UFC 254: Khabib vs. Gaethje (10/24/2020) - Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (UFC Fight Island)

[The Natural]

29-0.

Edited October 25, 2020 by The Natural

[The Natural]

 

[Jiji]

I'm seeing some people, whose opinions I generally agree with, poo poo the Khabib goat talk. I get that it's usually boring and tired conversations surrounding the subject but I'm a little confused as to what the arguments for pretty much anybody else are because I'm not really seeing them as all that convincing.

Who are the real alternatives? Jones is probably the most credible imo, though I could be hella biased towards current era because it's the most evolved of a fledgling sport's history (which makes the GOAT talk rather silly to begin with). But Jones' division has been traditionally one of the weakest, some of the best names on his resume were either washed or big middleweights or very small light heavyweights. So Gustafsson, Cormier, Machida are his biggest wins? Gus the first time is definitely an impressive W but dude was broken by Johnson and never recovered, so the second fight being a demolition wasn't a surprise. The Cormier fights are definitely his most noteworthy wins, yet one was overturned due to Jon getting popped for PEDs. He did a great job in cleaning up the remnants of the PRIDE era, proving he was clearly the next step in the sport's evolution. Khabib was never in danger in a fight and while I think Jones plays psychological warfare and willingly puts himself into danger or his opponent's wheelhouse so as to kill their hopes and will, Jones has looked vulnerable as of late and both Reyes and Santos pushed him hard. It is easy to diminish the records of fighters when we see the trajectory of their opponents after they lose to Jones, so I'm trying to think historically of where some of these challengers were at when they fought Jones. But for me, Jones is #2. 

GSP falls even more into the strength of opposition argument. Beyond the two Hughes wins, there isn't a super high calibre of opponents. He crushed an old and much smaller Penn and looked to have some help in the way of getting all greased up. His ability to do the opposite of Jones by playing it safe, developing a killer power jab, and being able to time his incredible power double and maintain top control was both impressive but also not so impressive if we are talking GOAT contender status. He rarely looked to finish later on because that would put his control game at risk. He lost but didn't lose to Hendricks near the end and he came back to beat a one eyed Bisping whose game matches very well with his. Meanwhile Khabib was in the craziest division in the history of the sport and cleaned it out, not once being put in jeopardy and so decisively beat everybody they put in front of him barring a couple of weird showings against guys clearly not on his level. He developed very good standup and the grappling on display yesterday was ludicrous. His spirit/will was unbreakable, his stamina and pressure legendary, and he carried himself like a gentleman in a sport full of and run by assholes. He fought on his own terms and when you work for Dana White that is a very tough thing to do. I understand both Jones and GSP could only fight the people that were put in front of them but Khabib's record is just on another level for me. I can but people saying Jones but I do not think it's close with GSP and Fedor was amazing but... I think the argument for him is long dead. Aldo's run up until he started to decline was great but he too started playing it safer like GSP and then competition caught up and/or he faded. Jones and Khabib are both flawless, never truly losing in the octagon but Jones has some obvious marks against him. 

Edited October 25, 2020 by Jiji

[supremebve]

41 minutes ago, Jiji said:

GSP falls even more into the strength of opposition argument. Beyond the two Hughes wins, there isn't a super high calibre of opponents. He crushed an old and much smaller Penn and looked to have some help in the way of getting all greased up. His ability to do the opposite of Jones by playing it safe, developing a killer power jab, and being able to time his incredible power double and maintain top control was both impressive but also not so impressive if we are talking GOAT contender status. He rarely looked to finish later on because that would put his control game at risk. He lost but didn't lose to Hendricks near the end and he came back to beat a one eyed Bisping whose game matches very well with his. Meanwhile Khabib was in the craziest division in the history of the sport and cleaned it out, not once being put in jeopardy and so decisively beat everybody they put in front of him barring a couple of weird showings against guys clearly not on his level. He developed very good standup and the grappling on display yesterday was ludicrous. His spirit/will was unbreakable, his stamina and pressure legendary, and he carried himself like a gentleman in a sport full of and run by assholes. He fought on his own terms and when you work for Dana White that is a very tough thing to do. I understand both Jones and GSP could only fight the people that were put in front of them but Khabib's record is just on another level for me. I can but people saying Jones but I do not think it's close with GSP and Fedor was amazing but... I think the argument for him is long dead. Aldo's run up until he started to decline was great but he too started playing it safer like GSP and then competition caught up and/or he faded. Jones and Khabib are both flawless, never truly losing in the octagon but Jones has some obvious marks against him. 

