Ever since the UFC folded Strikeforce and brought most of their fighters over the UFC, the roster has been pretty bloated. Things like Dana White promising every TUF 17 middleweight a UFC fight didn’t help either. So back in February, I started writing regular pieces examining who might be in danger of losing their job with a loss at each event. And it has been quite interesting, at least to me.
I did an update on how accurate my predictions were after six events, but it’s been a long time since then. We’re up to 17 events and a little over seven months since I started now, so I felt like doing another one. I do want to emphasize something I said in the first update though – it somehow doesn’t seem right to tally up how often I was right or wrong about someone losing their job. It seems sort of aloof, I guess. But the truth is that we’re writing about a sport here, and part of the business of sport is athletes getting signed and released. I’m not trying to be callous by writing this – I’m just giving people a clear view of what has gone on over the last few months.
With that in mind, here’s a quick breakdown of the last eleven events since my last update. I’ll start off with the stats from that post, and continue from there.
For those that haven’t read the pieces before, I assign each fighter on a card into one of three categories: ‘Likely to be cut with a loss’; ‘Possibly cut with a loss’; and ‘Likely safe regardless of the outcome’. This will briefly go through who lost on each card, what category they were in, and the outcome. The totals are based on the number of fighters eligible for release (ie. they lost) and how many actually got cut. You can click on each of the event names to get to the actual article pertaining to that card.
Let’s roll.
Up to UFC 159:
Likely – 15 for 19 (79%)
Possibly – 8 for 16 (50%)
Safe – 68 for 69 (Cheick Kongo’s contract expired)
UFC on FX 8: Belfort vs. Rockhold
Five in the likely category – Paulo Thiago, Roger Hollett, Fabio Maldonado, Jeremy Larsen, and Lucas Martins. 2 of them lost (Hollett and Larsen). Hollett was cut, Larsen was retained.
Four in the possibly category – John Cholish, Gleison Tibau, Jussier Formiga, and Azamat Gashimov. 2 of them lost (Cholish and Gashimov). Both were released.
Seventeen were on the likely list. All of them were retained.
Totals
Likely – 1 for 2
Possibly – 2 for 2
Safe – 17 for 17
Three in the likely category – K.J. Noons, Jeremy Stephens, and Estevan Payan. Two lost (Noons and Payan), but both were retained.
Three in the possibly category – Brian Bowles, George Roop, and Stephen Thompson. One of them lost (Bowles). He was suspended for elevated testosterone, but apparently hasn’t been cut.
18 were in the safe category. Nah-Shon Burrell was cut after his loss, everyone else was safe. I was on the fence with Burrell too because of the fact that he missed weight in his UFC debut. My bad.
Totals
Likely – 0 for 2
Possibly – 0 for 1
Safe – 17 for 18
UFC on Fuel 10: Nogueira vs. Werdum
Six in the likely category (Thiago Silva, Rodrigo Damm, Mizuto Hirota, Caio Magalhaes, Karlos Vemola, and Anthony Smith. Three of them lost (Hirota, Vemola, Smith). All three were released.
Five were in the possibly category – Rafael Cavalcante, Daniel Sarafian, Vaughan Lee, Derek Brunson, and Felipe Arantes. Two of them lost (Feijao, Lee). Brunson was removed from the card at the last minute. Both were retained by the promotion.
14 were on the safe list. One (Markes) didn’t fight. Two fighters (Eddie Mendez and Leandro Silva) were released after one fight in the promotion, which I didn’t expect. The rest were retained.
Totals
Likely – 3 for 3
Possibly – 0 for 2
Safe – 12 for 14
1 special case – Roy Nelson, who had his contract expire after his fight. He lost, but re-signed.
Three on the likely list – Mitch Clarke, John Maguire, and Dustin Pague. Two of them lost (Maguire, Pague). Maguire was released, Pague was spared.
Two on the possibly list – Jake Shields and Edwin Figueroa. Figueroa lost but was retained.
16 on the safe list. All 16 were retained.
Totals
Likely – 1 for 2
Possibly – 0 for 1
Safe – 16 for 16
Four on the likely list – Chris Leben, Dave Herman, Rafaello Oliveira, and Brian Melancon. Three of them lost (Leben, Herman, Oliveira). Only Herman was released.
Three on the possibly list – Tim Kennedy, Gabriel Gonzaga, and David Mitchell. Only one lost (Mitchell), but he was retained.
15 were on the safe list. Roger Gracie was cut after one fight. The rest were retained.
