What is the hardest part about being an MMA fan, besides keeping up? Longtime fans will agree – watching your heroes fall from grace by way of getting brutally beat up right before your eyes can be rather difficult to stomach.

In other sports, you sometimes see career-ending injuries, but by and large there are ample cases of athletes riding off into the sunset after finishing up their careers with a couple of not-so-great seasons. So your favorite player isn’t as sharp, athletic, or even putting up the same numbers as he or she once did in their prime; big deal.

When it comes to combat sports, when our heroes start to fade, the sight can be quite disturbing. A lot of guys go the Ken Shamrock and Takanori Gomi route, losing routinely in devastating fashion, but there are a select few O.G.’s who went out by way of the winner’s circle. Bloody Elbow has compiled a list of your top-ten MMA vets who left the sport on a W. Let us know who we missed in the comment section.

Top-10 MMA veterans that went out on a win:

**arranged by year of retirement

1.

Rickson Gracie 11-0 (400-0)

• Last fight- Technical Submission of Masakatsu Funaki on 5/26/2000
• First official MMA bout in 1980
• Finished each of his 11 MMA bouts (2 KO, 9 Sub)
• Rumored to have a combined record of 400-0 across multiple combative disciplines

2.

Guy Mezger 30-14-2

• Last fight – TKO of Daniel Bergman on 12/6/2003
• Veteran of UFC, Pancrase, and PRIDE FC
• UFC 13 middleweight tournament winner (200 pounds)
• First person to defeat Tito Ortiz in a professional MMA match

3.

Bas Rutten 28-4-1

• Last fight – TKO of Ruben Villareal on 7/22/2006
• Legendary run as King of Pancrase
• Won UFC heavyweight title in 1999 by defeating Kevin Randlemen at UFC 20
• Put the ‘Liver Shot’ on the map

4.

Pat Miletich 29-7

• Last fight – KO of Thomas Denny on 12/11/2008
• UFC 16 welterweight tournament winner
• Defeated Mikey Burnett at UFC 17.5 to become the 1st ever UFC welterweight champion
• Founder of Miletich Fighting Systems and coach of multiple world champions (Matt Hughes, Tim Sylvia, Robbie Lawler, etc.)

5.

Chris Lytle 31-18-5

• Last fight – Submission of Dan Hardy on 8/11/2011
• Competed in MMA while simultaneously holding down a job as a firefighter
• The Ultimate Fighter Season 4 finalist
• Finished career with 22 submission wins

6.

Kazuo Misaki 25-11-2

• Last fight – Decision over Paul Daley on 3/3/2012
• 2006 PRIDE welterweight Grand Prix winner
• Retired on a three-fight winning streak

7.

Dan Severn 101-19-7

• Last fight – Decision over Alex Rozman on 4/28/2012
• Won over 100 sanctioned MMA matches
• UFC 4 tournament finalist
• UFC 5 tournament winner
• UFC 7.5 tournament winner

8.

Forrest Griffin 19-7

• Last fight – Decision over Tito Ortiz on 7/7/2012
• Put MMA on the mainstream map with his Ultimate Fighter Season 1 Finale iconic war with Stephan Bonnar
• The Ultimate Fighter Season 1 winner
• Won the UFC light heavyweight title by defeating Quinton Jackson at UFC 86

9.

Pedro Rizzo 20-11

• Last fight – TKO of Andrew Flores Smith on 9/12/2015
• 3x UFC heavyweight title challenger
• One of the first MMA pioneers to devastate with leg kicks
• Has fought every heavyweight legend under the sun, from Fedor Emelianenko to Randy Couture and everything in between

10.

Urijah Faber 34-10

• Last fight- Decision over Brad Pickett on 12/17/2016
• Held WEC featherweight belt for over two years
• 4x UFC bantamweight title challenger
• Founder of Team Alpha Male and world champion coach

Candidates if they can remain retired:

Royce Gracie 15-2-3

• Last fight – TKO win over Ken Shamrock on 2/19/16

Tito Ortiz 19-12-1

• Last fight – Submission of Chael Sonnen on 1/21/2017

Matt Brown 21-16

• Last fight – KO win over Diego Sanchez on 11/11/17