Jon Anik has called hundreds of fights as the official play-by-play announcer for Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), but the veteran broadcaster experienced a first last week at UFC 284 in Perth, Australia.
In attendance to call one of the biggest fights on paper in UFC history, Anik witnessed reigning featherweight champion, Alexander Volkanovski, move up in weight to try to become double champ by beating lightweight titleholder, Islam Makhachev. This all went down in Volkanovski’s backyard of Australia so tension was at an all time high.
Unfortunately for Volkanovski, the judges ended up awarding Makhachev the unanimous decision win after a super-close, five-round affair. In fact, many people still believe Volkanovski did enough in one of his most impressive performances to date to claim the 155-pound strap and call himself a two-division champion.
That didn’t happen, though, and the Australian fans in attendance were not too happy when the final decision was read to close out UFC 284. They even started to throw food in the direction of the Octagon.
“After the decision was announced is the first time that I’ve ever — I’m sure it’s not the first time people have thrown stuff in our direction — [but] it’s the first time I’ve ever been hit with a burger and fries on the back, and it certainly felt a lot heavier than french fries,” Anik told MMA Fighting.
“On the Anik & Florian podcast, we tried to lead the dance with the technical stuff and the fight itself as opposed to the scorecards. But when so much is at stake, I understand why people who are emotional and passionate have their opinions, and I think the sport at its highest level is so close, and the elite fights between elite fighters oftentimes are the ones that are the most hotly contested.
“There’s any number of different directions in which we could go. The pound-for-pound discussion is largely a cosmetic one. I do believe that the next fights for Islam Makhachev and Alexander Volkanovski are bigger, and I would say in terms of the [UFC 284 fight’s] heightening expectations, you could argue it exceeded them.”
Despite all of the backlash Makhachev has received for allegedly taking an IV before his main event fight with Volkanovski and the fact that he nearly lost his lightweight reign to a 145-pounder, Anik believes fight fans need to credit the Dagestani fighter for his efforts.
“People say, ‘Oh, his first title defense [he] should have fought Benny Dariush, instead, he’s plucking a featherweight,’” Anik said. “Plucking a featherweight? He fought the No. 1 pound-for-pound fighter in the world who has a one-inch reach advantage against him, who twice backed up to be the guy in a lightweight championship fight. So the road was kind of paved for Makhachev, and he went into the belly of the beast, and did it in Perth, which, in theory, he didn’t necessarily have to do.
“So I would like to lead the dance as far as people who want to give Islam credit for going five rounds for the first time, for going toe-to-toe with his pound-for-pound equal in a lot of respects. You can sort of split hairs when it comes to the weight and the size and everything else, but I think it’s gonna be a very competitive rematch. I think the betting line is going to be significantly closer the second time around; I think the stock for both gentlemen goes up certainly. It would be hard to argue against Volkanovski’s stock going up, but can Islam get a modicum of credit folks for his part in all of this? This was not him sort of plucking off somebody from the lighter weight class for [his first] title defense.”
Do you agree with Anik? Does Makhachev deserve our credit?
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