Luke Rockhold isn’t a fan of Michael Bisping’s run as the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) middleweight title holder. Back in June 2016, Bisping stunned Rockhold with a first-round knockout win to capture the 185-pound title. Since then, Bisping has yet to defend his gold against a true number one contender. Rockhold told ESPN that “The […]
Luke Rockhold isn’t a fan of Michael Bisping’s run as the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) middleweight title holder. Back in June 2016, Bisping stunned Rockhold with a first-round knockout win to capture the 185-pound title. Since then, Bisping has yet to defend his gold against a true number one contender. Rockhold told ESPN that “The […]
He may have put on arguably the two most boring title fights in UFC welterweight title history with a record-setting snoozer over Demian Maia in the UFC 214 and a painfully slow defense against Stephen Thompson at UFC 209, but Tyron Woodley still believes his body of work has earned him a lofty position in […]
He may have put on arguably the two most boring title fights in UFC welterweight title history with a record-setting snoozer over Demian Maia in the UFC 214 and a painfully slow defense against Stephen Thompson at UFC 209, but Tyron Woodley still believes his body of work has earned him a lofty position in MMA history.
Woodley was thoroughly blasted by his boss Dana White after he successfully defended all 21 of Maia’s takedown attempts in a bout that set the record for least significant strikes in a title bout, so much so that the emotional exec actually took Woodley’s promised title bout with returning all-time great Georges St-Pierre off the table, giving the fight to Michael Bisping.
“The Chosen One” understandably wasn’t happy about it, and spoke out against White’s decision at the UFC post-fight press conference (via MMA Fighting) by declaring St-Pierre should actually have to fight him to be considered the best welterweight ever:
“[St-Pierre] should have to fight me. If you are the best welterweight of all time, you’re gonna come back into the sport and go up a weight class? I guarantee you if Demian Maia would have won, he would have been talking about fighting Demian Maia. I guarantee if Stephen Thompson would have won, he’d have been looking to fight Stephen Thompson. He doesn’t want to fight me because I’m a better version of him.”
Gary A. Vasquez for USA TODAY Sports
St-Pierre will move up a weight class to middleweight to fight champion Bisping, who has caused a sea of controversy since winning the belt by only defending it against a retiring Dan Henderson before going to the sidelines with knee surgery as the many top contenders in the division were methodically eliminated by Robert Whittaker, who conveniently hurt his own knee beating Yoel Romero. That’s made the 185-pound division a mess, and Woodley took note of it before correctly pointing out he was the only champion consistently defending the title against top contenders:
“When was the last time Michael Bisping fought? Think about it. I fought four world title fights against actual No. 1 contenders. Has he ever fought a No. 1 contender? I fought the No. 1 contender twice. I fought the No. 1 contender after that. And I fought the world champion who was Robbie Lawler at the time before that. I’m the only one that’s going by the old set of rules. So if it’s not Georges St-Pierre, let him run. But guess what? Whoever you put in front of me, I’m gonna run through them, I’m gonna beat them, and if he does not fight me, by default I will be the best welterweight of all-time.”
Woodley Photo courtesy of Joe Camporeale for USA TODAY Sports
Woodley may have a strong argument from some certain points of view, yet it’s difficult to say he would become the greatest fighter of all-time in a storied division, especially over a time-honored legend like St-Pierre, without actually fighting him if he’s indeed active. However, it’s just not a fight that is going to be made until Woodley proves he can deliver exciting bouts each and every time out to the cage, not every third or fourth time.
That’s the only way he’s going to gain a reputation as a draw, and that, in turn, is the only way he might eventually get to fight St-Pierre.
But one thing Woodley is correct about is the mess the middleweight division has become. The welterweight champ went off about Bisping’s injury and why it was strange to have St-Pierre jump the entire ranks in a class he had never once competed in before:
“The clarity should just be Georges. I don’t understand, you have an interim title right? Robert Whittaker just beat Yoel Romero. . . He deserves to fight Bisping next. How long is Bisping going to milk this knee injury? Is his knee severed or what the hell is going on? He should be fighting the No. 1 contenders like I’ve had to do.”
