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By: Matt Pelkey, MMATorch Columnist
We start off the night with a voiced-over intro previewing tonight's fights. After the opening video, Sean Wheelock and Jimmy Smith welcome us from cageside and further break down the action. After the commercial, we'll begin the night with Zoila Frausto and Jessica Pene vying for a spot in the woman's tournament quarterfinals.
Before the fight starts we get a recap of last week's two women's tournament bouts, with Megumi Fujii and Jessica Aguilar coming out on top. Good idea by Bellator to keep the people moving on in the tournaments fresh in the viewers' mind.
Cliches abound in Pene's intro video, but Frausto gets the star treatment after her brutal KO upset over Rosi Sexton that got her the spot in this tournament.
ROUND ONE: Tournament rules are the same this season. No elbos to the head til the finals to hopefully keep cuts out of play. Frausto with a nice right high kick as the first significant blow of the fight. Pene pressed Frausto up against the cage, but has little success against her stronger opponent. Frausto finally reverses position two minutes in, but they're still clinched against the cage. At three minutes in they finally separate. Nice inside leg kick by Zoila. Frausto stuffs another takedown, but finds herself against the cage again. Another separation, another head kick lands for Frausto. Pene tries to pull guard, as all else seems to be failing, but Frausto easily backs out as the first stanza comes to a close.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Frausto. Not a lot of action to speak of, but clear round for Frausto.
[Commercial Break]
ROUND TWO: Lots of circling and the occasional leg kick in the first minute of round two. Pene is doing a good job of holding the center of the cage and keeping the pressure on Frausto, but she needs to mount some offense at some point if she has any shot here. More clinch game against the fence. They're aware this is their only fight of the night, right? Frausto seems content to take this round solely on having the positioning advantage against the fence. With ten seconds left, a failed takedown attempt by Pene finds Frausto on top raining punches as the bell sounds.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Frausto. Even less action this time around. An argument could've been made for a 10-10 there before Frausto definitively took it at the end.
[Commercial Break]
ROUND THREE: Pene picks up the sense of urgency early in the third, but gets rag-dolled to the mat for her efforts by Frausto. Back to feet and Frausto has Pene's back against the fence. The fighters separate. Frausto using her jab effectively to keep Pene at bay. More fence clincing (*sigh*). I wouldn't mind this so much if it led to something. Anything. Spinning back kick to the ribs lands for Frausto. The last ten seconds of the fight went like this: Frausto tosses Pene to the ground, throws a high kick to the dome that's blocked as Pene gets back to her feet, lands a nice front push kick, and then a big punch as the horn sounds. Where was that all fight?
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Frausto. Should be an easy clean sweep here.
WINNER: Frausto by unanimous decision (30-27 on all cards)
POST FIGHT: Frausto says she's a little disappointed in her performance. She says going fifteen minutes for the first time was tough and Pene's length gave her problems. She doesn't care who's next, she just wants to be #1.
STAR RATING: (**-) Nothing awful (i.e. it wasn't a couple of sloppy, blown-up heavyweights. That's coming up next), but nothing remotely exciting from either fighter either.
RAMIFICATIONS: Frausto moves on to the semifinals and one step closer to a potential date with Megumi Fujii. Pene has plenty of room to grow, and I doubt we'll see her again in season 3.
[Commercial Break]
We get a four-way split screen look at the four heavyweight fighters in their locker rooms getting ready, and then a quick look at next week's card, which includes the kickoff of the bantamweight tournament.
FIGHT TWO: BRAD BLACKBURN VS. DAN HORNBUCKLE (WELTERWEIGHT)
Guess this isn't our main event. Hornbuckle says his loss in his last fight to Ben Askren in the Season 2 Welterweight Tournament Final has taught him how to deal with adversity inside the cage. Something tells me Brad Blackburn won't tool him on the mat like Askren did.
