Raul Rosas Jr. Details How Late Teammate Trevor Cooper Helped Him Grow

Raul Rosas Jr. recently reflected on his relationship with late coach and teammate, Trevor Cooper.

Rosas Jr. (9-1) picked up a second-round submission of Ricky Turcios at UFC on ESPN 57 on June 8. “El Nino Problema” dedicated the win to Cooper, who passed away in April.

Cooper was Rosas Jr.’s teammate at 10th Planet Jiu Jitsu in Las Vegas when the Mexican suffered his lone career loss against Christian Rodriguez at UFC 287 in April 2023. According to Rosas Jr., it was Cooper who contributed the most in identifying his mistakes from that loss and correcting them. Rosas Jr., who has earned 6 of his 9 career wins via submission, fondly admits that Cooper could submit him 10 times within a couple of minutes. Cooper, who also believed in Rosas Jr., had predicted an easy outing for the Mexican against Turcios, unlike the rest of their gym. Rosas Jr., 19, said on The MMA Hour:

“He meant a lot to me, he was like my brother, like my coach,” Rosas Jr. said on the MMA Hour. “He believed in me a lot. He is the one that helped me the most to correct when I lost to Christian Rodriguez. He wasn’t in my corner but he saw the fight. And then he started training me and he corrected every single mistake, every single detail, even mistakes that I didn’t realize, he realized. And that’s how he made me [a] much better fighter. He could tap me 10 times in like two minutes. Everybody just knew he was freak in jiu-jitsu; he was so smart. And then he passed away. Even when he was alive and I got the fight against Rickly Turcios and everybody here was saying that it was going to be a tough fight, war and this and that. And he was like, ‘Oh it’s another easy fight like the Terence Mitchell fight.’”

Cooper once made headlines by choking out a man nearly twice his size right outside 10th Planet Jiu Jitsu. Cooper was found dead this past April at a townhome in Henderson, Nevada, after a days’ long standoff with law enforcement. Police had initially tried to serve Cooper a warrant on charges of kidnapping, battery and administering drugs. The jiu-jitsu specialist opened fire on a SWAT team who returned fire but nobody was injured. The police entered the house after nearly a two-day barricade, to find Cooper dead due to a drug overdose.