THE PUNCHSPORT REPORT FOR JULY 2024

Everyone gets some much-needed rest.

Welcome to July. June was a ridiculously packed month full of twists, turns and thirteen whole-ass events, and if you're tuckered out from the chaos, good news: July is immeasurably calmer at just five. The UFC's taking the first week off, the PFL is in stasis until the playoffs begin, Bellator is gone until September and everyone is enjoying Summer vacation.

THIS MONTH'S PUNCHSPORTS EVENTS

• UFC on ESPN: Namajunas vs Cortez, July 13

• UFC Fight Night: Lemos vs Jandiroba, July 20

• UFC 304: Edwards vs Muhammad 2, July 27

• ONE Fight Night 23: Ok vs Rasulov, July 6

• Super Rizin 3: Asakura vs Hiramoto, July 28

IS THERE ANY NEWS

TAYLOR WILY - JUNE 14, 1968 - JUNE 20, 2024

In the canon of the UFC the world's very first memory of mixed martial arts had Taylor Wily in it, and it's funny, because MMA was the smallest part of his life.

As someone who blossomed into a human brick wall as a teenager Taylor wanted to pursue football, but as it turns out, getting into the NFL is hard. Being 6'2", 440 pounds and capable of still moving quickly does, however, make you a perfect match for sumo wrestling. There was already a two-decade tradition of Hawaiian-born sumo wrestlers competing in Japan, and the first and most prominent of them, Takamiyama Daigorō, had just founded the first foreigner-led stable in the sport's history. Wily was one of the first talents he scouted, and the re-christened Takamishū Daikichi made an immediate impact as one of the sport's hot, undefeated prospects.

But he hit the wall pretty hard. Wily's accomplishments were by no means minimal--sumo's fucking hard to do and getting anywhere is a big deal--but he just couldn't break into the ranks of the professionals. For people who understand the divisional structure of sumo, he topped out at Makushita 2; for people who don't, he was stuck one step below the level where you make actual money. He also very quickly discovered no longer had fully functional knees. Funnily enough, Wily wound up making a massive contribution to the sport not in competition, but in becoming the first mentor to fellow Hawaiian import Chad Rowan, who would shortly become the world-famous Akebono Tarō, one of the greatest sumo wrestlers of all time. But Wily's own career ended in 1989 after just two years. He briefly considered professional wrestling, but that ultimately didn't work any better.

But it did put him on the radar for the then-burgeoning UFC.

The first UFC was posited as a clash of martial arts styles, half to bring it as close to Bloodsport as possible, half to make it metatextually clear that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu was the best martial art there was. They sought representatives for the major martial arts of the world, and Taylor was a perfect fit for sumo. At the request of the promoters he exoticized his name, using the alternate Polynesian spelling for his first and switching his middle name into a surname, and thus, for one night only, was Teila Tuli born. He was matched up against the Dutch Savate expert Gerard Gordeau--who was actually primarily trained as a Karateka, but who's counting--and when all of the fighters assembled and began arguing over the sudden addition of rules on the eve of the no-rules fighting competition, Wily famously stood up, said "I just signed my paper, I don't know about you guys but I came here to party and if anyone else came to party I'll see you tomorrow night at the arena," and ended the bickering on the spot, without which the first UFC might never have happened.

Gerard Gordeau vs Teila Tuli was the first televised fight in UFC history and it ended in twenty-six seconds after Gordeau kicked out three or four of his teeth.

Those twenty-six seconds were the entirety of Wily's mixed martial arts career, and somehow, it's still one of the most important in the history of the sport, and in a way, that's the story of his life. He wasn't a successful football player, but he put himself in position to compete in one of the most exclusive sports in the world. He wasn't a top sumo player, but his success kept his stable alive long enough to cultivate one of the biggest stars in the history of the entire art. He lost his one and only MMA fight, but not only did he ensure the UFC event happened at all, his example set the tone for the unexpectedly brutal future of an entire sport.

And the greatest successes of his life came after the violence. He turned himself into a surprisingly successful actor working out of Hawaii, most notably turning a bit part into a recurring main character on the 2010 reboot of Hawaii Five-O. 56 is too goddamn young for anyone to die, but in those 56 years he went around the world, competed in multiple combat sports, made it through hundreds of episodes of a popular television show and had a family and children he loved.

We should be so lucky. He leaves behind a sumo record of 57-27-14 and an MMA record of 0-1.

After promoting it for two years, and devoting the entirety of 2023's The Ultimate Fighter 31 (jesus christ) to it, and dumping their own drug testing program over it, and promising a huge Summer showdown over it, and selling tickets at an enormous premium over it, Conor McGregor pulled out of his UFC return with a busted pinky toe. Dana White, in a rare moment of letting the marketing face drop, admitted in subsequent interviews that Conor definitely wasn't coming back anytime in the next few months. Conversation immediately turned to the likelihood that he returns in December for the end of the year, because no one can ever let go.

This one admittedly stunned the hell out of me. Dana White and Rizin President Nobuyuki Sakakibara met back in February for mysterious reasons, and it appears those reasons were a good old-fashioned talent raid. When top star and Flyweight champion Kyoji Horiguchi posted about not being able to come to terms with the UFC at the beginning of June it was assumed it simply hadn't worked out, which left everyone gobsmacked when the UFC signed Bantamweight champion Kai Asakura a week later. Not only is Kai a beltholder in Rizin, but he and brother Mikuru are real popular, millions-of-views Youtubers in Japan. In one additional little fuck-you to Kyoji, Kai also announced he'll be fighting at Flyweight in the UFC to maximize his physical advantages. In a company more and more dominated by Contender Series winners and low-budget replacements, a huge signing like this is rare and extremely welcome.

Similarly in rare but entirely welcome contractual news, Invicta Fighting Championships, the only major women's mixed martial arts league in America, signed a new distribution deal with CBS Sports. Invicta's broadcast struggles have gone on for quite some time--they were on AXS TV for awhile, and then despite being owned by the company that owns AXS they inexplicably stopped broadcasting on it, and then they just streamed on Youtube, which is a deeply unfortunate way to try to make money. After not promoting an event at all since last October there was a tangible fear they were quietly closing their doors, so CBS Sports broadcasting their next five events--there being another five events coming at all, frankly--is a big fucking improvement.

During the same week the UFC had to finally admit Conor wasn't fighting, they also learned Judge Boulware, the man in charge of their theoretically-settled antitrust lawsuit, was no longer satisfied with their arrangement. Boulware spiked the settlement agreement under the feeling it was insufficiently penalizing to the UFC and provided insufficient renumeration for its impacted fighters, which was a sizable surprise to both sides. This is still a developing story and it remains to be seen how it actually turns out, but let's not lose sight of what's truly important about it: It's very, very funny.

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WHAT HAPPENED IN JUNE

We got off to a quick start on June 1 with UFC 302: Makhachev vs Poirier, but the card itself was very, very slow, with nine out of twelve fights going to decision. On your early prelims, André Lima beat Mitch Raposo, Ailín Pérez outworked Joselyne Edwards and Bassil Hafez struggled but beat Mickey Gall. At the regular-flavor prelims, Jake Matthews overcame a rough first round to beat Philip Rowe, Grant Dawson outwrestled Joe Solecki, Jailton Almeida scored the night's first finish by choking out Alexander Romanov, and Roman Kopylov beat César Almeida. On the main card: Randy Brown narrowly outworked Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos, Niko Price edged out Alex Morono, Kevin Holland got a slightly controversial submission over Michał Oleksiejczuk when the referee ruled the latter's arm had broken, and Sean Strickland won an agonizing decision over Paulo Costa. The main event saw Islam Makhachev defending his Lightweight championship against Dustin Poirier, and it was a stellar fight that redeemed an otherwise awful card, with Poirier putting up a fantastic but ultimately losing effort and getting choked out midway through the fifth round.

July 8 brought three MMA events with it, and the first was PFL Europe 2, and I'll be honest, I don't know why I even listed it last month. I think two or three people even read the recap section, tops, and of those two or three people, I ask: Do you want to read the details of a European MMA card where 27 out of 28 fighters don't even rate a Wikipedia page? Is your life improved by knowing that Dylan Tuke defeated Kane Mousah? Even the main event was kind of silly, as Women's boxing champion Savannah Marshall made her MMA debut by knocking out Mirela Vargas. That's fine! But it was at a 160-pound catchweight. Even by the standards of weight classes that don't exist, it doesn't exist. I don't know. I don't know why the PFL does what it does. Shanelle Dyer got a minorly viral headkick and it was cool, and I hope the PFL investing in women's talent goes somewhere, but fuck.

Equally helpful for my ongoing sense of futility was ONE 167: Tawanchai vs Nattawut 2.The card was something of a fire hazard, as it lost its main event thanks to Stamp Fairtex's injury, it got no replacement and simply saw the co-main promoted, and the new co-main became a catchweight fight when company star Rodtang Jitmuangnon missed weight by most of an entire division. But the show must go on, and highlights included the newest of the Lee fighting family, Adrian, making his ONE debut by choking out Antonion Mammarella, former headliner Denice Zamboanga getting demoted to the prelims and beating Noelle Grandjean, Sittichai Sitsongpeenong welcoming former K-1 champion Masaaki Noiri to ONE by beating him in a kickboxing match. Grappling champion Kade Ruotolo made a successful transition to MMA by choking out Blake Cooper, Mikey Musumeci scored a victory over grappling rival Gabriel Sousa with a calf slicer, the unfortunately overweight Rodtang still put on a great performance by beating Denis Purić, and in the main event, Tawanchai P.K.Saenchai and Jo Nattawut had a fantastic back-and-forth fight that ultimately saw Tawanchai successfully defending his Featherweight Muay Thai Championship and scoring his second career win over Nattauwt. Except ONE CEO Chatri Sityodtong announced he thought Nattawut won so they'll have to have another rematch anyway. No matter where you are in the world, nothing matters.

Rizin was up next with Rizin 47, and boy, it was a rough night for the native roster. the card got off to a solid start for Rizin, with Sho Patrick Usami knocking out Kazuki Tokudome, Genji Umeno out-kickboxing Uoi Fullswing and BeyNoah outworking Johnny Case, but the foreigner fights started from there. Kazakhstan's Karshyga Dautbek destroyed Tetsuya Seki, American Spike Carlyle choked out South Korean Kim Kyung-pyo, Kyrgyzstan's Razhabali Shaydullaev rolled Koji Takeda, and Poland's Przemysław Kowalczyk snatched an armbar on Mikio Ueda. But Rizin won where it counted: In the co-main, Kleber Koike Erbst scored a heel hook on a way-too-aggressive Juan Archuleta, and in the main event, Kyoji Horiguchi survived a big scare against Sergio Pettis to avenge his Bellator loss by decision.

The UFC struck with UFC on ESPN: Cannonier vs Imavov, and it, too, was a pretty fuckin' long card. We got off to a great start, with Puja Tomar winning a robbery-of-the-year candidate decision over Rayanne dos Santos, but things smoothed out from there: Taylor Lapilus shut out Cody Stamann, Denise Gomes beat Eduarda Moura, Daniel Marcos finally got an uncontroversial UFC performance by dominating John Castañeda, Montana De La Rosa got her revenge decision over Andrea Lee, Brad Katona dominated but could not finish Jesse Butler, Carlos Prates finally scored the UFC's first knockout in almost twenty consecutive fights by kneeing Charles Radtke's chest into multiple pieces, and Ľudovít Klein pitched a perfect shutout over Thiago Moisés. The main card proved more eventful: Punahele Soriano put an absurd beating on Miguel Baeza, Zachary Reese stopped Julian Marquez in twenty seconds, Brunno Ferreira knocked out Dustin Stoltzfus with a reverse spinning elbow, Raul Rosas Jr. choked out Ricky Turcios, and in the biggest surprise of the year, Dominick Reyes snapped a four-year losing streak by knocking out Dustin Jacoby in just two minutes. So, of course, the main event had to be weird. Jared Cannonier opened up with a strong first two rounds against Nassourdine Imavov, but he began to flag almost immediately afterward, and a minute and a half into the fourth round he was stumbled with a punch and wobbled across the cage. Referee Jason Herzog stopped the fight--but only after Cannonier had visibly recovered, rendering the whole thing an unnecessary clusterfuck.

