Every division in UFC has its era it seems. Once home to the biggest champions in the sport like Tito Ortiz, Randy Kouture, Chuck Lidell, Forrest Griffin, Rashad Evans, Lyoto Machida, Shogun Rua, Jon Jones, and Daniel Cormier. There hasn’t been a stable UFC Light-heavyweight Champion for a long while now.
What is the Light-heavyweight curse?
The origin of the Light-heavyweight curse can be traced back to Jon Jones’s last fight in the UFC. ‘Jones’ defended his title against Dominic Reyes in a controversial fight which according to many, should have gone Dominic’s way. In the next fight, Reyes came in as the clear favorite against a challenger from Poland.
Surprising pretty much everyone Jan ‘Legendary Polish Power’ Blachowicz defeated Reyes and took the belt and soon had his title defense announced against the middleweight king Israel ‘The Last Stylebender’ Adesanya. Israel didn’t put on much weight and decided to come in around his natural weight for this fight.
If Anderson Silva has thought us anything from his move to Light-heavyweight, it’s the fact that adapting to the new weight limit is very important when moving up a division. Unfortunately, Izzy failed to learn that lesson and got dominated by Jan through wrestling where the weight advantage was visible.
For his next fight, Jan took on Glover Teixeira who was looking to make a new record at 40+ years of age. Blachowicz didn’t seem super serious about the fight and got dominated by Glover. Next in line for the title was Czech republic representative Jiri Prochazka. That fight was scheduled for Singapore.
Teixeira was dominating pretty much the entire fight but lost in the very 5th round by a rear naked choke. Fans wanted an immediate rematch and the fight was booked almost immediately. But the UFC 282 main event was called off due to Jiri suffering a shoulder injury so the contender fight between Magomed Ankalaev and Jan Blachowicz was moved to the main slot.
After an extremely controversial judging decision, the title bout ended in a draw and another title fight was booked for UFC 283 between Glover Teixeira and Jamahal Hill. We certainly hope the Rio card can end the UFC Light-Heavyweight Champion curse and finally give the fans some clarity.
