Dalton Rosta is undefeated in eight professional fights, all with Bellator, going into his title eliminator against Aaron Jeffery at Bellator 298. The fourth-ranked contender in Bellator’s middleweight division takes on sixth-ranked Aaron Jeffery on Friday in Sioux Falls, North Dakota.
With champion Johnny Eblen soon defending his belt against UFC welterweight champion Leon Edwards’ brother Fabian, this is a massive opportunity for Rosta to stamp his claim to the next title shot following that bout.
Being that he is teammates with Eblen, Rosta would not relish a fight against the current champion, but thinks he would dominate the challenger if he got a chance at Edwards.
“Against Fabian Edwards, I’d kill him. Against Johnny, Johnny’s style is very good, he has a good gas tank, it would be a tough fight. We’re teammates, we train with each other, we have wars in sparring, we fight and they’re good rounds. So I don’t know, that’s the toughest fight in the division for me and for him. We’re teammates, so hopefully we don’t have to fight each other.”
Fabian Edwards is known as a striker, so we asked Rosta if the wrestling aspect is why he thought he could destroy the Brit. His confidence in all realms of MMA shown through in his answer.
“No, even in striking. He’s a good striker and he’s long but sh*t he does is pretty basic and there’s a lot that can be exploited. Mixing everything up, this is MMA, if I was going to fight him I’m not just going to wrestle him but I’m also not just going to strike. And I say that now, but then I go into the fight and just f*cking strike or just wrestle. Sh*t always f*cking changes.”
Fabian has beaten the odds before, such as his last fight where he beat the MMA legend Gegard Mousasi. Even Rosta had to give him props for that bout.
“I’m not gonna lie, I was really impressed. But at the same time Gegard – Gegard is good don’t get me wrong, he’s a legend of the sport – he has a lot of experience but he seems like he’s a slow starter and it just doesn’t seem like he has that killer instinct anymore… He’s definitely past his prime but that doesn’t mean anything, he’s a great fighter. I just think there’s some things missing.”
Given his previous answers it’s no surprise that Rosta predicts Eblen to run through Edwards in Dublin in September, “I think Johnny’s gonna walk through him. I think he can finish him or take it to a decision, whatever is in Johnny’s head that night. Whatever Johnny wants to do, if he wants to torture him for five rounds he can torture him, if he wants to finish him he can finish him. I don’t see it going any other way unless Fabian were to land a lucky head kick or something like that.”
Given the importance of his current bout and the way the division stacks up, Rosta was asked if he has heard that he will get a title shot if he wins against Jeffery. He responded, “No, so I’m just treating this like another fight. I have another fight on my contract after this and I’d like to fight before the year’s end, so we’ll figure it out after this.”
In Aaron Jeffery’s last fight, and others in the past, he lost when his opponents implemented their wrestling effectively. However, just like with Edwards, Rosta, who has a wrestling background, sees more places than just the mat where he can beat the Canadian.
“He has holes everywhere, man. [Wrestling is] one of them obviously, but he leaves his body wide open, he has a very high guard in a boxing guard almost, his legs are there to be kicked, he’s very square in his stance so he’s creating a bigger target, and he’s very hittable up top. He comes forward and does all this little fidgety movement but he’s not moving his head off-line much, so he still gets hit and clipped with a lot of things. Sometimes he’s landing as he’s getting hit but he’s still taking a lot of shots.
“So really, whatever approach I choose to take, I don’t see where I’m going to have a problem in this fight. He likes to hold his opponents against the cage and dirty box, punch, knee, elbow, but good luck holding me there. Good luck stuffing my takedown if I choose to do that. Good luck keeping up with my speed. Good luck keeping up with my strength and my power. I think it’s going to be a great fight for me.”
Superman punch into a left hook!!
Dalton Rosta takes Romero Cotton’s 0 via KO.#Bellator283
pic.twitter.com/aLjwRY1kx8— MMA Mania (@mmamania) July 23, 2022
Pivoting the conversation away from the current fight, we asked Rosta to tell the story of how he got his fighting nickname, “Hercules.” It had to do with a former training partner of the legendary boxer Muhammad Ali.
