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Fighter Notes:
Fight #13
Damir Hadzovic
8th UFC Fight (3-4)This fight had been scheduled for May 22nd but was canceled just hours before the event as Hadzovic withdrew due to a non-COVID related virus. It’s now been re-booked just over a month later.
Hadzovic enters on a two fight losing streak and coming off a 15 month layoff. He was submitted in just 44 seconds by Renato Carneiro in his last fight after struggling in the grappling department in his previous match as well, which ended in a 2019 grappling heavy decision defeat at the hands of Christos Giagos, who took Hadzovic down six times on 13 attempts while controlling him for over five minutes of time. Giagos also led in significant strikes 47-24 and total strikes 67-42. Hadzovic’s third most recent loss was in another grappling heavy affair in a 2018 decision loss to Alan Patrick. Hadzovic was taken down nine times in that fight on 15 attempts and controlled for 12 and a half minutes.
Hadzovic has three UFC wins but those all came against questionable competition. His first UFC win was a 2017 R3 KO in a fight Hadzovic was losing on the mat against Marcin Held, who went 0-3 in the UFC and was released following his loss to Hadzovic. His second UFC win was a 2018 decision win over Nick Hein, who went 4-4 in the UFC, lost his last three fights, and retired a year after the loss to Hadzovic. His third UFC win came in a 2019 R2 KO against Marco Polo Reyes, who also went 4-4 in the UFC, but lost his last three before being released in 2019.
In his entire pro career, Hadzovic owns a 13-6 record, with seven knockouts and three submission wins. He’s also been finished twice himself, with a submission loss in his most recent fight and a R1 KO loss in his 2016 UFC debut. Hadzovic is a one-dimensional striker who’s an absolute liability when it comes to grappling.
Yancy Medeiros
15th UFC Fight (6-7, NC)Medeiros has been struggling even more than Hadzovic lately, as he enters on a three fight skid and off a 16 month layoff. He most recently lost a decision to Lando Vannata after getting knocked out in his two fights prior, in the second round against Gregor Gillespie in 2019 and in the first round of a five round fight against Donald Cerrone in 2018. Prior to that, Medeiros had finished three straight opponents, with a pair of knockouts to go along with a submission win.
Seven of his last eight fights have made it out of the first round, despite five of those ending early. Medeiros is 15-7 as a pro, with 12 of his 15 wins coming early, including eight KOs and four submissions. He amazingly only has one decision win in the last 11 years, but has also only been to three decisions over that time period. Eleven of his 14 UFC fights have ended with a finish—six by KO, four by submission and one “No Contest” which was originally a Medeiros R1 KO win before he tested positive for THC.
Medeiros has just one takedown in 14 UFC fights, so unfortunately he appears in a poor position to take advantage of Hadzovic’s putrid grappling game. He lands a slightly above average number of significant strikes, but absorbs even more, checking in with the fourth most significant strikes absorbed on the slate at 5.37/min. His opponents in his last three decisions have all landed 99 or more significant strikes.
Medeiros started his pro career at 185 lb, but dropped all the way down to 155 lb when he joined the UFC in 2013. Following a decision loss to Francisco Trinaldo in 2016, Medeiros moved up to 170 lb and landed three straight finishes. However, after getting knocked out in the first round by Cerrone in 2018, Medeiros dropped back down to 155 lb where he has lost his last two fights. He’s now 3-6 plus a “No Contest” at 155 lb in the UFC. Only two of those ten 155 lb fights have made it to the judges, with a 2015 split decision win over Makdessi and a 2016 loss to Trinaldo. Medeiros went 3-1 at 170 lb, so it’s a little surprising he dropped back down to 155 lb, but it likely signifies a concern with the power of opponents in the 170 lb division. Three of Medeiros’ last four fights at 155 lb notably ended in decisions.
Fight Prediction:
Medeiros will have a 1” height advantage and huge 5” reach advantage.
