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The whole purpose of that phrase is to summarize what (should be) common sense instead of rehashing the same exhausted explanation. People act like rankings and MMAmath make certain outcomes a guarantee but in reality, not every fighter has the same skills and weaknesses so some will match up better or worse against a particular type of opponent. It's like Pokemon; certain elemental types are more effective against others.
The classic example of this is Chuck Liddell, Wanderlei Silva, and Rampage. Chuck is an excellent counter puncher so he excels at fighting people who are aggressive like Wanderlei. However, when faced with a patient, iron chinned, standout wrestler like Rampage, he struggles. You'd think based on rankings that Rampage > Wanderlei because Rampage > Chuck and Chuck > Wanderlei but this isn't the case because Rampage is historically weak to aggressive strikers like Shogun and Wand so it's impossible to produce an accurate ranking because of how their styles match up.
This is the flaw in rankings; it bases a fighter's ability on accomplishments rather than overall skill so it is not a reliable system to predict fights. Sometimes, one unremarkable fighter can excel in an area where a remarkable fighter is weakest and it can be enough to produce an upset that on paper makes no sense based on shared opponents. Rankings = black and white, style matchups = the grey
The classic example of this is Chuck Liddell, Wanderlei Silva, and Rampage. Chuck is an excellent counter puncher so he excels at fighting people who are aggressive like Wanderlei. However, when faced with a patient, iron chinned, standout wrestler like Rampage, he struggles. You'd think based on rankings that Rampage > Wanderlei because Rampage > Chuck and Chuck > Wanderlei but this isn't the case because Rampage is historically weak to aggressive strikers like Shogun and Wand so it's impossible to produce an accurate ranking because of how their styles match up.
This is the flaw in rankings; it bases a fighter's ability on accomplishments rather than overall skill so it is not a reliable system to predict fights. Sometimes, one unremarkable fighter can excel in an area where a remarkable fighter is weakest and it can be enough to produce an upset that on paper makes no sense based on shared opponents. Rankings = black and white, style matchups = the grey