Matthew's Take
MATTHEW: Weighing in on the need for more weight classes in the UFC
Sep 9, 2010 - 1:25:50 PM MATTHEW: Weighing in on the need for more weight classes in the UFC

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By: Sam Matthew, MMATorch Columnist

With the UFC’s aggressive approach to global marketing and Dana White’s recent announcements on plans to setup shop in Europe and Asia, the biggest hindrance facing the world’s biggest and wealthiest MMA promotion appears to be its disparity of weight classes. With a paltry five weight divisions, ranging from 155 lbs. to 265 lbs. the need for the UFC to absorb its little brother promotion the WEC has become all the more apparent. Making this transition easier is the fact that Zuffa already owns the WEC, and has used the organization to setup stars like Jose Aldo, Urijah Faber, Miguel Torres and Dominick Cruz, whose fans would follow them to the UFC and abroad.

By simply adding two lower-weight classes to the big guns of the UFC, Dana White easily addresses the biggest issue facing a move to Asia in particular. Let’s face it, the Asian population are a stereotypically small people, and the vast majority of their fighters compete in the lighter weight divisions of featherweight (145 lbs.), bantamweight (135 lbs.) and even flyweight (125 lbs.), a class rarely seen in the states. Lacking any heavyweight talent whatsoever because there simply aren’t any large Asian men to choose from (the sole exception to this of course being the seven foot mutant Hong Man Choi), it’s no wonder the likes of DREAM and Sengoku are focusing on their local, smaller talent.

For all the other Asian fighters caught in the middle, it would be wise to learn a valuable lesson from their American counterparts: train in wrestling and cut weight. Asian competitors are notorious for hardly cutting any weight at all, relying more on skill and technique than size and strength, interestingly enough a fairly obvious cultural analogy made when comparing America to say, Japan. Not cutting weight is fine if you’re facing a similarly-sized opponent, but when, for example, a small Japanese lightweight like Shinya Aoki steps into the cage with a heavy Gilbert Melendez, who probably walks around at 180 lbs., the size disparity gives a significant advantage to the bigger opponent. If Asian MMA hopes to compete on an international level, the art of weight-cutting and wrestling will have to be put to better use.

But since I’ve already started a complete overhaul of Zuffa’s weight classes by adding at least the featherweight and bantamweight divisions, why stop there? Take a look at the current status of the UFC’s heavyweight class. With the biggest gap in weight jumping from 205 lbs. – 265 lbs. the need for one more division wedged right in the middle has become more apparent in the last two years. The giants of the division in Brock Lesnar and Shane Carwin actually cut down to 265 lbs., and they've absolutely dominated their smaller foes based on their size advantage alone. What I propose would be setting the heavyweight division weight limit at 250 lbs. and implementing a new super-heavyweight division with a cap at 300 lbs. or no weight limit at all, as is often seen in Europe. This would allow the smaller heavyweights who can’t make the drastic cut to 205, like Frank Mir, Minotauro Nogueira, and Cain Velasquez, some legitimate competition amongst each other.

For me, it’s difficult to watch a titan like Brock Lesnar beat up on someone much smaller than him. It goes against the very spirit of martial arts, which has always been about respect and modesty, the exact opposite of bullying and picking on people smaller than you. The way the current heavyweight class is structured with a 60 pound weight difference gives an unfair advantage to the hulks at the top. The creation of a new super-heavyweight division would quickly and decisively even out the playing field and allow the really big boys plenty of room to play.

Is this going to happen anytime soon? Absolutely not. The main reason being that Dana White is infatuated with his new big draw in the current heavyweight champ and wants to keep him there. But the other obvious reason is there are simply not very many fighters in the world walking around at 300 lbs. Indeed, you’d be hard pressed to even name a Top 10 if a super-heavyweight class were formed today. It would probably look something like Lesnar and Carwin at the top followed by the rest of Brock’s massive DeathClutch training partners.

But based on Lesnar’s success and the number of big wrestlers (both amateur and pro) increasingly finding financial incentive to move to MMA, I think the next few years will see a massive influx of larger opponents, and the need for a divide between the huge weight gap of 60 pounds will become all the more obvious.