Hot Take Pick one fighter from the pre-2005 era to become champ today.

[Fedorgasm]

MW vovchanchyn

Serious question, has he ever fought anywhere near that weight? I only followed him once he was a HW in pride

 

[Fedorgasm]

It's crazy to think about how many pre-2005 heavyweights have a legit shot at this.

Randy
Fedor
Mirko
Nog
Barnett
Sylvia
Arlovski

Not to mention Sergei/Mir/Coleman/Schultz as others have mentioned ITT

 

[Neck&Neck]

You could also pull 2004 GSP in to fight Islam. But that's the version of GSP that just lost to Matt Hughes so he was not exactly in his prime yet.

But if you got him right after that loss, he'd be very motivated and would train like crazy. It's the start of his prime.

Yeah I was going to go Georges but was a little earlier in his UFC career, so went with the current champ Hughes

 

[Cletus Fertitta]

Sakuraba fighting people his size would be really intriguing.

 

[dipstickjimmy]

Pre motorcycle injury Frank Mir would beat Tom Aspinall or Cyril Gane. He was working on the intricacies of maneuvers that modern day HWs don't even know the names of 20+ years ago

Yeah but he tapped to strikes.

 

[Fedorgasm]

Sakuraba fighting people his size would be really intriguing.

Yeah he'd either be fighting Islam or Khamzat though, depending on whether he felt like cutting weight.

Those would be tough matchups for sak

 

[Koala]

LHW Fedor Emelianenko

 

[Fedorgasm]

LHW Fedor Emelianenko

What's funny is that Fedor seemed to perform better against bigger guys.

The times when he fought guys close to LHW size were not his best performances.

He beat Randleman but not before being victimized by arguably the greatest suplex ever in an MMA fight.

He beat Lindland but almost got put on his back and had to grab the ropes to prevent it.

And of course we all saw what happened vs hendo and Bader (twice).

 

[aerius]

Pride Shogun with a couple months of training to get used to the cage will wreck the entire 2025 LHW division.

 

[Bullitt68]

Prime Cro Cop could've beaten Aspinall and Gane in the same night. Prime Fedor could've beaten them at the same time.

 

[HI SCOTT NEWMAN]

Dan Severn for certain!

 

[HuskySamoan]

Mark Schultz was a former Olympic gold medalist and TKO’d Goodridge on a few hours notice in his lone UFC fight. I think a full MMA camp Mark could have a good chance to beat Gane or Tom for HW gold. Styles make fights and good luck stopping those shots lol.

Mark Schultz was pretty undersized. Hed need more than 1 training camp to beat those guys, no fucking shot. We've seen Olympic medalists who spent years pursuing MMA now, like quite a lot of them at this point. Not only do people stop their shots, they take them down lmao.

Gable is going to be a fun experiment, since hes so young and so talented. And also HW is so terrible. But we've seen at HW a lot of world class wrestlers too now.

 

[jsbx45]

Fedor. I believe.

 

[Aluminati]

Prime Gomi vs Ilia Topuria

 

[RockyLockridge]

I don't think BJ Penn could beat topuria, but given the fact that the fight would be 12 weeks from now, he'd be fighting gaethje or paddy, and I think he could beat either one.

Imo BJ Penn would have to be a bw in today's UFC landscape to be competitive now

 

[funksoulbrother]

Bas rutten

 

[TheNewGame]

Imo BJ Penn would have to be a bw in today's UFC landscape to be competitive now

Prime Penn had a competitive fight with Machida, GSP and Hughes.

 

[WOLVERINEKILLS]

Prime Wanderli vs Poatan at LHW would be a fun fight.

 

[beater81]

2005 Gomi shadow realms Topuria

 

[KO Shotz]

Chuck, Wanderlei, or Shogun vs Pereira or BJ vs Ilia.