Firas Zahabi explains why Georges St-Pierre is the greatest of all time

In the eyes of Firas Zahabi, Georges St-Pierre is the greatest fighter of all time. Now, it’s worth noting that St-Pierre is Zahabi’s star pupil, so he’s understandably biased, but he actually makes some strong arguments for St-Pierre’s case.

Speaking to Fight Hub TV, Zahabi explained why he considers St-Pierre the greatest fighter in MMA history. For him, a big part of the argument is that the other GOAT contenders have all lost, or done things to damage their credibility.

“He’s number one, no doubt about it,” Zahabi said (transcribed by MMAFighting) “Who else could there be? Give me a name.”

“Conor [McGregor] hasn’t defended a title. [Fedor Emelianenko] had too many losses. [Anderson Silva] had too many losses and you know what happened. The testing didn’t go well. [Jon Jones] – testing. There’s nobody else! There’s nobody else. I’m not just saying that because I train him. Put me aside, the guy is the greatest martial artist of all-time. That’s it. He did it. Let’s give him his due props. He worked for it, he deserves it. If another name comes along that does more than what he did, I’ll be happy to say that there’s a new best of all time.

“Before the testing, and all the losses happened, I would say he was one of the best of all time. Now I’m telling you he is THE best of all time. That’s just the way it is. After the tests come back the way they did the losses happened the way they did, the hands were dealt the way they were, now the best of all time, today, is GSP. No doubt about it.”

You’ll notice that one key GOAT contender, Demetrious Johnson, is missing from Zahabi’s assessment. That’s not because Zahabi doesn’t consider him one of the best. In fact, Zahabi believe’s Johnson is right behind Georges St-Pierre in the GOAT race—and he’s still got time to surpass him.

“Demetrious Johnson is number-two in my opinion,” Zahabi said. “Absolutely. The only reason I wouldn’t give it to Demetrious – and I think the world of Demetrious, I can’t say enough good things about him – he didn’t have the hornets nest, the challengers that Georges had. He just didn’t have those legendary guys that went on a win streak, that were unstoppable, and then were stopped by the champ. He didn’t have that. And it’s not his fault. It’s not his fault at all. He took down everybody they put in front of him and he did it in style; however, he never had that guy.”

“The division is not that deep. There’s not that many people, per capita, that weigh 125 pounds, that can make that weight class. There’s not that many people in the population. How many of those guys were studs that haven’t lost in 10 years like a Jake Shields, Matt Hughes, so many guys, legends that Georges beat. Also, he didn’t win the championship in a weight class above.”

“Demetrious could still do it,” he concluded. “He’s got time. It could happen it just hasn’t happened for him yet.”

Who do you consider the greatest fighter of all time? Georges St-Pierre, Demetrious Johnson, or somebody else?

This article first appeared on BJPenn.com on 4/16/2018.