Faber, Jorgensen put friendship aside

After tentatively agreeing to accept a relatively short-notice fight in an Ultimate Fighting Championship main event, Scott Jorgensen spent a few anxious hours awaiting confirmation from his manager that the bout indeed was going to happen.

He spent some of that time about a month ago texting with one of his friends, a fellow fighter, to get his thoughts on the opportunity and the situation.

That friend was Urijah Faber, who happened to be the opponent the UFC had proposed to Jorgensen for Saturday’s The Ultimate Fighter 17 Finale card at Mandalay Bay.

The top bantamweight contenders had tried to avoid the situation since Faber dropped down to 135 pounds a few years ago, but a showdown in the octagon was inevitable. This was at least the third time the bout had been proposed, and the UFC was in need of a quality main event for the card after flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson was injured and pulled out of his bout.

Faber and Jorgensen, who share representation, decided the chance to fight in a main event on FX with a potential title shot on the line was worth setting their friendship aside, if only for one night.

“We’re friends, and we’re going to be friends,” Jorgensen said. “On Saturday night, we’ll go into battle for 25 minutes, and then it’s back to normal. We’re hosting an afterparty together. It’s nothing we haven’t faced before through wrestling and just training. We spar with our friends every day. It’s no different. I get to go do another fight — a main event in front of millions of people — it just happens to be against my friend.”

Many fighters know each other in one way or another, but Faber, 33, says his relationship with Jorgensen, 30, has been a lasting one. They met when Faber was coaching wrestling at his alma mater, UC Davis, and Jorgensen was competing for Boise State.

Faber helped convince Jorgensen to try mixed martial arts when his college career ended.

“It’s a real friendship,” Faber said. “It goes back almost 11 years now, so a long time. It’s one of those things where I know his family and he knows my family, but this is our job. My friends beat each other up every day in practice. This is an opportunity to make some cash and put on a show and go down in history, and this will be something we can always look back on and have bragging rights.

“I can, at least.”

The two have trained together sporadically, but it has been several years since they did so regularly. Familiarity probably won’t be much of an issue because both have said their styles have evolved a great deal since most of those training sessions.

Faber and Jorgensen are adamant their friendship will make no difference in the fight. Still, it could get uncomfortable should one be in a position to need to land that one big finishing blow to end the fight.

Faber said once the bell rings, instincts take over and he wouldn’t even think that way. Jorgensen echoed the sentiment.

“It’s a fight,” he said. “I’m guessing he’d do it to me if I was in that situation. I wouldn’t blame him. It’s a fight. We’re both trying to make our money and further our career. I wouldn’t expect him to hold back punches or not throw elbows and things that possibly cut me or hurt me or anything like that. I’m going in there like a fight, and I’m sure he’s doing the same.”

Jorgensen might have some explaining to do to his son, however. Braeten, 7, is a big Urijah Faber fan.

“He’s got school and wrestling, so he’s at home right now. He’s upset he couldn’t come,” Jorgensen said. “Every time I talk to him, he’s pumped about the fight. He’s such a big fan of Urijah. When I told him (we were fighting), it was like I gave him a Red Bull. He couldn’t sit still for like five hours.”

The five-round fight headlines a card that also features the reality show’s season title fight between middleweights Uriah Hall and Kelvin Gastelum and a heavyweight bout between Travis Browne and Gabriel Gonzaga.

Miesha Tate and Cat Zingano will meet in the first nontitle women’s bout in UFC history.

Contact reporter Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-224-5509. Follow him on Twitter: @adamhilllvrj.