BROWN DOMINATES FABER TO DEFEND WEC FEATHERWEIGHT CROWN

Mike Brown successfully defended his WEC Featherweight title as he pummeled a gutsy Urijah Faber for four of five rounds to earn a unanimous decision victory in the main event of WEC 41.  Faber suffered a broken right hand and an unspecified injury to his left hand during the first round, but fought gamely the rest of the way using every weapon at his disposal including Pancrase style open hand slaps and elbow strikes.  It wasn’t enough, however, as the relentless Brown pummeled Faber but standing and on the ground after spotting him the first round to earn the 49-46, 49-46, 48-47 nod from the judges.

Fighting in his hometown of Sacramento, California the challenger received a thunderous ovation as he entered the arena to his trademark ‘California Love’.  Brown followed, receiving a merciless barrage of boos which he clearly took as motivation.  Faber started well, scoring with a mixture of punches and kicks that clearly took Brown out of his rhythm.  Midway through the opening round Faber had perhaps his best opportunity of the night as he cinched in a deep guillotine choke, but Brown was able to escape.  The next punch by Faber may have turned the tide—he landed a hard right hand as Brown ducked his head slightly.  The punch made contact at the hardest part of Brown’s forehead with a sickening crack.  The impact wobbled the champion, but broke Faber’s right hand which was useless for the rest of the fight.  His left hand was also injured at some point during the opening five minutes, though the nature and source of the damage wasn’t apparent.  Faber’s punches opened a cut near Brown’s left eye, and ‘The California Kid’ clearly had the edge in the round.

From that point on, however, it was all Mike Brown.  Brown started to score with his punishing body punching attack in the second round, and also demonstrated his fluency both taking Faber to the ground and mixing up submission attempts with ‘ground and pound’ punching once he got there.  In the third round, the full extent of the injuries to Faber’s hands became apparent.  He quit throwing punches entirely, resorting to elbow strikes with the right arm and the occasional open handed slap with the left hand.  Brown would continue to dominate both striking with particularly good work to the body and on the ground for the rest of the fight. 

Urijah Faber—frequently derided as more a product of Zuffa hype than anything else—likely earned the respect of many of his detractors with his courageous performance.  Despite fighting four rounds without the use of his hands, he did everything he could to take the fight to his opponent.  In the last round of the fight, he tried several guillotine chokes in a last ditch effort to regain his title but without the ability to clasp his hands they were of minimal effectiveness.  While Brown earned a dominating victory, Faber clearly proved that he’s not a mere PR creation and has the courage, will and toughness of a championship level prizefighter.