The 20 Greatest Mixed Martial Artists of All-Time: Contributors Lists
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For this series on the the 20 greatest fighters in MMA history, ten of The Fight Site team offered up their own rankings. The team fiercely debated their lists amongst themselves, with individuals arguing for their own favourites, and offering perspectives other members may not have considered before.
However, we have some stubborn folks here and thus widely different lists were produced.
One thing was clear: our criteria. Our ethos is that competition is key, not the eye test. Fighters are ranked based on the level of opposition they faced, at what period of their careers they faced them, and how they performed. For example, a close and tough win over a great champion in the midst of their prime is worth far more than an easy drubbing of a recognisable name well past their best.
Then we had to debate how much the era mattered: were we leaning towards fighters from more recent times due to fighters today being stronger and more skilled than those of the past? Or did we have enough respect for the old timers who fought in extreme conditions for their reputation to hold up today just as it did in their time?
So without further ado, let us see how our lists panned out and what obstacles we faced in ranking just twenty out of the many excellent fighters we have seen since mixed martial arts became an organised sport?
*Rankings were generated prior to UFC 242. Khabib Nurmagomedov will have moved up in following editions. We at The Fight Site will be taking another look at the legacy of Khabib once this top 20 countdown has concluded.
Kyle McLachlan
Georges St-Pierre
Conor McGregor
Jose Aldo
Demetrious Johnson
Max Holloway
Jon Jones
Fedor Emelianenko
Dominick Cruz
Frankie Edgar
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Daniel Cormier
Anderson Silva
TJ Dillashaw
Rafael dos Anjos
Robbie Lawler
B.J Penn
Stipe Miocic
Maurico ‘Shogun’ Rua
Matt Hughes
Kazushi Sakuraba
KYLE: I am one of the only members of the team more favourable to the old timers, seeing enough in their strength of competition that their legacies still held up. I mean, how could I not rank Matt Hughes when he easily trounced one of the most important figures in MMA history without breaking a sweat and out-smarted a man who would go on to become a fighter so great he sits at the top of my list?
I’m sure that for anyone reading my list the first thing that will jump out at them is, ‘wait a sec’, Conor McGregor at number two?! Are you crazy? He never defended his title! He’s more celebrity than fighter! He punched an old man ferchrissakes!’
At least two of those things are absolutely true, but what is also true is this: a two-weight world champion, winning the UFC lightweight championship from Eddie Alvarez, one of the greatest 155lbers of all time. A win over Max Holloway, future 145lb champ who is comfortably in my top 5 of all time, and wins over ranked fighters whose quality jumps out at me, such as Dustin Poirier and Chad Mendes. Just two losses in his prime, one of them avenged, and one of them a gutsy performance against another of my all-time greats (Khabib Nurmagomedov)
But the real reason for that lofty ranking? I had Jose Aldo as my number two for much of this process, but could not ignore McGregor’s knockout of him, which stands up as the greatest victory in MMA history for me.
Like George Foreman, who ranks in my top five of all-time at heavyweight due mainly to his incredible victory over Michael Moorer, sometimes stunning single victories can put someone above those who have more depth to their resume.
If this was McGregor’s only elite level win, it’s likely he wouldn't even feature (see: Matt Serra TKO1 Georges St-Pierre). But McGregor has more going for him, so the insanely impressive victory over Aldo puts him in second place.
Danny Martin
Jose Aldo
Demetrious Johnson
Georges St-Pierre
Max Holloway
Conor McGregor
Khabib Nurmagomedov
TJ Dillashaw
Dominick Cruz
Eddie Alvarez
Frankie Edgar
Robert Whittaker
Jon Jones
Joseph Benavidez
Yoel Romero
Rafael dos Anjos
Robbie Lawler
Tony Ferguson
Anderson Silva
Henry Cejudo
Stipe Miocic
DANNY: There is a lot less science going into my rankings than there is for Ed (See below) but his first question feels like a vital one: How good are you at MMA?
