The fight between Belal Muhammad, and No.2 ranked Shavkat Rakhmonov was set to take place for the main event of UFC 315. However, Rakhmonov announced that he will not be ready to participate in the contest because of an injury. So the UFC decided to replace Rakhmonov with Jack Della Maddalena, who will face Belal Muhammad, now, for the welterweight title.
Belal Muhammad has had quite a run in the UFC, as he defeated Leon at UFC 304, in July of 2024, to be become the welterweight champ. His ground game was superior than that of Edwards, which he completely took advantage off to win the fight against the Brit. While Edwards initially couldn’t believe that he lost, and wanted a rematch against the champ, a loss against Sean Brady, was more than enough to keep him away from title contention, at least for some time. Now that Muhammad is the champ, he wanted to take on Shavkat Rakhmonov, who is currently undefeated in the UFC. However, since Rakhmonov was replaced by Maddalena, many fans and the media have been overlooking him, and already calling for Muhammad to win the bout.
Recently, Gilbert Burns gave his take on, why he thinks the fight is much closer than what most fans and analysts said. Let’s find out more.
Gilbert Burns, a UFC welterweight contender who’s fought Belal Muhammad, Jack Della Maddalena, and Sean Brady, stated that Maddelena is being heavily underrated going into UFC 315. Burns said, “The fight is closer than people think. JDM (Maddalena) is super underrated, people have no idea. That guy hits so hard, and his jiu-jitsu is getting so much better training with Craig Jones.”
Muhammad is currently -250 favorite to win the fight, meanwhile, Maddalena is the +200 underdog going into UFC 315. While the current welterweight champ is an extremely precise fighter in his own right, Maddalena has never lost in the UFC so far and is 7-0 in the UFC, and 17-2-0 overall. He’s finished 14 of his 17 fights so far in his MMA career, and is definitely a fighter to keep an eye on. In fact, the last time Maddalena lost an MMA fight was back in 2016! So all we’ll say is, do not expect Maddalena to be an extremely easy challenge for Muhammad at UFC 315.
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