A lightweight showdown between Benson
Henderson and Islam
Mamedov will serve as the co-main event for
Bellator 273, promotion officials announced Tuesday.
Bellator 273 takes place at the Footprint Center in Phoenix and is
headlined by a heavyweight title unification bout between reigning
champ Ryan Bader
and interim king Valentin
Moldavsky. The main card airs on Showtime at 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m.
PT, while the prelims stream at 7 p.m. ET/4 p.m. PT on the Showtime
Sports YouTube channel, the Bellator YouTube channel and Pluto
TV.
Two other bouts were confirmed for the main card: Henry
Corrales vs. Aiden Lee at
featherweight and Sabah
Homasi vs. Jaleel
Willis at welterweight. Meanwhile, the preliminary draw has
three new additions: Saad Awad vs.
Christopher Gonzalez at lightweight; Romero
Cotton vs. Dalton
Rosta at middleweight and Sullivan
Cauley vs. Ben Parrish
at light heavyweight.
A former UFC lightweight champion, Henderson enters the matchup
with Mamedov on a three-fight skid within the California-based
promotion. After falling to Michael
Chandler and Jason
Jackson in 2020, “Smooth” dropped a three-round verdict to
Brent
Primus in his lone appearance of 2021 at Bellator 268 on Oct.
16. Henderson is 5-6 in Bellator overall.
Mamedov looks like a talent to watch at 155 pounds after defeating
Primus via split decision in his promotional debut at Bellator 263.
The former Professional Fighters League competitor is unbeaten in
his last 20 professional outings with wins over the likes of
Thiago
Tavares, Natan
Schulte and Jorge
Patino.