After beating Colby Covington for the second time on Saturday night, Kamaru Usman has once again firmly cemented himself as the best welterweight on the planet. Usman is currently “lapping the division” as the majority of his current contenders have fallen short before the “Nigerian Nightmare.”
This means that all the current contenders need to make a statement to why they deserve a second or third shot at the champion, resulting in many fights needing to be created.
Firstly, we were supposed to have 3rd ranked, Leon Edwards facing off against 7th ranked, Jorge Masvidal, however, Masvidal has pulled out of the fight due to an injury which is yet to be disclosed. Khamzat Chimaev, who is coming off a dominant victory at UFC 267 is willing to step in, however, Edwards looks uninterested in fighting the Swede.
Colby Covington will be looking to rebound after his close loss to Usman and I’d love to see him either face, Gilbert Burns or Vinente Luque. I think both of those fighters provide a tricky test for Colby and the winners of those fights could potentially be next in line for a title fight against Usman if Edwards is still unwilling to fight Khamzat at UFC 269.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Vicente Luque stepped in to fight Edwards, he was the backup for Covington vs Usman last week, meaning he was in a training camp and is potentially ready to jump in to fight if needed once again.
A bit further down the rankings, former no.1 contender Stephen Thompson is looking to fight Belal Muhammad at the start of next year and whoever wins that fight is potentially a fight or two away from a title shot as well.
There are a lot of fights and potential fights in the welterweight division with the contenders being extremely closely ranked. It’ll be interesting to see what fights are made going into the new year.
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