- LobsterMobster
- Oct 29, 2009
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"I was being quiet and trying to be a good boy but he dialed the right combination to open the throw-down vault and it was on."
"Walter Foxx is ten times brighter than your bulb at the bottom of the tree merry xmas"
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Bellator prelims should be starting in about 30 minutes
 B League Preview
Bellator 292 - Friday, March 10
Main Card - 10 PM ET, ShowTime
Lightweight Title and Grand Prix Quarterfinal - Usman Nurmagomedov vs “Smooth” Benson Henderson
Usman is 16-0 with 8 TKO and 5 submission wins. He’s 5-0 in Bellator, most recently capturing the belt over Patricky Pitbull by an extremely wide margin in November.
Henderson is 30-11, with 3 TKO and 11 submission wins. He’s the former interim and unified WEC Lightweight champion, and the former UFC Lightweight champion, tied with the most successful consecutive defenses at three. However, those days are a decade old at this point.
Well, well, well. What do we have here? Looks like another Dagestani sambo practitioner up and won himself a world lightweight title. Seems to happen quite often. Seems a little convenient, don’t you think? Anyway, Usman should win this, he’s younger, more athletic, and has shown to be very good. However, remember to never count out Bendo’s ability to win a contentious split decision!
Lightweight Grand Prix Quarterfinal - Tofiq Musayev vs Alexander “Peresvet” Shabily
Musayev is 20-4, with 16 TKO and 2 submission wins. He went 5-1 in Rizin, winning the Lightweight Grand Prix, but falling short in a bid for the inaugural Lightweight title. He is now 1-0 in Bellator, knocking out Sidney Outlaw in 27 seconds last July.
Shabily is 22-3, which isn’t too Shabily at all. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m trying to remove it. He has notched 11 wins by TKO and 7 by submission. He’s currently riding a 7-fight win streak, including his last 3 in Bellator, most recently putting away Brent Primus in the second round last June.
Of the former Bellator champs they’ve beaten, I think Shabily’s win over Primus is more impressive than Musayev’s over Patricky Pitbull.
Heavyweight - Valentin Moldavsky vs Linton “The Swarm” Vassell
Moldavsky is 11-2, with 1 TKO and 3 submission wins. He went 3-1 in Rizin, losing in the semi-finals of the Heavyweight Grand Prix in 2016. He is 6-1 in Bellator, his lone blemish coming in his attempt to unify his interim Heavyweight Title with Ryan Bader’s regular belt. His most recent bout was a No Contest after he poked Steve Mowry in the eye just under one minute into the bout.
Vassell is 23-8, with 9 TKO and 9 submission wins. He is 11-5 in Bellator, twice failing to capture the Light Heavyweight title, once against Emanuel Newton, once against Ryan Bader. Vassell is currently on a 4-fight win streak, with three TKO stoppages.
This is a rematch from 2019 that saw Moldavsky take a 29-27 decision. Who has improved more? Moldavsky has beat up Javy Ayala, Roy Nelson, and Tim Johnson, then lost to Ryan Bader. Vassell has bested Sergei Kharitonov, Ronny Markes, Tyrell Fortune, and also Tim Johnson. Fortune is probably either man’s best win since their original meeting, which isn’t saying a lot.
Welterweight - Michael “Venom” Page vs Goiti Yamauchi
Page is 20-2, boasting 11 KO and 4 submission wins. He is 16-2 in Bellator, most recently losing a split decision for the interim Welterweight title last May.
Yamauchi is 28-5 with 3 TKO and 21 submission wins. He’s 14-4 in Bellator, currently on a 3-fight win streak, including knocking out Neiman Gracie last August.
It’s one thing to knock out a Gracie, they are bad at all non-grappling aspects of MMA, but Page is an adept counter striker. Yamauchi will need to engage his grappling if he’s going to win, and I really hope he wins.
Prelim Card - 7 PM ET, YouTube
Bantamweight - Erik “Goyito” Perez vs Enrique “El Fuerte” Barzola
Perez is 20-8, with 5 TKO and 8 submission wins. He had a very solid 7-2 UFC record, defeating the likes of uh, Ken Stone, Byron Bloodworth, and Taylor Lapilus. He’s currently 1-2 in Bellator, having gotten back to the win column with a decision over Blaine Shutt in 2021. He’s pulled out of a pair of fights since then, so let’s hope he makes it to the Circlegon this time.
Barzola is 18-7 with 5 TKO and 4 submission wins. He went 5-0 in Peru’s Inka FC, competing on such cards as Inka FC 25: No to Racism, and Inka FC 26: Jon Jones en Lima (Pretty sure Jones prefers Bogota). He won TUF: Latin America 2, and went 6-3 in UFC proper. He’s 2-2 in Bellator, defeating Darrion Caldwell as his most impressive win, but has dropped his last two bouts.
Like ships passing in the night, these two UFC alums never met in the world famous Octagon, with Barzola joining the roster in late 2015 and Perez out the door by the end of 2016. They will finally do battle where all great warriors yearn to compete, Bellator’s Circlegon!
Bantamweight - “Gentleman” Josh Hill vs “The Mean Green Fighting Machine” Cass Bell
Hill is 21-5 with 5 TKO and 4 sub wins. He went 1-1 on TUF 18, losing to Mike Wooten (More like Mike Who-ten). He went 2-2 in WSoF, dropping a pair of fights to Marlon Moraes. He is 3-2 in Bellator, losing his most recent bout to Marcos Breno in August.
