Former WWE Star Alberto Del Rio Signs With Ring Of Honor

Former WWE superstar Alberto Del Rio, now known as Alberto El Patron, posted a video on his official Facebook account today letting everyone know that he has signed with Ring of Honor.

Del Rio, who is the new AAA world heavyweight champion, was released from WWE over the summer after a physical altercation with a WWE employee. Del Rio subsequently took WWE to court, and got his non-compete clause thrown out, allowing him to work for any wrestling or MMA promotion he wanted to. The two major organizations that were mentioned in Del Rio’s non-compete clause were the UFC and TNA Impact wrestling.

There’s a chance that Alberto Del Rio could also be heading to Bellator MMA, as Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer has reported that Bellator has contacted Del Rio, and are interested in bringing him in.

Unlike CM Punk, if Del Rio chose to go into the world of MMA, it wouldn’t be met with much negativity, as Del Rio has 14 professional fights under his belt, and has a professional MMA record of 9-5. Del Rio’s last fight took place on February 27, 2010, where he lost by TKO in in the second round to Yamamoto Hanshi.

It looks like Del Rio’s deal with Ring of Honor isn’t going to be a long term one, as he’s only scheduled to work shows for ROH in the month of January, and one date in March. Del Rio’s Ring of Honor debut is set for January 3 in Nashville, Tennessee. Ring of Honor has only announced two other dates where Del Rio will be appearing, and they are January 30 in Dearborn, Michigan, and March 1 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Ring of Honor hasn’t named who Del Rio’s opponents will be. However, they are asking the fans on Twitter who Del Rio should face off against when he makes his ROH debut.

It was rumored that after it was apparent that top babyfaces Daniel Bryan and Roman Reigns were going to miss a significant amount of time, WWE offered Del Rio his job back as one of the company’s top good guys in place of Bryan and Reigns. However, Del Rio refused their job offer, and says he’s a lot more happy working elsewhere.

In a recent interview, Del Rio backed up CM Punk’s claim that working for WWE is a very creatively stifling, toxic environment, and it isn’t very much fun. It also appears that, like Punk, Del Rio has his heart set on never going back to WWE.

[Image via Ring of Honor]