UFC 308: Don’t screw this up, UFC — take Ilia Topuria home to Spain next

The UFC needs to bring their featherweight champion home to Spain where a big Stadium show could turn him into a legitimate European superstar.

Ryan Harkness breaks down daily mixed martial arts (MMA) news, providing unique context to stories that only 15 years of obsessing over the sport can provide, having worked for FOX Sports, Yahoo! Sports, UPROXX, MSN, Bleacher Report, HDNet and CagePotato, among others, before joining MMAmania.com in 2017.

Ilia Topuria is no one hit wonder.

The featherweight champion just cemented his reign as featherweight champion by knocking out Max Holloway in the third round of their UFC 308 title fight in Abu Dhabi (watch highlights here). While Holloway was arguably up on the scorecards coming into the third round, “El Matador” kept finding a home for some massive right hands — one of which stunned “Blessed” and set up the finish of the fight.

Now Topuria has beaten the two top names at 145 pounds. He took the belt off Alexander Volkanovski in February, and now he’s beaten Max Holloway. The question of what’s next looms large for the rising star, but really what we need to be talking about is where next.

Topuria is a Georgian-born fighter who now calls Spain home. That’s a country that’s more about soccer than striking, but the top footballers from Real Madrid have taken note of Ilia’s rise to the top of the UFC. Over the past year and a half he’s been feted and celebrated as a member of sports royalty in Spain. And as this has happened, he’s kept winning ... spectacularly.

We’d like to say all eyes were on Topuria in Spain today, but the truth is the nation was undoubtedly tied up watching ‘El Clasico,’ which was on at the exact same time he fought. Bacelona trounce Real Madrid 4-0, but Madridistas can take solace in their man earning a huge highlight win over Holloway. Even Barcelona fans are cheering on Ilia, despite his allegiances.

We’ll see how that highlight spreads over the coming days, and we’ll see how Topuria is welcomed upon his return home. If his return with the belt was any indication, Ilia is about to take another massive step up in celebrity. Which brings us to my call: the UFC needs to bring the Topuria show home to Spain next.

Having a star fight in his home country is a no-brainer move from any fight promoter worth their salt. But the UFC has not had the greatest track record of pulling this off with many of their top names. Max Holloway never fought in Hawaii, the Three Kings never fought in Africa, and Conor McGregor never got his Irish stadium show. The specific economics and general attitude of the UFC have removed any impetus for them to let the tail wag the dog in that way.

The UFC is keen on keeping business as usual. The bean counters lay out the schedule and give preference to cities that pay site fees to attract the promotion. That’s why smart money is on Ilia Topura fighting Alexander Holloway in Sydney next year — the Australian government pays good money for UFC to come down under, and they get the big fights.

When asked multiple times during pressers for UFC 308, UFC CEO Dana White hedged on the promotion going to Spain.

“Yes, we’re working on Spain. We’ll get to Spain as soon as possible,” he said. “The problem with Spain is the arenas are packed up. As soon as an arena opens up, we’ll be there.”

On it’s face it’s a fair enough logistical issue, but are we really suggesting that there are no venues in Spain that the UFC can book in four to five months? If they were shooting for Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, then we’d buy that there are some scheduling issues you can’t work through with some business meetings and maybe a little extra cash exchanging hands.

But these days the UFC is pretty insistent that the money flows their way when it comes to their traveling show.

That’s a smart business method in general, but when you have a man who is starting to look like another Conor McGregor emerging in a country with all the support he needs to become your new breakthrough star? You move mountains to make that happen. And you do it now while you can, because combat sports is unpredictable and reigns can be short.

Unfortunately, it’s a real question as to whether the UFC is feeling particularly ambitious about bringing Topuria to Spain soon, let alone Bernabeu next. These days the company runs a conveyor belt of events, creating content for broadcast partners and collecting site fees and gates from partnered venues. The machine is working just fine for the UFC without the headache of a stadium show in Spain (and perhaps another budget-destabilizing star like McGregor), so why do it?

Because it’s the biggest thing you can do for the sport of MMA right now. Bring Ilia Topuria home to Spain. Put him in Bernabeu. Anything else is promotional malpractice.