It was a landmark year for Dana White’s Contender Series.
The UFC’s prospect-search platform continued in 2022 with 10 weekly events between July-September. The totals for the 10 events: 49 total fights, 43 total UFC contracts handed out to winners and about two-thirds of the fights (32 of 49) ended with knockouts (22) or submissions (10).
The crazy thing is, the first event of 2022 looked bleak. UFC president Dana White handed out just one contract, to Joe Pyfer, and challenged fighters on future shows to turn up the heat if they wanted to win UFC deals. Turn it up they did with stoppages in 31 of the next 45 fights over nine events.
Below, take a look (alphabetically) of all the fighters who won their way into the UFC in 2022 – including several of whom who already have made their official promotional debuts.