[autotag]Patricio Freire[/autotag] dropped his featherweight title to[autotag] A.J. McKee[/autotag] at Bellator 263, but his coach Eric Albarracin wants to run it back in a different atmosphere.
Saturday’s event took place at The Forum in Los Angeles in McKee’s backyard. The arena was filled with fans cheering his name as the challenger to Freire’s crown, something that didn’t quite sit well with Albarracin in the aftermath of the fight.
“Brazilians don’t care, but Americans do, 16 games in the NFL are played to get a home-field advantage, 180 in baseball,” Albarracin said after grabbing the microphone at the post-fight news conference. “He’s the world champ-champ, I mean, when you ask a warrior, ‘Hey, where do you wanna fight?’ They say, ‘Anywhere, anytime.’ But obviously not in the hometown of the challenger giving him all the advantages.”
Entering the cage as a two-division champion, Freire had a lot to lose against a challenger in McKee, who was clearly the fan-favorite inside the arena. McKee trains out of Team Bodyshop in Lakewood, Calif., which is around a 30-minute drive away from The Forum, so naturally, he was going to receive cheers. During his walkout for the main event, Freire was met with boos, creating a hostile environment for a champion to defend his title.
Ultimately, Freire lost one of his titles in a quick fashion, but questions of a rematch taking place at lightweight were asked. While Freire or his coach didn’t seem opposed to the idea, Albarracin wants some things to change if that is the direction the promotion decides to go next.
“(McKee has) The youth, the range, the reach, and then throw the home-field advantage where he’s sleeping and training in his home gym – we traveled 36 hours to get here,” Albarracin continued. “I mean, let’s switch it up one time.”
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If Bellator does travel to Brazil for an event, it would be a first for the promotion.
“Pitbull” isn’t one to bring up those sort of talking points, but he agreed with his coach’s sentiment by taking the microphone back and simply stating, “That’s why he’s my coach. I need someone like him, he’s right.”
Watch Albarracin speak on why he believes evening the playing field makes sense for the rematch in the video above.
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