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Thread Primer MMA is an amazingly fun and exciting sport that I personally have been watching since I was in high school in the mid to late 2000s. Nothing hits you more in the feels than when you see a fighter you’ve been a fan of finally reach the summit of their division in their organization and claim a championship. There have been many MMA organizations over the years and they’ve produced numerous champions and icons of the sport. Boxing likes to track the lineal champions of the divisions and I think MMA is ripe for such a thing as well. Granted boxing and MMA have very different structures but it’s still doable due to the record keeping and stat tracking MMA does. So I had this notion and interest that was poking at my brain to track the lineage of each of the more “notable” (note: this may be subjective) MMA organizations over the decades and see who is their lineal champion. Some of these championships have direct paths that lead to the UFC belt (eg. Pride’s MW Championship). Some have paths that are more winding with a few random folks holding that lineal title. How Did I Track The Lines? - I tracked the paths of all the weight classes for various MMA organizations. - I tracked each lineal champion onto their next fight and then whomever they lost to became that line's holder. There was a lot of some shenanigans where fighters went to other organizations or swapped weightclasses for one offs early on. - I set a rule that if the champion of Organization A goes and loses in Organization B, then that should count. This includes one offs as well as when an organization shut down. - If a belt is vacated, both branches from that point are followed. Problems - Due to the chaotic nature of fighters jumping ship with the title in the early 2000s or so, tracking is a bit confusing and there were a ton of splits and paths. I have tried to make this visually easy to follow. - A larger image showing all the weight classes and organizations in one single image would be ideal as there have been many crossovers across weight classes which can be a bit confusing and having a clearer way of showing that would help. This is being worked on. The Lineal Paths These are the paths in a more graphic/visual illustration of the various belt lineages per weight class. Solid lines = the line moved within the same organization. Dotted lines = the line moved to a different organization Arrows = the line merges with a new line. No lines = the line stops with that fighter.            
Mekchu fucked around with this message at 06:18 on Jan 28, 2023 |
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Aug 17, 2022 15:27
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| # ? Apr 28, 2024 21:11 |
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Reserved for later use
Mekchu fucked around with this message at 13:44 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 17, 2022 15:27
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Update 1: While I tracked a lot of different organizations (WEC, Strikeforce, DREAM, Sengoku, Cage Rage, Smackgirl, etc.) I realized that most of them are what would be called C-League titles or, possibly barely B-League titles. For my own sanity while I did track them I'm going to hold out on doing much else with them.
Mekchu fucked around with this message at 16:24 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 17, 2022 15:28
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Update 2: I've updated the OP a bit with some revised information, as well as added the UFC & WEC belt history. I'm going to start to work on a more visually friendly way to show these paths.
Mekchu fucked around with this message at 16:23 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 20, 2022 11:41
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Update 3: I've tried doing the Heavyweight championships. I realized, due to how large the lines and stuff would be that doing all the ones i tracked would probably be a bad idea so i'm sticking with the main promotions of UFC, WEC, PRIDE, & WEC. I will add Bellator as soon as I can get that list done but this is just to mess around with LibreOffice and test it out and see how to visually display the lineages. I think sticking with those is, arguably, for the best in terms of getting these done and not making them a huge mess. I based most of this off of how Useful Charts on YouTube does there stuff (minus fighter photos because  but that's always doable at a later point)
Mekchu fucked around with this message at 16:22 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 22, 2022 08:53
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Update 5: I've finished the chart graphic for the lineage of all weight class titles and updated the OP. I think a larger image will be necessary but for now this project is, seemingly, done and sorted and just needs to be occasionally updated whenever a title changes hands. Mekchu fucked around with this message at 16:23 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 24, 2022 13:51
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This is cool to look back at the orgs and where the titles landed.
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Aug 24, 2022 16:04
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Rad stuff! Though I'm curious about the Bellator bantamweight title Dantas beat Makovsky, then he lost his next fight, to Tyson Nam (in Shooto Brazil), shouldn't that be the lineal path? Nam to Marlon Moraes to Assuncao to Moraes again to Cejudo?
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Aug 24, 2022 16:32
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LobsterMobster posted:Rad stuff! You're right. I misread my notes which means I need to redo that section.
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Aug 24, 2022 16:36
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God, i hate being a jerk, but also, after Kai beat Kyoji, he then lost to Kape, who lost to Pantoja
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Aug 24, 2022 16:39
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LobsterMobster posted:God, i hate being a jerk, but also, after Kai beat Kyoji, he then lost to Kape, who lost to Pantoja Yeah I'll admit there were probably a good number of mistakes I didn't catch on my doublechecks so its fine to point them out as I can fix them pretty easily (LibreOffice is pretty simple!). I don't want that to prevent any corrections. It was definitely an annoying thing where a reigning champion goes to a different promotion and loses, but still retains their belt. Lots of wonkiness. It's kind of why I'm avoiding DREAM and other non-Pride Japanese organizations. Mekchu fucked around with this message at 17:06 on Aug 24, 2022 |
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Aug 24, 2022 17:01
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Your charts show if you want your lineage to die, make sure Jon Jones becomes champion.
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Aug 24, 2022 17:14
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Fixed Bantamweight, not sure how to display that Dantas officially lost the title to Warren but guess it counts as a 2nd lineage and makes sense that way.
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Aug 26, 2022 05:26
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After rebuilding my PC and finding the files I'm going to be going back to updating this over the next week because of all the Francis Ngannou news. I meant to be doing this more regularly but things got in the way. Apologies. With Francis Ngannou leaving he is taking the UFC's HW belt, as in the original incarnation of it as well as its whole history of branches (Save for the 4th Lineage) with him.
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Jan 26, 2023 08:22
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Thread OP updated with the updated lineages. Next project is doing the ONE (MMA) & Rizin championships. PFL has no reigning championship thing set up as its a yearly league/tournament so that seems somewhat unnecessary at this point. Edit - Updated to include ONE Championship's belts. Mekchu fucked around with this message at 06:16 on Jan 28, 2023 |
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Jan 26, 2023 15:16
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| # ? Apr 28, 2024 21:11 |
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Time for an update 
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Sep 14, 2023 01:51
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