Khonry Gracie is the son of legendary MMA fighter Royce Gracie, and he’s going back to following in his father’s footsteps as he makes his return to MMA at Bellator 293 on March 31st, 2023. He’s not exactly new to the game, as he has a 2-2 professional MMA record and all four of those fights have taken place in the Bellator cage. He’s not alone either as several members of the Gracie family have competed for Bellator over the years, including his father Royce at one point in time. Out of all of them, Neiman Gracie has managed to put together the most impressive Bellator record and he continues to compete at the top of the promotion’s welterweight division.
Khonry on the other hand lost his debut fight by decision to a fellow debutante back in 2018, but bounced back from that almost immediately by winning his next two fights in a row. At this point he had a few cancelled fights and ended up spending over a year out of action as a result, it was unfortunate but it’s also part of the life of a professional fighter. He kept trying for a successful matchup though and his luck changed at Bellator 252 when he was booked against Trevor Gudde. Khonry wasn’t able to build on his winning streak though and ended up losing that fight by knockout in the third round. Because of his performance in that fight and his mixed record overall, Khonry was actually cut by Bellator and was no longer contracted to fight for the promotion.
Now it seems as though the matchmakers at Bellator have changed their mind, because Khonry Gracie has been approached to compete against David Pacheco at Bellator 293 on March 31st, 2023. Their fight is very early on in the preliminary card, but there are several other talented grapplers competing on the main card too. Rustam Khabilov will be fighting against Jaleel Willis while Cat Zingano features in the co-main event against Leah McCourt. The main event after that is a heavyweight matchup between Marcelo Golm and Daniel James.
