1. Jamel Herring: Came in as the rare underdog champion and put on an absolutely brilliant performance at age 35, turning away Carl Frampton and retaining his WBO title after flooring Frampton twice.
2. Murodjon Akhmadaliev: Retained both of his WBA Super and IBF World championships, making short work of Ryosuke Iwasa’s challenge in the main event on DAZN.
3. Patricio Freire: Advanced in the Bellator Featherweight Grand Prix and defended his featherweight title for a second time against Emmanuel Sanchez in Bellator’s Showtime debut. Even better, he didn’t wait to grind out a decision, putting him out in the first round.
4. Thomas Gilman/Jordan Oliver/Kyle Dake/David Taylor/Kyle Snyder/Gable Steveson: Winners of the 2021 Olympic Trials to represent the red, white, and blue.
5. Tim Tszyu: The Soul Taker continued his ascent towards a world title, TKOing Dennis Hogan inside of five rounds after his corner threw in the towel.
6. Donnie Nietes: After 27 months away from the ring, Nietes returned and immediately re-entered the world title scene, winning a secondary WBO title in the co-main event on Top Rank’s card from Dubai.
7. Israil Madrimov: Now 7-0 after a UD win over Emmany Kalombo, continuing his rise to stardom.
8. Jason Jackson: In the co-main event of Bellator’s debut on Showtime, Jackson avoided Neiman Gracie’s deadly submission game and earned a UD win.
9. Andy Muraski: Defeated Kennedy Maciel, Gianni Grippo, and Matheus Gabriel in one night to win Evolve Ur Game’s 160lb one-night tournament and 10k for his efforts.
10. Kaynan Duarte: In the second-best one-night eight-man grappling tournament of the weekend, yes, that’s a real sentence, it was Duarte toppling Victor Hugo in the finals of Third Coast Grappling 6.
11. Evan Cutts: Unseated Bassil Hafez by a 49-46, 47-48, 48-47 extremely thin split-decision to win the CFFC welterweight title.
12. Zulkarnaiyn Kamchybekov: The CFFC was up for grabs in the second-half of Cage Fury’s double-header, and Kamchybekov took it with a second-round head kick over Jesse Smith.
13. Brok Weaver: In Weaver’s first contest since being released by the UFC, he took a wide decision over Alexander Barahona in the main event of iKON Fighting Federation’s sixth contest on UFC Fight Pass.
14. Mayssa Bastos: In Evolve Ur Game’s inaugural event, Bastos put on a dominant 21-2 performance over Jessa Khan to become their women’s champion.
t15. Paul Capaldo: I mean, when you did this, you’re going to make the list.
t15. Carl Frampton: A world champion in two divisions and wins over the likes of Nonito Donaire, Leo Santa Cruz, Scott Quigg, Kiko Martinez, among many others has called it a career after his loss to Herring.
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