Hey fight friends. We’ve got a super packed weekend, with combat sports all over the place. There’s a ton of MMA on Friday, a little more on Saturday, and a top level boxing event to close things out. Let’s figure out who’s fighting whom.
FRIDAY
World Series of Fighting is a little desperate. Lightweight champ Justin “The Highlight” Gaethje has been beating up so many opponents that WSoF is throwing together an eight-man one-night tournament to determine his next challenger. Two of Gaethje’s recent opponents, Luis Palomino and Richard Patishnock meet in the first round. The other fighters in the tournament include “Handsome” Mike Ricci, Brian Cobb, Joao Zefferino, Brian Foster, Jorge Patino and Islam Mamedov. The prelims, which will be on WSOF.com, start at 8 p.m. ET, while the main card is on at 11 p.m. ET on NBC Sports.
Bellator is also featuring Friday night throwdowns. Prelims kick off at 7 p.m. ET, on Bellator.com and Spike.com, and there should be some choice moments there. The main card is at 9 p.m. ET on Spike TV, and the main event is going to be nuts. Hisaki Kato and Melvin Manhoef will be throwing fists at each other’s faces with the cruelest of intentions.
SATURDAY
Hey, it’s TUF Latin America 2’s finale! I didn’t watch that series, which means you probably didn’t watch it either. Anyway, early prelims are on Fight Pass starting at 6:30 p.m. ET, regular prelims start at 8 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1. The main card will begin at 10 p.m. ET, also on Fox Sports 1. While we don’t get Matt Brown taking on Kelvin Gastelum in the main event, we do get Neil Magny stepping in on short notice to face Gastelum, so that should be a good fight.
For once, UFC isn’t the biggest game in town. Miguel Cotto will be facing Saul “Canelo” Alvarez for the middleweight title, exclusively on pay per view. The event starts at 9 p.m. and will feature a three-bout undercard.
