The bout between legendary heavyweight Fedor Emelianenko and Matt Mitrione got canceled just a couple of hours before the event was set to take place.
The two were to fight it out in the main event of Bellator 172 but according to sources it was quickly scrapped when Mitrione fell ill.
Kidney stone, I’m told he still wanted to fight but commission pulled him. Unfortunate for @BellatorMMA https://t.co/ZpDBmZXqSA
— Brendan Schaub (@BrendanSchaub) February 18, 2017
Thank you for understanding the misery I've been in trying to pass this big ass stone without so much as an aspirin. #StillHasntPassed
— Matt Mitrione (@mattmitrione) February 19, 2017
Bellator officials made an attempt to find a quick replacement for Mitrione but in the end weren’t able to in spite of Chael Sonnen offering up himself. Heads of Bellator briefly indulged the idea but were unable to make it work in the end. Bellator 172’s new main event is Josh Thosom vs Patricky Pitbull Freire. You can check out the full fight below
“We have other plans for Chael and it would have interfered in that,” Coker said at the post-fight press conference. “It just got complicated and then the timeframe. I feel like we ran out of time. We set a deadline internally. … We had an obligation to the consumer to let the know this fight was going to be off.”
“It’s not really right to change the opponent just a few hours before the fight at such a short notice,” Emelianenko said through a translator. “That’s why my decision and the decision of Bellator was to postpone the fight.”
Per California State Athletic Commission executive officer Andy Foster, fans wanting to get a refund due to the cancellation are able to do so as long as they make the request before the event officially starts.
Fight was set to be a debut of Fedor in Bellator but hopefully they will be able to get something on the books in the near future.
