Chris Weidman is Contemplating Moving Up to Light Heavyweight

After suffering three straight losses to the top of the division’s heap, Chris Weidman finally secured a win over Kelvin Gastelum. The luck of the All-American may be looking up, but the outlook of the UFC’s middlweight division he calls home is still murky. Georges St-Pierre swooped down like some MMA super hero and cut everybody in line to fight Michael Bisping. With an already arduous path back to title contention, Weidman is getting together a contingency plan and thinks he found a short cut to another UFC belt by moving up. That’s right, Weidman could move up to light heavyweight.

“Yeah, definitely there has to be a clear picture. Like I said, my goal is to be the champ and there’s no way of me getting to have the belt for two years or more just based on other people taking their time with taking fights. It’s a weird place to be, it’s not interesting. I mean, if 185 doesn’t like, things don’t change, I want to maybe think about possibly going to 205. So we’ll see.”

“I think it’s a little bit of a thinner division and right now the title picture, I don’t feel like there’s clear contenders, you know? I don’t know how many guys that are up in the top-five that they’re shooting to fight for the title soon. So if there’s a clear picture to a title at 205, then I would consider that. But again, I’m not really putting too much thought into any of this. Obviously I gotta focus on getting my hand better and staying healthy, and that’s it, man. Let’s see, maybe Bisping or maybe GSP gets injured, I don’t know, and then I’ll be ready to go for November and Bisping won’t be able to scatter away from a guy like me. So that would be something that would work out for me nice for me. I’m in New York, I’m ready to go.” — Chris Weidman via Submission Radio.

Chris Weidman always had to deplete himself to make middleweight, so it’s possible he may enjoy a renewed vigor at a higher weight. He’s even said in the past that he wouldn’t leave the sport without fighting Jon Jones, he even offered to step in to face him at UFC 151, but all that was before he lost his middleweight title to Luke Rockhold. Despite his recent losses, his resume alone may be enough to skip him straight into light heavyweight’s top five. All this just in the nick of time, considering Jon Jones just came back and he’s nearly out of challengers already. Until then, he’s ready to step up just in case Bisping of St-Pierre get hurt.

This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 8/17/2017.