Scott Coker on Claims That Sonnen Threw Fight vs. Fedor: ‘That’s Just All Rubbish’

Fedor Emelianenko booked his spot in the heavyweight grand prix final with a TKO victory over Chael Sonnen in the first round of the Bellator 208 main event at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, N.Y., on Saturday night.

Unfortunately for Bellator, many fans found the main event to be a little suspicious and some claimed the fight was fixed. This wouldn’t be the first time Sonnen has been accused of fixing a fight. “The American Gangster” came under fire when he lost to Tito Ortiz at Bellator 170 in January 2017, with many claiming he allowed Ortiz to win.

Bellator CEO Scott Coker took to the media following Bellator 208 to rebuke those claims.

“I mean, come on – that doesn’t even deserve a response to the people that are saying it,” Coker told reporters. “Listen, Chael got clipped. He told me, he said, ‘Man, he hit me and he hit me really good.’ And he was done. That’s it. With Chael, the thing with Tito, ‘Oh, he let him go,’ or something. Come on. Why would you do that? You’re a professional athlete. You’re a fighter. He wants to continue, he wants to go to the next round of the tournament. That’s just all rubbish.”

Many claimed Sonnen fixed the fight when he rolled out of a potential submission attempt from back mount on Fedor and got finished seconds later. Sonnen later claimed he made a mistake attempting the move.

“The dive roll, I was going to lose that position anyway,” Sonnen said. “I was falling over the top so I tried to tuck his chin and go. I used to do that move all of the time in college and I always got it. But I missed it tonight. I rolled right over.”

Coker was obviously frustrated with the claims that Sonnen had fixed the fight. He claimed that Sonnen’s persona may be to blame for people thinking his fights are planned.

“I don’t know [why people say that],” Coker said. “To me, they see Chael, he’s got this character and they just feel like with Chael he’s this character, so maybe that’s what they’re thinking [it’s fixed]. If you had Fedor punching you and kicking you and kneeing you like he was doing today – that was real. That was not fake.”