Tachi Palace Hall of Fame welcomes Joe Soto, Alex Perez, and Michael McDonald
Photo Courtesy of Jacob Jeff
The Tachi Palace Hall of
Fame inducted three more fighters to the hall of fame on Friday, July 27th 2024. The Ceremony took place prior to the undercard of Urijah Faber’s A1
Combat 23, from the Tachi Palace Casino Resort. This Tachi Palace Hall of Fame
Class included Porterville’s Joe Soto, Lemoore’s Alex Perez and Modesto’s Michael
McDonald.
Hosted by the Tachi
Palace’s own Jacob Jeff, who welcomed in the new class of hall of famers. That
not only left their mark in Central Valley MMA scene, but never forgot where
they started when they did move on to bigger things.
Photo Courtesy of Jacob Jeff
For Modesto’s Michael “May
Day” McDonald, people in the Central Valley MMA scene knew or heard of his name
before he made his MMA debut at the Tachi Palace. McDonald trained with the
Last Stand Fight Team led by Professor Tom Theofanopoulos. McDonald and the
team would make the trip to compete down the road in Porterville before making his
debut in Lemoore at Palace Fighting Championship 12 in 2009. McDonald would go 4-1
at the Tachi Palace, even winning the title for the newly branded Tachi Palace
Fights in 2010. McDonald would go on to go 6-3 in the UFC and compete for their
interim bantamweight title before finishing his career with Bellator in 2018.
Congratulations to Michael “Mayday” McDonald.
Photo Courtesy of Jacob Jeff
Lemoore’s Alex Perez helped
establish the Tachi Palace Fights to become known as a powerhouse in regional
MMA. Perez fought thirteen times at the Tachi Palace and won the TPF Flyweight
title in 2015. Perez would make his way to the UFC in 2017 and has fought for
the UFC Flyweight title in his time there. Perez is still competing in the UFC and
is currently the No #7 ranked flyweight in the UFC. Congratulations to Alex “The
Decision” Perez.
Photo Courtesy of Jacob Jeff
Porterville’s “One Bad
Mofo” Joe Soto is an MMA a legend. Soto started his MMA career in Lemoore with the
Palace Fighting Championship at PFC 9 in 2008. Following a few wins locally, a
new promotion calling themselves Bellator MMA invited Soto to compete in their inaugural
featherweight tournament. Soto won the whole thing, becoming the promotion’s first
ever champion. Soto would return to the Tachi Palace in 2009 to help launch Tachi
Palace Fights. Soto would compete five more times at Tachi before getting the
call up to the UFC. Where he stepped in on short notice and nearly shocked the
world, by almost taking the UFC Bantamweight title in his UFC debut. Soto retired
from the sport In 2018, Congratulations to Joe “One Bad Mofo” Soto.
The Tachi Palace Hall of Fame
can be seen in its entirety below.
No comments:
Post a Comment