It all seemed a little strange, on the surface: Erik Perez is on one of the hottest streaks of his entire career, but he was about to walk away from the sport of mixed martial arts.
The native of Nuevo Leon, Mexico nicknamed “Goyito,” who is known equally for putting an exciting fights as he is for wearing lucha libre masks to his fights, scored a first-round finish of Andres Ayala on Nov. 18 in Monterrey, then announced he was going to retire.
Come again?
The bantamweight, who is now based out of San Diego’s Alliance MMA, has won five fights in a row, including his first two since jumping over from the UFC to Combate Americas, the sport’s premiere Latin American promotion.