Built from Diego Sanchez’s own numbers — record, form, fighting style and standout rate. Not reported prose. Decision fighter
5' 10" southpaw decision fighter campaigning at Welterweight. 19 UFC wins — 6 KO/TKO, 12 decision, 1 other.
The facts, plainly — vitals and record from public UFC statistics; nickname, nationality and camp from the public fighter register. A field we can't source stays “pending”; it never shows a fake value. Where a fighter was born and where they fight out of come from their Wikipedia entry; where we hold neither, the hometown shown is Sherdog’s. The social accounts are the ones linked from the fighter’s own official athlete page — we don’t match handles by name. The UFC record is counted from the official results themselves, and is dated by the first and last bout it counts.
| Nickname | Nightmare |
| Nationality | United States |
| Hometown (per Sherdog) | Albuquerque, New Mexico |
| Camp | Jackson-Wink MMA |
| Height | 5' 10" |
| Reach | 72" |
| Stance | Southpaw |
| Age | 44 |
| Date of birth | Dec 31, 1981 |
| Weight | 170 lbs. |
| Pro record | 31-13 |
| UFC record | UFC 19-13 first fight 2005-04-09 · last fight 2020-09-26 |
| Finish split | 19 UFC wins — 6 KO/TKO, 12 decision, 1 other |
| Social |
Every week Diego Sanchez has stood in the official UFC rankings, one row per table, each band running from the table that set it to the table that changed it.
Official UFC.com official rankings, 2013–present · rankings of 6 October 2026
A published rank holds until the next table changes it, so a band runs from the table that set it to the table that ended it — that is how a ranking works, and it is why an unbroken reign is drawn unbroken. Nothing is interpolated: the band is the last published STATUS, never a rank in between, and the hatched stretches are weeks the archive holds no table for at all. The champion band sits above #1 because a belt is not a rank. The three pound-for-pound tables — the combined one to January 2020, then the Men's and Women's ones — share a row, because they are one standing under three names.
Career averages over Diego Sanchez’s UFC bouts, straight from public UFC statistics — the same eight numbers on his official record. These are the source’s figures, not our read: what we make of them is the card below.
Six 0–100 scores, each a percentile rank against the Welterweight field — not against the whole roster. Tap any i for what a score measures.
Where the strikes go — and where they land on him. Career UFC totals, straight off the tape.
Significant strikes only, as recorded by UFCStats, across the fighter's whole UFC career. Shares are raw counts — nothing here is modelled or smoothed. Accuracy is landed ÷ attempted and comes from the per-round tape, which covers slightly fewer fights than the totals do. “Field” is the average fighter in that weight class, or across every division where a class is too small to average.
The level change — how often it lands, how often it is stopped. Career UFC rates, straight off the tape.
Rate bars run to the population’s 95th percentile (5.27 takedowns / 15m); a fighter above it pins the bar. Percentages are drawn on their own axis.
Career UFC takedown rates exactly as UFCStats publishes them: takedowns landed per 15 minutes, completion rate, submission attempts per 15 minutes, and the share of takedowns tried on them that they stuffed. Attempts per 15 is the one derived figure — landed ÷ completion rate — and it is omitted wherever either input is missing. UFCStats writes 0% where no attempt was recorded at all, so a percentage of exactly zero reads “n/a” here rather than as a measured rate. “Field” is the average fighter in that weight class, or across every division where a class is too small to average.
Pro record: 31-13. In the UFC: 19-13. Diego Sanchez’s last 8 UFC bouts, most recent first — the result in the cage, not our pick.
Straight off the official UFC fight record. Card names are left off on purpose: the only event labels in our data are derived, and we’d rather print nothing than print one that’s wrong.
8 post-fight bonuses since the UFC’s bonus programme began in 2006 — 7 Fight of the Night, 1 Performance of the Night.
| Date | Award | Opponent | Event | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019-03-02 | POTN | Performance of the Night | Mickey Gall | UFC 235: Jones vs. Smith |
| 2013-10-19 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Gilbert Melendez | UFC 166: Velasquez vs Dos Santos 3 |
| 2012-02-15 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Jake Ellenberger | UFC on FUEL TV: Sanchez vs Ellenberger |
| 2011-03-03 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Martin Kampmann | UFC Live: Sanchez vs Kampmann |
| 2010-10-23 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Paulo Thiago | UFC 121: Lesnar vs Velasquez |
| 2009-06-20 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Clay Guida | The Ultimate Fighter: United States vs. United Kingdom Finale |
| 2009-02-21 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Joe Stevenson | UFC 95: Sanchez vs Stevenson |
| 2006-08-17 | FOTN | Fight of the Night | Karo Parisyan | UFC Fight Night 6 |
The UFC's post-fight bonus programme began in 2006, so every total here is a career total since 2006. A fighter who fought only before then has no bonuses because the award did not exist yet. Fight of the Night is a shared award and is credited to both fighters. Performance, Knockout and Submission of the Night are individual awards, credited to the fighter the official record names.
