Hot Tweets: Amanda Nunes’ career, Charles Oliveira’s big win, and what comes next after UFC 289

Hello friends!

It was supposed to be kind of a quiet pay-per-view weekend; instead a number of pretty important things happened: Amanda Nunes defeated Irene Aldana to retain her bantamweight title and then retired, Charles Oliveira thumped Beneil Dariush leaving the lightweight title picture in flux, and a whole bunch of Canadians showed out for their countrymen in Vancouver. We have a lot of good questions this week about what happened at UFC 289 and what comes next, so let’s jump right in.

We were talking about this topic over the weekend, but Nunes’ career is somewhat singular in that despite being an all-time great, she doesn’t have many memorable or “great” fights. Almost all of her fights were either total bludgeonings or they were bad, and I think a lot of that has to do with who she is as a fighter.

Nunes is not the best fighter that’s ever stepped into the cage — there are a number of women who are technically more proficient than her in every area — but she is the best blend of skill and physicality ever in women’s MMA. Think about it, Germaine de Randamie was boxing her ears, but Amanda could win the grappling, so she won. Valentina Shevchenko is technically more proficient just about everywhere, but she couldn’t match Nunes’ physicality, so Nunes won. Julianna Peña, for her many faults, is tougher than a coffin nail, so when Nunes couldn’t simply overpower her, she failed, until the rematch where she instead just clubbed Peña around the cage for 25 minutes.

Nunes never gave us these incredible masterclasses of performances because that’s not really who she was. Instead she gave us overwhelming dominance in a way that somehow was less memorable than other all-timers. But if I’m picking five fights for her, I suppose I’ll go with Miesha Tate, Ronda Rousey, Holly Holm, Cris Cyborg, and Megan Anderson. All of those performances were dominant and they came against some of the most important names in WMMA history (and Megan Anderson).

As for the women’s featherweight division, I expect that to be shuttered before the end of the month. It was always a bit of a farce (the UFC never even put up rankings for it) and the only reason it still existed was so Nunes could carry on being “a two-division champion” — and to spite Cyborg. The former is no longer necessary and the latter isn’t a good enough reason to keep up the charade.

This is going to sound harsh, but no one deserves it. Women’s bantamweight is a horrendous division. Don’t believe me? Now that Nunes is retired, Raquel Pennington has the longest win streak in the division with five. That’s a totally respectable number. Do you know who is next? Mayra Bueno Silva at three. No one is separating themselves as the next woman up.

That being said, Pennington undeniably is next in line. She’s done all she needs to to fight for a title again, and if I were in charge, I’d say the winner of the Holm vs. Silva fight would be the appropriate person, but I strongly suspect it will just be Peña vs. Pennington for the strap. WAR Rocky.

Yeesh. What was that performance from Aldana? All the people thinking that the Mexican takeover was going to keep rolling really missed the mark.

Aldana landed 57 significant strikes, at a 28 percent clip. That’s bad by any measure. Aldana knows it, and her coaches certainly did as well, basically begging with her to start fighting every time she came back to the corner. She never did, and that could well be something she regrets for the rest of her career.

Coming into a title bout against the greatest women’s fighter of all-time, you know you’re in for an uphill climb; you don’t get to be a GOAT by accident. The best challengers, the ones who give themselves a chance for greatness, either live in complete ignorance of their opponent’s greatness (Peña) or accept the fact that a lot of this fight is going to suck for them, and they’ve just got to plow ahead (think Alexa Grasso). What you can’t do is overly respect the champion because then the battle is already lost, and it absolutely looks like that’s what happened with Aldana. She was timid from the jump, allowing Nunes to get rolling, and once Nunes is in a rhythm, Aldana never stood a chance.

Honestly, I’d call her a winner in all of this.

Peña is almost certainly going to get a title shot next and now forevermore she gets to be known as the one woman to beat peak Amanda Nunes. Had Aldana come in and upset Nunes, the narrative around Peña’s win would have shifted some from “impressive stuff” to “Nunes was on the decline.” Now, Peña has that forever, plus she doesn’t have to fight Nunes again!

