Former UFC Lightweight champion Frankie “The Answer” Edgar has been named to the 2024 UFC Hall of Fame class following an announcement at UFC 297 in Toronto Saturday night.
The 42 year old amassed a 24-11-1 MMA record over his 17 year professional career, recording 7 knockouts and 4 submissions along the way. Edgar was a former NCAA Div 1 wrestler at Clarion University, before switching his focus to mixed martial arts where he earned a 3rd degree blackbelt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu under Ricardo Almeida.
The 5’6″ former champion put together a 5-0 record before tryout out for season 5 of The Ultimate Fighter, but wasn’t selected to be a contestant. However a month later he was added to the UFC 67 card, earning an unanimous decision victory over a then undefeated Tyson Griffin, and the rest as they say is history.
“Frankie Edgar is one of the greatest athletes in UFC history,” UFC CEO Dana White said in a statement. “Frankie had an amazing career and consistently fought the best athletes in the world across multiple weight classes for more than 15 years. He is a legend, and it will be an honour to induct him into the UFC Hall of Fame as part of International Fight Week this summer.”
During his storied career, the Toms River, NJ native had memorable bouts against the likes of BJ Penn, Cub Swanson, and Urijah Faber. Those classic slugfests helped him to earn the 2nd most “Fight of the Night” bonuses in UFC history with 8.
As impressive as his career has been, some have accused the soon to be Hall of Famer of potentially “hanging on for too long” as he went 1-5 across his final 6 bouts, with 4 of those losses coming via either KO or TKO.
However, there’s little doubting Edgar’s championship pedigree, or his place amongst some of the all time greats in the Lightweight division. Edgar will be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame’s Modern Wing in a ceremony later this summer.
Photo: Andrius Petrucenia. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.