Sherdog’s 2023 Upset of the Year

“That’s why they play the games.” —sports cliché, attributed to many

Make no mistake: Upsets are a good thing. One of the fundamental gifts that sport bestows on us, alongside entertainment, inspiration, awe and humor, is the gift of surprise. Without the underdog’s hope, our favorite sports would be so bland as to not be worth watching.

Mixed martial arts is in no danger there. As an individual sport involving widely varying fight styles, a minimal yet constantly evolving rule set and often inconsistent judging, all of the variables add up to chaos. The result is that out of the thousands of MMA bouts that take place each year, about one-third end with the underdog’s hand being raised in victory. Even at the Ultimate Fighting Championship level, where the betting traffic is highest and scouting most thorough, whole calendar years will pass without an event where there are not at least one or two upsets.

Precisely because upsets are so commonplace in MMA, only a few seem to stick in our minds for longer than a week, and fewer still become truly unforgettable. What makes certain upsets the stuff of legend—or more than the stuff of Monday morning conversation, at least? If past winners of Sherdog’s “Upset of the Year” award are any indication, there are multiple paths to immortality. Sometimes an upset feels big because it is big, in the literal, mathematical sense: Roxanne Modafferi’s gutsy win over Maycee Barber, which won this category in 2020, saw “The Happy Warrior” prevail despite entering the cage as a +700 underdog, the longest odds for a winning UFC fighter in years.

In other cases, the magnitude of the upset comes not only from the odds but from the context. In our 2018 “Upset of the Year”, Henry Cejudo eked out a narrow decision over Demetrious Johnson to capture the UFC flyweight title. Cejudo had been a big betting underdog, but what made it feel like an all-timer of an upset was everything else: “Mighty Mouse” was the UFC’s longest-tenured, most dominant champion and arguably the top pound-for-pound fighter in the world, on a 13-fight win streak which included a first-round thrashing of Cejudo just two years before.

This year offered plenty of examples of MMA’s predictable unpredictability, and there were several worthy entries for “Upset of the Year.” Alexa Grasso’s dethroning of longtime flyweight champ Valentina Shevchenko at UFC 285, in addition to winning “Submission of the Year,” made the short list in this category. For sheer numerical fireworks, it would be impossible to top previously undefeated Bellator MMA super-prospect Joey Davis returning to action after a two-year layoff at Bellator 293, only to lose a split decision to Jefferson Creighton as a -1700 favorite. In perhaps the most eye-opening upset of 2023 from a subjective standpoint, Patricio “Pitbull” Freire, a pound-for-pound stalwart and Bellator’s greatest fighter ever, took a short-notice bout at Super Rizin 2 in July while in Japan to corner his brother Patricky, and was clocked in two and a half minutes by the unheralded Chihiro Suzuki.

In the end, one fight stood out from the pack, offering all of the elements of an all-time classic upset: long odds, high stakes and that vital, “Is this really happening?” energy that can only come when our expectations are upended in stunning fashion. The gift of surprise, in other words.

The first thing to remember about Sean Strickland’s middleweight title bid against Israel Adesanya on Sept. 9 is that Strickland wasn’t even supposed to be there. Adesanya had been scheduled to face streaking contender Dricus Du Plessis at UFC 293. Interest in that bout was high, thanks to a heated and frankly ugly build-up sparked by Du Plessis’ barbs about becoming the UFC’s first “real” African champ. Hype aside, Du Plessis, as a big, athletic fighter with strong wrestling and crushing power, seemed to present an interesting stylistic foil for “The Last Stylebender.”

When Du Plessis was forced to withdraw due to injury a month before the bout, “Tarzan” got the call. In terms of marketability, the UFC didn’t lose too much, as Strickland and Adesanya had been verbally sniping at each other for over a year. Better yet, UFC 293 was set to take place in Australia, where a packed, partisan, pro-Adesanya crowd would be guaranteed, regardless of opponent.

The big question was not over Strickland’s qualifications as the B-side to a UFC pay-per-view main event but his bona fides as a challenger to Adesanya. Strickland, who was voted Sherdog’s “Comeback Fighter of the Year” for 2020 on the strength of a six-fight win streak, had won his first two bouts of 2023, both times in the headliner of UFC Fight Night cards, most recently by knocking out Abusupiyan Magomedov at UFC on ESPN 48 in July. On paper, he was the most deserving candidate available on a month’s notice.

Stylistically, however, the fight seemed to be a nightmare matchup for the challenger. In the wake of multiple knee injuries and a move from welterweight to middleweight, Strickland’s once-underrated wrestling had disappeared from his arsenal entirely, and his comeback in the new decade had been built on solid, patient boxing, especially an excellent jab and cross. Unfortunately, “good striker who can’t or won’t wrestle” could describe more than a few of Adesanya’s highlight reel victims over the years. Until Alex Pereira came along, an absolutely gigantic, world-class kickboxer with several fights’ worth of first-hand experience against “The Last Stylebender,” it had simply been impossible to prosper in a striking match with Adesanya without at least the threat of the takedown.

Conventional wisdom held that Strickland, a very competent striker with a relatively limited repertoire, would be outmatched against Adesanya like so many other foes had been, and would either go down in flames like Paulo Costa, be toyed with like Derek Brunson or at best, acquit himself well in defeat as Robert Whittaker had done in his rematch. The champ entered the Octagon that night as a greater than six-to-one favorite, and any bettors prescient enough to lay down money on the challenger would enjoy a +450 return on their investment.

What is shocking, in hindsight, is how non-shocking the challenger’s dismantling of Adesanya at UFC 293 seemed once he got going, despite revealing no new wrinkles or revolutionary game planning. If we may indulge here in another sports cliché, Strickland stuck with what got him to the dance in the first place. Round after round, he marched forward behind his crisp one-two, cut off the cage and diligently stayed inside the lanky champion’s preferred kicking range, and round after round it worked. It is difficult to point out individual highlights, but very easy to point to the entire fight as an example of doing small, fundamental things correctly. Harking back to other famous MMA upsets, this was not Matt Serra’s shocking lamping of Georges St. Pierre, but something closer to Cody Garbrandt vs. Dominick Cruz, the kind of slow-motion revelation that leaves viewers wondering why nobody had done that before, at least with such success.

That is not to say that it didn’t feel like an upset in the making. As the fight wore on, the challenger grew in confidence even as the champ became increasingly frustrated and bewildered. By the championship rounds, Strickland was landing combinations on Adesanya, punctuated with shouting and roaring in his face. In the moment, it felt less like calculated taunting and more like pure jubilation from a competitor who was completely in the zone—again, reminiscent of Garbrandt’s performance against Cruz.

When the final horn sounded that night in Sydney, Strickland had won four out of five rounds on all three judges’ scorecards. He had done it in straightforward, uncontroversial fashion, and he had frankly made it look kind of easy. Only time will tell whether “Tarzan” caught Adesanya on an off night, or he simply has the man’s number, but we may find out next year. Strickland is set to defend the title against Du Plessis next month at UFC 297 and Adesanya, now having a built-in narrative with both men, may well await the winner, even if he takes another fight in the interim. Those are all matters for next year, however. For now, Strickland’s incredible performance at UFC 293 is Sherdog’s 2023 “Upset of the Year.”