Georges St. Pierre News

Tom Taylor - December 18, 2017

Shortly after he won the UFC middleweight title with a third-round submission of Michael Bisping, Georges St-Pierre vacated it, citing an ongoing battle with colitis and uncertainty about his fighting future. Since then, there has been widespread doubt as to whether the MMA great will ever fight again. According to his head coach Firas Zahabi, however, St-Pierre is likely to return if he’s offered a fight that interests him. Apparently, there are a few names that stand out to that end – one of which will definitely surprise you.

Justin Golightly - December 14, 2017

After the shake-up at middleweight, everything seems to have returned to normal. Not only is there movement, not only does Robert Whittaker get a fight, it’s with Luke Rockhold for the undisputed title thanks to Georges St-Pierre vacating the belt. While everything seems to be coming up Whittaker, he still lost out on a huge fight with the former welterweight king. It would have been a giant chance for the fighter just now reaching his prime, especially since Whittaker grew up watching him, to potentially put that win on his record. Belt or not, Whittaker wanted the fight out of respect. “I don’t think there was a doubt in any one’s mind who the real [UFC middleweight] champ was. I fought my way up through some hard dudes to get to where I am, and yeah, I am the champ, I was the champ. Yeah, it was [disappointing I couldn’t fight Georges St-Pierre for the belt], because I wanted to fight Georges out of respect more than anything. I idolized him as a child coming up and as a young man coming up in my career he was always like one of my biggest idols. To be able to fight him would’ve been great, to put him on my resume and say I fought Georges St-Pierre, that was great. But I don’t think I ever really convinced myself that he would fight me. I think it was a dangerous fight for him, a hard fight for him and it is what it is.” Perth make sure your ready 👊🏽 #ufc221 @ufc @lukerockhold pic.twitter.com/uEOtMOTh1k

Justin Golightly - December 14, 2017

Ever since Ben Askren walked away from combat sports, he made no mistake that only a fight with the best in the world could bring him back out of retirement. He threw the offer down on the table for a fight with Georges St-Pierre, but not a lot of people had faith it happened. Then, St-Pierre relinquished the UFC middleweight title and left the division leaving only two options: Retire for good or go back to welterweight. After hearing this news, he doubled down on his offer and even was willing to put some Bitcoin on the line. In his latest interview with Submission Radio, he talked in depth about St-Pierre and how he’s a stylistic nightmare for the former two-division champ. “Wasn’t that what you expected? I expected that [Georges St-Pierre would vacate the UFC middleweight title]. I knew that, I mean, my suspicion was that there’s no way that he’s ever going to fight again at middleweight. This was the one time he would because I think he had a good idea that he was gonna beat Michael Bisping, but there’s no way he wanted to fight Robert Whittaker. He didn’t want that fight. So, I definitely think we’ll never see him in middleweight again. Now, will we see him fight again? I’m not sure. GSP versus Conor [McGregor] is not a super fight. Conor McGregor is 2-1 in his last three fights against someone who is not even very good, so I don’t think Conor deserves a super fight against Georges. I see it pretty simply. Georges doesn’t like tough fights. And when Georges gets in a tough fight, he takes people down repeatedly and he’s very good at it, very good at it. He’s very good at maintaining top position. I’m not gonna go away easily, I will be a tough fight and Georges will not repeatedly take me down. And if he somehow takes me down he absolutely will not keep me down.”

Justin Golightly - December 12, 2017

Just last week, Georges St-Pierre vacated his freshly won UFC middleweight title, directly promoting Robert Whittaker’s fight with Luke Rockhold in Perth for the undisputed belt. It was the fallout from his UFC 217 health scare that led to his decision. St-Pierre basically tortured himself to move up a division, which culminated in a ulcerative colitis diagnosis. It became so bad, the fight was almost called off. Now John Danaher admits he even though St-Pierre would lose in his impaired state. “Halfway through this camp we knew there was something very seriously wrong. There was a point where we lost a week and a half of training. Even the day of the [Michael Bisping] fight, [Georges St-Pierre] was dealing with serious medical problems. I’m not going to lie to you, two weeks out I had a talk with Firas Zahabi and I said that the St-Pierre I saw train today gets knocked out by Michael Bisping. He did exactly what the plan was designed to do. He finished the fight with a beautiful strike setting up a submission hold. […] And he did it on a man above him in weight class. What made it all the more impressive if he did this with all the health problems he was dealing with.”

