The Featherweight Heir Apparent

Rising star, Ilia Topuria, will gamble his undefeated record in pursuit of UFC gold by taking on Featherweight kingpin, Alexander Volkanovski, this Saturday (Feb. 17, 2024) at UFC 298 inside Honda Center in Anaheim, California.

Featherweight is a division of great champions. Jose Aldo, Max Holloway and now Volkanovski — a trio of remarkably dominant 145-pound kings. Not only did those three reign over their divisions and rack up multiple title defenses, they all built strong arguments for being the best pound-for-pound fighters on the roster during their respective peaks.

At 27 years of age, Topuria is the standout of the next generation. A special talent from his UFC debut to first main event slot, the Spaniard is improving drastically fight-to-fight and has plus skills in all areas alongside being a tremendous athlete. No fighter is perfect, but there’s a ton to like about Topuria’s current abilities and overall potential.

Let’s take a closer look at his skill set:

Striking

Topuria joined the roster as a grappling ace but then started knocking everyone out with his hands. He’s proven himself an excellent puncher in the cage, and he fights more like a traditional boxer than most of his peers.

Compared to most, Topuria stands more squatted and with his lead foot tilted inward, which allows an extra bit of bounce in his step. He rolls his head like a boxer and builds combinations on the inside well, shifting his weight between shots far better than the average mixed martial arts (MMA) striker. He generates power within his stance, rather than relying on shifts and forward charges.

Topuria’s movement makes his jab rather effective. Because he’s light on his feet, he can bounce forward and pull back effectively, making for a nice feint that hides when he actually steps in with his jab. When “El Matador” jabs, it’s a hard, spearing strike that snaps his opponent’s head back. He’s not just flicking the punch; he’s making an impact. Topuria’s will jab to the body as well, and he’ll occasionally lean forward a bit with his right shoulder to load up the jab, allowing him to cover an extra step of distance and add power.

That just so happens to be a classic Volkanovski technique as well.

Before long, Topuria is hiding his left hook behind that same movement. His slight squat and advance forward could be the jab, but he’s also skilled at sneaking a left hook around the guard without a ton of tell. Like all Topuria shots, his hook has power, even in this case where it’s not fully loaded up.

Topuria’s educated lead hand helps him convince opponents to circle into his right hand, a tremendously powerful weapon. What’s interesting about Topuria is that he can throw his right hand as a very crisp straight shot or the more classically chaotic MMA-style overhand, in which he falls into the punch like a boxer never would. However, he has an ability that most fighters do not: he can follow up even the sloppier variation with powerful combinations. Topuria consistently manages to follow his right with a killer left hook regardless of his body positioning, which has caught several opponents off-guard.

A great element of Topuria’s striking is his commitment to body work. Aside from the body jab, Topuria will commonly take his right straight to the bread basket. Even more of a signature weapon for Topuria is his left hook to the liver. He’ll throw that punch as a lead, which requires exceptional quickness and great timing to land well.

Really though, Topuria’s boxing all comes together when his opponent nears the fence (GIF). Time and time again, that’s when Topuria sends foes to the canvas. His commitment to body punches and ability to string together multi-punch combinations of knockout-worthy punches is highly unusual, and it’s never more effective than when his opponent has no way to back off from the pocket.

Historically, Topuria hardly kicks at all. He bucked that trend in a career-best performance against Josh Emmett in his last bout, however, playing the classic calf kick off the jab dilemma really well. Any time Emmett began to parry the jab, Topuria would kick out his fellow boxer’s lead leg. If Emmett started lifting his lead leg to check, his face would be full of jab. Suddenly, Topuria was dominating the distance boxing and forcing ugly swings from his opponent.

The most impressive improvement in that bout, however, was probably Topuria’s defense. In the past, there have been major issues in Topuria’s defense, most notably his habit of backing straight up off his pulls (a trait Jai Herbert and even Bryce Mitchell managed to time with strikes).

Against Emmett, Topuria was consistently pulling back at a slight angle. Improving his positioning even further was his embrace of the shoulder roll. When Topuria took a step back and sideways, he did so while hiding his chin behind his shoulder or slipping his head off to one side. Often, Emmett’s punches brushed off his shoulder or missed entirely.

Unlike most who try to shoulder roll in the cage, Topuria was able to answer. He landed a couple check left hook counters while fading back behind his shoulder, but his most consistent counter shot was the right hand return. Immediately after feeling Emmett’s punch graze his shoulder, Topuria would fire a crisp right hand, often followed by a 3-2 in combination.