I couldn't disagree with this more.  The Welterweight division at the time GSP was champion was the best division in the sport and GSP fought and beat pretty much every viable contender.  Matt Hughes and BJ Penn were the biggest names, but at the time, Jon Fitch, Thiago Alves, Sean Sherk, Jake Shields, Nick Diaz, and Carlos Condit were all fighters who probably would have been champions if GSP didn't exist.  That was a murderers row of contenders, and for my money the best list of contenders on anyone's resume.  Khabib was the king of a better division from top to bottom, but he didn't fight that many great fighters on his way to the top.  The best fighter he fought on the way to the title was Rafael Dos Anjos, who was on his way to the championship.  Until the McGregor fight no one else on his resume was ever going to be better than a fringe contender.  

[twiztor]

1 hour ago, Jiji said:

I'm seeing some people, whose opinions I generally agree with, poo poo the Khabib goat talk. I get that it's usually boring and tired conversations surrounding the subject but I'm a little confused as to what the arguments for pretty much anybody else are because I'm not really seeing them as all that convincing.

my #1 GOAT is Jon Jones. He is the greatest fighter i have ever seen in my damn near 20 years of following this sport.

Jones (28-0) and Khabib (29-0) are both undefeated since 2008. Jones is undefeated in the UFC since 2008 (fuck that Matt Hamill "loss"). Khabib is undefeated in the UFC since 2012. Jones has won 22 UFC bouts (counting both the Hamill and 2nd DC fights). Khabib has won 13. Jones has held some version of the LHW title since 2011 and amassed 11 official defenses. Khabib won the LW belt in 2018 and has 3 defenses. Jones has beaten 6 previous LHW champions. Khabib has beaten 2 former LW kings.

numbers aside, Jones beat almost the entirety of the previous generation of LHWs ("cleaning up the remnants of PRIDE"). Then he beat everybody that was in his generation (including Gustafsson [2x], Cormier [3x], Glover, and future 2-division Bellator champ Ryan Bader). Now he's beating the "next" generation of LHWs (Reyes, as disputed as that was).

Every single other division saw an outflux of fighters over the last few years of guys moving down in weight. You didn't see that with LHW, partly because Jones was so dominant and talented that even lower weight Heavyweights knew they didn't have a chance moving down. If you've cleared out your division, more than once, and you are so good that you are prohibitive in new fighters joining your weight class you're quite clearly at the top of the heap.

[The Natural]

2 hours ago, Jiji said:

I'm seeing some people, whose opinions I generally agree with, poo poo the Khabib goat talk. I get that it's usually boring and tired conversations surrounding the subject but I'm a little confused as to what the arguments for pretty much anybody else are because I'm not really seeing them as all that convincing.

Who are the real alternatives? Jones is probably the most credible imo, though I could be hella biased towards current era because it's the most evolved of a fledgling sport's history (which makes the GOAT talk rather silly to begin with). But Jones' division has been traditionally one of the weakest, some of the best names on his resume were either washed or big middleweights or very small light heavyweights. So Gustafsson, Cormier, Machida are his biggest wins? Gus the first time is definitely an impressive W but dude was broken by Johnson and never recovered, so the second fight being a demolition wasn't a surprise. The Cormier fights are definitely his most noteworthy wins, yet one was overturned due to Jon getting popped for PEDs. He did a great job in cleaning up the remnants of the PRIDE era, proving he was clearly the next step in the sport's evolution. Khabib was never in danger in a fight and while I think Jones plays psychological warfare and willingly puts himself into danger or his opponent's wheelhouse so as to kill their hopes and will, Jones has looked vulnerable as of late and both Reyes and Santos pushed him hard. It is easy to diminish the records of fighters when we see the trajectory of their opponents after they lose to Jones, so I'm trying to think historically of where some of these challengers were at when they fought Jones. But for me, Jones is #2. 

