Does anyone actually think Volk is the best featherweight in the world?

[kflo]

To your point, there are fights that are so close that they are basically subjective.

Examples:
Moraes-Aldo (Media scores 9-9, no consensus)
Yoel-Costa (media scores 10-10, no consensus)

Cannot possibly be robbery in either direction due to lack of consensus.

However, in my estimation and just my opinion, a fight can be close, but be clear.
Examples:
Jones-Reyes (Media scores 14-7 in favor of Reyes)
Barboza-Ige (Media-scores 15-2 in favor of Barboza)

Both of those were close fights. However, I personally consider them robberies based on the following.

There was consensus regarding the winner among fans and media scores. The ringside judges are in the far minority. Consequently, the only thing keep them from their wins were minority opinions of the ringside judges (who notoriously suck).

That is my definition. If the vast majority of people understand that fighter X won, but the judges have a very unusual opinion that fighter Y won, I consider it a robbery, close or not. just my opinion.

If 7 out of 21 people with some knowledge of the sport legitimately thought one guy won, why are you suggesting they are blind and obviously wrong? A robbery to me is much more definitive than 1/3 people think the guy won.

 

[LetThemBleed]

Outstruck looks good on paper, but he was point fighting and not looking to do any damage. Those are the worst type of fighters imo. I do think the fight was close btw and that Volk won on points

You sure you watched the fight? Holloway hasn't ever been finished via strikes, his chin is elite, whilst battering Ortega he took a few absolute flush shots and they barely phased him, hell he took some massive shots from Poirier up at 155 and they only on occasion stopped his forward momentum, he never looked like he was close to getting stopped. Volk was landing some serious strikes in the latter rounds.

 

[Gamer2k4]

Judges have way too much say into our sport.

Who would you prefer have the say? Maybe they could run Twitter polls between rounds so you can tell everyone who you think should win instead?

 

[TriangleMonkey]

Styles always make fights but Id like to see Volk use his circular movement and leg kick game against a guy like Barboza, who thrives in those type of exchanges.

Volk has deadly hands though too, the the way he finished Mendes....

 

[Benoitthegr8]

Both Volk and Max are head and shoulders above the competition behind them, IMO it will become glaringly obvious after the Ortega fight. These two could fight 10 times with a 5/5 split, it’s literally that close. Instead of bitching because your fighter didn’t get the nod you should just appreciate the fact that the promotion has two equally skilled top notch fighters, they will eventually give us a trilogy, hopefully with a difinitive ending this time.

 

[DoctorStoppage]

Ortega will beat him and make it look easy

 

[PurpleDrank]

Even with Holloway making adjustments and Volk having an off night he still won. Though its all about matchups. I think Pitbull would beat Volk but struggle vs Holloway.

 

[Dan Torrance]

Ortega will beat him and make it look easy

I hope so.

He pulled it off against the Zombie.

Volks another level than Zombie though He's harder to figure out than Max too.

 

[Kvothe_the_kingkiller]

Serious question.

I'm not letting two basement dwellers who know nothing of fighting to tell me who the best featherweight in the world is.

As far as I'm concerned, Max is #1 and his first title defense since regaining his place was against Calvin Kattar and what a performance it was.

Judges have way too much say into our sport. It sucks ass, because we are tuning in to watch who is the better fighter among two individuals who weigh in the same the day before. Instead of that purity being the determining factor, judges and refs also have a say in history and I'm not a better, but I can't imagine contending with those intangible factors when betting on MMA is hard enough. It's not enough to predict a sport with this many variables but you also have to factor in consistent, pervasive, and inexcusable human error? No thanks.

Someone has to win close fights. Many thought Volk won the last 3 rounds. Some don't. Doesn't make that "some" right.

No one thought Max won the first fight. Those who say he got dominated aren't right, but Max did lost that first fight, no question.

It could just be a stylistic nightmare. And I sincerely doubt Volk can do to Katter and Ortega what Max did to them, so in many ways, sure, there's a sound argument that Max can be the better fighter all around and still be a bad matchup to Volk.

