His most impressive MMA win technically speaking I believe was against Dustin. But that wasn't his most impressive career win. His most impressive career win was against WME UFC. When a 4+ billion company makes it their sole intent to ensure you can't reach the top, and you not only reach it but break through the ceiling imposed on you... that is something that has only happened once in this sport's history (though I hope it happens again).
Brief recap on how massive of a task this was:
1. Matchmaking was rigged from the start. They needed Khabib (and Tony) gone. That's why they kept trying to have them pick each other off, and why they could amass the longest-ever contender streaks (and doing it in the deepest division) without getting title shots. Before Khabib haters shifted to the "he never fought a wrestler" meme they embraced the "Khabib never fought a striker" approach. People forget the perceptions around MJ and Barboza at the time Khabib was matched against them... they were perceived to be wrestler killers with one shot KO power. Exactly the kind of guys UFC thought, on paper, had the potential to derail Khabib.
2. Promo work was rigged from the start. First it was endless non-defense excuse making on the part of WME. Mayweather for a year. Then once that was over it was a year of maternity leave for a male fighter. It set the record for non-defense by an uninjured champion. When WME finally stripped their cash cow when it was clear he would never defend, they still promoted him as double champ. In a clear bid to derail Khabib before he could even be champ, UFC security allowed 30 into the Barclay's center the night before Khabib fought. Then when they attacked the bus, rather than drive away from the attack/out of the area like 99.99% of vehicle drivers in the history of vehicle attacks, they instead STOPPED the bus, then reversed into Conor's goons. I can't take credit for pointing this out though, so I'll credit Khabib himself.
Hilarious this is overlooked so often. UFC apparently also told Khabib the day before he had to go without any of his teammates on that bus. Gee I wonder why they'd request that... and so weird that 30 guys get past security, along with multiple cameras to record it and the UFC used it as promotion for 6 months...
Fact of the matter is if Khabib got off the bus, as planned, and so much as touched Conor, UFC would have pushed for criminal charges and for Khabib to be held in title limbo. That was the plan/to cancel the 223 title fight.
3. Reffing was rigged from the start.
This has been documented better than any other fight because there has never been a fight as obvious with fight fixing by the ref. Maybe second place is Mirg in Rumble-Vitor when Rumble was obviously supposed to be fired for missing weight again. Really though this was even more transparent.
There have been 100 threads on this. Any where from 14 to 18 fouls depending on who is counting. Khabib actually called out Herb on live TV at the end of round 3. He points out to Herb Conor is holding the gloves in hopes of demonstrating on international TV how much fight fixing is going on. Herb literally replies “let’s work” twice to try and redirect attention away from himself and blame Khabib for Conor cheating WHILE Khabib is pointing it out. Next level corruption. Dom explicitly concedes “he is holding that so he can’t complete the takedown.”
In between round 3-4 is when Khabib wouldn't let it slide. Khabib points out the glove grab happened 3 times to Herb yet again. Herb says “stop… stop” and separates them. Khabib states “three times now… you said if it happened twice you’d take away one point.” This is important to note. Dom literally just pointed out the cheating seconds ago but now Khabib is pushing back on the corruption of Dean, so there is a power disparity (fighter vs UFC corruption, as opposed to UFC-on-UFC criticism). The best way I can explain this from a PR POV is “I can insult my family but you can’t insult my family” sort of thing. So this part is amazing in that Dom JUST SAID IT but now that Khabib is pointing it out on NATIONAL TELEVISION you hear the reactions. Rogan replies “HE SHOULDN’T BE TALKING” immediately. Anik then tries to segue way from this uncomfortable spot to explain to the public to not internalize what Khabib said by saying “Khabib is not in his element unless he is jabbing… and talking… to whomever… the referee or his opponent” which can be translated as “don’t listen please.” Shills gonna shill. I almost counted that night's commentary as rigged as well, but we all know they're so obviously rigged in favor of certain outcomes that it isn't worth pointing out any longer as being a 4th factor at play.
4. UFC's calculus was rigged from the start.
They tried. My god, they tried. Conor got a do-over when he lost to Nate. Conor got a do-over when he lost to Dustin. The only other time I know of where a clear promotional favorite got an immediate rematch "do-over" for a non-controversial ending was when SF gave Cung Le a do-over vs Scott Smith.
As soon as the fight ended Dana was talking about lives being in danger and floated the idea of stripping Khabib and criminal prosecution. Rogan said the same. UFC shills all-around who cheered the bus attack couldn't wait to express their moral outrage. Ariel pushed moral outrage, king of corporate-brown-nosing and serial cheater Sonnen lectured us about the seriousness of breaching Unified Rules on jumping on a cage with a straight fucking face. Dana set the stage for the next phase (stripping of belt) to rig the game:
But they didn't do shit. Because even ESPN (and all public opinion) neutered their ability to do what they wanted. UFC was at the very least going to give Conor a do-over, at most would encourage criminal prosecution as an excuse to rip the belt away from Khabib just after defending it. There was an avalanche of PR in favor of Khabib.
Khabib beat all these factors.
1. Khabib understood he needed to belt's leverage to beat back the UFC's corruption. Not sure how much he understood it at that exact moment of the bus attack, but I guarantee that he did in general. So instead of them prosecuting Khabib we had to watch Dana feign outrage over Conor (and surprise, surprise... zero criminal charges!)
2. Khabib won the PR game. He went from a promotional supervillain with all the UFC shills hand-wringing the dire moral consequence of cage jumping, to becoming the undefeated legend who dominated LW and placed P4P #1 by that same PR machine.
3. Khabib took the long road to the title, won the belt anyway, and kept it. Zero bullshit rematches, zero contention, all justice, all accountability.
April to October 2018 truly was a master class in politics from Khabib. Much more than destroying Conor... he defeated a 4-billion dollar company that absolutely rigged it in every conceivable way... from the promo work to Conor's fight schedule to Herb Dean putting the fix in to attempts to strip Khabib after he won. He outplayed them every step of the way. Didn't get off the bus. Pointed out Herb's corruption on live TV in the 3rd round, to which the commentary quickly tried to cover it up. Annihilated the UFC in the media when the public pushback was so strong (even on ESPN) to Dana floating the idea of stripping him after he won.
TLDR: 30-0. Khabib vs WME ended in a submission victory for Khabib, bending the UFC PR power machine to his will until it snapped in two, ultimately serving his interests to close out his career.
