Bellator News

BJPENN.COM News - September 24, 2015

Former UFC fighter and TUF alum, Kendall Grove, now fights for Bellator MMA and will go against Joey Beltran this Friday at Bellator 143. Ahead of that fight Grove talked about the hottest topic in MMA, the controversial five year suspension handed to Nick Diaz by the Nevada State Athletic Commission.

BJPENN.COM News - September 24, 2015

Former Bellator bantamweight champion Joe Warren lost his title to Marcus Galvao in March, when he verbally tapped to a knee bar in the second round. Now he’s set to return to action this weekend against L.C. Davis in the main event of Bellator 143. Ahead of that scrap Warren talked to MMAFighting and said that he was obviously upset after the loss to Galvao, but he got over it, got back in the gym and says the desire to reclaim his title is still there.

BJPENN.COM News - September 24, 2015

Fedor Emelianenko was in the house at this past Saturday’s Bellator ‘Dynamite’ event in San Jose, California and apparently took photos with everyone in the arena. I mean, it’s not everyday you run into an MMA legend like Fedor, so of course you’re going to ask to take a picture. One of the photos making its way around the web is of Fedor standing next to Cris Cyborg’s pole dancing instructor.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

Former UFC lightweight and Strikeforce champion Josh Thomson made his promotional debut for Bellator MMA this past Saturday in front of his home crowd. It was a winning effort and afterwards Thomson had nothing but great things to say about his new boss and new promotion, which he considers to be like a family, something that was missing from the UFC.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

This past weekend, at Bellator ‘Dynamite’, fans who tuned in were treated to fireworks, Crazy Pride lady, kickboxing and MMA. We also saw a one-night light heavyweight tournament, featuring four of the promotions best 205’ers. Former UFC fighter Phil Davis ended up winning the whole thing and will now face the champ, Liam McGeary, next.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

Bellator MMA welterweight Paul Daley fought in the GLORY kickboxing ring this past Saturday at ‘Dynamite.’ He took on Fernando Gomez, who put up a tough fight but ultimately lost to Daley via unanimous decision. Daley is already in line for a shot at Bellator’s welterweight title but recently said he’d be more than willing to challenge for the GLORY belt as well, if the promotions let him.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

This past Saturday we finally got to see what Bellator’s ‘Dynamite’ event would actually look like. There were a lot of questions leading into the cross promoted event, featuring both MMA fights in a cage and GLORY kickboxing matches in a ring. The night also featured an old school one-night tournament in which former UFC fighter Phil Davis ended up winning. In the night’s main event champ Liam McGeary took on MMA vet Tito Ortiz. Ortiz seemed to have control of the fight, taking Liam down and working from top position, but eventually got trapped in an inverted triangle and tapped out.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

So there’s some good news and some not so good news when it comes to Bellator’s ‘Dynamite’ event this past Saturday. The event, which featured GLORY kickboxing and MMA action also had a four-man, one-night light heavyweight tournament, debuts of Josh Thomson and Phil Davis, and a main event between champ Liam McGeary and Tito Ortiz.

BJPENN.COM News - September 23, 2015

At this past Saturday’s Bellator ‘Dynamite’ event the light heavyweight champion Liam McGeary successfully defended his belt, submitting MMA vet Tito Ortiz with an inverted triangle. The fight started out with Ortiz getting an early takedown and it looked like it was going to be a classic Tito fight, full of ground and pound and top control. However, McGeary had different plans.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

Bellator added another big fight to their already stacked Bellator 145: Vengeance event. The show will take place on November 6, at the Scottrade Center in Saint Louis. On Tuesday the promotion announced that a lightweight rematch between Michael Chandler and David Rickels will take place on the main card of the big event. In the main event we’ll see a title fight between featherweight champion Patricio Freire and Daniel Straus. The lightweight title fight will also be on the line when the champ Will Brooks takes on Marcin Held in the co-main.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

This past Saturday the combat sports world watched as kickboxing and MMA collided at Bellator ‘Dynamite.’ On the MMA side of things we were treated to an old school one-night tournament featuring the best light heavyweights the promotion had to offer. In the opening fights, Phil Davis took out former champ Emanuel Newton and ‘King Mo’ defeated Linton Vassell.

