Dana White denied today that money had anything to do with the situation with Conor McGregor and UFC 200, but also admitted that the McGregor vs. Nate Diaz fight could still be saved and said he believed McGregor would fight for the UFC again within the next year.
White appeared this afternoon on the Colin Cowherd show on FS 1 and said, “It’s not a money issue. That’s false. That’s the problem with the Internet. Never ever was this about money. Conor makes a lot of money and he’s very happy with the money he makes.”
He said McGregor has never come back after agreeing to a deal and looked for more money.
White claimed the entire issue is that McGregor refused to come to Las Vegas this weekend for promotional purposes. White said they were going to shoot the television commercial and have press conferences in three cities, starting in Las Vegas, and then he’d be able to return to Iceland and train for the fight, noting it’s not like they were asking him three weeks before the fight to break camp.
White claimed that in a conversation with McGregor’s manager, he was asked to move this to May and White said that they were spending $10 million promoting the show and the money is in motion.
“It never got combative,” said White. “I was talking to his manager. They were asking, `Let’s move all this to May.’ You can’t move it. This stuff is in motion.”
“I’m not mad, even a little bit,” said White to Cowherd, who said that White didn’t appear to be mad yesterday when they were together. “You were with me yesterday, did I seem mad? It’s UFC 200. It’s a massive fight. Believe me, when Conor went out, ten other people called asking to come in.”
“Obviously Conor made a decision and made a choice to not want to fight on this card. And that’s how he gets paid. That’s on him. The show will go on.”
White said that McGregor does have to clear up the retirement talk, noting that if McGregor says he’s retired, then the UFC 200 fight with Jose Aldo vs. Frankie Edgar would be for the featherweight title and not, as it stands right now, the interim title.
A cryptic tweet out of nowhere by Conor McGregor has shaken up the MMA world.
McGregor earlier today wrote:
“I have decided to retire young.
Thanks for the cheese.
Catch ya’s later.”
There was nothing more said, no doubt by design.
With Ronda Rousey out of action, McGregor is the key draw for UFC business going into its planned biggest week in history in July when he was the headline UFC 200 against Nate Diaz.
McGregor has been unavailable to media and UFC has not said anything.
Whether this is a negotiating ploy, a legitimate retirement or just his own practical joke that will be explained that he’s always said he doesn’t want to fight a long time is unknown.
McGregor is a big spender, and he was likely to get his biggest paycheck to date for UFC 200. He had talked in the last year about a number of different business plans for the next few years but all of them involved building his name up bigger and continuing to fight.
There will no doubt be more on this as the day progresses.
Going against the NBA playoffs and with a taped show, Raw last night broke a new record for the least watched episode on its regular night outside of football season with 3.32 million viewers.
The show fell victim to a big third hour drop which led to it falling below the previous low mark set on 2/1 at 3.37 million viewers.
Dancing with the Stars, featuring UFC’s Paige VanZant, also had a big drop to 10.95 million viewers.
There were a number of shows during football season last year, as well as the 1/11 show against the college football championship game, that did lower numbers than Raw.
Raw was still the second highest rated show on cable, beating the NBA game on TBS that went head-to-head and did 3.21 million viewers, but falling behind the Warriors-Rockets late game that did 4.42 million viewers.
Keep in mind that the actual viewers of both games would be significantly higher if you included the local market broadcasts of each game.
The seasonal pattern of people tuning in late that comes after Daylight Savings time was in effect, but the pattern that the third hour doesn’t drop as much during that season was not. The first two hours were in the same range as last week, so the record low was entirely due to the big third hour drop.
The three hours were:
8 p.m. 3.49 million viewers 9 p.m. 3.54 million viewers 10 p.m. 2.98 million viewers
Whatever going on right now in Hulk Hogan’s lawsuit against Gawker clearly goes way beyond the courtroom. Media manipulation, while not new to the case, seems to be more prominent in recent weeks, or at least more obvious. By and large, the lines appear to be drawn as Hogan cozying up to “old media” companies that still have physical hard copy publications, while Gawker continues to live up to their stated goals of corporate transparency, with founder Nick Denton and others being much more available for quotes, interviews, etc.
