Sherdog’s Top 10: Greatest Bantamweights

6. Miguel Torres

The longtime World Extreme Cagefighting champion, long-time division kingpin, and pound-for-pound elite Miguel Torres comes in at a solid sixth place here. Torres began his career an amazing 37-1, including 5-0 in the WEC, with three bantamweight title defenses. Torres had some of the best BJJ in the sport at the time, limitless cardio and decent, if limited striking. Notable wins at that time were submitting Chase Beebe in the first round for the bantamweight crown, and then stopping Yoshiro Maeda and Manny Tapia with strikes before defeating Takeya Mizugaki in one of the greatest fights in bantamweight history. These aren't the most impressive names, and it should be noted that Torres' career prior to WEC was littered with anonymous journeymen. Still, it was the best competition available at the time.

Unfortunately for Torres, the 135-pound division would evolve very quickly. He lacked wrestling and more sophisticated strikers could exploit his weaknesses in the standup. Only 28 years old, Torres was knocked out in the first round by Brian Bowles, who doesn't even appear on the list, and after this, the former top pound-for-pound champion settled into a middling career, going 7-8 after that initial 37-1 stretch. Not only was he dominated by elite champions and contenders like Demetrious Johnson and Joseph Benavidez, but he was knocked out in a round by Michael McDonald and suffered an embarrassing first round submission defeat to Pablo Alfonso of all people. Nevertheless, for being the division's first great champion, Torres makes the middle of this list.

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