Bloody Elbow July MMA Meta-Rankings: Light Heavyweight

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 10:16 AM EDT

Fighter	Points	Promotion	Last Rank
1. Forrest Griffin	464	UFC	4
2. Quinton Jackson	451	UFC	1
3. Lyoto Machida	429	UFC	2
4. Chuck Liddell	427	UFC	3
5. Mauricio Rua	386	UFC	5
6. Wanderlei Silva	377	UFC	6
7. Keith Jardine	313	UFC	7
8. Rashad Evans	281	UFC	10
9. Thiago Silva	265	UFC	9
10. Rameu Thierry Sokoudjou	255	UFC	11
11. Dan Henderson	191	UFC	8
12. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira	185	Affliction	14
13. Tito Ortiz	145	???	13
14. Vladimir Matyushenko	120	IFL/???	12
15. Goran Reljic	115	UFC	NR
16. Renato Sobral	112	Affliction/Strikeforce	16
17. Stephan Bonnar	97	UFC	15
18. Brandon Vera	92	UFC	NR
18. Luis Arthur Cane	92	UFC	NR
19. Ricardo Arona	90	Unsigned	17
20. Glover Teixeira	81	PFC	NR
21. Wilson Gouveia	79	UFC	NR
22. Rafael Calvacante	76	EliteXC	NR
23. Kazuhiro Nakamura	75	???	NR
24. James Irvin	74	UFC	NR
24. Matt Hamill	74	UFC	NR

Very interesting to see how carrying the Meta-rankings out to the top 25 fighters changes how one sees the division. In addition to the guys who make the bottom rung of the odd top 10 list or two -- Matyushenko, Little Nog, Arona, Ortiz, Babalu Sobral -- you get an interesting mix of up and comers -- Cane, Teixeira, Calvacante -- and guys on their way down -- Irvin, Gouveia, Nakamura.

The UFC's utter domination of this division is impressive to behold. They've got 18 out of 25 and ALL of the top 11. That is one deep division. I wonder if they'll bring Vladdy over from the IFL. He really deserves to finish his career fighting the best, but I wonder if they'll be interested in an aging wrestler with a hard-to-spell name and a strictly business personality.

If Tito really does sign with Affliction, he'll be going to the second best 205lb division out there -- if Babalu and Little Nog constitue a division that is. Babalu vs Tito is a fight the UFC should have put on years ago, but I'll still be happy to see it. I'd enjoy seeing both/either fight Little Nog as well.

Naturally Forrest Griffin's win over Rampage sent him to the top of the rankings, but its far from unanimous. Rampage is a strong second, but his recent mental breakdown and rumors of a third fight with Wanderlei make me wonder how long he'll hold on at the upper reaches. Machida and Liddell are the next tier with a lot of sites differing over who should be more highly rated -- the undefeated rising star or the aging former champ.

Wandy and Shogun are the next tier, with Jardine, Rashad, Thiago Silva and Sokoudjou bunched closly behind them. Dan Henderson hangs on despite having been out of the division for over 18 months almost a year (thanks to BE reader "turdburgler" for the catch -- yes BE does have the brightest readers in MMA, despite their choice of handles) . I'm surprised to see how highly regarded Goran Reljic is, but an undefeated record and a KO win in your UFC debut will do wonders for your standing.

I think Glover Teixeira is rising more on account of his having beaten Sokoudjou a few years back than anything else. I wonder if the UFC will sign him up. Rafael Calvacante will clearly have a hard time finding decent challengers for his EliteXC belt.

Also, don't sleep on the Welterweight meta-rankings I posted on Saturday.

More on methodology in the full article.

Based on the premise that opinions are like assholes, everybody has one and they all stink. instead of putting up our own subjective fighter rankings, we compile and average the rankings of every source we could find online.

The goal is to show how the MMA community rates the fighters, not to bore you with our opinions.

Be sure and look at the points, they're a much more telling number than the ranking. There's clearly a huge gulf between the top 9 fighters and those that follow.

A total of 42 fighters were ranked in the top 25 by one source or another, for reasons of sanity I only track the top 25 (26 due to a tie) most highly rated fighters.

25 points are awarded for a first place ranking, 16 for a 10th place ranking, 1 for a 25th place ranking. A formula is used to "normalize" the data so all fighters are awarded points from those lists that do not include a full 25 fighters. Fuller explanation below.

