Now that he’s crowned himself ‘the most violent man,’ the UFC can have a lot of fun with Eddie Alvarez.
The uninformed received an Eddie Alvarez education at UFC 218. Despite claiming that coveted golden strap by finishing Rafael dos Anjos in the first round, his other performances inside the Octagon weren’t on the same level as we had seen from him when he was king of Bellator.
After dropping a decision to Donald Cerrone in his promotional debut, he implemented a more tactical and risk-averse gameplan to grind out split decision wins over Gilbert Melendez and Anthony Pettis, adding another pair of champion scalps to the pile.
An annihilation at the heavy hands of Conor McGregor was followed by an incredible dual with Dustin Poirier that ended as an unsatisfactory ‘No Contest’ because of a couple of illegal knees. This left him with an odd return from his time in the world’s biggest MMA organisation – one great victory, two less exciting decision wins, two defeats and a dodgy No Contest.
It took being matched up against an undefeated star with a like-minded approach to the fistic arts to actually bring out the dog in him. His sensational performance against Justin Gaethje at UFC 218 was a reminder of why so many people consider Alvarez to be the greatest lightweight ever.
Pure violence #UFC218 https://t.co/DR6cTIwUBH
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) December 3, 2017
Looking at the business end of the 155 division one would assume that the Alvarez vs Poirier rematch would be the logical next step. Both are coming off great wins while everyone ahead of them in the rankings either has a fight booked, is Conor McGregor or is waiting to fight Conor McGregor.
However, ‘the Underground King’ does not want to run it back with Poirier at this moment in time. He explained on the MMAHour that after what he did to Gaethje, he has bigger fish to fry than ‘the Diamond’.
“Considering what I just did, it would be the silliest thing I could do. They put me against an undefeated rising star. If Justin Gaethje beat me, he was going to fight for the title. Didn’t happen. Knocked the guy out. He’s never been beat in his life.”
“I respect Dustin’s push. He’s doing his best job, but it’s all for nothing. It would be silly for me to go backwards and look at that guy. I’m looking the same way he’s looking – forward to Tony Ferguson or keeping an eye on the Khabib-Barboza fight. I’m doing my best to help Edson whoop on Khabib, so we’ll see how that top shapes out.”
Listen the guy isn't scared to fight.. He just knows its a bad matchup for him… #undergroundtrackstar
— The Diamond (@DustinPoirier) December 11, 2017
As well as helping training partner Edson Barboza for his potential title eliminator against Khabib Nurmagomedov, Alvarez has a busy few weeks ahead of him from a business perspective. With one fight left on his current deal, Alvarez expects to sit down with president Dana White to discuss what he believes will be a ‘megafight’.
“I have one fight left (on my contract). I’m going to sit down with the bossman. He text me on the way home. We had a little bit of a conversation on the way home from the Justin Gaethje fight and I think we’re gearing to talk about a megafight. Shouldn’t be long before we sit down and talk to Dana and get some things hashed out about doing something big.”
“I should be heading out to Vegas within the next couple of weeks. I don’t know if we’re going to let the holidays settle down and then do it or maybe do it before, but I’m excited about the future and I’m excited about putting some stoopid ass fights on, like crazy, big fights for the fans.”
If not Poirier then who? The brass are hardly going to cough up enough cake to bring Nate Diaz back… are they?
