Undefeated former Bellator and ONE FC welterweight champion Ben Askren stepped away from the sport recently, but he’s made it clear he would return if he could fight Georges St-Pierre and he’s now detailed exactly how he thinks he would beat the UFC superstar.
“Here’s what I think happens, because the one thing I have over him is I have the wrestling advantage and I don’t get tired, and that’s usually what he’s relied on in the last, say, 10 to 12 fights or so,” Askren said on ‘The MMA Hour’ show. “I think he’s very tough to take down early. I think he’s very tough. I think he’s probably going to win the striking battle, but one of the things, I never take a lot of damage. I just don’t get hit a lot. That’s what I’m good at.
““And over the course of the second and third round, I start to wear him down, my takedowns become more effective,” he continued. “By the third and fourth round, I’ve started dominating with my top game. He’s used to being on top — he can’t get me off of the top. If he does get a momentary glimpse of hope, I’m back on him, no problem.
“And in the fifth round, he mentally breaks and he says, ‘I can’t do this anymore, I’ve never been in this position in my life,’ and he lets me finish him.”
“TKO. He just says, ‘I’m done with this sh-t.’”
Askren has previously predicted that a fight between him and GSP will be signed by late 2019, but in a separate interview on The MMA Hour show, the Canadian indicated that as things stand a fight with the former Olympic wrestler isn’t on his radar, though he does respect his skillset.
“(Askren) is a guy who’s extremely, extremely talented, a very dangerous guy, but nobody knows who he is because he’s never been exposed to the public,” St-Pierre told Ariel Helwani. “But he’s very good. In order to have a fight with me, I would have liked him to be exposed to the public so his stock goes up, so if I fight him, at least it’s a win-win situation.
“Otherwise, you fight a guy who’s extremely dangerous, who nobody cares about, who nobody knows who he is. It’s sad, but that’s the real way to look at it. And the reason why I’m saying that in your interview now is because I want people to be aware of who he is, I want him to have a chance to fight in the UFC, to go fight against the big dogs, the big boys of the sport, and I think he is certainly in the top five, maybe the top three in the welterweight division.”
“It’s not a fight that would interest me now because nobody knows who he is. Nobody knows who he is, but if they would have given him the chance to fight, to show his skill in the UFC, I’m sure he would have.”
