Bjorn Rebney: High hopes for Bellator's welterweight division 'rock stars'

Bellator Fighting Championship's reigning 170-pound champion has been, for lack of a better word, untouchable.

Oh, sure, Ben Askren's been tested, if you consider "tested" to be a couple guys taking some rounds against him. Jay Hieron even got a judge to say he beat him. But for the most part, it's been smooth sailing for the standout wrestler.

And maybe that's why Bjorn Rebney is starting to get excited about the near future for his welterweight roster.

Askren (10-0 MMA, 7-0 BFC) cruised through Bellator's Season 2 welterweight tournament, then beat Lyman Good to win the title. He defended it in 2011 against Jay Hieron and earlier this year against Douglas Lima, getting a unanimous decision sweep against the latter.

But on Friday, at Bellator 79, Rebney, Bellator's founder and CEO, had a couple of welterweights on display that he is hoping, along with a few others, can not only give him an exciting 170-pound tournament in 2013 – but might even be able to give Askren a run for his money.

Lima gave a total beating to Jacob Ortiz for nearly three rounds and finally got a TKO stoppage with 10 seconds left. And Ryan Ford improved to 2-0 under the Bellator banner with a unanimous decision win over Kyle Baker.

"We've got a lot of high hopes for Ryan," Rebney on Friday told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). "He's got things together in his life, and he's been looking real good the last couple times we've seen him fight. I'd love to get him into a 170-pound tournament and love to get all of his past issues behind him and let him just kind of rock and roll at a very high level."

A number of years ago, Ford served a four-year prison term. But he's not alone in Bellator for welterweights with troubled pasts.

Jon "War Machine" Koppenhaver just this past week was released from a prison sentence. Not only is he expected to be part of Bellator's next welterweight tournament, he's part of a web series that kicks off Thursday at Spike.com wherein fans can choose the fight they want to see open the promotion's run on Spike in January.

Not long after Bellator signed Koppenhaver, he was on his way back to jail on an old warrant. But Rebney stuck with him and in January finally gets to see if the patience paid off.

"I kept in touch with him, and as strange as it sounds coming out of my mouth, Jon's making good decisions," Rebney said. "I know that sounds counterintuitive to say, but he's making good decisions. He put himself in the best position he could be in when he was a guest of the state to try to stay out of trouble and get out. He got out, and he's back in the gym already.

"He threw up three times yesterday training, because, of course, he hasn't been doing a lot of training behind bars. But he's back in, training like a wild dog. And his anticipation and hope is that he can be ready to go come late January."

Could War Machine be the one to make it through the next welterweight tournament and dethrone Askren? Could it be Ford? Lima? Paul Daley or Ben Saunders?

Rebney isn't sure, but right now, he likes what he's got at 170 pounds.

"170 for us with the Limas and the Daleys and the Askrens and the Saunders, and Jon Koppenhaver coming back out of jail to join us now, and a lot of the other rock stars we've got, it's a great division."

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