Adesanya, Silva, Whittaker: Ranking every UFC middleweight champion from best to worst

Israel Adesanya will defend his UFC middleweight title with a rematch against New Zealand-born Australian Robert Whittaker this weekend.

The Last Stylebender’s second clash with ‘Bobby Knuckles’ will serve as the main event of UFC 271 at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas on February 12.

Adesanya, 32, currently reigns supreme over one of the UFC’s most historic divisions. But who is the best middleweight of all time?

Here, GiveMeSport ranks every UFC middleweight champion from best to worst, based almost entirely on statistics and nothing else…

Who else? And not only the best middleweight of all time, but arguably one of the greatest fighters, pound-for-pound, the world has ever seen.

Anderson Silva‘s most notable wins came against Vitor Belfort, Forrest Griffin, Nate Marquardt and Chael Sonnen.

Nicknamed The Spider from Brazil, he successfully defended his belt a record ten times before being released from his contract aged 45 in 2020.

Chris Weidman might be one of the most underrated middleweight champions of all time.

He won the title by knocking out the legendary Brazilian back in December 2013 and defended it three times before finally losing in December 2015 to Luke Rockhold.

Last time out, Adesanya comfortably outclassed Marvin Vettori to secure a clean sweep on the judges’ scorecards.

The Nigerian-born Kiwi has also beaten Derek Brunson, Paulo Costa, Kelvin Gastelum and Yoel Romero.

Will he jump above Weidman into second place by the end of the week? We’ll have to wait and see.

Rich Franklin, who was inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame in April 2019, is fourth ahead of Michael Bisping.

Franklin, from Cincinnati, turned pro in 1999 and took the title with a 2005 hammering of Evan Tanner.

He also bears an