WEC 48: Jose Aldo Gets a Leg Up on Urijah Faber, Runs Him Out Of ARCO

Despite an anticlimactic ending, it was a spectacular night of fights at WEC 48 on Saturday.

Featherweight champion Jose Aldo punished Urijah Faber’s left leg for 25 brutal minutes in the evening’s main event, earning the striker a lopsided unanimous decision victory in front of the former king’s hometown of Sacramento.

Unfortunately for Faber, the fight was taken out from underneath him – literally.

Aldo landed a few devastating kicks to Faber’s lead leg in the scrap’s early rounds and continued pounding away throughout the contest. Although he fought valiantly, the result was a runaway win for the Brazilian.

“I trained a lot of defensive leg kicks, but he’s really effective with them,” a battered Faber said after the loss, “He took my legs away from me. I was losing mobility.”

Aldo may have stolen Faber’s agility, but he didn’t take “The California Kid’s” heart, as the WEC’s poster boy found a way to soldier through and take Aldo the distance.

“We were planning for it to be a tough fight,” Aldo said through manager and translator Ed Soares, “I know the crowd here is for Uirjah, but I hold Sacramento close to my heart. It’s the first place I fought (for the WEC), and I hope they can adopt me … in my home away from home.”

The (49-45, 49-45 and 50-45) unanimous decision win bumped Aldo’s record to a dominant 17-1. The only thing that didn’t go right for Aldo was that fact he wasn’t able to finish his foe off, something he had done in his last six devastating victories.

Faber’s standing as one of the world’s best mixed martial artists is certainly not in jeopardy, however Aldo’s reign atop the WEC’s featherweight division appears to be only beginning.

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