Michael Bisping, a former middleweight champion would be keen to have a trilogy fight with Luke Rockhold for his retirement bout.
Bisping earns the UFC middleweight title from Luke Rockhold at UFC 199 back in of June 2016. He dropped it to Georges St-Pierre (GSP) at UFC 217 back in November. Just three weeks later, Bisping was booked to fight with Kelvin Gastelum in the main event at UFC Shanghai and he was knocked out in the first round.
Since Bisping has repeatedly said that he intends to retire and likely after his next bout, there’s been a ton of speculation about who he’ll face. Vitor Belfort threw his name out there. Lyoto Machida did the same. Instead of either of those guys taking on Bisping, they’ve been slated to fight each other at UFC 224 in June.
Bisping, who was speaking this week on his ‘Believe You Me’ podcast, where he opens up about fighting his pal for the third time: (Quotes via MMAFighting)
“If that motherf**ker wants to throw down at 205 [pounds], yeah, we can entertain that, buddy,” Bisping said about Rockhold, who has said a move to light-heavyweight is coming. “I’ve got no problem knocking you out again.”
“I exposed Luke Rockhold,” added Bisping. “I knocked him out. David Branch nearly knocked him out. Yoel knocked him out. I quite literally took his soul, so if he wants me to do it again, that is one that would stoke the fires so to speak.”
Both men have a long and storied feud and have won one fight each, a trilogy fight would make a lot of sense before Bisping hangs his gloves for good. Despite Rockhold saying it would be the only fight, he would take again at 185-pounds before moving up to light heavyweight. However, Bisping throws the idea they could fight at 205 pounds.
Rockhold recently dropped to Yoel Romero last month and teased a move to light heavyweight.
Michael Bisping and Luke are big names, former champs, etc, you would think the UFC will jump all over this. It’s certainly a fight a lot of people would love to see.
