{"id":646067,"date":"2026-05-03T23:59:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-03T23:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/646067\/"},"modified":"2026-05-03T23:59:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-03T23:59:09","slug":"daniel-cormier-nobody-would-complain-if-carlos-prates-got-next-title-shot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/646067\/","title":{"rendered":"Daniel Cormier: ‘Nobody would complain’ if Carlos Prates got next title shot"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daniel Cormier was blown away by the elite level of fighting Carlos Prates displayed against Jack Della Maddalena in the UFC Fight Night 275<\/a> main event, and it has him rethinking the entire welterweight title picture.<\/p>\n

UFC Hall of Famer and color commentator Cormier already considered Prates (24-7 MMA, 7-1 UFC) to be one of the best at 170 pounds following his knockout of former champ<\/a> Leon Edwards at UFC 322 in November. But then he followed it up with Saturday’s showing against Jack Della Maddalena (18-4 MMA, 8-2 UFC), where he delivered a complete destruction<\/a> en route to a third-round TKO.<\/p>\n

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Cormier said the performance put everyone on notice.<\/p>\n

“Carlos Prates has now put himself on the short-list of fighters who could potentially challenge the champion Islam Makhachev<\/a>,” Cormier said on his YouTube channel. “He was already close (before that performance). You beat the former champion in the way that he beat Della Maddalena \u2013 because that was bad. Honestly, when I was watching that from afar I was like, ‘How?’ Because I’ve never seen Jack just get beat on like that. I thought Jack Della Maddalena had a style that would create some real issues for Prates. No issues at all for Carlos \u2013\u00a0his punching power, his knees, his ability to go first and his calm demeanor.”<\/p>\n

In most circumstances, beating back-to-back ex-champions in the manner Prates did would elevate him directly into a title fight. It still might, but he may have to wait. The rumor mill has Ian Machado Garry<\/a> (17-1 MMA, 10-1 UFC) next challenging current champ Makhachev (28-1 MMA, 17-1 UFC) for gold at UFC 330 on Aug. 15, but nothing has been announced by the organization.<\/p>\n

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Given Machado Garry is the only person to beat Prates in the UFC, as he did by unanimous decision<\/a> in April 2025, it would make sense that the Irishman would go first. Cormier said Machado Garry should be hoping he has something signed, though, because the door is now open for the UFC to shuffle plans if not.<\/p>\n

“That performance told me two things: One, Prates is ready to compete for the UFC championship. Two, Prates learned (from his loss),” Cormier said. “Against Ian Garry, he froze. He did not fight well, and Ian Garry’s an absolute stud. I don’t care what you think of him. Ian Garry’s an absolute stud, but in that fight, Carlos looked like he just wasn’t ready. We had him smoking cigarettes all over the internet the week of the fight \u2013\u00a0all these things that just didn’t seem like he was ready for the spotlight the main event carries. Not this time, though.<\/p>\n

“I watched him deliver at a level that tells me he’s championship-ready. Dude’s championship-ready right now. Here’s the issue: The weight class is so stacked. It feels like it’s going to be Ian Garry, but if it was to be Prates after that, nobody would complain. I’ll tell you why: We just saw Islam beat Jack Della Maddalena in the way that he did. We saw him dominate JDM to win the championship. The way Islam beat Jack was not nearly as impressive as what Carlos Prates did.”<\/p>\n

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If Prates is not next for Makhachev, then Cormier seemingly doesn’t like the idea of him waiting to fight the winner of a Machado Garry fight, which the Brazilian said is his plan. Cormier would instead push for a title eliminator with unbeaten contender Michael Morales.<\/p>\n

“Because of the weight class being what it is, he might have to fight again,” Cormier said. “If he does, you hope it’s Morales.”<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Daniel Cormier: Carlos Prates ‘championship-ready’ after UFC Perth win<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Daniel Cormier was blown away by the elite level of fighting Carlos Prates displayed against Jack Della Maddalena…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":646068,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,39552,4226,641,45596,23591,23592,182320,638,82,36996],"class_list":["post-646067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-carlos-prates","tag-daniel-cormier","tag-fighting","tag-ian-machado-garry","tag-islam-makhachev","tag-jack-della-maddalena","tag-machado-garry","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc-fight-night"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646067","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=646067"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646067\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}