As Bellator makes its move to a new home and new night of the week with two newly announced cards, it has also given itself a new name.
Formerly Bellator Fighting Championships, the Chicago-based promotion which has been positioning itself as the No. 2 behind the UFC, is now simply Bellator MMA, just in time for the official announcement of its new broadcast home Spike TV, starting in 2013.
It is now set to make its debut on the cable channel on Thursday, Jan. 17 with Bellator 85 at the Bren Events Center in Irvine, Calif., and the event will feature two championship bouts.
In the main event, lightweight champion Michael Chandler will defend his belt against Olympic judoka Rick Hawn, while featherweight champion Pat Curran will put his title on the line vs. knockout artist Patricio (Pitbull) Freire.
The event will also feature the Bellator debut of MMA veteran Renato (Babalu) Sobral, who will fight in the quarterfinals of the light-heavyweight tournament against Russian submission ace Mikhail Zayats.
The following week, Bellator 86 will take place at the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Okla., and be headlined by the welterweight title fight between champion Ben Askren and Karl Amoussou.
Also, former Strikeforce light-heavyweight belt-holder Muhammed (King Mo) Lawal, who wrestled at Oklahoma State, will battle Przemyslaw Mysiala in a tournament quarter-final bout.
NOTES: The Season 7 featherweight tournament final between Rad Martinez and Shahbulat Shamhalaev has been postponed again. Originally scheduled for last week’s Bellator 83, it was bumped to this Friday’s Bellator 84 when Shamhalaev was hit with food poisoning. Unfortunately, according to MMAweekly.com, Martinez is unable to compete this week due to family commitments. It will instead air at a yet-to-be-determined date in 2013 …
Bellator’s first fan-voted fight has also been put on hold. The organization allowed fans to determine one of the matchups for its upcoming welterweight tournament by choosing among Paul Daley, Ben Saunders, Douglas Lima and War Machine. The public voted for Paul Daley to face War Machine (born Jon Koppenhaver) for what was supposed to be the first fight on the Season 8 debut on Jan. 17. Unfortunately, War Machine suffered an injury that has him sidelined 4-6 months. However, Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney said the fans’ choice will be honoured and they will meet once he returns.
