10 Things I Like at UFC 277
From high stakes championship pairings to prelims that will tell us where several fighters fit in their respective divisions, this Saturday's pay-per-view packs plenty of intrigue
First post from the new digs!
This feels like a card that has the potential to gather and build in the way we really want each and every card to gather and build.
The opening few fights are just fights, but we get rolling with the final early prelim and then we’re off, and it just looks (on paper) like the type of collection where as the stakes become greater moving further up the card, the fights themselves could very well become increasingly competitive and active and entertaining.
We’ve seen this a few times over the years — UFC 189 was one of the best examples, and the first London show of the year the most recent — and while this card doesn’t have the same star power or grandiose feel as UFC 189, it does present as a lineup that could just start rolling and keep building momentum.
I’m getting more and more excited for this card with each passing day, and come Saturday, I’m going to be bouncing around the new office counting down the minutes until this one jumps off.
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Pena’s Big Moment
I know what you’re thinking: wasn’t her big moment in December, when she won the actual title?
Sure, maybe, but do you know what I think is going to be even bigger for her? Walking out last here on Saturday and being introduced by Bruce Buffer as “the reigning, defending, undisputed UFC women’s bantamweight champion of the world… Julianna… ‘The Venezuelan Vixen’… PENA!”
Pena’s win over Nunes was her crowning achievement, obviously, and validation of everything she said in the preamble to the fight, but these last seven months have been the payoff. Becoming the champion is a massive achievement, but being the champ is the fun part, the cool part, and one of the coolest elements of that is fighting out of the red corner in the main event of a UFC pay-per-view.
Ironically, I also think that brings a different kind of pressure that Pena has never had to deal with before, and I’m really curious to see how she deals with it.
It’s one thing to be the challenger — and one that is dismissed as not having much of a chance — but now Pena has the belt and has to try and retain it. She’s fighting to prove the first fight wasn’t a fluke, wasn’t strictly a case of Nunes being injured and ill and not all that prepared. That initial win was great, but this one is her legacy fight, the one that will determine whether she’s viewed similarly to Matt Serra or someone altogether different.
This is a huge moment for Pena and I cannot wait to see how she handles it all.
Nunes’ Chance at Redemption
So if the outcome of their first meeting at UFC 269 was a result of illness and injury, with a smattering of “this one’s difficult for me to get hyped for” sprinkled in there, this is Nunes’ chance to show that, to prove that.
Remember when Jon Jones said for all those years that the reason his first fight with Alexander Gustafsson was close wasn’t because “The Mauler” was a world-class fighter on his level, but rather than he barely trained and was out living it up in the lead to the fight? We all spent years wondering how much credence to give to those claims, trying to separate truth from fiction. In the lead up to the rematch, Jones doubled down on his declarations and promised to prove in when they stepped back into the Octagon… and then he beat the absolute shit out of Alexander Gustafsson in the rematch.
Gus was out-gunned from the jump and was never in the fight, as Jones was on a mission to show just how superior a talent he was to the guy that previously gave him the toughest test of his career.
I think this might be similar, with the added motivation for Nunes being that she actually lost her title last time out.
A Guaranteed Banger
The first fight between Brandon Moreno and Kai Kara-France was tremendous fun and all kinds of entertaining, and I see no reason why Saturday’s rematch — which comes with the added bonus of being for the interim flyweight title and contested over five rounds — should be any different.
Moreno is in a weird little spot here, entering off a loss, with a 1-1-1 record over his last three, and fighting for the first time since changing gyms. The previous 19 months have been a whirlwind of championship fights against Deiveson Figueiredo with major emotional swings, and now he’s stepping in there this weekend fighting to maintain his place at the top of the list of title contenders because the Brazilian champion is still dealing with an injury and uncertain of his flyweight future.
Kara-France has really settled into his place in the division over his last three fights, showing tremendous patience and his uncanny power in his win over Rogerio Bontorin, his intelligence and precision in his victory over Cody Garbrandt, and his growth and maturity as a fighter overall in his March triumph over Askar Askarov. After a few years of being a fringe contender and, in my opinion, not quite living up to his advanced billing, he’s now exceeding expectations and fighting for UFC gold.
