Georges St-Pierre admittedly has "a lot of options" for his highly anticipated return fight.
Tyron Woodley wants to make GSP his first UFC welterweight title defense. Michael Bisping has been poking at the St-Pierre bear. And Donald Cerrone is the latest to call out the former longtime 170-pound champion.
GSP's top choice? He's still keeping that pretty close to the vest. But there is one matchup that he keeps going back to. It can be summed up in just three digits: 209.
St-Pierre is very interested in making his return to the UFC against Nick Diaz, he told MMA Fighting on Thursday in a phone interview to promote his new movie "Kickboxer: Vengeance."
"It could be very possible to happen," GSP said, slyly.
The Canadian icon fought Diaz back in 2013, winning by unanimous decision. The trash talk between the two men was legendary. That UFC 158 event amassed an estimated 950,000 pay-per-view buys, the second best that year only behind Chris Weidman vs. Anderson Silva 2 at UFC 168.
St-Pierre, 35, won that fight fairly handily, though Diaz had his moments. Since then, Diaz has spoken about a GSP rematch often. He has said that St-Pierre missed weight for the bout, but the Quebec commission covered it up. Most recently, Diaz has accused St-Pierre's nurse of drugging him before the contest.
"I beat him, but there was a lot of animosity," St-Pierre said. "I didn't feel I fought well that fight. He says I poisoned him and all that kind of stuff. Whatever. He has very good excuses. Even myself, I could make excuses, but I'm not that type of guy. Trust me when I say I didn't fight as well as I wanted to and it would be fun to do it again."
St-Pierre (25-2) has not fought since a 2013 split decision win over Johny Hendricks at UFC 167. A few weeks after that bout, he vacated the welterweight title he held since 2007 and went on an indefinite hiatus. St-Pierre never mentioned the word retirement and now, three years later, wants to come back. All signs point to him competing in the Octagon once against before the end of the year.
"There's a lot of options," GSP said of prospective opponents. "I know a lot of guys have called me out. ... Everybody is dangerous this game, I know. People say I'm ducking this guy, I'm ducking that guy. I'm not ducking anybody."
One man he definitely isn't ducking is Diaz. It seems like the Stockton bad boy is GSP's No. 1 choice of opponent. St-Pierre told MMA Fighting that the ball is in the UFC's court and "all the stars are aligned" for him to compete at UFC 206 in Toronto, where he is a massive draw, on Dec. 10.
"I'm not scared of this guy and it would be fun to be welcomed in the cage after a long layoff to fight a guy that has such a stature, that sort of skillset," St-Pierre said of Diaz. "He's a very dangerous guy, Nick Diaz. it would put me right back in the water where I left it, at the very world-class caliber level. I would welcome the challenge. I'm not a guy who would shy away from a challenge like that."