UFC Fight Night 32 was one of those entertaining cards that ultimately featured little in the way of fights relevant to any of the top 10 rankings across the UFC’s nine weight classes. Vitor Belfort and Dan Henderson were the only ranked fighters to compete on Saturday night, with Belfort coming in ranked #2 at middleweight and Henderson at #6 at light heavyweight. Henderson’s quick KO loss moved him down one notch to #7, while Chael Sonnen slid up to #6, and will certainly be in the top 5 if he can beat Rashad Evans this Saturday.
What’s interesting to me is that Belfort was not placed in the top 10 at LHW despite knocking out a top 10 opponent (admittedly one without a win in now three consecutive fights. Chael Sonnen finds himself ranked in the top 10 at LHW with a 1st round stoppage of Mauricio Rua, but his only other LHW bout in the last several years was a TKO loss to Jon Jones. Belfort, like Sonnen, has a title loss to Jon Jones but a 1st round win over Henderson, but isn’t given the same treatment, and he’s now won 3 fights in a row, something Sonnen last accomplished when he first earned a title shot against Anderson Silva.
Beyond this, the only other ranking changes were to fighters presently without a fight or fighting within the next few months. Martin Kampmann rose from #8 to #6 at welterweight, while Jake Shields and Matt Brown were bumped down to 7th and 8th respectively. Nick Diaz is still in the top 10 for reasons I cannot understand. Frank Mir and Stipe Miocic swapped the #8 and #9 placings at heavyweight, while Alexis Davis and Sara McMann flip-flopped #3 and #4. These types of occurrences are frequent given the fluctuating number of media panelists per event.
You can view the official rankings here, and take a peak at the rankings put out by Bloody Elbow writers Steph Daniels, Fraser Coffeen, Tim Burke, and T.P. Grant.
SBN coverage of UFC Fight Night 32
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