issue 218

July 2025

E. Spencer Kyte retraces Dustin Poirier's unbreakable legacy, whose grit made him precious, even without undisputed gold.

There will never be another Dustin Poirier. That may feel like a strange statement about a competitor who never claimed an undisputed title, wore eight losses, and was viewed as someone who couldn’t win the big one when it counted. But a few weeks ahead of Poirier making the final walk, no one is going to argue otherwise. We throw around terms like “your favorite fighters’ favorite fighter” all the time. It’s a way of saying something nice about someone who came up short. Poirier isn’t that. He is one-of-one because of the journey he’s taken us on throughout his career, thanks to his star-making turn in the incredible documentary Fightville. Focused on the grimy regional MMA scene in Louisiana, the film tracks the exploits of four individuals. Gil Guillory, a promoter and former wrestler. Tim Credeur, a veteran MMA fighter and the owner of Gladiators Academy. Albert Stainbeck, an aspiring fighter lacking conviction. Poirier, who was four fights into his pro career at the time. 

THE MOVIE THAT MADE HIM

Poirier has a gravitational pull throughout the film. It details his two wins under Guillory’s USA MMA shingle and wraps with the aspiring lightweight venturing to Montreal, where he knocked out Derek Gauthier, which earned him a chance to compete in the WEC. Still not quite comfortable when the camera is on him, you’re immediately drawn to the quiet kid who has to wear the same boxer briefs from Walmart for every fight. When the film premiered, Poirier had already matriculated to the UFC, having pulled off an upset in his promotional debut at UFC 125, beating Josh Grispi, who was initially penciled in to challenge Jose Aldo for the featherweight title before the Brazilian was forced off the card with an injury.

I watched it seated next to Poirier and Credeur, and stood with them in the lobby, chatting about the film, UFC 129. He wasn’t prepared to be in the spotlight and happily allowed Credeur to do most of the talking. Fourteen years and 30 additional UFC appearances later, he’s poised to exit as arguably the best ambassador the sport could ever ask for.

THE UNDERDOG

What makes you root for Chris Evans’ Steve Rogers in Captain America: The First Avenger is his gumption when he’s still five-foot-nothing and refuses to quit. This is summed up by the line he repeats multiple times: “I could do this all day.”

That is what makes Poirier an irreplaceable one-of-one. For the first five-and-a-half years of his UFC career, Poirier just couldn’t get over the hump. He’d string together wins, set up a marquee assignment, and then falter.

He fell to Chan Sung Jung and Cub Swanson, with a victory over Jonathan Brookins sandwiched in between. He claimed three victories, then got knocked out by Conor McGregor. After moving to lightweight and earning four consecutive wins, he stepped in with Michael Johnson and got dropped in 95 seconds. A different Poirier showed up for his next fight with Jim Miller. 

It was like he’d made a two-fold bargain with himself, telling himself that he wouldn’t lose again any time soon, but that if it were to happen, it would take some special to beat him. Fans got on board, and how ‘The Diamond’ was perceived shifted. It was no longer a question of whether he couldn’t win the big one. He just hadn’t done it yet, and everyone wanted to see it. That’s why his stoppage wins over Justin Gaethje and Eddie Alvarez resonated throughout the sport.

WINS FOR THE FANS

It’s why, to this day, I will argue that Poirier’s interim championship win over Max Holloway at UFC 236 is a more meaningful triumph than some athletes winning and defending the undisputed title multiple times. He was our chosen fighter. We had witnessed the highs and lows and knew the effort that went into reaching that point. It was how many times he’d picked himself up and said, “I could do this all day” as he marched back after each crushing defeat. We felt it in our souls when he said, “This is my belt. I earned this in blood. I get paid in full. This is mine.”

Officially, Poirier is 5-4 in his nine fights since that evening, but his record doesn’t matter to most. It doesn’t matter that he’s come up short in three bids to claim the undisputed lightweight title. After each loss, he’s mustered up the resolve to make another run at things. After he lost to Khabib Nurmagomedov, he threw down with Dan Hooker and earned consecutive wins over Conor McGregor. His status as ‘The People’s Champ’ solidified as he drew level and then moved ahead of the Irish superstar. After a loss to Charles Oliveira, he tapped into his grimy side and finished Michael Chandler. And after he lost to Justin Gaethje in his first battle for the BMF title, Poirier rolled into UFC 299 as the betting underdog against ascending French finisher Benoit Saint Denis, and earned himself one more shot at UFC gold by knocking him out midway through the second.

THE LAST RIDE

It’s fitting that Poirier’s final bout comes against Holloway and is for the BMF title. The two men have fought twice, and Poirier has won both times. Some would likely argue that McGregor would make a better opponent. But that chapter is over. Poirier put it to bed the last time they fought. You could make a case for Gaethje. Their series is level at one win apiece. However, Gaethje is chasing one more title shot, and beating Poirier isn’t going to get him that opportunity.

