Fighters of the Week

  1. Francis Ngannou: The stoppage might have been a little premature, seeing as how Curtis Blaydes could still fight back, sort of, but you can only get knocked down over and over and over again in 44 seconds before the ref doesn’t want to wait for an absolute killshot.

  2. Dmitry Bivol: Jean Pascal was game, and the former champion didn’t quit, but Bivol was the real deal and added another scalp to his world title reign. Bivol is willing to take on all comers at 175 or 168. C’mon back, Andre Ward! No? Just me? Ok.

  3. Khalid Yafai: The Brit made his fourth defense of his WBA junior bantamweight crown with a UD over Israel Gonzalez on DAZN.

  4. Alistair Overeem: Some of those ground and pound shots sounded like cannon fire. Overeem welcomed Sergey Pavlovich to the UFC and handed him his first career loss.

  5. Brandon Vera: He’s alive! After last defending the OneFC Heavyweight title nearly two years ago, he returned to Manila and took only 64 seconds to KO Mauro Cerilli to make his second defense in the main event.

6. Eduard Folayang: Once again on top of OneFC’s lightweight division, reclaiming the vacant lightweight championship after defeating Amir Khan (not that one) in the co-main of OneFC: Conqest of Champions.

7. Ross Nicholls: Pulled off a major upset in front of his home country as he became GrappleFest’s first champion, defeating Gianni Grippo by unanimous decision at GrappleFest 3.

8. Samy Sana: My resident French muay thai contact Lucas Bourdon says Sana is as legit as his record states, and he put on a good show in defeating Armen Petrosyan at OneFC in their Super Series.

9. Weili Zhang: After starting her pro career with a loss, Zhang’s reeled off 18 wins, including her last two in the UFC. An armbar-win over Jessica Aguilar should make more people take notice in a strawweight division that needs some new faces.

10. Matheus Diniz: Pulled off a dominant win in the co-main event of GrappleFest 3 over fellow black belt Daniel Strauss.

11. Guadalupe Martinez Guzman: Made her third defense of her WBC Women’s Junior Bantamweight title, this time in Cancun over Yulihan Alejandra Luna Avila.

12. Murodjon Akhmadaliev: The 2016 bantamweight bronze medalist made his televised debut on the Bivol-Pascal card and stopped 22-fight veteran Isaac Zarate in the ninth, now fighting in the junior featherweight division.

13. Chingiz Allazov: Main evented Marseille’s Nuit des Champions 2018 and came away with a win over Mohamed Hendouf.

14. Val Stanski: Still the WGP women’s Super Middleweight champion after a win in the main event of WGP 51 over Barbara Nepomuceno.

15. Gleison Tibau: The Patron Saint of Undercard Superstar will always make the rankings, and maybe after this win, he can escape from Oscar’s trainwreck of a promotion for one last run in the major leagues.