Khamzat Chimaev has had one of the most interesting careers in the UFC. His first two fights took part in a matter of 10 days across 2 divisions, both of which finished with him pretty much single-handedly dominating his opponents. Many thought he would clear out his divisions in no time but things took some shocking turns going forward.
How has Chimaev’s UFC journey actually gone?
It was actually Chimaev who had to pull out from his Leon Edwards fight owing to Covid-related issues. In his matchup against Li Jingliang, the Russian barely made weight and had to utilize the good old ‘Daniel Cormier towel trick’ to barely make weight. But the weight issues came back to haunt the Chechen as he missed weight by a huge margin in what would’ve been his biggest matchup to date against Nate Diaz.
Top welterweight Gilbert Burns agreed to take on ‘Borz’ in a high-voltage match. From pretty much the start of the fight promos, Chimaev all but disregarded his Brazillian foe. During ‘Durinho’s octagon entrance Khamzat was seen disrespectfully sitting on top of the octagon cage.
Unfortunately for him, Gilbert brought the fight and nearly derailed the hype train multiple times. Chimaev did manage to win the fight but a lot of mysticism surrounding him had already vanished.
What do other fighters say about Khamzat’s claims?
Neil Magny has been calling out Chimaev pretty much for his entire career. Strangely enough, the fight has never materialized, and ‘Borz’s team barely ever speaks on the matter.
I appreciate the acknowledgment boss man @danawhite hopefully the @ufc can book me a fight ASAP pic.twitter.com/Ew76Pmtq6x
— Neil Magny (@NeilMagny) December 15, 2021
Another Welterweight, Belal Muhammad has also been calling out Chimaev for the longest but hasn’t seen any affirmative result for some reason.
Me vs khamzat at 185 Tony vs Nate at 170 and. leech can be the special guest referee
— Belal Muhammad (@bullyb170) September 9, 2022
Middleweight Paulo Costa also called out the future prospect after the two had an altercation at UFC PI. Alex Pereira wanted to take on ‘Borz’ at Light-heavyweight after the potential challenger continuously kept calling him out. An impatient Michel Pereira has also not shied away from taking on the Allstars Gym representative.
With so many probable call-outs available, it’s really difficult to take Khamzat’s complaints about fighters ducking him seriously. The MMA world would probably like to see him attain greatness but his current set of actions may turn down many fans.
