Stipe vs DC is a little unique in that both fighters were near 40 years old, and DC was on the brink of retirement (and Stipe shouldn’t be far behind, honestly).
There are some outliers to what I said. Jose Aldo did actually manage to recapture the FW belt (or an interim actually, and then was promoted to undisputed). But he lost it right away, couldn’t regain it, and dropped a weight class and still can’t capture a belt there. How can you not see a reason to factor Pena, when we just watched Pena mollywhop Amanda? Pena put a pace on her, kept her at bay with a nice jab, dealt with Nunes’ looping shots well, was able to gas her, take her dow, sub her…I see plenty of reasons to favor Pena personally. But I guess we’ll find out.