The Sheet

Fight Day Scratches: None

Fighter Notes:

Fight #9

Steve Garcia

2nd UFC Fight (0-1)

After fighting most of his career at Bantamweight (135 lb), with a few fights at Featherweight (145 lb), Garcia made his short notice UFC debut against Luis Pena in February 2020 up at Lightweight (155 lb), which was the first time Garcia had ever fought at the weight class. Pena smothered Garcia on the ground for the entire fight, finishing with over 14 minutes of control time on his way to winning a decision. Now 20 months later Garcia will fight for just the second time in the UFC, again at 155 lb. Prior to the boring decision loss, Garcia had landed three straight TKO wins in the first eight minutes of fights.

Garcia originally tried to make his way into the UFC through DWCS in 2019, but despite landing a first round knockout victory he still wasn’t immediately rewarded with a UFC contract and instead fought his next fight in the LFA. That was likely due to the fact that Garcia missed weight by 3.5 lb for the 135 lb Bantamweight bout. That win notably came against Desmond Torres, who had spent a good portion of his career down at Flyweight (125 lb).

After not getting a contract, Garcia then took a fight in the LFA in January 2020 up at Featherweight. Despite moving back up to 145 lb, Garcia again missed weight, this time checking in a pound and a half over the limit. In a high-paced brawl, Garcia won with a round two TKO, but it came in a really quick/terrible stoppage with both fighters on their feet and Garcia’s opponent, Jose Mariscal, still fighting back. Garcia did split open the back of Mariscal’s head with elbows on the mat shortly before the fight was stopped, but it made no sense to stop the fight at that point after Mariscal returned to his feet. That win kept Garcia on the UFC radar and when they needed a short notice replacement to step in to face Luis Pena at 155 lb just six weeks later, Garcia was granted the opportunity.

After losing a one-sided, grappling-heavy decision to Pena in February 2020, Garcia withdrew from fights in August 2020 and March 2021 resulting in a 20 month gap between when he last fought and now. So it will be important to monitor him closely at weigh-ins as he prepares to fight at 155 lb for just the second time in his career.

Garcia is now 11-4 as a pro, with eight wins by KO and three by decision. Three of those knockouts have occurred in the first round, three ended in round two and two came in round three. However, three of his last four KO wins notably ended in round one. He’s never been knocked out himself, with his only early loss ending in a R1 submission against a super suspect Aalon Cruz in 2018. Garcia’s other three pro losses have all ended in decisions.

One final not on Garcia, while he only has one fight in the UFC, he previously faced several guys who later made it to the UFC. Garcia was submitted by former UFC fighter and questionable talen Aalon Cruz in 2018 after losing a split-decision loss to 2021 TUF winner Ricky Turcios in 2016. Garcia also has a decision win over UFC fighter Ronnie Lawrence in 2016, although that notably came just a year after Lawrence turned pro.

Charlie Ontiveros

2nd UFC Fight (0-1)

Coming off a bizarre loss in his short notice UFC debut, Ontiveros took on Kevin Holland in October 2020 and verbally tapped following a violent slam where Ontiveros suffered a neck injury and was carted off on a stretcher. Fortunately it was later revealed that he avoided any major injuries and it sounds like it was a muscle injury. Ontiveros started off the fight with a spinning backfist that momentarily dropped Holland, followed by an aggressive Axe Kick. Following the two flashy strikes, Holland said fuck this and took Ontiveros down to the mat with a big early slam. After spending two minutes on his back, Ontiveros was able to briefly return to his feet, but Holland immediately slammed him again and that’s when Ontiveros suffered the injury and verbally tapped. The fight lasted just half a round and the only real takeaways were Ontiveros looked dangerous on the feet and vulnerable on the mat. And just to reiterate, it’s important to note that Ontiveros took that fight on three day’s notice and was fighting up at 185 lb for the first time in his career. Clearly fighting up a weight class, he only tipped the scales at 182.5 lb for the fight. All but one of Ontiveros’ other 17 pro fights have been at Welterweight, with the one exception being a 174 lb Catchweight bout back in 2012 in his second pro match. Interestingly, Ontiveros is now dropping all the way down to Lightweight (155 lb) for the first time in his career. One other note since making his UFC debut, Ontiveros was later fined and suspended for six months when he tested positive for “DHCMT M3 metabolites.”

Prior to joining the UFC, Ontiveros’ landed a pair of first round knockouts and his last seven fights have now all ended in the first two rounds (4-3), with the last four ending in R1 (2-2). He’s 11-7 as a pro, with four wins by KO, two by submission, four by decision and one by DQ. Amazingly, all seven of his career losses have come by KO, although it’s somewhat ambiguous if the loss in his debut officially counts as a KO or a submission as it ended in a verbal tap, but is listed as a TKO. We actually saw a somewhat similar situation earlier in Ontiveros’s career when he verbally tapped due to a rib injury as he was taken down in the third round of a 2014 fight against Rashid Abdullah, which is also officially listed as a TKO. So that’s one thing to keep in mind when placing prop bets on this fight. His last two losses have both ended in R1, as have three of his last four, and his last five losses have all ended in the first two rounds. He’s only been to the third round five times in 18 fights. With a background in Taekwondo and karate, Ontiveros likes to throw a lot of flashy spinning attacks and axe kicks.

With Ontiveros dropping down to 155 lb for the first time in his career, it will be essential to monitor him closely at weigh-ins.

Fight Prediction:

Ontiveros will have a 2” height advantage and 3” reach advantage.

This is an interesting matchup between two strikers who are both coming off losses in their respective UFC debuts and are each fighting at a weight class they’re unaccustomed to. Despite the fact that Ontiveros is the one moving down a weight class, Garcia appears to be the more durable fighter who’s never been knocked out, while Ontiveros has been finished in all seven of his losses with a couple of verbal taps mixed in due to injury. With Garcia coming off a 20 month layoff and fighting up at 155 lb for just the second time in his career and Ontiveros coming off a PED suspension, a R1 TKO by neck injury and fighting down at 155 lb for the first time in his career, this makes for a super high variance spot with a wide range of potential outcomes. If the fight gets ugly, we like Garcia’s chances to land a finish, but if Ontiveros can control the distance he has a solid chance to land a highlight reel finish of his own. The line seems wide given all of the uncertainty, so we prefer betting on Ontiveros with the plus odds, but we’re not confident in either one of these two and a lopsided win for either guy wouldn’t surprise us. With that said, we would be surprised if this fight went the distance and expect it to end in a knockout.

The safest bets here are “Fight Doesn’t Start R3” at -154, “Fight Doesn’t Start R2” at +154, and “Fight Ends in R1 KO” at +190. We’re also taking a stab at “Ontiveros Wins by R1 KO” at +1500 and you can consider his +260 moneyline.

DFS Implications:

It’s hard to take much away from Garcia’s UFC debut as he was controlled by Luis Pena for 14 minutes on the mat on his way to losing a decision. If he was facing another grappler we would have concerns, but Ontiveros is a pure karate/Taekwondo style striker who shouldn’t be looking for any takedowns. If we look back at Garcia’s DWCS fight he landed 54 significant strikes (11.78/min) on his way to a first round TKO win, but it came against an undersized opponent who had fought much of his career down at Flyweight (125 lb). Now Garcia flips to the other end of the spectrum as he takes on an opponent who just competed at 185 lb and has spent the rest of his career at 170 lb. Further adding to the uncertainty, Garcia is fighting up at 155 lb for just the second time, after previously competing at 135 lb and 145 lb for his first 14 pro fights. He’s also now coming off a 20 month layoff. On Ontiveros’ side, he’s dropping down to 155 lb for the first time in his career and coming off a PED suspension and a neck injury, so overall this makes for an ultra high-variance spot, with a great chance one of these two lands a finish. Eight of Garcia’s 11 pro wins have come by KO and all seven of Ontiveros’ career losses are recorded as TKOs (two were verbal taps), so on paper at least that appears to be a very likely outcome. We don’t see Garcia scoring well in DFS in a decision, so he will be reliant on landing a finish to return value. The odds imply Garcia has a 74% chance to win, a 52% chance to get a finish and a 28% chance it comes in R1.

