For the second consecutive month, a combat sports organization embarks on their first pay-per-view. This time around kickboxing company GLORY takes a stab at charging for their product with a massive GLORY 17 card. Normally a GLORY event consists of a small tournament and a couple of feature bouts, but GLORY 17 features two title bouts (heavyweight and welterweight), an eight-man tournament to determine their middleweight champion, a four-man featherweight contender tournament, not to mention fighters like Mirko Filipovic and Andy Ristie on the Spike TV preliminary card, which is fantastic in its own right. The heavyweight title bout features the top two big men in the world as Daniel Ghita takes on Rico Verhoeven in the five-round contest. Welterweight champion Marc de Bonte returns just six weeks after capturing the title to defend against Joseph Valtellini. The middleweight tournament — which will require three victories in one night to win — features eight of the top ten 187 pounders in the world. Before the PPV card starts, a pair of former champions should provide some great entertainment on the Spike TV portion of the card. The legendary Cro Cop snapped a six-fight winning streak since returning to kickboxing in his last outing, and looks to right the ship here against Jarrell Miller. Former GLORY lightweight champion Andy Ristie attempts to rebound after dropping his title, and he faces American Ky Hollenbeck. The Spike TV card also features a featherweight contender tournament, where the winner will be entered in a championship tournament down the road. While this tournament is not for a belt, it does feature four of the top nine ranked featherweights in GLORY, so there is no shortage of talent that will be competing early in the night either. Oddsmaker Nick Kalikas opened the betting lines for GLORY 17 today at Several Bookmakers. The Spike TV portion of the card begins at 8pm ET, while the PPV starts at 10pm ET. ——————– MAIN CARD (PPV, 10pm ET) GLORY Heavyweight Title Rico Verhoeven -160 Daniel Ghita +120 GLORY Middleweight Title TBD TBD GLORY Welterweight Title Joseph Valtellini -155 Marc de Bonte +115 Middleweight Tournament Semifinal TBD TBD Middleweight Tournament Semifinal TBD TBD Middleweight Tournament Quarterfinal Artem Levin -405 Alex Pereira +285 Middleweight Tournament Quarterfinal Simon Marcus -230 Joe Schilling +170 Middleweight Tournament Quarterfinal Wayne Barrett -260 Bogdan Stoica +180 Middleweight Tournament Quarterfinal Filip Verlinden -215 Melvin Manhoef +165 ——————– PRELIMINARY CARD Featherweight Tournament Final TBD TBD Jarrell Miller -170 Mirko Filipovic +130 Andy Ristie -505 Ky Hollenbeck +335 Featherweight Tournament Seminfinal Shane Oblonsky -170 Marcus Vinicius +130 Featherweight Tournament Seminfinal Gabriel Varga -305 Yodkhunpon Sitmonchai +225 ——————–
