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Fighter Notes:
Chase Hooper
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Looking to bounce back from his first career loss, Hooper couldn’t keep up with 32-year-old UFC veteran Alex Caceres’ striking and was never able to control him on the ground like he’s done to his past opponents.
Still just 21 years old, Hooper’s stand up game is extremely raw, which leaves him predictably dependent on getting fights to the ground. This presents a legitimate problem against seasoned opponents who know how to take advantage of such things, but may be less of a factor against someone like Barrett, with extremely limited UFC experience.
Prior to the recent decision loss, Hooper had three straight early wins, including a R2 KO, a R1 submission and a R1 KO in his UFC debut. He was extremely close to getting a submission finish in his debut, but ended up closing it out with ground and pound instead. Seven of his nine career wins have come early, with three KO’s and four submission victories.
Peter Barrett
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Barrett made his UFC debut back in August against Youssef Zalal and appeared to be on the verge of getting finished for essentially the entire fight. We didn’t get to see much of Barrett’s offense in his debut as he spent the majority of the fight defending his face and neck, however we’ve yet to be impressed by him.
Barrett has lost 4 of his last 7 pro fights. Other than the recent decision loss, he’s been submitted via R1 Armbar, and R3 Arm-Triangle Choke, as well as knocked out in R1. To his credit, 9 of his 11 wins have come early, with 7 KO’s and 2 submissions. However, those early wins came against some questionable competition who entered with records of: 6-12, 3-9, 0-2, 7-17, 3-2, 10-12, 3-0, 15-75 (not a typo), and 5-1.
Now 34 years old and entering just his second UFC fight, Barrett doesn’t seem long for the UFC.
Fight Prediction:
Hooper will have a 3” height advantage and 1” reach advantage in this fight. Despite a lack of striking skills, we think Hooper will have no trouble getting Barrett to the mat, where he’ll most likely submit him quickly. There’s always a chance Barrett sells out to stop the submission and loses by ground and pound instead, which keeps Hooper’s KO chances alive, and at far better odds than his submission line. Either way, we like Hooper to get the early finish here, most likely in the first round.
DFS Implications:
After burning the field as a huge favorite in his last outing, we expect people to be far more hesitant to click Hooper’s name this week. He’ll still carry a reasonable amount of ownership, but it should be considerably lower than what it was in his last fight. And that is in spite of the fact that he gets a considerably easier opponent in this match. Barrett looked extremely vulnerable to being submitted in his last fight and we think a grappling specialist like Hooper should be able to get the job done. Hooper’s expensive on both DFS sites, but that should also help to keep his ownership lower. We think Hooper makes for a strong tournament pivot from the other top priced fighters.
We don’t see much upside in Barrett, and just hope others will chase him in the hope of achieving a similar upset as to what Caceres did against Hooper. Barrett is the type of fighter we look to attack in DFS, not roster.
Tecia Torres
13th UFC Fight (7-5)Coming off her first win in her last five fights, Torres beat a promising prospect in Brianna Van Buren who came in on a six fight winning streak. Torres outlanded Van Buren 74-34 in significant strikes, while successfully defending 5 of Van Buren’s 7 takedown attempts. Torres was 0 for 3 on her own attempts. The upset was impressive in the fact that Torres won, but she still scored just 67 DraftKings points. In fact, Torres has not scored above 86 DraftKings points in her last 10 fights.
Basically a lock to leave fights up to the judges, only 1 of Torres’ 16 pro fights has ended early—which was a 2017 R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission win.
Her only opponent to score well against her was Jessica Andrade, who did so on the back of 10 takedowns and 92 significant strikes landed in their 2018 fight.
Torres has been taken down at least once in 8 of her last 9 fights, but she hasn’t landed one of her open in her last four bouts. In fact, she only has a total of 7 takedowns across her 12 UFC appearances. Torres also only has one submission attempt in those 12 fights, which ended with her loan submission win.
Sam Hughes
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making her short notice UFC debut after Angela Hill tested positive for COVID, Hughes is coming off an October R1 Standing Guillotine Submission win as the horn sounded to end the first round. Both of Hughes’ last two fights have now ended with someone unconscious—unfortunately for Hughes, she was on the wrong end of one of those.
Hughes has just six pro fights to her name (5-1), after only going pro in 2019. She did compete for an LFA title and was ahead in the fight before getting submitted by Vanessa Demopoulos in R4, this past July. Five of Hughe’s six pro fights have ended early, four by submission. However, her first three wins were all against opponents who had never fought professionally before. And only one of those women has fought since—which ended with another R1 submission loss for her.
Hughes started off fighting at 130 lb in February 2019, but slowly worked her way down to 115 lb by July of 2020 for her LFA title fight. She’s fought once since the loss, which was at 120 lb catchweight because her opponent took the match on just one week’s notice.
Despite the 5-1 record, we weren’t very impressed with anything we saw out of Hughes. She’s gone against a much lower level of competition and is likely in for a rude awakening in the UFC. She does throw just enough volume to keep this fight in play for a pace up affair, but not enough to really get us excited.
Fight Prediction:
Hughes will have a 4” height advantage and 4.5” reach advantage in this fight, which isn’t anything that the 5’1” Torres isn’t used to. We think Torres will lead the dance in striking and inevitably take this fight to another middling decision, which she should be able to win without too much trouble.