Ontiveros has only been past the second round in five of his 18 pro fights, with his last four ending in R1 and his last seven ending in the first two rounds (4-3). He doesn’t throw a ton of volume and is unlikely to mix in any grappling, so he’s entirely dependent on landing a finish to score well, but he’s certainly capable of doing so. Working against him, Garcia has never been knocked out, but he’s also fighting at 155 lb for just the second time in his career, and he spent the first time being controlled on the mat for 14 minutes by Luis Pena. So we really have no idea how Garcia’s chin will hold up against larger, more powerful opponents, which just adds to the uncertainty in this fight. That’s exactly what we’re looking for in tournaments, especially with cheap underdogs with a history of landing finishes. Ontiveros has a non-existent floor, but a high ceiling that makes him an exciting tournament play. The odds imply he has a 26% chance to win, a 16% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #8

Loopy Godinez

2nd UFC Fight (0-1)

Godinez had been scheduled to face Sam Hughes here, but Hughes' coach tested positive for COVID mid fight week and Juarez stepped in on short notice—although Juarez had already been preparing to go on DWCS next week.

Coming off split-decision loss, Godinez dropped her April 2021 UFC debut against one-dimensional grappler Jessica Penne, who spent the entire fight looking to take Godinez’s back. The fight ended with Godinez ahead in significant strikes 40-31 and in takedowns 3-1 while Penne led in total strikes 98-68. It seemed like Godinez had done enough to win, but two of the judges disagreed in what was somewhat of a weird fight.

Prior to losing the split-decision in her UFC debut, Godinez was 5-0 as a pro. Four of those fights ended in decisions, while her lone finish came in a TKO in the first round of her second pro fight. She came close to landing a second KO win in a 2019 match, when she dropped her opponent just as the third round ended. The broadcast team even thought she had landed a KO, but it turned out the clock ran out before the fight could be stopped, so it went down as a decision. Godinez’s last two decision wins are listed as five round fights, but her second most recent match was actually changed to three rounds just before the match, due to a late opponent change and apparently no one picked up on that.

In her last fight before joining the UFC, Godinez took on Vanessa Demopoulos in a five round LFA Strawweight Championship fight. Godinez started off the fight fast, showing off her crisp boxing skills and she later dropped Demopoulos in R4 and Demopoulos looked lost for a few seconds. Godinez also showed her awareness to stay out of danger against the submission specialist in Demopoulos, and went on to win a decision in a hard fought brawl that left both of their faces split open.

In her fight prior to that, Godinez took on a pure striker in Lindsay Garbatt, and showed she can adjust her game plan based on her opponent, as she went 4 for 5 on takedowns against the one-dimensional striker.

Silvana Gomez Juarez

1st UFC Fight (0-0)

Juarez had originally been scheduled to go on DWCS next week, but was able to fastrak her way to the UFC after Sam Hughes dropped out of this fight and Juarez stepped in on short notice. She enters the UFC on a three fight winning streak with her last two wins coming by TKO in the first two rounds. She most recently finished an opponent in the second round with leg strikes after dropping her previous opponent in the first round with a body shot that quickly ended things.

Juarez is now 10-2 as a pro with eight of her wins coming early, including six KOs and two submissions. Her two career losses both came against UFC fighters, with a 2018 five round decision loss to Ariane Lipski and a 2015 R4 TKO loss against Poliana Botelho. Juarez also has a decision win over UFC fighter Vaness Melo.

While Juarez has two submission wins on her record, she’s really a pure kickboxer and doesn’t offer much of anything in terms of grappling. Both of those submission wins came by R3 Armbar in 2014 and she appears to be a one-dimensional striker. Impressively, five of her six KO wins have occurred in the first round, with the other coming in R2 of her most recent fight. She has crisp striking and solid footwork and looks like an interesting prospect. Unfortunately for her, she’s already 36 years old, so she’s getting a really late start in her UFC career. With that said, better late than never.

Juarez has fought as high as 135 lb in the past, but has spent most of her career at Flyweight (125 lb). She’s now dropping down to Strawweight, where she’s only competed at once in the past, when she won a decision in 2019. Both of her career losses occurred at Flyweight.

Fight Prediction:

Juarez will have a 1” height advantage and 4” reach advantage, but Godinez is notably 8 years younger than the 36-year-old Juarez.

Despite being the one making her short notice UFC debut, Juarez looks a little crisper with her striking and should make for a significantly tougher challenge for Godinez than Sam Hughes would have. At 36 years old, Juarez has no time to waste if she wants to make any noise in the UFC and we expect her to come out looking to make a big first impression. The fact that she was preparing to go on DWCS next week bodes well for her cardio and preparation, and reduces the significance that she took this fight on short notice. We expect this to play out primarily on the feet in a high-volume striking match, although if Godinez gets hurt or behind in the fight, it wouldn’t be surprising for her to look for a takedown. We actually kind of like Juarez’s chances to pull off the upset, but both ladies offer solid striking and this sets up as an exciting brawl. While this fight most likely goes the distance, if it does end early Juarez has the better chance to get the finish.

Our favorite bet here is Juarez’s moneyline at +250. We also like her R1 KO line as a long shot at +2200 and her R2 KO line at +3100, or her ITD line at +650.

DFS Implications:

Godinez had originally been scheduled to face Sam Hughes, and is priced on DraftKings based on her being a -225 favorite in that matchup. However, Hughes withdrew from the fight midweek and Juarez stepped in on short notice. Godinez is now actually a slightly larger favorite with the new matchup, but we liked her chances way more when she was facing Hughes so those odds seem off.

Godinez is a solid striker and will mix in occasional takedowns—or oftentimes slams that can register as missed takedowns due to lack of control. She faced a one-dimensional grappler in her UFC debut, so Godinez was unable to really showcase her striking. However, now she’ll face another pure striker and this sets up for a high paced brawl with the potential for Godinez to tack on a few takedowns. While Godinez is generally an unlikely candidate to land a finish, she has the potential to rack up a ton of significant strikes, while boosting her score with takedowns. Despite going up against a short notice replacement, this is by no means an easy matchup, and we expect these two to go to war. The winner has a good shot of putting up a decent score in a volume driven decision, and this looks like a fight where you’ll want to be over the field on both fighters. The odds imply Godinez has a 70% chance to win, a 22% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.

Fighters making their short notice UFC debuts have historically struggled mightily, but Juarez has a solid chance of bucking that trend. She offers crisp powerful striking and good footwork and has already fought against three fighters who went on to join the UFC (1-2). Unlike Godinez, Juarez has done a good job of finishing opponents, with 80% of her career wins coming early, including five R1 knockouts and one in R2 to go along with a pair of third round submissions. Juarez will also have a noticeable reach advantage and should look to push the pace. Coming in as more or less of an unknown, we expect Juarez to fly under the radar to some extent, so she makes for a great lower owned tournament play with sneaky upside and an underrated chance to win. The odds imply she has a 30% chance to win, an 11% chance to get a finish and a 5% chance to end things in R1.

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Fight #6

Damon Jackson

6th UFC Fight (1-2-1, NC)

Looking to bounce back from a R1 KO loss against future champ Ilia Topuria, Jackson had no chance in that matchup. Topuria made short work of him as he dropped Jackson midway through the first round with a beautiful combination of strikes. That marked the third time Jackson has been knocked out in his career, with his only other career loss ending in a submission. He would have two submission losses, but a 2015 R1 submission defeat was later overturned to a No Contest when his opponent tested positive for a banned diuretic.

Jackson originally joined the UFC in 2014 and did everything but win, with a 0-1-1, NC record before getting kicked out following a 2016 draw. After getting dropped by the organization, Jackson fought 10 times outside of the UFC from 2016 to 2020, going 8-2 before getting called back up. His two losses over that period both came by KO, while the majority of his wins were by submission, including five Rear-Naked Chokes.

Making his return to the UFC in September 2020, nearly five years after being released, Jackson pulled off the short notice upset in a comeback win against Mirsad Bektic. In a fight he was losing badly, Jackson landed a R3 Guillotine Choke to steal the victory and notch his first UFC win. His only other fight since then was the loss to Topuria.

Only 2 of Jackson’s 24 pro fights have made it to the judges, while 11 have ended in R1. He has 14 submission wins and three KOs to go with his lone decision win. His last 11 fights have all ended early, with six of those ending in R1. His last three losses have all come by KO, while his first career loss came in a 2014 R2 submission in his UFC debut.

Charles Rosa

11th UFC Fight (5-5)

Coming off a split-decision win over Justin Jaynes, Rosa has now alternated wins and losses for 11 straight fights, with the last four all ending in decisions. In his close win over Jaynes, Rosa led in significant strikes 51-44 and in total strikes 114-51. Both guys went 2 for 2 on their takedown attempts and each had two official submission attempts, while Rosa led in control time 3:37-2:53. Jaynes looked to have Rosa hurt late in R3, but foolishly went for a takedown and a submission opposed to trying to finish things on the feet.

