Bellator Announces Signing of Roger Huerta, Debut Set for April 8
Bellator today officially announced that it has signed lightweight UFC veteran Roger Huerta, who will compete in the promotion’s upcoming 155-pound tournament and debut at Bellator’s season two premiere on April 8 in Hollywood, Florida at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.
The terms of the deal, which was first reported on Saturday, were not announced during a Monday press conference. Huerta’s first opponent has yet to be determined, pending the final addition to the season two tournament’s roster, but is expected to be announced soon.
Huerta (21-3-1) emerged as a lightweight contender with six-straight UFC victories over the likes of Leonard Garcia and Clay Guida, but after dropping a decision to Kenny Florian in August 2008, “El Matador” declined a new contract with the UFC and took a break from fighting to pursue an acting career. He returned to action in September, completing his UFC contract with a split decision loss to Gray Maynard.
The back-to-back losses snapped Huerta’s 16-fight win streak.
Huerta, who was notably the first mixed martial artist to appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated in 2007, was also in talks with Strikeforce before signing with Bellator, where he joins Toby Imada, Carey Vanier, Ferrid Kheder, Mike Ricci, Janne Tulirinta and Chad Hinton in the lightweight tourney, which airs live on Fox Sports Net.
The winner of the tournament is then expected to face champion Eddie Alvarez, who won the promotion’s first lightweight tournament in 2009, during Bellator’s third season later this year.
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Tags: Roger Huerta
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yippie!!
Good for Huerta for staying active in mma. I was scared for a bit he would be out for another year and some change. Like someone posted earlier, Bellator is quickly becoming the number 2 under the UFC in my book.I think there doing it right, find the newest upcoming talent as opposed to the UFC castaways, and old outdated fighters. Well see how the tournament goes. I’m rooting for Huerta and Ben Askren. Anyone think Huerta can beat Alvarez, should he win the tournament?
Just when i was asking where he was at, he signs with Bellator. I bet he got a good deal with them and he’ll be their poster boy for US and Mexico.
I was hopin hed come back to the ufc but oh well, I wish him the best
How do you watch bellator? is it on PPV?
its on fox sports net.. there are tons of “fox sprots net” channels but hopefully Bellator will be broadcasted on all of them, kinda like how IFL was
I hope the events are live and not shown in the manner that IFL was. That would turn me completely off from Bellator. I don’t know why either, but when the IFL was on I couldn’t sit through a single episode. If it is tape delayed hopefully it will be shown like HDNET fights are. Now that’s bearable, even though showing it live would be the best.
Well, good luck Roger! May u have a successful career on bellaT!
Two things about this that really kick my curiousity into overdrive:
1) Will Roger Huerta bigfoot all over the Bellator 155ers?
If he does, that speaks volumes about the gap between UFC level talent and the rest of the MMA universe, which IMO is great for the UFC, but not so much for the sport as a whole.
And if Huerta does not in fact win the 155 tourney, or even advance or make a respectable showing, does that speak to Huerta’s lack of commitment for the sport, or the rising tide of talent outside of the UFC, which would be a great thing for MMA?
2) We’ll probably never know for sure, but did Strikeforce try and sign Huerta and lost him to Bellator, or were they not interested in his services from the get go?
If they weren’t interested, I’d find that odd but not really disturbing, as Scott Coker has a lot more on his mind that trying to sign a guy who can’t decide if he wants to fight MMA, be in movies, or model mens underwear.
If SF tried and failed to sign Huerta, then thats huge for Bellator.
Remember, on paper they should be light years behind SF, but if they can sign existing name talent like Huerta away from SF, and continue doing their already-excellent job of finding and signing new talent and promoting their events, and thereby almost always gaining traction in the daily MMA news cycle, then that paints a far better longterm picture for them.
Possibly even better than SF’s, considering as how Bellator is banking heavily on tomorrow’s MMA stars, and SF seems to be working with fringe talent like Herschel Walker, Bobby Lashley, Brett Rogers, and an assortment of UFC and PRIDE retreads.
If in fact this thing becomes a full-blown Bellator/Strikeforce throwdown for the number 2 org spot in North American MMA, a lot of people are going to recall that the first solidly landed strike was scored today, or over the weekend, by Bellator…
Good signing for Bellator forsure, here are a few of my thoughts while I have an opportunity…
The number two org in NA is the WEC, Strikeforce has better fighters and is just simply a bigger org, Tony Imada is famous for that sick reverse triangle from last year but hell he didn’t even win the tourney Eddie Alvarez did… Bellator signed a HW who well he doesn’t have anyone to fight as of yet, overall with the FEG and Strikeforce colab the LW weights between the two orgs Huerta simply has nothing for them {Gil, Thomson, Kawajiri,Aoki,Ishida,Shoalin ect} , is Huerta good yes is great well not as of yet…
I believe that this is a excellent change of pace for the young man and am excited to see how he does, in theroy he should walk through the tourney and fight for the title but as Imada showed last year anything is possible in MMA….
i used to have fsn but its msg+ now does anyone kno if they will still play bellator on that or do i need to try to find a new fsn?