MMA Fighting - Introducing The MMA Fighting Rankings Show | Risers, Fallers, And A Looming Civil War

Episode Date: September 2, 2021

In the debut episode of the MMA Fighting Rankings Show, co-hosts Shaun Al-Shatti and Alexander K. Lee peel back the curtain of MMA Fighting's Global Rankings to discuss the biggest risers and fallers of August, Joanna Jedrzejczyk's exit from the rankings and more. Then, the two are joined by Damon Martin and Jed Meshew to settle two debates raging internally among the team — and discuss the chaos caused by a certain rogue panelist. Follow Shaun Al-Shatti @ShaunAlShatti Follow Alexander K. Lee @AlexanderKLee Follow Damon Martin @DamonMartin Follow Jed Meshew @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Happy first of September. I hope August treated you wonderfully. And thank you so much for starting your month here with us. This is the debut of the M.M.A. fighting ranking show. I am Sean O'Shati, and I'm joined here by my good friend from the North, the Prince of positivity himself. Alexander K. Lee. What's going on, AK?

I am so excited right now. Sean, can I, can I, can I, can I, can I say why we're here? I mean, you kind of introduced it already. Can I, can I say with authority while we're here? Tell the people. Sean, we did it. We finally did it. Someone had to do it.

And my goodness, I never thought it would be us, but we, we fixed MMA. I think like we literally fixed MMA. Rankings are such a contentious part of this game. Sean, you know, you've been in this business for longer than I have. And there's a lot of great rankings out there. I'm not hating anybody else's rankings. I'm just saying, I think we. solved. I think we put together an airtight panel. And I think people are going to really be really

excited today. I'm sure people have been reading the rankings already, but now to give us a kind of chance to elaborate on what's going on here and just really explore the studio space with what we've been doing. Explore the studio space. I like that. You people actually join us in the middle of what is brewing to be a civil war inside of this airtight panel, as AK mentioned. We will get to it, though. First, though, let's quickly lay out what we're doing. here. I say happy first of the month because that is what this here show is going to be, A.K., once a month, the first Wednesday of every month, to be exact, we'll be talking about the very namesake of this show, the M.A. Fighting Global Rankings, it's all very self-explanatory.

And A.K., there's a reason we're coming on Wednesdays, obviously, that's when the rankings comes out, but also there's a reason why we felt like we wanted to do this show in the first place. A few months ago, we debuted these rankings, and it was something that we actually wanted to do as a website for a long, long, long, long time. Like I'm talking really long time. Like my first time I was ever at MMA fighting a decade ago, we were talking about doing something like this. And really the big reason is because of how rankings are used in this sport,

used by promotions and really used and abused, if we're being honest, right? We felt like it was important to have something of our own to hold on to, something that didn't belong to any promoter, something that we could really point to often without worrying about whether we're going to wake up and Leon Edwards is just going to be yanked out of the rankings without warning because he made someone at the UFC front office mad or I don't know one of the million examples. Nate Dia is just vanishing without a trace as a negotiating tactic, all of it. Also too, I mean at this point, MMA is such a huge sport. There are so many promotions. There's so many leagues. All of it.

It's fun to have these sort of conversations, right, about who deserves to be ranked above who. Is A.J. McKee better than Max Holloway. Is he better than Alexander Volcanowski? That type of thing. And yet I don't really know how it happened, A.K., that we have, we found ourselves sort of being the ringleaders of this whole experience. We are right now, I would say, the prison guards just really trying hard to not let the inmates burn down the whole asylum. It's been an experience, to say the least. Look, MMA, Sean, is supposed to be fun.

We always say that. What is more fun than a bunch of nerds arguing about theoretically who is better than who and comparing their resumes? And I think that's an aspect of this business that fans enjoy the most and can, and frankly, can join in on. So, yes, as you said, I may have overstated slightly saying that we fixed that our rankings are, you know, completely in solidarity. There's been some controversy.

Again, if people want to check out the rankings, we do, one thing we make very clear. We might have put all the exactly how we tabulated, but we do put how many first place votes every fighter got out of our eight person panel. And I don't, at a glance, I'm sure. our people will look and be a little surprised at some of the fighters who were not unanimous first place. I don't know. Should we bring up some examples now, Sean?

Please. I think for one thing, one specific thing, you mentioned we wanted to differentiate ourselves from promotional rankings and thus titles do not necessarily define how we are going to vote. And I think that's pretty evidence. If I want to draw one, our number one lightweight is Dustin Porrier, not Charles Oliva. Almost unanimously, too. Seven votes for Porriere, one vote for Dobry.

Bronx. So, and this is something I think a lot of fans would agree with. So we want fans know that you might disagree with a lot of what we, how these rankings turn out. But I guarantee there's also some of that will have you nodding your head and going like, yes, finally someone is reflecting kind of how we feel about things and not how the UFC defines something or necessarily the casual fan defines something. But the people who watch the fights and really follow these guys' careers, there's a very strong case for Porre, though he's never held the undisputed title is the number one lightweight in the world right now, and that's certainly reflected in our rankings. So that's just kind of an example of the kind of a few

different things you'll see here. Yeah, and absolutely. And as I said, I sort of joked at the beginning that we are the prison guards of this asylum. But it really has, I think, the debates and the civil war that has sort of been brewing within this eight-person crew has been really interesting to watch. And I think surprising in a lot of ways. But also it's maybe shouldn't be surprising because there is just to get that many people together. There's going to be massive gulfs in opinion. So that's sort of why we wanted to do this show. We want to inject some transparency into the process, peel back the curtain somewhat and let you guys know what we're thinking with a lot of this and sort of the methodology to it. And so today on this debut episode,

we're going to go five rounds, me and you AK, we're going to hit some movers and shakers, talk about some cuts this month, some big moves, really just sort of recap the month that was. And then later on in the show, we're going to be joined by two of our more controversial, maybe opinionated maybe rankers, Mr. Jedmishu and Mr. Damon Martin, obviously of MMA fighting and we're going to hit a few of the many, many heated

debates that we have uncovered during this process and maybe we'll be able to sway some people, maybe we'll be able to change some minds, change some hearts, who knows, we'll see how it goes. Yeah, and let's tell the listeners right now, if there is, after the show, or if there is some major point of contention you guys have, let us know,

you guys know where to find us on social media. I'm sorry, Sean, I have now opened the door. I do not want to be included that let AK know. My DMs are open. Feel my DMs are open. Hit me up. Let me know and I will try and tablay and keep track. And hopefully every month, you know, we're probably, we're pretty in tune with you guys. I assume we'll get to any major controversies. But maybe I'm missing one. Maybe there's a major one that you guys see in our rankings that are really having like scratch your heads and kind of question what it is we're thinking. And if I see a lot of that, then then I'll make sure that we address it

on this, on this monthly show. Yes. And with that, let us start the five speed rounds. Again, five very quick looks at the biggest movers and shakers of the past month. And we're going to start out there in France. The French Prince, Cyril Ghan, moving up to the top three of the heavyweight division. He was initially tied for number four. He is now number three and seven of our eight panelists at heavyweight. Now have it like this. Number one, Francis Ngano, number two, Stapie and Miochich, and number three, Cyril Gahn. There is one lone dissenter among that group who has gone above Miochich. But either way, AK, we were talking before the show, and you felt like this was the most significant move of the entire month. Why was that? Yeah, look,