Prior to that win, Rosa suffered a decision loss to Darrick Minner, which was just the fourth time Minner has gone the distance in 38 pro fights and his previous 13 fights had all ended in the first two rounds. While simply surviving to see a decision against Minner could be viewed as a moral victory, Minner has been finished 11 times himself and Rosa was unable to make it 12. Minner finished the fight ahead in significant strikes 45-15 and 96-40 in total strikes. He also went 4 for 5 on takedowns with over 12 and half minutes of control time and three official submission attempts, while Rosa missed his only takedown attempt and finished with two official submission attempts.

Looking back a bit further, following an April 2017 R3 KO loss to Shane Burgos, Rosa suffered a career threatening neck injury that kept him sidelined until October 2019 when he made his uncertain return but submitted Manny Bermudez in the first round. Bermudez looked to be controlling the fight convincingly, but the BJJ black belt Rosa was able to land a surprise Armbar off his back. Things didn’t go as smoothly in his next fight as he was completely dominated by Bryce Mitchell for 15 minutes on the ground and nearly submitted multiple times. Rosa landed just 5 significant strikes in 15 minutes of “action” in that one.

Rosa bounced back from the demoralizing loss with a split-decision win over Kevin Aguilar in June 2020, in what was a low-volume snoozer that stayed entirely on the feet. Rosa outlanded Aguilar 69-53 in significant strikes, but neither fighter landed a takedown on three combined attempts.

While Rosa’s fight against Aguilar took place at 155 lb, the rest of his UFC matches have been at 145 lb, where this next one will be. Half of Rosa’s career submission wins have been by Armbar, all in the first round, and he claims that's his move.

In his five fights since returning from his neck injury, Rosa has attempted just four takedowns, landing the most recent two against Jaynes, but failing to notch a takedown in his previous four fights. In contrast, he went 14 for 41 on takedowns in his first five UFC fights, while attempting at least four and landing at least one in every match.

Owning a 14-5 pro record, Rosa has three wins by KO and eight by submission to go with his three decision victories. However, 9 of those 11 finishes came in his first nine pro fights against opponents who entered with records of 0-1-1, 4-4, 2-2, 0-1, 6-13, 6-8, 9-5, 8-9, and 4-4. Since then, he’s only landed two finishes in his most recent 10 fights and both of those were desperation submissions in fights he was losing. Rosa has never been submitted himself in his 17 pro fights, and the only person to ever finish him was Shane Burgos who knocked him out in the third round of a 2017 fight. His other four career losses all ended in decisions.

Fight Prediction:

Jackson will have a 2” height and reach advantage.

This is a weird stylistic matchup between a fighter in Jackson who is constantly involved in fights that end quickly and Rosa who has been a boring decision machine. Both guys are submission specialists at heart, so we could see some interesting grappling exchanges, but in general we wish we could bet against both of these two. Jackson has been especially unimpressive with just one win in his five UFC fights and it seems like this line should be closer despite it getting slightly wider as the week went on. Jackson will be the more active submission threat, but it’s nearly impossible to ever bet on him to win a UFC fight so we’ll hold our breath and take Rosa here. We expect this one to either end in a submission or a decision and think a Rosa decision win is the most likely outcome.

Our favorite bets here are Rosa’s moneyline at +164 and “Jackson Wins by Submission” at +380. We also like “Rosa Wins Decision” at +320, “Rosa Wins by R1 Submission” at +1700 and “Fight Ends in Submission” at +220.

DFS Implications:

It’s hard to fully evaluate Jackson’s DFS ceiling as he only has one win in his five UFC fights and it came in the third round of a fight he was getting dominated. So it’s not surprising that it scored just 58 DraftKings points and 98 points on FD as he was controlled for essentially the entire fight leading up to the R3 Guillotine Choke comeback win. That FanDuel score was propped up by a ridiculous seven official submission attempts, which does point towards the fact that his submission over position fighting style actually lends itself more towards the FanDuel scoring system than DraftKings, which is extremely rare for grapplers. While Rosa isn’t an overwhelmingly talented opponent, he’s only been finished once in his career, which came in a KO against Shane Burgos, so on paper this doesn’t look like a favorable matchup for Jackson to land a finish. Rosa has gotten himself in some precarious situations in recent fights, so we do expect Jackson to get some opportunities to submit him, but we think more likely than not he fails to get Rosa out. With that said, the odds imply he has a 63% chance to win, a 25% chance to get a finish and a 13% chance it comes in R1.

Rosa needs a submission to score well in DFS, as his three UFC decision wins have been good for just 85/73, 58/67 and 74/93 DK/FD points. His two submission wins scored 93 and 95 DraftKings points and 109 and 134 points on FanDuel. One thing to keep in mind is that Rosa’s one big scoring explosion on FanDuel came prior to his neck injury and in a dream matchup, so you probably want to lower expectations based on his scoring since suffering a neck injury following the Shane Burgos fight. Since then, he’s failed to top 93 DraftKings points in his last five fights and rarely if ever contributes to winning DFS lineups. We generally want to fade fights that Rosa is part of when it comes to DFS, but on a nine fight card and going against an opponent who rarely sees the judges, everyone is in play on this slate. The odds imply Rosa has a 37% chance to win, a 17% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #6

Alexandr Romanov

4th UFC Fight (3-0)

We most recently saw Romanov take on another Heavyweight grappler in Juan Espino and the two essentially fought to a stalemate before the fight was stopped early in R3 for what appeared to be a pretty pedestrian inadvertent low blow by Espino. While it didn’t look like Espino put much behind the illegal knee, Romanov was completely gassed at that point and seemed to be simply looking for a way out of the fight. So he said he couldn’t continue and the fight ended in a split technical decision that Romanov narrowly won. In the end, Romanov led in significant strikes 32-12 and in total strikes 53-44, while landing 2 of his 4 takedown attempts with a little under six minutes of control time. Espino landed 4 of his 5 attempts with just under three minutes of control time.

The first round was close, with Romanov narrowly leading in significant strikes 5-4 and in control time 2:18-1:28, while Espino led in total strikes 20-14 and in takedowns 2-1. Neither guy was able to do much with their takedowns, making the round tougher to score. Espino’s biggest mistake in the fight was going for a Guillotine early in R2 that allowed Romanov to take top position and rain down strikes for several minutes and win the round. With all three judges rightfully giving Romanov R2 and Espino R3, the decision all came down to the close first round and two of the three judges thought Romanov did enough. Overall, Espino’s grappling prowess gave Romanov trouble as it prevented the one-sided domination on the mat we’ve seen from Romanov in the past. Both guys looked exhausted by the end of the second round, but Espino appeared to have a little more left in the tank. So the biggest takeaways were Romanov has no interest in fighting on the feet and has a one and half to two round gas tank.

Despite it coming in a questionable fashion, that win moved Romanov to a perfect 14-0 and 3-0 in the UFC. That was the first time he had ever needed the judges, and he’s still never been in a fight that lasted longer than 12 and a half minutes, with 10 of his fights ending in R1, one ending in R2 and three ending in the first half of the third round. He has five KOs and eight submission victories.

Romanov made his UFC debut in September 2020 and submitted Roque Martinez late in the second round after dominating him for nine plus minutes on the mat. He then submitted Marcos Rogerio de Lima with a rare Forearm Choke late in the first round of his next fight. Romanov has landed eight takedowns across his three UFC fights, with at least two in each of those. It’s no secret what his plan is coming into fights, but it’s easier said than done to stop him as he simply overpowers most of his opponents. After facing the toughest opponent of his career, now Romanov gets a far easier matchup.

Jared Vanderaa

3rd UFC Fight (1-1)

Bouncing back from a KO loss in his UFC debut, Vanderaa defeated Justin Tafa in a bloody high-volume decision in his most recent fight. Vanderaa looked far more comfortable without having to worry about getting taken down as he led Tafa in significant strikes 121-74 and in total strikes 141-74. Neither fighter attempted any takedowns in the 15 minute striking match, and Vanderaa easily won a decision. Vanderaa did get cut open in the second round and the ref took a hard look at him as he bled all over the Octagon, but the fight was allowed to continue.

Vanderaa originally punched his ticket to the UFC with a November 2020 R1 KO win on DWCS, where he immediately made a bold call out of Sergey Spivak, and Spivak accepted. Apparently they had almost fought earlier in their careers, and Vanderaa was still eager to see the matchup play out. However, Vanderaa may have bitten off more than he could chew on that one.

