MMA Awards 2023 - Nominations

[Frankie Crisp]

Give us your highlights - you can have up to 5 noms per award:

MMA Fight of the Year

Best MMA Fighter

MMA Rising Star

MMA Event of the Year

Best Knockout

 

Please note – most nominations tend to land before the calendar year is up, so if you edit your post for whatever reason, please @ me and flag the changes so I can update things at my end.

Nominations locked on 7th Jan.
 

[Keith Houchen]

@wandshogun09 @David @Egg Shen @Cousin Jim Bob @Lion_of_the_Midlands etc etc. 

[wandshogun09]

Cheers for the reminder, I’ll have a think. 

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

I don't watch MMA only boxing @Keith Houchen so I can only really make one set of nomination. 

Best Knockout

Jai Opetaia smashing Ellis Zorro's head off

Big Bang Zhang destroying Joe Joyce's iron chin in the second fight. 

Naoya Inoue smashing Stephen Fulton. 

Beterbiev letting the lions out of the camp when he beat Yarde

Tim Tszyu melting Carlos Ocampp in round 1. 

[Kfogg1991]

MMA Fight of the Year

Leon Vs Colby

Justin Vs porier

Khamzat Vs Usman

 

Best MMA Fighter

islam makhachev

Alexander volkanovski

Khamzat chimaev

Leon Edwards

 

MMA Rising Star

Tom aspinall

Sean o malley

 

MMA Event of the Year

UFC 296

UFC London

UFC fight night dariush Vs tsarukyan

UFC 295

Best Knockout

Josh Emmett knocking out Bryce Mitchell

Derick Lewis flying knee into the flurry of punches taking no damage at all

Tom aspinall knocking out Serge pavlovich

 

All in all 2023 has been the best and craziest year in mixed martial arts history 

 

[wandshogun09]

Alright, I’m stuck in with man flu. Everyone’s gone to the in-laws and left me here to feel sorry for myself. Thought I’d give this a proper think but it’s turned into a much longer post than I planned 😂 Apologies in advance. Anyway…

MMA FIGHT OF THE YEAR:

1) Brandon Moreno vs Alexandre Pantoja 2 (UFC 290 - Las Vegas - July 8th) - All year I’ve been saying Makhachev vs Volk was my FOTY but I rewatched this over the Christmas break and these little fuckers have it beat for me. 5 round absolute war, never a dull moment and the crowd is red hot throughout. Incredible stuff from both.

2) Islam Makhachev vs Alexander Volkanovski 1 (UFC 284 - Perth, Australia - February 11th) - Yeah, narrowly pipped to the #1 spot for me but this was tremendous stuff. Again, 5 rounds and about as high level as MMA got in 2023. Says it all about how great and how close it was that they did the immediate rematch in October and not one complaint was made about running it back. Amazing fight.

3) Justin Gaethje vs Rafael Fiziev (UFC 286 - London, UK - March 18th) - You know what you’re getting with Gaethje. Can’t be arsed to go back and check but I’m guessing he’s been at least nominated for FOTY every year on here since he signed with the UFC. I loved this fight. Only negative I can say is that it was only 3 rounds instead of 5 but that was probably a good thing for Fiziev. Another 2 rounds and I reckon his face might’ve actually fallen off. Banger fight as per when it comes to Gaethje.

4) Karol Rosa vs Irene Aldana (UFC 296 - Las Vegas - December 16th) - Never in a million years did I think this fight would make this list when it was announced but here we are. On a card that looked stacked like mid 90s Pamela Anderson going in, this was somehow the most entertaining scrap of the night. Bonkers slobberknocker that massively surpassed my expectations.

5) Elves Brener vs Guram Kutateladze (UFC Fight Night: Strickland vs Magomedov - Las Vegas - July 1st) - When you look at that pic there and realise that’s the winner of the fight, you know some mad shite went down. I saw this as a sacrifice going in, fully expected Kutateladze to steamroll him. And for a bit, he was wrecking him, split his head open etc. Batshit comeback and finish for Brener that instantly made me a fan of him. 
 

BEST MMA FIGHTER: 

This one’s difficult because most of the top fighters only fight once or twice these days.

1) Islam Makhachev - Some won’t like it but whatever. Looks like everyone’s gonna have to get used to it. But whether you like him or not, in the space of 8 months this year he’s gone 2-0 over Volkanovski. Who was pretty much unanimously considered to be the pound-for-pound best fighter in the sport going into those fights. Unless you have a seriously deep and weird hatred for Makhachev, I can’t see how you can leave him off your Top 5 fighters of the year.

