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Many people would suggest that the sport of MMA is simply pro-wrestling without the scripting, and while that’s not necessarily true all of the time, one thing the two do have in common is the fact that bitter rivalries produce a lot of interest – and usually draw a lot of money, too.
Over the last decade the UFC has seen plenty of epic feuds between fighters, with rivalries often spanning multiple fights and changing shows into must-see events for hardcore and casual fans alike. It’s been hard to whittle the list down, but here are the 5 best feuds in the UFC in the past decade (2010-2019).
#5 Jon Jones vs. Daniel Cormier
The feud between Jon Jones and Daniel Cormier started innocently enough; according to most sources, in their first meeting Jones jokingly told Cormier – a former Olympic wrestler – that he’d be able to take him down if they were to fight. Cormier never forgot the jibe and when he decided to move down from Heavyweight to Light-Heavyweight in 2014, a fight with Jones for his UFC Light-Heavyweight title seemed like a natural match to make.
The UFC put the fight together for September 2014’s UFC 178, and things kicked into high gear as the two fighters got a little too close in a pre-show press conference, with the result being a wild brawl with punches exchanged and Cormier even throwing his shoe at ‘Bones’. Later, Jones controversially got personal with Cormier during a conference call – after the call had gone off the air – threatening to kill him after ‘DC’ said he’d like to spit in his face.
The fight at UFC 178 fell apart when Jones picked up an injury, but it was re-booked for UFC 182 a couple of months later, and ‘Bones’ largely dominated en route to a decision win. More was yet to come, though, as Jones controversially tested positive for cocaine in a post-fight drug test and then went onto more issues following a hit-and-run incident.
‘Bones’ was stripped of his title due to his issues – and Cormier won the vacant title by defeating Anthony Johnson, before continuing the feud by telling Jones to “get his sh*t together”. Jones would return in 2016, but a potential rematch fell through when he then tested positive for a banned PED and found himself suspended again.
Eventually the two rematched in 2017 at UFC 214 – with Jones again managing to defeat Cormier, this time by TKO, to regain the title he never truly lost. Even then though, the feud didn’t end. Cormier was gracious in defeat – but only until Jones tested positive for banned substances again, bringing his victory into massive doubt.
The feud has since gone somewhat quiet; Cormier moved up to Heavyweight in 2018 and has remained in the division since, while Jones has since regained the 205lbs title yet again – but a third fight between the two remains a trump card that the UFC could look to pull out in the future, as the duo remain bitter enemies.
#4 Georges St-Pierre vs. Nick Diaz
The feud between Georges St-Pierre and Nick Diaz might’ve felt a little one-sided at times – with Diaz aiming a ton of barbs at the French-Canadian legend prior to their clash at UFC 158 in March 2013 – but there’s no denying that at the time, it was huge. And it did huge business for the UFC too, with the pay-per-view event drawing approximately 950,000 buys as well as an attendance of 16,523 at Montreal’s Bell Centre.
Things got started when Diaz was transferred over to the UFC from StrikeForce, where he had held the Welterweight title for some time. The Stockton bad boy was booked to challenge St-Pierre at UFC 137 in October 2011, but his lack of commitment to some pre-show press conferences resulted in the UFC pulling him and replacing him with Carlos Condit.
Fate then reared its head, as St-Pierre was sidelined with an ACL tear – and Diaz ended up defeating BJ Penn in the show’s replacement main event. Post-fight, the former StrikeForce star couldn’t help but aim some fury at St-Pierre – accusing him of being scared rather than being hurt.
That wasn’t the case, though, as ‘GSP’ was actually sidelined for over a year. And during that time, Diaz was defeated by Condit in an interim title fight, putting a future meeting between the two rivals into doubt. But when St-Pierre returned in late 2012 to defeat Condit, it was a no-brainer for the UFC to re-book the highly anticipated clash with Diaz.
This time it was St-Pierre who took the lead in promoting the fight, labelling Diaz an “uneducated fool” and stating that the Californian’s trash talk had gotten him more angry than he’d ever been before – sending him to a “dark place” in his mind.
