Tonight brings the semifinal fights in the heavyweight tournament. Eric Prindle will take on Ron Sparks, and Thiago Santos will be fighting Neil Grove. Both Santos and Grove are actually replacements for Mike Hayes and Blagoi Ivanov, respectively. Hayes suffered a broken orbital in his quarterfinal win over Grove that took him out of the tournament, then Ivanov was injured earlier this month and forced to withdraw from the fight.
The main event tonight is the long-awaited welterweight world championship battle between current champ Ben Askren and tournament winner Jay Hieron. Hieron comes to this fight having defeated Anthony Lapsley, Brent Weedman, and winning a controversial split decision over Olympic Judoka Rick Hawn in the tournament final. Askren has had only one fight since winning the belt, taking a unanimous decision over Nick Thompson in April of this year.
Join us at 9 p.m. ET tonight when the action gets underway!
SBN coverage of Bellator 56