Ultimate Fighter 19 participant Tyler King scored his second straight victory nearly two weeks ago as he defeated current Bellator light heavyweight Mike Mucitelli by unanimous decision at CES MMA 28 in a catchweight bout of 225 pounds.
It was the second win for King (9-2) in less than a month as he stepped up on 13 days notice to meet Mucitelli. The victory over Mucitelli came at a price as King suffered an injury in the opening minutes of the fight.
“I do not think I fought that great at all,” King told The MMA Report. “Very early in the fight, a couple of things happened and I just did not perform the way I wanted too. Early in the fight, he got under me, scooped me up, and slammed me. I hate to say this but when he slammed me, something went into my groin. It popped, tore, or whatever. After the fact, I went to the hospital and I did indeed tear my groin.”
“After that happened, I knew something was wrong and basically my approach and my gameplan going in was to show case my striking. I had really been working on my striking, clinch game, and we had been game planning for the type of strikes Mike was going to throw. About 15 seconds into the fight, that all went out the window. I realize that I was going to have to go into his world. Grapple him a little bit and take him down.”
With the injury he suffered in the fight against Mucitelli, King will need some time to recover. Initially, he wanted to fight on the upcoming WSOF 20 card in Connecticut but he is now looking to return in June due to the injury. It’s believe that Bellator will be returning to the Mohegan Sun in July and King would be interested in being on that card, if it was a fight to take place on the main card.
“I am not going to discount anything,” King explained. “The promotion I have been working with [CES], they have been great. I like being on TV. Bellator is great, but if I was just going to be on the undercard, I just beat one of their top contenders so I should be on the main card if I went in that direction. I rather be on a main card on AXS TV with CES than on an undercard, non-televised portion of another show.”
At this point, it’s unknown if King’s next fight will be in CES MMA or another promotion. King is open to taking a fight in any promotion and one thing he would like to do before his career is over would be to have a fight in Asia.
“I always look at the fights over in ONE FC in Asia and it’s kind of a bucket list thing for me. Fight in Asia in an old school match with soccer kicks and stomps. That is cool to me. That is something I could cross off my bucket list and say I fought in a full contact mixed martial arts fight in Asia, Pride rules. That is a bucket list thing I would like to do. A good opportunity will present itself and we will go from there.”