Is Takanori Gomi the world's best lightweight?

Question

I'm wondering if he's still ranked No1, or BJ has taken that spot?

Gomi is my all time favorite fighter.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=K03pk1qHpb4

Answer 1

BJ is vastly overrated. No one has a better Lightweight resume than Takanori Gomi. BJ becoming #1 after beating Sherk, Stevenson and Pulver? C'mon. Gomi fought and beat the likes of Tatsuya Kawajiri, Pulver, Mach Sakurai, Mitsuhiro Ishida, Luis Azeredo, and the list goes on. Gomi has beat much more top Lightweights than BJ. People say, "But, BJ beat Gomi?" I say to them, "that was years ago, way before Gomi polished his standup to where it is at right now." Gomi would ktfo BJ IMO if BJ were to fight standup like he did with Sherk. BJ's standup wasn't that impressive and his nuthuggers make such a big deal out of him.

Answer 2

I think the top spot has to go to BJ Penn  because if you look at his record the only negatives have come against Hughes, St. Pierre, Machida, Pulver and Uno.

3  of those fighters are higher weight classes than him.

St Pierre still ranked top 5 p4p in the world right now.

Hughes the most dominant champion in MMA history and Machida a fighter who is the next star at the minute fighting at LHW.

The only loss was to Jens Pulver who was the top LW in the world at the time,  (Gomi beat Pulver when Jens was concentrating more on his pro boxing career so he wasn't throwing kicks or concentrating as much on his grappeling).

Then there was the Draw against Uno in the LW tournament at UFC 41 which alot of people thought BJ won.

Gomi on the other hand although he may be more exciting than BJ Penn with his incredible Boxing, Mixing up head and Body attacks like very few others in MMA has a loss to Joachim Hansen who is a grade below the quality of opponents Penn has lost too.

Also he lost to Nick Diaz and the fight was overturned because Diaz smoked pot before hand which didn't really effect the performance.

Then when you look at the record against each other BJ has the win so he's faced better opposition which is what you look for in judging people (A fighter who's 30-15 could be better than  a fighter who's 300-0 if the 300-0 fighter has fought tomato cans and the 30-15 has fought real fighters)

and BJ holds the win over Gomi so you can't really put him ahead of him

1. BJ Penn

2. Takanori Gomi!