Top 10 strikers in MMA history: Who are?

[Royce Greasy]

1.Mirko Cro Cop
2.Pedro Rizzo
3.Bas Rutten/Anderson Silva
4.Vitor Belfort/Chuck Liddell
5.Igor Vovchanchyn
6.Junior Dos Santos/Francis Ngannou
7.Mark Hunt
8.Wanderlei Silva/Mauricio Rua
9.Gilbert Yvel
10.Maurice Smith

Honorable mentions : Alistair Overeem, Alex Pereira career is still ongoing, Cung Le, Andrei Arlovski, Sergei Kharitonov.

 

[Royce Greasy]

JDS defeated Miocic too. Yvel, Nelson, Rothwell, Lewis, Tuivasa, CroCop and Hunt are primarily strikers...

Even though Francis beat JDS I really believe he got him at the very end of his career at his worse, if they would have fought earlier I believe JDS would have beat him and his KO's and finishes are just as good, Francis also got outstruck by Lewis and Miocic nothing wrong with that but he ain't the most fearsome guy on the feet like some claim.

 

[GOATtalks]

1- Poatan
2- Anderson
3- Conor
4- Izzy
5- Gane
6- Aspinall
7- Holloway
8- Volk
9- O’Malley
10- Ngannou

 

[Marko Polo]

No Wonderboy? MVP? I’d put Robbie Lawler above a lot of those guys. Macheeta

 

[KavkazDominance]

One fight doesn’t define an entire career, and certainly not one sequence and punch. Volk has been proven vs better opposition with his striking.

You have to look at how their striking compares to a series of opponents

Then we can argue that Volkanovski is the general best proven striker but between Volk and Topuria, Topuria is the best striker. Because styles make fights. And Volkanovski style has been proven more efficient than Topuria, even though if we compare their both styles, Topuria's style beats his. Idk if that makes sense.

 

[whocares]

1. Ryan Hall
2. Khabib
3. Belal
4. Aljo
5. Askren
6. Robelis Despainge
7. Raquel Pennington
8. Jon Goulet
9. Anthony Smith
10. CM Punk

off the top of my head

 

[pick999]

Gsp
Silva
Overeem
Jon
Izzy
Fedor
Crocop
Machida
Vitor
Robert

 

[Hotora86]

I'm a big Machida's fan ,but when the figthers learned how handle him his performances declined considerably. He outsclassed lots of wreslters and strikers of a lower level as Thiago Silva, but had problems with Shogun and Rampage. I think he had the same Liddell problems with great strikers with a single punch power

I respectfully disagree.
The decline of Lyoto's performance was caused by two factors:
1) age and slowing down
2) abandonment of his usual strategy and looking for the KO due to pressure from fans, Dana and the UFC

After the close Shogun fight he came into the rematch guns blazing - which worked well enough against a non-striker like Evans but was disastrous against a veteran like Rua. These two fights killed his aura and that really made it harder for him to impose his will on fighters as well as before.

As for the "figured out" fallacy - I find this to be completely false since excellent fighters like Randy Couture, Mousasi, Hendo, Bader etc still lost despite supposedly "knowing" how to beat him after Rua did.

And since you mentioned "problems with Rampage" - the only one having problems in that fight was Page himself. He missed most of what he threw in that fight and got whooped (as per his own admission) in the 3rd rnd. Robbery.

 

[Hotora86]

I disagree.
What changed was perception.
Before the loss to Rua, he was amazingly "elusive".
But after Rua 1, the perception changed to "he runs too much".
So he tried to become more aggressive on the second fight and got ko'd.
After that, people actually punished him for being elusive. That's why he lost to rampage.
And it happened again against Mr. Wonderful in Brazil! A fight he clearly won, but the judges gave it to Davis.

So I think fighters never truly "learned to handle" Machida.
The perception of "too defensive" forced him outside of his style.

