Kenny Florian and Sean Sherk Get No Love

While Hughes at that time and GSP and BJ are currently top of the hill… They haven’t beaten anybody consensusly very good. I’d say Sherks 2 best wins (Other than Karo long lonnnnnng ago) Are Griffen and Florian and the Griffen fight was close.

Florian is fighting better and better comp and has earned his place. But Sherk beat him so its hard to rank him higher than Sherk. He finished Stevenson impressively and continues to climb but again… I never had Stevenson even RANKED. I have been proven correct in that regard IMO.

Some of the old PRIDE/current DREAM and WVR fighters may actually have trouble in the Octogon due to the same challenges that have proven to crop up in other fighters. A career of fast turn arounds and brutal fights over a long career, the difference in the ring and the cage and the strengths that each favors and in Hellboy’s case being undersized (fought at 145 and can still make it.) Others however I believe would absolutely DOMINATE. The cage is highly favorable to people such as JZ Calvancante and Aoki and Kawajiri and not detrimental to Eddie Alvarez. Hellboy I feel would struggle as he would be small and potentially be bullied against the cage by a fighter such as Sherk though I say Hellboy’s record is equally impressive and I find him to all around be a much more dynamic fighter.

Basically the long career’s and past dominant performances have EARNED the japanese fighters their rankings and it shouldn’t change without them losing to somebody new on the scene as Gomi did to Golyaev. (Even though Gomi was robbed)

The main problem is the top 10 is mainly non UFC fighters due to the period when the UFC did not have a lightweight division. According to most rankings, the only way to gain ranking is to beat a higher ranked fighter, and right now Sherk, Florian, and BJ are the only top 10 ranked UFC fighters.

It is my personal opinion that there would be much more parity if not UFC dominance if they could all fight each other. There are a lot of good UFC lightweights that get no ranking love due to the UFC/non-UFC split.

Yeah got to agree with iiowyn there about how UFC lightweights get looked down upon a bit because of the UFC disbanding the weight class for a while.

Actually, there’s a “What if?” for Mike Fagan. What if the UFC didn’t disband the lightweight division. You would most likely have Yves Edwards as a lightweight champion after he beat Josh Thomson and then its just craziness after that.

Also, I just looked at Sam Caplan’s rankings and thats some messed up stuff right there. How he has both Gonzaga and Sylvia over Couture is beyond me. I won’t even go into how he left the 10th spot on the pound for pound list “vacant”.

I have Sherk pretty much dominating any LW not named BJ Penn. Aoki could slip something in, and Florian keeps impressing me, but Sherk finds ways to win – even against a stud like Tyson Griffin in a stand up war.