I know a record is more than numbers, but Charles Oliveira is 33-8 (31-8 when he won the belt) looking at the other LW Champs:
Khabib (29-0, Impressive clearly), Conor (22-6) (21-3), Eddie Alverez (30-8)(28-4), RDA (31-13)(24-7), Pettis (25-12)(18-2), Benson (29-11)(16-2), Frankie (24-10)(13-1), BJ (16-14)(12-4-1).
But maybe we stop harping on Charles’ record and older fights are appreciate what we see now.
I agree. He’s been fighting at the highest level for the past 12 years. He was very young when he started. When you fight the best in the world you will lose some.
He is coming into his own right now.
He’s something like 20-3 at lightweight and close to .500 at featherweight. Definitely would have been interesting to see him at 155 all along.
It seems like there are 2 paths in MMA: thrown to the wolves, pay your dues as a young person, take some lumps, come out better for it and start winning later in your career when you hit your prime; and the other is to pad, protect and caudle until that prime. That first path really seems to be the K1/Glory way of doing things. Almost every single one of their fighters that’s relevant to me today took that path, they got the shit beat out of them until they learned how to do it right. And yet you’ve got guys like Floyd and Khabib who people seem to worship. A 29-0 record is a guy that never challenged himself. I don’t think one is inherently better than the other, I think there’s a logical flaw at play there.