Awards whose recipient the official list does not name are credited to nobody, so these counts are a floor: 245 of 1,339 Performance of the Night and 1 of 180 Submission of the Night awards are unassigned as of 11 October 2026.
| Date | Opponent | Method | Rd | Event | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-09-26 | L | Jake Matthews | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 253: Adesanya vs. Costa |
| 2020-02-15 | W | Michel Pereira | DQ | R3 | UFC Fight Night: Anderson vs. Blachowicz |
| 2019-07-06 | L | Michael Chiesa | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 239: Jones vs. Santos |
| 2019-03-02 | W | Mickey Gall | KO/TKO | R2 | UFC 235: Jones vs. Smith |
| 2018-09-08 | W | Craig White | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 228: Woodley vs. Till |
| 2017-11-11 | L | Matt Brown | KO/TKO | R1 | UFC Fight Night: Poirier vs. Pettis |
| 2017-04-22 | L | Al Iaquinta | KO/TKO | R1 | UFC Fight Night: Swanson vs. Lobov |
| 2016-11-05 | W | Marcin Held | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC Fight Night: Dos Anjos vs. Ferguson |
| 2016-07-09 | L | Joe Lauzon | KO/TKO | R1 | UFC 200: Tate vs Nunes |
| 2016-03-05 | W | Jim Miller | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 196: McGregor vs Diaz |
| 2015-11-21 | L | Ricardo Lamas | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC Fight Night: Magny vs Gastelum |
| 2014-06-07 | W | Ross Pearson | Decision (split) | R3 | UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs Khabilov |
| 2014-03-15 | L | Myles Jury | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 171: Hendricks vs Lawler |
| 2013-10-19 | L | Gilbert Melendez | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 166: Velasquez vs Dos Santos 3 |
| 2013-03-02 | W | Takanori Gomi | Decision (split) | R3 | UFC on FUEL TV: Silva vs. Stann |
| 2012-02-15 | L | Jake Ellenberger | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC on FUEL TV: Sanchez vs Ellenberger |
| 2011-03-03 | W | Martin Kampmann | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC Live: Sanchez vs Kampmann |
| 2010-10-23 | W | Paulo Thiago | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 121: Lesnar vs Velasquez |
| 2010-05-29 | L | John Hathaway | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 114: Rampage vs Evans |
| 2009-12-12 | L | BJ Penn | TKO (doctor) | R5 | UFC 107: Penn vs Sanchez |
| 2009-06-20 | W | Clay Guida | Decision (split) | R3 | The Ultimate Fighter: United States vs. United Kingdom Finale |
| 2009-02-21 | W | Joe Stevenson | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 95: Sanchez vs Stevenson |
| 2008-06-21 | W | Luigi Fioravanti | KO/TKO | R3 | The Ultimate Fighter: Team Rampage vs Team Forrest Finale |
| 2008-03-01 | W | David Bielkheden | KO/TKO | R1 | UFC 82: Pride of a Champion |
| 2007-09-22 | L | Jon Fitch | Decision (split) | R3 | UFC 76: Knockout |
| 2007-04-07 | L | Josh Koscheck | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 69: Shootout |
| 2006-12-13 | W | Joe Riggs | KO/TKO | R1 | UFC Fight Night: Sanchez vs Riggs |
| 2006-08-17 | W | Karo Parisyan | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC Fight Night 6 |
| 2006-05-27 | W | John Alessio | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | UFC 60: Hughes vs Gracie |
| 2005-11-05 | W | Nick Diaz | Decision (unanimous) | R3 | The Ultimate Fighter: Team Hughes vs. Team Franklin Finale |
| 2005-08-20 | W | Brian Gassaway | KO/TKO | R2 | UFC 54: Boiling Point |
| 2005-04-09 | W | Kenny Florian | KO/TKO | R1 | The Ultimate Fighter: Team Couture vs. Team Liddell Finale |
Every date links to that bout’s own page. Card names come from the official event record; where the UFC ran two cards on one date, or that record has no row for it, the Event column is left empty rather than filled with a guess.
The 19 cities Diego Sanchez has fought a UFC bout in, the camp on the record and the hometown on the record. Every pin was looked up by name in OpenStreetMap’s gazetteer and stored with the answer it gave; nothing here is estimated.
Coastline: Natural Earth (public domain). Pins: © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL. Every host city and camp on one map.