The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is all set to kickstart 2024 with a bang. The anticipation is building for UFC Fight Night 234, scheduled for this Saturday, at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas.
The headline event? A light heavyweight rematch between Magomed Ankalaev and Johnny Walker. It’s a fight that’s teetering on the edge of necessary and unnecessary. Ankalaev seemed to have the previous win in the bag before it ended in a no contest.
But the night isn’t just about them. There are other exciting match-ups on the card. For instance, the flyweight co-main event features Matheus Nicolau and Manel Kape. And then there’s the bantamweight showcase that pits Ricky Simon against Mario Bautista. These are well-crafted fights with high stakes in two of UFC’s most competitive divisions.
And of course, who can forget Jim Miller? Always a crowd favorite, he’s back in action, making his record 43rd trip to the Octagon against Gabriel Benitez. Add in an intriguing bout involving eternal prospect Phil Hawes, and you’ve got a tightly-packed five-fight table setter for UFC 297.
Now, let’s move on to the UFC Fight Night 234 “Ankalaev vs. Walker 2” preview.
In the light heavyweight category, we have Magomed Ankalaev (17-1-1, 9-1-1 UFC) up against Johnny Walker (21-7, 7-4 UFC). Ankalaev is arguably the most skilled light heavyweight in the world, but his journey to the title has been riddled with detours. He made his UFC debut in 2018, showing off solid striking and the ability to maul opponents on the mat.
Ankalaev’s debut was dominant until Paul Craig managed to latch on a desperation triangle choke, scoring a submission with just one second left in the fight. Despite this stunning result, Ankalaev rebounded with patient but dominant wins. However, his career took a strange turn in 2020.
He was matched with Ion Cutelaba, an interesting test. Ankalaev was comfortable in a slow-paced fight, while Cutelaba was expected to bring chaos. Ankalaev kept up and knocked Cutelaba out in a 38-second sprint. But Cutelaba quickly recovered, claiming he was exaggerating his wobbliness to lure Ankalaev into a trap.
A rematch was planned but kept falling apart due to the coronavirus pandemic. When it finally happened, Ankalaev quickly knocked Cutelaba out again, proving that most of the last year had been somewhat of a waste. Ankalaev kept winning, though he looked less and less inspiring as he moved up the ladder. He was better than everyone he faced, but he was content to neutralize his opponents in fights that rarely proved entertaining.
Still, wins were wins, and Ankalaev found himself in a title fight against Jan Blachowicz at the end of 2022. It ended up as a slow-paced affair that he probably did enough to win. However, the decision came in as a split draw and left the title vacant. The UFC quickly moved on from both Ankalaev and Blachowicz to crown a new champion.
Ankalaev was left to rebound against Walker in what seemed like a winnable fight in October. Walker’s size could prove intimidating, but Ankalaev figured to have the tools to exploit the many holes in the Brazilian’s game. He found an opening to get the ball rolling towards a first-round finish—until an illegal knee ended the fight in a no contest, temporarily stalling Ankalaev’s career once again and resulting in an immediate rematch.
As for Walker, he has been on his own long and winding path since making it to the UFC in 2018. Walker earned his contract with an ugly win over UFC vet Henrique da Silva on Dana White’s Contender Series, and there was not much reason for optimism about his UFC career save for his athletic potential.
As such, it was a shock when it took Walker all of four months to become a breakout star. He scored quick knockouts of Khalil Rountree, Justin Ledet, and Misha Cirkunov in that span, all while showing off the strange charisma that has continued to endear him to fans. However, that proved to be a bit of a high-water mark for Walker in terms of hype.
He managed to injure himself in his post-fight celebration following the Cirkunov win and hit a clear ceiling upon his recovery, getting knocked out by Corey Anderson and outwrestled by Nikita Krylov. After another injury layoff, his 2021 return against Thiago Santos showed a fighter clearly overcompensating for his prior issues.
No longer his typical whirlwind, Walker was one-half of one of the worst fights in recent memory, staying at range and constantly feinting while throwing out very little in terms of actual offense. Walker eventually came out of the wilderness and put together three straight wins leading into the first Ankalaev fight, but the magic does seem to be gone a bit.
Wins over Cutelaba and Craig mostly saw those opponents quickly implode on their own, and a decision victory over Anthony Smith showed that Walker can consistently commit to range offense but never ramp up past a simmer. With all that said, being an absolutely gigantic light heavyweight willing to peck at opponents from a distance could prove quite fruitful in a division that generally lacks technical depth.
Yet given how the first fight went between these two—and how badly Walker reacted once Ankalaev was able to penetrate his defenses—it is hard not to see the Russian breaking this fight open at some point and scoring a one-sided win. The pick is Ankalaev via second-round knockout.
Continue Reading »
Ankalaev vs. Walker
Kape vs. Nicolau
Miller vs. Benitez
Simon vs. Bautista
Ferreira vs. Hawes
The Prelims.