numerically, it's not. We're going to get to a couple of moves, other moves here that some guys shot more spots, two or three spots or enter the rankings, which is also a big deal. But I think once you reach a top five of any division, and this maybe isn't true for every division, but I think a good solid rule, it's hard to move up. I think that's something most people would agree with. You can be in the top five, and depending who you fight, you can win two or three fights and like barely inch up. Gone has just been on this straight rise into the top five, again, just by staying active, by winning fights, and then now, you know, getting this interim opportunity with Derek Lewis, a guy who, again, was right ahead of him in the rankings. We had him tied with Curtis Blades

in the last edition of our rankings tied for fourth. So he's really only technically moving up one spot and breaking up a tie with blades. But that's big. To be in that same conversation with Nganyu, Miyochich, and now, now gone. and those two guys who, again, are before this year, were far more established than him. For now, the argument you made that he is in that cluster of guys. And as we've seen some of the early odds, Sean, people actually picking Gaon to potentially beat in Ganu in a fight. Should it be booked? I don't know if you can have a bigger move than that.

You may disagree. I don't know. I don't know, Sean. But for me, this was the biggest impact move of the last month. Not only picking him, but he's the betting favorite now, too. which is just really. I mean, you look, you, you rewind a couple months ago when Francis Angano just destroys Stephen Meotich,

and all of a sudden it just looks like this is going to be the guy. He'll never lose. Yeah, who's going to be this guy? Who's going to be this guy? Who's going to be this guy? It lasted a couple months until he was an underdog in a fight. It's just, I don't know that I agree with it. I still favor Francis in that fight.

As would I. But I do agree that there now feels to be a very clear tier one here at heavyweight, and that's these three gentlemen. and that everybody else is now a step below them. And we'll see how this works out. It feels like steepy Milich's probably the odd man out right now. And Sean, that's a great way of putting it. That's what makes this move so impactful to me is that we didn't,

we haven't like, you know, quite classified by that of that. But I think most people, whether they realize it or not, do have those kind of tiers in their mind. And you're right, there is a tier one at heavyweight. And I don't think Derek Lewis was in it. To be honest, I think it was just Inganu and Miochich. That was the tier one of heavyweight. and now it is a three-person top tier because of God.

Yeah, that's actually a really, really great way of looking at it. So speaking of tears, let's move on to round number two here. And we're moving to the feather weights. The fight that we just saw this past weekend, the big fight for the UFC, Giga Chikadez. And I believe he was actually the biggest mover of this whole month in terms of everybody, in terms of upwards momentum in the rankings. He moves from 12 to number eight here in these featherweight rankings.

The highest we had him, a few people had him at number seven. The lowest was number 10. So that's around the same range. And again, speaking of tiers, it feels as if there is now very clear tiers that have delineated themselves at featherweight. Number one, you have Max Holloway, AJ McKee, Alexander Volcanowski.

Whatever order you want to put those in, that feels like that's the top tier, right? Those guys have separated themselves. Number two, you have Brian Ortega, Patricio Pitbull, Chan Sung, Jung. Those guys are sort of in that nebulous zone where they're clearly not with the number ones, but they're ahead of everybody else.

And then you have this very large, sort of open tier of number three. And I think you could throw a lot of guys in there, whether it's Giga Chikaze, Josh Emmett, Calvin Cater, Dan Igay, and probably even Edson Barbosa, those five, just sort of clustered together. Any of them could beat any of them on any given day. A lot of them have fought each other. Does that feel right to you? Does it feel like Giga now belongs in that group, obviously?

Yeah, yeah. And I think that's the case here is to say, was he already in the fact, he was, you know, unbeaten in the UFC, had just beaten Cub Swanson, right? Huge, huge win over a name, a veteran and a finish, no less. So I think some people might have had him in that tier already. I didn't. I was definitely a little more bullish with my, or less bullish, whichever one. I was definitely a little less eager to push him up the rankings until he fought someone else in the top 10 like Barbosa. So I probably had him 12 or lower. I can't remember my exact rank for him on mine. But he was in tier four, if we're kind of looking at that way. But now he's firmly in

that tier three, like you said, one of those guys that's maybe not quite one one went away from a title shot, but is certainly, you know, in the conversation of being someone who you feel like he's guaranteed to contend for one no matter what. So, yeah, I think this is a huge job. Again, not quite for me as breaking into the top three, like a tier one as as gone did. But yeah, in the featherweight division to move up like three or four. This is vision is so stupid stacked. So to be able to move up for that, yeah, with one win over a name guy like that, like Barbosa, is awesome. And look, maybe we're jumping the gun. Maybe some fans will say he hasn't done enough to pass Emmett.

He hasn't done enough to pass Arnold Allen, who's what, 8-0 in the UFC or something like that, right? But I think Chacade, by taking this tough fight with Barbosa, really did himself a service and really improved his resume above the guys I just named. Are you surprised by this? Because I got to say, I'm somewhat surprised. like Gika Chikade was obviously a very decorated kickboxer. He was a beast over in the kickboxing ring. But this is also somebody who just a few years ago lost to Austin Springer on Dana White's Contender Series, right?

Like this is, if you ask 95% of MMA fans, I don't think they could tell you who he lost to on Contender Series. And all of a sudden, he's been in the UFC now a couple of years. He's already 7 and 0 in the UFC. He actually has the best record of any Contender Series alum in the UFC, which again, I don't think anybody would have expected, considering some of the talent that has come off that show. Just a few years ago, he was.

struggling to get through, you know, guys like Brandon Davis and Jamal Emmer's. And now all of a sudden, he's just destroying people like Cubs Swanson and Ensign Barbosa. Are you surprised by how quickly this is happening? I mean, is it that quick, though? Like, like you said, now we're seven fights in, right? I get what you're saying with the first couple of fights. Anytime you look at a guy's resume and see split decision, split decision in his first two UFC fights, you're going to think, is this guy really, like, for a guy who came into

this sort of highly vaunted striker, if he's squeaking, just squeaking out, wins, like this. How hyped is he? But I remember watching those fights and reading a little bit about him, smarter people than me kind of hyping him up. And I was like, okay, I get it. Like I think maybe my opinion was slanted in a positive way because of what I'd heard about him. So maybe I saw the silver lining of these split decisions and the fact that, oh, he got a win, he did enough. I think that says a lot against two pretty respectable names that you just mentioned. So I'm not super surprised. And this isn't always the case for guys once they reached the UFC level. there was kind of a noticeable improvement with every fight, which is rare.

I guess that speaks to how relatively new he still is to MMA, that there is that room for growth and visible growth that you can see in fights. So, no, I wasn't super surprised. I was one of the few people on our staff that was picking Chakazadeh, to win. I didn't pick him to finish. That was really impressive. But I did think he would win. So, no, I'm not super surprised.

