It’s tough to imagine a main event fight that more completely embodies the current state of the UFC than Frankie Edgar vs. Urijah Faber.
When those two legends of the lighter weight classes collide on Saturday at UFC Fight Night 66, it’ll be from a place called Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay, Philippines. The 12-fight menu of events features mostly people you’ve never heard of before, and the main-card broadcast on Fox Sports 1 will kick off at 10 a.m. ET.
A few years ago—in 2011, maybe even 2013—Faber vs. Edgar might’ve been considered an honest-to-goodness superfight. Now, they’re both likely on the downslope of once-great careers after being driven out of their natural weight classes by champions they just couldn’t beat.
We’re still going to watch this fight. It’s still going to be good, but it doesn’t seem like the sort of appointment viewing it might’ve been a short time ago.
So, yeah, that basically goes double for UFC programming on the whole these days. The only thing that could make this bout any more representative of where we are as a sport in 2015 is if one of them has to pull out with a late-breaking injury.
Knock on wood and hope like heck that doesn’t happen.
The stakes are obvious here for both Faber and Edgar. They each want one more bite at the championship apple before it’s too late. The winner will be the presumptive No. 1 contender at featherweight, pending the outcome of Jose Aldo’s ballyhooed title defense against Conor McGregor at UFC 188 in July.
If another championship shot comes for either guy, it’ll be just in the nick of time.
Faber turned 36 on Thursday and is an astonishing 0-6 in title fights dating back to November 2008, when he lost his WEC (World Extreme Cagefighting) 145-pound strap to Mike Brown.
The fact that he’s even been given that many chances at the gold speaks not only to his incredible staying power, but the fact that he’s been arguably the biggest star in the featherweight and bantamweight divisions as long as they’ve existed in Zuffa-owned properties.
That 0-6 statistic can also be a little bit misleading. During the same stretch, Faber is 11-0 in non-title fights. Even at his advancing age, if you’re not one of the very best fighters in the world, he will beat you and probably make it look easy.
Just ask Scott Jorgensen, Brian Bowles or Michael McDonald:
You can’t blame him if he rolls into this meeting with Edgar brimming with the same cool confidence that has typified much of his career.
Faber spoke with anchors about his approach to Saturday’s fight during the UFC 187 post-fight show (h/t Fox Sports’ Elias Cepeda):
I think I’ll be faster but I won’t know until we fight. I think I have a power advantage with strikes but I can’t actually know for sure until we get in there. One advantage I do feel certain I’ll have is my creativity. Frankie is a great fighter, he’s fast, he’s got good wrestling and he’s got good boxing and good Jiu Jitsu. But everything he does is straightforward. I mix things up, a lot, and make the most of scrambles.
No one doubts that Edgar remains among the 145-pound class’ most elite contenders. Oddsmakers seem to know it, too, as he’s going off as something close to a 1-4 favorite, according to Odds Shark.
With that said, the former lightweight champion has had his owns struggles in recent years. He lost a trio of title fights in two different weight classes in 2012-13 and hasn’t really regained his once-lofty standing, despite a current three-fight win streak.
At 33, the Toms River, New Jersey native is also no spring chicken.
If he means to force his way into the history books as one of the UFC’s few multidivisional champions, this bout against the increasingly ironically nicknamed California Kid shapes up as a must-win for him.
“Faber’s been on top, he’s been a title contender since I pretty much got into the sport,” Edgar told Fox Sports’ Damon Martin. “He just hasn‘t been able to beat the champion, but he’s beaten everybody else. He’s always a fight away from the title and I think since 2010 (or) 2011 I’ve been there myself.”
Despite the fact that both Faber and Edgar are probably nearing the end of their journeys as professional fighters, all will not be lost for the loser here, either.
There will still be big fights there for the taking in any number of weight classes. Somebody has to come out on the short end of that Aldo-McGregor bout, after all, and a booking between any losing combination of Faber/Edgar vs. Aldo/McGregor would still be a huge featherweight fight.
Additionally, Edgar could still make the occasional appearance at lightweight and Faber at bantamweight—and, frankly, vice versa.
But as far as becoming UFC featherweight champ, this could be the last chance for both.
Their meeting comes too late to be truly super, but it’ll still be worth your time on a Saturday morning. Besides, ask yourself the defining question of all UFC programming these days: You got anything better to do?
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