There are aspects of Topuria’s defense that have shown issues that went untested by Emmett. For example, his head moving forward from a low stance is highly vulnerable from an MMA perspective, an opponents have timed this with knees and high kicks. Generally, Topuria’s defense to round kicks just isn’t that great, either absorbing them clean or blocking with a single hand. He does punch through kicks often enough that it’s a risky prospect for his opponent too, but stepping through kicks alone isn’t the best defense.

Wrestling

Despite his Greco-Roman wrestling background and clear abilities in that regard, Topuria hasn’t actually wrestled all that much in the Octagon. When he has, however, he’s been electric!

A majority of Topuria’s offensive wrestling came in his debut opposite Youssef Zalal, who was riding a nice win streak at the time. Early on, the two wrapped up along the fence, trading position and pummeling for under hooks. It seemed like a bit of a stalemate until Topuria suddenly locked his hands, hipped in, and suplexed Zalal across himself.

Greco-Roman wrestling 101!

Beyond that throw, Topuria has largely wrestled below the waist. He has a very powerful double leg shot that he most typically completes in the center of the cage. If his opponent is able to maintain their footing and get to the fence, Topuria continues to wrestle well. Often, he’ll switch to the high crotch and step deep between his opponent’s legs, threatening to lift. As his opponent tries to defend the lift, Topuria will reshoot and attempt to return to the double leg. Most recently, Topuria landed a few nice double legs on Emmett in the fifth round of their fight, shutting down any chance of a last-second comeback KO.

Defensively, Topuria shut Bryce Mitchell down wonderfully. He lowered his level an extra notch, which made his sprawl even more effective. When he started overthrowing, Mitchell was able to find his hips more effectively, but even then, Topuria was kicking his hips back and heavily weighting overhooks to stop him in his tracks.

Better yet, he routinely punished Mitchell’s takedown attempts with heavy knees and punches.

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu

A black belt with eight wins via tapout, Topuria is an excellent top player who hunts for chokes very well.

Once on top, Topuria loves to jump on the neck. He does great work controlling the head, even from a position like half guard that isn’t necessarily ideal to finish submissions. He’ll start threatening, and if there’s nothing there, he can still work to advance into mount (where he’ll attack the arm-triangle choke).

More often, Topuria starts working his way under the chin. As soon as he’s threatening the neck, Topuria will look to crank and pass into mount for the guillotine finish. If his opponent turns more onto their hip and starts fighting hands, Topuria is likely to swim his arm deeper and attack the anaconda. Against Zalal, Topuria nearly finished an anaconda by using his thigh to catch the elbow and tighten the squeeze, but Zalal either fought hands masterfully with his free hand or grabbed the glove to save himself.

Tying into this submission chain is the arm-across guillotine or seated arm triangle, which traps his opponent’s arm across their own neck — it’s the move Jack Hermansson used twice, and one fellow UFC 298 athlete Anthony Hernandez uses a dozen times per fight. The great thing about this choke is that it allows Topuria to retain control, and it can often be used to take the back as well.

It hasn’t happened yet in the UFC, but Topuria is always looking to step over an arm in mount for the triangle. In the likely event that his opponent tries to escape out the back door, Topuria will knee slide and circle behind, landing him in turtle — a great position to punch and take the back!

On the canvas, Topuria remains highly aggressive and excels at chaining his submissions and positional advancements together.

Conclusion

Topuria is already a great fighter. He has skills in all facets of the game, as well as the toughness, speed and power to succeed at an elite level. He’s facing one of the all-time best — but if anyone is going to dethrone Volkanovski at 145 pounds — “El Matador” seems like the man for the job.

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Andrew Richardson, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu brown belt, is a professional fighter who trains at Team Alpha Male in Sacramento, California. In addition to learning alongside world-class talent, Andrew has scouted opponents and developed winning strategies for several of the sport’s most elite fighters.

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Remember that MMAmania.com will deliver LIVE round-by-round, blow-by-blow coverage of the entire UFC 298 fight card right here, starting with the early ESPN+ “Prelims” matches online, which are scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. ET (simulcast on ESPN at 8 p.m. ET), before the pay-per-view (PPV) main card start time at 10 p.m. ET (also on ESPN+).

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