After our OpEd piece last week, it looks like Bellator has given a fans an answer.
#2 Unified ranked flyweight Jessica Eye reported on her twitter that she is out of Bellator and is now a free agent. Currently at 10-1, she is suspected to be heavily sought by Invicta and we won’t be surprised if she gets an offer from the UFC.
Update: Jessica Aguilar confirms she is out of Bellator as well. The #1 strawweight in the world, Aguilar has won 5 straight and has a notable win over Megumi Fujii. She could be signing to Invicta soon.
Speaking of Invicta, Felice Herrig has signed with the promotion according to a press release. The fan favorite Herrig (9-4) is currently ranked #6 in the division and is on a four fight win streak. No word on when she will be making her debut.
This doesn’t mean Bellator won’t be doing a division again, according to president Bjorn Rebney in an interview with the MMAReport.com (28:12 in):
“It is not an area of the business we can put together a key format…to put together a tournament,” Rebney expressed. “It is incumbent on me as the head of the organization to say realistically the single most important part for fighters…they fight. They fight regularly. If they don’t fight regularly they aren’t getting paid or building their brand.”
“We are taking steps to allow those ladies who have been nothing but awesome to this organization and have been world classes athletes to access more fights. It would not be fair to put them in a situation where other promoters would be hesitant to build them because they are a part of our structure.”
“I am not will saying we won’t look at re-visiting the women’s game, but right now we are working on a dynamic and a structure where these ladies can go out and make money.”
Wombat Sports 