UFC Bantamweight Championship
Dominick Cruz (21-1) vs. Urijah Faber (33-8)Cruz is well known as one of the few true defensive specialists in MMA. For years, Cruz has impressed the MMA world with his awkward head movement and unpredictable footwork, using both to land strikes and set up tremendous takedowns. Over the course of his recent three-year layoff, Cruz somehow managed to improve -- dramatically. His movement is now more efficient than ever, and the counters it sets up are more decisive. Cruz now knows how to sit down on his punches in the pocket, and yet he is more difficult to hit cleanly than ever before.
In contrast, Faber’s game is miraculously simple. Now 37 years old, “The California Kid” is still going, using much the same style that he has always used. Faber stays light on his toes, hopping on the edge of range and waiting for his opponent to charge in, at which point he greets him with a quick overhand right. Faber has made some improvements to his footwork; the pointless stance switching in which he used to dabble is reduced, and he uses more lateral movement than ever before. Though he would be loath to admit it, this almost certainly has to do with the year that Duane Ludwig spent at Faber’s Team Alpha Male.
On the ground, Faber remains a dangerous scrambler with a sneaky guillotine and an excellent back-take game. He is also quite dangerous with strikes, using an old school, Tito Ortiz-esque style of ground-and-pound to beat up his opponents from guard. However, it will almost certainly be Cruz’s decision whether or not Faber gets to use these tools. “The Dominator” is easily one of the best takedown artists in all of MMA. He is surprisingly strong given his willowy frame, but most of his success can be attributed to timing and misdirection. Cruz excels at drawing his opponents forward or making them react to a punch, only to change levels and complete a dazzling double-leg or knee-tap takedown. Cruz lacks Faber’s submission prowess, but he has good control by the standards of the bantamweight division, and his victory over Takeya Mizugaki suggests an improved focus on damaging ground-and-pound.
THE ODDS: Cruz (-565), Faber (+435)
THE PICK: Faber and Cruz may be 1-1, but their record together does not accurately portend the likely outcome of this fight. This is not a pick-’em rubber match. The strength-based scrambling game that led Faber to victory over Cruz nine years ago has not evolved all that much since; Cruz, on the other hand, has never stopped improving. T.J. Dillashaw was almost certainly the toughest opponent of Cruz’s career, and yet he beat him -- fresh off a three-year layoff, no less -- while showing new tricks and better fundamentals. This fight should more or less resemble the last one, except that Cruz is even better. Faber, meanwhile, is a little older and a little slower. The pick is Cruz by unanimous decision.
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