While Sean
O’Malley’s immediate future remains uncertain, Merab
Dvalishvili’s coach, John Wood, advises against a featherweight
move.
Advertisement
O’Malley’s short bantamweight title reign ended with a unanimous
decision loss against Dvalishvili last year. “Suga” got a chance at
redemption in a rematch at UFC 316
last weekend in Newark, New Jersey. Dvalishvili dominated O’Malley
for two rounds before submitting him in the third.
With consecutive title losses against Dvalishvili, O’Malley is far
removed from the title picture as long as the Georgian remains
champion. Considering he’ll have to fight down the rankings now,
O’Malley must return to the drawing board.
However, Wood notes that the
UFC doesn’t always work based on merit or rankings. Wood
believes a star like O’Malley could be back in title conversations
with a few flashy wins.
It’s been speculated that moving up to featherweight is the way
forward for O’Malley, who has teased it in the past. However, Wood
doesn’t think O’Malley has the frame for 145 pounds. According to
Wood, there are several good matchups for O’Malley at 135 pounds
before considering a move to featherweight.
“The best guy should always fight the next best guy and the next
best guy to the champion. That’s not the way it goes,” Wood told
MMAFighting.com. “So I do see a potential of
[O’Malley] being back in the mix after some time… 145? Those guys
are big. And O’Malley does have the size and the range. But he’ll
have to stack on some muscle. He doesn’t have a big frame from what
I see. So that might not be the smartest thing. But I think there’s
a lot of good fights for him that he can win at ‘35 and figure it
out from there.”