Bellator 54: Makovsky Fighting for Respect at BetLM

Bellator 54: Makovsky Fighting for Respect

Zach Makovsky is very good. How good? It’s dif­fi­cult to truly gauge if he’s amongst the top 10 ban­tamweights in the world.

He stormed to Bellator’s 135-pound tour­ney title last year, but even he rec­og­nizes that he needs to be more active and face a higher level of competition.

“I don’t know. I try not to get caught up in any of that. It kind of is what it is. The UFC is by far the biggest name in the game. I would think to most casual fans, they don’t know the sport is called Mixed Mar­tial Arts. To them, the sport is Ulti­mate Fight­ing,” Makovsky told Bloody Elbow’s Matt Roth. “It’s frus­trat­ing from that kind of stand point. But at the same time you appre­ci­ate what the UFC is doing and they’re obvi­ously doing good things for their business.”

Makovsky (13–2) is one of the head­lin­ers against Ryan Roberts at Bel­la­tor 54 tomor­row night in Atlantic City.

Bellator’s tour­na­ment for­mat is great because you con­trol your own des­tiny, but the tele­vi­sion expo­sure from the WEC might have been more ben­e­fi­cial over the last few years.

“I mean, of course if I fought in the WEC ear­lier I would have had that expo­sure so peo­ple would know me bet­ter but I kind of really started build­ing my name in Bel­la­tor. I kind of was under the radar until I got in the tour­na­ment and ended up win­ning it. There’s not much else I could have done oth­er­wise. I don’t think the WEC would have had me in there before I cre­ated a name in Bel­la­tor which is a good thing about Bel­la­tor,” said Makovsky.

Makovsky’s story is sim­i­lar to many of the elite fight­ers around mixed mar­tial arts. He was a stand­out wrestler at Drexel in Philadel­phia, but unlike most high level col­lege wrestlers he wasn’t a big high school star. He walked on at Drexel and when he was pushed to new lim­its, Makovsky took it as a chal­lenge and made him­self into an elite grappler.

The 28-year-old has a bright future and at 5-foot-4, he looks like a can­di­date to be a hot shot down at 125 pounds when that divi­sion blows up. But he’s got to get his work done at Bel­la­tor 54.

Roberts is big for the weight. He’s got UFC expe­ri­ence and been in there at light­weight with guys like Mar­cus Aure­lio, Don­ald Cer­rone and Duane Ludwig.

Related: Bel­la­tor

Related Posts:

• Bel­la­tor 54 Recap: Vianna Destroys Baker, Makovsky Cruises Past Roberts
• Bel­la­tor CEO Reb­ney Talks His Fight­ers, Spike and the Olympics
• Bel­la­tor 45 Weigh-in Results: Tour­ney Final­ists All on Weight
• Travis Browne — Respect Your Elders
• Travis Browne — Respect Your Elders

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