DFS Implications:
Torres has yet to give us any indication she can score well in DFS. A decision machine who adds little in the ground game, expensive plays (on DraftKings) don’t get much grosser. This also means that her ownership (on DraftKings) will be kept in check despite being the biggest favorite on the slate. So as a safe floor, contrarian tournament play, we understand the appeal, however, you’ll almost certainly need a R1 or late R2 finish for her to pay off.
FanDuel released their pricing for this fight considerably later than DraftKings, yet curiously decided to price the massive favorite Torres at just $15. Seemingly begging people to play her, her ownership will likely get out of control as a salary saving floor raiser. She makes for a great cash play, but we like the idea of fading her in larger tournaments to differentiate your lineups and increase your ceiling.
FanDuel’s now very loose pricing has made it possible to easily create lineups with all favorites. Barring another unusually high number of underdogs winning, this will almost certainly increase the pay point threshold in tournaments and has a chance to result in massive splits at the top IF underdogs fail to do well. If you do choose to play a lineup of all favorites on FanDuel, make sure you use a less popular MVP to at least reduce the number of people you’ll be splitting prizes with.
In terms of Hughes, betting on an inexperienced fighter making her short notice UFC debut to be the first person to ever finish a seasoned UFC verteran seems like a losing proposition. But hey, crazier things have happened. Hughes will likely need to take Torres down early and often to win this fight, as Torres appears to have the advantage on the feet. Torres does own a putrid 13% takedown defense, but looked decent stuffing takedowns in her last fight against a considerably better fighter than Hughes.
Billy Quarantillo
4th UFC Fight (3-0)This fight was originally scheduled back in April, but was canceled due to COVID.
After making his impressive UFC debut almost one year ago to the day, Quarantillo has won his first three UFC fights and is currently on an eight fight winning streak. He won his UFC debut with a R2 Triangle Choke Submission, before beating Spike Carlyle in a hard fought decision. He followed that up with a R3 KO of Kyle Nelson in his last match. He very nearly finished Nelson at the end of R2, but ran out of time. Quarantillo then face-planted Nelson with his first punch 7 seconds into R3. So really Quarantillo was unfortunate not to score more in that spot.
Now 15-2 as a pro, his only two losses came in a 2013 decision (in his third pro fight) and a 2016 R1 KO against Michel Quinones. Ten of Quarantillo’s 14 career wins have come early, with six KO’s and five submissions.
Not typically one to end fights in the first round, the BJJ black belt Quarantillo has shown the ability to wear on his opponents as fights go on before finishing them late. Six of his last seven fights have ended early, but only one of his last 12 wins came in R1. Looking like he’s squarely in the prime of his career, Quarantillo just turned 32 on Tuesday and hasn't lost a fight since 2016.
Gavin Tucker
5th UFC Fight (3-1)Two and a half years older than Quarantillo and also a BJJ black belt, Tucker joined the UFC back in 2017, but has just four UFC fights to his name. He didn’t fight at all in 2018 after pulling out of a fight against Andre Soukhamthath due to injury. He then fought just once in 2019 and once so far this year.
All four of his UFC fights have made it to the 3rd round, with his first two ending in decisions. In his 13 pro fights, his only career loss came by decision in his second UFC fight against Rick Glenn. The ref was widely criticized for not stopping the fight and allowing it to last the full 15 minutes, as Tucker took a vicious beating. He ended up getting outlanded 142-23 in significant strikes and left the fight with a broken face. He was also taken down four times and knocked down once in the heavily lopsided match. The brutal beating could be part of the reason why Tucker didn’t fight again for nearly two years.
Eight of his nine wins prior to joining the UFC ended early—with four KO’s and four submissions. Potentially due to his prior success, Tucker came into the UFC as a cocky, showboating raw talent, who relied on his speed and ability to dodge punches to succeed. His come-to-Jesus moment appears to have been when he was nearly beaten to death in the ring in 2017, and now all of a sudden he’s a polite, soft spoken individual. He did throw an illegal knee in his 2019 first fight back against Seung Woo Choi, which cost him a point, but overall he appears to have matured.
Fight Prediction:
Quarantillo will have a 4” height and reach advantage in this one. We think he’s an all around better fighter than Tucker and will look to prove that on Saturday. Tucker is by no means bad, and normally wouldn’t be a guy we’re looking to bet heavily against. However, we think Quarantillo will prove to be too much for him. This has the makings of a great fight and we think it will be a fun one to watch. We like Quarantillo to get a late finish and think his R3 line, which we’ve seen as high as +1400, is extremely interesting. His R2 odds at +900 are also worth considering, and of course the safer option of Quarantillo ITD at +300 makes a ton of sense.
DFS Implications:
Checking in as this week’s FanDuel value play of the week, Quarantillo is the latest favorite to be priced at just $15 (along with Torres, but she has a much lower ceiling). Despite going later into fights, Quarantillo’s slate leading 7.51 SSL/min and 1.71 takedowns/15 min keep him squarely in play for DFS, regardless of when he ends fights. He also averages 2.4 submission attempts/15 min, which just adds to his FanDuel upside. And just to be clear, we love Quarantillo on DraftKings as well.
With Tucker also priced at $15 on FanDuel, he makes for an interesting leverage play, as few people will pay $15 for the underdog when the favorite can be had for the same price. With that said, we think Quarantillo is egregiously mispriced and you’d be foolish not to take advantage of that. Outside of gaining leverage on the field, Tucker makes more sense as a value play on DraftKings. We still prefer Quarantillo on both sites, but you’ll likely want to have some exposure to Tucker in case things go sideways.
