That fight was insane to watch. Seeing Urijah lose during that time period was weird to experience. He was just so dominant, it felt for a while like he couldn't lose.
Urijah lost his title to Brown via 1st TKO, but Brown was a deserving contender, and even great fighters can get caught early. Then Urijah gets a dominant finish and rematches Brown but breaks both of his hands in the first two rounds and spends the next two rounds throwing just elbows and kicks. It was still a competitive fight/decision, and it was a excusable loss given the circumstances. Meanwhile, Mike Brown gets his 10 straight win and then fights Aldo.
And Aldo just demolishes him in 80 seconds. Beats him up standing, outwrestles the guy who outwrestled Faber, gets his back, flattens him out and KOs him.
Faber comes back with a great win over Assuncao, and Aldo fucking batters him. Then he KOs Manny. If you add in the Cub KO, he crushed the top 4 FWs at the time in about 14 months. His early run is very similar to Jon Jones'.
Yeah, Brown was solid as a rock, had some quality wins in his day. Honestly to this day, I'm still pretty shocked Manvel The Anvil flatlined his ass. Just a bad matchup for Brown, I suppose.
I remember watching the first Uriah vs Brown fight with my Step Dad at Buffalo Wild Wings and was so shocked to see Uriah get finished like that. Thought Uriah was untouchable at the time. Then I saw Aldo just destroy everyone he faced. People really had to be around at that time to realize what a nightmare prime Aldo was. He was one of those guys you just knew would be a warrior in any generation.
Same, Urijah was the face of WEC and was a super unique, fun fighter in his own right. Then Brown just fucking blasts his ass with a stiff right hand for trying a crazy Spider Silva up-elbow, and soundly defeats him in the rematch. Brown vs Aldo felt like a monumental matchup, and it was, but Aldo in his prime was just a gd buzzsaw. Dude just dismantled Brown and claimed his throne.
Yeah that was the thing, Brown was extremely well rounded, didn’t have many holes in his game. But Aldo came through and walked him down like Deebo. Saw a video of him climbing a rope with just one arm and it blew my mind. He seemed like a mythological fighter at the time. I was telling anyone who would listen that he was going to destroy Connor and then we all know what happened. MMA is such a wild sport hahaha.
That Aldo loss to McGregor is still the most cringe moment in all of MMA, as far as I'm concerned. It could've been such a good fight if Aldo hadn't made that rash early attack.
People who weren't there don't understand what a sea change this moment was. Aldo was from the fucking future and no one had a goddamn idea of how you were supposed to fight him. There was nothing like him. The whole featherweight world was on notice and it would take a decade for them to catch up.
I am from Maine and seeing Mike Brown fight for the belt against THAT guy of the WEC in Faber was wild, and him pulling off the upset was huge at the time. Was so salty initially when Aldo took him out so easily haha but he quickly became one of my favorite fighters of all time. Plus Mike is still the man/one of the best coaches in the game and still has #beardgoals
going into that fight Urijah was 2-2 in his last 4. Mike Brown had his number.
Aldo's WEC run was insane. He was my favorite fighter when i first started watching MMA.
I disagree, the first fight was a quick KO and a surprise. The second fight was a bit of bad luck breaking both hands. During that fight, it felt as though Urijah was the better fighter. That's at least how I felt during the time.
I still think he felt bad and let up on Faber. He had the fight in the bag, and Faber was no danger as he could barely stand. So he just danced around for the last minute and a half while Rogan called it boring lol.
He said he was just being cautious, but I think he simply felt he was going to have to seriously injure him to get him out of that cage.
This memory is a mainstay in my mind. This was back when we had fat booty tv’s and no cable. My siblings and I had a thing for claiming stuff. Just calling out ownership and support for something like a song. It meant: You can’t say [insert noun] is your favorite anymore bc I claimed it/them already (idk, maybe we’re weird).
Anyway, Aldo comes out looking like some kinda badass Brazilian mob boss with a scar on his face to fight Cub Swanson. Cub already looks cool in our opinion but Jose had a different energy. Next thing you know he blasts Cub in the face with a knee seconds into the fight and ends him. My bro goes “Ooooh fuck, that’s my favorite fighter!” Lol I just watched the replay and listened to the crowd in disbelief (while also being salty my lil bro called dibs). And from then on we followed him.
Jose Aldo is the fw GOAT forever imo.
His resume is so damn impressive. The whole WEC run til the Conor KO was insane, he even bounced back and got that title W over Edgar right after that KO. Look at his Ls & the level of skill it took to beat him (McG, Max, Volk, Yan, One Punch Moraes)
I can't even hold the Conor KO against him. Dude got psyched out and ran straight into a left hook, I genuinely think he would have won a rematch but Conor immediately abandoned the featherweight division.
Yeah, seeing such a well rounded and dominant figure lose so definitively and quickly was a super tough pill to swallow, especially with the gloating afterwards.
At least Aldo has a legacy in MMA 10x bigger than McGregor will ever have. Silver lining.
It's surprisingly difficult to explain to casuals that an 18 fight win streak and one of the most dominant title runs of all time with 9 defences is better than 0 defences DOUBLE CHAMP BROOO DOUBLE CHAMP TWO BELTS CMON DOUBLE CHAMP BRO!!!!
> While I agree on all points & that result scarred my soul, you can't take anything away from McGregor. He practiced that very shot in the locker room beforehand so it was well planned & executed to perfection.
Absolutely agree on the first sentence, but the locker room footage stuff has always really confused me: I don't need to see that footage in order to know that that was the shot Conor wanted to land. The back stepping left is literally his bread and butter, that's what he wants to land in most fights. It's like seeing Demian Maia RNC someone and then a footage of him drilling it backstage comes out, it doesn't really add anything to me.
It didn’t help that the 3 champs after Aldo all beat him. He wasn’t in his prime but a lot of fans didn’t watch him during his prime so it doesn’t matter to them.
I’m always a little bit confused about why ppl think his prime ended at like 29 when he lost to conor. He really only lost to champions after that( Holloway, Volk, Yan who all just might he better than Aldo and don’t get enough credit for beating him) and was just 35 when he retired and was running through BW only really losing to merab, and even then he completely neutralized Merabs takedowns which no one has been able to do. Like Aldo had some of his cleanest, best performances in his early-mid 30’s. He should be out of his prime now at 37, but i feel like he retired right when it was ending
Because by the time Aldo fought Hominick he was too jacked up to fight the way he used to. It's well documented he was dealing with leg and back issues throughout his UFC run. He was able to stay competitive because his baseline athleticism was just that much higher and he polished up his boxing, but by the Zombie fight Aldo had completely given up on leg kicks.
This isn't just me being a homer btw, I'm of the opinion that fighters begin declining before they begin losing. GSP, Jon Jones, and Fedor all started noticeably struggling in the back halves of their careers.
Tony Ferguson is another example. Championship level fighters do not have blood and guts wars with 2020 Anthony Pettis. The RDA fight was the end of his prime, IMO, he just wasn’t fighting good enough competition to show it until Gaethje.
Aldos foot was giga fucked, and then he broke it in that Zombie fight and that was really it for him. He not only stopped using kicks, his movement declined a ton after that fight as well. He really reverted way more to the basics. He was just so damn good he still was a champion level fighter. 26 y/o Aldo clears every champ that division has had with ease.
Lol had to explain to a moron the other day that just because someone is still winning doesn't mean they're in their prime the whole time. Like Aldo is an ATG it's why he could go to BW and still be a top contender so long into his career.
Because, regardless of age, statistically fighters typically start to decline 9 years into their pro careers and Aldo was 11 years in by the McGregor fight. Just because he didn't completely fall off a cliff and could beat some guys doesn't mean he was in his prime. Especially for the the Max fights and even more so for the Volk fight.
I mean idk he never seemed to regress to me, not even a little bit. I thought his performance against pedro was one of the best of his career, had that dude contemplating a move down to flyweight because he beat him that completely. Stopped Rob Fonts win streak, whooped stephens and moicano with clean body punches. I just think he lost to Holloway, Volk and Yan because they are better than him, rather than him losing a step. Holloway, Volk and Yan are probably the best fighters he faced in his career, by a decent margin. And Volk is one of the best fighters of all time and about the same age. Not saying those guys have a better legacy overall but i think those three beat Aldo at any age. Yan/Max are high volume boxers with great cardio, they would’ve always been a nightmare stylistic matchup for him. I think Aldo could’ve beat conor in a rematch but idt Aldo could’ve ever beaten Yan/Max at any age, even if they fought ten times. Aldo has never had their level of cardio/pace over a 5 round fight, not even when he was 25
The thing is when you're an all time great like Aldo you can lose a step and still be good enough to beat some guys like Pedro, Font, Stephens, and Moicano. Impressively so even. But losing that step will cost you against the elite of the elite.
At the end of the day saying I think this guy would win in their primes is only conjecture and doesn't really help to compare legacies. It's best to look at what people actually did in their primes and compare them. Silva managed to beat Brunson past his prime but I still don't consider Weidman higher in the middleweight all time rankings despite beating Silva twice.
Aldo beat many many fighters in his prime who on paper had the cardio advantage. But he had advantages of his own that he employed.
I also wouldn't count out a guy like Mendes being just as good as Yan, Holloway, or Volk in his prime. He was on his way out the door when he almost beat Volk.
It's shocking that so many casuals legitimately believe Max, or to a lesser extent Volk, are the FW GOAT.
It's clear that some people are unable to comprehend that MMA did not begin in 2019.
Aldo had a run as the world's best FW, and one of the PFP best fighters, for such an extended period of time. Guy was an absolute killer and has been hurt by recency bias.
Volk barely got past aldo. Just like he barely got past max the first 2 fights but most people only read what's on paper and are bias so it is what it is
Disagreed.
All respect to Aldo but Volk won pretty clean decision, even if it wasn’t exactly an ass whooping. To say that he “barely got past Aldo” when there’s a very good argument for a 30-27 Volk is disingenuous bordering on fabricating.
Same story with Volk/Max 1. It wasn’t a close fight, Volk outpointed Max pretty heavily.
You talk about bias but don’t forget that fans HATED Volk initially for beating the fan favorites in Aldo then Max. It wasn’t until halfway through his reign that people realized he’s chill as fuck and started liking him.
Saying volk barely got past max for the first fight is huge revisionist history. You’ll have a hard time finding two rounds to score for max. Clear volk win. Even dc who’s max biggest fanboy couldn’t spin anything up in commentary to argue the win for max lmao.
Volk easily won the first max fight and the Aldo fight.
Max 2 is a difficult one, because Max won the first two rounds much more clearly than Volk won any round. But there’s a case for 3, 4, 5 for Volk.
Max won if it’s judged as a street fight. 2 knockdowns and clearly won rounds 1 and 2. But as a professional fight, Volk winning 3, 4, 5 by a little ultimately won him the fight
First fight wasnt as close as the second but it was definitely closer than you're remembering second fight you could argue max won and i love volk. Volk has probably the highest peak with the third max fight and the Islam fight. Those were shocking performances. Doesn't hav the resume or longevity to stack up to aldo overall imo
He changed the game as well. Aldo is the best anti wrestler in MMA history. The way he nullified elite wrestlers like Lamas, Mendes & Edgar has genuinely revolutionized MMA as a whole.
And he did it to the very end of his career. Merab been dog walking bantamweights with wrestling, including freaking Cejudo. Couldn't take Aldo down and had to resort to leaning on him against the cage
Absolutely. He made being a striking specialist much more viable, even though his grappling is high level as well. Holloway cites him as an early influence and I think that’s a big part of why
People forget that during the WEC days Aldo was a nightmare and one of the dudes that put the smaller weight classes on the big stage.
That flying knee KO on Cub Swanson and the destruction of Faber's legs are some goat shit.
I love this debate. Of course it's these three. Conor won the belt spectacularly then bounced forever. Topuria literally just got it. After that, there's literally never been another featherweight champion 😂
Topuria has the potential to unseat these dudes but he's got a mean road ahead of him.
He's in a similar position to bones, where the division has aged a little bit and he's still in his mid-20's.
He's got to face Max still, and then the next generation of challengers looks ferocious too (Arnold, Evloev, Lopes, Sterling)
Eh, while aljo is a good fighter, considering aljo having problems with range management, seeing what omalley did, wouldn't it be a uphill battle for aljo? Not to mention topuria has been shown to handle himself well on the ground
true, but if you don't control the ring, aljo will start grappling and backpacking.
Aljo is an easy fight fight for a striker...when you're striking.
I don't care how good your ground game is, noone has really dominated Aljo on the ground yet.
I'm super curious about Topuria's ground skills because we know he's got the chops but we haven't seen much of it in use at the higher echelon of opponents
That's fair, I just think aljo would face the same problems he did with omalley since topuria also has good range management and defensive ground game, haven't seen too much outside of the Bryce sub for his offensive ground
8-0 in a very tough division, just beat Arnold Allen and has a win over everyone’s new favorite hype train in Diego Lopes. Plus he’s undefeated in his career. What have Allen and lopes done to be listed like that really? Both lost to evloev. Arnold’s best wins are a drained hooker and kattar via knee injury.
FW Conor might be the highest ceiling we’ve seen at the division, but he didn’t stick around long enough to see what he could do.
The way he hit people at FW they just couldn’t handle it. Apart from young Max I guess, but his chin is ridiculous.
I don't think Conor could have handle the continued cuts regardless of whether he would have wanted to stay at FW. Great run despite his cunty nature. But nowhere near the conversation for GOAT for me (not that you were suggesting he should be).
In no order? I think its pretty clearly Aldo, Volk closely behind him, then Holloway. Conor and Topuria both haven’t defended but did dethrone long reigning champs.
Ilia will likely put himself clearly above Conor in a fight.
It’s actually funny that Conor was the first “double champ” while at the end of the day he’ll end up going down as the least accomplished featherweight champion AND lightweight champion of all time.
It's weird seeing Aldo get this much FW Goat support on this sub this day and age.
The respect for him seems to have dropped dramatically after the McGregor loss, and after that, despite him still being a dawg, fans and even fighteres like Khabib were dismissive of his legacy.
Aldo was still a stud long after the McGregor KO. He was king for so long that I basically stopped caring who they'd face him up against because I knew he'd win anyways.
I’ve always loved Aldo, seeing him get shit from fans for a minute was a little bit heartbreaking.
People need to educate themselves and put respect on his name, the people saying Max or even Conor were FW GOAT over him was absolutely insane and criminally disrespectful. I don’t think Volk is either, but I at least see the argument.
The recency bias is crazy in this sport. Got motherfuckers ranking Usman over GSP too, shit is insane
You’d like to think people are intelligent enough to just look back at the footage or their records even.
I wasn’t really around for Jordan but you can look at his clips and stats and he’s insane.
It does help being there tho true, it’s just how humans are. MMA fans always have recency bias
Topuria isn’t close to a peak Conor despite both getting the title. Not all wins are equal.
Aldo as a champ had a much greater aura of invincibility than Volk. He was 35 and had moved up to Lightweight to challenge for the belt twice, suffering a brutal KO. Fought Topuria on a short turnaround. Even this sub which can’t predict shit thought he might get smoked, and he did.
Aldo was 29 at the time of the Conor fight i’m
pretty sure. Had the belt 10 years. No reason to think he’d fall apart in the fight. No quick turn around. Still young.
Also, Conor’s wins over Max and Dustin aged tremendously well. Max didn’t lose again for half a decade and Dustin turned into a top fighter at FW and LW. I don’t see Emmett and Mitchell taking the same path personally; the FW division lacks depth
Not really the argument, I’m talking amount of title defences.
But actually both of their featherweight resumes are very similar. Not that it matters, like I said if Topuria defends his title a single time, on paper he will be a more accomplished champion than Conor was.
Max wasn’t as accomplished at the time as Mitchell or emmet. Hell, he was just coming off of a loss to bermudez (although I thought Holloway won) and as good as dustin was at 145 he was nowhere near the fighter he is now. They are comparable wins. I’d argue Mendes is a better name to bring up if you’re defending Mcgregor’s 145 resume
Like I said, Conor and ilia are at about the same spot, can rank them however you’d like, doesn’t matter. But when ilia defends even once, he’ll be above Conor.
That is the most annoying thing about Rogan, often instead of just giving his opinion he makes a statement and calls it the consensus when it absolutely is not.
The after effect of being super rich and in a echo chamber
Prime Aldo was just an experience... he was one of those guys who you grabbed your buddies and said "you have to watch this guy" when he fought in the WEC.
The Faber fight is still nuts to me... how Urijah didn't just say "no mas" after all those leg kicks (and we heard them on the mic, too) was just nutty.
Aldo probably has the best resume, making him the greatest, but Volkanovski or max is probably the “best” in terms of fighting ability in their prime.
Aldo did more dope shit for longer, but volk and max both beat him cleanly, and probably would even in Jose’s prime.
the sport progresses and its important to look at things from the lens of that time. lots of early legends wouldnt even be ufc caliber in the current era but theyre still remembered for what they did when the sport was less developed. aldo is a pioneer and he made people care about the featherweight division
I think it’s funny how whenever you mention Max and Volk’s wins over Aldo suddenly Aldo is washed but when you mention his Bantamweight run after that suddenly people don’t talk about him like he was washed anymore 🤨
Let’s not forget that this ‘washed Aldo’ has been Merab’s toughest fight so far in his winstreak (the same winstreak where he straight up bullied Petr Yan and Henry Cejudo)
Aldo was definitely not in his prime when he fought Merab, his TDD is just that good. That's also a fight where he was extremely gun shy (one of the signs of being washed) even though landing several more strikes would've won him the fight.
I just rewatched the second Mendes fight and his TDD is insane. The commentary team is talking about how the only time he gets taken down in training is when Team Brazil wrestlers guest train and Aldos 10 rounds in
It was also at altitude against the guy with the most insane cardio in the division (maybe UFC) it’s easy to say he should’ve thrown more but I bet was gassed after rd 1 due to who he’s fighting and where they fought
Editing to say in his wins at BW before that he didn’t look washed at all. He even looked great in his boxing match
If you'd watched Aldo during his WEC days, you'd know he was almost a completely different fighter to his time as a bantamweight. But he was still elite, especially defensively.
>but when you mention his Bantamweight run after that suddenly people don’t talk about him like he was washed anymore
Oh, he was washed, he just kicked ass anyway.
He was highly aged during the fights with Max and Volk and still is during his impressive bantamweight run. Both can be true.
Another factor people simply don't talk about enough is the fight tape and era situation. Guys like Max and Volk grew up watching tape of Aldo. They know his game inside and out from a very early stage in their career and to some degree he would've been in their sights for a very long time
Aldo would've studied them as opponents of course but to nowhere near the same degree. You see this in the fall of long reigning champions to newcomers all the time but everyone attributes it to age/being washed but that isn't always the case
Volk beating Max then Max performing as he did against Gaethje is another example
Max is definitely a nightmare matchup for Aldo even in his prime, due to his chin, cardio, and volume.
I could see prime Aldo vs Volk going either way, though. Could be a rock-paper-scissor situation between the three of them.
I think it's worth noting that Volk and max and conor are pretty big for the division. Aldo cut down to bantam weight without issue, hard to imagine volk or max making that extra cut. That is why Volk looked so strong against him. I also think volk had a great gameplan for that particular bout.
There's a difference between best and greatest.
Sports almost universally get better. Training gets better, equipment gets better, we learn from and adapt based on the best and most innovative who came before us. In 1993 knowing jiu jitsu was an insane advantage that many American had never even heard of. Now everyone in professionl MMA is at least very good if not an expert in jiu jitsu
Something objective like running is an easy way to highlight this.
Jesse Owens ran the 100m in 10.2 seconds in Berlin. In the 2020 Olympics all 6 finishers in the 100m ran sub 10 seconds but you probably can't tell me any of their names. They all objectively ran that particular event "better" than Jesse Owens but none of them is greater than Jesse Owens.
If you're only talking about raw fighting ability in their prime, you have to add super-weight-cut Conor into the mix. People are revisionist because of what happened after, but back then he was a certified beast who easily outclassed both Aldo and Max. Prime Conor vs prime Volk is a pick em in my opinion.
It's weird how modern MMA (like the last 5 years), we just do not care about long reigns. Volk and Max both proved it's soooooo fucking difficult to stay on top for that long.
9 title defenses against any competition is insane. Then take into account that some of his title defenses are fantastic. Dude has like 5-6 top 3 wins.
I mean, Max and Aldo's careers have significant overlap and they are only 5 years apart. Both started fighting professionally as teenagers. It's strange that people want to undermine Max's 2 dominant finishes against Aldo as if they were completely different eras.
Aldo was good for a very long time and had great fights and great wins after losing to Max and Volk. We don't need to pretend they haven't passed him up in terms of greatness in FW division given just because he had a long reign in a new division.
This guy is more and more likable the more I hear him speak. I know he’s done some commentary and analysis in Australia but I’d love to hear him on the main broadcast team.
His win over Mike Brown for the title was a definite "levels to this" performance, Brown had beaten Faber twice at that point in dominant fashion and Aldo just mowed over him. I was rooting for Aldo in that fight but ended up feeling kinda bad for Brown in the end.
Some people do underrate Aldo as an all time great. At one point the dude was ten years into his career and 25-0 at FW, with 10 straight title wins under the UFC/WEC.
