USAT/SBN March MMA Consensus Rankings: Middleweight

by Kid Nate on Mar 25, 2009 9:34 PM EDT in Rankings Comment 31 comments

Rank	Fighter	%	Promotion	Last Rank
1	Anderson Silva	100	UFC	1
2	Yushin Okami	87	UFC	2
3	Nathan Marquardt	84	UFC	5
4	Dan Henderson	83	UFC	6
5	Gegard Mousasi	81	DREAM	4
6	Robbie Lawler	80	Strikeforce	3
7	Demian Maia	69	UFC	8
8	Jorge Santiago	67	WVR	7
9	Thales Leites	49	UFC	10
10	Rich Franklin	45	UFC	9
11	Vitor Belfort	44	Affliction	16
12	Yoshihiro Akiyama	32	UFC	13
13	Paulo Filho	31	Unsigned	11
14	Michael Bisping	30	UFC	14
15	Chael Sonnen	30	UFC	12
16	Kazuo Misaki	28	WVR	15
17	Frank Trigg	27	XCF	17
18	Ronaldo Souza	20	DREAM	18
19	Patrick Cote	17	UFC	19
20	Cung Le	17	Strikeforce	24
21	Dan Miller	16	UFC	21
22	Melvin Manhoef	14	DREAM	22
23	Matt Lindland	14	Affliction	20
24	Wilson Gouveia	13	UFC	23
25	Alan Belcher	12	UFC	25
25	Martin Kampmann	12	UFC	26

Rankings compiled by Richard.

Next month we'll get to see #1 Anderson Silva defend his UFC middleweight belt against #9 Thales Leites at UFC 97 on April 18th. If Leites upsets Silva, I'll expect a Serra-knocks-out-GSP level of shock to the rankings.

#2 Yushin Okami faces a stiffer challenge from #21 Dan Miller than their numerical rankings indicate when they meet at UFC 98. I'm sure the UFC brass will shed no tears if Miller upsets the hard-to-market Okami.

#3 Nate Marquardt is fresh off an impressive win over #24 Wilson Gouveia at UFC 95. Not sure what's next for Nate. #4 Dan Henderson and #14 Michael Bisping will be hosting the next season of TUF starting April 1st. They'll meet at UFC 100 with the winner presumably getting a title shot.

#5 Gegard Mousasi continues to rise in the rankings on the impact of his 2008 DREAM middleweight tournament win. Sadly for the division Mousasi is planning on moving up in weight class, although he has been talking about a possible match with #11 Vitor Belfort. That is if Vitor's dream match with #1 heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko doesn't happen at Affliction's third show.

#6 Robbie Lawler will face top 10 welterweight Jake Shields at Strike Force's May Showtime event. Hopefully Lawler will get to face relevant competition at middleweight at some point soon. I'd much prefer to see Lawler against Frank Shamrock.

No word on what's next for #7 Demian Maia after his impressive win over #15 Chael Sonnen at UFC 95. #8 Jorge Santiago is nursing an injured arm after his 2008 win at the Sengoku middleweight tournament. No word on when he'll return to the ring.

#12 Yoshihiro Akiyama has signed with the UFC and will face #25 Alan Belcher at UFC 100.

Based on the premise that all MMA rankings are subjective but that it’s still useful and informative to know who the online MMA community as a whole ranks as the best fighters in MMA, we collect and average the rankings of the top MMA websites to produce our consensus rankings.Show more »

We compile the top MMA rankings from each of our sources and award 25 points 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. This formula ensures that each ranking site awards the same number of total points regardless of how many fighters they choose to rank. Each fighter’s total is divided by the number of possible points to determine their standing in the Consensus Rankings.

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Comments

I look forward to watching Mousasi’s molasses-like descent, seeing as how he’s never fighting at this weight again.

by subo on Mar 25, 2009 10:06 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

yeah it'll probably take forever for him to slide down

"the spirit of your average dumbass with more overblown rhetoric" OR "the self-appointed savior of MMA"

by Kid Nate on Mar 25, 2009 10:11 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

i just dont understand

how defeating dean lister, evan tanner, and jason mcdonald makes you the number 2 middleweight in the world, I’ve never been impressed with Yushin, I just think everyone wants to see Anderson destroy him, so they build him up to get the rematch

by blueballlefty on Mar 25, 2009 10:53 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I honestly don’t get it either.

