Morning Report. Sean O’Malley questions Khamzat Chimaev’s last two weigh-ins. ‘He’s not gonna
Everyone noticed at last Saturday’s UFC 279 match an unprecedented last-minute change for its final three matches after the Bowers lost a massive seven-and-a-half pounds a day. Chimayev’s unprofessionalism led to him being disqualified from the main event match against Nate Diaz and scoring in the co-main event against Kevin Holland. Shemayev and Diaz both won their new matches and are now heading in very different directions. With Diaz on his way out of promotion, Chemayev is still number three in the official UFC welterweight rankings, but his ability to comfortably bring the weight limit into question is called into question. For Sean O’Malley, one of the biggest athletes in the bantam weight division at 135 pounds, he’s not quite sure how much truth might come from Shemayev’s claims that doctors have halted the weight-reduction process.
“Never in my five or six years in the UFC has a doctor come and check on me during weight reductions,” O’Malley said on his YouTube channel. “I’m sure if they would come and look at my last pound when I’m in the bathtub, they’d probably say to anyone, ‘Stop.’ Like, a doctor comes in, they’re not used to seeing humans like who-that.”
He seems reluctant to make the middleweight division his primary weight class in the UFC, and Chimaev has already had great success there. In two of his six UFC matches, Chimaev had early success, sending John Phillips on his first promotional appearance before punching Gerald Meerschaert in 16 seconds with a single punch. Chemayev has tussled with top contender £185 Jack Hermanson in a clash match and has expressed his desire to take on the winner in the upcoming title fight between Israel Adesanya and Alex Pereira. In addition, he appears to have developed a rivalry with Paulo Costa and, as such, has led all of the scenarios to the Swedish resident’s middleweight if these middleweight pursuits are as physically exhausting as many, like O’Malley, have begun to believe.
“I want to see him at 185 because even when he fought Gilbert Burns, he did the towel work, and he lost five pounds,” O’Malley said. “When was the last time he actually hit a five hundred? Not the last two fights, so it’s likely to be over a year. “I want to watch his next fight, I’m so curious who it’s going to be.
It can’t be Colby [Covington]. He won’t earn 170, dude. I just don’t see him – I don’t even know if the UFC will book him at 170. But it doesn’t look like he’s going to win. He wants to go up to 185. Which is kind of a surprise because he’s big and he’s great and ****** skilled. And he has to be confident. I don’t know if he wants those fights there. Those are big boys.”
