Cruz's comeback dominance sets up most interesting bantamweight clash since, well, ever

(A version of this story appears in today’s edition of USA TODAY.)

For former UFC bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz, watching current titleholder T.J. Dillashaw these days must feel a little bit like looking in a mirror.

You know that style Cruz is famous for? The one with the frantic footwork that makes opponents look like cats chasing a laser pointer? While Cruz (20-1 MMA, 3-0 UFC) was sidelined by knee injuries and surgeries, followed by more injuries and more surgeries, Dillashaw (11-2 MMA, 7-2 UFC) was using his own version of it to dethrone former champ Renan Barao. The Team Alpha Male product showed up on fight night looking like a blond “Dominator” and then went home with the UFC title after one of the biggest upsets in recent memory.

How’s Cruz supposed to feel about that, exactly? And after his return from a nearly three-year hiatus to demolish Takeya Mizugaki in 61 seconds at UFC 178, setting up a planned bantamweight title clash with Dillashaw, what are we supposed to expect when the man who never lost the title meets the man who took it using some borrowed techniques?

To hear Cruz tell it, he saw Dillashaw’s style evolution as more shout-out than swagger-jacking.

“(Dillashaw) has taken something that I used to be successful, and he’s added it to his own style to make it his,” Cruz told MMAjunkie. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say there was a small sense of pride.”

When you think about it, Dillashaw vs. Cruz seems like it has all the elements to be the most interesting bantamweight title fight since, well, ever. The UFC’s version of the 135-pound division may be only a few years old, but so far no matchup has seemed quite as compelling as this one pitting the originator of one style against the young champ who assimilated it into his own game with great results.

Add in a dash (OK, more than a dash) of personal animosity between Cruz and Team Alpha Male founder Urijah Faber, plus the chance to see the old champ fight the new one to determine the one and only rightful owner of the UFC bantamweight strap, and you have yourself a recipe for a really big fight. It’s already got Dillashaw’s adrenaline pumping.

“When I first got into this sport, Dominick Cruz was the champion,” Dillashaw said. “That was who I needed to beat. I’ve looked up to the guy as being a great fighter, which is why I’m so excited about this. People have asked me who I wanted to fight, I say Dominick Cruz. He’s the other guy who had the 135-pound belt, but I’m going to be the last one standing.”

Dillashaw doesn’t deny that he used some of Cruz’s techniques to beat Barao, though he did add that Cruz isn’t the only source of such inspiration, and that he’s “stolen something from all the great fighters I’ve watched.”

But for Cruz, seeing Dillashaw’s little homage to his style was actually kind of uplifting, he said, and it let him know that his influence on this sport wasn’t limited to the time he spent in the cage.

“He won a world championship with certain fundamentals that I used, and he admitted it,” Cruz said. “That made me feel great, especially being out, being hurt, and understanding that I’ve had a direct relation to a new style in a brand new sport. A lot of people can’t say that.”

Cruz’s dominant return demonstrated that he’s still as good as he ever was, if not better, but what it didn’t tell us is whether that will be good enough against Dillashaw.

That’s the other thing that makes this matchup so fascinating. Taking the champ from three years ago and dropping him in against the champ of today, and at a time when both have an equally strong claim to the belt? It’s a test pitting yesterday against today, like thawing out a frozen caveman to see how he fares in competition against, well, the cavemen of three years later, but you get the point.

Although Dillashaw is quick to acknowledge that the in-and-out style was Cruz’s before it was his, he also insists that it is but one of the many styles he’s capable of, while for Cruz it might be his one and only, as far as we know.

“I’m able to adapt to people’s styles,” Dillashaw said. “We’re going to figure out where his weaknesses are, and I’ll show that in the fight. I feel like I’m a little bit more dangerous than he is.”

As for Cruz, he gives Dillashaw his props for using the style well while he was away, he said, “but I’ve got to go out there and win it and show how it really looks.”

Whether he can do it, and whether the old champ is better than the new one, let’s just say it’s a question worth waiting for an answer to, even if we might not have realized just how eagerly we were waiting for it until now.

For complete coverage of UFC 178, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

Steven Marrocco contributed to this report.