Bellator CEO Rebney Talks His Fighters, Spike and the Olympics at LinesMaker

Bellator CEO Rebney Talks His Fighters, Spike and the Olympics

As Bel­la­tor CEO Bjorn Reb­ney looks at what has hap­pened in the fifth sea­son, he can’t help but still be amazed at how well his fight­ers per­form week in and week out. He talked to Cagewriter about some of his favorite moments of the sea­son and Bellator’s future.

“The thing that’s made me happy is the level of fights. From event no. 3 on, they’ve just been great. Dan­tas’ fly­ing knee, Alexis [Vila], the way that he knocked out Joe War­ren was crazy, Brian Rogers, and say­ing to me in the incred­i­bly artic­u­late way he speaks as a teacher, ‘I’m going to bring it.’ And then he did. Shle­menko pulling of a sub­mis­sion vic­tory, there’s all these things that have been jump­ing out at me. There’s just been moment after moment,” Reb­ney said.

One of the fights that he is most look­ing for­ward to is the Nov. 19 title fight between champ Eddie Alvarez and tour­na­ment champ Michael Chan­dler. He says that no one should count out Chandler.

“Nobody is talk­ing about Chan­dler in the upper ech­e­lon of the divi­sion. I’ll be hon­est with you. I don’t know if I can count on one hand the guys who can beat him.”

That fight will air on MTV2, but with the UFC end­ing their rela­tion­ship with Spike TV, there’s a chance that Bel­la­tor could switch to the sta­tion that is aimed towards young men. Bellator’s pre­lim­i­nary fights air on Spike’s web­site, and Bellator’s deal is with MTV’s par­ent company.

“We’re a great posi­tion in that our deal is with MTV net­works, so it’s that larger cor­po­rate umbrella. They con­trol Spike, MTV, MTV2. You never know what the future will bring. The fore­see­able future will be what it is, which is MTV2 and Spike.com for the pre­lims, but Spike is bet­ter than any­one in this space. They get it bet­ter than anyone.”

Reb­ney is also excited about some of the chal­lenges com­ing up for his fight­ers, both in and out of Bel­la­tor. He said that they are work­ing on a match-up between DREAM fighter Shinya Aoki and Alvarez, but that it will likely hap­pen in Feb­ru­ary, after Aoki fights in DREAM’s New Year’s Eve show.

War­ren is work­ing on return­ing to his wrestling roots and will try to make the 2012 Greco-Roman wrestling Olympic team. Reb­ney sup­ports the world cham­pion wrestler in try­ing to go for the gold.

“It’s a great plat­form for War­ren. If he can be our cham­pion at 145, and then go and make the U.S. Olympic team, what a great thing for Bel­la­tor and for MMA.”

Related: Bel­la­tor

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