Khamzat Chimaev was a heavy favorite going into his first title fight opportunity against Dricus du Plessis at UFC 319, but he somehow even outperformed expectations with a dominant and suffocating performance across all five rounds.
A clean sweep on the scorecards crowned Chimaev as champion after he vanquished du Plessis and sent him packing. Now Chimaev’s reign can officially begin and former UFC bantamweight champion Sean O’Malley expects him to stay on top of the middleweight division for quite
some time.
“I just don’t see anyone beating Khamzat,” O’Malley told the One Night with Steiny podcast. “To be honest, I don’t see anybody lasting as long as DDP did. Like DDP survived, which was impressive in itself. Khamzat is a finisher. He’s a killer.”
If there was a knock on Chimaev’s performance, it’s that he didn’t get a stoppage despite repeated takedowns and constant ground control that kept him ahead of du Plessis at every turn.
O’Malley admits it might be more of the same now that Chimaev is champion.
“I just don’t see that many exciting fights in the future … they’ll be big fights because he’s a star,” O’Malley said. “He’s a superstar. He’s exciting. But it’s just like who do you give that guy?”
There are two fights and four potential opponents all vying for that spot in marquee middleweight fights scheduled over the next two months.
In September, Nassourdine Imavov takes on Caio Borralho in the UFC Paris main event while Reinier de Ridder looks to keep his undefeated UFC run in tact when he clashes with Anthony “Fluffy” Hernandez in October at UFC Vancouver.
UFC CEO Dana White has said the most impressive winner out of those two fights likely ends up in a position to battle Chimaev for the middleweight title.
Whoever gets that shot is going to have to deal with Chimaev’s wrestling, which is arguably one of the greatest weapons existing in the sport today.
That grappling heavy style is difficult to deal with, but O’Malley admits that there are ways to beat wrestlers, which is why he doesn’t agree with the notion that those overpowering grapplers are just taking the sport by storm right now.
“It will probably go in waves like it does,” O’Malley said. “For a while it was a bunch of strikers when [Israel Adesanya] was champ. I was champ. Who else was champ at that time? Max Holloway, it goes in waves. There’s strikers and grapplers but the grapplers are getting pretty powerful.
“At the end of the day, it’s still an entertainment business and the little dorks will get weeded out sometimes. When they’re that good, they’re undeniable. They’re going to become champ.”
