Colby Covington is finally out of the UFC welterweight rankings, and it is hard to argue he had much business hanging on for this long.
The former interim champion has not won since his March 2022 victory over Jorge Masvidal, skipped all of 2025, and still kept a seat on the 170-pound ladder while the division kept moving without him. That changed in the latest update, where the UFC removed Covington from the top 15 and brought in Mike Malott at No. 11 and Yaroslav Amosov at No. 15.
That part matters because the rankings are supposed to reflect who is actually active and doing real work. Covington has stayed in headlines, but not because of meaningful UFC movement. His latest actual UFC stretch has been ugly. He lost to Leon Edwards in a failed title bid at UFC 296, dropped another fight to Joaquin Buckley after that, and never rebuilt any momentum before disappearing from competition altogether. The resume name still means something, but the recent results do not.
Malott, on the other hand, gave the panel a real reason to move him in. The Canadian welterweight pushed his record to 14-2-1 by stopping Gilbert Burns in the UFC Winnipeg main event, which made it four straight wins. Malott’s finish over Burns is exactly how you force your way into a crowded division. Amosov’s arrival also fits after his UFC debut finish over Neil Magny and his quick turnaround toward UFC 328.
🚨 Following the latest UFC ranking update, Colby Covington is no longer a ranked welterweight for the first time since 2017
(h/t @JohnMorgan_MMA) pic.twitter.com/K75VkfAomS
— Championship Rounds (@ChampRDS) April 21, 2026
Mike Malott gets the bump while Colby Covington pays for inactivity and losses
Covington’s removal does not mean he vanished from the sport. He has still been loud outside the cage, whether it was lawsuits, rankings talk, or political-event chatter. He has also stayed in the news through his lawsuit against Jorge Masvidal and his complaint about not getting a White House event offer. But none of that fixes the obvious problem. If you are not fighting and you are not winning, the rankings eventually stop pretending.
The current welterweight picture is too crowded to keep handing out courtesy spots. Islam Makhachev holds the belt, and the top of the class is stacked with Jack Della Maddalena, Ian Machado Garry, Michael Morales, Belal Muhammad, Carlos Prates, Sean Brady, Kamaru Usman, Leon Edwards, and Joaquin Buckley. That is a real queue, and Malott has now forced his way into it.
WELTERWEIGHT
Champion: Islam Makhachev
1. Jack Della Maddalena
2. Ian Machado Garry
3. Michael Morales
4. Belal Muhammed
5. Carlos Prates
6. Sean Brady
7. Kamaru Usman
8. Leon Edwards
9. Joaquin Buckley
10. Gabriel Bonfim
11. Mike Malott *NR
12. Michael Page
13. Uros Medic
14. Daniel Rodriguez
15. Yaroslav Amosov *NR
That does not mean Malott gets a free pass into title talk. It just means he now has the ranking beside his name that matches what he did in Winnipeg. Covington, meanwhile, is dealing with the opposite reality. A few years ago, he was still living off contender status and the strength of his mouth. Now the division has moved on, and the ranking next to his name is gone too.
