I think the opponent with the best credentials on paper was Justin Gaethje. It’s been discussed on here ad nauseam. The best grapplers he faced were Justin, Shalorus, Teibau, and Iaquinta.
GSP faced guys that were highly decorated wrestlers and grapplers, and beat them all. Hendricks, Shields, Koscheck x2, Fitch, Hughes. It’s worth noting that he also has wins over Parisyan and Trigg.
Finally someone who can answer a question.
Justin Gaethje might be the best Grappler Khabib fought
GSP wins easy. Weight classes exist for a reason. The one guy that had a weight cut as big or bigger than Khabib’s was Tibau, and Khabib really couldn’t do shit to him.
It would’ve been fun to see but ultimately, the fight didn’t make any sense. It would only serve to diminish 1 guy’s legacy. Let them both enjoy going out on top.
Gaethje is the best wrestler Khabib has fought. His grappling is pretty shit though.
RDA, Tibau, Shalarous, and even Poirier are much better grapplers.
You reek of a noob.
Noob lol says the guy with DEC '21 join date
I have actually had 1 on 1 conversations with both Khabib and GSP and have probably followed the sport before you were born.
If that’s a noob then sure I’m that
This is such biased bullshit.
GSP was one of the biggest juiced up size bullies in the sport, and when he ran into a bigger juicehead in Hendricks, he got beat out of the sport.
Khabib is an average sized LW who never juiced or used IV’s and actually fought through the USADA era which is why he struggled with cuts.
“This is bullshit, GSP is huge, he’s way bigger than the big guy Khabib struggled with!”
Interesting counterpoint
Khabib was only a kid when he fought a guy a juiced up as Georges (with a better take down defence % than GSP) and beat him on the scorecards 30-27 without getting scratched.
GSP actually got knocked out by a LW 
GSP in his prime would run through Khabib.
40 year old GSP who’s inactive and had two ACL tears vs prime Khabib is a tough fight for Georges. GSP likely even loses.
Father time catches up to everyone in MMA. It caught up to Fedor, Anderson Silva, and nearly every MMA legend.
USADA caught up with Georges. That’s why he retired right before the USADA era after pushing for it.
Good point. It was a striking match, though.
GSP and Khabib both walk around at similar weights. Earlier in their careers, they both entered the cage at similar weights, but later on Khabib cut more because he struggled frequently to make weight at 155. GSP never struggled to make weight at 170.
Hendricks also was fighting in the biggest fight of his life and then looked like shit after that whereas GSP was fighting the last fight of his run before he retired for 4 years.
So it was Peak Hendricks vs a declining tired end of the run GSP… and he still lost a decision.
Yea foreal!
It was known how much Khabib’s father admired GSP for a multitude of reasons … tho he vowed not to fight another opponent following his UFC254 victory over Gaethje, I believe it to be highly-LIKELY that he would’ve tried to hit 30-0 if a GSP fight fight was on the table simply because of the way his father respected the Canadien legend.
Proves how inept the UFC is since they gave up on what would have been an actual dream fight for fans and huge payday because professional athletes were being difficult. Cant use the money excuse either, as athletes in other sports have much bigger pay days.
Khabib is great but havent fought the wrestlers with the calibre of those GSP fought
Matt Hughes, John Fitch, Josh Koscheck, Jake Shields would all give Khabib hell. Prime BJ and Sean Sherk would have also been fun to see
I think the phrase I threw around at the time was “biggest fight of 2020”. I never heard a single person argue with that, whether they liked the fight or not.
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