Frankie Edgar Targets Retirement Fight at Madison Square Garden

If all goes as planned, Frankie Edgar could be the latest notable to call it quits from mixed martial arts this year.

The former UFC lightweight champion told ESPN that he plans to retire after one more Octagon appearance in 2022. Ideally, that would be at Madison Square Garden in New York. While the promotion hasn’t formally announced an event at the celebrated venue, UFC 281 will reportedly take place at MSG on Nov. 12.

“I think that would be cool,” Edgar said. “It would be a pretty cool sendoff at Madison Square Garden, it’s pretty much in my backyard. I trained up in Renzo’s for so many years, it would be a pretty cool sendoff.”

Edgar hasn’t competed since the promotion’s last trip to Madison Square Garden, when he suffered a front kick KO loss to Marlon Vera at UFC 268 last November. “The Answer” later revealed that he underwent hip surgery several months prior to that fight and had also been struggling with “nerve issues” in his back.

He admitted he’s been thinking about the end of the line since the loss to Vera. Edgar has lost four of his last five UFC appearances overall — with with of those coming via knockout or technical knockout.

"I've been kicking the idea of retirement around since my last fight," Edgar said. "The last two fights obviously didn't go the way I wanted them to. If I'm being honest, I would fight forever -- but that's kind of selfish to my family and the people that care about me. I need to announce my retirement so I can have a retirement fight and sail off into the sunset.”

Edgar believes a “legacy fight” against former bantamweight champion Dominick Cruz would be the ideal way to go out.

"I'm never one to call out or pick anybody, I usually let the UFC or [manager Ali Abdelaziz] figure that out," Edgar said. "But I'll say a name, just because I think it's more of a legacy fight. I know he has a fight coming up and who knows how that could go down, but Dominick Cruz -- he was a champion at 135 [pounds] when I was champion at 155. We were both pretty much the top of the division. That could be a fun fight.”

Though he has fallen on hard times of late, the 40-year-old Toms River, N.J., native has enjoyed a decorated career within the Las Vegas-based promotion. He claimed lightweight gold with an upset victory over B.J. Penn at UFC 112 and defended the belt against Penn and Gray Maynard before relinquishing the crown in a decision loss to Benson Henderson at UFC 144. Edgar later moved to 145 pounds and twice challenged for titles there before finally dropping to bantamweight, where he has posted a 1-2 mark since 2020. Edgar’s ledger includes other notables wins against the likes of Pedro Munhoz, Cub Swanson (twice), Yair Rodriguez, Jeremy Stephens, Chad Mendes, Urijah Faber, Charles Oliveira and Sean Sherk, to name a few.