Bellator Kickboxing Launching In April On Spike TV

Bellator MMA held a press conference on Thursday, which was hosted by the promotion’s President Scott Coker. At the conference, Coker announced that Bellator MMA would be getting into kickboxing. The name of the new promotion is Bellator Kickboxing and will be co-promoted with Octagon Kickboxing.

The first event will be on April 16th at the Pala Alpitour in Turin, Italy and will air on Spike TV following a Bellator MMA event. Coker brought out some of the fighters that would be joining the promotion. Kevin Ross, Joe Schilling, Keri Taylor-Melendez, and Anastasia Yankova.

“You’re going to see cards with both kickboxing and MMA, like Dynamite, as well as standalone cards that only feature one,” Coker said. When the Glory relationship ended, I said why don’t we just do it ourselves. We know how to do it as good or better than anybody.”

“As a fan, I loved Dynamite. If you love martial arts, it doesn’t have to just be MMA or kickboxing. Why don’t you watch both.”

Coker mentioned that active Bellator MMA fighters can compete in Bellator Kickboxing if they want.

“It’s an open book with us. We’ll have conversations with our fighters, and if they want to do both sports, they can.”

Joe Schilling said that he has two fights left on his Glory contract, including his fight this month. Then his focus will be on Bellator full-time.

You can watch the press conference here:

Make sure to check back in for our coverage of Bellator 149 on Friday night.