Photo by Woohae Cho/Zuffa LLC
“I was hoping that maybe the ranking would change but sadly it didn’t.”
With stoppage wins over Dustin Poirier, Dennis Bermudez and Frankie Edgar, Chan Sung Jung — better known as Korean Zombie — feels he should be ranked higher than Brian Ortega and Zabit Magomedsharipov in the UFC featherweight rankings.
Korean Zombie expressed his frustration with the rankings on Instagram and doubled down on those comments in a recent video interview.
“One gained victory over an 11th ranker, and another hadn’t fought in 13 months. This ain’t a voting system for popularity I’m number 2. ??? #ufc,” Jung posted on Instagram last month.
“I was shocked that Brian Ortega came in second place,” Zombie said in the video (h/t Abhinav Kini of The Body Lock MMA). “The last time Ortega won a fight was 20 months ago. Ortega last won 20 months ago when he defeated Frankie Edgar and he lost to Holloway about 13 months ago. That was the last fight Ortega competed in. It doesn’t make sense how he still remains as second place when his last win was so long ago.
“Third place is Zabit Magomedsharipov. So he beat someone [Calvin Kattar] who is in 11th place. I remember he beat [Jeremy] Stephens, but even then, Stephens was only ranked at 6th place. It is hard to understand how he is still in 3rd place.”
Zombie acknowledges his knockout loss to Yair Rodriguez at UFC Fight Night 139 was a huge setback but was hoping the UFC would rank him higher following his first-round dismantling of Edgar at UFC Busan.
“Ever since my return in 2017, I have fought four fighters,” Zombie added. “I defeated [Dennis] Bermudez. My fight with him [Yair Rodriguez] was my biggest setback. I have nothing to say. … Moicano was in 5th place when I defeated him last year. I even defeated Edgar who was in 4th place at the time during the same year.
“I won against two fighters that ranked pretty high and I still ended in 4th place. My opponents were ranked high while Zabit’s was ranked 6th, 7th or 8th, and 11th, so how he is still ranked #3 just doesn’t make sense to me. So that is why I threw a little fit. I was hoping that maybe the ranking would change but sadly it didn’t.”
Despite being ranked lower than Ortega and Magomedsharipov, Zombie feels he should get the first crack at Alexander Volkanovski, who beat Max Holloway last month to capture the UFC featherweight title. And, provided ‘Blessed’ doesn’t get an immediate rematch, Zombie vs. Volkanovski could be the UFC’s go-to matchup.