Here’s a preliminary ranking of The Ultimate Fighter Season 12 contestants. 

Grey represents an approximate ranking.  * means a fighter was not active in the past 450 days, or ranked too low for approximation.

In the House

Michael Johnson [#95 LW]

Nam Phan[#98 FW]

Jonathan Brookins [#117 LW]

Jeffrey Lentz [#120 FW]

Cody McKenzie [#175 LW]

Marc Stevens [#230 WW]

Alex Caceres [#279 FW]

Dane Sayers [#292 WW]

Spencer Paige [#352 LW]

Sevak Magakian [#362 LW]

Aaron Wilkinson [#400 LW]

Kyle Watson [*]

Sako Chivitchiyan [*]

Andy Main [*]

On the Outside, Looking in

The following fighters lost their elimination bouts on Episode 1.  However, at least one will make it into the house via a wild-card spot.  Keep in mind that sometimes additional fighters who were eliminated return to the house to substitute for a fighter who is injured or otherwise unable to compete.

Pablo Garza [#116 FW]

T.J O’Brien [#122 LW]

Jason Ambrose [#145 LW]

Joseph Duffy [#166 LW]

Ran Weathers [#176 FW]

Mike Budnik [#240 LW]

Michael Richman [#247 LW]

Daniel Head [#420 LW]

Toby Grear [#504 LW]

Steve Magdalino [#587 LW]

Ariel Sexton [#616 LW]

Jason Brenton [#700 LW]

Amir Khillah [#720 LW]

Paul Barrow [*]

Notable Info

• We may be releasing a few more sets than usual in the near future as we are attempting to put the pieces together to post the women’s divisional rankings.  Please bare with us if there are some technical difficulties.

We are in the process of expanding our women’s rankings into division-based rankings.  To start, they will likely be top 10 lists encompassing six divisions (or so) plus a division dominance list.  We’re still pinning down the fine details, but in the meantime, you may notice some odd rating fluctuations and page changes.

Notable Info

• In (what I’m sure will be) a celebratory release, Ray Mercer has fallen out of the rankings due to inactivity.  We decided to make a special early ranking release for this occasion.

Women’s (115 lbs) Tournament

[#3] Megumi Fujii vs. [#14]Lisa Ward

[#19]Jessica Aguilar vs. [#13] Zoila Frausto

Heavyweight Tournament

[#31] Neil Grove vs. [#36] Alexey Oleinik

[#21] Damian Grabowski vs. [#44] Cole Konrad

Bantamweight Tournament

[#35] Jose Vega vs. [#25] Ed West

[#10] Zach Makovsky vs. [#60] Ulysses Gomez

The following list consists of non-top 10 male fighters who have been ranked, have won at least 5 fights, and have went undefeated for the past two years, but have not moved their rank position more than 25 positions.

1. Nick Penner (Current Rank: #77 vs. 9/1/08 Rank: #72 | [5-0-0 2yr])

Talk about a stasis.  In this span, his rating went DOWN.  Penner has fought two debuting fighters and a 0-1 fighter.  In his last two, he’s taken a small jump in quality, but it’s time to move away from Canada and take an increase in competition.

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2. Delson Heleno (Current Rank: #43 vs. 9/1/08 Rank: #60 | [6-0-0 2yr])

Heleno has made a career out of bouncing around the minor circuits on a global scale.  His losses are pretty respectable, but he has no very good wins.  Maybe he’s simply peaked as a fighter.

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3. Brent Weedman (Current Rank: #39 vs. 9/1/08 Rank: #57 | [7-0-0 2yr])

On a positive note, he’s gotten noticed and moved onto Bellator from the southeastern US circuit.  Time will tell if he can rise up the rankings.

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4. Hector Lombard (Current Rank: #24 vs. 9/1/08 Rank: #45 | [10-0-0 2yr])

The most prolific thrasher of mid-level competition in professional mixed martial arts.  Shlemenko will be his highest ranked competition (at the time of the bout) since his loss to Akihiro Gono in June 2006.  In fact, Shlemenko is ranked higher than Lombard thanks to the Bellator Middleweight tournament.  It should be interesting, because Lombard’s two losses, and draw, were to the only three higher ranked fighters (at the time of the bout) that Lombard has faced outside of his pro debut against a 1-0 fighter.

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5. Joe Doerksen (Current Rank: #25 vs. 9/1/08 Rank: #58 | [6-0-0 2yr])

After nearly 60 professional fights, I think we know what we’re getting with Doerksen.

If you haven’t had a chance to check them out yet, you can do see here: All-Time Career Rankings