It’s a pivotal clash in the welterweight division as former champion Tyron Woodley looks to halt a three-fight slide against surging Brazilian Vicente Luque, who enters on a two-fight winning streak with designs on taking another step forward in the 170-pound ranks.

Woodley is in such a strange spot at the moment, as he stood atop the division just over two years ago, carrying a seven-fight unbeaten streak into his UFC 235 showdown with Karamu Usman. Since then, however, “The Chosen One” has seemingly been stuck in neutral, failing to pull the trigger while getting beaten by Usman, Gilbert Burns, and Colby Covington.

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Losing to a trio of elite talents isn’t the end of the world, but it’s the manner in which those fights played out that have many wondering about where Woodley is at in his career and if the former champion is pressed to deliver the kind of performance he knows he’s capable of when he steps into the Octagon on Saturday night.

As for Luque, this is a second opportunity to really break into the title picture for the ultra-talented Brazilian finisher, who has won eight of his last nine, seven by stoppage, and two straight since dropping a decision to Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson at UFC 244. “The Silent Assassin” is another highly skilled welterweight talent that knows a win over Woodley could potentially open the door to a step forward in the division in the second half of 2021.

It’s a meeting of bantamweights projected to be potential champions seeking to get things moving in that direction again as “Sugar” Sean O’Malley looks to rebound from his first professional loss in a clash with former rising star Thomas Almeida.

O’Malley returned from a two-year absence last March and instantly rekindled all the excitement about his upside in the bantamweight division, earning a first-round stoppage win over “Teco” Quinonez before following it up with a similar effort against veteran Eddie Wineland three months later. But he stumbled, literally and figuratively, at UFC 252 against Marlon “Chito” Vera, as one of his legs quickly became compromised before the confident Ecuadorian secured the stoppage late in the opening stanza.

Now the flamboyant 26-year-old is staring down a different kind of comeback fight — one where he’s returning from defeat for the first time, and still facing the same “How good is he?” questions that have followed him throughout his meteoric rise in the UFC.

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Heading into his main event showdown with Cody Garbrandt in May 2016, Almeida was 21-0 overall, 4-0 in the UFC, and primed to establish himself as the top young contender in the 135-pound weight class. That night, he was knocked out in less than three minutes and it’s been a rough road ever since, as the Brazilian dropped two of his next three fights before an eye injury nearly cost him his career.

Almeida returned to action last fall, facing Jonathan Martinez in a featherweight contest, and once again landed on the wrong side of the results, dropping a unanimous decision to “The Dragon,” leaving many to wonder what the now 29-year-old former rising star has left in the tank.

This is a critical moment for the highly regarded and highly scrutinized O’Malley, as an impressive return to the win column quiets much of the lingering chatter that remains following his loss to Vera and puts him back in a position to potentially face a Top 15 opponent later this year. Almeida was one of the most dangerous and explosive fighters in the division prior to his recent run of bad results, and channeling that again here would certainly shift perceptions of where he’s at in his career heading into the second quarter of the 2021 schedule.

Powerhouse Contender Series graduates Alonzo Menifield and William Knight meet in this light heavyweight contest brimming with explosive potential.

Knight earned a developmental deal after his victory over Herdem Alacabek in 2019 and returned to punch his ticket to the UFC roster last summer with a first-round finish of Cody Brundage. Just 25 days later, he was in the Octagon for his debut, posting a unanimous decision win over Aleksa Camur to push his record to 9-1 overall and his winning streak to three.

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Menifield also made tandem appearances on the Contender Series, defeating Daniel Jolly in the summer of 2017, and then smashing Dashawn Boatright in eight seconds to earn a contract the following year. After registering a pair of first-round stoppage wins to begin his UFC tenure, the Fortis MMA product stumbled in 2020, dropping consecutive contests to divisional stalwarts Devin Clark and Ovince Saint Preux.

Knight has all the momentum and the buzz at the moment, but Menifield was once the highly intriguing Contender Series grad looking to make waves in the light heavyweight division, so it should be interesting to see which of these finishers prevails when the leather starts flying this weekend.

In the light heavyweight division, European up and comers Modestas Bukauskas and Michal Oleksiejczuk each look to rebound from stoppage losses to Australian rising star Jimmy Crute.

Bukauskas parlayed a six-fight winning streak capped by winning and defending the Cage Warriors light heavyweight title into an opportunity to compete on the biggest stage in the sport. He impressed in his debut, earning a stoppage victory over Andreas Michailidis at the end of the first round of their UFC Fight Island engagement in mid-July, only to get thrown in with and defeated by the surging Crute three months later.

Oleksiejczuk landed on the wrong side of an appointment with the 25-year-old Australian eight months earlier, falling prey to a first-round submission finish. It was his second straight submission loss following back-to-back impressive first-round finishes, so it will be interesting to see if the 26-year-old Polish fighter can return to that form here.

The landscape in the light heavyweight division is currently shifting, with new names climbing the ranks and veterans starting to cede some ground, creating an opportunity for fighters like Bukauskas and Oleksiejczuk to potentially make some headway if they can string together a couple quality wins.

The action at UFC 260 gets underway in the middleweight division, as French-Canadian Marc-Andre Barriault looks to get back into the win column in a showdown with the returning Abu Azaitar.

A two-division champion under the TKO banner in his native Quebec before signing with the UFC, Barriault struggled in his first three trips into the Octagon, losing all three by decision. Last summer, he collected a second-round stoppage win over Oskar Piechota, but the bout was ruled a no contest after the 31-year-old from Quebec City failed a post-fight drug test.

The positive test was deemed to be a result of contamination, not intentional use, and now “Powerbar” returns in hopes of replicating his performance from June and earning his first UFC victory for a second time.

The 35-year-old Azaitar competes for the first time since registering a unanimous decision win over Vitor Miranda in his promotional debut in July 2018. That victory pushed his record to 14-2-1 overall and his unbeaten streak to double digits, but after being scratched from a pair of 2020 assignments, it’ll be interesting to see how the returning middleweight looks following such a long absence.