Mitrione and Emelianenko were scheduled to square off at Bellator 172’s main event on Saturday night before the fight was cancelled at the 11th hour
Mitrione had still yet to exit the hospital hours after the fight would have ended. The reason behind the late cancellation of the bout was a kidney stone which he could not pass. While addressing fans who were clearly bummed by the fight not going ahead, Bellator’s heavyweight also made a statement to others who questioned the former footballer’s desire to step up to the main event against Emelianenko in San Jose, Calif:
Thank you for understanding the misery I've been in trying to pass this big ass stone without so much as an aspirin. #StillHasntPassed
— Matt Mitrione (@mattmitrione) February 19, 2017
If missing out on an opportunity to fight a bonafide legend of MMA in Fedor Emelianenko wasn’t tough enough to deal with, the added pain of unsuccessfully passing a kidney stone is just downright awful. Throw a few disgruntled fight fans claiming you were too scared to fight, and you would not be blamed for losing your temper. Mitrione, despite all this, held his temper and addressed the “fools” with this offer:
And for y'all fools that have the nerve to claim that I'm scared or faking, come hold these nuts while I try to finally pee this stone out
— Matt Mitrione (@mattmitrione) February 19, 2017
Bellator was unable to provide a last-minute replacement for the promotional debut of “The Last Emperor”, and are yet to confirm when the Russian will fight next.
