MMA Fighter Wrestles Monster Alligator Outside Florida Elementary School: 'I Felt Like Batman'

Jul 22, 2023

Having an enormous, 10-foot alligator casually hanging out by an elementary school is not going to fly for pretty obvious reasons. So when this exact scenario recently occurred in, where else, Florida, a local MMA fighter took matters into his own hands.

Mike Dragich, a Marine Corps veteran who goes by the colorful nickname Blue Collar Brawler on social media, is also a licensed gator trapper. In other words, the man knew what he was doing when he wrangled the giant creature.

"I see how big the alligator was, and I was like, it's showtime," Dragich later told FOX 35 Orlando. "We just had to get the job done."

And as you can see in video that he posted to his Instagram account, below, the gator did not go down without a fight. After first attempting to drag it by its tail, Dragich eventually deployed a catch pole to tame the beast. But even then, the gator fought back with a couple of "death rolls," which a common name for the spinning maneuver alligators use to subdue and dismember their prey.

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"I felt like Batman, for real," Dragich recalled. "If you don't get these animals tired, they will hurt you, if not kill you."

When asked what he thinks of people who say he's crazy for tangling with alligators the way he does, the 33-year-old gave a reasoned response: "I am Florida man, that's what I have to say to that."

Jokes aside, Dragich wants to use his notoriety to promote his non-profit organization, Project Savior Outdoors, which connects veterans to the great outdoors to fight PTSD and deaths by suicide.

Related: Florida Man Loses Arm to Gator While Attempting to Pee Behind a Bar

"My heart goes to our veterans dealing with PTSD and the issue of veteran suicide," Dragich added. "It puts eyes on me, and I want to use that opportunity to get these veterans the help that they need."

Interestingly enough, this is not the first time this very specific type of story has gone viral. In August 2022, a retired MMA fighter, Mike Trinh of Missouri City, Texas, apprehended a gator in his driveway that was preventing his daughter from going to her first day of middle school. Trinh was able to wrangle the gator into the back of his truck, and released it into a nearby pond—which hopefully was nowhere near a school.