The PFL was back on June 13 with PFL 4, featuring the Heavyweight and Women's Flyweight brackets. Down at Women's 125, you had Juliana Velasquez pounding out Lisa Mauldin, Ilara Joanne outworking Shanna Young, Taila Santos narrowly beating Jena Bishop, Liz Carmouche scoring an amazing last-second armbar over Kana Watanabe, and Dakota Ditcheva knocking out Chelsea Hackett. Up at Men's Extra Large, Timothy Johnson knocked out Danilo Marques, Tyrell Fortune got a decision over Marcelo Golm, Oleg Popov very slowly outworked Davion Franklin, Denis Goltsov knocked out a last-minute replacement in Thiago Santos, and in the main event, Linton Vassell scored a split decision over Valentin Moldavsky. Officially, your Heavyweight playoffs will be Goltsov, Popov, Moldavsky and Johnson, and your Women's Flyweight playoffs are Ditcheva, Santos, Carmouche and Bishop.

June 15 saw UFC on ESPN: Perez vs Taira which, thanks to the last-minute removal of a Middleweight bout, was almost entirely fighters at 145 and below. On the prelims, Josefine Knutsson won her much-rescheduled match with Julia Polastri, Melquizael Costa tapped out Shayilan Nuerdanbieke, Westin Wilson got an honest to god UFC win by armbarring Jeka Saragih, Gabriella Fernandes got a split over Carli Judice, and Nate Maness dominated Jimmy Flick. Up top, Adam Fugitt got a split against Josh Quinlan, Asu Almabayev wrestled the absolute shit out of Jose Johnson, Brady Hiestand scored a third-round choke against Garrett Armfield, Lucas Almeida won a close call with Timothy Cuamba, and Miles Johns decidedly decisioned Douglas Silva de Andrade. Your main event was Tatsuro Taira's top-ten coming-out party against Alex Perez, and he punched his ticket impressively and weirdly: He took Perez's back standing, took him down to the ground by hooking his knee with one foot, and tore the entire goddamn thing in half.

Another long, three-event weekend later began with PFL 5 on June 21. The Lightweight and Light Heavyweight divisions took the stage, and it was, uh, long. At 205 pounds, Sadibou Sy managed a really, really funny TKO over Andrew Sanchez, Alex Polizzi decisioned our good friend Face Shoe, Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov shut out Simon Biyong, Rob Wilkinson got a skin-of-his-teeth split against Josh Silveira, and Impa Kasanganay got a doctor's stoppage over Jakob Nedoh that really, really should have been just a regular-flavor stoppage, but what can you do. Down at 155, Adam Piccolotti got a split over Michael Dufort, Gadzhi Rabadanov shut out Elvin Espinoza, Brent Primus choked out Solomon Renfro, Bruno Miranda beat Patricky Pitbull, and Mads Burnell got the upset win against Clay Collard. Your Light Heavyweight playoff competitors are Silveira, Yagshimuradov, Wilkinson and Kasanganay, and your Lightweights are Brent Primus, Gadzhi Rabadanov, Michael Dufort and Clay Collard, despite both losing, because playoff formats make perfect sense in combat sports.

The following morning saw the third outing in neo-Bellator, Bellator Champions Series 3: Jackson vs Kuramagomedov. It was yet another Dublin event and it was so Irish-themed that they had a Conor McGregor minicam for half the goddamn night, because we live in a lie. On your prelims, Michelle Montague choked out Karolina Sobek, Rizin's Shinobu Ota made a successful international debut by scoring the rare north-south choke on Roger Blanque, Sarvarjon Kahmidov 30-27ed Marcirley Alves, Zabit's brother Khasan Magomedsharipov took out Tyler Mathison, and Nathan Kelly choked out Jose Sanchez. On your main, Kasum Kasumov--god dammit it's still a Bellator card. I was in the middle of looking at typing 'Darragh Kelly did a thing' and I just still cannot bring myself to write out Bellator results in full without feeling the kind of existential crisis I just cannot accept. In fights that mattered, Arlene Blencowe dropped and choked out Sinead Kavanagh, Paul Hughes made his prospect debut by knocking out Bobby King, and in your main event, Ramazan Kuramagomedov won a narrow decision and Bellator's Welterweight Championship from Jason Jackson.

At the same goddamn time, the UFC's much-delayed, much-rebooked Saudi Arabian sportswashing debut happened. UFC on ABC: Whittaker vs Aliskerov was a card that could best be described as sort of tepid. On the prelims, the equally belated Road to UFC 2 Bantamweight Tournament ended with Lee Chang-ho taking a split over Xiao Long, Magomed Gadzhiyasulov got the rare majority decision over Brendson Ribeiro, Muin Gafurov dominated Kyung-ho Kang, Rinat Fakhretdinov got a real close split over Nicolas Dalby, Felipe Lima scored an upset submission against Muhammad Naimov, and in probably the best fight of the card, Nasrat Haqparast won a hard-boxing split over Jared Gordon. On the main, Volkan Oezdemir notched his first knockout in five years after starching Johnny Walker, Shara Magomedov got a late TKO over a visibly exhausted Antonio Trócoli, Kelvin Gastelum missed weight absurdly but still got a decision over Daniel Rodriguez, and Alexander Volkov outjabbed Sergei Pavlovich for three rounds. Your main event saw Robert Whittaker, arguably the second best Middleweight of the last ten years, facing Ikram Aliskerov, a guy who is 2-0 in the company, and unsurprisingly, Whittaker knocked him silly in under two minutes.

The feelgood story of the month was Invicta's shock announcement of a broadcast deal and five more events this year, and the first was Invicta FC 55: Bernardo vs Rubin on June 28. The card kicked off with two Flyweight rookie matches, as the 1-0 Violeta Mendoza pretty violently destroyed the debuting Fallon Johnson in one round, and in a double-debut matchup, Zoe Nowicki notched a decision over Josiane Oliveira. Rounding out the prelims down at Atomweight, Elisandra Ferreira also managed a decision over Katie Saull. On your main card, Bantamweight Taylor Guardado made short work of DEEP's Yoko Higashi with a rear naked choke in a minute and a half, Atomweight Andressa Romero overcame a tough first round to dominate Saori Oshima for the latter two, former UFC prospect Kay Hansen came in at Strawweight and got a real close split decision over Sayury Canon, and in the main event, Talita Bernardo overcame some tough striking from Olga Rubin to retain her Bantamweight championship by submission in two rounds.

The second phase of the PFL season ended shortly thereafter with PFL 6, which closed out the season for the Featherweights and Welterweights--and one really cool special feature match where Lorenz Larkin impressively murdered Alan Dominguez in one round. Up at 170 pounds, Neiman Gracie beat Don Madge, Andrey Koreshkov beat Goiti Yamauchi, Shamil Musaev knocked Murad Ramazanov the fuck out, Magomed Umalatov choked out a retiring Brennan Ward, and Logan Storley outwrestled Luca Poclit. At 145, Timur Khizriev beat Enrique Barzola, Kai Kamaka III defeated Pedro Carvalho, Gabriel Alves Braga missed weight by 5 1/2 pounds but still beat Bubba Jenkins after Jenkins injured his arm shooting a takedown, and in the main event, Brendan Loughnane unsurprisingly defeated the late replacement, never-won-in-the-PFL Justin Gonzales. So your Featherweight playoffs will include Loughnane, who didn't fight anyone who's won a fight in the last two years, Braga, who missed weight so badly his fight could easily have been cancelled, Khizriev and Kamaka III, and your Welterweight playoffs include Shamil Musaev, Magomed Umalatov, Don Madge, who just lost a fight to someone who is not in the playoffs, and Murad Ramazanov, who will not only have to fight again just 57 days after getting violently knocked out, but will have to rematch the guy who just knocked him out. It's almost like the seasonal playoff format doesn't work in MMA or something.

And we closed out the month on June 29 with UFC 303: Pereira vs Procházka 2, one of the biggest clusterfucks in recent memory. It was supposed to be Conor McGregor's comeback, and then he pulled out, and then the co-main event changed five times, and then the new co-main event got replaced with a new fight, and then the fight changed weight classes two days before the event, and then the fight changed competitors two hours before it happened. Wild shit. The early prelims saw a quartet of decisions, as Vinicius Oliveira outworked Ricky Simón, Rei Tsuruya won a fantastic grapple-off with Carlos Hernandez, Martin Buday beat Andrei Arlovski in a truly abominable fight, and Gillian Robertson dominated Michelle Waterson-Gomez, who retired after the match. Your regular prelims were more stoppage-centric: Payton Talbott ate his sacrificial lamb for dinner after knocking out Yanis Ghemmouri in nineteen seconds, Jean Silva knocked out Charles Jourdain in six and a half minutes, Andre Fili notched an exceptionally close split decision over Cub Swanson, and Joe Pyfer crushed Marc-André Barriault in a minute and a half. On your main card, Ian Machado Garry narrowly outgrappled Michael "Venom" Page to a decision, Macy Chiasson got dominated in the first round only to score a doctor's stoppage over Mayra Bueno Silva after elbowing her skull open, and Roman Dolidze won a slightly lackadaisical brawl with Anthony Smith. Your co-main event was weird as shit: It was supposed to be Brian Ortega vs Diego Lopes at 145 pounds, and then Thursday morning Ortega announced he couldn't make weight and the fight was moved to 155, and then Saturday, in mid-broadcast, it was revealed that Ortega was sick and had to be pulled from the fight, and he was replaced by Dan Ige, who took the fight on four goddamn hours' notice. Lopes won the decision, but Ige was incredibly game and won the third round, which is insane. Your main event was a Light Heavyweight Championship rematch between Alex Pereira and Jiří Procházka, but unlike their first fight last year this was all one-way traffic. Pereira chopped Jiří down with leg kicks, dropped him in the last seconds of the first round, and finished the job by dropping a still-out-of-it Jiří with a head kick almost immediately in the second.

WHAT'S COMING IN JULY

After a truly exhausting 13-14 events across June, everyone is taking it easy in July, with just five events to deal with.

Your only card for the first week of the month is ONE Fight Night 23: Ok vs Rasulov on July 6. ONE heard my complaints last month about their refusal to book MMA championship fights, and they responded by booking a bunch of interim ones instead, just to make me mad. As is always the case, there are currently nine fights on this card and most of them aren't actually MMA; your Muay Thai highlights include Luke Lessei vs Bampara Kouyate and Saemapetch Fairtex vs Nico Carrillo, and your obligatory grappling match is Tye Ruotolo vs Jozef Chan. In MMA, you've got Xie Wei vs Tatsumitsu Wada because they remembered Flyweight exists, Kang Ji-won vs Kirill Grishenko at Heavyweight, and in your main event, Ok Rae-yoon will face Alibeg Rasulov to crown an interim Lightweight champion. Yes, they said Christian Lee was coming back four months ago and now they're booking an interim title fight in his division, and no, Rasulov has never fought for ONE before. What're you gonna do.

We've got three straight weeks of the UFC next, and we start on July 13 with UFC on ESPN: Barber vs Namajunas Namajunas vs Cortez. I'll be honest: It's a little meh. Josh Fremd vs Andre Petroski, Luana Santos vs Mariya Agapova, Abdul Razak Alhassan vs Cody Brundage--is this doing anything for you yet? Julian Erosa vs Christian Rodriguez? Santiago Ponzinibbio vs Muslim Salikhov? Mike Malott is here! He's fighting Gilbert Urbina! Please care about Mike Malott, he's a nice boy. Drew Dober's fighting if they can find a replacement for Mike Davis. Your main WAS Maycee Barber vs Rose Namajunas, but Barber pulled out right at the end of June and was replaced by Tracy Cortez in what is probably a title eliminator and if one of them somehow gets a title shot before Manon Fiorot I will never stop screaming impotently.

