Fight Facts: Bellator 205
Fight Facts is a breakdown of all of the interesting information and cage curiosities on every card, with some puns, references and portmanteaus to keep things fun. These deep stat dives delve into the numbers, providing historical context and telling the stories behind those numbers.
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TOTAL NUMBER OF BELLATOR EVENTS: 205
Bellator MMA on Friday returned to Idaho, a state it first visited in 2016. Bellator 205 brought with it a plethora of fun matchups and featured the most rear-naked chokes ever at a Bellator event, the extension of a massive winning streak and the quickest fighter to ever earn 12 victories inside the promotion.
NUDIST COLONY: With a whopping five rear-naked
chokes performed throughout the night, Bellator 205 set the record
for the most rear-naked chokes at any event in Bellator history,
eclipsing the mark of four held by nine Bellator events in the
past.
KEEP IT ROLLING: All three fighters at Bellator 205 with undefeated records above 5-0 had their records stay intact, as A.J. McKee, Rafael Lovato Jr. and Adam Borics all won by stoppage.
DEADLY DOZEN: All 12 of McKee’s career bouts have taken place inside the Bellator cage, and he has won them all. By knocking out John Teixeira da Conceicao, McKee extended his own record for the longest winning streak in Bellator history with 12 straight victories.
12 ANGRY WINS: After making his pro MMA debut at Bellator 136 in April 2015, it took McKee just over three years and five months to earn 12 wins in Bellator. He reached 12 wins far faster than any other fighter to ever compete under the Bellator banner, with no other fighters earning their 12th win sooner than about five years and two months.
FIVE BY: Following his first-round knockout of “Macapa,” McKee now has five wins by knockout, four by decision, three by submission.
T-T-T-TODAY JUNIOR!: By forcing John Salter to tap in the third round with a rear-naked choke, Lovato bolstered his undefeated record to 9-0; he has finished his opponent in eight of those victories. His 4:27 win in Round 3 was the second-latest stoppage in a Bellator middleweight non-title bout.
LIVE BY THE SWORD: In losing by submission to Lovato, Salter has still never gone the distance in 19 career bouts. His bout with Lovato marked only the third time Salter had ever fought into the third round.
TRICKY PATRICKY: Patricky Freire scored a second-round knockout of Roger Huerta, and in doing so, he earned his 13th victory inside the Bellator cage, good for the second-most Bellator wins in history. The number ties him with David Rickels, Joe Warren and Pat Curran. They all trail Michael Chandler and Patricio Freire with 15.
TURN THE KEY SOFTLY: By pulling off a rare keylock submission over Ben Moa, Steve Mowry picked up the 14th submission of its kind in Bellator and the sixth for a heavyweight -- the most of any division by far.
NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN: Coming into Bellator 205, “Macapa” had never been stopped (26 fights), Veta Arteaga had never submitted an opponent (six fights) and Moa had never been defeated as a professional (four fights) or an amateur (four fights).
RUN ON FOR A LONG TIME: Salter chose the Johnny Cash cover of traditional folk song “God’s Gonna Cut You Down” as his walkout music and in doing so picked the fourth-most frequently used walkout song over in the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
COULD BE WORSE: In making her walk to the cage accompanied by “Till I Collapse” (Eminem ft. Nate Dogg), Arteaga avoided falling victim to the “Eminem Curse” by submitting Denise Kielholtz. Of all the Eminem tracks she could have selected, “Till I Collapse” celebrates the most recorded wins of any Eminem track when used in the UFC.
Jay Pettry is an attorney and a statistician. Writing about MMA since he started studying the “Eminem Curse” in 2012, and writing for Vice Sports and Combat Docket along the way, he put together many fight result and entrance music databases to better study the sport. You can find him on Twitter at @jaypettry.
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