This sets up as a standup striking battle between two struggling fighters who are both coming off extended layoffs. Medeiros has lost his last three, while Hadzovic has dropped a pair. Hadzovic’s biggest weakness has been his grappling, while he’s only been knocked out once in his career, which came in his UFC debut. Medeiros on the other hand, has been knocked out four times, including twice in his last three matches. Both of these guys appear on their way out of the UFC, but one of them will at least get one more shot with a win here—assuming this doesn’t end in a draw. It’s challenging to pick a winner in spots like this where we wish we could bet against both fighters, but Hadzovic appears more setup to attack Medeiros’ biggest weaknesses (his chin and striking defense) than Medeiros is to attack the grappling ineptitude of Hadzovic. We expect this to end in either a knockout or a decision and give the slight edge to Hadzovic in what feels close to a coin flip.
Our favorite bets here are “Fight Ends in KO” at +250, “Fight Ends in R2 KO” at +1000 and “Fight Ends in R3 KO” at +1200. We also like some of the value on Hadzovic’s side, including “Hadzovic Wins by KO” at +500, “Hadzovic Wins by R2 KO” at +1800 and “Hadzovic Wins by R3 KO” at +2200.
DFS Implications:
Hadzovic lacks the striking volume and grappling to score well in a decision, but has a decent chance to land a knockout here and sneak into the optimal lineup. He’s struggled immensely against grapplers, which is what led to his last three losses, but Medeiros is essentially a pure striker, just like Hadzovic, so this fight should play out on the feet. This is a matchup that both fighters should appreciate as neither likes to work off the mat. As the odds indicate, it’s a close call as to who wins, but the winner has a decent chance to get it done early. And with both fighters coming off extended layoff and in the midst of losing streaks, we expect their ownership to be relatively low. The odds imply Hadzovic has a 57% chance to win, a 28% chance to get a finish and a 13% chance it comes in R1.
Medeiros is in a similar spot to Hadzovic from a DFS perspective, as he lacks the pure striking volume or grappling stats to score well in a decision, but has a decent chance to get a finish in a win. The wild card for Medeiros will be whether or not he changes things up and tries to take Hadzovic down to attack his glaring grappling weakness. We’re not expecting it, as Medeiros has just one takedown in his 14 UFC fights, but it’s hard to imagine that he wouldn’t at least consider it if things aren’t going his way on the feet—and lately they haven’t been. If Medeiros did work on his wrestling during his 16 months away, and we have absolutely no reason to think he did, then he could bolster his DraftKings score through control time and ground strikes potentially to the point of being useful in a decision at his cheaper DK price tag. Again, that’s purely speculative, but Hadzovic’s grappling is absolutely terrible. Medeiros will also have a noticeable 5” reach advantage so it’s possible he just picks him apart on the feet. It makes sense to have some exposure to each of these guys without going too crazy. The odds imply Medeiros has a 43% chance to win, an 18% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in the first round.
Fight #12
Charles Rosa
10th UFC Fight (4-5)Rosa is coming off a decision loss to Darrick Minner, which was just the fourth time Minner has gone the distance in 37 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 10 times himself and Rosa was unable to make it 11. 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.
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. For what it’s worth, Rosa has alternated wins and losses over his last 10 fights and is coming off a loss. He often utilizes a sideways karate style stance, similar to Stephen Thompson, but far less effective. 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 last four fights since returning from his neck injury, Rosa has attempted just two takedowns, which were both unsuccessful. 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 13-5 pro record, Rosa has three wins by KO and eight by submission to go with his two decision victories. However, nine of those 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 nine 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 went the distance.
Justin Jaynes
5th UFC Fight (1-3)This Cindarella story quickly turned into a pumpkin, with Jaynes landing a 41 second R1 KO on extremely short notice against Frank Camacho in his June 2020 UFC debut, but then getting finished early in three straight fights. His one-dimensional power-punching fighting style was exposed in his fight against Gavin Tucker, who submitted Jaynes in the third round via Rear-Naked Choke. Janyes seemed like he might pull off another upset early on, both dropping Tucker in the first round and nearly landing a Guillotine Submission, but Tucker survived and took command of the fight from the second round on.
