We try not to do the P4P rankings all that often because, let's face it - they don't change all that much. The list is generally one full of champions and title changes are hard to come by in the UFC. But UFC 173 flipped the bantamweight division upside down when T.J. Dillashaw beat highly-ranked P4P fighter Renan Barao. And he didn't just defeat him - he beat the tar out of him for 23 minutes before finishing him. So with that in mind, we went back to the well to see how our rankings would change. And change they did.
As usual, our panel consists of two members from each of the three SB Nation MMA sites - Ariel Helwani and Dave Doyle from MMA Fighting; Thomas Myers and Alex Giardini from MMA Mania; and finally, Dallas Winston and yours truly from Bloody Elbow. Here's the usual fancy chart:
(Scoring: Fighters are given 10 points for a first-place vote, nine points for a second, etc., down to one point for 10th place. The results are then tallied up and presented here. Official SB Nation rankings policy: Fighters under commission suspension are ineligible to be ranked during the duration of their suspension or if they have licensing issues. This does not affect any fighters who would generally be considered for the pound-for-pound list at the moment. St-Pierre is considered a retired fighter and is thus ineligible for consideration).
The top two spots were never in doubt, as Jon Jones and Jose Aldo are the top active fighters in the world right now. But with Barao out of the three spot, a whole lot of people moved up. Cain Velasquez is now at three, Demetrious Johnson sits at four, Chris Weidman is at five, and Anthony Pettis is at six.
Barao dropped four spots to number seven overall, and was everywhere from fourth to unranked (yeah, that was me). Johny Hendricks moved up one spot to eight and wasn't a unanimous pick either. Anderson Silva dropped to nine and is only ranked by three of the six panelists overall. And making his debut on the list is Dillashaw, who sits in the 10 spot with half of the panelists selecting him.
Other fighters who received votes but didn't make the list included Daniel Cormier (picked on four ballots but finished one point behind Dillashaw), Junior dos Santos, Vitor Belfort, and Chad Mendes.
Upcoming matchups for ranked fighters
Jon Jones (1) vs. Alexander Gustafsson (NR) - UFC 177, August 30th (not official)
Jose Aldo (2) vs. Chad Mendes (NR) - UFC 176, August 2nd
Cain Velasquez (3) vs. Fabricio Werdum (NR) - UFC 180, November 15th
Demetrious Johnson (4) vs. Ali Bagautinov (NR) - UFC 174, June 14th
Chris Weidman (5) vs. Lyoto Machida (NR) - UFC 175, May 24th
Anthony Pettis (6) vs. Gilbert Melendez (NR) - 2017 or something