"It's ridiculous" - UFC analyst delivers ice cold warning about Islam Makhachev's middleweight aspirations

Islam Makhachev defended his UFC lightweight title for the fourth time at UFC 311 in a dominant show against Renato Moicano. Now, the 33-year-old has expressed his aspirations to fight for a second belt in another division. However, UFC analyst has warned Makhachev for his next move.

Makhachev's close friend Belal Muhammad reigns as the champion of the welterweight division. Hence, Makhachev isn't expected to clash with Muhammad and could directly move to the middleweight division.

However, Alan Jouban doesn't feel very impressed by such an idea. Talking to MMA journalist Mike Bohn on the episode 17 of The Bohnfire podcast, Jouban said that the idea of Makhachev moving up to the middleweight division is "ridiculous."

"I think he is going to be a champion for a while. The toughest test the division has against him, as much as I love Charles Oliveira, I just don't think his grappling is as strong as Islam's, I hope he stays in the division and sets records. We're talking about him going up. What's he gonna do? He's not gonna fight Belal, so he's gonna skip to 185, I don't wanna see that."

Jouban added:

"It's ridiculous! Nah, I don't want to see it. I like to see guys at their weight do dominant things and set records and that's when we talk about greatness."

Check out Alan Jouban's comments on Islam Makhachev's potential move to the middleweight division below (53:16):

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Chael Sonnen praised Islam Makhachev's demeanor at UFC 311 despite Umar Nurmagomedov's loss

Chael Sonnen lauded Islam Makhachev for his calm and composed demeanor at UFC 311. Makhachev entered the octagon to face Renato Moicano right after watching his undefeated teammate Umar Nurmagomedov suffer the first loss of his career in the co-main event against Merab Dvalishvili.

'The American Gangster' highlighted Makhachev's mental strength in the fight in an interaction with Daniel Cormier on their Good Guy / Bad Guy podcast. He said:

"Umar has never lost before, I wasn't sure when that fight was over that he lost, he was gonna be very close. He was a three and quarter favorite. I mean this was an unthinkable thing that Umar was gonna lose, and the energy that would have been sucked out of that room, no matter how stoic you wanted to be, and no matter how you wanted to rise to the occasion, you didn't have time."

Sonnen added:

"The sucked all the energy out of your team, the tones are different, the looks are different, the voice of his coaches are going to be different, they just failed. And he regrouped, and he was a different guy by the way, I thought he was gonna be different in a negative way, I thought this is gonna hurt him, it turned out that the anger really helped to serve him, but either way that was a different Islam."

Check out Chael Sonnen's comments on Islam Makhachev below: