Sherdog’s Top 10: Greatest Heavyweights

8. Daniel Cormier

Like Couture, Cormier is an illustration that the ranking heavyweight greats is not the same as ranking the same fighters by overall greatness. As the UFC’s first simultaneous two-division champion, Cormier’s MMA résumé surpasses that of everyone else on this list. However, because he spent much of his time at light heavyweight—where he would also make the all-time top 10—his ranking suffers here.

It's a shame, because even far past his physical prime, Cormier scored a first-round knockout of Stipe Miocic, who outranks him on this list. Then, in his 40s, Cormier dominated the first two and a half rounds of their rematch before gassing out and losing, and running on pure fumes, barely lost 48-47 in the rubber match. I think a prime Cormier would have beaten Miocic three times out of three, likely convincingly. Let's also not forget that these were Cormier's only defeats at heavyweight. He dominated Derrick Lewis en route to a Round 2 stoppage, won an easy decision over a prime Josh Barnett, with an iconic slam to the canvas, stopped a prime Antonio Silva in the first round, and destroyed near-prime versions of Frank Mir, Roy Nelson and Jeff Monson. There is an excellent argument that Cormier should be much higher on this list, and he did it all despite being even shortest fighter (5 feet, 11 inches) with the shortest reach.

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