GLOBAL-MMA Rankings (Non-Zuffa) - May 2012

A lot of interesting fights in M-1 and Bellator for the next rankings. Deuce is a solid top 10 now and Miranda proved he´s a legit MW fighter. Musa Khamanaev should be close to LW contenders.

Johan Lofgren wrote:A lot of interesting fights in M-1 and Bellator for the next rankings. Deuce is a solid top 10 now and Miranda proved he´s a legit MW fighter. Musa Khamanaev should be close to LW contenders.

Yup, that's right. I just made the updates on my PC this morning.

Miranda looked great. Awesome sub. finish. Hopefully White Wolf heals up quickly. Miranda vs. Magomed will be sweet.

Deuce was good as well. He should be rematching Guram now for the real belt.

Musa was solid. That was a big win.

Overall sweet event. Looking forward to their next one in June.

CDF47 you should post these rankings on Sherdog and other forums.

Johan Lofgren wrote:CDF47 you should post these rankings on Sherdog and other forums.

Yeah, every 3 months or so I post them up on Sherdog with the Zuffa rankings as well. I only visit this forum and Sherdog usually and TT but that site is pretty much dead.

Is there going to be Flyweight rankings in the future?

Sonatine wrote:Is there going to be Flyweight rankings in the future?

It´s possible. What do you think about the rankings? Any suggestions for the upcoming June rankings?

The rankings are awesome, it shows that there is a real, global talent pool outside of Zuffa. A lot of hard work has been put into it, and it shows. I also was going to suggest strawweight rankings as well. You have guys like Rambaa Somdet, Roy Docyogen, Lincon De Sa, Mikihito Yamagami et al. Or how about Women's rankings in the future too?

As far as suggestions go, I would suggest removing Lloyd Woodard from the LW rankings into "Other Contenders" and putting Brent Weedman in there, being the tournament runner-up and all. Michal Materla being KSW 185lbs champion may have boosted his chances in the rankings as well. How about Karl Amoussou in "Other Contenders" being this season's/summer series' 170lbs finalist.

I would also suggest putting Dantas at #1 at BW, as he captured the Bellator BW crown and has been active. Bibiano hasn't been active as of late and Makovsky and Ueda are both coming off losses.

Sonatine wrote:The rankings are awesome, it shows that there is a real, global talent pool outside of Zuffa. A lot of hard work has been put into it, and it shows. I also was going to suggest strawweight rankings as well. You have guys like Rambaa Somdet, Roy Docyogen, Lincon De Sa, Mikihito Yamagami et al. Or how about Women's rankings in the future too?

As far as suggestions go, I would suggest removing Lloyd Woodard from the LW rankings into "Other Contenders" and putting Brent Weedman in there, being the tournament runner-up and all. Michal Materla being KSW 185lbs champion may have boosted his chances in the rankings as well. How about Karl Amoussou in "Other Contenders" being this season's/summer series' 170lbs finalist.

Great suggestions. There are some solid flyweights outside Zuffa that could be ranked in the future. Straw Weight and Pin Weight may be digging a bit deep but they would be pretty unique here, as would Super Heavyweight.

The reason Woodard is so high is because after he finished Patricky Freire he jumped to the top 5 since Freire was holding a spot way up there. Fighters move up high when they beat top ranked fighters like Patricky was. After he lost to Hawn, Hawn jumped way up and Woodard dropped a bit. Weedman did not have wins over top guys like Patricky so he was ranked lower and now he is coming off a loss to Hawn so he will drop some more.

Yeah Materla jumped up some spots after winning the KSW title. Holding a title in promotions like Bellator, KSW, M-1, DREAM, ONE FC, Legend FC,..., have a good impact on the ranking of fighters, I agree.

Karl Amoussou will be showing up next month.

Sonatine wrote:I would also suggest putting Dantas at #1 at BW, as he captured the Bellator BW crown and has been active. Bibiano hasn't been active as of late and Makovsky and Ueda are both coming off losses.

Yeah, that is one of the tougher things about the rankings is when there are two solid champs from different promotions. We had Bibi at the top ahead of Makovsky when Makovsky was champ. Makovsky was number 2 so when Dantas beat him he took the number 2 spot. Fighters can drop in the rankings if they do not regularly fight against solid competition but Bibi had fights on NYE when he captured the DREAM title and he has some solid wins in the past as the former DREAM FW champ and now the DREAM BW champ. I wish we could have a Bibi vs. Dantas cross-promotional super fight to determine the number 1 fighter. That is really what this sport needs which would be great for these promotions outside Zuffa.

Great suggestions.

I would also recommend putting Straus in the FW rankings as well with his win over Sandro. But I'm sure you have that covered already.

Sonatine wrote:I would also recommend putting Straus in the FW rankings as well with his win over Sandro. But I'm sure you have that covered already.

Yup, got it covered. Thanks. Update will probably be posted Sunday.

I haven't gotten around to commenting on the rankings yet but I must say they look solid.

I do have one small issue though. Is it really fair to classify Mousasi as a non-Zuffa fighter these days? Sure he is the Dream champ but it seems doubtful that he will defend his belt again since Dream's future is anything but stable. Also, didn't he just sign a contract extension with Strikeforce? It seems like he is committed to fighting for Zuffa in the states right now and since he is one of Strikeforces top stars he will probably be given a UFC contract when Strikeforce is shut down. I don't know, I just don't think he counts as a non-Zuffa fighter anymore.

Frank Hill wrote:I haven't gotten around to commenting on the rankings yet but I must say they look solid.

I do have one small issue though. Is it really fair to classify Mousasi as a non-Zuffa fighter these days? Sure he is the Dream champ but it seems doubtful that he will defend his belt again since Dream's future is anything but stable. Also, didn't he just sign a contract extension with Strikeforce? It seems like he is committed to fighting for Zuffa in the states right now and since he is one of Strikeforces top stars he will probably be given a UFC contract when Strikeforce is shut down. I don't know, I just don't think he counts as a non-Zuffa fighter anymore.

Thanks for that comment. I appreciate it.

Yeah, I have been thinking the same thing about Mousasi. It may be about that time to drop him. He last fought for DREAM in July of last year and recently I read he did sign a 6 fight contract extension with SF (which could now be exclusive with Zuffa running the show). Last July he had contracts with both SF and DREAM but that could be over and I do not see him fighting for DREAM anytime soon now that they cancelled their July event and possibly all events for the year.

It will suck taking him off there. He is such a solid LHW but at least the fighter that beat him not too long ago will take his place: King Mo. Plus, Rampage should be heading this way real soon.