Contributor: Josh Hall
At UFC 162 this Saturday fans will finally get some answers as to whether Chris Weidman is as good as the hype, whether Anderson Silva can still continue his dominance over Father Time, and whether Frankie Edgar will take the first step back on the road to title contention against the ultra-talented FW Charles “Do Bronx” Oliveira. With both men coming off losses (3 in a row for Edgar, 1 for Oliveira) they will each need to make a statement in this co-main event bout.
Both fighters are in very different places in their respective careers, and their skill sets could not be more opposite. Frankie Edgar is the talented wrestler with amazing speed on the feet that he was able to parlay into an impressive title run at lightweight. Charles Oliveira hasn’t been a pro in MMA as long as Edgar has been a UFC fighter, and he brings to the table an extremely high finish rate with strong ground and pound and one of the most creative submission games in the Octagon. This will be Edgar’s first non-title bout since he faced Matt Veach in 2009, while it is by far the biggest step up in competition in the young career of Oliveira.
This is the kind of fight that will likely be determined by which man can better impose his style on his adversary, as Edgar will have every intention of keeping the fight on the feet while Oliveira will need to get the fight to the ground where he can use his long limbs to work his flashy and effective submission game. “Do Bronx” has all the physical tools to win this fight, with a good size advantage (5’10″ in contrast to the 5’6″ Edgar and a 5 inch reach advantage) in addition to amazing offensive talent, but I 
think it will be the already exposed defensive holes in the young Brazilian’s game that will ultimately be his undoing.
At UFC 152 Oliveira faced off with Cub Swanson and despite having moments of success in the fight suffered a painful end in the first round after being broken with body shots and finished with one good clean head shot. While the natural talent of the Brazilian has been able to mask some of the deficiencies in his still developing game, the Swanson fight laid out the perfect blueprint for Edgar to use against him.
Frankie Edgar has some of the best boxing in the MMA world, and he is a wonderfully talented counter striker. Against an aggressive fighter like “Do Bronx” he will have the opportunity to sit down on his punches, because Oliveira will come forward. He is always in search of a finish in any position which served him very well against lesser quality of opposition, but Edgar just went five rounds against the striking of Jose Aldo without being finished. He has, in fact, never been finished in a 20 fight career, which is one more thing working against Oliveira who has only 1 victory via decision in his 20 career fights.
Despite Edgar’s reputation for being a fighter that doesn’t hit very hard, he has shown the ability to do more than enough damage to finish when given the openings (i.e. Gray Maynard (III) and Mark Bocek). If “The Answer” fights a smart fight and 
uses defensive wrestling to keep the fight standing, he should have all the openings he needs to remind everyone watching how good his boxing actually is.
Edgar has always been a very smart fighter in the cage, and I fully expect him to use the Swanson footage to his full advantage. First Edgar goes to the body to hurt him after Oliveira initiates the action, and then he goes upstairs to score the finish and get back to his winning ways.
My prediction: Frankie Edgar via 2nd round TKO.
-Josh can be reached at [email protected] or @jhall282.
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