Bolts from the Blue // "Game over." - Jamal Williams
Bloody Elbow // "Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats." - H.L. Mencken

by Richard Wade on Mar 25, 2009 10:56 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Well I also don't get Marquardt's ranking

His best wins are ranked 16 and 24. And Misaki wasn’t even worth a damn when he beat him. Marquardt with hi KO of Gouveia earned himself a slot between 5 and 10. I have him 7 to 8. He may have done more damage to Leitas but he still lost because he cheated repeatedly. Combine that with 8 losses and you have a record only slightly more impressive than Denis Kang’s. Marquardt may have the talent to be top 2 or 3 but he certainly hasn’t proved it yet. Unless getting blown out by Anderson in rd. 1 secures that slot.

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 25, 2009 11:48 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

5-7 should move up 2 slots in the order they are in

Then Hendo should bump down to 6 and Marquardt to 7

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 25, 2009 11:51 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

IMO

that is

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 25, 2009 11:51 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Really? I think Henderson is underrated if anything.

by Richard Wade on Mar 25, 2009 11:53 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

But most (you could really say ALL) of his truly great performances

Have come at 205. For some reason even though he’s a wrestler that should be used to cutting. He just doesn’t perform well at 185

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 25, 2009 11:54 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Other than that though

Solid rankings top to bottom. You know I think Manhoef is wayyyyyyyy more dangerous than he is ranked but in applying the same standard to him as I do to Marquardt… He just doesn’t have the wins. (An unbelievable crushing of Hunt who he was giving up 70 lbs to should vault him a little higher than 22 though)

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 25, 2009 11:58 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

The same is true of Maia. More dangerous than his ranking might indicate.

by Richard Wade on Mar 26, 2009 12:02 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

agreed there

jacare also

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 26, 2009 12:15 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Any Blue belt in Brazilian Jiu Jijtsu can defeat Manhoef in less than 5 min!

by Demordio on Mar 26, 2009 2:26 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

99.9% of the fights with blue belts in Jiu Jitsu

vs Manhoef end with somebody asleep in the first 30 seconds. And its not Manhoef.

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 27, 2009 1:30 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I agree, everywhere I look it seems like people are saying that Hendo is overrated and Bisping is going to beat him. I could be underestimating Bisping in this fight but I don’t think Hendo is going to have much of a problem with him.

by The Legend on Mar 26, 2009 12:44 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Oh he'll still work over Bisping

when he eventually catches up to Bisping on his horse

Gimme 1 round!

by ItBurnzWhenIP on Mar 26, 2009 1:05 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I think if Leites win it would be a BIG upset but I am not sure if I put it on the level of Serra/GSP. When Serra beat GSP people struggled to find an advantage or a way to win for him(I don’t know if you guys did but people I know did), Leites has an advantage if he can get it to the ground.

by The Legend on Mar 25, 2009 11:03 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Its true, a Leites KO would be on par.

I dislike Matt Hughes.

by MonkeyCHops on Mar 25, 2009 11:43 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I don’t know about that. Anderson is a legit BJJ black belt, and worked over Henderson pretty badly on the ground. Even if he just concentrates on defence, I don’t see Leites subbing Silva.

"I'm AJB and I endorse this nut-puncher."

by AJB on Mar 26, 2009 2:50 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I wasn’t thinking about Leites KO’ing Anderson, but if that were to happen then I would probably put it on Serra/GSP level maybe even above. I can’t think of a fight right now where he has even been rocked.

by The Legend on Mar 26, 2009 12:41 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

If that happens, you won’t have to worry about what level to put it on, because the world will immediately come to an end, lol!

If you're not submitting, you're just rolling around with another guy.

by BJJDenver on Mar 26, 2009 10:51 AM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Why Anderson Silva is overrated.

