Luke Rockhold and UFC middleweight champ Michael Bisping simply won’t let up on one another with the trash talk. Bisping was watching Rockhold’s fight at UFC Fight Night Pittsburgh against David Branch and was sure to let him know his thoughts on what he saw, but Rockhold simply has no respect for Bisping and the way he’s handled his reign as champion.
“I think it’s the worst in UFC history, no one has ever gotten that treatment, no one has avoided all the top contenders. He was supposed to fight Jacare, he avoided that, he was supposed to fight Yoel, he avoided that, and somehow he’s getting away from this fight Whittaker. He found Dan Henderson, the No. 14th ranked at the time, and now he’s going for GSP. He hasn’t done anything.“
Rockhold doesn’t consider Michael Bisping the real champion and feels that Robert Whittaker is the true number one middlweight in the division. Of course, if he can’t get the fight with Whittaker right away, there’s always Yoel Romero.
“That would be Robert Whittaker, that would be the real champion, that’s the man who is fighting all the guys,” said Rockhold. “We’ll see what his timetable is of course, obviously a third option is Yoel Romero.”
The UFC middleweight champ Bisping has been telling the media that his fight with GSP at UFC 217 could be his last as he told Ariel Helwani on Monday.
“Just, I’ve been here for so long,” Bisping explained. “I’ve done it for so long now, and there’s other things to do in life. I mean, I still love this, don’t get me wrong. But you can’t do it forever. You can’t do it forever, and Georges — Georges should’ve stayed retired. He should’ve retired as a champion. I’m going to beat Georges and I’ll retire as a champion, maybe. I haven’t made my mind up on that yet. It depends.
“If there’s enough money involved, maybe I’ll stick around. But as of right now, I don’t know. My family wants me to retire. My wife wants me to retire. There’s a lot of people saying, ‘Mike, you should retire.’ My manager says it. So everyone’s in my ear saying, ‘Mike, you should retire, you should retire as champion.’ I’ve earned some money along the way, I’ve had a great career, I’ve represented my country. I’ve achieved more through mixed martial arts than what I ever would’ve dreamed of. We can’t keep going forever. You’ve got to know when the time is right, and I’m not saying the time is right, but I am contemplating it.”
However, Rockhold is going to pursue the rematch with Bisping regardless and wants to prove that Bisping was never the true middleweight champion.
“I’m going to put myself in position. He’s going to have a choice. Either he stands and fights like a man, or he runs. And we all know what he’s doing. He’s ran from the start and it looks like he’s going to run to the finish.”
