Alex Pereira doesn’t strike me as a guy who spends his Saturday nights on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and the prelims on in the background. He pretty much confirmed it. On the Connect Cast podcast, the former two-division champion admitted, “I don’t really watch many fights, but if Prates is fighting, the only way I wouldn’t watch is if I were otherwise occupied.”
That’s the whole endorsement right there. A man who can’t be bothered with most of the roster clears his schedule for one welterweight. And Pereira has it right. Carlos Prates is the best reason to watch any Brazilian on the UFC roster right now, and Poatan just handed the rest of us permission to say it out loud.
The Company He Beat Out
Pereira listed four countrymen he loves to watch: Prates, Mauricio Ruffy, Charles Oliveira and Jean Silva. That’s a loaded group. Every name on it can turn a random Fight Night into a highlight reel. When Pereira was pressed on the first one he really enjoys, though, he didn’t hedge. He went straight to Prates and called him the man.
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His reasoning was about as complicated as his left hook. “I like knockouts, you know?” Pereira said. Fair enough. Prates is 24-7 overall and has finished all seven of his UFC wins. Seven trips to the winner’s circle in the Octagon, zero trips to the judges’ table. That’s the stat that matters to a guy like Pereira, and it should matter to you too. Some fighters make you check the clock. Prates makes you put your phone down, because if you look away for the replay you’re going to be watching it on X with everybody else.
There’s a reason fan attention has piled up on him. A guy who finishes everyone is the fight equivalent of a Marvel post-credits scene. You stay in your seat because you know something is coming.
The Money Line Is the Real Headline
Here’s the part of the interview I can’t stop thinking about. Pereira said Prates ranks behind only him among the UFC’s highest-paid Brazilians. That’s Pereira’s claim, and he didn’t offer numbers, so treat it as Poatan talking rather than a pay stub. But sit with what he’s implying. If he’s correct, Prates is out-earning everybody else on that list of favorites, Oliveira included.
I love that he said it publicly. Fighter pay usually gets discussed in whispers and leaked documents, and here’s the biggest Brazilian star in the sport casually ranking the paychecks on a podcast. Pereira framed it as something bigger than bragging, too. He said he hopes their success inspires prospects back home to dream big. Good. A kid in Brazil hearing that two strikers are near the top of the company’s pay chart is a better recruiting pitch than any promo package.
It also tells you how the UFC values Prates, assuming Pereira has his facts straight. Promotions don’t pay a guy like the second-biggest Brazilian name on the roster by accident. They pay him because people watch.
Now He Has to Cash the Check
Praise is cheap. Toronto is going to cost something. Prates meets Michael Morales for the interim welterweight title at UFC 336 on Jan. 30, 2027, at Scotiabank Arena. Morales is 19-0. Undefeated guys don’t care about your highlight reel, and they definitely don’t care that Pereira tunes in for you.
This is exactly the kind of fight I want from a finisher with hype behind him. Prates could’ve been matched carefully and kept on the knockout treadmill for another year. Instead he’s walking into an interim belt fight against a man who has never lost. That’s calling your shot with the whole building watching. If Prates puts Morales away, Pereira’s endorsement looks like scouting genius. If he doesn’t, every one of those seven finishes gets a little asterisk from the internet.
Pereira’s own timing is interesting. He’s 13-4 and coming off a failed interim heavyweight title bid against Ciryl Gane at UFC Freedom 250. He’s got Sergei Pavlovich (21-3) next at UFC 335 on Dec. 12 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, which is no light assignment for a guy chasing a third division. My read: a fighter in that spot talking up the next Brazilian finisher sounds a lot like a star who knows exactly who could carry the flag after him. He didn’t say that. I’m saying it.
Sherdog threw the question to fans on X, asking who gets their vote for favorite Brazilian to watch. Mine goes where Pereira’s went. Prates finishes people, the UFC apparently pays him like it knows that, and he’s about to fight an unbeaten contender for a belt.
Pereira fights Dec. 12. Prates fights Jan. 30. So Poatan has seven weeks to make sure he isn’t otherwise occupied.
