If you are a long-time viewer of the site, you are probably familiar with the term, “quality performance”. If not, we made a blog post about it and the associated decay way back in 2008. Simply put, a fighter registers a quality performance when they fight another fighter reasonably close to or above their own rating and they deliver an outcome that is not egregiously beneath what is expected based on the ratings difference. So, it is important to know that quality performances are relative.
In other words, Fedor Emelianenko in his prime would not have registered a quality performance over #500 ranked Joe Schmoe, regardless of the outcome. However, if Joe Schmoe managed a split decision loss against Fedor, Joe would earn the quality performance — so these CAN be earned even in losses.
When looking at fighters with at least 15 wins that have had winning records, one fighter stands way above the rest.
I know what the hardcore fans are thinking — Travis Fulton. Even though he has had 310 pro fights (by our count) he managed 106 quality performances. This is still a very low percentage, but contrary to common belief, Fulton was a fairly high-level journeyman, especially in the early days of his career. Recent UFC competitor, Nikita Krylov actually scores a worse percentage (5 of 18), but this may be due to weaknesses in Eastern European record-keeping.
The winner by far is a man named Theodore Reynol.
Reynol earns this distinction by earning a single quality performance in 20 career fights. Spending the early part of his career competing in fights of unknown sanctioning status within bars and local cards in and around Minneapolis, Reynol went 15-0 with all 15 wins coming by submission or (T)KO, 14 of these in round 1, against opponents with a total record of 4-17. That’s right, 21 fights of experience split between 15 opponents. MixedMartialArts.com has this part of his career being a bit more epic, giving him credit for 3 additional wins.
After this career stage, Reynol decided to step it up and fought fellow undefeated fighter Jason Reinhardt, who dispatched of Reynol in the first round. Reynol then went 2-2 and finished his career at 17-3, but not before defeating one last debuting opponent.