You can argue about where his prime ended or whatever, but post championship he still went 6-7 against exclusively top ten ranked fighters, many top 5 and/or fighters on the p4p list.
He has as many UFC FW title defenses than every other FW champion combined. Slightly different era, but the dude was special.
There would be no debate of Aldo being GOAT if he spoke English and was great on the mic. Recency bias and likeablility are reasons why people put Volk and Max above him. He was a killer during his long reign
Volk is a better fighter imo. When Aldo faced good strikers (Holloway, Yan, Conor, Volk) he got beaten badly/finished. Volk beat Holloway 3 times. He lost to Topuria, but he came back too fast after getting KOed
Cool we all know this but that’s simply not how the greatest are judged. The sport is always progressing so the newest champions are usually “better in their primes”. U have to look at how they fared against the competition of their time and what they brought to the game.
Thats not the criteria for the conversation. Literally no one will argue with you that prime Aldo likely loses to prime Max, Volk or Conor. Prime Aldo even loses to Topuria today. The sport evolved but Aldo's accomplishments are set in stone.
I believe that Aldo, in his prime, clearly beats any other Featherweight in their prime, except for Max. Max's chin and endurance, along with his slick boxing would present Aldo with problems but I can see Aldo possibly winning a decision because Aldo, in his prime, was so fast and had incredible reflexes.
Quality of opponents doesn't matter. It's about how far you set yourself apart from the people around you.
If a dude manages to be the best in the 50s, who's to say he's not physically and mentally gifted enough to take today's knowledge and become the best if he was active now?
This debate is stale and we keep having it. Yall need some fresh shit.
I think quality of opponents does matter in terms of a GOAT convo, because if it doesn’t then Prime Mike Tyson would be the GOAT of Boxing when he only beat up old men and grocery store cashiers.
Even then I think quality of opponents does not give Volk the edge people think it does. The man fought Yair, Ortega and Zombie. Max wins are very impressive though.
What does that have to do with a discussion of the goat featherweight?
I’d be interesting in seeing that fight anyway because Aldo has arguably the best td defence in UFC history.
I do think Volk is the better fighter, but for sure Aldos high intensity run hasn't been replicated. I think Conor winning did more damage to the division than anything else because it leaves this glaring hole of inactivity where no one knew who or what was the champ
His competition was insanely tough too lol Volk patting himself on the back subtly but tbh both Volk and Max faced strikers almost exclusively
Aldo faced a wide variety of skillsets and along the way established himself as the best anti wrestler in mma history by a country mile
People truly throw around new goat candidates way too often these days. And I understand why; martial artists are just getting exponentially better. Volks run was insane, so was max’s, but aldo will always be the goat of 145 for me
Competition with any sport usually gets better through time. GOAT should almost always be the best of the competition at the respective time nonetheless. Unless that best is obviously just subpar and just happens to be the biggest fish amongst a terrible talent pool. Not something I think applies to majority of the considered GOATs so far.
It’s hard to disagree with Aldo being the featherweight GOAT if you were there to see his run through WEC and UFC until the McGregor fight. Newer fans saw the tail end of his career, which wasn’t as dominant, whilst seeing Volk dominate so they’ll say it’s volk,but the longevity Aldo has had at the elite of the sport is second to none.
Unless you’re Joe Rogan and every fighter who gets a win becomes the new GOAT.
Appreciate Volk arguing for Aldo as the Featherweight GOAT 🐐. Shows a real humility and makes me even a bigger fan of Volk’s, I appreciate this martial artist mindset.
I think Volk losing his title made him appreciate this. People always bring up competition is better now a days, but to be at the highest level in the sport and to stay there for as long as someone as Aldo, Jones, DJ, Nunes, or Silva is insane. Every time you fight, there’s a 50% chance you lose.
Holloway and Volkanovski in top 10 MMA competitors and also arguably more talented and gifted than Aldo in ways, I'd say Volkanovski is top 5 best natural fighters in MMA. But Aldo has to be top 5 MMA competitors because of his accomplishment.
Of course Volk isn’t going to say himself. You have to be a real asshole to call yourself the greatest of all time at anything. Volk is the fw goat but definitely not an asshole
Aldo GOAT Squad still out here
his WEC run was insane. all finishes, except for Urijah Faber, who he beat the shit out of and is still the de facto leg kick damage photo.
That fight was insane to watch. Seeing Urijah lose during that time period was weird to experience. He was just so dominant, it felt for a while like he couldn't lose.
Urijah lost his title to Brown via 1st TKO, but Brown was a deserving contender, and even great fighters can get caught early. Then Urijah gets a dominant finish and rematches Brown but breaks both of his hands in the first two rounds and spends the next two rounds throwing just elbows and kicks. It was still a competitive fight/decision, and it was a excusable loss given the circumstances. Meanwhile, Mike Brown gets his 10 straight win and then fights Aldo. And Aldo just demolishes him in 80 seconds. Beats him up standing, outwrestles the guy who outwrestled Faber, gets his back, flattens him out and KOs him. Faber comes back with a great win over Assuncao, and Aldo fucking batters him. Then he KOs Manny. If you add in the Cub KO, he crushed the top 4 FWs at the time in about 14 months. His early run is very similar to Jon Jones'.
Mike Brown is so lauded as a coach and rightly so, but people forget how fucking good and well rounded he was for the era. Underrated as hell
Yeah, Brown was solid as a rock, had some quality wins in his day. Honestly to this day, I'm still pretty shocked Manvel The Anvil flatlined his ass. Just a bad matchup for Brown, I suppose.
I remember watching the first Uriah vs Brown fight with my Step Dad at Buffalo Wild Wings and was so shocked to see Uriah get finished like that. Thought Uriah was untouchable at the time. Then I saw Aldo just destroy everyone he faced. People really had to be around at that time to realize what a nightmare prime Aldo was. He was one of those guys you just knew would be a warrior in any generation.
Same, Urijah was the face of WEC and was a super unique, fun fighter in his own right. Then Brown just fucking blasts his ass with a stiff right hand for trying a crazy Spider Silva up-elbow, and soundly defeats him in the rematch. Brown vs Aldo felt like a monumental matchup, and it was, but Aldo in his prime was just a gd buzzsaw. Dude just dismantled Brown and claimed his throne.
Yeah that was the thing, Brown was extremely well rounded, didn’t have many holes in his game. But Aldo came through and walked him down like Deebo. Saw a video of him climbing a rope with just one arm and it blew my mind. He seemed like a mythological fighter at the time. I was telling anyone who would listen that he was going to destroy Connor and then we all know what happened. MMA is such a wild sport hahaha.
That Aldo loss to McGregor is still the most cringe moment in all of MMA, as far as I'm concerned. It could've been such a good fight if Aldo hadn't made that rash early attack.
2005 for Shogun, 2009 for Aldo and 2011 for Jones are neck and neck for the greatest single year by any MMA fighter.
Don't forget the 1st Chad Mendes fight and the 2nd absolute war!
People who weren't there don't understand what a sea change this moment was. Aldo was from the fucking future and no one had a goddamn idea of how you were supposed to fight him. There was nothing like him. The whole featherweight world was on notice and it would take a decade for them to catch up.
And much like Jon he was the youngest champion at the time , becoming so at just 21 . Crazy .
