Max Holloway is one of the greatest featherweights of all time, and he’s still only 29 years old. He also enters Saturday’s main-event fight with Calvin Kattar at a career crossroads.

In Dec. 2019, Holloway’s two-plus year reign as the UFC’s undisputed featherweight champion came to an end at the hands of Alexander Volkanovski. They fought again last July, only for Volkanovski to win again by controversial split decision – although many, including myself, thought Holloway won three rounds, the belt remained around the Aussie’s waist. That’s left Holloway in the unenviable “Benavidez Position:” the No. 1 contender at his weight class, but with two losses to the champ on his recent record, perhaps without a path to another chance.

When people talk about Max Holloway in 2021, they talk about the defeats to Volkanovski, and whether that series merits a third fight or not. The conversation includes little discussion about how incredible and special a fighter Holloway is, even with those losses on his record. So let’s refresh our memory. Let’s go back to Dec. 2018, when the then-champion Holloway defended his title against a hyped, undefeated young stud named Brian Ortega.

Max Holloway has become a sure-fire Hall of Famer while still in his 20s because of a myriad of great performances, but the Ortega fight stands apart as one of my favorite fights of his career. Holloway displays every single trait that makes him an all-time great: his unrelenting pressure, great movement, ridiculous cardio, and a mean streak that has separated him from the rest of the pack. All of this is front of a roaring Toronto crowd chanting his name – although Holloway is Hawaiian, he’s fought many times in Canada over the years, and has developed a following there.

Holloway takes control of the fight right away and never lets up. The thing that sets Holloway apart from most other fighters is his fight IQ – he always seems to know the right times to move forward and to attack, and the exact right moment to get out of range. That’s apparent from the first round on. Against a fighter very willing to stand in and trade, but who isn’t known for his striking, Holloway comes after him from the beginning with heaps of punches, while mocking his younger opponent when he wobbles him.

Holloway busts Ortega’s nose up in the second round, a harbinger of things to come. The timing of his right hand is magic – watch how he rushes in by flicking the jab at Ortega multiple times, knowing that when Ortega finally has to move his head, it’ll be directly into the path of the right – and Ortega, the submission specialist and Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt, is unable to take him down and work his advantage.

But even though Ortega can’t hope to keep up with Holloway’s pace, he’s still game. Ortega finally has his moment in the third, sticking him with a hard counter right and even cracking him with the spinning back elbow he’d later use to to drop Chan Sung Jung. But again, he can’t get Holloway on the ground – meanwhile, the Hawaiian keeps the pressure on. The moment passes, and the champion reasserts control.

Once the fourth round starts, Holloway can feel it. Color commentator Joe Rogan reports that Holloway had told him between the third and fourth that he was going to finish Ortega in this round, and Holloway comes out like a house on fire. There’s a reason why Holloway’s record is littered with third and fourth-round stoppages – when a guy can come at someone with this kind of pace and this kind of heat that late into the fight, who can withstand it?

Holloway’s fourth round against Brian Ortega is one of the greatest single rounds I’ve ever seen. He absolutely overwhelms and breaks Ortega. It can be classified as nothing less than a relentless assault. Known for switching stances frequently, Holloway comes out in the fourth fighting southpaw, and it completely changes the game – suddenly, it seems like every punch he lands is hurting Ortega badly.

Holloway rushes Ortega again and again, moving forward with unceasing combinations, hurting Ortega multiple times and dropping him with a right hand late in the round. Again Ortega’s desperate attempts to take him down are easily stopped. Along the way, he messes up Ortega’s left eye, and after he finishes the round on something like a 30-punch combination, the referee waves off the fight.

Statistically, Holloway occupies a lofty place in UFC history. His record of most total significant strikes landed in his career is nearly 400 more than anyone else. In featherweight history, only Shane Burgos has a higher rate of strikes landed per minute. He’s a fighter that can put his foot on the gas and keep it there, for a very long time, and in a way that few fighters ever can match.

That’s the problem that the rest of the featherweight division is still facing, and it’s why I think there’s a very strong chance we see Holloway hold the title again someday. Ironically, if he fights for the belt in 2021, it most likely would be against Ortega. Ortega took nearly two years off after the loss to Holloway and looked like a new man upon his return in October, outstriking Jung across a revelatory five-round performance. He’s expected to be Volkanovski’s next challenger at some point in the first half of this year.

If he wins the belt, Holloway will likely be waiting for him – provided of course he gets past Kattar, a very good technical striker who will test him on the feet in ways Ortega could not. I know one thing: no matter how much Ortega has improved, I guarantee he doesn’t want to see Max Holloway again.

Really, no fighter should want to see Max Holloway in the cage. Friends, this is one bad son of a bitch.