July 20 brings us UFC Fight Night: Lemos vs Jandiroba, which they're taking so seriously that as I write this it's June 23 and they have yet to officially announce it, or more than eight fights for the card. Unofficially, you've probably got Mohammed Usman vs Thomas Petersen, Brian Keller vs Cody Gibson and Loik Radzhabov vs Trey Ogden to look forward to, but officially, you've got Luana Carolina vs Lucie Pudilová, Tracy Cortez vs Miranda Maverick, Lee Jeong-yeong vs Hyder Amil, Cody Durden vs Bruno Gustavo da Silva, Choi Doo-ho vs Bill Algeo, Steve Garcia vs Choi Seung-woo, Brad Tavares vs Park Jun-yong, and your main event of Amanda Lemos vs Virna Jandiroba.

And then we're back to England for July 27 and UFC 304: Edwards vs Muhammad 2. There are currently fourteen goddamn fights booked for this card, and boy, they packed every single UK-relevant fighter they could onto this one. Shauna Bannon! Caolán Loughran! Mick Parkin, Molly McCann and Christian Leroy Duncan! Sam Patterson? Nathaniel Wood! Oban Elliott, you son of a gun! Rounding out the top, you've got Modestas Bukauskas vs Marcin Prachnio, Muhammad Mokaev vs Manel Kape, Arnold Allen vs Giga Chikadze and, of course, Paddy Pimblett vs Bobby Green. Your co-main event sees the hilarious spectacle of an interim championship getting defended before its undisputed counterpart, as Tom Aspinall puts his pseudo-belt on the line against Curtis Blaydes, and in your main event, Leon Edwards finally defends the Welterweight title against Belal MUhammad.

Our month ends the next night with Super Rizin 3: Asakura vs Hiramoto. This is one of Rizin's big ones so they're bringing out the big guns, including, I swear to god, a cross-promotion with the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship in which Tai Emery will face Charisa Sigala and John Dodson meets Takaki Soya in bare-knuckle competition. Otherwise, it's a whole mess of Japanese stars. Rena Kubota vs Kate Oyama, Ryusei Ashizawa vs Kouzi, Hideo Tokoro vs Hiroya Kondo, Hiroaki Suzuki vs YA-MAN, Yutaka Saito vs Yuta Kubo, and Hiromasa Ougikubo vs Makoto Takahashi. And then, things get weird. Your co-main event is, I swear to god, a special standing-only exhibition between Rukiya Anpo and 45 year-old retired boxing legend Manny Pacquiao, for some reason, and your main event is even weirder, as real-life rivals Mikuru Asakura and Ren Hiramoto have promised to have a loser-leaves-town match where the winner gets bragging rights for life and the loser has to retire from MMA. Sure! Why not.

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CURRENT UFC CHAMPIONS
Heavyweight Champion, 265 lbs

Jon Jones - 27-1 (1), 0 Defenses

Very few things in combat sports reach the crossroads of awe-inspiring and unfathomably frustrating as Jon Jones. In 2020, Jon Jones notched the third defense of his second light-heavyweight championship reign after an exceedingly contentious decision against Dominick Reyes, only to abdicate the title because the UFC wasn't paying him enough, and he was bored of 205 pounds and wanted to move up to heavyweight like he'd been planning to for nearly a decade, and he needed more time to cement his place as not just one of the sport's greatest pound-for-pound fighters, but one of its biggest pound-for-pound pains in the ass. On September 23, 2021, Jon Jones was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame; on September 24, 2021, he was arrested (for the fifth time!) after his daughter called the police on him for beating her mother, during which he antagonized the police and, inexplicably, headbutted a police car. Because this is Jon Jones, of course, the primary charges were dropped, he paid $750 for the hood of the police cruiser, and got a stern warning to stay out of trouble, young man, because there is a money-powered reality-distorting field around Jon Jones whereby nothing matters. After a year of rumors, and after the unconscionable firing of heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou, the UFC gleefully announced Jon Jones vs Ciryl Gane to fill the vacant heavyweight throne. Did it matter to the matchmaking that there were more deserving candidates? Of course not, because it's Jon Jones: He deserves the spot for his earlier success. Did it matter to his public appearances that when last we saw him he was arrested for beating his fiancee? Of course not, because it's Jon Jones: He was, if anything, more up his own ass with self-righteousness than ever before. Did it matter to the fight that he hadn't competed in more than three years and looked terrible at the time? Of course not, because it's Jon fucking Jones. Ciryl Gane looked too nervous to use footwork let alone throw anything, and he should have been, as Jones effortlessly threw him to the canvas and choked him out in two minutes. The longest-running, most dominant and yet most persistently annoying show in mixed martial arts is back. And in the most predictable thing possible, some bullshit happened, he got injured, he's going to be gone for at least eight months, and the UFC is not only not stripping him of the title like they've done to everyone else, they've already gotten out ahead of themselves and made clear that when he comes back, he will be fighting Stipe Miocic, not whoever the interim champion is at the time. Funny, that.

Interim Heavyweight Champion

Tom Aspinall - 14-3, 0 Defenses

The UFC's Heavyweight division got itself into a weird spot in 2007. Randy Couture was the rightful, reigning, defending champion, but he and the UFC had a dispute that stretched out more than a year. The UFC couldn't strip him--it would have made it easier for him to get out of his contract--so they made an interim title. By the time Randy came back they had already made big plans for him and Brock Lesnar, but the interim title had gotten wrapped up in The Ultimate Fighter 8 (jesus christ) and it, too, had to be defended, meaning there were two championships being defended simultaneously: The Undisputed Championship, which was the 'real' belt despite being held by a guy trying to leave the company and contended for by someone with only two victories in the sport, and the Interim Championship, which was being fought over by the actual, legitimate top contenders. At UFC 295 on November 11th, 2023, Tom Aspinall, the rightful #4 contender, fought Sergei Pavlovich, the rightful #2 contender, for a new interim championship. And he won. On two weeks' notice! Aspinall's been one of the most promising heavyweight prospects in the world for years, his only loss in the UFC came from his knee tearing itself apart fifteen seconds into a fight, and he went toe-to-toe with one of the scariest punchers in the history of the sport and knocked him flat in just barely over a minute. He is, indisputably, the real deal. And now he gets to be the interim champion of a Heavyweight division in which the real champion, Jon Jones, is going to be out injured well into next year and, the UFC has made clear, will be returning to defend his title against Stipe Miocic, who by that time will have been on the shelf for 3+ years and will be going on 42. So congratulations, Tom. You're the real Heavyweight champion, and to prove it, you're defending your title before Jon Jones. Aspinall gets his injury rematch with Curtis Blaydes at UFC 304 on July 27.

Light-Heavyweight Champion, 205 lbs

Alex Pereira - 11-2, 2 Defenses

Conflicting things can be simultaneously true in this sport. It is true that Alex Pereira was brought into the UFC as a 3-1 rookie based on his history as a kickboxer rather than his accomplishments in the sport. It is true that he was fast-tracked to a title shot against the primary focus of that history, megastar Israel Adesanya, after beating just three fighters, none of whom had any hope of testing his grappling. It is also true that he rendered that discourse ultimately irrelevant by not just beating but stopping Adesanya in his title shot anyway, in the process becoming the fastest Middleweight to go from debut to champion since Anderson Silva. It was more or less an open secret that he wasn't going to stay there: Being bigger than most Heavyweights in the UFC, the weight cut to 185 was always a short-term thing. Luckily for the UFC, he got knocked out by Adesanya and gave him the title right back on his way up to 205. Once again, he got fast-tracked, this time by happenstance. A split decision victory over Jan Błachowicz made Pereira a top five contender, and when Jamahal Hill was forced to vacate his title thanks to an ankle injury--and the previous champion, Jiří Procházka, was back from his own title vacation and injury--Pereira was slotted right back into championship place. They met at UFC 295 on November 11th, and after two back-and-forth rounds, Pereira punished a Jiří who dared to grapple by elbowing his skull until he briefly stopped moving. The commentary and audience thought it was an early stoppage, but Jiří Procházka didn't, so fuck 'em. It is true that Alex Pereira has fought seven UFC fights without having to fight an actual grappler, and that was an intentional choice by matchmaking. It is true that getting the chance to win championships in two weight classes within just two years and seven fights in the UFC is not a thing that happens to most fighters. But it is unavoidably true that Alex Pereira is a two-division champion and no one can take it away from him. After none of the UFC's other ideas worked out, Alex Pereira vs Jamahal Hill became the main event of UFC 300, and after weeks of talking endless rafts of shit, Hill got knocked out in the first round. Pereira was scheduled to defend his title against Procházka for a second time in August, but after Conor McGregor pulled out of UFC 303 because his toe hurt, the rematch was moved up with fourteen days to prepare. There was no question about the stoppage this time: Alex dropped Jiří right at the end of the first round and finished the job thirteen seconds into the second. Pereira ironically reinjured his already-injured toe on Jiří's skull, so hopefully he gets more than two months to recover this time around.

Middleweight Champion, 185 lbs

Dricus du Plessis - 21-2, 0 Defenses

Middleweight's fucking wild, man. Generally when a belt changes hands repeatedly in a short period of time you can blame injuries and strippings and title vacations, but recent history has simply been a case study in how goddamn weird things can get at 185 pounds. As of this writing (February 1, 2024) we've had five separate Middleweight champions in less than fifteen months. Divisional king Israel Adesanya dropped the belt to his nemesis Alex Pereira, Adesanya dropped Pereira himself in an immediate rematch, and in one of 2023's bigger upsets, Adesanya lost his belt to human exclusion zone Sean Strickland. But that shot, initially, didn't belong to him: It belonged to Dricus du Plessis. Dricus joined the UFC in 2020 as one of the international scene's best prospects--a two-division champion in his native South Africa's Extreme Fighting Championship, a Welterweight champion in Poland's Konfrontacja Sztuk Walki, and a finishing machine who'd never gone to a decision in his life. The spotlight of the UFC gave him two new reputations: For one, as an exceptionally awkward-looking fighter who could appear shaky and exhausted and still easily knock anyone out, and for two, as a guy with real uncomfortable feelings about his homeland. Shortly after his debut Dricus du Plessis began making comments about becoming the first "real" African champion in the UFC, citing the way fighters like Kamaru Usman, Israel Adesanya and Francis Ngannou had left the country, and, boy, there's just no way to get around the topic that isn't gross as hell. But du Plessis knocked #1 contender Robert Whittaker dead, so it didn't matter. He was in pole position. And then he lost it, because he wanted more than a month to prepare for a world championship fight and the UFC decided that just wouldn't fly. A fully-trained du Plessis stepped into the cage against his replacement and now-champion Sean Strickland on January 20 at UFC 297, and after a close fight and a split decision, du Plessis brought the belt back to South Africa just like he promised. The UFC decided to go right back to their original racially uncomfortable plan: It's du Plessis vs Adesanya at UFC 305 on August 17.

Welterweight Champion, 170 lbs

Leon Edwards - 22-3 (1), 2 Defenses

It took half a decade to get the world to notice, but everyone sees Leon Edwards now. "Rocky" came from the kind of circumstances sports movies are made of--a poor kid from Jamaica who moved to England, lost his father to gang violence, nearly lost himself to it as a teenager and found a healthy outlet for his anger in mixed martial arts. Edwards made his debut in 2011 as a prime example of the modern generation of fighter, cross-trained from the beginning in every discipline, and in just three years he was the welterweight champion of Britain and off to the UFC. Entering 2016, Leon had suffered the first true loss of his career--he was 10-3, but one of those losses was a DQ for an illegal blow and the other a coinflip decision that could easily have gone either way--at the hands of the newly-crowned Ultimate Fighter 21 winner, Kamaru Usman, making his debut as an official UFC competitor. It took ten fights without a loss for Leon to get his rematch. The UFC seemed especially resistant to his title contendership, pushing him down in favor of the ostensibly more marketable UK star in Darren Till and booking him against numerous other contenders and gatekeepers while repeatedly elevating less deserving fighters to the championship. He wouldn't have gotten it at all, in fact, had Jorge Masvidal not gotten arrested. On August 20, the UFC acquiesced and granted the clear #1 contender his shot at the championship, and at revenge against Kamaru Usman--and after getting dominated for three and a half out of five rounds, with the commentators openly opining on the likelihood that he had given up, with just fifty-six seconds left in the fight, Edwards uncorked a headkick that shocked the world and knocked Kamaru Usman out for the first time in his career. The rubber match was inevitable, and once again, Edwards opened as an underdog, and once again, he proved everyone wrong. Instead of a last-minute comeback Leon simply shut Usman down for the majority of the fight, stuffing eleven of his takedown attempts, outstriking him in four out of five rounds and landing an absolutely wild 75% of his strikes in the process. It was an incredible performance against one of the greatest welterweights of all time, marred only by Leon losing a point for fence grabs. The decision was unquestionably his, and now legitimized as the champion of the world, Leon found himself dealing with the UFC's bullshit insistence that his first defense came not against the top contender, but rather, the UFC's favorite bigot, Colby Covington. Edwards dominated him and sent him away 4-1, finally ending the bullshit. After years of trying as hard as possible to avoid it, the UFC has finally relented and given Belal Muhammad his long-deserved title shot--it'll be Leon vs Belal 2 at UFC 304 on July 27.

