The hosts of The Hammer MMA Radio have been contributing to the UFC’s Official Fighter Rankings since its inception earlier this year. While the UFC themselves have confirmed that these rankings may not necessarily impact their matchmaking, the three of us still put a lot of thought into our selection process at the conclusion of each event. Following each event, we will be breaking down our thought process on a few of the relevant divisions right here at Last Word On Sports.
You can find our updated Rankings, as well as the overall UFC Rankings at http://www.ufc.com/rankings, which will both be updated on the Monday following every UFC event.
The Ultimate Fighter 17 Finale: Faber vs. Jorgensen
Note: Due to a technical error, Cat Zingano should be ranked #2 in the division between Sarah Kaufman and Meisha Tate. It will be corrected for the April 22nd, 2013 UFC Rankings Update. Sorry Cat.
Greg Persson: Cat Zingano’s impressive victory over Miesha Tate shook up the Hammer’s Rankings of the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Division. The unbeaten Zingano has been lifted up to the #2 Ranking behind only the champ, Ronda Rousey, and #1 Ranked Sarah Kaufman. Though Zingano has earned the next title shot against Rousey, Kaufman has not done anything to lose the #1 spot by beating Leslie Smith, who will no doubt make her UFC debut very soon.
Her history also includes victories over Tate, Alexis Davis and Liz Carmouche, which is a resume worthy of a razor-thin hold on the #1 spot. Kaufman will need to keep her record spotless going forward and even if Zingano is unsuccessful in defeating Rousey, a strong showing may see her eclipse Kaufman.
Davis, Tate and Carmouche all move down one spot as a result of Zingano’s ascent. The other major change to the rankings involves the #10 spot. Newly-signed Rosi Sexton replaces Germaine de Randamie as her record is far more impressive than the 3-2 posting by Germaine. Of course, once Sexton has her first UFC fight against Alexis Davis and de Randamie embarks on her UFC career, things may change back or be altered even further. As more women fight, things continue to take shape and women’s bantamweight is proving to be a very fast and exciting division.
Steve Jeffery: Updating the Heavyweight Rankings was the hardest division this week, even though the only movement was at the very bottom of the Top 10. The Hammer MMA Radio already had Travis Browne in the #10 slot going into this fight, whereas the aggregate Rankings from all media members did not have him in the Top 10 at all.
The real question for us was whether a win over the fading Gabriel Gonzaga was enough to move Travis Browne into the #9 slot previously occupied by Stefan Struve. Since they’ve both beaten roughly the same level of competition (and recently each had a notable loss), we had to dig a little deeper.
As Travis Browne’s most recent loss (Bigfoot Silva) was against a higher-ranked opponent than Struve’s most recent loss (Mark Hunt), and also the fact that Browne beat Struve when they fought each other, there seemed to be just enough in “Hapa’s” favor to bump him up another place. A place that can just as easily be re-taken if Struve wins his next fight.
Steve Jeffery: The only Men’s Bantamweight match with any real significance on last weekend’s card was the main event of Urijah Faber vs. Scott Jorgensen. This was kind of strange matchmaking in that Faber should be just out of Jorgensen’s reach at the moment, but these two friends were game enough to fight each other on short notice when the originally planned main event fell through.
Both guys deserve a ton of respect for stepping up but I’d imagine that very few people expected Faber (the highest ranked Bantamweight without a title) to beat the game but slightly outmatched Jorgensen. Since no upset occured, Faber keeps his spot directly below the current Champion and the current Interim Champion.
Also, even though Jorgensen has lost 3 out of his last 4 fights, all of those losses were against stellar competition. A loss to Faber isn’t quite enough to drop “Young Guns” below the very inactive Brian Bowles and the similarly hard-lucked Mike Easton at this time.
The Hammer MMA Radio has featured interviews with some of the biggest names in MMA over the years, including Georges St. Pierre, Matt Hughes, BJ Penn, Sean Sherk, Mark Coleman, Rory MacDonald, Brendan Schaub, Mark Bocek, Nate Diaz, Mark Hominick, Martin Kampmann, Johnny Hendricks, and many more, all of which are archived at http://www.thehammermma.com.
Hammer MMA Radio continues to bring unparalleled, independent coverage of all things MMA to fans of the sport and they always bring you straight goods and the last word, and we at LWOS are pleased to be partners with them.
You can follow Steve Jeffery on twitter @SteveJeffery and the site @lastwordonsport.