Well said, 100%

 

[DanDragon Machi]

1- Poatan
2- Anderson
3- Conor
4- Izzy
5- Gane
6- Aspinall
7- Holloway
8- Volk
9- O’Malley
10- Ngannou

Great list

But I think Jones striking is being understemating here. It's about efficient too

 

[DanDragon Machi]

I respectfully disagree.
The decline of Lyoto's performance was caused by two factors:
1) age and slowing down
2) abandonment of his usual strategy and looking for the KO due to pressure from fans, Dana and the UFC

After the close Shogun fight he came into the rematch guns blazing - which worked well enough against a non-striker like Evans but was disastrous against a veteran like Rua. These two fights killed his aura and that really made it harder for him to impose his will on fighters as well as before.

As for the "figured out" fallacy - I find this to be completely false since excellent fighters like Randy Couture, Mousasi, Hendo, Bader etc still lost despite supposedly "knowing" how to beat him after Rua did.

And since you mentioned "problems with Rampage" - the only one having problems in that fight was Page himself. He missed most of what he threw in that fight and got whooped (as per his own admission) in the 3rd rnd. Robbery.

I disagree of the second setence, Machida lost by Rampage and Davis because was too conservative. Against Shogun II I agree
It was hard for me as an Lyoto fan watch him being mauled by Rockhold and Romero on standing up

 

[DanDragon Machi]

As for the "figured out" fallacy - I find this to be completely false since excellent fighters like Randy Couture, Mousasi, Hendo, Bader etc still lost despite supposedly "knowing" how to beat him after Rua did.

He won Hendo by a very small margin. Was as much as Hendo is dangerous to anyone, Lyoto striking is much superior and the fight took place almost entirely in his area

 

[Vil7]

I think Stipe should be somewhere on that list.

 

[Fedorgasm]

This not includes only technique but also efficiency, physical quality, one punch power and endurence

My list:

1- Anderson Silva
2 - Alex Poatan
3 - Connor Mcgregor
4 - Israel Adesanya
5 - Jon Jones
6 - Max Holloway
7 - Robert Whittaker
8 - Tom Aspinall
9 - Francis Nganou
10 -Volkanovski

I wouldn't put Jones on there. He's completely pillow-fisted.

 

[Hotora86]

I disagree of the second setence, Machida lost by Rampage and Davis because was too conservative. Against Shogun II I agree
It was hard for me as an Lyoto fan watch him being mauled by Rockhold and Romero on standing up

Davis landed 2 TDs and nothing else.
Machida actually landed punches.
All news outlets and Dana himself scored the fight for Machida.

 

[GOATtalks]

Great list

But I think Jones striking is being understemating here. It's about efficient too

Yes, his striking is amazing, but I feel it wouldn’t be as effective as it is without the takedown threat.

 

[ChessJitsu]

In terms of raw skill it's mostly going to consist of the greats of the last 5 years I think but if you adjust it for how they stood against the fighters of their era I think it looks like this:

1. A. Silva (had no rivals in the stand-up at his peak)
2. Paotan (would probably beat prime Anderson but unlike A. SIlva he has rivals)
3. Aldo (going to put him above McGregor for longevity)
4. McGregor
5. Cro Cop
6. Jon Jones
7. Shevchenko
8. Shogun
9. Holloway
10. O'Malley (too soon but he's just so good)

 

[muaythaibeast]

Outstruck by a Machida out of his prime

There's no shame in being outstruck by Machida. He's an all time great striker.

 

[DanDragon Machi]

In terms of raw skill it's mostly going to consist of the greats of the last 5 years I think but if you adjust it for how they stood against the fighters of their era I think it looks like this:

1. A. Silva (had no rivals in the stand-up at his peak)
2. Paotan (would probably beat prime Anderson but unlike A. SIlva he has rivals)
3. Aldo (going to put him above McGregor for longevity)
4. McGregor
5. Cro Cop
6. Jon Jones
7. Shevchenko
8. Shogun
9. Holloway
10. O'Malley (too soon but he's just so good)

Shevchenko is great, but she had to became a wreslter against Grasso

 

[Bowel-forged Stool]

Even though Francis beat JDS I really believe he got him at the very end of his career at his worse, if they would have fought earlier I believe JDS would have beat him and his KO's and finishes are just as good, Francis also got outstruck by Lewis and Miocic nothing wrong with that but he ain't the most fearsome guy on the feet like some claim.