A broken hand for Francisco Rivera has caused the cancellation of his UFC 170 fight with Raphael Assuncao. You might think ‘big deal’. And why not? Neither man has a big name in the Ultimate Fighting Championship and I’d be willing to bet a lot of hardcore MMA couldn’t even pick either one out of a line up. Despite the relative anonymity of both men, their fight was set to be an important contest in the bantamweight division.
Renan Barão just defended his 135 pound title against Urijah Faber and by doing so scored yet another win over a top-five ranked fighter. He has now lain waste to four of the top six contenders in the division and with Dominick Cruz out of the picture for now, there is a real lack of viable contenders.
Enter Assuncao. He’s ranked #3 and the only man with anything approaching a claim to be the next contender. Don’t take my word for it, here’s what he had to say about the matter to MMA Fighting:
“I want my shot against Barao,” he said. “I’m the only undefeated bantamweight that hasn’t fought for the title yet. I’m the No. 3 in the division. I’ll ask the boss for this fight.”
“Dominick [Cruz] is hurt. Urijah [Faber], Eddie Wineland and Michael McDonald already fought Barao, and I can do a different fight with him.”
That’s exactly the argument I would have made. Assuncao is a different fighter at bantamweight. He is 5-0 after dropping a weight class and leaving a patchy run at featherweight in his rear-view mirror. Officially he beat #5-ranked TJ DIllashaw (although many people would argue against that) in his last, fight-of-the-night outing at UFN 29 and none of the rest of the top 10 have a real case. Iuri Alcantara is 1-1-1 and coming off a loss, Mike Easton is 0-3 in his last three and Takeya Mizugaki’s best win is over #12 Erik Perez.
It’s not the ideal situation, but Assuncao is the clear choice to face the champ next. Dana White and co. had better book that fight in a Brazilian arena though, because almost no-one is going to care less about it Stateside.