Lightweight Champion, 155 lbs

Islam Makhachev - 26-1, 3 Defenses

Destiny has come. When Islam Makhachev made his UFC debut in 2015, Khabib Nurmagomedov, considered by most to be the #1 contender and soon to be the best in the world, swore up and down that Makhachev, not him, would be the best lightweight champion of all time. Coming from him, the praise made sense: Khabib and Islam have trained together since they were children growing up and learning to wrestle in Makhachkala. Islam learned under Khabib's father, trained with Khabib's team and even made the pilgrimage to America to join Khabib at the American Kickboxing Academy. And then, two matches into his UFC tenure, Islam got knocked the fuck out in the first round by the little-known Adriano Martins, who hasn't won a fight in the six years since. Even as Makhachev racked up wins, the memory of his loss and his wrestling-heavy approach to his fights let people cast doubts on him. Sure, he's good--but he lost, so he's not as good as Khabib. Islam Makhachev, as his trainer tells it, never wanted to be Khabib. He loves fighting, but he doesn't love the spectacle or the glory or the attention. So when, after ten straight wins, Makhachev was picked to challenge Charles Oliveira for the vacant title he never truly lost, a lot of folks just weren't quite sure what to think. Sure, he was an incredible wrestler, but Charles Oliveira is a submission wizard, and sure, he's on a ten-fight streak, but he hasn't fought a single person actually IN the top ten, and Oliveira represents a huge, dangerous step up as a man who's been destroying some of the most accomplished lightweights in the sport's history. Analyst opinion was split right down the middle; the fight, as it turned out, was nowhere near that competitive, and the only analyst who was entirely correct was Khabib. Islam demolished the former champion, outstriking him, taking him down at will, controlling him in the grappling, and ultimately dropping him with punches and choking him out in the second round. His first defense was a different story. Islam faced featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 284 on February 12th in a rare best-of-the-best, champion vs champion match, and this time, his team's prediction of domination was thoroughly incorrect: It was a pitched battle that ended with Makhachev visibly exhausted and Volkanovski pounding on his face. Islam took an extremely close decision and the divisions will remain separate, but his aura of invulnerability has been thoroughly punctured. Or, at least, it was. In one of those funny moments of sport deterioration, his title defense against Charles Oliveira got scratched thanks to Oliveira busting his eyebrow in training, and on less than two weeks' notice the UFC ran Makhachev/Volkanovski 2, and with no hype, no marketing and no time to prepare, a visibly depleted Volkanovski got dropped by a headkick in the first round. Islam defended his Lightweight title against a Lightweight for the first time against Dustin Poirier at UFC 302 on June 1, and unfortunately for the dreams of many, he dominated Dustin and choked him out in the fifth round.

Featherweight Champion, 145 lbs

Ilia Topuria - 15-0, 0 Defenses

The king is dead, long live the king. Everyone paying attention knew Ilia Topuria was a special sort of prospect all the way back in 2020, but it wasn't until he destroyed Ryan Hall that the rest of the world noticed. A man who is equal parts German, Georgian and Spanish, Topuria established himself immediately as a force to be reckoned with: An undefeated wrecking machine with a strong wrestling game, a thoroughly solid grappling game, and the combination of terrifying knockout power and the sheer confidence to use it that can only come from having never lost a fight. Which was tested, thoroughly, when Topuria went up to Lightweight on short notice, fought a man in Jai Herbert who was half a foot taller than him, nearly got knocked out twice, and proceeded to recover, regroup, and fold Herbert in half with a punch in the second round. Suddenly, his prospect status was proven. Not only was he good, he was capable of dealing with adversity. Within the year he'd become the first (non-exhibition) fighter to ever beat Bryce Mitchell after ragdolling him and choking him out, and by the end of 2023 he'd dominated Josh Emmett, proving both his place at the top of the Featherweight contendership ladder and his ability to go five full rounds without falling over. His ascension couldn't have come at a better time. Alexander Volkanovski, one of the greatest champions in UFC history, was finally beginning to show signs of wear--somewhat unfairly, as those signs came from an incredibly inadvisable last-minute fill-in 155-pound fight against Islam Makhachev--but getting knocked out is getting knocked out, and when you've only been beaten once in a decade, getting knocked out in one round makes people ask difficult questions about your age, longevity, and durability. When Volk and Ilia met at UFC 298 on February 17, almost every question people had was, in fact, answered. Can Volk outwork Topuria? Absolutely; he won the first round handily and was dancing around him. Can Ilia keep himself in check? Completely; knowing just how good Volk was, Ilia was uncharacteristically patient and measured and didn't get himself in any real trouble in the first round while he figured out what he wanted to do. Can Alexander Volkanovski stand up to Ilia Topuria's punching power? Buddy: No one can. Three and a half minutes into the second round Topuria successfully trapped Volkanovski against the cage with his footwork, and one combination later, Volkanovski was on the floor. Ilia Topuria's destiny has come. He's the Featherweight champion. And he has, of course, already sworn to try to become a double champion within his next two fights.

Bantamweight Champion, 135 lbs

Sean O'Malley - 18-1 (1), 1 Defenses

The house always wins. I have spent years being mad about Sean O'Malley. Very few people get the red carpet rolled out for them without having some other previous success to draw on, but Dana White seemingly hand-selected Sean O'Malley as The Guy back in 2017 when he won a contract on the second-ever episode of the Contender Series, and from the second he first stepped into the octagon, he was treated like a Big Fucking Deal. His matchmaking was favorable, his marketing was endless, and even when he fucked up--getting his leg broken against Andre Soukhamthath, pissing hot for ostarine and missing a year, getting knocked out by Marlon Vera--the UFC was there to pick him up and keep pushing him up the ladder. He went from fighting regional fighters and flyweights to a top ten matchup, and when that match ended with him poking out Pedro Munhoz's eye, he was catapulted into a title eliminator against the #1-ranked Petr Yan, and when he got one of the year's worst decisions against Yan, he was allowed to sit on his hands for almost a year to wait for a title shot against a champion who was given three months and no injury recovery time to prepare. Is it fair for me to dislike Sean O'Malley for decisions the UFC made? Absolutely not, and I don't blame him for them whatsoever. Fortunately for me, Sean O'Malley also has a great love of making public hot takes like "here's my power ranking of my female coworkers by how fuckable I think they are" and "publicly avowed rapist Andrew Tate is a great guy I want to co-promote and advertise with" and "convicted child molester Tekashi69 is my homeboy" and "I have an open relationship with my wife where I get to bang other people but she doesn't because I'm the man" that make me feel deeply, thoroughly at peace with disliking him for other reasons. But none of that means he isn't a hell of a fighter or he didn't absolutely fucking flatten Aljamain Sterling with a picture-perfect counterpunch in their title fight. Did he deserve the shot? Not even a little. Did he prove he belongs at the top? Undeniably. However much of a shithead he may be, he's the champion of the goddamn world. Just in case his status as a marketing favorite had not been made abundantly clear, the UFC announced he will have his first title defense not in a rematch with Sterling, or a meeting with top contender Merab Dvalishvili, or even a bout with the streaking Cory Sandhagen, but--of course--a rematch with Marlon "Chito" Vera, the #6 contender on a one-fight win streak who knocked O'Malley out back in 2020. O'Malley dominated him, won a clear shut-out, and then called out Ilia Topuria, because weight classes are for chumps.

Flyweight Champion, 125 lbs

Alexandre Pantoja - 28-5, 2 Defenses

Sometimes, you just have someone's number. Brandon Moreno spent years fighting through a quadrilogy with Deiveson Figueiredo, and unfortunately for him, he had another trilogy waiting for him the second it was over. Alexandre "The Cannibal" Pantoja was Moreno's personal bogeyman, a man who'd fought and beaten him twice. But one of those fights was an exhibition on The Ultimate Fighter, and the other was against a Moreno with five less years of evolution and growth. Surely, a third fight in 2023 would be different. And it was--unlike the previous, one-sided dominations it was a fight-of-the-year candidate that took both men to their limit and led to a split decision--but its ending was not. Alexander Pantoja scored a third victory over Moreno, and with it, after sixteen years of competition, he finally became the clear, unequivocal best in the god damned world. Which was made even more poignant when he used his post-fight interview to ask if his absentee father was proud of him--and was made even more irritating when he also revealed that despite having eleven fights in the UFC at the time, he was paid so little that he'd been part-timing as a Doordash driver just to make ends meet right up until 2022. The idea that one of the absolute best fighters on the planet, after years and nearly a dozen fights in the world's biggest, most profitable fighting organization, would need to take on a gig-economy job to make money is outright offensive, and in a better world, it would have launched a furor. In this one, all we can do is be happy he's got the belt and will, hopefully, make some actual fucking money. His first title defense came against Brandon "Raw Dawg" Royval as the co-main event to UFC 296 on December 16th, and it was a wild affair with a couple scary moments, but Pantoja emerged victorious and notched the first successful defense of the title in three years. His next contender is, in all likelihood, the winner of the Brandon Moreno/Amir Albazi fight this February--or it would have been, until Albazi got injured. The UFC promoted a Moreno/Royval 2 showdown in hopes of scoring a Moreno rematch, but Royval won, so the UFC decided to forget the whole goddamn thing and book Pantoja against the #10-ranked Steve Erceg on May 4. It was a spirited fight, but Pantoja's experience ultimately got him the decision.

Women's Bantamweight, 135 lbs

Raquel Pennington - 16-8, 0 Defenses

The throne is once again full. Amanda Nunes left a gaping void in the world of women's mixed martial arts when she retired last Summer, and it took the UFC seven months to do something about it. The Women's Featherweight title? That's just gone, man. The patient could not be resuscitated. There's still life in Women's Bantamweight, though, and with Nunes gone and Julianna Peña injured, there was only one sensible match to make. Raquel Pennington should have gotten her title shot more than a year ago. "Rocky" is one of the UFC's longest-tenured women, at this point--her debut came more than a decade ago as a runner-up on The Ultimate Fighter 18 (jesus christ)--and the millstone weighing down her championship aspirations was the fact that more than five years ago she had a title fight, and it saw Amanda Nunes just beat her to a pulp. Despite being on the division's longest winning streak at the start of 2023, this loss was commonly cited as reason enough to deny Pennington the shot, and given that she's a generally affable, no-nonsense fighter with a grinding wrestling style, she is, categorically, the UFC's least favorite kind of person, which meant getting passed up over and over and having to settle for serving as a backup challenger for Irene Aldana--whom Pennington had already beaten. But with the top prospects out and Aldana having just gotten beaten even worse by Nunes than Raquel had, there was nowhere left for the company to hide. Mayra Bueno Silva had established herself as one of the division's most dangerous fighters after tearing apart Lina Länsberg's knee and nearly popping Holly Holm's skull out of her head with a ninja choke, and there were quite a few hoping she'd stop Pennington in her tracks when the two met at UFC 297 on January 20, but they were gratifyingly incorrect. Pennington outwrestled Silva, escaped her submission attempts, outstruck her 265 to 96, and finally, on a night where the UFC loudly celebrated bigotry, sexism and homophobia, took the belt home to her wife. Raquel's the first post-Nunes champion, and godspeed to her. The UFC is almost certainly waiting to see if either Peña gets healthy or the newly-signed Kayla Harrison beats Holly Holm to figure out what's next for Raquel.