Then Jaynes went up against Gabriel Benitez, who crumpled Jaynes with a violent knee to the body late in the first round and finished him with a flurry of punches on the ground. Benitez also landed several heavy leg kicks that looked to compromise Jaynes prior to the finish. Most recently Jaynes took on another dangerous striker in Devonte Smith and the fight was stopped in the second round as Jaynes’ eye swelled up like a balloon from heavy ground and pound strikes from Smith.
Before the recent trio of losses, Jaynes had won five straight fights in the first round and had previously never been finished early. Only two of his 16 career wins have been by decision, while eight have come by KO and five by submission (and one by DQ).
After fighting his UFC debut at 155 lb, Jaynes dropped down to 145 lb for his second fight. However, after losing to Tucker at 145 lb, he moved back up to 155 lb for his fight against Benitez. Then he fought at 160 lb Catchweight in his most recent fight against Smith. Continuing to bounce around in weight, now he’ll drop back down to 145 lb for this next one. He’s fought anywhere from 145-170 lb in the past, but the majority of his fights have been at 155 lb so that appears to be where he’s most comfortable. He looked good at weigh-ins at 145 lb, so maybe he’ll fare better than he did against Tucker, and this will notably be an easier matchup than his last three.
Fight Prediction:
Rosa will have a 2” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.
In a fight between two dysfunctional fighters who have both gone 2-3 in their last five matches, we get a R1 KO or bust fighter who’s been finished in his last three fights going against a one dimensional submission threat who hasn’t landed a takedown in over four years. Rosa has notably only been knocked out once in his career and Jaynes has only ever been submitted once, so it’s not an ideal matchup for either to succeed at what they do best. With that said, neither one of these two are very impressive and we still like the chances for someone to land a finish. Jaynes needs a first round KO or he’s essentially done, while Rosa is most dangerous attacking Armbars. Because Jaynes has such a small window to win fights, we still give the edge to Rosa, but both guys are live here to some extent. Jaynes has a reasonable chance to land a first round knockout, but if the fight makes it past the first five minutes we like Rosa to win.
The three bets we like here are “Jaynes Wins by R1 KO” at +900, “Rosa Wins by Submission” at +280 and “Rosa Wins by R1 Submission” at +700.
DFS Implications:
Rosa needs a submission to score well as his two UFC decision wins have been good for just 58 and 74 DraftKings points and 67 and 93 points on FanDuel. His two submission wins scored 93 and 95 DraftKings points and 109 and 134 points on FanDuel, which is still sort of on the fringe of being usable on DraftKings at his price, but he’s done better on FanDuel and had the one explosion spot on the back of four submission attempts, four takedowns defended and five takedowns landed. Just keep in mind that was prior to his neck injury and came in a dream matchup. Jayne’s aggressive fighting style should theoretically force Rosa into scoring more, but he really has a knack for sucking the life out of fights. With that said, we believe there’s a higher chance than normal that this Rosa fight produces a decent scorer. The odds imply he has a 61% chance to win a 35% chance to get a finish and a 18% chance it comes in R1.
Jaynes’ R1 KO or bust fighting style is perfect for DFS. The winners in his four UFC fights have finished with DK/FD scores of 131/127, 93/131, 115/135 and 97/112. That first score came in Jaynes’ 41 second R1 KO that included the DraftKings quick win bonus, but since then his opponents have all scored better on FanDuel than DraftKings. One thing to keep in mind is that Jaynes’ last three opponents have all been far more impressive than Rosa, so there’s definitely a chance Rosa can screw this up and find a way to churn out a middling DFS performance if he does win. Back to Jaynes though, it’s hard to see him winning this fight without an early KO, which makes it pretty easy to figure out the proper exposure. It’s been over four years and nine fights since Jaynes won a fight that made it out of the first round. Jaynes claims both he and his team bet their entire fight purse on his +145 moneyline, which seems idiotic. Why wouldn’t you bet it on the R1 KO line at +900? Anyways, the odds suggest he has a 39% chance to win, a 21% chance to get a finish and a 12% chance it comes in R1. Based on his history, his moneyline and R1 win line should be closer.