Even if there are tactical moments in this fight and grappling-heavy segments, those sequences should be paired with points of back-and-forth striking and the general madness and pleasure we’ve come to expect from the flyweights.
There is no way this isn’t great, no matter how long it lasts.
A Potential New Heavyweight Name to Watch
Sergei Pavlovich can enter the heavyweight title conversation on Saturday and that intrigues me.
You know me: I love seeing fighters progress up the divisional ladder and announce their presence as a real factor in their respective division, and his weekend could be hat moment for the 30-year-old Russian, as he steps in with top-end litmus test Derrick Lewis.
I’m not sure whether Pavlovich passes this test or not, and that’s part of why I’m so excited to see this matchup play out this weekend. On one hand, he’s earned three straight first-round stoppage wins and is 15-1 overall, but on the other hand, he lost to the very best opponent he’s faced thus far (Alistair Overeem) and beat the kind of guys everyone that climbs into the Top 10 in the UFC heavyweight division beats along the way.
Lewis is a logical step up in competition and the gatekeeper to contention at this point in his career, but he’s also still very much capable of knocking this dude out in a heartbeat and show that Pavlovich is in no way ready to enter the title conversation.
Someone is getting put to sleep and I can’t wait to find out who.
Further Flyweight Clarification
In addition to Moreno and Kara-France clubbing each other in the co-main event, Alexandre Pantoja (pictured, left) and Alex Perez are slated to square off earlier in the main card to help clarify the makeup of the flyweight division.
Pantoja was in line to challenge Moreno for the title after the Mexican won the belt last year, but it wasn’t meant to be. He suffered a knee injury that forced him to the sidelines and Moreno into a third consecutive bout with Figueiredo, which resulted in another title change, and Pantoja’s place in the pecking order getting pushed back one or two slots.
Perez being in this position is honestly a little surprising, given that (1) he hasn’t fought since his late 2020 loss to Figueiredo, and (2) has missed weight in each of his last two attempts to compete. I honestly thought the UFC was going to force him to bantamweight — at least for a fight or two — so seeing him land opposite Pantoja was a bit of a shock.
Regardless of what happens in the co-main event and Figueiredo’s future, the winner of this one is very much in the thick of the case in the 125-pound weight class, with a date one of the other Top 10 stalwarts likely next time out.
If both are sharp, this should be fun, but we need to see what each man looks like on Friday in order to get a better read on how this fight will play out on Saturday evening.
Lining Things Up at Light Heavyweight
Just as Pantoja and Perez are battling to clarify things in the flyweight division, Anthony Smith and Magomed Ankalaev open up the main card in a matchup that should do the same at light heavyweight.
Smith enters on a three-fight winning streak, all of which have been first-round stoppage wins, though none of them has come against a Top 10 opponent. Ankalaev arrives having won eight straight, with the last two coming against Volkan Oezdemir and Thiago Santos. They’re stationed side-by-side in the rankings — Smith at No. 5, Ankalaev at No. 4 — and could conceivably be fighting for the opportunity to face Jan Blachowicz in a future No. 1 contenders bout, though the direction that light heavyweight division is going to take down the 2022 stretch is anybody’s guess.
There is a little angst to this matchup and each man should be looking at this as a chance to make a statement and really stand out from the pack, which means we should be a contentious, competitive fight for as long as it lasts on Saturday night.
Welterweight Litmus Test
The prelims wrap with a welterweight contest between Alex Morono and Matthew Semelsberger that feels like a fight designed to get a better understanding of where “Semi the Jedi” stands in the 170-pound weight class.
Morono is a fairly well established figure in the welterweight division, brandishing a 10-4 record with one No Contest verdict, a three-fight winning streak, and a secure position in the Second 15.
