20 Seasons of 'The Ultimate Fighter': Part I

With a few exceptions, such as country vs. country and gym vs. gym iterations, each season of “The Ultimate Fighter” has begun with a draft, in which the opposing coaches picked fighters to represent them. Readers of the “TUF Redraft” series will remember that one of the core “TUF” truths is that almost all of those coaches were absolutely awful at drafting. However, thanks to the “even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while” principle, some picks stood out as brilliant in hindsight. Here are the top draft steals of the first 20 seasons of “The Ultimate Fighter,” ranked based on how they performed against the rest of the draft from their seasons.

1. Kelvin Gastelum

Season 17 (Team Sonnen)
Original Draft Position: 13 (of 14)
Redraft Position: 1
Post-TUF Record: 11-7-0, 1 NC

Go ahead and add “grand theft” to Chael Sonnen’s rap sheet, because draft larceny doesn’t get much more egregious than picking a fighter in the last round who then goes on to win the tournament and become the best fighter of the bunch. Gastelum’s foe in the season finale, Uriah Hall, is experiencing a late-career resurgence and is nipping at his heels, but Hall was drafted third, so there is still no question as to who represented a better value pick. After an early run at welterweight that was rife with promise but plagued by weight issues, Gastelum moved up to 185 pounds, where he fought for a title, giving Israel Adesanya all he could handle for five rounds, and remains a fringe contender today. Not bad for a guy drafted immediately after Adam Cella.

2. Rashad Evans

Season 2 (Team Franklin)
Original Draft Position: 9 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 1
Post-TUF Record: 14-8-1

Season 2 featured heavyweights and welterweights being drafted out of the same pool, so it’s more telling that Evans was the fifth out of eight big men taken. While first overall pick Keith Jardine went on to an inconsistent but respectable career as a light heavyweight and middleweight in and out of the UFC, the next three heavyweights picked before Evans, Mike Whitehead, Seth Petruzelli and Dan Christison, went a dismal combined 1-6 in the Octagon.

3. Ed Herman

Season 3 (Team Shamrock)
Original Draft Position: 12 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 3
Post-TUF Record: 13-11, 1 NC (13-10, 1 NC UFC)

Like Evans, Herman’s season featured two weight classes being drafted simultaneously, so it is more instructive to think of him as the sixth out of eight middleweights taken. Ultimately it doesn’t matter too much, since “Short Fuse” has more UFC wins (13) than all the rest, who have 11 combined — seven of which belong to Kendall Grove. The man drafted directly before Herman, Mike Stine, never fought again professionally.

4. Roxanne Modafferi

Season 18 (Team Tate)
Original Draft Position: 7 (of 8)
Redraft Position: 3
Post-TUF Record: 10-8 (4-6 UFC)

Chalk it up to two factors: One, “The Happy Warrior” has carved a nearly two-decade career out of being underestimated; and two, Ronda Rousey might have been the worst at drafting of any coach in “TUF” history. Modafferi did not actually come to the UFC for good until the all-flyweight 26th season in 2017, but her post-“TUF” record, like Modafferi herself, is deceptively strong, only having lost to Top 10 fighters. The three women for whom Rousey passed up Modafferi in the Season 18 draft, Shayna Baszler, Jessamyn Duke and Peggy Morgan, went a combined 3-12 for the remainder of their careers.

5. Sergio Moraes

“TUF” Brazil 1 (Team Vitor)
Original Draft Position: 7 (of 8)
Redraft Position: 3
Post-TUF Record: 8-6-1 (8-5-1 UFC)

The low draft positions of some of the fighters on this list are understandable in hindsight. Moraes is not one of them. At the time of his season, “The Panther” was 29 years old and one of the best grapplers on the planet, a four-time Mundials gold medalist with a win over Kron Gracie. No, he wasn’t a true middleweight, but neither were Francisco Trinaldo or Renee Forte, both of whom were chosen well before him. Predictably, he went on to one of the best careers of any cast member, putting together a seven-fight unbeaten streak and crashing the welterweight Top 10 before running into Kamaru Usman. Now out of the UFC and in a bit of a free-fall, Moraes is nonetheless secure as the steal of the “TUF Brazil 1” draft.