Rafael Fiziev
4th UFC Fight (2-1)This fight was originally scheduled for November 28th before Moicano tested positive for COVID. Now rescheduled just two weeks later, apparently Moicano is recovered.
After getting knocked out 86 seconds into the first round of his 2019 UFC debut against Magomed Mustafaev, Fiziev bounced back with two lopsided decision wins in his next two fights. Both wins were more impressive on tape than for DFS purposes, but it’s only a matter of time until Fiziev gets his first finish in the UFC.
Still only 27 years old, Fiziev has just nine pro fights to his name. Prior to joining the UFC he was 6-0 with all six wins coming early—including five in R1 and one in R2. Five of those wins came by KO, but he does have one submission win to his name.
A coach at Tiger Muay Thai in Thailand, Fiziev’s Muay Thai background is evident when you watch his violent leg strikes as well as his exceptional balance. Made famous for his Matrix style maneuvers, which he uses to dodge head kicks in exciting fashion, this guy definitely has a future hustling the Limbo circuit if fighting doesn’t work out. He’s also now successfully defended all 15 of the takedowns attempted on him in the UFC. There were no attempts in his brief debut, but Alex White went 0 for 11 before Marc Diakiese followed that up with an 0 for 4 performance.
As is often the case with Muay Thai fighters, Fiziev doesn’t add much in the ground game, but he does have one takedown in each of his last two fights. He also tacked on three advances in his last match, but has not attempted a submission in the UFC.
Renato Moicano
10th UFC Fight (6-3)Coming off a quick 44 second R1 Rear-Naked Choke Submission win in his first fight after moving up to the 155 lb Lightweight division, Moicano had previously fought his entire career at Featherweight (145 lb). However, after suffering back-to-back losses for the first time as a pro, apparently he decided it was time for a change.
Moicano entered the UFC in 2014 and won his first fight via R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission. He then went on to win a pair of decisions before getting submitted by Guillotine Choke versus Brian Ortega in R3 of his fourth UFC match. Moicano was ahead of Ortega 109-65 in significant strikes before succumbing to the submission.
He bounced back from the loss with a convincing decision win over Calvin Kattar, where he relentlessly attacked Kattar’s legs and outlanded him 116-41 in significant strikes. He followed that up with another submission win in a dominating R1 finish of Cub Swanson.
It’s possible that this is a premature call, but as of now the win over Swanson appears to have been where Moicano’s career peaked. He went on to get knocked out early in R2 of his next fight, against Jose Aldo in February 2019. Despite the loss, he was awarded a main event spot against The Korean Zombie in his next fight. Things went south quickly, as the Zombie dropped Moicano 30 seconds into the fight with a clean right hand. Moicano briefly survived face down on the mat, but the ref quickly stopped the fight at the 58 second mark due to the punishment Moicano was taking. Following that tough loss, he made the move up to Lightweight.
With his only three career losses coming against top Flyweights in Brian Ortega, Jose Aldo and The Korean Zombie, it seems fair to give Moicano some benefit of the doubt as to where he’s at in his career. Still just 31 years old and 1-0 in his new weight class, maybe he can fare better against a lower level of opponents in his new division.
After three of his first five UFC fights ended in decisions, his last four have all ended in the first six minutes—including three in R1. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues on Saturday.
Fight Prediction:
At 5’11”, Moicano will have a 3” height advantage and a 1” reach advantage in this fight, but Fiziev’s last two opponents were 5’10” and 6’0”, so he seems fine facing taller opponents. The trajectory appears to be pointed up on Fiziev as his UFC career looks to be picking up momentum. We’ve seen his striking output increase in each of his UFC fights and his confidence appears to be growing with it.
Considering Moicano has never knocked anyone out—not only in the UFC, but in his entire pro career—you would think he would be looking to take this fight to the ground, where he has seven submission wins as a pro. However, Moicano didn’t attempt a single takedown in his 2018 fight against another striker in Calvin Kattar, so it’s hard to say with much certainty what his approach will be here. After getting knocked out twice in a row by top level Flyweights, Moicano’s only fight since moving up to Lightweight didn’t last long enough for us to take much away from it—literally each guy landed one significant strike.
Fiziev appears to be the more powerful striker, while Moicano has thrown more volume in his career. If Fiziev’s 100% takedown defense can hold up, he’s the more likely one to end the fight standing up. This sets up as a good fight that both guys are capable of winning. With that said, we like Fiziev’s side of things and think there’s a decent chance for him to get his first UFC KO here. That’s far from a lock though, so don’t be surprised if we see another decision.
DFS Implications:
With no impressive DFS scores so far in the UFC, we can likely get Fiziev at reasonable ownership—although his middle of the road pricing is sure to drive it up some. We think a ceiling performance is coming soon for Fiziev, it’s just a matter of when. His last two opponents had only combined for one KO loss in their pro careers, while Moicano has been knocked out twice in his last three fights, so you can see why there’s reason for optimism here. While it appears he’ll need the early finish to score well, Fiziev looks like a solid play on both DFS sites. He especially stands out on FanDuel, where he’s relatively cheaper and can score from his consistent takedown defense.
In his nine UFC fights, Moicano has never scored above 88 DraftKings points in a fight that made it out of the second round. So it seems he’ll need to end this one before the third round to put up a decent score. Based on the current odds, the chances of him doing that are somewhere in the 20-25% range. While Moicano was able to put up a huge score on Cub Swanson back in 2018, this feels like a much tougher spot for a ceiling performance.
