UFC president Dana White appeared recently on the SHOUT! The Buffalo Football Podcast, and picked three fighters to keep your eye on in 2021.
Obviously, Khamzat [Chimaev], said White. What I love about that kid is that he wants to fight all the time. The guys that are as good as him and want to fight all the time, not everybody wants to fight him, so it’s tough to make fights. You sprinkle some COVID on top of that and here we are. Everybody was asking this weekend why he pulled out of the fight. He got COVID. He’s a savage. He tried to get back in the gym and train through it but I guess his lungs didn’t respond well, so the doctor wants him to take some time off until he trains again. He doesn’t even want him to start training until sometime in January.
So you’ve got him – Kevin Holland. Another guy like Chimaev, wants to fight all the time. The kid went 5-0 in 2020. He’s fun, he’s exciting. Good looking kid. And then another one would be Joaquin Buckley, who had in 2020 — not in 2020, but ever — he had one of the most viral moments ever in UFC history with that knockout he had [vs . Impa Kasangay href=”https://www.mixedmartialarts.com/fighter/Impa-Kasanganay:B41ADA6E8A660EB8/” target=”” class=”tpd-prodfile-search”].
KO of the Year! 🔓
Go all angles on @NewMansa94's masterpiece 😳
[ #UFCFightIsland5 | #InAbuDhabi | @VisitAbuDhabi ] pic.twitter.com/1ywVZzin5U
— UFC (@ufc) October 10, 2020
Those are just three. We’re putting together this piece right now for the contender series and the amount of talent that’s coming off that show is phenomenal. And that’s just three guys out of many.
Dana White’s breakout fighters of the year went a combined 10-1 in 2020, with the sole loss being Buckley to Holland.
UG, who is your breakout fighter of the year 2020? Did Dana’s list do it, or do you have another name?
h/t Jed Meshew for MMA Fighting
