Top 10 fighters - why are they not elite?

Naos

Naos

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Why do people not consider the Top 10 fighters of each division elite?

These are arguably the Top 10 fighters in the WORLD at that weightclass. In. The. World.
That means you put them up against pretty much any other fighter in the same weightclass on the planet and they'll run through them.

There is a thread on here saying Nick Diaz is not elite as he loses against the top 5. It's madness.
 
Heheh did you just read my post from that thread?


Blayt7hh said:
I guess my point is that since the definition of elite doesn't set any kind of exact standard for what determines an elite MMA fighter, then considering a fighter who has beaten some top ten fighters as an elite fighter isn't really a silly belief. And of course Guida was elite, he has wins over a lot of top fighters.
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because theres no offical rankings system , and can depend on the division
ww is jam packed with eleite talent that would be beasts anyhere they go.........hw not so much when guys like shuab and mitrione are there
 
Naos said:
Why do people not consider the Top 10 fighters of each division elite?

These are arguably the Top 10 fighters in the WORLD at that weightclass. In. The. World.
That means you put them up against pretty much any other fighter in the same weightclass on the planet and they'll run through them.

There is a thread on here saying Nick Diaz is not elite as he loses against the top 5. It's madness.
Click to expand...

It's a relative term based on taking a subset out of a larger group. The size of the subset is subjective. People who say that fighters in the top ten are not necessarily elite have chosen a smaller subset.
 
Albert Tumenov should feel bad that he is not as elite as Felice Herrig.
 
Naos said:
Why do people not consider the Top 10 fighters of each division elite?

These are arguably the Top 10 fighters in the WORLD at that weightclass. In. The. World.
That means you put them up against pretty much any other fighter in the same weightclass on the planet and they'll run through them.

There is a thread on here saying Nick Diaz is not elite as he loses against the top 5. It's madness.
Click to expand...

Elite: "a select part of a group that is superior to the rest in terms of ability or qualities"
MMA has so many aspects - sometimes you just don't feel that the top 10 is really that superior.

Brett Rogers became top 10 after his KO of Arlovski - but no one considered him really too big of a quality.
Or even top contender Sonnen - wrestling elite, but anything else?...
 
Naos said:
Why do people not consider the Top 10 fighters of each division elite?

These are arguably the Top 10 fighters in the WORLD at that weightclass. In. The. World.
That means you put them up against pretty much any other fighter in the same weightclass on the planet and they'll run through them.

There is a thread on here saying Nick Diaz is not elite as he loses against the top 5. It's madness.
Click to expand...
OMG the entire world. But 'top 10' is as arbitrary as it gets isn't it. Why not top 8, or top 20, or top 5?
 
basementdweller said:
OMG the entire world. But 'top 10' is as arbitrary as it gets isn't it. Why not top 8, or top 20, or top 5?
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You're right - lets go with top 20.

The point is, people complain that Nick or McGregor is not fighting elite fighters. It's stupid.
 
If you're not top 3 you're a can here and need to reinvent your career.
 
Naos said:
You're right - lets go with top 20.

The point is, people complain that Nick or McGregor is not fighting elite fighters. It's stupid.
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yeah Nate is only elite if you consider Bisping elite. Either way Nate isn't the kind of elite that can be really competitive against McGregor. Upsets happen but the disparity in this fight is big. Nate got picked apart very hard by RDA and Thomson. McGregor shouldn't have many problems with him.
 
Well if MMA were like football/soccer with a billion+ people doing it worldwide then the top 10 of every division would indeed be elite. But it's a niche sport with a very shallow talent pool, and there is typically a sharp skill drop off before hitting the double digits within any given division, and more often than not the top guy him/herself isn't even elite to begin with.

Of course, ultimately it depends on what your definition of elite is.
 
It's all relative. Every NFL quarterback in 100x better quarterback than guy on the street. But there are only 5-6 elite ones within NFL. How is this possible because you're comparing them to other NFL quarterbacks.
 
It's a relative term.

If in 10 years time the best 100 metres runner in the world can only do it in 15 seconds, they are not elite.

They may be the best in the world at the time, but their skills do not equate to being elite.

In 50 years time people won't be singing praises of Ben Rothwell for example. Sure, he's on a tear at the moment and looking like an absolute beast, but he isn't an elite fighter, he's just one of the best of a bad bunch.
 
I would call everyone in top 10, in male divisions in the UFC elite.
 
Because a lot of people probably think of elite as meaning 'realistic title contenders.' Many divisions are so shallow, you don't even need quality wins just a semi-decent winstreak to make it to a high ranking eg. Jimi Manuwa, Bethe Correia, Paige VanZant, or even Matt Mitrione and Fabio Maldonado who were almost top 10. Also it's really hard to get pushed out of the top 10 if you've been there for a while in shallow divisions so far past prime guys have often stayed ranked when they seemed no longer viable contenders eg. Big Nog, Lil Nog, Shogun, Rampage, Hendo etc.

In such cases ie. where they are really quite unproven or past prime it's far from obvious that the 'top 10' fighter would run through almost anyone who isn't ranked top 10. A top 10 ranking has even less value in certain ultra shallow divisions that don't exist yet in the UFC such as women's 105 or 145 where you can become top 10 while having 2 or 3 fights. When it wouldn't even be a huge surprise if a random debuting fighter could beat the top 10, it's hard to call them definitively 'elite...'
 
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It's semantics, people can argue forever.

Ultimately, all they're arguing about is the definition of the word 'elite'.
 
AimedWithV said:
Elite: "a select part of a group that is superior to the rest in terms of ability or qualities"
MMA has so many aspects - sometimes you just don't feel that the top 10 is really that superior.

Brett Rogers became top 10 after his KO of Arlovski - but no one considered him really too big of a quality.
Or even top contender Sonnen - wrestling elite, but anything else?...
Click to expand...
Sonnens wrestling was almost enougn to beat prime Silva.
 
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