He briefly started off the fight against Spivak well in his debut, pushing Spivak back up against the cage, but made a vital mistake just 30 seconds in, as threw a second leg kick which Spivak caught and drove through to take Vanderaa down. Spivak controlled Vanderaa on the ground for the remainder of the round in smothering fashion. Idiotically, Vanderaa threw a head kick to start R2 and as soon as it missed, Spivak was able to take his back and immediately got the fight right back to the ground. He once again controlled Vanderaa on the ground for an entire round, although this time he turned up the intensity late and finished the fight with heavy ground and pound that left Vanderaa’s face a bloody mess. In the 60 seconds that this fight stayed upright, Vanderaa appeared to be holding his own and was actually the one pushing Spivak backwards early on. His problem was that he couldn’t stay off his back and looked to have no strategy for getting up once there. Vanderaa is surprisingly a BJJ black belt, but you never would have guessed it from watching that fight and he looks terrible off his back.

Vanderaa’s previous DWCS fight only lasted three and a half minutes, but he looked pretty hittable before he took the fight to the ground and finished it with his ground and pound. He did show he could take a punch, but it’s hard to take too much away from the short fight. One thing to note, Vanderaa’s opponent in that match, Harry Hunsucker, took the fight on less than a week’s notice and is far from impressive.

Vanderaa is now 12-5 as a pro, with seven of his wins coming by KO, three by submission and two in decisions. He’s also been submitted twice himself, but has only been knocked out once, which came in his UFC debut. While six of his last eight fights have ended early, only one of his last 10 have ended in the first round. He’s notably had three fights make it to the 5th round in his career, with two of those ending in decisions. So at least on paper, he seems like he has the gas tank to remain competitive later into fights. He’s notably been finished in the second round in his last two losses, once by Triangle Choke in 2019 and then by ground and pound in his 2021 UFC debut.

Fight Prediction:

Vanderaa will have a 2” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.

After seeing what Spivak was able to do to Vanderaa on the mat, Romanov has to be salivating over this matchup. Spivak landed all three of his takedowns and Vanderaa demonstrated a low fight IQ to continue throwing kicks even after that led to him getting taken down in the first round. Vanderaa has okay striking and seems somewhat durable on the feet, but he appears helpless off his back and Romanov should have a field day from top position. We like Romanov to get a finish here in the first two rounds and Vanderaa’s only chance to survive will be to evade takedowns and try to outland Romanov, who’s biggest liability is his gas tank. That’s easier said than done when you have a 265 lb locomotive charging at you inside the smaller cage at the Apex and we don’t see Vanderaa having the mobility to run away for 10 minutes. We like Romanov to win by R2 submission in this one.

It’s no secret that Romanov likely ends this fight in the first two rounds so there’s not much value in the lines. His R1 line is just +100. So we’re taking a stab on two longer lines in his R2 win line at +380 and his R2 submission line at +750. Vanderaa’s last two losses have both occurred in R2 and he’s never been finished in the first round in his career.

DFS Implications:

Romanov had been smashing opponents and DFS slates up until his recent bizarre technical decision win that resulted from him milking a half-hearted cup check. That came in a much tougher matchup than this against another high-level Heavyweight grappler in Juan Espino and we’re not concerned about a potential repeat here. Romanov’s gameplan is clear, as he wants to get fights to the ground immediately and smash his opponents until they give up or present a submission opportunity. He lacks much of a standup game, but that hasn’t really been an issue for him as he rolls in with a perfect 14-0 pro record with 13 finishes. He’s an elite play on both DFS sites and it’s hard to see him failing here, but crazy things can happen in a fight as we saw in his last match. The odds imply he has an 84% chance to win, a 66% chance to get a finish and a 39% chance it comes in R1.

While 10 of Vanderaa’s 12 career wins have come early, this looks like about the worst possible matchup he could ask for. He struggled mightily off his back in his UFC debut and this sets up for a repeat performance. If Vanderaa somehow pulls off this massive upset, it will likely mean he either landed an early finish or defended a ton of takedowns and simply wore Romanov out. We don’t see either of those happening, but they each present strong scoring potential if they do. Vanderaa notably landed 121 significant strikes in his last fight, but with no other stats to boost his score he still tallied just 83 DraftKings points in the decision win. That scored a little better on FanDuel, where he finished with 93 points, and considering the potential to defend takedowns, he’s a little more interesting over there (but still super gross). The odds imply he has an 16% chance to win, a 10% chance to get a finish and a 5% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #5

Chris Gutierrez

7th UFC Fight (4-1-1)

Coming off a decision win over Andre Ewell, Gutierrez relentlessly attacked Ewell’s legs and nearly finished him with leg strikes in the third round as he landed 22 leg strikes in that round alone. That fight took place at a 140 lb Catchweight, but now Gutierrez will drop back down to his normal 135 lb weight. Gutierrez has gone 4-0-1 in his last five fights, with four of those five matches going the distance.

Prior to his recent win, Gutierrez fought UFC newcomer Cody Durden to a draw. Primarily a wrestler, Durden completely controlled Gutierrez on the ground in the first round but looked to tire out late in the fight after taking it on short notice. Gutierrez picked things up in the next two rounds resulting in the draw.

Gutierrez won his previous fight to that with a R2 TKO by leg kicks. He completely destroyed the legs of Vince Morales, attacking him with a variety of kicks from both stances. Leg strikes are Gutierrez’s primary weapon for ending fights early and that’s how he landed his last two TKOs. He does have one submission win on his record, but he’s not much of a threat on the ground and he’s only landed three takedowns in his six UFC fights. All six of his UFC fights have made it to the second round, with four ending in decisions. His only UFC loss came in his 2018 UFC debut via R2 Rear-Naked Choke against a really tough Raoni Barcelos.

Gutierrez is now 16-4-2 as a pro with seven wins by KO, one by submission and eight decisions. He’s never been knocked out, but has been submitted once to go along with three decision losses. That lone submission loss came against a really tough opponent in Raoni Barcelos in Gutierrez’s UFC debut.

Felipe Colares

5th UFC Fight (2-2)

Coming off a decision win over Luke Sanders, Colares nearly got a finish through ground and pound at the end of round two, but Sanders was saved by the horn. Sanders actually started the fight way ahead in significant strikes as he outlanded Colares 48-16 in the first round, while also landing a knockdown. The fight ended up going to a decision and Sanders finished ahead in significant strikes 118-78 and in total strikes 131-104. Both guys landed a pair of takedowns, Sanders on five attempts and Colares on 10, and each finished with nearly three minutes of control time. That fight took place at 145 lb, as did Colares’ 2019 UFC debut, but now he’ll be dropping back down to 135 lb, where he’s gone 1-1 so far in the UFC.

Colares has alternated wins and losses over his last five fights, with all five of those ending in decisions. That comes after he finished the first seven opponents of his pro career with five submissions and a pair of KOs. However, those finishes mostly came against questionable competition who entered with records of: 0-0, 1-1, 0-1, 1-1, 0-1, 8-4, and 5-3.

Colares has notably never been finished as a pro, but was very nearly knocked out late in R1 of his second most recent fight against a really tough Montel jackson. Overall, he was absolutely dominated by Jackson in that fight, who led in significant strikes 75-7, total strikes 96-8, takedowns 11-1 and control time 10:37-1:22. Colares attempted eight takedowns, but landed just one, while Jackson went 11 for 15 on his attempts. Colares did attempt three submission attempts and is a BJJ black belt, but was dominated severly for the first two rounds. Jackson looked gassed late and essentially rode out his early work.

Prior to that fight, Colares took on a debuting Domingo Pilarte. Colares quickly looked to turn it into a grappling match from the start and that’s how essentially the entire fight played out. However, Colares looked frustrated with the grappling nature by the end of the fight as Pilarte took his back and held a body lock for the final minutes of the fight. The match ended in a low-volume split decision win for Colares, who came out ahead in significant strikes 23-11 and total strikes 92-69. Both fighters landed two takdowns—Pilarte on five attempts and Colares on eight—and Colares narrowly came out ahead on control time 6:38-6:10.

Looking back at his February 2019 UFC debut, Colares took on another grappler in Geraldo de Freitas Jr. The first couple of minutes played out on the feet, before Colares was eventually able to get it to the ground and turn it into a back and forth grappling match. De Freitas Jr. dominated the striking, coming out ahead 49-21 in significant strikes, and took Colares down six times on nine attempts, while controlling him for over six and a half minutes. Colares responded with three takedowns of his own, on eight attempts, and just over four minutes of control time.

Colares has now gone 8 for 34 on takedowns in the UFC, so despite his desire to get fights to the ground, he’s really struggled with his 23% takedown accuracy.

