Payton Talbott did exactly what a young fighter should do after beating a legend. He looked straight past everybody and called out Sean O’Malley. That came right after he stopped Deiveson Figueiredo in the first round of the UFC 332 co-headliner this past Saturday at Delta Center in Salt Lake City, and I respect it completely. Nobody ever got a pay bump by asking for the guy two spots below them.
Then T.J. Dillashaw went on the JAXXON PODCAST, watched the fight back, and gave Talbott the most useful feedback a prospect can get. He agreed with the ambition and then handed him a different map. Dillashaw doesn’t see the O’Malley fight as likely to happen. He likes Marlon Vera as the next step instead. I think he nailed it, and I think Talbott should want that fight just as badly.
What Dillashaw Saw on the Tape
A former champion earns his podcast chair in the film breakdown, and Dillashaw went to the physical stuff first. “Look at the reach advantage, the height,” he said, and he put Talbott’s edge over Figueiredo at two and a half inches, which he said still makes a big difference. His blunt summary: “Talbott is a very long fighter.”
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Length comes from your parents, though. Timing gets built in the gym, and timing is the part Dillashaw kept circling back to. He said Talbott has “great timing, he saw everything,” and he pointed to the exact moment the fight turned. “He was going for a leg kick, and Talbott just saw it and pieced him up with a one-two down the middle, which started everything.”
That’s the sequence that matters. Figueiredo committed to a kick, Talbott read it early and went straight down the pipe. From there, Dillashaw said, Figueiredo never really got his feet back under him. He gave Figueiredo credit for throwing back and staying in the fight, but called the finish a matter of time.
Dillashaw also put his finger on the defensive flaw that made it possible. “Deiveson holds his hands a little bit too wide,” he said, and he described a lean-back style where those wide hands become a bigger problem coming forward, especially for the shorter man in the matchup. Then there was the moment that probably made everyone at Delta Center gasp. When Figueiredo shot for a takedown, Dillashaw said Talbott “Almost kneed his face off when he shot in for this shot.” He added that it was so close to landing.
Put all of that together and you get a long fighter who reads entries, punishes them straight down the middle and has a knee waiting if you change levels. That’s a nightmare puzzle for anybody at 135.
Why Vera Is the Correct Next Call
Look at the résumé first. Talbott is now 12-1 overall and 6-1 in the UFC, and the Figueiredo win (Figueiredo is 25-8-1, 14-8-1 in the UFC) was his second straight victory over a former UFC champion. Two ex-champs in a row is a real run, and it’s enough to justify a big swing on the mic. It still doesn’t guarantee the phone rings with O’Malley on the other end, and Dillashaw clearly doesn’t think it will.
So the question becomes what fight moves Talbott forward without sending him into a holding pattern. Sitting around waiting for a star who isn’t coming is how prospects go cold. Ask anyone who’s spent a year tweeting at a guy who never tweets back.
Dillashaw’s answer was simple. “He looked real good,” he said. “I’d love to see him against a top fighter now.” Then came the line I think matters most: “I like that fight (Vera). I actually like it for ‘Chito,’ too.”
That second sentence is how fights actually get booked. A matchup that only makes sense for one side turns into a staring contest between managers. A matchup that a former champion thinks works for both guys can get done fast. Vera gets a chance against a hot name with momentum, and Talbott gets the “top fighter” Dillashaw wants to see him face.
My argument is that Vera is the better fight for Talbott right now, even more than O’Malley would be. If Talbott beats Vera after back-to-back wins over former champions, the O’Malley callout stops being a hopeful ask and becomes something the promotion has a hard time ignoring. He’d be walking into that conversation with a stack of receipts instead of a single highlight.
And I love a guy who calls his shot. Talbott already called his. Dillashaw offered a smarter route to the same destination. If I’m in Talbott’s corner, I take the Vera fight, win it the same way he beat Figueiredo, and grab the mic one more time to say O’Malley’s name even louder.
