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For seven and a half years, Fedor Emelianenko was a fixture in the rarified air of pound-for-pound lists. Not anymore.

Emelianenko's shocking June 26 loss to Fabricio Werdum radically resculpted the face of the heavyweight division and also the pound-for-pound list. For the first time since its inception, the Sherdog.com P4P rankings now feature no heavyweights. Perhaps none too surprisingly, the vast majority of the list now represents MMA's deepest and most competitive weight classes. In fact, six of the 10 entrants are fixtures at 155, 170 or 205 pounds. Furthermore, middleweights Anderson Silva and Jake Shields have recent accomplishments at 205 and 170 pounds respectively.

And while the coming month of July will be a quiet one, the month of August won't be. Half of the pound-for-pound top-10 will see August action, including Anderson Silva defending the pound-for-pound mantle when he meets Chael Sonnen, Jon Fitch renewing his rivalry with Thiago Alves in a high-stakes welterweight rematch and lightweight entrants B.J. Penn and Frankie Edgar settling their score with the UFC lightweight title on the line.

1. Anderson Silva (26-4)

A month after the fact, the hysteria that surrounded Silva following his dubious domination of Demian Maia has subsided. Attention has now turned to the next fight for the middleweight kingpin, as ???The Spider??? will risk his 185-pound mantle against outspoken Republican-stroke-fighter Chael Sonnen at UFC 117 on Aug. 7 in Oakland, Calif. With his recent string of victories over Dan Miller, Yushin Okami and Nate Marquardt, Sonnen has emerged as an accomplished, deserving challenger. However, the biggest factor in making the fight a blockbuster will center on Sonnen???s infamous trash talking and whether it can inspire Silva to fight from bell to bell.

2. Georges St. Pierre (20-2)

The story remains the same for St. Pierre. Coming off a dominant title performance against Dan Hardy in March, he has been positioned for a rematch with yet another elite welterweight in Josh Koscheck, courtesy of the former NCAA national wrestling champion???s May 8 win over Paul Daley. They met previously in August 2007, with St. Pierre winning a unanimous decision. Now, when they collide three-plus years later, it will be on the heels of the 12th season of ???The Ultimate Fighter,??? which figures to build the second GSP-Koscheck bout with an easy and obvious face-heel dynamic.

3. Jose Aldo (17-1)

Though Alexandre Franca Nogueira was perhaps the first true dominant featherweight during the division's embryonic stages, it his countryman Aldo who is now situated as the first truly great 145-pounder. Coming off a brutal blowout of divisional posterboy Urijah Faber in April, Aldo figures to return to action in the early fall to make his second title defense. Whether that title shot goes to veteran Manny Gamburyan or young upstart Josh Grispi, the real issue for WEC going forward is going to be making challengers seem credible against the dynamic, destructive Aldo.