Athletes
THE 10 | Amazing Without Being Undisputed
Highlighting The Best Fighters To Compete In The Octagon Without Winning Undisputed Gold In The UFC
Will Ferrell’s fictional NASCAR driver Ricky Bobby best verbalized the misguided way too many people think about success in sports when he said, “If you’re not first, you’re last.”
In reality, there is a massive gulf between those two positions, and chances are that if you asked anyone that rarely made the podium and regularly failed to reach the Top 10, they would all tell you that a second-place finish would be mighty satisfying.
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When it comes to the athletes that compete inside the Octagon, there has long been a negative connotation attached to being “the best fighters to never win undisputed UFC gold,” as if an athlete’s success hinges exclusively on whether they stood atop their respective division or not.
But in the wake of the outpouring of love shown to Jim Miller ahead of his appearance at UFC 300 and ahead of UFC 302 next weekend in New Jersey, it feels like time to recalibrate the conversation around the great fighters that never managed to earn undisputed status in the UFC, and celebrate them for the successes they did enjoy, which is quite a lot.
The 10 athletes below combined to go 121-68-1 with three no contest verdicts over the course of their careers, including a handful of interim title wins and 26 total championship appearances between them.
This is an outstanding pack of competitors that deserve to be celebrated for their triumphs, not remembered for the rare moments when they came up short.
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Please note: these athletes are listed in alphabetical order, not some kind of hierarchy
Joseph Benavidez
It’s fitting that this list begins with Benavidez because he is perhaps the best example of what it means to be absolutely elite without ever having won undisputed UFC gold.
On September 22, 2012, Benavidez fought Demetrious Johnson in a bout to determine the inaugural flyweight champion in UFC history. He lost by split decision, regrouped, beat Ian McCall, Darren Uyenoyama, and Jussier Formiga, and then lost to Johnson again. Undeterred, he rattled off six straight wins before being sidelined by a knee injury and dropping his return bout against Sergio Pettis by split decision.
Once again, Benavidez dusted himself off, posted three consecutive victories over ranked competitors, and landed in two more championship bouts against Deiveson Figueiredo before calling it a career following his loss to Askar Askarov in March 2021.
He was one of the best flyweights on the planet for a decade — a full decade — and only lost to legitimately world-class competition, beating a host of title challengers and perennial contenders along the way.
Belt or no belt, there is no denying that Joe B. was an absolute stud.
Colby Covington
This one is probably going to be hard for some people to take because Covington can rub some folks the wrong way when positioned in front of a microphone or camera, but if we’re speaking strictly about skills and ability, results in the Octagon, it’s hard to not recognize him as one of the best fighters to never hold undisputed UFC gold.
“Chaos” is 12-4 in the Octagon with wins over three former champions, an interim title victory, and his last three setbacks coming in championship fights, the first two of which were ultra-competitive from start-to-finish. It was said during his two fights with Kamaru Usman that if not for “The Nigerian Nightmare,” Covington would have likely enjoyed his own lengthy reign atop the division, and I believe that wholeheartedly.
Covington isn’t a standout athlete, but he figured out how to weaponize his conditioning, turning pressure, pace, and volume into significant weapons that he used to suffocate and break a number of excellent fighters and nearly unseat Usman not once, but twice.
Yves Edwards
The reason Edwards never won UFC gold is that there was no UFC lightweight title during the best stretch of his multiple stints competing inside the Octagon. He earned a win at UFC 41, where BJ Penn and Caol Uno fought to a draw in a bout for the vacant title, which resulted in the promotion putting the title — and eventually the division — on hiatus.
Edwards followed that win up with victories at UFC 43 and UFC 45, then beat future title challenger Hermes Franca at UFC 47, and closed out his run at UFC 49 with his signature victory — a first-round, flying head kick knockout of Josh Thomson, which lives on to this day in the montage that runs ahead of the main card at live events.