Tonight’s Raw from London will once again have Shane McMahon in charge. At this rate, he will surpass Bud Selig’s record as longest interim authority figure in history. However, the string of good Raws will likely continue. Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn will continue their program, and so will Chris Jericho-Dean Ambrose. The semifinals of the #1 Contenders tag team tournament feature the Usos vs. the Vaudevillians and Enzo Amore/Big Cass vs. the Dudley Boyz, which has been teased ever since WrestleMania. The WWE website is also teasing a potential Emma vs. Becky Lynch program.
Our coverage starts at 8 ET.
The Big Takeaway: A show that dragged at points that was full of wrestling. The #1 contender tag team tournament will feature the Vaudevillains vs. Enzo Amore and Big Cass in an NXT final. Only storyline news was the acknowledgement of a relationship between A.J. Styles, Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows from New Japan Pro Wrestling (simply referred to as New Japan on the broadcast, because we can’t be having pro wrestling mentioned on our pro wrestling show). Anderson and Gallows jumped Roman Reigns after Styles confronted Reigns in an another interview segment where Reigns was heavily booed. Styles denied any knowledge that Anderson and Gallows were going to jump him, but Reigns didn’t believe it.
Show Recap:
Dean Ambrose came out for the first full-length edition of the Ambrose Asylum. He told a joke about a large monster being discovered in the Thames River and said he didn’t know Braun Strowman could swim. CBS late night talk show host James Corden’s parents were at ringside, who Ambrose introduce a nice response. Then he brought out Shane McMahon to a big reaction. He told Shane to have a seat, but since the set didn’t include chairs, they stood.
They replayed the clip of Shane jumping off the Hell in a Cell onto the table against the Undertaker. They showed an angle that showed how gimmicked the table really was. Ambrose still put over the stunt as something even he wondered “What was Shane thinking?” Ambrose asked Shane what his agenda was. Shane said the fans were on his mind because he was giving stars a chance who, ordinarily, would never get a chance. He mentioned Sami Zayn, A.J. Styles and Sasha Banks.
Kevin Owens interrupted him. Owens said he’s been watching the same old crap he’s seen for years: a McMahon filled with power with a vendetta against him. Shane denied that. Owens asked why did he remove him from the building last week? Shane said because he threatened to go after Zayn before his match with Styles. Owens said he was being honest and Zayn didn’t deserve to be the WWE World Heavyweight Champion.
Zayn came out with the crowd singing his theme song before he could start his promo. Zayn said Owens was riding his coattails because he was signed by the WWE before Owens. That’s why Owens attacked him in NXT. But they both knew Owens would have never ended up in the WWE without him. Crowd had a mixed reaction for that.
Then Chris Jericho showed up. So do the 20-minute opening segment. Jericho told Zayn there were bigger issues than his emotions. Jericho told Shane he was drunk with power, and he never liked Shane. Jericho told Shane to remember he was the best in the world at what he does, which included hosting the greatest WWE talk show of all time “The Highlight Reel.” Shane said the new generation was about new opportunities, which is why they had the Highlight Reel. Shane got in a plug for the WWE Network. They all started arguing, and Ambrose yelled at everyone to be careful around his plant. Shane ordered Jericho to face Ambrose at Payback, along with Owens vs. Zayn. Shane left the ring and Ambrose handed him the plant. It wound up as a four-way brawl where Zayn and Ambrose cleaned house quickly.
It was announced that Shane had ordered Ambrose vs. Owens as the main event.
Chris Jericho defeated Sami Zayn (12:47)
Jericho won after thumbing Zayn in the eye while referee Charles Robinson tried to break them up in the corner, followed by a codebreaker. Good match. Jericho applied the Walls of Jericho, but Zayn made the ropes. Zayn later did his spot where he dove through two sets of ropes into a tornado DDT on the floor. Zayn hit his Blue Thunder bomb for a near fall. Consecutive jobs for Zayn isn’t helping him burst out of the gates early.
Mauro Ranallo made his Raw debut doing a backstage interview with Styles. Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows showed up and Styles greeted them like they were old pals. It was stange to see Anderson and Gallows treated like babyfaces when they basically made a heel debut last week attacking the Usos. Anderson said he had been trying to get in the WWE for years. They laughed together and left to catch up on old times. Michael Cole mentioned that Styles, Anderson and Gallows were old friends from New Japan.