2) Leon Edwards - Can’t leave Brum’s finest off the list. 2022 was the year Leon stole the show with that crazy headkick. But 2023 was the year he properly solidified himself as the man at 170. Beat Usman again March, winning the trilogy and erasing any silly talk of flukes and being a one hit wonder. Then ends the year by shutting down Colby the Cunt in fantastically dull fashion to the point it’s gonna make forcing another Colby title fight down us a very hard sell, even for Dana. Best of all, Leon embarrassed Colby with his hero Trump sat cageside!

3) Tom Aspinall - Another Brit. Had to include Big Tom in this. Despite the fact he’s only fought for a grand total of just over 2 minutes this year, there’s a bit more to it than that. First, he came back in July from that knee injury which kept him on the bench for a year. Pissed through Tybura (who’s no bum) on the London card in July. Then at MSG in November, chinned Pavlovich who was starting to be talked about as basically the UFC’s answer to Ivan Drago. Arguably the most dangerous Heavyweight on the roster and Aspinall smoked him in a minute and change, on short notice, at MSG, to win the interim title. Beautiful. Jones and Stipe won’t fight him so expect that interim belt to be upgraded to the full undisputed version sometime in ‘24. The UK’s first UFC Heavyweight champ! Seems an absolute top bloke as well.

4) Alexa Grasso - What a year. I’ll happily admit I was completely wrong on this one. I totally wrote off her chances against the dominant champ Valentina Shevchenko going into their first fight in March. Entertaining fighter but I just didn’t see it and thought it’d be a routine title defence for Shev. Yet here we are going into 2024 and Grasso not only ended Shev’s title reign of terror, she’s gone 2-0 over her. Crazy. Gotta love an underdog story and Grasso seems like the ultimate babyface.

5) Sean Strickland - I fucking hate having to include this prick but fair’s fair. Credit where it’s due. For the win over Israel Adesanya alone, I begrudgingly have to admit he warrants a spot here. He’s gone 3-0 this year, although the wins over Imavov and Magomedov were almost meaningless really. That performance against Adesanya was something else though. Not just that he won, he knocked Izzy down and won every round. Never thought he had a fight like that in him. Seeing him with the belt is rotten but what can you do? Fair play. Still a bollock though.

**Just wanna throw in an honourable mention on this one for big Francis Ngannou though.

OK, he never actually fought in MMA this year and that’s the only reason I left him off my Top 5. But man! His performance against Tyson Fury in October actually outdoes anything any other fighter achieved in 2023 for me. Can’t overstate what a mental accomplishment that was. To make his pro boxing debut against the man most consider to be the greatest Heavyweight of this generation, 0-0 vs. 33-0-1, and do what he did was mind blowing. If he was gonna pull it off (and I gave him no chance going in), I think everyone assumed it’d have to be a bomb, the perfect punch landing for the KO. But to perform how he did over 10 rounds, the way he came prepared, fought intelligently and handled Tyson’s tricks…I still can’t believe it. He never got the decision officially but it was a W in every other way imaginable.

 

MMA RISING STAR:

1) Shavkat Rakhmonov - Think I voted him last year as well but sod it. He’s still rising and with submission wins over Geoff Neal and Wonderboy Thompson this year, it feels like he’s set up nicely now for big things over the next 12 months. Hard to see how he doesn’t at least challenge for the title in 2024, if not win the thing.

2) Ian Garry - Proper Marmite character but, like him or hate him, he’s becoming a major talking point and so far he’s been delivering in the cage. Still unbeaten, only 26 years old and coming off 3 wins this year. He’s here to stay and no doubt he’s gonna be ruffling more feathers in 2024. Feels like him, Shavkat and Maddalena are all just one big win away from title contention. But none are quite there yet.

3) Diego Lopes - This lad has been an absolute breath of fresh air this year. Never heard of him in January, now in just 3 fights in the UFC, he’s a can’t miss fighter. From the minute he burst through the door in May and dragged tricky, undefeated, grinding wrestler Movsar Evloev to a proper banger of a fight, I knew I was gonna like this guy. And he’s been non-stop excitement since. Not sure how far he can go but he’s easily been my favourite addition to the roster in ‘23. Hopefully he gets to fight on that Mexico card in Feb.

4) Benoit Saint-Denis - What a turnaround for this guy. Made his UFC debut in 2021 and got battered to the point the ref basically got blackballed for not stopping it. Since then, BSD has been running through fuckers. He’s 5-0 since then with 5 finishes. This year he’s won 3 fights. Stopped the type train of Ismael Bonfim before it even got going, finished Thiago Moises faster than current champ Makhachev managed, and kicked Matt Frevola’s head into the nosebleeds at MSG. He’s on a roll, nasty bastard and should hopefully be getting some biggish fights next year.

