Bellator 206 Poses Tough Test for Former Title Challenger Higo

Leandro Higo joined Fight Night Picks’ Craig Allen on Monday to discuss his upcoming bout at Bellator 205

Leandro “Pitbull” Higo (18-4) is in a precarious position. The former bantamweight title challenger, who faced champ Darrion Caldwell (13-1) at Bellator 195 in a losing bid is now set to face one of the hottest prospects in MMA in Aaron Pico (3-1). For Higo, he sees plenty of opportunities to shine in his featherweight debut.

“Pico has been a bit impressive lately,” said Higo with the aid of translator Matheus Aquino. “But he doesn’t fight anyone who is really in a position to oppose him. The only fight that he got hit, he was flat so we can see that his chin isn’t the best, doesn’t seem like he takes it well to taking shots and he doesn’t absorb them well and that’s one big flaw to have in an MMA fight.”

“His ground game, we know he has wrestling and we know he has boxing but he has several holes in his striking and he doesn’t seem to have any good jiu-jitsu as well. So I’m glad to test him on his weaknesses — I’m also looking forward to showing the difference in our ground game.”

Title aspirations for Higo lie in the bantamweight division, as coach and mentor Patricio “Pitbull” Freire is also the reigning Bellator featherweight champion. Higo was featured on The Ultimate Fighter: Brazil 4, going 1-1 before catching on with RFA/LFA. There, he became bantamweight champion and in 2017 made the move to Bellator where he was able to push then champion Eduardo Dantas (20-6) to an unsuccessful split decision.

“I think that after I beat Pico, it will sure put my name very high, a lot of people (will) know about me because he has a lot of presence in the media and the US,” said a confident Higo. “Realistically I see myself as a top five featherweight, but the belt that I’m looking for is the one in my division, bantamweight. I plan to be fighting in both divisions because I want to be very active and I know it’s harder for Bellator to get me fights at bantamweight so my plan is to do one fight at featherweight, another at bantamweight until I get the belt.”

“In the future we’ll see what happens but I would love to be a two-division champion. Right now Patricio is the champion so I don’t think about fighting him, but you never know how long he’s going to be in that division. If he’s going to move up, or perhaps he may want to move down as well.”

Higo’s second title challenge came this spring at Bellator 195 against the aforementioned Darrion Caldwell. Though it resulted in a first round submission loss, Higo’s still eager to rematch whether at 135 lbs or 145 lbs.

“I think he’ll (Caldwell) eventually move up,” said Higo. “But he’ll try to defend his belt. I hope I’m the one to challenge him, I don’t see him moving up that quickly to featherweight within a year. So I want to be in a position to fight him again within a year and get the belt from him before he moves up for good.”

In a top-heavy bantamweight division, title challengers have been few and far between. UFC vet Michael McDonald recently fought former champ Eduardo Dantas at Bellator 202 in July, only to have the pair sidelined with multiple injuries. A win for Higo over the surging Aaron Pico, even at featherweight, could hold title implications for the “Pitbull”.