I think he's where he should be at this stage of his U.S. career, top 10 in our rankings. I wrote a little bit about this this weekend, but I just really always do enjoy sort of the process that we go through with these crossover athletes, like especially these really like accomplished crossover athletes, right? Where you got somebody coming in from kickboxing and he's making this transition and you sort of get a chance to see the switch flip in real time and sort of just the connective tissues really kind of come together in his mind as he's sort of figuring out this newer aspect of what

he's doing. Because again, I was at UFC 248 when he fought Jamal Embers. And I remember watching that fight and just kind of coming away, just not really, not really thinking much about it, right? Like, it was just like, okay, I guess like this isn't going to really work out for Giga. Like, he's probably not going to be the guy that maybe he could have been or we thought he might have been. And all of a sudden, now he's just three knockouts in a row, three post fight bonuses in a row.

Again, you can see that switch just flipping in real time. He's out here trying chokes on Edson Barboso. Like, that's a really fun little wrinkle, right? Like, I'm actually really excited now for what Giga can do. and I think he's going to be moving up this division in his rankings moving forward. And I think Izzy Adesanya is a good example of that as well as like, I mean, he certainly had even a much more hype than Giga did coming to the UFC.

But like if you watch the Vittori fight, the first one, he kind of squeaks it out and you're like, oh, you have a few concerns. But the guy that the Izzy that fought Vittori the first time was very different from the Izzy that then fought Derek Brunson and just smoked him. And then very completely different from the Izzy that fought like Robert Whitaker. Like you just saw amazing growth from his second UFC fight to you know, his, when he became a champion. Like it's, it doesn't look like the same guy at all.

It's, uh, it's really amazing. But yeah, it's right. You see, you very noticeably see that switch. And it's really fun to see. Yeah. Well, let's move on to round number three. Uh, and this actually fits round number three for the third man of his generation. Ray Cooper, the third, the standout over there in PFL, debuting at number 13 here on our

welterweight rankings. And AK, you actually had, you and I actually had Ray Cooper higher than anybody else. We're responsible for this. We're responsible for this, Sean. We really are. I had him at number 10. You had him in number 11. Actually, switch that.

You had him at number 10. I had him at number 11. He was as low as number 15 for one of our panelists. Otherwise, it seemed like everyone more or less floated him in that same zone as you and I did just a little bit lower. Let me read you off a few stats here from Ray Cooper, who obviously gets into these rankings by beating Roy and McDonald in the way that he did. Very dominant.

It wasn't entertaining to say the least, but it was a very dominant. prominent performance. Very wrestling heavy. Ten wins, two losses, one draw, eight finishes, three PFL final appearances, one championship, potentially a second coming up, wins over Jake Shields in there and now Roy McDonald too. And that's just really over the PFL run. That's the last few years here for Ray Cooper. Is it possible, do you think that we were underrating or overlooking Ray Cooper as a group up to this point? I think a lot of people kind of discounted the Jake Shields wins. I remember at the time, that was a big deal, I thought.

There was a cool storyline that his dad had fought Jake Shields as well, which I guess may have made it sound worse than it was. It's like, oh, he's beating up one of his dad's opponents. How much of an achievement is that? But it was. Jake Shield probably was not in anyone's top 20 rankings by the time he fought Ray Cooper, but still a name, a very tough guy. And he finished Jake Shields twice.

That's an accomplishment. I don't care what stage of Jake Shields' career he was at. That's an accomplishment. And then, like you said, the success he's had since then. A couple of slip-ups. But other than that, he's been the guy, one of the faces of the PFL. And it sounds crazy. I think he's one of the few PFL guys in any of our rankings, except, of course,

Caleb Harrison, who'd be in our pound for pound, of course, women's pound for pound. But for most of the men, he's one of the few men who has not had UFC experience. Like I said, we've had Roy McDonald in our past two rankings. But obviously he's a guy who we have, you know, we can gauge him from his accomplishments to UFC, his accomplishments in Belator. Ray Cooper burst onto the scene. He's a veteran, but he was not a known guy until he fought for the PFL. And now he's number, we're saying he's the number 13th best wealth to wait in the world, Sean. And that might actually be low.

That might be too low. Oh, ah. He's really good. He's really, really good, man. He's up next for him is Mago Med, Mogomed, Mogamad Karimov, who's actually the gentleman who beat him in the first season PFL final. So a rematch here

kind of come in full circle. That's a big fight for Ray Cooper. He could cash himself another million dollar check. It should have happened in 2019. Magelma Keremov got, I think, injured or withdrew for whatever reason.

So this is, if you're a PFL fanatic guys, this is like the rematch you've been waiting for since season one of the PFL. This should have happened two years ago before the, but they didn't have a season in 2020,

of course, because the pandemic. I am so excited for this one. Ray Cooper, representing for PFL on these rankings. Top 15. I love it. In the world, we're saying. I love it. This is people, this is why the global rankings need to happen because you're not going to see this. Again, if you only follow UFC of Belcher rankings, you're not going to see Ray Cooper's name there. So we are saying he is top 15. Might be too low. Might be too low. And might be too low. Let's move on. Round number

four here. Got to talk about my guy. Been my guy. I've been riding and dying on this train. You are so happy. Finally, finally, I still feel like he's too low in this, but maybe not. Vicente Lucke is of course who I'm talking about. And this one is fairly straightforward. He moves from number nine to tied for number six right now. And F, AK5 out of eight of us have him at number six. It feels as if this is a pretty unanimous decision, at least among this group. Right behind that little tier, I'd say two tiers of Usman, Covington, Burns, Edwards, Thompson.

Right behind that. Coming up then is Vicente Lucke. And that feels about right, considering that Vicente's last two losses were two of those. men, Leon Edwards and Stephen Thompson. That being said, look at everything Vesente Luka has done. This unbeaten run, he's finishing everybody. He's one of the low-key, most violent men in the entire UFC. And I will stand on that against anybody.

Is there a case for Vesente Luka needed to be higher than tied for six right now? I won't make it. I, Frank, I'll make it. I definitely have been one of the people who has been very, very slow to creep Luque up my rankings. This is probably the most I've ever pushed him up after a fight, like two or three spots. For me, it's always been like... I will say you candidly have him the lowest of anybody on the whole crew.

I have him an eighth, I think. You have an eighth, yeah. Yeah, that's the lowest. That's the lowest. It looks like, it looks like, yes, me and one other. Yeah, and I'm okay with that. I don't know, but I don't blame people at all because Luque just has the results. What is that?

9, 10 out of 11 wins? That's why. It is becoming an outrageous Tony Ferguson-esque street. Yeah. And a lot of stopages. You know, we're not talking like, oh, he's just kind of eking out wins over like over a good opponent. He's like killing. He's killing like good high level top 25, top 30 welter weights.

I know that seems like a pretty wide range. But again, that's high level guy. Welterweight is another, you know, has always been one of the deepest divisions of the O.C. And the way he's been handling some of these guys is absurd. So for me, you know, he lost to Thompson too. That's another reason I wouldn't put him above there. But Edwards as well. And Edwards as well.

