Daniel Cormier and Chael Sonnen astonished at Alex Pereira's rapid rise in the UFC: "He's amazing"

Alex Pereira was recently praised by former UFC fighters-turned-analysts Daniel Cormier and Chael Sonnen. The pair discussed 'Poatan's' rise to MMA superstardom on a recent episode of their Good Guy / Bad Guy show on ESPN MMA's YouTube channel.

They spoke about Pereira's debut as a pivotal point in UFC history given what the Brazilian knockout artist has gone on to accomplish in relatively short order. Neither man could help but fawn over the reigning UFC light heavyweight champion, who is on a tear:

"I know we praise Pereira a lot here, Chael. But when you put it into perspective, he really did only start three years ago, so as we headed to New York City, we gotta go back to that night where you go, 'Okay, he got a double knee [knockout],' but the guy never tried to take him down. My anticipation or expectation was the next fight he would get a wrestler that would take him down and then he would flame out. That hasn't happened and I'm happy it hasn't, because he's amazing."

This led to Sonnen praising Pereira's ability to transition to MMA from kickboxing and find historic levels of success:

"This is a sports story, this is not just an MMA story. What Alex Pereira is doing at 36 years old, Daniel. He's going to be 37 in just a minute and he's gone and he's won the belt in a brand new sport in two different divisions. He's locked himself in as a future Hall of Famer."

Check out Daniel Cormier and Chael Sonnen praise Alex Pereira (26:41):

Pereira was recently rumored to be an option for a short-notice main event at UFC 310, which lost its headliner following Belal Muhammad's withdrawal from his welterweight title defense against Shavkat Rakhmonov due to injury.

However, this was subsequently shot down, and Pereira isn't scheduled to fight again in 2024.

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Alex Pereira's accomplishments since signing with the UFC

Alex Pereira's first UFC fight took place on Nov. 6, 2021. In three short years, he defeated five different UFC champions, knocking out all of them besides Jan Błachowicz, whom he beat via split decision.

He also fought thrice in very short order in 2024, stepping in on short-notice to save both UFC 300 and UFC 303, before demolishing Khalil Rountree Jr. at UFC 307.