Merab Dvalishvili’s nose is f—ked up, and it’s not going to be better any time soon.
The former Bantamweight kingpin’s nose has been crooked for more than a decade ago, shifted off to the side by some random strike in the cage or gym. It’s never bothered “The Machine” much, as Dvalishvili has a seemingly inhuman ability to walk through punishment without slowing down. Unfortunately, he caught a knee to the face in training, breaking his nose even worse and restricting his ability to breathe on one side.
“What a good day and what a stupid accident,” Dvalishvili said in his first Instagram video (via MMA Junkie). “Again, 12 years after, my nose is f—ked up even worse. As you see, it’s even more cracked same direction. When I touch, my bones are broken inside, and one side I can’t even breathe. I’m gonna do X-ray now. I’m sure UFC will help me with that, even I don’t have a fight coming up. I’m gonna try to do surgery to fix this nose, and let’s see how it goes. First time when I broke my nose, it was in professional debut. Now, it was just sparring. I got kneed.”
Thankfully, Dvalishvili was able to get his nose looked at by a doctor shortly after the recent break. The news wasn’t great, however, as Dvalishvili was informed that recovery would take about a year if he went under the knife. That’s too long for a 35-year-old fighter in immediate title contention, so Dvalishvili intends to wait until after his career.
“I did my X-ray, and X-ray shows that my nose is broken at two places,” Dvalishvili said in the second video. “I just saw doctor, nose surgeon, and he said if he will fix my nose and then make straight, then he has to re-break other bones too, and it will take one more year to heal up. Of course, I don’t want to do that.
“Otherwise, he said keep it that way, and you can do surgery after you retire, but I said, ‘I’m not going into retirement the next 20 years.’ So, I guess I’m going to keep my nose even more crooked (than) what it used to be before, and I’m gonna deal with that, and I’m still going to compete at wrestling tournament against Henry Cejudo at RAF, and that’s it. God bless everyone.”
Dvalishvili is impervious to pain and all, but his nose getting smashed up even worse cannot help his odds against current champion Petr Yan, right? Dvalishvili being fatigued and injured was a big part of the narrative after he lost the rematch to “No Mercy,” but now he’ll have to take on the Russian ace with limited breathing, potentially affecting his greatest asset: cardio.
