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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
At 42-years-old, Vladimir Matyushenko's 16th year in the sport will see him take on the tournament field in Bellator MMA. After two losses in a row in the UFC, Matyushenko was released from his contract, and in an uncharacteristic move, Bellator opted to sign him.
Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney explained why they were willing to give Matyushenko a shot in an interview with TheMMAReport.com.
"He came in and met with us," Rebney said. "We sat here in the office and we had a really long meeting. He is convinced at this stage of his career that he is at a place that he can really still excel and compete at a very high level. The guy is 26-7. If you look down the list of the loses, he has lost to big names. When he loses, he loses to guys with very big names and he thinks he stay has gas in the tank. He feels that literally a couple of very good years left in front of him right now to compete at a very high level.”
“He looked at 205, we have the Emanuel Newton’s of the world, Mikhail Zayats and then we have [King] Mo coming back, Babalu and people like that. He just fit into this 205 division right now. We have extremely well known names and we got guys who can compete at a very high level that nobody has ever heard of and are working up that ladder real quick.”
He won't immediately be a part of the tournament field, and his first fight with Bellator will come outside of that format either during this year's summer series or at the outset of season nine, but he could find his way into a 2014 tournament with a win.
"Bellator is one of the biggest promotions in the world, and to be associated with them is an honor," Matyushenko said. "I am optimistic and excited to work with Bellator. The amount of respect and honor I felt from Bjorn and the entire Bellator team was tremendous, and getting into the Bellator cage and cementing my legacy as a Bellator World Champion is the only thing on my mind."
Matyushenko's most recent UFC run ended with a 4-3 mark, with his losses all coming against top ten competition in Ryan Bader, Alexander Gustafsson, and now-UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones. The most recent loss came in January, where Bader caught him in a submission in under a minute.
Penick's Analysis: Matyushenko to Bellator is an odd move, simply because Bellator doesn't make a habit of signing UFC fighters after their release. That said, it still kind of makes sense, because he doesn't command as high a price as someone like Jon Fitch, and Bellator's 205 lb. division isn't what anyone would consider deep. Matyushenko will still need to win a fight to get into the tournament as well, though that's something I'd expect him to do. Despite getting trounced by the really good fighters he was defeated by in his most recent UFC run, he's capable of beating most of the competition level he'll face in Bellator.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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