Really, for you, it's the two Bellator guys. You have Amosov and Douglas Lima in sort of that top range. And that's sort of what's putting Lucke behind them. Yeah, yeah. It's always difficult to compare, of course, guys cross-promotionally, you know, so they have no shared opponents. And in this case, now it looks like, so Lucke is tied with Amosov in our consensus ranking. But yeah, so for Lucke to be the leader of potentially Tier 3, again, guys who are maybe two

fights away or just the right match, you know, maybe one fight away with the right matchup. from getting a title shot. That's awesome. I will say, this is someone who I always thought is going to be a win three fights, lose one guy, or in this case,

lose one, four or five fights lose one guy. And, and, you know, be popular, but never a title contender. And now, man, you really could talk me

into Lucay potentially fighting for a title in, by next year. He's one fight away, really. If he gets a big one next, if it's a, if it's a neat.

I mean, the UFC treasures violence. UFC likes violence. The Sentee Lukee is a violent, violent man. If he's able to get something like a Nate Dia's fight, which is actually seemingly on the table

or something like that in his next fight, I think he could do enough in that type of performance. I think he would avoid a Leon Edwards type of situation. I think if he wins that in a Dias fight or something like that, it would be spectacular and it would make him make that jump into sort of that conversation. We'll see, though.

He continues to get disrespected, mostly by you, but we'll see. He is one of the most disrespectful men in this whole sport. Final round here, round number five, and then we'll bring in the other two gentlemen and we'll get to our debates the cuts.

Yeah, speaking of disrespect. The cuts, the inactivity cuts is one thing that one of the main rules that we really wanted to hammer on and have when we created these rankings is to have some kind of threshold to prevent people from really squatting on their spot for just endless stretches of inactivity, right? Like we see this all the time in the UFC rankings where people are just there, they're not fighting, and they're just jamming up the ability for other fighters to make any sense of forward progression. For a long time, the welterweight division has been. like this. There are other divisions you could point to as well. Conne McGregor was like a top right to lightweight forever. Sean, I think something's wrong with our rankings, Sean. Where's John Jones? I do not see John Jones. What is, uh... And there you go. Sean, what's going on? I see, I'm looking at light heavyweight. No John Jones. I'm looking at pound for pound.

No John Jones. What's what is this? What kind of rankings are these? And there we go. We decided that 18 months was the good cutoff point. It's about it's that nice middle ground. It's not too long. It's not too short. No activity. If you haven't fought for a year and a half, you're not relevant to the current conversation. When you do come back, we'll throw you back in.

Simple as that. John Jones is not relevant? John Jones is... What are we... Sean, what are we saying? The facts. What? We're saying the facts.

So last month, obviously, the biggest victim was Mr. John Jones Jones. This month, it is two fan favorites, and it's very sad to see them go. Yonahe and Jacek and Y'all of Romero, both fighters who I had extraordinarily highly ranked in their respective divisions for me. It's now 18 months for both of them. Their last fight was that last pre-pandemic show where Yohanna went to war.

One of the greatest fights of all time against Wiley-Jang and Yuel Vermeiro did the exact opposite against Israel at Asenia. They're now out. So their spots in the rankings were up for grabs. AK, what's been your experience so far with these cutoffs and sort of working system that we have? Personally, I have always had it, like as long as they get booked for a fight, I kind of like to keep them in my own, like the rankings I had kept long before we sort of conceived doing

MMA fighting global rankings. I was more like, one, I had a shorter cutoff. I would go a year, but it would have to be a year without a booking. So if you got a booking that kind of extended your life on the rankings for me, you know, and then I would kind of take it case by case from there if they were nowhere close to an action fight. But I don't mind the way we do it. I think 18 months, no fight, even if there is a booking.

I think that's fair because otherwise it really, really extends how long someone can be in the rankings without actually appearing. you know, not all, and frankly, it's better for the fans. I think not all the fans keep up with every potential booking and everyone that fell through. So it would look odd to some if they see like, why is Yawanna up there and she hasn't fought again since the Zhang Wei Li fight, which now feels like it was honestly like frigging three years ago. The crazy thing about Yonna is she has not even had a fight, a fight like potentially

booked. I have not heard rumors of her coming back. I haven't even seen like people throwing out kind of like fake Yonah matchups. So she's in a really weird spot. And I think this is a perfect example of why we have the 18 months caught off. Why remove people from the rankings? It's like, of course we know if you were to ask us, okay, who are the five best strawways in the world? She's firmly in there.

No, no, no, just no debate, no debate. She's in the top three. She's in the top three. Yeah. I think any list without her in the top three is like, it would just be bizarre. But if you don't fight and you don't stay active, and she seems happy, by the way, not fighting right now. So more power to you want to, whatever you're doing with your life, if you're just out there enjoying life. I congratulate you.

But for the purposes of rankings, you really do got to take them out at some point. So that's just what happens with Joanna here. Again, fans can disagree. Other members of the media can disagree. But she just does not have any credentials to speak of over the last 18 months and thus has been removed. And again, we'll throw her back in when she competes. It's as simple as that. We try to keep the sport moving.

Keep the flow moving. We're not trying to hold up divisions here. None of that. We're keeping it moving. And in the spirit of keeping it moving, that was five rounds. We're going to take a quick break. And then AK, on the other side, the gloves are coming off. Workday knows there are two kinds of people in business,

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Faster. Workday. Moving business forever forward. All right, y'all, we are back. Joining us now, two of our fine esteemed members of the panel, Damon Martin, Jedmishu. Thank you for joining us, gentlemen. Two main topics of contention we wanted to hit here today. First up, the bantam waits. This has been a very weird, bizarre. That whole division right now is very, is in a very weird place. Obviously, Al Jemaine Sterling is currently the UFC champion. Peter Yon, was winning that fight at UFC 259 before that fourth round foul. The whole thing is a bit of a mess. We haven't gotten any resolution to it yet.

And the way that our rankings played out, it actually, it wasn't purposeful, but it kind of became a perfect representation of how this division feels right now. We had four different people on the panel vote for Al Jermaine Sterling as the number one fighter, and we had four different people vote for Peter Jan as the number one fighter.

The point system that we use internally actually brought them to an exact tie. So that is where they have been for the past couple of months. They've been tied for first place, those two gentlemen. And it's caused a lot of anger. It's got a lot of dissension in the ranks. And so we just wanted to bring this on and talk it out.

Full transparency. I voted for Peter Yon, number one. Damon, you also voted for Peter Yon, number one. AK and Jed, you're both on Al Jermaine Sterling side. We are clearly on the superior side on this, Damon. So I'm going to open the floor to the Sterling side first, AK Jed, whoever wants to go here, please explain why you're telling me that Al Jemaine Sterling is the number one

Bansomway in the world. Jed, may I just set the table real quickly here? You absolutely can because I have a beef that I want to get out at some point. Oh, Lord. Okay, okay. Get ready to fire. So obviously, I don't expect. Actually, I don't even know if Jed would agree with this.

But I think, you know, the UFC title is a pretty good gauge for who is the best in a weight class. Again, Sean, we discussed early on the show, certainly not the case with Dustin Porre. Seven of our voters think he's in first place. And I think that's a perfectly rational case he made based on resume, who he's beaten. you know, putting Porre above Charles Olivera completely makes sense. UFC belt be damned. In this case, again, I'm not against Peoteryon being number one, but I think beyond the fight itself, which I'll agree, I think Peotre Jan was winning, but technically it was disqualified

and loss, and I think a very justified disqualification. That to me, again, is an official loss. He did not beat Al Jemaine Sterling, and Al Jemeyerling is thus, for me, ranked above him, Not just based on that, the results going into it. We'll compare, we'll get to resume comparison. The second, I think I want to let my boy here fire off. I feel like he's ready to go. Jed, please hit him up.

