Jim Miller: A rare bright spot in the UFC's version of combat sports

With a win at UFC Vegas 84, Jim Miller continued to show why he's one of MMA's best fighters to root for.

Illustration by Chris Rini in 2022 and still accurate today.

Sports are, by their nature, a transitory medium. Today’s stars are always on the verge of getting replaced. The next generation of talent isn’t somewhere way down the line in the distant future, more often than not they’re right around the corner, constantly working to claw their way to relevancy.

More so perhaps than boxing the UFC especially knows and relishes this fact. For the bulk of the promotion’s history, the Octagon has been a place where fighters might get a flash of success, a few brief years, before being cast off for the next hot commodity. A threshing machine more interested in sorting potential PPV sellers than protecting anyone’s legacy.

That’s less the case now, where fighters are getting more and more chances to put together extended runs in the Endeavor-owned organization even without a lot of highlight successes to their name (see my recent editorial on Andrei Arlovski). But even in that atmosphere, Jim Miller feels like something special.

Over 15 years of bouts inside the Octagon, Miller has put together a 26-16 record. He’s never fought for a title, and the raw numbers may not look like much on paper, but has stayed an action fight mainstay for every minute of that run. At his worst Miller was losing to the likes of Dustin Poirier, Anthony Pettis, Francisco Trinaldo, and Dan Hooker—and battling the prolonged effects of Lyme disease. Outside of that run he’s never lost two fights in a row and has won five of his last six, with all victories coming by finish. The last time Jim Miller won a decision was 2016…