Stephen Espinoza & Showtime to Run Bellator

Very thought out reply! Great debate.

But, in MMA your only as good as your last fight! All the guys you stated are on the decline either in Age or perfomance or Both!

Fortune is the only Bellator fighter who could walk into the UFC and be a top 10 contender! No other Bellator fighter could do that.

This is why he is the Key to the Future of Bellator! The others you stated are just Card fillers with no hope of being a breakout star like Fortune!

Bellator has used the guys you stated and the perormances are lackluster at best...no fan excitment.

Tyrell is a guy that gives fans excitement do to his growing potential. It's like watching Conner, or Stylebender in there first few UFC fights...there is anticipation there for greatness.

Kongo, UFCers, Ayala, and the rest don't have that.

See Rampage's, Mir's, Country's, Mitrione's last fights and tell me i am wrong!

They are just name value for Sherdogers but can't move the needle for growth..any one who does not fallow MMA would be turned off by there performances.
 
Very thought out reply! Great debate.

But, in MMA your only as good as your last fight! All the guys you stated are on the decline either in Age or perfomance or Both!

Fortune is the only Bellator fighter who could walk into the UFC and be a top 10 contender! No other Bellator fighter could do that.

This is why he is the Key to the Future of Bellator! The others you stated are just Card fillers with no hope of being a breakout star like Fortune!

Bellator has used the guys you stated and the perormances are lackluster at best...no fan excitment.

Tyrell is a guy that gives fans excitement do to his growing potential. It's like watching Conner, or Stylebender in there first few UFC fights...there is anticipation there for greatness.

Kongo, UFCers, Ayala, and the rest don't have that.

See Rampage's, Mir's, Country's, Mitrione's last fights and tell me i am wrong!

They are just name value for Sherdogers but can't move the needle for growth..any one who does not fallow MMA would be turned off by there performances.
Again, you try to change the goalposts to fit your narrative. The here and the now, the actual present, Bobby Lashley on any Bellator card will out draw anything Tyrell Fortune. Anything Cheick Kongo right now will out draw any matchup Tyrell Fortune. I'm not referring to the future, I'm referring to the present. Bobby Lashley could headline any Bellator card and put him against Fedor Emelianenko or Ryan Nader or Vitaly Minakov or Cheick Kongo, those matchups would be a ratings bonanza. Put Tyrell Fortune in against any of them not named Bobby Lashley or Cheick Kongo, those fights would not draw what Bobby Lashley or Cheick Kongo would draw. Those are facts. I am not mentioning exciting fighting styles, I'm not mentioning would could be one day in the future, I'm starting the current day and time. Put Linton Vassell vs say Brett McDermott on a England card, he would get a bigger "pop" than Tyrell Fortune in England because Linton Vassell is from England. Put Javy Ayala vs Sergei Kharitonov on a card before Coker's stupid decision of Sergei Kharitonov vs Linton Vassell, and Javy Ayala vs Sergei Kharitonov would have drawn great interest because of the revenge factor from Sergei Kharitonov. Put Ryan Nader vs a then undefeated Vitaly Minakov returning to claim his belt, that fight would have been bigger than anything Tyrell Fortune right now. And it would have viewed as a legitimate bug time Bellator Heavyweight Title matchup. The newly crowned Bellator Heavyweight Champion Ryan Nader vs the returning, undefeated, former Bellator Heavyweight Champion Vitaly Minakov. You debate as if Tyrell Fortune has reached the popularity that Bobby Lashley has garnered from his WWE and TNT wrestling efforts. And you debate as if Tyrell Fortune has reached the popularity that Cheick Kongo has earned during his long MMA career. Tyrell Fortune has not come close to that type of popularity, yet. He may, but not under Scott Coker.
 
