While most of the best talent is under the UFC banner and Bellator and WSOF have seemed scooped up the rest, there is still plenty of talent yet to be signed by the top promotions of the MMA food chain. These are not necessarily 'free agents' or even prospects, they are (mostly) top 100 ranked fighters who are navigating the nebulous seas of regional and international fight promotion for whatever reason.
Will anyone on this list be signed by a major US promotion in the near future? Your guess is as good as mine, but they should at least be considered if promotions hope to compete for top talent.
Lightweights (155lb)
RANK | NAME | RECORD | AGE | Last Promotion |
22 | Shinya Aoki | 37-6-0-1 | 31 | ONE FC/IGF (Asia/Japan) |
26 | Alexander Sarnavskiy | 30-2-0 | 25 | UVS (Russia) |
33 | Rick Hawn | 19-4-0 | 38 | Titan FC |
38 | Koji Ando | 11-3-2 | 29 | ONE FC (Asia) |
43 | Musa Khamanaev | 15-3-0 | 27 | Absolute CB (Russia) |
52 | Pat Healy | 30-20-0-1 | 31 | Titan FC |
61 | Mike Ricci | 10-4-0 | 28 | Titan FC |
62 | Satoru Kitaoka | 35-13-9 | 34 | Pancrase (Japan) |
63 | TJ O'Brien | 20-7-0 | 28 | Pinnacle Combat |
65 | Jesse Ronson | 14-5-0 | 29 | Provincial FC |
68 | Tom Gallicchio | 19-8-0 | ? | MFC (Canada) |
75 | Joshua Aveles | 20-10-1 | 26 | KOTC |
76 | Ramazan Esenbaev | 8-1-1 | ? | IGF (Japan) |
77 | Mateusz Gamrot | 8-0-0 | 24 | KSW (Poland) |
81 | Steven Ray | 16-5-0 | 24 | Cage Warriors (UK) |
82 | Darrell Horcher | 11-1-0 | 27 | Cage Fury FC |
84 | Ricardo Tirloni | 18-6-0 | 31 | Arena Tour (Argentina) |
88 | Mansour Barnaoui | 11-2-0 | 22 | BAMMA (UK) |
92 | Gleristone Santos | 27-4-0 | 26 | Titan FC |
94 | Gesias Cavalcante | 19-8-1-2 | 31 | Kungfu Union (China) |
96 | Vuyisile Colossa | 7-4-0 | 32 | ONE FC (Asia) |
97 | Ryan Dickson | 10-2-0 | 25 | Hard Knocks FC |
99 | David Khachatryan | 18-2-0 | 27 | Fight Nights (Russia) |
100 | Jacob Volkmann | 17-6-0 | 34 | Pinnacle Combat |
101 | Flavio Alvaro | 48-10-0 | 37 | Thunder Fight (Brazil) |
Big 3 in Comparison
Promotion | # Top 100 fighters | Champ |
UFC | 63 | Anthony Pettis |
Bellator | 8 | Will Brooks |
WSOF | 4 | Justin Gaethje |
Titan FC | 4 | vacant |
*All Rankings taken from Fight Matrix at time of writing. Promotions without a country listed next to it are considered US based.