This past Saturday at UFC Vegas 26, Gregor Gillespie (14-1) made his return after an extensive layoff. Gillespie hadn’t fought since the night of the BMF title fight which took place in November of 2019.
It didn’t appear that there were injuries that Gillespie was dealing with, but he spent some time outside of the cage to improve. At UFC Vegas 26, he had a tough test in front of him in Diego Ferreira (17-4).
Ferreira had only lost to Beneil Dariush and Dustin Poirier in his career. In his last appearances, Ferreira lost to Dariush for the second time so you knew that he was hungry coming into UFC Vegas 26.
One thing about this fight was the weight. Ferreira came in over four pounds over the lightweight limit. Gillespie earned 30% of his purse for accepting the fight and he wasn’t about to let the extra weight get in the way of his UFC return.
The first round was a very good round. There were a lot of scrambles and Ferreira had some success landing big shots on Gillespie. At times, it didn’t look great for the return of Gregor Gillespie.
However, Gillespie was able to turn the fight around in the second round. Gillespie used his pace and his grappling to get in a dominant position and he got the TKO victory over Diego Ferreira at UFC Vegas 26.
What’s next after UFC Vegas 26?
With that victory on Saturday, Gillespie is now 7-1 in the UFC with six of his wins coming by finish. He’s now ranked 12th in the lightweight division. Now that he’s made his successful return, what’s next for Gillespie.
Well, I think the UFC should put him up against the guy directly in front of him in the rankings. That lightweight contender is Islam Makhachev (19-1). Makhachev has won seven fights in a row and looks like a future lightweight champion.
He’s 8-1 in the UFC with four finishes. Both of these men are elite grapplers and both are looking to take that next step towards title contention. A matchup between the two would give us that contender.