GSP falls even more into the strength of opposition argument. Beyond the two Hughes wins, there isn't a super high calibre of opponents. He crushed an old and much smaller Penn and looked to have some help in the way of getting all greased up. His ability to do the opposite of Jones by playing it safe, developing a killer power jab, and being able to time his incredible power double and maintain top control was both impressive but also not so impressive if we are talking GOAT contender status. He rarely looked to finish later on because that would put his control game at risk. He lost but didn't lose to Hendricks near the end and he came back to beat a one eyed Bisping whose game matches very well with his. Meanwhile Khabib was in the craziest division in the history of the sport and cleaned it out, not once being put in jeopardy and so decisively beat everybody they put in front of him barring a couple of weird showings against guys clearly not on his level. He developed very good standup and the grappling on display yesterday was ludicrous. His spirit/will was unbreakable, his stamina and pressure legendary, and he carried himself like a gentleman in a sport full of and run by assholes. He fought on his own terms and when you work for Dana White that is a very tough thing to do. I understand both Jones and GSP could only fight the people that were put in front of them but Khabib's record is just on another level for me. I can but people saying Jones but I do not think it's close with GSP and Fedor was amazing but... I think the argument for him is long dead. Aldo's run up until he started to decline was great but he too started playing it safer like GSP and then competition caught up and/or he faded. Jones and Khabib are both flawless, never truly losing in the octagon but Jones has some obvious marks against him. 

Thanks for the post.

To me if a fighter pisses hot, that taints a fighter's career and DQs you from GOAT contention. That's how I feel about Jon Jones and Anderson Silva. Jones' 2011 is one of the greatest for a fighter in any year beating Ryan Bader, Shogun Rua to become the youngest UFC Champion ever, Quinton Jackson and Lyoto Machida finishing all four. Jones has lost fights he somehow won by decision: Alexander Gustafsson in their first fight, Thiago Santos and Dominick Reyes. Anderson Silva holds the record for longest win streak in UFC history at 16, his standout wins were versus Rich Franklin twice, Dan Henderson, Vitor Belfort, Chael Sonnen X2 and consecutive title defenses till Mighty Mouse beat it.

Fedor Emelianenko was an undersized heavyweight who lost on cuts to Tsuyoshi Kosaka and went on to win 28 straight fights against Big Nog and Cro Cop before losing properly to Fabricio Werdum's Triangle Choke. A knock on Fedor is that he never fought in the UFC. The Heavyweight division and the Middleweight division doesn't have the pedigree, quality of opposition as Welterweight and Lightweight which are plus points in the cases for Georges St-Pierre and Khabib Nurmagomedov.

Georges St. Pierre's Welterweight resume stands out with over Matt Hughes twice, BJ Penn twice, Carlos Condit, Johny Hendricks though that split decision win was highly controversial, Jake Shields, Josh Koscheck twice and Matt Serra. GDP won so many rounds in a row. GSP also avenged his only two defeats vs. Hughes and Serra. After four years out, GSP became a two weight world champion by Rear Naked Choke to Michael Bisping for Bisping's UFC Middleweight Championship.

Khabib Nurmagomedov goes out on a perfect professional MMA record, 29-0 in the deepest weight class in MMA going back years, Lightweight. Khabib Nurmagomedov finished a former UFC Lightweight Champion or Interim Lightweight Champion in a row by submission: Conor McGregor, Dustin Poirier and Justin Gaethje easily.

To me, Georges St-Pierre is still the Greatest MMA Fighter of All Time.

Edited October 25, 2020 by The Natural

[Jiji]

11 minutes ago, supremebve said:

I couldn't disagree with this more.  The Welterweight division at the time GSP was champion was the best division in the sport and GSP fought and beat pretty much every viable contender.  Matt Hughes and BJ Penn were the biggest names, but at the time, Jon Fitch, Thiago Alves, Sean Sherk, Jake Shields, Nick Diaz, and Carlos Condit were all fighters who probably would have been champions if GSP didn't exist.  That was a murderers row of contenders, and for my money the best list of contenders on anyone's resume.  Khabib was the king of a better division from top to bottom, but he didn't fight that many great fighters on his way to the top.  The best fighter he fought on the way to the title was Rafael Dos Anjos, who was on his way to the championship.  Until the McGregor fight no one else on his resume was ever going to be better than a fringe contender.  

Look at Fitch's record on his way to the GSP fight. Thiago Alves is about it. Sean Sherk was a roided up lightweight. Diaz and Condit were good fighters, definitely. Let's add them to Hughes and I guess Penn, though I still have huge reservations about how meaningful that win was. Shields is a specialist and that fight was a disaster, but even then Jake picked up some impressive wins on the way to that shit show in Toronto. Let's add him. Conversely, Khabib beat McGregor, Poirier, Gaethje, RDA, and Barboza. I agree that he didn't face all of the big names at LW. That's fair. But when I look at the dominating fashion in which Khabib fought, Jones is the only guy who comes close imo and as twiztor said, he cleaned out that division a number of times. He beat the guys of the specialist era and then kept going. Michael Johnson caught Khabib with one great punch. That was about the most danger he was ever in during his entire UFC career.