Dana White has pulled the old bait-and-switch on us yet again. Only days after saying that returning former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre would meet the winner of the welterweight title fight between Tyron Woodley and Demain Maia in the co-main event of last night’s UFC 214 after GSP’s rumored fight with Michael Bisping was a […]
Dana White has pulled the old bait-and-switch on us yet again.
Only days after saying that returning former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre would meet the winner of the welterweight title fight between Tyron Woodley and Demain Maia in the co-main event of last night’s UFC 214 after GSP’s rumored fight with Michael Bisping was a ‘ship that had sailed,’ White laid into Woodley vs. Maia at the post-fight press conference after the bout failed to deliver in any way:
“What’d you think about watching the Woodley Maia fight? Listen, when you break a record for most for the leat punches in a five-round fight, a title fight, and you beat it by, it was 130 and these guys threw 60 or something like that, I think that sums it up.”
White was then asked if St-Pierre vs. Bisping was back on due to the lackluster nature of Woodley’s performance, to which the outspoken executive replied it was indeed was before explaining why:
“Yep. Yep. There you go. Because I know Michael Bisping will fight. Michael Bisping will show up and he will fight, so I’m gonna give it to him.”
Photo: Joe Camporeale – USA TODAY Sports
Now, it’s fair to say that the long-tenured “Count,” who’s no doubt as reliable as any fighter in UFC history, isn’t exactly known for putting on the most earth-shattering performances in the octagon, as many online have perhaps given him a reputation for having no knockout power at all.
But with his recent finish of Luke Rockhold to win the belt at 2016’s UFC 199 coupled with his close, exciting victories over Anderson Silva and Dan Henderson, it’s hard to argue that Bisping is not exciting and willing to bring the action to his opponents. St-Pierre has obviously garnered his own reputation for being a safe, calculating fighter – perhaps more so than any other competitor in MMA after his upset loss to Matt Serra.
Taking that into account, a bout pitting a safe fighter like ‘GSP’ against Woodley, a champion with all the well-rounded skills in the world who simply appears to refuse to use them at times, has correctly been deemed a fight that would not be entertaining to the fans. Of course, interim middleweight champion Robert Whittaker should be getting the next rightful shot at the UFC 185-pound belt, but a knee injury suffered in his impressive decision victory over Yoel Romero at UFC 213 will keep him out of action until 2018.
White said Whittaker would fight the winner of Bisping vs. St-Pierre, but he did not yet have a date for the bout, which was revealed at a press conference prior to UFC 209 this March, an event where Woodley ironically put on another highly tentative performance versus Stephen Thompson.
It’s no secret that the UFC is having a tough run in the first seven months of 2017. After a banner year in 2016 with multiple pay-per-view (PPV) events eclipsing the coveted one-million buy threshold, new owners WME-IMG are finding out just what it’s like to run the world’s biggest MMA promotion in a time […]
It’s no secret that the UFC is having a tough run in the first seven months of 2017.
After a banner year in 2016 with multiple pay-per-view (PPV) events eclipsing the coveted one-million buy threshold, new owners WME-IMG are finding out just what it’s like to run the world’s biggest MMA promotion in a time of downward-trending PPVs without flagship stars Conor McGregor and Ronda Rousey anywhere close to the octagon.
True, McGregor will return to the ring against Floyd Mayweather, on August 26, but that could be hurting the UFC’s actual numbers more than helping them. We’ll get to that shortly.
Regardless, both the preliminary card television ratings and pay-per-view buyrates for July 8’s UFC 213 from Las Vegas were recently revealed, and the numbers ultimately amounted to some of the most dismal overall viewership turnouts the UFC has ever seen. Now, women’s bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes’ extremely late withdrawal from her championship bout versus Valentina Shevchenko most definitely caused the lack of buys, but the numbers are concerning nonetheless.
Things didn’t get better two weeks later when UFC on FOX 25 aired live from the Nassau Coliseum on July 22. Despite former middleweight champion Chris Weidman securing an emotional headlining win over Kelvin Gastelum in his hometown, the card had the lowest-ever ratings for a UFC on FOX event in overnight ratings, a number that rose to “only” the third-worst of all-time when the time slot spillover numbers for the main event were factored in.
That continued a disturbing decline for big FOX-aired cards in 2017, but those numbers are also simply indicative of the overall trend of the year, where pay-per-view rates have went down drastically in addition to TV-aired events and PPV prelim numbers.
