It’s been a week or two since UFC president Dana White confirmed that former welterweight champion and pound for pound great Georges St-Pierre was returning to the UFC after a three year career hiatus. Since then rumors have swirled over who the Canadian would face. Would it beConor McGregor? Would it be Nick Diaz? Would it be whoever is holding his old 170 pound belt?
It turns out it’s none of the above. Today on SportsCenter, White revealed that GSP will instead face Michael Bisping for the UFC middleweight belt. Bisping is currently sidelined following knee surgery, but will be back in action late spring.
“I’m not a big believer in long layoffs, even Muhammad Ali after a three year layoff didn’t look the same, but the Korean Zombie just came back and looked amazing after a three year layoff so who knows?” White said during the SportsCenter interview. “Georges St-Pierre is always in shape, takes care of himself physically, so we’ll see what happens.”
.@GeorgesStPierre RETURNS later this year to take on @Bisping for the UFC MW title! pic.twitter.com/XnHXmnDkzL
— UFC (@ufc) March 1, 2017
The UFC hasn’t locked in a date yet but we’re expecting things to go down in June or July. Hopefully we’ll know more when the UFC holds a press conference this Friday leading into UFC 209 with both St-Pierre and Bisping in attendance. As far as how close we came to seeing GSP versus Conor McGregor?
“Not even close!” White said with a laugh. But… “Georges said he could make 155 pounds.”
