Sports blog information from USA TODAY.
Here are the top four honorable mentions and winner of MMA Junkie’s “Knockout of the Year” award for 2023.
With another action-packed year of MMA in the books, MMA Junkie takes a look at the best knockouts from January to December. Here are the top five and winner of MMA Junkie’s “Knockout of the Year” award for 2023.
At the bottom of the post, let us know if we got it right by voting on your choice for “Knockout of the Year.”
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Check out which veterans of the UFC are in combat sports action across the globe this weekend.
This week, the UFC returns to pay-per-view for UFC 291 in Salt Lake City.
The event at Delta Center features a lightweight rematch, this time for the BMF title, between [autotag]Dustin Poirier[/autotag] and [autotag]Justin Gaethje[/autotag].
Elsewhere, many other combat sports events are taking place that feature a number of familiar names that have competed under the UFC banner.
Check out which veterans of the global MMA leader are competing in MMA and bareknuckle boxing this week from July 28-30.
Check out the names and details about their bouts below.
Upcoming event information from Tapology.
Lorenz Larkin is running hot, and he explains why things are going so well for him in his career ahead of Bellator X Rizin 2 in Japan.
[autotag]Lorenz Larkin[/autotag] is on one of the best runs of his professional MMA career and credits a fresh perspective for his success.
When Bellator and Rizin collide for their second co-promotional event in Japan on July 29, Larkin (25-7 MMA, 7-2 BMMA) will look to extend his current winning streak to eight. Standing across the cage from him at Bellator X Rizin 2 will be former Bellator welterweight champ Andrey Koreshkov (26-4 MMA, 15-4 BMMA).
Larkin doesn’t care about the name he’ll be facing. In fact, he believes changing his mentality to not caring about much at all is the reason he’s running so hot at this point in his career.
“I really think I just stopped giving a f*ck about everything,” Larkin told MMA Junkie Radio. “The good thing is, even if something is bothering me like out there, when I fight or when I train, that sh*t is out of my head. I don’t even think about it. But I think for the most part, I just stopped worrying about every-f*cking-thing else that comes with fighting.”
Larkin, 36, says he will also get some added motivation in his second appearance of 2023 because he will be fighting at Saitama Super Arena, which is one of his favorite locations on the planet. However, beyond that, and whatever the result is against Koreshkov, “The Monsoon” just hopes Bellator can keep him active, because he has no plans on slowing down.
“Just keep me busy,” Larkin said. “I’m not even worried about all the other bullsh*t, just keep me fighting. Because with me, when I’m stagnant, that’s the sh*t that’s stupid for me. I either get big, which I’m pretty sure is no f*cking secret now. I get big. If there’s no fight on the table, like, I don’t just f*cking train 24/7. I don’t beat up my body like that. I’m doing other sh*t. I’m f*cking off-roading or shooting, or f*cking doing other sh*t.
“So for me, keep me excited. keep me busy. I never b*tch and complain about opponents. Just keep me busy. So far, I’ve had one fight in February, and then I got this fight now, so we’ll see if that comes true or not. But in the past, it’s been like two fights a year, so I don’t know.”
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For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for Bellator X Rizin 2.
All the UFC and Bellator fight announcements that were first reported or confirmed by MMA Junkie in the past week.
MMA fight announcements are hard to follow. With so many outlets and channels available, it’s nearly impossible to organize.
But here at MMA Junkie, we’ve got your back.
Each week, we’ll compile all the newly surfaced fights in one spot. Every Monday, expect a feature listing everything you might have missed from the UFC or Bellator.
Here are the fight announcements that were broken or confirmed by MMA Junkie or officially announced by a promotion from June 5-11.
The Bellator x RIZIN 2 card continues to fill as Lorenz Larkin enters a fight with high violence potential and Danny Sabatello returns.
Two main card bouts have been added to the upcoming Bellator x RIZIN show this summer.
