{"id":286914,"date":"2025-11-16T14:36:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-16T14:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/286914\/"},"modified":"2025-11-16T14:36:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-16T14:36:09","slug":"islam-makhachev-ready-to-take-on-all-welterweight-challengers-after-ufc-322","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/286914\/","title":{"rendered":"Islam Makhachev ready to take on all welterweight challengers after UFC 322"},"content":{"rendered":"

Islam Makhachev is flying high after a dominant performance at UFC 322<\/a> that saw him blank Jack Della Maddalena<\/a> on the scorecard to secure the UFC welterweight title. Makhachev is now a two division champion and expects to retake his position as No. 1 on the pound-for-pound ranking over Ilia Topuria.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the most competitive division right now, welterweight, 100%,\u201d Makhachev said at the UFC 322 post-fight press conference.<\/a> \u201cA lot of young guys who fought today. Next week there\u2019s gonna be [Garry and Muhammad] and there\u2019s also Kamaru [Usman]<\/a> and [Ilia] Topuria. All killers who want to take my belts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. I don\u2019t give you, no. I\u2019m working so hard to be double champion, and I feel [great] today. I don\u2019t have to cut much weight, and I\u2019m gonna defend my belt many, many times more.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Makhachev initially called for a spot on the UFC\u2019s big June White House card, he suggested his next title defense could come sooner than that due to the lack of damage he took against JDM.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo injury. Nothing. I don\u2019t feel any pains. I am ready. Who is gonna be next?\u201d he asked. \u201cLet\u2019s do this, and I will make it easy. Today, I show you. Jack\u2019s one of the best in this game. One of the hardest opponents. That\u2019s why I prepare so hard: to make this easy. This is our plan. I tried to do some chokes, try to make kimura, but he defends very well. But I make this easy because I\u2019m training so hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Della Maddalena seemed to have no answer whatsoever for getting back to his feet once Makhachev took him down. Islam said that had more to do with his ability to nullify his opponent than anything else.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I take him down first time, I feel it\u2019s gonna be long night [for him] and I can do whatever I want on the ground,\u201d Makhachev said. \u201cI expect for him to try to get up, but we\u2019re working. We watch his old fights. He have a couple sweeps, a couple things in the ground, but I block him there. And that\u2019s why I make this easy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leading up to the fight, much was made of Della Maddalena\u2019s teammate Craig Jones, one of the best BJJ aces in the world. He\u2019d helped JDM keep the fight against Belal Muhammad standing, but there was no such success in New York City on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

\u201cI told him, \u2018Your jiu jitsu not working. You have to come to Dagestan for two, three years,\u2019\u201d Makhachev said of Jones. \u201cHe starts laughing. He told Khadib, \u2018I will come Dagestan.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Islam Makhachev is flying high after a dominant performance at UFC 322 that saw him blank Jack Della…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":286915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,127022,638,109794,82,127021,702],"class_list":{"0":"post-286914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-jack-della-vs-islam-start-time","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-preview-and-live-results","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-ufc-322-fight-card","16":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}