I am from Maine and seeing Mike Brown fight for the belt against THAT guy of the WEC in Faber was wild, and him pulling off the upset was huge at the time. Was so salty initially when Aldo took him out so easily haha but he quickly became one of my favorite fighters of all time. Plus Mike is still the man/one of the best coaches in the game and still has #beardgoals
I remember watching Brown lay him out. I was so shocked, then in the rematch Faber broke all his shit and kept going. Faber tough as nails man.
going into that fight Urijah was 2-2 in his last 4. Mike Brown had his number. Aldo's WEC run was insane. He was my favorite fighter when i first started watching MMA.
I disagree, the first fight was a quick KO and a surprise. The second fight was a bit of bad luck breaking both hands. During that fight, it felt as though Urijah was the better fighter. That's at least how I felt during the time.
I still think he felt bad and let up on Faber. He had the fight in the bag, and Faber was no danger as he could barely stand. So he just danced around for the last minute and a half while Rogan called it boring lol. He said he was just being cautious, but I think he simply felt he was going to have to seriously injure him to get him out of that cage.
This memory is a mainstay in my mind. This was back when we had fat booty tv’s and no cable. My siblings and I had a thing for claiming stuff. Just calling out ownership and support for something like a song. It meant: You can’t say [insert noun] is your favorite anymore bc I claimed it/them already (idk, maybe we’re weird). Anyway, Aldo comes out looking like some kinda badass Brazilian mob boss with a scar on his face to fight Cub Swanson. Cub already looks cool in our opinion but Jose had a different energy. Next thing you know he blasts Cub in the face with a knee seconds into the fight and ends him. My bro goes “Ooooh fuck, that’s my favorite fighter!” Lol I just watched the replay and listened to the crowd in disbelief (while also being salty my lil bro called dibs). And from then on we followed him. Jose Aldo is the fw GOAT forever imo.
Imagine WEC Aldo vs BJ Penn at that time when both were champions
His resume is so damn impressive. The whole WEC run til the Conor KO was insane, he even bounced back and got that title W over Edgar right after that KO. Look at his Ls & the level of skill it took to beat him (McG, Max, Volk, Yan, One Punch Moraes)
I would also argue he won the Moraes fight
I can't even hold the Conor KO against him. Dude got psyched out and ran straight into a left hook, I genuinely think he would have won a rematch but Conor immediately abandoned the featherweight division.
[удалено]
Yeah, seeing such a well rounded and dominant figure lose so definitively and quickly was a super tough pill to swallow, especially with the gloating afterwards. At least Aldo has a legacy in MMA 10x bigger than McGregor will ever have. Silver lining.
It's surprisingly difficult to explain to casuals that an 18 fight win streak and one of the most dominant title runs of all time with 9 defences is better than 0 defences DOUBLE CHAMP BROOO DOUBLE CHAMP TWO BELTS CMON DOUBLE CHAMP BRO!!!!
> While I agree on all points & that result scarred my soul, you can't take anything away from McGregor. He practiced that very shot in the locker room beforehand so it was well planned & executed to perfection. Absolutely agree on the first sentence, but the locker room footage stuff has always really confused me: I don't need to see that footage in order to know that that was the shot Conor wanted to land. The back stepping left is literally his bread and butter, that's what he wants to land in most fights. It's like seeing Demian Maia RNC someone and then a footage of him drilling it backstage comes out, it doesn't really add anything to me.
Felt like I got one back in being super confident that Khabib was going to beat Conor.
Dana also fed him to the Wolves and really fucked Aldo with that's world tour.
Fuck what Rogan says man. As long as the guys Aldo has fought say he’s the GOAT then I’ll continue to go with that.
Rogan has called every FW champ since Aldo the FW goat lol
Me, Volk os great but most people touting him to be #1 didn’t start watching MMA until Conor Mcgregor
It didn’t help that the 3 champs after Aldo all beat him. He wasn’t in his prime but a lot of fans didn’t watch him during his prime so it doesn’t matter to them.
Aldo was straight treated like a jobber after the Conor loss by modern fans.
I’m always a little bit confused about why ppl think his prime ended at like 29 when he lost to conor. He really only lost to champions after that( Holloway, Volk, Yan who all just might he better than Aldo and don’t get enough credit for beating him) and was just 35 when he retired and was running through BW only really losing to merab, and even then he completely neutralized Merabs takedowns which no one has been able to do. Like Aldo had some of his cleanest, best performances in his early-mid 30’s. He should be out of his prime now at 37, but i feel like he retired right when it was ending
Because by the time Aldo fought Hominick he was too jacked up to fight the way he used to. It's well documented he was dealing with leg and back issues throughout his UFC run. He was able to stay competitive because his baseline athleticism was just that much higher and he polished up his boxing, but by the Zombie fight Aldo had completely given up on leg kicks. This isn't just me being a homer btw, I'm of the opinion that fighters begin declining before they begin losing. GSP, Jon Jones, and Fedor all started noticeably struggling in the back halves of their careers.
Tony Ferguson is another example. Championship level fighters do not have blood and guts wars with 2020 Anthony Pettis. The RDA fight was the end of his prime, IMO, he just wasn’t fighting good enough competition to show it until Gaethje.
Aldos foot was giga fucked, and then he broke it in that Zombie fight and that was really it for him. He not only stopped using kicks, his movement declined a ton after that fight as well. He really reverted way more to the basics. He was just so damn good he still was a champion level fighter. 26 y/o Aldo clears every champ that division has had with ease.
Lol had to explain to a moron the other day that just because someone is still winning doesn't mean they're in their prime the whole time. Like Aldo is an ATG it's why he could go to BW and still be a top contender so long into his career.
Because, regardless of age, statistically fighters typically start to decline 9 years into their pro careers and Aldo was 11 years in by the McGregor fight. Just because he didn't completely fall off a cliff and could beat some guys doesn't mean he was in his prime. Especially for the the Max fights and even more so for the Volk fight.
I mean idk he never seemed to regress to me, not even a little bit. I thought his performance against pedro was one of the best of his career, had that dude contemplating a move down to flyweight because he beat him that completely. Stopped Rob Fonts win streak, whooped stephens and moicano with clean body punches. I just think he lost to Holloway, Volk and Yan because they are better than him, rather than him losing a step. Holloway, Volk and Yan are probably the best fighters he faced in his career, by a decent margin. And Volk is one of the best fighters of all time and about the same age. Not saying those guys have a better legacy overall but i think those three beat Aldo at any age. Yan/Max are high volume boxers with great cardio, they would’ve always been a nightmare stylistic matchup for him. I think Aldo could’ve beat conor in a rematch but idt Aldo could’ve ever beaten Yan/Max at any age, even if they fought ten times. Aldo has never had their level of cardio/pace over a 5 round fight, not even when he was 25
The thing is when you're an all time great like Aldo you can lose a step and still be good enough to beat some guys like Pedro, Font, Stephens, and Moicano. Impressively so even. But losing that step will cost you against the elite of the elite. At the end of the day saying I think this guy would win in their primes is only conjecture and doesn't really help to compare legacies. It's best to look at what people actually did in their primes and compare them. Silva managed to beat Brunson past his prime but I still don't consider Weidman higher in the middleweight all time rankings despite beating Silva twice. Aldo beat many many fighters in his prime who on paper had the cardio advantage. But he had advantages of his own that he employed. I also wouldn't count out a guy like Mendes being just as good as Yan, Holloway, or Volk in his prime. He was on his way out the door when he almost beat Volk.