BJPENN.COM News - September 22, 2015

Bellator’s ‘King Mo’ Lawal was scheduled to fight in the ‘Dynamite’ light heavyweight tournament final this past Saturday, against Phil Davis. That didn’t happen. Mo won his first fight, defeating Linton Vassell, to advance to the final where he would fight for the chance to be the next title challenger. Unfortunately during that first fight he injured a rib and between fights determined that he wouldn’t be able to fight later that night. So, the alternate Francis Carmont stepped in and lost to Davis via TKO.

BJPENN.COM News - September 21, 2015

World Series of Fighting and Bellator both ran major events this weekend and two Renzo Gracie fighters brought some gold back to the gym with them! Liam Mcgeary stepped into the Bellator cage on Saturday evening to defend his light heavyweight championship against the legendary Tito Ortiz. Ortiz was looking to secure gold for the first time since his dominant run in the octagon with the UFC and was well on his way of doing that when he blasted the champion with shots on the ground. Ortiz left himself susceptible to strikes when the tried to implement his ground and pound gameplan and walked into an inverted triangle choke! The jiu-jitsu paid off for Mcgeary as it put another “W” in his record.

BJPENN.COM News - September 20, 2015

Fedor Emelianenko dropped a bombshell on the mixed martial arts community at “DYNAMITE” on Saturday evening when it was announced he would NOT be fighting for either Bellator or the Ultimate Fighting Championship. Instead, “The Last Emperor” will be squaring off in the main-event of brand new Japan based MMA promotion! The card is set to take place on New Year’s Eve and will mark Fedor’s first fight in Japan since 2011.

BJPENN.COM News - September 20, 2015

When Reebok and Ultimate Fighting Championship signed an exclusive in-octagon sponsorship deal, fighters were reluctant to celebrate. Fighters like Urijah Faber would be forbidden from promoting his clothing line, Torque, in the octagon like he used to in earlier UFC and WEC days. Miesha Tate and Brendan Schaub sponsorship income would decrease by at least 80% due to the inability to rock external sponsorships in the octagon. UFC lightweight Josh Thomson was one of the first fighters to make the choice not to re-sign with the UFC and jump ship to Bellator, following Phil Davis. On Saturday night, “The Real Punk” informed MMA Fighting that three sponsors alone paid him more than $35,000 for his fight on Saturday at Bellator’s “DYNAMITE” event!

BJPENN.COM News - September 20, 2015

Tito Ortiz is one of the most decorated fighters to step inside a cage, whether it be the UFC’s octagon or Bellator’s cage. He started his professional fighting career in 1997 and is still receiving opportunities at championship gold in 2015— and it’s not just because of his star-power. Ortiz was riding a two fight win streak at the time he signed the dotted line to challenge Liam Mcgeary at “DYNAMITE” on Saturday night and was undefeated in the Viacom owned promotion. With big wins over Alexander Shlemenko and Stephan Bonnar, Ortiz seemed like a viable opponent for Mcgeary. Mcgeary did a fantastic job at catching the former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion off guard with a reverse triangle submission however, and picked up a quick first round win.

BJPENN.COM News - September 20, 2015

In April 2015, Phil Davis made the biggest decision of his career when he jumped ship from the Ultimate Fighting Championship to Bellator. Davis surely made an impact on his first fight with his new company as he won two fights in one night to become the next Bellator Light Heavyweight Championship challenger! Davis didn’t even need five minutes to dispose of former champion Emanuel Newton on Saturday night at “DYNAMITE”. Newton landed some good shots on Davis, but “Mr. Wonderful” locked on a kimura that there was no escape from. “King Mo” won the semi-final bout on the opposite end of the bracket but injury kept him from competing for the right to fight for another championship.

BJPENN.COM News - September 20, 2015

The final of the Bellator ‘Dynamite’ light heavyweight tournament wasn’t really what we were expecting, with ‘King Mo’ getting injured and unable to compete. However we still got an exciting match up between Phil Davis and alternate Francis Carmont. The fight started and they each stayed patient and went through a feeling out process. Then out of nowhere Davis connected with a big punch that dropped Carmont.