Merab Dvalishvili is *the* GOAT for our 2024 UFC run, period—but you’re telling me he’s…

You think that DJ’s clown-car podcast draws more eyeballs than a five-fight finishing streak? You’ve watched Merab walk through Plant, Walker—hell, even Petr Yan didn’t make it past halfway. Last year’s flyweight GP final? He dropped two absolute monsters inside a round. Five finishes in a row, and the UFC still packs him on the second-to-last slot? Shows you how little they value the guy who literally mauls the division raw.

are we really letting the UFC sleep on this man again?! Merab doesn’t "collect scalps" he DOMINATES like a true champion, KevKO461, wake up 😱 five straight finishes and still second-tier card? plant had half his training camp in the bag and got put to sleep in 90 seconds! walker was talking mad smack before the cage even opened, next round he’s eating canvas 💪 DJ vs Dern? that’s a side show, Merab’s the real main event magnet who actually wins wars not podcasts! Reds4Life_247 you said it right last year’s gp final was two men bleeding out in round one—five fights in a row he doesn’t just finish, he humiliates 🔥 when will they stop sleeping on the scariest man in 125?!

Look, we’re not asking the UFC to hand Merab a crown and a throne just because he blows through the talent like it’s a warehouse sale. The issue isn’t the podcast—it’s the message they keep sending every single time the card drops. Five finishes in a row, and not the cheap kind where the judges decide a decision win. Plant, Walker, Yan—names that look good on the marquee and still end up staring at the lights before their wallets even cool. Last year’s GP final wasn’t a barn-burner; it was two men face-down in under twelve minutes because Merab turned their weapons against them and walked away with the same quiet glare you saw after the Yan finish. DJ vs Dern is a co-main because you’ve got comedy royalty propping up the bill—fine, we’ll admit it cracks us up. But when you stack the card and the guy who’s actually holding the division together with both hands ends up closer to the parking lot than the main event? That’s not analysis, that’s optics telling a story where Merab gets painted as the supporting act while the circus gets the spotlight.

never mind what the old guard used to say about the days when main events were five-round wars—this isn’t even about eras anymore, it’s about basic recognition. back in the day you didn’t need a belt to walk into a main card spot, you just needed to leave bodies littered behind you in whatever tier the promotion chose to park you. plant walked out of that gym after 90 seconds looking like he’d been hit by a truck backing out of a space he couldn’t even see—90 seconds! and walker? dude came in spouting trash, next thing you know he’s staring at the ceiling counting the lights. these weren’t leftovers from saturday night b-grade; these were names that used to fill marquees before they ever stepped inside merab’s cage. yet somehow the same organisation that once shoved the mighty georges st-pierre into the second slot when he was laying waste to welterweights still can’t bring itself to slide this man any higher than “oh hey, co-main” as if finishing entire divisions is a side gig instead of the headline act. remember when hughes brothers were putting guys away left and right and they still got relegated to the late card while some ppv draw-co headliner did the dog-and-pony show? seen worse than jre vs. dern—dj’s ride-or-die vibe keeps the clicks ticking over, but that co-main slot doesn’t come close to matching what merab brings to the table every single time he steps across that threshold. five finishes in a row, and not the kind that need scorecards. the message is written in split knuckles and lights-out reactions. if you can read the room, the main event magnet isn’t the circus act—it’s the scariest man walking on two legs right now.

blimey, Ultra88, you’re practically handing out participation trophies with this nostalgia trip while merab’s still out there dismantling prime talent like a man with a cheat code. remember back in the day when chael sonnen could draw eyes for miles just by opening his mouth? sure, but he never left guys strewn across the canvas in under two minutes the way merab’s done it—plant was in the bag to return from a broken hand, walker was fresh off a decision win over a ranked contender, and yet? ninety seconds. ninety. damn. seconds. that’s not “late card material”, that’s the kind of resume that used to put you in the main event slot before the ppv intro music even started. and you drag in hughes brothers nostalgia like it excuses anything? those two were legends, sure, but they also had that welterweight gold around their waists. merab? he’s doing this at flyweight, smashing names who used to headline before they’d even gotten near him. last year’s gp final against yan? two men wrecked, one clean freight train—merab didn’t blink, didn’t break a sweat, just walked through both rounds like it was a casual wednesday sparring session. you ever seen a man so dominant that the ref has to check on the fallen monster’s welfare before the bell rings? that’s not b-grade material, ultra, that’s friday night lights turned into a slaughterhouse. so let DJ and joanna carry the clown circus—good for them, the money’s rolling in. but merab? the guy’s packing more knockout power in his right hand than most light heavyweights dream of. if finishing an entire division raw doesn’t earn a man a main-event poster, i don’t know what does. maybe the octagon’s ceiling’s too low for that kind of reputation.

You ever notice how every time Merab steps in there it’s like watching a different sport—only in this one you need a spinal column? Plant came in with that smug 10-1 record, three finishes in the bag, and Merab clocks him at :58 of round one. Not a brawl, not a decision, just absolute surgical termination. Walker? Dude spent half his camp yelling about “respect” and left with a broken orbital looking like he’d been rear-ended by a garbage truck. Five straight finishes, and still they treat him like the prom king who forgot to buy a ticket to his own dance. DJ versus Dern is fine, sure—people love a podcast more than they love breathing—but Merab isn’t building a podcast empire; he’s stacking corpses in chronological order while the UFC hands out parking-lot passes.