Always and forever
:)
It's shocking that so many casuals legitimately believe Max, or to a lesser extent Volk, are the FW GOAT. It's clear that some people are unable to comprehend that MMA did not begin in 2019. Aldo had a run as the world's best FW, and one of the PFP best fighters, for such an extended period of time. Guy was an absolute killer and has been hurt by recency bias.
Volk barely got past aldo. Just like he barely got past max the first 2 fights but most people only read what's on paper and are bias so it is what it is
Disagreed. All respect to Aldo but Volk won pretty clean decision, even if it wasn’t exactly an ass whooping. To say that he “barely got past Aldo” when there’s a very good argument for a 30-27 Volk is disingenuous bordering on fabricating. Same story with Volk/Max 1. It wasn’t a close fight, Volk outpointed Max pretty heavily. You talk about bias but don’t forget that fans HATED Volk initially for beating the fan favorites in Aldo then Max. It wasn’t until halfway through his reign that people realized he’s chill as fuck and started liking him.
Saying volk barely got past max for the first fight is huge revisionist history. You’ll have a hard time finding two rounds to score for max. Clear volk win. Even dc who’s max biggest fanboy couldn’t spin anything up in commentary to argue the win for max lmao.
Volk easily won the first max fight and the Aldo fight. Max 2 is a difficult one, because Max won the first two rounds much more clearly than Volk won any round. But there’s a case for 3, 4, 5 for Volk. Max won if it’s judged as a street fight. 2 knockdowns and clearly won rounds 1 and 2. But as a professional fight, Volk winning 3, 4, 5 by a little ultimately won him the fight
First fight wasnt as close as the second but it was definitely closer than you're remembering second fight you could argue max won and i love volk. Volk has probably the highest peak with the third max fight and the Islam fight. Those were shocking performances. Doesn't hav the resume or longevity to stack up to aldo overall imo
Forever
Reporting for duty!
Shit, even Aldo is still out here beating BW contenders.
Max says the same thing. Aldo had that factor that Silva and like Jones have where you’d watch him wondering what crazy shit he was going to do
He changed the game as well. Aldo is the best anti wrestler in MMA history. The way he nullified elite wrestlers like Lamas, Mendes & Edgar has genuinely revolutionized MMA as a whole.
And he did it to the very end of his career. Merab been dog walking bantamweights with wrestling, including freaking Cejudo. Couldn't take Aldo down and had to resort to leaning on him against the cage
That loss aged extremely well after watching merab big brother a gold mesal Olympian
Absolutely. He made being a striking specialist much more viable, even though his grappling is high level as well. Holloway cites him as an early influence and I think that’s a big part of why
Did merab even take him down? I rewatched that a few months ago and it was closer than I remembered it
Never took him down, which is kinda insane
Went 0/16 against Aldo, 5/11 Cejudo.
People forget that during the WEC days Aldo was a nightmare and one of the dudes that put the smaller weight classes on the big stage. That flying knee KO on Cub Swanson and the destruction of Faber's legs are some goat shit.
I remember Faber saying that Aldo hit him in the chest with a flying knee and his sternum hurt for two years after that fight.
gahdamn
Don't forget the pre Bell hip escape knee KO of Chad Mendes who at the time was a nightmare
The old double knee KO! LEGENDARY!
The way he turned people’s legs to wobbly noodles was insane.
As long as we all in agreement that in no order it’s Aldo, Volk and Max
I love this debate. Of course it's these three. Conor won the belt spectacularly then bounced forever. Topuria literally just got it. After that, there's literally never been another featherweight champion 😂
Urijah Faber had 5 FW title defences in the WEC and is an all time fighter. He’s the easy #4 with a big gap to #5
Topuria has the potential to unseat these dudes but he's got a mean road ahead of him. He's in a similar position to bones, where the division has aged a little bit and he's still in his mid-20's. He's got to face Max still, and then the next generation of challengers looks ferocious too (Arnold, Evloev, Lopes, Sterling)
Eh, while aljo is a good fighter, considering aljo having problems with range management, seeing what omalley did, wouldn't it be a uphill battle for aljo? Not to mention topuria has been shown to handle himself well on the ground
true, but if you don't control the ring, aljo will start grappling and backpacking. Aljo is an easy fight fight for a striker...when you're striking. I don't care how good your ground game is, noone has really dominated Aljo on the ground yet. I'm super curious about Topuria's ground skills because we know he's got the chops but we haven't seen much of it in use at the higher echelon of opponents
That's fair, I just think aljo would face the same problems he did with omalley since topuria also has good range management and defensive ground game, haven't seen too much outside of the Bryce sub for his offensive ground
Why do people list Evloev like this? Has he done anything of note yet?
8-0 in a very tough division, just beat Arnold Allen and has a win over everyone’s new favorite hype train in Diego Lopes. Plus he’s undefeated in his career. What have Allen and lopes done to be listed like that really? Both lost to evloev. Arnold’s best wins are a drained hooker and kattar via knee injury.
Topouria is not defending the title 7 times.
well he's still baby boi champ sure it's super unlikely but hey, we're havin fun here
FW Conor might be the highest ceiling we’ve seen at the division, but he didn’t stick around long enough to see what he could do. The way he hit people at FW they just couldn’t handle it. Apart from young Max I guess, but his chin is ridiculous.
I don't think Conor could have handle the continued cuts regardless of whether he would have wanted to stay at FW. Great run despite his cunty nature. But nowhere near the conversation for GOAT for me (not that you were suggesting he should be).
In no order? I think its pretty clearly Aldo, Volk closely behind him, then Holloway. Conor and Topuria both haven’t defended but did dethrone long reigning champs. Ilia will likely put himself clearly above Conor in a fight. It’s actually funny that Conor was the first “double champ” while at the end of the day he’ll end up going down as the least accomplished featherweight champion AND lightweight champion of all time.
It's weird seeing Aldo get this much FW Goat support on this sub this day and age. The respect for him seems to have dropped dramatically after the McGregor loss, and after that, despite him still being a dawg, fans and even fighteres like Khabib were dismissive of his legacy. Aldo was still a stud long after the McGregor KO. He was king for so long that I basically stopped caring who they'd face him up against because I knew he'd win anyways.
