The UFC's first ever quadrilogy is now in the books and I would say that, as a whole, it delivered. It would have been unfortunate for the first one to have fallen short. While the ending was more anticlimactic than you would want in an ideal world, it was clear the way that fight was going. Moreno winning was probably the better thing for the promotion as well since he has a longer future at flyweight ahead of him. Regardless, this rivalry between Brandon Moreno and Deiveson Figueiredo has left the division in a much better place than they found it. There won't be any talk of folding the division for quite awhile now and that is a good thing. Brandon Moreno looks poised to hold onto this belt for awhile, especially if he can get past his next defense or two. Let's just get into it.
This final chapter gave us the clearest picture of these two fighters in my opinion. Brandon Moreno has shown himself to just be the better flyweight at this juncture. The weight cut and age has seemingly seen Deiveson Figueiredo decline (at least while fighting at 125 lbs), while Moreno is still ascending. Even if this fight would have continued, it really seemed like it was going to be all Moreno down the stretch. Out of the 4 fights, this really seemed like the only one where one guy was going to pull away with it. Even the second fight where Figgy had the really bad cut, he was still somewhat competitive. This fight didn't feel that way. Moreno's evolution had him on another level. He wasn't being effected moment to moment by Figueiredo's power and physicality and that really left Figgy with nowhere to go. Moreno's cardio, volume, and ability to push the pace was only going to have those late rounds trending more and more in his favor. For someone who's not necessarily the biggest Moreno fan ever, I'm as excited to see him fight again as I've ever been.
As for the next move, it seems pretty set that Moreno will be fighting Alexandre Pantoja next. Pantoja has sort of been the true number one contender for awhile now, but has been the odd man out due to the back and forth between Figgy and Moreno. On top of having earned the number one contender status, Pantoja also has history with Moreno and has already beaten him twice in the past. That really is all he needs to earn this fight. Since Kai Kara-France lost to Moreno last year and Askar Askarov has left the promotion, Pantoja really is the no brainer choice here. Pantoja is also almost a guarantee to put on an exciting fight, so that is only another thing working in his favor.
Deiveson Figueiredo really didn't look all that great in this one, at least compared to the version from a few years ago. That guy was dismantling Joe Benavidez and Alex Perez like it was nothing. This version of Figgy wasn't as good as that and wasn't even as good as the previous three Moreno fights. I think his age started to catch up to him and combined with the years of tough weight cuts, he just didn't have the same level at his disposal. He didn't look or feel nearly as explosive or dangerous. His power didn't seem the same. His volume was really down. Even his grappling and submission game didn't feel like it was there. His best moment was the guillotine attempt, but because Moreno was so calm, it didn't even feel like it was that close to finishing. Given what we saw, it is clearly the right time for Figgy to make the move the bantamweight. There's really no route to him to fight for the title again and the weight cut is just too much for him at this stage of his career. It's probably the most exciting and interesting thing for him to do as well, so that's good from a fan's perspective.
Moving to bantamweight obviously opens a wide array of possibilities for Figgy going forward. The question we don't have the answer to is how much respect is he going to get whenever he's booked. There are very real questions about how his game translates to larger opponents and how effective he can be without cutting the extra 10 lbs. He is the former champion, so it's not out of the question that he gets thrust right into the title picture, but I don't think a top 5 opponent is really in the cards. It's hard enough to get a top 5 opponent at bantamweight for guys on long win streaks, so I don't think Figgy comes in and just skips the line. From there, it depends on matchups. I don't get the vibe that Dominick Cruz is all that interested in fighting an unraked opponent from another division. Maybe the loser of Rob Font vs Adrian Yanez would make some sense for him as whoever that is could benefit from the rub they would get from fighting the former champion. I kind of think Figgy is going to be limited to that 10-15 range. Jack Shore, Said Nurmagomedov, Umar Nurmagomedov, and Chris Gutierrez are the range where I see Figgy fitting in most. I can't imagine he fights someone unraked, but anyone in the rankings gives him a hard time in my opinion. Maybe an older veteran like Pedro Munhoz is the move. That could be the type of opponent that interests Munhoz, but he's booked with Gutierrez right now. It's kind of hard to say, but I think Munhoz is probably the matchup I would want to see for him.
What do you guys think? What did you make of the fight and the finish? Who should Moreno's next defense be? Who do you want to see Figueiredo fight in his bantamweight debut? Leave any and all comments below. Thanks for reading and have a good one.
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