Bellator’s 10th season rolls on with Bellator 117 this Friday night, April 18th coming to us from Council Bluffs, Iowa. The main event features a welterweight battle between Douglas Lima and Rick Hawn that will decide the next welterweight champion. Both men are battle tested in Bellator, as both have won tournaments and have seperated themselves from the rest of the field as the top two men in the weight class. Much has been made of former champion Ben Askren vacating the belt due to a lack of competition, but whereas you had a dominant but boring champion before, the Lima-Hawn fight has a lot of potential for fireworks.
For Bellator, most books wait until the week of the fight to post a line, so be on the lookout. Lima has gone 7-1 in Bellator, with his only loss coming over 5 rounds to Askren, while Hawn is a solid 10-2 under the organization’s flag. His last loss comes to Michael Chandler at lightweight, and as a welter he dropped a Split Decision to Jay Hieron. Both have a l9ot of experience, and they have a lot of experience in the Bellator cage so it is hard to draw too many conclusions from their resumes. This should be a near pick ’em fight when the line hits at the books.
It will be interesting to see if there is a favorite, as the line may have a tendency to favor Hawn. Hawn has an extensive judo background, olympic pedigree and his transition to MMA has been impressive. Lima however, may be the sounder pick when it comes down to the lines. Lima’s JJ background is high level, and competing in that sport all his life he can at least offset some of the advantages Hawn may have in terms of competition. The other factor is tha Hawn competed at 155 lbs, and he lost to the top guy there at the time in Michael Chandler. In a match which is so close on paper, he may be conceding some overall size to Lima, who cannot make 155 lbs. Lima as an underdog may definitely have some value.
