Dana White explains why Georges St-Pierre won’t get lightweight title shot

Georges St-Pierre is retired. That being said, a large portion of the MMA community is still clinging to the hope that the former UFC welterweight and middleweight champion will eventually dust off his gloves and return to the Octagon — perhaps in pursuit of a third title against UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov.

UFC President Dana White says that won’t be happening, as St-Pierre didn’t hold up his end of the deal after battling Michael Bisping for the middleweight title in 2017. He doesn’t seem to trust the Canadian after this incident.

“Well there’s two things — first of all, who doesn’t love Georges St-Pierre? Love Georges St-Pierre, the best ever as far as human beings, great guy, love him. Georges St-Pierre and I had a deal, he was going to fight [Michael] Bisping at 185 pounds and if he won, he would defend the title. He bailed on that. Didn’t do it,” White told TSN recently (transcript via MMA Fighting). “So you can’t just come out and hand pick fights that you want for titles.”

“He made this deal with me that he would defend the title,” White added. “He went in and he saw Bisping as an easy fight. He fought Bisping and then you look at the guys that are behind Bisping and they’re all killers. They’re all literally killers.

“But now to come back and he wants to fight at 155 for the title. We’re not doing a goofy 165 [pound] whatever, that’s not going to happen.”

While Dana White claims Georges St-Pierre wants to fight for the lightweight title, it’s worth noting that the Canadian hasn’t publicly mentioned the possibility since before his retirement.

Whatever the case, White says a potential St-Pierre vs. Nurmagomedov fight is further complicated by the fact that there are multiple other deserving contenders in the lightweight division.

“I guess if I get into a position where Khabib the champ wants it bad enough, we’re going to have to talk about it but at the end of the day it doesn’t make sense to me,” White said. “You have other guys lined up behind him. You’re just asking me if Tony Ferguson is going to get a shot. We’ll give you a shot after Georges St-Pierre slides in at 155 and gets his shot. Then you’ve got Conor [McGregor] who wants a rematch.

“There’s guys backed up that want to fight in that division. You can’t come back out of retirement and hand pick fights that you want when you didn’t even keep your word with me on defending the [185] pound belt. Have I made that clear?”

Do you think we’ll ever see Georges St-Pierre fighting for the UFC lightweight title?

This article first appeared on BJPENN.COM on 7/16/2019.