Roger Huerta, the first fighter ever to grace the cover of Sports Illustrated has signed with Bellator Fighting Championships after leaving the UFC early last year.

“Bellator provided me with a sense of security,” Huerta told Sherdog.com on Monday. “I control my own destiny in the tournament. The winner gets to face one of the best lightweight fighters in the world — that’s the goal. If I lose, then it’s my fault. It’s on me and I can deal with that.”

“I have the ability to fight four times this year,” Huerta said. “It’s more of a staying active, and that’s more of what they brought to the table. … The main thing for me was, I wanted to fight constantly.”

Huerta, (20-3-1) enters the eight-man bracket for his shot at being the tournament winner for $100,000 over three bouts ($10,000/$10,000; $15,000/$15,000; $25,000/$25,000) during a 12-week span. The goal is to earn the opportunity to challenge Bellator lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez in the fall.

“I know I’ll have a target on my back and that these guys will be fighting with everything they’ve got when they meet me,” he said. “I’m going to be facing these guys at their best.”

“I know it’s going to be hard because I have to win the three fights, but I’m giving myself more fights if I win,” said Huerta. “It’s up to me, and I like the sound of that.”

Tags: Bellator Fighting Championships, Roger Huerta

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 at EthGMT-2 and is filed under Cage Coverage, MMA News Worldwide. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.