It's a tough sport. Volk found himself in an almost identical exchange earlier in the fight and clinched Ilia's head, this time he got sloppy and threw an off balance sort of counter hook and paid the ultimate price. Easy for me to say sitting on a couch but you gotta know the second you get in a phone booth exchange with Ilia you gotta either clinch, or cover up and circle out.
Volk is certainly deserving of an immediate rematch, and this probably isn't even fair, but I feel like the Islam loss hurts his case. It's just bad optics. He's the greatest FW of all-time, but he's coming off two short finishes.
I had a feeling Whittaker would get rocked but win a 29-28. Didn't think it would be that perfect and that flush of a kick though. Unbelievable he was able to survive that.
Merab really feels like Khabib at 135. I'm not a big O'Malley fan so I hope after he beats Chito we see him and Merab.
Obviously Ilia's Conor call-out won't come to fruition, but it popped into my head as well just because they both have power that 45ers just don't possess. I can't see Ilia losing to anyone outside of a Khabib/Merab type fighter.
This was the best card for me in quite some time.