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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
Bellator's summer series will feature some longer main cards on Spike TV, as they've added a four-man heavyweight tournament to their June 19 summer debut. Bellator finalized the June 19 card on Tuesday, and the main card will feature six fights.
The new four-man heavyweight field will pit Vinicius Quieroz against Rich Hale on one side of the bracket, with Ron Sparks taking on Vitaly Minakov on the other.
Those two new bouts join the Lightweight Championship fight between Michael Chandler and Dave Jansen, along with the four-man light heavyweight tournament featuring "King Mo" and "Babalu" Sobral, and the Bellator debut of War Machine on the main card for the event.
Russia's Minakov made his Bellator debut last November, moving his career record to 10-0 with a second round stoppage over Vladimir Starcencov.
"I want everyone to know that I'm not here just to 'take part' in a Bellator Tournament, but to win it all and become a Bellator Champion," Minakov said in a press release.
He's taking on the 8-1 Sparks, who hasn't fought since suffering his only career loss in November of 2011. He was knocked out by Eric Prindle in his last appearance in the Bellator tournament field.
"Everyone knows I'm looking stand in that cage and throw bombs, no questions asked,” Sparks said. "I think the heavyweight tournament is going to be awesome. I am looking forward to it being a four-man tournament. It will give the fighters more opportunities to fight and I want my shot at the title."
Hale is a Bellator tournament vet and has competed in both the heavyweight and light heavyweight divisions. He takes on Quieroz, a one-time UFC vet who was released after a failed steroid test out of his first fight in the organization. He lost his last outing by TKO to Alexander Volkov last November.
"This event is insanely stacked, and it's the reason we are making this a jam packed three hour show," Bellator Chairman & CEO Bjorn Rebney said. "With a Lightweight Title fight, Mo, Babalu, War Machine and the start of our heavyweight tournament, this is going to be an amazing show start to finish on Spike."
The three-hour main card will air from 7-10PM ET on Spike TV, leading into the debut episode of Spike's new reality series, "Fight Master: Bellator MMA."
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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