Former UFC and Bellator lightweight champion, Eddie Alvarez, has officially signed with ONE Championship. Founder / CEO Chatri Sityodtong broke the widely-anticipated news with a Facebook post on Tuesday morning.
“Please join me in welcoming Eddie Alvarez to ONE Championship! Eddie is not only one of the greatest lightweights in history, but he is the only athlete ever to win world titles in both UFC and Bellator,” he said. “His goal is to become the only person to win all three major world titles in the largest global promotions in history.”
Alvarez, who holds a professional record of 29-6 (1 NC), is currently ranked No. 4 in the UFC lightweight rankings and boasts wins over the likes of Shinya Aoki, Rafael Dos Anjos, Michael Chandler, Anthony Pettis, and Gilbert Melendez, just to name a few.
Alvarez is currently 1-1 against Aoki, who has been promised a lightweight title shot at the ONE Championship event on March 31st in Tokyo, Japan. “The Underground King” was submitted by “Tobikan Judan” in a 2008 fight for the WAMMA belt, but then stopped Aoki in the Bellator cage during their 2012 rematch.
A trilogy fight with Aoki seems like an obvious matchup for the 34 year-old slugger although it remains to be seen whether Alvarez will continue to compete at lightweight, given that ONE Championship has a policy which limits the amount in which fighters are allowed to dehydrate themselves.