Ali Abdelaziz picks Kamaru Usman as the greatest fighter he has managed

20 August 2022

Ali Abdelaziz feels that Kamaru Usman is the best MMA fighter that he has managed. Ali opened up about the same during his recent interview with TMZ Sports and noted that Khabib retired a bit too early to be considered the best MMA fighter under his management.

Ali, throughout his career, has managed some big names including Khabib Nurmagomedov, Kamaru Usman, Henry Cejudo, and Frankie Edgar among others.

"It's very hard, man. You're talking about Henry Cejudo, two-division champion, who defended two-weight divisions, right? Khabib, undefeated, never lost, barely lost a round. But when you talk about Kamaru, for me Kamaru at welterweight, one of the hardest divisions in the UFC, he's beating these guys and he's sticking around. He's 35, sticking around,” the accomplished MMA manager noted to TMZ.

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He further went on to explain his decision. Ali said that the likes of Henry Cejudo and Khabib Nurmagomedov retired early in MMA giving the UFC Welterweight champion Kamaru Usman the edge over the others.

"You can say Khabib a little bit retired early, you can say Henry retired a little bit early, right? Right now, it's tough man. I love all of them. Everybody knows how close I am to Khabib and how I love them. I love Kamaru too but right now, the way Kamaru is doing it, I don't think anybody's doing it the way Kamaru is doing it and he's willing to go up to light heavyweight and do a two-division champion and skip a weight division,” he added.

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Khabib retired with an undefeated record of 29-0 to his name and had wins over Dustin Poirier, Conor McGregor and Justin Gaethje on his resume. Usman, on the other hand, is 20-1 in his professional MMA career and is undefeated in the UFC.

What do you think of the comparison from Ali? Let us know in the comments below.