It has recently come to our attention that we’ve been shortchanging Michael Bisping for years.
There’s no other way to say it: We underestimated him. We dismissed him. We didn’t like him very much, if you want to know the truth.
From the moment Bisping swaggered to international prominence by winning Season 3 of The Ultimate Fighter back in 2006, we labeled him an underwhelming talent—good, not great—lacking knockout power and possessing the sort of bad attitude that made it easy to cheer for his professional demise.
But over the course of the next 10 years and 25 fights, Bisping took that low opinion we had of him, wadded it up and stuck it right in our faces.
Naturally, he took tremendous glee in doing it.
It’s hard to believe that when he takes on Dan Henderson in the main event of Saturday’s UFC 204, Bisping will basically be fighting for immortality. He’ll be out to cement a legacy not just as a guy who exceeded expectations, but as one of the greatest fighters in UFC history.
Does that sound like hyperbole? It’s not.
According to some statistics compiled by MMAjunkie’s Mike Bohn, Bisping’s resume is already eye-popping. A victory over Henderson could put it into the stratosphere.
Bisping’s 15 victories at 185 pounds are the most in the history of the middleweight division.
This fight will be his 27th appearance in the Octagon, which will move him into a tie with Tito Ortiz and Frank Mir for the most all-time.
And here’s the kicker: If he beats Henderson on Saturday, Bisping’s 20 wins in the UFC will be the most in company history. Period. Full stop.
Additional extenuating stakes of his fight against Henderson are obvious.
When the two met the first time at UFC 100 in July 2009, Bisping suffered a second-round knockout so ridiculous that Henderson uses a silhouette version of it on his personal merchandise to this day.
At the time, fans stateside considered it a feel-good moment to see the cocky Brit get his comeuppance. The murderous right hand Henderson landed on Bisping’s jaw—later nicknamed the “H-bomb” by longtime mixed martial arts announcer Mauro Ranallo—made Bisping the subject of some of MMA’s earliest and meanest internet memes.
The fact that Henderson delivered an additional strike to the already-downed and unconscious Bisping was largely viewed as the cherry on top.
To a guy as proud and obviously sensitive as Bisping, however, you get the feeling it’s been eating at him ever since.
“I made his career with that fight but, after UFC 204, that will finally be eradicated," Bisping told Kevin Francis of the Daily Star this week. "He’s famous for just one thing—knocking me out in that fight. He caught me that night. Yes, that fight made him.”
Those lingering bad feelings made this bout an easy sell for the UFC, despite the fact that it doesn’t make clear sense according to the middleweight pecking order. It’s about revenge, we’ve been told, and that’s true—though there are also forces at work here much larger than that.
Bisping is currently riding a four-fight win streak dating back to April 2015. He was considered an extreme long shot when he filled in for an injured Chris Weidman and fought Luke Rockhold for the title at UFC 199.
Rockhold had just defeated Bisping via quick and easy guillotine choke in November 2014. After taking the championship off Weidman himself at UFC 194, the 31-year-old Rockhold was considered the prototype for the future of the 185-pound division—big, athletic and deadly in all facets of the game.
When Bisping won their rematch by first-round knockout, it threw the entire weight class into chaos. At 37 years old, it seemed inconceivable that Bisping had risen to such heights.
It didn’t make sense, yet here we were.
Still, people couldn’t quite believe it. It was widely posited that perhaps Rockhold had taken him lightly. Even after years of Bisping proving he was better than we thought he was, you see, we were still looking for reasons to undermine him.
Maybe that’s truly what’s up for grabs in this fight against Henderson.
Bigger than the all-time UFC wins record or the slippery concept of revenge, this is a chance for Bisping to solidify himself as the rightful middleweight champion.
Perhaps some of the stigma of that win over Rockhold as a “fluke” would fall by the wayside if he can craft a successful first defense of the belt—especially if it comes over a guy who once knocked him silly at UFC 100.
Even if this win would be over a flagging 46-year-old version of Henderson, it would propel Bisping forward. It would thrust him back into the thick of competition as most of the 185-pound division’s best fighters return from injury and suspension toward the end of this year.
A victory means they’d all still be chasing Bisping, which is obviously a position he relishes. It would also give him wins over Anderson Silva, Rockhold and Henderson in his last three fights—yet another feat that would’ve seemed impossible if someone told you Bisping was going to accomplish it just a few years ago.
A loss, on the other hand, means that Henderson officially takes control of the narrative.
The American has said he’ll retire after this fight—win, lose or draw—and adding the UFC title to his own already-impressive resume would make Henderson (and by extension, maybe not Bisping) one of the greatest MMA fighters of all time.
If he makes good on his promise to walk away with the gold around his waist, Bisping’s storybook ending would effectively become Henderson’s.
“Win or lose I’m ready mentally to retire,” Henderson told SevereMMA.com’s Niall McGrath and Petesy Carroll in July. “My body could still probably go another two, three years more [but] I’ve put it through enough. I’m ready to take it a little bit easier.”
Even worse, if Bisping once again succumbs to Henderson’s big right hand—truly, one of Hendo’s only obvious paths to victory here—he risks losing everything all over again.
Bisping’s modern UFC career was built in the wake of that KO. He scuffled for a time, defeating the likes of Denis Kang, Jorge Rivera and Jason “Mayhem” Miller but losing to most of the top-flight competition he faced.
During his most recent win steak, he appears to have put that inconsistency behind him. But it would all come crashing down around him if Henderson knocks him out again.
And so, perhaps we return to the hyperbolic again.
Is it too much to say the difference between winning and losing here for Bisping might be the difference between historic greatness and forever being remembered as just a lousy internet meme?
Maybe.
Maybe not.
