Bellator President Scott Coker may be facing potentially insurmountable odds in his battle with the UFC—but he’s not willing to go down without a fight. Coker is pulling out every promotional trick in the book, taking a page from the beloved Pride Fighting Championships wherever he can while also adding some interesting twists of his own.
Take, for example, Saturday’s Dynamite 1 show in San Jose, California—the second “tent pole” event of the Coker regime. It was familiar at times, with legendary Pride ring announcer Lenne Hardt belting out fighter names with an enthusiasm that bordered on comical and fireworks announcing to the world that this was no ordinary show.
But then there was the ring, sitting next to the cage, allowing Bellator to mix in some Glory Kickboxing bouts to go along with the mixed martial arts madness. At one point during the preliminaries, there were even two fights being contested at once.
It was innovative for certain. Whether it worked is a question that can’t be answered right away. The kickboxing bouts, unfortunately, failed to deliver. But that’s a failure of execution, not of concept. The idea may not be broken—it just needs a bit of fine-tuning and a better class of fighter.
At Dynamite 1, things went mostly to plan. Light heavyweight champion Liam McGeary went mainstream with a win over fading legend Tito Ortiz. Former UFC contender Phil Davis announced himself as McGeary’s next challenger by winning a one-night tournament in impressive fashion.
Of course, the entire show wasn’t perfection, even if the concept was. But what card is? In a new post-fight series, we’ll look at the card as a whole and choose the five best and worst moments—the handful of things worth talking about on Twitter afterward.
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