But that's a different argument than the poor argument you're making. You can do better. We expect better from you

 

[Small Town Andrew]

I think max or pitbull are the most dangerous

Volk might be best p4p point fighter though so he might be the hardest to beat

 

[MCS]

I had the rematch a draw. So Volk would retain. But it's fair to think Max is #1 because the KD's made those rounds easier to score for Max than the closer ones for Volk. But I did think the commentary was biased towards Max. Volk did well in that fight. It was no robbery.

For top rank you also got to look at Volk's streak and his first win over Max, which was one-sided. They need a 3rd fight.

 

[Sweater of AV]

No, it's Patricio Freire.

Patricio-McKee will be great.

 

[cburm]

Serious question.

I'm not letting two basement dwellers who know nothing of fighting to tell me who the best featherweight in the world is.

As far as I'm concerned, Max is #1 and his first title defense since regaining his place was against Calvin Kattar and what a performance it was.

Judges have way too much say into our sport. It sucks ass, because we are tuning in to watch who is the better fighter among two individuals who weigh in the same the day before. Instead of that purity being the determining factor, judges and refs also have a say in history and I'm not a better, but I can't imagine contending with those intangible factors when betting on MMA is hard enough. It's not enough to predict a sport with this many variables but you also have to factor in consistent, pervasive, and inexcusable human error? No thanks.

Hes got the belt...
But hes def not the fw goat thats max or aldo still who ever defended the most

 

[Fesaine]

Yes.
He and Max is exchangeable for the first place.

 

[IMPmmath]

I think Max,Pitbull and Volk are all very close.any given night situation, but if they all fought each other tonight my guess would be Max>PB>Volk

 

[legkicktko]

Who would you prefer have the say? Maybe they could run Twitter polls between rounds so you can tell everyone who you think should win instead?

We should have mma media scoring. More people will filter out bias and outliers. Maybe 20 judges scoring remotely

 

[Kvothe_the_kingkiller]

We should have mma media scoring. More people will filter out bias and outliers. Maybe 20 judges scoring remotely

But your still stuck with, even if we bend over backwards changing the criteria how fights are scored just to strengthen your argument, he still barely eked out 1 of 2 fights against Volk.

I just love how much he improved from fight 1 to fight 2. Many sherdoggers may forget, but lot of these fools thought Max had "no chance" in a rematch. They were flat our wrong. Max can beat Volk on any given Sunday. And vice versa.

He'll win a few and get a 3rd, and whether he wins or loses that 3rd fight he's still a legend.

 

[Char Jawz]

I would love to see Volkanovski against Patricio Pitbull for that distinction. I think of all the UFC FWs, Volk would have the best chance of winning the UFC/Bellator unification title at FW.

 

[humdizzle]

he's the best featherweight in the ufc. Max got exposed for being a pillow fisted volume striker with no ground game. If he could implement some grappling he might have been able to tire volk out and get a finish in the later rounds.

best fw in the world is pitbull right now. i dont think volk could beat chandler.

 

[george14]

Believe it or not, this actually helps me see the other side. I am a Max fan, but I'm not a Max groupie. He's not a top 5 favorite fighter of mine. I am looking at the situation as unbiased as possible. I think that close fights can still be clear. For example, I had Volk-Max 1 as 4-1 in favor of Volk if not 5-0.

But in the rematch, I rewatched initially and thought Max had 3 rounds. I am open to rewatching it a third time and seeing what I think. I also try to stay close to the judging criteria.

My macro-point was that relying on judges to tell us who the better fighter is is hilariously flawed. If you had different judges judge the second fight, Max could be the best, despite that the fight was the same. But since those particular judges said it was Volk, we kinda take that as meaning the Volk is the better fighter. I try to not look at that way. The fight is the fight. People perceive it differently. The problem? The people we rely on to judge are notoriously bad at their job. A lot of people on this site know more about the sport than they do.

I agree with you for sure. A panel of 3 judges scoring a fight dictates who the public can view as "better" is ridiculous. Then it gets lost in the weeds as time goes on because you get to say "Max lost twice to Volk" without really providing context. A great example of that is Golovkin-Canelo; he is 0-1-1 against Canelo but most people think it should be 2-0 Golovkin or 1-1, hell some think it's 0-0-2. Point being, judges can be wrong and/or biased.

I think there should be more draws in combat sports because many fights are close enough to warrant that.