Media Usman: ''I am not chasing GSP, GSP had 4 fights before his title shot''

[ThunderStruck]

Time stamp: 8:28

Usman: ''I hate the way that's being put that I'm chasing GSP, I am not chasing GSP. GSP had maybe what four fights before he got the title shot? You know I had to take the long back roads, back door, back alley in order to get the title shot.''

Usman has a point. It was even worse for Khabib as he was robbed from title fight in 2016, and had to wait Conor for 2 years because of UFC's favoritism, and only in 2018 the belt was vacated. When you consider all of these, the title defense criteria is not the best criteria when UFC is not even being fair who gets title shot or not, and Usman is right about this, he too had to work his way to title shot, while GSP got his title shot only 2 fights later. Then Hughes submits GSP in the first title fight, then 4 fights later he won his title shot against Hughes, but then got KOed by Serra in the title fight. He has many decision wins, even a split decision with Hendricks. But let's be honest, he was UFC's favorite for sure.

He has finishes over BJ Penn (a lightweight), and Serra (the guy who KOed him before) and Hughes (the guy who finished him before).

-GSP was also never P4P No.1, while Usman already become P4P No.1.
-So even based on P4P No.1 criteria, Usman can be ahead of GSP.

GSP had 8 top 10 wins before his first title defense, including 4 or 5 top 5 wins.

How many top 10 wins did Usman get before his first defense? 1? 2?

He got it totally backward, GSP had beat far more ranked guys before starting racking up title defenses, unlike Usman.

Usman is full of shit.

 

[Zed237]

Rosters were way thinner.

 

[Bend NvR Break]

Imagine that thinking anything GSP has every done is more impressive to Usman's accommplishments

Usman is brutalizing and humiliating his competition unlike GSP decisioning them

This is strange.....

GSP really wasn't a decision machine until after the second Serra fight. Before that he was stopping people.

Usman was a decision machine, outside 1 KO, through the Woodley title. Then he finishes Colby, Masdival (once) and burns and people think he's go KO artist? Gtfo with that.

 

[Cooliox]

View attachment 889139

Stop lying to yourself, it’s pathetic

Pathetic to count ultimate fighter finale against a non-ufc opponent as a 'ufc fight'

I see you're a victim of mass marketing. Probably can't think for yourself just yet. 100% still living with parents.

 

[campbecc]

They didn't do him any favors giving him a title shot before he was ready. He had a lot of fights before he won the title.

 

[johny ringo]

And after those 4 fights he fought the best of the division. Not cherry picking opponents. GSP will always cast a giant shadow over Marty.

 

[LHWBelt]

I hold champ champ status against a fighters greatness in most circumstances. Unless it's a fight between 2 dominant champs who cleaned out his division a champ champ fight is just a shortcut to achieving greatness. Of course GSP already had the great career at WW but like Izzy he just so happened to go up a weight class when the division champ seemed beatable. It makes GSP look worse considering the circumstances under which he'd left WW. People wanted GSP to go up to fight AS when both were domiant champs doing it when he'd been retired for 5 years and when MW had a beatable champ in a stacked division makes a mockery of the accomplishment.

GSP was typically facing grapplers and Condit and Hendricks were able to give him problems. All these mutli dimensional guys would have been a nightmare for him. Nick Diaz is the best guy he dominated who really had a standup game.

He shoulda fought Anderson but it's not a mockery of an accomplishment. People thought Izzy would smoke a weak champ in Jan but it didn't turn out that way. I don't even like GSP but he's clearly the best WW so far. There's a good argument for a lot of divisions but Jones, Anderson, and GSP are all clearly the best of their divisions.

 

[PunchyMcSplodo]

and early in the next decade

Hughes
Penn
GSP
Condit
Hendricks
Thiago 2008/2009
Diaz
Stick
Kos

LOL do you really think you're contradicting me by listing 9 people?

How many total fighters do you think were on the UFC WW roster in the 2000s, on average? Around two dozen, give or take.

How big do you think the roster averages over the last 5 years?

Come on, man. There's a reason GSP was already fighting for a title within like 4 fights.

Lightweight journeymen are fighting Usman for the title lately lol.

