During Friday night’s Bellator 149: Shamrock vs. Gracie 3 event, which aired live from the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas on Spike TV, Bellator MMA announced and began the promotion for the two main events scheduled for their event in San Jose, Califo…
During Friday night’s Bellator 149: Shamrock vs. Gracie 3 event, which aired live from the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas on Spike TV, Bellator MMA announced and began the promotion for the two main events scheduled for their event in San Jose, California in May.
In what was a fight that had already been made but was delayed, former top-ranked UFC Light Heavyweight contender “Mr. Wonderful” Phil Davis takes on longtime MMA veteran and exciting 205-pound contender, Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal in what was announced as the main event for the 5/14 show.
Joining Davis-Lawal as the co-main event for the show, which will air live and free on Spike TV, will be former UFC Lightweight contender Josh “The Punk” Thomson taking on former Bellator Lightweight Champion Michael Chandler.
Bellator: Davis vs. Lawal takes place from the SAP Center on Saturday, May 14, 2016, and will air live and free exclusively on Spike TV.
Describing the atmosphere of a Bellator weigh-in — especially one headlined by the freakiest freakshow fight this side of Kinnikuman vs. Bob Sapp — is a difficult thing to do on paper. The energy is not quite as high as at the typically UFC event (well, a pay-per-view, anyway) and the loudest bouts of applause from the half-filled floor seating generally are oft reserved for the bevy of local fighters competing on the evening’s undercard. There is a distinct lack of frills at a Bellator event, which makes sense given that the promotion is now run under the guidance of Scott “No Nonsense” Coker.
At yesterday afternoon’s Bellator 138: Unfinished Business weigh-ins, which took place at the Scottrade Center in downtown St. Louis, the atmosphere was similarly underwhelming for a card that features the likes of Patricky Pitbull, Daniel Straus, and Michael Chandler to name a few. It was the featherweight champion who made the biggest impact, however, both on and off the scale. After missing weight on his first try, Pitbull frustratingly addressed the media about being the co-main event to a couple of fighters he felt “sorry for” before openly admitting that he would NOT be watching their fight. Talk about a company man, amiright?
Describing the atmosphere of a Bellator weigh-in — especially one headlined by the freakiest freakshow fight this side of Kinnikuman vs. Bob Sapp – is a difficult thing to do on paper. The energy is not quite as high as at the typically UFC event (well, a pay-per-view, anyway) and the loudest bouts of applause from the half-filled floor seating generally are oft reserved for the bevy of local fighters competing on the evening’s undercard. There is a distinct lack of frills at a Bellator event, which makes sense given that the promotion is now run under the guidance of Scott “No Nonsense” Coker.
At yesterday afternoon’s Bellator 138: Unfinished Business weigh-ins, which took place at the Scottrade Center in downtown St. Louis, the atmosphere was similarly underwhelming for a card that features the likes of Patricky Pitbull, Daniel Straus, and Michael Chandler to name a few. It was the featherweight champion who made the biggest impact, however, both on and off the scale. After missing weight on his first try, Pitbull frustratingly addressed the media about being the co-main event to a couple of fighters he felt “sorry for” before openly admitting that he would NOT be watching their fight. Talk about a company man, amiright?
Patricky would make weight on his second try, which is more than you could say for undercard fighters Chris Heatherly and Matt Helm, who both showed up heavy for their respective fights with Garrett Gross and Rashard Lovelace.
But onto the reason why we’re all here: The main event. We’d been lucky enough to steal some timewith Ken Shamrock recently, who at 51-years-old appears to be in some of the best shape of his life (thanks to genetics and hard work, of course). On top of that, his recent interviews have painted him as a honest, humbled, and most importantly, reinvigorated man with a renewed passion to end his career on a high note. The “World’s Most Dangerous Spray Tan” he was rocking at yesterday’s weigh-ins, on the other hand…
Oooh boy.
As for Slice, well, what is there to say, really? The man showed up sporting a Dude Wipes sponsorship across his backside — which, if there has ever been a product that epitomizes this fight, it’s freaking Dude Wipes.
