Contributor: Nolan Howell
The Forum in Inglewood, California houses some legendary moments in sports history, but Saturday night featured the last fight for one of the most colorful characters and a pioneer in mixed martial arts as light heavyweight legend Tito Ortiz faced off against Chael Sonnen in the main event. Ortiz left the arena with a submission victory in the first round, but it wouldn’t have been fitting if the mixed martial artist formerly known as the Huntington Beach Bad Boy didn’t leave with a little controversy.
Ortiz scored a takedown and Sonnen grabbed a D’arce choke before he held onto a guillotine and front facelock as Ortiz flipped, twisted, and turned. Ortiz secured mount and scored a few strikes before Sonnen gave up his back and Ortiz locked in a mutt of a rear naked choke, chinlock, and neck crank. Nevertheless, Sonnen turned red in the face and was left with no choice but to tap. Referee “Big” John McCarthy had to pry Ortiz off a few seconds after the tap, but he was declared the victor and had his son lay his gloves in the center of the ring to signify the end.
The combination of the unnecessary holding of the submission, a slight tap of Sonnen’s glove by Ortiz during the D’arce, and the strange combination that caused the tap had many crying foul, but that’s the nature of the beast when dealing with Bellator main events and these conspiracies can easily be dismissed.
In the co-main event, Paul Daley delivered a knockout of the year candidate against Brennan Ward. Ward spent most of the fight looking to take down Daley and succeeding, only for “Semtex” to
get back to his feet. Against the cage, Daley spun out of a waistlock from Ward with a spinning back elbow. Whether Ward was rocked or spooked, he backed up and Daley followed with a flying knee that crumbled Ward and left him leaving on a stretcher for precautionary reasons. Daley called for former UFC welterweight title challenger Rory MacDonald after the fight.
Middleweights Hisaki Kato and Ralek Gracie put on an absolute snoozer, with Kato winning a unanimous decision in a fight marred by inactivity. Emmanuel Sanchez earned a majority decision win to move up in the featherweight division against Georgi Karakhanyan, where both shared illegal knees and Sanchez suffered a point deduction where he struck last and seemingly in blatant retaliation. And in the opener, Derek Campos was able to outlast Derek Anderson and capture the final two rounds in a lightweight scrap.
Also announced at this event was a heavyweight rematch between “King Mo” Lawal and Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, who looked in proper shape for the weight class.
-Nolan can be reached @undercardnolan or at [email protected]
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