(Daniel Straus mugshot via…hmm…I want to say Jailbase, maybe?)

2013 has already gotten off to a very rocky start for Bellator featherweight Daniel Straus. Just a few days after he was forced to withdraw from his scheduled April 4th title fight against Pat Curran due to a broken hand, Straus was arrested this past Friday in Broward County, Florida, for driving with a suspended license, possession of over 20 grams of cannabis or three grams of synthetic cannabis, possession of MDMA (ecstacy), and drug paraphernalia possession or use.

The 28-year-old Cincinnati native (born Daniel Mason-Straus) was taken to the North Broward Bureau Detention Center in Pompano Beach on a bond of $2,200, and third-degree felony charges were filed yesterday in the Broward County Judicial Circuit Court of Florida. Straus is currently unlisted in the Broward Sheriff’s Office inmate database.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that Straus has run afoul of the law. As he told ESPN in October:

(Full fight video of Shamhalaev’s tournament-winning performance against Rad Martinez at Bellator 90, courtesy of Wax6ynat Wamxanaeb-P3A MaptnHe3 Fuck You.) 

Another day, another injury.

At last week’s Bellator 90 event, stone-faced Russian “Assassin” (is there any other kind?) Shabulat Shamhalaev wrapped up the promotion’s 7th season featherweight tournament with a vicious knockout over fellow finalist Rad Martinez. In doing so, Shamhalaev earned a future shot at the winner of the Pat Curran/Daniel Straus featherweight title fight scheduled for April 4th. Fortunately for Shamhalaev (and unfortunately for Straus), a broken hand has forced the season six tournament winner out of the fight and has in turn opened the door for the Russian, who will now face Curran a bit earlier than expected. Bjorn Rebney broke the news via his Twitter account:

When I managed to speak to Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney after Bellator 69 in Lake Charles, Louisiana, he spoke very highly of welterweight prospect Andrey Koreshkov, who had just improved to 10-0 that evening.  The twenty-two year old Russian fighter earned a spot in this season’s welterweight tournament, where he would quietly improve to 11-0 at Bellator 74 with a unanimous decision over Jordan Smith. At last night’s Bellator 78, Koreshkov looked to make a name for himself against Marius Zaromskis in the tournament semifinals.

But before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let’s talk about the main event of the evening. Former Bellator welterweight champion Lyman Good took the next step towards earning the title back with a second round TKO over Michail Tsarev, although he arguably could not have picked up a more unimpressive victory. This isn’t to say that Good looked bad up until that point -he didn’t – but because the stoppage was, frankly, cheap. Good accidentally poked Tsarev in the eye in the middle of the second round, causing Tsarev to turn to the referee looking for time out. It looked like the referee was about to call for a break in the action, but Lyman Good pounced on “The Lonely Wolf.” The TKO victory was awarded to Good shortly afterwards.

Video of the main event, as well as Koreshkov’s victory, is after the jump

seven by JMMANow

Spiritwolf vs Zaromskis (courtesy of IronForgesIron.com)

The fighters in Bellator may not get the same respect and acclaim as their Zuffa-based brethren, but at least they have video evidence to back up their wild fight stories. Season six of our favorite Friday night fights marched on last night, and here’s how it all went down.

The rematch between Waachiim Spiritwolf and Marius Zaromskis was far more eventful than their initial clash, though the ending was just as unsatisfying. After spending the opening minutes pressed against the cage, Zaromskis took advantage of the space created by a ‘Tan’ Dan Miragliotta break to land a backward elbow that opened a small vertical cut between Spiritwolf’s brows. The Native American responded with a slam, but Zaromskis was immediately back to his feet. The pair spent the remainder of the round tightly clinched with Spiritwolf working very hard for short-lived takedowns. Round two looked less promising for Waachiim, who had missed weight the day before. He showed signs of fatigue early on and had trouble finding the clinch at the end of his lunging punches. Zaromskis backed him up with a series of knees and kicks to the head, but a bloodied Spiritwolf responded with a torrent of heavy hands that forced the wobbled Lithuanian to retreat. Spritwolf downed him with another punch and closed out the final two minutes of the frame on top, trying to land finishing blows through Zaromskis tight defense.

Unfortunately, the battle would end on the stools and not the canvas…

Before I even begin to analyze this card, let’s get a few things out of the way: No, there were not as many decisions on this card as last week’s smothering performances; the main event ended by submission. No, the card overall was not comparable to a ProElite event, although there was a light sparring session thrown in with the fights that we could have done without. Simply put, the main card of Bellator 65 brought a lot of decisions, but was overall an entertaining event.

The evening kicked off with the opening bouts of the season six bantamweight tournament. The first bout saw Marcos Galvao outwork Ed West on his way to a unanimous decision victory. West attempted to keep Galvao outside with kicks throughout the fight, but Galvao was able to consistently take West down and avoid submission attempts. When the fight would find its way back to the feet, Marcos Galvao threw flying knees and hard rights to win over the judges, 30-27 on all scorecards.

