Denny Burkholder

As we gear up for Saturday's landmark UFC 100 pay-per-view event, it's a convenient time to take stock of some of other UFC milestones.

In following this sport closely for years, I've amassed hours of video and recorded plenty of statistics. Most of the time, the stats I compile go into a series of Excel spreadsheets (yeah, I'm a geek) and never see the light of day in a column, unless a particular stat jumps out as relevant to whatever event I'm writing about that week. Just for fun, I thought I'd dig through the data and present some of it here.

The majority of this stuff is UFC trivia in the purest sense of the word. It's trivial. So don't take my inclusion (or exclusion) of any UFC statistic as an endorsement, indictment, or judgment of any kind. It's just trivia, for those who enjoy that sort of thing. You never know -- maybe you'll be able to win a few bets this weekend at your UFC 100 social gatherings by proving yourself the ultimate fountain of useless UFC information.

UFC Not-So-100

-- UFC 100 on July 11 will actually be the 133rd UFC event in history. The actual 100th UFC event in chronological order was UFC 78 on 11/17/2007, headlined by Rashad Evans vs. Michael Bisping in Newark, N.J.

-- UFC 100 is the 100th "numbered" UFC event only if you exclude those events denoted with a decimal, most notably UFC 37.5, which was a last-minute show thrown together to be featured on an episode of Fox Sports Net's The Best Damn Sports Show Period on June 22, 2002. Other events such as the Ultimate Ultimate 1995 and 1996 are also sometimes referred to as a ".5" event.

-- UFC 100 isn't even the 100th UFC event to be broadcast on pay-per-view in the United States. It will be the 96th UFC PPV offering, since UFC 70, UFC 75, UFC 89 and UFC 95 all aired on free (cable) television in the United States.

-- The 33 UFC events that fall out of the traditional numbered, non-decimal event sequence are: Ultimate Ultimate 1995 (12/16/1995), Ultimate Ultimate 1996 (12/7/1996), Ultimate Japan 1 (12/21/1997), Ultimate Brazil (10/16/1998), UFC 37.5 (6/22/2002), The Final Chapter (10/10/2006), The Ultimate Fighter Finales 1-9, and Ultimate Fight Nights 1-18.

Chronological milestone fights

• 1: Gerard Gordeau def. Teila Tuli via TKO at 26 seconds, UFC 1 (11/12/1993).
• 50: Royce Gracie drew with Ken Shamrock, 36:00, UFC 5 (4/7/1995).
• 100: Don Frye def. Brian Johnston via submission, 4:38, UFC 10 (7/12/1996).
• 150: Maurice Smith def. Mark Coleman via unanimous decision, 21:00, UFC 14 (7/27/1997).
• 200: Tito Ortiz def. Guy Mezger via TKO, 9:55, UFC 19 (3/5/1999).
• 300: Tito Ortiz def. Elvis Sinosic via TKO, 3:32 of Round 1, UFC 32 (6/29/2001).
• 400: Karo Parisyan def. Dave Strasser via submission, 3:50 of Round 1, UFC 44 (9/26/2003).
• 500: Jonathan Goulet def. Jay Hieron via TKO, 1:05 of Round 3, UFC Fight Night 2 (10/3/2005).
• 600: Hermes Franca def. Joe Jordan via submission, 47 seconds of Round 3, UFC 61 (7/8/2006).
• 700: Mirko Cro Cop def. Eddie Sanchez via TKO, 4:33 of Round 1, UFC 67 (2/3/2007).
• 800: Marcus Davis def. Paul Taylor via submission, 4:14 of Round 1, UFC 75 (9/8/2007).
• 900: Marcus Aurelio def. Ryan Roberts via submission, 16 seconds of Round 1, UFC Fight Night 13 (4/2/2008).
• 1000: Jim Miller def. David Baron via submission, 3:19 of Round 3, UFC 89 (10/18/2008).
• 1100: Shane Nelson def. Aaron Riley via TKO, 44 seconds of Round 1, UFC 96 (3/7/2009).

Total fights

-- There have been 1,163 total UFC fights. There are 1,165 fight results that are considered "official," but two of those bouts never happened. In both cases, a winner was decided via forfeiture.

