As the final UFC event of 2023 came to a close, with Welterweight Champion Leon “Rocky” Edwards reigning victorious, the mask that Colby Covington had spent the previous six years sculpting lay smashed to pieces on the Octagon floor. 

For the first time since Covington decided to trade class for controversy, he stood totally exposed to the MMA world. The excellence of Edwards and his own personal insecurities had quelled the chaos once and for all. 

This was meant to have been his night. The night that he finally became the best welterweight on the planet. He was fighting in front of his people and his deity Donald Trump. 

He really was the “People’s Champ” as he made his entrance into the T-Mobile Arena. The crowd chanted back the “You Suck” as a term of endearment just like they do for Kurt Angle. 

Screams of “Colby, Colby”, “U-S-A” and “Fuck You Leon” would punctuate the opening minutes of the contest but by then, Colby Covington had already accepted his fate. Reality had struck and “Chaos” was no more. 

While there are some truths interwoven into the persona that Covington has crafted, the weaknesses that it is supposed to cover up were put on show over this past fight week. 

Despite what he says, Colby Covington knows that he has never been the best welterweight fighter on the planet. When he claimed the interim UFC Welterweight Championship against Rafael dos Anjos, who was only three fights into his time in the weight class, Tyron Woodley still ruled the division. 

Even though he pushed Kamaru Usman harder than anyone had until that point, in two encounters, there were still clearly levels between a true great and a great fighter. 

Covington didn’t even hold a win over a currently ranked welterweight contender when he, for the third time, tried to win the championship. He knew that he didn’t deserve this shot. He knew that he couldn’t beat Leon Edwards.

That’s why the American stooped as low as possible at the press conference. Some people will have viewed what he said about Leon’s father as a genius way to rattle the defending champion – which it clearly did – so that Edwards would be thrown off his game plan – which he clearly wasn’t. It was the last act of a desperate man who knew that he was outmatched. 

While his fans, certain media outlets and even the UFC themselves will raise the 35-year-old up as a master trash talker, it is simply another lie that Covington has allowed the world to tell itself. He has neither the razor-sharp wit of a vintage Conor McGregor nor the comedic delivery of Chael Sonnen. 

He is just the loudest talker, the kid at school who struggles to read aloud in front of class and when the other kids laugh, can only retort with “shut the fuck up”. 

When they came face to face in the middle of the Octagon, the realisation that the final trick in his bag hadn’t worked dawned on Covington. He didn’t look into the eyes of a man seething with fury and frothing at the mouth, but into the eyes of the stone-cold smooth operator who had twice defeated the man that Covington could not. The fight was over before it had begun. 

Leon’s superior skills and his own self-doubt destroyed Colby Covington on Saturday night. He knew that he couldn’t trade strikes with Edwards, that Edwards was too savvy to fall for takedown set-ups and that he couldn’t afford to lower his hands otherwise he’d be turned into a meme. 

Instead of fighting his fight, Colby Covington froze.

The man that has for so long preached about being the Cardio King, that nobody brings pressure like him, backpedalled. Every Edwards movement was met by a shuffle backwards. Every feint shook Covington, forcing his frame to tighten and his hands to remain stuck to his temples. 

The champion chewed up the challenger’s leg, poked holes in his defence and sniped him with left hands. There were flashes of that now iconic head kick as well.

There will be many who wanted to see “more” from Leon in this fight, to see justice be served and for him to render Covington unconscious but what the champ did will haunt the American longer than any image of his prone body laid out on the canvas.

Covington blamed his first loss to Usman on referee Marc Goddard. He blamed the second loss on the judges. He has no excuse for this defeat. 

He could not hurt Leon Edwards. He could not beat Leon Edwards. He is not on the same level as Leon Edwards and this version of Colby Covington did not belong in the same Octagon as Leon Edwards. He couldn’t even outwrestle Leon Edwards. 

At the end of the fight, Colby Covington was credited with 2 takedowns from 10 attempts, while Leon secured 2 from 3 and when it did go to the mat it was the Birmingham representative who got the upper hand. He bounced back to his feet with ease at times while simply outmanoeuvring or overpowering Covington at others. The 32-year-old was also the one that created any real danger on the ground, briefly finding a triangle armbar. 

There is no denying that Leon would have LOVED to spark out Covington but there is that small part of a fighter’s brain that might’ve helped Covington to chalk it up to luck or Leon being the more accomplished striker. What nobody, no matter your thoughts on him as a person, can take away from Colby Covington is that he’s an elite wrestler. Leon Edwards willingly walked into that world and won. 

That will eat the All-American alive. It will burn him up inside when he wakes up, when he goes to bed at night and the next time that he hits the mats at the gym. That is Leon Edwards’ great revenge. 

Covington tried to salvage his image in his post-fight interview citing ring rust but sitting on the sidelines for two years meant that nobody cared. Trump left before Covington launched into his final political catcall.

The illusion had been shattered once and for all. Boos reigned down from the stands, boos from the same fans who had lauded him as the great American hero barely half an hour before. He lashed out at them too, the people he supposedly represents, calling them all “broke bitches”. 

There was one last opportunity for the insecurities that had drowned him in the fight to come to the fore as Covington called for his next opponent in front of the media. It wasn’t Belal Muhammad or Shavkat Rakhmonov who drew his ire, both fighters that represent scalps that would catapult him back into title contention, but Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson. 

Colby Covington will ride again in the UFC. He will upset somebody, make more heinous comments and people will tune in to see him lose but it will be as a novelty sideshow rather than a trumped up headliner. Everyone is “in” on the joke now and nobody is laughing with you anymore Colby. They’re laughing at you.