Earlier this year, Bellator imported Polish MMA heavyweight Damian Grabowski and it yielded mixed results. To put it like Chael Sonnen, Grawbowski collectively ‘spent more time on his back than a Thai hooker’. He squeaked out a win against Scott Barrett in Chicago only to lose a unanimous decision to Cole Konrad just weeks later. If you spelled Cole with a ‘K’, the probablity of him being a Mortal Kombat character would increase.
Now Bellator has welcomed another Polish phenom to their organization, lightweight Marcin Held. In a period of activity that would even make Stefan Struve jealous, the 18-year-old is rocking a 10-1 record with 25 amateur fights. Clearly fighting his way out of his mother’s womb was declared his first amateur bout, and he won by decision. At this rate if he continues to fight until Randy Couture’s age he will have somewhere around 5,000 fights under his belt (actually a little over 300). Bjorn Rebney admits that he’s been stalking Marcin Held since the age of seventeen — and that sentence can only work if we’re talking about an incredible MMA prospect and nothing else.
“We have been watching Marcin for over a year and are thrilled to be able to welcome him to Bellator. He is a prodigy in every sense of the word and a tremendous addition to our lightweight division.”
I always thought “prodigy” was no longer a usable term amongst those in the MMA world. Kind of like Michael Jordan who inexplicably had the number ’23’ retired in Miami. Props to Bellator for signing the future of the lightweight division. [Source]