However, it’s a perfect situation for Holloway: a chance to gain vengeance given their history. Alexander Volkanovski may be his chief rival, and the win over Gaethje is unquestionably his most memorable victory. Still, in terms of kindred spirits, the UFC 318 headliners feel connected more than anyone else. Odd as this may seem, it’s also right that Poirier’s final bout is for the BMF title. Few fighters embody what that ceremonial belt represents more, to greater effect, than the 36-year-old Louisiana native. It would be cinematic for him to lay his gloves down in the center of the cage, in his home state, and walk off into the sunset with that title slung over his shoulder; his wife Jolie on one arm, his daughter Parker on the other, and a legion of fans at Smoothie King Center on their feet.

A RETURN TO FIGHTVILLE

Michael Tucker, who co-directed Fightville, kept under wraps that he was readying to film Poirier again until the UFC officially announced that ‘The Diamond’ would be making this final walk to the Octagon at UFC 318. 

“We went to Lafayette, saw him, then it became clear that he was going to announce it, and then they announced it, and we pretty much went straight to ATT and filmed for a couple weeks,” the filmmaker said a couple weeks back. “We’re back from that, we’ll catch the end of camp, and we’ll go into New Orleans with him. This will sort of be a, we’re kind of calling it Fightville 2, but Dustin’s story is really rare, I think. For people who don’t know the sport, I think they, if I was to take the Top 20 fighters in the world, very few of them have a story worth making a film about. But Dustin is the perpetual underdog. He’s the person people are constantly saying, ‘You can’t do that.’ I was just looking at the second McGregor fight, and that moment where he’s just standing there and McGregor is on the canvas, you can’t write a movie like that.”

The fact that Poirier’s career has played out the way it has, from those bouts detailed in the film until now, is, well, cinematic, and while we all love a rendition of The Hero’s Journey and know it ends in triumph. 

“I would love that he win the title, but there is something so Greek about his story,” said Tucker.

The Greeks, of course, are famous for their tragedies.

TRIUMPH NOT TRAGEDY 

The documentarian doesn’t see tragedy in Poirier’s story arc. He sees the same beloved underdog we have all rooted for. 

“He’s just developed so much along the way,” offered Tucker. “He’s got the full package. He’s complete. As is Dustin’s story, he had these initial setbacks, and then these crazy victories. The amount of damage and abuse he’s taken is nuts, and for someone to be 35, 36 years old and still fighting at that level, against the upper (echelon). Just watching him grow up has been incredible. He’s so well-spoken. He should keep commentating, being in that space. He’s good with people, he’s got a great heart. There aren’t that many pure people, so how great that he’s fighting Max, who is also one of those guys? They’re just pure. Win or lose, those guys will put on a fantastic fight, and they’ll both walk out of there with a smile on their face.”

A MAN WHO WILL BE MISSED 

Michael W. Gray, one of the executive producers on Fightville, echoed everything Tucker had to say. 

“(Michael) showed me some of the footage he had of Dustin, and at the time, I understood the story that he was trying to tell,” began Gray. “I was looking at it and it was an artistic look at this underworld from a filmmaker’ and then Dustin came in and you could tell. If you see a hamburger from McDonald’s and you see a hamburger from the bistro by your house, they’re both burgers, but you know. I was like, ‘This guy has something special. He has the charisma. He has the look about him.’ And in getting to know Dustin, he had a spark, a spirit. A weird chemistry. He was a sweet, caring, thoughtful, passionate guy who would listen to you when you spoke, but he was an absolute animal and vicious as a competitor when the bell went off.

“I knew this is gonna resonate, especially from this kind of guy,” added the producer, who has trained and coached combat sports for several years. “He was so humble and so sweet, but when he walked into the cage and it closed, this other guy emerged and did his business. It was a perfect combination of personality and passion, and the look of him that made it plausible to tell the story. I don’t think you could have done it with any of those other fighters.”

WHY THE FANS LOVE HIM

There might not be a better way to explain who Poirier is and why he resonates so much with fans than the story Gray told me when we spoke for this piece.

We were down in North Carolina at some film festival screening the movie, and Dustin came. We were in the movie, and then we went out. We and Dustin went out afterwards, just the two of us, and we went out for a beer. We’re at an outside bar, just bulls*******, and a drunk guy comes up and says, ‘Hey man, are you a wrestler?’ to Dustin. I’m like, ‘Uh oh,’ and the guy asks if he’s a wrestler again. 

Dustin says, ‘No man, I’m not.”

“Why are your ears all screwy?”

“I’m a UFC fighter.”

“Get the hell outta here!” and then he turns around to his friends and says, “This guy over here says he’s a UFC fighter.”

This group of guys comes over, and I’m thinking, “What is gonna happen here?”

The guy goes, “This guy is telling me that he’s a UFC fighter,” and Dustin says, “Everybody relax. Gimme a second.”

He goes on his phone, and he pulls up his own picture on UFC.com, and goes, “This is UFC.com, here’s me. I’m a UFC fighter; that’s just my job, just like you have a job.”

And the guy was like, "Holy s***! Can we take a picture with you?” and it just squashed it.

If you had so many other people there, it could have gone very badly, but he just squashed it all and came out of it calm and cool.

That’s who Poirier is to a tee, a regular guy with an irregular job, who is only going to throw hands when he’s getting paid, and can make a fan out of everyone he meets.

There really will never be another one like him, and like everyone else, I sure am going to miss him when he’s gone.