Patchy Mix is set to compete for the Bellator bantamweight championship amidst rumors of the promotion’s potential demise, leaving the fighter uncertain about his future in the organization.
Ever since Patchy Mix first arrived in Bellator, he’s dreamed of becoming the company’s undisputed bantamweight champion. On Friday night, he’ll get his second opportunity to capture that title, but it might also be the last chance he’ll ever have to compete for the promotion as rumors continue to swirl about Bellator’s looming demise.
With Showtime announcing plans to get out of the combat sports business at the end of 2023 and parent company Paramount speaking to potential buyers about a sale, Bellator appears to be teetering on the brink of extinction. That’s a hard pill to swallow for many of the athletes who built their careers in Bellator, which includes Mix after he signed with the promotion in 2019 as a 10-0 prospect.
That being said, Mix faces a potential reality where he beats Sergio Pettis at Bellator 301 to become champion but then suddenly has a belt that doesn’t even exist anymore. Anything is possible, including a buyer purchasing Bellator and then keeping the organization intact for the time being, which obviously affects Mix and every other fighter on the roster.
Major sales like these have only happened a handful of times in MMA history — usually involving the UFC buying a rival promotion — but there a lot of unknowns that surround Bellator’s future and the fighters under contract there. Maybe that means just moving to another organization, or perhaps it’s just competing for a different owner under the same Bellator banner.
Mix can’t say for certain what the future holds, but he expects to make himself a very hot commodity with another impressive win against an opponent like Pettis on Friday. “No matter where I go, I’m going to get paid,” Mix said. “I’ve got the best manager in the game Ali [Abdelaziz] and the best team, Dominance MMA.”