Volkov Wins UFC 333 Title Eliminator and Demands Heavyweight Shot
Alexander Volkov beat Rizvan Kuniev by unanimous decision and asked Dana White directly for a title fight.
Alexander Volkov beat Rizvan Kuniev by unanimous decision at UFC 333 on Saturday in Abu Dhabi, winning the heavyweight title eliminator and immediately calling his shot.
"What should I do to take a title shot? Answer me please," Volkov said after the fight, directing his question at UFC CEO Dana White. It was the second time he asked that weekend. He posed the same question at the pre-fight press conference and got no answer then either.
The scorecards read 29-28, 30-27, 30-27. Volkov controlled the fight from the outside in the first round, landing jabs, body kicks, and combinations that took advantage of his reach. In the second, he snapped Kuniev's head back repeatedly and mixed in clinch work. The third round was his most dominant: calf kicks and teeps forced Kuniev to switch stances, and with about a minute left Volkov took his back, dragged him to the canvas, and locked in a rear-naked choke attempt that sealed the round.
Kuniev had his moments, including a superman punch in the second round, but never sustained enough offense to threaten the outcome.
Volkov now holds the second-most significant strikes in UFC heavyweight history behind only Andrei Arlovski. He is a former Bellator champion who has spent roughly a decade in the UFC, and the win came on his birthday. Per the post-UFC 333 rankings update reported by MMA Mania, Volkov has moved past Alex Pereira in the heavyweight rankings.
White has not publicly responded to Volkov's title shot request.
Alexander Volkov has been asking politely for a title shot for years, and nobody in the UFC seems to hear him. He just won a title eliminator on his birthday, and Dana White could not even give the man a straight answer at the press conference.
Here is the reality: Volkov is 38, he has been in the UFC for a decade, and he holds the second-most significant strikes in heavyweight history. He is not a drawl, as Brendan Schaub would say, but he is a legitimate top-five heavyweight who keeps winning. At some point the UFC has to either give him the shot or explain why not.
The problem is timing. Alex Pereira has the UFC 335 fight against Sergei Pavlovich already booked, and the winner of that probably jumps the line. But if Pereira loses again at heavyweight, Volkov's case becomes undeniable. He earned it. Whether the UFC cares about what is earned is a different question entirely.
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