Belal Muhammad makes a good argument.

[LoveMyMMA]

Burns was fighting Belal injured, Wonderboy was past his prime, Luque meh, Brady meh

LOL Burns was fighting Belal injured my ass.

Stop making sad excuses.
Belal INJURED him.

 

[EnthusiastCultivator]

He’s a solid fighter and he probably deserves a title shot, probably has a decent chance of capturing the belt at some point even, but he’ll never be in GOAT discussions which is what’s laughable about this topic

Why say “never”? Who knows what the future holds.

 

[Deleted member 504083]

LOL Burns was fighting Belal injured my ass.

Stop making sad excuses.
Belal INJURED him.

Uriah Hall injured Weidman too

 

[blaseblase]

Burns was fighting Belal injured, Wonderboy was past his prime, Luque meh, Brady meh

As opposed to Usman fighting 36 year old Masvidal 2x?

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Belal can't defend something he has never won

He has never had an impactful win

Right, he's just had "incidental" wins over almost a third of the current rankings

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

There is no one in WW more deserving of a title shot than Belal. Even Usman had an easier road to championship.

Every win brings him closer to GOAT.

There's almost no one in UFC history who has done everything they were supposed to up to this point and still didn't get the nod towards being booked for a title shot moreso than Belal

 

[Deleted member 504083]

As opposed to Usman fighting 36 year old Masvidal 2x?

Usman clearly isn't the GOAT WW tho. GSP is.

 

[Aurelian]

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

There is no one in WW more deserving of a title shot than Belal. Even Usman had an easier road to championship.

Every win brings him closer to GOAT.

Nobody hates Belal because he's a Muslim. What kind of logic is that? Do you and fellow Muslims have a victim complex going on or sum?

 

[DougieJones]

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

This is sooo, like, 2002

 

[IBeLurkin]

Sure is defending like it

Yes, beating Hughes was a great defense

Gr8 b8 m8, r8 8/8

 

[Deleted member 592822]

Burns was fighting Belal injured, Wonderboy was past his prime, Luque meh, Brady meh

Luque was too 5 when he beat him. Wonderboy put a stellar performance less than one year ago. Brady was undefeated and supposed to steamroll belal. Burns was injured during the fight not before. All very good wins all ranked.

Who does Colby beat that is worthy of note? 40yo journeyman masvidal ? 38yo more than washed up coming from 2 losses Woodley and Lawler ? undersized RDA who took him down ? 40yo Maia ? Oh wait he had 2 losses against Usman ! wow two losses ! And be finished max griffin ! Unbelievable. Jon Jonesque in his record

 

[Deleted member 592822]

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

There is no one in WW more deserving of a title shot than Belal. Even Usman had an easier road to championship.

Every win brings him closer to GOAT.

more because he's an Arab. Even more because he's a Palestinian

 

[wlu.29]

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

There is no one in WW more deserving of a title shot than Belal. Even Usman had an easier road to championship.

Every win brings him closer to GOAT.

People like khabib and islam

 

[Blastbeat]

People hate him just because he’s a Muslim and this clouds their judgement.

There is no one in WW more deserving of a title shot than Belal. Even Usman had an easier road to championship.

Every win brings him closer to GOAT.

dont bring religion into it. he's an unlikable cornball personality with a fighting style thats as interesting as a dissertation on wallpaper.
he deserves a title shot based on his wins, but lets not pretend its Islam that makes him boring and cringy. he does that himself.

 

[Blastbeat]

There's almost no one in UFC history who has done everything they were supposed to up to this point and still didn't get the nod towards being booked for a title shot moreso than Belal

Tony Ferguson

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Gr8 b8 m8, r8 8/8

TJ fought and lost his belt in a VERY closely contested fight to Dom.

What happened after that?
Cruz 'defended' against 1 fight win streak, 37-year old Faber; while TJ fought 7 fight win streak, was already promised multiple title shots, perrenial #1 contender Assuncao.
Cruz then continued his dumb "TAM" feud by taking on #6 ranked, best win is Thomas Almeida, Cody Garbrandt; while TJ fought #2 ranked, surging contender John Lineker.

Sometimes, champions have storylines and challengers are doing the grunt work of the division. Like if Usman has to do 2 completely undeserved rematches, and then maybe gets one himself, while another guy has to beat 3 top-5 opponents and still not get a title shot for it.

Having given you that to process, I'll reference another post I've made on the subject.

Just had a thought experiment...

We often judge champs by number of defenses, but that's probably not too fair, because you usually become a contender in the first place by beating ranked guys. So by the time you win the belt and become champ, you'll already have some section of the rankings already beaten. (Of course, the rankings are always moving, so you can compile a bunch of wins, but how many stay current shows how fewer challengers you have right now in front of you)

Now, I don't think Belal beats Usman and Leon in his next two fights. I figure the likelihood is extremely low. BUT I also thought he was gonna lose nearly every fight he's had since Leon, and that's not happened yet. So let's take a look at the ranked wins Belal would have if he does become champ, compared to the current ranked wins of all the champs.

