Sports

UFC 149 Analysis: Faber nearing end, Barao just getting started

Urijah Faber simply wasn’t good enough.

His striking wasn’t good enough to threaten Renan Barao standing up. His wrestling wasn’t good enough to get Barao to the ground.

The 33-year-old MMA legend might have seen his last title chance go by the wayside Saturday night in a five-round unanimous decision loss in a fight for the interim bantamweight title at UFC 149 in Calgary. Barao, 25, outstruck him badly and was elusive every time Faber tried to take the fight down to the canvas. The Brazilian (29-1-1) has now won his last 19 fights and will face champion Dominick Cruz when he returns from a knee injury sometime in 2013.

Faber (26-6) broke a rib in the first round courtesy of a Barao knee, he tweeted Sunday. Injury or no injury, it might not have mattered for the veteran. Faber was not necessarily blown out. You just never got the feeling that he would do any kind of serious damage to Barao throughout the fight. Because of his popularity, Faber could be back in the title hunt with one or two more victories. But his time as a legitimate championship contender is over.

This seems to be just the beginning for Barao, who is a training partner of featherweight champion Jose Aldo, one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world. Cruz will likely be his next opponent and the champion better hope the torn ACL doesn’t hamper his quickness and footwork, because Barao will be a very dangerous opponent. Look for him to be a title contender at this weight – maybe even featherweight as he gets older – for a long time. He doesn’t do any one thing exceptionally well, but he has very few holes in his game – Barao’s kickboxing, jiu-jitsu and takedown defense are all solid.

*

It’s too early to proclaim Hector Lombard a bust after his UFC debut. But the former Bellator middleweight champion was abysmal in a decision loss to Tim Boetsch in the co-main event. He stood flat-footed most of the fight, dropped his hands and showed little respect for his opponent’s boxing. That’s all well and good, but when the openings came for him to counterstrike he was woefully inefficient. Lombard is 34 and doesn’t look ready for prime time. At this rate, he may never be despite a knack for destroying tomato cans in Bellator.

*

I give credit to Boetsch for pushing the action against Lombard and when the third round was over I wanted badly for him to get the decision simply because of how uninterested Lombard looked throughout the fight. But let’s be honest – Lombard was more effective in what little he did. Boetsch is a grinder and a gatekeeper type. Little more than that. He shouldn’t be in the mix for a middleweight title shot no matter how thin the division looks to be right now.

*

Cheick Kongo looks like a million bucks when he gets in the cage – he has one of the best physiques in MMA. But the heavyweight veteran seems to have abandoned his bread and butter: devastating kickboxing. Kongo was much happier to clinch against the cage with Shawn Jordan in a boring three-round decision win. And the saddest thing? He was actually getting the better of the striking exchanges.

*

File the Brian Ebersole-James Head fight into the same “bad judges decision” file as Boetsch-Lombard. Ebersole, though almost as underwhelming as Lombard, deserved to beat Head. He also looked like he completely overlooked the unheralded welterweight. And this is a guy who wants a title shot if he moves down to lightweight? Now he’ll be a long way off in either division.

*

If not for a spirited brawl between Matthew Riddle and Chris Clements, this main card would have been a total disaster. Riddle had one of the cooler finishes you’ll see, taking down Clements with a standing arm triangle and locking it up on the ground for a third-round submission win. Riddle earned Submission of the Night honors and a cool $65,000 bonus for his efforts.

*

Too bad the fights at UFC 149 weren’t reversed. The prelims were much more exciting than the main card, which UFC president Dana White called “embarrassing” afterward. Bryan Caraway and Matt Gagnon earned the $65,000 Fight of the Night bonus for a wild, back-and-forth scrap that Caraway finished in the third round with a rear-naked choke. Ryan Jimmo, making his UFC debut, starched Anthony Perosh with a one-punch KO in seven seconds to earn the Knockout of the Night bonus. Both those fights aired live on FX.

*

UFC 149 wasn’t a total loss for the UFC. Actually, financially it was quite the gain. The company set its all-time arena record with a gate revenue of $4.1 million. More than 16,000 showed up for the sold out show at the Scotiabank Saddledome. The money total was also a record for the building, smashing the previous mark set by the Rolling Stones. Canada continued its unbridled passion for MMA — even if the card was devoid of star power.

mraimondi@nypost.com