By the time the fight came around, the hype was at a fever pitch like never before for a ‘GSP’ fight – even major feuds like his ones with Josh Koscheck and BJ Penn. And when it came down to it, St-Pierre was able to overcome his rival, putting an end to the feud – on his behalf at least. For Diaz meanwhile, bitter feelings continued – and years later he would accuse ‘GSP’ of steroid abuse prior to their fight.
#3 ‘Rampage’ Jackson vs. Rashad Evans
There have been very few feuds in UFC history that got quite as personal as this one did, and the promotion tried – and failed – on numerous occasions, with various pairings, to reproduce the bitter rivalry that ‘Rampage’ Jackson and Rashad Evans built during their stint as coaches on the 10th season of The Ultimate Fighter.
The feud began in early 2009, when ‘Rampage’ defeated Evans’ training partner Keith Jardine to claim a shot at the UFC Light-Heavyweight title that, at that point, Evans held. ‘Suga’ would lose the title to Lyoto Machida before the fight with ‘Rampage’ could be finalised, but rather than book a Jackson vs. Machida title fight, the UFC decided to capitalise on the burgeoning heat between the two, and installed them as TUF coaches to build to their own fight instead.
Prior to TUF we’d only seen one relatively heated staredown between the two, but the reality show tapings kicked things into a new gear entirely. The two fighters came close to blows on multiple occasion, and things got so personal at one point that ‘Rampage’ actually accused Evans of being an ‘Uncle Tom’, an incredibly offensive insult towards an African-American like ‘Suga’.
Despite the fight being delayed due to a quasi-retirement from Jackson – who left the UFC temporarily to pursue acting following his casting in the 2010 movie The A-Team – by the time the promotion rebooked it for May 2010’s UFC 114, the heat somehow increased, to the point that the show drew over a million buys on pay-per-view.
It would be Evans who came away from the feud with his hand raised; he stunned Jackson with a right hand in the opening seconds of the fight and then used his grappling to dominate proceedings despite a late knockdown from ‘Rampage’, who was accused by some of not taking the fight seriously. Following the fight the hatchet was apparently buried – the two men have since starred in a film together – but it remains one of the most heated feuds in UFC history.
#2 Khabib Nurmagomedov vs. Conor McGregor
The most recent feud on this list, current UFC Lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov’s rivalry with former champion Conor McGregor currently lies dormant, as ‘The Eagle’ has stated on numerous occasions that he’s not all that interested in a rematch with the controversial Irishman, who he defeated last October in one-sided fashion. Even if we never get a second fight between the two, though, this one remains one of the most heated feuds in UFC history.
It’s actually hard to pinpoint quite where the issue between the two began; most likely, the problems started in late 2016, when the UFC scrapped the idea of Nurmagomedov challenging then-champion Eddie Alvarez for the Lightweight crown, and put McGregor into the fight instead. On the same night that ‘The Notorious One’ violently knocked out Alvarez to claim the title, Khabib destroyed Michael Johnson on the undercard, affirming his status as the top contender in the division.
But McGregor stepped away from the UFC temporarily, preferring to pursue a boxing match with Floyd Mayweather than defend his title against the Dagestani. McGregor was forced to vacate his title, and from there, the fighters began to sling mud at each other over Twitter, seemingly building to a likely fight in 2018.
It was at April 2018’s UFC 223 that things came to a head; Nurmagomedov, who was set to fight Max Holloway – and eventually replacement Al Iaquinta – for the vacant title, confronted McGregor’s training partner Artem Lobov at a hotel housing some of the fighters, essentially threatening him for some McGregor-supporting trash talk he’d used online.
That was all the fuel ‘The Notorious One’ needed, and so he flew out to Brooklyn, where the show was taking place, and along with some training partners, attacked a bus carrying Nurmagomedov, some of his team, and various other UFC fighters, eventually throwing a metal dolly through one of the vehicle’s windows.
