If you follow Bellator closely, you’ve seen the evolution of their Middleweight champion, Hector Lombard. Over 2 years ago, Lombard won the first middleweight tournament and claimed their crown, and since then has left a multitude of challengers in his wake. In a recent interview with Sherdog, Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney proclaimed his Middleweight champion Hector Lombard as among the best in the world and rightfully so, but when pushed as to whom he thinks has a shot to stop Lombard, he offered up an interesting response.
“We have an incredibly dominant champion,” Rebney stated when asked about finding opponents for Lombard. “It’s not easy. I think, right now, when you look at Vitor Vianna and Alexander Shlemenko (this season’s tourney finalists), we could provide a good test for Hector Lombard. I think he’s one of the best two middleweights on earth. I think Hector is an absolute monster.
“I think there’s one guy on earth right now that I would look at and say to myself, ‘He could beat Hector.’ His name is Anderson Silva. I don’t know that I would pick Anderson to beat Hector, but it would be one heck of a fight. We’ll see what happens with Alexander and Vitor, and one of those guys is going to come out with a big win.”
We’ll see if the dominant champion continues his ways on November 19th as he fights Trevor Prangley in a non-title fight in Hollywood, Florida. That evening will also see Shlemenko and Vianna facing off for the right to challenge Lombard for his title.