Daniel Pineda
9th UFC Fight (4-4)After originally joining the UFC in 2012, Pineda won his first two fights—both by R1 submission. However, after losing four of his next five matches he was released in 2014. Three of those four losses came in decisions, while he was also knocked out once in the first round. His third win over that first UFC stint was another R1 submission.
After leaving the UFC in 2014, he won eight of his next 10 fights, with nine of those 10 ending early—including five more R1 wins.
His last two fights before being invited back to the UFC were also wins, but were both overturned to No Contests after he failed a drug test—which also resulted in a 6 month suspension. Following the conclusion of his suspension, the UFC decided to give him another shot.
In his first fight back this past August, Pineda was matched up against Herbert Burns, who missed weight by 3 lb. Pineda did a great job of commanding the fight and reversing positions against the BJJ black belt. He was able to finish Burns as the ref stopped the fight late in the second round as Pineda pummeled Burns on the ground in the Crucifix position.
Pineda has been finished early eight times in his 13 pro losses. He’s been knocked out twice and submitted six times. All six of his submission losses came prior to 2011. Amazingly, all 27 of his career wins have come early—including 9 KO’s and 18 submissions. Of his 27 wins, 17 didn’t make it out of the first round. And four of his eight early losses also came in R1. Win or lose, Pineda generally makes for exciting fights.
"Anything is possible with these two!"
-Dana White on Swanson vs. Pineda
Cub Swanson
19th UFC Fight (11-7)Now 37 years old, Swanson hasn’t fought in 14 months following his first win since 2017. He lost four in a row prior to the win. That string of losses came against a series of tough opponents, beginning with a 2017 R2 Guillotine Submission at the hands of Brian Ortega. He followed that up with a decision loss to Frankie Edgar, before getting finished in R1 by Renato Carneiro via Rear-Naked Choke Submission. His most recent loss came via decision against Shane Burgos in 2019.
We’ve seen a ton of significant strikes landed in each of Swanson’s last two fights, both of which ended in three round decisions. In the loss to Burgos, Swanson was outlanded 129-134 (8.6/8.9 SSL/min) in significant strikes. In his most recent fight Swanson won the striking battle 135-86 (9.0/5.7 SSL/min) against a grappler in Kron Gracie. Despite being known as a grappler, Gracie was forced into a stand up battle and went 0 for 2 on his takedown attempts. Pineda isn’t typically a high volume striker, but Swanson appears to want to push the pace. Keep in mind, we’ve also seen Swanson take part in many lower volume affairs also, so there’s no guarantee his recent volume uptick continues.
Swanson has been finished early eight times in his 37 pro fights. His only KO loss came prior to joining the UFC against Jose Aldo in 2009, 8 seconds into R1. While he’s only been knocked out once, he’s been submitted seven times—which is notable going against an opponent in Pineda who has 18 wins by submission. Of Swanson’s seven submission losses, two were by Rear-Naked Choke, three were by Guillotine Choke, one was by Neck Crank and the other was an Arm-Triangle Choke.
With all of his submission wins, Pineda has unsurprisingly gotten it done in a variety of ways. However, we’ve seen him be most effective with Rear-Naked Chokes (6 wins) and Kimuras (3 wins). He did win a 2018 match with a R1 Guillotine Choke after winning his previous fight with a R1 Triangle Choke.
Swanson himself has four submission wins on his record, but the last one came in 2009. His last early win of any kind came in a 2013 R3 KO. Since then he’s gone 6-6 with all six wins ending in decisions, but four of the six losses ending early by submission.
Fight Prediction:
This sets up as a fun fight to watch with the potential for lots of action. Pineda’s submission-heavy offense gets matched up against an opponent in Swanson who’s shown he’s quite vulnerable to being submitted. While it’s of some concern that Swanson was able to defeat another grappler in Gracie in his last fight, we’re not overly worried about it. While nothing is ever a sure thing, we like this spot for Pineda to get another submission win over the aging Swanson. Pineda Wins by Submission at +260 and Pineda ITD at +145 are both interesting.
DFS Implications:
Swanson has not landed a takedown in his last five fights and seems entirely reliant on insane striking volume and early finishes to score well in DFS. Since he hasn’t finished an opponent since 2013 and he’s now 37 years old, he’s pretty much relying on landing 140 significant strikes or more to score well in DFS. It’s possible a little bit less would be enough if we get another slate that goes heavily the favorites’ ways, which wouldn’t really be surprising. For what it’s worth, he does check several of the boxes for a lower owned dog that could break the slate with high volume upside in a potentially high scoring fight. He also looks like a better play on FanDuel where he’s significantly cheaper and can score off takedowns defended.
Pineda sets up as a solid DFS play this week, with a huge ceiling at an affordable price on both sites. His four UFC wins have scored 121, 110, 110 and 111 points on DraftKings. Obviously, he’ll be highly owned because of that, but we think you can differentiate elsewhere. It does make sense to have some exposure to Swanson as a leverage/hedge play, because if he does win there’s a very real chance he ends up in the optimal lineup.
Ciryl Gane
4th UFC Fight (3-0)A jacked Heavyweight who’s very light on his feet, Gane comes in just 6-0 as a pro, with five early finishes. Three of his wins have come by submission, while two have been by KO. His first fight to make it to the judges came in his last bout against another fleet-footed Heavyweight in Tanner Boser.
