White Shoots Down Weidman/Silva … but why? Didn’t he already call Weidman #1?

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Dana White is the most influential and important person in the history of the sport we all love. Hell, this sport has made me a multimillionaire (you know, from the ads on this page that you guys are kind enough to keep clicking), and White is responsible for getting MMA to that level. Having said that, he’s a very emotional guy and he sometimes (ok, it’s way more than just ‘sometimes’) he says things that completely contradict what he might have said the day before.

Last night on UFC Tonight he answered questions about Anderson Silva’s next contender. Specifically, he was asked about the possibility of Silva vs. Chris Weidman. His answer went from “No, no” to “who knows” to “we’ll see.” To an untrained eye, this answer may show uncertainty. But for me—a multimillionaire owner of an MMA media conglomerate—I can see through his jargon.

Here’s what White REALLY is saying with this answer. Remember, he’s very emotional and knee-jerk. His first answer is EXACTLY what he wanted to say—“No no.” That’s means Weidman can forget about a title shot for now. I’m 100% sure of that. Then the guy on White’s other shoulder reminded him that he’s not just spokesman, but also a public figure who has to maintain some semblance of political correctness…at least for Weidman. That’s when he softened it a bit by saying vague garbage like “we’ll see.”

You know what else is funny about this? White just came out and said Weidman was #1. Remember after UFC 150 when he was asked if Weidman was next? In case you don’t, he answered resoundingly. “Yes. He just took out the No. 3 guy in the division in Mark Munoz. And he completely destroyed him.”

He also threw out another line about the middleweight division being on fire right now and that there are a ton of challengers. But he can’t expect us to believe him, right? The champion has already come out and said there are NO challengers at all. Now White says there are a lot of option? I’m not buying this.

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Pretty simple answer for this one;
Silva vs GSP


Is it going to happen?
I will always doubt it until it actually happens, but Dana is just trying to clear the table for it to happen if things go as planned.
Its not Dana knocking Weidman or disrespecting him in any way, its just a matter of taking the opportunity to finally make GSP vs Silva if he can. He didn't say Weidman doesn't deserve it, he just said he can't committ to him fighting Silva next because, again, GSP vs Silva is a possibility, and Dana doesn't want to roadblock that fight by scheduling Weidman for a fight with Silva.

This is from MMAWeekly:

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Right now, the UFC appears in a holding pattern waiting for the possible super fight between Anderson Silva and UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre. If St-Pierre wins at UFC 154 in Montreal on Nov 17, then all roads will likely lead to a showdown with Anderson Silva in 2013.

“No (he’s not getting a title shot),” White answered. “I mean it could happen, who knows, we’ll see what happens.”

White admitted that he didn’t want to jump ahead too fast and shut down the possibility of Weidman getting the next title shot, but with everything else that’s been said recently it’s almost a lock that Silva’s next fight is riding on what happens with St-Pierre in November.

Chris Weidman now becomes the odd-man out awaiting word on another fight or if he wants to gamble on Carlos Condit winning at UFC 154, and then throwing his name back into the hat to face Anderson Silva if that scenario plays out.

http://www.mmaweekly.com/chris-weidman-will-likely-fight-again-before-possibly-receiving-title-shot



Its very smart of Dana to be non-committal about this, IMO.

At the same time it's completely retarded. You have a healthy champ and multiple healthy contenders at 185... one who Dana already said is #1 contender... but instead of having Silva defend that title more than once this year, lets just go ahead and hold out to try to set up a non-title catch weight fight for next year....

If was going to happen it would have by now... but I suppose we can all hold our breath...

I agree that we shouldn't expect GSP vs Silva to happen. But if it does, it would likely be the biggest fight in UFC history. That's a much, much more important fight than Silva/Weidman. It would be kind of dumb to just go ahead and schedule Silva for yet another title defense when the possiblity of this superfight is out there.

Its too bad for Weidman, but that's life. And its not like Weidman has been waiting in the wings as the top guy for years, so I don't really feel like that fight absolutely needs to happen any time soon or is long overdue or anything like that.

On top of that, GSP vs Silva would likely be a catchweight fight, so as far as Weidman being the #1 contender for the MW title, nothing has changed. He can either wait it out (which would probably cost him his #1 contender status, because there are plenty of fights out there that he could and should take), or he can take another fight and further prove why he is the top challenger to the title.

My main point is a champion fighting only once a year is fucked and thats what is going down no matter what. I hate catch weight fights for Champs and/or Champs fighting out of their weight class and not defending the title they hold. I care not who said Champion is or who they will fight. Either make the fight a double title fight or relinquish the titles IMO
I absolutely hate the idea of putting 2 weight classes/ titles on hold for a super fight. But I am likely not in the majority on that mode of thinking.

Ahhhhhh......I see!

So this isn't about Chris Weidman at all. Its about Silva not fighting in the near future.

Well, that's a whole different debate altogether, but I will say that if- IF- this works out and GSP and Silva finally meet in the Octagon, I will have no issue with Silva waiting.

On the other hand, if Silva waits and then once again this thing falls through for whatever reason, he will have wasted several months of his soon-to-be-over-with career. But in that case, where the only fight he would have taken in that timeframe was against Chris Weidman, he wouldn't have lost a very important several months of his career, so no big deal to me.

I am with you that it kind of sucks putting the weight classes "on hold" (at least as far as title shots go), but if this fight happens, it will be well worth it, if for no other reason than just to get it over with so we can stop wondering about it.

The title picture has been on hold for a year already at 170 essentially. Which is irritating as fuck, but at least that will come to an end soon enough.

Yeah but that's with the champ being completely inactive. At least in this case the champs would still be fighting someone, albeit not in the form of a title defense.

But again, I'll believe it when I see them in the Octagon together. Until then, I'll always be skeptical.

Yeah... it is a good dream though.

Another question to throw into the equation is "how long will we have to wait for GSP to gain the weight?" Since he has already said he would have to bulk up before taking the Silva fight...

Yep, being that GSP is as much science experiment as he is fighter, he's probably gonna spend at least 6 months in a mass-building laboratory that's isolated somewhere in the Canadian wilderness, where he will be suspended in a vat of amniotic fluid while a team of 12 human-enhancement doctors will fine-tune the dosing of muscle building and lean mass-producing formulas to infuse into GSP via his 7 intravenous feeding tubes located strategically throughout his body at maximum effectivity areas.

Nothing out of the ordinary for him, really.