Daniel Cormier watched Carlos Prates dismantle Jack Della Maddalena at UFC Perth and came away with one conclusion: the Brazilian is ready to fight for a world title right now.
Speaking on his YouTube channel, Cormier offered a thorough breakdown of what Prates’ third-round stoppage of the former welterweight champion means for the division’s title picture.
“Carlos Prates has now put himself on the short-list of fighters who could potentially challenge the champion, Islam Makhachev. Before he goes in there with Jack Della Maddalena, that happens when you’ve already got a victory over Leon Edwards, when you already have beaten guys like Geoff Neal and so many others on your way towards a fight with a former champion. He’s on a short list. He’s already close. You beat the former champion in the way that he beat Della Maddalena – because that was bad. That was bad. Honestly, when I was watching that from afar, I thought to myself — because I’ve never seen Jack just get beat on like that — ‘How does Prates win?’ going into the fight.”
Cormier also identified a specific lesson in growth from the way Prates handled his main event opportunity compared to his previous stumble on the big stage.
“That performance told me two things: One, Prates is ready to compete for the UFC championship. Two, Prates learned. The first time Prates did that, against Ian Garry, he froze. He froze. He did not fight well. Not this time, though. I watched him deliver at a level that tells me he’s championship-ready. Dude’s championship-ready. He’s championship-ready right now.”
He acknowledged the crowded nature of the welterweight division while making clear he would not object to Prates leapfrogging the queue.
“Here’s the issue though: The weight class is so stacked. It feels like it’s going to be Ian Garry, but if it was to be Prates after that? Nobody would complain. Nobody would complain, and I’ll tell you why: We just saw Islam beat Jack Della Maddalena in the way that he did. We saw him dominate Jack Della Maddalena to win the championship. The way Islam beat Jack was not nearly as impressive as what Carlos Prates did the other day. It was impressive. He made it look easy. But that, yesterday, was crazy. It looked like Della Maddalena didn’t belong in there with Prates.”