The tenth season of Bellator MMA will begin on February 28th at the Mohegan Sun Arena and the card will be headlined by the opening round of the four man light heavyweight tournament.
The field features former UFC champion Quinton “Rampage Jackson, former Bellator champion Christian M’Pumbu, Summer Series tournament winner Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal, and season eight tournament finalist Mikhail Zayats.
Bellator MMA Chairman and CEO Bjorn Rebney announced the tournament field last week during a conference call and did not state when the finals of this tournament will take place. It has been speculated by several people in the mixed martial arts community that the finals will likely take place on the inaugural Bellator MMA pay-per-view later on this season.
A breakdown of the fighters in the season 10 light heavyweight tournament is below.
Quinton “Rampage” Jackson (33-11)
Jackson was signed by Bellator MMA last year and made his debut with the organization at Bellator 108 in November against Joey Beltran. He defeated Beltran with one second left in the opening round and the victory snapped a three fight losing streak.
This will be the first tournament fight for Jackson since 2005, where he faced Mauricio “Shogun” Rua in the opening round of the 2005 Pride Middleweight Grand Prix Tournament. He is considered the favorite to win this tournament and he will face M’Pumbu in the opening round.
Christian M’Pumbu (18-5-1)
The first ever Bellator light heavyweight champion will take his first step in regaining the Bellator title when he faces Jackson at Bellator 110. He is currently on a two fight losing streak and this will be his first fight since losing the title to Attila Vegh.
When he steps into the cage on February 28th, it will exactly be one year to date that he lost the title to Vegh in the main event of Bellator 91. If he is able to defeat Jackson, it will be his first win since May of 2011, where he defeated Rich Hale by TKO to win the inaugural Bellator light heavyweight title.
Muhammed “King Mo” Lawal (11-3, 1NC)
After losing to Emanuel Newton for a second time in 2013 in an interim title bout, Lawal will enter the Bellator MMA tournament for a third time. Both of his defeats in Bellator have come against Newton, and all three of his wins in Bellator have come by TKO/KO.
If people do not consider Jackson the favorite, then Lawal would be the other favorite to win this tournament. He has been through this process before and won the Summer Series tournament last year. He recently tweeted that he was going to Florida to train with American Top Team, as his previous training camps have been in Las Vegas.
Mikhail Zayats (22-7)
After winning five in a row and nine of ten, Bellator MMA signed Zayats to a long term promotional agreement and was entered into the season eight tournament. After defeating Renato Sobral and Jacob Noe by stoppage in the first round, he was eliminated by current interim Bellator champion Emanuel Newton in the final.
He returned to Bellator MMA during season nine and defeated Aaron Rosa by kimura submission in the first round at Bellator 103 in October. It was his ninth career win to take place in the first round and his twelfth overall win to come by submission.