On Sunday night at the finale of Season 19 of The Ultimate Fighter, former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar faced off against the man he took the title from, former lightweight and welterweight champion BJ Penn.
Penn had been out for 19 months after a semi-retirement, and this was his first career fight at featherweight. Edgar had been out one year to the day, and his last fight, which won Fight of the Night, was a unanimous-decision victory over Charles Oliveira.
In a completely dominant fight, Edgar kept up his winning ways and defeated Penn with a TKO due to ground-and-pound late in the third round. Let’s check out what we learned from the featherweight fight.
What We’ll Remember About This Fight
Edgar’s total domination. Each round consisted of Edgar being quicker with strikes, then getting the fight to the ground and totally controlling Penn. He turned it up a notch in the third round and was able to completely overwhelm Penn with elbows and punches.
What We Learned About Edgar
Nothing we didn’t already know. He’s fast and a top-level grappler with good ground-and-pound and knockout power. He’s also really adept at beating up Penn.
What We Learned About Penn
That his weight was never the reason for his cardio issues. Even at 145 pounds, with Mike Dolce helping him to make weight, Penn was very tired by the end of the second. Many thought a drop to featherweight would help his cardio, but it simply didn’t.
What’s Next for Edgar
There are a lot of potential fights for Edgar. Depending on how long Jose Aldo is out with his injury, maybe Edgar could get an interim title fight against Chad Mendes.
If that fight doesn’t happen, then a fight with either Cub Swanson or Ricardo Lamas could be a definite possibility, with the winner getting the next title shot.
What’s Next for Penn
Retirement. No question.
Going into the fight, UFC President Dana White had said that if Penn were to lose, he would push for him to retire. He never had to push Penn though, as The Prodigy essentially announced his retirement in the cage after the fight and then later made it official.
Now, Penn can go back to Hawaii and just relax knowing that he’s finally retired—for real. He will eventually end up in the UFC Hall of Fame as one of two fighters to ever earn a UFC title in two different weight classes.
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