Everyone has a fighting chance
Since the Ultimate Fighting Championship announced arguably the year’s biggest fight between current lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov and former champion Conor McGregor at UFC 229 on Oct. 6 in Las Vegas, the rest of card has begun to take shape quickly.
Former Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz has sat back as quietly as possible as T.J. Dillashaw and Cody Garbrandt sorted out their differences in the form of two knockout victories for Dillashaw at UFC 217 and this past weekend’s UFC 227.
Bellator MMA officially announced the first round of its welterweight tournament, with a Douglas Lima vs. Andrey Koreshkov trilogy fight and a Paul Daley vs. Michael Page grudge match highlighting the the announcement.
Former two-time Ultimate Fighting Championship king Georges St. Pierre isn’t necessarily a gambling man, but he knows who he has his money on for the newly-announced Conor McGregor vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov lightweight title fight at UFC 229 in October.
The term “superfight,” once understood to mean a matchup between the champions of two weight divisions — the most recent example being Ultimate Fighting Championship light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier facing off against heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic — has been thrown around a lot recently. UFC President Dana White says the term is being “completely overused.”
Heavy-hitting Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight Thiago Santos is coming off a hard-fought unanimous decision victory over debutant Kevin Holland on Saturday night at UFC 227 in Los Angeles. Santos looked to have the better of his opponent early on before Holland kicked into gear landing some nice shots of his own. The win was a confidence boost for Santos’ title aspirations after a devastating knockout loss at the hands of David Branch in his last fight.
Kevin Holland was a winner on Dana White’s Contender Series earlier this year, but he didn’t initially win over the man for whom the event is named.
During his streak of 11 consecutive flyweight title defenses, Demetrious Johnson rarely lost rounds as he usually outclassed every opponent put in front of him.
One of the most logical next opponents for UFC bantamweight king T.J. Dillashaw would seem to be the last man to defeat him.
It’s essentially settled that Daniel Cormier will make his first – and likely only – heavyweight title defense against Brock Lesnar at some point in early 2019.