With most of the MMA world idle for the holidays, Bellator and Rizin hosted a cross-promotion event on New Year’s Eve in Japan.
Bellator’s brightest stars including [autotag]A.J. McKee[/autotag], [autotag]Patricio Freire[/autotag], [autotag]Kyoji Horiguchi[/autotag], [autotag]Juan Archuleta[/autotag], and [autotag]Gadzhi Rabadanov[/autotag] represented the promotion against Rizin FF’s lineup. It was a clean sweep for Bellator, as they won all five bouts at the year-end event.
Horiguchi returned to flyweight, where he picked up a unanimous decision win over Hiromasa Ougikubo. The former UFC title challenger re-enters the rankings at 125 pounds this week, marking the biggest move ahead of 2023 events.
Check out all the latest pound-for-pound and divisional USA TODAY Sports/MMA Junkie rankings above.