From Israel Adesanya to Conor McGregor: A look at all the UFC fighters who have graced the cover of EA Sports’ games

2. UFC 2 - Conor McGregor and Ronda Rousey

Jon Jones, Georges St-Pierre, and Anderson Silva were the most dominant champions the UFC ever had. Coincidentally, they were also the biggest pay-per-view draw on the UFC roster. However, the UFC’s money-making machine took a major blow in 2013-14 with Georges St-Pierre’s retirement, Anderson Silva’s loss of title, and Jon Jones’ run-ins with the law.

Conor McGregor and Ronda Rousey emerged as the new star faces of the organization and took the market by storm from 2014-2016, even surpassing the Silva-Jones-St-Pierre trio in some matrices.

It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that McGregor and Rousey were also the first truly global pure MMA stars and expanded the sport’s footprint in unchartered territories. No wonder the duo graced the cover of UFC 2, which was released in March 2016.

3. UFC 3 - Conor McGregor

After becoming the first ever simultaneous two-division champion in UFC history, Conor McGregor tried his hand at boxing and put up a good fight against boxing great Floyd Mayweather in 2017. The boxing match generated over $600 million in revenue and became one of the biggest combat sports events in history. The Irishman’s position as the biggest MMA star was unshakable at this point and he remained on the cover of the third installment in the EA Sports UFC video game franchise.