1. Errol Spence Jr.: Took less than a full round to turn Carlos Ocampo’s insides into soup and retain his IBF world welterweight strap.
2. Daniel Roman: And still WBA junior featherweight champion after vanquishing his toughest test yet in Moises Flores.
3. Rodtang Jitmuangnon/Tenshin Nasukawa: They get the dual-treatment here because of the absolute classic they put on. In the end, Tenshin took the victory by an extra round decision, but Jitmuangnon gave him his toughest test to date, and while Rodtang is signed to OneFC, they’re both very young and I’d love to see them go at it again.
4. Angel Acosta: If you shelled out 35 (!) bucks, you would have seen Acosta defend his WBO Junior flyweight title by stopping Carlos Buitrago in the twelfth round.
5. Yuta Murakoshi: Won K-1’s eight-man featherweight tournament to claim gold.
6. Ilia Topuria: Won the vacant Cage Warriors bantamweight title with a D’arce choke in the first round over Brian Bouland, and thus becomes a hot commodity for the big leagues.
7. Andre Ewell: And speaking of winning vacant bantamweight titles with D’arce chokes, here’s Ewell pulling it off in the main event of CES MMA 50 on AXS!
8. Koya Urabe: The K-1 lightweight champ KO’d Arthur Sorsor in the co-main of K-1’s Featherweight Grand Prix.
9. Masaaki Noiri: The Super Welterweight big cheese of K-1 knocked out Vincent Foschiani at K-1’s World Featherweight Grand Prix.
10. Ognjen Topic: At Friday Night Nights on Fight Pass, Topic defended his WKA lightweight belt against Miguel Martinez and came out on top, finishing him in the first round.
11. Lewis Ritson: Main evented the Metro Radia Arena in Newcastle and remained undefeated and walked away with his British Lightweight championship after a first-round destruction of Paul Hyland Jr., flooing him three times.
12. Hideaki Yamazaki: The former K-1 featherweight champion needed a win desperately after a losing streak, and he got it at K-1’s Featherweight GP, defeating Jin Nakazawa by decision.
13. Hisaki Kato: Got another nice win for his fledgling kickboxing career with a victory over veteran Makoto Uehara at K-1’s GP.
14. Gavin McDonnell: Since losing a majority decision to Rey Vargas in February of 2017 for his first world title, has won four straight, and is due for another crack at junior featherweight gold.
15. Charlie Edwards: After falling in his bid for a world title in his ninth pro fight, Edwards banked another win, his fifth since the loss, defeating 12-1 Anthony Nelson and working his way towards another crack at gold.
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