One of the things Islam Makhachev does better than anybody in fighting is to smash glass slippers and roll around in the shards.
Renato Moicano was enjoying a beautiful moment in a game he’s never ruled heading into UFC 311, and for a 24-hour period Moicano collected as many accolades as he could before stepping in for the injured Arman Tsarukyan to face Makhachev. What a story it made for the 35-year-old veteran to get his chance out of the blue. What a story it would have made if he won the lightweight title against all odds.
Yet we all know Cinderella has no place in MMA. Makhachev took Moicano out late in the first round in the sparkling new Intuit Dome in Los Angeles, in what almost felt like a ritualistic slaughter. A D’Arce choke that made him tap in a panic, and a sequence that will play on a loop in his mind for a long, long time. We kind of knew what was coming beforehand, which is a polite way of saying we knew exactly what was coming.
Because we’d seen it before.
We saw it with Dustin Poirier, who had — like Moicano — upset Benoit Saint Denis and emerged as one of the feel-good stories of 2024. Poirier was enjoying the kind of renaissance you almost never see in the UFC, and his reluctance to go gently into that good night was inspiring. The narratives before UFC 302 were poetic from just about any angle. But when he stepped in with Makhachev, that particular daydream got dark in a hurry. He lasted until the fifth round, but he was being overwhelmed from the opening moments. Succumbing, minute by brutal minute. Until he tapped.
