Who will be the next WORLD CHAMPION to break the MAGIC EIGHT?

[SirKratos]

Um, does draw count as a succesful tilte defence?

Ofc it does

 

[Keithhackney]

Why 8? Why not 7 and put Ronda in there? Or 9 and take Jones out? Seems arbitrary.

Probably because 8 excludes Ronda and includes Jones. Jones is an all time great, Ronda was in the right place at the right time.

 

[Yangpetrus]

Michael Perry

 

[AZZA B]

Robert Whittaker is still only about 27 years old and with Romero out the way he could go on a good run

 

[McBlaze]

Joanna is the best, that is all

 

[Mbmmax]

Any fighter can have one good title fight and win gold. Then a proportion of those champs had what it took to string together two good title fights and mount a successful defense of their crown. A smaller proportion than that managed to defend twice. Still fewer compiled 3. Etc. This isn't news to most of you. Any non-casual knows why 8+ defenses is considered the toughest ask in the game. The challenge of winning a title in a second division is nothing to sniff at (even if you do outweigh your "bigger" opponent) but compared to the EPIC SAGA that must be written to encompass 8+ defenses of a World Title, winning a mere 2 title fights in separate divisions is relatively small fry.

Only five masters of the game have achieved this monumental task.

• 11 DJ
• 10 Spider (robbed of 11th by Lutter's lack of professionalism missing weight)
• 9 GSP
• 9 Jose Scarface
• 8 Jonny Bones

Ronda fell at 7. Joanna, Hughes and Tito all fell at 5.

So which of the current champs, if any, has what it takes to join that small, elite band of LEGENDS who have cracked 8+, and expand THE FABULOUS FIVE to THE SPLENDID SIX?

• 1 Thug Rose
• 0 Nicco
• 3 Amanda Leao
• 2 Cyborg
• 0 Henry
• 1 Max Blessed
• 0 The Eagle
• 3 T-Wood
• 0 Robert Knuckles (robbed of 1 by Romero's lack of professionalism missing weight)
• 2 DC
• 0 DC

I would pick Cyborg because she apeaapp the most dominant, however Khabib may be a good choice if he gets past Conor.

 

[Crimson Glory]

DC or T-Wood.

That's who my money is on.

 

[Kaiokenrye24]

I think TJ can get pretty close, I just hope Max gets back soon. He's an alltimer if this isnt serious, even if he has to go to 155

 

[QcChopper]

Conor.

 

[wookie brawl]

Conor.

This is a thread about record title defences not record number of titles stripped.

 

[THEGOATOFMMA]

DJ should be at 12.

Joke decision.

 

[Rum]

Why 8? Why not 7 and put Ronda in there? Or 9 and take Jones out? Seems arbitrary.

It is somewhat arbitrary and I have nothing against Ronda. I mean, you can ask who will break the record, but to me that's a separate idea. So I'm less interested in getting at who might, by some miracle, take the #1 spot than thinking of an elite group, because if the premise is anyone can have one or two good nights and win a title fight or two, then the difference between 10 and 11, or between 9 and 10, or even between 9 and 11, is maybe not a whole lot.

But the proportion of fighters who've won 1 or 2 and gone on to win 4 or more title fights in succession is far, faaaaaaaar smaller than the proportion who've won one or two, so the four title fight difference between 7 and 11 feels fairly significant.

The whole idea is it's an elite group, so you want to limit it fairly rigorously. I was going to make it 9, because that'd be DJ and the 3 other guys who were within 2 of his record, but leaving Jones out of the elite group seemed goofy.

 

[Fossor]

Valentina.

 

[Sonny Qc]

I would bet on DJ winning Back His title and going on another run

 

[imarayda]

I think woodly can do it. 8 defenses does seem like a random number

 

[Maaj19]

Benavidez beat him a little over a year ago. Lol

In a pretty clear robbery

 

[Sirwastealot]

Literally all the 2 weight champions have been gifted a title shot at at least once.

Easier to win a title when you get a shot despite being 0-0 in the division.

So are we now pretending that it is just easy to beat the champion of a higher weight class. Like that guy who's champ after beating all the top contenders, he's easy! The real difficult fights are guys ranked 2, 5 and 8.

It's still impressive af to beat another champ. And DC, on top of being the LHW champ, also had multiple wins at HW in UFC and was the strikeforce HW champ. You can't even pretend he didn't deserve that shot. If Stipe beat him it would have been the best win of his career too.

 

[LEWIS540]

So are we now pretending that it is just easy to beat the champion of a higher weight class. Like that guy who's champ after beating all the top contenders, he's easy! The real difficult fights are guys ranked 2, 5 and 8.

It's still impressive af to beat another champ. And DC, on top of being the LHW champ, also had multiple wins at HW in UFC and was the strikeforce HW champ. You can't even pretend he didn't deserve that shot. If Stipe beat him it would have been the best win of his career too.

Duh.

I am saying it is harder to beat 2-4 top contenders to earn your title shot rather than be gifted it on name value.

GSP beating say, Jacare and Romero to earn a MW title shot is far more impressive (and just) then inexplicably being given a title shot at a weight he had never fought at, having not fought in 4 years.

DC (and maybe Randy) was obviously not as bad as GSP, McGregor and BJ. Still it’s not a meritocracy.

 

[gevoudane]

Unfortunately I dont think any of them will. Cyborg would have the best chance but I dont think she will even do it.

 

[Dark Individual]

Khabib would have done it but he got his title way too late and he'd probably retire in 2 years