Preview: UFC 316 ‘Dvalishvili vs. O'Malley 2’

The Octagon lands in Newark for UFC 316, and it's a big night for both bantamweight divisions. Merab Dvalishvili takes on Sean O'Malley in the headliner to see who reigns over what might be the sport's best division, and on the women's side, Kayla Harrison looks to continue her successful UFC campaign by unseating Julianna Pena. And further down the card, former Bellator champion Patrick “Patchy” Mix makes his long-anticipated UFC debut and has a chance to mark himself as an immediate contender with a win over the surging Mario Bautista. Past that are two other well-matched fights to round out the card; Joe Pyfer looks to announce himself while Kelvin Gastelum looks to stay relevant at middleweight, and a welterweight pairing of Vicente Luque and Kevin Holland is a fun matchup that could go any number of ways.

UFC Men’s Bantamweight Championship
Merab Dvalishvili (19-4) vs. Sean O'Malley (18-2, 1 NC)
Odds: Dvalishvili (-285), O'Malley (+230)

Merab Dvalishvili's bantamweight title reign continues to be a fascinating bit of business, as "The Machine" continues breaking the conventional limits of mixed martial arts while lording over what might be the UFC's best division. Dvalishvili earned his UFC contract in 2017 with a quick spinning backfist knockout of Raufeon Stots, which was a bit of false advertising in a sense; that result does accurately reflect the Georgian's often wild and aggressive approach, but he's almost never been a high-level knockout threat at any point in his career. In fact, it was Dvalishvili's lack of striking output that cost him his UFC debut against Frankie Saenz, which saw Dvalishvili fight with what's become his signature takedown-heavy approach but still lose a split decision. After another controversial loss to Ricky Simon, Dvalishvili finally got back in the win column against Terrion Ware, and since that point it's been off to the races as Dvalishvili has now won twelve straight fights. Dvalishvili has proven impossible for opponents to shake as he constantly sells out on his wrestling attack, which has impressively gotten even more relentless as he's faced stronger competition and become a five-round fighter; his first UFC main event, a 2023 victory over Petr Yan, saw Dvalishvili attempt 49 takedowns and 401 strikes - a pace that borders on inhuman. Concerning most fighters with such a wrestling-heavy approach, the conventional wisdom is that strong defensive wrestling will eventually pay off with some sort of gain, whether it's tiring a wrestler out or simply discouraging them to try other options after their lack of success. With Dvalishvili, those rules just don't apply, something made most evident in Dvalishvili's last title defense against Umar Nurmagomedov; Nurmagomedov got off to a strong start, looked sharp everywhere and was clearly winning the first half of the fight - and still wound up absolutely exhausted against a persistent-as-ever Dvalishvili, who clearly took things over to win a unanimous decision and defend his title. Even with the bantamweight division being the UFC's best, there's not a clear contender that poses an obvious threat to Dvalishvili's reign - at least for as long as Dvalishvili is capable of doing what seems to be the physically impossible. So in the face of that, it's understandable the UFC would just run back Dvalishvili's title-winning fight against Sean O'Malley from this past September.

In contrast to Dvalishvili's long road, O'Malley had a bit of a curated path to championship contention, even if "Suga" did extremely well to meet the moment whenever he needed to step up. O'Malley was a clear standout on the first edition of the Contender Series, and the UFC clearly agreed, pushing O'Malley into prominent spots while marketing him as a future star. But things got completely derailed after O'Malley's second UFC fight, a decision win over Andre Soukhamthath; beyond a major foot injury suffered in the fight, O'Malley dealt with some minor snags in his drug testing that eventually kept him out of action for over two years. On the plus side, O'Malley looked like one of the sharpest strikers in the sport upon his return, stringing together some quick knockouts with impressive accuracy - until a loss to Marlon "Chito" Vera, which saw Vera injure O'Malley's legs with some kicks and raise more worries that O'Malley might not be durable enough to reach his full potential. After that, the UFC clearly slow-played O'Malley in his rise up the ranks, giving him a few showcase matchups in 2021 before a forgivable next step up against Pedro Munhoz to kick off 2022. O'Malley's performance against Munhoz wasn't particularly great, as he looked overly cautious up until the point that an eye poke ended the fight in a no contest, but the UFC still decided it was time for O'Malley to sink or swim, as he was subsequently thrown into the deep end for a fight against Yan. Conventional wisdom was that Yan's violent and aggressive game would tear through O'Malley, but it wound up being a hard-fought effort that saw both men find a ton of success, with O'Malley landing enough offense to stem the tide before Yan could break the fight open. Most observers felt that Yan won a close but tough affair, but those observers didn't include the judges, who gave O'Malley the split decision and the UFC enough cover to rocket O'Malley into a title fight against Aljamain Sterling. After a slow feeling-out process, O'Malley obliterated Sterling for a second-round knockout to seemingly give the UFC champion they always wanted, and O'Malley's first title defense against Vera only raised his stock further; O'Malley kept up his sharp and accurate striking for five rounds in a dominant performance, looking like he turned the corner from top bantamweight to one of the truly elite fighters in the sport. That made his title defense against Dvalishvili one of the most fascinating fights the UFC could put on when it came around this past September - so with that backdrop, the bout itself was a clear disappointment. Dvalishvili did Dvalishvili things for the most part, but it was a baffling showing from O'Malley. Once Dvalishvili found some wrestling success, O'Malley's game seemed to totally break apart; the striking output that figured to be the base of his approach was suddenly gone, and O'Malley seemed more reliant on attempting to time Dvalishvili's entries and landing knockout blows rather than defending the ever-present wrestling threat. O'Malley did seem to finally find a bit of a groove near the end of the fight, but by then things were clearly in Hail Mary territory. Given the dynamic of that first fight, Dvalishvili almost certainly has to be the pick here, but in a way O'Malley's terrible performance might actually be a strong sign for this rematch, if only because it was so uncharacteristic; there are so many basic adjustments that O'Malley can make that also line up with what he typically likes to do, whether it's simply throwing more offense or - and this is amazing to say, given the opponent - be more prepared for Dvalishvili to hunt for takedowns. Add in that Dvalishvili does like to waste his time on the feet at times, and a bounce-back performance from O'Malley could lead to a ton of damage that figures to win rounds, if not an outright knockout. But even with all those obvious and potentially fruitful improvements that O'Malley can make on paper, the fact is that Dvalishvili completely took him out of his game in their first fight - so the safest bet is that he does so again here. The pick is Dvalishvili via decision.

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Dvalishvili vs. O'Malley
Pena vs. Harrison
Gastelum vs. Pyfer
Bautista vs. Mix
Luque vs. Holland
The Prelims