1. Kamaru Usman: In a finish I don’t think any of us saw coming, The Nigerian Nightmare threw an absolutely supercharged right hand into Jorge Masvidal’s jaw, turning his head and sending him down the canvas, besting the Baddest Motherfucker in the violence department.
2. Valentina Shevchenko: Pure and utter dominance. That’s what we witnessed Saturday night. Jessica Andrade rolled the dice and stepped up in weight to challenge for the Bullet’s flyweight title and was utterly handled. On the feet, on the ground, and everywhere in between. Shevchenko showed off surprising acumen on the ground, adding another wrinkle to her game. She finished Andrade and it was never in doubt.
3. Rose Namajunas: Weili Zhang had to watch out for Rose’s length and head kick. She did not. And now, Namajunas is a two-time UFC Women’s strawweight champion.
4. Emanuel Navarrete: It was a rougher and tougher challenge than most of us anticipated, but Navarrete finished Christopher Diaz in the twelfth-round to defend his WBO world featherweight strap.
5. Kenshiro Teraji: Teraji, maybe the best boxer at 108lbs, walked to a relatively easy title defense of his WBC title over Tetsuya Hisada in Osaka.
6. John Lineker: Did what John Lineker does, knocking out Troy Worthen in the main event of ONE on TNT, reminding American audiences just who he is.
7. Clay Collard: In the co-biggest upset of the week, the man who spent most of 2020 dethroning prospects dethroned a lot of PFL executives’ hopes by defeating Anthony Pettis, eliminating PFL’s biggest acquisition (or second, depending on how you feel about Rory MacDonald in 2021) out of their tournament in their first event of the 2021 season. Not sure why they even booked Pettis against a dangerous fighter like Collard in the first round.
8. Bubba Jenkins: Stopped Lance Palmer’s quest to be a three-time PFL champion, pulling off an upset decision in the featherweight tournament.
9. Marcin Held: Prevented Natan Schulte from going back-to-back, knocking him out in the first round at PFL 1, matching Collard for the biggest upset of the week.
10. Mason Fowler: It took overtime, but Fowler once again successfully defended his Submission Underground Absolute championship, getting a RNC on Andy Varela in the main event of SUG 22.
11. Pierangela Rodriguez: TKO’d Svetlana Gotsyk in the 5th round in the main event of LFA 105 to become the Women’s strawweight champion.
12. Vagner Rocha: Staved off father time and a hard-charging young opponent in William Tackett to take the main event of Fight To Win 171.
13. Cris Lencioni/Owen Papworth: Because Submission Underground is the best, we had a TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP CHANGE, and Team SAC defeated the brothers Simon, Ricky and John, at SUG 22.
14. Movlid Khaybulaev: Stayed undefeated and advanced in the PFL featherweight tournament, pitching a shutout over Lazar Stojadinovic.
15. Felix Cash: Liberated the Commonwealth and BBBofC British middleweight titles off of the shoulder of Denzel Bentley in London on Saturday.
Honorable Mention:
Phil De Fries/Tony Johnson: Two peas in a pod, really. Both journeymen heavyweights, each defended their regional championships in their respective main events over the weekend: Johnson in ACA, De Fries in KSW.
Riki Matsuoka
Randy Brown
Junny Ocasio
Kotomi
Marian Ziolkowski
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