In his August 2019 UFC debut, Gane submitted Raphael Pessoa towards the end of R1, in what had been a low volume affair. Pessoa had never been submitted in his prior nine fights.
Gane followed up the first round win with his first ever trip to the third round, against questionable talent Don'Tale Mayes. Ganes commanded the fight and finished Mayes 14 seconds before the judges were needed. The late R3 finish filled up the stat sheet and scored an impressive 120 DraftKings points.
He then fought Boser to a disappointing decision in his last fight. Gane was unable to take Boser down on his only official attempt. For the first two rounds, the fight played out like a 10 minute Spiderman meme with both guys not used to staring across the octagon at another Heavyweight as light and nimble on their feet as they are. Gane started to turn it on late in R3 and went on to win by decision.
After fighting four times in 2019, including once prior to joining the UFC, Gane now hasn’t stepped into the octagon in nearly a year after he watched four straight fights get canceled. The first of those was due to him suffering an injury, but the next three were completely out of his control with three straight opponents withdrawing. Apparently no one wants to fight this monster.
Junior Dos Santos
23rd UFC Fight (15-7)Dos Santos has been knocked out in three straight fights—two in R2 and one in R1. The losses came against stiff competition in Francis N’gannou, Curtis Blaydes and Jairzinho Rozenstruik. His last five fights have now all ended with KO’s in the first two rounds, with him winning two of those. He has only been submitted once in 29 fights, which came in 2007 by R1 Armbar.
Dos Santos has been dropping weight lately and looked noticeably leaner in his last match. He weighed 249 lb against N’gannou, 247 lb against Blaydes, and then most recently just 238.5 lb against Rozenstruik.
UPDATE: The weight cutting trend ended and Dos Santos came in at 246.5 lb for this fight.
Limiting his upside, Dos Santos’ last R1 win came in 2011. On the flipside, he’s only been finished in the first round three times in his career—a 2019 KO vs. Francis N’gannou, a 2017 KO vs Stipe Miocic and a 2007 Submission vs. Joaquim Ferreira. We don’t want to put too much weight in historical stats with a fighter who may be quickly going off a cliff in his career, but he does seem like a tough guy to finish in the first five minutes.
There’s plenty of speculation that a loss here would spell the end of Dos Santos’ UFC career. We think that’s 100% accurate and the UFC probably already has a box of his things waiting for him out back.
Fight Prediction:
While both fighters are the same height, Gane will have a 4” reach advantage and is six years younger than the 36-year-old Dos Santos. If the UFC wanted Dos Santos to stick around, it’s unlikely this is the matchup they would have given him. Betting on aging fighters to grasp one last taste of victory against up and coming studs seems like it’s generally a losing proposition. And the UFC has made it abundantly clear they’re done hanging onto vets in the twilight of their careers. We like Gane to finish this one in the first two rounds as Dos Santos looks pretty much shot at this point in his career.
DFS Implications:
Gane looks like a solid DFS play on both sites tied for the highest R1 finishing chances on the slate. He’s also one of the most expensive plays, so he’ll need to not only get the finish, but also outscore most of the fighters around him to be usable. We think he’s a good bet to do so, but you always need a few things to work out just right in these situations.
Dos Santos will continue to be overowned until he dies of old age, so let the name brand donkeys continue to chase ghosts while we focus on actual good plays. If he pulls out a miracle, so be it, but having much exposure to guys like this is a long term losing strategy.
Kevin Holland
10th UFC Fight (7-2)Fighting for the fifth time this year, Holland was supposed to be half of the main event last week before he tested positive for COVID and was replaced by Marvin Vettori. Holland claims the test was a false positive and he repeatedly tested negative just a few days later, so who knows what exactly is going on. Welcome to 2020.
A BJJ black belt, Holland has now won his last four fights, with three of those ending in KO’s (two in R1 and one in R3). He’s also had the luxury of going against late replacements making their UFC debuts in two of those four fights. However, one of those guys was Joaquin Buckley who’s looked pretty good in his last two fights after getting KO’d by Holland.
Holland has never been KO’d in his 25 pro fights and the only two early losses in his career both came by Rear-Naked Choke—once in 2019 against Brendan Allen and previously in 2015 well before joining the UFC.
Jacare Souza
15th UFC Fight (9-5)After a failed attempt at moving up to Light Heavyweight (205 lb) against Jan Błachowicz, the 41-year-old Souza will now retreat back to Middleweight (185 lb), where he previously spent his entire career.
Souza has now lost back-to-back five round decision fights, 3 of his last 4 matches, and four of his last six trips inside the octagon. All of that after winning 7 of his first 8 UFC fights. He originally joined the UFC in 2013—10 years after he started his pro MMA career in 2003. Despite the recent high loss total, he’s only been finished early once in the last 12 years and three times total in his career—a 2003 R1 KO in his first pro fight, a 2008 R1 KO and most recently a 2017 R2 KO vs. Robert Whittaker (of all people). His last three losses have all come in decisions and the only UFC fighter to ever score well against him was Robert Whittaker.
Fight Prediction:
Holland will have a 2” height advantage and massive 9” reach advantage in this fight. The line has curiously moved dramatically in Souza’s favor throughout the week. After Holland opened the week as -165 favorite he’s now been bet all the way down to a +105 dog. It’s hard to say whether this is due to an unknown injury, Holland’s recent positive COVID test, or simply due to Souza’s name recognition, but such a line move obviously gives some reason for concern. Without knowing the reason for the shift, we still like Holland to win a decision here.