Fight Prediction:

Gutierrez will have a 1” height advantage, but Colares will have a 2” reach advantage.

Gutierrez generally has more success when he’s facing other strikers as he can relentlessly attack their legs without worrying about getting his kicks caught and taken down. He nearly finished a striker in Ewell with leg strikes late in his last fight, but previously had more trouble with wrestler Cody Durden. Looking back one fight further, Gutierrez finished Vince Morales with leg strikes in R2, but split a 2019 decision with another grappler in Geraldo de Freitas and was submitted by Raoni Barcelos. So this isn’t an ideal matchup for Gutierrez as he faces another grappler in Colares, but we’re not overly sold on Colares talent so it’s also not the toughest matchup. With that said, we expect Colares will be looking to take this fight to the ground, while Gutierrez will be focused on staying upright and selectively striking. That could turn this into more of a chess match than a brawl, but we have notably seen opponents fill up stats sheets against Colares in his last two fights. With that said, we like Gutierrez to win a lower volume decision if he can stay off his back.

Continuing the theme of this card, this is another gross spot for betting as the outcome we’re expecting, a Gutierrez decision win, is set at -105. You can also consider “Colares Wins by Submission” at +800 or “Colares Wins by Decision” at +420, but we’re not overly excited about betting this fight in general. If you want to take a longer stab at something, Gutierrez generally wears on his opponents as fights go on so you can consider his R3 KO line at +1800.

DFS Implications:

Gutierrez has never landed above 69 significant strikes or more than one takedown in a UFC fight. He’s essentially a binary novelty prop bet for DFS purproses: Will he land a TKO by leg strikes? His last two KOs came by leg strikes, and he nearly landed a third in his most recent match. The only time Gutierrez has scored above 75 DraftKings points was in his lone UFC finish, which came in the second round of a 2020 match and scored 114 DraftKings points and 135 points on FanDuel. He should get the opportunity to defend multiple takedowns, so we prefer him on FanDuel, but he’ll still need a finish to be useful and Colares has notably never been finished in 12 pro fights and should be looking to slow this fight down with grappling. The odds imply Gutierrez has a 69% chance to win, a 25% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.

Colares has yet to put up a useful score in his first four UFC fights, with DraftKings scores of 82, 10, 75 and 32. He’s struggled getting opponents to the mat and owns just a 23% takedown accuracy, while attempting an average of nine takedowns per 15 minutes but only landing an average of two. While he has five submissions on his record, his last five fights have all gone the distance and all of his finishes came against far less experienced opponents prior to joining the UFC. Colares’ grappling heavy style lends itself more towards the DraftKings scoring system, so we prefer him over there, but he’s still unlikely to serve as anything more than a value play without a finish. His only chance to put up a big score will be to land a submission, something he hasn’t done since 2016. The odds imply he has a 31% chance to win, a 15% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #4

Sabina Mazo

6th UFC Fight (3-2)

After losing a decision to Alexis Davis up at 135 lb in her last outing, Mazo will now drop back down to 125 lb where she has spent the rest of her career. Davis was able to control Mazo on the mat for the majority of the first and third rounds as she finished with three takedowns and nearly nine minutes of control time. The second round stayed mostly on the feet. Mazo finished ahead in significant strikes 64-49, but Davis led in total strikes 128-71. The loss clearly showed a weakness in Mazo’s ground game. It also marked the sixth time Mazo has gone the distance in her last seven fights, including two five round decisions in the LFA in 2018. The one exception was a 2020 R3 Rear-Naked Choke win over Justine Kish.

Impressively, Mazo landed 108 or more significant strikes in all three of her fights leading up to her recent loss, all of which she won by decision. However, the last two of those were close fights, with a split-decision followed by a R3 finish in a fight she was potentially losing. In that fight, she was able to knock her opponent down with a sneaky right head kick hidden behind a right jab and then immediately jumped on top and finished her with a Rear-Naked Choke, which was the first submission win of Mazo’s career. Her most dangerous weapon is her head kick, which is how she landed each of her two career KO victories, both in the first round of consecutive 2017 fights.

In her second most recent win, Mazo won a split-decision over J.J. Aldrich. She outlanded Aldrich 118-58 in significant strikes, but the fight looked closer than the striking numbers would suggest. Prior to that close split-decision victory, Mazo dominated Shana Dobson for 15 minutes, winning the significant striking battle 108-33 and tacking on four takedowns and nearly 11 minutes of control time. The judges ruled it a lopsided 30-25, 30-25, 30-24 in what was Mazo’s first UFC win. Dobson notably finished Agapova two fights later, although you could argue that Agapova finished Agapova.

Mazo has the second highest average striking volume on the slate at 6.56 SSL/min. She’s now 9-2 as a pro with two wins by KO, one by submission and six decisions. Both of her career losses also went the distance.

Mariya Agapova

3rd UFC Fight (1-1)

Agapova is looking to bounce back after completely gassing out after just one round in her last fight, where she was a ridiculous -1400 favorite but lost in an early R2 TKO. She 100% emptied her gas tank in the first round with a completely unsustainable pace, so it will be interesting to see how she starts this next fight.

Prior to the loss, Agapova had won three straight fights in the first round with a pair of Rear-Naked Chokes and a KO. The most recent of those came in her UFC debut against a terrible Hannah Cifers, while the first two occurred in Invicta. Agapova originally tried to get in the UFC through DWCS in 2019, but lost a smothering decision to Tracy Cortez and was forced to wait a bit longer. That decision loss to Cortez was the first of Agapova’s career as she entered the match 6-0 with four finishes.

Agapova is now 9-2 as a pro with three wins by KO, four by submission and two decisions. She’s coming off her first early loss, with her only other loss coming in the DWCS decision against Cortez. Her last four fights have ended in seven min or less, so it will be interesting to see if she can manage her cardio better if this fight makes it to the back half. She did go three rounds with Cortez in 2019, but she spent the entire fight being smothered by Cortez on the mat.

Fight Prediction:

Mazo will have a 1” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.

Agapova hasn’t been involved in a fight that lasted longer than seven minutes in the last four years, so her cardio is a major concern after seeing what happened in her last fight. This is a pretty appealing matchup as both of these two are solid strikers and have no problem throwing down in a brawl. Agapova has been much more of a finisher, while Mazo relies on landing enough volume to point her way to decisions, but she does have a dangerous head kick. Agapova is most dangerous in the opening round, so if Mazo can survive the initial blitz she should be in good shape down the stretch as she has routinely demonstrated significantly better cardio. We expect Agapova to make some adjustments after her previous meltdown, but we don’t expect her to look like a completely different fighter. So it’s hard to know exactly what we’ll get out of her after 14 months away from the Octagon. We always like Agapova’s chances to land a first round finish, but if the fight makes it to round two look for Mazo to take over and win with either a mid to late finish or in a decision.

Our favorite bets here are “Agapova R1 Win” at +1000, “Mazo Wins in R2” at +1100, “Mazo Wins in R3” at +1400, and “Fight Doesn’t Start R3” at +215 and “Agapova R1 Submission Win” at +2100 as an even longer shot.

DFS Implications:

Mazo’s high striking volume has allowed her to put up big DFS totals in two of her three UFC decision wins, scoring 108 DraftKings points and a whopping 152 FanDuel points in her most recent victory. While she only scored 81 DraftKings points and 91 on FanDuel in the fight prior to that, she put up 125 on Draftkings and 109 on FanDuel in her one-sided dismantling of Shana Dobson back in 2019. We expect this to be a standup brawl so another high striking output is likely and now Mazo gets the additional potential upside of Agapova gassing out. We imagine Agapova has made some changes in the last 14 months after she completely gassed out after five minutes in her last fight, but she’ll need to demonstrate improved cardio before we believe it. Agapova is notably extremely dangerous early on in fights, so it’s hard to consider Mazo a safe play, but if she can survive the first five minutes she should be in great shape to either get a finish or win a high-volume decision. The odds imply she has a 63% chance to win, a 22% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.