Other than that, it appears that Slice has developed a little bit of a paunch since we last saw him, but has not lost one bit of pep in that excellent beard. (I swear, I saw a small squirrel poking out of it at one point. A squirrel with a switchblade.)
All joking aside, this card is loaded with great fighters and should make for an action packed night of fights. Former champion Daniel Straus looks to get back on the road to another title fight as he takes on undefeated Bellator newcomer Henry Corrales. Patricio Pitbull defends his feather weight title against Daniel Weichel, and hometown fight Michael Chandler will square off with 15-4 Derek Campos. And finally, one lucky fan may get to take home the head of last minute replacement Dan Charles after Bobby Lastly knocks it into the 17th row.
A full video of the Bellator 138 weigh-ins is below along with a full list of results.
Main card (Spike at 9 p.m. ET)
Kimbo Slice (232) vs. Ken Shamrock (204.4)
Patricio Freire (144.9) vs. Daniel Weichel (144.5)
Bobby Lashley (239) vs. Dan Charles (228)
Daniel Straus (144.4) vs. Henry Corrales (144.9)
Michael Chandler (155.6) vs. Derek Campos (152.5)
Undercard
Miles McDonald (115.3) vs. Dan O’Connor (115.3)
Justin Lawrence (145.7) vs. Sean Wilson (145.8)
Eric Irvin (155.6) vs. Hugh Pulley (155.2)
Rashard Lovelace (160.6) vs. Matt Helm (164.8)
Kain Royer (184.6) vs. Enrique Watson (185.8)
A.J. Siscoe (135.5) vs. Garrett Mueller (135.6)
Adam Cella (170.3) vs. Kyle Kurtz (171)
Justin Guthrie (170.3) vs. Steven Mann (169.8)
Garrett Gross (155.2) vs. Chris Heatherly (160*)
Bellator 131, the first of Bellator’s BIG events under Scott Coker was pretty god damn awesome.
Look, we know you’re busy and just want the GIFs, so we won’t burden your minds by making you read a painstaking punch-by-punch recap.
BUT FIRST, Bellator debuted a wicked new entrance ramp. Look at King Mo and Jo Vedepo’s entrance:
Check out the GIFs (via Zombie Prophet) from Bellator 131 below, and the card’s full results are written at the bottom of the post:
(Photo via Getty)
Bellator 131, the first of Bellator’s BIG events under Scott Coker was pretty god damn awesome.
Look, we know you’re busy and just want the GIFs, so we won’t burden your minds by making you read a painstaking punch-by-punch recap.
BUT FIRST, Bellator debuted a wicked new entrance ramp. Look at King Mo and Jo Vedepo’s entrance:
Check out the GIFs (via Zombie Prophet) from Bellator 131 below, and the card’s full results are written at the bottom of the post:
King Mo smothered Joe Vedepo in the first two rounds while landing some intermittent ground and pound. He finally managed to put Vedepo away in the third round:
In the next fight, Mike Richman FUCKING DESTROYED Nam Phan. We’re not exaggerating. Richman straight up punching bagged him, landing unanswered combo after unanswered combo. Don’t believe us? Look at the GIF?
Melvin Manhoef vs. Joe Schilling was perhaps the fight of the year…or at least the bar room brawl-in-a-cage of the year. It was a true back-and-forth contest that saw both men hurt at times, but ultimately it was Schilling who prevailed and put Manhoef out COLD.
In the co-main event, Will Brooks scored a BIZARRE TKO finish over Michael Chandler, and in doing so defended his Bellator lightweight title. The fight was close going into the fourth round, but then Brooks landed a punch so hard it made Chandler literally forget he was in a fight. Chandler backed away and tried to wave off the fight, which proved to be a bad idea. Brooks blasted him multiple times, ending the match.