Enzo Amore and Big Cass came out. Fans chanted Amore’s name to the tune of “Seven Nation Army” again. Amore had a riddle. There is “hell” in “hello.” There is “end” in “friend.” And there is “Dud” in “Dudley.” Amore said the Dudleyz were a couple of duds. Amore says he and Cass were A cups because they were real whether anyone liked them or not.
Enzo & Cass defeated the Dudley Boyz to advance to the finals of the WWE #1 Contenders Tag Team Tournament (8:33)
Enzo pinned Bubba Ray Dudley after a Rocket Launcher. Bubba Ray accidentally hit Devon Dudley with a forearm before the finish after Cass got the hot tag. Cass hit the Empire Elbow and big boot after the hot tag. Match was fine and the announcers put over Enzo & Cass winning as a major one.
Roman Reigns came out. The crowd reactions just get worse. They weren’t chanting “Lou,” they were booing. And Reigns did the exact same opening line he’s given over the past two weeks about being “the guy.” Reigns put over Styles, who got a minor chant. Reigns said this was the era of the Roman Empire, which got jeers and boring chants.
Styles came out. Crowd liked him, but it wasn’t an overwhelming reaction or anything. They sure like him better than Reigns, without a doubt. Styles put over Reigns as being “one heck of a champion.” He had power, explosiveness and quickness. Styles admitted he would have to have the match of his life in order to beat Reigns, but having the match of his life is what he does. Having the match of his life is what’s made him a champion everywhere he’s been, and it’s what is going to make him champion at Payback.
Reigns said he had the match of his life at WrestleMania. He admits the whole world like Styles, but they won’t like it when he beats Styles at Payback. But they will respect him. Reigns said he would rather be respected as WWE champion and that liked without it. Styles said he wants to be liked and respected, because that’s what is going to make him a phenomenal WWE Champion.
Styles left, but Anderson and Gallows ran out of the crowd to jump Reigns. Placed popped big when Gallows kicked Reigns while he was on Anderson’s shoulders. Styles watched on and looked disappointed when his friends jumped Reigns.
First thing we saw after the break was Regins walking backstage, not selling a thng. Styles told Reigns he didn’t know that was going to happen. Reigns didn’t buy any of that, reminding Styles that Anderson and Gallows’ jumped his cousins, the Usos, next week. Reigns told Styles to bring all of his friends, because he would withstand them all. He muttered one vs. all.
Baron Corbin defeated Fandango (1:21)
Baron Corbin won with the End of Days in a squash. Dolph Ziggler was at ringside doing commentary. Corbin threw Fandango into Ziggler before the finish. Ziggler jumped Corbin afterwards, only to have Corbin give him the End of Days on the floor.
Maryse and the Miz walked backstage. Maryze found spilt coffee on their way and demanded a stage manager place his jacket over it so they could walk over the stain.
Another Greetings of Puerto Rico vignette from whatever the Primo and Epico will be called in this new gimmick. They put over Puerto Rico beaches.
MizTV started with the photo of Prince Charles, saying you would never know it’s royalty. Miz said his baby was like royalty. They started making out when Cesaro came out. Lots of Cesaro Section signs to be seen as Cesaro said the only royalty Miz knew was how to be a royal pain in the ass. Miz said he was the one with a starring role but Cesaro was just as supporting actor. Crowd chanted “boring.” Miz claimed he prepared a monologue taken from the movie “Taken.” It was orginally delivered by Liam Nesson. Miz got on his cell phone and acted out a scene that was supposed to be in Cesaro’s words, and sounded like it was taken straight from every one of Neeson’s films over the past 10 years.
Cesaro put his hands over Miz’s mouth and said “When my hand goes up, your mouth goes shut.” Cesaro said he would becoming the Intercontinental Champion at Payback, and since Miz likes movie quotes, he quoted Roddy Piper from “They Live.” Cesaro mentioned it was Piper’s birthday last week. He gave the famous “I came here to kick ass and chew bubblegum” line. Miz teased a fight with Cesaro, but Miz said Cesaro had a match with Rusev.
