Kamaru Usman defended his welterweight title on Sunday with an emphatic knockout victory over former teammate Gilbert Burns at UFC 258.
The win means that Usman breaks Georges St. Pierre’s record for 12 consecutive victories in the welterweight division. The Nigerian Nightmare finished Burns 34 seconds into the third round after being knocked down for the first time in his UFC career in the early stages of the first round.
This is now his 13th consecutive win in the UFC and his third title defence with wins over Jorge Masvidal, Colby Covington, Gilbert Burns, Tyron Woodley and Rafael Dos Anjos last in his five fights.
The crucial talking point was Usman’s ability to use his dominant hand after switching to a southpaw stance. The deciding punch which dropped Burns was through a right-hand jab, and Herb Dean jumped in to stop the beating Usman’s ground and pound.
Burns entered the fight on a four-fight win streak at welterweight with two performance of the night victories over Tyron Woodley and Demian Maia.
After the fight was stopped, Usman made his way over to one of the cameras saying “put some respect on my name.”
“How do you beat that,” Joe Rogan added post-fight and with a stacked resume having beaten the top contenders, there really isn’t many matchups left for the champion.
Unlike Rogan, Kamaru had Jorge Masvidal on his mind, calling out the Cuban American despite having already beaten him on fight island. Their first fight ended in a dominant unanimous decision victory for the Nigerian, with Masvidal taking the bout on six-days notice.
When talking about Masvidal in his post-fight interview, Usman said, “The only reason this man took the fight is because it was on six days’ notice and he had a built-in excuse.”
“I’ll give you a whole training camp, and I guarantee you won’t sign on that dotted line because this time I’m going to finish [you].”
Whether Usman fights Masvidal next or takes on the Colby Covington rematch, his quest for greatness continues. His ability to take on adversity and dominate his opponents ever since entering the octagon has proven that he is one of the sport’s biggest names.
One name that could be thrown into the mix is Leon Edwards. Again, an opponent Usman has already beaten, but this was in 2015, and since then, the Englishman has not lost a single fight going on an eight-fight win streak. He was due to face rising star Khamzat Chimaev in December, January and March with all three contests being cancelled due to COVID related issues.
Edwards is still keen to fight on the 13th of March without an opponent being announced; however, if Dana is willing to offer the Brit a fight with Usman for the title, he will likely forego his desire to keep his spot on the fight card.
