The Ultimate Fighter 17 Finale this Saturday night isn’t your average TUF Finale.
For starters, the promotion has moved the event outside of its long-time home at the Palms (due, strangely enough, to a beef between Dana White and the owners of the hotel over gambling lines of credit) to the Mandalay Bay Events Center. It’s a unique setup, because the UFC typically only runs Mandalay Bay for bigger pay-per-view events, and this one is a free card.
But in keeping with the bigger theme of the event, the promotion has stacked the card with intriguing fights, none of which are more intriguing than the main event between Scott Jorgensen and Urijah Faber. Yesterday I broke down Faber’s career timeline, and today we’ll take a look at notable moments from Jorgensen‘s career.
Sept. 17, 1982: Jorgensen is born in St. George, Utah. He began wrestling in third grade, and wrestled in college for Boise State University.
June 15, 2006: Jorgensen makes his professional fighting debut against Mike Morris at Alaska Fighting Championship 24. He earns a first-round submission by armbar in 1:31.
Sept. 9, 2006: Jorgensen loses his first professional fight to Joe Jesser at Ring of Fire 26, dropping his record to 2-1. He rebounds by earning consecutive victories over Tyler Toner and Chris David before signing with World Extreme Cagefighting.
Feb. 13, 2008: Jorgensen makes his WEC debut at WEC 32, losing a unanimous decision to Damacio Page. After the loss, Jorgensen defeated Kenji Osawa and Frank Gomez at WEC 35 and WEC 38, respectively.
June 7, 2009: Jorgensen loses to Antonio Banuelos, dropping his WEC record to 2-2.
Oct. 10, 2009: Jorgensen begins a five-fight WEC winning streak by beating Noah Thomas. During the streak, Jorgensen beat Takeya Mizugaki, Chad George, Brad Pickett and earned revenge on Banuelos. The streak also secured Jorgensen his first WEC title shot as well as his first Fight of the Night award.
Dec. 16, 2010: Jorgensen faces Dominick Cruz for the WEC bantamweight championship, but loses a unanimous decision. The fight is notable for being the final bout in the history of the WEC, as the promotion was folded into the UFC the following month.
June 4, 2011: Jorgensen makes his UFC debut, beating Ken Stone at the Ultimate Fighter 13 Finale. He would follow that up by beating Jeff Curran at UFC 137.
Feb. 4, 2012: Jorgensen loses to Renan Barao in a bout that could have vaulted him into UFC title contention. He then lost to Eddie Wineland before rebounding with a win over John Albert.
April 13, 2013: Jorgensen faces Urijah Faber in the main event of the Ultimate Fighter 17 Finale. Jorgensen and Faber have been friends for years. They’re managed by the same company. In fact, Faber is widely credited by Jorgensen as one of the driving factors that helped get him into mixed martial arts.
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