On November 9 at the UFC Apex, Gerald Meerschaert draws the task of welcoming Reinier de Ridder to the Octagon. The former two-weight titleholder in ONE Championship was recently announced to have signed with the promotion, making this one of the more highly anticipated debuts of the year.
For the veteran Meerschaert, coming up against opponents that have got hype behind them and playing the role of the underdog or party spoiler is nothing new. The 36-year old submission specialist is no stranger to taking on guys that are on the rise and he doesn’t mind that.
The result may not have gone his way but he was the third UFC opponent of Khamzat Chimaev during the absolute peak of the massive amounts of excitement around him. When looking at this fight, rather than him being set up to lose to “The Dutch Knight”, he believes that the UFC benefits from either outcome.
Unlike the Chimaev fight where a loss would have derailed an incredibly exciting addition to the roster, Meerschaert told James Lynch in a recent interview for Inside Fighting that if he goes out there and beats de Ridder, it’s a great look for the promotion.
If he loses to his fellow grappling ace, then the UFC has a new contender that it can push towards big things in the middleweight division. Putting this fight together means that the promotion can’t lose regardless of the outcome.
“I can see both sides of that because if he wins and they want to invest in him, there’s someone there that you get fresh into the mix but on the same hand, I could see them giving him to me just on the, I do like to derail hype trains. Obviously I didn’t with Chimaev but how great for them to have their guy who’s a submission guy beat ONE FC’s double champ so they can be like, ‘See, our guys are better!’ They can play off either way of that, I don’t know if that’s the reason why. There’s certainly tougher match-ups they could have given him to your point but either way, I’m here.”
