The news this afternoon that UFC welterweight champ Georges St-Pierre had suffered a knee injury and was withdrawing from UFC 137, it caught everyone by surprise, including his opponent Carlos ‘The Natural Born Killer’ Condit (27-5).
With Condit having already stepped up as a replacement for Nick Diaz, the former WEC champ was quick to decide that he’d wait for the champ to heal rather than take a fight with another opponent on short notice.
UFC President Dana White even Tweeted to fans that Josh Koscheck had been willing to step up on a weeks notice, but Condit explained to MMAFighting.com that it didn’t “make sense” for him to fight another opponent.
“It was a surprise…This has probably been the longest training camp of my career. Everything’s been going well, and then I get the call that [St-Pierre] is hurt. It took the wind out of my sails to say the least.”
“From the sound of it, Georges, his recovery time isn’t going to be six months or anything like that,” said Condit. “From what I heard, they’re looking at more like six weeks. To take another fight just doesn’t make sense.”
Both men were to have met in the headliner of UFC 137, which is scheduled to take place on October 29 at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada.