Sherdog’s Top 10: Burglars

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3. Benson Henderson

Few would have predicted that the ultra-dynamic, athletic and brutalizing Henderson who captured the World Extreme Cagefighting lightweight title would go on to eke out so many razor-thin decisions during his run atop the UFC’s 155-pound division. Perhaps his close victory over Donald Cerrone at WEC 43 should have been a sign of things to come, but even his first three fights in the UFC -- wins over Mark Bocek, Jim Miller and Clay Guida -- were decisions of the dominating variety.

The scrap in which he won the title from Frankie Edgar, a decision at UFC 144, was close if not especially controversial. Henderson soundly outstruck Edgar and knocked him down with an upkick, and although the champion did land five takedowns, he was unable to maintain any control. In their rematch at UFC 150, however, almost everybody scored the fight against Henderson. One media member and FightMetric had the fight as a draw, and the seven other media scores had it either 48-47 or 49-46 in Edgar’s favor.

Henderson’s next moment of controversy came against Gilbert Melendez. Although many remember it today as another robbery, in reality it was a close fight that could have gone either way: Seven media members scored it for Henderson and six for Melendez. Still, it was depressing proof of the fact that the then-champion seemed to be unable to firmly demonstrate that he was actually winning fights or that he had become content to fight conservatively and eke out victories on the scorecards.

The final straw came against Josh Thomson, yet another split decision that went Henderson’s way. While he landed significantly more strikes than his veteran opponent, Thomson capitalized repeatedly on Henderson’s tendency to give up his back and spent long periods of the fight in dominant positions. Thirteen of 16 media scores went for Thomson, and Henderson’s pattern of winning close fights was established for good.

When he finally dropped a close decision that probably should have gone his way to Cerrone in January, it felt like karma had finally caught up with Henderson or at least simple statistical regression had done so. No fighter -- no matter how much his or her style is tailored toward winning over the judges -- can win every razor-thin fight.

Number 2 » He provides an object lesson in how to crack the judging formula in MMA. Looking busy is far more important than actually landing strikes; the more impressive those shots look -- and few would deny that he always seems as though he is trying to finish the fight with a single mighty swing -- the more likely it is that the judges will reward misses with rounds scored in that fighter’s favor.