I disagree. Every fight is a risk and any knowledge of statistics will tell you that multiplying risk by taking multiple fights will be worse than the risk of a single fight, no matter how risky that fight is. Like you said, losing would close him out completely, so by taking THE top contender, he's taking the least amount of chances for that to happen by using some random hypothetical that he can get a shot in a very populated division by taking no fights. You even admit he's being opportunistic and even point out that anyone would in this situation, so the question remains, 'why applaud it?'
Multiple risks, a single risk, both end with the same result if he ends up losing. Taking the least amount of chances does not negate the risk or change the outcome if he loses so I'm unsure why this matters. Not to mention a guy like Usman at his stage of his career is not going to be running the gauntlet to get into another TS. He's going to be getting one off 1-2 wins at the most.
Good take. It's easy to sleep on Usman because he's on a skid but he was a bad dude when/before he was champ, and he did pretty well against Khamzat especially given circumstances. I think he has a decent shot here but his age is a major concern for me. Sadly, I wouldn't bet on him here.
Because multiple risks is more risky. How is that not part of the calculations here? Here's a guy who should have to take multiple risks to get back into range, but now he faces the same consequences of things go wrong, sure, but with less chance of it going wrong, and comes with the immediate reward if things go right, which wouldn't normally be on the table. By a very simple risk/reward model, he's taking the easiest and most rewarding path he can and frankly shouldn't have, so any nonsense about "Oh good on him for taking this fight" is ridiculous.
Fighters should defend their spots, regardless of their age or stage. 2 fights is fine, but 1 would put him solidly behind the other streaking fighters, especially considering what happens if Leon wins a bounce back fight later. When he decides to fight, a higher level of opponent should be available for him and get first looks for recovery, no? Champion or not, MW fight or not, no stage should have a 1 win lead to a title shot and definitely not zero wins leading to an interim. 2 at least is good, but again, a harder path that he's getting a chance to avoid.
Multiple risks is only more risky if the risk level is the same as the single risk.
Again, multiple fights is only the harder path if the match ups are as difficult as the single fight. Buckley is no where near Usman's level, Usman is a nightmare match up for Brady and Ian Garry has shown nothing that says he has the championship level mental to hang with a guy like Usman. The guy ran away from Neal to a decision win and MVP turned him into a grappler, and even then he still nearly lost that fight and would have if MVP had better grappling IQ. Usman fighting these 3 back to back would be less risk than fighting Shavkat once.
Usman isn't preventing anything. If the other contenders were actually guys who people wanted to watch they would be getting the interim shot over Usman right now. He's getting it cause 170's contenders are not draws and are boring as shit outside of JDM and Shavkat. Sean Brady just finished laying and praying Burns for 5 rounds and Ian Garry ran away from Neal to a decision win then put on one of the worst fights of the year against MVP. What makes you think the public wants to watch Sean Brady or Ian Garry over Usman?
Not really. His best win is Wonderboy. They were targeting a Shavkat vs JDM fight before JDM got injured so he fell into a title shot. He has looked damn impressive but it's no injustice to have him fight one more
