Yahoo! Sports P4P top 10
Credit: Dave Doyle, Yahoo! Sports
Month in and month out, there are nine fighters you can almost guarantee will be ranked among the world’s top 10 pound-for-pound mixed martial arts.
By and large, the pundits agree that at this time Anderson Silva, Georges St. Pierre, Quinton Jackson, B.J. Penn, Fedor Emelianenko, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Urijah Faber, Dan Henderson and Randy Couture all deserve a place among elite, but disagree on where they should be placed.
The No. 10 spot, though, has been in flux. This month, Miguel Torres becomes the third fighter in four months to claim the final position in the Y! Sports Top 10. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua held it for two months. Rua was preceded by Gilbert Melendez.
Several others consistently knock on the door, but haven’t gotten in. Here’s a look at Torres, Rua and three combatants who haven’t cracked the top 10:
Torres: The newly crowned WEC bantamweight champion is officially 24-1, but others have pegged his real record as 33-1, including several fights against much larger men back in the days when it was hard for the 135-pound group to find quality opponents in their weight class. Torres’ national visibility should help lift the recognition of the bantamweight division in general.
Norifumi “Kid” Yamamoto: Yamamoto has won 14 consecutive matches, including victories over Jeff Curran, Caol Uno, Genki Sudo and Rani Yahya. But he never fought in PRIDE or the UFC, which has hurt his visibility among North American voters.
Rua: Still one of the world’s best light heavyweights, the last impression most voters had of “Shogun” was his submission loss to Forrest Griffin in September. Five months later, Rua pulled out of his planned June match with Chuck Liddell because of a knee injury, which will keep him out of the spotlight longer.
Gesias “JZ Calvan” Calvancante: A fighter with a legitimate beef over his exclusion from the poll. The American Top Team lightweight is 12-0-1 in his past 13 fights. He has a highly anticipated matchup with Shinya Aoki in DREAM’s debut card on March 15 in Japan.
Paulo Filho: The WEC middleweight champion boasts a 16-0 record, but a dismal performance on national TV in his last title defense against Chael Sonnen, in which he looked terrible for the better part of two rounds before pulling out the win with an armbar, didn’t help his ascension up the rankings.
The Yahoo! Sports MMA Top 10 pound-for-pound poll, the only one of its sort in mainstream sports media, features 15 reporters and editors from the major national sports websites; newspapers that cover MMA; and legitimate MMA-only news-related websites. Each voter selects their top 10, with 10 points awarded for a first-place vote, 9 for a second, etc., down to 1 point for a 10th-place vote.
The only two guidelines placed on voters are: 1. Fighters need to have competed at least once within the past 12 months in order to be considered; 2. Fighters under suspension for banned substance or drugs of abuse usage cannot be considered until they are reinstated. For more on info on the panel, including links to their sites, go here.
10. Miguel Torres
Points: 10
Affiliation: WEC
Weight class: Bantamweight (WEC bantamweight champion)
Hometown: E. Chicago, Ind.
Record: 21-1
Last month’s ranking: Unranked
Most recent result: def. Chase Beebe, R1 submission, Feb. 13
Analysis: Torres’ absence from the rankings until this point has more to do with the lack of exposure for bantamweights than it is any reflection on his skills. And Torres left no doubt about his skills with one of the finest displays of pure jiu-jitsu you’ll ever see in MMA during his WEC bantamweight title win over Beebe.
9. Dan Henderson
Points: 30
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Light heavyweight/middleweight
Hometown: Victorville, Calif.
Record: 22-8
Last month’s ranking: 7
Most recent result: lost to Anderson Silva, R2 submission, March 1
Analysis: Henderson is the only member of the top 10 who is coming off back-to-back losses. But then, those losses are to No. 1 Anderson Silva and No. 3 Quinton Jackson. So it wouldn’t be fair to be too harsh to a fighter who stepped up and provided fans with two of the biggest matches of the past six months.
8. Randy Couture
Points: 54
Affiliation:Under contract to UFC
Weight class: Heavyweight
Hometown: Gresham, Ore.
Record: 16-8
Last month’s ranking: 8
Most recent results: def. Gabriel Gonzaga, Round 3 TKO, Aug. 25
Analysis: Don’t expect Couture to drop his grievances with the UFC anytime soon, as all indications are the wagons are circling in his camp and no dissenting thoughts are being allowed in. Fighters lose their eligibility for the poll if they go a full year without fighting, which would mean “The Natural” can no long be considered starting with the September poll.
