10 great fighters who never got a UFC title shot

#8 Ryan Bader

Ryan Bader captured gold in Bellator but never got a shot in the UFC

Currently sitting pretty as the Bellator Light-Heavyweight champion, it could be argued that only a reputation for putting on less than entertaining fights kept Ryan Bader from a shot at UFC gold in late 2015. Prior to that period, Bader had always been defeated right before a title opportunity came to him – his initial run was stopped by Jon Jones in 2011, another strong run ended at the hands of Lyoto Machida in 2012, and he was knocked out by Glover Teixeira in 2013.

After the Teixeira loss though, Bader became far more consistent and defeated Anthony Perosh, Rafael Feijao, Ovince St. Preux and Phil Davis to stake his claim for a title shot. When he crashed a press conference to taunt the new champion Daniel Cormier in 2015, it seemed logical to match the two later in the year.

Unfortunately the UFC felt that Bader’s style wouldn’t draw enough eyeballs, and gave the title shot at UFC 192 to Alexander Gustafsson instead, despite the Swede coming off a loss. Bader defeated Rashad Evans at the same show, but then lost a #1 contender’s fight to Anthony Johnson in early 2016.

He recovered by beating Ilir Latifi and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, but by that stage – with Jon Jones set to return and Johnson still lurking around waiting for his shot – the chances of a title opportunity had sailed and Bader moved over to Bellator. A fight with Cormier likely would’ve gone badly for him, but he still should’ve been given the shot.