By the Numbers: One Championship Lightweight Grand Prix

Can "Dagi" conquer Christian Lee and walk away with the ONE Lightweight World Grand Prix strap this Sunday? #WeAreONE #ONEChampionship #ONECentury pic.twitter.com/oFXXEZOVlN

— ONE Championship (@ONEChampionship) October 7, 2019

The One Championship Lightweight Grand Prix has been littered with stoppages. This is why it’s only fitting that the finals showdown will pit two exemplary finishers in Saygid Guseyn Arslanaliev and current lightweight titleholder Christian Lee, who replaced the injured Eddie Alvarez.

These young and talented lightweights have 20 stoppages between them and will surely turn their One Championship: Century bout into an absolute barnburner. Let the numbers below show just how intense this one can get.

8: Competitors entered the One Championship lightweight tournament, namely Honorio Banario, Lowen Tynanes, Eddie Alvarez, Timofey Nastyukhin, Amir Khan, Ariel Sexton, Ev Ting and Saygid Guseyn Arslanaliev.

4: Competitors injured. It’s quite unfortunate that not every quarterfinals or semifinals winner was able to advance to the next round due to injuries. In the semifinals, Sexton was replaced by Khan, Tynanes was replaced by Alvarez and Nastyukhin was replaced by Folayang. The last contender to give up his spot was Alvarez, who dropped out of the finals due to an injury.

17: Days into the fight when One Championship founder and CEO Chatri Sityodtong announced that Alvarez had withdrawn from the finals. His spot was first offered to Folayang, who was his opponent in the semifinals. Unfortunately, the Filipino couldn’t make it due to visa issues. Then, it was offered to Lee, who jumped at the chance.

4: Years is the age difference between finalists Lee and Arslanaliev. This one is a battle of young guns, with the Russian older than his opponent by only four years. Arslanaliev was born on Oct. 23, 1994, while Lee was born on June 21, 1998.

6: Finishes have been rolled out so far in the tournament. In the quarterfinals, Tynanes knocked out Banario, Sexton submitted Khan, Arslanaliev knocked out Ting and Nastyukhin knocked out Alvarez. In the semifinals, Arslanaliev knocked out Khan and Alvarez submitted Folayang.

0: Decisions coming into the finals. There has been no shortage of excitement in the Lightweight Grand Prix. All bouts in the quarterfinals and semifinals ended via stoppage, five of which came in the first round.

20: Wins between the finalists Arslanaliev and Lee. The Team Corvos representative has won eight times as a professional, six by KO or TKO and two by submission. Apart from Khan and Ting, other notables on his resume are Nastyukhin and Tetsuya Yamada. Evolve MMA’s Lee, on the other hand, carries 12 career victories. Like Arslanaliev, he has never heard the final bell. Lee owns eight wins by KO or TKO and four by submission, stopping the likes of Shinya Aoki, Edward Kelly, Kotetsu Boku and Kazunori Yokota.

4: Losses between Arslanaliev and Lee. Arslanaliev has lost only once in his career, to Georgi Stoyanov at One Championship: Quest for Power. As for Lee, he has dropped one fight to Edward Kelly (which he later avenged) and two to Martin Nguyen.