Cage Warriors belts, what are they worth ?

[Koniradi98]

What are they worth nowadays ? they meant to be a ticket to the UFC, but now it seems like CW is giving them away like free candy, well atleast to guys they want to promote.
The only current CW champ that is UFC level, is BW champ Jack Shore (10-0) imo.

In the last few weeks they announced some new titlefights, but nothing really impressiv.



Bak vs Trueman
Bak vacated his LW title before even defending it once in order to fight for the FW title. ( I can't imagine that Paddy would have had to do this).


In this Interview, Trueman states that CW told him, that if he doesn't fight bak they would have made an interim titlefight. A bit weird when you consider that Trueman just won the title through a fw tournament where he fought in october and december. Plus he has to fight in the hometown of the contender.

Then the interim WW titlefight between Dalby vs Lohore.
Houston won the title in october and seems to have other interests right now. But I don't really see the need to make a interim title fight, just make it a number 1 contender fight. (To be fair, both would probably beat Houston)


Robertsen vs. Webb for the MW title.
Seems like Billstein got stripped, because he decided to fight Shlemenko in Russia after winning the CW title in september. Where he defeated 3-2 Welterweight Stanton who took this fight on 24 hours notice because Chadwick couldn't make weight. Chadwick got signed by Bellator after this.

Anyway, still a shit fight, both have no notable wins.


And then when you look at the other divisions

HW: Cerilli signed with ONE where he got KO'd by Vera
LHW: Karl Moore signed with Bellator, after he got KO'd by Cerilli when CW tried to make him a double division champ.
LW: Since the title is vacated, I expect them to push Paddy Pimblett again. If not ,Jack Grant or Rhys McKee probably will become champion.
BW: Shore probably will get an UFC shot sooner or later.
FW: Nathan Greyson got signed by Bellator. Before that he got stripped by CW, because he decided to not defend his title after the UFC scrapped the flyweight divison. And that only a few days before his scheduled title defense against O'driscoll.

Generally I have the feeling, that CW belts lost a lot of value, and that CW is extremly obvious trying to push their favourite fighters. And imo CW's current rooster also looks quite weak, especially after Bellator signed a lot solid fighters from this region. particularly the heavier divisions are basically non-existent.

If I am not mistaken the last 2 CW fighters that got signed by the UFC are Molly McCann and Chris Fishgold both managed by CW CEO Graham Boylan.

 

[qw3rty]

Just give all the belts to Paddy Pimblett just like UFC is trying to do with Conor.

HW/LHW situation is really funny

 

[europe1]

To be fair, isn't this buisness as usual for regional feeder-orgs?

 

[TheBrownRanger]

They're regional belts. Nobody is really expected to defend them for that long.

 

[GoldenAzazel]

Well they're the highest level that you can compete in the UK and Ireland.

Soren Bak seems pretty solid with wins over guys like Pimblett, Jacobsen, and Stapleton. You're right though, there's no way he would have been forced to vacate if he was managed by Graham Boylan.

Interim titles almost always mean less than that world title, but if Houston v Dalby happens and Houston wins then you can't deny that's a legit belt to have as well.

As you said Jack Shore is a guy who looks like he has a decent amount of potential and could be UFC level. So that's another belt with a bit of legitimacy.

Personally, I think the UK scene took a bit of a hit when Bellator raped us of our talent, destroyed BAMMA who they seemed to have a positive relationship with, and then told then fans to go fuck themselves when they put MVP v Daley in the US.