Khamzat Chimaev had a history making performance against Dricus du Plessis but there was a certain aspect of the fight that seemed to be lacking a bit according to a former UFC title challenger.
During an appearance on Submission Radio, Hardy touched upon the pay-per-view main event in Chicago from over the weekend and largely indicated how impressed he was by this changing of the guard performance in the UFC's 185 pound ranks.
The former UFC welterweight title challenger did seem to perceive that there was a bit of an uncharacteristic aspect to the 31-year-old phenom's in-cage effort on Saturday as compared to some of Chimaev's prior fights. In expressing what he saw take place in the du Plessis vs. Chimaev headliner at UFC 319, Dan Hardy said,
"He [Chimaev] was kind of tenderizing him and, you know, controlling him. It was impressive from a control perspective, don’t get me wrong. But, of course, you know, the main event of a pay-per-view, you kind of want to see a bit more intention to finish. That’s what I would like to have seen."
"That’s what Khamzat’s been all about. That’s why people have been so excited about him because of how, you know, overly aggressive he is, like, violent. It’s scary to watch sometimes. That was just kind of, I don’t know, it seemed a bit of a safer performance. Maybe out of respect for Dricus and his strength and explosiveness and scrambling ability.”
Khamzat Chimaev's performance assessed by surging middleweight contender who was cageside in Chicago
While some prospective title challengers might go a little quiet in the wake of such a dominant win by Khamzat Chimaev, someone who was cageside for the UFC 319 bout against Dricus du Plessis seems confident in navigating a path to victory against the newly minted champion. 'Borz' is looking to get back in the cage again at UFC 321 on October 25th in Abu Dhabi and a ranked middleweight who recently notched his own statement win is already envisioning how a Khamzat Chimaev fight plays out down the line.
Anthony 'Fluffy' Hernandez secured his eighth win in a row in what was a pressure heavy, dominant performance against Roman Dolidze when he notched a fourth round submission. During an interview with ESPNDeportes touching on what he saw while sitting front row cageside at UFC 319 and what he sees transpiring going forward,
“Congratulations to him, it was a pretty f***ing boring fight, not gonna lie, but man call me for the fight, I can wrestle, I can do jiu-jitsu, I can stop all the s**t and I can shut him down and with my gas tank man, I’ll drown him, I promise.”
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