Cesaro said he talked with Shane earlier in the day and said there wouldn’t be a singles match. Instead, it would be the League of Nations and Miz vs. Cesaro. Then Cesaro stripped off his suit to reveal a New Day t-shirt, and the New Day came out for the 8-man tag.
The New Day & Cesaro defeated the League of Nations & the Miz (13:27)
If you looked at this match for 30 seconds, you might have thought the hot blonde at ringside was Lana. But it was Maryse. Anyway, Cesaro pinned Sheamus after the Gotch Neutralizer after the usual spots where guys did their finishers on each other. Cesaro teased the Cesaro Swing on Sheamus, but Alberto Del Rio stopped him. Xavier Woods got the heat. Crowd lost interest about midway through.
Charlotte did an interview with Ranallo. They showed a replay from last week where Ric Flair helped Charlotte retain the title against Natalya. This led to Natalya walking in and saying Shane had granted her a rematch against Charlotte for the WWE Women’s Championship, and she would have Bret Hart in her corner. Charlotte and Ric didn’t look happy at all over that.
They announced that E! would start airing a Total Divas spinoff called Total Bellas, featuring Nikki and Brie Bella, Daniel Bryan, John Cena and John Laurinaitis.
Natalya, Paige, Sasha Banks and Becky Lynch defeated Naomi, Summer Rae, Tamina and Charlotte via submission ( 10:25)
Natalya made Charlotte tap out to the sharpshooter. Classic New Japan booking where the challenger wins over the champion in a tag match before the title match. Becky Lynch was kicked hard on the floor by Tamina to set up the hot tag. Crowd liked the match, which dragged at points. Well executed hot tag sequence by Natalya on Summer Rae, which included a slingshot atmoic drop, then stepping over Rae’s back into a seated drop kick.
Styles was shown talking to Anderson and Gallows. Since there was no audio, you couldn’t tell what he was saying. It was vague because he didn’t look
More from the Puerto Rico guys. They’re surrounded by history and they walked past Ponce De Leon’s house. Is walking past the Fountain of Youth supposed to get them heat?
The Vaudevillains defeated the Usos in the semifinals of the WWE #1 Contenders Tag Team Tournament (3:25)
Simon Gotch pinned Jey Uso after the Whirling Dervish. They were doing hot tags within two minutes, which was just as well because the crowd was dead. Jey had his right shoulder taped selling the beating by Anderson and Gallows from last week. He did a tope on Gotch, but starting selling his shoulder. Aiden English rammed Jey’s shoulder into the post. Fans weren’t into the Vaudevillains at all, so the decision on who goes over in the tournament final should be easy.
Apollo Crews defeated Heath Slater (4:29)
There was actually a stipulation to this match. If Apollo Crews won, he had to join Social Outcasts. They did a skit on the Raw preshow where Heath Slater, Curtis Axel and Bo Dallas tried to get him to join their group. There was no Adam Rose, nor any mention of him. Slater actually got a near fall reversing a crossbody before Crews won with the Spin-Out Powerbomb.
On his way to the back, Crews crossed paths with Owens. They shared a brief glare before Crews went to gorilla.
Dean Ambrose defeated Kevin Owens (17:15)
The highlight of the show. Ambrose won with Dirty Deeds after Owens got Ambrose’s knees to the gut going for the frog splash, then missed a cannonball. Early on, the match was a brawl. Each man threw the other into the announcer’s table. Highlights after the commercial break included Owens giving Ambrose a frog splash off the apron to the floor, followed by a successful cannonball. Ambrose attempted his elbow off the top rope, but Owens rolled out of the ring, so Ambrose hit Owens with a plancha. The two fought on the top rope before Owens caught the Super Fisherman’s Buster for a really good near fall, which got the crowd to chant “This is Awesome.”
Afterwards, Jericho ran in and gave Ambrose a codebreaker.
