{"id":452620,"date":"2026-02-04T05:04:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T05:04:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/452620\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T05:04:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T05:04:09","slug":"usman-nurmagomedov-gets-high-hopes-from-cousin-in-26","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/452620\/","title":{"rendered":"Usman Nurmagomedov Gets High Hopes From Cousin In ’26"},"content":{"rendered":"

Usman Nurmagomedov\u00a0<\/a>(20-0, 1 NC MMA, 2-0 PFL) has done a phenomenal job in keeping with the family honor in his professional career. Having the last name of Nurmagomedov and being adept at MMA is like having the last name of Judge and being able to hit towering home runs over the wall at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s paid off handsomely for him up to now. Aside from a 2023 bout in the landmark Bellator 300 against Brent Primus (16-5, 1 NC MMA, 4-2 PFL) being reversed to a no-contest, he\u2019s come out on the right end of the fight every single time.<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov now turns his attention to this Saturday night in Dubai, United Arab Emirates for PFL Dubai, the first event in the 2026 PFL schedule<\/a>. Awaiting him this weekend will be 2025 PFL Lightweight Tournament Champion Alfie Davis<\/a> (20-5-1 MMA, 3-1 PFL) for the PFL Lightweight Championship on ESPN\u2019s<\/a> direct-to-consumer streaming service.<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov Receives High Praise From Cousin Khabib Ahead of Anticipated PFL Dubai Clash<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov\u2019s cousin is pretty well-versed in MMA in his own right. The great Khabib Nurmagomedov<\/a> retired from the sport with an undefeated record in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, but he\u2019s stayed in the sport as a coach.<\/p>\n

Khabib has been watching his cousin\u2019s maturation as a fighter over the last several years. To say that he\u2019s impressed with what Usman Nurmagomedov has been able to do would be the understatement of the century.<\/p>\n

Recently, Khabib Nurmagomedov sat down to talk about his cousin\u2019s upcoming fight with Alfie Davis in an interview<\/a> with Team Gorilla.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very good and competitive fight,\u201d Khabib said of his cousin Usman Nurmagomedov\u2019s Saturday night contest, translated through onscreen subtitles. \u201cUsman\u2019s opponent is very uncomfortable in style. We know what to expect, but the opponent is fast and has very rare punches in MMA. If you work carefully, Usman should win with experience and skill.\u201d<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov Reflects on First Fight With Paul Hughes<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov comes into PFL Dubai having swept a two-fight series over Paul Hughes. While the initial fight against Hughes resulted in a victory, Nurmagomedov knew that there was room for improvement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just that the preparation was bad,\u201d Usman Nurmagomedov said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t the most difficult fight of my career. I fought like I was on the street.:<\/p>\n

When the rematch happened this past October, Usman\u2019s gameplan took on a different tone.<\/p>\n

\u201cI trained like a professional fighter,\u201d he said. \u201cNobody knew Paul Hughes before the fight with me. He came out, gave a good fight, and they started talking about him. Anyone who fights me becomes famous. A lot of people wanted me to lose, that\u2019s why there\u2019s so much talk about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Usman Nurmagomedov on Alfie Davis and Khabib Nurmagomedov on Cousin\u2019s Chances Against UFC Fighters<\/p>\n

In Alfie Davis\u2019 last fight, he took Gadzhi Rabadanov (26-5-2 MMA, 7-1 PFL the distance to secure the tournament championship at 155 lbs. Ahead of Saturday\u2019s contest in Dubai, Usman Nurmagomedov appears to be nonplussed about his adversary.<\/p>\n

\u201cI won\u2019t say that the opponent is easy, but I won\u2019t say that he is special, either,\u201d he said. \u201cA rival is like a rival.\u201d<\/p>\n

From there, Khabib Nurmagomedov had a chance to weigh in on the idea\u00a0 that his cousin might one day make the jump to MMA\u2019s No. 1 promotion, the UFC.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have my own opinion on this,\u201d he said, \u201cbut it\u2019s not right to talk about the UFC, [with him] being a PFL fighter. In one year, Usman has grown a lot. I\u2019m fighting with him myself. I\u2019m working personally, and from the outside, he\u2019s at least on the same level as them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Final Thoughts<\/p>\n

Any talk of Usman Nurmagomedov potentially joining the UFC will wait for another day. At this stage in his career, he\u2019ll be needing to take it one fight at a time and one round at a time.<\/p>\n

Perhaps with a few more defenses of the PFL Lightweight Championship, the Nurmagomedov camp can begin to seriously consider diving into the UFC\u2019s pool. As long as he stays undefeated, he could possibly pique the interest of UFC CEO Dana White.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Usman Nurmagomedov\u00a0(20-0, 1 NC MMA, 2-0 PFL) has done a phenomenal job in keeping with the family honor…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":452621,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-452620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452620","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=452620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/452620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/452621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=452620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=452620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=452620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}