And finally, the main event bbetween Tito Ortiz and Stephan Bonnar. This fight wasn’t particularly good, but it could’ve been WAY worse. Ortiz won a split decision by smothering Bonnar and also bruising and cutting up his face with some of the slowest punches we have ever seen. Like the only thing slower than Ortiz’s punches were Bonnar’s attempts at evading them. Ugly stuff. Even better (or worse), both fighters continued their feud after the bell. Ortiz flipped off Bonnar and threw his water at him. Bonnar told Ortiz to eat a turd burger (ugh). Here are some GIF highlights from the fight:
The complete results:
Main Card
Tito Ortiz def. Stephan Bonnar via split decision (30-27, 28-29, 30-27)
Will Brooks def. Michael Chandler via TKO (punches), Round 4, 3:48
Joe Schilling def. Melvin Manhoef via knockout (punches), Round 2, 0:32
Mike Richman def. Nam Phan via knockout (punches), Round 1, 0:46
Muhammed Lawal def. Joe Vedepo via TKO (punches), Round 3, 0:39
Preliminary Card
Joao Faria def. Ian Butler via submission (arm-triangle choke), Round 3, 1:58
A.J. Matthews def. Kyle Bolt via knockout (punches), Round 1, 1:39
Jonathan Santa Maria def. Ron Henderson via split decision (28-29, 29-28, 30-27)
Andy Murad def. Bubba Pugh via split decision (28-29, 29-28, 29-28)
Nick Garcia def. Matthew Ramirez via submission (guillotine choke), Round 2, 0:56
Jordan Bailey def. Alex Higley via submission (rear-naked choke), Round 1, 3:27
Rolando Perez vs. Mark Vorgeas ruled split draw (29-27 Vorgeas, 26-30, 28-28)
Despite the UFC’s legal team being among CagePotato’s most avid readers, we can’t convince them to give us any insights into the UFC’s PPV business. We can only judge a card’s interest by the PPV estimates that circulate a few weeks after an event has passed.
There’s another way to judge fans’ interest in a particular fight card though: Web traffic.
In between discussions about which IFL team was the best (I’m a huge Quad City Silverbacks fan), we at CagePotato headquarters started opining about how Bellator 120: Rampage vs. King Mo would compare to a low-level UFC PPV. Some of us said it’d bury an event like UFC 173: Barao vs. Dillashaw in terms of traffic, some of us said it would get buried.
Now that fight week(end) is over, we can jump into AnalyticsPotato mode and see which fight card wowed the web more. And to be clear, I’m using unique page views as the primary metric to judge interest. And by “coverage” we mean articles before/during/after the card that are about the card. Seems obvious but it’s important to be clear.
Earlier in the week, we reported on the CagePotato twitter that Bellator 120 received about 34% more traffic, but that calculation was made in error. There were a couple of articles in our UFC 173 coverage that I forgot to include in the tally. However, even with these pieces added, Bellator 120 still wins out. Bellator 120’s coverage, on the whole, received 11% more traffic than UFC 173’s.
Despite the UFC’s legal team being among CagePotato’s most avid readers, we can’t convince them to give us any insights into the UFC’s PPV business. We can only judge a card’s interest by the PPV estimates that circulate a few weeks after an event has passed.
There’s another way to judge fans’ interest in a particular fight card though: Web traffic.
In between discussions about which IFL team was the best (I’m a huge Quad City Silverbacks fan), we at CagePotato headquarters started opining about how Bellator 120: Rampage vs. King Mo would compare to a low-level UFC PPV. Some of us said it’d bury an event like UFC 173: Barao vs. Dillashaw in terms of traffic, some of us said it would get buried.
Now that fight week(end) is over, we can jump into AnalyticsPotato mode and see which fight card wowed the web more. And to be clear, I’m using unique page views as the primary metric to judge interest. And by “coverage” we mean articles before/during/after the card that are about the card. Seems obvious but it’s important to be clear.
Earlier in the week, we reported on the CagePotato twitter that Bellator 120 received about 34% more traffic, but that calculation was made in error. There were a couple of articles in our UFC 173 coverage that I forgot to include in the tally. However, even with these pieces added, Bellator 120 still wins out. Bellator 120′s coverage, on the whole, received 11% more traffic than UFC 173′s.
Other random insights:
The time spent on page, an important and overlooked metric, was “virtually identical” for both Bellator 120 and UFC 173. Referral sources, too, were identical, with much of the traffic coming from search (Google) and social (Facebook and a bit from Twitter). This isn’t terribly surprising.
What does all of this mean, then?