DFS Implications:
In general, we love playing Kevin Holland, especially when he can be had at such a bargain. However, this one feels like a trap. Souza seems to suck opponents into fighting his style of fight and he’s an extremely tough guy to finish. Even at 41 years old, his chin seems to have held up, at least from what we can tell. While Holland has scored highly in his early finishes, he’s been completely unusable in his decision wins. While we know it’s hard to pass on Holland at his price tag, there are a ton of red flags here.
Souza has become somewhat of a blackhole for fantasy production for both him and his opponents—at least outside of a high-volume five round decision loss to Jack Hermansson in 2019. His last fight went five full rounds, yet we only 91 significant strikes landed with no grappling stats added on. Souza looked content with pushing Błachowicz up against the cage for as long as humanly possible, and landed just 20 significant strikes in 25 minutes of action. While his wins have historically scored well, they seem to be losing steam with his last four scoring 127, 105, 105 and then 92 points on DraftKings most recently. You can easily make the argument that he’s a solid value play, especially on FanDuel at just $14, now that he’s the slight favorite. And while that’s true, the pricing is so loose on FanDuel this week, you don’t have to play him. He’s also likely to be heavily owned based on the line flip so it’s a great leverage opportunity to fade him. Holland has never been KO’d and we’re not betting that changes Saturday.
Mackenzie Dern
6th UFC Fight (4-1)Coming off back-to-back R1 Submission wins following a 2019 decision loss to Amanda Ribas, Dern is now 9-1 as a pro with six wins by submission and three by decision. Her last three wins have all come in the first round, after she won her 2018 UFC debut against Ashley Yoder in a decision. Five of Dern’s six career submission wins have come in the first round. She has never finished a fight in the second round and if she fails to get the R1 finish, it’s been tough for her to score well.
Dern’s takedown accuracy and defense may be a bit perplexing at first glance, but the context required to fully understand her pathetic 7% takedown accuracy and 0% defense is that she will do whatever’s possible to try and get the fight to the ground. Whether that’s pulling guard, pretending to slip on a missed kick, tossing out banana peels or just generally tangling herself up with her opponents. While the numbers look terrible, her unorthodox strategy has proven to be effective. However, it will be interesting to see how she does against a real mechanic like Jandiroba.
"You do not want to miss this fight!"
-Dana White on Dern vs. Jandiroba
Virna Jandiroba
4th UFC Fight (2-1)The 32-year-old Jandiroba comes into this fight with a 16-1 pro record that includes 13 wins by submission, with eight in R1. After suffering her first and only career loss in her UFC debut against Carla Esparza, Jandiroba rebounded with a R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission win over Mallory Martin in 2019. She followed that up with a R1 Armbar submission of Feilce Herrig this past August, and has now seen her last three wins all come by submission in the first two rounds. Her last opponent, Herrig, had never been submitted as a pro, and Jandiroba still made short work of her. Prior to joining the UFC, Jandiroba won 14 straight fights, with 11 of those coming by submission.
Fight Prediction:
Dern will have a 1” height advantage, while Jandiroba will have a 1” reach advantage in this fight. This sets up as an exceptional grappling battle between two elite BJJ black belt submission specialists. The UFC decided to move this fight to the main card on Thursday, after originally having it in the prelims, so clearly they’re expecting it to be a good one as well. We could see this going a few different ways.
Nine of Jandiroba’s 13 submissions have come by some form of choke, while she also has four wins by Armbar. Dern on the other hand has half of her submission wins by grabbing a limb and twisting (2 Armbars & 1 Kneebar), with the other three coming by Rear-Naked Choke. Dern seems to be the more comfortable of the two going for submissions off her back, while Jandiroba really excels when she can exert downward pressure. While Dern is throwing snot balls trying to get opponents to the ground, Jandiroba offers a much more technical takedown execution. We think Dern has the advantage in the grappling/submission department by being the more slippery of the two, and with the ability to get submissions from a greater number of positions.
Dern’s stand up game is far from elite, but Jandiroba really doesn’t offer anything at all in the striking department—coming in dead last on the slate at an anemic 1.22 SS Landed/Min. However, she also leads the slate with the fewest SS Absorbed/Min at just 1.52. Dern clearly has an advantage when it comes to striking, and it’s not close.
Jandiroba’s game plan is pretty straightforward—shoot for a double leg takedown, exert downward pressure, try to set up an Arm-Triangle Choke, and adjust to an Armbar or Rear-Naked Choke depending on how her opponent reacts.
Dern, on the other hand, is more likely to come out swinging like an octopus and will adapt to wherever the fight takes her. Normally she has no concern with allowing opponents to either take her down or hop on top after she’s conveniently made her way to the mat in the hopes of baiting them in. It will be interesting to see how much she adjusts her approach going against a one-dimensional submission specialist here. We think she’s much more likely to want to keep the fight standing up, where she’ll have a clear advantage.
Neither one of these two women have ever been finished in their careers, so it will be interesting to see if that changes Saturday. We would not be surprised in the slightest if their grappling skills canceled each other out and Dern ended up winning a decision based on her striking. In fact, that’s probably the most likely scenario.
DFS Implications:
Jandiroba has shown a consistently high ceiling in her wins, landing one submission after the next. It will be interesting to see how she does against a fellow submission expert, but her cheap price tag on both DFS sites feels almost too good to pass up. Unfortunately we think that will be the general consensus, so her ownership will likely be one of if not the highest on the slate for any underdog. She’s been priced at $9,000 and $9,100 on DraftKings in her last two fights and rewarded those who have played her with scores of 106 and 104 DraftKings points. Now priced at just $7,500 we think people will be jumping at the opportunity to play her.
