Seth Petruzelli

Seth Christopher Petruzelli (born December 3, 1979) is a retired American mixed martial artist, kickboxer and entrepreneur. Petruzelli competed in the Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight divisions for the UFC, WEC, EliteXC, King of the Cage, BAMMA, and Bellator.

Background

Petruzelli was born in Cape Coral, Florida and is a native of Fort Myers, Florida. He began training in martial arts at the age of seven and continued on training through high school. Petruzelli attended Bishop Verot High School as a freshman before transferring to Mariner High School to take advantage of the school's elite wrestling team. He also played football and ran in track and field. Petruzelli was a three-sport letterman all four years of high school and was also all-state center in football. Petruzelli was offered a scholarship to wrestle and play football in college but ended up turning professional in mixed martial arts right out of high school. He holds a 3rd degree black belt in Shitō-ryū Karate and a Black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. He eventually went on to study psychology at the University of Central Florida.^[1]

Mixed martial arts career

Petruzelli was a member of the cast of the Ultimate Fighting Championship's The Ultimate Fighter 2 as a Heavyweight. He was eliminated in the semi-finals by Brad Imes after having defeated Dan Christison by unanimous decision in an elimination bout. He later had the opportunity to fight in the UFC in 2006, but was cut after losses to Matt Hamill and Wilson Gouveia.

EliteXC controversy

On October 4, 2008, at EliteXC: Heat, he defeated Kimbo Slice in 14 seconds by TKO. He was offered the fight as a stand-in after UFC Hall of Famer Ken Shamrock received a cut over his left eye in pre-fight practice and was forced to back out.^[2]

On October 10, 2008, two days after the fight with Slice, he told the radio show The Monsters in the Morning:

"The promoters kinda hinted to me and they gave me the money to stand and throw with him, they didn't want me to take him down. Let's just put it that way. It was worth my while to try and stand up punch him."^[3][4]

EliteXC Vice President Jared Shaw immediately denied what could be perceived as them trying to fix the fight,^[3] and Petruzelli later clarified his statement telling respectively Yahoo! Sports and FiveOuncesofPain.com:

What that meant was they offer a knockout bonus, submission bonuses, fight of the night bonuses. I think it just got misconstrued. I wanted to have an exciting fight and I wanted the knock out bonus so I wanted to keep it standing. [...] They just said, ‘we want to see an exciting fight no matter what happens.’ I took it as I wanted the knockout bonus.^[3]

What was meant to be said was that I wanted to keep the fight standing for myself because I knew that was what the crowd, the promoters, and everyone wanted to see because that’s more exciting than just taking someone to the ground. That was my thing only. I wanted to keep it exciting so I decided to keep it standing. It had nothing to do with anybody else. That was all me.^[5]

On October 23, 2008, the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation concluded its investigation of the bout and found no wrongdoing.^[6]

2008-2010

In December 2008, Petruzelli opened his own MMA gym in Orlando, Florida called "The Jungle" on East Colonial Drive.

On August 22, 2009, Petruzelli fought in the Art Of Fighting 4 at the USF Sundome in Florida.

Petruzelli was expected to face MMA pioneer and former King of Pancrase Ken Shamrock on March 6, 2010 at an event called International Unlimited Fighting: The Return of Buluc but the fight was called off.^[7]

Return to the UFC

Petruzelli returned to the UFC at UFC 116 to face UFC newcomer Ricardo Romero. Despite having dominated the initial stages of the fight, Petruzelli lost by armbar submission and was visibly hurt.^[8]

Petruzelli stated via Twitter that his arm was not broken and it had just popped. He was given another fight by the UFC, and expressed excitement to face Tito Ortiz or Matt Hamill depending on whoever loses the fight. On November 13, he faced Karlos Vemola at UFC 122 in Oberhausen, Germany. He lost the fight via TKO (strikes) at 3:46 of the first round and was released from the promotion after dropping to 0-4 in the UFC.^[9]

Post-UFC Career

Petruzelli faced Dave Mewborn on April 22 serving as the Main Event for World Extreme Fighting 46 at the UCF Arena in Orlando Florida.^[10] He defeated Mewborn by TKO at 3:06 of the first round.

