Golden Glory-Holland fighter Siyar “The Killer” Bahadurzada (18-4-1) originally from Afghanistan, where he grew up until he was fifteen years old, has done pretty well for himself this past year.  He successfully defended his Shooto world title in Brazil for the second time making him the 3 time reigning LHW Shooto World Champion and he recently defeated Derrick Noble in the United Glory tournament in Holland, a fight for which he lost some 37lbs in a very short amount of time to drop down to welterweight.  

Despite the success of last year there has been something missing.  Another highlight of early on the year was Strikeforce offering Bahadurzada a four fight deal back in April 2010.  However, despite the initial excitement and buzz in the MMA media no fight offer has materialized for the fighter for some 10 months.  As the year dragged on questions from fans and supporters, as well as, from the fighter himself, about when the Strikeforce fight will finally happen have gone unanswered.

However, yesterday Bahaduzada announced on his twitter account that he has some big news coming up.  What was suspected to be good news about a fight finally being set up, turned out to be a quite disappointing revelation that the fighter had just found out about that morning.  Turns out that Strikeforce had actually never signed the contract that he as well as Golden Glory management had been promised.  You can see the frustration and anger this news caused for the fighter, after finding out that close to a year of waiting had passed by with no result.  Considering Bahadurzada is 26 at the moment, this was a prime year of his career that may have been lost in waiting for answers that never came.

This is quite surprising given Bahadurzada’s mentioned successes and the fact that he is a Golden Glory product, training on a regular basis with the likes of Alistair and Valentijn Overeem, Gokhan “The Rebel” Saki and other notables at Golden Glory who have all preformed great in the past year as well.  MMAValor was able to catch up with Bahadurzada and get him to talk about what has happened to him and find out more about this matter.

MMAValor: Initially did Golden Glory go to Strikeforce to secure the contract or did Strikeforce seek out Golden Glory management to have you fight for them?

SB: It was a deal made with Strikeforce with Alistair [Overeem], Marloes [Coenen] and me.

MMAValor: Who wrote up the contract, Strikeforce or Golden Glory?

SB: Strikeforce.

MMAValor: To your knowledge did Golden Glory management have any problems with anything in the contract?

SB: No.

MMAValor: Did you yourself have any problems with anything in the contract?

SB: No.

MMAValor: Do you know of any attempts at all by Strikeforce trying to contact you or Golden Glory management prior to today about problems with your contract?

SB: No.

MMAValor: While waiting, did you yourself or Golden Glory management try to contact Strikeforce to find out what was happening?  What was the response you received?

SB: Yep, we mailed them 1000’s of times and called them all the time.  These people will just not say anything about a date for a fight.  Absolutely nothing!

MMAValor: Was the contract sent to Golden Glory?  Did they make any corrections to your knowledge prior to signing it and ask Strikeforce to accept those changes?

SB: I signed the contract after Golden Glory agreed with Strikeforce.

MMAValor: What is the reason that Strikeforce is giving for not signing your contract, from your understanding?

SB: Because of the money that they have offered.  I mean they offered us that money. We accepted and now they are complaining about the money? It makes no sense!

But how can Golden Glory management not have been aware that the contract was not actually signed by Strikeforce?  How could it have gone unnoticed for so long?
Further conversation again revealed that Strikeforce appears to have been quite unresponsive and maybe even deceiving to the fighter and his management.  Siyar claims that Golden Glory has had to deal with the promotion’s unresponsiveness and ambiguity for close to a year and a half.  Initially the promotion had asked to sign the three fighters Alistair Overeem, Marloes Coenen and Siyar Bahadurzada.  However, Bahadurzada’s contract was delayed for six months.  Trying to talk to the promotion was not working: “We tried to talk to them but they would postpone everything to “soon”.
In addition, the fighter would not get a response from Strikeforce on the issue of his US Visa needed to be secured for him by the promotion in order to fight on US soil: “They were like yeah we are going to get busy with Siyar’s visa to the US tomorrow, a month later still nothing, 3 months later still nothing, 6 months later still nothing.”

And while waiting what can a fighter miss out on?   Wins do not go unnoticed by other organizations.

MMAValor: You actually have had a successful 2010 with your Shooto title defense and a win at the United Glory tourney over Derrick Noble.  Did any other organizations try to contact you while you were waiting on Strikeforce?  What was your response?

SB: Yes, Bellator offered me a pretty good contract which we turned down, because of the Strikeforce contract, and Maximum Fighting Championship (MFC) which is a  Canadian organization, where  I could have gotten the chance to  fight Thales Leites.

MMAValor: Alistair Overeem and Marloes Coenen both fought for Strikeforce this year and did very well.  Did they receive their contracts prior to yours or about the same time?

SB: They signed earlier than I did, but Strikeforce had promised to sign 3 Golden Glory fighters –  Alistair, Marloes and me.

MMAValor: Why you then, why is there a problem with you and not them?

SB: You will need to ask that of Scott Coker.

Has Siyar given up on fighting in the US?  No!  Asked about whether he still wants to fight in the US this is his answer: “I would love to fight in the  US.  I have a huge community there who supports me and I would love to fight for the US MMA fans.  They want to see KO’s.  I’ll give them what they want and I will take “fighting with passion” to a whole new level.”

After nearly a year lost, continuous frustration and much disappointment Bahaduzada is not giving up.  He is still keeping focused with a positive outlook on what the future can hold.

MMAValor: How do you see your future now?  Where will you go from here?

SB: I see my future bright.  I have come so far from nothing that I had in Afghanistan. There is nothing you can’t achieve if you put effort into it.  I’ll keep fighting hard and KO people and when I have made a big name in US, hopefully UFC would ask me to fight there.  Because nobody can deny talent.  If you fight hard and entertain, the fans would want to see you fight more, and pay to come watch you.  I thank God I am an exciting fighter.  My record on Sherdog doesn’t lie!  Check it out!  One day Strikeforce will regret this.  I will make them regret this.  Trust me!  I am determined and I will make things happen!

MMAValor: On your twitter account you have challenged Strikeforce to set up a fight with either  Nick Diaz or Evangelista “Cyborg” Santos based on the outcome of their fight on January 29th claiming that you would do the fight for free and would give up MMA if you do not KO the Strikeforce WW champion.   Some people may think that it is a very bad move to put your career on the line for one fight, and unpaid on top.  Please explain?

SB: Let me put this black and white for you. Once I have said something, I’ll back it up!  In this case it’s with my MMA career.  But I wouldn’t give a rats f**k if it was with my life!  I honor my words like a real man, anytime anywhere! Unlike Strikeforce!

Thank you to Siyar Bahadurzada for taking the time out to talk to mmavalor.com.  You can follow Siyar on twitter at twitter.com/siyarthekiller and you can follow us as well at twitter.com/mmavalor.