Agapova has been a R1 or bust DFS play, with seven of her nine career wins coming early, including six in R1. She typically comes out of the gates like a rabid mongoose blitzing her opponents with chaotic striking flurries, but it’s possible we see her dial it back a little. For DFS purposes, we hope she doesn’t as her chaotic start to fights present both a massive early ceiling for her followed by a teed up R2 finish for her opponents when she drains her tank. Agapova scored 114 DraftKings points and 134 points on FanDuel in her R1 win in her UFC debut and was then easily finished early in R2 of her second fight, where Dobson scored 103 DraftKings points and 101 points on FanDuel. So assuming Agapova doesn’t completely change the way she fights following her previous meltdown and 14 month layoff, you want to target both sides of her fights. The odds imply she has a 37% chance to win, a 19% chance to get a finish and an 8% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #3

Matheus Nicolau

6th UFC Fight (4-1)

Entering this match on a three fight winning streak, Nicolau has won 9 of his last 10 fights, with 4 of his last 6 going the distance. After originally joining the UFC at just 22 years old in 2015, Nicolau fought only four times from 2015-2018 before curiously parting ways with the organization despite owning a 3-1 record in 2019 following his first UFC loss in a 2018 R1 KO. A large part of why Nicolau fought just four times in four years in his first stint with the UFC is that he tested positive for PEDs in October 2016 and was suspended for a year.

Following his departure from the organization, Nicolau won his next fight by R1 submission in May 2019 and then followed it up with a decision victory in August 2019. We then didn’t see him compete for 19 months following a few cancelations in 2020 and early 2021, before he made his return to the UFC in March 2021 against Manel Kape. Nicolau had originally been scheduled to face Tagir Ulanbekov, but Ulanbekov withdrew for the second straight time and Kape stepped in on short notice after fighting in his UFC debut just a month earlier. Nicolau did a good job of controlling Kape as he landed 2 of his 3 takedowns in the first round with two and half minutes of control time. Just as he did in his UFC debut, Kape started slow, as Nicolau led in significant strikes just 7-2 in the first round. Kape bounced back in the second round as he led in strikes and defended all three of Nicolau’s R2 takedown attempts, but the third round was a close striking battle and two of the three judges thought Nicolau did enough to win a split-decision. The fight ended with Kape leading in significant strikes 61-55, while Nicolau led in total strikes 76-73 and went 2 for 9 on his takedown attempts with two and a half minutes of control time. Both guys had their moments in the fight and the decision could have gone either way, but Kape was shocked it didn’t go in his favor and to this day swears he 100% won the fight.

A BJJ black belt, Nicolau is now 16-2-1 as a pro, with four wins by KO, five by submission and seven decisions. While four of his last five wins have gone the distance, his last two finishes have both come by Japanese Necktie (2015 & 2019). Both of his career losses ended in R1 KOs (2012 & 2018), but four of his five UFC matches have made it to the third round, with three ending in decisions. He won his UFC debut with a third round submission, but his last three UFC wins have all ended with the judges.

Nicolau has fought at both 125 lb and 135 lb in his career. He made his UFC debut at 135 lb where he landed his only UFC finish, before dropping down to 125 lb after that. He did move back up to 135 lb for his two fights outside of the UFC in 2019, but dropped back down to 125 lb when he returned and that’s where he’s stayed.

Tim Elliott

16th UFC Fight (6-9)

Coming off a dominating grappling performance against Jordan Espinosa, Elliot accrued over 13 minutes of control time on his way to a lopsided decision win. Elliot led in significant strikes 25-13 and in total strikes 91-22 as he took Espinosa down four times on seven attempts and controlled the entire fight. That was Elliot’s 15th UFC fight, but just the second time he’s won two fights in a row with the organization, and the first since winning his second and third UFC fights back in 2012 and 2013.

In fairness, Elliot has gone up against numerous top Flyweight opponents, with losses to John Dodson, Joseph Benavidez, Demetrious Johnson, Deiveson Figueiredo, Askar Askarov and Brandon Royval and he notably took Demetrious Johnson to a five round decision back in 2016. However, three of Elliot’s last four losses have come by submission and he’s generally been a guy that either fights to decisions or gets submitted, with 10 of his 15 UFC fights going the distance (5-5) and four ending in submission losses. His only early win in the UFC was a 2017 R2 Anaconda Choke Submission over Mark De La Rosa.

Elliot originally joined the UFC in 2012, however, after going 2-4 he was released in 2015. Five of those fights ended in decisions, while the sixth was a R1 Guillotine Choke loss to Joseph Benavidez. After getting released, Elliot went 3-0 in Titan FC with two five round decision wins and a R2 Guillotine Choke victory. He then worked his way back into the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter, which he ended up winning to get a shot at the Flyweight title against Demetrious Johnson. While Elliot lost a five round decision to Johnson, it more importantly got him his spot back on the UFC roster.

Following the loss and sitting at 2-5 in the UFC, Elliot put up a career best grappling performance in a decision win against Louis Smolka in 2017. Elliot landed 12 takedowns, three reversals and eight minutes of control time to go along with 57 significant strikes as he cruised to a unanimous 30-27 decision win.

However, following the highlight reel performance, Elliot lost four of his next five fights with three of those losses ending in submissions in the first two rounds. He notably tore his ACL in June of 2018, which resulted in nearly a two year layoff from December 2017 until October 2019 and he lost his first three fights after coming back. Since then, Elliot has been training out of Glory MMA with James Krause and has won two straight decisions. After gassing out against Brandon Royval in his most recent loss, Elliot has done a better job of managing his cardio with the help of Krause and now appears more focussed on actually winning fights opposed to just putting on a good show.

Prior to his recent decision win over Espinosa, Elliot outlanded Ryan Benoit 67-55 in significant strikes, but amazingly went just 1 for 13 on takedowns. Elliot squeaked out a unanimous 29-28 decision, which ended a three fight losing streak. He also came dangerously close to getting submitted with a kneebar in the second round. He looked slightly more methodical in that match than he has in the past and seemed to pace himself better. That can likely be attributed to the coaching of James Krause. In Elliot’s prior match against Brandon Royval, Elliot looked to gas out by the second round when he then got submitted.

A former high school state champion wrestler, Elliot is now 17-11-1 as a pro, with three wins by KO, six by submission and eight decisions. He’s only been knocked out once, but has been submitted five times and lost five decisions. His only career KO loss came in his third pro fight back in 2009 and all three of his career KO wins occurred between 2009 and 2011 before he joined the UFC. So since 2011 all 19 of his pro fights have ended in either submissions (3-4) or decisions (7-5).

Fight Prediction:

Elliott will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 66” reach.

Elliot relies on his grappling to win fights as he doesn’t offer much on the feet. That worked well for him in his last two fights against struggling strikers, but now he’ll face a more advanced grappler in BJJ black belt Matheus Nicolau, who’s yet to be taken down in five UFC fights, albeit on just three attempts. Elliot lost to the last two advanced grapplers he faced in Brandon Royval and Askar Askarov and this looks like another tough matchup for him to succeed. We expect this fight to either go the distance or end with a Nicolau submission victory, and it’s unlikely Elliot wins his third straight decision here.

Our favorite two bets here are ​​Nicolau’s submission line at +500 and his R1 submission line at +1300.

DFS Implications:

Nicolau amazingly landed three knockdowns in the first round against Louis Smolka in 2017 to go along with two takedowns and a decent number of strikes and control time to score 122 DraftKings points and 139 points on FanDuel despite the fight ending in a decision. He similarly landed two knockdowns and three takedowns in his 2015 UFC debut to score 117 DraftKings points and 135 FanDuel points in the third round submission victory. However, he put up DK/FD totals of just 71/70 and 50/51 in his other two UFC wins, which both ended in decisions. Elliot has notably never been knocked down in 15 UFC fights and hasn’t been taken down more than once in a fight in his last eight matches. So Nicolau appears dependent on landing an early finish to return value, although there’s always a slight chance we see a dominating grappling performance that boosts his DraftKings score with control time and ground strikes or a ton of takedowns defended that prop up his FanDuel score. The latter appears almost inevitable if Nicolau wins in a longer fight as Elliot has gone just 12 for 41 (29%) on takedowns in his last four matches, with double digit attempts in three of those four fights. So we prefer Nicolau on FanDuel where he should have the chance to defend a ton of takedowns and where submission wins are more valuable, but he still likely needs a finish to return value on either site. There does appear to be a decent chance he lands a finish, as 5 of his 16 career wins have come by submission and Elliot has been submitted in three of his last four losses. The odds imply Nicolau has a 63% chance to win, a 24% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.

