Former UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman moved up to middleweight and took on Khamzat Chimaev in a title eliminator at UFC 294 last October. ‘Borz’, one of the biggest, most hyped names in the promotion, at the time was scheduled to take on the then #6 ranked Paulo Costa in the co-main event of the Abu Dhabi card. However, Costa caught a bad case of staph infection, which worsened to the point he had to undergo surgery weeks removed from the fight. This, of course, forced the Brazilian to pull out.

And Usman, who had previously refused to fight the Chechnyan at middleweight (inviting him to welterweight, the division Usman had been a historically great champion in), accepted UFC’s offer to fight Chimaev at 185 on UFC 294. But he thinks that ‘Borz’ has gotten unfair flak from the fans because of the tempestuous nature of their fight and the controversial result at the end of it.

Kamaru Usman defends Khamzat Chimaev

In a recent episode of the ‘Pound 4 Pound’ Podcast with fellow UFC legend and former two-division concurrent champion Henry Cejudo, Usman confessed he had felt an undeniable shift in the narrative surrounding Khamzat Chimaev following their UFC 294 clash. No longer was ‘Borz’ seen as the same unstoppable force that had taken the promotion by storm with his explosive knockouts and eagerness to fight in the Fight Island days during the pandemic. And a large part of it is how his UFC 294 co-main event bout against the Nigerian went.

“I think just because of my fight [with Khamzat at UFC 294], people are downplaying his skills, whether he’s good or not. Everyone is saying ‘he’s not that good’. But I was a champion, you know. I think he’s kind of getting the short end of the stick here… I still believe that he is a problem to deal with inside that octagon, and I know from that first round I had my hands full,” claimed Usman.

The 37-year-old went as far as to compliment Chimaev, feeling that because of how he fought in the first round, he had proven he belonged at the top, competing against the best fighters in the world. In addition, Usman hinted at the fact that the Swedish national was going up against one of the greatest champions in UFC history, so ‘Borz’ not dominating the whole fight should not be surprising to fans.

Starting strong, ‘Borz’ dominated the first round, taking Usman to the ground and putting the man Dana White termed as the greatest UFC welterweight of all time on his back for almost the entire round. The second round, however, was much more up in the air, but the third round belonged to ‘The Nigerian Nightmare,’ who outworked and outclassed ‘Borz’ with his historically great striking. In the end, at the end of the scheduled three rounds, with neither man having managed to stop the other, ‘Borz’ managed to eke out a split majority decision.

Online, the buzz among fans was that the decision should have gone to Usman, or been a draw, as one of the judges saw it. And Usman’s performance got an indictment from none other than the UFC CEO, Dana White himself. He felt that the fight would probably have turned out a very different way had it been a five-round affair (as Usman had wanted it to be), instead of three.

Despite the criticism, Chimaev is all set to take a big step in his career as he will be a part of the main card at UFC’s first Saudi Arabia event.

‘Borz’ to take on Robert Whittaker on historic card

After his victory over Usman, Chimaev became the official number-one title contender for the middleweight title on account of their bout being officially billed as the title eliminator. This, along with a lot of money, is probably why the Nigerian overcame his previous hesitation and agreed to fight ‘Borz’ at middleweight.

The 30-year-old was then offered a shot at then-champion Sean Strickland barely three months later in January on UFC 297, the promotion’s first PPV card of 2024. To make matters worse, he was recovering from an injury, all of which made him decide to turn the title shot down. While the division moved on in his absence, and the title changed hands, he is not far from fighting for the title.

Up next, the Chechen is scheduled to headline UFC’s first Saudi Arabia event on June 22 against former champion Robert Whittaker. And the winner will have a very good case for a middleweight title shot. What seems more likely, however, is that the UFC may decide to have the winner of Whittaker-Chimaev fight the winner of the upcoming UFC 303 clash between Strickland and Paulo Costa (who is coming off a loss to Whittaker) in an official title eliminator.

Strickland, too, is waiting for his title rematch since losing it to Dricus Du Plessis via a razor-thin split decision on UFC 297, and the champion, ‘DDP’ is also on board. Whatever the UFC decides to do eventually, the winner of Chimaev’s next fight will be, at most, one step away from a 185-pound title shot.