Contributor: Chris Groves
Bellator wasn’t being very subtle with the field for their currently ongoing Light Heavyweight tournament. There were two established name sand the rest were a bunch of lower level fighters with little name value. The two “names” were Renato “Babalu” Sobral and Muhammad “King Mo” Lawal. With guys like Jacob Noe and Przemyslaw Mysiala in the tournament, it was no secret that the finale Bellator was fishing for was ‘Babalu vs King Mo’. For them, that was the biggest fight they could put on in their light heavyweight division.
Renato Sobral was a well traveled, bit of a journeyman character…known for his battles with Chuck Liddell, perhaps for exiting the UFC on a win, as well as being a former Strikeforce Light Heavyweight champion. Who cares if he made a habit of regularly being knocked out in recent years? He had name value. His opponent? Mikhail Zayats, the man perhaps best known for being knocked out with a strangely set-up head-kick courtesy of Vinny Magalhaes. However, he had rebounded with a few wins over no-name fighters so he was good enough to put Sobral over, right? Wrong.
At roughly 3.5 minutes into the first round, Zayats landed a spinning backfist that sent Sobral stumbling face-forward into the cage. Zayats followed up with verve, and after a few more seconds Sobral found himself in an oh-so-familiar position: on his back eating punches. So, just like that, the big Sobral vs Mo fight went kaput. Well, at least King Mo had an easy path to winning the tournament and challenging for the title, right?…..right?
King Mo was one of Bellator/Viacom’s biggest signings. Spike signed him to a contract that would have him participate in Professional Wrestling and Mixed Martial Arts under their banner. Much to the chagrin of TNA show writers, King Mo was shoehorned into their programming. Simultaneously, he was welcomed into the thinly stacked Bellator Light Heavyweight tournament with open arms. The obvious goal was to make him a crossover superstar, to put him in front of as many viewers as possible in as many ways as possible. The aim was to create a draw, elevate his status, and thus the status of Bellator. Spike also ran an hour long special dedicated essentially to the idea of King Mo being an impressive individual and an amazing athlete who was destined for greatness and all other manner of hyperbole.
Mo got by his first round opponent, Przemyslaw Mysiala, easily enough; 1st round knockout, bing-bam-boom. Surely Spike and Bellator execs assumed that HE would be the big name that actually paid off in this whole scheme. King Mo would next face Emanuel Newton, a well traveled and moderately successful fighter. Defeating him seemed to be an easy enough task for King Mo. However, at 2.5 minutes into the first round, once again a backfist changed everything. After missing a right hand Newton followed up with the finishing blow that Mo never saw coming. He fell to the ground like a vase that had been knocked over.
With Mo sleeping, Bellator is now left to promote their tournament final between two men whose only claims to fame are “knocking out those one dudes”. Bellator learned that in MMA, even the best laid plans can be ruined…by a pair of properly timed backfists.
–Chris can be reached at [email protected]
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