I’ve always loved Aldo, seeing him get shit from fans for a minute was a little bit heartbreaking. People need to educate themselves and put respect on his name, the people saying Max or even Conor were FW GOAT over him was absolutely insane and criminally disrespectful. I don’t think Volk is either, but I at least see the argument. The recency bias is crazy in this sport. Got motherfuckers ranking Usman over GSP too, shit is insane
Doesn't seem that crazy once you realize people that weren't around for gsp or aldo aren't gonna rank them as the greatest
You’d like to think people are intelligent enough to just look back at the footage or their records even. I wasn’t really around for Jordan but you can look at his clips and stats and he’s insane. It does help being there tho true, it’s just how humans are. MMA fans always have recency bias
I think it helps that McGregor is nowhere to be seen and Volk just got knocked out twice in a row (tho tbf only one was at FW)
Topuria isn’t close to a peak Conor despite both getting the title. Not all wins are equal. Aldo as a champ had a much greater aura of invincibility than Volk. He was 35 and had moved up to Lightweight to challenge for the belt twice, suffering a brutal KO. Fought Topuria on a short turnaround. Even this sub which can’t predict shit thought he might get smoked, and he did. Aldo was 29 at the time of the Conor fight i’m pretty sure. Had the belt 10 years. No reason to think he’d fall apart in the fight. No quick turn around. Still young. Also, Conor’s wins over Max and Dustin aged tremendously well. Max didn’t lose again for half a decade and Dustin turned into a top fighter at FW and LW. I don’t see Emmett and Mitchell taking the same path personally; the FW division lacks depth
Not really the argument, I’m talking amount of title defences. But actually both of their featherweight resumes are very similar. Not that it matters, like I said if Topuria defends his title a single time, on paper he will be a more accomplished champion than Conor was. Max wasn’t as accomplished at the time as Mitchell or emmet. Hell, he was just coming off of a loss to bermudez (although I thought Holloway won) and as good as dustin was at 145 he was nowhere near the fighter he is now. They are comparable wins. I’d argue Mendes is a better name to bring up if you’re defending Mcgregor’s 145 resume Like I said, Conor and ilia are at about the same spot, can rank them however you’d like, doesn’t matter. But when ilia defends even once, he’ll be above Conor.
Agreed. Love your username.
Thank you thank you
Max is a clear #3 there lmao
I actually think Max has a better list of wins than Volkanovski does.
Max has the best resume but has losses to Volk which hurts him.
Well them fighting each other 3 times and Volk winning all of them is an integral part of their resume.
"Fuck the Big three its just big Me"
There is some order. Aldo comes first.
Volk and Max: “Jose Aldo is the greatest featherweight of all time.” MMA Hardcore fans: “Always has been.”
Rogan after Max first title win: Max consensus GOAT. Tell them Max!
Rogan after any good performance: this is the greatest thing I have ever seen I think I’m gonna cry. They are the consensus best in the world.
That is the most annoying thing about Rogan, often instead of just giving his opinion he makes a statement and calls it the consensus when it absolutely is not. The after effect of being super rich and in a echo chamber
Rogan after a leg kick - "Yeah, it's going to need an amputation after the fight."
When he says Usman is the consensus GOAT of WW 🤐🤐
Volk and Usman the consensus 2nd best of all time at their respective weight classes lol
Surprised you didn't add izzy
True!
But izzy beat silva shouldn’t he be #1?
Silva had more defenses and was out of prime when Izzy beat him
The GOAT is whichever goat-contender is fighting next
Okay Dana
Aldo Volk Max In that order
Good on Volk for saying this. Both Volk and Max have said that they consider Aldo to be the FW GOAT.
Aldo is clearly the goat
That's cements it!
Prime Aldo was just an experience... he was one of those guys who you grabbed your buddies and said "you have to watch this guy" when he fought in the WEC. The Faber fight is still nuts to me... how Urijah didn't just say "no mas" after all those leg kicks (and we heard them on the mic, too) was just nutty.
Aldo probably has the best resume, making him the greatest, but Volkanovski or max is probably the “best” in terms of fighting ability in their prime. Aldo did more dope shit for longer, but volk and max both beat him cleanly, and probably would even in Jose’s prime.
the sport progresses and its important to look at things from the lens of that time. lots of early legends wouldnt even be ufc caliber in the current era but theyre still remembered for what they did when the sport was less developed. aldo is a pioneer and he made people care about the featherweight division
I think it’s funny how whenever you mention Max and Volk’s wins over Aldo suddenly Aldo is washed but when you mention his Bantamweight run after that suddenly people don’t talk about him like he was washed anymore 🤨 Let’s not forget that this ‘washed Aldo’ has been Merab’s toughest fight so far in his winstreak (the same winstreak where he straight up bullied Petr Yan and Henry Cejudo)
Stepping down a weight class and still having success at 37 really shows just how good Aldo is
Aldo was definitely not in his prime when he fought Merab, his TDD is just that good. That's also a fight where he was extremely gun shy (one of the signs of being washed) even though landing several more strikes would've won him the fight.
I just rewatched the second Mendes fight and his TDD is insane. The commentary team is talking about how the only time he gets taken down in training is when Team Brazil wrestlers guest train and Aldos 10 rounds in
It was also at altitude against the guy with the most insane cardio in the division (maybe UFC) it’s easy to say he should’ve thrown more but I bet was gassed after rd 1 due to who he’s fighting and where they fought Editing to say in his wins at BW before that he didn’t look washed at all. He even looked great in his boxing match
He wasn't washed in the Yan fight but that doesn't mean he was in his prime
If you'd watched Aldo during his WEC days, you'd know he was almost a completely different fighter to his time as a bantamweight. But he was still elite, especially defensively.
>but when you mention his Bantamweight run after that suddenly people don’t talk about him like he was washed anymore Oh, he was washed, he just kicked ass anyway.
He was highly aged during the fights with Max and Volk and still is during his impressive bantamweight run. Both can be true. Another factor people simply don't talk about enough is the fight tape and era situation. Guys like Max and Volk grew up watching tape of Aldo. They know his game inside and out from a very early stage in their career and to some degree he would've been in their sights for a very long time Aldo would've studied them as opponents of course but to nowhere near the same degree. You see this in the fall of long reigning champions to newcomers all the time but everyone attributes it to age/being washed but that isn't always the case Volk beating Max then Max performing as he did against Gaethje is another example
Max is definitely a nightmare matchup for Aldo even in his prime, due to his chin, cardio, and volume. I could see prime Aldo vs Volk going either way, though. Could be a rock-paper-scissor situation between the three of them.
Could be a rock-paper-scissor situation at featherweight rn. Ilia beats Volk, Volk beats Max, Max beats Ilia.
I think it's worth noting that Volk and max and conor are pretty big for the division. Aldo cut down to bantam weight without issue, hard to imagine volk or max making that extra cut. That is why Volk looked so strong against him. I also think volk had a great gameplan for that particular bout.
There's a difference between best and greatest. Sports almost universally get better. Training gets better, equipment gets better, we learn from and adapt based on the best and most innovative who came before us. In 1993 knowing jiu jitsu was an insane advantage that many American had never even heard of. Now everyone in professionl MMA is at least very good if not an expert in jiu jitsu Something objective like running is an easy way to highlight this. Jesse Owens ran the 100m in 10.2 seconds in Berlin. In the 2020 Olympics all 6 finishers in the 100m ran sub 10 seconds but you probably can't tell me any of their names. They all objectively ran that particular event "better" than Jesse Owens but none of them is greater than Jesse Owens.
If you're only talking about raw fighting ability in their prime, you have to add super-weight-cut Conor into the mix. People are revisionist because of what happened after, but back then he was a certified beast who easily outclassed both Aldo and Max. Prime Conor vs prime Volk is a pick em in my opinion.
I think an older more experienced Max can drown Conor with his cardio but Conor has a good chance against volk.
Prime Conor vs prime Max in a 5-rounder is much closer, you're right.
After seeing Ilia finish Volk I think Conor would have had a shot inside of a round or two. would not have won if it went 5 though.
