Cage Warriors' Collin Reuter hopes to parlay Internet fame into MMA success

Collin Reuter (9-1-1) will walk to the cage for his next fight wearing a white t-shirt and a few patches on his shorts. Sponsors haven’t quite caught up to his online notoriety.

Reuter’s knockout of Gerald Fike at an event this past year made the Internet rounds not necessarily for what he did, which was land a crushing overhand right inside the fight’s first minute. It was for how Fike fell to the canvas, arched like an unconscious diver.

But while it didn’t buy him much in the way of extra cash, it did attract the attention of Cage Warrior talent scouts, who signed him to fight Jack Mason (23-11) at the promotion’s “Cage Warriors: Fight Night 8,” which takes place Saturday at Mirbeh Sports Hall in Al Fujairah, United Arab Emirates. The event’s main-card streams live on MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com).

For Reuter, that’s good enough for now. He told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio) that bigger-name opponents are hesitant to fight him. If that’s true, it’s likely because they’ve seen what he can do.

“It’s really an honor to be able to fight out of the country, where you can do it and have a job at the same time,” he said.

When he’s not striking a heavy bag, Reuter is helping his company strike gold. A fueler at a large-scale gold-mining operation, he works 12-hour days on a five-day on, five-day off schedule. Amazingly, he rarely sees the product they’re searching for.

“When you get hired, they take you up to security, and you get to hold a chunk of gold the size of a brick,” he said.

After work, he puts in a training session, then picks up the pace on his off-days.

“I fit fighting into my life right now, because my priority is my son,” he said.

But he’d undoubtedly like to make fighting his main focus. At 21, he traveled to Las Vegas to audition for “The Ultimate Fighter” and made it to the interview session. His personality apparently wasn’t as big as his fighting, so he went home disappointed.

He doesn’t plan on feeling that again when he returns to Alaska from the Middle East. He believes he can stop Mason anywhere the fight goes.

“I guess I made my name off my knockout, but I came up in jiu-jitsu,” Reuter said. “That’s always been my go-to. But obviously, I’ve got heavy hands.”

Hopefully one day, those will pay off. Maybe the next time “TUF” features guys his size.

“I can do 155 or 170,” he said. “I definitely have a lot more exposure.”

For the latest on Cage Warriors Fight Night 8, stay tuned to the MMA Rumors section of the site.

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