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| Marloes Coenen, Julia Budd |
On Monday a rumour surfaced on Twitter that Bellator had signed Marloes Coenen and Gina Carano. After some digging, I came to the conclusion that Marloes did sign with Bellator and Gina did not. And new Bellator president Scott Coker confirmed that they did not sign Gina. Today Bellator announced they have signed Marloes Coenen and Julia Budd and they will fight on an upcoming Bellator show. Of course they are heralding this as the next era of the women's division. Two fighters do not make a division. We'll see who else they sign. Both Marloes and Julia have most recently fought for Invicta. Marloes has been around since she won the 2000 World Remix Tournament in Tokyo. Things didn't go so well for her in Invicta. After breaking her hand during an unimpressive win over Romy Ruyssen, she got clobbered by Cris Cyborg. I favour her over Julia because Marloes is a more complete fighter. Julia is a kickboxer who has problems on the ground. She won all four of her Invicta fights but none of those opponents measure up to Marloes. I'm not surprised by this signing as Coker has always been a big Marloes Coenen fan. And unlike other 145lb fighters, Marloes isn't planning a drop to 135. And I doubt that Julia could drop to 135 even if she wanted to. And the biggest problem with a 145lb division is the depth. A lot of 145lb fighters including Cris Cyborg and Ediane Gomes want to drop to 135 to get into the UFC. Among the fighters to consider are Veronica Rothenhausler who will be on the next Invicta show, Amanda Bell who beat Ronda Rousey's BFF Marina Shafir a few days ago and of course the infamous Fallon Fox. And another name I will float because I know Coker likes her is Belgian Cindy Dandois. Cindy had a baby so she hasn't fought for three years. But last year she was training with Miesha Tate. Time for a comeback. As for Gina Carano, as I have said for months, I don't believe she will sign with anyone as there is no mention of the possibility of her fighting in any of her movie contracts and the film producer has to sign off on it. Some producers may not want her to fight. This fight will be on Spike TV. I'll let you know when a date is announced.
The 145Ib division is too thin and I am not sure how Coker builds it up. Strikeforce 2.0? It seems like the old days of Gina/Cyborg and Cyborg/some undersized Asian girls. It would be crazy if Cyborg decides to go to Bellator! I prefer to see some new girls there. Also, how does Invicta keep this division if most of its fighters jump to the 135Ib division and go to UFC? It already gave the 115Ibs division to UFC and now Knapp just has the 105Ib and 125Ib ones. I can't imagine how she survives unless she manages to find new stars.
ReplyDeleteInvicta will survive because Zuffa will buy it if they have to. they need the content for UFC Fight Pass.
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