Notable Info

• Effects from recent and newly added shows.  Notable changes stem from DREAM, PalaceFC, Cage Rage, and other shows.

Shinya Aoki officially takes the #1 Lightweight spot from Takanori Gomi.

Last week, I examined the progress made by fighters who competed in the light heavyweight division on the Season 1 of The Ultimate Fighter reality series. Let’s now look at the other half of the picture: the middleweight contestants from Season 1.

The middleweights turned out to be a talented group of fighters: five out of eight are still competing in the UFC, and hold a .700 or better record in the Octagon. Most of them were also a bit undersized for their weight division: only Chris Leben and Nate Quarry still compete at 185 lbs; the rest dropped one or more weight classes. Also, while the fighter with most prior experience went on to win the contest, the two fighters with the highest current rankings both only had 2 wins in professional MMA bouts prior to the show.

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Notable Info

• The usual.  Added some recent and old shows.
• Two very minor bug fixes.  Will cause some fluctuations low in the divisions where points are more scarce.

There is no question that the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ reality series – better known as ‘TUF’ – has been the most influential vehicle for promoting the success of UFC, and to a lesser extent MMA in general, in North America. The careers of most contestants have been boosted like they could have never imagined. Even the ones who never came close to winning were still given a chance to prove their worth in the UFC, and many of the fighters released from the UFC were instantly picked up by smaller organizations simply because of the newly acquired name recognition.

With the show now in it’s seventh season, let’s take a look back at where it all started. The first season of ‘The Ultimate Fighter’ took place in 2005, and featured 8 middleweights and 8 lightheavyweights competing for two ‘six figure’ contracts with the UFC. Most of the contestants were virtually unknown in the MMA world at the time, yet all are now very familiar names for most fans. I will start with the light heavyweight division, and examine the middleweights next week.

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Notable Info

• Effects from recent and newly added shows.  Notable changes stem from Shooto 5/3

There is a virtual deadlock at the #1 Lightweight spot between Takanori Gomi and Shinya Aoki.  The recent Shooto show, and some recently added shows caused moderate shakeups in the lower weight divisions.

Notable Info

• Effects from recent shows such as Pancrase, Cage Gladiators, DREAM, and UWC can now be observed.
• Additions and corrections made to historical shows/bouts.

The #1 Lightweight spot is still Takanori Gomi’s, but by less than 1 rating point!  With Gomi’s decaying point total, lack of scheduled bouts, and the upcoming Sherk/Penn title match, it is an absolute certainty that Gomi’s reign at the top will come to an end, very shortly.

The next rankings update is scheduled for May 4th.

Notable Info

• Historical shows and a few recent minor shows added to the database.
• Notable changes are restricted to the women’s division (SmackGirl 4/26).

The next update will be on April 29th after the DREAM show.

Takanori Gomi’s relative inactivity and lack of recent achievements have left his point total stagnant.  In fact, his points have actually decreased approximately 7% since they were at their peak level, which was reached after he beat Ishida on 12/31/06.  This is not to say that this was him at his fighting peak as it is inaccurate to compare the value of a point between time (sort of like the value of the dollar), but with increased competition, the outstanding pool of points becomes larger.  This means that Gomi is essentially “swimming against the current”.

On April 29th the #2 Lightweight, Gesias Calvancante, squares off against the #6 Lightweight, Shinya Aoki.  If Calvancante were to win, he would take the top spot from Takanori Gomi.  If Aoki wins, his eventual point total would depend on the type of win.

Regardless of this outcome, the top spot may be in jeopardy again on May 24th, when #3 Lightweight, BJ Penn, squares off against the #5 Lightweight, Sean Sherk for the FightMatrix recognized UFC Lightweight title.

To follow-up on Oleg’s excellent Light Heavyweight articles, I decided to run the current code on the database, to simulate what the ratings would look like one year ago today.  The “Diff” column shows the ranking difference between then, and today.

Rank	Diff	Fighter	Record	Points
1	2	Chuck Liddell Last Fight: 12/30/2006 [UFC]	20-3-0	514
2	4	Mauricio Rua Last Fight: 2/24/2007 [PRIDE]	16-2-0	349
3	4	Sokoudjou Last Fight: 4/8/2007 [PRIDE]	4-1-0	290
4	NR	Dan Henderson Last Fight: 2/24/2007 [PRIDE]	22-5-0	286
5	3	Ricardo Arona Last Fight: 4/8/2007 [PRIDE]	13-5-0	206
6	5	Quinton Jackson Last Fight: 2/3/2007 [UFC]	26-6-0	177
7	5	Wanderlei Silva Last Fight: 2/24/2007 [PRIDE]	31-7-1	171
8	1	Tito Ortiz Last Fight: 12/30/2006 [UFC]	16-5-0	170
9	7	Ryoto Machida Last Fight: 4/21/2007 [UFC]	10-0-0	168
10	1	Antonio Rogerio Nogueira Last Fight: 2/24/2007 [PRIDE]	12-3-0	164

Ratings Run Date: April 22, 2007

While George St. Pierre solidified his position atop the welterweight division with a victory over Matt Serra, with six middleweight bouts UFC 83 had the biggest impact on the 185 lbs weight class.

• [#17] Demian Maia, [#18] Jason MacDonald, and [#20] Jason Day all blasted into the Top 20 with impressive stoppage wins.
• Michael Bisping made his middleweight debut at #30.
• Nate Quarry improved to #49 with a lopsided decision over Kalib ‘Running Man’ Starnes.
• [#50] Ed Herman, [#53] Joe Doerksen, [#57] Alan Belcher all fall to the bottom half of the Top 100.  Starnes falls to #80.
• [#5] Rich Franklin’s victory over [#41] Travis Lutter had no significant impact on either man’s rank.
• Former #99 Evan Tanner is displaced from the Top 100.

In the lightweight division, Mac Danzig makes his 155 lbs debut at #33.  Mark Bocek drops out of Top 100, while Rich Clementi and Sam Stout sit at #24 and #35 respectively after their bout.

In the official Fight of The Night, Jonathan Goulet improved to #25 in the welterweight division with a KO victory over Kuniyoshi Hironaka.  Hironaka falls to #61.