Why Bellator Needs to Keep Their Light HWT and Heavyweight Divisions

Why Bellator Needs To Keep Their Light HWT and Heavyweight Divisions.

June 15, 2013

By Ryan Porzl

In 2013, Bellator officially established itself as the #2 MMA organization in the world with their move to Spike TV and the end of Strikeforce. Despite Bellator's growth over the years, there have been many fans and even MMA reporters who believe Bellator needs to end their Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight divisions as they believe they lack depth. They believe Bellator should only focus on their established divisions such as Bantamweight, Featherweight, Lightweight, Welterweight, and Middleweight until more talent pops up. I disagree. Not only do I disagree with this theory but I feel it would be very foolish for them to do so and I will explain why I think getting rid of these weight classes would be a mistake.

The argument fans and reporters say is that the divisions should go because there's not a lot of depth in these divisions and they should discontinue them until more talent comes along. The problem with that is that at what point do you know there's enough talent out there to start a division? There's no official number that makes a companies weight division stacked. Another problem is that building something takes time and effort. If Bellator wants strong divisions they need to start small and build on them as time goes by. They can't not have these divisions until one day they decide there's enough fish in the sea at which point they go shopping and sign two dozen fighters. By doing that, they would find themselves in a situation where they now have all these fighters that nobody cares about since they don't know them. Also with Bellator being a tournament format promotion, the the company would spent a year trying to figure out who are the 8 best fighters that deserve tobe in the tournament to crown a champion. This will likely lead to arguments that UFC has created new divisions in recent years so Bellator can too. However, the problem is the UFC didn't technically create divisions from scratch but rather transferred divisions from other companies into the UFC. The Bantamweight & Featherweight divisions came from the WEC while the Women's Bantamweight division comes from Strikeforce. Bellator doesn't own any other company that could serve as a company to introduce fans to certain weight classes, build them up, and eventually absorb those companies divisions. While UFC did create a Flyweight division, Bellator can't do it the same way. Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight are a different story. A lot of the UFC's flyweights were small bantamweights who eventually fought in their natural weights when the flyweight division was created. They can't sign Heavyweights and Light Heavyweights and then expect them to cut 40 – 100 pounds to fight in Middleweight until they got enough to fill a Light Heavyweight and Heavyweight division. Obviously, many would make the argument that UFC dropped their Lightweight and Middleweight divisions for several years when they didn't have the talent. While that was true, the problem was when the UFC brought those divisions back they weren't great overnight. The Middleweight division took years to get good and that was after they got a great champion and really brought in guys from other companies like Dan Henderson from PRIDE, Chael Sonnen from WEC, and Luke Rockhold & Jacare Souza from Strikeforce. Same with Lightweight as it took UFC four years before they got a stacked division and once again one of the key things was absorbing the WEC's lightweight division.

Another reason to keep those divisions is the fact that American audiences expect them. In an interview with Sherdog's Jordan Breen, Bellator CEO: Bjorn Rebney explained how when you are a major MMA promotion, on Spike TV, and in over 100 countries, you're not a real MMA promotion without the Bantamweight – Heavyweight divisions and everything in between. The question is do you want a flyweight or Women's divisions? But the other weight classes are here to stay. Rebney is right. Focusing on smaller weight classes can work in Asia but not in the United States. In North America, fans expect the bigger weight divisions and usually enjoyed the concept of a heavyweight champion of the world.

Another reason is the fact that Bellator focusing only on smaller divisions won't work. A good example is the WEC. After being purchased by Zuffa (parent company of the UFC) in 2006, the WEC saw all the divisions from Welterweight – Heavyweight be absorbed into the UFC in an attempt to focus on smaller divisions. While the events were critically acclaimed, they failed to draw outside of fights featuring Urijah Faber.

