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Frankie Edgar vs Chris Gutierrez – 9/10
Only Frankie being 41 years old stops this fight from being a perfect ten, but it must be said that only two years ago he beat another top contender who hits hard and throws good low kicks in Pedro Munhoz. His movement will be key to avoid Gutierrez’s low kicks in this, as it was in that fight. Bantamweight top fifteen matchups are always high level fights and both Chris and Frankie always bring the action when they fight. The worry is that with Frankie’s age and coming off two brutal, highlight-reel, back-to-back KO losses to top five contenders he may be set up here for another knockout loss, against a man who is coming off of a spinning backfist knockout himself.
Most fans will be rooting for Frankie in this one though, as the man is a veritable legend in the sport, having won the lightweight belt in incredible fashion against fellow legend BJ Penn, going on to have one of the best trilogies of all time with Gray Maynard, and even when losing the belt it was in a Fight of the Night against Benson Henderson. After that, Frankie would go down to challenge for the featherweight title twice before moving down to bantamweight, where he is now. At 135-lbs everyone can truly see why Frankie doing what he did at lightweight was so amazing because he is smaller than even most top bantamweights and could probably have made flyweight in his heyday. He never cut weight to make 155, an achievement no one can match outside of heavyweights, and despite constantly facing much, much bigger foes at lightweight he was a force in the division and one of the best in the world for years. On Saturday, Frankie will become the tenth UFC fighter to fight thirty times in the promotion. It will be his last hurrah.
Edgar’s Best Fight: vs Maynard 2
Gutierrez’s Best Fight: vs Danaa Batgerel
