Alberto Blas sent a ripple effect through the bare-knuckle fighting community when he defected to rival organization BKB as BKFC’s then-bantamweight champion, with one of BKFC’s announcers offering up his thoughts on that unfolding of events.
As a recent guest on Bowks Talking Bouts, Sean Wheelock delved into several subjects, including what information he is privy to regarding Blas no longer being contracted to BKFC, considering the commentator is within the inner circle of the gloveless promotion. When getting into his thoughts on this Blas situation, Wheelock said,
“Alberto Blas had not fought for us for awhile and I wasn’t sure. One thing that I’ve learned being in this sport a long time is to stay in one’s proverbial lane. I don’t get involved in matchmaking. Now there have been numerous times when I’ve been called about ‘hey, you’re buddies with this guy, could you get him in?’ That’s how Joe Riggs got in BKFC… I’ve been asked my opinion. Do you think this guy is worth it? Do you think this woman would be good? What do you think of their style? But I’m not actively asking on matchmaking.”
“So I probably found out on the Franco Tenaglia-Tony Soto change maybe six hours before it was released publically. We have such a high volume of shows that I’m really living show to show and I’m looking at bout sheet to bout sheet. So I don’t know what the full fight card is coming up for our BKFC’s in August. I know the main fights. But I don’t know the full fight card because a lot of that could change. So I know there had been a lot of discussion with Alberto Blas. I don’t know anyone’s contract situation and if I did, it would be because the fighter would tell me.”
Sean Wheelock on the Alberto Blas BKFC-BKB situation continued
Delving into further details on the situation regarding how the 135-pound title became vacant for BKFC amid Blas’ exodus and directly continuing his thought from the quote above, Wheelock continued,
“It wouldn’t be because I would find out from BKFC. So it’s not that I can’t get this information, it’s that I don’t seek this information out. So Blas is no longer the champion, Tenaglia is no longer the champion… I think it’s just the nature of it. It’s not dissimilar to when I was in Bellator, we lost Vitaly Minakov. He walked away as he was the champion. Hector Lombard as the 185 champion went to the UFC. Ben Askren was released from his contract, and I think he played out his contract, and was able to walk with the 170 title and went to ONE Championship.
“So I don’t want to be a matchmaker [laughs] and I really try to stay out of that. We have a phenomenal matchmaking team at BKFC led by a guy named Nate Shook. There’s Andy Hall, there’s Kevin Smith. They deal with a lot of traumas and dramas on a daily, if not an hourly, basis in that job. So I stay clear of that. What I can tell you is Alberto Blas is a phenomenal fighter. All wins by first round finish. I got to know him as a person. I genuinely found him to be a really enjoyable person. Very candid, great in our fighter meetings, very respectful.”
“I can only judge people in this business by how they treat me and he treated me great. Just nothing but warm and respectful. My joke, Dylan, is if I picked my friends by who my other friends like in fighting, my only friend would be Chris Lytle because he’s the only guy I know who everybody likes. So you always hear good things, bad things, I stay out of all of that. Blas is a great fighter, he’s no longer our champion, we have a lot of depth at 135.”