There are several big underlying factors for this sharp and disturbing decline. On the eve of the biggest pay-per-view of the year, let’s take at the five most impactful.
Promoting Only McGregor & Rousey:
The UFC enjoyed their most lucrative two-year stretch in history from 2015-2016, a time when their biggest-ever crossover stars in Rousey and McGregor were winning big fights in dominant fashion. Rousey was being called the most dominant fighter in MMA, and McGregor won both the featherweight and lightweight titles while becoming the sport’s biggest star.
But that time period simply couldn’t be sustained, as Rousey infamously lost the belt to Holly Holm at UFC 193, following it up with another unsuccessful title fight in her 48-second loss to Nunes at 2016’s UFC 207, after which it appears Rousey may never fight in the UFC again.
McGregor is not gone; at least not in the same sense as Rousey. He’s obviously involved in his hyped-up boxing match with Floyd Mayweather, and while the UFC will obviously get a ton of attention and hype from that massive spectacle, it brings up one vital, overarching point – the UFC simply promoted only their top two stars in recent years, and while it clearly worked in that regard, it left them much too dependent on McGregor and Rousey for success, because their other fighters just aren’t bringing in any numbers at all.
If they ever want to get back to the level where they have their big draws and their mid-level stars; say in the time of dominant champions Anderson Silva and Georges St-Pierre where mid-level stars like Rashad Evans and Rampage Jackson could still sell an in-between card for 350-400,000 buys, they’re going to have to diversify their promotional strategy.
It’s been over a full year since we last saw former UFC middleweight champion Luke Rockhold compete when he was shockingly knocked out by current champion Michael Bisping in the first round of their late replacement bout at June 2016’s UFC 199. Rockhold was then scheduled to face old foe Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza, whom he […]
It’s been over a full year since we last saw former UFC middleweight champion Luke Rockhold compete when he was shockingly knocked out by current champion Michael Bisping in the first round of their late replacement bout at June 2016’s UFC 199.
Rockhold was then scheduled to face old foe Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza, whom he won the Strikeforce middleweight championship from, last November, but a knee injury forced him out. Since then, Rockhold has largely remained out of the limelight, healing from the knee injury and biding his time.
And when he did choose to finally speak out, it was against his employers at the UFC, against whom he said his fellow middleweights should organize a strike after the supremely skilled 185-pound fray was in a state of confusion due to Bisping chasing a bout with former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre and nursing his own knee injury.
Rumors of a bout with rising contender Gegard Mousasi swirled, but those ultimately fell by the wayside when “The Dreamcatcher” left the UFC and signed with Bellator MMA.
So Rockhold’s return was left in limbo; that is, until this evening (Sat., July 22, 2017) when the promotion announced that Rockhold will return against former World Series of Fighting (WSOF) middleweight and light heavyweight champion David Branch in the main event of UFC Fight Night Pittsburgh on September 16, 2017 from the PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Rockhold was in attendance at UFC on FOX 25 from Uniondale, New York, and made an appearance when his fight was announced:
So the former champion will finally return after a long layoff as he attempts to climb back to a shot at the belt he held briefly. However, it’s safe to wonder just how far a win over Branch, who only recently returned to the UFC and is justifiably ranked well below the No. 3-ranked Rockhold.
A bout against recent interim title challenger Yoel Romero was also rumored for Rockhold’s return, but clearly couldn’t be negotiated. Is it a good idea for Rockhold to take what many feel will be a “tuneup” fight in his return, or will Branch prove that the former champ has actually signed on for a lose-lose-proposition?
The UFC announced Saturday that Luke Rockhold would take on David Branch at the UFC Fight Night in Pittsburgh on Saturday, Sept. 16.
As Brett Okamoto of ESPN noted, that’s the same night as Gennady Golovkin vs. Canelo Alvarez, one of the most anticipat…
The UFC announced Saturday that Luke Rockhold would take on David Branch at the UFC Fight Night in Pittsburgh on Saturday, Sept. 16.
As Brett Okamoto of ESPN noted, that’s the same night as Gennady Golovkin vs. Canelo Alvarez, one of the most anticipated boxing matches of the year.
This article will be updated to provide more information on this story as it becomes available.
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