Bloody Elbow is the premier MMA community, and it is because every single user brings something to the table whether in the form of humerous banter or expert knowledge in a one of the martial arts. Being a huge fight fan, i believe this is my contribution to the BE community. LATE NIGHT FIGHTS as a series was created in order to highlight great classics and those fights that are often cited but rarely seen as well as the past, present and future legends of MMA in their early non UFC or non MMA bouts. - KJJ

Backround: This is the debut UFC fight for Frankie Edgar, having gone 5-0 and coming off a win over Jim Miller to beat the RFC featherweight champion and defend his own RFC lightweight title.. Tyson Griffin had knocked out BANG Ludwig at Strikeforce : Revenge to get his call up to the big show where he tapped out David Lee at UFC 63: Hughes vs Penn. What followed was the 2007 Fight of the Year as voted by some random website. Enjoy!

Round 1
Edgar scores a few takedowns in the opening round. Edgar with some strong punching from Griffin's guard. Tyson works to his feet and scores a takedown of his own. after a scramble, Edgar takes Griffin back down to the mat. He passes to half guard and lands some strong shots to Griffin's head. First round goes to Edgar, 10-9. 

Round 2
This is turning out to be an awesome contest. Griffin comes out and lands a few hard shots. Edgar scores a takedown but can't hold Griffin down. Griffin stands up and delivers a series of lowkicks that send Edgar to the canvas. Edgar scrambles and ends up in mount. He lands some shots on Griffin before Tyson escaped the bad position. Sherdog.com scores the close round 10-9 for Griffin. 

Round 3
Edgar lays a beating on the gassed out Griffin for the first four minutes of the round. With about 50 seconds left in the fight, Griffin rolled into a kneebar. The hold was very tight as Edgar screamed and pounded the mat but he rolled out and dropped some punches down on his opponent's head. Sherdog.com scores the round 10-9 for Edgar. The judges rule 29-28 x2 and 30-27 for the winner by unanimous decision, Frankie Edgar

Aftermath: Frankie Edgar has gone 7-1-1 since this bout. He beat such names as Sean Sherk, Hermes Franca and Mark Bocek before facing lightweight kingpin B.J. Penn at UFC 112. A close match and Penn's legendary status prompted an immediate rematch at UFC 118. I watched that fight at a bar with 3 of my friends in Toronto with 95% of the bar screaming Penn fans, 3% Penn haters and 2% Edgar fans (us). Having family from Toms River and living a half hour away from TR i made sure to be nice and loud when the fight ended. Edgar since defended his title for a second time against Gray Maynard in a 47-47 draw. His third title defense is also against The Bully, TBA (lets go UFC 133 in Philly!). Tyson Griffin has had a little more up & down path since this fight. He has gone 6-4 since this fight gaining wins over names like Clay Guida, MArcus Aurelio, Hermes Franca and Rafael Dos Anjos. His loses include Sean Sherk, Evan Dunham, Takanori Gomi and a carnival style robbery by Nik Lentz. Griffin has dropped divisions and will fight Manny Gamburyan at UFC on VS 4: Marquardt vs Johnson

Other Recent LNF Installments:

LNF 13: Cinderella Has an Iron Jaw Part 2: Welcome to the K1 World Grand Prix 2001

LNF 12: Vitor Belfort's boxing debut, Spider Silva Muay Thai Match

LNF 11: Cinderella has an Iron Jaw - Mark Hunts climb to K1 History - Part 1: "The Most Exciting Fight in K1 History"

Upcoming LNF:

LNF 15: BJ Penn vs Takanori Gomi

LNF 16:  Cinderella has an Iron Jaw - Mark Hunt's climb to K-1 History - Part 3: The Man, The Kiwi, The Champion.

LNF 17: Lyoto Machida vs Sam Hoger

LNF 18: UFC 130 Primer: Rampage vs Sakuraba & Hamill vs Bisping