Former two-division ONE Championship king Reinier de Ridder made his UFC debut on Saturday night with a submission win over Gerald Meerschaert at UFC Vegas 100.
He may have made much bigger waves in his post-fight press conference. De Ridder sent a stern warning to any fighters looking to sign with ONE Championship.
“This is something I feel I have to do for other fighters. If you’re thinking of signing with ONE Championship, don’t,” he told reporters at his post-fight scrum.
“It’s that simple. You should not. There’s nothing there. There’s no fights. You’re just wrong if you do this, if you sign there, this is a bad mistake.”
De Ridder (18-2) fought for ONE eight times going 7-2 in that span. His only losses where Anatoly Malykhin who took both his titles via finish.
‘The Dutch Knight’ said his problem comes from lack of fights which put unnecessary stress on him and his family.
“It’s been a bad couple of years. The stress I’ve been put through, the stress my family’s been put through, to even just get fights. It hasn’t been nice. It’s hard for me to talk bad because I had a couple of good years at ONE as well,” he said.
“In the beginning they treated me well. Over the past couple of years it’s been really bad.”
No response to Reinier de Ridder’s comments has been made by ONE Championship as of this post.