Fight #11
Julia Avila
4th UFC Fight (2-1)This fight had been scheduled to take place on March 20th, but Stoliarenko collapsed during weigh-ins and the fight was postponed. Obviously it will be important to monitor Stoliarenko at weigh-ins on Friday. UPDATE: She looked fine. Avila has now ridiculously had 9 of her last 12 scheduled fights fall through, and none of those were her fault. First, Melissa Gatto withdrew due to injury in what would have been Avila’s 2019 UFC debut. Gatto was then replaced by Pannie Kianzad. Then four straight fights with Karol Rosa fell through, two due to Rosa withdrawing and two due to events being canceled due to COVID. Then Avila was scheduled to face Nicco Montana last August but the first date was pushed back a month and then Montana tested positive for COVID on the rescheduled date. It was rebooked another month later but Montana withdrew again. And finally Stoliarenko’s recent botched weight cut was the ninth time Avila has prepared for a fight in the last two years just to see it fall through. She also recently had a falling out with her camp and ended up switching teams. She claims to have a more methodical approach to fighting now, but that remains to be seen.
Coming off her first UFC loss and just the second loss of her career, Avila’s ground game was exposed against the BJJ black belt and grappling world champion Sijara Eubanks in that last match. That looked like a terrible matchup for Avila going in, as Eubanks is a decision machine who’s never been finished. That proved true as Eubanks was able to absorb the initial blitz of Avila 30 seconds in and quickly take the fight to the ground. In a grappling heavy decision, Eubanks landed 3 of 7 takedowns and a massive 10 minutes of control time.
Prior to the loss, Avila looked unstoppable and finished Gina Mazany with a blitz of strikes in just 22 seconds in her second most recent fight. Prior to that, Avila made her 2019 UFC debut against a tough Pannie Kianzad and won a lopsided, low-volume decision with judges scores of 30-27, 30-26 and 30-26.
Avila is a solid striker, with an extra gear that most fighters don’t possess. She’s also a BJJ brown belt and has one submission win on her record, which was a 2017 R1 Armbar. However, she didn’t have many answers off her back in her last match. With that said, she did survive three official submission attempts from the black belt Eubanks, including multiple chokes that looked tight, and showed better survival abilities than actually being offensive off her back. Avila has never been submitted and her only early loss came prior to joining the UFC in 2018 in a freak injury where she got kicked in the hand 49 seconds into R1 and dislocated a finger. She didn't seem worried about it but the ref waived the fight off. Since then she's 4-1 with three KO's, including two in R1 and one in R2. Although two of those three KO wins came just prior to joining the UFC and she has just one inside of the organization.
Julija Stoliarenko
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Also a BJJ brown belt, Stoliarenko made her way into the UFC through the Ultimate FIghter in 2018, but after losing a decision in her debut she was released and forced to fight elsewhere. After winning her next five fights, including four straight R1 Armbar Submission followed by a five round bloodbath split decision win in Invicta, Stoliarenko was invited back into the UFC, where she lost a smothering decision to Yana Kunitskaya in her most recent fight. Kunitskaya amassed over 13 minutes of control time in the 15 minute fight as she pressed Stoliarenko up against the cage for essentially the entire fight. Stoliarenko started to look tired after the first round as Kunitskaya wore her out in the clinch as Stoliarenko did everything she could to get the fight to the ground. Kunitskaya finished the fight way ahead 43-6 in significant strikes and 209-30 in total strikes.
