Sherdog’s Top 10: Greatest Fighters of the 1990s

7. Dan Severn

Severn, the first “triple crown” winner in UFC history, and MMA's first wrestler of note, finishes a worthy seventh, the same ranking I personally gave him. Severn is a fascinating figure, with even his age being a matter of speculation; I have seen him listed as being born in 1954 and 1957 as well as the more commonly quoted 1958. By Severn’s own admission in interviews, he was washed-up as a wrestler and “running on fumes” when he debuted at UFC 4 in December of 1994, having suffered a number of injuries in the 80s and being at least 36 years old, if not older. Yet, Severn still enjoyed immediate success in early MMA, scoring several thunderous suplexes of skilled muay thai practitioner Anthony Macias before finishing him with a rear-naked choke just under two minutes. After a second win that night, Severn faced Royce Gracie, winner of the first two UFC tournaments and who had never been defeated in the cage, in the final. Against the 240-plus pound Severn, grappler Royce was the one taken down, with seemingly no way to win. However, after almost 16 straight minutes of fighting, he executed a tactic that very few people in North America, not even the commentators, had ever seen before. It was called a triangle choke, and Severn had no choice but to tap.

Severn was undeterred, however, coming back to win the UFC 5 tournament with three straight stoppages, including one in the finals over highly skilled sambo stylist Oleg Taktarov. Severn then lost by submission again in the UFC 6 superfight against Ken Shamrock, this time by guillotine. Yet again, Severn recovered from a loss with a huge success, winning the very first “Ultimate Ultimate,” a competition that pitted the champions and runners-up of the early UFCs against one another. In addition to taking down and choking out 350-pound behemoth Paul Varelans in just 100 seconds, Severn dominated and beat down early MMA star “Tank” Abbott before rematching Taktarov in the finals. This would be far different than their first match, which Severn had won easily in four minutes. The rematch went the full 33 minutes and Taktarov had a few submission attempts that were almost successful. Yet, Severn was victorious in the end. Severn's last major triumph was defeating Shamrock in a superfight rematch at UFC 9 in one of the most boring bouts in MMA history, in part due to local law enforcement threatening to arrest the martial artists if they struck with a closed fist. This made Severn the UFC's first “triple crown winner,” as he had won a UFC tournament, a UFC superfight, and an Ultimate Ultimate. Severn's time among the elite of the sport would come to an end in early 1997, facing Mark Coleman for the first official heavyweight championship at UFC 12. The much younger, better wrestler Coleman dominated Severn before choking him out with a scarf hold in just under three minutes. Still, Severn had left his mark on the sport as its first significant wrestler and a wildly successful one at that.

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