By the Numbers: Marlon Moraes vs. Jose Aldo

Two fiery Brazilians collide as Jose Aldo drops to 135 to meet Marlon Moraes. Coming off a failed bid to capture the Ultimate Fighting Championship bantamweight title, Moraes will look to bounce back with a victory over Aldo, who himself has his eyes set on the same bounty. Ahead of their declaration of war on Dec. 14 at UFC 245, see how they match up against one another through the numbers below.

UFC championship experience

Aldo owns the record for the most successful title defenses in UFC featherweight history at seven. He had already defended the World Extreme Cagefighting belt twice before it was promoted to a UFC title after the California-based promotion was acquired by Zuffa. That legendary run included wins over Mark Hominick, Kenny Florian, Frankie Edgar, Chan Sung Jung, Ricardo Lamas and Chad Mendes twice. Going into his ill-fated bout against Conor McGregor, Aldo had amassed a staggering 25-1 record and was riding a nine-year/18-fight winning streak.

As if his career was not already impressive enough, Aldo did not let the McGregor loss stop him. He would capture the interim featherweight title by defeating Edgar for a second time (which eventually became, due to McGregor’s longtime absence from the division, the undisputed featherweight title). Unfortunately, however, he lost a title unification bout to Max Holloway and then lost to Holloway again with the belt on the line in their rematch. In all, Aldo has appeared in 11 UFC championship bouts.

Moraes, who has only fought in the Octagon five times, has already challenged for a UFC title once. At UFC 238, he faced Henry Cejudo for the vacant bantamweight crown and lost by TKO.

World championships held

As previously mentioned, Aldo was already a champion in the WEC before the UFC took over. He captured the WEC featherweight championship by dropping and stopping Mike Brown and successfully defended it against Urijah Faber and Manny Gamburyan.

Before making his way to the UFC, Moraes was the World Series of Fighting bantamweight king. He became the inaugural champion by beating Josh Rettinghouse and defended the belt against Sheymon Moraes, Joseph Barajas, Josenaldo Silva and Josh Hill twice.

Wins by stoppage

Moraes and Aldo are expert finishers with the numbers to back it up. The younger Moraes carries a 72 percent finishing rate, having beaten 10 opponents by KO or TKO and six by submission. The last time he went to a decision was Nov. 11, 2017, when he met John Dodson at UFC Fight Night 120. Aldo, on the other hand, will be bringing with him a 65 percent stoppage rate, with 17 wins by KO or TKO and one by submission.

Losses by stoppage

Moraes has lost six times in his career and was stopped on five occasions. He was knocked out by Henry Cejudo, Zeilton Rodrigues and Alexandre Pinheiro and was tapped out by Deividas Taurosevicius and Ralph Acosta. As for Aldo, he’s been stopped four times as a professional. He had never been stopped in the Octagon prior to the McGregor fight, but since then he was stopped by Holloway twice. And going back to his formative years in Brazil, Aldo was submitted by Luciano Azevedo at Jungle Fight 5.