6. Court McGee

Season 11 (Team Liddell)
Original Draft Position: 12 (of 14)
Redraft Position: 2
Post-TUF Record: 9-9

Draft picks don’t get much better than taking someone in the second to last round who then goes on to win the whole thing. McGee’s victory at the Season 11 finale was a feel-good moment for anyone who had heard his harrowing life story on the show. His record since then is solid and respectable, and while he has appeared to be in decline of late, he showed signs of life in a vigorous performance against Claudio Silva earlier this month. At 36, “The Crusher” might not be done quite yet.

7. Brad Tavares

Season 11 (Team Liddell)
Original Draft Position: 10 (of 14)
Redraft Position: 1
Post-TUF Record: 13-6

Chuck Liddell may have been largely checked out as a coach by the time of Season 11, but he could still pick ‘em, as evidenced by his selection of McGee and Tavares in the back half of the draft. Tavares, who remains a fringe contender at middleweight to this day, is easily the most accomplished fighter to come out of his season. He comes in just behind McGee on this list thanks to his higher draft position and to McGee winning the finale over Team Ortiz’s Kris McCray, which you had better believe mattered to the two nemesis coaches.

8. Matt Mitrione

Season 10 (Team Rashad)
Original Draft Position: 13 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 2
Post-TUF Record: 13-8, 1 NC (9-5 UFC)

“Meathead” was the steal of the all-heavyweight Season 10, and would be higher on this list if not for two things. First, being heavyweights, that season featured a ton of fighters with next to no experience — former NFL lineman Mitrione had no professional fights at all — making scouting incredibly difficult. Second, Quinton Jackson was, with the possible exception of Rousey, the worst drafter in “TUF” history, meaning that Rashad Evans had all the time in the world to get his value picks in. Of the seven men that “Rampage” drafted before Evans took Mitrione, six never notched a single win in the UFC, and the other, Kevin Ferguson, prevailed in a dreadful fight over a handpicked Houston Alexander.

9. Kenny Florian

Season 1 (Team Liddell)
Original Draft Position: 11 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 3
Post-TUF Record: 12-5

The skinny, unassuming, 2-1 Florian was underdrafted because, standing in line to be picked with the rest of the Season 1 cast, he didn’t even look as if he belonged in the same sport as Josh Koscheck and Nate Quarry, let alone the same weight class. “KenFlo” was chosen fifth out of eight middleweights, then went on to be one of the show’s biggest success stories. He would be higher on this list if not for the fact that he was part of that ridiculously loaded inaugural season; of the middleweights drafted ahead of him — Quarry, Koscheck, Chris Leben and Sanchez — there’s not a chump among them.

10. Michael Chiesa

Season 15 (Team Faber)
Original Draft Position: 10 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 1
Post-TUF Record: 11-4

Chiesa was picked tenth out of 16 lightweights on the “live” Season 15, then won the tournament, defeating No. 1 pick Justin Lawrence and No. 2 Al Iaquinta in the process. He went on to a solid run at lightweight before finally moving up to 170 pounds, where he has won four straight and certified himself a top welterweight contender. “Maverick” would be higher on this list if not for the fact that several of the men drafted ahead of him, such as Iaquinta, James Vick, Myles Jury and Vinc Pichel, went on to have pretty good careers themselves. However, at 33 and at home in his new weight class, Chiesa might have more upward mobility than anyone else on this list.

Honorable Mention: Roy Nelson

Season 10 (Team Rashad)
Original Draft Position: 9 (of 16)
Redraft Position: 1
Post-TUF Record: 10-14 (9-10 UFC)

“Big Country” is the inspiration behind the entire “TUF Redraft” series. While doing research for an unrelated article, your author noticed that Nelson had been picked ninth on his all-heavyweight season of “TUF,” then gone on to win the tournament, finishing the No. 1, 2 and 3 draft picks along the way. After demonstrating in the most direct manner possible that he should have been picked first, Nelson proceeded to have the best post-show résumé of any fighter from the season, his modest win-loss ratio belying the fact that he fought contenders pretty much every time out. Even at the time, it was baffling that Nelson slid so far; he was easily the most accomplished fighter in the cast, a former International Fight League champion who had been a robbery away from beating Andrei Arlovski just a year before.

Also: Matt Brown (Season 7), Chris Camozzi (Season 11), George Roop (Season 8), Tom Lawlor (Season 8), Manny Gamburyan (Season 5).

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