I'm tromping at the bit. And the first thing that needs to be said here is, oh, I know that this is Sean just laid the table. It's dead even. Same number of first place votes, same number of points. And yet if you go to MMAFighting.com and look at our global MMA rankings and go down to Bantamweight, Peter Jan is the first. first name in the T1.

Al Jermaine Sterling is the second. Does P come before A? No. Does Y come before S? No, it sure doesn't. But we put him up there. And when I say we, I mean, the conspiracy that Sean Al-Shaddy is running here in control of the graphics and setting things up. He is trying to implant it in your head.

Hey, this is a joint effort between me and AK. This is a joint effort between the two of us. And, Chad, by the way, you know who shouldn't go unnoticed in this in this debacle? His one little Miss cool Alex, Alex Savas, who is responsible for this beautiful graphics. But I had not, you're right, I did not realize she was in the pocket of a big MMA fighting. She's in the pocket of big yon. Run by Sean Al Shadi. I had not even noticed that.

See, that's, wow. It's a travesty. And I just wanted that to be known to everybody that the true champion is Al Jermaine Sterling. And I don't, I don't know how we're having a debate here. Actions have consequences. Peter Yan lost. Like he lost totally within the rule set of MMA. It's just like AK said, like, we don't have to get into resume, but we sure can.

If you guys want to go into even worse ground for you, I'm happy to trash Jan's resume. But I don't have to because he lost the head-to-head. Like, we live in a society. There are rules. And Pianian broke him. And he didn't break him in like, oh, he accidentally need him. He stood over top, Sterling, stared him in the face for five seconds, punching him and then was like, no, I'm a knee this dude.

Like he just, he blatantly violated the rules. It's a 100% clean win for Sterling. I've said it since day one. He's the champ. He's the top dude. Deal with it. Damon, get in here. What do you think?

Well, here's the thing. Now, okay, now let's get the B team out of the way. Let's go to the A team. Listen, the reality is this. And I truly mean this, where it's ended where they're tied, you know, T1, T1, T1. their top one, number one. I think that honestly is the way to do it. The reality is I don't think there is a clear-cut winner here,

so I think them being tied is kind of justifiable in a way because it's an unanswered question. It's unfinished business. Yes, Algebra and Sterling is the champion. He's holding that championship title. And based on the rule set, yes, absolutely. And I don't begrudge him that. I told, I said that right after the fight.

He shouldn't feel bad that he didn't break the rules. But at the same time, even he has said, Al Jermaine has said that while, yes, I am the champion, he understands it's not the way he wants to become champion. Winning on a disqualification isn't legitimately winning a title in the way you want to win a title. You know, obviously if Anthony Smith had not been able to continue in his fight with John Jones, after, you know, losing the majority of that fight, would he hold the title? Would he be the light heavyweight champ? Sure, he would have been.

But would have been legitimate? would he have felt like he beat John Jones? And the answer is no. And I don't think Al Jemite Stirling will tell you he felt like he beat Peter Yon. That's why they're doing the rematch in October. Hopefully we get some clarification around that point. But for now, Peter Yon was the legit champion based on the system of wins and losses, meaning. What?

Based on he went out and bought Jose Aldo, which was for the for the vacant title. He knocked him out and finished it, which by the way, that win looks better and better, consider what Jose Aldo's look like since that fight. truth. He went out there and knocked out Joseo. He knocked out Jose Alty, he beat him to become champion. Basically, what we're dealing with right now is almost a vacant title situation, in my opinion. No, Al Jermaine holds the title. He's absolutely, I'm not taking any way from Al Jermaine, but Al Jame may be the first one to tell you. That's not the way he wants to earn it. That's not the way he wants to earn becoming the number one Bandsway in the world by his qualification.

He wants to go out there and beat Peter Yon. And when he beats, if he beats Peter Yon in October, a 100% rank him is the number one band's weight in the world. You bring up a good point, Damon, that I think the way it actually worked out. No, hold on, hold on. The way it actually worked out is perfect, because I agree with everybody in that. This is sort of where the division is right now. The number one, number one being tied, the way the point system's actually worked out because a few different people had some of these gentlemen number three on their list, too.

So the way the point systems worked out is very bizarre, but it actually worked out really favorably for us. But to me, the whole argument comes back to an idea of, do we trust our own eyes, right? Because we sort of had this discussion last month, internally when it came to Corey Sanhagen versus T.J. Dillishaw, where there are several of us on the ranking panels, and I will say myself included,

who still have Corey Sanhangan ranked above T.J. Dillishaw, because I trust my own eyes. And I watched that fight, and I don't care what the judges said. Corey Sanhagen won that fight. The judges make bad calls sometimes. This one isn't necessarily the same situation because Peter Jan,

that was the right call for Al Jemaine to get that win. But still, I watched that fight. and Peter Jan, I came away from it feeling as if Peter Jan is the better fighter between the two. And to me, that's the spirit of what all of this is about, right? When you're watching this, how to instinctively, when you're, the eye test, that fight leaves me coming away from this feeling like Peter Jan is the best number one bantamweight in the world. And it would be different if Al Jemaine Sterling say got some random knockout or some Hail Mary submission and he won, then sure, I'll give him that and then I would give him that number one spot.

But the way that fight ended was so inconclusive in terms of their actual state. standing in the division, that to me, I feel fully justified, still saying that Peter Yon is the best bantam weight in the world. I think, look, I understand what you're saying there. But I, but for the result matters. Now, listen, Jed and I, anyone who's either red misfist or even listen to Jed and I have a debate on say, between the links or really just talk on any other M.A. fighting programming knows we love cheating.

Okay. We fully approve. We fully approve cheating. 100% supporting cheating. 100%. Absolutely. However, what we don't support, Janet, I think I'm comfortable speaking for both of us in the situation.

What we don't support is getting caught. Don't get caught. Don't cheat in such a way that literally costs you a world title. Like, there has to be consequence for these things. And in our case, again, sorry, Jen, I keep speaking for you. In our case, those consequences extend beyond not just losing his officially sanctioned UFC shiny gold belts. the punishment extends to take a number one spot in the official global rankings of the world

that might be an oxymoron, I don't care. And so I don't know how you guys can look the other way and say, well, we're still going to give Yon the top spot. It's okay to get disqualified. You can still be number one. But did you come away for that fight feeling as if Al Jermaine Sterling is the best Bantamway in the world?

I don't know if I'll say that, but I didn't necessarily feel that. I didn't necessarily feel that I didn't necessarily feel that Peodor Jan was the best band in the world. Well, and let's also not forget, let's also not forget the rules at play here, guys, because there's no consistency. And this is putting,

somebody's forgetting the rules, because you're just writing off Al Jermaine Sterling's win. No, this is taking, this is taking, you know, the issue with the referees and the officials, because when this same exact thing happened a couple years ago in a fight between Dustin Porre and Eddie Alvarez,

when Eddie Alvarez egregiously through two knees and basically knocked out Dustapori and he couldn't continue. They called that a no contest. Now, at the time, I argued and said that should have been a disqualification. He was clearly down. Eddie knew he was throwing the knees and it should have been a disqualification. But they said, no, no, it's a no contest. So now there's a no contest on his record instead of a win.

