5 of the best featherweight fights in MMA history

2. Dustin Poirier vs. The Korean Zombie at UFC Fairfax

This is what I like to call the UFC’s introduction to both Chan Sung Jung (The Korean Zombie) and Dustin Poirier, two men who have become huge favorites all around the world thanks to the wars they have put on throughout their careers. It was only appropriate that the only time these two faced each other, it was announced as the fight of the year by a number of media outlets.

Coming into this fight, everyone knew about the heart and toughness of these two competitors but they were yet to truly establish themselves. Both of them were heading into their first ever UFC main event and it showed as it seemed that neither of them had truly prepared for five rounds. The good thing about that is they gave us an insane 19 minutes of action, with both men leaving it all on the line to make sure they would get their hand raised.

What’s perhaps most interesting about this fight is that most of the action took place in frenetic sprawls rather than on the feet. Both of them were coming in as established submission specialists, something you wouldn’t expect nowadays from either man and were hoping to clamp on another impressive submission win. After an extremely hard-fought, back-and-forth battle, Jung managed to choke Poirier out with his own move, the D’Arce choke, to cement himself as a top contender in the 145-pound division.

Given the action and bravery shown by both men, it was hard to not put this fight at number 1. It also introduced us to two of the biggest stars in MMA, particularly Dustin Poirier, who had yet to establish himself in the same manner Jung had. In the end, this fight falls short of being the greatest featherweight fight of all time because… Well, just wait and see what is undoubtedly the greatest featherweight fight of all time.