Totals
Likely – 1 for 3
Possibly – 0 for 1
Safe – 14 for 15
UFC on Fox 8: Johnson vs. Moraga
Four on the likely list – Melvin Guillard, Trevor Smith, John Albert, and Yaotzin Meza. Two of them lost (Smith, Albert). Albert was released, Smith stayed after his FOTN performance.
Four on the possibly list – Bobby Voelker, Tim Means, Aaron Riley, and Justin Salas. Three of them lost (Voelker, Means, Riley). Means was released, Riley retired. I’ll put an asterisk beside Riley, since he did leave but he wasn’t actually cut (though he probably would have been).
16 on the safe list. All 16 were retained.
Totals
Likely – 1 for 2
Possibly – 2 for 3*
Safe – 14 for 15
Three on the likely list – Sheila Gaff, Josh Clopton, and Bristol Marunde. All three lost. Gaff and Marunde were cut.
A whopping eight on the possibly list – Thiago Santos, Anthony Perosh, Amanda Nunes, Vinny Magalhaes, Ian McCall, Iliarde Santos, Viscardi Andrade, and Ednaldo Oliveira. Four of them lost (T. Santos, Magalhaes, I. Santos, Oliveira). Magalhaes and Oliveira were released.
13 fighters were on the safe list. All of them were retained.
Totals
Likely – 2 for 3
Possibly -2 for 4
Safe – 13 for 13
UFC Fight Night 26: Shogun vs. Sonnen
Two were on the likely list -Michael Johnson and John Howard. Both won. There goes that idea.
Five were on the possibly list – Daniel Pineda, Manny Gamburyan, Cole Miller, Ramsey Nijem, and James Vick. Three of them lost (Pineda, Miller, Nijem). None of them have been released.
19 were on the safe list. All of them were retained.
Totals
Likely – 0 for 0
Possibly -0 for 3
Safe – 19 for 19
UFC Fight Night 27: Condit vs. Kampmann
Five were on the likely list -Papy Abedi, Jason High, Zak Cummings, Ben Alloway, and Roger Bowling. One went to a No Contest (Bowling), two lost (Abedi, Alloway). Both were released.
Three were on the possibly list -Justin Edwards, Hatsu Hioki, and Abel Trujillo. One went to a No Contest (Trujillo), the other two lost. Neither were released.
15 were on the safe list. James Head was released, all of the others were retained.
Totals
Likely – 2 for 2
Possibly -0 for 2
Safe – 14 for 15
Three on the likely list – Ryan Couture, Jared Hamman, and Magnus Cedenblad. Two of them lost (Couture, Hamman). Couture was released.
Four on the possibly list – Brandon Vera, Ben Rothwell, Chico Camus, and Al Iaquinta. One lost (Vera), but that might be flipped to a No Contest due to Rothwell’s suspension. He has apparently been retained either way.
17 were on the safe list. All 17 have been retained to this point.
Totals
Likely – 1 for 2
Possibly -0 for 1
Safe – 17 for 17
UFC Fight Night 28: Teixeira vs. Bader
Four on the likely list – Joao Zeferino, Keith Wisniewski, Yuri Villefort, and Sean Spencer. Three of them lost (Zeferino, Wisniewski, Villefort). All three were released.
One on the possibly list – Marcos Vinicius. He was retained despite losing.
17 on the safe list. Yushin Okami was surprisingly cut, the other 16 were retained.
Totals
Likely – 3 for 3
Possibly -0 for 1
Safe – 16 for 17
* The UFC hasn’t tipped their hand in any direction regarding releases from this card as of yet, with the exception of Mike Ricci.
Two were on the likely list – Michel Prazeres and Nandor Guelmino. Guelmino lost, but he hasn’t been cut as of yet.
Two were on the possibly list – Matt Mitrione and Mitch Gagnon. Mitrione lost, and there has been no word of a cut as of yet. So I’m assuming he’s safe.
22 on the safe list (which I didn’t write out, but they’re safe by process of elimination). Mike Ricci has been released after his loss. No one else has as of yet.
Totals
Likely – 0 for 1
Possibly -0 for 1
Safe – 21 for 22
So, after all of that, here’s my grand totals after 17 events:
Likely – 30 for 44 (68.2%)
Possibly – 14 for 38 (36.8%)
Safe – 258 for 269 (95.9%)
My percentages have gone down since my last event, and it’s becoming harder to predict who the must-releases are overall in my eyes. But I’m okay with those stats and hope to maintain them, if not improve.
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