This Saturday Hooker vs Parnasse · Accor Arena Paris France See this week's picks →
Events · UFC 89: Bisping vs Leben · Michael Bisping vs Chris Leben
From the tape · 18 Oct 2008

Michael Bisping vs Chris Leben

UFC 89: Bisping vs Leben · Birmingham, England, United Kingdom
Result

Michael Bisping beat Chris Leben

Method
Decision - Unanimous
Round
3 of 3
Clock
5:00
MiddleweightMainReferee · Dan Miragliotta

We published no prediction for this bout. Everything on this page is the official record and the tape it was fought on — the result, the round-by-round counts, the judges’ cards where they exist and the sportsbook line where one was published. Our graded calls start in 2026 and live on the public record.

MB
Red corner MichaelBisping“The Count”HB Ultimate · Manchester
VSOn the tape
CL
Blue corner ChrisLeben“The Crippler”Alliance MMA · Portland, Oregon
Middleweight3 rounds18 Oct 2008
The story going in
  • Comes in on a 2-fight win streak.
  • Comes in on a 2-fight win streak.
  • Has finished 5 of 6 UFC wins.
  • Has finished 6 of 8 UFC wins.
30-9
Record
22-11
29
Age
−1 yr28
+2″6' 1"
Height
5' 11"
+2″75″
Reach
73″
Orthodox
Stance
Southpaw
7
UFC bouts
+411
+8%5/683% of wins
Finishes
6/875% of wins
HB Ultimate
Gym
Alliance MMA
Manchester
From
Portland, Oregon
Vitals, record, nickname and camp come from the public UFC fighter register and are current, not a snapshot of fight night. UFC bouts, finish rate and every storyline line are counted off the official UFC fight record. A tick marks the side holding the raw edge in that row — longer reach, taller, younger, more bouts, a higher finish rate. It is a fact about the tape, not a prediction, and rows with no clean comparison (record, stance, gym, hometown) carry no tick at all. Any row we cannot fill on both sides is left out rather than half-drawn. Streaks, bout counts and finish rates are as they stood going into this fight — this bout and everything after it is excluded from the count.

Round by round

Every round the fight went, shaded by where the significant strikes actually landed — the takedowns, control time and knockdowns beside them, and how the three judges scored that round.

UFCStats · per round

3 rounds of tape

Round 15:00 of action
Michael Bisping20 sig landed
HEAD65%13 of 39BODY35%7 of 11LEGS0%0 of 1
Chris Leben23 sig landed
HEAD30%7 of 35BODY30%7 of 11LEGS39%9 of 11
20 of 51
Sig.
strikes
23 of 57
1 of 3
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:19
Control
0:07
Distance 16Clinch 4Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 18Clinch 5Ground 0
Judges · this round · Bisping firstRichard Bertrand10–9Chris Lee10–9
Round 25:00 of action
Michael Bisping20 sig landed
HEAD85%17 of 42BODY15%3 of 6LEGS0%0 of 1
Chris Leben14 sig landed
HEAD57%8 of 43BODY14%2 of 8LEGS29%4 of 7
20 of 49
Sig.
strikes
14 of 58
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 1
0:09
Control
0:00
Distance 20Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 13Clinch 1Ground 0
Judges · this round · Bisping firstRichard Bertrand10–9Chris Lee10–9
Round 35:00 of actionEnded 5:00
Michael Bisping30 sig landed
HEAD73%22 of 52BODY13%4 of 4LEGS13%4 of 4
Chris Leben14 sig landed
HEAD50%7 of 39BODY21%3 of 5LEGS29%4 of 5
30 of 60
Sig.
strikes
14 of 49
0 of 0
Take-
downs
1 of 1
0:02
Control
0:40
Distance 29Clinch 1Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 12Clinch 2Ground 0
Judges · this round · Bisping firstRichard Bertrand10–9Chris Lee10–9

Significant strikes, takedowns, control time, knockdowns and submission attempts exactly as UFCStats recorded them for this bout, round by round. Zone percentages are that round’s landed head, body and leg counts over their own total — raw arithmetic, nothing modelled or smoothed. A round in which a fighter landed nothing shades empty and reads zero; it is never filled in from the round before.

The cards, totalled

The judges’ final totals, the media’s cards beside them, and how these judges usually score. Their round-by-round 10–9s are with the rounds above.

Official card

Unanimous Decision

Referee · Dan Miragliotta
Michael BispingChris Leben
Official totals — Michael Bisping first
JudgeTotal
Richard Bertrand2.0 avg spread · 44% wide30–27
Chris Lee2.0 avg spread · 44% wide30–27

Each judge’s round-by-round scores sit with the round they belong to, in the round-by-round section above — switch a round there and the three cards for it change with the stats.

Media cards — 4 scored, Michael Bisping first · unofficial

Fight Metric.com30–27
MM AJunkie.com30–27
Sherdog.com30–27
MM AWeekly.com29–28

Fan vote · unofficial

30-27 Bisping · 48%29-28 Leben · 24%29-28 Bisping · 14%30-27 Leben · 10%30-28 Bisping · 5%

21 fan cards submitted to MMA Decisions.

Official cards come from the UFCStats fight record and MMA Decisions. Media cards and the fan vote are MMA Decisions’ own collection and are not official. Judge tendency figures are that judge’s whole recorded history, not this bout — they are context for how a card was scored, never a claim that it was scored wrongly.

Takedowns

Takedowns

The level change — head to head

Career UFC takedown rates. Red corner left, blue corner right.

Michael Bisping

1.05takedowns / 15 min
1.05 / 15m
TAKEDOWNS
1.14 / 15m
2.44 / 15m
ATTEMPTS
2.78 / 15m
43%
ACCURACY
41%
0.30 / 15m
SUB ATT
0.80 / 15m

Chris Leben

1.14takedowns / 15 min

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. Rate bars run to the population’s 95th percentile (6.86 takedowns / 15m); a fighter above it pins the bar. Percentages are drawn on their own axis.

Ranked in Middleweight

The market story

Where the price started and where it finished — the sportsbook consensus, with the vig removed. We captured no price series for this bout, so there is no chart to draw.

Michael Bisping↑ +6.7pp
open 60.2%close 66.9%
Chris Leben↓ −6.7pp
open 39.8%close 33.1%
0%50%100%
OpenClosing consensus (BFO, vig removed)

Michael Bisping opened at 60.2% and closed at 66.9% (+6.7pp), with Chris Leben moving the other way by the same amount — the two are one de-vigged pair, so they always sum to 100%. There is no line between those two points because nobody recorded one: we hold the open and the close for this bout, not the days in between.

Show the numbers
CornerOpen (US)Close (US)Open %Close %Move
Michael Bisping-170-23060.2%66.9%+6.7pp
Chris Leben14019039.8%33.1%−6.7pp
Opening and closing moneylines from BestFightOdds (data/refs/bfo_fighter_moneylines.csv), one row per fighter per bout, de-vigged pairwise so the two corners sum to 100% · scraped 2026-06-10. No price series was captured for this bout, so no line is drawn between the two points.
← Every fighter on the record