The two "fights" that never took place were Harold Howard vs. Royce Gracie at UFC 3, and Mark Coleman vs. Scott Ferrozzo at UFC 11. In both cases, the scheduled fight was decided via forfeit without ever starting because the losing fighters (Gracie and Ferrozzo) were unable to continue fighting due to damage and/or fatigue from earlier fights in a one-night tournament. The forfeitures are officially recorded as default wins for Howard and Coleman since, due to the tournament format, a winner had to be determined despite no fight taking place.

Of the 1,163 UFC fights that actually took place:

• 442 (38%) ended via KO or TKO.
• 365 (31%) ended via submission.
• 339 (29%) ended with a winner declared via decision.
• 88 (7.6%) ended in less than 1 minute.
• 447 (38.4%) happened in Las Vegas.

Winners, losers, and the lack thereof

• Most UFC wins | via KO/TKO | via submission | via decision

• 369 different men have won at least one UFC fight.
• 603 different men have lost at least one UFC fight.
• Only five fighters in history have fought in the UFC without earning a win or suffering a loss: Ron Faircloth (0-0-0, 1 NC), C.J. Fernandes (0-0-1), Bobby Hoffman (0-0-0, 1 NC), Mark David Robinson (0-0-0, 1 NC) and Alfonso Alcarez (0-0-1).
• The all-time record for most UFC losses is 10, held by David "Tank" Abbott. Chris "Lights Out" Lytle is in second place with 9 losses. Jeremy Horn is in third place with 7 losses, and six fighters (Chuck Liddell, Elvis Sinosic, Evan Tanner, Ken Shamrock, Randy Couture and Tito Ortiz) are tied with 6 losses apiece. Once you dig down to the fighters with 4 or 5 losses, the list gets very long.

This is perhaps the most misleading statistic of the bunch, because racking up a bunch of UFC losses requires sticking around in the UFC for a long enough period of time to accumulate them. For every guy with four or five UFC losses on his record, there are 10 worse fighters that only lost once or twice in the UFC before the company booted them. If a fighter had enough UFC longevity to lose at least five fights, he obviously had some quality about him -- fighting ability, untapped potential, fan appeal, marketability, or solid wins to balance out his losses -- to hang on to his UFC contract.

Tank Abbott put forth some dismal performances in his UFC losses and was far from a complete MMA fighter. But he was popular with viewers, so they kept bringing him back. The fights Abbott did win were often by spectacular, highlight-reel knockout (the Steve Nelmark KO in particular is burned into my memory forever), a fact which kept many fans coming back to see if Abbott could do it again, even if they were pretty sure he couldn't. Others despised him for his disrespectful behavior and his unkempt appearance, and tuned in because they wanted to see him get beaten. As the stats show, those fans often got what they paid for.

Lytle is simply a case of a solid midcard fighter who is good enough to decisively beat fighters on the lower end of the card and to put up a hell of a fight when he loses. Lytle doesn't win them all, but he's better than a lot of fighters with significantly fewer losses to their credit.

Horn and Shamrock are two cases of guys that have enjoyed lengthy careers and have also fought pretty stiff competition in comparison to some guys with prettier win-loss records. Horn's record includes losses to Chuck Liddell, Nate Marquardt and Frank Shamrock. Most fighters were never good enough to be considered for a fight with those guys, let alone given the chance to lose to them.

Shamrock was a top UFC star from virtually day one, and all of his losses were in high-profile fights. He lost to Tito Ortiz three times, and also lost to Dan Severn, Royce Gracie and Rich Franklin.

And the first shall be last

-- Most losses via KO or TKO: Five (three-way tie between Chuck Liddell, Evan Tanner and Randy Couture). Four fighters (Elvis Sinosic, Ken Shamrock, Marvin Eastman and Pete Sell) have lost UFC fights via KO/TKO four times each.

It's a shame that the three guys tied for most KO/TKO losses happen to be three bona fide UFC legends. It's also worth noting that Liddell -- who will be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame on Friday -- holds the all-time record for most UFC wins (10) via KO/TKO, and that two of his five KO losses were within the past year, after "The Iceman" had clearly begun to slow down. It's also notable that Liddell, Couture and Tanner have a combined 40 wins in the Octagon, so this statistic, while factually accurate, is hardly indicative of career success.

Snap or tap

-- Most losses via submission: Five (tie between Jeremy Horn and David "Tank" Abbott). Three fighters (Brian Johnston, Dan Severn, Pete Spratt) have lost four UFC fights via submission.