A glaring omission on my list is Daniel Cormier for the simple fact that he is bolstered tremendously by being in light heavyweight and heavyweight. Looking back on it, Jon Jones himself might be rather high. It is always easier to be considered great in these division than it is at 145, 155, or 170.
On the other hand, Jose Aldo has the greatest command over MMA that I have ever seen. If you threw a size-parity version of almost anybody on this list against Jose Aldo on his best day (barring McGregor and Holloway), they would likely lose quite badly. Demetrious Johnson tends to be people’s go-to pick for most skilled fighter ever, but great wrestlers weren’t deterred if they wanted to take DJ down badly enough. Aldo sealed off an entire phase of fighting from his opponents systematically.
These rankings are fairly loose, as the cream of the crop from flyweight to welterweight is generally fairly even when comparing them head-to-head. There is still a solid argument for Alvarez over Khabib. I will remember Benavidez as a better fighter than Jon Jones. However, the #1 pick doesn’t change and I doubt it ever will.
Ed Gallo
Jose Aldo
Demetrious Johnson
Georges St-Pierre
Max Holloway
Conor McGregor
Dominick Cruz
TJ Dillashaw
Eddie Alvarez
Frankie Edgar
Robbie Lawler
Joseph Benavidez
Dustin Poirier
Tony Ferguson
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Rafael dos Anjos
Benson Henderson
Robert Whittaker
Yoel Romero
Henry Cejudo
Johny Hendricks
ED: My criteria is simple and rigid:
- Quality of competition (how good was the fighter at MMA in that fight?)
- Bad losses, arguable wins, and head-to-head results are used as tiebreaking criteria.
A fighter needs at least three quality wins to be eligible for ranking. Through an entirely subjective process, I assigned point values to victories based on how skilled the opponent in question was at that very moment. No projecting or leaning on far removed past performances. If it was difficult to capture the fighter’s value from that one fight alone, their general “form” in the lead up to and immediate future after that fight may be considered.
A minimum rating of 70, out of 100, is required for a win to be considered quality. For the most part, “relativity” will not be a valid reason to consider fighters of old as quality opponents, meaning this list certainly has a recency bias. If their skills don’t hold up, they don’t hold up. MMA is a rapidly evolving sport, it shouldn’t be controversial to point out that MMA fighters overall were much less skilled 15 years ago than they are today. The same can be said for the skill gap between lighter and heavier weight classes. It is simply more impressive to beat fighters who are better at fighting. While it may seem unfair to penalize heavier or older fighters for not having high quality opposition available, it is an even greater injustice not to recognize those who do face the very best in the sport, and defeat them.
There are some flaws with this system. For example, Benson Henderson lost plenty of the fights he has as wins on his record, and Patricio Pitbull suffered an early injury, not many would consider that a legitimate win. I factor that type of career into tiebreaking criteria, but ultimately the wins stand and are used for calculations.
It will likely occur that some of the most skilled 20 fighters of all time will not make the top 20, due to lacking quality wins of their own. Chad Mendes, for example, was an undeniable “A” fighter for a good stretch, but only has one quality win to his name.
You might prefer to call this, “The top 20 pound-for-pound collectors of quality wins of all time.”
I understand the impulse to be appalled by the apparent lack of respect for many “name” fighters, such as a great number of former heavyweight and light heavyweight champions. I implore you, before passing judgement, watch them fight and tell me they’re more skilled than those who received higher ratings.
If you’re interested in seeing the individual win ratings that led to these rankings, as well as an additional dozen “honorable mention” candidates, I invite you to peruse the full document.
Seth Petarra
Georges St-Pierre
Jose Aldo
Demetrious Johnson
Jon Jones
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Max Holloway
Conor McGregror
Stipe Miocic
TJ Dillashaw
Daniel Cormier
Anderson Silva
Dominick Cruz
Fedor Emelianeko
Dustin Poirier
Eddie Alvarez
Tony Ferguson
Robert Whittaker
Yoel Romero
Rafael dos Anjos
Joseph Benavidez
SETH: My top 5 matches up with most of the rest of the site’s with Georges St-Pierre, Jose Aldo, Demetrious Johnson, and Jon Jones occupying the first four spots with the exception of UFC lightweight champ Khabib Nurmagomedov at #5. The now 28-0 Russian has submitted former two weight champ #7 Conor McGregor and Interim lightweight champ #14 Dustin Poirier in his last two fights, and for this level of dominance over high level P4P competition, Khabib deserves proper respect and a spot in the top five (EDITOR’S NOTE: Seth ranked Khabib top five prior to his fight with Poirier). Stipe Miocic’s come from behind fourth round TKO against heavyweight champ Daniel Cormier notches him the #8 spot and the UFC heavyweight title for the former 3x champ.
