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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
When Roy "Big Country" Nelson joined the tenth season of The Ultimate Fighter, he was under contract to Roy Jones Jr's promotion, Square Ring Productions. Nelson had only fought once for the promotion, and had not gotten any other fights from them prior to moving to the UFC, so he felt he was in the clear.
However, that didn't stop Jones and Square Ring Productions from suing Nelson and the UFC in Nevada. And though Nelson competed several times for the UFC while the issue was on-going, the lawsuit was used as the excuse for keeping Nelson out of this month's UFC 125 event when Shane Carwin was pulled from the fight for back surgery.
But now, Nelson says the case is behind him, and he downplayed the UFC's issue with the case to begin with.
"All I can simply say is it has finally been settled, and we'll all just live a happy life because of the legal system in Las Vegas," Nelson said in an interview with MMAWeekly.com.
"There was nothing to worry about; it was like nine months old."
With that out of the way, Nelson turns his attention to a bout with former UFC Heavyweight Champion Frank Mir, which will come at UFC 130 in Las Vegas, and he said the lawsuit did let him know one thing for sure: he just wants to fight.
Penick's Analysis: Thankfully for all involved it has been taken care of, and Nelson can concentrate solely on fighting. It was fairly clear the UFC was using this as a scapegoat when taking him off of 125, as they had already targeted him for the event, and he had fought numerous times already while this was already an issue. But, the fact that it's now done and over with means that it's not going to be a distraction for Nelson, not that it necessarily was before, but it completely takes it out of the equation. Now, he's just got a tough fight with Mir to concentrate on, and that will be a very good fight for the Memorial Day weekend card.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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