ROUND ONE: Not a tournament bout, so elbows are legal. Blackburn comes out immediately with some heavy leather, but Hornbuckle ducks under and plants him on his back with a double leg. Blackburn pops up to his feet and drops Hornbuckle with a big punch! Blackburn now in Hornbuckle's closed guard, giving The Handler time to recover. Hornbuckle gets back to his feet and looks to have recovered two minutes in. Both guys are throwing with bad intentions, but not much is landing. This is more time we've seen Hornbuckle on his feet than in his first three Bellator fights combined. Blackburn is still landing the harder shots, but Hornbuckle does seem to have found his comfort zone a bit here.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Blackburn. He had the knockdown early and continued to land shots throughout the round.
[Commercial Break]
ROUND TWO: A minute in, both fighters seem content to let this play out on the feet. After two minutes of back and forth action, Hornbuckle eats a hard kick straight to the groin as both fighters were trying to throw kicks. Hornbuckle is fine and we continue. Hornbuckle lands a couple hard punches and a head kick in his best offensive flurry of the fight so far. Hornbuckle is liberally landing kicks to the midsection of Blackburn, perhaps in an attempt to wear Blackburn down much like Amir Sadollah did. Another nice flurry by Hornbuckle as the bell sounds.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Hornbuckle. Fairly close round that was stolen by Hornbuckle in the second half. Should be a deciding third round.
[Commercial Break]
ROUND THREE: No point of trying to break down the third round action. Very back and forth in the first half of the round with a slight edge to Blackburn, but Hornbuckle really turned it on in the last couple minutes, being very aggressive and mixing up his strikes nicely.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Hornbuckle. The second half of a round is always what sticks in a judge's mind and Hornbuckle controlled the last two minutes of this fight.
WINNER: Hornbuckle by unanimous decision (29-28 on all cards)
POST FIGHT: No post-fight interview for Hornbuckle. Can't say I blame Bellator. They're short on time, and this fight was basically pointless.
STAR RATING: (***) Good fight. Much more exciting than the ladies, and while neither was ever really close to finishing the other, it was a good back and forth kickboxing match.
RAMIFICATIONS: Its hard to define what wins mean in Bellator for non-champions in non-tournament bouts, but Hornbuckle gets back on track with the win. Either he or Blackburn would be good live bodies for Strikeforce to match up with Nick Diaz.
FIGHT THREE: SCOTT BARRETT VS. DAMIAN GRABOWSKI (HEAVYWEIGHT TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL)
We get a quick recap of last week's Neil Grove TKO over Eddie Sanchez to kick off the heavyweight tournament as a set up for tonight's heavyweight action. Grabowski looks like a scary dude, and he's one of the favorites to reach the finals along with another of tonight's participants, Cole Konrad.
ROUND ONE: Grabowski lands the first strike with a nice outside leg kick. After a short clinch, Grabowski knees Barrett in the balls. Barrett picks Damian up and lightly sets him down on the mat. Barrett moves to half guard and tries to isolate an arm. Grabowski reverses and winds up in Barrett's guard. Another reversal puts Barrett back on top. Barrett finally postures up and lands some nice punches, but Grabowski gets back to his feet. The round ends with Barrett pushing Grabowski up against the cage, but unable to secure a takedown.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Barrett. Grabowski was active the first time he was on his back, but not the second. Barrett's time on top and couple of nice punches towards the end of the round sealed it for him.
ROUND TWO: Barrett comes right out and picks Grabowski up and slams him down hard to start the second round. Grabowski lands some nice punches from the bottom, but he's gonna need a reversal or stand-up here. Barrett now in half guard, content to smother. Barrett gets the mount, then takes Grabowski's back and starts raining down punches, but Grabowski reverses into top control. Nice "body, body, head" punches from Grabowski, but he's gonna need something more damaging to steal this round. More of the same as the round ends with Grabowski on top.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Barrett. He spent most of the round on top and landed some nice shots when he took Grabowski's back. Grabowski on top for the last minute wasn't enough.
