UFC 270 poster: Heavyweight champions collide! | Ngannou vs. Gane

UFC 270 marks the first pay-per-view (PPV) event of 2022 and it goes down on Jan. 22 from inside Honda Center in Anaheim, California.

Headlining the card: a Heavyweight title unifier between former teammates Francis Ngannou and Ciryl Gane. It’s a big fight. Big enough that UFC devoted the entire UFC 270 poster to just Ngannou and Gane, even though the card also features the third bout between Flyweight champion, Brandon Moreno, and Deiveson Figueiredo.

Take a look:

There’s a lot going on when it comes to the Ngannou vs. Gane fight. First off, it’s a chance for champion Ngannou to knock the belt off Gane’s waist, an interim title that “The Predator” has made clear should never have been issued in the first place. It’s also a chance for him to take some form of revenge against his former coach at The MMA Factory, Fernand Lopez, who has been talking all sorts of smack about what a lousy person Ngannou secretly is.

Last, but not least, Ngannou has just one more fight on his UFC contract. It’s a complicated situation: on one hand, beating Gane would put him in a much better negotiation position with UFC in some ways. In others, it actually locks him in with the company because of a champion clause that keeps him from walking away from the promotion with the belt. And there are signs Ngannou wants to walk away ... he certainly sees the $10+ million paydays going around in boxing and isn’t likely to accept a paltry $2 or $3 million from UFC.

So make sure to enjoy this Heavyweight championship match up, because unless Gane wins it could be the last we see for a while as Ngannou takes on UFC.