[The Natural]

I was doing my reply to Jiji as supremebve and twiztor's came through. Interesting seeing our similarities and differences on the GOAT standings.

[supremebve]

15 minutes ago, Jiji said:

Look at Fitch's record on his way to the GSP fight. Thiago Alves is about it. Sean Sherk was a roided up lightweight. Diaz and Condit were good fighters, definitely. Let's add them to Hughes and I guess Penn, though I still have huge reservations about how meaningful that win was. Shields is a specialist and that fight was a disaster, but even then Jake picked up some impressive wins on the way to that shit show in Toronto. Let's add him. Conversely, Khabib beat McGregor, Poirier, Gaethje, RDA, and Barboza. I agree that he didn't face all of the big names at LW. That's fair. But when I look at the dominating fashion in which Khabib fought, Jones is the only guy who comes close imo and as twiztor said, he cleaned out that division a number of times. He beat the guys of the specialist era and then kept going. Michael Johnson caught Khabib with one great punch. That was about the most danger he was ever in during his entire UFC career.

Fitch was on a 16 fight winning streak, and was flat out dominating everyone including Thiago Alves.  I thought Thiago Alves killed Matt Hughes on his way to his title shot.  Sherk may have been a roided up lightweight, but he was a damn good roided up light weight.  Jake Shields was dull as dishwater, but he's one of the best grapplers in the history of MMA.  Nick Diaz is Nick Diaz, and Carlos Condit was the champion when GSP was out injured.  All of those dudes are better than Barboza in comparison to their competition at the time.  Understand that I'm of the opinion that Khabib is the best of all time, but no one has a better resume than GSP.  His case for GOAT is that he fought in the best division in the sport at the time and fought almost every single relevant fighter of the time.  Seriously, who is the best Welterweight of his time that he didn't fight and beat?  The only one I can think of is Robbie Lawler, but he was out of the UFC and fighting at middleweight at the time.  Anderson Silva fought in the weakest division at the time.  Jon Jones fought in a division that has a lot of names, but not really a lot of depth.  Fedor fought in a division that could have been great if they combined the Pride and UFC divisions, but he only fought half of the relevant competition.  

If Khabib fought and beat McGregor, Gaethje, RDA, Barboza, Tony Ferguson, Donald Cerrone, Eddie Alvarez, Anthony Pettis, James Vick, Dan Hooker, Nate Diaz, Kevin Lee, and Charles Oliveira you could say their resumes were the same.  With that said, I think Khabib smashes everyone listed, but he didn't.  No shade, but Khabib's case is about his utter and complete dominance, not who he beat along the way.

[twiztor]

1 hour ago, supremebve said:

Fedor fought in a division that could have been great if they combined the Pride and UFC divisions, but he only fought half of the relevant competition.  

which of the UFC heavyweights of the time (we're talking 2000-2007ish when Pride went under) would have even been in the top 10? the only name is Randy Couture, who the argument could be made that he was a LHW fighting up. Frank Mir maybe but that's due as much to his injury as anything else. Fedor has wins over Heath Herring (when he was ranked #2 in Pride), Big Nog (2x), CroCop, Coleman (2x), Hunt, Randleman, Sylvia (in 2008), and Arlovski (in 2009).

If you want to make the argument that Fedor can't be the GOAT because he fought too many cans, then i won't disagree with that. But to imply that there was some deep talent in UFC that Fedor was avoiding is just completely untrue. 

[OSJ]

11 minutes ago, twiztor said:

which of the UFC heavyweights of the time (we're talking 2000-2007ish when Pride went under) would have even been in the top 10? the only name is Randy Couture, who the argument could be made that he was a LHW fighting up. Frank Mir maybe but that's due as much to his injury as anything else. Fedor has wins over Heath Herring (when he was ranked #2 in Pride), Big Nog (2x), CroCop, Coleman (2x), Hunt, Randleman, Sylvia (in 2008), and Arlovski (in 2009).

If you want to make the argument that Fedor can't be the GOAT because he fought too many cans, then i won't disagree with that. But to imply that there was some deep talent in UFC that Fedor was avoiding is just completely untrue. 

