Welterweight could get very interesting in the next year or so (but Belal needs to go).

[Azure]

So your solution to make wew good is to remove the guy nobody can beat?

 

[Harlekin]

Bilal might be 37 in his next fight or close to.
His style is based on cardio. Even the russian mountain diet has its limits.

 

[Cheese_&_mma_lover]

This is a fairly shit take.

How is Shavkat and Luque anything alike.

How has Shavkat, Garry and JDM been exposed?

I do agree that Buckley, Morales and Prates ( my personal favorite of this bunch) have a bright future.

Shavkat was exposed. Shavkat only wants to do bodylock trip takedown (the first takedown you learn in jiujitsu, and easy to defend). shav's wrestling IQ is just too low, Belal will just spam the same takedown on shav for 5 rounds just like the Luque fight.

JDM was exposed, bum wrestler as well. jumps the Gilly, and loses position

Garry was expossed, he is too hesitant. you just have to land the first punch and then do nothing, except hop away from his low kicks.

 

[Domitian]

 

[bjjwar]

We could very well end up with an Islam Makhachev vs Shavkat Rakhmonov matchup for the title down the line, which would be a dream fight. But how do we get there? Hear me out:

So we've got Belal as the current (36 year old) champion. In this hypothetical, he's actually the one pawn that's ruining the setup. Due to the super annoying "Muslim friendz dont fight Muslim friendz" situation he has with Islam, it's unlikely they will ever get matched up. Islam has already stated he intends to move up to Welterweight rather sooner than later in order to become double champ, which I'm actually fine with should he get past Tsarukyan.

Nobody likes Belal (except for @HHJ). However, he isn't going to step aside just because his friend Islam wants to move up and fight for the title. In other words, someone has to go and take it off him. We all hope it's going to be Shavkat, so let's hope that fight gets rebooked soon. Shavkat would be the favourite against Belal, but in case he loses, Belal would probably face the winner of JDM vs Edwards. Belal disposed of Edwards pretty easily, so a rematch wouldn't be favourable. JDM needs to win against Edwards, but that's a very tough matchup for JDM aswell. In short, it's pretty much All Eyez On Shavkat. I think the other top 10 guys are currently too far off from a title shot. Unless something crazy happens #5 Brady won't get it just by beating #8 Burns, #3 Usman is on a 3 loss skid, #6 Buckley needs a top win, #7 Garry just lost against Shavkat, #9 Colby is about to (thank god) fade out of existence (how the fuck is he even #9?).

Which top 5/10 ranked matchups do you want to see at Welterweight?

Idk WW is filled with a bunch of old washed and boring fighters. Usman is old and washed, barely fights. Colby is old and made the paraplegic 70yr old Mike Tyson that fought Paul look like prime Tyson. Gary is boring af. Brady is boring. MVP is old and boring. Wonderboy is old and washed. Edwards is washed and boring. JDM got his ass beat by Burns who is also old. Belal is old and boring. You only have Buckley and Shavkat and thats it at the top who were having some exciting fights and that being said as soon as Shavkat faced a top dog he also looked terrible.