To be fair, he was super exciting coming up and made himself a fan favorite early on. So even though he changed his style and fought more conservatively and became more predictable, he had built up a ton of goodwill and the fans were just happy to see him win.
I don’t share your opinion. GSP was the best in the business imo. He would paralyze wrestlers or strikers with his attacks. He did have some boring fights but I blame his opponents just as much as I blame him. It takes two to tango.
With GSP he had a lot of miles on his odometer but he never ducked anyone. He beat a roided to the gills Big Rig. This was big rig at his peak, and this was GSP at the end of his career and he still won. After USADA big rig went to shit, that’s how roided to the gills he was.
GSP also drew up the blue print for beating BJ Penn. Before GSP Penn was thought to be a next gen fighter that was unbeatable. He exploited a flaw and BJ was never really the same after that.