Bellators WW division matchmaking/ranking system

[GangGangGang]

I think your rankings kind of show the issue with Bellator rankings in a nutshell. If you look at the top 17 (champ and top 16 challengers as it would be in the UFC), then there's only been the following matchups.

Lima Vs Koreshkov x3
Lima Vs MVP
Lima Vs Larkin
Lima Vs Daley
Larkin Vs Daley
Larkin Vs Koreshkov
MVP Vs Daley
Amasov Vs Ruth
Gracie Vs Ruth
Ruth Vs Jackson
Fitch Vs Daley

So 13 fights between the entire top 17 fighters (unless I've missed any). I'd probably personally consider putting Erick Silva above Enkamp which would add his fights with Daley and Amasov.

C. Kamaru Usman
1. Tyron Woodley
2. Colby Covington
3. Jorge Masvidal
4. Leon Edwards
5. Stephen Thompson
6. Gilbert Burns
7. Demian Maia
8. Michael Chiesa
9. Rafael Dos Anjos
10. Nate Diaz
11. Robbie Lawler
12. Geoff Neal
13. Vicente Luque
14. Conor McGregor
15. Anthony Pettis

Usman Vs Covington
Usman Vs Woodley
Usman Vs Edwards
Usman Vs Maia
Usman Vs RDA
Woodley Vs Thompson x2
Woodley Vs Maia
Woodley Vs Lawler
Covington Vs Maia
Covington Vs RDA
Covington Vs Lawler
Masvidal Vs Thompson
Masvidal Vs Maia
Masvidal Vs Diaz
Thompson Vs Luque
Thompson Vs Pettis
Burns Vs Maia
Chiesa Vs RDA
Chiesa Vs Pettis
Diaz Vs McGregor x2
Diaz Vs RDA
Diaz Vs Pettis
Lawler Vs RDA

There's 25 fights between the UFC equivalents, which I guess makes the UFC matchmaking roughly twice as competitive.

To be fair, the UFC WWs have been around in UFC much longer.. Only guys in Bellator that have been around a fair amount are Koreshkov, Daley and Lima really.. Guys like Amosov, Fitch, Houston, Crutchmer, Mein, Enkamp, Kunimoto, Wallhead, Homasi, Nakamura, Jackson are all new to the WW division.

 

[careto]

I agree. It really is great when you see how deep Bellators WW division is despite only having 50 fighters in the division or so. Bellator does have some great upcoming talent that nobody knows about yet. Also forgot they have 4 total Gracies in the WW division.

I think your rankings kind of show the issue with Bellator rankings in a nutshell. If you look at the top 17 (champ and top 16 challengers as it would be in the UFC), then there's only been the following matchups.

Lima Vs Koreshkov x3
Lima Vs MVP
Lima Vs Larkin
Lima Vs Daley
Larkin Vs Daley
Larkin Vs Koreshkov
MVP Vs Daley
Amasov Vs Ruth
Gracie Vs Ruth
Ruth Vs Jackson
Fitch Vs Daley

So 13 fights between the entire top 17 fighters (unless I've missed any). I'd probably personally consider putting Erick Silva above Enkamp which would add his fights with Daley and Amasov.

C. Kamaru Usman
1. Tyron Woodley
2. Colby Covington
3. Jorge Masvidal
4. Leon Edwards
5. Stephen Thompson
6. Gilbert Burns
7. Demian Maia
8. Michael Chiesa
9. Rafael Dos Anjos
10. Nate Diaz
11. Robbie Lawler
12. Geoff Neal
13. Vicente Luque
14. Conor McGregor
15. Anthony Pettis

Usman Vs Covington
Usman Vs Woodley
Usman Vs Edwards
Usman Vs Maia
Usman Vs RDA
Woodley Vs Thompson x2
Woodley Vs Maia
Woodley Vs Lawler
Covington Vs Maia
Covington Vs RDA
Covington Vs Lawler
Masvidal Vs Thompson
Masvidal Vs Maia
Masvidal Vs Diaz
Thompson Vs Luque
Thompson Vs Pettis
Burns Vs Maia
Chiesa Vs RDA
Chiesa Vs Pettis
Diaz Vs McGregor x2
Diaz Vs RDA
Diaz Vs Pettis
Lawler Vs RDA

There's 25 fights between the UFC equivalents, which I guess makes the UFC matchmaking roughly twice as competitive.

