Bellator preview: Season nine

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that's flimsier than a TUF door.

Bellator is back with hot tournament action! Plus there's title defenses and a pay-per-view to boot!

Featherweight

Title Fight

• Pat Curran vs Daniel Straus

Tournament

• Diego Nunes vs Patricio Freire
• Desmond Green vs Fabricio da Silva
• Shahbulat Shamhalaev vs Akop Stepanyan
• Andrew Fisher vs Joe Taimanglo

My picks: Nunes, Freire or Shamhalaev. It seems really weird that Nunes and Freire would be a quarterfinal fight, though.

Lightweight

Title Fight

• Michael Chandler vs Eddie Alvarez

Tournament

• Marcus Davis vs Alexander Sarnavskiy
• John Alessio vs Will Brooks
• Saad Awad vs Martin Stapleton
• Rich Clementi vs Rob Sinclair

Picks: Sarnavskiy and Brooks. Also, I thought Clementi retired after Marcin Held beat him. Weird.

Welterweight

Season 8 Tournament Finals

• Douglas Lima vs Ben Saunders

Tournament

• War Machine vs Vaughn Anderson
• Matthew Riddle vs Luis Melo Jr
• Brent Weedman vs Justin Baesman
• Mark Scanlon vs Herman Terrado

Thoughts: I don't really have a pick for this tournament since I don't know over half the guys included (Seriously, Herman Terrado is the cheap knockoff version of retired wrestler, Human Tornado, right?). I guess I'll go with Matt Riddle's favorite superhero, Weedman.

Middleweight

Title Fight

• Alexander Shlemenko vs Brett Cooper

Tournament

• Justin Torrey vs Andreas Spang
• Jeremy Kimball vs Perry Filkins
• Mikkel Parlo vs Brian Rogers
• Jason Butcher vs Giva Santana

Prediction: Rogers, possibly Spang.

Light Heavyweight

Interim Title Fight

• Emmanuel Newton vs Muhammed Lawal

Check out the breakdown of what's going on when after the jump.

Bellator Summer Series Preview

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that takes medical advice from Dan Quinn.

Bellator finally returns with its summer series, and I am so very happy. Four-man tournaments in Bantamweight, Light Heavyweight, and Heavyweight will take place, in addition to some title defenses.

Bantamweight Tournament

A tournament has been announced for the 135 pounders, but no participants have been officially named. Oh, Bellator, you crazy little goofball.

Light Heavyweight Tournament

The tournament with the most name recognition, as it features Muhammed "King Mo" Lawal, "Silverback" Seth Petruzelli (Known to some as the "Kimbo Killer") and apparent MMA legend, Renato "Babalu" Sobral. Also, whatever the hell a Jacob Noe is. I fully expect the winner of this tournament to beat Atilla Vegh.

Heavyweight Tournament

The heavyweight tournament is thin on big name talent, and it's uncertain on how good the fighers are. Vinicius Queiroz had his UFC run stopped before it started, getting submitted by Rob "It's Already Been" Broughton, while Richard Hale is partly known for getting the second inverted triangle in Bellator history and also for getting knocked out by the comparably tinier Christian M'Pumbu in the Season Four Light Heavyweight tournament finals/championship fight. Ron Sparks, like Queiroz, has a victory over Mark Holota, but he hasn't fought in two years and is 38. Vitaly Minakov is Russian, which is a boon in Bellator, but he's not Dagestani, which isn't as good. He's also undefeated, an accomplished sambist/judoka, and has gotten called "Fedor's Prototype", so he'll probably get upset in the first round in hilarious fashion.

Bellator 96

The entire first round of both the Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight tournaments begin, with Lawal vs Petruzelli, Noe vs Sobral, Queiroz vs Hale, and Sparks vs Minakov. Also, War Machine makes his Bellator debut (Unless he gets arrested again between now and Wednesday) against the totally real person called Blas Avena.

Bellator 97

This card is probably going to be super rad since it features a Welterweight title defense from "Funky" Ben Askren, taking on Andrey Koreshkov. Also slated is Michael Chandler making a Lightweight defense against David "Caveman" Rickels, and a Featherweight fight betwixt Patricio "Pitbull" Freire and Rob Emerson. I fully expect both champions to successfully retain, though I would love to see Rickels win the belt for his cromagnon people. Also, Douglas Lima and Ben Saunders will finally face each other in the Welterweight finals from Season Seven.

