The current champion has all but abandoned the featherweight division. He’s moved up and out to a higher weight class and a higher-priced zip code, but his presence looms over the rest of the 145-pounders as a specter of gold. Everybody wants him, but Conor McGregor only cares about money, which is, to be fair, how it’s supposed to be in prizefighting.
Filling in the power vacuum was the purpose of UFC 200’s interim title match between Jose Aldo and Frankie Edgar. That realization is kind of depressing considering the accomplishments of both men, but here we are. MMA can be kind of cruel like that.
Even after winning by unanimous decision Saturday night, Aldo remains at the mercy of McGregor’s whim. He may have restaked his claim to the top slot in the division, but it is largely ceremonial. So long as McGregor is parading around the world with that shiny belt on his shoulder, what exactly does Aldo’s mean?
Depending on how you look at it, it is either a divisional placeholder or a handcuff connecting him to McGregor. Either way, it is virtually meaningless unless and until he can trade up for the real thing.
That seemed clear to Aldo in the seconds after the result—ironically, exactly the same 49-46, 49-46, 48-47 scores as their first match at UFC 156—was announced.
“I had one goal and it’s to beat this guy,” he said, pointing toward McGregor, who was sitting in the first row of the audience. “And you can bet that next time I’m in there, I will beat him.”
His performance might not have convinced everyone.
While the scorecards seemed decisive, the fight was closer than those numbers make it appear. In fact, FightMetric statistics showed that the two ended with exactly the same total of landed strikes: 81 apiece.
The difference was in the power.
While Edgar went with his usual stick-and-move style, Aldo’s advantage in dynamic athleticism started manifesting from the second round on. He stuffed all 11 of Edgar’s takedown tries and piled up significant strikes, landing several knees to the face and straight right hands that left Edgar’s face bloodied.
Prior to the bout, Edgar said he needed to get off to a faster start than he did the first time they faced off. In that fight, he did better as the minutes ticked by. He accomplished that objective by winning the first round on two of the three scorecards, but this time it was Aldo who found a new comfort level with each passing moment.
In a way, that made perfect sense.
For the first time in his UFC career, after all, Aldo came into the fight having to face self-doubt. He hadn’t lost in more than a decade, a span of 18 straight fights, and then after a year of lead-up, promotional hype and trading verbal bombs with McGregor, and with all the chips were on the line, he was shockingly crushed in a 13-second knockout.
The result was so stunning it almost did not compute. Aldo retreated back to Brazil and regrouped, but he couldn’t escape the whispers about what the loss meant for him.
Had all of the years of sparring and fighting caught up to him? Was his chin suddenly compromised? Had he overreached in the emotion of the moment and made a crucial error?
Any and all were possible, but no one except Aldo could have factual insight into how it affected him. And in the weeks before UFC 200, he tried to downplay all of those possibilities, saying that he had nothing to learn from the defeat.
That was a worrisome reaction, if only because it is almost universally believed to be true that you learn more from losses than wins.
Aside from that, he signed on to face someone brimming with confidence. Edgar came into the rematch with the feeling he wouldn’t be denied. After an uncharacteristic losing streak, he reinvented himself with some additional power to go with his stick-and-move striking style and brilliant wrestling transitions. He reeled off a five-fight win streak, including three stoppages.
Despite his past loss to Aldo by unanimous decision in 2013, Edgar came into the fight favored to win on most sportsbooks, according to Odds Shark.
Edgar also felt Aldo’s doubt would be a factor.
It wasn’t.
His stand-up was crisp and accurate, and while he never dropped or staggered Edgar, he did enough to make you think that the McGregor result was an aberration.
There will only be one way to prove that, though, and that’s to do it against McGregor. And that’s where things get tricky.
McGregor has Nate Diaz coming up in August, and while a second loss against him may leave The Notorious with no choice but to return to featherweight, a win could lead him anywhere.
On Saturday night, UFC President Dana White tried to lessen that possibility, saying that no matter the result, McGregor would head back down to face Aldo. But this is MMA, where promises are often made and broken with the speed of a flyweight jab. If either McGregor or the UFC senses a bigger payday elsewhere, Aldo may be left behind. And the thing is, he’s been around long enough to know it.
He’s in purgatory now, a passive observer in a legendary career. If that doesn‘t seem fair, that’s the cost of losing a grudge match and awaiting a new one.
“I’m prepared,” Aldo said in the post-fight press conference. “We can fight right now if he wanted to. We’re just going to have to see if he keeps his word, and if he doesn’t show up, I’m just going to have to see him somewhere else to fight him.”
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