'He has done what his father did': How Khabib Nurmagomedov raised the stakes for MMA's most successful team

If you want to know how good they’ve been, just check the numbers. UFC lightweight champion Islam Makhachev and his teammate Umar Nurmagomedov, who share top billing at UFC 311 when the former defends his belt in Saturday's main event and the latter challenges for the bantamweight title in the co-headliner, are a combined 44-1 as professionals.

Want to expand the outlook? Go ahead and include another teammate, Usman Nurmagomedov, the current Bellator lightweight champion. Then the combined record goes up to 62-1, with one no contest. Just for fun, how about throwing in former UFC lightweight champ Khabib Nurmagomedov, now retired from active competition and leading the team as some combination of head coach and Slavedriver-In-Chief, depending on who you ask. That brings the group’s overall record to 91-1, with one no contest.

For perspective, add up the career records of the past four champions in any UFC division. Not only do they all fall short of these four teammates in combined winning percentage, only one weight class (featherweight, where the combined record is 100-21) owns more overall wins.

To put it simply, this is success at a rate we’ve never seen from any single gym or team in MMA history. In a sport that’s practically defined by the many, many ways one can lose — a lucky punch, a bad judges’ decision, a slip on a sponsor logo — all these guys do is win. Which at some point has to make you wonder ... how?! How are they doing it? How have they been so good, for so long?

“It’s because we still follow the plan,” says Makhachev, who defends his 155-pound title in a rematch with top contender Arman Tsarukyan. “The father plan.”

By this, of course, he means the plan laid out by Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, father to Khabib and uncle to Umar. Long recognized as the patriarch of the Eagles MMA team, as well as a founding cornerstone of Dagestani MMA in general, the elder Nurmagomedov died of complications from COVID-19 in 2020. His death was a heavy blow not just to his son Khabib, who retired as the undefeated UFC lightweight champion later that year, but also to the entire team.

“He was a very wise man,” says Umar, who takes on 135-pound champion Merab Dvalishvili at UFC 311. “He was tough but also gentle. He [taught] me many things, not just in training, but how to be a good person. I have many stories about him, how he helped, things he did for our village, social projects. He [brought] people together.”

UFC Hall of Famer Khabib has always credited his father’s role in his success, along with Javier Mendez, the head coach of the American Kickboxing Academy in San Jose, Calif. Mendez encountered Khabib early on in the future champ's transition to the UFC and was initially stunned by the young fighter’s discipline and work ethic, he says. But once he met Abdulmanap, it all made sense.

“As soon as they came into the gym, they’re so humble and respectful,” Mendez says. “They go around and shake everybody’s hands. If you’re an elder, they won’t let you do anything. Even now they’re still like that. Whatever you’re doing, they’ll jump right up to do it for you. That was the foundation laid by Abdulmanap.”

Mendez still refers to Abdulmanap as “the greatest coach I’ve ever known.” It went beyond what he managed to communicate to his fighters when they were together in the gym, he says, which is one of the reasons that the team has continued to be so successful even after his passing.

“He created a real brotherhood among those guys,” Mendez says. “He instilled that discipline in them, but it was more than just that. He had a huge love for those guys. He really was a truly great man.”

Without his father there to lead the team, Khabib has stepped up to be the steady hand on the wheel. This is both good news and bad news for the group, as his training sessions are known to be especially grueling.

“Khabib is like [Abdulmanap’s] exact copy,” Umar says. “He’s like his father everywhere. But in the gym, I think he is even stronger sometimes. If you had seen him just today, the way he trained us — he is like a no mercy coach.”

Maybe that’s how it has to be. Maybe you don’t get to 91-1 with easy training sessions. But now Makhachev stands on the precipice of breaking Khabib's record for consecutive UFC lightweight title defenses. Another victory over Tsarukyan will give Makhachev four straight wins with the belt, surpassing Khabib's three consecutive title defenses — a long-fraught benchmark shared by fellow former 155-pound champs B.J. Penn, Frankie Edgar and Benson Henderson.

At that point, it might have to be said that Khabib's legacy is more than just his undefeated record and his UFC title wins, more than still being the only UFC champion to retire unbeaten and stay that way. It would also have to include his work as a coach, as the successor to the foundation laid by his father, and as the leader of the sport’s most successful team.

And that, to hear Makhachev tell it, could be one of the reasons he pushes his fighters so hard.

“After his father [died], he understood that we need someone who is not just a coach,” Makhachev says. “We need someone who everyone listens to, everyone respects. He understood that moment. So he has done what his father did.”

With a record like theirs, clearly father’s plan had a lot going for it. Maybe all it needed was the right student-turned-teacher to keep it going for the next generation.