That is the way you win the BMF belt.
The timekeeper smacking the clacker, signifying 10 seconds left within the round, within the fight. Max Holloway, having battered Justin Gaethje for a overwhelming majority of the past 24 minutes and 50 seconds of motion, strolls to the middle of the cage.
Holloway, the previous dominant UFC featherweight champion, points to the energy drink can painted across the middle of the octagon. The meaning is evident: We’re going to throw down, right here, at once. Gaethje, oh-so-appropriately nicknamed “The Highlight,” knows nothing but to oblige.
There’s really no need for Holloway to do that; nearly everyone watching knows Holloway could have run a 10-second victory lap and cruise to a transparent and violence-filled decision victory.
But that just isn’t how a BMF does things.
The fists fly furiously, the brisker Holloway winging lefts and rights recklessly, needlessly as Gaethje, his nose busted greater than 20 minutes earlier by a gnarly kick, musters all he can to steal a victory.
Gaethje lasts nine seconds. Not 10.
With a cracking overhand right, Holloway plants the previous interim UFC lightweight champ into the canvas, sprawled across a can of Monster.
Holloway was the true monster Saturday night, making good on the religion placed in each him and Gaethje to entertain the masses amid a stacked-to-the-gills UFC 300 mega-event in Las Vegas.
It’s not that the BMF belt that Gaethje placed on the road holds prestige. Truthfully, it’s goofy, even a little bit cringe, after I say it out loud. Back in 2019 at UFC 244, the UFC lacked a weight class’ championship fight to centerpiece at Madison Square Garden. Solution: Make up a belt and pit a pair of star-level journeyman against one another in Jorge Masvidal and Nate Diaz.
It was meant as a one-off, and Masvidal indeed never put the belt on the road. Once he’d moved on, enough persistence of the concept of a recent BMF belt manifested, well, one other BMF belt. Gaethje against Dustin Poirier, likewise a former interim titleholder at 155 kilos, made sense. The six minutes of cage carnage justified the matchup.
But really, fights like that never needed a symbolic trinket with some big goofy letters lifted from the wallet of Jules Winnfield — it was much cooler in “Pulp Fiction,” like Fonzie.
Every fight Holloway takes is a BMF battle.
Every fight Gaethje takes is a BMF battle.
Neither needs a belt, or must defend said belt, for that to be true. These are two of essentially the most violent, take-all-comers fighters in UFC history, with elite skill to match.
And that’s why it’s no issue for either to face toe to toe at the tip of an action-packed battle — even Holloway, who didn’t know for certain he was up on two judges’ scorecards through 4 rounds but needed to know he was in an excellent spot near the tip of one other strong frame.
Was it dumb for Holloway, who could have locked up one more featherweight title shot with the victory up in weight, to play Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots with such an enormous opportunity on the road? Hell yeah, it was.
Does Holloway, The Pride of Hawaii, know one other solution to fight? Hell no, he doesn’t.
That’s why he’s a BMF. A trophy has nothing to do with that.
That is the way you win the BMF belt.
The timekeeper smacking the clacker, signifying 10 seconds left within the round, within the fight. Max Holloway, having battered Justin Gaethje for a overwhelming majority of the past 24 minutes and 50 seconds of motion, strolls to the middle of the cage.
Holloway, the previous dominant UFC featherweight champion, points to the energy drink can painted across the middle of the octagon. The meaning is evident: We’re going to throw down, right here, at once. Gaethje, oh-so-appropriately nicknamed “The Highlight,” knows nothing but to oblige.
There’s really no need for Holloway to do that; nearly everyone watching knows Holloway could have run a 10-second victory lap and cruise to a transparent and violence-filled decision victory.
But that just isn’t how a BMF does things.
The fists fly furiously, the brisker Holloway winging lefts and rights recklessly, needlessly as Gaethje, his nose busted greater than 20 minutes earlier by a gnarly kick, musters all he can to steal a victory.
Gaethje lasts nine seconds. Not 10.
With a cracking overhand right, Holloway plants the previous interim UFC lightweight champ into the canvas, sprawled across a can of Monster.
Holloway was the true monster Saturday night, making good on the religion placed in each him and Gaethje to entertain the masses amid a stacked-to-the-gills UFC 300 mega-event in Las Vegas.
It’s not that the BMF belt that Gaethje placed on the road holds prestige. Truthfully, it’s goofy, even a little bit cringe, after I say it out loud. Back in 2019 at UFC 244, the UFC lacked a weight class’ championship fight to centerpiece at Madison Square Garden. Solution: Make up a belt and pit a pair of star-level journeyman against one another in Jorge Masvidal and Nate Diaz.
It was meant as a one-off, and Masvidal indeed never put the belt on the road. Once he’d moved on, enough persistence of the concept of a recent BMF belt manifested, well, one other BMF belt. Gaethje against Dustin Poirier, likewise a former interim titleholder at 155 kilos, made sense. The six minutes of cage carnage justified the matchup.
But really, fights like that never needed a symbolic trinket with some big goofy letters lifted from the wallet of Jules Winnfield — it was much cooler in “Pulp Fiction,” like Fonzie.
Every fight Holloway takes is a BMF battle.
Every fight Gaethje takes is a BMF battle.
Neither needs a belt, or must defend said belt, for that to be true. These are two of essentially the most violent, take-all-comers fighters in UFC history, with elite skill to match.
And that’s why it’s no issue for either to face toe to toe at the tip of an action-packed battle — even Holloway, who didn’t know for certain he was up on two judges’ scorecards through 4 rounds but needed to know he was in an excellent spot near the tip of one other strong frame.
Was it dumb for Holloway, who could have locked up one more featherweight title shot with the victory up in weight, to play Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots with such an enormous opportunity on the road? Hell yeah, it was.
Does Holloway, The Pride of Hawaii, know one other solution to fight? Hell no, he doesn’t.
That’s why he’s a BMF. A trophy has nothing to do with that.
