How do you rate Usman's reign as champion?

[empsim]

Could've had a much better title reign without the 2 Masvidal fights.

 

[Lee_]

Leon Edwards is a bad dude bro

I agree, I just don't think he matches up that well with Us.

 

[aali14]

Not the greatest reign.

5 title defenses, 2 of it came from cherry picking C level fighter Masvidal, which also happened to be the two only wins where he was dominant in his defenses.

The other 3 title defenses against Colby and Burns he struggled and was nowhere near dominant.

It was also very clear he was trying his best to avoid the Khamzat fight, thankfully for Usman, Leon solved that problem for him, now he doesn't have to worry about Khamzat anymore.

 

[benebox]

He had a good run with some really impressive performances. I did score the Colby rematch against him but seem to be in the slight minority.

 

[Mack Yancy]

Cleared out the division? He defended the title against three different people, one of which was Masvidal. Compare that to GSP, who defended against nine unique fighters and held the belt for nearly twice as long as Usman did.



You seem to forget how massive the Masviadal Hype Train was. I remember MMA fans calling him the best boxer in the UFC. Usman beat who the UFC (and the fans) put in front of him twice. People like you can only downplay Masvidal in retrospect. You were on his nuts back in the day.

 

[SuperAlly]

Marty has a dub over Leon and won almost every round they fought in. If Leon had not gotten a title shot very few would have been like "the one thing Martys resume was missing was a win over prime Leon Edwards". He got a title shot because of the viral hit "i believe i deserve a title shot next".

What a terrible, terrible take.

 

[The_Demon_In_Me]

Usman the best african champion

 

[You Will Vote For Dreyga]

You are a moron and make pretty terrible posts/threads.

Edwards was the #1 contender on a NINE FIGHT WIN STREAK. It is literally impossible to have 'cleaned out the division' when there is a #1 contender you last fought SEVEN YEARS AGO on a nine fight streak.

When they finally fought, Usman got knocked out.

For the benefit of everyone else, please post less. You're terrible at it.

And he did all that after LOSING to Usman. And will most likely lose the the trilogy

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

He cleaned out the division and wound up doing rematches.

You can always spin something to try to belittle it but .... why?

He is a solid #3 all time at WW behind GSP and Hughes. His fights with Colby were epic, his KO of Masvidal was potential KO of the year.

Agree. Colby fights were great, Burns is super dangerous, beat Jorge to sleep at his own game, controlled Leon mostly.

I think Usman has a good argument to be #2 personally. Hughes has some pretty soft title defenses and benefited from 170 being the lightest available option. Could go either way IMO.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

I mean he was winning on points, but not really dominating that fight. He was on his way to winning 3-2 if he survived, unless the fifth turned into a rout, which would have ended in a draw.

But the key thing is that he hadn't exhausted Edwards, or punished him enough to break him down. Edwards was relatively crisp in the fifth, and thus still dangerous.

Overall Edwards is clearly a top all time WW. I'd put him at third, but very close to 2nd. I think he could surpass Hughes with a late career surge.

I don’t think we can properly rate Leon until he fights the top guys of his era. It’s not entirely his fault, but Luque, RDA and Nelson are his best wins leading up to Usman.

And the details of the Usman win matter. He was losing (it was never going to be 3-2, it was 4-1 or a Hail Mary KO). He was showing no spark. Usman took his foot off the gas. Leon landed an amazing kick. Without the kick no one is even going to make the case that he’s top ten all time. Jumping to #2 seems crazy to me but it’s an interesting conversation.

 

[OverhandLoop]

Fantastic fighter. Skilled as hell. Great career and for sure a hall of famer. Dominated his division, and indeed is even an all-time great. However, the early comparisons to GSP never sat well with me.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

Great fighter, and good resume overall—but his reign specifically? Meh…his reign is just Colby twice and Masvidal twice, plus Burns. Colby didn’t deserve his 2nd shot, and Mas didn’t deserve either shot.

Whether you think Colby deserved it or not, that’s a really big challenge. It’s not Usman’s fault that they didn’t make Colby beat up Jorge and someone else first. And while Jorge 100% did not deserve that rematch, Usman’s performance was spectacular. Woodley is also very dangerous and no one had solved that puzzle. Burns is no throw-in either, he’s awesome. And while the Leon fight ended in disaster, Usman proved once again to be a step ahead of the division until he got caught slipping. In my opinion it is a very strong body of work.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

You show a list of top 10 guys in the division from a contemporary time, then scratch Leon's name off even though when they fought he was 2-1 and not ranked in the top 30 lol

Stop and use critical thinking.

When both guys were ranked and fought, Leon knocked Usman out.

If you’re going to accuse him of not providing the full context then don’t do the same thing. “Usman got knocked out” is far from the full story from that fight. But like he said, we’ll learn more from the rematch, assuming it happens.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

Marty has a dub over Leon and won almost every round they fought in. If Leon had not gotten a title shot very few would have been like "the one thing Martys resume was missing was a win over prime Leon Edwards". He got a title shot because of the viral hit "i believe i deserve a title shot next".

Agree. Leon did deserve a title shot based on the number of consecutive wins but he hadn’t done anything to make anyone think he was the guy. If odds were released for every potential Usman fight at that time, Leon probably would have had the 5th or 6th best odds.

 

[DreyDay]

I really would like to see him against Shavedcat

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

Very highly. While Masvidal wasn't a great opppnent Marty dominated Woodley and Burns and also beat Colby twice. That is more quality than any run in the smaller weight classes except MMs. Volks is probably in the ballpark but he's more starved for quality opponents.

He also completely and savagely buried Jorge. It’s not just the wins and losses but the quality of the performances that matter in these conversations. Volk-Max III. GSP-Koscheck II. BJ’s entire run.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

I really would like to see him against Shavedcat

Yea that’s what that headkick deprived us of (at least temporarily). Usman’s path to GSP land was to shut down Khamzat and Shavkat. There’s was a chance he was gonna get them a bit before their peak, but now they’ve got got a minimum of 6 months to a year of extra training (and extra age and damage on Usman).

 

[Fioretti]

Second best ever at WW. If he recaptures, defends a few times, and gets another finish or two, he surpasses GSP.

 

[Gamer2k4]

You seem to forget how massive the Masviadal Hype Train was. I remember MMA fans calling him the best boxer in the UFC. Usman beat who the UFC (and the fans) put in front of him twice. People like you can only downplay Masvidal in retrospect. You were on his nuts back in the day.

People like me, huh? I would love to see you point to a post of mine where I voiced any opinion like that. (Heck, I don't think I've ever praised Masvidal at all.)

I do remember the UFC pushing Masvidal like crazy, but that doesn't mean a darn thing. I'm pretty sure the general sentiment here (and certainly one I held) is that if you have to fight for a made-up BMF belt, you're never going to be good enough to get the real one.

 

[ineverpost]

He'll get the belt back barring some mental lapses from being KTFO. The head kick is the great equalizer and no one has ever dared throw kicks like that against him due to his wrestling. Would like to see more strikers willing to do this against NCAA stylists. They usually spend the entire fight worried about the take down and it doesn't even matter because their 2 years (or sometimes less) of amateur wrestling training not going to matter against a champion level wrestler. Just let the strikes fly.