Sriram Muralidaran
Jose Aldo
Georges St-Pierre
Demetrious Johnson
Max Holloway
Conor McGregor
Jon Jones
TJ Dillashaw
Dominick Cruz
Frankie Edgar
Rafael dos Anjos
Stipe Miocic
Fedor Emelianenko
Anderson Silva
Kazushi Sakuraba
Eddie Alvarez
Robert Whittaker
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Yoel Romero
Joseph Benavidez
Robbie Lawler
SRIRAM: Level of competition/performance, longevity, and relevant context are the criteria I used, roughly in that order (context can vary in importance depending on its scope, but that’s why it’s a rough order). Level of competition does not take era into account, which is why (for instance) Anderson Silva ranks lower than many others do; his longevity keeps him in the top 20 and as the greatest middleweight to this day, but his competition wasn’t skilled enough relative to the fighters building resumes today to rank him higher than he is (which does lead to a sort of recency bias, keeping fighters like Matt Hughes and BJ Penn out). In general, high level-of-comp with lower longevity will rank higher than the opposite, which is why Conor McGregor and Max Holloway are ranked higher than fighters like Jon Jones; while many unduly treat McGregor as a flash-in-the-pan because he never defended a title, his best three wins (Jose Aldo, Eddie Alvarez, Chad Mendes) place his CV among the best ever, and Holloway is building an all-timer’s resume in front of our eyes with his wins over Jose Aldo and Frankie Edgar. The same goes for Miocic ranking above Emelianenko. Of course, the cream of the crop (top 3) have a healthy dose of both factors; Jose Aldo not only ruled 145 for years and years, he also defeated fighters fantastic by any era, and the same goes (to a lesser degree than Aldo) for St-Pierre and Johnson.
Any particularly controversial inclusions are likely a result of “relevant context”, which deserves some explanation. Some of it is heavy context in terms of injuries, such as Dominick Cruz, who built a great resume despite those struggles with activity. Some is context in terms of performances, such as Robert Whittaker, whose fights against Romero were made even more impressive by mid-fight injuries that elevated them to unprecedented tasks at the highest level. Relevant context also gave Jose Aldo’s late-career wins more importance, particularly with the Moicano finish; not only is Moicano an excellent win in isolation, Aldo finished him at a point in his career where most would be totally past-prime. Three inclusions are helped heavily by punching above their weight: Kazushi Sakuraba (whose resume wouldn’t really hold up but for being absurdly undersized against most of them), Frankie Edgar (who won the lightweight belt despite being a natural featherweight and maybe lower, and has longevity at multiple deep weight-classes), and Rafael dos Anjos (who competes successfully at 170 as a former lightweight despite being undersized against the current elite; his case is also helped by being a two-division champion at two strong divisions but for a robbery loss against Colby Covington).
Dáire Nugent
Jose Aldo
Georges St-Pierre
Demetrious Johnson
Jon Jones
Max Holloway
Fedor Emelianenko
Anderson Silva
Conor McGregor
Eddie Alvarez
Rafael dos Anjos
Dominick Cruz
Frankie Edgar
TJ Dillashaw
Stipe Miocic
Robert Whittaker
Daniel Cormier
Yoel Romero
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Joseph Benavidez
Urijah Faber
EDITOR’S NOTE: Friend of the site Daire kindly provided some of his own analysis to one of our forthcoming articles on ‘The 20 Greatest Mixed Martial Artists’ of all time. Mum’s the word on which fighter made the cut, but we also fielded his opinion on who he felt were worthy of making the list.
