Dalton Rosta Bashes ‘Scared’ Romero Cotton, Expresses Gratitude for New Opponent at Bellator 273

After spending some time with fellow American Top Team fighters in All Elite Wrestling, Dalton Rosta is ready to get back in the Bellator MMA cage and proceed with his mixed martial arts career. Dalton Rosta (5-0 Bellator) was supposed to collide with Romero Cotton on the upcoming Bellator 273 card. A few days before the fight, Cotton withdrew from the clash for undisclosed reasons. The California-based promotion had to find a new opponent for “Hercules,” who will now face short-notice replacement Duane Johnson. While Rosta expressed much gratitude to Bellator for keeping his fight on the card, he had some fiery words for Cotton.

“I wasn’t surprised, I had a feeling it was going to happen,” the 26-year-old Pennsylvanian told Sherdog. “I was hoping that they could find me a replacement opponent, and they did. That was the one thing that scared me a little bit because so many people bought tickets and stuff to get in my fight: plane tickets, event tickets, hotels, everything. To have to cancel the fight completely, it would have been very discouraging. I’m just glad that they got me a new opponent.”

Rosta feels he knows the reason his proposed matchup with Cotton has fallen through multiple times, and no longer holds out hope of that fight ever happening.

“Personally, I think he’s scared. I don’t think he wants to fight, I think he’s trying to protect his record. We were supposed to fight two other times, he pulled out both times, and this was the third time. I just don’t think he wants to fight.

Rosta also discussed his latest days of camp, his professional wrestling experience, shared his pick for the Bellator 273 main event, and more.

Timestamps:

(00:00) Intro
(01:02) Discussing his weight cut
(01:39) Comments on Cotton pulling out of their fight
(03:00) Switching strategy midway through the camp
(03:42) His pro-wrestling experience in AEW
(05:34) His pick for the main event between Ryan Bader and Valentin Moldavsky
(06:00) Outro

Tudor Leonte started writing about mixed martial arts in 2013 for Italian media outlets. His journey with Sherdog began in 2018 and he now covers One Championship and countless European shows. You can follow him on Twitter @MrTudorLeonte.