A New Breed of UFC Heavyweight: Implications for the Division

Perplexing as it seemed, the UFC’s heavyweight division was always considered both the weakest and most unpopular weight class. Whilst boxing always thrived on big money heavy-weight match ups, the UFC failed to instill the same interest.

Quite possibly the draw of many fight fans for a heavyweight boxing match was that a fight could be ended at any minute with just one punch. But in UFC, one-punch power holds slightly less significance when a fight can be ended just as quickly by a head kick, a knee, or a submission.

Additionally, the popularity of the light-heavyweight division meant that anyone capable of making the cut to the more lucrative weight class took the opportunity to shed the lbs.  The result was an uninspired heavyweight division propped up by fighters too lazy to make the cut and a few genuine heavyweights.

However, the landscape of the heavyweight division has now changed. Recently we have witnessed a new influx of heavyweight fighters who are bigger, stronger and strangely enough, faster. The UFC’s new heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar now cuts to make weight.  Not far behind him is Shane Carwin, a guy who can seemingly knock anyone out with a jab. Not only are these guy’s strong, but they are improving in all areas with each fight. In Brock's fight with Randy Couture it was clear that size was the real issue. 

This begs the question of what implications this new breed of heavy-weight have for the division. Is a 206 lower limit and a 265 upper limit sufficient?

If things continue the way they are heading, I think the answer is most certainly no.

Whilst a super heavy-weight division is already sanctioned for fighters over 265 lbs, I don’t think it offers a solution.  Instead I believe that the current UFC heavyweight division would need reclassifying into a 206-225 lbs heavyweight and 226-265 lbs super heavyweight division.

Would this work?

I have discussed this issue with a number of fighters and have come to the same decision each time. Splitting the heavyweight division would benefit both the heavy-weight and light heavyweight divisions.

Whilst many would tend to disagree with my stance on this, my reasoning is as follows.

The 205 lbs light heavyweight division is stacked. So much so in fact that I believe it hampers the future growth of the division. The sheer depth of the 205 lbs roster make it almost impossible to breed the next generation of 205 lbs, because there are just so many big names already there.

If we consider a fighter like Machida who is 6-0 inside the UFC (14-0 overall).  Whilst he is slatted to fight for the title, it has taken him six straight wins, coupled with the fact that Rampage was unable to fight in May to get this shot.  If Rampage wasn’t injured it’s quite likely that we would have seen Machida fighting again before a getting his shot.

As a result I think that skimming off some off the bigger 205 lbs fighters wouldn’t make the division any less interesting. In fact it might open it up so we could get a better progression for up and comers like Jon Jones (instead of putting them on the undercard).  It would also provide a better home for some of the light heavyweight fighters who need to cut too much weight. Fighters like Shogun and Vera and Liddell would be much more effective at this kind of weight class as they would have more energy and would be more explosive.

As for the current heavy-weight division, I did the maths and the average weight is already 240 lbs. Now, bearing in mind that, unlike any other division; most heavyweights don’t need to cut weight to make the upper-limit, we know that this is a fairly accurate record the average fighter’s weight.  It can also be argued that bar Randy Couture, none of the UFC’s top 10 heavyweights are under this average weight anyway.  So splitting the division wouldn’t take away from what ever depth the division does have.

So to sum up I believe that a new 206-225 lbs division would not adversely affect the light heavy-weight or heavyweight divisions. Instead, I believe it would create a new, better-suited division for some of the guys just too small to be legitimate heavyweight and yet too big to challenge at light heavyweight.