The biggest UFC fight of the year, considering the only fight McGregor had this year was in a boxing ring, is Michael Bisping vs. Georges St. Pierre for the middleweight title at UFC 217. That fight will headline the biggest card of 2017 with two other title fights on the card. It will be the first time GSP will be in the octagon since 2013 when he surprisingly retired after his controversial decision over Johnny Hendricks. The stacked card will be in Las Vegas this Saturday night, November 4.
We’ve all been awaiting the return of GSP over the past year, and when they announced it would be against Michael Bisping, it was the perfect match-up. Two top ten MMA fighters of all-time sharing the octagon together, what’s not to like. GSP, who always fought at welterweight, will make his middleweight debut in his comeback fight. He’ll also be trying to join the elite few that have captured UFC gold in two weight classes. Does he have it in him?
Michael Bisping is never an easy fight, especially when you haven’t fought in four years. Bisping could end the GSP comeback tour as it starts. Bisping has had a long journey to become champion, and he doesn’t let GSP forget that he was here fighting all the steroid guys when GSP ran and hid. Bisping is a big kick-boxer who’s strongest asset is his stamina. He has an unmatched gas tank and is always pushing the pace of the fight.
For GSP to win, he will have to make sure Bisping spends a lot of time on his back in this fight, which is a very hard thing to accomplish. Bisping will be the bigger fighter with the more devastating one punch. I like Bisping to win this fight. I think he’ll be too big and too much for rusty GSP coming back form a four year layoff. I’m picking Bisping to win by unanimous decision.
The co-main event is one of the biggest grudge matches in the UFC right now. Most UFC fans are aware of the feud between Bantamweight Champion, Cody Garbrandt and former alpha male teammate TJ Dillashaw. Alpha Male is one of the most known MMA teams, so when their star fighter and champion TJ Dillashaw and former coach Duane Ludwig split from the team to start their own team it was a big controversy. Alpha Male leader Urijah Faber was very outspoken about the split up, and when TJ wanted everything to be cool, the alpha male team had other ideas. Cody “No Love” Garbrandt (my favorite nickname in MMA) was the next upcoming star in the alpha male ranks, knocking out everyone in his path with TJ, and the belt, in his eyes. At the time, it seemed he could kill two birds with one stone since TJ was champ, but then TJ lost the belt, and it seemed he would have to accomplish both feats separately. He accomplished the first in dominating fashion by destroying Dominick Cruz to capture the Bantamweight belt. Now, it’s time for step two: the two top pupils of alpha male will face-off for the belt.
The match-up is so close it’s hard to predict how the fight will go. Both have great foot work and head movement. The boxing nod would have to go to Cody, while the wrestling nod I would have to give to TJ. Even though Cody has a wrestling background as well as boxing, he’s yet to showcase his wrestling ability which he swears he has, so it should make it interesting. I go back and forth on this fight every time I think about it, but my official choice is going to be TJ Dillashaw to regain his bantamweight title by unanimous decision.
The third title fight is for the women;s strawweight title. The undefeated champion and greatest female fighter of all-time Joanna Jędrejczyk, or as she likes to go by “Joanna Champion”, will look to defend her title once again. Rose Namajunas has been on the hunt to fight Joanna for a long time now. That time has come. Rose has won four of her last five fights, with the only loss coming in a split-decision to the very tough Karolina Kowalkiewicz. When you have a dominate champion like Joanna, it’s always exciting when a fighter like Rose stands across from her. We all know Rose is a straight up bad-ass and is going to bring it on fight night with everything she has. She’ll be ready to die in there for a victory, the only problem is she might have to. Joanna is too good and too focused for me to think that she will lose anytime soon. (Of course I felt that about Rousey too and we all know how that turned out.) Joanna Champion is her name, and her name it will stay. I see her getting yet another victory and defending her title yet another time. I’m picking Joanna Champion to defend her title in dramatic fashion with a TKO finish over Rose.
The best non-title fight of the night will be the second fight on the main card between Stephen Thompson vs. Jorge Masvidal. They’re two of the best strikers in all of the UFC, but they have two different styles. Thompson uses the karate and kickboxing style, while Masvidal uses the straight-up boxing style. They could be the very best in all of UFC at their respected fighting styles. It has a lot of potential to be fight of the night. My pick is Masvidal by KO, which will lead to him getting the next title shot at the welterweight division.
It will be the best fight card of the year with an all-time main event with two legends to finish the night. Get to a place that is buying this fight, take a seat, and watch this one. You won’t want to miss it. I’m still figuring out how the hell I’m going to watch this, since I’m going to be at a wedding all night. My brothers and I have been thinking more about how we’re going to watch the fights that night than we’ve thought about the wedding. I don’t even know where this damn wedding is. All we’ve been talking about is either getting the fight at the hotel, or we might just have to bring one of our computers down to the reception party and just huddle around it while everyone else dances. It’s still up in the air. The only definite is that, in no conceivable way, will we miss these fights.