Yair Rodriguez should go to Bellator

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Poatan Power

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Hear me out.

He's turning 31 in a couple of months. Only a few years left of his prime as a mixed martial artist.

Gets finished by Volk. can't beat Max. But will always be hovering in the top 5.

Only fights about 1x a year (6 since 2019).

How fun would a fight with Pitbull be? Pico? Kennedy? I bet Yair could hit some highlight reel finishes in Bellator and secure the title. With his typical fight schedule he probably will only fight a 3-4 more times by the time he's 35, anyway.

With as exciting as he is, I'm sure he could draw some cash from making the move, too. I love Yair but what's the move over the next couple years unless Volk moves up and he improves enough to beat Max? Seems like he and others (Whittaker, for example) in the UFC where there is a dominant champ don't have much vertical mobility for financial gain and notoriety and could only benefit from "fun" matchups like a BMF title match or something.

Thoughts?
 
Seems like a good idea, just depends on how many fights are left on his contract
 
Eat My Teep said:
Hear me out.

He's turning 31 in a couple of months. Only a few years left of his prime as a mixed martial artist.

Gets finished by Volk. can't beat Max. But will always be hovering in the top 5.

Only fights about 1x a year (6 since 2019).

How fun would a fight with Pitbull be? Pico? Kennedy? I bet Yair could hit some highlight reel finishes in Bellator and secure the title. With his typical fight schedule he probably will only fight a 3-4 more times by the time he's 35, anyway.

With as exciting as he is, I'm sure he could draw some cash from making the move, too. I love Yair but what's the move over the next couple years unless Volk moves up and he improves enough to beat Max? Seems like he and others (Whittaker, for example) in the UFC where there is a dominant champ don't have much vertical mobility for financial gain and notoriety and could only benefit from "fun" matchups like a BMF title match or something.

Thoughts?
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Bellators 145 division has too many good wrestlers, I'm not confident he beats Aaron Pico, Timur Khizriev, Khasan Magomedsharipov and maybe a couple others. Patricio is done though, I've been saying that for over a year.
 
There’s much more interesting stuff in the UFC. Volk/Max are either going to age out or move up soon. Yair/Topuria/Allen will all have a good shot of getting the belt in the next few years
 
Nah, theres still some good fights for him in UFC. You could do Kattar or Giga next which would be fun striking matches that could headline a fight night.

BUt I guess its more about his contract, if his contract was up now maybe he would look to PFL or something to win a tournament but UFC aint gonna cut him and doubt his contract is up yet.
 
Yair never had potential to be champ.

he was always going to remain in the top 10 rotating ranks with wins and losses.

with a few more wins sure he can get another title shot but I honestly think he will never hold the belt.
 
Substance Abuse said:
Bellator is about to be sold to PFL. I don't think that's a great idea.
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Damn what? I haven't heard that.

I have a feeling Yair is going to get on the receiving end of grapple fucking from here on out with unfavorable match ups for up and comers. Which sucks on two fronts because it also doesn't make his style any more fun to watch when that's his match up.
 
Eat My Teep said:
Damn what? I haven't heard that.

I have a feeling Yair is going to get on the receiving end of grapple fucking from here on out with unfavorable match ups for up and comers. Which sucks on two fronts because it also doesn't make his style any more fun to watch when that's his match up.
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He shouldn't, Volkanovski is almost on his way out. Jair has a solid 5years left, Bellator would do nothing for him. Jair being a UFC fighter hailing from Mexico and being one of the faces as a top Mexican fighter has resulted in him having sponsors correlates with him being a UFC fighter. He's better off being in the UFC.
 
Getting starched by Volk is a bad way to leave the UFC and would hurt Bellator's marketing of him a bit. If he wanted to leave he would probably need to get a win or 2 to get some special treatment like UFC vets Mousasi and Bader got.

I think he could get the belt in PFL or Bellator. His grappling defence looked great against Emmet and Ortega but Volk is clearly above those elite grapplers and he showed it holding his own with Islam so I'm not going to write off his grappling like others seem to be doing again.
Patricio is arguably done too and at his age it'll be hard to see him regain the strength/build he seemed to lose with his cut to BW so if Coker gave Yair a fight against Pico he could have an easy path to the title since Pico despite being elite at boxing and wrestling has a void of skills in clinching and fighting anywhere else that isn't pure wrestling or pure boxing.... if Pitbull looks like he did against Borics' I think he puts Yair away though.
 
Liverkick-king56 said:
As a fan of Bellator that news scares the hell out of me.... Bellator finally feels like a legit promotion and they're being swallowed by a promo that feels like a gimmick.
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MMA life coming full circle with the tournament/playoffs format...
 
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