Yoel Romero picks up vintage 3rd round TKO at Bellator 280
Bellator Fighting Championships returns to us tonight, May 6, 2022, for Bellator 280, going down live from the AccorHotels Arena in Paris, France.
Headlining the event is a heavyweight championship rematch between Bellator heavyweight champion Ryan Bader and Cheick Kongo, nearly three years after their first fight ended in a very anticlimactic no contest.
Since then, Bader went 1-2 down at 205 lbs, losing his light-heavyweight title in the process, though he avenged his defeat to former UFC champion Lyoto Machida in that one victory. However, he is coming off a win, and title defense since moving back up to heavyweight, having defeated Valentin Moldavsky in January.
Kongo on the other hand has gone just 1-1 since then, losing a very close split decision to Tim Johnson, and having submitted Sergei Kharitonov in his last outing last August.
Three-time UFC title challenger Yoel Romero co-headlined the event tonight opposing 10-1 Alex Polizzi, who’s 4-1 in Bellator competition thus far.
Click here for Bellator 280 results
Continue reading to see how this bout went down:
Official Result: Yoel Romero def. Alex Polizzi via TKO (punches) at 4:59 of round three
Polizzi opens up the bout with some leg kicks, but is unable to get any real offense going through the first round. He attempts some takedowns on Romero, none of which did he come close to securing, though Polizzi was able to land a some nice punches to Romero.
Romero was also able to land some punches of his own, and secured a takedown to finish the round one.
Romero really begins to take the fight over in the second, as he’s making Polizzi miss on nearly every striking attempt, even his leg kicks. He also starts to tag Polizzi up pretty bad, stunning him a number of times, and dropping him viciously toward the end of the round. It honestly could’ve been stopped right then and there.
Romero coasts the first three minutes of the third round, but starts to land that nasty overhand right once again and has Polizzi on very wobbly legs, again.
It’s that same overhand right he was landing in the second round, and a right hook behind it could’ve ended the fight a tad earlier. Romero then lands a beautiful jab-cross in the final five seconds and drops Polizzi, before landing a couple follow up punches for the latest stoppage in Bellator history.
Just as we said it could’ve been stopped in the second, well, it wouldn’t quite be a vintage Yoel Romero win then, would it? Of his last nine wins, seven come via third-round knockout, with eight total third-round knockouts throughout his career.
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