How UFC 322 could shake up its most compelling division

NEW YORK — Not so long ago, it would’ve been preposterous to argue that UFC’s welterweight division was more competitive, more talent-rich, and more compelling than any in the sport. But today, how could anyone deny it?

Three of the division’s top five contenders — Belal Muhammad, Leon Edwards, and Kamaru Usman — have been its undisputed champion within the last three-and-a-half years. And that doesn’t include the guy challenging for that title this weekend — Islam Makhachev — who just vacated a lightweight belt he successfully defended four times.

Six active, dangerous title hopefuls in their athletic primes — Sean Brady, Shavkhat Rakhmonov, Ian Garry, Joaquin Buckley, Michael Morales, Carlos Prates — round out the top-9 and are a combined 27-3 in the UFC since 2023. 

An old guard of gatekeepers — Colby Covington, Gilbert Burns, Geoff Neal, Kevin Holland — is slowly being weeded out of the top-15 and replaced by hungry up-and-comers (Gabriel Bonfim, Rinat Fakhretdinov, Joel Alvarez, Uros Medic, Mike Malott, Jacobe Smith, Ramiz Brahimaj).

And at UFC 322, welterweight’s rapidly evolving landscape stands to shift seismically. Makhachev — only the sport’s most accomplished lightweight — is making his divisional debut against Jack Della Jack Della Maddalena, UFC’s second-youngest champion. And perhaps the only fighter in the company who can currently contest Makhachev’s standing as its pound-for-pound best, Ilya Topuria, appears hellbent on following him up the divisional ladder until he gets his opportunity to prove otherwise. 

Meanwhile, Brady, a 32-year-old with an 18-1 record, is risking it all and putting his spot on the line against Morales, a 26-year-old with an 18-0 record. Edwards, a former champion who defended his belt twice, is meeting Prates, a creative, dangerous fighter out of a Fighting Nerds camp that, despite recent setbacks, is still renowned for producing some of the most uniquely difficult styles to match up with in the game today.

Clearly, the division’s come a long way from where it was. When he fought Muhammad at UFC 315, Della Maddalena became the first fighter under the age of 30 to challenge for the welterweight title since a 25-year-old Darren Till lost his undefeated record to Tyron Woodley at UFC 228 in September, 2018. And only the second since Canadian Rory MacDonald — 25 at the time — came up devastatingly short trying to take the belt from Robbie Lawler in one of the greatest fights in the sport’s history over a decade ago at UFC 189.

That’s a remarkable lack of up-and-coming challengers in the span of 126 pay-per-views, particularly following an era when twentysomethings Georges St-Pierre, Carlos Condit, Nick Diaz, and Johny Hendricks reigned atop the division. You can partly thank the dominance of high-level ground specialists such as Usman, Covington, and Damian Maia for that, as they repeatedly turned away strikers trying to reach the top of the ladder. But you can also point to a lack of activity from upper-ranked fighters and a lack of entertainment value from those trying to work their way up the rankings, if we’re being fair.

And yet, the seas have shifted. Della Maddalena fronts a wave of younger talent UFC’s matchmakers have used to progressively pick off the old guard, refreshing welterweight’s stagnant rankings post-pandemic. And although Makhachev’s divisional debut has slightly delayed the upward mobility of several fighters within the division’s top-10, the results of three key fights on Saturday’s main card stand to reshuffle the deck and lay the groundwork for what ought to be a series of fascinating welterweight matchups in 2026.

UR Islam Makhachev vs. C Jack Della Maddalena

It’s impossible to say where Makhachev ought to rank among welterweight’s top contenders considering he’s never fought any of them and common opponents are sparse. But his widely agreed-upon status as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport makes any consideration moot. Like it or not, when that guy enters a division, everyone else steps aside.

And while a victory over Della Maddalena Saturday would be tremendously impressive, it speaks to the fight world’s reverence of Makhachev that the result is so widely expected. He’s trended as anywhere from a -250 to -295 favourite this week as the fighter moving up a weight class to challenge a champion who once competed at middleweight. Many believe Makhachev would have already been welterweight champion by now if not for his friend and training partner, Muhammad, unexpectedly seizing the strap and holding onto it for 10 months.

Both Makhachev and UFC President Dana White have alluded to Usman, the 38-year-old who won the belt in 2019 and ruled the division for nearly a half decade while defending it five times, as being best positioned for the next title shot. And your milage for that may vary depending on your definition of position. 

Positioned as an all-time divisional great coming off a victory? Sure. Positioned as the most active with fresh wins over current top welterweight competition? Not quite.

Ultimately, this would be UFC’s final opportunity to cash a return on Usman’s legacy — a powerful matchmaking driver whether it makes meritocratic sense or not. But seeing him jump the line with only one win in the last four years would be a bitter pill for one of these next two fighters to accept. 

No. 2 Sean Brady vs. No. 8 Michael Morales

Brady was arguably deserving of a title shot after dominating Edwards behind enemy lines in London, making a loud statement that elevated him all the way to the division’s No. 1 contender spot. But he and everyone else took a backseat when Makhachev came up, so, instead, Brady’s taking a massive leap of faith and giving an undefeated up-and-comer within his division an opportunity.

“It’s a little crazy. Everyone wants a title shot but no one wants to fight for it,” Brady said. “I’m a fighter. I'm just going to keep fighting people until I'm undeniable and I get a shot. I don't want to be one of these guys saying, ‘I deserve this, I deserve this.’ You earn what you get here.”

