As Pereira smashed through Magomed Ankalaev in just 80 seconds at UFC 320, it was like the former champ was being forgotten in real time.
LAS VEGAS — When the lights dropped for Magomed Ankalaev’s walkout at T-Mobile on Saturday night, the boos were loud, but not deafening. He was persona non grata. It was almost like he was sneaking back into a house he’d robbed last March, and now people were gathered to watch their hero, Alex Pereira, take back the stolen possession.
That would be the UFC light heavyweight belt.
Because when Pereira walked out, the bigness of the moment was felt. Standing at attention were the Dana Whites, the Ari Emanuels, the Zuckerbergs and Jimmy Butlers and Puka Nucuas, everyone in the building — everyone. The native song he came out to played like a Paxató ceremony. When he fired his imaginary arrow and screamed, 19,000 partisans screamed in unison. It carried the feeling of a time-honored ritual. When you get a fighter who can play to anticipation with a sense of his own magnitude — and deliver upon it, along with a nearly $9 million gate — that’s when the fight game is at its very best.
Pereira delivered.
But you know what happens in those moments just before a fight? There’s a kind of shared hysteria that comes with nearing that appointed moment when you find out the truth. It’s the old gambler’s libido. There was a feeling in the lead-up to UFC 320’s main event that this could be it for the all the possibilities Pereira gives the UFC. The idea of him against Tom Aspinall or Jon Jones or anyone else who can captivate the imagination in the blockbuster sense, moving to heavyweight, perhaps fighting Khamzat Chimaev at a catchweight. That it could be lost to a guy who doesn’t even move the needle enough to create strong feelings of dislike like Ankalaev was a sad notion.
We’ve seen it too often in the UFC, when the fun option gets dumped to the canvas and snuffed out of his livelihood one hammerfist at a time.
It seems unfair, but Ankalaev was the fun police, and that was clear as they stood across the cage staring at each other for the rematch. The world of Ankalaev was flat and narrow and almost undetectable to the casual eye. If he was on a menu, he’d be beet borscht. Nobody was having fun in the beet borscht era. If he were a movie, he’d be "Yentl." If he belonged to a lyric, he’d be the young lad being talked to in the Pink Floyd song, “Another Brick in the The Wall, Part 2,” who isn't going to get any pudding if he doesn't eat his meat.
Problem is he exists in the same era as Pereira. Worse, he beat Pereira by the dullest of margins in their first fight back in March, which ended Pereira’s rock star world tour with a thud. Yet when they were loosed on each other in the rematch, any signs of gun-shy Pereira were gone. If he was holstered and hesitant in the first fight, worried about level changes for the takedown, he was chomping at the bit to be rid of that former self in the rematch. It turns out the killer instincts had been honed for the past seven months.
“Poatan” came across the Octagon and landed a quick punch on Ankalaev, and the place roared. We’re talking stentorian levels. Decibels dancing. Pereira moved forward. Every punch came with volume swells. He spoke for the people with his hands, and they spoke back with piercing animal screams.
The fight didn’t last very long, only 80 total seconds, which in some circles might’ve felt like a rip-off. Not when it comes from a guy whose reputation (and identity) is so wrapped up in delivering big-time knockouts. When the right hand landed that wobbled Ankalaev, there was a moment of pandemonium in Vegas, as anyone who had bet the dog — whether on hunch or heart — had proof of their conviction.
Then the elbows. The finishing blows. Ankalaev was not only in the wrong era, he was in the wrong place. This was an ambush. It was a no-win situation for the man who walked in with the belt. Had he won, he’d have killed the party — he’d have made the division a drowsy place, and we’d be debating Carlos Ulberg and Jiri Prochazka for his next opponent.
And when he lost, he was being forgotten in real time.
Moments after Herb Dean stepped in, people were talking about future fights with Jones, fights at the White House, fights with Aspinall. The move to heavyweight was getting bigger in the pupils before Bruce Buffer could yell out, “and new!” One fellow sitting on media row said they were in prime position for a trilogy fight between Pereira and Ankalaev, but I didn’t have to tell him what he was already coming to understand.
The UFC doesn’t want Ankalaev anywhere near that belt. They doubled down on the Ankalaev rematch because they wanted to win their money back, and they did. They got their champion back. They got the man who will bring a house like that out of their collective seat and keep them on the edge of that seat when they sit down. They got it.
They got “Poatan” back.
Category: General Sports
