Bellator’s Joe Schilling is ready to put kickboxing behind him for good ahead of Bellator 210 bout with Will Morris.

Joe Schilling is considered to be one of the best modern-day kickboxers in the game, so when he transitioned into MMA in XXX many thought he’d tear through the competition. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case and Schilling fell to a 2-5 record while bouncing between MMA bouts and kickboxing fights. Now Schilling is ready to put kickboxing in the past and focus on MMA entirely in hopes of having success in the cage.

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“I think [kickboxing] is pretty much put to bed,” Schilling told FanSided. “Maybe if there was some cool fight that came along or some interesting match-up somewhere and they wanted me to do it, I’d do it, but for the most part, I am just focused on MMA right now. I had a hard time balancing the two. I was an MMA fighter one month and a kickboxer another month. I think in my own head I was focusing on being a kickboxer, I never really took MMA that seriously. I was on a four-fight win streak with kickboxing and now I haven’t fought in a year and in that year I have really been focusing on MMA. There is no kickboxing to fall back on and rely on so I really have to make this work now.”

It’s been more than three years since Schilling has entered the cage and more than four since he’s had his hand raised in MMA, but he assured us that he’s a new fighter now and won’t be the same Schilling we saw previously.

“I definitely think I’m a different fighter now after all these years,” he said. “I feel like I reached a ceiling with kickboxing. There weren’t any new fans to be gotten or new titles to be won or money to be made so I want to keep progressing, I’m a hungry fighter and I have goals and aspirations and I want to keep progressing towards something. MMA is a lot higher of a ceiling for all of those things. So here we are.”

Schilling has been focused on elements of the fight game that aren’t used in kickboxing in order to excel at MMA.

“I’ve been working a lot of my wrestling,” he said. “I’ve been working on my jiu-jitsu, I’ve been doing some jiu-jitsu tournaments and I have been a part of a lot of MMA camps. I was training partners with Mickey Gall for his last fight and Donald Cerrone for his last fight. So I’ve been working on my ground game and just overall MMA.”

Schilling will face a last-minute replacement in Will Morris on Friday, Nov. 30, but he isn’t worried about a new face in front of him.

“They say he’s pretty well-rounded,” Schilling said. “He’s pretty aggressive with his striking, he seems like a pretty aggressive guy. The fights I saw ended in the first round. It should be an exciting first round.I’m just focusing on me performing like I’m supposed to, I can’t really worry too much about the opponent.”

Schilling vs. Morris will take place on Fri., Nov. 30, 2018, live from WinStar World Casino and Resort in Thackerville, Oklahoma and will air on DAZN at 7 p.m. ET.