Sherdog’s Top 10: Greatest Brazilian Fighters

3. Amanda Nunes

Nunes, who topped Sherdog's list of the 10 greatest female fighters, is a highly impressive third here. At her best, Nunes achieved a level of fighting ability that no other woman, not even rival Valentina Shevchenko, ever has. Nunes is a tremendous threat anywhere a fight goes, with excellent wrestling, arguably the best in her division, fantastic, slick submission skills and brutal ground-and-pound. Of course, her biggest weapon is her fast, technical, and above all, viciously powerful striking, arguably the best in WMMA history at any weight. Nunes' talent for fighting was immediately apparent, scoring a TKO stoppage between the second and third round of highly skilled and far more experienced Vanessa Porto in Brazil before knocking out Julia Budd and Germaine de Randamie, two of the best fighters in women’s MMA history. However, Nunes suffered from cardio woes as well as a certain mental weakness, wilting when an opponent offered significant resistance. Thus, in addition to a submission loss in her pro debut, which is absolutely forgivable, Nunes was stopped by far less skilled fighters in Alexis Davis and Cat Zingano via ground-and-pound, and even dropped a decision to Sarah D'Alelio that wasn't remotely close, with D'Alelio sweeping every round on every card. After that, however, Nunes moved to American Top Team and won 12 straight fights, a legendary streak that cemented her as the most dominant fighter in the sport. The only two close fights during that time were against fellow pound-for-pound elite Valentina Shevchenko. Everything else was a one-sided beating, and that included many of the other greatest female fighters ever. She knocked out Ronda Rousey, Holly Holm and even Cristiane Justino, with “Cyborg” and Rousey succumbing in less than a minute. She submitted Sara McMann, Miesha Tate and Megan Anderson in the first round, obliterated Raquel Pennington before stopping her in the fifth round, delivered a hellacious 25 minute beating to Felicia Spencer and easily defeated de Randamie in their rematch. Alas, the flaws from her earlier losses were not completely exorcised. In what I consider the second most shocking upset in UFC championship history, surpassing Georges St. Pierre losing by knockout to Matt Serra, and trailing only Maurice Smith defeating Mark Coleman, Nunes was submitted by Julianna Pena as a -1100 favorite. Nunes easily dominated the first round, but then showed poor cardio and seemed to give up when the fight got tough. Nunes won the title back in a rematch in a one-sided decision, but she didn't look the same. She fought cautiously and was closely managing her energy, yet still couldn't stop Pena, and occasionally got into bad situations. Nunes seems to be past her prime now at 34, but on the flipside, there is no one to challenge her at 135 pounds, especially since virtually all the new elite female talent is at 115 and 125 pounds. It will be interesting to see where her career goes from here and whether she will be higher or lower on this list in future iterations.

Continue Reading » Number 2