Petr Yan remains the standard at 135 pounds after putting his rivalry with Merab Dvalishvili to rest at UFC 333 on Saturday in Abu Dhabi.
The UFC bantamweight champion settled the score in the evening’s co-main event trilogy bout. After Dvalishvili’s patented pressure game overwhelmed him in the first two rounds, Yan rallied to win the final three with crisp boxing and lethal body kicks. His unanimous decision victory put him up 2-1 in the series against Dvalishvili after he reclaimed the title from “The Machine” a year ago in an even more dominant effort.
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In the immediate aftermath of Yan’s win, thoughts swirled about who would challenge “No Mercy” next. While another rematch seems obvious, UFC Hall of Famer and commentator Daniel Cormier’s suggested challenger wasn’t the one everyone expected — including former UFC champion Sean O’Malley and his coach Tim Welch.
Cormier suggested a rematch between Song Yadong and Yan in the champion’s post-fight interview, with Song sitting cageside and having recently scored a huge knockout of Umar Nurmagomedov at UFC Shanghai in August. Yan previously defeated Song via a unanimous decision in March 2024. Yet O’Malley seems like the most obvious next contender after his past wins over Song and Yan, which is why Welch was so confused.
On Monday’s edition of “The Ariel Helwani Show,” Welch said he was confused by the suggestion and plans to talk to Cormier about it.
“If you look back this year, ‘Sugar’ has his hand raised in a unanimous decision versus Song Yadong,” Welch told Uncrowned. “Then UFC 299, Petr Yan has his hand raised against Song Yadong. So I’m curious if someone was in Daniel Cormier’s ear because Song was there, but I don’t think that was the case. I think ‘DC’ was pushing for Song because maybe deep down ‘Suge’ rubs him the wrong way.
“Past little comments. I don’t know. We’re going to get to the bottom of it when I talk to him. I’m curious, and I could be totally wrong with that, but it’s always seemed like ‘DC’ has a little something against ‘Sugar,’ and he doesn’t like seeing him win.
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“I think he thought that first Yan fight with ‘Suge,’ Petr Yan won because of the takedowns,” Welch added.
Ultimately, Welch isn’t concerned that his fighter will miss out on the next title shot. The first fight between Yan and O’Malley — a split decision win for O’Malley — was the Fight of the Night at UFC 280 in late 2022, and their accolades have only grown since.
“The UFC knows what the biggest fight is, and they know how sweet of a fight this is going to be,” Welch said. “And if you want to see Song and Petr fight, go watch their UFC 299 fight. It wasn’t the most exciting thing. It was still a sick fight, but I was more surprised that Petr Yan wasn’t calling for the ‘Sugar’ rematch more. If there was pay-per-view points involved, I’m sure he would have been calling for it a lot more. But now that there’s not, he sees Song Yadong as an orthodox boxer who will stand there and sit in the pocket with him.
“He thinks of ‘Suge,’ and he remembers how ‘Suge’ made him feel in that cage. He couldn’t track ‘Suge’ down. It was hard for him. That was the first time Petr’s shot [takedowns] that many times in a fight ever in his career, I’m pretty sure. I’m sure Petr Yan remembers how that felt.”
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The outcome of Yan vs. Dvalishvili 3 benefited O’Malley more than a Dvalishvili win would have. Georgia’s finest dethroned O’Malley in September 2024, then shut him down again in their rematch, leaving O’Malley on the outside looking in at a future title fight.
Although the door is now wide open for O’Malley to rematch Yan, Welch understands the dangers “Sugar” faces. He had plenty of praise for the current champion’s latest stellar showing, but still sees areas O’Malley can exploit.
“It’s scary, because [O’Malley] is one of my best friends,” Welch said. “Yeah, I’m his coach, but being locked in the cage with Petr Yan for five rounds is a scary thing, but I do think ‘Suge’ poses a lot of problems for him.”