They ran it back and obviously Dustin beat him and, you know, the right guy won. In this case, now we have a disqualification. The inconsistency of the rules about what's a disqualification, what's, I'm not saying it's wrong to be a disqualification. I'm not saying it's wrong to be a disqualification. I'm saying there's no, there's no consistency in the rules. So if one thing's in this qualification, another things have no contest, I don't know who's right or who's wrong in that instance, because nobody knows who's right or who's wrong in that instance.

So in this particular case, I agree with Sean. The eye test is at that moment, Peter Jan was winning. Should he be punished in having this title taken away from him? Sure, but does that make me feel like he's not still the best bansuate of the guys currently competing? No, I still think he's there. But again, four weeks from now, we're going to get our answer five, we are, excuse me, eight weeks from now, we're going to get our answer.

We're going to find out who is truly the best band to win in the world until, you know, eventually we see, you know, guys like T.J. Dillishaw and Corey saying he can get that mix again. But for now, those two guys will fight and we'll hopefully find out for sure in October. I don't, I understand. I agree. There's always going to be issues with consistency when it comes to officiating, judging, what have you in M.A. I just don't see how that's Al Jemeyerling's problem.

I don't see why he should be penalized because of the nebulous, you know, officiating issues that are ongoing in the sport. In this case, it was clearly ruled in a way that was favorable to him. Maybe Eddie should have, who need who in the, it's terrible, who need who in the Porreya, Alvarez played again? Eddie definitely. Eddie, yeah. Need Forier.

Maybe Porre just didn't milk it enough, which is another thing I'm going to give Sterling credit for. By the way, and I think he was genuinely hurt, for the record. I don't subscribe to that he was faking. Oscar Aljo, whatever this bull crap memes are that are coming on. I think he was genuinely hurt, but maybe there was some degree of, he was exhausted. Maybe he wasn't exactly in a hurry to get up and continue that fight. And I think he should get credit for that, not scorn.

Or maybe he just got kneading the head very illegally. Look, by a very powerful Russian man. There's just no two ways around it. We would talk about inconsistency's rules. We have rules. Dude won. Like, okay, you said that everybody, this has been so frustrating for me. too. But Corey Sanhagen, I mean, sorry, TJ Delishaw beat Corey Sanhagen and you're still,

I still maintain that Corey Sanhagen won that fight. Like at a certain point, another mistake. I get it, Sean. You are all about anarchy. But the fact remains that whether you think he would win in a fight again is not the question. How it was, do you think he would win in a fight based on history and follow the rules? Because he clearly hasn't done that before. Al Jermaine Sterling is the only of the two competitors that followed the rules and thus he won. Like, you just, actions have consequences. And I could maybe excuse this if Yon's strike felt unintentional. If he was throwing a knee and at that time, Aljo fell to the ground and his knees hit.

And then it's more a syntax of how dumb the grounded rules are written. But it's not. He stood over top of Sterling for several seconds, punched him several times, and then was like, I'm a knee this dude and did it. There was no confusion about the rule set or the legality. Under any rule set, Sterling was down. He blatantly violated the rules. I'm of the opinion that any time you violate the rules,

and it results in the fight being stopped, that should be a DQ. But in this instance, I just don't even think it's arguable that it's a DQ. Sterling won, and whether I would pick Sterling or Jan against either one in the future is moot. the result stands. Who would you pick in the future? I actually really think I'm still going to pick Sterling if that fight ends up happening. I know it's booked, but

at this day and age, you can never just feel confident that the fight's happening, right? Assuming they end up going later this year, COVID, nothing gets in the way. I still think I'm picking Sterling in that fight. Well, fortunately, again, the way that this all played out, we were actually very lucky because we kind of were able to

avoid this whole discussion to begin with because they are tied right now. Jed, you bring up good point of the subtleties at play here with Peter Yon being ahead of him. I don't know that that was intentional, but that is quite hilarious that that is sure. Listen to him. I'm surprised it turned out that way. I didn't realize that I'm the only person just inside baseball who put Yon as number three and that that's what has prevented him from taking the top spot. And boy, do I love that. I wasn't going to single you out, but that is absolutely the reason that this is happening.

Fawn's Best Bannoy in the world, baby. But I didn't put Fawn at number one because even though I think he'd give the boots to anybody else in the vision right now, he hasn't beaten the people Al Jermaine Sterling is beaten. And see, that's the other argument I'll make real quick here is to that point.

One thing I've always argued with rankings when you talk about wins and losses. And I agree typically when you say wins and losses matter most. But the problem is rules, we talk about the rules, like what's a no contest versus what's a disqualification? We can also argue all day about judging. So this time, when we started doing the MMA fighting global rankings, I said to myself,

I need to judge based on what I'm seeing, not necessarily what is just wins and losses. And that's why I did rank Corey Sanhagen ahead of T.J. Dillishaw, because Corey Sanhagan won that fight. It's not T.J. Dillishol's fault. I'm not blaming him. But the judges got it wrong that night, okay? So why am I going to rank T.J. ahead of Corey when in my head, 100% I know for a fact, Corey won that fight, why am I going to just jump T.J. Dillishol ahead of him simply because he has a win because two judges egregiously scored that fight the wrong way, and now he's ranked ahead of him. I don't agree with that. And we have so many issues with refereeing and judging in this sport that if we don't at least act common sense about certain results, then nothing's

ever going to change. If there's not even a repercussion in rankings for a guy winning a fight when he shouldn't want to fight, then what's the point? I mean, what's the point even debating it at that point? So, Damon, hold on. I'm actually glad that you brought up common sense, Damon, because we need to move on to our second discussion point here. Yes. Sorry, Sean, as we do, let me just,

I'm not going to bring us back, but I don't want to say, Jed, you were not the only reason that the scoring ended up the way it did, because we also had someone ranked Sterling third, and that kind of Sean goes to what we're talking. This rogue panelist had Sterling third. And as, sorry, Sean said, that will lead it to, he's also responsible for this, this next point of discussion that you're bringing up. So, please, please go ahead.

We will not, we will not name this person. No, we don't need to. He can name himself if he wants to name himself. There is a rogue panelist among the eight-person group right now. And we mentioned A.K. earlier that there is sort of a civil war that is brewing right now within this panel. It's because of this gentleman. It is purely because of this gentleman. And Jed, one of the reasons we wanted to have you on

is because I feel you slipping. I feel you slipping to the dark side and I don't like it and we need to nip this in the bud. So what we are talking about, if people were paying attention and managed to see last month's rankings and also this month's rankings, if they look at the Women's Bantamway Division,

they're probably going to notice something weird. They're going to notice that Amanda Nunes has seven first place votes and one second place vote. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, seven first place votes and then Jermaineerandemi has the other first place vote. That seems very weird, right? Mani Nunes, not only did she beat Jermaine d'Ranami,

but she has just generally been the queen of that division since Misha Tate retired, which was a very long time ago at this point. Like, this has been an ongoing thing. I don't think anybody in the world would argue that Amanda Nunes is not the number one bantamweight in the world. I'm about to. Well, we're going to get into it because this is where we have reached. One rogue panelist has decided that because of our cutoff rules,

18 months, no fight. You get taken out of the rankings, just to remind you, Amanda Nunes hasn't defended her title, the Bantamweight title in the UFC, for past 18 months now. I don't remember, I don't know the exact time, but I know it's past 18 months. December 2019. So there you go. But Amanda Nunes has certainly fought several times since then. She's two titles of the defending the UFC.

