Opinion: Gegard Mousasi's Time for Talking

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In the cage and the ring, Gegard Mousasi has struggled with aggression over the years. However, ahead of the biggest fight of his career, he has had no problems getting assertive before stepping into the Octagon.

Mousasi will square off with former Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight kingpin Chris Weidman this Saturday at UFC 210 in Buffalo, New York. While the bout may be the three-round co-feature to the championship rematch between Daniel Cormier and Anthony Johnson, it is crucial and not simply because of the 185-pound stakes involved. After all, with the ongoing Michael Bisping-Georges St. Pierre scheduling drama and poor, presumptive No. 1 contender Yoel Romero sitting on the sidelines, it’s not as though anyone views Mousasi-Weidman as any sort of title eliminator.

Coming off of a string of injuries, an invasive neck surgery and two brutal knockout losses that not just knocked him off his throne but reduced him to being just another top-10 middleweight, this bout is critical for Weidman. At the same time, Mousasi has won four in a row, so it may seem like one man is in a much more difficult situation than the other. However, this is prizefighting, and more pertinently, this is the last fight on Mousasi’s UFC contract.

Maybe this is a potential make-or-break moment for Weidman, but this fight is a potential money-making moment for Mousasi and “The Dreamcatcher” thinks it’s time to get paid.

“It comes all down to this fight. That’s why I trained so hard for this fight,” Mousasi told Damon Martin on “Fight Society” this week. “It’s not because I want to beat Chris Weidman. It’s because I need to get paid, and I’m going to get paid. That’s what I’m going to do.”

Mousasi has spent a full decade now as either an elite light heavyweight or an elite middleweight, but while being calm, cool and collected may be virtuous at times in and out of the cage, his taciturn nature has done him more harm than good throughout his career. While we can chalk up his September 2015 upset loss to Uriah Hall to a once-in-a-lifetime video game-style combination, Mousasi’s other defeats -- or even his dubious draw with Keith Jardine -- have been marked by a peculiar passivity, a caution that seems completely at odds with how offensively potent and predatory Mousasi can be.

It’s hard not to see those shortcomings as a reflection of his personality, a personality that has never quite clicked with the MMA public. It’s what makes Mousasi’s money-hungry about face during fight week so refreshing, even if it comes as a direct consequence of the WME-IMG era of the UFC, one in which the promotion is more willing than ever to let elite talent walk out the door. It’s why, even with a four-fight winning streak and compared to Weidman’s seemingly dire circumstances, this fight is still the biggest of the Dutch-bred fighter’s career.

“I just see that Vitor Belfort is making tons more money than me. I defeated Dan Henderson; he’s making tons more money than me. I defeated Mark Hunt. He’s making $800,000 a fight,” Mousasi told Martin. “I can beat Michael Bisping, and even before he was champion, he was making a lot more than me. Why don’t I deserve to make some money? How is it possible Mark Hunt is making $800,000 with a record of 10-10? He has a record of 10 wins, 10 losses. Look at my record. How the [expletive] is that possible?”

In this circumstance, it’s flippant and ignorant to act as though Mousasi’s losses to Muhammed Lawal or Lyoto Machida -- or even the Hall defeat, which he avenged in style last year -- are the reasons he’s less compensated than other athletes he has beaten. To argue that wins and losses are what ultimately determine any fighter’s contract, let alone a UFC fighter’s contract, is to essentially disregard the history of the sport, especially its recent history.

“He’s the most boring person in MMA,” Lawal said of Mousasi back in 2012. “If they want me to beat Mousasi up -- my bad, ‘Kermit’ -- up, I’ll do it, but he’s just so boring. I hate thinking about him. I would beat him up, but the dude’s boring. Let’s join my bandwagon, and let’s boycott Gegard. How about that?”

Sure, Lawal is one of the most outspoken folks this sport has to offer, but this is more or less how the world perceives Mousasi. No one ever denies his skill, technique or how impressive the names on his resume are, but they focus on an abstract ennui that seems to encircle the man. Consider the irony here, too, since Mousasi is hardly the one that made his bout with “King Mo” a largely forgettable 25-minute affair. Lawal could never even think of something funnier to say about him than to point out that his voice does sound like the world’s most famous, green Muppet.

Whatever his voice may sound like, if Mousasi was ever going to use that voice to his advantage, this is the time. Just as his own opponent, Weidman, gambled on himself to beat Anderson Silva in their first bout with one fight left on his contract, Mousasi is betting on the same gambit. He turned down a contract offer from the UFC last month. Prior to arriving in Buffalo, Mousasi says the UFC wanted to negotiate with his management, a move at which the former Strikeforce and Dream champion balked.

There has never been a better time for Mousasi to get vocal and, frankly, to get real. Beating Weidman at UFC 210 will make him the best free agent available on the market, which is especially important at this moment in time, knowing Mousasi’s pre-existing relationship with Scott Coker, who was at the helm of Strikeforce when Mousasi reigned as champion. As the UFC is de-emphasizing its international events, Bellator MMA is accelerating its global schedule, looking to break into new European markets while also promoting kickboxing events, which would be right up the alley of the K-1 veteran.

If he loses to Weidman, the likely scenario is that Mousasi is lowballed by the UFC and ends up being a perfect fit for Bellator, where he could realistically be a two-division champion while kickboxing on the side. Mousasi is adamant, however, that he wants to re-sign with the UFC, and a win in Buffalo would hopefully serve to at least incite a small bidding war for his services and get him the sort of contract he wants.

More than that, if Mousasi topples Weidman and can’t come to terms with the UFC, it will be perhaps the most stark and confounding example of how WME-IMG is running its $4 billion investment in regards to talent. Benson Henderson’s days as a champion were done in the UFC. The promotion doubted whether Ryan Bader would ever fight for a title. Lorenz Larkin was viewed as fungible because of the wealth of up-and-coming UFC welterweight talent. However, for Mousasi to knock off Weidman for his fifth straight Octagon win and be allowed to walk away because WME-IMG didn’t want to pay up? Such a happening would offer crystalline, conclusive proof that WME-IMG’s cost-cutting measures have truly undermined the UFC’s fundamental product, so much so that it has bolstered and emboldened its own competition. It would be another brutal reminder that the question that drives so many of us to love this sport -- “Who is the best fighter in the world?” -- matters less than ever.

It’s almost fight night. “The time for talking is done,” they say. If nothing else, Gegard Mousasi used that time brilliantly for a change.