SUMMARY: Your usual taped Raw. Beginning and the end were very good. There was a lull in the middle. Only real takeaway as far as how Reigns is concerned is to compare with how Daniel Bryan was booked two years ago. Of course, Reigns is far from over in the fans’ eyes, but at least he’s booked as being smart. He’s suspicious of Styles after being jumped by two of Styles’ friends. In the months after winning the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, Bryan was constantly being outsmarted by Kane, looking every bit as dumb as any Friday the 13th victim that got beheaded by Jason Vorhees. It goes to show you when Vince McMahon has his heart behind someone, he’s going full throttle. If he isn’t, even the most promising of prospects job to HHH for no reason.
Dave Meltzer revealed today in a breaking news audio update that the company that Impact Wrestling/TNA has been negotiating with is Aroluxe, a company that former wrestlers Ron and Don Harris are involved with. The Harris brothers were mid-level stars in both the WWF and WCW in the late 90s and were brought in to TNA by former owner Jeff Jarrett when the company started.
Negotiations are still ongoing. TNA president Dixie Carter was hopeful of securing a deal whereby an investor would purchase 49% interest in the company, allowing her to maintain a majority interest. Whether she finds a company willing to do that or not, the company is in a crunch position as they are essentially out of money and will require a cash influx to get them through their next set of TV tapings scheduled for later this week.
If Carter is not able to find an investor willing to let her maintain control of the company there will obviously be a shakeup in the company and details of that are likely to come out in the next week or so.
Total Non-Stop Action Wrestling started in late 2002 as a weekly pay per view product owned and operated by Jeff and Jerry Jarrett. Father Jerry pulled out of the partnership early and Jeff went to Panda Energy for financing to keep the company afloat. They remained as a weekly PPV property until late 2004, when they secured a broadcast contract with Fox Sports Network and used that platform to move to the more traditional monthly PPV model.
They were at times in their history profitable but ever since spending big money to acquire free agents Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Jeff Hardy, Rob Van Dam and others in 2010 the promotion has been a money loser. They started on SPIKE TV in 2005 and at times garnered audiences upwards of 1.5 million. By late 2014, they were down under a million and on top of the declining ratings, the promotion was secretly employing Vince Russo as a consultant despite the fact that SPIKE executives had made it clear they did not want the company to have any dealings with Russo.
They moved to Destination America in 2015 and it quickly became clear that it would not be a good fit. Destination America announced midway through the first year that they would not be renewing them for a second season, despite announcing a “multi-year” contract at the start of the relationship. In late 2015 the company announced that they would start the following year on POP TV, the former TV Guide channel. While no terms were announced at the time, it was believed to be an ad revenue sharing deal.
POP TV president Brad Schwartz announced that they hoped that the promotion would return to the 1.3 million audience level with the move to POP. This despite the fact that the show averaged less than half of that number during it’s year on Destination America. With the move to POP, ratings declined even further, settling in around 300,000 despite being available in 80 million homes in the United States.
There is talk that the feud between HHH and Stephanie McMahon vs. Shane McMahon will kick off on tonight’s Raw show from London’s O2 Arena.
Even though Shane McMahon lost the match, he is now official as in charge for the third straight week. HHH and Stephanie were scheduled to return to Raw this week as well and a feud between the two sides was on the books.
There has been talk the past few days that Finn Balor will debut, which given the location, makes sense for a debut. This has not been officially confirmed.
What is confirmed for today’s show are the semifinals of the tag team tournament for a title shot at the Payback show, with the Usos vs. Vaudevillains and Enzo Amore & Big Cass vs. Dudleys, as well as a singles match with Emma vs. Becky Lynch.
As it turns out, a lot was changed beacuse the singles match ended up as an eight-person match.
Thanks to Chris Fox:
Superstars results
Big Show beat Curtis Axel & Bo Dallas
The live crowd booed Show even though he was the face. Show won after choke slamming both at the same time.
Kalisto beat Tyler Breeze. Breeze got good heat. Salida del Sol for the finish,
Raw opened with Dean Ambrose out with them trying to put over the fans as the Ambrose Asylum. He made a joke about Braun Strowman, points out James Corden’s parents in the front row and then introduced Shane McMahon. Shane put over that the WWE fans deserve better than what they’ve been getting. Kevin Owens came out and said this new Shane McMahon era is hte same old crap and how Shane has been punishing him for being an honest man in saying Sami Zayn never deserved to be put in the world title picture. Sami Zayn came out and said he was signed by WWE before Owens and if it wasn’t for him, Owens would have never made it to WWE. Chris Jericho came out and said that Shane was drunk with power for taking the Highlight Reel segment away from him.
