While their UFC 307 meeting got canceled, former bantamweight king, Aljamain Sterling is stoked to face undefeated Russian contender, Movsar Evloev in the octagon. After the UFC confirmed Sterling vs Evloev for UFC 310, the ‘Funkmaster’ dropped a subtle tweet that revealed his warrior spirit.
Reacting to the re-scheduled bout on social media, Sterling said he was game for the challenger – Evloev.
“Race to the title!”
Following a rather tumultuous run at bantamweight, racking up the title in controversy and then losing it to Sean O’Malley, Sterling moved up to featherweight to capture a second belt.
In fact, he made his featherweight debut successfully against Calvin Kattar at UFC 300 and is now looking forward to his next opponent.
Race to the title! 💯💪🏾 https://t.co/mR3DYKJlV2
— Aljamain Sterling (@funkmasterMMA) September 27, 2024
On the other hand, Evloev is carrying the wind in his sail, coming in hot with an 18-0 unblemished streak. As of now, the Russian is sixth in the rankings with top dogs like Brian Ortega, Max Holloway, Alexander Volkanovski, Yair Rodriguez occupying the top spots in front of him.
Sterling & Evloev were slated to face each at UFC 307 when disaster struck Sterling after the former champ injured himself in sparring, forcing him to pullout of the bout.
But while both their ambitions lie at the top of the division with UFC gold on their shoulders, it would appear there’s a lot more going on up there than either of these fighters is prepared for at the moment.
Race to the featherweight mountain
And a race it is, indeed! There are three main characters in this story about the featherweight title. The first is the champion, the Spaniard, Ilia Topuria. Extremely confident, devilishly handsome and claims to have the abilities of one Yuri Boyka from the Undisputed movies.
He’s the next generation of fighters, and claims to be able to beat anyone with ease. And he probably can in his weight class. His problem is that he’s facing the BMF champion, Max Holloway- the second character.
Holloway has never been knocked out or tapped out in his entire career. He’s a warrior and he fights like it. Case in point, his last fight with Justin Gaethje for the BMF title, where despite winning the fight with more points on his side, he took the last few seconds to brawl and give the American fighter a chance.
Gaethje took the bait and got knocked out in quite possibly the most viewed KO in the last 5 years! It was spectacular. And since Topuria and Holloway are duking it out against each other soon, there’s not really much space for anybody else.
Anybody else, except Conor McGregor, the exception to every UFC rule in the guidebook. McGregor recently called out Topuria for being short after the Spaniard had asserted that he doesn’t want to fight the Irishman because it wasn’t a challenge for him anymore and he had better fights ahead of him.
Unfortunately, McGregor took offense.
Now, with Michael Chandler breaking up with McGregor over a Charles Oliveira fight, the Irishman is free from any commitments. So, if he truly decides to purse Topuria, UFC is going to make that fight, which means both Sterling and Evloev might have to wait quite a bit longer before either can get an appointment.
