UFC President Dana White is back to throwing Georges St-Pierre under the bus a bit, criticizing the former UFC Welterweight Champion while praising Conor McGregor’s move up to welterweight at UFC 196.
“That’s the thing – nobody wants to do it. GSP would never move up to 185 to fight Anderson Silva. He wouldn’t do it,” White said on ESPN Radio’s Russillo and Kanell this week (transcribed by FoxSports.com). “That’s what makes Saturday so fun. You know how many times we wanted to do the GSP-Anderson Silva fight? GSP would not do it. Would not do it. Guys don’t do that stuff. That’s what makes Conor McGregor so unique, so fascinating and so fun.
“For GSP he was moving up one weight class. Conor McGregor jumped up two weight classes… Conor McGregor is so much fun in the fight business. Guys don’t do that. Guys who are making the money that Conor McGregor makes, has the money in the bank, and all the things that are going on with him, he has a world title, he just decides to jump up two weight classes and fight somebody else.”
Penick’s Analysis: The most laughable thing about this is White’s varying stances on the issue throughout the years. He discouraged GSP from going up to middleweight; he talked about Silva dropping down to welterweight; on this week’s new “Looking for a Fight” episode he was talking about how much he hates it when fighters fight out of their weight class, but here he is ripping St-Pierre for not doing it while praising McGregor. It’s not surprising to see, of course, it’s what he does. He’ll twist situations to whatever his narrative happens to be on that particular day or for a particular person, and here it’s to try boosting McGregor while somewhat tearing down GSP.
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Dana’s such a damned suck up it’s ridiculous.
Why does he have to disparage one of the fighters that made the UFC what it is today & made the company a lot of $$$ in the process, in order to put salve on the ass of his current #1 star who got his ass choked out 3 days ago?
And, believe me, I was never even a big fan of GSP’s. I just think it’s a really shitty thing to do.
I used to be cool with Dana, but it’s gotten to the point where I really can’t stand him anymore. He’s just a shady character IMO.
Ronda can’t go up to even 140, but GSP needed to go up to be the smallest MW in history in order to fight the best fighter in the history of the sport, at the peak of his powers, who also happened to be absolutely gigantic for a middleweight (major run-on sentence, bite me).