UFC icon Urijah Faber has been out of the game for five years now, but he seems to be considering getting back into it.
The former UFC title challenger retired after his decision victory over Brad Pickett in 2016. Three years later, he made a brief comeback, defeating bantamweight fighter Ricky Simon but being soon stopped by Petr Yan. Since then, Faber has remained an active member of the USADA and has tried to set up a few bouts; however, none have made it past the planning phase.
Many doubt if the 45-year-old would compete in MMA, but the fighter seems to be active in other combat sports. Faber recently defeated ONE Championship titleholder Bibiano Fernandes and has opened up about transitioning to BKFC or boxing.
In an interview with MMA Fighting, Faber also spoke about his new gig with the drug testing pool and his desire to leave MMA.
“I stay in the drug [testing] pool just because I don’t do drugs and you never know if an opportunity presents itself, but I likely will not be doing MMA [again]. But you never know,” Urijah Faber stated in the interview. “I don’t think I’d want to do bare-knuckle, but you never know. I think I will do combat jiu-jitsu because I feel like that’s the new age, that’s where things are going.”
“I’ve had some good offers money-wise for bare-knuckle, but I’m not trying to fight world champion boxers in bare-knuckle,” Faber said via MMA Fighting.
He also spoke about possibly signing on to BKFC or a boxing match. However, he has no desire to go after the heavy hitters.
“You know, I’ve got kids, I don’t want to break cheekbones and that kind of stuff, lose teeth. But if they had an interesting matchup, my boy Conor McGregor is now an owner there, so he could probably find an opponent for me. I’m just competing. At 45, I want to keep testing myself and keep staying active as an athlete. It’s my passion. That’s what I’ve done my whole life.”
“Chad Mendes and I both fought Jose Aldo, and he was our toughest fight, so I’d prefer not to get beat up by Aldo at this point in my life,” Faber joked. “I would do a boxing match against him. I think they offered me something not too long ago before he signed back with the UFC, but it was not the kind of offer that was super intriguing. And I talked to Aldo before about bare-knuckle. He has no desire of doing bare-knuckle. But I would do a boxing match with Jose Aldo.”
He concluded:
“I love boxing. I love pure boxing. I love pure wrestling. I love pure jiu-jitsu, I love blending it together. I would not want to do a kickboxing match with Jose Aldo, that’s for damn sure. I learned my lesson. Google ‘Urijah Faber’s leg,’ and if you don’t know what we’re talking about, you’ll know.”