What gets overlooked is timing... Fedor beat those guys when it MEANT something. Cro Cop was deadly until Fedor schooled him, twelve years ago Arlovski MEANT something, Big Nog MEANT something. No, we're never going to see prime Fedor against Jon Jones, that ship has sailed, but to say that Fedor is anything less than in the discussion for GOAT is silly.

[supremebve]

7 minutes ago, twiztor said:

which of the UFC heavyweights of the time (we're talking 2000-2007ish when Pride went under) would have even been in the top 10? the only name is Randy Couture, who the argument could be made that he was a LHW fighting up. Frank Mir maybe but that's due as much to his injury as anything else. Fedor has wins over Heath Herring (when he was ranked #2 in Pride), Big Nog (2x), CroCop, Coleman (2x), Hunt, Randleman, Sylvia (in 2008), and Arlovski (in 2009).

If you want to make the argument that Fedor can't be the GOAT because he fought too many cans, then i won't disagree with that. But to imply that there was some deep talent in UFC that Fedor was avoiding is just completely untrue. 

Honestly, he did beat the vast majority of the fighters of his era, but he was never in a division with all ten of the top ten heavyweights in the world.  Yeah, he beat Sylvia and Arlovski, but he beat them after they were cut from the UFC and replaced by better fighters.  

 

3 minutes ago, OSJ said:

What gets overlooked is timing... Fedor beat those guys when it MEANT something. Cro Cop was deadly until Fedor schooled him, twelve years ago Arlovski MEANT something, Big Nog MEANT something. No, we're never going to see prime Fedor against Jon Jones, that ship has sailed, but to say that Fedor is anything less than in the discussion for GOAT is silly.

This is the thing about MMA...there can be no consensus GOAT.  Fedor, GSP, Anderson Silva, Jon Jones, Jose Aldo, Demetrios Johnson, Amanda Nunes, and now Khabib all have valid arguments.  You can form arguments against them, but those are the fighters that mattered the most over the years.

[John E. Dynamite]

I'm firmly with the GSP camp on this one. The Fitch and Alves wins have been unfortunately dulled by history and they make me ask the question - how many of GSP's wins were over guys who were in the P4P Top Ten?

Sherdog started their P4P Top Ten rankings in the wake of GSP's loss to Matt Serra, so he wasn't on the inaugural list. Their archives are perfectly intact from August, 2008, right after GSP's drubbing of Fitch. Based on the language used in their Welterweight rankings that month (and the fact that Fitch was in P4P Top 10s as late as after the Penn draw, all the way at #5), I'm going to assume Fitch was considered top-10 heading into that fight. That's also how I remember it, as Fitch was on a 16-fight win streak and hadn't developed a reputation as a non-finisher, he was considered a very real challenge. There's only one P4P list I can find from 2008 and Thiago Alves was ranked #9 after he beat Koscheck (the fight before Alves' GSP fight), so he counts - I think a lot of people forget just how good he looked back then. Penn was ranked #4 P4P before his second GSP fight. Jake Shields was ranked #6 a month before his challenge. Carlos Condit was ranked #10 interim title win over Diaz, then was bumped off the list by Junior Dos Santos in Sherdog's August list, which you can either dispute or claim that he was #11 during the unification fight with GSP. You could also claim that Dominick Cruz's three-year layoff started before the unification match, regardless, Condit counts for something. Bisping was ranked #9, take that how you will.

So that's an 5 or 6 guys ranked top ten P4P if you count Matt Hughes in 2006 who was coming off winning the second Penn fight and likely very high in the rankings, unquestionably top 10. Then you wonder how high up Johny Hendricks was in Nov '13 (I would imagine top 15), where Serra was in the rematch (hey, if Bisping was #9...), and Sherk in '05 (who was 31-1-1 at the time, with his only loss to Hughes).

GSP beat 5 top 10 P4P guys at the very, very least and maybe 8 all-in-all. Nobody remembers how highly regarded Fitch, Alves, and Shields were these days (and GSP didn't memorably finish any of them) but he beat them. Nobody, nobody at all, comes close to GSP's strength of schedule. Both of his losses were avenged in ways that showed clear growth. GSP's wins before he became the man were also really, really good. His first ever MMA fight was against Ivan Menjivar, his last fight before going to the UFC was a win over Pete Spratt (who was coming off a win over Robbie Lawler in the UFC), and beat Karo Parysian (who left the UFC 18-5-1 with all of his losses to eventual champions or contenders) and Jay Heiron (pretty damned underrated, hair's breadth from being a Bellator champ) before the first Hughes fight. His bounce-back fights from the first Hughes loss were Mayhem, Trigg, Sherk and Penn.