Yeah, Matt Sera and BJ Penn were giants. Sean Sherk, too. Don't know how they made 170.

Also, LOL at pretending that people like Dan Hardy were markedly better than Masvidal or Burns in their current runs.

 

[SalvadorAllende]

He was also fighting Sean Strickland in his 4th fight in the UFC

 

[DestinedAussie]

He was also a boring ass blanket during his come up.

Yeah effective for getting the wins but not easy for Dana to sell as exciting.

 

[SalvadorAllende]

Why is that a bad thing? Sean is a middleweight, who was cutting too much weight for welterweight. It's a very good win, he is no.7 in the middleweight division right now.

To say that GSP had it easy because he had a TS in his 4th fight is misleading. If anything he was thrown to the wolves pretty early.

And I like Sean but he wasn't as good at WW as he is MW (mainly because MW is weak)

 

[Ozze]

Champs nowadays are so obnoxious.

Just say "GSP was a legend of the sport and it would be a great honor to tie or even surpass his records."

There. Take notes.

 

[Phisher]

He was also a boring ass blanket during his come up.

...and GSP was boring after he won the belt the second time.

 

[HP_Nut]

Kamaru's 1st 7 wins in the UFC were against guys who were not ranked top 10 at the time of the fight. GSP's 4 fight win streak before beating Hughes in the rematch featured 3 highly ranked WWs at that time in Trigg, Sherk, & Penn. Those guys were all top 5 ranked

In GSP's heyday, there was no "warming up" or fighting a bunch of unranked guys, UFC threw you into the deepend of the pool right away. GSP's very 1st UFC fight was Karo

 

[Adamant]

-GSP was also never P4P No.1, while Usman already become P4P No.1.

There wasn't an official "P4P ranking" when GSP was in his prime.

Having an "official P4P ranking" is a joke.

 

[mjfan23]

Usman fights in an era where journeyman Jorge gets two title shots and a 40 year old wonderboy is one his toughest matchups lol

 

[Mike]

You guys can keep trying to spin it that Usman is better than gsp, but nobodies buying it lmao

 

[ScholarDayo]

Kamaru's 1st 7 wins in the UFC were against guys who were not ranked top 10 at the time of the fight. GSP's 4 fight win streak before beating Hughes in the rematch featured 3 highly ranked WWs at that time in Trigg, Sherk, & Penn. Those guys were all top 5 ranked

In GSP's heyday, there was no "warming up" or fighting a bunch of unranked guys, UFC threw you into the deepend of the pool right away. GSP's very 1st UFC fight was Karo

None of them would be top 15 today. The talent pool was weak.

 

[NoBiasJustMMA]

There was no WW division in the UFC during that time. Karo was barely top ten worldwide. Half the guys were out of the UFC or one and done for Matt Hughes. There was also the Japanese reverence during that time. We counted Pancrase champions as much as UFC and there were talks of Gomi being a suitable match for Matt Hughes.

I really have no horse in this race between Usman and GSP. They are both good fighters. I just can't fault Usman for starting on the bottom in the UFC while most of the contenders during the early times had their outside UFC fights count as a starting point. UFC have so many events now. They can afford a large stable and hold division rankings in house. Usman had to fight in a smaller league then fight in the ultimate fighter and then start from on the bottom of the UFC. Usman was also held back from contention because he was boring. GSP fought in the small league and was off the races. It's just a different time and it really is hard to compare them both.

I know all of this, my point is still the same GSP fought high ranked guys right away In the UFC and GSP's first title shot was for a vacant title. Usman started in the UFC fighting lower level guys within the organization and no one vacated the title in his first defense so he had to win more fights to earn his title shot because he was fighting lower ranked guys and a number 1 contender spot didn't get freed up.

I'm not trash talking him or anything just stating there are clear reasons why GSP earned his title shot sooner.

 

[Carsormyr]

I'm a fan of Usman, and it's obvious that he's not at the level of GSP's body of work yet. Having said that, GSP's career is done and Usman is still going so it may change in the future, although I doubt it given Usman's age. Also there's no one on GSP's resume that Usman wouldn't obliterate too, so there's that.