Meanwhile, at 185, Rockhold conquers in shade of McGregor's shadow

The good thing about being on a fight card headlined by Conor McGregor is that you know people will watch. The bad thing, as new UFC middleweight champ Luke Rockhold may have learned, is that they may think of your great success as little more than a footnote.

It took Rockhold (15-2 MMA, 5-1 UFC) just under four full rounds to wrest the UFC middleweight title from the previously unbeaten Chris Weidman (13-1 MMA, 9-1 UFC) in Saturday’s UFC 194 pay-per-view co-headliner at Las Vegas’ MGM Grand Garden Arena. It took McGregor only 13 second to make us mostly forget about it.

That’s not to say we won’t remember, once we snap back to reality. And once we do remember, chances are it’ll all coming flooding back to us as we recall how thoroughly Rockhold dismantled the champ, how brutally he beat him down to cement his position as the best 185-pounder in the world.

But if you looked around on the world wide web in the immediate aftermath of UFC 194, what you saw was a lot of chatter about McGregor’s (19-2 MMA, 7-0 UFC) first-round knockout win over Jose Aldo (25-2 MMA, 7-1 UFC). You saw their respective corners experience the agony and ecstasy. You saw Irish fans running wild in Las Vegas. You saw McGregor hosting his own one-man press conference, where he laid out plans for his future like a superhero weighing which cape to wear to work in the morning.

You didn’t see much about Rockhold, though. And why would you? All he did was systematically dismantle the guy we’d already started talking about as the next great middleweight. Remember the guy who dethroned Anderson Silva? The one who beat up Vitor Belfort and Lyoto Machida after that? Rockhold opened up his head on live TV, turning what had initially looked like a competitive fight into sadistic torture session before it was finally called off.

Luke Rockhold

Unfortunately for him, he did all this as an opening act for McGregor, which means garnering his share of the spotlight is bound to be a challenge.

But now that the McGregor fever has begun to break, maybe we’ll turn our collective attention back to the exploits of the middleweight division’s handsomest man. It can’t hurt that the 185-pound class he’s now champion of has a wealth of interesting opportunities.

For starters, take Yoel Romero (11-1 MMA, 7-0 UFC), who nearly knocked out and then barely squeaked by Ronaldo Souza (22-4 MMA, 5-1 UFC). Even pushing 40, Romero remains one of the most athletically interesting contenders in the division. And “Jacare”? He may have lost, but his stock didn’t plummet too far after an effort like that.

Then there’s Belfort, the man who owns a knockout win over Rockhold, albeit during his TRT era. Rockhold is still salivating over the prospects of that rematch, and Belfort has never been one to turn down a shot at a shiny gold belt.

With so many possibilities for Rockhold’s first title defense, the only hard part is picking one – which will inevitably mean disappointing someone else.

Whoever the UFC chooses to the challenge the new champ, next time he should get the stage all to himself. Rockhold is a representative of that new breed of MMA fighter we’ve been hearing about seemingly for years. Instead of being a converted wrestler or a striker with some takedown defense, he’s the kind of fighter who can do it all, and do it well.

He also seems to be somehow still improving. A fight with Romero, or rematches with Belfort and Souza, they all promise to test him in different ways. That’s something Rockhold could use right now, as we puzzle over just how good he might become.

The other thing he could use is the chance to shine all on his own. And for that, he might have to stay far away from McGregor.

For complete coverage of UFC 194, check out the UFC Events section of the site.