One of the biggest issues that onlookers have with the FightMatrix ranking system is how we initially rank fighters that move divisions.
Due to the nature of the point-based system, we cannot take away all of a fighter’s point balance and start them unranked, simply because they moved divisions. If this was the case, the opponents who beat them would gain nothing for doing so, and in all but the most extreme cases, this would be 100% incorrect. Fighters outside of the big organizations shift divisions all of the time, so its not as if a new division means its a new sport with new rules or even an entirely new crop of fighters.
We do reduce the point balances of fighters who move up in division, in order to represent the increased difficulty in fighting “bigger” fighters in more proven weight divisions. This is done at a rate of approximately 12-15% per division. I provided a range here, because some divisional jumps differ in size and we do take that into account. Note: This isn’t something we’ve always done. It was always planned, but we did not have enough divisional information until late 2009.
In order to make this work, we must do the inverse when a fighter moves down in division. This means a fighter’s points will actually increase, as they are moving into a division with smaller fighters. Current examples of this are Wanderlei Silva (#4 MW), and Wagnney Fabiano (#5 BW). Even if these fighters have only fought once in their latest tenure (or career) at the lower division, please understand that for the most part, their new divisional ratings should be considered as projection unless its a “rating-solidifying” result (big win, big loss, draw against equal-rated). This downward move is more controversial than the upward move, especially when a fighter makes a drastic weight cut that ultimately ends up being a bad idea.
When we debut our comprehensive historical month-by-month and all-time divisional rankings (ETA: Unknown), we’ll have enough data around the divisional moves to provide modified information as to whether or not the moves should have been compensated for.