Justin Golightly - December 8, 2017

There have been mixed reactions to the recent news of Georges St-Pierre leaving middleweight and vacating the title he just won a month ago. It was his battle with his stomach in the arduous rode to weight gain that resulted in ulcerative colitis, prompting St-Pierre to abandon the division. Ignoring the negativity, we’ll focus directly on the positive. Eighth-ranked Derek Brunson has his eyes set on a springboard right at the top of the middleweight rankings with a win over Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza. GSP vacates. That’s a real martial artist. Way to not stall the division. Best of luck bro! A win over #3 Jacare puts me next in line for the title shot 👊

Justin Golightly - December 8, 2017

When Ben Askren retired with a squeaky clean record at ONE: Immortal Pursuit, he left an asterisk above the ‘R’ word. He said that the only thing that could lure him back was a shot at the best welterweight in the world, not the third best, not the second best, but the best. The only problem with that was that Georges St-Pierre was a middleweight now and Tyron Woodley is too great of a friend for Askren to look for a fight with. However, as of last night, St-Pierre is no longer a middleweight and has vacated his middleweight title. That was enough for Askren to double-down on his call-out. @GeorgesStPierre if you want to make it more interesting I’ll put my bitcoin against yours as a side bet that you don’t make it 5 rounds against me.

Russell Ess - December 8, 2017

Big news for the UFC middleweight division was dropped late Thursday as the UFC announced that Georges St-Pierre vacated his newly captured middleweight title. With St-Pierre vacating the title, UFC interim middleweight champion Robert Whittaker was deemed the undisputed champion and former champ Luke Rockhold is now challenging Whittaker for the belt at UFC 221 in February. While Dana White may not be so happy about GSP’s decision to leave the middleweight division, former UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos praised “Rush” for his quick decision to drop his new title.

Drake Riggs - December 7, 2017

Well, the speculation has ended, Georges St-Pierre’s Middleweight title reign has come to an end before it could even really begin. After it was announced that Robert Whittaker would fight Luke Rockhold at UFC 221, it was assumed that Whittaker would be defending a title… It was just unclear whether or not it would be his Interim title or if St-Pierre would be vacating his Middleweight title making Whittaker the new undisputed champion. The latter has been announced as the case. https://twitter.com/ufc/status/938951789835177984

Justin Golightly - December 6, 2017

As quick as he left us, Georges St-Pierre was suddenly back in all of our lives and causing a shockwave that is still reverberating through the UFC. After four years away from the sport, St-Pierre returned in a division above where he reigned supreme for so many years. …And it paid off. He became the UFC middleweight champion, but he went through hell to do it. It was a brutal journey to put on that much mass which ultimately resulted in ulcerative colitis. It seems this was the final nail in the coffin: St-Pierre is leaving the middleweight division. “We’ll have to talk about it, but I’m not sure if I compete, if I will go back at 185-pounds. I don’t think so. Of course in terms of weight, If I want to go back to compete at 185-pounds I will. Obviously eating — I did what I did, I learned from my mistakes — I don’t think it’s a good thing to do. Force myself to eat to gain muscle mass. I’ve always been against performance enhancing drugs and I [moved up to another weight division] the natural way. There is no easy way. I did it the hard way and it was to gain weight and maintain my muscle mass. It was very hard and it was not healthy. I think the body has a natural weight where you can perform and its best athletic ability and for me, the weight I am now is my perfect weight.” — Georges St-Pierre speaking to TSN.

Tom Taylor - December 5, 2017

Now that Georges St-Pierre is the UFC middleweight champion, the big question is, who does he fight next? Though interim middleweight champion Robert Whittaker would seem to be the most logical choice, St-Pierre also has options outside the middleweight division, such as UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley and UFC lightweight champ Conor McGregor. Whatever the case, all the confusion surrounding St-Pierre has got former middleweight champion Luke Rockhold pretty aggravated. In his opinion, St-Pierre needs to make his intentions clear, or get drop the title altogether.

Justin Golightly - December 2, 2017

At UFC 217. Georges St-Pierre swooped back into the UFC and did the unthinkable. Moving up in weight in his first fight in four years, he fought Michael Bisping and choked him out to become the UFC middleweight champion. Other than Dana White and St-Pierre repeatedly saying that he is “contractually obligated” to defend against Robert Whittaker next, his future has been up in the air and there have been rumblings about a move back to welterweight. However, it looks like St-Pierre won’t be fighting in any of those divisions anytime soon. Dana White announced that he has ulcerative colitis. Dana White says UFC middleweight champion Georges St-Pierre is going to be “out for a minute,” as he’s dealing with colitis. That sounds unpleasant. https://t.co/w1umXJ9DX7

Russell Ess - November 29, 2017

If you saw UFC strawweight Michelle Waterson outside of training or competing in the Octagon, it’s likely that you would never guess that she beats people up for a living. With a nickname like the “Karate Hottie,” Waterson is known for her good looks and also for her skills as a professional MMA fighter.

