(Ahhhh the good ol’ days, right Georges?)
It’s been three years since Georges St. Pierre last competed in the octagon, three years the former champ has gloriously spent selling booze, signing boobs and unearthing dinosaur bones. It’s a life that stood in stark contrast to what we come to see from St. Pierre in the latter stages of his career — the self-doubt, the anxiety, the onslaught of strikes he was beginning to absorb in each fight — and one that GSP himself admitted to being more than content with. Georges St. Pierre was one of the all-too rare fighters to recognize that his best days were behind him and that is was best to step away from the sport while he still had his facilities intact.
And now, he’s ready to take it all back.
On yesterday’s edition of The MMA Hour, St. Pierre dropped the bomb that he was not only ready to return to the cage, but already had a fight in mind for when he does.
“What I did is I did a training camp to see where I’m at,” said St-Pierre. “I’ve been training, but being in shape and being in fighting shape is something different. I did a training to push myself and go back to the highest level of competition. I didn’t fight, but I put myself through a training camp and I sparred and everything, and I did it successfully. Now I know for a fact that I could go back and fight, if my management and the UFC get to an agreement.”
“I love my sport and I still feel I’m at my best right now. The clock is running. I’m not getting any younger. I’m in the peak of my career and if there is a shot, there is another goal, another run, I better do it and do it quick, because it is time to do it now.”
It’s a statement that sounds undoubtedly familiar to fight fans. GSP, like countless fighters before him, got a taste of the normal life and decided that he would rather go through the hell that is mixed martial arts to prove that he’s “still got it.” It’s not hard to see why he’d think such a thing; he did, after all, step away from the sport with the belt in hand and an incredible 9 title defenses to his credit. But you can’t help shake the feeling that “the clock is running” and “I’m not getting any younger” aren’t exactly the greatest reasons for returning to one of the most dangerous sports on the planet.
Our own Trent Reinsmith further elaborated on why GSP should stay retired back when the news was still fresh in our minds:
St-Pierre left the sport as one of the top five (or better) fighters of all time. If he comes back and loses, not only will his legacy be tarnished, but it’s entirely feasible that the UFC would use that loss to further step on what St-Pierre has contributed to the promotion. The UFC machine would undoubtedly use a victory over St-Pierre as the launching point of a media campaign for whatever fighter defeated the mid-30’s version of St-Pierre.
Plus, St-Pierre doesn’t need to fight. He’s made his millions; he’s appearing in movies, he has sponsorship deals. He’s doing exactly what (almost) every professional fighter dreams of doing: making money without getting punched in the head by the likes of Johny Hendricks or Nick Diaz.
This isn’t to mention that, in unretiring, St. Pierre would be casting himself back into the arms of the very people that buried him when he chose to step away from the sport in the first place. Does anyone even remember the unjustifiably dickish language that Dana White used to try and pressure St. Pierre into an immediate rematch with Johny Hendricks? Here, let us remind you…
“You owe it to the fans, you owe it to that belt, you owe it to this company, and you owe it to Johny Hendricks to give him that opportunity to fight again, unless you’re gonna retire…There’s no ‘Hey listen I’m gonna go on a cruise and be gone for two years.’”
You hear that? Forget the fact that George St. Pierre had spent the past nine years bleeding for the UFC and netting them millions of dollars in the process, or that he was questioning not only his future health but how the lax drug-testing policies of the promotion he was fighting for were affecting it, he was a fighter, and fighters fight whether they want to or not! Are you not entertained?! ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!!!
Why in God’s name would St. Pierre want to sign up for that circus again? The answer, or so it seems, is glory. Later on in his interview, St. Pierre then moved on to who he would like to face upon his return. His answer? Newly-crowned middleweight champ Michael Bisping.
“Look, it’s something big,” said St. Pierre. “You just give me the chills thinking about it, because it’s not the first time that people have mentioned it. I’m sure Michael and his side people have talked to him about it, because he creates a lot of buzz. I always said if I come back, I would come back for something very big. Bisping is the man to beat right now. He beat Silva, he knocked out Rockhold, Rockhold beat Jacare and Weidman. [Bisping is] bigger than me. [When I was fighting as a welterweight] I never really considered going up and going back down after, because I was the welterweight champion. Now that I’ve retired, I can make things more experimentally. I could, if I want to, fight at lightweight, as well. It would be easy for me. I could fight at welterweight, and I can also fight at middleweight. I’m not a big welterweight, and even though Michael Bisping is bigger than me, I believe if I fight him, I believe I’ll beat him.”
For what it’s worth, Bisping seems up for the bout, no doubt because it would easily make for the most lucrative of his career. And look, I’m not here to play the moral police and question whether or not GSP “should” come back from a mental health standpoint. As far as I see it, George St. Pierre is a grown-ass man who can do what he pleases, even if that means losing a few more million brain cells in a half baked quest to recapture the glory of his former self. He’s no different than Fedor Emelianenko, even if the latter’s most recent performance should serve as a shining example of why he probably *shouldn’t* come back. Completing a training camp is one thing, but actually getting back in the ring and squaring off against a bigger opponent than anyone you’ve ever faced before seem’s like a fool’s errand to me. Then again, that’s why one of us is a legend of the game and the other a legend in his own mind.
The point is…well, I’m not really sure. George St. Pierre has his mind set on coming back and the UFC is more than willing to make that a reality, so I guess all we can do now is watch the fight and wait until the aftermath to start questioning how terrible the UFC, MMA fans, and the members of the MMA media should feel for watching it in the first place. At least St. Pierre can do so knowing that the sport’s drug-testing policies are finally in order.
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