Women's Flyweight, 125 lbs

Alexa Grasso - 16-3-1, 1 Defense, Sort Of

Every once in awhile someone gets to shock the combat sports world, and in 2023, it's Alexa Grasso. The UFC has been high on Grasso since she left Invicta for her company debut back in 2016--she's been one of the most consistently featured fighters in ANY women's division, be it her time at strawweight or her move up to flyweight--but her two bids at the top of the mountain at 115 pounds met with disaster, once in Tatiana Suarez handing her the only stoppage loss of her career and once in Carla Esparza outwrestling her to a decision, and watching her manhandled by 115-pound fighters left the world doubting her 125-pound chances. But thanks to her solid boxing and her ever-improving ground game she ran up a four-fight winning streak, and when the UFC announced that she'd be taking on divisional queen and one of the greatest of all time in Valentina Shevchenko, the collective fan reaction was a unanimous "sure, okay," because Valentina disposing of people was a generally accepted phenomenon and she needed a warm body. The first round was a slight surprise, with Grasso stinging Shevchenko on the feet, but as so often happens, by the fourth round Valentina had taken over the fight, was ahead on every judge's scorecard and looked poised to cruise to her eighth title defense. And then, she was struck down by the bane of the sport: Spinning shit. Backed into the fence, Shevchenko did what she does entirely too often--a spinning back kick--and in the half-second she was turned away Grasso leapt to her back, dragged her to the floor, and became the first person to ever submit Valentina Shevchenko. Alexa Grasso, after years of work, is the Women's Flyweight Champion of the World. A rematch was inevitable, and it came at UFC Noche on September 16th, and, like everything does, it ended in controversy. After an incredibly close fight that the media had split almost cleanly down the middle, the judges ruled the contest a split draw. Which wouldn't be crazy--were it not for said draw hinging on Mike Bell, who is typically one of MMA's most reliable judges, giving Grasso a completely, utterly inexplicable and inexcusable 10-8 score in the final round, without which Valentina Shevchenko would have won a split decision. So Grasso did not win, in the end, but she did defend her title, technically. But good news: We’re running it back again. Grasso and Shevchenko are the coaches of The Ultimate Fighter 32 (jesus christ), so this Summer, it’s fight #3.

Women's Strawweight, 115 lbs

Zhang Weili - 25-3, 2 Defenses

Are you really surprised? There's a long tradition of underestimating unlikely champions in mixed martial arts, particularly when they're not the fan-friendliest in style or personality, from Michael Bisping to Frankie Edgar, only to have those demeaned champions remind the world that they didn't reach the peak of their divisions by mistake. Many of the wise, studied scribes of the sport warned the foolish masses against assuming the same about Women's Strawweight Champion Carla Esparza: She was no pushover, they said, and Zhang will have real trouble. And then, come fight day, we unwashed masses pulled them from their ivory towers and forced them to run in the streets amongst the mud and filth so they, too, could feel the unburdened joy of being, because Zhang Weili, as basically every fan had assumed, did, in fact, beat the absolute tar out of Carla. It wasn't particularly close: Carla got outlanded 37-6, hurt several times on the feet, and choked out just a minute into the second round. The inexplicable, season-long Cookie Monster subplot is over, Zhang Weili is now a two-time world champion, and things are back as they should be. What comes next, however, is tricky. Carla was blown out, so a rematch is out of the question. Rose Namajunas, the only person in the UFC to beat Weili, is a likely candidate--but after her disastrous performance against Carla, it remains to be seen how much faith the UFC has in her. Jéssica Andrade has a claim, but she's splitting time between 115 and 125, and probably needs to pick a weight class if she wants a shot. So the UFC solved the problem by picking Amanda Lemos. In a surprise to no one, Zhang absolutely dominated Lemos, outstriking her 296-29, smashing her to the tune of multiple 10-8 rounds, and winning a very, very wide decision. The next step was a China vs China championship showdown against Yan Xiaonan at UFC 300, and Yan did better than some expected--which is to say she won a round while also arguably getting choked out once and TKOed once, and ultimately, Zhang took a lopsided decision again.

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NOTABLE CHAMPIONS ACROSS THE WORLD

ONE apparently capitulated under the incredible pressure of the angry sentence I wrote here that maybe two people read and booked a couple MMA title defenses, and so, begrudgingly, I have returned to work.

ONE Heavyweight Champion, 265 lbs

Anatoly Malykhin - 14-0, 0 Defenses

ONE Light Heavyweight Champion, 225 lbs

Anatoly Malykhin - 14-0, 0 Defenses

ONE Middleweight Champion, 205 lbs

Anatoly Malykhin - 14-0, 0 Defenses

Nothing is real, and we are all a part of the great dream. Anatoly Malykhin, a Master of Sport and international champion wrestler, took to MMA in 2016. Five years later, at the tender professional age of 8-0, he was in ONE. Two fights later, he was the interim Heavyweight champion. ONE's mixed martial arts divisions have always been slim at best and ephemeral at worst, but above 185 pounds, the air got real, real thin. Arjan Bhullar, the actual 265-pound champion, was having contractual issues with ONE and didn't want to fight. In another universe, Malykhin fought other Heavyweights and carried the torch for ONE's big boys. In this one, he dropped to 225 pounds in 2022 and just beat the absolute shit out of double-champ Reinier de Ridder, taking his title in the process. But he was still the 265-pound champion, and he still wanted to unify the belts, and thus, in June of 2023, he mauled a finally-present Bhullar to become the undisputed Heavyweight champion. In another universe, he defended either of these titles, lending credibility to ONE's divisional depth. In this universe, ONE didn't have any divisional depth, and thus, on March 1, 2024, Anatoly dropped to 205 pounds to, once again, beat the shit out of now single-champ Reinier de Ridder. ONE immediately began astroturfing as much marketing as they could behind the idea of having the first major triple champion in mixed martial arts history, and like all good marketing, that is, technically, true. But he got there by beating the same guy twice, once at a weight class recognized by no other major organization on Earth, and now rules over three divisions with almost no one in them. On November 8, more than seven hundred days after his first undisputed championship win, Malykhin will finally defend a belt when he puts the Heavyweight title on the line against Oumar "Reug Reug" Kane.

ONE Welterweight Champion, 185 lbs

Christian Lee - 17-4, 0 Defenses

ONE Lightweight Champion, 170 lbs

Christian Lee - 17-4, 0 Defenses

It took three tries, but by god, Chatri gets what Chatri wants. Christian Lee, the male half of the first family of ONE Championship and its homegrown golden boy, was very mad about losing his lightweight championship in a controversial decision to Ok Rae Yoon last year. He demanded the decision be reviewed and overturned and his championship reinstated. Unsurprisingly: This did not happen. After months of complaining and just shy of a year of waiting, the two had their long-awaited rematch and Lee left nothing to chance, knocking Yoon out in six minutes to reclaim his belt. Having finally retrieved his title, Lee, being a responsible champion, proceeded to immediately challenge ONE'S 185-pound champion, Kiamrian Abbasov, for his title, a move that was definitely in no way influenced by ONE's repeated attempts to get his sister Angela Lee double-champion status. Fortunately for Christian, Abbasov horribly botched his weight cut: He came in overweight, lost his title on the scale, and was visibly depleted in the fight. Which is particularly lucky, because Abbasov beat Lee senseless in the first round to the point that a standing TKO would not have been an unreasonable stoppage. But whether from his failed weight cut or simply from punching himself out, Abbasov was exhausted by the second round, and Lee mounted a gutsy comeback and ultimately stopped him with ground-and-pound in the fourth round. After three attempts, ONE has succeeded in getting two belts on a Lee. Unfortunately, it was followed by tragedy. After the passing of his younger sister Victoria, Christian took the whole of the year to, understandably, grieve. ONE planned his comeback for February of 2024, but, y'know, that clearly did not happen. In June, ONE announced Ok Rae Yoon will meet the debuting Alibeg Rasulov at ONE Fight Night 24 for an interim Lightweight championship. Whether that means it's more or less likely Christian is still coming back is up to you.

ONE Featherweight Champion, 155 lbs

Tang Kai - 16-2, 1 Defense

Tang Kai has been flying under the radar for some time, and in hindsight, that was clearly a mistake. He made his professional debut as a 20 year-old collegiate wrestler and won a rookie featherweight tournament in China's WBK (after investigating, we THINK it's World Battle Kings), but his stylistic limitations became apparent when he moved up to Kunlun Fight--and stopped fighting rookies. Dominant decision losses to ACA standout Bekhruz "Ong Bak" Zukurov and Road to UFC runner-up Asikeerbai Jinensibieke made Kai's weaknesses too apparent to ignore, and he made the tough call to commit to his dream, pack up his life, and move away from home to start training with real fight camps, most notably Shanghai's Dragon Gym and Phuket's legendary Tiger Muay Thai. It's worked out quite well: He hasn't lost a fight in five years. Three knockout wins in China's Rebel FC got ONE's attention, and since debuting with the organization in 2019, Kai has soundly defeated everyone in his path. He claims his wrestling base makes him impossible to take down and he proves it by using it almost entirely defensively, vastly preferring to bludgeon his opponents on his feet. His fight against Thanh Le, while blistering and difficult, was proof: He evaded every takedown attempt, widely outstruck him, dropped him with punches and leg kicks alike, and took the belt he's held for two years. And then, absolutely nothing else happened. It took ONE almost a full year to book another match for Tang Kai, and it was just an instant rematch with Thanh Le with no fanfare, and it was delayed by eight full months thanks to an injury. So after more than a year and a half without a fight, Tang Kai finally fought Thanh Le again, and this time, he knocked him out in three rounds. Congratulations, Tang Kai: You are back at square one.

ONE Bantamweight Champion, 145 lbs

Fabricio Andrade - 9-2 (1), 0 Defenses

The second time was the charm. When Fabricio "Wonder Boy" Andrade joined ONE Championship back in 2020 he was a virtual unknown in the mixed martial arts world, a 20-3 kickboxer but only a 3-2 mixed martial artist who'd been fighting out in the regional circuit of China. His association with Tiger Muay Thai put him on ONE's radar, and his visible striking skills despite being just 21 at the time made him interesting enough for a developmental contract. Said contract proceeded to develop into Andrade going on a five-fight winning streak that only got more dominant as he met tougher competition, and three straight first-round knockouts punched his ticket to the championship picture. His first appearance in the spotlight, unfortunately, went a touch awry. First, bantamweight champion John Lineker lost his title on the scale after missing weight, meaning only Andrade was eligible to become champion, and he was well on his way to doing so before hitting Lineker with an errant strike to the groin so hard it shattered his cup, and with the fight not yet halfway complete, it had to be rendered a No Contest. It took four months to get to the rematch, and it was much more closely contested, but after four rounds Lineker threw in the towel, his face having been punched too swollen to continue. Fabricio Andrade is 25 and a world goddamn champion. He promptly skipped away from MMA completely and faced Jonathan Haggerty for ONE's Featherweight Kickboxing Championship on November 3rd, where he was immediately destroyed. Haggerty wants an MMA fight next.