GSP is the greatest MMA fighter ever. Bar none. Period.

Edited October 25, 2020 by John E. Dynamite

[Elsalvajeloco]

Quote

Jon Jones fought in a division that has a lot of names, but not really a lot of depth. 

Wouldn't a lot of names mean depth? Any time you use the phrase "a lot", that usually means depth.

Re: Penn

There was a reason why UFC 94 was a huge show. BJ wasn't considered old at the time. That was way later. There was many people that thought BJ had a chance to knock him out. Now, the folks who actually thought about it picked GSP to win. However, that doesn't take away the merit away from the victory. The win was huge for GSP in terms of legacy. The only thing that hurts that win in my eyes is Penn didn't exactly have the strongest career he could have had due to various things behind the scenes with his career. He could have had a run much longer than he did had not just left UFC to go have random fights at random weights.

As much as I don't like Fitch, that was still a very good win for GSP just based on Fitch's longevity. You could make the same case for Shields because he was around for awhile and for the vast majority of his career, he was a very good fighter.

With that said, the one thing that hurts GSP when it comes to GOAT argument in my eyes actually is the fact that he never went up against a Khabib type guy that wasn't gonna get double legged instantly. The closest guys on that level were like Sherk (who probably should have never been a WW) and Hughes. However, those guys are not even in the same stratosphere in terms of what they could do with their grappling compared to Khabib. Hughes developed some halfway decent BJJ towards to end of his last title run, but that wasn't exactly against the strongest competition. I never thought the Koscheck and Fitch level guys who were good had any chance of beating him because what were they good at that GSP wasn't better at? 

That's why it was funny to me that people weren't penalizing GSP for what they were penalizing Anderson for at the time? Who did people see as a true challenge for GSP within reason (meaning not Anderson or anyone at a higher weight class)?

For me, that's why it's very hard to compare the fighters from now to back then. The luxury the fighters have now for the most part is now 95% of the top talent does reside in the UFC, and the doors have opened up when it comes to fostering better talent. IMO We also get more mediocre and so-so fighters, but that's what comes with the territory. Khabib is the closest we're going to get to the Anderson Silva and GSP level scary dominant fighter. That's now the latest benchmark. Everything else is going to be based on longevity. There are going to be guys who look dominant from time-to-time, but we're not going to have many folks who look like the rest of division doesn't even belong in the same sport as them.

With Jones, I'm of two minds. Based on longevity and consistent strength of schedule, he should be always in the running for GOAT whether you take away a lot of potential cheating or not. He was fighting better guys on the way up to the point when he was champion, he had burn though like half the division by the time 2011 ended. Moreover, I think he changed the narrative on what you needed to be an all time great fighter. Did he have unbelievable KO power? No. Was he this wrestling dynamo? His wrestling is pretty good, but there were and better wrestlers than him. Was he this submission wizard? Well, once he beat you into a pulp on the ground or softened you pretty nice on the feet, he could easily submit you. He could win via any avenue he needed to beat you with. At the same time, it's also what will eventually or probably spell doom for him in his career just because everyone now is competent at just about everything. Besides the second Cormier fight and maybe Machida where that first round was slightly touch and go, he has never shown that has the one great eraser to end fights out of nowhere. That's where the world class strikers and submission grapplers can do and always have in their back pocket. It took a decade for him to get to this place, but now, I think Jon needs that more than ever in an era where guys are more well rounded and less easily overpowered. Otherwise his fights are going to devolve into who's going to win in a measured kickboxing match: Jon Jones or the guy who Jon Jones is facing? That's what both the Reyes and Marreta fights were. His wrestling isn't as dominant because he's not this world class wrestler and never was. Add in the fact, someone like Anthony Smith will be more defensive in the clinch and also be in full on "don't get finished" mode just so he can say he went the distance on route to a 50-45 3x loss. If he goes to heavyweight, I don't think that changes unless it just reinvigorates him. He's not going to look otherworldly in every fight like we saw for a very long stretch of his career. So the question becomes are you willing to take the wins he does accumulate or do you favor fighters who are going to have impressive finishes with a shorter resume over a much shorter timeframe? 