I think Bellator's erratic matchmaking is on display more often than not, and the fans have to suffer through terrible matchmaking. You can see examples with Paul Daley, which instead of fighting against Neiman, Koreshkov, Amosov, or someone in the top 10, he is fighting Homasi. No disrespect to Homasi but Daley is a big name, why is he fighting a guy who is not ranked at all? I get it that is a fun match-up, but if they wanted to set-up a fun match-up then book Daley vs Raymond Daniels.
Also, after Neiman beat a top 10 opponent in Ruth, he faced a top 5 opponent in Macdonald, and after that...they matched up with Kunimoto. Again, no disrespect to Kunimoto, but Neiman should be a contender, a couple of fights away from a title-shot. Why does he go from top 10 and top 5 opponents to a top 20 opponent? Neiman should be fighting Daley, MVP, Fitch, maybe even Millender if they are looking for a rebound fight but not a guy who is not ranked at all.
Ballator's matchmaking sometimes cheats us of great fights. You dont see things like this in the UFC, there is always consistency in their matchmaking, or at least there is some semblance of consistence most of the time.

 

[GangGangGang]

I think Bellator's erratic matchmaking is on display more often than not, and the fans have to suffer through terrible matchmaking. You can see examples with Paul Daley, which instead of fighting against Neiman, Koreshkov, Amosov, or someone in the top 10, he is fighting Homasi. No disrespect to Homasi but Daley is a big name, why is he fighting a guy who is not ranked at all? I get it that is a fun match up, but if they wanted to set up a fun match up then book Daley vs Raymond Daniels.
Also, after Neiman beat a top 10 opponent in Ruth, he faced a top 5 opponent in Macdonald, and after that...they matched up with Kunimoto. Again, no disrespect to Kunimoto, but why do you go from top 10 and top 5 opponents to top 20 opponents? Neiman should be fighting Daley, MVP, Fitch, maybe even Millender but not a guy who is not ranked at all.
Ballator's matchmaking sometimes cheats us of great fights. You dont see things like this in the UFC, there is always consistency in their matchmaking, or at least there is some semblance of consistence most of the time.

I think Coker is more about 'fun' fights or making certain fighters look good. Usually with Bellator the odds heavily favour one guy. The absolute ONLY saving grace when it comes to Bellators matchmaking is their grand prix tournaments. I thoroughly enjoyed both the WW and HW tournaments. Heres to hoping that FW is exciting and we get LW, MW and LHW tournaments down the road.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

I agree, maybe Houston and Crutchmer shouldnt be getting top 10 guys quiet yet but they are ready for someone like Homasi, Kunimoto, Nakamura, maybe even Jordan Mein. I understand they want to build them up but sometimes its too slow of a process, at least they not be fighting regional guys or guys with losing records.
Sometimes they strike gold when throwing someone to the wolves, for example, Cormier, literally coming from the Challengers Series in Strikeforce and winning the HW Grand Prix and going on to become an all-time great. But these are rare cases. Also, nobody thought Neiman was quiet ready for someone like Ruth, let alone someone like Rory but he performed quiet great, he just needs that cage experience to be in title contention soon. Sometimes pushing these guys pays off.

Especially Houston, he's just been in there with Nicolas Dalby, there's no point putting him in there with anyone outside the top 15.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

I do agree the UFC's matchmaking is superior to Bellator's though. I think the future of their divisions is quiet even though

Maybe, Bellator have been doing a decent job of attracting prospects recently, at least testing their patience to wait for that UFC offer. They also seem to do a good job of hanging onto people at the moment, but there may come a time where these guys want to move on, and that'll be the test.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

I think Coker is more about 'fun' fights or making certain fighters look good. Usually with Bellator the odds heavily favour one guy. The absolute ONLY saving grace when it comes to Bellators matchmaking is their grand prix tournaments. I thoroughly enjoyed both the WW and HW tournaments. Heres to hoping that FW is exciting and we get LW, MW and LHW tournaments down the road.

Yeah, this is one thing I prefer about PFL of the non UFC orgs, with the way they set up, you can guarantee the best are going to fight the best.

