Former UFC lightweight champion Frankie Edgar, who was inducted into the promotion’s hall of fame last summer in Las Vegas, insisted he was done fighting after getting knocked out by Chris Gutierrez as part of the UFC 281 lineup in late 2022.
On his way out the door, Edgar lost six of his last eight fights with five of those losses coming by way of knockout. That’s why combat sports fans were horrified to learn “The Answer” is coming out of retirement to box for BKFC at the Oct. 4 card in New Jersey.
Edgar turns 44 in October.
“We’re in Jersey. You guys came here. It’s hard to pass up,” Edgar said at the BKFC 82 press conference. “As soon as I saw this sport I was very intrigued. I’m a fighter. This is definitely the fightiest of all combat sports, you know what I mean? I had to try it out. Why not do it here? I used to fight for free at Seaside with no gloves, so why not get paid to do it here in Newark? Training has been awesome. Training just for boxing, I mean, my neck feels great. No one is hanging on my neck, my shoulders feel great. It’s amazing. I said I’d never fight again, and here I am, so who is going to take me for my word really? Let’s see how this first one goes and we’ll take it from there.”
Their co-headliner will be contested at featherweight.
Edgar fights former UFC bantamweight Jimmie “El Terror” Rivera, 36, who already holds a 2-2-1 record for BKFC. The Oct. 4 lineup is topped by another pair of UFC veterans in the form of Mike Perry and Jeremy Stephens and their “King of Violence” title fight.
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