“Give me Masvidal, BMF vs NMF” Stephen Thompson proposes for a stand-up fight against Jorge Masvidal


“Give me Masvidal, BMF vs NMF” Stephen Thompson proposes for a stand-up fight against Jorge Masvidal

Stephen Thompson vs Jorge Masvidal UFC 217

Perhaps, UFC Megastar Jorge Masvidal should look for options other than the top 5 in the welterweight and perhaps, Stephen Thompson is a perfect fight to potentially get back on the winning track, without facing the hurdle of a lack of wrestling pedigree. Thompson and Masvidal, both are on a 2 and 3 fight skid respectively, and lack of experience in grappling seems to be the primary problem faced by both of these seasoned strikers.

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Masvidal last fought headlining UFC 272 where he lost a unanimous decision to his former teammate turned bitter rival Colby Covington due to the unstoppable pace and dominating wrestling heavy pressure from Covington. Thompson lost the same way in his last fight back in December 2021 when he was handed a 3-round unanimous decision loss by Belal Muhammad.

Stephen Thompson believes grapplers holding down their opponents makes the fight boring

Stephen Thompson and Jorge Masvidal
Stephen Thompson and Jorge Masvidal

In an interview with BJ PENN dot com correspondent Cole Shelton, Thompson talked about the UFC welterweight division, the evolution of wrestling in MMA since the time he started off as an MMA fighter, completing his decade fighting at the top of the competition in the sport since the time he debuted in UFC in February of 2012, and a potential rematch between him and Masvidal. Masvidal and Thompson fought for the first time in Madison Square Garden in 2017 at UFC 217, where Thompson won the fight via unanimous decision.

“It’s not fun fights and the fans don’t like it when guys just hold you down and not really improve anything,” Thompson explained on Just Scrap Radio on BJPENN.com the problem of a striker like him fighting a grappler. “With the [Gilbert] Burns fight [which Thompson lost at UFC 264], he just held me there, he was hitting me with a few shots but nothing hurt. I want to get back into some exciting fights, let’s make a standup fight happen. Give me Masvidal, he’s on a losing streak as well so let’s make that happen [h/t BJPenn.com]

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I would like to fight in May, we will see though. I had some names thrown at me like Robbie Lawler and now Masvidal came off the loss so that would be a fun rematch,” Thompson said The NMF vs. the BMF, so yeah man those are the kind of the guys I’m looking at. Give me a striker for my next fight. Don’t give me a wrestler, and the wrestlers are just a different pedigree. I’ve fought wrestlers in the past but now they are on a different level.” [h/t BJPenn.com]

What do you make of this fight proposal between Jorge Masvidal and Stephen Thompson by Thompson himself? Do you believe Masvidal’s stand-up game has elevated since the time he fought Thompson for the first time? Regardless, who do you think will win the rematch then? This will be a classic video-game styled fight all over again between a traditional, karate based kickboxer in Thompson going against an unpredictable street fighter like Masvidal, regardless, both the fighters are 2 of the most explosive knockout artists on the roster.

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