Elliot’s 2017 150 point DraftKings explosion is nothing more than a pimple on the butt of obscurity at this point in his career. He’s gone 2-3 in his last five fights, with just one DK score about 76 points during that stretch, which required over 13 minutes of control time to total 97 DraftKings points, but just 59 points on FanDuel, in his most recent decision win. Elliot is hardly a threat to finish fights, with just one early win in his 15 UFC matches, which occurred in a 2017 R2 submission against a terrible Mark De La Rosa. That fight also notably took place at 135 lb, while Elliot typically competes at 125 lb. Elliot has gone just 4-8 in his last 12 UFC fights, and despite coming in on a two fight winning streak with the help of James Krause, we don’t see him extending that streak to three here in a tougher matchup than his last two. If he does somehow pull off the upset, it would almost certainly come in a decision and his grappling heavy fighting style generally scores much better on DraftKings than FanDuel. The odds imply he has a 37% chance to win, a 14% chance to get a finish and a 6% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #2

Randy Brown

12th UFC Fight (7-4)

Coming off a first round submission win, Brown amazingly was able to get Alex Oliveira to tap with a one armed Rear-Naked Choke Submission. Brown dropped Oliveira 87 seconds into the fight and looked close to landing a knockout, however, Oliveira was able to hang on and return to his feet. Brown then took his back standing up and got one arm under his chin, which is apparently all he needed as he dragged Oliveira back to the mat and immediately forced a tap.

In Brown’s second most recent fight he was knocked out by an incredibly tough Vicente Luque late in the second round. Luque did a great job of attacking the stilts of Brown early on in the fight and because Brown is so tall, he looks especially vulnerable to leg strikes as he has a wider stance and skinny twig legs. Luque eventually finished the compromised Brown at the end of the second round.

That was Brown’s fourth UFC loss and the third time he had been finished in the second round. He had previously been knocked out by Niko Price in the second round of a 2018 match in a crazy ending where Price knocked Brown out with hammer fists off his back. The other early loss in Brown’s career was a 2016 second round Rear-Naked Choke submission loss in his second UFC fight. Five of Brown’s 11 UFC fights have ended in R2 (2-3), while 8 of his 11 UFC fights have ended early (5-3).

Brown is now 13-4 as a pro with six wins by KO, five by submission and two decisions. Other than his three previously mentioned R2 losses, he lost a 2017 decision to Belal Muhammad in just the third decision he’s been to in 17 fights. While his fights generally end early, prior to his recent R1 win he had seen the second round 10 straight times since joining the UFC. And that recent R1 finish was just the third first round finish of his career, with six of his finishes coming in R2 and two ending in R3. Overall, nine of his 17 pro fights have ended in the second round (6-3).

With his last five fights all ending early, Brown has now won three of his last four and is looking to keep his momentum going against the least experienced opponent he’s faced in a while.

Jared Gooden

4th UFC Fight (1-2)

After losing a pair of decisions in his first two UFC fights, Gooden stepped into a short notice fight in his last match and landed a first round KO against Niklas Stolze in just 68 seconds.

Gooden made his UFC debut in November 2020 and lost an ultra high-volume striking battle against a 38-year-old Alan Jouban, who had lost 3 of his previous four fights and then retired afterwards. Jouban finished ahead in significant strikes 168-100 and in total strikes almost the same at 169-101. That’s an average of 11.27 SSL/min for Jouban and 6.67/min for Gooden. Jouban missed on his only takedown attempt, while Gooden landed his only attempt. Jouban looked very close to ending the fight in the second round as he had Gooden rocked, but Gooden was able to survive and recover despite Jouban pouring it on. Jouban ended the third round with a Guillotine Choke attempt that also looked very close to stopping things but Gooden was saved by the final horn. Jouban finished his UFC career with 13 fights under his belt, but amazingly landed 25% of his total career significant strikes in that one fight against Gooden.

Following the loss in his debut, Gooden took on Abubakar Nurmagomedov, who was also coming off a loss in his UFC debut as well as a 16 month layoff. In a fight that stayed more on the feet than most people expected going in, Nurmagomedov landed just 1 of his 5 takedown attempts with over four minutes of control time, but outlanded Gooden 60-43 in significant strikes, while Gooden led 111-100 in total strikes.

Prior to joining the UFC, Gooden had finished three straight opponents in the first two rounds with a pair of submissions followed by a KO. And his most recent five fights before joining the UFC all ended early, with him winning four of those. He’s now 18-6 as a pro, with 14 of those wins coming early, including eight KOs and six submissions. Four of those 14 finishes occurred in the first round, while six were in R2 and four in R3. Five of his six career losses have ended in decisions and he’s only ever been finished once, which came in a 2019 53 second R1 KO, where he was absolutely dominated by a larger opponent as he fought up a weight class for the first time during a three fight stretch up at 185 lb from 2019 to 2020. Gooden dropped back down to 170 lb one fight before joining the UFC.

Gooden looks very hittable on tape and the numbers agree as he checks in with the highest average number of significant strikes absorbed on the slate at 7.55/min. He also lands above average volume himself with 5.04 SSL/min (4th most on the slate). He’s stopped 5 of the 6 takedowns attempted against him so far in the UFC, while landing both of his attempts.

UPDATE: Gooden missed weight by three pounds but otherwise seemed fine.

Fight Prediction:

Brown will have a 3” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.

This sets up for an exciting matchup with a good chance for a finish. Gooden is far more hittable but has also been more durable thus far in his career, as he’s only been finished once in 24 pro fights, while Brown has been finished three times in 17 fights. In fairness to Brown, he’s been facing immensely tougher competition compared to Gooden, as this will be Brown’s 12th UFC fight, but just Gooden’s 4th. Gooden has gone up against a couple of grapplers in his last two fights, so his poor striking defense has been somewhat masked, but we expect Brown to do a better job of exposing it. While Gooden is actually a BJJ brown belt and Brown is just a purple belt, Brown looks like the better grappler and should have the advantage wherever the fight goes. Brown has looked very vulnerable to leg strikes, but Gooden is more of a boxer and is less likely than most to take advantage of Brown’s vulnerability. We have seen Brown get knocked out in the second round in each of his last two losses, so there’s always a chance Gooden lands another clean shot to notch his second straight KO victory, but we like Brown’s more diverse skill set to prevail and there’s a great chance he lands a finish.

Brown’s versatility and Gooden’s durability make this a trickier spot to bet and there are several different ways this fight could end. You can consider Brown’s ITD line at +120 but we wish it was a little wider. Our favorite two safer bets are probably “Fight Ends in R2” at +360 and “Fight Doesn’t Start R3” at +100. Brown has also shown somewhat of a suspect chin at times, which keeps Gooden’s +460 KO line in play. We also like Brown’s R2 and R3 win lines at +600 and +850, as well as his R2 and R3 submission lines at +1500 and +2100 respectively.

DFS Implications:

Despite landing finishes in five of his last six UFC wins, Brown has often underwhelmed in DFS with DraftKings scores of 90, 96 and 60 in three of those finishes. To his credit, he did score 110 DraftKings points in the other two early wins, but his finishes have generally come later in fights and he lacks the striking volume and takedown numbers to fill up a statsheet. It’s possible that going against Gooden who averages a slate-leading 7.55 SSA/min can bring the best out of Brown, but keep in mind Gooden has only been finished once in his career and that came up at 185 lb. With that said, Gooden has so far faced two grapplers and a guy on the verge of retirement since joining the UFC and we still like Brown’s chances to get a finish. When you combine that with the pace up matchup this looks like a good spot for Brown to hit a ceiling performance. Gooden’s weight miss adds some additional uncertainty and could potentially affect his cardio down the stretch. The odds imply Brown has a 68% chance to win, a 40% chance to get a finish and a 21% chance it comes in R1.

Gooden’s recent R1 KO win should bump up his ownership as he scored 111 DraftKings points and 126 points on FanDuel in the 68 second win. While he’s proven he has a puncher’s chance to win fights, the win simply masks his flaws and he’s still extremely hittable and has yet to show much of a ground game. Working in Gooden’s favor, Brown has been knocked out in the second round in each of his last two losses and has shown a suspect chin at times. Nevertheless, we expect the UFC veteran to be too much for Gooden so we don’t want to be left chasing Gooden’s last performance. The odds imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 20% chance it comes early and a 10% chance it comes in R1.

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Fight #1

Mackenzie Dern

8th UFC Fight (6-1)

Entering her first career five round fight, Dern has won four straight with three of those ending in first round submissions. She’s coming off a first round submission by Armbar against Nine Nunes, who tapped literally the second Dern had her arm isolated with just 13 seconds remaining in the first round. While Dern may be the best female grappler on the planet, she has a putrid 10% takedown accuracy as she’ll throw anything at her opponents to try and get the fight to the mat or even just to grab a limb. With that said, Dern was able to get Nunes down without too much trouble early in the first round on just two attempts, despite Nunes entering the fight with a 77% takedown defense. Dern then had nearly four minutes to advance her position and hunt for a submission and she patiently used nearly all of it before tactfully finishing the fight with just seconds remaining.

