5 questions that could be answered at UFC 311: Islam Makhachev vs. Arman Tsarukyan 2

This weekend sees the first pay-per-view event of 2025. UFC 311 is set to go down in Inglewood, California, and it's a loaded card.

UFC 311: Islam Makhachev vs. Arman Tsarukyan features two title bouts, as well as other key fights. So, naturally, there are plenty of questions heading in.

Will we actually get answers to these questions, or will the event throw even more things into flux? Right now it's impossible to say.

For now, though, here are five questions that could be answered at UFC 311: Islam Makhachev vs. Arman Tsarukyan 2.

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#5. Will the UFC be forced to change venue at the last minute?

UFC 311 is supposed to take place at the Intuit Dome in Inglewood, California. The event will mark the promotion's first trip to Inglewood since December 2018 and will be their first at the Intuit Dome.

However, as the world is well aware, Southern California is currently suffering from a series of devastating wildfires that have laid waste to swathes of the area, including Greater Los Angeles.

While the Intuit Dome has not been directly affected by this catastrophe, a number of events scheduled for the venue have already been canceled.

So will UFC 311 really go ahead as planned? Right now, that appears to be the case. However, with two days still to go before the pay-per-view, plans could still change.

Dana White has claimed that the event will go ahead in Inglewood as planned.

However, White has been known to change plans before. He's already suggested that if the Intuit Dome is a no-go, then Las Vegas would be the alternative, with either the T-Mobile Arena or the UFC APEX mooted as potential venues.

If this is the case, it would be ironic. The promotion's last trip to Inglewood was actually a last-minute switch from Las Vegas, as headliner Jon Jones failed to secure a licence to fight from the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

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#4. Will Payton Talbott live up to his billing as UFC 311's biggest betting favorite?

According to the latest odds at DraftKings, UFC 311's biggest betting favorite is not a champion like Islam Makhachev or a former titleholder like Jiri Prochazka. Instead, the fighter most heavily favored to win this weekend is bantamweight prospect Payton Talbott.

The graduate of Dana White's Contender Series is currently a -1200 favorite to beat Raoni Barcelos, who has odds of +750 to win.

On the surface, such wide odds are understandable. Talbott, who has drawn comparisons to former bantamweight champ Sean O'Malley, has looked fantastic in his UFC career thus far. He's 3-0, and scored two incredible knockouts last year.

Barcelos, though, has 23 fights to his name, more than double the amount on Talbott's record. And while he's lost to the likes of O'Malley and Umar Nurmagomedov, he does have some big wins too, over Said Nurmagomedov and Chris Gutierrez.

Whether this experience can help the Brazilian is debatable, but as such a big betting favorite, Talbott will likely be feeling the pressure.

So can he live up to the billing or will he falter under the spotlight? Hopefully it's a question that will be answered this weekend.

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#3. Can Jiri Prochazka draw Jamahal Hill into a firefight?

While it isn't receiving as much hype as the two title fights at the top of UFC 311, the light heavyweight bout between Jiri Prochazka and Jamahal Hill is still an outstanding clash.

Both men have held the 205-pound title in recent years, and although both suffered bad knockouts at the hands of Alex Pereira last year, they're still very viable contenders.

The big question coming into this one surrounds what kind of fight it will turn out to be.

Hill, a rangy striker, would clearly be advised to take a similar approach as he did in his win over Glover Teixeira. If he can keep Prochazka on the end of his strikes, pick him apart from the outside and avoid taking too much damage, he could find a path to victory.

That kind of approach is never easy against 'BJP', though. The Czech fighter has the ability to draw his foes into wild brawls like few others, as we saw when he destroyed Aleksandar Rakic in the second round of their clash last year.

The big issue for Hill may be the fact that Prochazka actually matches him in the reach department. This could well make staying on the outside difficult for 'Sweet Dreams'.

Hill has the power to knock Prochazka out, but a brawl simply doesn't favor him. Whether he can avoid such a fight, then, is a key question for this weekend.

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#2. Will Merab Dvalishvili and Umar Nurmagomedov cancel each other's wrestling out?

UFC 311's co-headliner will see bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili make the first defense of his crown, as he takes on top contender Umar Nurmagomedov.

Not only is this a battle that pits an undefeated challenger against a champ riding an eleven-fight win streak dating back to 2018, but it is also a clash of two of the best wrestlers in the UFC.

Dvalishvili is a bullying fighter who loves to stick to his foes like glue and beat them up from the clinch and on the ground. No fighter in bantamweight history has bettered his number of 72 takedowns in the octagon.

Nurmagomedov, though, is a fantastic wrestler who trains with Khabib Nurmagomedov and Islam Makhachev. His takedown accuracy - 54.6% - is higher than Dvalishvili's, and he recently outgrappled the very tough Cory Sandhagen.

We've seen on numerous occasions before, though, that when two fantastic grapplers face off, their wrestling is cancelled out and we instead get a striking contest.

If that's the case here, then it's arguable that Nurmagomedov should be favored. Given he's never fought at this level, though, it's diffcult to pick him.

Overall, then, the question of who comes out on top in the wrestling department here - or whether neither man does - is one of the bigger ones going into this weekend's event.

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#1. Has Arman Tsarukyan evolved enough to beat Islam Makhachev?

Back in 2019, before Islam Makhachev climbed to the top of the UFC's lightweight division, the promotion often struggled to find opponents willing to face him.

With no big-name opponent ready to step up that April, then, the matchmakers instead turned to a then-unknown Arman Tsarukyan.

Just 22 years old at the time, the Armenian held an impressive record of 13-1, but was widely expected to be fodder for Makhachev.

Instead, he gave the Dagestani one of his toughest ever fights, engaging in multiple grappling exchanges with him and often managing to secure dominant positions.

In the end, Makhachev squeezed out a tight decision win, but it was clear that he'd been pushed hard.

In the years that have followed, Makhachev has beaten a further nine opponents, claiming the 155-pound title along the way. He's beaten legends, and has defended his title successfully three times.

However, only a couple of fighters have tested him like Tsarukyan did.

Tsarukyan, of course, has improved dramatically since then. Not only is he still a very dangerous grappler, but his striking has come on in leaps and bounds, and he now holds four knockout wins in the octagon.

The big question, then, is whether the Armenian has evolved enough to be able to defeat Makhachev this time around.

If he can not only hang in there with Makhachev in the grappling department as he did before, but also land some heavy blows standing, then he's got a huge chance to win this fight.

There are still questions around Tsarukyan, of course, notably over his ability in a five round bout. It might well be fair to argue, though, that he stands the best chance of dethroning Makhachev of any of his recent foes.