At a glance, people are probably saying “The best Bellator has to offer only barely edges out a lower-level UFC card!” And that’s fair to an extent. But it’s worth noting that before the card, most of our UFC 173-related content wasn’t doing too well. There was very little hype around the event. Fans had a “how dare the UFC charge us for this crap” attitude about it. Even the live-blog was sub-par during the event. Once it was updated to reflect the huge upset that was TJ Dillashaw defeating Renan Barao, however, traffic on it exploded. The massive upset could’ve definitely helped UFC 173.
Alas, web traffic means little in terms of PPV buys. It’s highly likely that many people who read our post-fight Bellator coverage wanted to see if the event was a train wreck without having to pay for it. Furthermore, we’re just one website. A sample size of one isn’t much to go on. When asked on Twitter, some sites reported that their Bellator 120 traffic was far below expectations.
So, to get a clearer picture, we ran a Google trends comparison:
Interestingly, the search term “Bellator 120″ peaked the day after the PPV, indicating our theory above about most of the traffic coming from people who didn’t watch the PPV. And UFC 173′s peak was slightly higher than Bellator 120′s.
If anything is to be taken from this, it’s that Bellator is capable of generating at least as much Internet-interest (even if it derives from schadenfreude) from the fans as the UFC. Whether that’ll hold true for their future PPV outings is impossible to tell.
Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney didn’t give out the gate numbers at the post-fight presser, even when asked (which probably means they were bad). And it’s still too early to know how Bellator 120 performed at the box office. So, financially, Bellator’s first PPV can’t definitively be called a success or a failure.
Regarding entertainment value, however, Bellator 120 was a success. There were some pacing issues, yes, but overall the card delivered.
In the first fight, Michael Page did his best Anderson Silva impression, knocking out Ricky Rainey (who’s name was hilariously spelled wrong at the post-fight presser) after taunting him mercilessly. In the next bout, former Bellator heavyweight champ Alexander Volkov scored an upset submission win over Blagoi Ivanov.
Then came Tito Ortiz vs. Alexander Shlemenko. Ortiz was the laughing stock of this card, without a doubt. He was a relic from a bygone era who hadn’t won a fight in three years. His ridiculous pre-fight promos (he promised to make Shlemenko “literally shit himself”) only made him look worse. Shlemenko, on the other hand, was Bellator’s middleweight champ and a stern Russian killer. He’d have no problem with Ortiz despite the considerable size difference, or so the world thought. But Ortiz won the fight. He submitted Shlemenko with an arm-triangle choke in the very first round. Then he gave the worst post-fight interview of all time; he pretended to be Hulk Hogan.
As crazy as Ortiz-Shlemenko was, it wasn’t the emotional high point of the PPV, nor was Michael Chandler vs. Will Brooks. Chandler-Brooks was not a particularly anticipated match. In fact, the entire Bellator PPV was centered around the rubber match between Chandler and Eddie Alvarez. When Alvarez withdrew due to a concussion, many thought it meant death for Bellator 120. Will Brooks was thrown in against Chandler, but it was a squash match—or at least that’s what conventional wisdom held. But Brooks upended fans and pundits, beating Chandler via split decision. He was made of sterner stuff than we all gave him credit for.
Then we had the main event, Rampage Jackson vs. King Mo. The fight itself was banal. Mo dominated Rampage with wrestling while Rampage landed a couple of decent shots throughout the fight. It seemed like a pretty easy decision win for King Mo, but the judges didn’t see it that way; they awarded Rampage with a unanimous decision. What happened after the fight was the real draw though. King Mo and Rampage started jaw-jacking. During the Spike TV portion of the broadcast, King Mo accused Bjorn Rebney of “dick riding” Rampage. He didn’t hold in such feelings in his post-fight speech, nor did he silence himself at the post-fight presser. Him and Rampage yelled at each other while the presser stream intermittently died possibly due to the sheer volume of viewers.
So what’s the fallout?
(Because Getty had no images from last night. / Photo via Getty)
Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney didn’t give out the gate numbers at the post-fight presser, even when asked (which probably means they were bad). And it’s still too early to know how Bellator 120 performed at the box office. So, financially, Bellator’s first PPV can’t definitively be called a success or a failure.