Dern is now 11-1 as a pro and 6-1 in the UFC with four of her last five wins ending in R1 submissions and her only career loss coming in a 2019 decision against a really tough Amanda Ribas, which occurred just four months after Dern had a baby. Of Dern’s 11 career wins, seven have ended in submissions, including six in the first round. Her other four wins have all come by decision and all 12 of her fights have ended in either decisions or submission wins. Her only fight to make it past the first round and not end in a decision was a 2017 R3 Armbar submission victory.

The only person to last longer than a round against Dern in her last four fights was another submission specialist in Virna Jandiroba. That fight played out more on the feet than many people may have expected going in, with Dern going 0 for 5 on takedowns and Jandiroba going 1 for 1. Dern finished ahead in significant strikes 82-63 and in total strikes 101-80 in what was largely a striking battle.

Amazingly, Dern has only landed one total takedown in her last six fights and just two in her entire UFC career. However, she has such a large bag of tricks to entangle herself with her opponents, that she often doesn't rely on traditional takedowns to engage in grappling. Whether that’s pulling guard, grabbing a limb or pretending to slip on a banana peel, Dern's opponents consistently end up on the mat before they realize it in her fights. So while her takedown numbers look terrible, her unorthodox strategy has proven to be effective.

Here are Dern’s takedowns and attempts beginning with her most recent fight:

1 of 2 - R1 Submission W
0 of 5 - Decision W
0 of 0 - R1 Submission W
0 of 1 - R1 Submission W
0 of 6 - Decision L
0 of 0 - R1 Submission W
1 of 6 - Decision W

Marina Rodriguez

8th UFC Fight (4-1-2)

After starting her UFC career going 2-1-2, Rodriguez has now won two in a row and looks like one of the more dangerous strikers in the division. She’s coming off a decision win over Michelle Waterson in the first five round fight of Rodriguez’s career, which she accepted on short notice with the condition it be fought up a weight class at 125 lb. All of Rodriguez’s previous fights had been at Strawweight (115 lb), where this upcoming fight will also be. Rodriguez outlanded Waterson 125-88 in significant strikes and 144-100 in total strikes, while stuffing four of Waterson’s five takedown attempts on her way to winning a unanimous decision.

In Rodriguez’s second most recent fight, Ribas controlled her on the ground for most of the first round, however, Rodriguez caught her with a clean right hook to the chin that dropped Ribas early in the second round and Rodriguez went to town with her ground and pound, until Herb Dean appeared to stop the fight. At that point, Rodriguez pulled up and walked away seemingly victorious only to turn around and see Dean claim he never actually called the fight. Both ladies appeared to look at Herb Dean confused—Ribas unsure what dimension she was in and Rodriguez pointing at him to call bullshit—but Dean told them to fight on. So Rodriguez quickly went back to work landing elbows and punches before Dean quickly stepped in again, to stop things for real just moments later, as he appeared to realize the mess he had caused. After the fight, you could see in super slow motion that Dean appeared to be going in to stop the fight, but at the very last second changed his mind and tried to juke his way out of making contact with Rodriguez. It was clearly not his best work and everyone watching/participating seemed to think that he had initially stopped the action. Regardless of the referee's shenanigans, the Muay Thai striker Rodriguez clearly demonstrated her power in that matchup as she handed Ribas her first UFC loss.

Rodriguez originally landed her shot in the UFC with a R1 KO on DWCS in 2018, but then fought to five straight decisions. Somehow, two of those ended in draws. She then landed her only UFC finish with the R2 KO against Ribas, before fighting to another decision most recently.

With a 14-1-2 pro record, Rodriguez has never been finished early and her only career loss came by split-decision against Carla Esparza. While seven of her 14 pro wins ended in decisions, she does have six KOs and a submission win on her record. However, five of those six finishes came in her first six fights against less experienced opponents who entered with records of: 2-0, 0-2, 2-0, 4-3, and 4-5. With that said, Rodriguez is a very solid Muay Thai striker, but she doesn’t really offer anything in terms of grappling and she’s landed just one takedown in her seven UFC fights. She notably has been taken down 10 times in her last four matches, which clearly has been her biggest weakness so far in the UFC.

Fight Prediction:

Rodriguez will have a 2” height and reach advantage.

This is a classic grappler versus striker battle, but Dern’s striking is still better than Rodriguez’s grappling, so it’s pretty clear who holds the overall advantage. Dern is unstoppable on the mat and Rodriguez’s only chance in this fight will be to make sure it never gets there. That’s asking a lot for someone that has been taken down 10 times in her last four fights, but Rodriguez has never been finished for what it’s worth and throws nasty slicing elbows off her back. That will be Rodriguez’s last line of defense if Dern does get the fight to the mat, but Dern is such a high-level grappler that it’s unlikely to be enough to stop her barring a doctor stoppage due to a cut, which of course is always possible. Dern has finished half of the opponents she’s faced in her career in the first round and that’s how she’s notched four of her last five wins, so that’s generally the most likely outcome anytime she fights. The only wildcard here is that this will be Dern’s first career five round fight and we sometimes see fighters behave differently when they go from fighting three rounds to five (just look at Johnny Walker last week). So while a first round submission win is still the most likely outcome, we have to lower our expectations compared to normal, as it’s possible with the extra rounds to work Dern doesn’t push for the early submission quite as hard. Or maybe she will, who knows. That’s what makes predicting how five round fights will go so challenging. Either way, we like Dern to grapple her way to victory here and while Rodriguez always has a puncher's chance, this looks like a terrible matchup for her.

In general we’ve found five round fights to be less profitable than their three round counterparts for a variety of reasons. So we’re treading lightly here and just rolling with “Dern Wins by R1 Submission” at +410 and “Under 2.5 Rounds” at -138.

DFS Implications:

In her six UFC wins, Dern has four first round submission victories and two decision wins. Her four R1 finishes have returned DK/FD scores of 111/118, 102/130, 92/108 and 106/126. Her one lower DraftKings score came in a hyper efficient finish of Hannah Cifers where Dern basically accumulated no other stats other than the submission win as she failed to land a takedown in the fight and landed just 5 significant strikes. That presents one way that Dern can land an early finish and still not put up a huge DraftKings score. Because she’s only landed two takedowns in seven UFC fights, has never landed a knockdown and doesn’t land much striking volume, a mid round finish may also struggle to really score well, but she does have the potential to rack up control time on DraftKings. In her two three-round decision wins, Dern scored 71/69 and 75/73 DK/FD points, which if you extend that pace over five rounds would be good for totals of 99/102 and 105/108. With that said, it’s unlikely Dern wins a five round decision here as that would likely mean she spent at least three rounds dominating Rodriguez on the mat without submitting her. If that did somehow happen, she would score much better on DraftKings than FanDuel through control time and total strikes, but again it’s incredibly unlikely. In the end, you’re playing Dern for her ability to end this fight with an early submission and that’s certainly the most likely way this fight ends. With her cheap DraftKings price tag combined with the smaller 9-fight slate, it’s a little hard to see Dern not ending up in the optimal lineup with a win here, however, you’ll need to find ways to get unique on such a small slate and fading the main event is the easiest way to do that. The odds imply she has a 63% chance to win, a 46% chance to get a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.

Rodriguez lands a solid amount of striking volume and is always dangerous on the feet, but she’s a liability when it comes to grappling and that’s the most important factor in this matchup. In her last seven fights she’s spent 28.67% of the time being controlled by her opponents and she’s been taken down 10 times in her last four fights. While Dern has a head-scratching 10% career takedown accuracy, she’s generally able to entangle herself with her opponents and end up on the mat without the use of traditional takedowns, so it’s important to look past her piss-poor takedown accuracy. While Rodriguez has never been finished in her career, she has struggled against grapplers as her only loss was against Carla Esparza and Amanda Ribas controlled Rodriguez for most of the first round on the mat in their recent fight. We also saw Cynthia Calvillo take her down three times on four attempts as they fought to a draw. So while Rodriguez is always a threat to finish fights in a striking battle, Dern should constantly be looking to get this fight to the ground, which makes a high-volume brawl very likely. It does, however, present the chance for Rodriguez to defend multiple takedowns, which raises her floor and ceiling on FanDuel. Overall this looks like an incredibly tough spot for Rodriguez to succeed, but if she does win it likely means she knocked Dern out, which would propel her into winning lineups on both sites. The odds imply she has a 37% chance to win, a 22% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.

Good luck to everyone this week, we hope you win big! Tag us on Twitter @dfs_mma with your winnings so we can see how you did!

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• Dern Fight Time Under 10 Min
• Dern Over 92.5 Fantasy Pts
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