The greatest heavyweight in mixed martial arts history, Fedor Emelianenko, appeared recently on Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour. UFC president Dana White has said that the best thing he ever did was start women’s divisions, and his biggest regret is not signing Fedor.

Now 40, Fedor fights Matt Mitrione on Saturday in the main event of Bellator 172 in San Jose, California. Emelianenko said he was close to signing with the UFC last year, but that he ultimately signed with Bellator due to a good relationship with Scott Coker from the Strikeforce days, and because Bellator signed a number of members of his team.

We had made great relations with Scott Coker, said Emelianenko said through an interpreter, as transcribed by Marc Raimondi for MMA Fighting. I received a very good offer from Bellator. In addition, Bellator invited my entire team. So all of the guys will be performing as well.

One of the main reasons was the ability for my team to perform, for my guys to perform. The other reasons were, we were not exactly on the same terms [with the UFC] as far as the financial conditions and some other things, some other smaller things as well.

Depending on the point of view, a lot of times you can be very close and sort of go around and around and never get to it. There were some things that were not satisfactory for UFC and there were some things that were not satisfactory for me and we never came to an agreement.

Fedor says he has a two-fight deal with Bellator, with a one-fight extension. He said he plans to close out his career in Bellator. His last fight was a highly controversial decision over Fabio Maldonado for Eurasia Fight Nights in June, in which Fedor overcame a near KO in the first round. He said he never thought about quitting though.

I did not think so at the moment, said Emelianenko. I do understand that there isn’t a whole lot of time that I have left and considering my age, of course. But no, I didn’t think it was time to end my career after the last fight. No, I didn’t have any thoughts like that.

Mitrione will be an incredibly tough fight, particularly considering it will be in a cage, which is a significantly different contest that the rings Fedor came up in. There is some chance that Saturday will be Fedor’s final fight.