Rewatch HW is stalled/dead? Let's crunch some numbers:

[BEATDOWNS]

Once we get rid of the sit out merchant Jones the division will thrive again.

 

[muaythaibeast]

No one really cared that middleweight was a poor division when Silva was walking through one dimensional guys like Maia, or none dimensional guys like Cote or Lutter.
if the UFC just embrace that they have a champ that is head and shoulders clear of everyone else, that alone creates an aura for the division.

 

[Araquém]

Yeah there has to be a lot of athletic talent out there just from HW NCAA wrestling alone....the vast majority of those guys are done with their athletic career by 22 years old. Only a tiny fraction go on to wrestle at a higher level.

Same thing with college football and basketball, tremendous talent pool of HW sized athletes and only a tiny fraction go on to play professionally. 22 is still a very young age to start training as a HW in MMA, and especially for the wrestlers as they would already be masters in arguably the most important martial art. Football may not be a martial art but I would say that having that elite level of physical development and experience prior to training is a huge advantage in its own right.

This is just from America too, then think about all the HW wrestlers internationally, rugby players, et

 

[Araquém]

Yeah there has to be a lot of athletic talent out there just from HW NCAA wrestling alone....the vast majority of those guys are done with their athletic career by 22 years old. Only a tiny fraction go on to wrestle at a higher level.

Same thing with college football and basketball, tremendous talent pool of HW sized athletes and only a tiny fraction go on to play professionally. 22 is still a very young age to start training as a HW in MMA, and especially for the wrestlers as they would already be masters in arguably the most important martial art. Football may not be a martial art but I would say that having that elite level of physical development and experience prior to training is a huge advantage in its own right.

This is just from America too, then think about all the HW wrestlers internationally, rugby players, etc.Being good at american football have nothing to do with being good at fighting

Yeah there has to be a lot of athletic talent out there just from HW NCAA wrestling alone....the vast majority of those guys are done with their athletic career by 22 years old. Only a tiny fraction go on to wrestle at a higher level.

Same thing with college football and basketball, tremendous talent pool of HW sized athletes and only a tiny fraction go on to play professionally. 22 is still a very young age to start training as a HW in MMA, and especially for the wrestlers as they would already be masters in arguably the most important martial art. Football may not be a martial art but I would say that having that elite level of physical development and experience prior to training is a huge advantage in its own right.

This is just from America too, then think about all the HW wrestlers internationally, rugby players, etc.

Lol! American football have nothing to do with MMA. Being good at that means nothing when comes to fighting

 

[Rio Ferdinand]

If Jon doesn't fight in UFC 317/318/319, then its time to strip him.

 

[Tweak896]

HW belt has been dead so long I don't think it can come back anytime soon

 

[Russie]

Stalled and dead. Jones has it stalled and it's dead due to what the HW roster looks like. It's never had extensive depth but seemingly it's at it's all time worst.

 

[jeff7b9]

Jones was scheduled to fight Tom on 2023-11-11, but pulled out due to injury just over a fortnight beforehand - Interim Belt created.)

Jon was never scheduled to fight Aspinall.
That was the old man Stipe fight which was cancelled and rescheduled for a year later.

Please point out anything I got wrong or missed out, I'll be back later.

 

[jeff7b9]

I dont remember people shitting on HW this hard back when a WWE wrestler won the title in his 4th fight by beating a 45 year old LHW.

"WWE Wrestler"



106-5 Collegiate Wrestling record

55-3 NCAA D1 wrestling record
1998 Juco National Champion
2x Big 10 Conference Champion
2x NCAA D1 All American
1999 BCAA D1 HW runner up
2000 NCAA D1 HW National Champion
National Wrestling Hall Of Fame

 

[AndrewGolota48]

Lol! American football have nothing to do with MMA. Being good at that means nothing when comes to fighting

Yes to a large extent bro, believe me I've argued this many times with clowns that think NFL players are automatically superheroes....but playing football doesn't make them bad fighters either, and all I'm saying is that there is a substantial group of HW sized young men that are athletically inclined. I would guess that there's a higher chance of getting some good pro MMA fighters from that group than from a Weight Watchers program, for example....If given sufficient motivation and participation, you're bound to find some gems in that group that would otherwise go undiscovered.

 

[World eater]

Maybe it’s time the heavyweight part of the forum and the lightweights exchanged the names.

 

[Eric Silva 2.0]

Here are the top seven HWs (I chose seven as I would say they become irrelevant to the belts after that).