Bellator Fighting Championships

Petruzelli made his Bellator debut against Ricco Rodriguez at Bellator 48. He won the fight via KO in the first round. After the fight Petruzelli was rewarded with a BJJ black belt under Thiago Domingues (a De La Riva Blackbelt).

He returned in 2013 as a participant in the Bellator Season 7 Light Heavyweight tournament. He lost to Jacob Noe via TKO in the opening round at Bellator 85.

Petruzelli competed in Bellator's Light Heavyweight summer series tournament on Spike.^[11] He faced Muhammed Lawal in the opening round of a 4-man tournament at Bellator 96 on June 19, 2013 and lost via knockout in the first round. Following the loss Petruzelli announced his retirement from MMA.^[12]

Championships and accomplishments

• Ultimate Fighting Championship
  • Fight of the Night (Two times)

• Ultimate Warrior Challenge
  • Ultimate Warrior Challenge
  • Knockout of the Night

Kickboxing record

Kickboxing record

0 wins (0 KOs), 3 losses, 0 draws Date Result Opponent Event Location Method Round Time Record 2012-09-08 Loss Xavier Vigney K-1 World Grand Prix 2012 in Los Angeles Los Angeles, California, USA TKO (right knee) 2 1:17 0-3 2004-05-30 Loss Aleksandr Pitchkounov Kyokushin vs K-1 2004 All Out Battle Tokyo, Japan TKO (corner stoppage) 2 2:18 0-2 2004-03-27 Loss Bob Sapp K-1 World Grand Prix 2004 in Saitama Saitama, Japan TKO (arm injury) 1 0:57 0-1 Legend:       Win       Loss       Draw/No contest       Notes

Mixed martial arts record

Personal life

He was born in Cape Coral, Florida.^[13] He and his wife Leslie have been married since 2006.^[3] The couple are currently going through a divorce.^{[14] [15]}

References

1. ↑ UFC Profile info
2. ↑ "Petruzelli Shocks Slice". Sherdog. Retrieved 2008-10-05. 
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 "Petruzelli in center of Elite XC storm". Yahoo. 
4. ↑ "Monsters in the Morning interview with Seth Petruzelli". WTKS-FM. October 6, 2008. 
5. ↑ Caplan, Seth (October 6, 2008). "Petruzelli disputes reports he received a bribe to keep Slice fight a standup affair". FiveOunceOfPain.com. 
6. ↑ Franklin McNeil. "ProElite exonerated of wrongdoing in Slice-Petruzelli fight". ESPN. 
7. ↑ "Ken Shamrock vs Seth Petruzelli set for IUF: 'The Return of Buluc' on March 6 in Cancun". mmamania.com. Retrieved 2010-01-04. 
8. ↑ "Seth Petruzelli rejoins UFC, meets Ricardo Romero on UFC 116 preliminary card". MMAjunkie. 
9. ↑ "Seth Petruzelli released by UFC". fiveouncesofpain.com. November 23, 2010. 
10. ↑ twitter.com/silverbackseth
11. ↑ http://www.mmaweekly.com/king-mo-lawal-slated-to-return-as-part-of-bellator-summer-series-tournament
12. ↑ "Seth Petruzelli announces retirement following KO loss at Bellator 96". MMAjunkie.com. Retrieved 2013-06-21. 
13. ↑ "Seth Petruzelli on FightResouce". FIGHTRESOURCE.com. 2008-10-05. Retrieved 2008-10-05. 
14. ↑ "ThatMMAGuy interviews Seth Petruzelli". THATGUYMMA.WORDPRESS.com. 2010-04-28. Retrieved 2010-06-20. 
15. ↑ "Seth Petruzelli Knocks outs former UFC Champ". TOPMMA-FIGHTERS.com. 2011-08-21. Retrieved 2011-08-21. 

External links

• Seth Petruzelli Official Bio
• http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1849444048
• http://www.facebook.com/pages/Silverback-Seth-Petruzelli/146795278672784
• http://www.twitter.com/silverbackseth
• Seth Petruzelli Interview
• Seth Petruzelli on UFC.com
• Professional MMA record for Seth Petruzelli from Sherdog