7. Urijah Faber
Points: 55
Affiliation: WEC
Weight class: Featherweight (WEC featherweight champion)
Hometown: Sacramento, Calif.
Record: 20-1
Last month’s ranking: 9
2007 results: def. Jeff Curran, submission R2, Dec. 12
Analysis: The winner of 12 consecutive matches, Faber defends his title on June 1 in Sacramento against Jens Pulver in what is shaping up as the biggest card in WEC history.
6. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira
Points: 74
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Heavyweight (UFC interim heavyweight champion)
Hometown: Vitoria da Conquista, Brazil
Record: 31-4-1
Last month’s ranking: 6
Recent results: def. Tim Sylvia, R3 submission, Feb. 2
Analysis: In his public posturing, UFC president Dana White continues to offer potential opponents to Randy Couture and not Nogueria. This is a legal maneuver to bolster the UFC’s claims in their battle against Couture. But most chatter seems to have Nogueira’s next matchup against Frank Mir.
5. B.J. Penn
Points: 87
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Lightweight (UFC lightweight champion)
Hometown: Hilo, Hawaii
Record: 12-4-1
Last month’s ranking: 5
Most recent result: def. Joe Stevenson, R2 submission, Jan. 19
Analysis: For all the talk that Penn’s pure skills are the best in the world, it has been four years since he’s pieced together as many as three consecutive wins. He has a chance for his third in a row with his lightweight title defense against former champ Sean Sherk on Memorial Day weekend in Vegas.
4. Fedor Emelianenko
Points: 89
Affiliation: M-1
Weight class: Heavyweight
Hometown: Stary Oskol, Russia
Record: 27-1 (1 no-contest)
Last month’s ranking: 4
Most recent result: def. Hong Man-Choi, R1 submission, Dec. 31.
Analysis: The formation of the M-1 promotion was announced in September. We’ve yet to see its first live event. On a possibly related note, Mark Cuban’s promotion, HDNet Fights, has yet to announce a make-up date for its cancelled February card in Dallas. Cuban is presumed to be the promoter who wants to put together a Couture-Emelianenko match, but one has to wonder at this point if he’s content to pile up MMA promotions to fill air time on his cable station, as opposed to investing in a major-league organization.
3. Quinton “Rampage” Jackson
Points: 112
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Light heavyweight (UFC lt. heavyweight champion)
Hometown: Memphis, Tenn.
Record: 28-6
Last month’s ranking: 3
Most recent result: def. Dan Henderson, unanimous decision, Sept. 8
Analysis: Those who have tuned out The Ultimate Fighter over the past couple seasons should have reason to watch the upcoming seventh season, as the combination of Rampage and Forrest Griffin should make the show worth watching.
2. Georges St. Pierre
Points: 130 (2 first-place votes)
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Welterweight (interim welterweight champion)
Hometown: Saint-Isidore, Quebec
Record: 15-2
Last month’s ranking: 2
Most recent result: def. Matt Hughes, R2 submission, Dec. 29.
Analysis: After UFC 82, Dana White ripped into those who don’t consider Anderson Silva the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter. But does such an assertion shortchange St. Pierre? Most won’t rank GSP ahead of Silva now, with St. Pierre’s loss to Matt Serra still looming. But if St. Pierre finishes Serra next month the way most people expect, that will put him at 9-1 in his past 10 fights, with his only loss in that span avenged.
1. Anderson “Spider” Silva
Points: 145 (13 first-place votes)
Affiliation: UFC
Weight class: Middleweight (UFC middleweight champion)
Hometown: Curitiba, Brazil
Record: 21-4
Last month’s ranking: 1
Most recent result: def. Dan Henderson, R2 submission, March 1
Analysis: Seven straight wins. Seven straight finishes. No match went longer than two rounds. Silva’s only loss in the past 38 months was a disqualification against Yushin Okami. His two fights before the Okami debacle also were finishes inside of two rounds. It has become clear we have Silva, St. Pierre, and then everyone else.
Votes for others: Kid Yamamoto, Mauricio Rua 8; Paulo Filho 5; Gesias Calvancante 4; Forrest Griffin, Chuck Liddell, Jon Fitch, Matt Serra 3; Sean Sherk 2; Matt Hughes, Lyoto Machida 1.
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