E282 - Ilia Topuria is your new 145 king | UFC 298: Ilia Topuria vs. Alexander Volkanovski recap

The Fight Library

Ilia Topuria is your new king of the featherweight division. He knocked out the long-reigning champion Alexander Volkanovski in round two to take home the title to his native country of Spain. Let's talk about the fights! Chapters 0:00 Intro 0:57 Ilia Topuria is the king of 145 11:37 Bobby Knuckles violence 15:10 Ian Garry stunk up the joint 18:46 Merab the machine! 20:17 Other outs and ins Ilia Topuria absolutely stole the show at UFC 298. Knocking out a fighter the calibre of Alexander Volkanovski is phenomenal in it's own right. To see that made my jaw drop. So what is next for Ilia Topuria? Max Holloway? Movsar Evloev? Volkanovski 2? You be the judge. Robert Whittaker and Paulo Costa had a fantastic fight. Costa almost put Robert Whittaker away with a spinning heel kick but Whittaker, who has done this time and time again, survived and dominated the rest of the fight. This means we need to get Robert Whittaker and Sean Strickland next, right? Former champion vs. former champion! Ian Machado Garry stunk up the place. He allowed Geoff Neal to get him to the fence and clinch up with him for extended periods of the night. What happens if Colby Covington or Shavkat Rakhmonov get you there? You die. Ian Machado Garry is a fantastic fighter but this fight was just underwhelming and I need to see more from a fighter with the talent he has. Merab Dvalishvili defeated Henry Cejudo by doing exactly what Cejudo does best: wrestling. Cejudo hung up the gloves again and gave a good account of himself. But he is 37. It's time to be done. He showed that he can still do things but these young guns, Merab Dvalishvili specifically, are not who he can keep up with anymore. We also get into the weeds on Fluffy Hernandez, Amanda Lemos vs. Mackenzie Dern, Rinya Nakamura and more from UFC 298.