ONE Championships Ranking System is Unsustainable
Ranking systems are not new in combat sports, and ONE championship is no longer a new promotion. This raises the question of whether we should hold the ONE championship to a standard similar to that of the UFC or top-level boxing. If we were to hold them to that, a suitable ranking system would be the minimum we could ask of them.
However, they are failing in that regard and failing badly.
The MMA fighters signed to ONE Championship seem dissatisfied with their inactivity and being outright ignored by the matchmakers. Top-ranked flyweight Reese McLaren would go on to say in an Instagram post.
“with the promotion shifting its focus towards Muay Thai and kickboxing, along with being ghosted by a matchmaker and a lack of communication, I feel it’s time for me to move on. As a competitor, I need to stay active and continue growing.“
McLaren isn’t the only MMA fighter to speak as even the likes of Reinier De Ridder, two weight divisions for the promotion. I would also tell other fighters to avoid signing with ONE Championship.
“This is something that’s hard for me to talk bad because I had a couple of good years at ONE as well. In the beginning they treated me well, but over the last couple of years it’s been really bad.”
“This is something I feel I have to do for other fighters, if you think of signing with ONE Championship, don’t. It’s that simple, you should not, there’s nothing there, there’s no fights, you’re just wrong if you do this. If you sign there it’s a bad mistake.”
This is just on the MMA side of the problem, but you may ask, ” What does this have to do with the rankings?” That’s a good question. The answer is that there are barely any rankings in the first place.
ONE Championship’s ranking system: A closer look.
If we were to go to the fighter rankings page for ONE, the problem would immediately become apparent: the rankings are barren. They are so barren that there are no rankings for all combat sports after the featherweight division.
This means there are essentially just the champion and a few fighters. Along with rankings, only track five fighters per division and a very lacking number compared to other promotions.
That is unacceptable not only in MMA but also in Kickboxing and Muay Thai. One has had a stranglehold on Muay Thai, as its variation has made it as mainstream as ever.
Especially since ONE is a promotion operating out of Singapore and owned by Thai national Chatri Sityodtong, along with the company holding nearly all of its events in Thailand and renting out Lumpinee Stadium every Friday for its Muay Thai events.
So the fact that ONE has yet to fill out even their Muay Thai rankings in the lighter divisions in a nation known for Muay Thai is frankly insane.
This issue also notably plagues kickboxing as Pound for Pound Number kickboxer on the planet, Chingiz Allazov, would infamously sever his ties with ONE over disagreements on the generation’s great career and, most recently, even Muay Thai. Russian Muay Thai Lightweight Dmitry Menshikov is attempting to leave ONE using legal action.
Needless to say, this cannot persist. As these problems will only serve to hurt ONE in the future if does not sort out these issues plaguing its promotion and as a result system of ranking fighters.
Lessons ONE can learn from the UFC.
The UFC, for the things one can criticize them for, is very good at making a relatively easy-to-follow product. As if you were to go to their fighter rankings page. It would show that they track 15 fighters per division, which shows that even in more stagnant divisions like the current heavyweight division.
There are still narratives to be told and exciting matchups to be made, which will pay off in exciting fighter journeys, rivalries, and, of course, title shots. This also adds prestige to the belt, as all of the fighters in the division are marketed as having the potential to one day become champions; thus, the title of champion in the UFC means so much more than an MMA champion in ONE.
This is a reasonably easy problem to fix for ONE as they are now a global powerhouse in martial arts and have come the closest to making kickboxing and Muay Thai mainstream in ways that Glory and k-1 haven’t been able to achieve for some time now.
So, for one, the pathway is clear, but it is not clear whether they make the right choices for the good of Muay Thai and Kickboxing, which we don’t. As a guy who loves those two sports the most, I sure hope they do.
