Victories over UFC Champions, Part I

By virtue of being one of the first MMA organizations in the world and having an unbroken history that extends to their present day dominance, the title of ‘UFC Champion’ is arguably the most prestigious title that any fighter can hold.  ‘UFC Champion’ is by no means the only prestigious title an MMA champion may have won, but it is without a doubt the most consistently meaningful title in the history of our sport.  And if being a UFC champion is worth so much, what about victories over those champions?  Which fighters in MMA history have defeated the most members of this exclusive club?

To be clear, the criteria for ‘UFC Champion’ is as follows. Interim champions count. Early UFC tournament (Pre UFC 20) winners count as champions, and post UFC 20 tournament winners such as UFC Japan 2 and TUF tournament winners are not counted. Superfight winners count as champs. A win over a champion, future, present, past or at any point in their career counts. That’s the criteria used for this list.  I’ve included every fighter with three or more victories over different UFC champions.  For a list of all UFC Champions, see here.

There are an incredible number of interesting tidbits sorting through this information. For instance, Pedro Rizzo, who was never a UFC or PRIDE champion, nevertheless beat five UFC champions in his career. Fedor has defeated five UFC champions despite never fighting for the UFC, and Kazushi Sakuraba has defeated seven UFC champions, although none of those wins took place in the Octagon.  Alternately, there are fighters such as Pat Miletich, who won 5 UFC welterweight title bouts and the UFC 16 tournament, but never defeated another UFC champion in his career.

Check back next week for part two, which will include other organizations’ title-holders, a ‘most losses’ category, and more analysis and statistics pulled from the data.