On his “Precision Podcast” this week, Demetrious Johnson asked out loud what plenty of casual viewers have muttered at their TVs during a Movsar Evloev fight. “How the fck is he still in the UFC?” the former flyweight champion said. He liked the line enough to circle back to it, then tacked on “Not even a submission? Fck!” for good measure.
It’s a great clip, and the question has a very short answer. Evloev is 20-0. He’s 10-0 inside the octagon. On Oct. 24 he headlines UFC 333 at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi against featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski (28-4, 15-3 UFC), streaming on Paramount+. The UFC keeps him because he beats everybody it puts across from him. A promotion that cut its unbeaten contenders for winning too quietly would have an even stranger business model than the one it already runs.
The stat that set Johnson off
To be fair to Mighty Mouse, the number he’s reacting to is real and a little startling. Per MMA Junkie’s report, Evloev finished seven of his 10 pro fights before he signed with the UFC. Since then, every one of his 10 octagon wins has gone to the judges. That split tells you something changed once the competition got harder, and it explains why a fighter with an unblemished record waited this long for a title shot. Volkanovski said as much himself, acknowledging that the lack of finishes probably stretched out Evloev’s road to the belt.
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Johnson’s comparison point is Michael Page. “Like, they just cut MVP,” he said, describing a UFC that’s eager to drop fighters it doesn’t find exciting. He then gave Page some credit, saying the guy may not be knocking people out, “but he is doing some flashy sh*t in there.”
Why the MVP comparison falls apart
This is where I get off the train. Flashy and winning are two different currencies, and when a promotion has to choose which one to bank on in a title picture, it should pick the second one every time. Johnson actually conceded the point in the middle of his own rant: “Movsar Evloev does know how to win.” That’s the job description. Everything else is decoration.
I also have limited patience for the decision-equals-boring reflex, because it usually comes from people who can’t see what’s happening on the mat. Winning a UFC decision means beating a professional fighter in more rounds than he beats you, which means controlling position, landing more, defending more and staying out of trouble for 15 straight minutes. Doing that 10 consecutive times, against guys who are paid to stop you from doing exactly that, is a skill set. It might not make the highlight reel. It does make you very hard to beat.
And as someone who spends a fair amount of time yelling at scorecards, I’ll point out the obvious. A fighter who goes to the judges 10 times in a row and leaves with his hand raised every time has been winning clearly enough that the people with the pencils couldn’t find a way to mess it up. Given some of the cards I’ve seen, that’s no small feat.
The finishing gap is a fair criticism, and it’s one Evloev will hear until he shuts it down himself. Seven finishes on the regional scene suggest the ability exists. Somewhere between signing and now, though, he decided that the surest path to 20-0 ran through the scorecards. You can wish he’d take more risks. You can’t call it a failed strategy when the strategy delivered a main event against the champion.
What Oct. 24 actually settles
The most interesting voice in this whole thing belongs to Volkanovski. He’s the man who has to stand in front of Evloev for five rounds, and he said he feels bad for how the UFC and the fans treat his opponent. When the champ is the one defending the challenger’s reputation, I’d suggest the critics are reading the box score and skipping the tape.
That doesn’t let Evloev off the hook in Abu Dhabi. If he beats Volkanovski on the cards, Johnson’s question turns into a trivia answer about an undefeated champion who never finished anyone in the UFC, and nobody gets cut for holding the belt. If he loses, the clip from the “Precision Podcast” will get replayed for months, and the decision streak will be used as evidence that he was always a contender who couldn’t close.
My pick is Evloev by decision, which I realize is the least shocking prediction ever typed. On Oct. 24 at Etihad Arena, I expect him to grind out round after round against the champion, take the belt on the scorecards and make it 11-0 in the octagon with zero finishes. Johnson will hate every minute of it, and the UFC will be very glad it never cut him.
