Bellator sues 'betrayed' Eddie Alvarez, fight future in limbo pending lawsuit

When Eddie Alvarez fulfilled the final fight on his Bellator contract last October, he did so in impressive fashion by disposing of Patricky Freire in the very first round via knockout.

The performance only raised the lightweight's stock further, making him a very hot commodity Bellator clearly wanted to retain and one Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) obviously wanted on its roster.

UFC president Dana White knew obtaining the talents of the former 155-pound champion wouldn't be easy. As a matter of fact, the brash head honcho of the world's leading mixed martial arts (MMA) organization hinted just last week that it would get downright "ugly."

Apparently, White was on to something.

After Zuffa finally made an official contract offer to "The Silent Assassin," Bellator proceeded to match it, leaving the next move up to Lorenzo Fertitta and White, which has yet to be made. In the midst of it all, Eddie himself has remained rather quiet, choosing to lay low and let things play themselves out.

Until now.

Appearing on today's (Jan. 7, 2013) episode of "The MMA Hour," Alvarez revealed negotiations with Bellator took a turn for the worse and the promotion he's called home for the last three years is now suing him after Team Alvarez felt the offer from Bellator was far from a match compared to the one received from the UFC.

His words:

"Everyone heard that Bellator has matched and what not. It's such a difficult situation. We went to settlement maybe a a couple of days ago. We had a settlement meeting where we were supposed to settle our differences and everything was supposed to get worked out . Long story short, I was sued thirty minutes after our settlement agreement was over. There was some tension in the air and I'm trying not to get too frustrated in the meantime of what's going on."

As far as Bellator matching the contract made by the UFC, Alvarez says the offer was not even close to being equal:

"No we don't believe it was matched at all. I want to give details to you guys, but I'm not allowed because were in the middle of a pending lawsuit, I guess. All I can say is, like I said on twitter the other day. If I wanted to go to dinner with one guy, and another guy asked me to dinner. And the intentions of guy number one were to take me to fine dining restaurant to eat lobster and the intentions of the second guy is to take me to McDonald's, then guy number two just believes that dinner is dinner. And dinner isn't dinner. There is a huge difference when talking about MacDonald's and fine dining. The two we don't believe are comparable.

When I signed with Bellator four years ago, I read everything. I'm a man of my word and I'm willing to fulfill every obligation and I did that. I held my end of the bargain, fought every fight they wanted me to fight and the truth is, it's not a match. A match, in my book, a match is if I was to fight for one promotion and got paid ten dollars, then the other promotion would pay me ten dollars. That's not what's going on here. They're going to the media saying it's a match, not even close. The terms are not the same, not even, no, not the same. I don't know what the strategy is here. To us, it's plain and simple. If this goes before anybody, they are going to see pretty much that it is not a match. I'm disappointed. I gave a lot of my life to Bellator, to this promotion, and I've let them know how I feel and I don't get much back in return."

Alvarez also revealed he "liked" the UFC deal and declared it "was a much better deal" than Bellator's and also revealed he isn't quite sure on what grounds Bellator was suing him for. As much as he wanted to reveal details to all the happenings of his current battle, "The Silent Assassin" just couldn't, for legal reasons.

He did mention this isn't the first time Bellator has threatened to sue him, just the first they actually followed through.

Following his appearance on The MMA Hour, Alvarez opened himself up for questions via his twitter account, mentioning how he feels "betrayed" by Bjorn Rebney when asked about the situation.

See Rebney's response right here.

Unfortunately for Eddie, it seems the road back to action will be prolonged a bit further as his fighting future now lies in the hands of the court system.