“So I started off boxing at Elwood City but when I started at Youngstown I switched to a trainer at Youngstown. I was going down to the gym, it’s just called Downtown Boxing Club, there are a lot of old-timers there. One of them was actually Muhammad Ali’s old sparring partner. My first day down there I was hitting the pads with Sam Calderon who was my boxing coach at the time and usually when someone is cracking the pads hard or looks good on the pads or fast everyone stops working out and just starts watching.
“After the first round I look around and everyone is surrounding the ring watching me hit pads. So then the next round I’m hitting pads again and people are making comments. And there’s this guy – I don’t know why I’m drawing a blank on his name right now – anyways, he just [said], ‘That’s Herc, that’s Hercules,’ and he called me Herc and after a couple of weeks everybody in the gym was calling me Herc.
Given that he is in Bellator, Dalton Rosta knows a fight with UFC champion Israel Adesanya is not on the cards at the moment, but it remains a dream fight for him, “I’d love to fight Israel Adesanya but he’s in the UFC.”
“I would just take him down. For example, Yoel Romero has the wrestling pedigree to take him down but sat there and tried striking with him. Robert Whittaker, he’s not the greatest wrestler but he has the wrestling capability of taking Israel Adesanya down, didn’t take him down. Everybody tried striking with him. Paulo Costa is a black belt in jiu-jitsu and he’s a strong guy. Jan Blachowicz took him down and Jan is not a good wrestler, you saw him struggle to take Pereira down this past weekend. The blueprint is there.”
Dalton Rosta was a born fighter, from the streets of Pittsburgh to the wrestling mats to the Bellator cage. It is a way of life for him
“Whenever I was a kid growing up I’ve always gravitated towards fighting. I got in a lot of street fights when I was a kid, not because I wanted to but because I had to. The neighborhood I grew up in I was getting picked up a lot, I was forced into fighting. I’ve always just liked wrestling, I’ve always liked boxing, I’ve always liked watching fighting, whether it was movies or cartoons or whatever. My dad put me in wrestling when I was 6, put me in BJJ when I was [12], put me in boxing when I was 11, so I dabbled in a little bit of everything.
“Whenever I started jiu-jitsu at my dojo that I was going to there was a kid there named Hank who whenever the UFC fights were on he would have everybody from the dojo come over to watch the fights. We’d always go over and watch and back then we were watching like Brock Lesnar vs Frank Mir, Liddell vs Oritz, Lyoto Machida vs Jon Jones… But no one in particular that made me want to fight, it’s just something I’ve always wanted to do.”
Given that he is such a fan of fights it’s no surprise that he has a bevy of fighters he enjoys watching, “My favorite fighter growing up was probably Jon Jones. And then Conor McGregor whenever he broke on the scene. And now my favorite fighter would probably be – tough one, there’s a lot of good fighters. The 155-lb division is just good period, they just put on a lot of good fights: Chandler vs Gaethje, Gaethje vs Poirier twice, Charles vs all three of them. That division is probably my favorite division to watch just because they always have bangers. And then Joanna is always banging it out, Zhang Weili.”
Still, all fighters have to have a life outside of the cage, and Rosta is no exception. Growing up in Western Pennsyvlania it’s no surprise that he is an outdoors type.
“I like to go hunting in the wintertime back home in Pittsburgh, I like going hiking, I like riding a motorcycle, I shoot guns. I got a few guns: AR-15, .500 Magnum, 30-08, 25-06, got a SIG P365 X-Macro, so I got a few toys. I like playing videogames, like hanging out with my boys, boating, that’s about it man.”
In Pittsburgh, being a Steelers fan is almost expected of every resident, “Oh yeah, big Steelers fan, don’t know how I left that out. Football, like going to football games, like watching football. That was my first love growing up.”
Before letting Dalton go, we asked him for a prediction, given his utter confidence that he can beat Aaron Jeffery everywhere.
“I think either first round knockout or second. I think I hurt him in the first and I think I can get him out of there in the first but if he’s durable enough – and I’ve seen, he is durable, that’s one thing I’ll give him credit for – I can get him out of there in the second.”
Dalton Rosta takes on Aaron Jeffery on the main card of of Bellator 298 in Sioux Falls, North Dakota on Friday, August 11th, 2023.