Fights in the last five years:

Jones: 2
Tom: 9
Ciryl: 9
Volkov: 11
Pav: 7
Blaydes: 8
Almeida: 12


Fights in the last two years:

Jones: 1
Tom: 3
Ciryl: 2
Volkov: 3
Pav: 4
Blaydes: 3
Almeida: 5


Fights for the Belts in the last five years:

2024-11-16 Jones beat Stipe Defended Belt
2024- 7-27 Tom beat Blaydes Defended Interim Belt
2023-11-11 Tom beat Pav Won Vacant Interim Belt

(Jones was scheduled to fight Tom on 2023-11-11, but pulled out due to injury just over a fortnight beforehand - Interim Belt created.)

2023- 3- 4 Jones beat Gane Won Vacant Belt

(Ngannou leaves the UFC, vacating the belt.)

2022- 1-22 Ngannou beat Gane Unified Belts
2021- 8- 7 Gane beat Lewis Won Interim Belt

(Ngannou can not agree with the UFC on (terms for) his next fight, and an Interim Belt is created.)

2021- 3-27 Ngannou beat Stipe Won Belt
2020- 8-15 Stipe beat DC Defended Belt

Fights for Belt: 8
Of which - for Interim: 4
Of which - for Normal: 4

(So less than one fight for the Normal Belt per year.)

Time elapsed since the Normal Belt has been defended: 5 months
Time elapsed since the Interim Belt has been defended: 9 months
Time the Interim Belt has been held: 1 year, 5 months


Fights for the Belts in the last two years:

2024-11-16 Jones beat Stipe Defended Belt
2024- 7-27 Tom beat Blaydes Defended Interim Belt
2023-11-11 Tom beat Pav Won Vacant Interim Belt

Fights for Belt: 3
Of which - for Interim: 2
Of which - for Normal: 1

Please point out anything I got wrong or missed out, I'll be back later.

I think dead might be going to far but stalled is accurate as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Deleted member 110072]

Stalled and dead. Jones has it stalled and it's dead due to what the HW roster looks like. It's never had extensive depth but seemingly it's at it's all time worst.

That makes Jones sitting out all the worse IMHO, besides him Aspinall doesn't really have any big fights so I think the main way he could build hype would be to be an active champ getting a lot of quick finishes, what he was doing basically before he got put on the shelf by Jones avoiding him.

At least if you have a credible champ people are interested in I think that could potentially help draw in talent, maybe try and get some Glory kickboxers to switch or something.

 

[Islam Imamate]

Just skimmed the OP, but Jon wasn't scheduled to fight Tom when he pulled out, he was scheduled to fight Stipe, and Pavlovich was the backup, then Jon pulled out and instead of Stipe fighting the backup fighter, they pulled him too and called Tom and lied to him to get him to take it by telling it was an "interim title" while still treating him like any other contender after he won, and a year and half later he still hasn't fought for the title and they've made him fight more contenders.

I don't even mind that they made Tom defend the interim belt as I think that should be the norm but he's clearly being treated differently than other interim champs who are basically just #1 contenders, some of whom even claim outright as they win the belt that they won't fight anyone but the champ.

 

[GordoBarraBJJ]

Regardless of what anyone says , tom is the actual champ.

Ducking and fighting a retired fireman doesn't do shit to stake your claim as "champ".

 

[wisdom blows]

Why won’t Jon defend his belt?

 

[Only Here for Attachments]

Regardless of what anyone says , tom is the actual champ.

Ducking and fighting a retired fireman doesn't do shit to stake your claim as "champ".

What about beating the #1-ranked guy prior to said retired fireman?

 

[jeff7b9]

At least if you have a credible champ people are interested in I think that could potentially help draw in talent, maybe try and get some Glory kickboxers to switch or something.

And yet when a Glory Champion Artem Vahkitov who has beaten Alex Pereira wanted to come to the UFC ...

Even AFTER he went to contender series and won...

They offered him a UFC minimum contract

 

[jeff7b9]

Why won’t Jon defend his belt?

 

[Deleted member 110072]

And yet when a Glory Champion Artem Vahkitov who has beaten Alex Pereira wanted to come to the UFC ...

Even AFTER he went to contender series and won...

They offered him a UFC minimum contract

Indeed not a good sign, before that Tyrone Spong was basically screaming "come and get me" to the UFC and nothing happened.

I suspect they only showed interest in Alexs because he had the KO win over Izzy.