Dynamite 1 Fallout

It was Bellator's Big Night. An event they had spent months hyping. The basket they put all there eggs into. It not only featured a big title fight with Tito Ortiz who for better or worse has come the face of Bellator in recent years challenging. It also featured a one night tournament and it was a hybrid show with Glory Kickboxing rules fights. The truth is Bellator could have done three separate shows with each of those as the hook. Instead though they went for broke. And I can't help but feel the event was a let down. Don't get me wrong I have seen worse shows. By no means were these the worst fights I have seen. But this show just felt like a missed chance. Instead of a major event it felt like two average shows put together.

Of course the biggest news coming out of Dynamite 1 was Fedor Emilenko's return to MMA and his reunion with the founder of Pride. Fedor's return will headline a New Year's Eve event that will be broadcast on Spike TV. The problem for Bellator is this show appears to one they have nothing to do with. The announcement began with Kevin Kay of Spike TV not Bellator boss Scott Coker introducing it. No mention was made of Bellator during the segment. Some have suggested Bellator will co-promote the unnamed event but it didn't come off that way. If they were going to co-promote or even loan one of there fighters as Fedor's foe it would have made all the sense in the world. Instead Fedor, Kay, and Nobuyuki Sakakibara stood together as Scott Coker snuck into the photo at the last second.

Production wise I really felt like I was watching a Pride FC tribute show and I mean that in a bad way. One thing Coker had going for him was the fact Strikeforce came off as it's own product. Same with Bellator back when it started. But since Viacom took over more and more it feels like Bellator is about using stars from other companies. For better or worse Tito Ortiz has become the face of Bellator. The spent big money on Phil Davis and brought in veteran Josh Thompson. Davis can be viewed a coup given his top five ranking but the fact Thompson I don't they really needed to go after. Thompson entered the show on a 3 fight skid. On top of that he's nearing age 37 and had openly talked about retirement. Honestly I feel Bellator would have been better off giving Thompson slot to another younger fighter. And I'm not the only one the feels this way as current Bellator Lightweight champion Will Brooks lashed out at the company on Twitter after Liam McGreay's interview was cut short to let Tito Ortiz talk.

Now like I said this felt like Pride Tribute show and it was clear that is what they were going for. In all the build up for the event we were reminded time and again about the old Pride and K-1 crossover shows. The stage was built to look like Pride's old event. They not only brought out fighters for a parade but even spent money to bring in Pride's old announcer. The problem is they are not Pride. Pride was it's own thing. It had it's own rules it had the best fighters in the world. Bellator might hope it can win over fans looking for a Pride fix but honestly I think those fans will just watch Fight Pass

The In Ring Action- The main card started with the first match of the tournament Muhammad “King Mo” Lawal taking on Linton Vassell. Over the last few years Mo has tried to be come more of pure boxer. It seemed like a recipe for disaster given Vassell's massive reach. But Lawal got more brawl style in this time landing a number of power punches that hurt Vassell in the first round. Surprisingly Mo didn't seem like he tried to finish often allowing Vassell to recover and get back into fight. Post fight King Mo blamed a slick canvas. He clearly slipped early on and fighters on the prelims also slipped. Vassell had better second round but never took control. It appeared Lawal had stamped his ticket to the finals but suffered an injury during the fight that took him out. The second fight of the opening round featured Phil Davis' Bellator debut against former champion Emmanuel Newton. In his two prior fights coming in Newton has looked awful and that trend continued here. Newton never got going and Davis easily took him down and submitted him. It gave Davis his first finish since 2010 but the problem is it doesn’t' show Davis is any better. Newton doesn't represent an elight fighter just another guy Davis would have easily beat in the UFC.

Than it was time to move to the Glory portion of the night. Calling it Glory isn't fair as only one fight featured Glory fighters instead two of the fighters were about promoting Bellator fighters using Kickboxing fights. Keri Anne Taylor-Melendez entered with a 2-1 Kickboxing record but hadn't fought in years. Still though she looked much better than her Hadley Griffinth who was making her kickboxing debut. Griffinth has fought MMA in the past but in six pro fight and eight total counting her armature career she only won once. It was a terrible mismatch. Melendez through great combinations landing at will. Griffith looked nervous and unable to land anything. There was never any doubt that Melendez was going to win. Now I have no problem with having Women fight but the problem is this wasn't the start of Glory doing a women's division. It was made clear Melendez will soon debut for Bellator. The second Glory Rules fight saw Paul Daley battle Fernando Gonzalez. Both men have kick boxed in the past but are more known as MMA fighters.