As for Fedor, right now, I think I have Werdum neck-and-neck with him or slightly above him just because he beat Fedor, Cain, and a laundry list of good fighters. You can not be lower than 1B or 2 on the HW list. Also, I think Stipe deserves to be at least 2 or 3 because he beat Werdum, DC (who is an ATG), Overeem, and an absolute killer in Ngannou. If the HW list is cloudy as to who is 1, 2, and 3, then you can't be the greatest of all time over all the weight classes. 

[Elsalvajeloco]

11 minutes ago, John E. Dynamite said:

I'm firmly with the GSP camp on this one. The Fitch and Alves wins have been unfortunately dulled by history and they make me ask the question - how many of GSP's wins were over guys who were in the P4P Top Ten?

I myself wasn't the biggest fan of the Sherdog rankings.

I remember Jordan Breen and others talking about them during the radio shows, and not being all the way sure how they were weighing things and where some of the bias was. It got to a point where even De Santis didn't understand their rankings. If the guy who was basically running their website (TJ) and their chief editor (Breen) didn't fully understand their rankings sometimes, I am not sure if that should be the be all, end all when it comes to GSP as GOAT argument.

[John E. Dynamite]

9 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

I myself wasn't the biggest fan of the Sherdog rankings.

I remember Jordan Breen and others talking about them during the radio shows, and not being all the way sure how they were weighing things and where some of the bias was. It got to a point where even De Santis didn't understand their rankings. If the guy who was basically running their website (TJ) and their chief editor (Breen) didn't fully understand their rankings sometimes, I am not sure if that should be the be all, end all when it comes to GSP as GOAT argument.

Those arguments, as I remember them, had more to do with divisional rankings, how to rank non-UFC fighters, and fighters being over-or-underrated by a few spots. Looking at straight-up P4P top tens (not even the rankings within them) paints a more consistent picture. It's the most solid way I can think of while trying to figure out how people felt during the time GSP's fights happened. No recency bias. The argument I am making is that the number of fighters who were in the P4P conversation that GSP beat isn't just high, it's without equal. And that modern fans (or older fans who just forgot) don't realize the esteem that people like Fitch, Alves, Shields, Sherk, etc. were held in.

I think if someone were to dig through every archived forum and news site and try to figure out what the consensus Top 10s were at the time of GSP's fights, a similar conclusion would be reached.

Edited October 25, 2020 by John E. Dynamite

[John E. Dynamite]

38 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

Wouldn't a lot of names mean depth? Any time you use the phrase "a lot", that usually means depth.. 

Jones' first title fights were Rua, Rampage, Lyoto, Evans, Belfort, and Sonnen.

Jones was born in 1987. Mauricio Rua is the only person on that list who was born in the 80's. Four of those fighters were natural Middleweights. Two of them challenged Jones after their prior fight was at Middleweight. Five of them were Light Heavyweights when that was still MMA's "showcase" division, something it no longer was when Jones won the title. And one of them was more famous for being a professional asshole than how he fought.

That Jones run is the very definition of "names, not depth". And it's still a great run. But Lyoto was probably the best win, and how high would you have ranked him P4P when that fight happened? Oh, and lest we forget Gustafsson was viewed as a helplessly overmatched contender and went 3-5 after the first Jones fight.

Edited October 25, 2020 by John E. Dynamite

[Elsalvajeloco]

1 minute ago, John E. Dynamite said:

Those arguments, as I remember them, had more to do with divisional rankings, how to rank non-UFC fighters, and fighters being over-or-underrated by a few spots. Looking at straight-up P4P top tens (not even the rankings within them) paints a more consistent picture. 

To me (at least), that should color the overall P4P rankings though in that you have no way to qualify how those guys made the list. It's also much tougher at a time when you have quite the wealth of talent or "name" fighters outside the UFC. For example, I use to love it when Breen would break down a lot of the more obscure non-UFC fights that were happening that weekend or w/e whether they be in TKO, MFC, Shooto, Cage Force/Greatest Common Multiple, some of the Eastern Europe orgs, etc. I think the reason why he stopped doing it is because he would hype how good some of these guys were and then the fight would happen, and they would get their ass whooped or not performed anywhere close to where he said. If the determinant is as arbitrary he won a Shooto class B tournament or he won this fight in this organization against a guy who MIGHT be top 15-25 in their division, then you're gonna have a lot of more pretenders than contenders. I don't think that's recency bias as much we know what it takes to compete at the highest level now. Or at least the picture is lot more clearer. 

