As we were watching UFC 154 on Saturday night, making hilarious quips and cyber high-fiving because we’re all awesome bros and babes, there was some excitement and chatter about something that wasn’t happening in the ring and in no way related to Brittney Palmer’s body. UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva and former light heavyweight champion Lyoto Machida were on hand to watch the highly-anticipated and much-celebrated return of welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre. Silva’s presence of course begged the question: “Yo, is he gonna challenge GSP?”
And the answer, as we all learned, was “Nah”. It turns out that Silva and Machida were in Canada to film a movie with Steven Seagal, which sounds horribly awesome and I can’t wait to see it when it goes straight to Laser Disc, which Seagal invented, by the way. But don’t let that discourage you from thinking that Silva vs. St-Pierre will happen, because Silva is at least saying all the right things.
“I have my plans. First, the people are talking Anderson and St-Pierre,” Silva said at Bell Centre before the start of UFC 154. “Now the people are talking Anderson and Jon Jones.
“My first goal is the Georges St-Pierre fight, the superfight. And the second goal, maybe Jon Jones. I don’t know.
“This is not my decision. This is Dana White’s decision.” (Via ESPN)
Obviously, White wants to make this fight happen, but it’s going to be up to Silva, because after he finishes this film – I’m just going to assume that the title is Front Kicks for Revenge* – he’s going on vacation. Oh, and GSP is probably going to spend a few weeks in a giant tub of ice. The earliest this fight would happen would be in May, but Silva also only has two fights remaining on his UFC contract, and as USA Today points out, Silva’s probably bringing this up because he wants to remind White that he’ll be expecting a ton of money on his next contract. Either way, Dana White’s words: “I’ll make this fight.”
That said, if this is all just Silva positioning for more cash, White and Co. couldn’t go wrong if they gave Johny Hendricks that fight that he earnestly begged for after his knockout win over win over Martin Kampmann.
*It’s actually called Tapped.
