Opinion: How Many Wins for a Title Shot?

In the wake of Ilia Topuria's impressive dismantling of Josh Emmett on Saturday, many are clamoring for him to get the next shot at the UFC featherweight title. I'm one of them, being a fan of the 26-year-old Georgian dynamo and not seeing a better contender that Alexander Volkanovski hasn't already beaten. And yet, the situation is very curious. Topuria is 6-0 in the UFC, with five of those victories occurring at featherweight. Furthermore, only his wins over Emmett and Bryce Mitchell were against high-quality opposition. Recall that just a few months ago, Arnold Allen was 10-0 in the same division, with at least three big victories in Sodiq Yusuff, Dan Hooker and Calvin Kattar, yet that was not enough to get a crack at the featherweight title, but merely former champion Max Holloway. This brings us to a very interesting question; how many wins does it take for a fighter to receive a title shot, and what are the factors that go into it? Note that we will be examining fighters who built their reputations in the UFC, not well-established champions from other major organizations like Michael Chandler.

The reasoning for why Topuria needed half the wins of Allen appears obvious. Topuria has four stoppages in six fights and has produced multiple highlight-reel finishes, while Allen has the same number of stoppages in 10 wins, only one of which was a knockout. Notice, of course, that 10 wins over the opponents that Allen has faced is far more difficult than six wins over Topuria's foes. One can argue that Topuria is a better fighter based on the abilities he has shown within those fights, but if one is focused on accomplishments, Allen has a clear advantage. But regardless of fairness, haven't we answered our initial query? Recording multiple exciting stoppages, especially of the knockout variety, drastically cuts down on the number of wins needed compared to decisions, even those that result from out-striking the opponent?

There is more to the story. Consider Tony Ferguson. In his prime, Ferguson was one of the most exciting fighters that MMA has ever seen, a blistering whirlwind of endless, unorthodox attacks, constantly trying to finish the opponent in the striking and grappling alike. Ferguson was 13-1, including 10 wins in a row over tremendous opposition, when he was finally booked to face Khabib Nurmagomedov for the vacant lightweight crown in April 2018. Nor did he lack for finishes, having recorded nine in those 13 victories, with wins over top contenders and former champions in Rafael dos Anjos, Edson Barboza, Kevin Lee—who, believe it or not, was considered to be a potential awful match-up for Nurmagomedov in 2017—and Josh Thomson. And yet, despite all those spectacular stoppages and excitement, he needed a ridiculous 10 straight wins and to go 13-1 overall.

By contrast, let's look at Kamaru Usman. He went 9-0 before getting a shot at Tyron Woodley's welterweight crown. That's not as fast as it will be for Topuria, but it's better than the number of victories it took for Ferguson or Allen's non-shot. And yet, prior to becoming champion, Usman was mostly an overwhelming, grinding grappler with few big highlights. He had just two stoppages in those 9 wins.

I can only guess at the disparity here, but a possibility is interpersonal relationships and marketing. Usman has always gotten along well with Dana White, while it didn't appear that Ferguson did. As for Allen, I doubt White has talked to him more than a handful of times. Perhaps the UFC felt that Ferguson was too much of a loose cannon to be trusted as champion. A silly consideration given that the UFC titlist in Ferguson's prime was named Conor McGregor, who has a laundry list of embarrassing scandals, but of course, McGregor was also the biggest star in the history of MMA.

It helps to examine extremes. Who was the fighter in recent times who achieved a title shot after the fewest number of wins? Unsurprisingly, it's Alex Pereira, who need only three wins to get a crack at Israel Adesanya, only one of which came against a top contender, Sean Strickland. The Brazilian was in many ways the perfect storm of what the UFC was looking for. He is a great, former world champion kickboxer, which the promotion has always loved. Anyone remember the short UFC stint of Gokhan Saki, who debuted with a record of 0-1? Pereira produced amazing highlight-reel knockouts against Andreas Michailidis and Strickland. There was a ready-made storyline about him being 2-0 against UFC middleweight kingpin Israel Adesanya in kickboxing. And last but certainly not least, Dana White liked him.

Thus, we can draw some conclusions. If you're a fighter who wants to reduce their number of fighters before a title shot, be a world-class kickboxer who delivers amazing knockouts and will smile and laugh at anything Dana says. On the flipside, if you're a grinding grappler who always wins by decision and rubs Dana the wrong way, you may never get a title shot even if you're promised one, as Matt Lindland learned the hard way.