Gray Maynard is close to again reaching the precipice of finally feeling what it’s like to wear a UFC belt, but is also one loss at Saturday’s UFC 160 away from fading into the background in the lightweight division in which he has gained so much prominence.
As the UFC continues to expand with an infusion of new talent from Strikeforce – including lightweight contender K.J. Noons, who will compete in the fight before him against Donald Cerrone – Maynard is like a throwback to a different time in the division; specifically when it was only him and Frankie Edgar in the forefront. They fought three times, producing one of the more memorable trilogies in UFC history. Their bouts featured blood, guts, heart and determination, the kind of qualities that leave you wanting more, because they left it all in the cage and provided full value.
Edgar, the native of New Jersey with the blue-collar mentality, won the UFC title and went as far as he could with the belt, including fighting Maynard to a draw as champion and beating him nine months later, before suffering back-to-back losses to Benson Henderson. Edgar is now in the featherweight division, having lost a title fight to longtime champion Jose Aldo and preparing to face Charles Oliveira in July at UFC 162. It will be his first non-title fight in more than three years.
With or without a belt, Edgar will always be one of those fighters with which you associate the term The People’s Champ – with no disrespect to Tito Ortiz – because of all that he has done, notably battling back so many times from adversity, his crushed, crimson face often showing the physical beating he absorbed. He is only 31, but with enough scars from battles that you wonder if at some point his body will start to feel really, really old.
Then there are the 50 shades of Gray, who just turned 34 but has also logged a lot of rounds. In his last 10 fights, the Arizona native has gone the distance in all but one bout. He is a grinder, but some would also say he is not a finisher. The phrase that repeatedly runs through his fight record is “win by decision.” He won his last fight, back in June 2012 in the main event of UFC on FX, against Clay Guida, by split decision. Guida entered the cage with braided locks because Maynard’s camp protested that the most famous hair in professional MMA posed a possible distraction and could be an unfair advantage.
The only thing uglier than Guida’s hairstyle was the way he fought, or rather didn’t. He ran laps around the cage like a cyclist in a velodrome race. Even though he is a high-energy fighter with an unlimited tank, this particular strategy of limited engagement seemed odd. Maynard never really got in gear in the fight, but nonetheless won.
Maynard battled a hamstring problem going into the fight and then needed almost two months to recover. A knee condition, tied in with the hamstring issue, required a scope and kept him out of a scheduled fight in late December against Joe Lauzon. It may have been a blessing in disguise because Lauzon battled Jim Miller in what became one of the top fights of the year.
Now Maynard faces T.J. Grant, who is fighting for only the fifth time in the lightweight ranks after dropping down from welterweight. Grant has not fought anyone of this calibre, but UFC president Dana White has decided the winner of the bout will go on to fight Henderson, a champion whom some people thought was fortunate to be declared the winner of his title defence against Gilbert Melendez in April.
A Henderson-Melendez rematch would seem to make far more sense than a title defence against the winner of the Maynard-Grant fight. This is one of those curious decisions that probably drives fans wild. Most times White does what the fans want, but making the Maynard-Grant fight a No. 1 contender match seems strange.
But perhaps this is White’s way of paying back Maynard for all that he has done in this division, in which he is currently ranked third. Maynard is predicting he will knock out Grant, to effectively make a statement that he should get the shot at the belt. He has been in the business long enough to know that things can change; that a dull, desultory, plodding performance won’t help to sell him as the top contender for the belt. Like advertised fights, White’s comments are subject to change.
Anything resembling what happened in the fight against Guida simply won’t look good, even if Maynard isn’t necessarily to blame because he spent the majority of the bout chasing a challenger.
Maynard’s work speaks for itself, but there simply won’t be many more opportunities to be this close to the top without a win. The new guard is nipping at his heels. Edgar is no longer in his rear-view mirror, although you never know if somehow their paths might collide again because the history they have built up can always be parlayed into another fight. These two warriors have given as much to the sport as the sport has given to them.
If Maynard has rust from an absence of nearly a year away from the cage, that will be understandable. But the flipside is, he doesn’t have a lot of time to dawdle. He has fought only 14 times over the course of six years, which is relatively light but a product of the many tough battles in which he has fought and the time needed to recover.
His record is 11-1-1 (one no contest). The only thing missing in his resume is a championship. No one can deny what he has done, and while a belt won’t necessarily solidify his career it will be the reward of years of hard work for the fighter nicknamed The Bully.