After three years as the reigning champion and a legendary, undefeated career, UFC lightweight king Khabib Nurmagomedov is stepping away from the sport and leaving the division in the lurch.
If he hadn’t decided to retire at the age of 32, one could easily see Khabib continuing to dominate for many years to come. Instead, we’ll soon have a vacant title in what has traditionally been the sport’s deepest division.
As such, your head swims with possibilities. But one of those possibilities has me more excited than any other: how about a good, old-fashioned, eight-man UFC Lightweight Grand Prix tournament for the gold?
Under Dana White, the UFC has been loath to set up actual big-time tournaments, which have elsewhere been a staple of Bellator and Pride – Strikeforce also tried its hand at it with the Heavyweight Grand Prix over a decade ago, which turned Daniel Cormier into a star.
Ironically, the UFC’s last attempt to decide a champion by tournament came in this same lightweight division, nearly 20 years ago. Inaugural champion Jens Pulver vacated the belt in 2002 after a pay dispute, leading the UFC to set up a four-man bracket featuring B.J. Penn, Din Thomas, Matt Serra and Caol Uno. Penn and Uno met in the final, but the climactic matchup ended up as a draw, and the organization essentially abandoned the lightweight division for nearly three years.
Tournaments are fun and cool, they carry with them an epic feel, and they produce a legitimate champ. A few months back, I was vocally in favor of the UFC doing a four-man bracket between Jan Blachowicz, Dominick Reyes, Glover Teixeira and Thiago Santos for the vacated light heavyweight belt. Instead, they turned the already-scheduled Blachowicz-Reyes fight into a vacant title fight, and Blachowicz took home the belt. Perfectly fine, but a little underwhelming. Let’s do it bigger this time.
I’ve put together what I feel to be my best bracket for an eight-man tournament to determine a new UFC lightweight champion. Please, Dana White, Sean Shelby, Mick Maynard, if you’re reading this, feel free to take this idea verbatim. I don’t even need credit for it. Getting to see this play out will be reward enough.
Quarterfinals:
Conor McGregor vs. Dustin Poirier II
This essentially amounts to a No. 1 seed vs. a No. 2 seed in the first round, but that’s just how it goes – although this fight hasn’t been officially booked yet, the rematch between two of the world’s best pound-for-pound fighters looks to be a-go for early next year.
In real life, I expect Dana White to simply set this up as a title fight for the vacant belt, and dispense with all pretenses of doing something cool or unique. But where’s the fun in that? Also, where’s the justice? If any fighter deserves an immediate look at the belt, it’s Poirier, but Conor has a lot to prove at 155 pounds.
McGregor has fought just twice in the last four years, and has only twice in his career ever fought at lightweight: his title win against Eddie Alvarez in Nov. 2016, and his defeat at the hands of Khabib in Oct. 2018. His most recent fight, against a fading Donald Cerrone in January, was at 170 pounds, and so was the pair of fights with Nate Diaz in 2016.
I think the idea that Conor will be immediately re-inserted into a lightweight title fight, after retiring and unretiring so many times and only occasionally fighting at 155 pounds, is a joke. It’ll happen anyway, but it’s still a joke.
A fight between Conor and Poirier is still absolute money, and I can’t wait to see it. It has plenty of value, let’s just make it the first step towards gold.
Tony Ferguson vs. Charles Oliveira
A UFC mainstay for over a decade, Charles “Do Bronx” Oliveira – somehow still just 30 years old – has quietly been on the run of his life over the last three years. Oliveira has won seven in a row, one of the longest currently-running streaks in the UFC, and has been publicly agitating for a shot at the title.
Oliveira has established himself as a legitimate force since returning to 155 pounds in 2017, after missing weight a billion times at featherweight – sometimes by absolutely comical margins. What better way to reward him for his success than a look at Ferguson, one of the best lightweights ever to never win an undisputed title, and who needs to prove himself all over again after sustaining a massive beating against Justin Gaethje a few months back?
It looks, on paper, like a very fun stylistic matchup: Ferguson, one of the most unorthodox fighters we’ve ever seen, taking on Oliveira, a BJJ tornado with more submission wins inside the Octagon than any fighter in history. If Ferguson wins, he gets Conor or Poirier, giving us a marquee fight that’s never happened before. If Oliveira wins, he has a chance to become a true superstar.
Dan Hooker vs. Paul Felder II
Back in February, top-10 contenders Dan Hooker and Paul Felder went at it in a Fight of the Night main event in Hooker’s hometown of Auckland, New Zealand. It was a battle between savvy, technical strikers that went down to the wire – it was an absolute joy to watch, as both guys went to war and ended up palling around together in the hospital afterwards.
Hooker took home a split decision in front of his home fans, but it wasn’t without controversy – a slim majority of media outlets scored the fight 48-47 for Felder. Since then, the 35-year-old Felder has focused on his excellent work as a regular color commentator on UFC events, saying in the media that while he isn’t retired, it’ll take an enticing challenge to get him back in the cage anytime soon.
Is the chance to avenge a controversial loss, and at the same time put yourself in the running for your first-ever UFC title opportunity, enticing enough for you? Something tells me Felder would be into the idea. If the first fight is any indication, it’ll be guaranteed fireworks from two of the tournament’s dark horses.
Justin Gaethje vs. Beneil Dariush
Justin Gaethje may have gotten summarily owned by Khabib on Saturday, but he’s still one of the most vicious killers in the UFC, and he’d be the heavy betting favorite to move clear of this side of the bracket. That’s just fine with me: I think Gaethje is a championship-caliber fighter, and I think any of these matchups could bring some fun times. Plus, we’ve already seen him against Tony and Poirier, so let’s stick him over here.
For his opponent, and the last entrant in this tournament, I’m going to go with a personal favorite: Iranian-American badass Beneil Dariush, who has won five in a row and has been surging up the rankings in recent months.
Both guys are finishing machines. Gaethje’s relentless pressure and constant bomb-throwing reminds you of a T-1000, while Dariush has been nothing but highlights in his last few fights – he knocked Drakkar Klose out cold in March in one of the year’s wildest scraps, then destroyed Scott Holtzman with an outrageous spinning backfist in August.
The UFC is clearly ready to elevate Dariush, who had a fight booked with Oliveira earlier this fall that ended up falling through. Let’s give him the real test against Gaethje, and watch the sparks fly. This fight IS NOT going the distance, and in the end, that’s what we all want.
Betting odds would likely set the expected outcome of this eight-man bracket is a McGregor-Ferguson semifinal on one side (money), a Hooker-Gaethje semifinal on the other side (money), and McGregor-Gaethje in the finals (DING DING DING BIG TIME MONEY BABY). Who wouldn’t want to see that, provided we can actually get Conor on task to fight three times in a relatively expedient amount of time?
Let’s do this. I want nothing else.
The Big Fight 