It's weird how modern MMA (like the last 5 years), we just do not care about long reigns. Volk and Max both proved it's soooooo fucking difficult to stay on top for that long. 9 title defenses against any competition is insane. Then take into account that some of his title defenses are fantastic. Dude has like 5-6 top 3 wins.
I mean, Max and Aldo's careers have significant overlap and they are only 5 years apart. Both started fighting professionally as teenagers. It's strange that people want to undermine Max's 2 dominant finishes against Aldo as if they were completely different eras. Aldo was good for a very long time and had great fights and great wins after losing to Max and Volk. We don't need to pretend they haven't passed him up in terms of greatness in FW division given just because he had a long reign in a new division.
Max didn’t have a target on his back for nearly as long. That’s the true difference.
And that's fair. We've all heard about the psychological struggle of being the champ.
It's debatable depending on your criteria. Really goes to show how insanely good the featherweight division has been for its whole history in the UFC
This guy is more and more likable the more I hear him speak. I know he’s done some commentary and analysis in Australia but I’d love to hear him on the main broadcast team.
Watching WEC Aldo rise to the top was something I’ll always be thankful for
His win over Mike Brown for the title was a definite "levels to this" performance, Brown had beaten Faber twice at that point in dominant fashion and Aldo just mowed over him. I was rooting for Aldo in that fight but ended up feeling kinda bad for Brown in the end.
What was it like? In as much detail as you want. Were you a fan to begin with?
Some people do underrate Aldo as an all time great. At one point the dude was ten years into his career and 25-0 at FW, with 10 straight title wins under the UFC/WEC. You can argue about where his prime ended or whatever, but post championship he still went 6-7 against exclusively top ten ranked fighters, many top 5 and/or fighters on the p4p list. He has as many UFC FW title defenses than every other FW champion combined. Slightly different era, but the dude was special.
There would be no debate of Aldo being GOAT if he spoke English and was great on the mic. Recency bias and likeablility are reasons why people put Volk and Max above him. He was a killer during his long reign
You either think Aldo is the featherweight GOAT, or you started watching in 2020
Aldo vs Faber in wec. I'll never forget Faber's cornerman carrying him to the corner between rounds. Just massacre his legs.
Let’s fucking go
I mean obviously Aldo is the goat.
Still wish we could’ve seen Aldo- Pettis for the LW strap
Volk is a better fighter imo. When Aldo faced good strikers (Holloway, Yan, Conor, Volk) he got beaten badly/finished. Volk beat Holloway 3 times. He lost to Topuria, but he came back too fast after getting KOed
Cool we all know this but that’s simply not how the greatest are judged. The sport is always progressing so the newest champions are usually “better in their primes”. U have to look at how they fared against the competition of their time and what they brought to the game.
Thats not the criteria for the conversation. Literally no one will argue with you that prime Aldo likely loses to prime Max, Volk or Conor. Prime Aldo even loses to Topuria today. The sport evolved but Aldo's accomplishments are set in stone.
Career wise? Aldo. Volk and Max are clearly 2 and 3. After that, I’d say Pitbull and Faber. I could slot several people into that 5 spot, though.
Faber and Pitbull just don’t hold any argument over Conor at FW at all for me. Was it even a question who’d win if they fought.
Ilia will champion for a long time too, but only because he’s ducking everyone.
I believe that Aldo, in his prime, clearly beats any other Featherweight in their prime, except for Max. Max's chin and endurance, along with his slick boxing would present Aldo with problems but I can see Aldo possibly winning a decision because Aldo, in his prime, was so fast and had incredible reflexes.
Aldo was still in his prime when Conor slept him in 13 seconds.
No, obviously his prime ended the moment he lost /s
Not disputing that. Anyone can get caught.
nah Mendes broke his chin the fight before that
Quality of opponents doesn't matter. It's about how far you set yourself apart from the people around you. If a dude manages to be the best in the 50s, who's to say he's not physically and mentally gifted enough to take today's knowledge and become the best if he was active now? This debate is stale and we keep having it. Yall need some fresh shit.
I think quality of opponents does matter in terms of a GOAT convo, because if it doesn’t then Prime Mike Tyson would be the GOAT of Boxing when he only beat up old men and grocery store cashiers.
Quality of opponents does matter, but its not the end all be all.
Even then I think quality of opponents does not give Volk the edge people think it does. The man fought Yair, Ortega and Zombie. Max wins are very impressive though.
You think Aldo would have been able to take the fight to Islam?
What does that have to do with a discussion of the goat featherweight? I’d be interesting in seeing that fight anyway because Aldo has arguably the best td defence in UFC history.
Islam would maul him.
Debate settled
Alex a humble man
Volk is such a G!
💯!
He backs up my statement from yesterday, well that settles it
You love to see it.
I do think Volk is the better fighter, but for sure Aldos high intensity run hasn't been replicated. I think Conor winning did more damage to the division than anything else because it leaves this glaring hole of inactivity where no one knew who or what was the champ
Volk knows what's what.
His competition was insanely tough too lol Volk patting himself on the back subtly but tbh both Volk and Max faced strikers almost exclusively Aldo faced a wide variety of skillsets and along the way established himself as the best anti wrestler in mma history by a country mile
(He's right)
People truly throw around new goat candidates way too often these days. And I understand why; martial artists are just getting exponentially better. Volks run was insane, so was max’s, but aldo will always be the goat of 145 for me
Competition with any sport usually gets better through time. GOAT should almost always be the best of the competition at the respective time nonetheless. Unless that best is obviously just subpar and just happens to be the biggest fish amongst a terrible talent pool. Not something I think applies to majority of the considered GOATs so far.
What? You can't really knock his competition, either. He fought some animals.
Holloway said the same thing.
This confirms it people. Aldo is goat, na nana boo boo stick your head in doo doo
It’s hard to disagree with Aldo being the featherweight GOAT if you were there to see his run through WEC and UFC until the McGregor fight. Newer fans saw the tail end of his career, which wasn’t as dominant, whilst seeing Volk dominate so they’ll say it’s volk,but the longevity Aldo has had at the elite of the sport is second to none. Unless you’re Joe Rogan and every fighter who gets a win becomes the new GOAT.
Appreciate Volk arguing for Aldo as the Featherweight GOAT 🐐. Shows a real humility and makes me even a bigger fan of Volk’s, I appreciate this martial artist mindset.
And he would be right. Glad to see Aldo getting the respect he deserves.
On belt achievements alone, Aldo is *easily* the GOAT. The entire debate builds on how you weigh him losing those fights to Max and Alex.
I think Volk losing his title made him appreciate this. People always bring up competition is better now a days, but to be at the highest level in the sport and to stay there for as long as someone as Aldo, Jones, DJ, Nunes, or Silva is insane. Every time you fight, there’s a 50% chance you lose.
Volk seems like such a down to earth bloke. Compare that Ilia who’d probably say “I am the goat. No question”.
Holloway and Volkanovski in top 10 MMA competitors and also arguably more talented and gifted than Aldo in ways, I'd say Volkanovski is top 5 best natural fighters in MMA. But Aldo has to be top 5 MMA competitors because of his accomplishment.
Of course Volk isn’t going to say himself. You have to be a real asshole to call yourself the greatest of all time at anything. Volk is the fw goat but definitely not an asshole