1. Oleksandr Usyk: Went and goddamned did it. After cleaning out the cruiserweight division, Usyk defeated Anthony Joshua on the cards IN GREAT BRITAIN to win three of the four major heavyweight championships.
2. Alexander Volkanovski: Finally clear of Max Holloway for the time being, Volkanovski put on a terrific bout with Brian Ortega, while at the same time, very clearly winning and not very closely, defending his UFC featherweight championship.
3. Valentina Shevchenko: Sometimes when Valentina is clearly superior to her opponents, she’ll toy with them, like an animal playing with their food, and that’s what we saw against Lauren Murphy before Bullet finally put her out of her misery in the fourth round.
4. Lawrence Okolie: In the co-main of the Joseph-Usyk card, Okolie retained his WBO world cruiserweight championship over Dilan Prasovic, knocking out the overwhelmed challenger in the third round.
5. Ok Rae Yoon: Unseated Christian Lee as One Lightweight champion in his third defense in the main event of ONE: Revolution by unanimous decision.
6. Joshua Pacio: Closed the book on his feud with Yosuke Saruta, earning another finish over the former Strawweight champ and defended the ONE title he won from Saruta for the third time.
7. Capitan Petchyindee Academy: Capitan made a successful maiden defense of his ONE Kickboxing Bantamweight championship with a UD win over France’s Mehdi Zatout in the co-main of ONE: Revolution.
8. Tye Ruotolo/Kade Ruotolo/Rafaela Ribeiro/Mayssa Bastos/Tim Spriggs: Winners of Sunday’s Who’s Number One massive tournaments.
9. Robbie Lawler: SEVENTEEN AND A HALF YEARS LATER, Lawler gets his vengeance against Nick Diaz, finishing Diaz like he was finished at UFC 47 against the elder Stockton brother.
10. Curtis Blaydes: Stayed in heavyweight contention with a dominant performance over Jairzinho Rozenstruik, pitching a three-round shutout.
11. Merab Dvalishvili: Had a dominant performance against Marlon Moraes, a former WSOF champion and UFC title contender, putting the best win of his career feather in his cap.
12. Yuri Simoes: Your main event winner over Fellipe Andrew at Fight To Win 185.
13. Saul Sanchez: It was a short night of work for the ShoBox main event underdog, as he dropped Ja’Rico O’Quinn not once, not twice, but thrice, in the first round, earning the TKO win.
14. Josh Silveira: That’s how you make a name for yourself. Landed a thunderous head kick in the first minute of his main event title fight at LFA 115, knocking out Tee Cummins and claiming the LFA light heavyweight championship and a ticket to the bigs in MMA’s shallowest division.
15. Hakuho: The greatest Sumo of all-time has called it a career. Well done to a living legend.
Honorable Mention:
Kazane: Winner of the eight-man RISE 53kg championship, besting Shiro Matsumoto by extension round in the finals.
Tenshin Nasukawa: Got the best of RISE Bantamweight champion Masahiko Suzuki in the main event of Thursday’s RISE World Series card.
Callum Smith: Good GOD.
AJ Dobson/Michael Morales/Keydson Rodrigues/Victor Martinez: The four newest UFC signees after getting awarded contracts at Dana White’s Contender Series.
Shane Campbell
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