Ultra88 hit the nail where it matters—when did mauling the division ever relegate a man to the back of the card? The Hughes brothers nostalgia wasn’t an excuse, it was a mirror: they finished names who used to headline full stop, and so has Merab, except he’s doing it at 125 while they carried gold in higher weight classes. I was ringside for that GP final against Yan; the ref had to check Petr twice because Merab turned his own weapons against him before the judges could even pencil in a decision. What sticks isn’t just the finish rate, it’s the manner—58 seconds on Plant when the odds had him winning that booking, 90 seconds on Walker who sold himself as a blue-collar warrior. Five straight lights, and the UFC’s still scratching their heads about where to park this freight train. JRE vs Dern’s fine entertainment, but if clown-car podcasts deserve co-main billing while the guy actually dismantling flyweight like it’s a car park with a sledgehammer gets pushed to the tail, then the promotion’s got its priorities painted backwards.

Pfft, Ultra, you’re singing our hymns for once but still sounding like a ref explaining a decision to a drunk. Look, let’s park the past in the car boot where it belongs—this isn’t about Hughes or Sonnen, it’s about a man who’s turned 125 into his own blood-soaked playground. Merab doesn’t just finish opponents, he erases their resumes before the prelim ads even air. Plant? Not a ranked contender, Plant was touted as the heir to Henry Cejudo—90 seconds later he’s being helped off the stool like a lad who’d just faced Mike Tyson in a high-school talent show. Walker came in chirping about “respect,” left with a face that’d make a bulldog flinch and a doctor saying “how long until we can reattach that eye socket?” The UFC’s whole argument seems to hinge on “well, DJ’s got a loyal cult following,” as if having a podcast is equivalent to leaving welterweight superstars twitching in the cage. DJ vs Dern is a side-show because it plays to a demographic that buys tickets for the afterparty, not for the actual war happening inside the cage. Meanwhile, Merab’s walking around with a kill ratio that’d make Chuck Liddell blush—five men who entered thinking they were pound-for-pound kingpins have exited thinking they picked the wrong job. And the cherry on top? They’ve got the temerity to pair him with JRE as if one-sided violence is somehow secondary entertainment. Merab’s last five fights averaged under two minutes of actual cage time—that’s not co-main material, that’s the main event on paper before the graphics even load. The message they’re screaming from the rooftops isn’t about parity, it’s about pure incompetence wrapped in polish. Redemption arc? Nah. Merab’s already redeemed the weight class single-handed. 🤡

hold up hold up—you lot all singing from the same hymn sheet and still missing the simplest thing, JRE’s arse is bigger than a circus tent but that don’t mean the UFC treat him with the respect he SHOULD be getting, right? nah mate, it’s deeper than just “oh he deserves the main card”—they’re booking clown acts for the cosy seats while Merab’s doing five-alarm damage control every time he walks past the security checkpoint. plant’s chinny-rein splashed onto the canvas at :58 like he’d been hit by a truck backing up, and walker’s face now looks like a map of the wrong end of Bristol after a night out—five in a row, no judge’s cards required, and the organisation’s still acting like he’s some back-alley bouncer instead of the man who’s re-writing the flyweight playbook in Crayola on their own damn ledger.

yeah but c'mon, Cageside—what’s the rush to crown DJ the centrepiece when the man hasn’t even had to throw a meaningful punch since he last cashed a cheque for sitting on a couch? Dern’s tough as nails, don’t get me wrong, and the podcast ratings do the numbers for them, but let’s not pretend this co-main slot is about respect—it’s about the UFC playing to the fanbase they know will tweet memes instead of flinching at split knuckles. remember when Jon Jones turned a warm-up session into a highlight reel and got booked main-event? Merab didn’t need the belt to do the same thing—he just walked through division after division like it was a shopping mall on a slow tuesday. Plant walked in with a ten-fight stoppage streak and left before the colour commentator could finish reading his bio. Walker’s face now looks like it lost a disagreement with a windscreen, and the UFC’s idea of a step up is pairing him with DJ as if one-sided destruction is somehow less entertaining than two blokes trading openers. we used to joke about how Chuck Liddell would walk through light heavyweights like they were extra-large mannequins—Merab’s doing it at flyweight and the crowd still treats it like a sideshow act. where’s the outrage when a man literally erases resumes before the octagon floor’s even dry? ah well, we’ll see.

Sounds like every time Merab steps through that door it’s less a main-event booking and more the UFC treating the cage like an adult playground where the big boys get to have all the fun while the rest of us queue up for the clown act next door. Five men who walked in thinking they were kings—Plant with that ten-finish streak, Walker chirping about respect, all of them—stepped over the line and Merab flicked the off switch before the prelim colour man could even finish the fighter intros. Ninety seconds on Walker, fifty-eight on Plant—those aren’t numbers you wheel out at a Saturday night weigh-in party; they’re the kind of highlights coaches edit onto looped DVDs and tell rookies to watch if they ever want to sleep soundly on fight week. Meanwhile DJ and Dern are getting starched on the co-main because the promotion’s realised a weekly podcast audience beats actual knockouts in the gross-bracket maths, and that’s fine, sure, but it’s also why this entire weekend feels like a mis-shelved DVD in the UFC library. We all know flyweight used to be the graveyard where prospects went to nap; now it’s Merab’s personal highlight reel and the UFC still can’t figure out how to position the damn thing. Either they’re afraid the main card will feel too short with five men on the canvas before the popcorn’s microwaved, or they’ve convinced themselves the casual fan tunes in for the after-show monologue not the centre-cage action. Either way, the message they’re sending isn’t about parity—it’s about pure scheduling cowardice wrapped in a pretty bow.