MMA News Forums » MMA Forums » General MMA Forum

[Dr. MMA]

Please note that the MMANews FORUMS rankings are separate from the MMANews website rankings.

Rankings committee members: Dr. MMA, Rivethead, b0sH, KevoOnTheRadio and Sakara=Excitement (*Please note that b0sH was unavailable for this month's rankings, thus the rankings are from the other 4 members.)
Appointed to combine and matrix rankings from the committee members: SWIFTboy

The following criteria were taken into account while generating the rankings:

A) Rankings are not based on opinion of fighter's skillset and potential but are based on evidence, i.e. fighter's opposition, track record, how dominant the wins were (dependent on opposition), and how dominant the losses were (dependent on opposition).

B) Recent victories hold more weight than historical, however, it doesn't negate it.

C) A fighter is ranked in the division where they have had their two most recent consecutive fights. This could be two actual fights or one actual fight and a scheduled fight. For example, BJ Penn is considered a WW now (1 actual fight and 1 scheduled on Saturday), Jake Shields is also a WW, but Kenny Florian is still a LW (as he only has one scheduled fight at FW and his two most recent consecutive actual/scheduled bouts were at LW).

D) If a fighter hasn't fought in 18 months or hasn't won a fight in 24 months, they will be removed from the top 10.

E) Head-to-head matchup is primarily considered when rankings are tied, similar to other sports like hockey or soccer.
e.g. If half of us thought that Machida was #3 and the other half thought Rampage was #3, then we look to their actual fight. Rampage won, so he moves up and Machida moves down.

F) With regards to the holy trinities (e.g. Machida beat Rashad who beat Rampage who beat Machida), we evaluate the individual's rank and their opposition's at the time of the fight. More recent victories are weighed heavier as are more dominating victories.
e.g. #4 ranked Machida defeated #1 ranked Rashad in May 2009, #3 ranked Rashad beat #4 ranked Rampage in May 2010, and #4 ranked Rampage beat #2 ranked Machida in Nov 2010. However, the dominance of their victories varied greatly. These factors was taken into consideration.

__________________________________________________ ______________________
The MMANews Forums rankings as of May 10, 2011 are:

Heavyweight
1 Cain Valasquez
2 Fabricio Werdum
3 Junior Dos Santos
4 Fedor Emelianenko
5 Antonio Silva
6 Brock Lesnar
7 Shane Carwin
8 Alistair Overeem
9 Frank Mir
10 Josh Barnett

Light Heavyweight
1 Jon Jones
2 Rashad Evans
3 Mauricio Rua
4 Quinton Jackson
5 Lyoto Machida
6 Forrest Griffin
7 Dan Henderson
8 Ryan Bader
9 Phil Davis
10 Rafael Cavalcante

Middleweight
1 Anderson Silva
2 Chael Sonnen
3 Yushin Okami
4 Nate Marquardt
5 Demian Maia
6 Ronaldo Souza
7 Vitor Belfort
8 Jorge Santiago
9 Hector Lombard
10 Michael Bisping

Welterweight
1 Georges St. Pierre
2 Jake Shields
3 Jon Fitch
4 Nick Diaz
5 Josh Koscheck
6 Thiago Alves
7 Carlos Condit
8 BJ Penn
9 Diego Sanchez
10 Paul Daley

Lightweight
1 Frankie Edgar
2 Gilbert Melendez
3 Grey Maynard
4 Eddie Alvarez
5 Shinya Aoki
6 Jim Miller
7 Kenny Florian
8 Denis Siver
9 Tatsuya Kawajiri
10 Georges Sotiropoulos

Featherweight
1 Jose Aldo
2 Hatsu Hioki
3 Chad Mendes
4 Bibiano Fernandes
5 Michihiro Omigawa
6 Marlon Sandro
7 Diego Nunes
8 Hiroyuki Takaya
9 Joe Warren
10 Mark Hominick

Bantamweight
1 Dominic Cruz
2 Joseph Benavidez
3 Brian Bowles
4 Urijah Faber
5 Miguel Torres
6 Scott Jorgensen
7 Brad Pickett
8 Demetrious Johnson
9 Takeya Mizugaki
10 Eddie Wineland

[TBEAR]

Looks good fella's. I approve (not like that matters much, I guess )

[Adambomb]

No offense, but Fedor at #4 reeks of nuthugging. He's rated higher than Bigfoot even after Bigfoot destroyed him? Plus, Fedor's beaten exactly 0 fighters in your top 10. Logically, wouldn't he belong with the Overeem, Mir, & Barnett group who have also not beaten a current top 10 heavyweight?

The guy is the GOAT, but he hasn't beaten any current relevant heavyweight contenders. That should be reflected in the rankings.

Everything else is reasonable, although I'd probably rank Penn higher as his KO of Hughes and his draw with Fitch are much more impressive than anything Alves, Condit, Koscheck, or Diaz have achieved.

[Sick_Lunatic]

Very good list guys. But here's my 2 cents .......(not like it matters, just bored at work and wanted to comment)

Heavyweight
Dos Santos to 2, Werdum to 3 (because JDS holds a win over him, and hasn't lost)
Fedor to 5, Silva to 4 (same shyte).
Not sure about Mir in there, as he's 2-2 in his last 4, and one of those wins was over CroCop. And his loses were in devasting fashion. But there's not many other people out there, Nelson will take his spot in a few weeks.

Light Heavyweight
Bang on. Maybe Bader shouldn't be there, but he's only lost to Jones

Middleweight
Pretty weak divison to have Maia ranked at 5 (as he's only won by decision, over lower ranked opponents). But again, nobody really out there. Bisping to 5 and Maia to 10. Suprised Belfort is so low after one KO, but he hasn't fought at MW really (actually only the 1 fight, or is he scheduled for Rio or something, completely forgot)

Welterweight
Good shyte, no complaints here. No Rumble Johnson though? Or Rory Macdonald (not yet I guess)

And the rest look good. Plus I'm lazy and lunch is over.

