Roundtable: What’s the best UFC event of the summer slate?

The UFC’s summer time season is upon us, and there’s no scarcity of championship bouts, grudge matches, and assured bangers to stay up for. However when it’s your hard-earned {dollars} we’re speaking about, little discretion is critical even for essentially the most hardcore combat fan.

With that in thoughts, MMA Combating’s Alexander Ok. Lee, Mike Heck, and Jed Meshew took a more in-depth have a look at the upcoming slate of pay-per-view occasions and made their picks for which UFC present is most deserving of your $80.

Heck: I’ll go along with UFC 317, the UFC’s annual Worldwide Combat Week pay-per-view card.

There’s lots of meat on the bone by way of storylines, speaking factors within the aftermath, and most significantly, significant fights. Ilia Topuria preventing Charles Oliveira for the vacant light-weight title could not have been all people’s first alternative, however it’s a rattling good matchup and a lot can come from it. Lightweight goes to be in an fascinating place within the fallout of this card, and whatever the end result, Topuria would be the headline grabber for a number of weeks following.

I shall be sincere and say I don’t love the flyweight title combat, largely as a result of, in my view, the person who needs to be difficult for the title is preventing on the identical card in a unique combat with Manel Kape going through Brandon Royval. However any time Alexandre Pantoja fights, you get to see top-of-the-line on the planet compete, and Kai Kara-France is rarely in a boring combat.

Plus, Paulo Costa vs. Roman Kopylov is bizarre and foolish, Dariush vs. Moicano is an efficient one, Jack Hermansson is again in opposition to Gregory Rodrigues, and Viviane Araujo vs. Tracy Cortez has stakes within the flyweight division. It doesn’t seem as if the combat card is full both, so I believe the UFC will make a giant deal out of it. Topuria and Oliveira are each supremely over with the fan base, and having a important occasion with a lot pre- and post-fight sizzle makes the joy ranges solely rise. I’m trying ahead to this card, gents, despite the fact that it’s not the best IFW card we’ve ever seen.

Lee: You guys know I’m going full weirdo with this one. That’s proper, I’m advocating for UFC 316.

I are likely to get increasingly excited for an occasion the nearer it will get to combat evening, and that is no exception as I’ve progressively warmed as much as all of the June 7 matchups and the potential silliness which may ensue. No, I’m nonetheless not thrilled with Sean O’Malley getting an instantaneous rematch with Merab Dvalishvili, however at the least Dvalishvili defended his title in O’Malley’s absence, and there’s an simple spark between the 2—let’s simply hope that carries over into the cage this time.

Picture by Cooper Neill/Zuffa LLC

Actually, if we’re speaking bantamweights, it’s the grudge match on the ladies’s aspect that’s extra compelling. Julianna Peña, love her or hate her, is among the few girls’s 135ers proper now that may persistently get a response and her fights all the time go away followers speaking (even when what they’re speaking about is Peña being too robust for her personal good and successful questionable choices *cough* UFC 307 *cough*. A combat between the UFC champion and Kayla Harrison, MMA Fighting’s No. 1 bantamweight, has been the one to make for some time, even with an Amanda Nunes comeback looming, and we’re going to study loads about Peña and Harrison by evening’s finish.

The remainder of the cardboard is such a combined bag, I can’t assist however like it. Kelvin Gastelum vs. Joe Pyfer has contemporary warmth after their UFC Mexico bout was cancelled on account of a Pyfer sickness, adopted by Pyfer making some dumb comments concerning the nation. Mario Bautista welcomes former PFLator star Patchy Mix to the, uh, combine in a bout nobody would have predicted 12 months in the past. And Kevin Holland makes his third (!) look this yr in an ideal matchup in opposition to veteran Vicente Luque.

Add in a fireplace matchup between Bruno Silva and Joshua Van on the prelims, and an equally spicy matchup between “Salsa Boy” Waldo Cortes-Acosta and Serghei Spivac, and I’m all the way in which in.

Meshew: I’d prefer to thank each of my esteemed colleagues for not stepping on my nook, each as a result of I’m clearly the one who ought to discuss this man, but additionally as a result of it’s the proper reply. I’m talking, after all, about UFC 319 and Dricus du Plessis defending his middleweight title in opposition to Khamzat Chimaev.

Picture by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC

Khamzat Chimaev is the Prince Who Was Promised. Since his breakout yr in 2020, principally everybody believed that can be the yr Chimaev would lastly declare a UFC title. Initially, we thought it might be at 170 kilos, however now he’s lastly getting the prospect at 185 kilos. And his alternative comes in opposition to a person who couldn’t be much less comparable.

Nearly instantly after becoming a member of the UFC, folks started to dismiss du Plessis. They known as “DDP” sloppy and goofy, and steadfastly refused to consider he was elite regardless of his outcomes. I say “they” as a result of I used to be not one among them. I used to be one of many earliest adopters of “Stilknocks” as an elite middleweight, choosing him to beat Robert Whittaker when folks advised me I used to be loopy. Nicely, who’s loopy now? Sure, DDP is unconventional, however he’s additionally the perfect, and this combat with Chimaev is unimaginable.

Chimaev’s brutal effectivity vs. du Plessis’s efficient brutality: that’s what I want in my life. May Chimaev ragdoll DDP en path to a first-round stoppage? Positive. May DDP survive one spherical after which out-HOSS a fading Chimaev, regardless of trying like he’s near passing out? Completely. This combat is the middleweight equal of two walruses smashing into one another on an unbalanced sheet of ice. Something might occur in there, and I can’t look forward to it.

So, positive, we don’t know the rest about UFC 319, however it doesn’t matter within the slightest. The UFC might fill the undercard of this one with 24 Contender Collection signees, and I received’t care in any respect. This important occasion is all I want.