She has defended the other one. And she is about to defend this bandamweight title again soon. It seems very silly and very nitpicky and very weird to decide. that Amanda Nunes should be taken out of the rankings for inactivity when she has been active, but that is the stance that one panelist has taken. And now it has caused ramifications all across these rankings. It's a bizarre thing to happen. And now, again, there is sort of a Civil War brewing.

And Jed, again, I feel you slipping. So please, Jed, can you explain to me, make this make sense to me of why this is happening? I don't know if I can make it make sense to you because you're for anarchy and chaos. And I'm glad to know this because now, based on our previous comments, I can do what's right and put Joel Romero as the top middleweight in the world because he beat both Robert Whitaker and Israel. Well, Y'all Romero right now is out for an activity, so you can't. Oh, why is he out?

He's out because he hasn't competed in the time. Well, that just folds nicely into this. There are rules, Sean. If we don't follow the rules, we live amongst the animals. And it's very, very clear. Like I don't understand what's up. Like, I, I'm glad that our rogue panelists who I would be happy to name, but everybody else seems to be getting real cloak and dagger with it. So I won't.

When he's here, he can name himself. He can name himself. I'm glad the rogue panelist has made, uh, has made a great point because I hadn't even noticed it. Because you're right, I got caught up in the glitz and glamour of Amanda Nunes beating Felicia Spencer and Megan Anderson and forgot that she hasn't fought at her ostensibly best weight and the only. actual legitimate women's weight class that she is a champion in in almost two years. So yeah, we have rules. I'm just my main point, I get the, I'm never going to sway y'all, but my main point is if we in the very first iteration of doing this, we are already breaking the rules. That doesn't set a solid precedent for anything. And if we're going to break the rules for Amanan Nunes, sure,

she's the goat, love her, tremendous fighter, best we've ever seen. but we should also break the rules for you all Romero because he's the man and has beaten both of the future middleweight title fight guys. So you can have it one way or you can have it the other boys. You can't have both. And I'm not going to lie. I'm pretty surprised that A.K. Lee, a fan of rules and order is just he's just not with me on this. I don't know what's going on.

Chad, you're right. Rules, rules, rule. Okay, we know this. Rules, rule. hashtag rules rule that's how I live my life I'm not going to disagree I think there's just certain also common sense rules which I admit look listen you and the rogue panelists had made a good point that we we there was nothing in the rules that says holding a title for a major promotion makes you exempt from you know from being removed from the rankings or from one set of rankings if you're let's say you're

a two division champion I think we need to amend these rules and we may in the future and we will let listeners and readers know when we do because this also applies to one mr. Prudicio Pitbull, Ryan Bader, who is not fought at heavyweight in the 18-month window we're talking about, but who in some of our rankings, we have still, some of the panelists have still included, which I think is fine. By the way, let me just cut in. The rogue panelist, you mentioned Ryan Bader. The rogue panelist also has Ryan Bader as a top five pound-for-pound male fighter in the world.

So that's all I'm saying. Well, I'm not here to debate the merits of one person's insanity. Okay. I'm just here to debate that he's, look, a broken clock is right twice a day. In this instance, the blind squirrel found that nut because rules matter. Sure. We got to follow. But I think there has to be some common common sense rules, just internal rules that

Sean, you and I, I think, didn't write down certain rules because we just assumed people would be rational. Yes. And kind of have, which is obviously a huge mistake. That's on us. That's on us. You give a gun to a monkey. If you give a gun to a monkey and the monkey shoots someone,

you don't blame the monkey. Okay, you don't blame the monkey. You can, okay, so that's on us. All right. But this specific case with Nunez, the only thing that really hurts it, like wanting to not include her is just no one at 135 has made a strong case to take her spot.

If, let me, let me do you know, if Jermaine de Rondami or Homme or Rani Aldana or someone had rattled off like three wins in 2020 and like had one in four, like four fight win streak, I'd be like, Okay, you know what? This is maybe the uncrowned champion of this division.

I understand. So you mean Jermaine Duranami, who is, if you take out the loss to the fighter who's not competing Amanda Nunes, has done a phenomenal job and beating several top ranked opponents. What has she done since the loss to Nunez? She beat the future title challenger of Bantamweight plus ambition. And I would have her over Pena. That's fine. That earns her the spot over Pena.

How can that put her over Nunez? There's one fight since she fought Nunez. That's, it's pretty simple. That fight occurred in October of last year, which is within our 18 time. She has competed. The champion has not. But if it gets to be the champion, I'm not. Dammit, please, David.

Let me get in here. Let me jump in a little logic. Let me just ask you a question. Has Amanda Nunes fought in the last 18 months? Yes or no? Yeah. Okay. There's your answer.

Boom, done. She fought. That seems settled. She fought. I understand she has to fought a Banton way, but she is a two-division champion. She has competed. The rules say you have to compete within 18 months.

It doesn't say you have to compete in your weight class within 18 months. So she has to compete within 18 months. She has competed twice within the last 18 months, just not in that particular weight class. So rules be, you want to follow the rules. We want to go by the rules. Rules rule. Hashtag rules rule. The reality is she has fought within the last 18 months.

Yoel Romero has not. John Jones has not. Yuanian Jacek has not. There's a reason why they are removed because they actually haven't competed at all in 18 months. Amanda Nunes has. On top of that, it would just take out the 18 month,

the 18 month part, which again, by the rule, she has fought in the last 18 months. I don't care that she has to fought in Bantuwait in 18 months. She has fought within the last 18 months, which is the parameters we're working within.

Part two of that is... Where are these parameters? is written down. I need confirmation. Literally on the MAA. At the beginning of every, we list them at the beginning of the two we've done so far and we'll continue to do so. That's on a spreadsheet that's not official.

No, on the actual order. It is publicly anyone. Every reader can go and read this right now. It is on NMAFind.com slash rankings and go to our latest. Thank you, Damon, because I didn't even realize that. That we, this is the exact wording. Fighters will be removed in rankings. If they do not compete within 18 months of their most recent

does not say anything about division. Yes. So she has competed within 18 months. Conversation over. That's it. But part two of this is if we're just talking about logic in terms of rankings, I mean, there's no, there is literally no more clear-cut number one fighter in the world in any division in the sport than Amanda Nunes. I mean, she has beaten every, but she's beaten every champion that the UFC's ever had a banter way. She holds win over number two and number three convincing wins over both and a couple of wins over Durand Emmy. has two wins over her and a head to kick knockout over Holly Holie Holm. Obviously, Arena Aldana is fantastic, but obviously she just had a loss to Holly home and then came back and got a big win. I have a much bigger problem with Giuliana Pena being ranked fifth than I do with anything about Amanda Nunes because Giuliana Pena, her biggest current win is over Nico Montanio, who hasn't fought in, that was about three years ago.

