Usman vs. Shabliy Purse and Payouts: Khabib Nurmagomedov’s Brother Reportedly Banks Big at Bellator San Diego

While the UFC held yet another Fight Night at its Apex facility in Vegas featuring a welterweight bout as the main event, its American competitor, Bellator went to San Diego for a lightweight banger featuring Khabib Nurmagomedov‘s cousin brother, Usman Nurmagomedov. The lightweight champ successfully defended his title against fellow undefeated Russian, Alexander Shabliy, earning himself a generous purse in the process.

Usman who captured the belt in 2022 with a win over Patricky Pitbull proved that there are levels to this game, handing ‘Peresvet’ his first loss in the promotion. With this win, according to Sportysalaries.com, Nurmagomedov who has been active in the promotion since 2021 will take away a guaranteed purse of $500k.

Prior to this fight, the undefeated Russian champion had defeated MMA veteran Benson Henderson to defend his title and now he has done it again for the second time in the promotion’s Championship Series at  Pechanga Arena. As for the challenger, Alexander, he took home the guaranteed show money of $300k for his effort to derail the champion.

Meanwhile, the card also delivered the goods, firing on all cylinders giving the fandom what they were longing for – pure unadulterated violence!

Bellator’s San Diego card goes down as a banger of an event

While Bellator put together a lightweight title fight in the main event, featuring an all-out Russian affair pitching two undefeated fighters, the co-main event of the evening also stole the headlines despite the unprecedented postponement of Raufeon Stots vs Marcos Breno.

Instead, the promotion moved Lorenz Larkin to co-headline the event against the Georgian Levan Chokheli.

What transpired next was a vicious first-round TKO win for Larkin over his Georgian counterpart Chokheli.  Lorenz wasted no time and pounced on his opponent as soon as he was rocked, finishing him in a jiffy in under two minutes! Former Bellator welterweight champion, Douglas Lima was another name that caught the attention of fans.

He got into the octagon to fight America’s Aaron Jeffery. But after their three-round affair, Jeffery picked off a comfortable unanimous decision win over the Brazilian to improve his position in the standings. ‘Lady Samurai’ Sumiko Inaba also put down a beatdown, stopping her opponent, Mackenzie Stiller in R2 after some brutal ground shots in the main card flyweight thriller.

Armenian-born Jora Ayvazyan also registered a win defeating fellow lightweight Yancy Medeiros in their three-round duel, earning himself a cold one.