Interim Belt

[jeff7b9]

Agreed with the rest but the Dustin title fight was legitimately good and a nice reward for fighting down against a surging contender (who admittedly has gotten destroyed since then). But Dustin made it to the 5th round and put a huge gash on Islam, that's better than Oliveira did

I have been a Dustin Poirier fan since the Fightville documentary, and I was a big WEC fan.

But the fact remins that he was most definitely NOT the most deserving title contender. He beat BSD who was ranked #11 or #12.

Charles at that point had victories over most of the top 5 via stoppage at that point. Sub Gaethje, Sub Dustin, TKO Chandler, UD Beniel

If champs fought 2-3x per year like Matt Hughes, then you could get away with a throw away title fight every once in a while, but these days once every 9 months is about how often we can see a champ, so if you do a "just for fun" title defense you win up with only 1 legitimate title defense in 18-27 months. That is the recipe for rank squatting because if the shot only comes up once every year and a half then it doesn't make sense to risk your rank vs a lower ranked guy,

which gets us where we are right now with 4 guys claiming they are next and refusing to fight anyone but the champ and meanwhile the entire top 5 is sitting with no fight booked.

 

[gentel]

Charles at that point had victories over most of the top 5 via stoppage at that point. Sub Gaethje, Sub Dustin, TKO Chandler, UD Beniel

Thing is though, the Charles title rematch came first and he killed his eligibility by hard sparring and pulling out with the forehead cut. It's like the current Tsarukyan situation, yes they're the most qualified but they set the division back 6 months by pulling out

It's not like they just frontran Dustin over Charles, he had the title rematch scheduled first and only after that pullout did Dustin get a chance

 

[tritestill]

creates more drama.the longer drama the more build up
look at jones and aspinal people love to drama

People want Jon to stop ducking the best HW in the division, don't think people love that.

 

[Young Calf Kick]

The idea of #1 contender fights seems to be dead. Have to slap fake title fights together every time a fight doesn’t materialize at the time planned.

Correct. And the UFC killed it themselves by continuously breaking #1 contender promises. Rankings also barely matter. The promotion sells hot air with sprinkles on it. The business is actually way closer to being ran like a movie theater than it is to a sports promotion.

 

[Mohawk Banditó]

Correct. And the UFC killed it themselves by continuously breaking #1 contender promises. Rankings also barely matter. The promotion sells hot air with sprinkles on it. The business is actually way closer to being ran like a movie theater than it is to a sports promotion.

At some point before Belal fought for the belt, I had checked welterweight to see when the last time they actually had a fight between 2 people who would get a title shot with a win, and it was like 5 years after Colby vs RDA for the interim, and even that didn't successfully result in a shot, so the last actual title eliminator was 7 years prior with Maia vs Masvidal.

The whole time, they just kept booking top names in one off fights against people with struggling momentum and then gave out shots for it.

It's fucking ridiculous how bad their lack of eliminators have become

 

[Neck&Neck]

They should just make a second BMF Belt

 

[MMAFanCal]

I strongly oppose that as this would Adesanya vs Strickland situation. Khamzat will be risking his title shot. He should just wait till Dricus fight is scheduled. He just needs to wait for a couple more month till September or October and possibly in Abu Dhabi, he can get his title shot in the most favorable setting for him. This is a dream come true situation for Khamzat.