Bellator 39 Results And Recap

Added on Apr 04, 2011 by John Petit in

UFC & MMA

Bellator 39 took place Saturday night at the Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, and although it was sparsely attended live, it turned out to be a great night of fights. The main event featured a Lightweight Championship fight between current champion Eddie Alvarez and Pat Curran.

Everyone figured that Alvarez would tear through Pat Curran, and although Alvarez won by a majority decision, Curran made a fight out of it. It was Pat’s tenacious takedown defense that had Alvarez frustrated at points in the fight, but Curran wasn’t able to really land cleanly on Alvarez. Alvarez was very complimentary of Pat Curran, and he told the crowd that he expected Curran to be a champion one day because of how good he is at the age of 23. I have to concur, Curran won a lot of fans on Saturday night, and I see him being very competitive as his career evolves.

Rick Hawn was able to defeat Lyman Good, who fell short again in the lightweight tournament, by split decision. It was a close a fight, and many had scored it for Good, but I thought Hawn did enough to win the fight and advance in the tournament. Hawn was able to use his judo to smother Good in the second round, and I thought that was the turning point in the fight. After that, Good was too concerned with the takedown to really go after Rick.

In the other lightweight tournament fight, it was Patricky “Pitbull” Freire who knocked out Toby Imada by a viscous flying knee that brought back memories of BJ Penn’s win over Caol Uno. Patricky landed the knee and Imada was out on his feet, and all it took was a punch to send him crumbling to the mat. They ended up taking Imada out on a stretcher, but the update is that he is fine and was even telling the paramedics he didn’t want to go to the hospital. I personally hope they made him go, but it will be the Pitbull who will face Rick Hawn in the finals. The winner will face Eddie Alvarez for the title.

UFC vet Ben Saunder mad his Bellator debut against Matt Lee, and by the end it looked like a horror show. I never figured out why the fight was made a catchweight, but the size difference between Matt Lee and Saunders was gigantic. Saunders was able to use his size, and cut up Matt Lee with his elbows while holding him up against the fence. The doctor almost stopped the fight after the second round because of how bad a few of the cuts had gotten, but two minutes into the third the blood had become to much for Lee to deal with and they stopped it. Lee showed a tremendous amount of heart in the fight.

Main Card
Eddie Alvarez def. Pat Curran via unanimous decision (49-46, 50-45, 50-45) for the Bellator Lightweight Title
Rick Hawn def. Lyman Good via split decision (29-28, 28-29, 30-27)
Patricky “Pitbull” Freire def. Toby Imada via TKO (flying knee, punches) – Round 1, 2:53
Ben Saunders def. Matt Lee via TKO (doctor stoppage) – Round 3, 1:24

Preliminary Bouts
Greg Rebello vs. Dan Cramer (After the main card)
Ryan Quinn def. Mike Winters via unanimous decision
David Jansen def. Scott McAfee via submission (choke) – Round 1, 4:58
Rene Nazare def. Luiz Azeredo via TKO (injury) – Round 1, 5:00
John McLaughlin def. Blair Tugman via unanimous decision