UFC Rankings: Derek Brunson Moves Up, Tom Aspinall Nears Top 10

By Fight Sports Sep 9, 2021

Derek Brunson enters deeper in the top five rankings, and Tom Aspinall gets one position away from the sliding in the top 10.

Brunson (23-7) moved up to the No. 4 spot in the UFC’s middleweight rankings after defeating Darren Till (18-4-1) via submission rear-naked choke in the third round of the headliner of UFC Fight Night 191. Aspinall (11-2) is now No. 11 in heavyweight rankings after earning his fourth victory Saturday with his brutal elbow.

Before fighting with Till, Brunson was the No. 5 middleweight.

He only moved up with one position and replaced former No. 4 ranked title challenger Marvin Vettori. Till, meanwhile, fell by one position and remains on the No. 9 position.

There are only three fighters between Brunson and current middleweight champion Israel Adesanya.

Robert Whittaker, who is the next in the line of the title shot
Paulo Costa, who suffered defeat against Adesanya and is going to fight against Marvin Vettori;
And No. 3 ranked middleweight, Jared Cannonier, who suffered a loss against Robert Whittaker, and defeated only No. 9 ranked Kelvin Gastelum, who is No. 10 ranked for this moment.

Brunson has called out Adesanya, but the champion doesn’t seem to be threatened by it.

Aspinall defeated Sergey Spivak in the co-main event and moved up by two positions, making himself only one position away from the top 10. Sergey Spivak was on four winning streaks, but suffering a first-round KO loss against the English man brought him down to the #15 position.