Heavyweight - Jon Jones
1 ranked win (special case, straight to the shot)

Light HW - Let's say both Jiri and Hill to be fair
Jiri - 2 Hill - 1

Middleweight - Strickland
4 ranked wins

Welterweight - Edwards
2 ranked wins (3 if you count RDA, who is ranked at LW, even though he's been WW his last 2 fights)

Lightweight - Islam
3 ranked wins (4 including Volk)

Featherweight - Volkanovski
3 ranked wins (But Zombie only recently retired)

Bantamweight - Sugar Mallet
2 ranked wins

Flyweight - Pantoja
5 ranked wins

Women's FW - Grasso
3 ranked wins

Women's Straw - Zhang
3 ranked wins (But probably should be 4 with Tecia if she wasn't unranked for coming down with that common injury we call "a baby")

If Belal makes his way to champ, he will have:
6 ranked wins

Meaning, he'd basically have already gotten a stronger hold over his own division than every champ today.
~~~~

So, feel free to question whether or not I'm b8'ing, but I'll tell ya this: You might think it's wrong, but my "b8'ing" feels so right.

Luque was too 5 when he beat him. Wonderboy put a stellar performance less than one year ago. Brady was undefeated and supposed to steamroll belal. Burns was injured during the fight not before. All very good wins all ranked.

Who does Colby beat that is worthy of note? 40yo journeyman masvidal ? 38yo more than washed up coming from 2 losses Woodley and Lawler ? undersized RDA who took him down ? 40yo Maia ? Oh wait he had 2 losses against Usman ! wow two losses ! And be finished max griffin ! Unbelievable. Jon Jonesque in his record

By Colby-fan logic, Luque was the backup on Usman-Covington 2, and so was provably the next contender when Belal beat him.

People like khabib and islam

Coulda fooled me. They get some of the most undue hate around here

 

[fizzlehiss]

Burns was fighting Belal injured, Wonderboy was past his prime, Luque meh, Brady meh

Fuck off with such pathetic cope. Belal injured Burns, and Burns wasn't doing well before the injury anyways. Belal did beat all those guys fair and square.

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Tony Ferguson

Except Tony was scheduled for multiple interim title fights, which IS a championship fight when the champ isn't available: Firstly at 9 wins, when he beat a bunch of ok people, #9 Thomson, #6 Barboza, and #2 RDA. Then booked again for the interim when that fight fell through, and beat #7 Kevin Lee to become the interim champ, but was stripped for injury. Then beat #8 Pettis and #4 Cowboy and then was booked for the undisputed title, which fell through, so he got another interim shot.

So he was getting chances, despite only ever needing to dip his toe into the top 5 of his division once before each time, as opposed to the 3 times Belal has.

Fuck off with such pathetic cope. Belal injured Burns, and Burns wasn't doing well before the injury anyways. Belal did beat all those guys fair and square.

No, see, Belal getting rocked after Edwards poked him in the eye the first time is because Belal is bad and had nothing for him, so that fight's basically a loss for Belal; while Burns looking bad after Belal injured him is because of the inexplicable and completely forgivable injury alone, so that fight's basically a no contest. It's perfect logic. No holes whatsoever

 

[nostradumbass]

If Belal does somehow eventually become champ, he'll have already have done what equates to like 4 title defenses before his first defense.

Seriously, who would he defend against besides Shavkat? Give Colby shot #4?

Goat's a long shot, but he's already more dominant than some champs without even being one yet

Rematch with Geoff Neal, who beat him last time.

Him becoming champ is a big if, and It would be like next summer if it did happen, and then there's Shavkat, Islam coming up for a champ/champ fight, then who knows what the rankings will even look like by then? Khamzat won't still be in the rankings, wonderboy will probably be out of the top 10, Garry could climb into the mix.

I'm not sure Belal beats Leon or Colby to become champ, but certainly if he did, and beat Usman before, then Shavkat, then Islam, then yeah, he'd be in goat discussions, but let's not get ahead of ourselves and start tallying wins he hasn't even had.

 

[Deleted member 504083]

Luque was too 5 when he beat him. Wonderboy put a stellar performance less than one year ago. Brady was undefeated and supposed to steamroll belal. Burns was injured during the fight not before. All very good wins all ranked.

Who does Colby beat that is worthy of note? 40yo journeyman masvidal ? 38yo more than washed up coming from 2 losses Woodley and Lawler ? undersized RDA who took him down ? 40yo Maia ? Oh wait he had 2 losses against Usman ! wow two losses ! And be finished max griffin ! Unbelievable. Jon Jonesque in his record

-Guys like Luque and Brady aren't going to be much of a factor in determining a GOAT.

-Wonderboy is still pretty decent against non grapplers like Neal and Luque, but his TDD seems to have progressively gotten worse with age.

-The Burns injury was a complete fluke. Nice TDD by Belal tho.

-Nobody has ever said Colby is the WW GOAT

 

[Mike]

He argues like a sherdogger lmao. No, hell no he's not even close to the best ww ever. Not even in the conversation.