No contests

-- There are five "No Contest" fights in UFC's history. Three of those fights originally had winners:

• Marcus Silveira def. Kazushi Sakuraba via TKO in their first fight at Ultimate Japan I on 12/21/1997
• Bobby Hoffman def. Mark David Robinson via KO at 3:27 of Round 1 at UFC 30 on 2/23/2001
• Karo Parisyan def. Dong Hyun Kim via split decision at UFC 94 on 1/31/2009

Silveira vs. Sakuraba was changed to a no contest after a replay convinced referee "Big" John McCarthy that he had erroneously ruled that Sakuraba was knocked out. Hoffman vs. Robinson was changed to a no contest after Hoffman failed an athletic commission drug test. Likewise, Parisyan vs. Kim was changed to a no contest after Parisyan tested positive for banned substances.

The other two "No Contests" are:

• Alessio Sakara vs. Ron Faircloth, NC, 10 seconds of Round 2, UFC 55, 10/7/2005 (unintentional kick to the groin by Faircloth rendered Sakara unable to continue).
• Gray Maynard vs. Rob Emerson, NC, 39 seconds of Round 2, TUF 5 Finale, 6/23/2007 (Maynard slammed Emerson, simultaneously knocking himself out while inflicting a rib injury to Emerson that caused him to tap out).

Draws

-- There have been eight fights in UFC history that resulted in a draw:

• Royce Gracie vs. Ken Shamrock (UFC 5, 36:00)
• Oleg Taktarov vs. Ken Shamrock (UFC 7, 33:00)
• Jens Pulver vs. Alfonso Alcarez (UFC 22, 5:00, R2)
• Ron Waterman vs. Tim Lajcik (UFC 22, 5:00, R3)
• Brad Gumm vs. C.J. Fernandes (UFC 27, 5:00, R2)
• B.J. Penn vs. Caol Uno (UFC 41, 5:00, R5)
• Ian Freeman vs. Vernon White (UFC 43, 5:00, R3)
• Tito Ortiz vs. Rashad Evans (UFC 73, 5:00, R3)

-- UFC 22 is the only show in UFC history to feature more than one fight that ended in a draw.

-- 22 UFC title fights scheduled for five 5:00 rounds have gone to a decision. Out of those 22, only one resulted in a draw on judge's scorecards: B.J. Penn vs. Caol Uno for the lightweight title at UFC 41 (2/28/2003).

Marathon men

-- In the days before the UFC began dividing fights into rounds, four fights lasted 30 minutes or longer with no breaks. All four happened in the span of just over one year, from the spring of 1995 to 1996. Ken Shamrock was in three of the four fights. Two of the four didn't even result in a winner. Dan Severn won the other two:

• Royce Gracie drew with Ken Shamrock, 36:00, UFC 5 (4/7/1995).
• Oleg Taktarov drew with Ken Shamrock, 33:00, UFC 7 (9/8/1995).
• Dan Severn defeated Oleg Taktarov via unanimous dec., 30:00, Ultimate Ultimate 1995 (12/16/1995).
• Dan Severn defeated Ken Shamrock via split dec., 30:00, UFC 9 (5/17/1996).

These are the only four fights in UFC history to exceed 25 minutes in length, making them the longest fights in the company's history. The current round structure allows for a maximum fight length of 25 minutes (for five-round title bouts only), so unless the rules change, these fights will likely hold on to their places as the longest ever.

Pattern behavior

• Most decisions in a single show: Seven (three-way tie between UFC 99, UFC 97, UFC 94).
• Most fights ending in KO/TKO in a single show: Eight (UFC 92).
• Most fights ending in a submission in a single show: 10 (UFC 2).

It's notable that there have been three shows in 2009 alone that share the record for most decisions on a single card.

It's also worth noting that the show with the most submissions -- UFC 2 -- happened way back on March 11, 1994, on a card that featured a whopping 15 total fights.

Like I said, these stats are trivial for the most part. They're fun to sort through and they can provide you with fodder for conversations with your MMA-watching friends, but otherwise, they're to be taken with a grain of salt.

Without watching the events and the fights in question, the statistics only tell part of the story.

Until then, I hope you all enjoy UFC 100 (or is it 133?) this weekend, and reflect well upon the hours of entertainment this promotion has given fans over the past 16 years.


7/8 UPDATE: A reader pointed out one "No Contest" fight that I didn't have listed (Hoffman vs. Robinson, which was originally a Hoffman win via KO). That has been corrected above, along with any statistic that would have been affected by the change. Thanks for the correction!