Former UFC featherweight champion, Ilia Topuria, surrendered his 145-pound title to purse a second strap in the lightweight division. With Islam Makhachev headed to welterweight, “El Matador” will battle former 155-pound kingpin, Charles Oliveira, for the vacant title atop the UFC 317 pay-per-view (PPV) card next month in Las Vegas.
That’s what makes the timing of his departure “a little bit odd.”
Topuria recently split from his longtime team in favor of a more travel-friend squad. His former head coach was “sad” about the departure but insisted there was no bad blood. Former UFC heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier, who now serves as analyst and color commentator, suggests there may be more to the story.
“Ilia Topuria wants to fight Islam but needs to get through Charles Oliveira first, especially when we are hearing that he and his team are kind of going in separate directions,” Cormier said on his YouTube channel. “Just because of the schedule, they said it’s no bad blood. I really don’t know how, at this point, a month before what will be your opportunity to win a second title, how much effect that will have on Team Topuria.”
Topuria is a sizable betting favorite heading into UFC 317.
“Honestly, if I’m Ilia, I’m still just using those guys because even if I have to do my training camp with someone else,” Cormier continued. “I know that those guys know me so well, that if they can get with me for a week, two weeks, we are still so aligned — especially if there’s no bad blood — we’re still so aligned that we will get through the fight, and we will still be able to coexist. Not only coexist, but also we gel. Right? This is the team that got this guy from a young, young man, to being 16-0 and a UFC champion, beating the two greatest featherweights of all time. So to have that familiarity is very important to an athlete.”
At the same time, changes can be inevitable.
“A lot of times we see athletes switch teams as they get down later into the career — this man is still in the heart of his career,” Cormier said. “So there is something to the idea that we have grown so much that we can’t come together and collaborate on what is going to be one of the biggest moments of his entire fight career, especially knowing those guys have trained him since he was like 15 years old. To me, that’s a little bit odd, but it is what it is.”
We’ll find out for certain next month in Las Vegas.
