The mixed martial arts journey for Fernando Gonzalez started back in 2003 when he made his professional debut and he started his career with 11-3 and eight of those victories came by knockout or submission.
Following his 11-3 start in the sport, Gonzalez (22-13) went 9-10 in his next nineteen fights and nearly called it a career after losing to David Mitchell at the beginning of last year at West Coast Fighting Championships 8.
“I had been fighting for thirteen years and had not made that breakthrough,” Gonzalez said on The MMA Report Live. “After awhile, I was slacking on the local circuits and we go through the whole training camp and we would weigh in and the guys would not show up to fight me. That happened two or three different times and basically a lot of it had to do with them trying to build their name. I already had a big enough record but not enough names.”
“The higher level fighters that didn’t really want to fight. It’s not that they were afraid of me, but it was not smart of their behalf if they were trying to make it in a Bellator or UFC. Fighting someone with not a big name and it was going to be a tough fight. It just did not benefit them. I was not getting the matchups I wanted and I actually went to Bellator.”
“At the time, Bjorn Rebney was running Bellator and I pleaded with him — ‘man please, how can I get in here? I want to be able to show what I have.’ He is the one who got me into Bellator and I am very appreciated of him doing that. Scott Coker, I fought for him in Strikeforce before and they are giving me some great matchups. I am very happy to be in this company.”
If he did not get into Bellator last year, Gonzalez admitted that he would likely be retired instead of preparing for a fight at Bellator 132 next week against Marius Zaromskis.
“Yeah, definitely. It was a hard road,” Gonzalez said when asked about whether he would be retired if he did not get a Bellator offer. “I was pretty much there. I had already put my family through a lot. I have my son and wife. Not just myself, I have to think about them. We just had not made it and we were struggling. We were both working hard and I had to pick up a second job at the time that I got the call from Bellator.
“Obviously, there are other guys like Zach Light and Christian Printup, who helped me get me in there. I actually trained with Zach back in the day and Christian was running the WEC when I fought them in Tachi Palace. It felt like it was faith that I ran into them the day I did get the knock to fight in Bellator.”
Next Friday night he will face Zaromskis in one of the four main card bouts on Spike TV at Bellator 132 and he will be looking to improve to 3-0 in Bellator. He is coming off a knockout win at Bellator 127 against Karo Parisyan and a win over Zaromskis could put him in a tremendous opportunity in a division that is searching for new title contenders.