Bellator will kickoff the 2013 Summer Series in two days as Bellator 96 comes from the WinStar World Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma and the next light heavyweight tournament will begin on this card.
Unlike previous tournaments, this will be a four-man tournament and not a eight-man. All four fighters in this tournament were in the previous light heavyweight tournament which took place during season eight at the beginning of the year.
The opening round bouts will be Jacob Noe vs. Renato “Babalu” Sobral and Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal vs. Seth Petruzelli. The winners of these bouts will advance to the tournament final which is scheduled to take place on July 31st at Bellator 96 from the Santa Ana Center in Rio Rancho, New Mexico.
The winner of the tournament will be guaranteed a title shot and they will face either current Bellator light heavyweight champion Attila Vegh or Emanuel Newton. Vegh will be defending the title against Newton at some point this year and Bellator has not currently announced when that fight will take place.
Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal (9-2, 1NC) vs. Seth Petruzelli (14-7)
Lawal and Petruzelli will headline Wednesday nights fight card from Oklahoma and Lawal is considered the favorite to win the tournament. Of course, Lawal was considered the favorite to win the season eight tournament and was defeated by Newton in the semifinals by a spinning back fist knockout.
This will be Lawal’s first fight since the knockout and recently told “Inside MMA” on AXS TV that a spinning [explicative] was not going to happen anymore.
Petruzelli was a quarterfinalist in the season eight tournament and was eliminated by Jacob Noe. He lost the fight by TKO in the first round and said he had an injury coming into the fight that he re-injured during the fight. It was his first defeat in Bellator as he won his debut with the organization in 2011 as he defeated Ricco Rodriguez in a catchweight bout of 230 pounds.
There is an analogy in fighting that styles make fights and with the style of Lawal and Petruzelli, this fight is unlikely to go the distance. Even though Lawal has a wrestling background, he has turned into a striker and three of his last four fights have ended in the first round and his last two wins are by knockout in the first round.
Petruzelli is also a fighter that likes to end the fight quickly and by knocking his opponent out. Six of his last seven wins have come by TKO/KO and they have all come in the first round. The last time that Petruzelli had a fight go to the third round was back in 2006 when he was defeated by Matt Hamill.
Based off what each fighter has done throughout their career, it’s likely that this fight will end in the first round. Lawal will be the betting favorite in this fight which the odds for the fight have not been released. Whoever wins this fight, will likely be the favorite in the final.
Jacob Noe (11-2, 1NC) vs. Renato “Babalu” Sobral (37-10)
Just like Lawal and Petruzelli, Noe and Sobral were in the season eight light heavyweight tournament with Babalu being defeated in the first round by Mikhail Zayats and Noe making it to the semifinals were he was defeated by Zayats.
Noe recently told TheMMAReport.com about the changes he has made in his training for this fight which included doing the final half of his training camp at Team Syndicate in Las Vegas. He knows what his opponents strengths are and that he will have to stay away from the ground and the submission attacks of Babalu.
Babalu was an active from from 1997-2010 but took a break from the sport for nearly two years before returning last summer. After he scored a submission win in ONE FC, he was signed by Bellator and made his debut in the light heavyweight tournament quarterfinals at Bellator 85. He was defeated by Zayats in the first round by knockout after Zayats landed a spinning back fist.
This fight will likely go down one of two ways: Noe wins by knockout or Babalu wins by submission. If Noe is able to keep the fight on the feet, he will likely advance on to the final but if Babalu is able to take the fight to the ground, it will be the MMA veteran advancing to the final.