I feel like you have to undeniably clear out the top 5 first. No close calls / questionable wins. Then you should be allowed to go up a weight class and fight the number 1 contender to see if you’re even eligible to fight the champ at that weight class.
To be fair, being two division simultaneous champion looks good for a fighter’s resume. Prime example, Amanda Nunes. She was defending both 135 and 145 as a double champ. That only works with a 10 lbs difference from each weight class. Anything over that like 15 or 20 lbs difference is just not practical.
That's true, but in her case the women's featherweight division never actually existed in the UFC, they never even had rankings. The only reason it was put in place was for Cyborg and after she left the UFC it was pointless. Also in her case and many other fighters cases they cleared out the competition in the division or stepped up on short notice to fill in for a title fight. The McGregor and Cejudo examples, look what happened to those divisions for years. It eventually rights itself but in the mean time you lose out on many fun fights and some fighters are essentially screwed out of there chance to fight for the belt. The long term health of a division is based on stars, but also a stable of interesting challengers with good stories to fight for the title. If fighters are constantly leaving the division without losing the belt in the cage we end up with more questions for yeas.
Its like a drug on a winning streak, then some try to engineer the environment to tip the favour to them destroying the quality of competition. Its a point of diminishing returns and the industry changes and diversivies to adapt and "win", the fighters stay the same. Both need to be there to make money and create good platforms for it, but the spirit and soul of competition is stagnant if its "all take" from administration. Alot of sport gets ruined like that
