For the first time in years, the UFC’s middleweight division is interesting.
Even though Anderson Silva has cleared out every potential contender the UFC has thrown his way over the last five years, new challengers like Chris Weidman, Alan Belcher and Tim Boetsch are all inching their way towards a 185-lb title fight, and veterans Michael Bisping, Vitor Belfort and Brian Stann are doing much of he same.
Things have never looked more promising for a division that has been so thoroughly dominated by “The Spider” since he won the title in just his second UFC bout.
So of course, he decided now is the time to call out Georges St-Pierre.
In a statement with the Brazilian MMA outlet Tatame, Silva’s manager Jorge Guimaraes let it be known that the only opponent that Silva’s camp feels is worthy of fighting “The Spider” is GSP, effectively reigniting internet fan’s passion for debating the most talked about super fight in MMA.
But as Bleacher Report lead writer Jeremy Botter mentioned in his original post about this story, this fight is extremely unlikely to happen.
Those six middleweights listed above are all chomping at the bit to get a shot at the champion; and even if Silva can defeat the ones that break away from the pack and earn the shot, he’ll have guys like Rich Franklin and Hector Lombard jumping in to fill their spots.
It doesn’t get any better on St-Pierre’s side of the fence.
GSP has been sidelined with various injuries for well over a year now, and in his absence a whole new crop of contenders has bloomed in the welterweight division.
Not only does St-Pierre have current number one contender and interim champion Carlos Condit to worry about, but guys like Martin Kampmann, Johny Hendricks and Jake Ellenberger have clawed their way towards the top of the welterweight ladder; and you know Nick Diaz is wandering around Stockton thinking about a title shot.
With so many guys jockeying for position to earn a shot at gold, it just isn’t right for St-Pierre and Silva to hold up their respective divisions with a super fight.
Neither champion is all that active anyway, as both fighters have fought twice a year at the most since 2009; and holding up two UFC divisions for another six months would be bad business for Dana White and Co.
It makes sense that Silva wants to fight GSP, but his timing could not be worse here.
It’s obvious the UFC is excited about the current state of the middleweight division; and since St-Pierre already has his next two opponents practically set in stone, there’s no chance the UFC will make this fight happen.
In all honesty, the fight doesn’t need to happen anyway.
Right now, Silva and St-Pierre are two of the very few bankable stars they have on their roster, and a fight between them would severely damage the loser’s mystique.
Both fighters have been extremely dominant over the last five years, and to be honest, that’s much of their appeal. The second either Silva or St-Pierre’s reign ends their marketability will take a major hit, and by matching them up the UFC is just killing one of their biggest stars.
While it would be fun for the fans and would probably break records on PPV, the Silva vs. St-Pierre fight doesn’t need to happen right now and the UFC has no reason to kill one of their biggest stars while it’s still growing.
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