At Bellator x RIZIN 2, welterweight strikers [autotag]Andrey Koreshkov[/autotag] (26-4 MMA, 15-4 BMMA) and [autotag]Lorenz Larkin[/autotag] (25-7 MMA, 7-2 BMMA) will collide, before bantamweight contenders [autotag]Magomed Magomedov[/autotag] (19-3 MMA, 3-2 BMMA) and [autotag]Danny Sabatello[/autotag] (14-2 MMA, 4-1 BMMA) later on the July 30 card (July 29 in the United States) at Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan. Promotion officials announced the bookings Wednesday.
Koreshkov, 32, has won four straight fights. Over that stretch, he’s alternated fights in and outside of Bellator, as the promotion has allowed him to take bouts outside the promotion. Koreshkov most recently competed at Shlemenko FC 4 in June and won by TKO.
Larkin, 36, has not lost in eight straight appearances and has bounced between middleweight and welterweight. In February, Larkin landed one of the most violent knockouts of 2023 when he put Mukhamed Berkhamov to sleep with a standing elbow in February.
𝗚𝗢𝗢𝗗𝗡𝗜𝗚𝗛𝗧! What a KO from @da_MONSOON 😱
💻 @MonsterEnergy Prelims fueled by @NorthgateGlzMrk | Bellator YouTube
📺 #Bellator290 | 𝑪𝑩𝑺 & 𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒂𝒎𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒕+ | 9pm ET / 6pm PT pic.twitter.com/XlwX1jOc78
— Bellator MMA (@BellatorMMA) February 5, 2023
Magomedov, 31, looks to get back in the win column after a submission loss to Patchy Mix in December. The bout was a bantamweight grand prix semifinal, which Magomedov advanced into after a quarterfinal win over Enrique Barzola.
Sabatello, 30, bounced back in April from a bantamweight grand prix semifinal loss of his own vs. Raufeon Stots. Sabatello defeated rising prospect Marcos Breno by second-round submission.
With the additions, the Bellator x RIZIN 2 lineup includes:
With another action-packed month of MMA in the books, MMA Junkie looks at the best knockouts from February 2023.
With another action-packed month of MMA in the books, MMA Junkie looks at the best knockouts from February 2023: Here are the five nominees, listed in chronological order, and winner of MMA Junkie’s Knockout of the Month award for February.
At the bottom of the post, let us know if we got it right by voting for your choice.
Find out how much weight all 28 fighters at Bellator 290 gained from the Friday morning official weigh-ins to Saturday night’s fights.
At Bellator 290 on Feb. 4 in Inglewood, Calif., 16 of the 28 fighters on the card gained more than 10 percent of their weight back. Two of those 16 exceeded the 15 percent threshold.
MMA Junkie obtained a list of fight-night weights Monday from California State Athletic Commission executive director Andy Foster.
In California, fighters have their weights checked on fight day – not solely when they have to hit their marks on the scale. The extra procedure was instituted in 2017 as part of the commission’s efforts to cut back on excessive weight cutting. Within those rules was a cap on how much a fighter could gain from the official weigh-ins to the fight.
If a fighter gains more than 10 percent back before the bout, the commission can make a recommendation they move to a higher weight class. If a fighter gains more than 15 percent, the commission can potentially cancel their fight.
Check out the weight gains and percentages for all 28 fighters on the card at Kia Forum.
It’s only February, but don’t be surprised if Lorenz Larkin remains a candidate for Knockout of the Year by the end of 2023.
INGLEWOOD, Calif. – It’s only February, but don’t be surprised if [autotag]Lorenz Larkin[/autotag] remains a candidate for Knockout of the Year by the end of 2023. And that has him feeling a certain way.
Larkin obliterated Mukhamed Berkhamov with a hellacious elbow to win by first-round knockout Saturday night at Bellator 290. The finish sent the crowd at Kia Forum into a frenzy given how violent it was, with Berkhamov’s limp body crashing to the canvas face first.
Afterward, Larkin spoke like a man still with a chip on his shoulder at 36.