Shane announced Jericho vs. Zayn for Raw.
Chris Jericho beat Sami Zayn clean with the codebreaker.
A.J. Styles hugged with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson. They acknowledged their past.
Enzo & Cass beat The Dudleys to advance in the tournament clean with the rocket launcher.
Roman Reigns came out and was heavily booed. He put over A.J. Styles who came out. Styles said he’ll need to have the match of his life to beat Reigns. Gallows and Anderson came out to attack Reigns and left without Styles.
Backstage, Styles told Reigns that he had no idea Gallows & Andeson were going to attack him. Reigns told Styles that it won’t matter how many friends Styles brings, he’s not winning the title.
Baron Corbin beat Fandango with the End of Days.
Dolph Ziggler was on commentary. Fandango was really over in London. Corbin threw Fandago onto Ziggler which led to a brawl between the two. Corbin then hit the End of Days on Ziggler outside the ring.
Next was Miz TV with Maryse. Miz made fun of Prince George, calling him plain and generic, and said his baby, referring to his IC title belt, is pristine. Cesaro came out and called Miz a royal pain in the ass. This segment drew “boring” chants and Miz said that the crowd was jealous because they could never get a woman who looked like Maryse, and he also couldn’t understand what they were chanting. He tried to do a scene from “Taken” and Cesaro cut a line from “They Live.” This led to an eight-man tag.’
New Day & Cesaro beat Alberto Del Rio & Rusev & Sheamus & Miz. Cesaro pinned Sheamus using the Neutralizer.
Charlotte and Natalya were talking. It was annnounced that Bret Hart would be in Nataya’s corner in the match at Payback, to counter Ric Flair, so they are doing the same scenario as their NXT match.
Paige & Sasha Banks & Becky Lynch & Natalya beat Naomi & Tamina & Summer Rae & Charlotte when Natalya made Charlotte tap to the sharpshooter.
Vaudevillains beat Usos. Vaudevillains didn’t get much of a reaction. They won with the whirling dervish.
The Social Outcasts, or at least the three left, tried to add Apollo Crews to their stable. He said he would join if one of them could beat him.
Apollo Crews beat Heath Slater with the spinning power bomb.
Kevin Owens pushed that he’d be back tomorrow for Smackdown tapings to big cheers.
Dean Ambrose pinned Kevin Owens with Dirty Deeds. After the match, Jericho laid out Ambrose with the codebreaker. Styles then made the save.
They did a dark match where Styles & Ambrose beat Jericho & Owens.
So no Authority and no Finn Balor this week, no big feud, no big anything.
The Monday Night Wars can officially be declared over. The World Wrestling Federation lost a few battles over the nearly four years, but has now won the war.
Last night’s UFC on FOX event did 2.13 million viewers based on the overnight ratings, but led FOX to winning a weak night overall in the 18-49 demo.
The number is about as good as you’d hope for considering it was an April show where two of the top three fights changed late in the game.
The 0.8 in the overnights beat ABC’s 0.6 with rerun programming, beat CBS’ 0.5 with rerun programming and NBC’s 0.3 with live Premier Boxing.
Because of viewership mostly with older viewers, when it came to overall viewers, ABC and CBS all beat FOX. NBC did not as the boxing only did 1.24 million viewers, which is a terrible prime time number, even for Saturday, for first-run programming.
It should be noted that the final number will be up somewhat for NBC and FOX because the number measures viewership for FOX stations from 8-10 p.m. on the West Coast, when they were airing other programming since UFC aired from 5-7 p.m.
The growth will be less than usual because the main event ended right around 10 p.m. due to Glover Teixeira knocking out Rashad Evans in just 1:48. Usually the final rating growth includes both the West Coast viewership and the post-10 p.m. viewership which is always the largest rated portion of the show. That’s why five round main events are so valuable when it comes to ratings and why they stalled to have the main event start past 9:50 p.m., hoping for it to go long.
