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Urijah Faber looks forward to 'TUF' exposure

1:49 PM


Installing 135-pounders as coaches for FX's revamped version of The Ultimate Fighter can only help raise the visibility of mixed martial arts' little guys, in Urijah Faber's view.

"Great for the weight class," says Faber, who will coach against bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz for the next 13 weeks of the Ultimate Fighting Championship's reality show. "This is something that needs to happen to help grow the brand and the '35-pound class."

After seven years and 14 seasons on Spike TV, TUF will move to Fox's FX channel with a new broadcast day, Friday, and a twist: For the first time, each episode's fights will air live. The cast members will be lightweights this time, but expect Cruz and Faber to attract much of the limelight as they train not only their teams, but also themselves ahead of their July title bout.

"It's being pushed by a lot of different entities as something new," Faber says. "It's going to be bigger than the other shows, so to put our weight class at the forefront of that is awesome."

USA TODAY spoke to Faber last week about the program. Excerpts from the conversation:

Who will be your assistant coaches on the program?

I'm going to have Master Thong and Fabio Prado; Dustin Akbari; Lance Palmer; Justin Buchholz are some of my main coaches. And we'll have the guys from the team — Joseph Benavidez; Chad (Mendes); T.J. (Dillashaw); and Danny Castillo — come train and help out.

We'll probably have a bunch of guest coaches, as well. I'm thinking like Phil Nurse and Mark Dellagrotte and Duke Roufus, Mark Munoz. (They'll) come in and do just little bits at a time.

What's the appeal of doing TUF for you?

First and foremost, it's great for exposure. A lot of the bigger names in the sport have been coaches on the show or come off the show as contestants.

On top of that, It's going to build up the fight between Dominick and I. We're going to be in each other's face. That should be interesting.

I've never done anything like this before. It'll be a new experience.

On top of that, hopefully I'll be able to mold some of these young guys into future champions. This is a big point in a lot of these guys' careers, and being able to be a part of that should be awesome.

One of the things that Dominick has suggested is that having you guys coaching this time, in some ways, provides some validation for the bantamweight class. Would you agree with that?

I would say yes. Great for the weight class.

One of the cool things about this show is that it's a new format. It's being pushed by a lot of different entities as something new.

It's going to be bigger than the other shows, so to put our weight class at the forefront of that is awesome. We're kind of behind because it's been so long that the UFC had gone without having our weight class, so this is something that needs to happen to help grow the brand and the '35-pound class.

Does the fact that the fights are live change the way you might have approached things when it was all taped?

I don't know, because it's such a new experience for me.

One thing's for sure, we're going to have to be training in addition to coaching, a little bit at least. We have a small period after we're done filming, but nonetheless, we've got to stay in shape and continue to grow as fighters, as well, during the process. That'll be new.

Other than that, it's pretty cut-and-dried for me, at least, because I'll be a coach and not a contestant.

How do you manage your own preparation for fighting Dominick while also coaching these guys?

We're going to find out, but I think it should be pretty easy. I've been a guy that juggles a lot of things for a long time now. Being asked to do something like this, where it's multiple things at one time, is kind of par for the course for me.

How much disruption has there been to your normal routine because of the need to move to Vegas for three months?

There's a Whole Foods right next to my apartment that we're staying at, so that's a good sign.

I don't think it's going to be too much of a change. We'll see as it goes on.

I'm not a big fan of Vegas as a place to live. I can be here for two days or so, but three months is a different story. So I don't like that necessarily.

But I've been on the road for the last five months. Aside from being home for about a month to stay with my sister when she was in a car accident, I've been gone two or three days at a time. So that should be nice to stay put for a little bit and get into a little regimen and be in one place. I think it'll actually be better for me.

How is your sister doing these days?

She's doing awesome, man. She's doing really great. She's healing up physically. Cognitively, she's like nothing ever happened.

Now she's just letting her scars heal up and she's getting her body stronger doing physical therapy and stuff like that. So we're pretty lucky.

You just mentioned you don't much care for Vegas as a place to live. What is it about the area that rubs you the wrong way?

It's really dry, first and foremost.

Most of my experience has been in casinos and it's just not the best environment. I'm here with an open mind.

There's a lot of visitors here all the time. There's smoke. You know, it's Sin City.

