Conor McGregor Fight News: Bantamweight Champ Dominick Cruz Explains Why Frankie Edgar Is a Bad Match-Up for McGregor
Reigning UFC world bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz is almost certain that featherweight champion Conor McGregor will have a difficult time against former lightweight champion Frankie Edgar.
After "The Notorious" experienced his first UFC loss in the hands of Nate Diaz last March 5th at UFC 196 in a non-title welterweight bout, he decided to have the exact same fight as the headliner for UFC 200 on July 9th.
For his part, Frankie Edgar has been promised the next crack at the world featherweight title that McGregor holds, after beating two-time title contender Chad Mendes via first round knockout at the Ultimate Fighter 22 Finale last December.
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However, McGregor opted to go another route, challenging 155-pound champion Rafael Dos Anjos instead. And when Dos Anjos pulled out of the originally scheduled fight at UFC 196 due to a broken foot, the Irishman chose to fight Diaz, instead.
This has led to Edgar declaring that McGregor may be scared of him, first in an interview in early March. His coach Mark Henry reiterated the same sentiments in another interview, weeks after.
Edgar, however, will be getting a chance to finally have a crack at McGregor, as he faces former long-time featherweight champion José Aldo at the co-main event of UFC 200. Both men will be fighting for the interim 145-pound title.
As for Cruz, Edgar will be a "terrible style match-up" for McGregor, and expects a difficult fight for the latter. But according to 'The Dominator', the worst thing would be for McGregor to come back down at featherweight and lose to Edgar, as opposed to losing to Diaz a second time.
Cruz laid out his thoughts on the possible McGregor-Edgar match-up in a report by the Daily Star.
"What if Conor McGregor goes back down and fights Frankie Edgar at 145lbs? Which is an extremely terrible style match-up and a hard fight and then he loses? Now he's lost all his push, whereas if he stays at 170, fights Diaz and he happens to lose again, he still has it because he's like: 'Well, but it was it 170,'" Cruz explained.
"So there's still excuses to make for it, to say why he's the best," he continued. "If he loses to Frankie Edgar at 145, you pretty much kill the excuses. It doesn't necessarily take away legitimacy but it buys time."
Cruz is set to put his title on the line against veteran Urijah Faber at UFC 199 on June 4th in Los Angeles.
