Tony Ferguson: Lightweight’s Rightful Title Contender

Last week, I discussed my thoughts on the highly overlooked and outstanding lightweight contest between Rafael dos Anjos and Tony Ferguson. I went deep on my pick for Ferguson winning the bout. I’ve been a Ferguson fan for some time, and I feel he truly had all the tools to talk out of the fight with a win, and that’s exactly what I did. I stated after the fight, and wanted to reinforce, my belief that Tony Ferguson is the rightful No. 1 contender for the UFC lightweight title. So for this week’s column, I wanted to explore why.

There’s been a lot of debate as of late, and rightfully so, about the types of fights that are being booked for title match-ups. The debate pertains to fighters getting their title shots due to the merit of their records and their wins versus their amount of star power. It comes up in cases when people like Dan Henderson are granted a title shot against Michael Bisping, despite being ranked outside of the top 10. Or, Ronda Rousey, who is still ranked in the top five but is coming off a crushing loss, is set to receive an immediate title shot against Amanda Nunes for her upcoming MMA return at UFC 207. My feeling is that sometimes fights like those will occur, but UFC has to make up for it with more merit-based title bouts. It simply shouldn’t happen all the time. One thing I want to point out though is that this isn’t really a new debate. It’s one that raged for years even before ZUFFA sold the company to WME-IMG, especially when you had 1-1 in the UFC Brock Lesnar being granted a quick title shot against Randy Couture.

Regardless, I think Tony Ferguson has been getting overlooked for quite some time. He’s now 9-0, and I think he should’ve been in the title conversation after his wins over Josh Thomson and Edson Barboza. Right now, he’s stuck in a similar situation to Max Holloway at featherweight. Holloway is realistically the top contender and has an almost unprecedented winning streak. However, the champion at featherweight is Conor McGregor. He’s not fighting at featherweight anymore or defending his title. He’s not relinquishing it either. And now, McGregor is fighting Eddie Alvarez for the lightweight title this month. I get it. That’s a huge fight. It’s the biggest card of the year. At the same time, it’s creating a log jam in two divisions.

From a fight perspective, Ferguson does everything right. He’s fun to watch. His fights are always exciting to watch. Against Rafael dos Anjos, Ferguson’s performance was masterful. He was clearly prepped and ready for the higher elevation for fighting in Mexico City, which we’ve seen in the past is a major variable and has cost fighters in the UFC in the past. Just ask Cain Velasquez. The fight was competitive, but Ferguson looked like the man who was ready to go through a five-round war of attrition. Even by the end of the fight, Ferguson looked like he could continue fighting for another several rounds. While his defense did get a little loose and lax at times, Ferguson generally used excellent striking, footwork and movement. Not to mention, he mixed in a lot of unorthodox spinning attacks, knee strikes, and dynamic strikes. Dos Anjos, who is a strong grappler and ground fighter, also couldn’t keep Dos Anjos on the ground. It’s another area where Ferguson is strong, and his takedown defense was on point. Those are all the tools you really need to prove you are an elite fighter. It’s not just impressive that Ferguson did these things, but he did them against a former champion, who has been dominating throughout the lightweight division for a while.

I’ve pointed out before that lightweight is the most stacked, bloodiest division in MMA. So for Ferguson to be 9-0 in the UFC and 12-1 in the Octagon overall is pretty outstanding. Not only that, he put a stamp on that winning streak with a win over the former champion, who lost the belt in his last fight. Last night, Dos Anjos looked more like the mid-level fighter he was earlier in his career and not the elite contender and champion he later transformed into. That says a lot about Ferguson’s skill set.

For all these reasons, I would say Ferguson is the rightful title contender at lightweight. Yes, even moreso than Khabib Nurmagomedov. Nurmagomedov is 7-0 in the UFC, and he’s undefeated in his MMA career at 23-0. Before his extended layoff, he actually beat Rafael dos Anjos before he would go and win the title from Anthony Pettis. In fact, there was talk of Nurmagomedov fighting Eddie Alvarez at UFC 205 for the title. Nurmagomedov is also ranked No. 1 in the division. At the same time, Nurmagomedov’s one fight in two years was over a late-notice replacement in Darrell Horcher. While Nurmagomedov was out and constantly getting injured, Ferguson was the one fighting up through the lightweight ranks, staying active and building his resume. So even if Nurmagomedov walks away with a dominant win over Michael Johnson at UFC 205, I would still nominate Ferguson to receive the next title shot. Granted, that’s merely just my opinion. It just seems that it would be insane if Ferguson had to fight and get an unprecedented 10th win in order to earn a title shot.

I get there is this view of booking fights based on their numeric value, but Ferguson has proven himself to be a pretty singular fighter and athlete. Hopefully, the UFC brass will take notice and give him the shot at the belt against the winner of McGregor vs. Alvarez that Ferguson has earned and deserves.

Jeffrey Harris is 411mania’s resident Jack of All Trades and has covered MMA for the site since 2008. You can shoot him an e-mail at [email protected] or hit him up on Facebook. He also co-hosts the 411 Ground & Pound Radio podcast along with Robert Winfree. You can listen to the latest episode of the podcast in the player below.