[Commercial Break]
ROUND THREE: Grabowski lands several nice leg kicks to start the round and clearly looks like the fresher fighter. Grabowski is just lighting Barrett up with punches right now. Barrett is lucky he has such an enormous head. Grabowski now slows considerably as he may have punched himself out. Barrett musters up his last ounce of strength and gets a takedown with under a minute left. It won't be enough to take the round, but it may have just won him the fight.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Grabowski. He might've been on his way to a 10-8 before the takedown likely saved the fight for Barrett.
WINNER: Damian Grabowski by unanimous decision (30-27 on all cards)
POST FIGHT: Again no interview with the winner as we're now even shorter on time, and this was a fishy decision to say the least.
STAR RATING: (**) The third round was surprisingly the best, but it was what you'd expect from two lower level heavyweights going the distance. The decision also really took away from this one.
RAMIFICATIONS: Well Grabowski moves on, so Bellator got the result they wanted, but he better hope Cole Konrad gets upset before they match-up. If Grabowski had trouble with Scott Barrett's wrestling, he doesn't have a prayer against Konrad.
[Commercial Break]
FIGHT FOUR: ROGENT LLORET VS. COLE KONRAD (HEAVYWEIGHT TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL)
Yeah, they're definitely short on time. Back from commercial, both fighters are already in the cage and we go straight to the introductions. No entrances or video packages.
ROUND ONE: Please God, let this be exciting. After a glove touch, Konrad comes right at Lloret with punches. Lloret tries to throw a low kick, but finds himself on his back immediately. Konrad working from half-guard. Konrad's blubbery physique is hypnotic. After two minutes of nothing, Lloret tries to spin out and back to his feet, but finds himself caught in a Konrad guillotine. He's able to escape that and does get back upright. The whole last minute is filled with circling and not much else.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Konrad. Not much action, but the two minutes on top and the guillotine attempt were plenty for Konrad to take it.
ROUND TWO: Lots of jabs from Konrad to start things in round two, but nothing significant landing. Lloret does a nice job avoiding getting into a clinch with Konrad, but he may want to think about some offense at some point. Konrad gets impatient and bull-rushes Lloret against the fence, but can't get the takedown. More circling until Konrad finally gets a trip takedown, but Lloret pops right back to his feet. Konrad lands some knees to the thigh against the fence with thirty seconds to go. They separate with ten seconds left an no more punches are thrown in the round.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Konrad. Glad we saved the worst (and there's been some serious crap on this card) for last. Jamie, you better be having fun.
ROUND THREE: Barring a miracle, we're gonna go through an entire Bellator show without not only a finish, but without a single highlight whatsoever. Konrad gets an early takedown and I doze off. I let you know when something changes. Nothing. Still nothing. I actually applaud the ref for letting this stay on the mat, despite the utter lack of...well, anything happening. Ha! With ten seconds left he finally tells them to improve their position. The rounds ends with Konrad on top.
Pelkey's Scorecard: 10-9 Konrad. It was literally Konrad laying on top of Lloret for four and a half minutes doing NOTHING.
WINNER: Konrad by unanimous decision (30-27 on all cards)
POST FIGHT: Yeah, right.
STAR RATING: (*-) Just awful, and one of the worst nights of fights you'll ever see on U.S. national television.
RAMIFICATIONS: Konrad moves on, and if he's the best heavyweight in the tournament (and he is), Bellator is in trouble. They get by on an unusual amount of awesome highlight finishes and reliably strong shows, but this was just a crapfest tonight.
Well that's another Bellator event in the books. They'll be back next Thursday to try to erase the memory of this show. I'd also like to throw out a Happy Birthday to Torch Editor-In-Chief Jamie Penick!
DON'T GO YET... WE SUGGEST THESE MMATORCH ARTICLES, TOO!
Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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Chris Park - Matt Pelkey
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