Is his headlining spot on Saturday’s UFC Fight Night event a chance for Kamaru Usman to jump the line for a middleweight title shot? Is Dricus du Plessis really so vulnerable to suffocating wrestlers or was it just one in particular? And what form of entertainment did we really get out of Conor McGregor’s UFC return in the end?
All that and more in this week’s mailbag. To ask a question of your own, hit up @BenFowlkesMMA on X or @Ben_Fowlkes on Threads.
@justlikelasagna: Well, the last month of mayhem is over and now we get back to the business of fights. Dricus Du Plessis vs. Kamaru Usman is a legit main event. Could we see Usman in another title fight? That would be something I didn’t have on my bingo card.
Kamaru Usman is almost 40, and as we sit here two days before his UFC Fight Night headliner he has won exactly one fight since 2022. That fight wasn’t even in the weight class where he’s currently competing. He’s 0-1 as a middleweight in the UFC. All of which is to say, I am consistently surprised when his name pops up in title-contention talk.
Granted, if he were to beat Dricus du Plessis that would give him a victory over a former UFC middleweight champ. That definitely helps bolster the ol’ resume. But are we really going to reach down past Nassourdine Imavov, the raven man himself, and effectively tell him that his years of work at 185 pounds are worth less than Usman’s lone win in the division. Balderdash, I say. Balderdash and poppycock.
Beating DDP would be big, but I think Usman should have to get at least one more win at middleweight before he fights for a title. And I’d have to see something really special from him Saturday before I’d be willing to believe he might actually win that belt.
@Mike_Fierce_:I am not a Conor McGregor fan. But he was absolutely instrumental in ushering in modern MMA over 3 legitimate mainstream platforms with Fox, ESPN, and now Paramount. He proved that the pre-fight “Show” is just as big if not BIGGER than the actual fight. Are we not entertained?
I was not very entertained, no. Not by this. It’s like if I watched months worth of trailers for a big blockbuster movie, then I showed up on opening night and the projector broke and the theater caught fire.
Would it be memorable? Absolutely. Would I feel like I got what I was promised? Definitely not.
Seems like the Conor McGregor appeal at this point is based on the guy he used to be, all while it is abundantly clear he is not that guy anymore and probably never will be again. I get that it provides some hype and excitement that’s fun to be around, but how long can we coast on those fumes? How long can he? Especially after this absolute disaster we saw last Saturday.
@MMAJunkieGeorge: What did you think of RJ Clifford’s breakdown of the McGregor injury? Seemed like the most rational take that I’ve heard since Saturday night.
For those who haven’t seen it, the video is on RJ Clifford’s Instagram page, where he points out that Max Holloway read McGregor’s jumping kick and stepped back ever so slightly, forcing McGregor to extend in mid-air in an effort to reach him. This resulted in McGregor’s other foot landing too far in front of his body, which put too much pressure on his knee.
It’s a good analysis. That may have been what did it. But maybe the years off and all the late nights in the club didn’t exactly make his aging body any more resilient and capable of withstanding one misplaced foot.
Seems like a sign of our colossal disappointment that we’ve had to resort to Zapruder-ing every single second of available footage from this night. Maybe it’s to be expected. The build-up was months if not years in the making. A lot of people shuffled to the side their concerns about McGregor’s character and potential crimes for the sake of getting that Big Fight Feeling. Then we were denied the payoff of an actual fight in the end, so here we are examining each foot placement from the locker room to the prep point to the cage.
That’s how you know a fighter really failed to deliver. Here we are nearly a week later, still watching clips of him taking off his shoes.
@thomasm62224263: Bobby Knuckles at 205 seems to be bringing out a world of disparate opinions. Was Krylov a fair litmus test, or a soft entry into the depths of hell? Jamahal Hill mebbe next…..?
I think Nikita Krylov was a great first test. He’s big but in a way that is fairly representative of the light heavyweight division, so it let us see how Robert Whittaker would handle the size and strength disparity. He can hit but isn’t exactly one of the scariest knockout artists in the weight class, so we got proof that Whittaker can stand up to the punching power. We also got to see that speed and skill are ultimately on Whittaker’s side, even if he got pushed around a little bit in the beginning.
But I don’t blame him for being baffled by the commentators’ criticism of his physique. If you had just closed your ears and listened to this fight, you’d have thought he showed up looking like Butterbean. This is clearly an in-shape man! He’s also 35 and no longer has to starve himself to make weight! Just because he doesn’t have washboard abs doesn’t mean he’s gone soft in the belly.
@shadore66: Usman’s knees are shot but couldn’t he just wrestle ddp to a decision?
I get the sense he’ll definitely try, but I don’t know. That’s why they have the fights. Also let’s remind ourselves that just because Khamzat Chimaev was able to take du Plessis down and keep him there, that’s no guarantee that every wrestler on the roster will be able to do the same. This seems especially true for one coming up from a lower weight class.
@ewillcock: Can you name three active heavyweights who you think would beat Gable right now? I can’t. Shouldn’t he get a number one contender bout next?
Here’s the thing: We have yet to see Gable Steveson fight anyone who wasn’t specifically chosen as a professional victim. He hasn’t faced any real competition yet. His UFC debut against Elisha Ellison was the first time we’ve seen him face any real resistance in the form of meaningful strikes to the head. He handled it well, but he was also up against a 10-to-1 underdog who was there to get steamrolled.
I totally understand why my couchpeople think Steveson has the goods, especially when compared to the current crop of heavyweights. But let’s also acknowledge that we’re going off what we see of him when he’s up against the MMA version of enhancement talent. We need to see him fight someone with a Wikipedia page and some actual UFC wins at heavyweight before we’ll really know what we’re dealing with here.
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