I really don't get this. Daley had openly called out Glory's best. Why giving him Nikey Hozelkin was unlikely there were still plenty of good fighters Glory could have used. That said I would assume it was Bellator or Viacom that came up with this. Using the Glory ring and name but just hoping Daley would score a big knockout and not have to worry about the ground game. The MMA side of things picked up with Josh Thompson making his Bellator debut. Thompson was given an easy win over Mike Bronzoulis. It was clear Bronzoulis had no answers for Thompson on the ground as The Punk stopped a three fight skid. Finally some actual Glory Kickboxers stepped into the ring as Saulo Cavalair re-matched with Zack Mwekassa for the vacant light heavyweight title.. Last time Cavalair knocked the Black Beast out with a head kick and tried to replicate that magic. The fight was good. Sadly the Glory Light Heavyweight division was built around Tyrone Spoong who had fought for Glory since a leg injury. And former champion Gokhan Saki who vacated the title after a contract dispute.

Than it was time to return tournament and the last thing Bellator wanted to happen happened. Going into this event Bellator made it clear they would have an alternate bout but didn’t' want the winner to actually advance. They even modified the rules to give the judges two chances to pick a winner in event of a draw. They had said “If the winner of a round cant' advance than the loser will.” The commission though stopped that. King Mo suffered a rib injury and was unable to move on. Under Bellator's modified rules that should have meant Linton Vassell got a second chance. Except the California Commission refused to allow that saying Vassell had taken to many punches in the head. Instead Francis Carmont advanced. Carmont has mostly fought at middleweight. He was a mid to low level fighter in the UFC. Davis easily knocked him out. But it's hard to be impressed by it. The UFC would be ripped to pieces if they had booked this fight. Of course Davis won this fight he's a better fighter from a higher weight class.

Finally it was main event time. For better or worse Bellator has built itself around Tito Ortiz. They put him big fights. They keep doing Unrivaled specials to hype him up. Early on Ortiz manged to score a takedown and seemed to turn back the clock until he was caught in an inverted triangle by champion Liam McGeary. The fact McGeary was so easily taken down by Ortiz is worrying but he still managed to get the win. Ortiz who is usually an excuse machine opening declared this was the best he's been in years and gave McGEary the credit for what he did.

Biggest Winners

RFA and WSOF- Both companies put on very good shows that were better than Dynamite. Hopefully people checked them out. Bellator is clearly number 2 in terms of size but it's not number 2 in terms of putting on the best show.

Liam McGeary- He kept the title. Even with all the promotion built around Ortiz most knew going it McGeary should win. Still though fights like this scream trap. And down side of losing isn't people going “He lost to a legend.” Its people going “He lost to a guy that one like one fight in the UFC since 2006. It juts shows how bad Bellator is.” The win doesn't make McGeary elite but it shows he's not a can. Also a win over Phil Davis will get people talking. Plus if nothing else McGeary can smile knowing he jacked up what ever plans Viacom had.

Phil Davis- Similar to McGeary, Davis was expected to win. But how many times have we seen heavy favorite upset? Davis did what he needed to do he came into the event in shape ready to fight. Why there are doubts about how good the men he beat are compared to fighters he's already faced and beat. Still though Davis got his first finish in years and than capped off the event with another one.

Biggest Losers

Glory- This show did get a lot of press and the idea of having Kickboxing and MMA could be a good hook. Glory has often tried to use MMA fighter to promote the company. This could have been a great chance to win over MMA fans. The problem as I said above was the fact two of the three Glory Rules fight weren't with Glory fighters. When I watch Glory I see high level technical fighters and many great finishes. Two of the fights were pretty one sided mis matches. Also it doesn't help none of the fighter were finished. With two of the winners moving back to Bellator, Glory can't even promote them on upcoming cards.

Emanuel Newton- Remember when this guy was on a winning streak held the Bellator Title and could be argued as a legit top ten fighter? Man that seems like forever ago. The warning signs were there against Linton Vassell. Newton looked off in the fight and needed a fifth round submission to keep his title. That could be explained away as one bad night one bad match up than he looked even worse against Liam McGreary this time there would be no last second finish to save his title. Worse for Newton he tested positive for Pot. Newton talked a good talk before the fight. Admitted he had taken things to easy. Had bought own hype to much. Than Newton went out and looked awful against Phil Davis. Yes Davis was the heavy favorite going into the event. But that is 3 awful fights in a row and 2 bad losses in a row. Newton is 45 fights into his career you have to wonder if his best days are behind him.