Bellator Inks Featherweight Karakhanyan
Brian Knapp Jan 5, 2010
Bellator Fighting Championships on Tuesday announced it had reached
an exclusive agreement with featherweight prospect Georgi
Karakhanyan.
The 24-year-old will carry an eight-fight winning streak into Bellator’s second season, scheduled to begin in April. He becomes the latest in a string of acquisitions by the tournament-based promotion, which recently signed 2008 Olympian Ben Askren, Arizona Combat Sports standout Jacob McClintock and Sengoku veteran Dan Hornbuckle.
“Georgi is a proven winner” Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney said in a release. “He brings an explosive style to the cage that makes for great fights.”
A former professional soccer player, Karakhanyan last competed in May, when he earned a unanimous decision against Albert Rios at Call to Arms 1. The Brazilian jiu-jitsu brown belt has delivered eight of his 12 career wins by submission, seven of them inside one round. Karakhanyan, who trains out of the Millennia Mixed Martial Arts Training Center in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., has never been finished. Nicknamed “Insane,” he suffered his lone defeat in a disputed split decision to Chris David in 2008.
“I do some strange things in the cage sometime,” Karakhanyan said. “I talk to my corner; I talk to my opponents. I like to surprise people. That’s what I’m all about.”
The 24-year-old will carry an eight-fight winning streak into Bellator’s second season, scheduled to begin in April. He becomes the latest in a string of acquisitions by the tournament-based promotion, which recently signed 2008 Olympian Ben Askren, Arizona Combat Sports standout Jacob McClintock and Sengoku veteran Dan Hornbuckle.
“Georgi is a proven winner” Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney said in a release. “He brings an explosive style to the cage that makes for great fights.”
A former professional soccer player, Karakhanyan last competed in May, when he earned a unanimous decision against Albert Rios at Call to Arms 1. The Brazilian jiu-jitsu brown belt has delivered eight of his 12 career wins by submission, seven of them inside one round. Karakhanyan, who trains out of the Millennia Mixed Martial Arts Training Center in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., has never been finished. Nicknamed “Insane,” he suffered his lone defeat in a disputed split decision to Chris David in 2008.
“I do some strange things in the cage sometime,” Karakhanyan said. “I talk to my corner; I talk to my opponents. I like to surprise people. That’s what I’m all about.”
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