Again, you try to change the goalposts to fit your narrative. The here and the now, the actual present, Bobby Lashley on any Bellator card will out draw anything Tyrell Fortune. Anything Cheick Kongo right now will out draw any matchup Tyrell Fortune. I'm not referring to the future, I'm referring to the present. Bobby Lashley could headline any Bellator card and put him against Fedor Emelianenko or Ryan Nader or Vitaly Minakov or Cheick Kongo, those matchups would be a ratings bonanza. Put Tyrell Fortune in against any of them not named Bobby Lashley or Cheick Kongo, those fights would not draw what Bobby Lashley or Cheick Kongo would draw. Those are facts. I am not mentioning exciting fighting styles, I'm not mentioning would could be one day in the future, I'm starting the current day and time. Put Linton Vassell vs say Brett McDermott on a England card, he would get a bigger "pop" than Tyrell Fortune in England because Linton Vassell is from England. Put Javy Ayala vs Sergei Kharitonov on a card before Coker's stupid decision of Sergei Kharitonov vs Linton Vassell, and Javy Ayala vs Sergei Kharitonov would have drawn great interest because of the revenge factor from Sergei Kharitonov. Put Ryan Nader vs a then undefeated Vitaly Minakov returning to claim his belt, that fight would have been bigger than anything Tyrell Fortune right now. And it would have viewed as a legitimate bug time Bellator Heavyweight Title matchup. The newly crowned Bellator Heavyweight Champion Ryan Nader vs the returning, undefeated, former Bellator Heavyweight Champion Vitaly Minakov. You debate as if Tyrell Fortune has reached the popularity that Bobby Lashley has garnered from his WWE and TNT wrestling efforts. And you debate as if Tyrell Fortune has reached the popularity that Cheick Kongo has earned during his long MMA career. Tyrell Fortune has not come close to that type of popularity, yet. He may, but not under Scott Coker.

Rodney, why do you keep bringing up Bobby Lashley? He's 43 and hasn't fought in Bellator since Oct. 2016!
 
Rodney, why do you keep bringing up Bobby Lashley? He's 43 and hasn't fought in Bellator since Oct. 2016!
Merely referring to Bobby Lashley's viewership segment numbers when he has fought on a Bellator card, noting his popularity that Tyrell Fortune has yet to even come close to reaching. Any smart MMA promoter would have long ago taken advantage of Bobby Lashley's popularity, but not Scott Coker. Therein lies some of Bellator's problems.
 
At some point you have to believe there is a shake up coming.

For as much as I bash Coker on how he operates his MMA orgs I do always wonder who else is out there to run it??? MMA promoters aren't exactly growing on trees and many times more than not they all have been failures in the field of MMA. There is a reason why WME kept Dana around. He has 100 times the knowledge of how the UFC works and how to make money in this sport that riddled with nothing but failures for the most part than anyone WME could replace him with.

I guess what really irks me about Bellator is they are making 30-33 million a year from the Dazn deal and they are doing nothing with that money to build the Bellator brand. It's almost like business as usual when they were losing money. It's like Viacom said we paid 50 million for this years back and we spend millions a year on it and we haven't seen much return until the Dazn deal came up and are just pocketing a majority of the money from Dazn to get their investment back. They don't seem interested in building anything long term.

I firmly believe Bellator would be better off being bought out. It would allow the new owners to capitalize fully on media deals, have more of a desire to build the brand and product, and be owned by people with passion for the sport and not just be one little enity in the corner in part of a multi billion dollar media company. It's quite apparent they get minimal attention or support from Viacom/Paramount. Shit, they don't even replay any events of Bellator and advertising is basically bare minimum.
You don't really need to have booked MMA to know how to book MMA. Can take bookers from boxing, kickboxing or wrestling and it would still work. The principles in booking work the same.

It's the booking that Bellator struggles with. Everything else is pretty good, except for Big John. Outside of their grandprix their fights have little direction.

The actual promotion for Bellator is quite good. They have good recognition. They expand to smart markets. They got to Hawaii before the UFC even did. They sign good TV deals, it's really easy to find a way to watch Bellator. Scott Coker does do good things with Bellator - it's just that the fights they put on under his regime have no drama or weight behind them, and they probably put on too many cards.

They have the ability to make stars, they just chose not to. They're too scared of the risk, and rather rely on booking old guys with name rec.
 
Easy solution imo, watch RIZIN, by far the best presentation, production, rulesets, announcers, female Atomweights & many other things. Plus the confessions series *before/after, behind scenes* show is 2nd to none when it comes to hyping up events, telling stories, etc....countdown & embedded arent even close, also KSW is well worth watching too, as is DEEP, Pancrase, RISE if you like kickboxing & Deep Jewels had some of the best cards this year imo
I actively root for Rizin to do well, but they don't have the talent pool that Bellator does. Bellator is the number 2 MMA org in the world, in terms of actual sports (which is what MMA is.)

I see this likely being a positive move.
 
I actively root for Rizin to do well, but they don't have the talent pool that Bellator does. Bellator is the number 2 MMA org in the world, in terms of actual sports (which is what MMA is.)

I see this likely being a positive move.

In the world? Bellator barely pulls in any viewers here in America
 
In the world? Bellator barely pulls in any viewers here in America
In terms of actual sports. As in, the talent level of the fighters, regardless of how popular the org is or is not. That said, Bellator seems to be doing well for dazn and vice versa.
 
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