After a relatively quiet Season 3 effort over the past several months, Bellator is set to go out with a bang over the next two weeks. First up is tomorrow night’s Bellator 33 card, which hosts a lightweight superfight between Eddie Alvarez and Roger Huerta, as well as the Welterweight Championship fight between champion Lyman Good and top contender Ben Askren.
Eddie Alvarez vs. Roger Huerta (Main Event)
When former UFC lightweight contender Roger Huerta first signed with Bellator in April, most fans thought a bout between himself and Bellator Lightweight Champion Eddie Alvarez was inevitable. Apparently, they were right, though Huerta’s disappointing semifinal loss to Pat Curran has taken some of the luster out of the affair. Still, this match-up remains the most anticipated by far of Bellator’s third season, as Curran suffered an injury during training, allowing the promotion to put the bout together.
According to Tapology users, this fight is going to live up to its hype. In one of the closes polls in recent history, the champion Alvarez is favored by the narrowest of margins. However, it is interesting to note that, while a slight majority of users are favoring Alvarez, only 19% of them feel he has what it takes to finish the durable Huerta within 15 minutes. Huerta’s backers, on the other hand, feel that he has a solid chance of taking Alvarez out.
BFC Welterweight Championship: Lyman Good vs. Ben Askren
Lyman Good sports a perfect professional record and wears the Bellator Welterweight Championship belt around his waist, but that has not stopped Tapology users from pegging him as a heavy underdog heading into his first title defense. While only 17% of Ben Askren backers feel he has what it takes to finish Good inside of the 25-minute time period, 82% believe he will walk out of the cage with the belt. Apparently an Olympic wrestling pedigree and a brash, confident persona to match makes Askren one of the easiest picks of the month.
“Tapology Fightcenter” is a new series that collects and displays prediction statistics from the Tapology user base prior to every major MMA fight card.