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Georges St-Pierre doesn’t think the UFC wants to risk Khabib Nurmagomedov losing his lightweight title.
Georges St-Pierre vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov is the mega fight everyone’s talking about, but GSP doesn’t think the UFC is interested in the matchup.
St-Pierre retired shortly after winning the UFC middleweight title in 2017, and ‘Rush’ doesn’t think the premiere fight promotion want to risk Khabib losing his lightweight title and GSP sailing off into the sunset with yet another UFC belt in his possession.
On top of that, the former UFC welterweight and middleweight champion isn’t sure he could make the cut to 155 pounds.
“It’s tempting, and I still train hard,” St-Pierre told BT Sport in a recent interview (h/t Steven Marrocco of MMA Fighting). “Now, it’s COVID, so it’s illegal to train combat sports here. I train hard, and I feel I’m at my best. But the fighter is always the last one to find out when your time is up. I don’t know.
“It takes three parties to make a fight: It takes one opponent, another opponent, and the organization. And I don’t know if the organization would want that. I run away with welterweight, I run away with the middleweight. They surely don’t want me to run away with the lightweight. And I’m 39 years old. I don’t think I could go to 155 [pounds] without my performance being compromised.”
“Khabib is fighting at 155, but I believe he’s heavier than me,” he added. “He walks around at a heavier weight. He’s younger than me, so he can fluctuate weight better. I’ve never been a fan of cutting weight, so I never did it. I mean, I lost weight, but I didn’t lose much weight compared to most of the guys. I’m afraid of the long-term consequences. And physically, I’m very fit. I don’t have a lot of water retention and fat when I’m around at my walking around weight.”
With St-Pierre stating that a comeback at this stage in his career is ‘incredibly low’, don’t get too excited at the prospect of a title fight with Khabib.
Nurmagomedov is scheduled to take on newly-crowned interim lightweight champ Justin Gaethje in a title unification bout at UFC 254 on Oct. 24 at a TBD location.