Merab Dvalishvili has some more hardware to add to his trophy case.
On Saturday night, during the UFC Nashville broadcast on ESPN, the UFC announced Dvalishvili had won the 2025 Fighter of the Year ESPY for his sensational run atop the men’s bantamweight division.
Breaking News @MerabDvalishvil is the @ESPYS winner for 2025 Fighter Of The Year! pic.twitter.com/zkbGwKYDMV
— UFC (@ufc) July 13, 2025
Unlike other Fighter of the Year awards, the ESPYs do not consider a calendar year. Instead, the award time frame was July 1 of 2024 through June 20 of this year, meaning Ilia Topuria’s win over Charles Oliveira to claim the lightweight title was not considered.
Instead, the ESPYs celebrated Dvalishvili, who racked up three title wins in that time, taking the belt from Sean O’Malley at UFC 306, then defending it against Umar Nurmagomedov at UFC 311, and finally, submitting O’Malley in their rematch at UFC 316 in June.
Other finalists for the ESPY were middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis, women’s bantamweight champion Kayla Harrison, and former lightweight champion Islam Makhachev.
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