Bellator's Patricio "Pitbull" Freire: "How can I be motivated to fight if I know the people I fight for... want me to lose?"

By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

Earlier this week, Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney tried to defend their decision to book the immediate rematch between Daniel Straus and Pat Curran. He argued that the idea of them completing the trilogy out-weighed the tournament win of Patricio "Pitbull" Freire, who has been vocally out-spoken in the wake of the Straus-Curran announcement.

Rebney's statement didn't sit well with Freire, who released another lengthy comment via Twitter on Friday expressing his feelings on the entire situation. Freire's statement below:

"Never in my entire career have I felt so disrespected and disappointed. @BellatorMMA announces their tournament brackets and in all of them they only have the champion, on the Featherweight one they have @PatCurranMMA as well. I don't have anything against Curran himself, what I don't like is the clear way he's being favored. I have all the desire in the world to fight and beat him again, not letting it to the judges this time. The issue is not this one. It's how the entire division is overlooked because of him. What is fair is fair, the only ones who can fight for Bellator's Featherweight belt are me and Frodo, if Frodo can't, then it's me. But the disrespect now goes beyond just the Featherweight division. Why is @kongo4real not there? Why is @MikeChandlerMMA not there? @PhenomLima and @RickHawnMMA will define the champion, I get that. But why is Curran worth of being on the image and the other challengers aren't? And why do you have it like the tournament winner will fight the winner of @DanielStraus vs Curran? There is a line and it's being ignored. And what about your champion? Daniel Straus deserves respect. I miss the time when Bellator's "title shots are earned, not given" were true. Also I miss the time when champions were respected. I want to be respected when I am champion and I think Daniel Straus should get respect for what he achieved. How can I be motivated to fight if I know the people I fight for and I have defended all these years want me to lose? How would you feel if you were me?

Penick's Analysis: Bellator made another highly questionable move today, announcing that Joe Warren will fight the Bantamweight Champion on May 2. That in and of itself wouldn't be a problem. However, he'll be fighting the Champion with a full three months of preparation, while that Champ will have to bounce back eight weeks after either retaining (in Eduardo Dantas' case) or capturing (in Rafael Silva's case) the Title. It really isn't respectful to certain fighters when moves are made in such blatant favoritism towards others. The simple fact of the matter is either Frodo Khasbulaev has gotten screwed out of his title fight due to dubious "visa issues" which somehow haven't been worked on in several months, or Pitbull's gotten screwed out of his title fight by virtue of being next in line. Rebney's explanation for giving Curran the fight doesn't mesh with what happened in the second fight. It doesn't necessitate the immediate rematch over those who have earned their shots, and that decision is going to have a ripple effect of negativity for some time.

Source: http://www.mmatorch.com/artman2/publish/Bellator/article_20041.shtml

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