The original card featured a top three fights of Tony Ferguson vs. Khabib Nurmagomedov, but Ferguson was injured and Nurmagomedov instead beat unknown Darrell Horcher; Teixiera vs. Evans and Dan Henderson vs. Lyoto Machida, the ladder canceled when Machida was provisionally suspended on a PED violation for admitting use of a supplement that contained banned DHEA.
Last year’s show in April headlined by Machida vs. Luke Rockhold, which was a much stronger match at the time, did 2.43 million on the overnights and ended up with the West Coast at 2,745,000 viewers.
For this show, a final number of 2.35 million or greater should be considered okay.
Bellator MMA had it’s first overseas show Saturday from Torino Italy. The show took place at 3 pm eastern and aired on tape delay on SpikeTV with a late 10 pm start time. In terms of star power, it was one of the weaker shows that Bellator has put on since the MTV 2 days but in many ways, the promotion looked more “big league” than ever before.
The show took place in front of a hot crowd in a bigger building than they usually run. The fighters that they were hoping to showcase did what they were supposed to, particularly Alessio Sakara scoring an impressive TKO win in front of his home country. All of the walkouts aired in their entirety, which was a nice change from UFC.
Perhaps the best thing on the show was the opening video montage that was more of a promo for Spike Sports than Bellator MMA specifically but featured mainly Bellator fighters. The tag line of Fighters First was all over the video. Particularly memorable was a Josh Koscheck quote “I can say what I want and I can wear what I want”. This video is worth going out of your way to see although I’m sure it will air before all MMA, Kickboxing and Boxing events on Spike for the next while.
It wasn’t all good news. In the first three fights, the losers looked they belonged nowhere near a professional MMA cage, let alone on national TV. And the main event was a terrible fight with referee John McCarthy even stopping the fight midway through the second while both fighters were standing, warning them that they had to fight. Not sure what he would’ve done if they hadn’t picked it up a bit but they did….only slightly.
The show kicked off with two local fighters making their Bellator debuts. Daniele Scatizzi scored a first round TKO win over Daniele Miceli in a welterweight fight. Scatizzi looked okay but we’ll probably never see either of these guys in a Bellator cage again unless they come back to Italy.
In the second fight, Anastasia Yankova, who they’ve been promoting pretty heavily and could be the face of the new female flyweight division in Bellator dominated Anjela Pink, who was making her pro debut. It was her third submission win in her three fight career.
AJ McKee had a very impressive performance in dominating Italian fighter Danilo Belluardo on his way to a first round TKO win. It was his fourth straight first round finish with all four of his career fights going a combined 10 minutes. He had a great promo after the fight, basically putting the entire division on notice and saying he’s coming for the belt. McKee is the son of MMA vet Antonio McKee and Bellator has high hopes for his future and he did not disappoint on this night.
In what really should’ve been the main event of the show, especially with the benefit of hindsight, Alessio Sakara came out to the biggest pop of the night by far. He was fighting in his home country for the first time in over a decade and did not disappoint. After a first round which he may have lost, he came out strong in the second and stopped Bellator vet Brian Rogers with punches to score a TKO win. The win probably ensures him a few more Bellator fights and the promotion should really have him headline the next show if they ever return to Italy.
The main event was a terrible fight which Bellator mainstay Patricky “Pitbull” Freire won by unanimous decision over the debuting Kevin Souza, who was recently cut from UFC despite a 3-1 record there. Several times referee John McCarthy warned the fighters to pick up the action while on their feet and midway through the second round, he stopped the fight and warned the fighters they had to keep fighting. The fight was very close, despite Freire scoring 30-27 on all 3 judges scorecards, but neither guy impressed at all. Souza took the fight on short notice and Freire is a lifer in Bellator so they’ll probably both be back but after a long day of MMA after the UFC on FOX show, that was a hard fight to sit through.
Overall, I’d say the show was a minor success and something that Bellator should definitely do again. It came across much differently than the normal Friday night shows they run in casinos and more shows like this would make the promotion seem like a viable alternative to UFC in the world of MMA.
Bellator returns to Spike TV on Friday night with Bellator 153. Benson Henderson makes his promotional debut and challenges Andrey Koreshkov in the show’s main event.