Rankings were compiled from the following sites: TAGG Radio, MMA News, Sherdog, Cage Potato, MMA On Tap, Five Ounces of Pain, Houston Chronicle's Brawl Sports, WAMMA, MMA Fighting, MMA-ELO, FCFighter, 411 Mania, MMA Madness, FightMatrix, M MMA Playground, HDNet/Inside MMA, MMAVT (Japan), and Total MMA. Figure 4 Online hadn't updated their rankings for July.

The normalization scheme as explained by JCS of FightMatrix is here:

The “normalization number” (new name) would be:

120
divided by
(Total Fighters Found in Any List minus 10)

Every fighter found somewhere else, but on a Top 10 list would be assigned this number.

The “normalization” number would not apply to a fighter not found on a Top 25 list. They would simply get 0.

So the process would be:

Do all of the Top 25 lists first, #1 = 25, #2 = 24…. #24 = 2, #25 = 1
Do all of the Top 10 lists, same scoring structure.. stops at #10 = 16

Figure out that normalization variable.

Fill in the normalization variable to all fighters not found in the Top 10 lists, but found elsewhere.

Do your totals and rank.

1 recs | Comment 28 comments

Read Related

Story-email Email Printer Print

Comments

Goran Reljic is ranked high. Hmm.

by Luke Thomas on Jul 30, 2008 10:31 AM EDT 0 recs

So Is Machida

When in reality…the only people he has beaten is a washed up Tito Ortiz and Sokoudjou. If he beats Thiago Silva…that just derails that bandwagon everyone is on now…and still doesn’t give him that ‘highly ranked’ opponent he needs to beat at this point.

http://tharealness.wordpress.com/

by Tha Realness on Jul 30, 2008 10:53 AM EDT up 0 recs

I’m curious why you don’t count the Penn and Franklin victories as valuable. Is it because they’ve often fought at other weights?

by asa on Jul 30, 2008 2:28 PM EDT up 0 recs

I personally feel Machida’s fight with Penn was a draw. Penn came in to fight Machida at 185lbs (if I am not mistaken) and Machida was 205lbs. I think Machida won that fight based on him being able to take Penn down (which he did two times, as i recall). But stand up wise, Machida had nothing on Penn, even when he took Penn down, he couldn’t do anything with him.

His victory over Franklin was before Franklin became a well rounded fighter, if he had beat Franklin when Franklin was dominating the division we’d be having a different discussion.

by lovingmma25 on Jul 30, 2008 2:37 PM EDT up 0 recs

Hmm .. good points on the Penn fight.

His victory over Franklin was before Franklin became a well rounded fighter, if he had beat Franklin when Franklin was dominating the division we’d be having a different discussion.

Wasn’t he also the fighter he was back then? :) Just sayin’ is all.

by asa on Jul 30, 2008 6:47 PM EDT up 0 recs

It’s not just the people he’s beaten, but how he looked doing it. As it stands very few LHWs have any significant chance of defeating or even hurting Machida. To the people that do rankings on reputable sites, that’s an important consideration. Add in his 13-0-0 record and you have the justification for his high rank.

Oh, and the “Young Franklin” and “Young Bonnar” arguments don’t work. Don’t forget that Machida was younger and less experienced at that time as well.

by Flying Gogoplata on Jul 30, 2008 3:14 PM EDT up 0 recs

Hard to do more in your fights than win every time. No one, and I mean no one, wants to fight him at all.

by Day Man on Jul 31, 2008 1:33 AM EDT up 0 recs

Ummmm

This is obviously not a question for us to answer so much as the sites you pull from, but is anyone else curious to know why Anderson Silva isn’t on the list? If James Irvin makes #24, shouldn’t Anderson be above him somewhere? Or do you think we’ll see that next month?

Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ. -- TangleBones

by jemaleddin on Jul 30, 2008 11:02 AM EDT 0 recs

I don't know

Human perception is a funny thing. I think Anderson Silva is so locked into people’s minds as the top middleweight that we’ll need to see him beat more 205lbers before he’s ranked at Light Heavy.
Irvin will be gone next month I guarantee you that.