As for the other opening bout of the bantamweight tournament- it happened. That’s about all there is to say about Luis Nogueira vs. Alexis Vila. In a fight that saw very little action, Nogueira managed to avoid Vila’s wild strikes throughout the first round and take Vila’s back. And that’s about it; neither fighter landed anything of significance for the rest of the bout, although Vila was more active than Nogueira for the rest of the fight. Controversial decision? If there was more action, maybe. But since Vila’s offensive output was equally non-existent, it’s hard to say that either fighter deserved a victory.

Say what you want about how bitter SPIKE is acting towards the UFC ever since acquiring rights to Bellator. But after watching Bellator 60 last night in Hammond, Indiana on MTV2, it’s not hard to understand what SPIKE sees in the promotion. Season Six kicked off with a bang, with a new featherweight champion and four men advancing in the season’s featherweight tournament.

Even without considering Joe Warren’s Greco-Roman background, it’s no surprise that Warren’s gameplan would consist of attempting takedowns early and often after the brutal knockout loss to Alexis Vila he suffered in his last fight at Bellator 51. And while Warren found success with his takedowns, he was completely unable to keep Pat Curran on the mat. Curran landed some hard shots throughout the fight, but a hard right knee in the third round put Warren out on his feet. But since the referee didn’t stop the fight, Curran then landed a flurry of punches and knees that caused Joe Warren to turn his back to the challenger. And when the referee still didn’t stop the fight, Pat Curran landed two huge uppercuts that floored Warren, finally ending the fight one minute and twenty five seconds into the third round. With the victory, Curran improves to 17-4 in his MMA career, including a 7-1 run in Bellator.

Video After the jump.

(Props: YouTube.com/BellatorMMA)

The last event of Bellator’s fourth season went down last night in Lake Charles, Louisiana, featuring the finals of the light-heavyweight and featherweight tournaments. Christian M’Pumbu earned his way to the LHW finals by knocking out Chris Davis and Tim Carpenter, and it was business as usual against co-finalist Richard Hale. M’Pumbu dropped Hale once in the first round, but was unable to finish him with a D’arce choke. The Congolese-French standout didn’t make the same mistake twice; after scoring another knockdown in the third, M’Pumbu threw down leather until the ref was forced to stop the fight, picking up a $100,000 check and the title of Bellator’s first-ever light-heavyweight champion.

In the featherweight final, Patricio Freire edged out Daniel Straus to a unanimous decision, earning a rematch with champion Joe Warren, who he lost a split decision to last June. Full Bellator 45 results are after the jump…

It looks like he punched him out, woke him up, and then punched him out again, all inside of two seconds.  Damn, playa.

Well kids, it’s another lazy Sunday, and another look back on Bellator’s last card, conceived and executed for maximum entertainment. Bjorn Rebney and company pour their hearts and souls into each season, and if something goes wrong, there’s only one party to blame: the terrorists. Bellator 41 popped off under the desert sun in Yuma, Arizona yesterday, and we’re tempted to call this a mistake — an outdoor event in the harsh late afternoon sun, where it’s 99 degrees in April? Sure, it sounds harsh and perhaps cruel to the fighters who spent Thursday and Friday purging any spare liquids out of their bodies, but anyone believing that just can’t grasp the next-level meta-thinking that goes on inside Bellator HQ. There’s a higher purpose here, and we’re just too pedestrian in our thinking to follow it.

Something else we cannot always understand is the logic that MMA judges apply when filling out their cute little “official scorecards”, which are apparently legally binding even when no one on the planet agrees with them. We’ve seen this phenomenon before at all levels in every promotion, but it still never fails to incite much wailing and gnashing of teeth among the common MMA fan, including calls for the promotion’s owner to fire the judges involved. For the last time, guy at the bar who tranes UFC: the judges are not employed by the organization, they are meant to be fair and impartial employees of the state’s athletic commission. That judges occasionally seem to be drunker than a cricket in a hubcap cannot be blamed on Scott, Dana, and Bjorn. You blame that on stupid.

Come on in past the jump and we’ll fill you in on last night’s televised card, and discuss the latest “worst decision EVAR”.

“It’s always darkest just before the dawn.  Also during a knockout.”

Another day at the office for those tournament-throwin’ characters in Bellator, with an earlier start time meant to stay out of Big Daddy Zuffa’s sun and results guaranteed to make us look like we have no friggin’ clue what we’re talking about.  For the record, the CagePotato picks for the featherweight quarterfinals in Concho, Oklahoma were Larkin, Reis, Karakhanyan, and Straus.  So who’s up, who’s down, and who choked?  If necessary, re-introduce yourselves to the 145ers, then come on in for quick results from the event.

Just don’t mention last night’s UFC event.  Some of us are wearing our Pride shirts in mourning.

(That’s no mean mug, that’s really just Warren’s normal expression.  PicProps:  Bellator.com)

We bid you good morning, Potato Nation, and we present you with our second installment of preview materials for the upcoming Bellator tournaments, this time running down the 145ers set to do battle in March.  By now you should know that Bellator will be airing live on Saturdays on MTV2, so we’re really going to stop telling you.  But don’t come crying to us when your DVR doesn’t magically start recording the fights in the new time slot, all teary-eyed with your bare face hanging out, asking us what went on and who advanced, because we totally won’t even tell you.

Sorry about that.  Listen, go grab some coffee, and venture in past the jump for introductions and videos for all eight featherweights confirmed for the brackets.