Azamat Murzakanov Is Starting His Rise

That’s all UFC fans have seen from Murzakanov since earning his contract. Granted, his debut was only five months ago, but when you look at the man he’ll be standing across from Saturday at UFC Fight Night: Vera vs Cruz in San Diego, Murzakanov will have a hill to climb in Octagon experience.

His opponent, Devin Clark, has fought a handful of top names in the UFC light heavyweight division, including Aleksandar Rakic, Anthony Smith, Jan Blachowicz and Ryan Spann, just to name a few. Despite losing these bouts, the experience from competing against elite level competition would seem to offer at least a minor advantage on fight night. Murzakanov feels it’s an opportunity to send a farewell to the veteran Clark.

“To be honest with you, I’ve seen some of his fights and I’m not really impressed,” Murzakanov said. “He wins some, he loses; he’s back-and-forth. He’s been here for a long time. I’m not impressed by his performances. He [must] get out of the way [for newcomers].”

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“He has a lot of experience, that’s why he needs to retire. So, I’m going to retire him in the Octagon.”

It makes sense for Murzakanov to come into this fight with an “out with the old in with the new” mentality considering he boasts an 11-0 undefeated record with nine finishes and has all the potential to be an elite-caliber fighter.

However, it’s not his first objective to keep that unbeaten streak going throughout his entire career. Murzakanov hopes to put on exciting performances instead, to please fans and earn approval from his supporters.

“Of course, one of my main goals is to give the excitement and mostly not to disappoint my fans, my coaches, my teammates, everyone who supports me,” Murzakanov said. “And, of course, going along with that, it doesn’t hurt to be undefeated, and I’m going to try and stay undefeated.”

That starts with delivering another good performance this weekend against Clark, an opponent that Murzakanov doesn’t fear in the slightest. To back up his words, he almost finds it necessary to get the job done inside 15 minutes.

“It’s very hard to predict what’s going to happen but I will try my best to finish [the fight],” Murzakanov said.

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A win can bring him one step closer to being in the light heavyweight rankings, a ladder that he hopes to climb all the way to the top by the end of his career. The quickest way to get in that Top 15 is to fight and win as often as his body allows it, and it seems that as long as his opponents don’t back out of their scheduled bouts, fans will be seeing a lot more from Murzakanov in the near future.

“It would be excellent to get closer to the rankings and to have at least another fight by the end of the year and try to climb up the ranks,” Murzakanov said.

“I don’t want to be like a gatekeeper. I don’t want to be one of those guys, like my opponent, for example, to win some and lose some. I don’t want to be like that. I want to go to the top.”