Anderson Silva vs. Thales Leites?? Seriously? The UFC has all these middleweights under contract and they throw him the #9 guy?? I give the man credit….he beat #3, #4 (although I think Henderson beats him 2 out of 3 times) and #10. You can’t question that. But let’s look at his recent fights:

Leites
Cote’
Irvin

I would rather see him fight Henderson, Maia, or Bisping 10 times than watch the UFC feed him tomato cans. Thank god Wandy is coming down.

The man is good, but with the exception of Henderson (ONCE) and Franklin, he hasn’t exactly been fighting big time competition. If you look at other fighters such as Wandy or Fedor…or Big Nog….they have been fighting people like Rampage, Chuck (in his day), Big Nog, CroCop, Fedor, Henderson, etc., etc.

Bottom line is that kind of competition is in a whole other league than the tomato cans Silva has been fighting like Cote’ and Leites. It gets even worse when you look at GSP’s situation at WW….his division is so bad they had to bring up BJ Penn.

I respect the man…he has a couple of big wins..but to crown him the p4p king or “one of the greatest ever” is a joke.

by P4P is a stupid concept on Mar 26, 2009 11:13 AM EDT reply actions 0 recs

I'm not sure if that is fair

His dominance has left the MW division in need of growing a crop of new challengers. That is happening, but he can’t be asked to simply sit by and wait for a year or so while those new challengers prove their worth fighting their way up.

Cote’ and Leites were/are the best at the moment that he hasn’t already proven his superiority over.

by Razreshat on Mar 26, 2009 12:54 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I would argue that Wandy, Henderson and Maia don’t have anything to prove.

Bisping might, but even he would be legit competition.

by P4P is a stupid concept on Mar 26, 2009 1:13 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Ok...lets look

Wandy is 2 for 4 since 2005…plenty of questions there.

Henderson might have been challenging for Anderson, but frankly the hand over the mouth thing made him look more than a little bit desperate. He’s also 2-2 since coming back to the UFC and lost to Anderson just last year.

Maia is amazing, but until recently he was largely an unknown commodity and hadn’t done enough to even argue for a title shot.

Bisping is new-ish to Middleweight and hasn’t beaten anyone that should propel him to a title shot. Defeating Hendo would go a long way, but might more likely make Hendo look like he is on the back end of his career. And if you listen to Bisping talk, he seems to fear getting his hype traing derailed by getting exposed by Silva…but at least he would be in pretty good company.

by Razreshat on Mar 26, 2009 1:54 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

I think all your points are valid, but regardless, I think all 4 of them are better than the last 3 guys the UFC has served up to him on a platter.

by P4P is a stupid concept on Mar 26, 2009 2:23 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

for example, Wandy is 2-2, but he lost to who? Rampage and Chuck- both major league fighters.

Henderson- lost to Silva and Rampage- again, both serious fighters. Furthermore, Henderson beat Silva is Rd. 1. If he wasn’t so impaitient in Rd. 2, who knows what would have happened.

I mean…bottom line is these guys’ losses were to major players….. but the minor-leaguers Silva has been fighting not only haven’t beaten any big players, they haven’t even FOUGHT against any.

Again, I would have no problem giving Silva full props if his resume’ consisted of wins over the big names, but the fact is, it doesn’t. He beat Franklin and Henderson, which absolutely makes him one of the great fighters of today. In Fedor’s case, he fought against clowns b/c there wasn’t really another option. Silva, on the other hand, COULD be fighting against better competition, but hasn’t been.

He is a great fighter and athlete, but as a serious fan, I get annoyed at watching someone of his skill walk out to the cage and go through the motions with a B-list fighter month after month when he could be challenging himself.

by P4P is a stupid concept on Mar 26, 2009 2:36 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Leites isn’t a tomato can. Cote’ ins’t a great fighter but he isn’t a can either.

by The Legend on Mar 26, 2009 12:40 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

Relatively speaking, he’s just AAA-ball.

by P4P is a stupid concept on Mar 26, 2009 12:42 PM EDT up reply actions 0 recs

Vitor Belfort

I Think Vitor “The Fenom” Belfort is one of the best middle weights there are!

by Demordio on Mar 26, 2009 2:24 PM EDT reply actions 0 recs

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