ONE Flyweight Champion, 135 lbs

Demetrious Johnson - 31-4-1, 0 Defenses

The king has returned. Demetrious Johnson's 2019 debut with ONE Championship was essentially scandalous. "Mighty Mouse" had long been a fan favorite of the lighter weight classes, a 5'3" combat machine who had been going the distance with world champions like Kid Yamamoto and Dominick Cruz while still working a day job in a warehouse, but it was only in 2012 when he dedicated himself to mixed martial arts as his full-time job that he became a star. He won the UFC's flyweight tournament and became its inaugural champion, and his talents are the reason a division that has existed for a decade has only had five champions--three of whom came in the last two years after he left. By 2018, Johnson had one of the longest winning streaks in the UFC, was the all-time recordholder for championship defenses in the UFC and had recorded some of the most outstanding finishes in the history of the UFC. By 2019, he was out of the company. Johnson and the UFC never got along--or, to be blunt, Johnson was one of the few publicly calling the UFC out on its bullshit. When he won the flyweight title and became a world champion while only getting paid $23k/23k he let it be known, when the UFC cut sponsorship money in the Reebok era he noted the raw deal it gave the fighters, and when Dana White tried to force him to take fights up at bantamweight by threatening to kill the flyweight division if he didn't, he told the world. After Henry Cejudo beat him in a razor-close coinflip decision and took the bargaining leverage of his championship away, it was over in a heartbeat. Dana White personally disliked him enough that he traded him to ONE Championship in exchange for their welterweight champion, Ben Askren. Johnson proceeded to immediately win ONE's flyweight grand prix, but took the first stoppage loss of his entire career in his shot at Adriano Moraes and his world championship and engendered a thousand MMA thinkpieces about if his time as a top fighter was over. A year and a half later, he got his rematch, and on August 27 at ONE on Prime Video 1 he returned the favor, handing Moraes his own first stoppage loss after knocking him out with a flying knee. The trilogy match was inevitable, and on May 5th, Johnson beat Moraes by a comprehensive decision, ending the story--and maybe his career. He says he's not sure if he's coming back yet. Fingers crossed.

ONE Strawweight Champion, 125 lbs

Joshua Pacio - 22-4, 0 Defenses

It's been a difficult couple of years for Joshua Pacio. "The Passion" stands as a true veteran of ONE Championship, having made his debut--and his first, unsuccessful attempt at winning the Strawweight title--all the way back in 2016. Pacio established himself as both a fan favorite and a solid promotional favorite for the company, and when he lost his second bid for the title against Yosuke Saruta in 2019, ONE, in a trick they'd become very friendly with over the years, gave him an instant rematch anyway. Pacio knocked Saruta out in the rematch and became easily the greatest 125-pound champion in ONE history, ultimately defending the title three times--including a trilogy match against Saruta. By 2022, Pacio was a crown jewel for ONE's lineup. Which is when he promptly got wrestled into paste by UFC cast-off Jarred Brooks. Rather than having him defend the title, ONE booked Brooks into grappling matches, and in the meantime Pacio fought and defeated undefeated prospect Mansur Malachiev to earn himself a rematch. Multiple delays ensued, but on March 1, the Brooks/Pacio rematch finally came. Fifty-six seconds in, Pacio attempted a standing kimura on Brooks, who hoisted him off the ground, suplexed him, and knocked him out. Unfortunately, this was a problem. Under ONE's ruleset, slams that land headfirst are illegal. ONE has been regularly criticized for this--less for the rule itself as for ONE's tendency to selectively enforce the rule, using it to benefit fighters they would like to succeed. ONE, of course, denies this vehemently. However you draw your own conclusions, at the end of the day Jarred Brooks was disqualified, and thus, by DQ, Joshua Pacio is now a three-time Strawweight champion. He almost immediately announced he has torn his ACL and is out for the next year. Because he's out, Jarred Brooks is now fighting Gustavo Balart at ONE 25 in August for an interim Strawweight championship.

ONE Women's Strawweight Champion, 125 lbs

Xiong Jing Nan - 18-2, 7 Defenses

Xiong Jing Nan dreamed of lifting weights. She'd enjoyed sports as a child, and when China started its national push for Olympic supremacy she began training heavily in hope of joining the national weightlifting team. But then she met aspirants for its boxing team and fell in love with the idea of living out a martial arts movie and getting to hit people for fun and profit and she never looked back. She turned pro in 2014 and immediately became a standout, going 9-1 in China's Kunlun Fight promotion with wins across three separate weight classes. What made her truly dangerous wasn't one-punch power, but the ability to break her opponents with constant pressure striking, scoring TKOs with combinations stretched out across dozens of consecutive, unending strikes. The story was no different when she moved to ONE in 2017, and she was strawweight champion within two fights. ONE's women's MMA divisions have been its most stable, each having had exactly one champion, and they were so dominant that they inevitably had to fight each other--and, hilariously, traded wins back and forth in the process. 115 lbs champion Angela Lee went up to 125 to challenge for Xiong Jing Nan's belt but Nan stopped her with body kicks in the fifth round, and half a year later Nan dropped down to 115 to challenge for Lee's belt only for Lee to choke her out with twelve seconds left in the fight. Xiong has notched three successful title defenses since, which set her up for her greatest challenger yet: Angela Lee, again, apparently. Despite ONE's best attempts, Xiong successfully defended her title against Lee again, nearly finishing her in the first round and ultimately winning a decision. An entire 364 days later, she had her next fight: A special rules match, with MMA gloves but only punches and no takedowns or clinching allowed, against Muay Thai champion Nat "Wondergirl" Jaroonsak. Half a year later her next fight was finally announced, and it was, once, defending her title against ONE's new postergirl in Stamp Fairtex as the company attempts, once again, to make a double champ at Xiong Jing Nan's expense, and with Stamp out injured ONE is, once again, completely silent about Xiong's future.

ONE Women's Atomweight Champion, 115 lbs

Stamp Fairtex - 10-2, 0 Defenses

It was slightly awkward when Seo Hee Ham and Stamp Fairtex were booked to meet at ONE Fight Night 14 in an interim atomweight title match, given the longstanding rumors of Angela Lee's retirement, and boy, it didn't get any less weird when ONE, which clearly knew what was going on, had Angela Lee announce that retirement just minutes before said match, which was promptly changed to an undisputed championship bout. But that's just part of how ONE rolls, as is their blatant attempts at favoritism, and boy, Stamp Fairtex is their most successful case study thus far. ONE signed her back in 2017 as a Muay Thai stadium champion, and within one fight in ONE she was their Atomweight Kickboxing Champion, and within two fights she was their Atomweight Muay Thai champion. Is this a statement about how quickly they push people they want or how thin their divisions can be? The answer, as always, is Yes. But none of that stopped Stamp from being really fucking good at fighting, and as she transitioned to mixed martial arts she ran up a great record--with the sole exception of a two-fight series with Alyona Rassohyna, where she tapped out in the first and attempted to deny it, then won a real close split decision in an immediate rematch. ONE did not feel the need to book a rubber match, for some odd reason. Stamp won the 2021 Atomweight Grand Prix, got her shot at Angela Lee, and got choked out for her troubles, but a year and two wins later, she was good to go for another championship showdown. It wasn't easy--Seo Hee Ham dropped Stamp in the second round and, for some mysterious reason, when recapping the round, ONE chose to highlight Stamp's offense and not show it--but she stopped Ham with body shots in the third round, and in doing so became not just the undisputed champion, but the first person to ever actually knock Ham out in a fight. (Before you say it: No, Ayaka Hamasaki doesn't count, that was a corner stoppage.) ONE has their new star, and she's a hell of a striker. They immediately booked the rest of their championship year around her, setting up fights with Denise Zamboanga and Xiong Jing Nan regardless of what happened in the first, and as always before a fall, Stamp immediately got injured and will miss the rest of the year. Fuck off, ONE.

Rizin Lightweight Champion, 156 lbs

Roberto de Souza - 16-3, 2 Defenses

Roberto "Satoshi" de Souza is trying to become the new Gegard Mousasi. On April 17 he had the chance to avenge the only loss of his career, a half-knockout half-injury against "Hollywood" Johnny Case back in 2019, and he succeeded in emphatic fashion, climbing Case's back, locking him in an inverted triangle choke and eventually forcing an armbar. He's now 14-1 and inarguably one of the best lightweights outside of the UFC, but unlike most of the other fighters to bear that title, he has made it clear he has no interest in changing that. Where the A.J. McKees and Michael Chandlers of the world want to test free agency and notoriety, Roberto de Souza is happy in Japan, both because his Rizin pay is fairly lucrative and his entire family jiu-jitsu business is based in the country. This is admirable, but it's also a little unfortunate: Rizin really only has around a dozen lightweights under contract, and "Satoshi" has already beaten a third of them. He may be waiting for a Spike Carlyle or a Luiz Gustavo to work their way into contention, but the Rizin ranks hold few surprises for him at this point. It was thus of particular interest when the main event for the New Year's Eve Bellator x Rizin card was announced as Roberto de Souza vs AJ McKee--a test of where Souza ranks with the rest of the world's competition. Unfortunately for him and Rizin, the answer was "under them." He positionally threatened McKee and was able to land some solid strikes in the final round, but was otherwise controlled and lost a decision. On May 6th, Satoshi beat Spike Carlyle in a fantastic fight--but it was a non-title fight, because Japanese promoters are still real scared of their own belts. Satoshi fought Patricky Pitbull at Bellator x Rizin 2 on July 29th--in another non-title fight, naturally--and took the first definitive beating of his career, getting utterly outclassed and ultimately stopped on leg kicks in three rounds. He fought Keita Nakamura at Rizin Landmark 9 on March 23 and put in one of the best performances of his career, battering K-Taro to a TKO in just 1:43--but because this is Japanese MMA it was, of course, a non-title fight, so it doesn't count as a title defense.

Rizin Featherweight Champion, 145 lbs

Chihiro Suzuki - 13-3 (1), 1 Defense

Chihiro Suzuki has had a very fortunate year. Suzuki rose to Rizin's notice not through MMA, but after winning Japan's KNOCK OUT Super Lightweight Kickboxing championship. He made his Rizin debut six months later--and got knocked out in twenty seconds. He spent the next two and a half years simultaneously rounding out his MMA game and annually defending his kickboxing gold, and by 2023, he was one of Rizin's top Featherweight contenders, more than ready for his shot at Kleber Koike Erbst's Rizin championship. And--he got armbarred in three minutes. However, hilariously enough, Erbst lost his belt on the scale after missing weight, meaning the title was vacant and the fight, by Rizin rules, was a No Contest, so Suzuki didn't even technically lose. He then proceeded to get the biggest break of his career. At Bellator x Rizin 2 on July 30th, 2023, despite having just lost a five-round fight to Sergio Pettis a month prior, Patrício Pitbull was thrown onto the card against Suzuki on four days' notice--and Suzuki not only beat him, he became the first person to ever knock out Bellator's GOAT. Rizin immediately booked Suzuki in against new champion Vugar Keramov for their debut in Keramov's home country of Azerbaijan, and Keramov looked poised and powerful and was in the process of ragdolling Suzuki like he does everyone else--and Suzuki caught him with an upkick on the jaw and punched him the rest of the way out from his goddamn back. Chihiro Suzuki, you are Rizin's new star. Hold onto it as long as you can and pray they don't book a Kleber rematch. He defended his title for the first time at Rizin 46 on April 29 by stopping Masanori Kanehara in one round.

Rizin Bantamweight Champion, 135 lbs

VACANT - The faceless fear

We went three whole months without Vacant holding a title belt, and those months were the darkest of our lives. Rizin's Bantamweight Championship of the World is one of the most snakebitten titles in the entire goddamn sport. Kyoji Horiguchi won the inaugural belt in 2018, got injured in a non-title loss to Kai Asakura, and vacated to spend a year on the shelf rehabbing his injuries. Manel Kape, one of Rizin's biggest international stars, won the belt a month after Kyoji let it go--and vacated it four months later to sign with the UFC. Kai Asakura, the man who beat Kyoji only to be denied his title, won the once-again vacated belt and, finally, became a world champion--and got knocked out by Kyoji in his comeback fight just a few months later. Kyoji proceeded to hold the title for two years without ever once fighting in Rizin, as he instead went over to Bellator and lost two fights in a row, and upon returning to Japan, he once again vacated the belt, this time so he could drop to Flyweight. Bellator's Juan Archuleta took the belt home to America after winning at the big Bellator vs Rizin cross-promotional event, and he promptly lost it on the scale. This past December, Kai Asakura finally won the belt--again!--and just under six months later announced he, too, was vacating it to sign with the UFC. The Rizin Bantamweight Championship has existed for almost six years, and it has had six champions, and five of them had to give up the belt for one reason or another, and none of them ever successfully defended it. This is Vacant's belt, and no matter who gets it next, Vacant will have it back again soon enough.