But Semelsberger remains a question mark — a former collegiate defensive back who is still figuring things out as a fighter, but has gone 4-1 in the UFC with a couple knockouts in under 20 seconds, a good win over a previously unbeaten prospect last time out, and both a ceiling and floor that remains undefined at this moment.
Do I expect him to develop into a world champion? Probably not, but could he become an athletic, powerful fighter that cracks the Top 15? I don’t think that’s out of the question, though I could also see him being someone that struggles to maintain residence in the Second 15 too, which is why I love this fight.
Critical Lightweight Pairing No. 1
Saturday’s prelims also feature a pair of critical lightweight contests, the first involving Drew Dober and Rafael Alves.
Dober is one of those fighters that resides in the upper third of the Second 15 in the lightweight division. He was ranked last year prior to losing to Islam Makhachev and Brad Riddell, but the fact that he faced both those men tells you where he stands divisionally. Alves, on the other hand, is the unknown in this equation — a 31-year-old Brazilian who only moved up to lightweight after missing weight by an egregious amount ahead of his debut, and then lost his debut before making quick work of Marc Diakiese, who has subsequently gone on to win consecutive fights.
It’s difficult enough to maintain position in the lightweight division, never mind make headway, and this fight has the potential to be an illustration of that.
Dober doesn’t necessarily vault back into the rankings with a win because the ebb and flow of the division since his last appearance (a win over Terrance McKinney in March) means he’s probably a little further from the Top 15 now than he was then, while Alves can only go so far either, even though his initial UFC victory has aged extremely well and beating Dober is no easy feat.
This is why it’s highlighted as a critical lightweight pairing and one I’m very much looking forward to watching on Saturday evening.
Critical Lightweight Pairing No. 2
The other critical lightweight pairing features Drakkar Klose taking on short-notice replacement Rafa Garcia in a bout that could help determine whether the former’s window for being a genuine contender has closed.
Klose was on the cusp of breaking into the Top 15 when he fought Beneil Dariush at UFC 248, and he was on the brink of beating Dariush before he got a little hurried and was ultimately finished. He finally returned to action after two years on the sidelines earlier this year with a dominant win over Brandon Jenkins, and was initially scheduled to face long-time Top 15 stalwart Diego Ferreira here before the Fortis MMA man was forced out for undisclosed reasons.
Now he faces Garcia, a dangerous, but less established replacement opponent who presents as a high risk, low reward challenge for Klose.
What I said about the lightweight division earlier is true: there is so much talent climbing the ranks right now, that it feels like a lot of these tenured veterans that might otherwise be making a little push or finally getting to face ranked opposition on a consistent basis may have already missed their chances, and that would be heartbreaking for Klose, who missed a year of action due to lingering issues after being shoved by Jeremy Stephens at the pre-fight weigh-ins ahead of their fight last year.
The only way for him to really find out is to get another quality win this weekend, and given how good he looked against Jenkins, that certainly isn’t out of the question.
Sophomore Showing for DWCS Grad
Michael Morales was one of the members of the Dana White’s Contender Series Class of ‘21 that I was high on coming off the show, as I noted when he and four of his classmates made their debuts at UFC 270:
There are a couple in this group that I think have solid long-term potential (Morales, Della Maddalena), but as I said, rather than being all-in on any of these new arrivals, I want a couple opportunities to see them compete because fighting at this level, with this much attention is entirely different than anything they’ve done before, and I don’t think we can make a real assessment of what direction an athlete’s career may go before seeing them make that walk a couple of times.
He won that debut against Trevin Giles by first-round stoppage and returns for his sophomore appearance against newcomer Adam Fugitt, who steps in for Ramiz Brahimaj this weekend.
While it’s not the kind of matchup I was hoping to see in his second outing, it’s still another chance to get a look at the talented 23-year-old from Ecuador, who rates out as a four-star prospect to me and feels like someone that could find his way into the rankings a few years down the line if things break right for him.
This is a chance to see what improvements, gains, and adjustments he’s made since his January debut, and get another read on where he fits within the welterweight division, both now and into the future.