Regarding entertainment value, however, Bellator 120 was a success. There were some pacing issues, yes, but overall the card delivered.
In the first fight, Michael Page did his best Anderson Silva impression, knocking out Ricky Rainey (who’s name was hilariously spelled wrong at the post-fight presser) after taunting him mercilessly. In the next bout, former Bellator heavyweight champ Alexander Volkov scored an upset submission win over Blagoi Ivanov.
Then came Tito Ortiz vs. Alexander Shlemenko. Ortiz was the laughing stock of this card, without a doubt. He was a relic from a bygone era who hadn’t won a fight in three years. His ridiculous pre-fight promos (he promised to make Shlemenko “literally shit himself”) only made him look worse. Shlemenko, on the other hand, was Bellator’s middleweight champ and a stern Russian killer. He’d have no problem with Ortiz despite the considerable size difference, or so the world thought. But Ortiz won the fight. He submitted Shlemenko with an arm-triangle choke in the very first round. Then he gave the worst post-fight interview of all time; he pretended to be Hulk Hogan.
As crazy as Ortiz-Shlemenko was, it wasn’t the emotional high point of the PPV, nor was Michael Chandler vs. Will Brooks. Chandler-Brooks was not a particularly anticipated match. In fact, the entire Bellator PPV was centered around the rubber match between Chandler and Eddie Alvarez. When Alvarez withdrew due to a concussion, many thought it meant death for Bellator 120. Will Brooks was thrown in against Chandler, but it was a squash match—or at least that’s what conventional wisdom held. But Brooks upended fans and pundits, beating Chandler via split decision. He was made of sterner stuff than we all gave him credit for.
Then we had the main event, Rampage Jackson vs. King Mo. The fight itself was banal. Mo dominated Rampage with wrestling while Rampage landed a couple of decent shots throughout the fight. It seemed like a pretty easy decision win for King Mo, but the judges didn’t see it that way; they awarded Rampage with a unanimous decision. What happened after the fight was the real draw though. King Mo and Rampage started jaw-jacking. During the Spike TV portion of the broadcast, King Mo accused Bjorn Rebney of “dick riding” Rampage. He didn’t hold in such feelings in his post-fight speech, nor did he silence himself at the post-fight presser. Him and Rampage yelled at each other while the presser stream intermittently died possibly due to the sheer volume of viewers.
So what’s the fallout?
It’s tough to parse this one out, Potato Nation.
Michael Page looked great, which is obviously a good thing for Bellator. And there’s not much to say about Ivanov vs. Volkov. It was a good fight. Volkov will get a title shot at Vitaly Minakov, and Ivanov will likely get placed into another heavyweight tournament sometime soon.
Ortiz-Shlemenko is tough to pass judgement on. Bellator obviously has more invested in Ortiz, so him winning his first fight under their banner is a positive thing. Now he can be featured in other fight cards. How much Ortiz’s presence will increase viewership remains to be seen. Still, it’s better than him losing, which would’ve damaged whatever remaining value his name had beyond repair. However, no good can come from your middleweight champion losing to an ancient UFC washout and has been—and looking like a total scrub while doing it.
At first, it seemed like Will Brooks defeating Michael Chandler destroyed the Bellator lightweight division. But apparently Eddie Alvarez can demand to fight Chandler anyway, meaning Brooks’ victory didn’t wreck the much-anticipated rubber match between Alvarez and Chandler. Brooks beating Chandler helps get him over as a legitimate talent. Brooks winning, while maybe not optimal, isn’t the disaster people made it out to be.
Last night’s crown jewel was Rampage vs. King Mo, and not because of what happened in the cage. It was all about the post-fight hysterics. The questionable decision and (now seemingly legitimate) beef between the two makes a rematch enticing from a promotional standpoint, something that couldn’t have been said if either man decisively finished the other.
The PPV could’ve gone much worse. Could it have been better? Maybe. There have been worse UFC PPVs that we paid more money for. Bellator 120 didn’t go bad enough to destroy Bellator, but it certainly didn’t go good enough to bring the Viacom-owned promotion to new heights of excellence. If nothing else, Bellator 120 was a perfect example of the inherent insanity that makes MMA special.