Joshua Yandle
1. Aldo
2. Georges St-Pierre
3. Demetrious Johnson
4. ConorMcGregor
5. Max Holloway
6. Fedor Emelianenko
7. Jon Jones
8. Frankie Edgar
9. Anderson Silva
10. Eddie Alvarez
11. TJ Dillashaw
12. DominickCruz
13. Stipe Miocic
14. Rafael dos Anjos
15. Joseph Benavidez
16. Robbie Lawler
17. Robert Whittaker
18. Khabib Nurmagomedov
19. Henry Cejudo
20. Daniel Cormier
JOSHUA: Quality of opposition & level of performance are the main factors in my list. For the same reasons Ed lays out above, I haven’t adjusted for the times. As a result my list isn’t friendly to the old timers, with only Fedor making the list at No.6.
Aldo claims the No.1 spot because he has the best level of competition in my mind, and performed brilliantly against all of them. The Mendes he fought the 2nd time was one of the best fighters to never win a belt. An elite wrestler, fantastic athlete and also an excellent boxer; Mendes was a phenomenal fighter. Aldo showed his mettle, facing adversity and making adjustments in order to beat him in one of the best fights of all time. Frankie Edgar is an indisputable all time great (8th on my list), with top notch wins across multiple weight classes. Aldo didn't just beat him, he completely tooled him. Twice. His other wins are nothing to sniff at, either. With Hominick, Florian, 2012 Mendes, Lamas, Faber and Moicano, Aldo has bested a truly elite stable of fighters.
Losing to two of the best strikers the sport has ever seen does very little to knock Jose down on my list, the game passes everyone by eventually.
Jones, Silva and DC are all lower than they would likely be on the lists of many others.
Most of Jones’s wins from his early reign don’t hold up too well. With the two exceptions, Machida and Vitor, being natural MW’s. Despite putting in some impressive performances (the Glover fight a personal favourite), he simply hasn’t faced the level of competition needed to be higher up on the list.
Silva, whilst having a phenomenal career, was the product of an older era and unfortunately, his quality of opposition simply doesn’t hold up.
DC, like Jones, suffers from being in a poor division, and was never truly the No.1 at 205 with his losses to Jones. His work at HW is impressive, but he hasn’t notched any elite wins there apart from Stipe, who best him in the rematch. His wins vs Anthony Johnson help him claim the final spot on my list.
Ryan Wagner
Jose Aldo
Georges St-Pierre
Demetrious Johnson
Jon Jones
Fedor Emelianenko
Max Holloway
TJ Dillashaw
Dominick Cruz
Conor McGregor
Anderson Silva
Frankie Edgar
Kazushi Sakuraba
Rafael dos Anjos
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Tony Ferguson
Joseph Benavidez
Robbie Lawler
Eddie Alvarez
Robert Whittaker
Stipe Miocic
RYAN: The most important criterion for me is strength of schedule, but dominance and longevity are perquisites for making my top 5. Many excellent fighters have beaten world-class competition, but it is another matter entirely to dominate a division for years. Long-reigning champions leave a mark on the metagame of their division, and the whole of MMA, in a way rarely seen by short-term champions and perennial title contenders.
Defending a title over the long term is perhaps the most difficult feat in MMA. When a champion dominates a division for years, all eyes are drawn to him. Contenders begin shaping their game to beat the champion years before they start fighting elite competition. It’s an arms race between the champion and an entire division scrambling to catch up to him. For this reason, I’ve ranked such as Jon Jones and Fedor Emelianenko who dominated their divisions for years over fighters such as Max Holloway, who beat better competition and are (in my estimation) vastly more skilled, but lacked the divisional dominance.
Within the top 5, I’ve ranked them by strength of schedule, with Aldo taking the top spot due to wins over a fellow all-time-great in Frankie Edgar, and Chad Mendes, an all-time-great in talent if not in resume. Several of Aldo’s tier-two wins such as Renato Moicano and Mark Hominick rival the best wins of other GOAT candidates as well. As for the number-two spot, the race between Georges St-Pierre and Demetrious Johnson was very tight, but I ultimately went with St-Pierre. While Johnson’s four wins over the pair of Joseph Benavidez and Henry Cejudo rival St-Pierre’s best (and yes, we at The Fight Site consider the second Johnson/Cejudo fight a win for Johnson), St-Pierre fought a more consistent schedule of elite fighters with fewer “gimme” fights.
