Which interim champion is most likely to win their unification bout?
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At UFC 236, we saw two interim champions crowed in the middleweight and lightweight divisions. Israel Adesanya fought Kelvin Gastellum at middleweight, and Dustin Poirier fought Max Holloway at lightweight.
Of course Kelvin was supposed to fight the champion, Robert Whittaker in the main event of UFC 234 in Australia, but “The Reaper” was forced to pull out due to a hernia needing immediate surgery. In the lightweight division, it was put on hold after Khabib and Conor’s post-fight brawl at UFC 229, where suspensions were handed out. As a result of 236, Dustin booked a unification fight against Khabib, and Israel booked a unification fight with Robert Whittaker in the very near future.
This begs the question, of the two interim champions, who is most likely to successfully win their unification bout, Dustin or Izzy?
I went back and forth on this, and I want to be clear that it is very possible that both men successfully unify their titles. However, I am believe that Dustin Poirier is most likely to beat Khabib and win the lightweight championship. Don’t get me wrong, Khabib is one of the most dominant champions in UFC history with an incredible undefeated streak. He takes his opponents down, dictates the pace, and pounds them on the ground until his opponent can no longer take it. However, Poirier is no joke and going into 236 many people were underestimating him. Then he went out and out-struck the greatest featherweight champion of all-time.
As we saw against Max, Dustin is a big lightweight contender and puts on pressure. Pressure I don’t think Khabib has dealt with it yet. Khabib historically has been the fighter applying pressure, and I don’t know how he would handle the tables being turned. Dustin also has decent wrestling ability and while Khabib is the much better wrestler, Dustin has very good defense.
Khabib landed one big over-hand right against McGregor at UFC 229, but generally speaking, he is much more comfortable on the ground. If Dustin could go in the Octagon, keep it on the feet and keep pushing forward, I think he would cause Khabib problems. I don’t think Dustin would finish Khabib in any stretch of the imagination, but I think it is very possible that Dustin could out-point Khabib over 5 rounds. Dustin will be an underdog going into their big title fight, but he is stiff competition for anybody in the lightweight division. This would be Khabib’s toughest competition so far and Dustin is such a hungry fighter that he would give Khabib a very tough fight.
I take nothing away from Israel, since it is entirely possible that he beats Whittaker too in their massive fight for Australia. However, I think Dustin is most likely because of his toughness and his pressure. There is no guarantee that Dustin would beat Khabib and there is no guarantee that Israel would beat Whittaker, but all points to Dustin having the best chance.
Either way I can not wait for both these fights to be signed. Dustin and Israel gave arguably the performance of their careers at UFC 236 and they proved without a shadow of a doubt that they have the skills to defeat the champion in their respective divisions.
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