UFC 217 and the Return of GSP

Georges St. Pierre returns tomorrow night, and this is one of the most exciting comebacks in MMA history. Usually when guys are coming back after a retirement, it usually leads to morbid curiosity as I almost certainly know that a legend from the past is going to get smashed, but I still hold out that bit of hope that maybe they can show some of their past magic. GSP is different as despite a four-year layoff, he is still younger than his opponent on Saturday night.

So the question is, does GSP have what it takes to win a title at a different weight class than the one he specialized in after taking a long hiatus from the sport? Well, it's not going to be easy. Mixed Martial Arts is maybe the fastest evolving sport that we have. Just when you think a fighter has figured things out, somebody comes out of nowhere to shock the world. Anderson Silva was unbeatable until Chris Weidman had his number; nobody could handle Dominick Cruz's footwork until Cody Garbrandt came along and did it better; and Jon Jones continually gets TKO'd by USADA. Although GSP proved to be nearly unstoppable in his prime; we're years away from that era.

GSP's greatest strength is his versatility. He lacked a clear weakness, so opponents couldn't find an easy way to exploit him. Even if they were better in one area, GSP was strong enough in other facets of the fight game to keep them out of that area and control the match for victory. But even if he has versatile skills, have those skills grown, have they stagnated, or have they already started to deteriorate? It's not like those skills couldn't have grown. His opponent is a great example of that as Michael Bisping is fighting better now than he ever has in his career.

Speaking of Michael Bisping, he presents an interesting fight for St. Pierre. He's not a guy known for knockout power, but if he connects, as he did against Luke Rockhold, he definitely can put a guy out. Out of GSP's past opponents, I would say Bisping's style most closely matches up with Carlos Condit, a guy with good footwork who can strike in a variety of ways. GSP dispatched of Condit fairly easily, but Bisping is larger and has better wrestling defense. And that latter part is where this fight is going to be won.

If Bisping keeps it standing, I don't think GSP will offer enough on the feet to win the fight, but if Bisping's sprawl isn't on point, it is going to be 25 minutes of ground and pound for him as GSP is excellent at controlling opponents on the ground. Since I wear GSP-tinted glasses, I think he has the wrestling to get the fight to the ground and control the fight, making a triumphant return to the UFC to win the Middleweight Title.

The Rest of UFC 217
Since this card is in New York, they put together quite a stacked card. Although, GSP/Bisping is the main event and the one I am most excited for, here are quick thoughts and predictions for the four other fights on the main card.

Johny Hendricks vs. Paulo "Borrachinha" Henrique Costa
I really don't care about this fight. Borrachinha is an up and coming prospect as he is undefeated and has finished his first two opponents in the UFC. That part is interesting. Unfortunately, it is against Johny Hendricks, a guy who has had the fight beaten out of him in the last few years. The guy got lazy with the Welterweight limit, so he moved up in weight and still managed to miss the Middleweight limit. He's a man fighting for a paycheck, and considering he'll be making six figures to do it, it's good money to take a beating, but that's all I see happening in this fight. I say the Brazilian stops him in the first round.

Stephen Thompson vs. Jorge Masvidal
Don't sleep on this fight. Stephen Thompson's only loss in the last five years is to the Welterweight Champion, Tyron Woodley, and that was only by Majority Decision. But do not underestimate Jorge Masvidal, the man with the worst luck in the UFC. In the last six years, he has five losses, but four of those were by split decision, and Masvidal has fought some of the best in the division during that time. I think this is a super close fight, but nobody's truly figured out Thompson yet as even Woodley was just barely able to get by, so I'll stick with Masvidal's bad luck continuing and him losing by decision to Wonderboy.

Joanna Jędrzejczyk vs. Rose Namajunas
Good God, does this division need easier to spell names. Namajunas is about as easy as it gets with these Strawweight Ladies. Anyway, there's a reason that Jedrzejczyk is champion. Namajunas most impressive win was beating up Michelle Waterson in her last fight, and although that was impressive, Waterson is undersized for the Strawweight division. Also, the fact that Namajunas couldn't handle Karolina Kowalkiewicz in the fight before that, someone that Jedrzejczyk handled easily is not a good sign for her chances. Namajunas sticks around for the whole fight, but the champion retains.

