The strawweight division has long been the most competitive among the four (though really three) women’s divisions in the UFC. Outside the UFC, Bellator has the bonafide best featherweight division, while the PFL has focused on lightweight (though that will change in 2023). Regardless, it was a strawweight queen who claimed our Fighter of the Year (Female) award this year.
Fighter of the Year 2022: Female
Jay Anderson: Amanda Nunes won her bantamweight belt back in her lone fight of 2022. The strawweights played hot potato with the strap. Valentina Shevchenko continued to win, but looked mortal against Taila Santos in her only fight of 2022. Over in Bellator, Cris Cyborg fought just once; Liz Carmouche picked up two wins, winning and defending the flyweight title — with both fights coming against Juliana Velasquez. But the real Female Fighter of the Year for 2022 would have to be Larissa Pacheco, who won four fights, with three stoppages, and became the first woman to defeat Kayla Harrison in MMA — winning a million dollars in the process.
Gabriel Gonzalez: Weili Zhang. While the expectations of living up to the classic against Joanna Jedrzejczyk were unrealistic, few could have predicted the blitzing that Zhang delivered for a Knockout of the Year candidate that returned her to title contention. With a throttling follow-up performance against Carla Esparza to regain the championship, Zhang took this one by a landslide.
Eddie Law: Weili Zhang came into 2022 with plenty of questions following his two consecutive losses to then champion Rose Namajunas. Instead of accepting her fate to face fighters who would more fit her fight style she moved to Arizona to train under Henry Cejudo and solidify her ground game.
After a very exciting fight against former champ Joanna Jedrzejczyk, she took the belt from Carla Esparza with the same ground game many thought she did not have. Long live the champ.
Alex Behunin: Weili Zhang. It was quite the year for the Weili Zhang, who ended up with the strawweight title by dominating Carla Esparza at UFC 281. Oh, she also knocked out and retired Joanna Jędrzejczyk at UFC 275.
Jamie Theodosi: Weili Zhang. Not only did she score one of the knockouts of the year, but she also went on to utterly dominate the at the time champion, Esparza. In my opinion, any other answer here is quite simply, incorrect.
Val Dewar: Zhang Weili. The former strawweight champion Zhang rebounded from her first losses since her pro MMA debut in 2013 to regain her old belt in 2022 by defeating Carla Esparza. Earlier in the year she had already defeated the greatest strawweight of all time, Joanna Jedrzejczyk, for a second time and defeating the first UFC strawweight champion just made sure this award would really not be in question. The fact that both fights were won by finish was a nice cherry on top for the champ.
Michael Lynch: Weili Zhang. 2-0 on the year, a possible Fight of the Year against Joanna and then won belt against Esparza.
End result: It’s a landslide for Weili Zhang for our female Fight of the Year. Zhang is now the third two-time women’s strawweight champion in the UFC, after Rose Namajunas and Carla Esparza.
