There will be a distinctive British flair to Saturday's UFC 304 pay-per-view card, which emanates from Manchester, England, and features a cornucopia of top MMA talent from across the United Kingdom.
The pound-for-pound ranked skills of welterweight champion Leon Edwards will be on full display in the main event as he defends his 170-pound title against Belal Muhammad in a rematch of their 2021 bout that was aborted via an accidental eye poke. Tom Aspinall will make the first defense of his interim heavyweight title in the co-main event when he welcomes Curtis Blaydes in a rematch of their 2022 bout that ended with an Aspinall knee injury and a Blaydes win.
Let's take a closer look at the biggest storylines entering this event as we draw closer to the UFC's first appearance in Manchester since 2016.
1. Leon Edwards has evolved into one of the best fighters on the planet
Once thought to either have been, at worst, lucky to have hoisted the UFC's title after head-kicking Kamaru Usman in Round 5 back in 2022 or, at best, a transitional champion until the next crop of welterweights appeared, Edwards is finally starting to receive the respect he deserves as one of the MMA's best fighters. Maybe it was his quiet demeanor or the meandering journey he took to become champion that saw so many people sleep on him. Or maybe it was the fact that Edwards lacks one singular dominant skill and is, instead, one of the more well-rounded fighters at the elite level today. Either way, his current 13-fight unbeaten streak is nothing to scoff at. The only blemish during that run was the no contest against Muhammad in their first meeting three years ago when Edwards accidentally poked the eye of his opponent, leaving him unable to continue.
The current UFC record for an unbroken win streak (excluding no contests or draws) is 16 for Anderson Silva while Jon Jones holds the overall consecutive record of having not lost in 18 consecutive fights. A victory in his rematch with Muhammad would move Edwards into a fifth-place tie for the latter, placing him in select company alongside Demetrious Johnson, Max Holloway, Georges St-Pierre and Khabib Nurmagomedov. Edwards, who was born in Jamaica and moved to England at age nine, will also be main eventing his fourth straight PPV card, including his second appearance in his last three fights on British soil.
2. Belal Muhammad's long and winding road to a title shot is finally here
For all of the talk about Edwards' 13-fight unbeaten streak, Muhammad's own streak has reached 10 bouts now that the 36-year-old native of Chicago finally gets his chance at UFC gold. Written off and overlooked multiple times along the way, some began to wonder whether UFC brass had it out for Muhammad as others, including Jorge Masvidal and Colby Covington, received multiple shots at the 170-pound belt. Then, there was the emergence of Khamzat Chimaev, which teased an even longer wait for Muhammad, who rebounded from his 2021 no contest against Edwards to rifle off three consecutive wins against strong competition (Demian Maia, Stephen Thomson and Vicente Luque) to put him on the doorstep of the crown. But Muhammad's call still never came. So what did he do? He handled his business like a professional and was willing to jump through any hoop placed in his way. That meant an impressive stoppage win of unbeaten prospect Sean Brady in 2022. And when that also wasn't enough to get the call, Muhammad filled in on extremely late notice at UFC 288 last year to hold off former title challenger Gilbert Burns. "Remember the Name" is an apropos nickname for Muhammad, who like Edwards, brings a balanced game that makes him a "greater than the sum of his parts" type of competitor yet few tend to sing his praises as a truly elite fighter. Muhammad, instead, brings many intangibles to the fight that are difficult to quantify with statistics or highlights. But he belongs in this fight and will finally get his chance to leave his mark in the history books.
3. Forget the interim tag, Tom Aspinall is the best heavyweight in the UFC
How can one say that when Jon Jones, the greatest fighter in MMA history, is currently wearing the UFC's heavyweight strap? It's quite easy, actually. Jones emerged from a three-year hiatus conveniently after then-champion Francis Ngannou left the promotion. Then, Jones moved up in weight to submit a massively disappointing Cyril Gane with ease in just over two minutes in March 2023 to win the title (as Gane was fresh off losing to an injured Ngannou before going life-and-death with brawler Tai Tuivasa). Jones, who was scheduled to fight former champion Stipe Miocic in his first title defense last fall, instead suffered a pectoral injury that will keep him out for a full year. Aspinall captured the interim title in Jones' absence by knocking out Sergei Pavlovich in just 69 seconds yet UFC remained steadfast on rebooking Jones-Miocic for this coming November, despite the fact that Miocic hasn't fought since early 2021. Add in that Jones has shown zero public interest in fighting Aspinall while constantly teasing retirement (only to magically show interest in light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira possibly moving up in weight) and you have a messy promotional snafu that easily could've been avoided. Meanwhile, all Aspinall has done is win, with the exception of his injury defeat to Blaydes in their first meeting back in 2022 (in a fight that lasted 15 seconds). Aspinall is 8-0 in the UFC besides that fight and enters Saturday with not only a second chance at besting Blaydes but an opportunity to showcase himself as the most capable and willing heavyweight on the roster.
4. With a history of coming up short in big moments, it's time for Curtis Blaydes to deliver
At 6-foot-4 with decent hands and a strong gas tank to fuel his decorated grappling skills, Blaydes has looked like a potential future heavyweight champion ever since he first stepped foot in the Octagon in 2016. His debut fight, a loss to Francis Ngannou via doctor stoppage, didn't diminish that thought since he had the most success early that any heavyweight not named Miocic has had against Ngannou. Ever since that fight, Blaydes has three times put together impressive win streaks of five, four and three wins, respectively, while defeating some big names in the process, including Mark Hunt, Alistair Overeem, Junior dos Santos, Aspinall, Jairzinho Rozentruik and Jailton Almeida. But each time it appeared to be Blaydes' turn to take his swing for the title, an ill-timed (and often disastrous) defeat has followed right when he was on the verge of breaking through. Ngannou obliterated Blaydes in just 45 seconds in their 2018 rematch. Then, Derrick Lewis finished Blaydes with just one punch in 2021. Last year, it was Pavlovich who needed less than one round to do the same. But after a surprisingly thorough finish of Almeida in March to snap his opponent's 15-bout win streak, Blaydes is back again in the biggest fight of his career and his first with any form of title at stake. On paper, Blaydes has the type of balanced game that could give Aspinall issues in their rematch. But he is going to need to avoid getting caught with the big one should the 33-year-old ever truly fulfill his bright potential inside the Octagon.
5. Paddy Pimblett will likely close as an underdog for the first time in his UFC run
It's a fact that may be surprising to some considering the 29-year-old Pimblett first debuted in UFC three years ago with a ton of hype behind him as a bit of a Conor McGregor clone, at least from the standpoint of his ability to speak on the microphone. But Pimblett has been wildly inconsistent despite winning all five of his UFC appearances, including a very questionable decision win over Jared Gordon two years ago. Pimblett, who became the first fighter in four bouts to fail to finish faded veteran Tony Ferguson last December as the former interim titleholder fell to a seventh straight defeat, will welcome another veteran striker in Bobby "King" Green, who is undergoing a bit of late-career resurgence at age 37 having won three of his last four. The fact that Pimblett is the underdog against the dangerous-yet-freewheeling Green speaks to how inconsistent he has been. But, in many ways, this is the fight Pimblett needs to put his entire game together as he approaches age 30 so that labels of him being nothing more than a hype job don't continue to follow him. Pimblett will not only be fighting on home soil, he will also have his best bud and teammate, women's strawweight Molly McCann, once against competing on the fight card with him.
