If there’s anything Dana White hates the most, it’s paying his damn fighters. If you’re wondering why so many of his top stars are agitating about retiring or leaving the UFC, that’s why. Full stop.
And if you can find your way to them, Scott Coker and Bellator have their loving arms and wallets outstretched. Last week, another top UFC contender, light heavyweight Corey Anderson, announced that he was jumping to Bellator after having extensive differences with the UFC over his pay and his placement.
Anderson is universally ranked as one of the top five light heavyweights in the world, and one has to figure he’ll be on the fast track to the main event in Bellator. Anderson is an energetic, active wrestler who has showcased some much improved striking over the last couple years, as he displayed when he knocked out the hyped Johnny Walker last November.
From time to time, we’ve seen Bellator enter the market and spray big money on big UFC names to anchor various divisions. Ryan Bader was a top contender at 205 when he jumped in 2017, and he’s since become one of the promotion’s cornerstones, holding both Bellator’s light heavyweight and heavyweight titles simultaneously. He won the former belt off Phil Davis, another perennial top 10 UFC light heavyweight whose wrestle-fuck style didn’t earn him many fans in the Octagon.
Former UFC featherweight champ Cris Cyborg has become the main calling card of Bellator’s women, while former lightweight kingpin Benson Henderson has lended credibility to 155. And if Bellator had full control over fate, their cash outlays on UFC stars would probably end exactly the way they did with Gegard Mousasi and Rory MacDonald. Both were two of the top fighters in the world in their weight classes when they signed with Bellator – Mousasi at middleweight, MacDonald at welterweight – and both won the championships in short order. Then, after medium-length reigns, they lost their titles, in doing so elevating homegrown Bellator stars: Mousasi to Rafael Lovato Jr. and MacDonald to Douglas Lima.
Anderson will have a little bit of a tougher time, if only because 205 is arguably the deepest division Bellator has in terms of real high-level talent. Bader is still champion, having spent most of the last three years beating people at heavyweight, and Davis still lurks as a considerable test. Sambo champion Vadim Nemkov is rising as one of the most promising young light heavyweights in the world, and he challenges Bader for the belt on Friday night. The all-action Liam McGeary could also prove to be a very difficult hill for Anderson to climb.
But one has to wonder, just a little bit, if things might have changed a little if Anderson had waited another week or two. On Saturday night, longtime light heavyweight champion Jon Jones announced that he was dropping his UFC title and moving up to pursue adventures at heavyweight, ending one of the longest continuous teases since Fry and Leela.
That, obviously, changes absolutely everything. Jones and his greatest rival, Daniel Cormier, have had a stranglehold on the division for almost a decade, and now both are out of the picture. That leaves a relatively thin upper class at light heavyweight scrambling to step into the spotlight, and Anderson could have been one of the fighters to take advantage of the power vacuum.
With Jones’ abdication of the title, September takes on huge importance. One could easily see a de facto four-man tournament formed out of two previously scheduled bouts. On September 12, former Jones title challengers Thiago Santos – the only man to ever win a judge’s scorecard against “Bones” – and Glover Teixeira face off. Two weeks later, it’s No. 3 ranked Jan Blachowicz versus Dominick Reyes, who many (such as myself) thought deserved a decision win over Jones in their title fight earlier this year. The UFC announced late Tuesday night that the Reyes-Blachowicz fight will now officially be for the vacant title, and one has to imagine the new champion’s first challenger will most likely come from the winner of Santos-Teixeira.
Wrestlers of Anderson’s ilk have often had trouble moving up the ladder in the UFC, but the former NAIA All-American had gradually been displaying a greater level of comfort and willingness to stay on the feet. Nevertheless, Anderson wouldn’t be in this picture anyway, owing to an explosive one-punch knockout loss to Blachowicz in February that ended a four-fight win streak.
Still, let’s say Blachowicz comes out of this fray with the belt. Let’s not forget, the Anderson-Blachowicz fight earlier this year was actually a rematch – Anderson won the first fight by decision in 2015, and perhaps there could be some interest and momentum towards building to a rubber match. Meanwhile, if the respected veteran Teixeira makes it out with the gold, even better for Anderson, who nullified Teixeira with his wrestling in 2018 in the Brazilian’s most recent defeat.
Anderson could very conceivably be one or two good wins away from a title shot in this new UFC landscape, where if Jones was still the champ, the picture would be a little less clear. Nevertheless, the die is cast for Corey Anderson. He’s committed to Bellator. The road there doesn’t look that much easier than it would be in the UFC, but the goal of gold is still the same. Let’s see if he can finally make that leap.
The Big Fight 