Bell is 6-2 with 1 TKO and 3 submission wins., with all of his pro fights taking place in Bellator. He bounced back from a pair of losses to take a split decision over Jared Scoggins at the end of 2022.
In a rare turn of events, Hill is the younger, yet far more experienced fighter, as Bell didn’t turn pro until he was 31. Both guys are in their mid-30s, so hooray for aging Bantamweights.
Lightweight - Islam Mamedov vs Shamil “The Chechen Wolf” Nikaev
Mamedov is 22-2, with 4 TKO and 10 submission wins. He went 4-0 in WSoF and PFL, but he had to pull out of the 2018 tournament between the quarter-final and semi-final rounds, which were on the same night, and went to a Majority Draw in the 2019 quarter-finals, losing out on moving to the next round after the arcane oracles determined his opponent, Loik “Jaguar Paw” Radzhabov was a lot cooler. Mamedov is 2-1 in Bellator, beating Brent Primus, but dropping a split decision to Benson Henderson (See, Usman, see how easy it can happen?). He’s currently on a 2-fight win streak, stopping off in Eagle FC to briefly destroy Zach Zane inside of two minutes before heading back to Bellator to decision Nick Browne in October.
Before I go into the record regurgitation, I have to admit this: When I first looked at Nikaev’s profile page, I misread his nickname as “The Chicken Wolf”. I don’t want any confusion that I possess even a shred of knowledge, I am fully, powerfully dumb. Anyway, he is 10-0, with a single, lone, sad submission win to his name. Nikaev is 1-0 in Bellator, but that was in 2020, and he has not fought since then.
Nikaev’s best win is probably Alexander “Tiger” Sarnavskiy, but that was about 5 years past the height of his power in Bellator. Mamedov’s got a win over former champ Brent Primus, but it was a split decision, and you can’t make me rewatch that fight to see how it actually played out. Heck off.
Fight appears to have been cancelled.
Middleweight - Khalid Murtazaliev vs Tony Johnson
Murtazaliev is 16-3, boasting 13 TKO wins. He went 1-0 in UFC, beating CB Dolloway into a second round retirement, then he failed a pair of drug tests, got suspended for two years and was released. Khalid is 2-1 in Bellator, most recently winning by ground and pound in October.
Johnson is 9-3 with 5 TKO wins. He went 0-1 in Strikeforce, losing by first round submission in 2008 on a card that was headlined by Bobby Southworth losing the Light Heavyweight title to Babalu Sobral. He notched a win on the Contender Series in 2019, but it was by decision, so clearly he’s worthless. He’s 2-1 in Bellator, having lost his most recent fight in 2021.
Johnson’s got some big gaps in his resume. He had five fights between 2007 - 2008, didn’t fight again until 2011, just once. Then he returned in 2013, again, for a single bout, then came back again in 2017. He had a decent run of four fights from 2017 to 2019, but then that Covid thing happened in 2020.
Light Heavyweight - Julius Anglickas vs Dovletdzhan Yagshimuradov
Anglickas is 10-3, with 3 TKO and 4 submission wins. He’s 3-2 in Bellator, having dropped his last two bouts to Vadim Nemkov and Phil Davis.
Yagshimuradov is 19-7, with 12 TKO and 4 submission wins. He went 9-4 in Oplot (Oplot Never Die, except when it is brought to The Hague for its war crimes tribunal). He’s 1-2 in Bellator, having dropped his first two bouts in the company, but bouncing back with a second round TKO over Rafael Carvalho.
The enduring memory of Anglickas that has been seared into my brain is Vadim Nemkov beating the poo poo out of him but being unable to get a finish for nearly 20 minutes before securing a submission late in round four. Sorry, Julius.
Bantamweight - Bobby “The Humble Warrior” Seronio III vs Alberto Garcia
Seronio III is fittingly, 3-0, with all of those fights having had taken place in Bellator. In those, he won the middle bout by stoppage, getting a second round KO.
Garcia is 2-0, winning his pro debut by retirement after the first round, but it was oddly a three-minute round.
Both guys have beat Miguel Peimbert. This is the only place to get hard hitting information about the Bellator prelims!
Featherweight - Laird Anderson vs Rogelio Luna
Anderson is 3-0, all three bouts taking place in Bellator. He has back to back finishes, a first round rear naked choke in April, and a second round crucifix TKO in November.
Luna is 1-0, having defeated Socrates Hernandez last April.
Anderson has fought some dudes with experience, which is more than can be said for Luna.
Heavyweight - Wladmir “Blanka” Gouvea vs Sean “The Apache Assassin” Tucker
Gouvea is 1-0, notching a second round TKO win in Bellator in November.
Tucker is 1-3. He is 0-1 in Bellator, having lost by second round TKO back in 2016. He’s on a one-fight win streak, but that fight was in 2019.
Looks like Tucker was brought in to lose.
Middleweight - Theo Haig vs Adam Wamsley
Haig is 1-0, securing a first round rear naked choke in Bellator last April.
Wamsley is 2-2, winning his first two bouts, but dropping his most recent pair of fights.. However, he has not fought since April 2021.
Time for Haig to beat up his promotionally appointed canman.
Welterweight - Dupree Stewart vs Demetri Georgiades
Stewart is making his pro debut, having gone 5-0 as an amateur.
Georgiades is also making his professional debut, though he went 2-2 on the unpaid circuit.
Two little baby fights just trying to crawl their way towards competency.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Go5Zl79cXo
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Mar 11, 2023 00:56