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 11:11 AM EDT up 0 recs

a) That’s the same reason that BJ isn’t ranked higher on the welterweight lists when, in fact, he can beat a lot of the guys ranked above him.

b) I can’t imagine why Irvin took the fight – if he won, he’d ONLY be beating a middleweight. And by losing to a middleweight, he’s tanked his rankings. Note to fighters who don’t want to screw up their career with a pointless fight: never take a match against a woman, a freak, or Anderson Silva. :-)

Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ. -- TangleBones

by jemaleddin on Jul 30, 2008 11:26 AM EDT up 0 recs

and the methadone didn't help any either

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 11:38 AM EDT up 0 recs

And yet, I’ve always heard that methadone “can’t hurt, might help.”

By the way: Methadone isn’t just a treatment for heroin addiction. It’s commonly prescribed as a cheap painkiller, especially for older people on a fixed income. I wish I could get that out to all the dozens of MMA bloggers who haven’t bothered to look it up…

Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ. -- TangleBones

by jemaleddin on Jul 30, 2008 1:35 PM EDT up 0 recs

It doesn’t matter that he’d beat a middleweight, beating Anderson Silva is beating Anderson Silva.

Plus the loss shouldn’t have hurt him that much, because it was against someone who is seen as unstoppable.

The drug test was the only bad thing that could have happened to Irvin in this fight.

by Phildo on Jul 30, 2008 11:50 AM EDT up 0 recs

You’re right as he may have been looked upon favorably for taking the fight to begin with. I hope all goes well with his appeal (if he does one).

by lovingmma25 on Jul 30, 2008 11:52 AM EDT up 0 recs

The fact that Penn lost his last two fights at welterweight probably doesn’t help either.

Intentional Blog on Balls

by Richard on Jul 30, 2008 6:47 PM EDT up 0 recs

Luis Cane should make a nice jump if he can beat Sokoudjou at UFC 89.

You know what would be awesome… if we could add another column and put what next fight (ranked fighter) is upcoming for each fighter.

by Nick Thomas on Jul 30, 2008 11:10 AM EDT 0 recs

that would be awesome

an awesome amount of work. but probably worth doing.

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 11:11 AM EDT up 0 recs

That’s a damn fine idea.

Intentional Blog on Balls

by Richard on Jul 30, 2008 6:49 PM EDT up 0 recs

Also

Including each fighters overall record beside their names would be dope(I know you have the names linked to sherdog’s fight finder) but my work blocks it :(

3. Lyoto Machida (13-0) like that

http://tharealness.wordpress.com/

by Tha Realness on Jul 30, 2008 11:17 AM EDT 0 recs

Figure 4 Online hadn’t updated their rankings for July.

F4W July Rankings

Note: The date is incorrectly listed as 6/27/08 rather than 7/27/08

by Brett Jones on Jul 30, 2008 1:35 PM EDT 0 recs

ah thanks

too late to include them on any but lightweight. What they get for mislabeling their stories.

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 2:11 PM EDT up 0 recs

Hendo

Hendo hasn’t been inactive as a LHW for “over 18 months”. He fought Rampage less than 11 months ago and Wandy less than 17 months ago. I think he should only be ranked as a Middleweight until he announces his next LHW fight if there is one, but it hasn’t been that long since a lot of polls ranked him #2 as a LHW, definitely within the last year.

by turdburgler on Jul 30, 2008 3:46 PM EDT 0 recs

Glover #20????

Interesting logic.. I mean he beat Sok in his 3rd fight before he really took off. Ed Herman beat Glover before that, does that make Herman Top 15?

by JCS_FM on Jul 30, 2008 4:19 PM EDT 0 recs

there's no logic to it as far as I can tell behind that

But it takes more than just one or two wayward lists for some one to make top twenty. I can’t think of any other reason for it. Can you?

by Kid Nate on Jul 30, 2008 4:43 PM EDT up 0 recs

I think it’s pretty clear that Ed Herman is a top 15 light heavyweight.

Intentional Blog on Balls

by Richard on Jul 30, 2008 6:50 PM EDT up 0 recs

Excellent rankings. They look almost right. I agree with everyone cept Reljic. He has one UFC win on his record. One win, no matter who its over shouldn’t get you top 20 status. And where’s Bisping. I know he’s a 185 now, but he’s still better at 205 than #14 down.

by Josh H. on Jul 30, 2008 8:29 PM EDT 0 recs