Did Johny Hendricks think he’d ever find himself here?
The rest of us sure didn’t.
For 13 solid months back in 2013-14, it seemed like Hendricks would be the new standard-bearer in the UFC welterweight division. Fast forward a year and change and here he is essentially fighting for his life as an elite member of the 170-pound division.
He pretty much has to beat Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson on Saturday in the main event of the UFC’s shape-shifting Fight Night 82 to preserve any notion of him as a man who might help us forget about Georges St-Pierre.
A lot of people thought Hendricks deserved to get the nod over St-Pierre when the two fought to a razor-close decision at UFC 167. St-Pierre walked away with the judges’ verdict, but their bout amounted to our first clue that Hendricks was going to be an important person to keep our eyes on moving forward.
That bout in November 2013 also appeared to be the one to finally convince GSP that he needed to take a break from his fighting life. He announced an indefinite leave of absence from MMA a month later and still has not returned to active duty. Each day that passes makes it seem more and more likely that he never will.
In St-Pierre’s stead, Hendricks won the welterweight title in another classic bout against Robbie Lawler at UFC 171. Even diehard fans of the French Canadian phenom couldn’t help but look at Hendricks and Lawler slugging it out and admit they brought a new energy, a new urgency to one of the UFC’s best weight classes.
Their second fight at UFC 181 was just as good, but this time Hendricks came out on the wrong end of another split decision. That loss signaled the beginning of a protracted slide for him. Leading up to the second Lawler fight, he had surgery to repair a torn bicep tendon, and he faded down the stretch of their grueling battle.
In the wake of it, he struggled to get things back together. He fought just once during 2015 and in September of that year committed a cringe-worthy public relations gaffe when he said fans were partly to blame for him not getting a chance to earn his title back.
He won a comeback fight against Matt Brown in March but had to drop out of a potential title eliminator against Tyron Woodley at UFC 192 when he was hospitalized during his weight cut. Reports came back that Hendricks was suffering from an intestinal blockage and a kidney stone, but it was still the sort of last-minute withdrawal that could’ve put him in the UFC’s doghouse.
As he approaches this bout with the comparatively less heralded Thompson, Hendricks unexpectedly needs to prove he’s still the championship-level fighter we took him for in the first place.
"I wish a lot of things could have went different but they didn't and it is what it is," Hendricks told ESPN.com’s Brett Okamoto this week. "I'm still that guy, though. The best way I can say it is that I'm going to be there again. What I'm saying every day now is, 'How do I erase everything that happened?' And it's by proving to the world where I belong."
He comes in as a roughly a 3-1 favorite over Thompson, according to Odds Shark, but the underdog also shapes up as an opponent Hendricks can't afford to overlook. The 32-year-old Wonderboy is riding high on a five-fight win streak, capped with his spinning hook kick knockout of Jake Ellenberger in July.
Thompson may still be mired in the process of trying to prove he’s for real, but his unorthodox karate style has been effective enough to beat an increasingly more difficult gauntlet of competition. Hendricks represents a huge leap forward for him, but Thompson knows it's one that could pave his own way to the upper echelon of the welterweight class if he is able to win it, as he told MMA Junkie's John Morgan:
He’s definitely the best wrestler I’ve faced so far. But I’ve just improved leaps and bounds in my wrestling in the past three, four or five fights. I think I’m ready to step up to that next level of competition. I’m ready to show the fans and the UFC that I’m ready for that, and hopefully, depending on how well I do in this fight and how I beat Johny Hendricks will determine whether or not I go for a title.
The fight underwent some last-minute changes when the heavyweight main event for UFC 196 fell apart. After the event was shifted to free TV and rebranded as UFC Fight Night 82, Hendricks and Thompson were promoted to main event status.
Along with that change, their fight was extended from three rounds to five, and there’s no telling who that might favor. Thompson has yet to go five rounds during his MMA career, and Hendricks has been seen to fade in the later rounds.
The question of Thompson’s inexperience and how Hendricks has handled his conditioning—so far, quite well, it seems—could go a long way to deciding who wins this fight.
For Hendricks, it’s a must win, if for no other reason than to prove we didn't misjudge him back in 2013. He needs to show he can still be a trendsetter in this new-look division.
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