Bellator Season Eight Preview

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that's crazier than Charles Bennett.

Bellator Fighting Championships is all about tournaments.  It's how fighters earn title shots, which I really like.  The only thing required of a fighter is "win the tournament", no matter how impressively the wins come.

The following tournaments will be contested over the course of Bellator's eighth season (Possibly going past season 8 and into season 9)

Lightweight

• Champion - Michael Chandler
• Challengers - Rick Hawn, Marcin Held/Dave Jansen
• Tournament Favorites - Patricky Freire, Lloyd Woodard

Welterweight

• Champion - Ben Askren
• Challengers - Karl Amoussou, Andrey Koreshkov
• Tournament Favorites - Douglas Lima, Ben Saunders

Light Heavyweight

• Champion - Christian M'Pumbu
• Challenger - Attila Vegh
• Tournament Favorites - Seth Petruzelli, Muhammed Lawal

Check out the rest of the season 8 preview after the break.

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that's less intense than Gegard Mousasi.

Fights - A whole lot of fights went down, so let's not waste any time and get right into the action.

SFL 13 - Super Fight League crowned a bunch of champions on Friday as it was their last show of the year.

Khan vs Eidehlouei

Jamshed Khan defeated Rouhollah Eidehlouei due to retirement at the end of round two.

Check out a ton more fights, plus pure craziness after the jump!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s dirtier than Matt Lindland.

Fights - A whole lot of action when down this weekend, so let's get right into the punches!

SFL 12 - Super Fight League brought the awesome with a bunch of sloppy fighting that amused me to no end.

Babu vs Singh

Sharath Babu finished off Varinder Singh in just under four minutes by way of technical knock out due to punches.

For way more fights, check out the rest of This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff after the jump!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s dumber than letting Masakazu Imanari touch your foot.

 

 Fights - A whole lot of fights to cover, and some of them were half-decent!

Hardrock MMA 51 - The only reason I know about this event is because noted psychopath Junie Browning was making his return to MMA here.  It looks like it was pretty neat!

Goodal vs Bell

Ian Goodal submitted Eric Bell in round three with a rear naked choke.  It was a pretty good fight with a neat finish, but I think I love Ian's entrance music the best.

For a lot more fights (Seriously, a LOT more), and some news about fights, follow after the break!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s more erratic than Dominick Cruz.

Fights - There was a UFC PPV, Bellator, SFL (BOOM, POW, PUNCH, KICK, WOW!) and a random assortment of two people flailing their limbs at each other until one cannot take it any more (Wait, I already said Super Fight League).

TPF 15 - Tachi Palace Fights is a regional MMA organization that works as a half-decent feeder league to the UFC.

Clark vs Miranda

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

Dominick Clark knocked out Andy Miranda in just under two minutes in the first round.

Perez vs De Soto

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Alex Perez took just two seconds longer than Clark to knockout Carlos De Soto with punches.

Check out many much more fights after the jump!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s more of a joke than Kimbo Slice.

Fights - Hey, UFC fights are back, yay!  Plus Bellator and SFL (PUNCH KICK WOW) as always (Well, not always, Bellator's season ends in a month, and I don't know if SFL is going to literally run every week or not).

Bellator 80 - On this edition of Bellator Fighting Championships, the finals for the Heavyweight and Featherweight tournaments were set up, plus former champion and self-proclaimed "Baddest Man on the Planet", Joe Warren returned to see if he would get knocked out for the third fight in a row.

DeRocher vs. Krahl

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Ryan DeRocher punched Taylor Krahl, and now Taylor has to crawl everywhere he goes.  I am the worst.

Vedepo vs. Bernhard

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This is some crazy stuff.  Bernhard throws a kick and slips, so Vedepo dives into guard, and gets stuck in a triangle.  Vedepo jams his shin and knee all up in Bernhard's neck, and eventually postures up enough and the pressure causes Bernhard to tap out.

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

So, ladies and gentlemans, here is the Vedepo choke.  If works perfectly against dorks too dumb to let go of a crappy triangle to avoid getting themselves choked out.

Check out more Bellator, SFL, UFC and other fights, plus lots of news after the jump!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s spiraling downwards more than Drew Fickett.