When you combine Jandiroba’s high ownership with Dern’s expensive price tag, we could see Dern’s ownership well below that of Jandiroba’s. That makes for an interesting leverage opportunity in Dern, despite the fact that she’s the favorite and the line has moved in her favor. There’s also a lot of leverage to be gained by fading this fight entirely and hoping it ends in a lower scoring decision win for Dern, which again, we think is the most likely outcome.
Tony Ferguson
18th UFC Fight (15-2)Prior to his recent KO loss against Justin Gaethje, the Jiu-Jitsu black belt Ferguson had won 12 in a row, including nine early finishes. However, none of his last eight fights ended in the first round. Of his 25 pro wins, he has 12 KO’s and 8 submission victories, with nine wins coming in R1.
Ferguson only has 4 career losses in 29 pro fights. His only submission loss was a 2009 R1 Triangle Choke. His only KO loss came from a R5 referee stoppage in his last fight against Justin Gaethje and his two decision losses came in 2009 and 2012.
Ferguson’s high volume striking has allowed him to land over 100 significant strikes in his last three fights as well as four of his last five. Note that two of those fights made it beyond the third round so he had extra time to work with. To put that in better context, here are his significant strikes landed/absorbed per minute in his last three fights beginning with the most recent: 6.0/6.3, 10.4/6.8, 11.4/4.5. So while Oliveira is generally more of a submission threat than volume striker, Ferguson seems like he’s looking for a brawl. With that said, Ferguson does have five submission wins in his last 10 fights. Now 36 years old and coming off a loss, you’re starting to hear whispers about whether he’s past his prime.
Charles Oliveira
27th UFC Fight (17-8, NC)Coasting in on a seven fight winning streak, the 31-year-old 3rd degree BJJ black black Oliveira is 29-8 as a pro. Eight of his 29 wins have come by KO, 19 have been by submission, while only two were by decision. On the other side of things, 7 of his 8 losses have come early, including four KO’s and three submissions. Impressively, 92% of his pro fights have ended early.
His last 14 fights all ended early, with him winning 10 of those. Prior to his last fight, which ended with a R3 submission win, he had gone nine fights in a row without seeing a 3rd round.
Notably, Oliveira will not have his head coach in his corner for this fight after he tested positive for COVID this past week. We had some initial concern as to whether the fight would even proceed, but apparently it was a contained case. This fight was announced just three weeks ago, so neither fighter has had a ton of time to prepare.
Fight Prediction:
Oliveira has routinely made short work of second-tier UFC fights, but has mostly struggled against higher ranked opponents. Anthony Pettis submitted Oliveira in R3 of their 2016 match, whereas Ferguson beat Pettis by TKO (Corner’s Stoppage) after the second round of their 2018 brawl. Oliveira also has losses to Felder, Lamas, Holloway, Edgar, Swanson, Cerrone, and Miller.
Ferguson started playing mental games early this week, predicting Oliveira would come in heavy and blame the relative short notice as an excuse. He went on to say the fight wouldn’t go on if Oliveira missed weight. Oliveira clapped back by weighing in early with a bulky Bane style mask and sunglasses on, while still coming in a pound and a half under the limit. Ferguson came in a half pound heavier despite his lack of accessories. So maybe someone should tell Tony to have a coke and smile and shut the fuck up.
This will be a good test to see what Ferguson has left in his career. If he loses to the #7 ranked Lightweight Oliveira, it’s most likely an indicator that he’s on the way down. However, a convincing win here would cement his top three ranking in the Lightweight division and keep him in title shot contention.
We’re not super confident with our pick in this one, as we could see either guy finishing the other, but we give the slight edge to Ferguson just because Oliveira has struggled to beat other top fighters. It’s entirely possible Ferguson’s game has dropped off more than we’re accounting for, but he looks like a tough guy to finish. We’ll say Ferguson gets another R2 KO (during the actual round this time), but it’s our least confident pick on the slate. We could also see Oliveir submitting Ferguson. This should be a fun fight to watch.
DFS Implications:
Despite only one of his last 10 fights ending in R1, Ferguson has scored over a 100 DraftKings points in six of his last 10 matches—including in his last four R2 wins. He also has a 2014 R2 Submission that scored just 88 points. Ferguson has not scored well in his third round finishes with a 2016 R3 Submission Win over Kevin Lee that scored just 72 DraftKings points and 2015 three round decision win against Josh Thomson that scored only 87 DraftKings points.
He has a 130 point 5 round decision that makes his DraftKings sheet look a little better than it should, at least when we’re discussing using him in a three round fight. That would only be equivalent to roughly a 90 point three round decision without the additional rounds.
Disregarding the 130 point five round decision win, he has scored above 120 DraftKings points twice in his other nine most recent fights. Both of those came in best-case-scenario doctor/corner stoppages following the second round—which if you’re unfamiliar with how the scoring works, that means the second round ended, but because his opponent couldn’t continue into the third round, a R2 KO was awarded. That allows fighters to rack up stats for 10 full minutes while still getting the R2 bonus. Having two of those in a row is very unusual and he’s likely due for some regression in the other direction—like an early R2 or R3 finish.
Ferguson doesn’t have a takedown in his last eight fights, so he’s entirely reliant on strikes and finishes to score well in DFS. Based on our calculations, we think Ferguson has between a 35-40% chance of finishing this fight in the first two rounds, which is what it would likely take for him to score well.