“It’s just another feather in the cap. For me, it was more so like redemption from what happened last time and from a lot of people thinking that this fight was gonna go the whole other way,” Larkin told reporters backstage, including MMA Junkie. “I think just from my interviews from the last fight showed how much frustration I had, and I had such a good camp the last fight and how I felt, even though he took me down and yada yada yada. I just felt like he had nothing for me.
“For this fight to happen like that, this was no luck. I wish there was f*cking cameras in the back of me warming up. These are the things I work on. I’m more happy in this moment just to show off the hard work that me and my team put in. That’s where it’s at for me.”
It was the second encounter between Larkin (25-7 MMA, 7-2 BMMA) and Berkhamov (15-2 MMA, 1-1 BMMA) after an illegal strike (an elbow) caused their Bellator 283 fight to end in a no contest last July. The finish at Bellator 290 happened while the two men engaged in a back-and-forth of punches before they clinched in the middle of the cage. On the break, that’s when Larkin unleashed his vicious elbow that landed flush to the temple.
Larkin, who became the first man in 16 fights to finish Berkhamov, was glad to leave no doubt, not just because what it says about him but also his team at Southern California’s Millenia MMA.
“If you grab me, these are the tools that I have in my bag,” Larkin said. “And if you give me the opportunity, I’m gonna take it. It’s nothing to cut you. I’m not trying to cut you. I’m trying to do what I did tonight. Everything has bad intentions on it. This is just a little bit of me and a big part of my team.”
LORENZ FREAKIN’ LARKIN WITH THE HELL-BOW KNOCKOUT.
And he was hyped! 😤🙌#Bellator290 | Live results: https://t.co/n3DPN0OQYc pic.twitter.com/8hZeUP66Rb
— MMA Junkie (@MMAJunkie) February 5, 2023
Larkin, who joined Bellator after leaving the UFC in 2016, got off to a rough start when he joined, losing to then-welterweight champion Douglas Lima and Paul Daley in his first two promotional appearances. Things have changed since then as he’s currently on a seven-fight winning streak.
It could be time for another title shot, although Larkin didn’t have a specific opponent in mind for what could be next.
“I never have a name in mind,” said Larkin, who expressed wanting to compete March 31 at Bellator 293 in Temecula. “My thing is, Bellator calls me, they give me a name, I can text back or say yes. That’s it. I don’t need to call nobody out. I’ve fought the best of the best. I’m not scared of nobody. I just take the fights. I don’t need to do all the sh*t talking, all the callouts. At the end of the day, I just put my f*cking head down, I grind it out, and I keep showing up. That’s all I do – lace these f*cking boots and go to work. I don’t need to do all the other sh*t. It comes along with it.”
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for Bellator 290.
Check out these photos from Bellator 290, which took place at Kia Forum in Inglewood, Calif.
Check out these photos from Bellator 290, which took place at Kia Forum in Inglewood, Calif. (Photos courtesy of Lucas Noonan, Bellator MMA)
The attention was on Fedor Emelianenko after Bellator 290, but Ryan Bader continued to show he’s elite in a rematch setting.
The first Bellator event of 2023, Bellator 290, went down Saturday at Kia Forum in Inglewood, Calif., and it marked a monumental occasion for both the promotion and the sport.
In addition to being the organization’s debut showcase on CBS, the card marked the retirement fight of legendary former PRIDE champion [autotag]Fedor Emelianenko[/autotag] (40-7 MMA, 4-3 BMMA), who suffered a first-round TKO loss to heavyweight titleholder [autotag]Ryan Bader[/autotag] (31-7 MMA, 9-2 BMMA) in their main event rematch.
The co-headliner saw middleweight champion [autotag]Johnny Eblen [/autotag](13-0 MMA, 9-0 BMMA) remain undefeated with a unanimous decision win over [autotag]Anatoly Tokov[/autotag] (31-3 MMA, 7-1 BMMA) for his first title defense.
For more on the numbers behind the title bouts, as well as the rest of the card, check below for MMA Junkie’s post-event facts from Bellator 290.
