At UFC 254 in October, Khabib Nurmagomedov shocked mixed martial arts fans by retiring after his 29th win. Most expected him to at least go for an unprecedented 30 wins without a loss. Instead, he left the octagon for what may be the final time after submitting Justin Gaethje in the second round.
Now, the UFC will have to fill the spot of one its greatest champions of all time and figure out what’s next for the lightweight division.
While UFC President Dana White seems to be confident that Nurmagomedov will return for at least another fight, he is still retired for now. That leaves five top lightweight contenders: Tony Ferguson, Dustin Poirier, Conor McGregor, Gaethje, and Bellator champion Michael Chandler.
Each of the five fighters has a legitimate case to be the next champion, and it’s up to White and the UFC matchmakers to decide what will happen next.
The next fight scheduled in the division will be between McGregor and Dustin Poirier in January. Last time the two met, McGregor was on his rise to becoming the most well-known UFC fighter ever, and he knocked out Poirier in the first round.
Since that fight in 2014, Poirier has only lost twice, and he gave Nurmagomedov one of the stiffest challenges he’s seen.
That leaves three fighters with a stake to be the next champion. What seems to make the most sense would be a fight between Chandler and Ferguson. Ferguson was in line to be the one fighting Nurmagomedov in October before he got dominated by Gaethje.
Those are also the only two of the top five that never had a title shot against Nurmagomedov.
The matchup between Chandler and Ferguson also gives Gaethje some time to heal after his second-round defeat.
After those first two fights happen, it’ll be up to White to decide who Gaethje should fight next, whether it should be the winner of Poirier and McGregor or Chandler and Ferguson.
The other option that the UFC could explore would be a lightweight tournament with the belt as the prize for the winner.
Unfortunately for us spectators, this does not seem like a very likely outcome. The UFC hasn’t done a tournament since 2012, and before that it hadn’t done one since UFC 23 in 1999. Also, White notoriously has a dislike for these tournaments because they are hard to pull off and one injury could derail the whole thing.
It would be fun to watch, though, right?
No matter how the UFC decides to handle the lightweight championship, there is no bad option for the fans or the organization. The division is the most talented in the company, and that creates good fights and a whole lot of pay-per view buys.