I'm not worried about the temptations. I'm more worried about the environment and knowing where to relax and where to train hard and all that stuff.

It's a pretty flat and dry place.

Now that the 32 names have been released for the cast, have you had a chance to do much scouting on them?

Yeah, I've seen quite a few guys that are pretty impressive. I've been checking them out and doing my due diligence the best I can.

But we aren't really going to know what these guys are made of until we're face-to-face watching them beat each other up. That's the part I'm looking forward to the most and that'll tell the most about these guys.

I figure there are some favorites in there, but you never know. Some of these guys have records that have been padded a little bit. Some of these guys have got undefeated records that probably shouldn't be. Some guys have records that are really skewed that shouldn't be. So I'm just going to watch them fight, meet the guys and try and make an assessment.

One of the names that has been drawing some attention recently has been Dakota Cochrane. Do you think his background might give him some difficulty if he makes into the house, or do you think it won't really matter to the other guys?

He's the gay porn dude?


I don't think it'll matter. The bottom line is, they can make fun of him all they want, but at some point they're going to have to fight the guy. Who knows how tough he is? He's probably pretty tough. Probably not real bright when it comes to making decisions if he's really a straight guy that did that just to make some money.

But these guys are individuals. I think they'll will have some fun with it, but the same joke over and over probably is going to get old.

I don't agree with what the guy did if he truly just did it for money or whatever, but I'm not going to hold it against him.

Guys might be intimidated of the guy. It sounds like he's definitely on a different level than a lot of other people.

I'm not sure how many people are going to be picking on him; if they're going to be avoiding him; if they're going to think he's kind of crazy.

It's going to be a topic, no doubt, if he gets in the house. I'm sure the producers would love for him to get in the house.

In the past, we've seen coaches use TUF as a way to build buzz for upcoming fights by getting in each others' faces, talking trash, playing pranks. How much thought have you given to the promotional opportunities that the show has for you?

I haven't really given too much thought about it other than the fact that it's going to be real. Dominick and I really don't get along and we're really going to be stuck in each other's face.

The trials and tribulations of everyday training, you can be an agitated person when you're in there. Girlfriends understand that and people that are close to you understand that, let alone the guy that you're going to fight.

The guy that gets on your nerves, the guy that you're doing battle against is going to be in your face every day? … It's going to be real and it's going to be intense, I'm sure.

Do you have anything specific planned or are you just going to let it happen organically?

I'm just going to let it happen organically. I don't know how cool planning stuff out is. I'm just going to do my best and see what happens and not be afraid of a confrontation?

You've said that you should have gotten the decision when you fought Dominick last year. Why do you think so?

He had a lot of takedown attempts that were unsuccessful. During the stand-up, I can't think of more than two or three punches that he threw that you could be like, "Oh!" like a power punch. Even those that landed didn't really affect me.

I knocked him down three times directly from connecting with punches. He recovered quickly, but you know when you hit someone in the face and on the chin and they fall down, you feel like you're winning the fight. Three different rounds that he actually went down.

Then on top of that, I felt like I was the fresher guy in the fourth and the fifth round. He was trying for the takedown in the fifth, but I think I was winning the stand-up in the fifth and he didn't get the takedowns in the fifth.

It's one of those things where it was obviously a close fight because it didn't get finished and we were both active the whole time. But I thought I had done enough. I'm happy to do more next time.

Knowing now how that sort of fight plays in the eyes of the judges, what do you think you need to do differently to get a definitive win?

You know, I'm not really sure. Just find a way to score more points in addition to going for the kill.

Dominick's not a guy that you can just decide you're going to do something to, because he's got such an awkward style.

I feel like I had a good game plan going in that allowed me to have as much success as I did. I'm going to have to get another game plan to have more success next time.

We've seen guys that just walk straight forward into him, like when Scotty Jorgensen fought him. Brian Bowles was having trouble hitting him and stuff like that.

I didn't have trouble hitting the guy. He landed four more punches than I did a round and none of them were power shots, so it's not like there's a huge discrepancy when it came to that. Joseph (Benavidez), I think he won the stand-up against him also.

So I just have to be smart about my game plan and do more to score points, in addition to trying to finish the fight.

'Rampage' Jackson: I'm almost done with UFC
'Lil Nog' out, Thiago Silva in against Gustafsson