UFC roster currently at 988.

[Sticko]

This is per the UFC website. I remember when the roster got to about 5-600 and people were saying it was way too bloated. What number do you think makes sense?

UFC is notoriously bad at updating their own website. They do not have 988 active fighters.
If they do around 48 cards a year, with roughly 11 fights each, the average fighter probably fights a little less than 2x a year. So they need close to 600 fighters

 

[The Fat Mexican]

Way too many of these guys still belong to the regional circuits and should still be developing their skills before making it to the UFC... and that's probably one of the reasons why so many cards are watered down these days.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

642 is the number I get using the wiki of debuted fighters and adding the recent signings to it.

 

[Hellowhosthat]

And somehow Dana doesnt know who Alexander Schlemenko is. But then you've got Carlos Ulberg, a guy who is either 3-0 or 5-0 depending on where you look, which includes a win over "unknown fighter", competing at 259.

I tend to believe Dana when it comes to that, it's not really his job and I doubt he really watches MMA outside the UFC. I'm sure Shelby and Maynard know who he is.

 

[wearetheromans]

who is #988 p4p?

Cm punk

 

[Hellowhosthat]

Scanning through just the A fighters on this list and good lord someone needs to update this. It has Corey Anderson there, it has Olaf Alfonso there for some reason who never fought for the UFC and has been retired for years, Thiago Alves is still there etc etc.

The roster on the Fight Pass app is much more up to date.

 

[Pastinaca1]

This is why most cards suck. They focus on quantity instead of quality

 

[Garnet_StrongerThanYou]

Unless they start doing a lot of midweek cards, the maximum number of fights that the UFC can possibly put on in a year is 550. It takes 2 fighters per fight, so that is 1100 fighter slots per year. For fighters to average between 2 and 2.5 fights per year, the UFC needs between 440 and 550 fighters.

a lot of guys don’t fight.

 

[Askafan]

The site says 732 and even that figure includes many fighters who are gone, for example it lists 151 females including the likes of Tate and Cyborg ...... the actual figure is less than 120.

Try wikipedia, it's more accurate, if imperfect.

 

[TIMELESS TRUTH]

I remember when the fans here had to spend PPV money to watch fights, the fighters were much more important to us back then.

Who the fuck cares to sit through a million shitty fights just to pretend to care about the sport now?

The hordes of mediocre fighters and fans like to feel desperately connected and massage their egos through Twitter! What a joke...

 

[Hellowhosthat]

I remember when the fans here had to spend PPV money to watch fights, the fighters were much more important to us back then.

Who the fuck cares to sit through a million shitty fights just to pretend to care about the sport now?

The hordes of mediocre fighters and fans like to feel desperately connected and massage their egos through Twitter! What a joke...

Even then did people really care about Red Schafer and Ninja Roberts?

 

[Eiger]

During the UFC 258 post-fight press conference, a reporter asked Dana when Kamaru Usman will be getting more mainstream sponsorships, and if the UFC-Endeavor can help with that, and Dana replies that he's tied to 475 fighters that all need to be promoted and helped out in that way, and it's not as simple as one may assume. So my takeaway after hearing that was that there's 475 fighters on the roster, or that it is at least the UFC's goal to get to that number.

Cue'd up

 

[Char Jawz]

I used to play "World of Mixed Martial Arts 4 & 5" with the real world UFC mods. I would do 48 cards a year with 16 fights (usually with one 4 man tourney per card) and had to keep a roster of at least 800 fighters to keep it going. There were various injuries and suspensions to deal with too.

I don't play it these days...too time consuming.

The point is, these numbers don't surprise me. I had the feature turned off where fighters could refuse fights, so I didn't have to deal with that shit at least.

 

[Char Jawz]

360. Capped at thirty per division, give or take a few.

That would work if no one got USADA'd, injured, put in jail, refused to fight or whatever else comes up in UFC match making issues. Unfortunately they need twice that many because half the fighters are dealing with some kind of bullshit half the time.

 

[Joseph_McBride]

The card of the year is today, & still sherdoggers will find a way to spend the day bitching & complaining.

 

[Pepy]

who is #988 p4p?

Jessica Eye

 

[mma03]

Who is that in the background, walking towards the camera. That subtle bounce, nice.

 

[Huligani]

It should only have about a third of that.

 

[GrantB13]

By reading the thread, it seems like this is inaccurate. But the point still stands, they have way to many freaking fighters. If the UFC is supposed to be the best of the best then it makes little sense to have people who aren't even ranked, but they should probably limit it to the top 30 of each division for 15 ranked and then the next 15 unranked. That would give the UFC 330 fighters (360 if you count women's 145, but lol). I think the problem is that the UFC needs so many cheap guys to fill the gaps because most of the top guys only fight once or twice a year or are so picky that they sit out for long periods.

 

[GrantB13]

The card of the year is today, & still sherdoggers will find a way to spend the day bitching & complaining.

It's the first week of the third month of the year. A little early to call it the card of the year.