If things were heated before, they were now off the charts. And of course, despite UFC President Dana White condemning McGregor’s behaviour, the fight was booked for October 2018’s UFC 229, with the Irishman throwing even more fuel onto the fire by mercilessly mocking Khabib’s religion, ethnicity and character.
Of course, everyone knows what happened next – the largely one-sided fight in favour of Nurmagomedov ending with McGregor tapping out to a fourth round neck crank, and the wild brawl afterwards that ended with Khabib leaping into the crowd to attack McGregor’s training partners while ‘The Notorious One’ exchanged blows inside the Octagon with members of Khabib’s team.
As of the time of writing, a rematch between the two seems unlikely, but with a feud this heated, the UFC will likely book it in the future if they can justify it. Regardless, the two men certainly don’t look like they’ll bury the hatchet any time soon.
#1 Anderson Silva vs. Chael Sonnen
The feud between Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov might’ve gone further than any other in UFC history – spilling into law-breaking and truly shocking scenes at UFC 229 – but for me, the feud between legendary UFC Middleweight champion Anderson Silva and his greatest ever foil, the loudmouth wrestler Chael Sonnen remains the best of the past decade. Prior to their rivalry, both Silva and Sonnen were highly rated, but were never true needle-movers, as Dana White would put it. With their feud, both men became bonafide superstars.
Things started innocently enough, as Sonnen became the top contender to Silva’s Middleweight crown by defeating Nate Marquardt at UFC 109 in February 2010. ‘The American Gangster’, as he would eventually be known, was hardly renowned for his personality at that point; he didn’t even have a nickname. But evidently Sonnen saw a chance for notoriety and snatched it, suddenly becoming the sport’s greatest-ever trash talker.
The former All-American wrestler began to launch incredible tirades towards Silva, aiming fire at everything from his fighting style and his lack of popularity in the US to his training partners and the culture of his home country of Brazil. It seemed like nothing was off limits for Sonnen, who was granted his shot at ‘The Spider’ at UFC 117 in August 2010.
Nobody really expected what happened next. Silva remained stoic despite all of the trash-talk, and most fans simply figured he’d destroy Sonnen like he had his previous six title challengers – but when it came to the fight, that wasn’t the case at all. ‘The American Gangster’ came flying out of the gate, tagging Silva with punches before taking him to the ground over and over, where he proceeded to pound him with elbows. This pattern went on for four rounds – and it looked like the UFC would have a new champion – until ‘The Spider’ somehow pulled out a miracle finish with a triangle choke to retain.
The fight was so good that the UFC looked to book an immediate rematch, meaning the rivalry was not over – and of course, Sonnen himself wouldn’t let it die anyway, claiming he’d basically beaten Silva despite submitting. Despite the plans though, any ideas of a rematch were derailed when Sonnen tested positive for a banned substance and found himself suspended.
Thankfully for the UFC, Silva continued to win, and when Sonnen returned over a year later and defeated Brian Stann, the feud quickly started up again. ‘The American Gangster’ called Silva out in his post-fight promo, stating that he “absolutely sucked” and claiming he’d leave the UFC for good if he failed to beat the Brazilian in a rematch.
The UFC naturally obliged by booking the fight, and in a hilarious moment, Sonnen actually showed up to a television interview with a replica UFC belt – as if he’d beaten Silva to win it at UFC 117. The fight garnered so much hype that Dana White predicted the pay-per-view it would main event – UFC 148 – would break the promotion’s buyrate record. Even the weigh-in created more heat as Silva struck the challenger with his shoulder during a staredown.
When the fight finally went down, despite Sonnen’s best efforts, it was Silva who once again came away with his hand raised. He defeated ‘The American Gangster’ by TKO in the second round, capitalising on a botched spinning backfist attempt to hurt Sonnen with a knee to the body before finishing him off with a series of strikes.
With that, the rivalry was essentially done, with Silva being gracious in victory – and Sonnen surprisingly being gracious in defeat. Despite the hatchet being buried and the story ending, though, the feud had done a lot for both men – turning them into superstars and major drawing cards – and both fights were fantastic, meaning it should rank as the best UFC feud of the decade.
