UFC News: Daniel Cormier granted huge honour

What's the story?

UFC Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight Champion Daniel Cormier had an amazing 2018 by every means.

However, as if his entire year was not enough, ESPN added to his year, making it even better. ESPN ranked Daniel Cormier as the third most dominant athlete in 2018.

In case you didn't know...

Daniel Cormier has had something of a landmark 2018 in every way. Cormier started off the year coming of an overturned knockout loss to Jon Jones due to the latter testing positive for drugs. With low confidence, he went into to earn the UFC Light Heavyweight Championship he had been handed back.

Earn it back he did. Daniel Cormier defeated Volkan Oezdemir at UFC 220 in the fight in a matter of two rounds, winning the fight by TKO. With a start like that to the year, it only got better.

Cormier faced UFC Heavyweight Champion Stipe Miocic at UFC 226 by moving up a division and won by knocking the Champion out in the very first round. As if that was not enough for a year, he defended his UFC Heavyweight Championship against Derrick Lewis in November at UFC 230.

The heart of the matter

In the ESPN rankings of the most dominant athletes, Daniel Cormier was given a dominance rating of 2.273. This rating means that he was 2.273 standard deviations better than the usual top-four performer in MMA since the year of 1998. This is an incredible achievement by any means.

Cormier expressed his pleasure at having made the list saying that the year had been beyond his wildest imagination.

What an honor to be mentioned with these other amazing athletes. I couldn’t ever imagine a year like this. Now all I need is that nice shiny ESPY for fighter of the year and I’m set. Thank you all for your support this year and throughout my entire career. We did this together. pic.twitter.com/IH6S9FE7Cv

— Daniel Cormier (@dc_mma) December 11, 2018

You can see the rest of the top 20 rankings here:

20. Mike Trout - MLB

19. James Harden - NBA

18. Patrick Mahomes - NFL

17. Alex Ovechkin - NHL

16. Justify - Horse Racing

15. Drew Brees - NFL

14. Mookie Betts - MLB

13. Lebron James - NBA

12. Lewis Hamilton - F1

11. Yuzuru Hanyu - Figure Skating

10. Novak Djokovic -Tennis

9. Simona Halep - Tennis

8. Luka Modric - Football (Soccer)

7. Breanna Stewart - WNBA

6. Chloe Kim - Snowboarding

5. Katie Ledecky - Swimming

4. Ariya Jutanugarn - Golf

3. Daniel Cormier - MMA

2. Eliud Kipchoge - Marathon

1. Simone Biles - Gymnastics

What's next?

Daniel Cormier is now set to face Brock Lesnar, although at this stage it is doubtful if the fight will be happening.