Hamzat Chimaev fell seven positions in the UFC pound-for-pound rankings following his defeat to Sean Strickland at UFC 328. The post provides the complete updated top-10 P4P rankings. Islam Makhachev remains at #1, followed by Ilia Topuria at #2 and Alex Volkanovski at #3. Strickland now shares the #7 spot with Merab Dvalishvili. Chimaev dropped from #3 to #10 in the prestigious rankings.
Hamzat Chimaev tumbled seven spots in the UFC pound-for-pound rankings following his loss to Sean Strickland at UFC 328 on May 9, dropping from third to tenth in one of the most significant single-fight ranking slides in recent memory.
Strickland, now the middleweight champion at 35 years old, improved his record to 31-7-0 with the victory. The American fighter out of Xtreme Couture stands six-foot-one with a 76-inch reach and has built his reputation on relentless output, landing 6.04 significant strikes per minute at 42 percent accuracy. The win earned him a shared seventh-place position in the pound-for-pound standings alongside Merab Dvalishvili.
Islam Makhachev holds firm at number one on the pound-for-pound list with a 28-1-0 record. The 34-year-old Russian welterweight champion, fighting out of Eagles MMA, is one of the sport's premier grapplers, averaging 3.2 takedowns per 15 minutes and 1.1 submission attempts per 15 minutes, complementing a striking accuracy of 58 percent.
Ilia Topuria and Alex Volkanovski occupy the second and third positions respectively in the updated rankings.
Why it matters
- Chimaev's fall from third to tenth reflects how much weight a single defeat carries at the elite pound-for-pound level
- Strickland's rise to seventh reinforces his standing as a legitimate top-ten fighter across all divisions, not just middleweight
- The updated rankings signal a reshuffled middleweight picture following one of the division's most consequential results at UFC 328
Merab Dvalishvili vs Petr Yan
See the AI pick, live odds and the full matchup breakdown
Saturday, May 9, 2026