Rizin Flyweight Champion, 125 lbs

Kyoji Horiguchi - 32-5 (1), 0 Defenses

Well, this was a long time coming. Before Rizin even existed, Kyoji Horiguchi was the consensus #2 Flyweight fighter on the planet. He'd won Shooto's 125-pound title, he'd come to America half to face the best in the world and half because Japan's MMA scene was in a real, real bad place at the time, and by mid-2015, he was 15-1 and ready to fight for a world championship. Unfortunately, said championship was held by Demetrious "Mighty Mouse" Johnson, the best Flyweight of all time. Johnson dealt Kyoji his second-ever loss and first-ever stoppage, and it stopped Horiguchi's dream of being the best, but it also opened him up to becoming a star. A year later he was out of the UFC, back home in Japan, and, immediately, one of Rizin's top attractions. But Rizin didn't have a 125-pound division--so he settled for just winning is 135-pound belt instead. When Rizin began cross-promoting with Bellator, he went and took their belt, too, just for good measure. But his strength of schedule and his own injuries caught up with him: He ultimately vacated both belts without ever recording a title defense. By the time he came back in 2021, things had changed. He'd been knocked out for the first time in Kai Asakura back in 2019, but he was fighting hurt and on short notice, so that was excused. When Sergio Pettis knocked him out in his 2021 return fight, it was a warning; when Patchy Mix dominated him in his first match in the Bellator Grand Prix of 2022, it was a sign. Horiguchi needed to be back at 125. Bellator opened a Flyweight division more or less just for him, and at Bellator x Rizin 2 in the summer of 2023, Horiguchi faced Rizin star Makoto "Shinryu" Takahashi to crown the company's inaugural champion--and the fight ended in a No Contest after Horiguchi poked Shinryu in the eye twenty-five seconds into the first round. And then Bellator got sold and stopped operating as an independent entity. Whoops! Rizin decided to just make the goddamn belt themselves, and on New Year's Eve of 2023, Horiguchi and Takahashi had their rematch, and this time, Horiguchi choked him out. Eight years after his first attempt, Kyoji Horiguchi has a Flyweight world championship. His first act as a 125-pound champion? Taking a June 9 fight against Sergio Pettis at 135 pounds, which he won by unanimous decision, but which, of course, was not a title defense.

Rizin Women's Super Atomweight Championship, 108 lbs

Seika Izawa - 13-0, 1 Defense

All hail the new queen. After years of reigning as Japan's best atomweight, the legendary Ayaka Hamasaki fell not once but twice to the rookie Seika Izawa. A 24 year-old who was pushed into judo as a child by a frustrated mother who was tired of her constant fighting with her brothers, Izawa discovered a love for grappling that led her to win junior championships in judo, wrestling and sumo alike. She would still be pursuing judo had the pandemic not shut down much of its competitive scene, but fortunately, mixed martial arts is a terrible sport run by monsters who don't care about things like deadly diseases, which made it a tempting professional prospect. Four months after her formal MMA training began Izawa was winning fights in DEEP, less than a year after that she was DEEP's strawweight champion, and one year later she was dominating one of the best women's fighters in history on Rizin's New Year's Eve special. As Japanese organizations tend to do, frustratingly, the fight was a non-title affair, meaning Izawa had to come back and do it again on April 17. After a scary moment where Hamasaki almost stole an armbar, Izawa resumed her wrestling domination and formally took Rizin's atomweight championship. As entirely fresh blood, the world of Rizin's talent is open to her--but that also means she's got a real, real big target on her back. Rizin's Superatomweight Grand Prix was both a big coming-out party for Izawa and a series of opportunities to look shockingly mortal: She had a fair bit of trouble with Anastasiya Svetkivska in the semifinals before ultimately submitting her, but her berth in the finals against former rival Si Woo Park proved the toughest fight of her career, ending in a split decision victory she easily could have lost. Seika was supposed to face Miyuu Yamamoto at Rizin 42, but after Yamamoto had to pull out with an injury, Izawa was instead scheduled to face...the last person Yamamoto beat, the 5-3 Suwanan Boonsorn, at DEEP Jewels 41 on July 28. Izawa choked her out, shockingly. It took more than an entire year, but Izawa finally had a title defense against the 8-4 grappler Claire Lopez, and Izawa scored the fastest championship victory in Rizin history, choking her out in just barely one minute. Seika scored one more win on New Year's Eve, choking out Miyuu Yamamoto in her retirement bout, and while it was an honor, it does sort of emphasize the problem with Seika's position. She's unquestionably the best Atomweight in the world, but the last real top fighter she faced was more than a year ago. Will Rizin bring her real competition, or are they trying to simply build a star? And what IS real competition at Atomweight? She choked out Si Yoon Park at DEEP JEWELS 44 to add yet another win and belt to her credit, but the Rizin title wasn't on the line, so she's still only got the one defense.

Welcome Invicta Fighting Championships to the beltholder roll call. Despite having been an Invicta fan since their first event back in 2012, I didn't add them to this list when I started it because they simply weren't big enough. In the two and a half years since, however, the definition of 'big' has contracted: One of these companies is now on life support and another is owned by a competitor that's keeping it around only as long as it entertains them. Meanwhile, Invicta just surfaced after seven months of radio silence to announce they are not only still alive, but have a new broadcast deal and another half-year of events on the books. So, welcome back to the only major women's MMA league in America, and may it continue for years to come. At the moment they're still in a rebuilding phase and half their divisions are vacant, so hopefully over the coming months Featherweight and Atomweight will join this list again, but for now:

Invicta Bantamweight Championship, 135 lbs

Talita Bernardo - 11-4, 1 Defense

Sometimes you bounce off the top to get where you need to be. Unlike a lot of her peers, Talita Bernardo wasn't a childhood martial artist--she didn't even start training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu until 2009, when she was already 22, as part of a dare. Five years later she was a brown belt and by the sixth she was 5-1, trained with UFC fighters, and had just won her first international fight after a successful trip to Poland. This put her on the UFC's radar, and in 2017 Germaine de Randamie pulled out of a fight with Marion Reneau, the UFC needed a late replacement, and Bernardo was ready. Except, as it turned out, she wasn't. Over the next year and a half Bernardo went 1-3 in the company, and after getting flattened by Viviane Araujo, she was cut. Talita, undeterred, sat out a couple COVID years before picking up where she left off and just aggressively grappling the shit out of people, and one victory later she was in Invicta, and two victories after that she was its top contender. On January 18, 2023, Talita outworked one-time Contender Series competitor Taneisha Tennant to become the seventh Invicta Bantamweight Champion. After a long wait, half from scheduling problems and half from Invicta itself seeking a new broadcast partner, Bernardo made her first successful defense of the title on June 28, choking out Bellator vet Olga Rubin in two rounds.

Invicta Strawweight Championship, 115 lbs

Danni McCormack - 8-2, 1 Defense

No matter where you go in mixed martial arts, you cannot escape SBG Ireland. Like a lot of her peers, "Mac" jumped into the sport thanks in large part to Conor McGregor's success, and like a lot of her peers, she jumped into the deep end. Her amateur career started with one-week tournaments, and her professional debut in 2019 saw her going straight to Bellator in an attempt to satiate their endless hunger for potential Irish stars. Her career got off to a solid, 5-0 start, but in 2022 she got punched out by France's Stéphanie Page and one fight later she was dropping a split decision in Malta, and Bellator did not come calling back afterward. But Invicta did. McCormack made her Invicta debut at the end of 2022, won her debut with a clear decision, and one fight later she was facing the highly-rated Valesca "Tina Black" Machado, Bellator's reigning Strawweight champion. Danni was nearly finished in the first round, but she outlasted a visibly flustered Machado and, in a sizable upset, took her title by decision. Later that year, on October 27, she defended her title against Karolina Wójcik in a rematch from their bout as amateurs almost seven years prior, and this time Danni beat her and choked her unconscious in the fourth round.

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THE BELLATOR CHAMPIONSHIP GRAVEYARD

Bellator Heavyweight Champion, 265 lbs

Ryan Bader - 31-8 (1), 3 Defenses

Ryan Bader is the greatest Bellator Heavyweight Champion of all time, and on a dairy farm somewhere in Wisconsin, Cole Konrad feels a pang of regret. Bader made his name as the winner of The Ultimate Fighter: Nogueira vs Mir all the way back in 2008, but his UFC career proved to be one of Sisyphean torment and humiliation that included, somehow, impossibly, being the only man to lose a UFC fight to Tito Ortiz during his last six years in the company. Bader left for free agency and Bellator in 2016 and became its light-heavyweight champion on his first night with the organization, and just two years later he became its first-ever simultaneous double-champion after knocking out the legendary Fedor Emelianenko and taking the heavyweight title. Bader would go on to lose his 205-pound crown, but Fedor never forgot his 35-second drubbing at the American wrestler's hands, and for his retirement fight, he demanded a rematch. Thus it was that the entire mixed martial arts community watched with bated breath as on February 4th, 2023, Fedor Emelianenko walked into the cage one last time and promptly got the absolute crap beaten out of him again. Ryan Bader remains undefeated at heavyweight. He was to defend his title against Linton Vassell at Bellator's series finale-sounding Bellator 300, but Vassell got injured and, as Bader himself put it in a reddit post, Viacom is done with Bellator and didn't want to pay for a replacement. Ryan Bader is the best heavyweight champion outside of the UFC, and it's anyone's guess if he'll still be champion of anything by January. He also, unfortunately, got his shit completely wrecked by Renan Ferreira in thirty seconds, making him the one and only Bellator fighter to lose at PFL vs Bellator.

Bellator Light-Heavyweight Champion, 205 lbs

Corey Anderson - 18-6 (1), 0 Defenses

Corey Anderson has been passed over by the sport so many times, but now, finally, his day has come. His success as a college wrestler led him to Ben Askren, and Ben Askren actually tricked him into trying mixed martial arts, and getting outsmarted by Ben Askren might still be the worst loss of his career. Anderson burst into the UFC as the champion of The Ultimate Fighter 19 back in 2014, and as a big, strong, undefeated 5-0 wrestler, he looked like a genuine championship threat. He was, of course, immediately knocked out by Gian Villante, and if you do not know or remnember who that is: That's the point. This sort of derailing became the story of Anderson's career, and by 2017 he had been knocked out twice in a row and was considering retirement. Instead, he launched into a fantastic, four-fight winning streak that included effortlessly destroying the UFC's big hype project Johnny Walker, giving Anderson a #5 ranking and a title eliminator against Jan Błachowicz, whom he'd beaten back in 2015. Unfortunately, this time Jan knocked him out--and despite being 4 for his last 5 and unequivocally one of the best 205-pound fighters in the world, the UFC released him because they didn't want to market a wrestler. Anderson went to Bellator, joined the 2021 Light Heavyweight Grand Prix, knocked out Ryan Bader in less than a minute and made it to the tournament final against reignning, Bellator-undefeated champion Vadim Nemkov--and he almost won. But at 4:55 of the third round, an inadvertent headbutt busted Nemkov's eye, and a doctor ruled him unable to continue. If the fight had lasted five more seconds it would have gone to a technical decision, and Anderson would have won the $1 million tournament purse and his first world championship. Instead, he got nothing, and Nemkov beat him in a rematch seven months later. It took a year and a half and Nemkov's own move up to Heavyweight for Anderson to get another chance, but at the first-ever PFL-owned Bellator Champions Series event on March 22, 2024, Corey Anderson wrestled Karl Moore for five excruciating rounds and won that god damned belt. His future as a titleholder will depend on PFL's commitment to the Bellator brand.

