I'm starting to think Ajagba would upset Kabayel and Parker.

Wait, you don't seriously think these guys are fringe contenders?

Goodall and Shaw aren't even fringe gatekeepers... And Bakole and Vianello aren't the top end of gatekeeper tier either.

I know the divisions thin right now but that's exceptionally generous to pretty irrelevant fighters.

 

It does...

Top/legit contenders are the guys who have realistic chances of getting and holding belts without ridiculous amounts of cherrypicking - they're the guys consistently at the top, with the resumes to prove it.

Fringe contenders are guys who don't quite have no chance of getting belts, but would need to be either very lucky to get a weak champion to fight OR would rely on a punchers chance to get lucky with.

Gatekeepers are the barrier between the mediocre journeymen and the contenders (of both types) - they rarely realistically win against the top contenders, and usually would push the fringe guys close but not quite close enough... But they're a step above the journeymen - they're also, in a way, the barrier that really turns a prospect into the real thing (and plenty of prospects don't pass).
Gatekeepers are often pretty durable but limited in some important sense, without a big enough trump card to compensate for it.

Journeymen are the majority - the mediocre who are kept away from the serious rankings and fights by the gatekeepers.


The higher up the tree you go, the thinner the branches get - there are far more journeymen than gatekeepers and fewer contenders again.

Goodall and Shaw aren't proven enough to class as gatekeepers.

Vianello is a decent gatekeeper but nothing more.

Bakole is inconsistent, but even at his best he hasn't really proven he's beyond gatekeeper level...
Beating a mummified Takam and limited Yoka, whilst losing to Hunter, just isn't the kind of depth to suggest he's anything much more (and as for Anderson, he was a hyped prospect but what happened is precisely what normally happens when an overhyped prospect hits the gatekeeper wall).

Bakole is the only one of that group that gets REMOTELY close to being a fringe contender... But I still think that's a stretch, I can respect a disagreement on that one - but not the others.


These things are movable - sometimes a fighter drags themselves up, sometimes they self-destruct, sometimes they decline but don't know when to quit.