It says one thing about Brady’s desire to stay active and another about his self-belief that he’s putting his divisional position on the line like this. The UFC has advanced Morales, an undefeated 25-year-old, cautiously since he emerged from the Contender Series in 2021, but the Ecuadorian has demonstrated improvements as he’s met each challenge and is coming off consecutive first-round finishes of veteran gatekeepers Magny and Burns.

“He’s a young, great fighter,” Brady said. “There’s really nothing else for me. If this fight didn’t happen, I probably wasn’t fighting until next year. I’m a fighter. Winning solves everything. I’m going to go out there, win Saturday, and whatever is next for me is next.”

Morales is the youngest member of welterweight’s top-15 and while he can sometimes look it — the volume striker can get wild and reckless in exchanges — it’ll be difficult to deny him a title shot sometime soon if he gets past Brady in by far his stiffest challenge yet. And style points could be meaningful if Morales does so in spectacular fashion and meets the moment on the mic afterwards. 

Brady, currently ranging from -130 to -150, is and ought to be the favourite, and with the lone loss of his career coming against Muhammad, his opportunity to fight for gold may be inevitable. But even emerging triumphant when taking risks like these doesn’t always work out. 

Just ask Rakhmonov, who was booked to fight Muhammad for the title last December when the then champion had to pull out due to a bone infection in his foot. Rather than wait for Muhammad to get healthy, Rakhmonov kept the date and faced Garry instead, winning via unanimous decision after five rounds. 

But due to an injury suffered in that fight, Rakhmonov wasn’t available when Muhammad was healthy in May, which is how Della Maddalena got his title shot. And after a recent setback, Rakhmonov still doesn’t have an opponent while the division has motored on without him.

The fight game’s all about managing risk, both inside and out of the octagon. And Brady knows the one he’s taken. What makes it tricky is that the reward he’s after could be as close or as far as ever depending on what happens around him in the division this month. Which leaves him with only one thing to worry about — just win. Quickly, if possible.

“I'm confident against anybody. If I'm as good as I say I am, I should be able to beat anybody in the division,” Brady said. “I would have to fight Michael either now or later. So, f--- it — I might as well get him out of here now and then deal with everybody else after that.”

No. 4 Leon Edwards vs. No. 9 Carlos Prates

Edwards had to string together nine victories and a no-contest before the UFC reluctantly gave him a long-overdue title shot against Usman in 2022. And he made the most of it, scoring a last-minute head kick knockout to take the belt before defending it twice over the next 18 months.

But after losing it to Muhammad and getting submitted by Brady his next time out, at 34 in a red hot division, and never a favourite of UFC brass in the first place, Edwards has quickly entered do-or-die territory. Every fight from here on out is essentially a must-win if he’s going to work his way back to another title opportunity. And Prates will not be a straightforward step in that pursuit.

“I think he's the first striker I’ve faced in, like, four years. So, it's exciting now to be able to win a fight with a striker,” Edwards said. “You can flow a bit more; it's a more entertaining fight. So, I feel like he's a good opponent to get back to where I left off.”

A long, patient, powerful striker, Prates was sometimes lost in the shuffle of Fighting Nerds prospects but pulled off a four-knockout, four-performance-bonus 2024 and hadn’t seen a third round in his UFC career before a unanimous decision loss in a five-rounder with Garry in April. 

Despite the result, Prates had Garry hurt late in the fight and bounced right back four months later with a show-stealing, walk-off spinning back elbow knockout of Neal at UFC 319. That’s earned him another shot at a top welterweight contender, and another lightning strike knockout would place Prates firmly in the conversation among the division’s top-five.

“It’s going to be interesting. This is like the semi-finals to see who’s going to be the next title contender,” Prates said. “I'm really excited for this. But to be honest, I think if I finish the fight with a really good knockout, I'm going to be next for the title.”

That’s the theme running through all three welterweight fights on this card — high stakes in both corners of the octagon. Young up-and-comers with something to prove, veteran contenders trying to hang onto their spots, an undefeated record, a No. 1 contender putting it all on the line, an all-time great. The consequences of Saturday’s results stand to be meaningful and far-reaching.

Which is to say nothing of the Garry vs. Muhammad bout booked for the following Saturday, which will throw another wrinkle into the reshuffling atop the division. Or Gabriel Bonfim’s methodical deconstruction of Randy Brown last weekend, using a barrage of first-round leg kicks to set up a show-closing knee in the second. And Uros Medic’s stunning stoppage of Muslim Salikhov on the same card, giving the Serbian three victories in his last four outings, each within the first two minutes of the fight.  

And somewhere off in the distance is Rakhmonov, on the verge of returning from injury; Usman, patiently awaiting the right moment for one last hurrah; Joaquin Buckley, who’d rattled off six straight victories in the span of 20 months before falling to Usman in June; and the emerging Seok Hyeon Ko, who just dominated Oban Elliott and Phil Rowe, spending 23:25 of 30 combined minutes in top control while absorbing only 14 strikes along the way.

It's a busy, crowded field standing atop a perpetually shifting welterweight landscape. Such is life in UFC’s most competitive, talent-rich, compelling division. 

“That’s just the game that we’re in. ‘It’s what have you done for me lately,’” Edwards said. “I feel at the moment, there’s a little title tournament going on with the welterweights. There’s no clear-cut contender for the title. But I think after the next few weeks, we’ll know where everything lies.