Muhammad doesn’t just want to be an active champion, he wants to be as active as Pereira. He’ll have to get past Shavkat Rakhmonov at UFC 310 first, though.
Things are gonna change at 170 with Belal Muhammad as champion.
So sayeth Belal, who won the welterweight title from Leon Edwards at the end of July, but is already set to return and defend it against Shavkat Rakhmonov at UFC 310, four months later. That’s a relatively quick turnaround for a UFC champion these days, and “Remember The Name” says you can expect more of that.
“I love to fight,” he told Grind City Media. “It’s so hard to stay healthy in this game that if if I’m healthy, I wanna be in the cage.”
“People are like, ‘Oh, we thought you were gonna wait a year to defend and you’re gonna push it longer because it took you this long to get in.’ Sitting on the couch doesn’t get you paid, sitting on the couch doesn’t make me happy. I wanna get happy by competing. I love to compete and it’s such a small window in this game where you don’t know what tomorrow is gonna hold that I’d rather stay busy.”
Muhammad forced himself to wait for a promised title shot after beating Gilbert Burns at UFC 288. Fourteen months later he finally made the best of his opportunity at UFC 304. So he’s done waiting around.
“The hardest thing for me was that wait,” he said. “I wanted to get into the cage. I wanted to fight. And then for 2025, I’m trying to get on that Alex Pereira schedule … next year for myself is just staying busy.”
Muhammad is hoping that his willingness to stay active encourages the other top names at 170 to fight as well. Welterweight has become a bit of a logjam at the top with several fighters seeming content to squat on their ranking.
“I think after Shavkat some of these other guys have to fight each other,” Belal said. “Some of these guys have to compete and we’re gonna see more of a clearer road of what a number one contender is in the division. Now that I’m busy, it’s gonna make them wanna get busier. And I think we’re gonna see who’s the next ones up.”
Muhammad vs. Rakhmonov goes down as the main event of UFC 310 on December 7th in Las Vegas, Nevada. The odds are against Belal winning, but when is that not the case?