Adam Conklin - November 28, 2017

  There’s no shortage of contenders in the UFC’s middleweight division. Former champions Luke Rockhold and Chris Weidman are still considered to be at the top of the heap while dangerous contenders such as Kelvin Gastelum and Yoel Romero wait for a signature win to earn the chance to fight for the belt.

Justin Golightly - November 28, 2017

After demolishing Japanese MMA veteran Shinya Aoki at ONE: Immortal Pursuit, Ben Askren rode his funky train into the sunset, retiring from MMA for good. …Or maybe not. Freshly-retired Askren took to Twitter to plant the seed of a possible return fight with Georges St-Pierre. If you think this opens the door to a bunch of other potential match-ups, you’re wrong. For Askren, it’s either the “best in the world” or he’s happy to move on to a new chapter outside of the cage. “I’ve never said I’m retired, period. I’ve said that I’m retired with the caveat that if I somehow get to fight to prove that I’m No. 1 in the world, I will take that opportunity. I’m not gonna fight to be No. 3 or 5 or 7 or anything else. Just to be No. 1, that’s it. It’s not really a money thing, it’s a pride thing. There’s this other guy who was a very famous welterweight named Georges St-Pierre who doesn’t seem to have a dance partner right now and doesn’t seem to want to fight Tyron [Woodley] or Robert Whittaker. So I figure, he doesn’t want to get hit hard, I don’t hit that hard. So we might as well just get in there and get after it.“If he needs a dance partner, I’m more than willing to do it. I’ll come to Montreal and fit the bill for him. We’ll fill out the Bell Centre.”

Justin Golightly - November 25, 2017

He came, he wrestled, he got funky, now he’s gone. Ben Askren was able to take out multiple-time lightweight champion and grappling guru Shinya Aoki at ONE Championship’s Immortal Pursuit in his retirement fight. He walks away from the sport with little to no damage and boasts an undefeated record of 18 wins, 11 of those victories being finishes. While he never got to display his skills inside the UFC’s Octagon, Askren is completely content with how his career has played out. That isn’t to say that an asterisk isn’t always above the ‘R’ word, but it would have to be something massive to get Askren to fight again. @GeorgesStPierre how’s the spring weather in Montreal? I hear it’s a nice time to test your true Martial Arts skills

Chris Taylor - November 19, 2017

UFC officials hope to have middleweight champ Georges St-Pierre return to action at UFC 221 this February in Perth, Australia. “Listen, bottom line is that we want to have Robbie (Whittaker) fight in Perth,” David Shaw, UFC Vice President of international content said at the UFC Fight Night 121 post-fight press conference via Forbes. “The stars are sort of aligning for that event, having a pay-per-view there. First time in Western Australia, which is meaningful to us. We want to blow it out of the water and make it a very significant event and make a real impact, not only for Western Australians but for Australian fans all over the country.”

Tom Taylor - November 14, 2017

With the actioned packed UFC 217 and UFC Norfolk cards now in the rear-view, the UFC has updated its official rankings. Unsurprisingly, these rankings have experienced some tectonic shifts in the wake of these cards – perhaps none as notable as Georges St-Pierre’s blasting by Conor McGregor on the pound-for-pound list. Here’s how the rankings look as of Monday.

Justin Golightly - November 11, 2017

There’s no secret that Tyron Woodley wanted the winner between Michael Bisping and Georges St-Pierre’s fight at UFC 217. Now that St-Pierre made his successful return and captured the UFC middleweight title, Woodley has stepped into overdrive to try and make this superfight happen. On his new show with TMZ Executive Producer Evan Roseblum, Woodley talked to the man face-to-face to get the biggest fight of his career. “Now you’ve had your warm-up fight, you’ve beat up [Michael] Bisping. I think it’s time to solidify. You’re the greatest welterweight of all time. That’s my goal to be the greatest welterweight of all time. Let’s get it in. Forget the contract, you were the welterweight king at one point. Anything that’s gonna’ sell, the UFC’s gonna’ do. I’ll come up to middleweight, we can do that fight there. Both of us don’t have to get in the sauna’s much. Let’s get it in. Robert Whittaker or Tyron Woodley? Just think about it. Legacy wise for me? There’s not a fight I want more.”