5 Fights We Need to See After UFC 312

Dricus Du Plessis tightened his grip on the UFC middleweight belt over the weekend, picking up his second title defense with a decision win over former champ Sean Strickland in the UFC 312 main event. The victory cemented him as one of the sport's top pound-for-pound fighters right now, but the road is not going to get any easier for him from here.

Having dealt with Strickland, who had he already beaten once before, Du Plessis will now have to turn his attention to one of a growing number of newly emerged middleweight contenders, like Khamzat Chimaev, Nassourdine Imavov, and Caio Borralho. He is going to have his hands full over the next year or so.

Strawweight champ Zhang Weili may have the opposite problem. After her impressive decision win over Tatiana Suarez in the UFC 312 co-headliner, she is starting to run low on legitimate opposition, and UFC matchmakers may need to get creative as they consider her next move.

Unfortunately, there wasn't much on the UFC 312 card that had much bearing on the rankings beyond the top two fights, but the event still opened the door to some exciting matchup possibilities for Du Plessis, Zhang, and a few others.

Here are the fights we hope will be made when the dust has settled.

After his lopsided decision win over Sean Strickland in Sydney, it's time for Dricus Du Plessis to shift his attention to the fight most people wanted to see to begin with: a showdown with unbeaten middleweight contender Khamzat Chimaev.

Chimaev has been hailed as a future title challenge since he arrived in the UFC in the midst of the pandemic. While his recent Octagon career has been hindered by health issues and scale fails, he finally made it back to the cage late last year, when he asserted himself as the top middleweight contender with a quick and brutal submission win against former champ Robert Whittaker.

Much like Belal Muhammad vs. Shavkat Rakhmonov at welterweight, or Jon Jones vs. Tom Aspinall at heavyweight, this is the fight the UFC needs to make at middleweight. Anything else would be a big mistake. Thankfully, Du Plessis and Dana White both seem to recognize this. With a little luck, we'll see this massive and extremely competitive looking title fight before the summer is up.

Sean Strickland's UFC 312 loss to Dricus Du Plessis was very reminiscent of Colby Covington's late 2023 loss to Leon Edwards at welterweight. Like Covington, he probably wasn't the most deserving contender in the weight class but got the opportunity based on his ability to create buzz. Also like Covington, he told anyone who would listen that he we were in for a bloody war when the cage door closed. And lastly, he ultimately delivered one of the most uninspired and low-effort title challenges in recent memory—just like Covington.

Despite all that—and much like Covington again—he remains a big enough star that he can probably expect another big fight when he's ready to get back in there.

The obvious choice is former champ Robert Whittaker, who recently suffered a brutal submission loss to Khamzat Chimaev.

Strickland didn't have much interest in fighting Whittaker for the No. 1 contender spot last year, but after his lame UFC 312 performance, he isn't really in position to deny bout offers. It's an obvious matchup for both guys, and it could turn into a pretty fun fight—provided Strickland decides to throw more than a handful of jabs a round.

Some fans have felt for a while that strawweight champ Zhang Weili, and not flyweight champ Valentina Shevchenko, is the top pound-for-pound female fighter on earth. That was a pretty hot take for a while, but after Shevchenko's 2023 loss to Alexa Grasso—which she later avenged—and Zhang's dominant UFC 312 win over the formerly unbeaten Tatiana Suarez, it's not the controversial idea it once was.

Still, there's no way to know for sure who's really the best unless they fight, and as luck would have it, there's no reason they can't. They're only separated by 10 pounds, and they both seem to be open to the idea.

It would definitely be a slap in the face to Manon Fiorot, who is wholly deserving of a crack at Shevchenko's belt, but it would be hard to deny Zhang the opportunity if she wants it.

In fact, based on Dana White's comments at the UFC 312 post-fight press conference, all the Chinese star needs to do is ask.

It's a shame the UFC let Robelis Despaigne go after his losses to Waldo Cortes-Acosta and Austen Lane. Maybe he wasn't a world-beater, but at 6'7", and with a string of super quick knockouts behind him, he would have made an awesome opponent for the newly arrived Tallison Teixeira.

Teixeira, also 6'7", made his UFC debut on last weekend's main card, knocking out the tough Justin Tafa with a barrage of knees and elbows in just 35 seconds. The win brought him to 8-0—and all eight of his wins have come in the first round.

Unfortunately, it's no longer possible to match him up with Despaigne to see which towering heavyweight lands a fight-ending bomb first, but there are still some good options for the newcomer.

The best is probably his fellow Brazilian Jhonata Diniz. Diniz got off to a great start in the UFC, with back-to-back wins over Lane and Karl Williams. He then took a tough loss to Marcin Tybura when confronted with a big step up in competition, and was unfortunately deprived of his opportunity to bounce back when his opponent Vitor Petrino was forced out of their planned matchup at UFC 313 next month.

Teixeira certainly didn't take much damage at UFC 312, so why not give him a quick turnaround and book him to fight Diniz at UFC 313?

Jake Matthews has long been right on the cusp of the welterweight rankings but has always been too inconsistent to really break through. After extending his win streak to two with a decision victory over Francisco Prado in the UFC 312 main card opener, he is once again closing in on the top-15.

If Matthews gets his way, his next fight will be against Neil Magny. Magny was in the rankings for years—we're talking a significant number of years—but recently made his exit after a tough loss to Michael Morales, who Matthews has also lost to recently.

Having exited the top 15, he is in a very similar position to Matthews—just on the outside of the rankings, looking in. Based on that, there's really no reason not to give Matthews the matchup he asked for. Magny has proven he isn't the type of guy to turn down fights, so it should be as simple as sending out the bout agreements.