[Dr. MMA]

Originally Posted by Adambomb

No offense, but Fedor at #4 reeks of nuthugging. He's rated higher than Bigfoot even after Bigfoot destroyed him? Plus, Fedor's beaten exactly 0 fighters in your top 10. Logically, wouldn't he belong with the Overeem, Mir, & Barnett group who have also not beaten a current top 10 heavyweight?

The guy is the GOAT, but he hasn't beaten any current relevant heavyweight contenders. That should be reflected in the rankings.

Everything else is reasonable, although I'd probably rank Penn higher as his KO of Hughes and his draw with Fitch are much more impressive than anything Alves, Condit, Koscheck, or Diaz have achieved.

This was heavily debated in the February 23rd rankings. There are reasons given of why it is the case. I've provided the link below:
http://www.mmanews.com/forums/genera...rd-2011-a.html

I'm not sure if the debate continued in the March 31st rankings, but I've posted the link anyways:
http://www.mmanews.com/forums/genera...31-2011-a.html

[Adambomb]

Originally Posted by Dr. MMA

This was heavily debated in the February 23rd rankings. There are reasons given of why it is the case. I've provided the link below:
http://www.mmanews.com/forums/genera...rd-2011-a.html

I'm not sure if the debate continued in the March 31st rankings, but I've posted the link anyways:
http://www.mmanews.com/forums/genera...31-2011-a.html

Fedor's track record is great, but the "top 10" opponents he defeated are currently all irrelevant, so his dominance is negated, while both his losses (to current top 10 calibur fighters) were embarassingly bad.

Fedor hasn't won a fight since 2009 (the longest drought of any fighter you have listed in any division), & Bigfoot's domination of him proves that Bigfoot is the better fighter. Having Bigfoot ranked behind Fedor is illogical and causes these rankings (at least at heavyweight) to become a joke.

The point of these rankings appears to be to remove "what if?" opinions and personal bias in order to rate purely on performance. That's a great idea, but it has to be applied unilaterally. Fedor hasn't performed well in some time, but is getting the benefit of the doubt due to inactivity & nostalgia. Doesn't Randy Couture belong in the top 10 at 205 if you're basing so much on historical success? He beat Chuck & Tito when they were both top 5, & his only losses at 205 came to Chuck (#1 or #2 at the time) & Machida. Certainly no shame in that. He's also won 2 of his last 3, and just like Fedor beat Tim Sylvia over 2 years ago when he was a top 10 heavyweight.

[TBEAR]

Originally Posted by Adambomb

Fedor's track record is great, but the "top 10" opponents he defeated are currently all irrelevant, so his dominance is negated, while both his losses (to current top 10 calibur fighters) were embarassingly bad.

Fedor hasn't won a fight since 2009 (the longest drought of any fighter you have listed in any division), & Bigfoot's domination of him proves that Bigfoot is the better fighter. Having Bigfoot ranked behind Fedor is illogical and causes these rankings (at least at heavyweight) to become a joke.

The point of these rankings appears to be to remove "what if?" opinions and personal bias in order to rate purely on performance. That's a great idea, but it has to be applied unilaterally. Fedor hasn't performed well in some time, but is getting the benefit of the doubt due to inactivity & nostalgia. Doesn't Randy Couture belong in the top 10 at 205 if you're basing so much on historical success? He beat Chuck & Tito when they were both top 5, & his only losses at 205 came to Chuck (#1 or #2 at the time) & Machida. Certainly no shame in that. He's also won 2 of his last 3, and just like Fedor beat Tim Sylvia over 2 years ago when he was a top 10 heavyweight.

Remeber that rankings are subjective. There will never be a set of rankings that everyone agrees on. With this set of rankings, being run through a panel of 5, you get a very good snapshot of a set of MMA fans. I am not saying you are right or wrong, because it is subjective.

If you look though, at the other site rankings(including MMANEWS site ranking) this is a very soild set of rankings IMO.

[SWIFTboy]

Originally Posted by TBEAR

Remeber that rankings are subjective. There will never be a set of rankings that everyone agrees on. With this set of rankings, being run through a panel of 5, you get a very good snapshot of a set of MMA fans. I am not saying you are right or wrong, because it is subjective.

If you look though, at the other site rankings(including MMANEWS site ranking) this is a very soild set of rankings IMO.

Yeah but people should definitely voice their opinions on areas they disagree with, especially when (as in this case) they back up their opinion with clear reasoning.

Maybe they will sway the opinion of the voters and maybe not but voicing your opinion in a constructive maner is highly encouraged.

In the end these are the most solid rankings I've seen though.

[TBEAR]

Originally Posted by SWIFTboy

Yeah but people should definitely voice their opinions on areas they disagree with, especially when (as in this case) they back up their opinion with clear reasoning.

Maybe they will sway the opinion of the voters and maybe not but voicing your opinion in a constructive maner is highly encouraged.

In the end these are the most solid rankings I've seen though.

Yeah for sure, I was not tring to tell him not to say his peace. My point was simply not everyone will agree, and I think that these are pretty soild rankings. I also think he atleast thought out his point and backed it up with some facts. By no means, was I tring to take away from his post. Hell I even rep'ed it cause it was well thought out

[Kimbo> Rampage]

Werdum beats fedor and jumps to #2, bigfoot beats fedor, more impressively imo and he is still below him. Not saying either should be too high up, but using the logic that jumped werdum up.

Not too bad, as again no rankings will ever be completely unanimous. Better than most, not the best though...