Fights - In addition to the Bellator, Super Fight League (PUNCH KICK WOW) and random grab bag fights, there was also World Series of Fighting 1 going down on Saturday.  Hooray for new MMA organizations!

Bellator 79 - There were some vicious beatings doled out to people with ridiculous choices in personal grooming (So, pretty standard for a MMA event).

Minakov vs. Starcencov

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

Bellator has a ton of Russian fighters, and sometimes, they get matched up (Though Starcencov is technically Russian-Canadian).  Vitaly Minakov punched Vladimir Starcencov in the face for a while until Vladimir fell down.

Ford vs. Baker

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In the first of two "guy what looks dumb gets beaten up" fights, Ryan Ford punched the ridiculous out of Kyle Baker's mustache and bald head on the way to a unanimous decision victory.

Check out more from Bellator, SFL, WSoF, and much more after the jump!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s less predictable than Genki Sudo.

Fights - As always, fights happened, and I'm here to give a brief synopsis of the cool parts, and whatnot.

Bellator 78 - As usual, Bellator Fighting Championships had a good event on Friday that was kind of marred by some bad refereeing in the co-main and main event.

McNally Beats Blattman
 

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

Justin McNally made extremely short work of Dave Blattman, choking him into unconsciousness with a triangle in under 40 seconds.

Parlo Clips Combs's Beard

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

Mikkel Parlo finished off Jared Combs in just under four minutes with a TKO.

Check out more Bellator fights, Super Fight League (BOOM, POW, PUNCH, KICK, WOW!), some more randomly grabbed fights, plus some fight news, including Halloween costumes after the jump.

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s sadder than Jens Pulver.

Fights - There are no UFC events until November 10, so we'll have to make do with B-league and lower level fights.

Bellator 77 - Bellator Fighting Championships had the opening round of their new Lightweight tournament on Friday, and once again helped to provide evidence that Free MMA is Best MMA.  A small highlight video courtesy of Bellator FC can be viewed right here.

Brett Martinez vs. Eric Albright

Gif by https://twitter.com/ZProphet_MMA

 
Martinez and Albright traded submissions briefly before Martinez finished the fight with a guillotine.

Check out more Bellator and all sorts of other stuff after the jump.

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s emptier than Jason Guida’s gas tank.

Fights - A whole lot of fights from a lot of events to cover, let's jump right in with the biggest one of the This Week!

UFC 153 went down on Saturday, and it was one of the best events I've seen in quite some time.

Rony Bezerra vs. Sam Sicilia

"Honey Jason" took on Sam Sicilia on the prelims, and there was lots of fun punches.  Rony hit Sam with some good shots and finished things off with some ground and pound.

Check out more fights and some VERY INTERESTING NEWS after the jump!

These Weeks in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s less powerful than a Side Czech Kick.

 Sorry for the hiatus, I am a dumb, lazy jerk!  I'm going to try and recap as much of the stuff I missed from last week's nonexistent Dumb MMA Stuff, and also include the Dumb MMA Stuff that happened this week!  Let's get to it.

Fights - Oh, man, too many fights, all kinds of crazy, fun fights happened!

UFC on Fuel:  Struve vs. Miocic - UFC insists on airing fights on Fuel, a fake, made up channel that only six people on the planet get, and half of them are sasquatches.  The fights were good, though!

Robbie Peralta's a Busy Man

Peralta made very short work of Jason Young, finishing the fight in 23 seconds with a flurry of punches.  Man I love tinyweight fights.

Check out a bunch more fight recaps after the break!

This Week in Dumb MMA Stuff

Welcome to Leg Kick TKO, a MMA blog that’s as hard-hitting as Michael Bisping.

Fights – Bellator 73 was on Friday, and there were some interesting fights with good finishes (And a fight or two in non-Bellator promotions that weren’t bad, either).

Cosmo Alexandre defeated Harry Johnson (Seriously, dude’s parents?) with a knee to the body in the second round.  This fight is notable because Alexandre dropped Johnson with a punch to the body in the first that the referee thought was a low blow, giving Johnson a momentary reprieve.  Alexandre’s knee in the second was also initially thought to be low, but replay showed it hit Johnson in the guts.  As he moaned to death, Johnson was unable to continue, leading to the stoppage victory for Alexandre. 

Check out more fights and some news after the jump