GSP's new official Blog at YardBarker.com

No more stupid Flash blog ...and GSP writes alot! ....lol

http://www.yardbarker.com/users/StPierre

Hughes being a dick, GSP (& Grandma Dee) Responds

How Quickly Matt Hughes Forgets!

submitted by grmd61

Unlike my grandson Cody, I have never been a Matt Hughes fan. This has caused many clashes over the years between grandmother and grandson, both watching Pay Per Views together, but cheering for different fighters. It did make shopping for gifts for Cody easy: anything from Matt Hughes' store, especially if autographed for $20,00 extra was sure to be a favorite.

Never mind the fact that Hughes had promised to attend a wrestling tournament in small town Clinton, Illinois, but failed to show. He was quickly forgiven for that by the earnest young wrestlers who adored him; although Grandma still had to bid on Hughes' autographed tee shirts in spite of her displeasure with the "no show" which the kids had suffered in stoic silence.

Then during UFC TUF 4 "The Comeback" when Matt Hughes came on the show as a "guest coach" and made rude comments towards Grandma's favorite fighter Georges St. Pierre, it did show a petty side of Hughes of which Cody had not been aware.

Thank heaven for the outspoken Matt Serra whose defence of GSP brought him up very highly in the Willis's family's estimation, making him their season favorite. And what a predicament that presented when through fate, GSP and Matt Serra became opponents after the show's finale when Georges beat Hughes and became the Welterweight champion. If only a Hughes v Serra fight could have occurred first!

Naturally, this was not to be and when Serra "shocked the world" by defeating Georges, another set of circumstances, including an injury to Serra's back put GSP and Hughes back in contention for an "interim belt."

The second meeting of Serra v St. Pierre ended favorably for Georges and made him an instant hero in his hometown of Montreal Quebec, Canada. where the event was held.

Each time St. Pierre beat Hughes he had been very generous in praising Hughes for his strength and wrestling ability. So when Hughes stepped in to meet Thigo Alves ( replacing an injured Chuck Liddell ) as headliner in the London venue UFC 85, he may truly have believed Georges' complements, overestimating his own capabilities. While watching Matt face off with Thiago "a youngster" with superior Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu skills, he looked pathetically old, slow and much less of a force than his record in the UFC would indicate.

Hughes looked pale with exhaustion when he faced off with Alves at the beginning of the second round. He had given away his intention to shoot for a takedown and even I as a sixty-two year old non-fighter knew exactly what was about to happen as he took a wicked knee to the head, sprawling backwards on the mat.

Only the sick way that Hughes fell with his left knee out of alignment was a complete surprise. Well, that and the fact Hughes wasn't carried out of the octagon and somehow "gimped" out on his own power. That may be the only exemplary moment Hughes displayed in his fight with Alves.

Yet Hughes has apparently forgotten his own foibles and failings in his last fight. Of all things he chose to be critical of Georges' five round title fight with Jon Fitch which, though it went the distance, resulted in perfect scores for Georges and a unanimous decision. Since then Hughes stated that Georges "looked smaller" to him and the fight "not being exciting," prompted Huges to leave during the third round "to beat the rush;" which was ludicrous at best, and sour grapes at worse.

In January a fight with old foe Matt Serra is looming in his future, and an aging Hughes may find himself eating his own words at Serra's hands.

To me a loss to Matt Serra would put the world back in order and end the cyclic journey as it should be ended, with Serra teaching Hughes that it is best to keep your words to others very sweet, in the event that you may someday be eating them.

Ah, Grandma Dee loves a big dose of poetic justice almost better than chocolate!

(Source)

Post Fight Press Conference - UFC 87

http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=videoPlayer.home&gid=13962

Georges St Pierre dismantles Jon Fitch

Chris Parry

Vancouver Sun

Sunday, August 10, 2008

CREDIT: John Mahoney/Canwest News Service Georges St. Pierre rests against the ropes following a sparring session at the Legion Fight Club in Victoriaville.

It took about 90 seconds for Montreal's Georges St Pierre to show a sell out crowd of 15,000 and a massive pay-per-view TV audience that he wasn't going to lose his UFC world welterweight title to unbeaten John Fitch.

Coming in to the main event of UFC 87, there were plenty of people willing to pontificate that the Canadian champion might not respond well to the pressure of a title defense. After all, the last time St Pierre was asked to defend a belt, he lost to a rank underdog.

But that talk was quickly silenced as the man they call GSP dodged a thigh kick and planted a huge right hand on the challenger's chin, dropping him to the mat and opening a big cut under his left eye.

And it only got worse for Fitch from there.

But in what was a classic example of why the sport of mixed martial arts is taking off so rapidly, as St Pierre went in for the kill, peppering the American with blows to the head, the expected TKO never came. Seemingly unable to mount much of an offense, Fitch simply refused to cede, wrapped the champion up in knots, and eventually even mounted a little offense in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds.

But only a little.

The flow of the match was fairly consistent; St Pierre would crack Fitch in the face with a snapping kick or a brutal left jab, Fitch's legs would buckle underneath him, but then he'd straighten up, defend like crazy as his head cleared, and start swinging again.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

St Pierre hit his opponent with punches, knees, elbows, spinning back kicks, roundhouse kicks, knee lifts to the jaw, even spinning backhand chops. The only thing he didn't hit the challenger with was a socket wrench, though chances are Fitch would have shaken that off too.

If points were allocated for knockdowns, the defending champion would have won by a cricket score, but Fitch's determination to stand under a barrage brought nearly as much acclaim as the dismantling laid upon him by the champion. In fact, as St Pierre started to run out of gas and resorted to defensive grappling and clock watching in the later rounds, a bloodied and beaten Fitch began to look just a little dangerous - as if he saw himself as just a twisted arm away from stealing an unlikely win.

But in the end, it wasn't even close. St Pierre was so explosive, so accurate and so balanced in his attack that all Fitch could really do was hang tough, take the blows, and hope for an opening that seldom came.

As the champion was announced the winner by unanimous decision, St Pierre dropped to his knees in front of Fitch and extended a hand of respect, a move that was quickly matched by the challenger, leaving the pair sitting in the middle of the octagon, chatting away like new best friends. You'd hardly know they had spent the previous half hour trying to rip each other's heads off.

Though the crowd was almost to a man in St Pierre's corner at the commencement of the fight, Fitch's refusal to stay down earned him loud respect from the crowd - and the guy who beat him to a pulp.

"This loss will be great for him," said St Pierre afterwards. "It will only make him better."

God help the rest of the UFC if it does - if these guys aren't two of the best pound for pound competitors in any fighting sport out there, it's hard to imagine who is.

After the match, lightweight world champion BJ Penn came to the ring and challenged GSP to meet him up a weight class for a title bout, a prospect that St Pierre was happy to agree to and which, if it happens, would be one of the biggest fights in UFC history. That said, the idea of St Pierre/Fitch 2 would certainly draw a similarly large audience, even if only to answer the question, "Can Jon Fitch be knocked out?"