Joe Schilling Signs New Contract With Bellator MMA

Joe Schilling has signed a new MMA contract with Bellator. Schilling confirmed the news to MMAjunkie in a new interview, revealing that it is a multi-fight deal. Highlights from the interview are below:

On his improvement during his three-year hiatus: “I would (expletive) kill me back then. I’ve spent maybe five camps with Donald Cerrone now and been involved in a lot of MMA camps since then. I just did my first jiu-jitsu tournament a few weeks ago, and that went well. Mickey Gall just moved out here, I’ve been working with him a lot. Yves Edwards is coaching me. Even Matt Brown. I’ve been getting more well rounded.”

On taking his career more seriously now: “The biggest thing was just the mental decision that I’m going to do MMA. Before it was like, ‘Oh, I’m just going to do MMA when I can’t get kickboxing fights.’ It was just a side-hustle thing. Now it’s just what it is. It’s full-on MMA from now on. I think for a long time when I had my foot on both I was still relying and focusing on kickboxing and not really going all in on MMA. I’ve been training MMA consistently for the past year now, and it worked out.”

On what weight class he may fight in: “I’m still at 185, but there’s a lot of interesting matchups at welterweight. I’m willing to go up in weight; I’m willing to go down in weight. I could make 170 with the right matchup and the right motivation. For Wanderlei (Silva) or ‘Rampage’ (Jackson) I would go up to heavyweight. I want to be part of big fights. I’ve been in the big fights in kickboxing, but a big fight in kickboxing is not even comparable to a mid-level MMA fight as far as exposure and financial gain. I want to be part of big fights and big, exciting matchups. I’m not really sure what they’re going to do. I think I have to get some fights in there and show people this is a different Joe Schilling than the last one three years ago. Paul Daley would be (expletive) fireworks. It would be a (expletive) war. Some big fights and some stylistically good matchups.”