Coach: Edgar camp for UFC 205 was a ‘total disaster’

Frankie Edgar’s coach Mark Henry spoke recently with Chisanga Malata for the UK’s Daily Star and revealed the turmoil before the fight with Jeremy Stephens at UFC 205. Edgar fought with a torn MCL, which left him unable to do any wrestling or jiu-jitsu in preparation. The coach pleaded with Edgar to pull out of the fight, but ‘The Answer’ answered “no.”

“People don’t know that in this camp with Frankie, it was a just a total disaster,” said Henry. He did no wrestling at all the entire camp, he did no jiu-jitsu the entire camp. We asked him to pull out and he wouldn’t pull out of the fight and he said, ‘I’m not pulling out no matter what.’

To try and compensate for his knee, he messed up his back badly so he had to get an epidural for his back. He just would not pull out of the fight no matter what.

To put all that aside, no wrestling the whole camp when you wrestle a lot and no jiu-jitsu and not being able to do some certain cardio things, man, he did really good.”

People don’t know the back story because Frankie doesn’t really talk about it. But what he accomplished in that fight considering everything against him and considering how great Jeremy is and the size difference, I really give him credit.

In the end, Edgar put on a vintage performance. He was stunned in the second but came back to take a unanimous decision.

The win put Edgar at the top the division, right below interim champion Jose Aldo, and champion Conor McGregor:
Champion : Conor McGregor
1 Jose Aldo (Interim Champion)
2 Frankie Edgar
3 Max Holloway
4 Ricardo Lamas
5 Cub Swanson
6 Anthony Pettis
7 Jeremy Stephens
8 Charles Oliveira
9 Dennis Bermudez
10 Brian Ortega