UFC – Urijah Faber On His Old Rival Dominick Cruz: He’s A Decent Guy
Urijah Faber and Dominick Cruz fought each other three times during their respective careers, giving birth to one of the greatest rivalries in MMA history.
Faber submitted Cruz in the WEC to retain his featherweight title in 2007. That was Dominick’s only loss, until his last one against Cody Garbrandt at UFC 207 in December 2016. Nonetheless, ‘The Dominator’ won their next two fights in the UFC, defending his bantamweight title both times in 2011 and 2016.
But despite their feud that carried on for years, it would appear that their bad blood is now a thing of the past. Speaking on MMA Fighting’s The A-Side (as transcribed by BJPenn.com), Faber was hypothetically asked who he would choose to step inside a lifeboat with, in order to escape a sinking ship, Cruz or TJ Dillashaw. ‘The California Kid’ chose the former.
“I’ve actually got some respect for Dom Cruz, I think I’ll go with Dom on this one,” Faber said. “He and I can have a conversation. I’ve had discussions with him before. I think, back in the day, he always had kind of a chip on his shoulder about me, and that’s gone. He’s had his own successful career, he’s got world championships, he’s got a job outside the fight space.
“I feel like I was always kind of fielding a guy who had a little animosity for no reason,” Faber continued. “But at the end of the day he’s actually a decent guy and he’s put a lot of hard work into what has become a great career for him.”
Urijah Faber lost his last fight against Petr Yan at UFC 245 by knockout, while Dominick Cruz is currently scheduled to challenge Henry Cejudo for the UFC bantamweight title on May 9th, at a currently unknown location.
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