Cruz: TJ vs. Faber feud a fugazi?
Dominick Cruz: “You can dress up a turd, but it still stinks. That’s T.J. Dillashaw. He’s still an Alpha Male guy. … He’s still one of them.”
Former UFC bantamweight Dominick Cruz is no fan of Urijah Faber’s Sacramento, Calif based team – he refers to them as Team Alpha Fail. In 2007, Cruz lost to Faber in a WEC featherweight title fight bid; he hasn’t lost since. Cruz has beaten TAM’s Joseph Benavidez, twice, and avenged the loss to Faber.
Sunday night at UFC Fight Night 81, Cruz fights former TAM standout T.J. Dillashaw. Dillashaw has engaged in an extended squabble with Faber, but Cruz is dubious, as he explained during a recent media call.
In fact, Cruz still considers Dillashaw a Team Alpha Male fighter. TAM fighters Joseph Benavidez and Lance Palmer were in Colorado as part of Dillashaw’s camp. And Dillashaw will have TAM coach Justin Buchholz? in his corner vs. Cruz.
And the winner of Dillashaw vs. Cruz will likely next face Faber.
“You can dress up a turd, but it still stinks,” said Cruz, as transcribed by Marc Raimondi for MMAFighting.com. “That’s T.J. Dillashaw. He’s still an Alpha Male guy. He’s still got those guys training with him. He’s still one of them. He’s still a jock, still a meathead. He’s still not that bright and he’s still uses a lot of the fundamentals those guys use. That’s what built him up into this sport so he’s going to have a lot of those things. He’s got new techniques from Ludwig. Ludwig’s helped him move along and fix some techniques with his kickboxing and stuff but it’s still an Alpha Male guy in my eyes.”?
“Those guys all have a weird dynamic. You never know which side they’re playing, because they’re always trying to make money and build some fights up for the future. So, they could be best friends behind the scenes and just pretending to beef right now or they could be really beefing. Faber is the kind of guy, he wants you to do good, but he never wants you to do better than him. Right now, T.J. is doing a little bit better than him. I’m sure there’s a real jealousy in Faber’s eyes right now and that’s why all this stuff is going on the way it is.”
“Faber is always trying to get the big-money fights, so he’s trying to cut him off to make a beef.”
T.J. Dillashaw fights Dominic Cruz in the main event of UFC Fight Night 81 in Boston Sunday night.