 

[skylolow]

I think Bellator's erratic matchmaking is on display more often than not, and the fans have to suffer through terrible matchmaking. You can see examples with Paul Daley, which instead of fighting against Neiman, Koreshkov, Amosov, or someone in the top 10, he is fighting Homasi. No disrespect to Homasi but Daley is a big name, why is he fighting a guy who is not ranked at all? I get it that is a fun match-up, but if they wanted to set-up a fun match-up then book Daley vs Raymond Daniels.
Also, after Neiman beat a top 10 opponent in Ruth, he faced a top 5 opponent in Macdonald, and after that...they matched up with Kunimoto. Again, no disrespect to Kunimoto, but Neiman should be a contender, a couple of fights away from a title-shot. Why does he go from top 10 and top 5 opponents to a top 20 opponent? Neiman should be fighting Daley, MVP, Fitch, maybe even Millender if they are looking for a rebound fight but not a guy who is not ranked at all.
Ballator's matchmaking sometimes cheats us of great fights. You dont see things like this in the UFC, there is always consistency in their matchmaking, or at least there is some semblance of consistence most of the time.

I truly believe what your talking about here is exactly why Bellator hasn't been building its ratings up or really even sustaining ratings over the last few years. Hard to build matchups to mean something when you really don't have a game plan to build the fights leading up to it. Just zero direction most of the time and that is why fans don't really follow Bellator show to show. Not to mention because of the matchmaking issues a lot of events are just awful on paper even for diehards to tune into.

They severely need to revamp how they do things and this work stoppage right now is a perfect time to realign their shows and schedule. Plan out how your going to use the roster throughout the year and not just the next three cards. It's like we get good card, awful card, ok card, awful card, good card, ok card, good card, awful card and so on and so. It's like any media we take in, if you give us crap after crap people lose interest real quick in your product and it seems like Bellator does this all to often through the year and in the end fans barely care about the product.

Personally, I think it's time for Coker to go or shift positions and someone else take control of the actual product as a whole.

 

[careto]

I truly believe what your talking about here is exactly why Bellator hasn't been building its ratings up or really even sustaining ratings over the last few years. Hard to build matchups to mean something when you really don't have a game plan to build the fights leading up to it. Just zero direction most of the time and that is why fans don't really follow Bellator show to show. Not to mention because of the matchmaking issues a lot of events are just awful on paper even for diehards to tune into.

They severely need to revamp how they do things and this work stoppage right now is a perfect time to realign their shows and schedule. Plan out how your going to use the roster throughout the year and not just the next three cards. It's like we get good card, awful card, ok card, awful card, good card, ok card, good card, awful card and so on and so. It's like any media we take in, if you give us crap after crap people lose interest real quick in your product and it seems like Bellator does this all to often through the year and in the end fans barely care about the product.

Personally, I think it's time for Coker to go or shift positions and someone else take control of the actual product as a whole.

Bellator makes a big mistake trying to copy the UFC, they should not be putting 30+ events a year, they do not have the name-value in their roster to do so. Like you said, they put a bunch of event, of which only a few are worth watching.
They should take this break to differentiate themselves from the UFC. Bellator should focus on doing fewer events, something around 12 or 15 events but stacking those cards top to bottom. Letting the fans know that, even though they have fewer events, every event they put its going to be a banger.
Few but big stacked cards and 2 tournaments per year is what Bellator should be doing. BW and LW should be the next tournaments and preferrably happen at the same time.

 

[careto]

Maybe, Bellator have been doing a decent job of attracting prospects recently, at least testing their patience to wait for that UFC offer. They also seem to do a good job of hanging onto people at the moment, but there may come a time where these guys want to move on, and that'll be the test.

They have attracted a lot of prospects, the idea ia that those guys become the future of the division. However, Bellator makes a mistake with their matchmaking and promoting said guys. For example, after Julius Anglickas defeated Jordan Young he should have been promoted and pushed to title contention in a few fights. But what happened? You dont hear about him again. Who knows what is next Anglickas but he should have gotten some promotion and a top 10 fight.

 

[careto]

I think Coker is more about 'fun' fights or making certain fighters look good. Usually with Bellator the odds heavily favour one guy. The absolute ONLY saving grace when it comes to Bellators matchmaking is their grand prix tournaments. I thoroughly enjoyed both the WW and HW tournaments. Heres to hoping that FW is exciting and we get LW, MW and LHW tournaments down the road.

