rockhold in one and went on to let the other top middleweights sort shit out amongst themselves for a year and a half. There's about five guys who all have a decent claim for the next title shot besides Whittaker who is first in line. Either Bobby or Georges will have a lot to do if and when the title is reunified.
Welterweight is similarly insane. Woodley is struggling with the company and unpopularity with the fans, while still looking pretty hard to beat for any of the multitudinous top fighters. There's a steady changing of the welterweight guard from old standards to new blood, with fighters who are both old and new like RDA and GSP coming back into the mix too. Either path is full of excitement, and I really hope the UFC relaxes the reebok rule to let GSP wear his karate gi like he always used to. If anyone has earned such and exemption, it's him. His list of achievements is unparalleled, especially with the recent addition of two-weight championship and a stoppage victory over a bigger champion after years out of the sport. I don't think anyone can claim to edge him out anymore. DJ has a great flyweight run but only one belt, Jon Jones has one belt and two post USADA drug failures, Anderson Silva has one belt and drug failures, and BJ, Cruz, Aldo, Fedor, and all the other guys just can't equal the championship streak, the competition, the multiple weight divisions, and the years long period of not losing a single round of a fight. It's settled. We just needed reminding.
GOAT
And, years later, still GOAT