In 2016 the r/MMA community created our own r/MMA Virtual Championship Belts that only exist in our collective imagination on this subreddit.

In each division we picked a low level fight that was of high interest, whether because of intriguing contenders or meme potential, and the winner of those matchups became the first r/MMA Virtual Champions. We then tracked them as they rode various contenders up the ranks on their way to potentially unify with the UFC title. Those initial matchups from 2016 (and ’17 for 2 W divisions) for the inaugural r/MMA Virtual Championship Belts were:

INAGURAL r/MMA VIRTUAL CHAMPIONSHIP MATCHUPS:

|Heavyweight| Walt “The Big Ticket” Harris def. Cody East

|Light-Heavyweight| Paul “Bear Jew” Craig def. Henrique de Silva

|Middleweight| Cezar “Mutate” Ferreira def. Jack Hermansson

|Welterweight| “Platinum” Mike Perry def. Danny Roberts

|Lightweight| Marco Polo “el Toro” Reyes def. Dong Hyun Kim

|Featherweight| Artem “The Russian Hammer” Lobov def. Teruto Ishihara

|Bantamweight| Marlon “Chito” Vera def. Guangzhou Ning

|Flyweight| Brandon “Assassin Baby” Moreno def. Louis Smolka

|W-Bantamweight| Leslie “Peacemaker” Smith def. Irene Aldana

|W-Flyweight| Jessica-Rose “Jessy Jess” Clark def. Paige VanZant

|W-Strawweight| Felice “Lil’ Bulldog” Herrig def. Alexa Grasso

We made some good calls in 2016. Chito is a top contender and fighting this weekend. Moreno lost the virtual belt and left the UFC, only to come back and regain it on his way to the UFC belt. Grasso lost her shot at our Virtual Strawweight belt, but is the current Flyweight champ. Maybe our greatest call was to be paying attention to Reyes vs Kim which ended up being an all time great fight. Anyways, here are where the current r/MMA Virtual Championship stand:

CURRENT r/MMA VIRTUAL CHAMPIONS: Heavyweight | Francis ‘The Predator’ Ngannou Light-Heavyweight | Jiri Prochazka Middleweight | Israel Adesanya – UFC Champion Welterweight | Khamzat Chimaev Lightweight | Khabib ‘The Eagle’ Nurmagomedov – UFC Champion Featherweight | Yair Rodriguez – Interim UFC Champion Bantamweight | Aljamain ‘Funkmaster’ Sterling – UFC Champion Flyweight | Brandon ‘Assassin Baby’ Moreno – UFC Champion W-Bantamweight | Amanda Nunes – UFC Champion W-Flyweight | Alexa Grasso – UFC Champion W-Strawweight | Amanda Lemos Conor Belt | Fabricio Andrade (One FC)

6 of the r/MMA Virtual Championship belts unified with the UFC belt. So we voted on a new matchup for a new lineage in that division. For example this weekend’s fight doesn’t stem from the initial matchup where Felice Herrig beat Alexa Grasso. That belt later went to Karolina and then was unified by Andrade. We then voted for the 2019 matchup of Mackenzie Dern and Amanda Ribas to start a new belt lineage, and that belt now is with Lemos.

Since I stopped posting about them in early 2020 the belts in all the divisions have unified except Welterweight, a weight class in which current r/MMA Virtual Welterweight Champion Khamzat Chimaev may never compete again, and Lemos’s Women’s Strawweight. Thus, Saturday’s fight will likely be the last time a non unified r/MMA Virtual Championship Belt will be contested.

One last shout out to /u/Skillbo_Baggins for starting this and also to /u/nonstopPOOPOO, and to the r/MMA community that enjoyed these posts and encouraged me to keep doing them – it’s been fun!