{"id":159066,"date":"2025-09-21T15:26:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T15:26:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/159066\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T15:26:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T15:26:09","slug":"former-bellator-champion-wants-ufc-contract-before-his-38-fight-career-ends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/159066\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Bellator champion wants UFC contract before his 38-fight career ends"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A near 40-fight veteran who has made his mark in Bellator and Rizin is looking for a UFC run before he wraps up his career.<\/p>\n<p>Juan Archuleta has mixed it up with the likes of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/bellator\/bellator-228-results-patricio-freire-defeats-juan-archuleta-highlights\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Patricio \u201cPitbull\u201d Freire<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/juan-archuleta\/rizin-champion-juan-archuleta-calls-for-rematch-with-bellators-patchy-mix-only-guy-to-beat-him\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Patchy Mix<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/bellator\/bellator-258-results-sergio-pettis-defeats-juan-archuleta-highlights\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sergio Pettis<\/a>, and Kai Asakura. While Archuleta has been in the trenches as a pro MMA fighter since 2013, \u201cThe Spaniard\u201d has never competed under the UFC banner.<\/p>\n<p>Archuleta doesn\u2019t want his prizefighting career to end without stepping inside the Octagon. During an interview with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mmafighting.com\/ufc\/404729\/juan-archuleta-making-one-last-run-to-get-signed-to-ufc-after-scoring-viral-knockout\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">MMAFighting.com<\/a>, Archuleta said he hopes he can provide something that the UFC brass is looking for.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Former Bellator &amp; RIZIN Champ Juan Archuleta training with former UFC Champ Aljamain Sterling at UFC PI. <\/p>\n<p>Archuleta wants to make it to the UFC with a win over ex-UFC fighter Jose Johnson this weekend at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/XFC53?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#XFC53<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/nCcJaAu0gh\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/nCcJaAu0gh<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Christopher De Santiago (@Chris_DSantiago) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Chris_DSantiago\/status\/1968149613170638880?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">September 17, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIdeal scenario to walk away with storybook ending,\u201d Archuleta told MMA Fighting about his desire to sign with UFC. \u201cThat\u2019s definitely the ideal situation. Finish off the last three or four years of opportunity I have right now and just ride off into the sunset.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously, I have to bring something of value to the UFC for them to sign me and right now it\u2019s like they want to see people that want to fight and people that want to end fights.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Archuleta is fresh off a second-round submission victory over Jose Johnson at XFC 53. It was a successful title defense for Archuleta, who is the Borroka Featherweight Champion.<\/p>\n<p>While the 38-year-old would like his next fight to be under the UFC banner, Archuleta has an idea of what direction he\u2019d go in if it isn\u2019t meant to be.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf this doesn\u2019t happen, signing up with RIZIN on New Year\u2019s to make one more run at the featherweight title there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Archuleta has amassed a pro MMA record of 31-7. He has 12 knockout victories and two submission wins. After finding himself in a three-fight skid, \u201cThe Spaniard\u201d has rebounded with two straight victories. Whether or not he\u2019ll finally get the call to join the UFC roster remains to be seen.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A near 40-fight veteran who has made his mark in Bellator and Rizin is looking for a UFC&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159067,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85],"class_list":["post-159066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159066\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}