Cody Garbrandt vs. TJ Dillashaw
TJ Dillashaw is a tremendous fighter. He puts up a high pace and has knockout power to back it up. He combines this with an impressive wrestling pedigree, and when you put it all together, it's kind of surprising he isn't an unbeatable champion reigning over his division. No matter how you slice it, Dillashaw is a special fighter.

But Cody Garbrandt is SPECIAL. He is so freaking good. All of the compliments I gave Dillashaw above can also be said about Garbrandt, except his knockout power is so impressive that he has finished all but two of his opponents via strikes. I'll admit, I thought Dominick Cruz was going to be unbeatable in that division, but Garbrandt not only beat him, he did it while talking shit the entire fight. There is a lot of bad blood in this fight, and for actual action, I don't think you can top this one. Dillashaw is super good, but I say Garbrandt not only wins, he finishes him late in the fight.

The UFC is putting on so many fight cards that many of them get watered down. This is not one of those times, as this is definitely worth going out of your way to see.

Johny Hendricks Did Not Get Robbed

So the overwhelming majority of people who watched the GSP-Johny Hendricks fight felt that Hendricks was robbed when the decision went GSP's way. I hate to break it to you, but Johny Hendricks was not robbed in that fight. It was close, and the decision did not go his way. This isn't an issue with the judging; this is simply a case where the judges watched a very close fight and two of them favored GSP over Hendricks. It's a defensible position and not a robbery.

The issue that people have is that there were a few things working heavily in Hendricks's favor. The first is that the crowd was behind him, because he is the first guy to give GSP a competitive fight in six years. That means that the crowd was reacting more to his shots than they were to GSP's which made them feel more powerful.

The second thing that was working for Johny was Joe Rogan. I'm not saying that Rogan is biased towards Hendricks; I really think he just got caught up in the moment, but either way, his commentary was definitely biased towards Hendricks. When GSP hit a strike, he would note that it was a nice shot by Georges. When Hendricks landed a shot, he would say, "That was a HARD shot from Hendricks." It made Hendricks's shots seem like they were a lot more powerful than GSP's. Now I think that judging the power behind shots from television is incredibly difficult, so it may have been than Johny was landing harder shots, but I do not believe that the difference was as pronounced as Rogan made it sound.

Finally, the third thing working for Johny is that he doesn't bruise easy and GSP does. GSP has always bruised easy (Fedor Emelianenko had this same issue), so even if he was landing better shots, he was the one who looked worse at the end of fights. This gave the impression that Hendricks did far better in his strikes but basic skin damage is not a way to judge who won a fight.

Because of all of these factors, people thought that there was going to be a new welterweight champion in the UFC. There wasn't, and I have no issue with this. According to FightMetric, Hendricks outlanded GSP in strikes by 17 through the fight, but GSP outlanded Hendricks in significant strikes by 16. Just because the majority of people leaned towards Hendricks in a close fight does not make this a robbery.

It was a close fight and GSP got the win. The judges don't need to be fired for that. There are a lot of really awful decisions in MMA, but this isn't one of them.

With all that being said, I would have given the edge to Hendricks.

UFC 167 Predictions

Since it's the 20th Annivesary card for the UFC, I feel that I can grace the UFC with my picks and maybe give them some publicity to help out their brand. With the massive reach of this blog, I wouldn't be surprised if Dana White decided to send me some swag in gratitude of my effort. I'll review all the fights I have opinions on, so I apologize if you are a big fan of someone like Cody Donovan.

Sergio Pettis vs. Will Campuzano
I'm very excited about this fight, as Sergio Pettis is basically being labeled as a smaller version of his brother, Anthony Pettis. Campuzano is a solid fighter but has struggled against top-level competition. He may have the experience advantage, but I'll take Pettis in the first round via TKO.

Erik Perez vs. Edwin Figueroa
The UFC wants Perez to succeed, so they have given him a favorable matchup. Expect him to bounce back from his loss to Mizugaki with a highly entertaining TKO in the first round.

Rick Story vs. Brian Ebersole
Rick Story is one of the most interesting fighters in the UFC. Not that his style is super exciting, but in that he beat Johny Hendricks and Thiago Alves in back-to-back fights and looked on his way to a title shot. Then he got dominated by Charlie Brenneman, lost to Martin Kampmann, and has then gone back and forth between wins and losses in his last four fights. Ebersole has tremendous size for 170 (and tremendous chest hair for any weight class), and I think he can counter Story's wrestling to take a decision.

