{"id":275796,"date":"2025-11-10T16:53:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-10T16:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/275796\/"},"modified":"2025-11-10T16:53:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T16:53:11","slug":"goat-islam-in-that-conversation-with-della-maddalena-win-at-ufc-322","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/275796\/","title":{"rendered":"GOAT? Islam \u2018in that conversation\u2019 with Della Maddalena win at UFC 322"},"content":{"rendered":"

But securing a victory over current welterweight champion, Jack Della Maddalena, in the UFC 322 pay-per-view (PPV) main event<\/a> this weekend in New York City would certainly put Makhachev \u201cin that conversation.\u201d That\u2019s according to former middleweight titleholder, Michael Bisping, who is not in any hurry to start handing out GOAT memberships.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t sound right,\u201d Bisping told MMA Junkie<\/a>. \u201cMaybe I\u2019m not giving him his credit there. When you look at Anderson Silva, his second fight in the UFC he became the champ. He beat Chris Leben, then he beat Rich Franklin to become the champion. So the majority of those 16 wins were title defenses. That\u2019s a little different. When you talk about Jon Jones, there\u2019s a lot of title defenses in there, as well. Same with Georges St-Pierre. I\u2019m certainly not critiquing Islam Makhachev\u2019s career. I\u2019m not nit-picking or discrediting it at all. If he gets the job done, I think without question he deserves to be in that conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n

None of this matters if Makhachev is unable to emerge victorious at UFC 322 and he\u2019s facing a younger champion who hasn\u2019t lost in over nine years. Maddalena, 29, took over the welterweight throne by defeating Belal Muhammad at UFC 315 last May<\/a> and plans to send Makhachev back down to 155 pounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sort of hoping for that narrative,\u201d Maddalena (18-2) told MMA Fighting<\/a>. \u201cThat means I\u2019ve done my job and put him back in his place. Honestly, that\u2019s sort of the narrative I\u2019m hoping that comes the day after the fight is that he\u2019s just a lightweight, he would never do well in the welterweight division. It\u2019s a hard one because obviously he hasn\u2019t done anything in the welterweight division but I think his resume is very respectable.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely feel like I\u2019ve got the underdog mentality this time around,\u201d Maddalena added. \u201cI feel like I\u2019ve got everything to prove. But I like it that way. It gives me more motivation. A lot of drive to prove I\u2019m the champion and then solidify my spot as the top guy. I feel like I\u2019m definitely the underdog. I feel like a little bit I\u2019m being written off. Come fight night, and after the fight, I think there\u2019s going to be a lot of different opinions on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll find out on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

To see who else is fighting at UFC 322 this weekend in New York click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But securing a victory over current welterweight champion, Jack Della Maddalena, in the UFC 322 pay-per-view (PPV) main…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104679,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,40762,785,85,1396,1647],"class_list":{"0":"post-275796","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc-news","15":"tag-upcoming-ufc-events"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=275796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}