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It's the most solid way I can think of while trying to figure out how people felt during the time GSP's fights happened.

I think having watched the fights is/was the best way.

[John E. Dynamite]

3 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

I think having watched the fights is/was the best way.

The people who made the rankings watched the fights, and they watched them in a situation with no recency bias or knowledge of what the fighters in said fights would become later in their careers. Fitch and Shields were not celebrated then and are not celebrated now - they were absolute boredom engines who just fucking beat everyone. I think they require a lot more context then just watching Georges whoop them.

[Elsalvajeloco]

7 minutes ago, John E. Dynamite said:

Jones' first title fights were Rua, Rampage, Lyoto, Evans, Belfort, and Sonnen.

Jones was born in 1987. Mauricio Rua is the only person on that list who was born in the 80's. Four of those fighters were natural Middleweights.

To be honest, outside of heavyweight and even then we had plenty of people drop, everyone was a natural ____________ and not in their right weight class. That doesn't strip away what they accomplish. Moreover, age (and height to be fair) in respect to your weight class became a bigger factor only fairly recently. Like I don't penalize GSP for the fact that he competed when most welterweights were 6'0" and under. Usually, they were around 5'6" - 5'9".  Serra, Sherk, and a lot of those guys honestly would be featherweights now. I don't hold that against GSP though because it was a much different era.

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Five of them were Light Heavyweights when that was still MMA's "showcase" division, something it no longer was when Jones won the title.

It was very much the showcase the division or otherwise, it would have never been a story that Jon was that dominant. Was it not a big deal when he replaced Rashad at UFC 128? It was still the showcase division and then it became Jon's division.

[Elsalvajeloco]

1 minute ago, John E. Dynamite said:

The people who made the rankings watched the fights, and they watched them in a situation with no recency bias or knowledge of what the fighters in said fights would become later in their careers.

But who is "they"? Because Sherdog wasn't the only MMA website. Shit, we had rankings at one point that went 500 fighters deep for every weight class. Every site had their own rankings.

[John E. Dynamite]

2 minutes ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

It was very much the showcase the division or otherwise, it would have never been a story that Jon was that dominant. Was it not a big deal when he replaced Rashad at UFC 128? It was still the showcase division and then it became Jon's division.

Anderson and GSP were in their heydays. Cain had just beat Brock. I think the shift happened some time in 2010.

[John E. Dynamite]

1 minute ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

But who is "they"? Because Sherdog wasn't the only MMA website. Shit, we had rankings at one point that went 500 fighters deep for every weight class. Every site had their own rankings.

Then I'll let you know when I find those site's archives and see where GSP's contenders lined up on the day he fought them. The data is going to say the same thing.

The argument is that GSP fought better competition than any other P4P GOAT contender, not whether or not Jordan Breen went "eeeh" sometimes. The Sherdog P4Ps are the easiest to pull up, and are a good enough indicator even if they aren't perfect.

[Elsalvajeloco]

Just now, John E. Dynamite said:

Anderson and GSP were in their heydays. Cain had just beat Brock. I think the shift happened some time in 2010.

Yeah, this is something that definitely didn't happen. Being the showcase division doesn't mean it's only the division that exists. Plus, Anderson was head and shoulders above his division. Same with GSP. Matter of fact, we never discussed 170 like we did post GSP-Hendricks when you just had a bunch of killers just pop up. Welterweight started to flourish AFTER GSP retired. 

HW at that time when Cain beat Brock was just Cain and JDS. That's it. They were trying to rebuilt at HW which is why they kept pushing hard to get Fedor.

[Elsalvajeloco]

4 minutes ago, John E. Dynamite said:

Then I'll let you know when I find those site's archives and see where GSP's contenders lined up on the day he fought them. The data is going to say the same thing.

The argument is that GSP fought better competition than any other P4P GOAT contender, not whether or not Jordan Breen went "eeeh" sometimes. The Sherdog P4Ps are the easiest to pull up, and are a good enough indicator even if they aren't perfect.

But who is coming up with the "data"? Who is making these lists? Joe Blow MMA website guy who probably isn't more knowledgeable as anyone in this forum? I at least named some names who likely contributed to what went into lists. And if we go back to just Sherdog, judging by their forums, quality control is basically non-existent.

Edited October 25, 2020 by Elsalvajeloco