3 biggest storylines ahead of UFC 310

UFC 310 - and another title defense for flyweight champion Alexandre Pantoja - is upon us.

In Saturday's main event, Pantoja puts his title on the line for the third time against Kai Asakura, a UFC newcomer and former two-time Rizin FF champion. In the co-headliner, welterweights Shavkat Rakhmonov and Ian Machado Garry meet in a five-round No. 1 contender bout.

Here are three key storylines ahead of the final pay-per-view of the year, which takes place at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

Will Asakura finally get Japan a UFC title?

Asakura has a chance to make history in more ways than one when he steps into the Octagon for the first time.

Win or lose, he'll join a rare group of fighters who challenged for a title in their UFC debut, which includes Gilbert Melendez and Joe Soto. Dana White and Co. apparently wanted to give Asakura a top-three opponent before he fought for the championship, but those plans fell apart and turned into the Pantoja fight that's headlining this weekend's card.

But if Asakura beats Pantoja, he'd be the first to win a title in his UFC debut.

He'd also be the first Japanese fighter to become a UFC champion in the modern era.

Yes, that's right. A country with some of the deepest roots in martial arts has never produced a UFC champion. Six Japanese fighters have tried, from Kyoji Horiguchi to Yushin Okami, but all have failed. Asakura has a chance to put Japan back on the map as an MMA powerhouse. In some respects, Asakura is carrying the entire country on his shoulders.

"I want to bring back MMA's popularity in Japan and provide a place where my friends, teammates, and other fighters are able to earn a living in Japan," Asakura told UFC.com's E. Spencer Kyte ahead of the fight. "I feel like someone has to bring the MMA scene back to Japan, and I'm very proud that I'm part of the Japanese generation that will bring MMA popularity back to Japan."

The UFC has been to Japan nine times in its 31-year history. Only six countries have held more UFC events (the United States, Brazil, Canada, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, and Australia). The promotion visited Japan three times in the span of 13 months in the late 1990s and early 2000s and for four straight years from 2012-15. But the last event in Japan took place back in 2017.

Clearly, hosting events in that area of the world hasn't been the UFC's top priority over the last seven years. However, that could change in the blink of an eye if Asakura gets his hand raised.

Is Garry a top-3 welterweight?

The short-notice matchup between Rakhmonov and Garry is the biggest fight on the card, and for good reason. Not only will it determine the next challenger for welterweight champion Belal Muhammad, but it'll answer some questions about two of the division's undefeated and most promising contenders.

Above all, we'll find out whether or not Garry - Ireland's best hope of a UFC title since Conor McGregor - is indeed championship material.

Garry has been perfect throughout his Octagon run, winning eight in a row and beating the likes of Michael "Venom" Page, Geoff Neal, and Neil Magny. However, his two most recent performances weren't overly convincing. Instead, they were competitive fights in which Garry did just enough to win. Those victories continued to move Garry up the ladder, but they didn't quite put him in the mix as a top-three welterweight.

Beating Rakhmonov would silence any critics, and it'd be Garry's last step before challenging for the title.

Why is Evloev-Sterling on the prelims?

The UFC 310 bout order leaves a lot to be desired.

Fans were shocked to see Bryce Mitchell versus Kron Gracie on the main card when another featherweight bout with much larger stakes, Movsar Evloev versus Aljamain Sterling, was buried on the preliminary card. Evloev-Sterling is easily the third-most important fight of the entire night and should set up the winner for a No. 1 contender bout at worst, and yet it's underneath a matchup between the No. 13-ranked featherweight and an unranked fighter who hasn't won since 2019.

Make it make sense.

Evloev said he wasn't bothered by the card placement, but Sterling, on the other hand, was quite puzzled. He's a former bantamweight champion with the most consecutive title defenses in division history (three) and multiple pay-per-view main events under his belt. Sterling's also 1-0 in his new division, and it's not like he's at the tail end of his career. He deserves better.