USAT/SBN May 2011 MMA Consensus Rankings: Bantamweight

by Richard Wade on May 25, 2011 6:00 PM EDT

Rank	Fighter	%	Promotion	Last Rank
1	Dominick Cruz	100	UFC	1
2	Joseph Benavidez	93	UFC	2
3	Brian Bowles	91	UFC	3
4	Urijah Faber	89	UFC	4
5	Miguel Torres	83	UFC	5
6	Scott Jorgensen	82	UFC	6
7	Takeya Mizugaki	64	UFC	7
8	Brad Pickett	61	UFC	8
9	Demetrious Johnson	58	UFC	9
10	Masakatsu Ueda	52	Shooto	10
11	Wagnney Fabiano	44	UFC	11
12	Eddie Wineland	36	UFC	12
13	Michael McDonald	32	UFC	14
14	Damacio Page	30	UFC	13
15	Renan Barao	29	UFC	15
16	Masakazu Imanari	28	DEEP	19
17	Zach Makovsky	27	Bellator	16
18	Antonio Banuelos	22	UFC	18
19	Hiroshi Nakamura	21	DEEP	20
20	Takafumi Otsuka	19	DEEP	22
21	Charlie Valencia	17	UFC	17
22	Shuichiro Katsumura	16	Shooto	24
23	Akitoshi Tamura	15	WVR	23
24	Joe Warren	14	Bellator	21
25	Ian Loveland	13	UFC	26

#1 Dominick Cruz and #4 Urijah Faber are scheduled to headline UFC 132 on July 2 in the UFC's first Bantamweight title fight.

UFC 132 will also feature #3 Brian Bowles vs. the vastly overrated #7 Takeya Mizugaki.

#2 Joseph Benavidez is set to take on #12 Eddie Wineland at UFC on Versus 5 in a bout that could raise Wineland to title contender status.

#5 Miguel Torres will continue trying to work his way back to a title shot when he faces #9 Demetrious Johnson at UFC 130.

#6 Scott Jorgensen has been given a gift of a UFC debut bout at The Ultimate Fighter Finale 13 where he'll meet unranked Ken Stone.

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. 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.