My beef with the grand prix tournaments is that they move too slow. It takes over a year to get a champion. At some point the tournament losses momentum after you get 1 fight of the tournament every 3 months.
If they could condense the tournament in 3 events in a span of 8-9 months ot would be great.
Or putting 2 grand prix tournament running at the same time, for example BW and LW going on at the same time on different events.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

Bellator makes a big mistake trying to copy the UFC, they should not be putting 30+ events a year, they do not have the name-value in their roster to do so. Like you said, they put a bunch of event, of which only a few are worth watching.
They should take this break to differentiate themselves from the UFC. Bellator should focus on doing fewer events, something around 12 or 15 events but stacking those cards top to bottom. Letting the fans know that, even though they have fewer events, every event they put its going to be a banger.
Few but big stacked cards and 2 tournaments per year is what Bellator should be doing. BW and LW should be the next tournaments and preferrably happen at the same time.

I agree with this but I also don't mind them running Strikeforce Challengers style shows to build up the prospects they sign who haven't made their debuts. Just be honest about what they are.

 

[pankrat]

I think it's a very good division, but I think the UFC has a crazy one. If you look at someone like Kunchenko he had an unbeaten record against better competition than Amosov going into the UFC and I believe he could have beaten the guys Yaroslav has beaten in Bellator, but he finds it hard to get any traction going in that division.

That being said I believe Lima, Koreshkov, MVP, Amosov, Neiman, Davis, Storley, Daley, Mein and Millender are UFC calibre fighters

I agree those are UFC caliber fighters but as far as I know Fitch is not officialy retired and I still favour him over most of them, actually dominated Daley

 

[Hellowhosthat]

I agree those are UFC caliber fighters but as far as I know Fitch is not officialy retired and I still favour him over most of them, actually dominated Daley

I agree Fitch is UFC calibre but to be honest I don't believe he's clean at the moment.

 

[pankrat]

I agree Fitch is UFC calibre but to be honest I don't believe he's clean at the moment.

jaja well that's likely true but its a pretty speculative criteria to bring in this discussion

the fact is in the last 7 years he has only lost to a blatant cheater in Palhares via kneebar and has just drawed with the champion last year.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

jaja well that's likely true but its a pretty speculative criteria to bring in this discussion

the fact is in the last 7 years he has only lost to a blatant cheater in Palhares via kneebar and has just drawed with the champion last year.

Yeah, I like Fitch a lot more than a lot of people. Big fan of him. I think he'd do fine in the UFC if current Fitch can pass USADA, I'm just not sure he can (though I appreciate this criteria could be applied to anyone outside the UFC)

 

[careto]

I agree those are UFC caliber fighters but as far as I know Fitch is not officialy retired and I still favour him over most of them, actually dominated Daley

Fitch vs Neiman should be a grapplers delight. I think Fitch beats anyone not named Lima, Amosov, or Larkin in the Bellator's WW division. Maybe Koreshkov can also get the TKO before suffering the inevitable take down.

 

[pankrat]

Fitch vs Neiman should be a grapplers delight. I think Fitch beats anyone not named Lima, Amosov, or Larkin in the Bellator's WW division. Maybe Koreshkov can also get the TKO before suffering the inevitable take down.

I can see those guys beating him but I can also see Fitch grinding them all down lol

He has shut my mouth several times this late in his career; most recently vs Rory, but also vs Shields and even Okami, who was outgrappled by Fitch as nobody ever did

The guy is obviously on the juice imo but with his experience, toughness and grinding ability on the juice I think he has a chance of beating anybody in Bellator, and he earned the chance of a tittle eliminator in the Rory fight imo

 

[careto]

I think Lima can keep it standing long enough to get the TKO but who knows maybe Fitch will shit us up and get an upset.

 

[careto]

I agree with this but I also don't mind them running Strikeforce Challengers style shows to build up the prospects they sign who haven't made their debuts. Just be honest about what they are.

Josh Thomson mentioned in his podcast that the Challenger Series worked because, at the time, the casual fans were interested in seeing prospects develop into realities. But that now, casual fans are more interested in seeing the best fighters against each other; they arent interested in watching no-names fighting anymore.
I like watching prospects develop, thats why I enjoyed the Challenger Series but I guess the casuals arent interested in watching people with little name recognition.