Urijah Faber earns title Shot against Dominick Cruz
Coming into his UFC 128 co-main event fight with the former bantamweight champion Eddie Wineland (18-7-1), Urijah Faber (25-4) was focused solely on the task at hand. He left the speculation and what if’s to the fans and media regarding a possible future matchup with the current bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz.
In a tough three round scrap that went down to the final round, Faber defeated Wineland by unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28 & 29-28) to improve to 2-0 in the bantamweight division. The win by Faber prompted UFC President Dana White to confirm that Faber’s next opponent would in fact be the UFC bantamweight champion Cruz.
As most of you know Faber already holds a victory over Cruz who fought the then featherweight champ Faber back at WEC 26 in 2007. Faber made quick work of Cruz in their meeting, catching the challenger in a guillotine submission in the first round. Once Cruz became the WEC bantamweight champ there has always been banter between the two that further escalated once Faber moved down in weight.
Cruz last fought at WEC 53 in December against Scott Jorgensen where he successfully made his second title defense with a unanimous decision victory. Following the fight with Jorgensen, Cruz had hand surgery that was scheduled to keep him out of action for roughly 4-6 months.
It’s now clear the two will rematch, this time for the bantamweight belt at a date and event to be determined later. The only question now is with the Ultimate Fighter’s 14th season set to feature the lighter weight classes, could we see these two rivals as coaches, further hyping their upcoming fight?
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