Bellator Middleweight Champion, 185 lbs

Johnny Eblen - 15-0, 2 Defenses

There's an old combat sports tradition whereby a champion isn't really a champion until they defend their title. Gegard Mousasi has been established as the best middleweight outside the UFC that, despite the one-sided nature of their fight, Johnny Eblen's victory over him was treated as an aberration rather than the passing of a torch. It didn't matter that Eblen was undefeated, widely considered one of the absolute best by his cohort at American Top Team or that he'd dropped Mousasi on his face with his bare hands, the world needed verification. On February 4th at Bellator 290, they got it. Fedor Emelianenko's team was intending to pull one big, beautiful night of success out of the ether for their leader's retirement fight, but it was not to be: Vadim Nemkov had to pull out of the card thanks to an injury, Fedor himself was crushed for the second time by heavyweight champion Ryan Bader, and middleweight hopeful Anatoly Tokov was competitive for the first couple of rounds but was subsequently washed out by Eblen's overwhelming assault. Johnny Eblen is a defending champion now, and as things always seem to go, the conversation changed overnight from his being overrated to his being better than everyone in the UFC. This mindset only grew again after Bellator 299 on September 23rd, as Eblen faced Fabian Edwards, knocked him out in the third round, and nearly got into a post-fight brawl with his brother, UFC champion Leon Edwards. Eblen admits he has no idea what his future is or if Bellator will still be around, but he's considering a move to light-heavyweight with Vadim Nemkov leaving the division wide open. Eblen had a scare against Impa Kasanganay but ultimately won his PFL vs Bellator bout, and in a sign that they may already be running out of ideas, he'll be fighting Fabian Edwards for the second time in a year when they rematch at Bellator Champions Series 5 on September 14.

Bellator Welterweight Champion, 170 lbs

Ramazan Kuramagomedov - 13-0, 0 Defenses

On a long enough timeline, the Russian grapplers come for us all. Jason Jackson made multiple marks on history in 2023: He became the first man to ever defeat Yaroslav Amosov, the first new champion of the PFL era, and the winner of the last main event in Bellator-branded history. It was a long road for a man who'd been plugging away in the company since 2018. Ramazan Kuramagomedov, by contrast, came in right as the door was closing. He'd won a Contender Series fight back in 2019, but he did it through grappling and Dana White was disinterested. Ramazan kept racking up victories in regional organizations instead, and he ultimately became the last major talent signed by Bellator, making his debut in June of 2023 and running up a 2-0 record before the year was out thanks to unsurprisingly great wrestling and the freedom to throw winging hooks and kicks that comes from possessing no fear of the ground game. Bellator's new reality as a PFL-owned operation meant a number of adjustments to the way they booked talent, and with a number of their more popular Welterweights booked into the 2024 PFL tournament instead, Kuramagomedov was tapped to fight Jason Jackson at Bellator Champions Series 3 on June 22. It was a much harder fight than Ramazan was accustomed to, but ultimately, he came away with both the decision and the Welterweight championship. Where he goes from here is up to the PFL.

Bellator Lightweight Champion, 155 lbs

Usman Nurmagomedov - 17-0 (1), 2 Defenses

If there's a single, developing throughline of mixed martial arts in 2022, it's the growing power of the Dagestani wrestling brigade. Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov built an army of ultra-grapplers, and after his passing the American Kickboxing Academy's Javier Mendez and Adulmanap's son and protege, the now-retired Khabib Nurmagomedov, unleashed them on the world. Usman, Khabib's cousin (as well as the younger brother of Umar Nurmagomedov, undefeated and ranked UFC bantamweight), took to Bellator in April of 2021 and proceeded to burn an undefeated path through the Manny Muros and Patrik Pietiläe of the world. His style was a little more eclectic--lots of spinning kicks, lots of stick-and-move jabs and stomps to the leg--but the resemblance became uncanny once he inevitably, and easily, ragdolled his opponents to the canvas and generally choked them out in short order thereafter. When he was announced as the #1 contender to Bellator's lightweight title, I was somewhat miffed: He hadn't beaten any top contenders, Bellator had already held a title eliminator and it was won in a crushing thirty-second knockout by Tofiq Musayev, the whole thing smacked of a pathetic attempt to glom onto some of Khabib's mainstream attention. I at no point said that he wouldn't very, very easily win. At Bellator 288 on November 18th, Usman very, very easily won, defeating Patricky "Pitbull" Freire at every aspect of the game and leaving him sans both his championship and one eyebrow. Usman's first fight as champion was both a defense and an entry into the first round of Bellator's Lightweight Grand Prix on March 3rd at Bellator 292, where he met, crushed, and retired former UFC champion Benson Henderson, handing him just the third submission loss of a 17-year, 42-fight career. He faced fellow tournament semifinalist Brent Primus at Bellator 300 on October 7th, and it was as one-sided and yet uneventful as you can imagine. Until Usman failed his drug test. Bellator says it was for medication rather than PEDs and thus he won't be stripped, but the fight's a No Contest and they need a rematch, which seems awfully selective. And then the company got bought, so it was all forgotten anyway. He was supposed to face Alexander Shabily on May 17, but an injury scratched the fight; it'll now take place at Bellator Champions Series 4 on September 7.

Bellator Featherweight Champion, 145 lbs

Patrício Pitbull - 36-7, 2 Defenses

Patrício Pitbull had a weird goddamn 2023. Pitbull has long been the GOAT of Bellator, sometimes to the company's open chagrin--there were definitely times they would have vastly preferred a Pat Curran or a Michael Chandler to carry their banner, and Patrício had this unfortunate habit of not just beating them but making them look like shit. By mid-2021, he was Bellator's dual featherweight and lightweight champion, he was on a seven-fight win streak, and he was a finalist in their Featherweight Grand Prix. And then undefeated rising star A.J. McKee dropped him and choked him out in two minutes. Bellator, clearly, felt they had hit the jackpot and were going to be riding the McKee train for some time, as by their rematch ten months later, McKee was the centerpiece of all of their advertising. It was somewhat awkward when, as he had done to so many before, Patrício took him to a victorious decision that made McKee kind of look like shit, neutralizing his offense in the clinch, jabbing under his range, and grinding away the clock. Bellator pushed for a trilogy, but McKee, pissed off, tired of cutting weight and worried about having it happen all over again, declined and moved up to lightweight. Instead of a big-money rematch, Patrício was left to face top contender Ádám Borics, and the match, while hard-fought, was not particularly entertaining or memorable. Pitbull's next fight was the rare cross-promotional bout, facing Rizin's featherweight champion Kleber Koike Erbst on the New Year's Eve Bellator x Rizin special. It was the only fight on the card that wasn't particularly competitive: He shut Kleber down completely and won a wide decision. There is only one featherweight king outside the UFC--and it's one who had a two-fight losing streak, with one of those fights being a bantamweight loss to Sergio Pettis and the other a lightweight knockout to Chihiro Suzuki that he took on four days' notice, because MMA is silly. Pitbull did, however, become the first Bellator champion to canonically defend a title under their new PFL ownership: He fought Jeremy Kennedy at Bellator Champions Series 1 on March 22 and mauled him in three rounds.

Bellator Bantamweight Champion, 135 lbs

Patchy Mix - 20-1, 1 Defense

It took a long goddamn time, but Patchy Mix is finally getting the credit he deserves. Fans had already singled out Patchy as a uniquely talented fighter by 2019, when he signed to Bellator as the 10-0 King of the Cage Bantamweight Champion who'd submitted almost everyone he faced, but it wasn't really until he choked out Yuki Motoya at Bellator's first co-promotion with Rizin that people really paid attention. Which was unfortunate, because his next fight was a shot at Juan Archuleta for the vacant Bellator Bantamweight Championship and Archuleta schooled him on their feet, ending both Mix's title hopes and his undefeated streak. It didn't help matters when, two fights later, he blew his weight cut for a big Dublin match against James Gallagher. But Mix kept winning, and when he entered the Bantamweight Grand Prix and promptly stormed the bracket by beating Kyoji Horiguchi and choking out Magomed Magomedov, suddenly, people paid attention again. When he fought interim champion Raufeon Stots and knocked him out cold with a knee in less than a minute and a half, people began wondering if maybe he was the real champion and Sergio Pettis, who'd been out for a year and a half and returned to a vanity fight with Patrício Pitbull, wasn't the fake. The two met at Bellator 301 on November 17th, and Mix left no doubt: He outwrestled Pettis and choked him out in the second round. Patchy Mix is, finally, the undisputed Bellator Bantamweight Champion. He technically defended his title against Magomed Magomedov at Bellator Champions Series 2 on May 17, but as much as I love Patchy, the decision probably should've gone the other way.

Bellator Women's Featherweight Champion, 145 lbs

Cris Cyborg - 27-2 (1), 5 Defenses

Yup. It's 2024 and Cris Cyborg is still out there. For those who don't know, Cris Cyborg was the canonical women's featherweight fighter, a Muay Thai wrecking machine who didn't just beat but brutalized essentially all of her opponents, including ex-Star Wars Gina Carano, and her popularity as a destroyer of humans is the only real reason women's featherweight even exists as a division, to the point that the UFC added it when she was the only actual fighter at the weight class they employed. She was 20-1 (1) when she passed the torch to Amanda Nunes, who slew her in just fifty-one seconds. She took one more fight in the UFC to complete her contract, but left for Bellator almost immediately afterward with uncharacteristic cooperation from the UFC itself--after all, they'd gotten what they wanted out of her. Her first Bellator fight was a one-sided destruction of their featherweight champion, and she's defended it three times since. At this point in Cyborg's career the problem isn't her or her fighting or her age, but simply that there's no one in Bellator for her to fight--after just five fights she's already hitting rematches, having just recorded her second one-sided bludgeoning of a very game but outmatched Arlene Blencowe. Cyborg decided her next fight would be a boxing match, and on September 25 she faced Simone da Silva, a jobber to the stars coming off twelve straight losses who had been knocked out just one month prior. Undeterred, she had her second boxing match on the undercard of December 10th’s Crawford/Avanesyan card, taking a unanimous decision over Gabrielle “Gabanator” Holloway, who is 6-6 in MMA and 0-3 in boxing. After a year and a half of inactivity, Cris Cyborg returned to MMA to defend her title against Cat Zingano at Bellator 300 on October 7th. It lasted four minutes. Cyborg has been open and public about her lack of communication with PFL, and despite being one of Bellator's biggest names, those fences do not appear to be mending.

Bellator Women's Flyweight Champion, 125 lbs

Liz Carmouche - 22-7, 3 Defenses

It took more than a decade and some controversy, but Liz Carmouche got her flowers. "Girl-Rilla" was just as present a figure in establishing women's MMA in the mainstream, but she's the most consistently forgotten because she was the losing fighter in all of those establishing moments. She was a challenger for the early, pre-fame Strikeforce Women's Bantamweight Championship, and was winning on the scorecards before Marloes Coenen choked her out. She was a central part of the inaugural Invicta FC card, and was planned as a title contender before the big show came calling. She became one half of the first women's fight in UFC history, and at one point had Ronda Rousey in a nearly destiny-defying neck crank, but was ultimately submitted in the first round. She's one of two women to ever defeat Valentina Shevchenko, but when given a second chance at the now-UFC champion Shevchenko, she fell short. Despite her powerful wrestling and submission skills, she was eternally denied the top of the mountain. So it was both particularly appropriate and particularly cruel when she finally won a championship on April 22, 2022--in a way that displeased everybody. Standing champion Juliana Velasquez was winning on every scorecard, but Liz Carmouche got her in the crucifix position and landed a number of, respectfully, small elbows, but referee Mike Beltran called a TKO to the immediate chagrin of the entirely safe ex-champion. The controversy made a rematch all but mandatory, and it took Bellator most of the year to do it, but the two met in the cage to run it back at Bellator 289 on December 9, and this time there was no controversy, as Velasquez submitted to an armbar two rounds in. The weirdness didn't stop there: Liz's next title defense against Deanna Bennett also hit the skids, as Bennett missed weight and was thus ineligible to win the championship. Carmouche put it on the line anyway, and fortunately, she choked Bennett out in the fourth round. She defended her title against Ilima-Lei Macfarlane at Bellator 300 on October 7th, and it was one of those fights where friends don't really want to hurt each other--until Ilima got kicked enough that her leg collapsed in the fifth round. Her status as champion is questionable, though--of all Bellator's titleholders, Liz is the only one taking part in this year's PFL season. At PFL 1 on April 4 she beat Juliana Velasquez for the third time, and at PFL 4 on June 13 she got into real trouble with Kana Watanabe only to get an amazing comeback armbar submission with just seconds left in the fight. Later this year she'll face Taila Santos in the playoffs.