Start with the calendar, because Dana White apparently didn’t.
Islam Makhachev (29-1 MMA, 18-1 UFC) beat Ian Machado Garry by unanimous decision at UFC 330 in August. UFC 336 lands Jan. 30 at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, roughly five months later. Ramadan is expected to start Feb. 7, eight days after that card. So the ask was for the welterweight champion to defend on a short turnaround, against a guy who’d been trashing him, a week before a month of fasting. Makhachev said no. White got agitated, insisted the division had to move forward, and now Carlos Prates (24-7 MMA, 7-1 UFC) fights Michael Morales (19-0 MMA, 7-0 UFC) for an interim belt in the co-main.
Two guys who’ve actually lived inside this business looked at that sequence and sided with the champ. They’re right, and the interim belt is the dumbest part of the whole thing.
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Brown smells a grudge
Matt Brown went off on The Fighter vs. The Writer, and his complaint is the one I keep coming back to. Makhachev had been out two months when this blew up. Two. Brown’s position is that a champion with that résumé gets to be choosy, and he said so plainly: “When you get to that level, you get a little bit more picky and choosy, as you should. I’m not going to hate on Islam being picky and choosy about this fight.”
Then he got to the belt. “He just fought what two months ago? Two months ago. We don’t need to do this. The interim title’s not going to mean anything.”
And then the line that matters: “Is that the UFC trying to punch Islam in the gut?” Brown admitted he doesn’t know what got said behind closed doors. He also said that if Makhachev told the UFC he’d fight in March or April or whenever, that’s totally fair. Which, as it happens, is about what Makhachev has said publicly. He’s already stated he’ll gladly face the Prates vs. Morales winner once Ramadan ends.
So the UFC has a champion who defended in August, has named his next opponent pool and has given a rough window. That’s a guy with a schedule. Interim belts exist for champions who are hurt, suspended or vanished. Makhachev is none of those, and slapping an interim tag on a fight because the boss is annoyed turns a title into a tantrum with a strap attached.
Brown’s fix is boring and correct. He wants a written standard, a set period without a defense that triggers an interim title, the way boxing handles it. If the UFC had that rule, nobody would be guessing about motives. They don’t, so we’re guessing, and the guess Brown landed on is pretty easy to land on.
Cejudo likes the fight more than the fuss
Henry Cejudo came at it from the champion’s chair. On his Pound 4 Pound podcast with Kamaru Usman, he said flatly, “Islam Makhachev is right on this one.” His reasoning is the old champ logic: make the top two settle it, then take the survivor. “As the champion, you want the No. 1 contenders to fight each other,” Cejudo said.
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He also pointed out that Makhachev has talked this way before at press conferences, which makes this read as a stated policy he’s finally applying. Cejudo went a step further and said he likes Prates vs. Morales better than either man fighting Islam right now, calling it “a pay-per-view main event.”
Here’s where my two defense witnesses split a little. Cejudo loves the matchup. Brown loves the matchup too, calling it amazing, but hates that it knocks off a contender and comes wrapped in a belt that means nothing. I’m with both of them, which is easy when you’re not the one who has to fill a card in Toronto. Morales walking in at 19-0 against a guy who’s 7-1 in the UFC is a legitimately great fight. It needed no fake gold to sell it.
Prates did this to himself, a little
Prates went off on Makhachev for not fighting him. Makhachev’s reply was to remind him that Machado Garry beat him in April 2025. That’s the transitive property, which I normally treat like a 12-leg parlay of favorites, a fun idea that loses you money. But Makhachev wasn’t using it to predict anything. He was using it to explain why Prates doesn’t get to skip the line. A guy who lost to the man the champion just beat has a fair case for a title shot. A guy who lost to the man the champion just beat and still hasn’t fought the undefeated contender next to him in the rankings has a weaker one.
That’s why the January bout works on merit and the belt doesn’t. Win it, and you’re the same thing you’d have been without it: next in line for Makhachev. The only person the strap actually affects is the champion, who now gets to hear the word interim attached to his division every time his name comes up through the winter.
Makhachev originally said he wanted to fight before Ramadan. Then the UFC 336 announcement came, he changed course, and the promotion answered with a belt. The fight happens Jan. 30 in Toronto. Ramadan starts Feb. 7. And the champion, last seen beating Machado Garry in August, will be sitting at home watching somebody win a title he still holds.