Oliveira also makes for an interesting DFS play, especially on DraftKings where there is limited value available. While we gave the slight hesitant edge to Ferguson in our fight prediction, we would not be surprised at all if Oliveira won this one. He has a slick ground game and underrated striking. We haven’t seen Ferguson be asked to defend much grappling lately, so maybe Oliveira can catch him with something. We don’t think it’s the most likely outcome, but it’s certainly in play. Keep in mind, we currently have him projected as the second most owned underdog, so he won’t be a sneaky play.
Deiveson Figueiredo
11th UFC Fight (9-1)Just three weeks removed from his first successful title defense, Figueiredo is wasting no time in slicing through the Flyweight division. Considering that Moreno fought on the same card back in November, it seems like the two are on a pretty even playing field.
Figueiredo’s only career loss came in an ultra low volume (26-14 in significant strikes) three round decision against Jussier Formiga in March 2019. A large portion of the fight was spent with Formiga lying on top of Figueiredo doing very little work, but it was enough for him to squeak out a decision. The stalling strategy seems like one of the only ways to defeat Figueiredo.
Bouncing back from his first and only career loss with a decision win over a tough Alexandre Pantoja, Figueiredo has now won five straight since the Formiga fight. He’s won the last four early, with three first round submissions and a R2 KO.
Figueiredo won the vacant Flyweight belt with a R1 Rear-Naked Choke Submission against Joseph Benavidez this past July. That was his second straight finish of Benavidez after he knocked him out in R2 of their prior fight. Because Figueiredo missed weight in their first match, he was ineligible for the belt.
Seven of Figueiredo’s nine UFC wins have come early, four by KO and three by submission—all four of the KO’s came in R2, while all three submissions came in R1. Looking at his entire pro career, 17 of his 20 career wins came early with nine KO's and eight submissions. Eleven of those early finishes came in R1.
This will be Figueiredo’s fourth straight five round fight, although he didn’t make it out of the first two rounds in the last three. No one in the Flyweight division can stand and strike with Figueiredo and live to talk about it.
Brandon Moreno
10th UFC Fight (6-2-1)Also on a quick turnaround, Moreno was credited with a R1 KO against Brandon Royval after Royval dislocated his shoulder just before the end of R1. To Moreno’s credit, he controlled Royval on the ground for an extended period of time before the injury, but he would not have gotten the R1 finish without the injury.
Moreno came into the UFC in 2016 on an 8 fight winning streak and submitted Louis Smolka in the first round of his debut with a Guillotine Choke. He then beat Ryan Benoit in a decision before getting another submission win in his third UFC fight—this time with a R2 Rear-Naked Choke.
The explosive start to his UFC career was enough to land him a main event spot against Sergio Pettis, which Moreno went on to lose in a decision. He followed that up with his only other UFC loss to date, in a three round decision loss to S Alexandre Pantoja.
Following the pair of losses, Moreno fought a 2019 match in the LFA where notched a R4 KO. He then returned to the UFC with a split decision draw against Askar Askarov. Since the draw, he’s won his last three fights, with two decisions before the most recent “KO”.
Moreno has never been finished early in 24 pro fights, with all five of his losses coming by decision. Five of his last six UFC fights have now made it to the judges, after two of his first three ended early. He seems to have settled into a less exciting fighting style, which is likely why the UFC has been reluctant to give him a title shot.
Fight Prediction:
Moreno has no chance of winning this fight if it stays on the feet, so we’d be surprised if he didn’t look to take Figueiredo down early in the fight. If he can control Figueiredo on the ground, we could see Moreno extend the fight and look to test Figueiredo’s cardio. Figueiredo hasn’t made it past the second round in his last four fights and has never seen a fourth round in his career. His prior weight cutting struggles are well documented, so it’s hard to know what to expect from him late in a championship fight, if this were to make it that far. It’s not a foregone conclusion he would look bad, but it is a mystery. We still like Figueiredo’s chances to win this one early, but we’d be lying if we said we didn’t have any concerns based on the matchup.
Figueiredo has shown a long history of submitting opponents in R1 or knocking them out in R2—so both of those props are interesting at +700 and +1100 respectively. If it makes it out of the second round, we think he ends up winning a decision, which the oddsmakers currently have at +400.
DFS Implications:
Prior to his recent first round victory, Moreno had really struggled to score well in DFS. His last five UFC fights had all ended in decisions, and he failed to score above 76 DraftKings points in any of those. In his only five round fight in the UFC, Moreno was outlanded 76-45 in significant strikes, but he did land four takedowns. Nevertheless, he tallied just 46 DraftKings points in that decision loss to Pettis. It seems far more likely that Moreno could limit Figueiredo’s ceiling opposed to actually winning this fight, but Figueiredo’s lone career loss did come from being controlled on the ground in a low output fight, a game plan which Moreno would be wise to emulate.
We always love betting on Figueiredo, but this is far from an ideal spot for an early finish. It also doesn’t set up for a ton of striking volume, so DFS scoring gets a little dicey as the fight goes on. Lately we’ve been looking to be over the field on Figueiredo, but that could get you in trouble this week if Moreno can drag the fight out of the first round. We still think Figueiredo wins, but there’s a higher chance than normal that he disappoints in DFS.
Good luck to everyone this week, we hope you win big! Tag us on Twitter with your winnings so we can see how you did! @dfs_mma