The inventor of Thug-Jitsu fought just about everyone from his era and transcended generations, getting back to the UFC for a third stint in 2010 and earning a Knockout of the Night bonus in his final career win over Jeremy Stephens in December 2012.
Urijah Faber
Faber went 18-0 in non-title fights from the start of his career at the tail end of 2003 to the close of 2014. He also went 14-7 during that span in championship bouts.
Dude was 32-7 at the start of his 12th full year as a professional fighter and the only time he lost was in title fights. I don’t care how much you want to knock him for coming up short in his four different UFC championship opportunities, that is a staggering feat and the fact that he fought for UFC gold four different times tells you all you need to know about the level of skill and talent Faber possessed.
He’s kind of like the 1990-93 Buffalo Bills with Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, and that tremendous defensive group that made four straight Super Bowls: sure, winning one or more of them would have been amazing, without a doubt, but it’s still an insane accomplishment to get there four years in a row.
Faber actually fought for UFC gold in 2011, 2012, 2014, and 2016, remaining in the championship mix the entire time, with Frankie Edgar standing as the only man to beat him in a non-title bout during that stretch.
UFC belt or no UFC belt, “The California Kid” was an all-time great.
Tony Ferguson
This one probably hurts the most because time and again, the MMA gods conspired against us to keep Ferguson from ever fighting for the undisputed title.
Somewhere down the line, when enough time has passed, there is a great documentary to be made about Ferguson’s run from winning The Ultimate Fighter through to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, which was the last unpredictable obstacle to prevent him from sharing the Octagon with Khabib Nurmagomedov and challenging for the undisputed title.
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After winning his first two post-TUF appearances, Ferguson suffered a unanimous decision loss to Michael Johnson on May 5, 2012. He wouldn’t lose again until his bout with Justin Gaethje at UFC 249 eight years and four days later. In between those setbacks, “El Cucuy” collected wins over Danny Castillo, Gleison Tibau, Josh Thomson, Edson Barboza, Rafael Dos Anjos, Kevin Lee, Anthony Pettis, and Donald Cerrone, amongst others, ultimately running his winning streak to a dozen before facing Gaethje.
Ferguson was inventive, aggressive, and dangerous in all phases, and is one of only a couple interim champions in UFC history to never get the opportunity to fight for the undisputed title.
Claudia Gadelha
Some will look at Gadelha’s 9-5 overall mark inside the Octagon and perhaps question her inclusion on this list, but, as is often the case, her record doesn’t paint the whole picture.
Prior to signing with the UFC, Gadelha was 11-0 and poised to challenge Carla Esparza for the Invicta FC strawweight title, but the night before the fight, Esparza was taken to the hospital with a bacterial infection, which caused the fight to be scrapped. She was then expected to take part in the historic 20th season of The Ultimate Fighter, which would crown the first UFC strawweight champion, but was pulled from the competition and brought directly onto the roster instead.
Gadelha won her debut and faced off with Joanna Jedrzejczyk in a title eliminator in their shared sophomore treks into the Octagon, with the Polish contender landing on the happy side of a debated split decision before going on to trounce Esparza, who dominated on TUF 20 and won the title, and begin her reign as “Joanna Champion.”
After beating Jessica Aguilar in the summer of 2015, Gadelha and Jedrzejczyk coached opposite one another on TUF before facing off during International Fight Week in 2016. Gadelha won the first two rounds, but momentum shifted in the champion’s favor midway through the fight, and Jedrzejczyk rolled with it, winning out to retain her title.
The Brazilian remained a contender for the rest of her days before retiring following a loss to Yan Xiaonan in November 2020.
If a couple things break a different way, there are a couple different instances where it’s easy to see Gadelha claiming UFC gold.
Dan Henderson
Inclusion on this list isn’t strictly limited to the success one had inside the Octagon; it also takes into account who these men and women were throughout their careers, which is a part of what made “Hendo” an absolute lock for this group.
