Michael Bisping: UFC retirement fight must be soon; Luke Rockhold telling 'porky pies'

LONDON – Former UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping is still torn between having an official retirement fight and simply just walking away.

Following his title-fight loss to Georges St-Pierre at UFC 217 in November and subsequent knockout against Kelvin Gastelum just weeks later, Bisping (30-9 MMA, 20-9 UFC) said he would have one last hurrah before hanging up his gloves for good. Since then, though, the narrative has taken some twists and turns.

Bisping wanted to retire on home soil, and Saturday’s UFC Fight Night 127 card in London seemed like the perfect fit. The Brit said a rematch with Rashad Evans nearly came together, but apparently the UFC and Bisping “couldn’t agree to terms this time.”

Although Bisping would like to have a grandiose retirement fight, he said there are some conditions that need to be met. The frontrunner of those is that he gets to fight on a card in the United Kingdom, ideally somewhere in England. And secondly, Bisping, who turned 39 in February, said it needs to happen sooner than later.

“If it’s 2019, I’ll be 40 by then. It’s got to be sometime soon,” Bisping told reporters at a UFC Gym press conference. “Maybe sometime this summer? We’ll see. If I walk away now, obviously I don’t want to walk away on a loss and would love to have one in the U.K. The U.K. fanbase has really supported me.”

The UFC reportedly is planning to host a late-May event in Liverpool, and if that materializes, it would be the perfect host for Bisping’s send-off. The question, however, is who he would share the octagon with in his 30th and final UFC appearance.

In recent weeks, talk of a trilogy bout with longtime rival Luke Rockhold (16-4 MMA, 6-3 UFC) has begun to heat up. Bisping and Rockhold have exchanged a plethora of hostile messages on social media, and Rockhold claims there’s a contract offer awaiting Bisping’s signature. But according to Bisping, that’s simply false.

“There is no contract,” Bisping said. “He’s full of it. He’s just telling lies. That’s why I said, ‘OK, show everyone the (contract).’ He kept saying to sign the contract. I’m like, ‘Show me the contract.’ He can’t, because it doesn’t exist. I’ll say right now: I’m at a UFC event. UFC have not offered me a contract to fight Luke Rockhold. So he’s telling a few porky pies there.”

Bisping said he would be content with his accomplishments if the right scenario for a retirement fight never comes to pass. He’s keeping occupied with outside projects, mostly in the film industry, and if he never has to enter a cage and take a real punch again, he said he won’t be bothered.

“I am very busy outside the octagon,” Bisping said. “I just finished filming an episode of ‘MacGyver,’ I’ve got ‘XxX’ – I’ve got a lot of acting projects going on, so life’s good. It’s a little easier on-screen than actually taking it for real. And I’m 39, can’t do it forever, but in the U.K., one more, that does sound nice.”

For more on UFC Fight Night 127, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.