Not long after T.J. Dillashaw had the UFC bantamweight title wrapped around his waist, the debate over whom the newly-minted champion would face in his initial defence began.
Either way, the Team Alpha Male standout would be looking at a rematch, but would he be facing Renan Barao, the man he just decimated, or Rafael Assuncao, the consensus top contender who scored a split decision win over the TUF 14 finalist the previous October?
On one hand, the battle with Assuncao, which took place in Brazil, was an incredibly close contest, one many observers believed Dillashaw deserved to win. The “beat-the-guy-that-beat-me” narrative combined with the fact that Assuncao was the first option to face Barao at UFC 173 would make for an easy fight to sell.
On the other hand, Barao’s loss ended a nine-year unbeaten streak and halted his run of consecutive victories at 22 bouts. He had earned a 9-0 mark under the Zuffa umbrella prior to his Memorial Day weekend setback, a record that included wins in four prior championship bouts.
Despite the one-sided nature of their first encounter, it’s hard to argue that a fighter that has one poor showing in nearly a decade isn’t deserving of a chance to immediately reclaim the title he’d held (in some form) for nearly two years.
In the end, the UFC opted to line Dillashaw up opposite Barao in his first title defence instead of Assuncao and though it was met with some groans when announced, this was the right fight to make.
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Back in May, Dillashaw turned in one of the best championship performances in UFC history — he fought a near-perfect fight, executed a flawless strategy and completely dominated Barao from start to finish. Part of what made it such an incredible performance, however, is that few people expected it.
While Dillashaw has always been someone pundits pegged as a potential champion down the line, the consensus heading into UFC 173 was that he wasn’t at that level yet. His previous outing — a dominant, but unspectacular decision win over Mike Easton — didn’t hint at the 28-year-old making any major strides in his development. He was the unlucky up-and-comer that appeared to get his number called a little too soon against an opponent that was too skilled and too scary.
As for Barao, he entered in the midst of a dominant run that saw him earn stoppage wins over Eddie Wineland, Michael McDonald and Urijah Faber to propel himself into the pound-for-pound debate and extend his otherworldly winning streak.
A quick stoppage against Faber and the fact that he’s Brazilian and competes at bantamweight kept some from giving the Nova Uniao product the credit he was due, but the 27-year-old champion had barely been tested in his first seven UFC appearances, which included six victories over fighters ranked in the Top 10.
One bad showing and suddenly his previous nine years weren’t enough to warrant a rematch? Alexander Gustafsson turns in a “close, but no cigar” effort opposite Jon Jones and “The Mauler” is deserving of another crack at the light-heavyweight title right away, but the guy that hadn’t lost a fight in nearly a decade and held a version of the UFC bantamweight title for the previous two years drops one fight and he needs to go get a win or two before having a chance to reclaim the title?
Doing any fight other than this one wouldn’t have made sense. You can’t have a fighter like Barao go on the run he went on and then slot him behind anyone, even a fighter like Assuncao that has earned his No. 1 contender status.
Take nothing away from Dillashaw and the virtuoso performance he delivered May 24 inside the MGM Grand Garden Arena, but one poor showing doesn’t trump a nine-year undefeated streak and a two-year run as the top bantamweight in the sport. At some point, a fighter’s overall resume has to count for something and there is no one in the 135-pound ranks — save for maybe former champ Dominick Cruz — with the kind of impressive credentials Barao possesses.
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Regardless of the fact that he got beaten down and stopped, the Brazilian was deserving of an immediate rematch and this is a fight fans should be hyped to see.
We’ll find out whether UFC 173 was an aberration, whether Dillashaw had the best night of his career at the same time Barao was turning in his worst performance to date. We get to see what kind of adjustments the former champion makes after tasting defeat for the first time in 34 fights and if the current titleholder can execute his game plan to perfection once again.
Much like when Chris Weidman beat Anderson Silva the first time, people want to see if that was one bad night or a difficult matchup that would produce the same results no matter how many times you ran it back inside the Octagon.
Maybe UFC 173 was Barao’s one mulligan; maybe Dillashaw just put it all together perfectly at the exact right time; maybe the Brazilian just needed a wake-up call and comes back with a renewed ferocity on Saturday; maybe the champion represents Barao’s personal brand of kryptonite and duplicates his earlier effort; maybe we get some combination of all these things.
The only way to find out for sure is to have them square off for a second time, which is why Saturday’s championship rematch was always the right fight to make.