Yet another reason is because there's no need for them to. A year ago there would be a good argument on a lack of depth. However, in the last year, Bellator had made an effort to sign new talent. Some talent are veterans looking to regain old glory while others are unknown guys who need a chance in the big leagues. Just because these guys aren't as known or established as UFC fighters doesn't mean they're not as good. In the past year, Bellator's light heavyweight division has grown leaps and bounds. The company has signed several notable veterans and legends to the division including Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal, Renato “Babalu” Sobral, Vladmir Matyushenko, Seth Petruzelli, and most recently, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. Also in typical Bellator fashion, the promotion has also begun building new talent. New talent includes the likes of Attila Vegh, Emanuel Newton, Mikhail Zayats, Phelipe Lins, Jacob Noe, and former champion: Christian M'Pumbu. Vegh is the current (as of writing) Bellator Light Heavyweight Champion. Prior to MMA, Vegh began wrestling at the age of five until fifteen when he switched to kempo karate where he went on to win sixteen karate championships including one world, one European, and fourteen Hungarian. He also trains out in American Top Team. Newton is the season eight Bellator Light Heavyweight Tournament Winner who has also competed in wrestling while in school. He's a former MFC Light Heavyweight Champion and trains out of Mark Munoz's Reign Train Center & Rafael Cordeiro's Kings MMA. Zayats is the season eight tournament runner up who is a grand master in Combat Sambo and Hand-to-Hand Combat. He was also a gold medalist in the 2008 World Sambo Championships, a former M-1 Global tournament winner, a former M-1 Global title contender, and trains with Bellator Middleweight Champion: Alexander Shlemenko at the Rusfighter Sport Club. Despite being only 5-0, Phelipe Lins was ranked #2 in Bloodyelbow.com's 2012 World MMA Scouting Report in the Light Heavyweight portion. Noe is a former Tournament Semifinalist and M'Pumbu is the former Bellator Light Heavyweight Champion. The Heavyweight division doesn't have any big names or legends but it does have fighters with lots of potential. Fighters include Alexander Volkov, Richard Hale, Thiago “Big Monster” Santos, Blagoi Ivanov, Alexei Kudin, Ruslan Magomedov, and Vitaly Minakov. Volkov is the current (as of writing) Bellator Heavyweight Champion. He holds a black belt in Kyokushin Karate and trains at the Rusfighter Sport Club with Alexander Shlemenko. Kudin & Magomedov come from kickboxing and boxing backgrounds & both were ranking on bloodyelbow.com's 2012 World MMA Scouting Report in the heavyweight portion. Hale and Santos are former Bellator tournament runner ups. Ivanov is undefeated and a former gold medalist in the World Sambo Championships where he defeated MMA Legend: Fedor Emelianenko en route to the gold medal. He's also considered a star on the rise as he's defeated several aging legends including Ricco Rodriguez and Kazuyuki Fujita. Then there's Vitaly Minakov. Also undefeated, Minakov is a four time world combat sambo champion and a former national judo champion. He was named the biggest prospect of 2013 by Bleacherreport.com

The final reason not to because there have been worse heavyweight and light heavyweight divisions. Remember from 2003-2007, the UFC's heavyweight division was basically “The Tim Sylvia Show” with Andrei Arlovski vs. Justin Eilers, Andrei Arlovski vs. Paul Buentello, and Frank Mir being on the shelf for his entire year-long reign due to a motorcycle accident sprinkled in. I wasn't an MMA fan at the time but I don't think anyone was suggesting the UFC end their heavyweight division back then. Same with Light Heavyweight as the UFC had Tito Ortiz spend his three year reign as champion fight the occasional good opponents (Yuki Kondo & Vladimir Matyushenko) but also fight a natural middleweight (Evan Tanner), a tomato can (Elvis Sinosic), and an aging legend who was coming off having the remainder of his prime beat out of him by Don Frye (Ken Shamrock). There was also Chuck Liddell who spent his two year reign as champion using the wayback machine to fight one rematch after another. In fact none of The Iceman's title fights including his win over Randy Couture and his title loss to Quinton “Rampage” Jackson were original fights. Yet once again, no one was saying UFC should call it a day in the Light Heavyweight division. Instead the UFC would weather the storm and within several years eventually built up those divisions.

So after all that, I admit the LHW and HW divisions of Bellator aren't the best right now but if you give it a chance and allow them to develop talent then I believe you'll enjoy it for what it is and then after awhile they'll become something special.