That's like Nico's only fight in the last five years. Yeah. And then Sarah McMahon, who I have the utmost respect for. for, but Sarah McMahon was never a top five fighter. I'm sorry when she got title shot. She didn't really deserve that title shot. And her other fights are losses to Durand, Emmy, and Schochenko. I could argue all day why Giuliana Pena is not number five.

But there's no argument that anyone in their right mind would say who is the number one Bansway woman in the world. And there's not a person on earth besides the one rogue person in our panel who would say anyone other than Amanda Nunes. But again, I just go back to the rules. You have to fight within 18 months. Amanda Nunes has fought within 18 months. Conversation over.

I want to say that we are misappropriating or miss, I don't remember, I'm not sure the word I'm looking for here. We are misconstruing the rogue panelists here because the rogue panelists would agree that Amanda Nunes is the best Bannon way in the world. The rogue panelist and myself are just advocating for following the rules, which pretty clearly state. Now, on your name, your other point, if that's a good one, if that's true, it's a good one. I'm not a hundred

percent confident that that is what we agreed to during the conceptualization of the event. I got to, we're going to have to dig into. We're going to have to find those meeting notes. That's fair. Find the meeting notes. No, that's fair. That's fair. That's fair. Because I will say here and now that if we can conclusively say that we just said compete, I would say that we didn't have this conversation then and we should have because I do on a substantive level believe you need to compete in the weight class because how long does Kevin Lee get to stay

ranked at lightweight if he stays at welterweight and keeps losing up there? Is it, is it forever because he still has a win over Gregor Gillespie? Well, I think the competing at the weight class matters. Yes, but I think the real exception, sorry, I think the real exception is for dual division champions. Again, you're right, you're right. Did we discuss this in depth? I don't know. I think you're making a fair point. Did we make this a clear exception? I think we should. I think we will have an internal discussion.

But I think like I said, I think two division. Because at some point you're punishing two division champions for like doing cool things. No, because this is what. But a man is put up defended her Bannon Way title. Again, but again, but against who though? Against who though, right? Like I think. Were people claiming for her to fight Megan Anderson?

No. More so than rematches. Jermaine de Random E or Holly Holmes though? No, that was just the fight they threw at her. Like it's- Felicia Spencer and Egan Anderson are fine wins, but like, she's beat everybody so it doesn't matter. She made a choice.

Like she could have said, no, I want to fight. I want to defend my 135 title and then I'll go to fight. Against GDR again, against Holly Holm like a rematch? Like, okay. I don't want to be like the landscape. There was no. There was no. You're saying choose.

You're saying choose as if Amanda Nunes has that power. Ultimately the UFC and, we know this, tells you who, I mean, look at what they just did to Frise Zingano. Francis Zingano, I don't want to fight until September. Okay, we'll just crown an interim interim champion after you've been tight. You've held the title for three whole months. I would love to see the UFC crown an in-armed women's band-a-weight champion. If Amanda Nunes, if Amanda Nunes, yes, I mean, maybe she expressed interest in staying

a featherway for another fight. But ultimately, we all know if the UFC's, hey, Arena-Aldana's on there, she's on a great win streak. We're going to book you against her. I'm quite sure she would have said, yes. I'm also quite sure that didn't happen. I'm quite sure the UFC said, okay, Felicia Spencer's out there, okay,

Megan Anster's out there, her contract's coming up. Can you go on beat her so you can drop her the very next day, which is exactly what happened? Yeah, so there you go. And like I said, if they would have said you're going to fight,

they said she's fighting Giuliana Pena. Guess what? She's fighting Giuliana Pena. That's how the UFC works. And by the way, Damon, she was going to, she did choose to defend her phantomweight title in that 18-month window.

This was supposed to happen in August. right this was like this was in the 18-month window against he also chose to get COVID you know oh my gosh hold on now okay okay I don't believe she said like she did choose to defend her title like she booked a tell defense which has now been rebooked so I get it now I guess we can just wait till November when she's back in there but it's so a K I thought I was going to be able to sway him on this show because he loves rules but see here's the thing here's totally against rules but here's the thing and this let's wrap it up with this

because we're just going in circles at this point. Yeah, yeah, of course. Ultimately, the rule was put in place for one reason. As we said at the top, it was put in place to stop divisions from being log jammed unnecessarily, right? Stop divisions where forward progress was basically impossible

because people were just sitting and squatting on their rankings and not fighting. No one is, that division right now is not log jammed because of Amanda Nunes. She is not stopping anybody from forward progress that they would otherwise be making. It is very clear that she's the best bantam weight in the world.

And again, I go with what Damon said. She's been active. She has fought several times in the last 18 months, which ultimately was the rule that we established. The rest of this just feels like very high form trolling to me. Okay. Well, I can't speak for the unnamed panelists. Right. And given some of the unnamed panelists, other rankings, I would not put high form trolling

outside of the realm of possibility. I genuinely bought the argument and still believe it. If I am, again, as I said earlier, I'm willing to admit that Damon's argument is great. And if that is what is determined that it is just activity, I think that maybe we should revisit what activity constitutes as far as divisional rankings go. But if it's just activity by the rules, I agree, there's no argument against placing Amanda Nunes at number one. However, I'm still not 100% confident that that is. Okay. Is what we agreed to.

I know that that's what's been publicly projected, but I don't need to go check the minutes. Need to do the due diligence to confirm before I'm willing to agree that Amanda as I know you will. And I know you will. Yeah. Look, if anything, this has spurred, I think, Sean, the need for some sort of further internal discussion. Sure.

And we should say, we should say, if we're lucky enough to get the rogue panelists for next one's show, this is a TBC conversation. So I don't want to guarantee it, but I do feel like we hopefully will get them for the next show and maybe perhaps find some peace and resolution. Otherwise, we're waiting until December when Nunez actually fights at 135 again. Yes. Let's end it there. We no one's changing anybody's mind here.

But all I can say, Jed, is I feel you slipping. I feel you slipping. I feel you slipping. Don't go to the dark side, my friend. Please stay over here. Stay on the side of the light. Stay on the side of common sense. That's all I asked.

That's all I wanted from this. I make no promises. Fair enough. Really fast before we get out of here. One last thing before we go here, just to run down quickly. of what's to come. Actually, we're looking ahead to September as the busiest month so far of these MMA fighting global rankings, AK. We're looking at 14 fights of significance between fighters on these rankings just within that one month span alone coming up. And really,

a lot of it is coming down to UFC 266. You have eight different fights on there between ranked fighters, including a number one ranked featherweight, certain man named Alexander Volcanowski, and then also the number one ranked women's flyweight, Valentina to Shepchenko. So a lot of movement to expect a lot going to happen over the next couple months. We could have to see big, big changes. We'll see. In the meantime, thank you so much for tuning into the debut edition of the M.M.A. Fighting Ranking Show. That man is A.K. Lee. Thank you to Damon Martin. Thank you to Jedmishu for joining us. We'll be back again next month.