USAT/SBN January MMA Consensus Rankings: Bantamweight

Rankings compiled by Richard Wade.

Georgia MMA rolls on, but its featherweight king faces his biggest test at WEC 47 in March.

I'm talking, of course, of #1 Brian Bowles who still reigns over the bantamweight division after crushing  # 2 Miguel Torres at WEC 42. Bowles will lock horns with the number one contender and former featherweight #3 Dominick Cruz in Columbus, Ohio. Cruz has been training in preparation for this bout at the Alliance center with Phil Davis, Mike Easton and Brandon Vera.

After dropping a decision to bantamweight contender #3 Dominick Cruz at WEC 42, #4 Joseph Benavidez returns to action at WEC 47 against former WEC Bantamweight champion #2 Miguel Torres. This is also the Mullet Man's return to action since getting stopped for the first time in his professional career.

Shooto's Featherweight standout #5 Masakatsu Ueda but drops from fourth to the fifth spot after a unanimous decision win over BJJ player #20 Eduardo Dantas at "Revolutionary Exchanges". According to Sherdog.com's Jordan Breen, he takes on Shuichiro Katsumura in March at  "The Way of Shooto 2".

#6 Scott Jorgensen is walking into his fight with Chad George at WEC 47 on a two-fight win streak. After crushing Noah Thomas at WEC 43 and out-pointing #7 Takeya Mizugaki at WEC 45, he'll be ready for the likely overmatched George.

#8 Damacio Page looked impressive in his win over Will Campuzano, but has not competed since WEC 43. After the fight, he went through shoulder surgery to repair a torn labrum, missing cartilage and a torn rotator cuff. According to the most recent reports, he is looking to return to action sometime in May of this year.

#9 Rani Yahya stays in the top ten, but only after dropping three spots. A gifted BJJ practitioner with very few MMA skills, he lost in the first round to #4 Joseph Benavidez by TKO at WEC 45. 

#10 Wagnney Fabiano is an interesting addition to the list. A former top ten mainstay at featherweight, the Nova Unaio black belt dropped to bantamweight at WEC 46, besting Clint Godfrey by unanimous decision. The performance was one-sided if less than impressive, although it is unclear how much the extra cut affected the Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt.

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.