Belal Muhammad explains why he switched his prediction for Sean O’Malley vs. Merab Dvalishvili at UFC 306: “If you’d have asked me maybe a month ago..”

Belal Muhammad has explained why he’s switched his prediction for this weekend’s main event between Sean O’Malley and Merab Dvalishvili.

Tomorrow night, Sean O’Malley will defend his UFC bantamweight championship against Merab Dvalishvili. In the eyes of many, this contest is just too close to call.

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They have very different styles and when they come together, nobody really knows who is going to get the upperhand. Either way, though, we’re expecting a fun fight at the Sphere.

During a recent podcast appearance, UFC welterweight champion Belal Muhammad gave his official prediction.

Muhammad backs O’Malley

“If you’d have asked me maybe a month ago, I would say Merab’s gonna wrestle, and Merab is on another level,” Muhammad said. “Especially with his last fight, beating Cejudo the way he did, but I’ve swayed—I’m picking O’Malley in this fight. I think he’s a sharpshooter; he’s so good at moving laterally. Merab gets hit a lot in a lot of his fights, and he’s been rocked a lot. He’s a ‘Machine’, so he’ll walk through those punches, but I just think that O’Malley hits differently than anybody he’s fought.”

“He has so much confidence after knocking out Aljo, who I think has better striking than Merab. Merab is very wild when he runs in, and even with his takedowns, he’ll sacrifice defense just to shoot in and grab a hold of you. Once he grabs a hold of you, it’s gonna be a long night, but I think that O’Malley has been training for him. He knows how to do that back step. I think I see Merab walking into something.”

“Merab has just been posting. I think he’s been doing too much social media, thinking about promoting and being a character instead of training hard for the fight. You’re getting stitches, you’re showing you’re getting stitches, then you’re taking them out with scissors, then you’re drinking in Mexico, and you’re showing all of this stuff that does not need to be documented.

“All of this stuff does not need to be posted. But I think now he’s in that social media mindset where it’s not about the hunger anymore. It’s not, ‘This is my first time getting this title shot; it took me this long to get here; I can’t let the opportunity pass me up.’ It’s, ‘Let me show the UFC that I can be sold. I can sell myself. I can do this,’ and you’re thinking about other stuff instead of the goal, which is to win the fight.”

Quotes via MMA News

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