Eddie Alvarez wonders just how legitimate Khabib Nurmagomedov’s title run actually is.
At UFC 223, Nurmagomedov defeated Al Iaquinta inside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, NY. “The Eagle” was initially set to meet Tony Ferguson, but “El Cucuy” went down with an injury. Max Holloway stepped up as a replacement, but he was deemed medically unfit to compete during his weight cut.
Through no fault of his own, Nurmagomedov had to face an 11th ranked fighter to capture the gold. Iaquinta has moved up one spot since the fight, but he wasn’t in the top 10 before his emergency showdown with “The Eagle.” This has caused some to question the legitimacy of Nurmagomedov’s championship win.
One of those skeptics is Eddie Alvarez. A former UFC lightweight champion himself, Alvarez knows a thing or two about capturing gold. During a recent appearance on MMAFighting.com‘s “The MMA Hour,” Alvarez explained why he doesn’t hold Nurmagomedov’s title win in high regard:
“If the Philadelphia Eagles show up for the Super Bowl, and New England can’t make it, you don’t bring in the third-place team to play for the Lombardi Trophy. You have to wait and you have be patient. You can’t tell the No. three, four, five guys ‘you get a title shot.’ It just got silly real fast. Everything got silly real fast, and it made the belt quite meaningless.”
Nurmagomedov’s next opponent is unknown, but there are options. Tony Ferguson is out of the picture with an injury and Conor McGregor is in a fight with the law. If McGregor can get past some hurdles by the end of the year, then fighting Nurmagomedov at the November show in Madison Square Garden wouldn’t surprise too many people.
If neither of those options are available, Alvarez, Dustin Poirier, and Kevin Lee are. All three men are in the top five. It’s possible that Nurmagomedov only fights one more time this year and if that’s the case then a rematch between Alvarez and Poirier to determine the number one contender this summer may just be an option the UFC will want to explore.
Do you think Eddie Alvarez has a point about Khabib Nurmagomedov’s title win?
