With his recent win over Alexander Shlemenko who had been riding a 13-fight win streak since 2011, Tito Ortiz silenced the naysayers and proved himself to still be a force in the sport. The Russian fighter was as high as a 1/5 favourite making Ortiz achievement of not only beating him but stopping him after just 2-and-a-half minutes of combat all the more laudable. In his strongly dismissive response when asked about Tito Ortiz recently, Dana White made it all too apparent that The Huntington Beach Bad Boys recent success makes him uncomfortable. He was the one who cut Tito after his loss to Forrest Griffin and now he has potentially armed Bellator with a potential title contender who is irrefutably a PPV draw. Though in the media Dana White portrays Tito to be a can, on his record he has some impressive wins over fighters still ranked in the top 10 of their respective divisions like Ryan Bader and Vitor Belfort as well as a draw in a fight in which he dominated with Light Heavyweight royalty Rashad Evans. With performances against top competitors like these, Tito Ortiz though without doubt on the decline now adds a lot of legitimacy to the ranks of Bellator MMA. New fans to the sport could well see Tito Ortiz record with his win over Belfort and think that Bellator is an alternative to the UFC rather than being a lower-rung promotion.
Hailing from South East London, Sam Heard is an aspiring writer and recent graduate from the University of Warwick. Sam's favourite things include energy drinks, late nights spent watching the UFC with his girlfriend and annihilating his friends at FIFA.