The one notable exception to my prioritizing dominance is Anderson Silva, who I don’t feel has the strength of schedule to merit a spot in the top-nine regardless of dominance.
I’d also like to note that it feels a bit tenuous to rank fighters in the middle of their run on a GOAT list, but the other option seemed even worse. Take someone like Robert Whittaker - he has the victories over world-class opposition to justify his inclusion on this list, but everything he’s done of real relevance to the GOAT conversation has come within the span of two years. If he falls apart soon and fails to replicate those performances, he could well drop clearly out of the race, leaving only a brief period in which his work was exemplary. On other hand, I cannot in good conscious rank fighters like Matt Hughes, who dominated a burgeoning, but by modern standards weak, Welterweight division for many years; no amount of wins over the kind of competition Hughes fought trumps a single win over a fighter like Yoel Romero, who Whittaker beat twice, for me.
Hamady Diagne
Jose Aldo
Georges St-Pierre
Demetrious Johnson
Max Holloway
Conor McGregor
Fedor Emelianenko
Anderson Silva
Jon Jones
Kazushi Sakuraba
Eddie Alvarez
TJ Dillashaw
Rafael dos Anjos
Dominick Cruz
Frankie Edgar
Daniel Cormier
Robert Whittaker
Khabib Nurmagomedov
Stipe Miocic
Henry Cejudo
Yoel Romero
HAMADY: To be honest, when we were asked to put together a list of best 20 Mixed Martial Artists of all time, I was far from being confident. Because I am first and foremost a muay thai and kickboxing aficionado, even if I’ve been closely following MMA for more than 15 years now; And also, because I think MMA is still a young sport.
Anyway, I did. No rocket science behind what i did, and how I did it. Level of competition, number of quality wins, were my main criteria. Longevity also played a factor, and I think it shows on that list. For the most part, it is similar with my fellow contributors, although Japan MMA still has big impact on me, and it explains why guys like Fedor and Sakuraba are ranked higher in my top than most.
Aldo sat atop a murderers row of a weight class for 10 years, beating the best competition available consistently, and convincingly. Mendes 2 and both Edgar wins were absolutely masterful and a testimony of the Jose's greatness. In my opinion, it will be very hard to surpass what Aldo did, although Khabib has a fair shot at it. Speaking of which, the rankings were made a few months before Khabib's win over Poirier, he's now way higher in my list.
Callan Gallacher
Jose Aldo
2. Demetrious Johnson
3. Georges St-Pierre
4. Max Holloway
5. Conor McGregor
6. Dominick Cruz
7. Frankie Edgar
8. Eddie Alvarez
9. Tony Ferguson
10. Khabib Nurmagomedov
11. Rafael dos Anjos
12. Dustin Poirier
13. Joseph Benavidez
14. Yoel Romero
15. Robert Whittaker
16. Stipe Miocic
17. Fedor Emelianenko
18. Daniel Cormier
19. Kazushi Sakuraba
20. Robbie LawlerCALLAN: I went for a hybrid type Criteria. No matter how much we dance around it or make believe otherwise, these lists are 99% subjective, I personally tend to see “level of opposition beaten” as the great leveller but if arguing with people on twitter over ranking the all time greats has taught me one thing it’s that one man’s Justin Gaethje is another man’s Jessica Andrade. Anyway, I basically ranked these guys based on who I think beat the best opponents at the time of their fights. I base the quality of wins on level of opponent taking into account form & performance on the night. I didn’t rank anybody who’s failed a PED test in the USADA era except Yoel Romero was found to be innocent of any wrongdoing. One last thing, I did these rankings before Khabib grannied Dustin, which saw him move up on my rankings and a significant shakeup besides, but we’ll talk about that some other time.