Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) recently crowned Michael Bisping its middleweight champion, before sending “The Count” into his first title defense against aging combat sports veteran Dan Henderson.
Yes, this is the same Bisping who was throttled by Tim Kennedy back in April 2014.
That’s a fact not lost on the Hitler hunter, who expects new UFC matchmakers — taking over for the soon-to-be-departing Joe Silva later this year — to put his name “in the mix” for early 2017.
If not, Kennedy told Submission Radio his next fight could very well be his last.
“The division’s a mess, man. It’s a disaster. It’s anybody’s chance to get that next title fight and everybody wants it because, especially for me, Michael Bisping is the easiest fight in the division. The current champion of the division. If you go down that list, from Chris Weidman, to Jacare, to Luke Rockhold, Derek Brunson – that would be my number two, three, four and five right there. I don’t put Yoel Romero in there because I think he’s a cheater and he shouldn’t even be in the UFC. The Vitor Belforts, the Lyoto Machidas, they’re so past prime, those four guys would walk through them. They’re talking about Nick Diaz coming back to the middleweight division and GSP, who has been out of this sport, maybe in retirement for the past few years, coming back and getting an automatic title shot. The division’s a mess, it’s anybody’s game. What I know is November 12 I’m gonna go fight Rashad, I’m gonna beat him in a very, very clear decisive fashion, and Michael Bisping, he has not wanted to utter my name for the past year. So if he wants to stand there and really be a champion, stop calling out dudes that have been retired for a few years, stop calling out a 47-year-old man. Why don’t you fight a guy that beat the brakes off of you and on November 12 at Madison Square Garden is going to make a huge statement in the division.”
He’s going to need one.
That’s because Kennedy (18-5) hasn’t been seen since his technical knockout loss to Yoel Romero in the wake of the now-infamous Stool Gate debacle at UFC 178 (more on that here). In addition, there is quite the bottleneck at the top of the 185-pound division (see it).
And let’s not forget about Rashad Evans.
“Suga” will be making his middleweight debut at the upcoming UFC 205 pay-per-view (PPV) event on Nov. 12 in New York City, and will be looking to make a statement of his own next month in the “Big Apple.”
And then we have this little variable…