If they were handing out belts instead of trophies and big checks when Henderson won the UFC 17 middleweight tournament, we wouldn’t be having this conversation, but they weren’t and we are. When he came back to the promotion in the fall of 2007, Henderson did so as a two-division champion in PRIDE, having closed out his run with the organization by knocking out Wanderlei Silva.
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The fact that he fought in back-to-back title bouts in two different divisions to begin his second run in the UFC should tell you everything you need to know about just how good Henderson was for the vast majority of his career, but just in case it wasn’t, he scored one of the most memorable knockouts in UFC history, bounced to Strikeforce, won the light heavyweight title and earned a stoppage win over Fedor Emelianenko, then came back and closed out his career by fighting for UFC gold one final time.
Some people will get lost in the fact that he struggled to have success during that third tour of duty, but check the names and check the resume as a whole and then get back to me. Henderson was one of the best of his era and I will not hear otherwise.
Gray Maynard
Maynard was 10-0 with one no contest heading into his UFC 125 title bout with Frankie Edgar, having beaten “The Answer” in the past, as well as Jim Miller, Roger Huerta, Nate Diaz, and Kenny Florian.
On New Year’s Day 2011, he was within a whisper of dispatching Edgar in the first round and claiming gold and, to this day, the fact that it was scored a split draw still feels a little debatable. They eventually ran it back in October, and right out of the chute in that fight, it again appeared that “The Bully” was on the brink of putting Edgar away and claiming the title, only for the pride of Toms River, New Jersey to persevere and eventually put Maynard away late in the fourth.
He never regained that form or returned to contention, but during that three or four-year run starting with his initial meeting with Edgar and through their two-fight series in 2011, Maynard was unquestionably one of the best lightweights in the world and came as close to winning the belt as you can get without actually doing so.
Chad Mendes
Mendes established himself as a contender during his days in the WEC, running his record to 9-0 before transitioning over to the UFC at the start of 2011, where he promptly won his first two bouts to set up a championship clash with Jose Aldo.
Their UFC 142 meeting in Rio de Janeiro ended at the close of the first round, after Aldo drove a knee into Mendes’ forehead and earned the stoppage. Five victories later, Mendes was back in the Octagon with Aldo, and back in Rio, only this time, they combined for one of the best fights of the year.
The Team Alpha Male member landed on the wrong side of the scorecards and lost three of his next five before calling it a career, but even then, he was still facing elite competition, beating Ricardo Lamas and Myles Jury while losing to Conor McGregor, Frankie Edgar, and Alexander Volkanovski.
Mendes is one of those elite talents who has been lost to history a little, overshadowed by the transcendent talents that bested him, but you don’t go 17-2 to start your career with Jose Aldo being the only one to beat you without being a world-class competitor.
Dustin Poirier
Honestly, it’s fitting that Poirier closes out this list as he has a chance to remove himself from it on June 1st when he faces Islam Makhachev for the lightweight title in the UFC 302 main event.
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“The Diamond” is 22-7 with one no contest inside the Octagon. He’s a former interim lightweight champion, a two-time undisputed lightweight title challenger, and holds notable victories over Max Holloway (twice), Conor McGregor (twice), Bobby Green, Jim Miller, Eddie Alvarez, Anthony Pettis, Justin Gaethje, Dan Hooker, Michael Chandler, and Benoit Saint Denis.
Not many fighters in UFC history have seven wins over individuals that held championship gold at one point or another, and the ones that do have earned legendary status.
The fact that he’s fighting for the title again only further bolsters his standing as one of the absolute best of his era, but a win would unquestionably elevate him to the next level of the pantheon.
Honorable Mentions: Donald Cerrone, Carlos Condit, Kenny Florian, Justin Gaethje, Alexander Gustafsson
UFC 302: Makhachev vs Poirier took place live from Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey on June 1, 2024. See the Final Prelim and Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses, and relive the action on UFC Fight Pass!
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