Thales Leites vs. Ed Herman
Remember when Leites fought Anderson Silva for the title? You don't? Consider yourself lucky, because it was awful. He got released and won enough on the independent scene to get called back up. Ed Herman isn't the most athletic guy in the world, but he knows how to pressure opponents. I think this match is super boring, and we see a lot of clinch work, but I don't think Leites has what it takes to get the takedowns and finish the fight, so let's go with Herman by decision.

Donald Cerrone vs. Evan Dunham
This is my pick for fight of the night. Both of these guys go all out and are not afraid to fight in all aspects. I would give Dunham the edge on the ground and Cerrone the edge on the feet. Cerrone's wrestling has gotten leaps and bounds better than it was in the WEC. Because of that, I think he does enough to keep distance and outstrike Dunham in an exciting, back and forth decision.

Josh Koscheck vs. Tyron Woodley
I see the exact same fighters in this match. Tyron Woodley is a wrestler who can occasionally land a big right hand and put people out. Koscheck has been doing that for years. But Koscheck is the much more decorated wrestler, and he has been more impressive using his wrestling in MMA. He has lost 5 of his last 10 fights, but one was a split to Hendricks, one was to GSP, and he got caught a couple times by Robbie Lawler and Paulo Thiago. He only really looked bad against Alves, since GSP makes everyone look bad. Meanwhile, everyone started freaking out when Woodley knocked out Jay Hieron, but he looked awful against Nate Marquardt before that, and he lost a decision to Jake Shields who hasn't been all that impressive since coming over to the UFC. I'm not on the Woodley bandwagon, so I'll take Kos by decision.

Rory MacDonald vs. Robbie Lawler
I'm taking Rory in an easy win here. I know that Lawler has looked good since moving to 170. His win over Koscheck is a good win, but it's quite a step up from Bobby Voelker to Rory MacDonald. His only loss was to Carlos Condit, and had the fight been 10 seconds shorter, he would still be undefeated. The dude has just ran through everyone, and I don't expect that to change, as he gets a submission in the second round.

Rashad Evans vs. Chael Sonnen
I'm an unabashed Chael Sonnen supporter. I picked Sonnen in his first fight against Anderson Silva, and I am still bitter over him losing that one. If you recognize that Chael Sonnen is a pro wrestling character and not a real person, he's wildly entertaining and totally fun. I also love wrestlers in the UFC, so Chael has a lot of things going for him in my mind. Rashad Evans is a good fighter. I want to be clear about that, because I am about to tear apart his entire career. It just seems like he has fought everyone at the right time for the best chance to succeed. He fought new era Tito Ortiz twice and manged one win and one draw out of it. He fought Liddell after Chuck had lost a step. He fought Rampage after he lost a step. He won the title by beating Forrest Griffin, who, let's face it, has a lot of heart, but also may be one of the least talented champions in UFC history (he was a champion; that's still amazing). He also fought Phil Davis before Davis had progressed enough in striking. In his last three fights, he's beaten a 42 year-old Dan Henderson, and looked terrible against Jon Jones (everyone looks terrible against him) and Lil' Nog, which is not as easy to explain. Rashad is good and taken advantage of opportunities, so good for him, but I say his luck runs out and Chael gets the victory.

Georges St. Pierre vs. Johny Hendricks
Is Johny Hendricks a legit contender to GSP's title? Yeah, he's earned the shot, but unless GSP treats him like Matt Serra, I don't see a great chance of Hendricks winning tonight's fight. Out of his last five fights, he has won three decisions, two of them split decisions. I do think he has gotten better as time has gone on, especially the two years since he won a split decision over Mike Pierce, but it was just a year ago that he barely beat Josh Koscheck. GSP beats everyone by decision which makes people underestimate how great he is. He is not squeaking by in these decisions, he is dominating, just not finishing. It is another fight where people are doubting GSP, but there's no need to. GSP will outstrike Hendricks on the feet, and the only guy I see having a chance to outwrestle him in the welterweight division just got released by Bellator. GSP is great, and he's still going to be champ after winning all five rounds against Johny Hendricks.