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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
Bobby Lashley is returning to MMA action this March, but it won't be for Strikeforce.
New HDNet partner Titan Fighting Championships - which featured Tim Sylvia's latest loss to Abe Wagner live on HDNet this January - announced Friday morning that Lashley will headline their March 25 event on HDNet.
The card, which takes place from the Historic Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kansas, also features a bout between Phil Baroni and Nick Nolte.
Lashley will meet M-1 challenge veteran James Jack, a 6-2-1 professional, in the night's main event. This fight marks a return home for Lashley, as he was born in Junction City, Kansas, where his parents still live.
"We received an overwhelming amount of positive feedback from the MMA community following our HDNet debut on January 28," said Titan FC President Joe Kelly in a release. "A lot of unique opportunities have presented themselves to Titan since the show and working with Bobby Lashley was one of them. We are really excited to be working with Bobby as he continues his pursuit of MMA greatness."
"There's a group of regular Titan fans that I communicate with on a regular basis. They serve as a focus group for the promotion, as I bounce ideas off of them and gauge their reaction. When I floated the idea of Bobby fighting on the card, the response was incredible."
Lashley, a former professional wrestler who had been featured in the WWE and TNA, made the move to MMA in 2008, and put together five straight wins before suffering a loss to Chad Griggs in his last fight in August of 2010. There were questions surrounding whether he would return to the sport following the loss, and they've now been answered.
"In the fight game, a fighter is usually viewed as only being good as their last fight. But I don't think that is a fair way to evaluate a fighter, especially an athletically-gifted heavyweight who is only six fights into his career," Kelly stated. "Bobby won't admit it and he refuses to make excuses but the reality is that he was diagnosed with mononucleosis shortly after the fight. Also, if anyone watched Griggs' fight last weekend against Gian Villante, who was widely considered one of the top prospects in MMA coming into that fight, you can clearly see that Griggs is the real deal. Anyone who is writing Bobby off is making a huge mistake. I believe that Titan Fighting will be the perfect platform for Bobby to prove his critics wrong."
Penick's Analysis: This is the right fit for Lashley's next fight. He's still a name that is going to garner some attention, but he means more to a more regionally-based promotion like Titan FC than to Strikeforce for this fight. And with a chance to fight in front of essentially an old hometown crowd it presented a unique opportunity for him. This is the right level of opponent for him to be facing, and hopefully after his loss people can stop trying to project further expectations on him than are necessary, and let him progress as a 5-1 heavyweight.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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