5) Tatsuro Taira - It’s been a slow burn with him. So much so that maybe I shouldn’t be calling him a ‘rising star’ because he hasn’t even been allowed to ‘rise’ from the prelims yet. He looks the business though. Undefeated, only 23, seems to be improving and closing gaps in his skillset and defence from one fight to the next. There’s no rush with him given his age but I’d like to see him stepped up a bit in 2024. Both in terms of opposition and card placement.

 

MMA EVENT OF THE YEAR:

1) UFC 290 - July 8th - Piss easy choice this. I said it in July, 290 genuinely might be my favourite UFC card of all time. It has a bit of everything on there. My #1 FOTY in Moreno vs Pantoja 2, another FOTY runner up in Hooker vs Turner on the undercard, a bunch of mad finishes, surprises and upsets and to cap it off the perfect sendoff for one of my favourite fighters ever Robbie Lawler in his final fight. It’s gonna be hard to top this one for me, any year, nothing else this year came close and there were some cracking cards this year. 290 was next level though.

2) UFC 295 - November 11th - Another belter. It’s weird but I actually don’t think losing that Jones vs Stipe fight hurt this one much at all. We ended up getting a much more exciting and relevant Heavyweight fight in its place anyway in Aspinall vs Pavlovich. And the Pereira vs Prochazka main event was ace. Real life Tekken fight come to life. Undercard was rammed full of fun scraps and highlight reel stuff as well. These MSG cards never miss.

3) UFC Austin - December 2nd - One of the best Fight Night cards I can recall in recent memory. Dariush vs Tsarukyan, Turner vs Green and Figgy vs Font was about as strong a Top 3 as you can get on a non-PPV show. The pleasant surprise here though was that the prelims were batshit. From the unexpected mad slugfest between Rodolfo Bellato and Ihor Potieria to the back-to-back powerbomb KOs in consecutive fights! Mental.

4) UFC 287 - April 8th - Loved this card. The UFC seem to like Miami. They loaded this one up and they’ve done the same for 299 in March next year. This was class. Just a fun card pretty much top to bottom. Pereira and Izzy in the main event is always gonna end in dramatic fashion and this was no different. Font vs Yanez was as good a 3 minute fight as you’ll see, Gastelum vs Curtis was the unexpected FOTN and you had exciting fighters like Holland, Rosas etc scattered throughout the card.

5) UFC 285 - March 4th - This was a biggie. Jon Jones long awaited return and long awaited Heavyweight debut. Then you had Alexa Grasso shocking the world in the co-main against Shevchenko, Shavkat’s first proper scrap against Geoff Neal, Bo Nickal’s debut plus Du Plessis and Garry on the fucking prelims!

 

BEST KNOCKOUT:

1) Robbie Lawler blasting Niko Price to bits in seconds in his retirement fight (UFC 290 - July 8th) 

A fine finish in its own right but if it was anyone else, this wouldn’t be my #1. It’s the fact it’s Lawler, in his last ever fight, that makes this one special. Context. One of the fighters who made me a fan and he was just a 20 year old kid or something back then. Following the ups and downs of his career, then seeing how that fight week played out with him getting inducted into the Hall Of Fame and stuff, a loss would’ve been a huge downer. Seeing him roll back the years and give us a classic Robbie Lawler burst of violent nostalgia, then the whole post-fight bit. It was perfect. One of my favourite moments in combat sports history. Not just MMA. 

2) Drakkar Klose channeling his inner Kevin Nash and trying to Jackknife poor Joe Solecki straight through the Octagon floor (UFC Austin - December 2nd)

3) Islam Makhachev stopping Alexander Volkanovski just 3 minutes into their rematch with a headkick Mirko Cro Cop would be proud of (UFC 294 - October 21st)

4) Israel Adesanya finally exorcising the Alex Pereira shaped demon after losing to him 3 times across Kickboxing and MMA (UFC 287 - April 8th) 

5) Lorenz Larkin with the hellbow KO making Mukhamed Berkhamov do the full Flair Flop (Bellator 290 - February 4th 2023)

And I’m off to buy some medicine and painkillers 🤒

 

Edited December 28, 2023 by wandshogun09

[Kfogg1991]

You know what's fucking crazy I genuinely forgot the Jones Vs gane fight was this year some reason I was convinced it was late last year mental