I know Peña believes she is better than Nunes, but I have eyeballs and a functioning cerebral cortex and I can tell you, definitively, that she is incorrect. Fighting Nunes again would have only resulted in her suffering substantially more brain trauma and entirely dismissing her one win as a fluke. Peña is arguably the second-biggest winner of the weekend.

On the first question I would say the answer is definitively not. On the second, it’s tough, but Oliveira certainly has a case.

Let’s start here: Oliveira’s résumé is unimpeachably great. The man has been cooking dudes in spectacular fashion for 13 years, and he has only been getting better it seems. But on the “greatest lightweight résumé,” I don’t think it’s particularly close. A lot of Oliveira’s career was at 145 pounds, and the quality of his lightweight résumé is largely from the last few years. Now, his current run is excellent, no doubt, but it’s not really better than Khabib Nurmagomedov’s résumé currently, and when you add in career lightweight greats like Eddie Alvarez, I don’t think Oliveira stacks up, at least not for the moment.

As for most dangerous UFC fighter, I mean, statistically that’s accurate. He does have the most finishes in promotional history, a record to which he is extremely likely to keep adding. The question for me would be how much do you factor in his losses? Because while he has the most stoppage wins in UFC history, he’s also pretty high up on the most stoppage losses in promotional history as well. Oliveira has been saved by the referee against eight different opponents, putting him right up there with guys like Donald Cerrone and Andrei Arlovski. That’s a pretty damning stat. So yes, Oliveira is the danger, but he’s also generally in pretty big danger himself.

The UFC is going back to Abu Dhabi in October and that is almost 100 percent where Islam Makhachev will defend the 155-pound title next. Dustin Poirier and Justin Gaethje are fighting at the end of July in a bout where they are going to beat the souls out of each other. While I think the winner of that fight deserves the next shot at Makhachev, the timeline simply doesn’t add up. Oliveira is almost certainly going to get the next title shot.

But, if somehow that doesn’t happen, if the UFC calls an audible, or Makhachev gets injured or something, I think there is an obvious opponent for “Do Bronx”: Alexander Volkanovski. If Volk beats Yair Rodriguez, he is almost certainly going to start lobbying for a lightweight title shot. He does not deserve one. He has zero wins at lightweight and losing to the champ and then dropping back to featherweight and winning again does not merit a rematch. Volk is a champion in a division and should defend that belt against whoever is next; unless he says “screw it” and moves up to lightweight to fight in a No. 1 contender bout. Get an actual win in the weight class against a former champion and then you can’t deny him. That’s the fight I’d like to see.

Mike Malott dummied Adam Fugitt on Saturday to the delight of the Vancouver fans and then cut an excellent post-fight promo. And that was the point. The UFC gave the man prime placement on a pay-per-view to see if he could show out and establish himself as a star in the Canadian market. He did about as well as possible. Now the UFC knows that if the kid can fight, they for sure have something, so they’re going to have to elevate him somewhat, particularly since he’s no spring chicken. Malott is already 31 and competing in a deep and competitive weight class. If he’s going to make a run, it’s got to start soon — so yes, I think his next fight is against a bigger name.

I don’t know if they’ll strap the rockets to him, but they’re going to see what he’s got.

On Saturday, Stephen Erceg came in on short notice and beat up David Dvorak, MMA Fighting’s No. 14 flyweight. That’s quite an achievement for a 27-year-old kid making his UFC debut but the truth is always a little murkier. Dvorak was not the No. 14 flyweight because he was incredible, but because the division is still relatively weak. Dvorak lost to the two best guys he ever fought (now the three, I guess) and so Erceg’s win could simply be the result of Dvorak being overvalued in the rankings.

Time will tell, but with the UFC heading back to Sydney in September, I would imagine “Astro Boy” gets the call — and since he is now going to be ranked in the UFC’s official rankings, it’ll probably be against another ranked guy.

Thanks for reading, and thank you for everyone who sent in Tweets! Do you have any burning questions about things at least somewhat related to combat sports? Then you’re in luck, because you can send your Hot Tweets to me, @JedKMeshew, and I will answer them! Doesn’t matter if they’re topical or insane. Send them to me and I’ll answer the ones I like the most. Let’s have fun.