All eight of Stoliarenko’s career finishes have come by R1 Armbar. Her only other career win came in the 2020 five round split decision victory in Invicta just before joining the UFC. She’s been knocked out in two of her four career losses, but both of those KOs came very early in her pro career in her third and fourth pro fights (R3 & R2). Her last 11 fights have all ended in either decisions or R1 Armbar wins.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’7” but Avila will have a 3” reach advantage.
There’s a good chance this fight ends in the first round, as both ladies have excelled at finishing fights quickly. Both are also coming off a loss and obviously want to get back into the win column. Avila generally looks to overwhelm opponents with early striking barrages, while Stoliarenko always looks to get fights to the ground in whatever means possible as she hunts for Armbars. None of that is a secret, so there’s definitely a chance that Avila changes her approach and comes in a little more cautiously to avoid getting taken down early on. Adding to the uncertainty, Avila recently switched teams and claims she will come in with a more methodical approach, but maybe she’s just playing coy. As long as Avila can avoid getting submitted, there’s a decent chance she lands another KO here, but it wouldn’t be shocking to see it go the distance.
“Avila Wins by KO” at +340 and “Avila Wins by R1 KO” at +850 are out favorite two bets. ”Stoliarenko Wins by Submission” at +700 and ”Stoliarenko Wins by R1 Submission” at +1500 are great hedges. You can also consider betting the fight doesn’t go the distance at +136.
DFS Implications:
Based on her striking volume, essentially nonexistent grappling and high price tag, Avila is a R1 KO or bust DFS play and her R1 win line of +550 implies she has just an 11% chance of accomplishing that. In her one UFC decision win, Avila put up just 73 points on DraftKings and 64 points on FanDuel, despite dominating the fight. Her blitzing fighting style has already gotten her one DraftKings quick win bonus and seems perfectly tailored to end fights quickly. Her four career KO wins have taken just 22, 128, 78 and 88 seconds respectively. She checks in as a massive favorite with an implied 75% chance to win this fight, a 25% chance to end it early and an 11% chance to end it in R1.
Stoliarenko has historically been a R1 or bust fighter as well, with eight of her nine career wins coming in the first round. She’s just 1-2-2 in fights that have lasted longer than five minutes. Stoliarenko has several wins in under 60 seconds, all outside of the UFC, which is notable on DraftKings with the quick win bonus. The odds imply she has just a 25% chance to win, a 14% chance to get a finish and is tied for a slate-low 6% chance to get a first round finish.
Fight #10
Marcin Prachnio
5th UFC Fight (1-3)After getting knocked out in the first round in his first three UFC fights, Prachnio not only survived his last fight, he somehow managed to win. The victory came against Khalil Rountree, who entered with a 4-4 UFC record plus a “No Contest” with three R1 KO wins, but also three R1 losses (2 KOs & 1 Submission). Rountree did momentarily drop Prachnio with a clean right hook to the chin late in the second round, but refused to really look to put the fight away as he allowed Prachnio time to recover. He did land a head kick that connected shortly after, but he again frustratingly then stepped back to admire his work instead of trying to close the show.
Prachnio joined the UFC in 2018 and was abruptly welcomed by Sam Alvey with a R1 KO loss. Then received the same treatment from Magomed Ankalaev in 2018 and Mike Rodriguez in 2020. Prachnio didn’t fight in 2019 as he battled injuries and surely a bruised ego.
Prior to joining the UFC, Prachnio was 13-2, with 10 KOs and one submission win. That really makes you wonder what level of competition he was facing if he could go 15 fights with only one KO loss and then get immediately knocked out in the first round three straight times.
Amazingly 14 of Prachnio’s 19 career fights have ended in the first round. His other five all made it to the third round, with four ending in decisions. Prachnio has average power, but absolutely no chin or grappling game. He did show he could land a decent amount of volume in his recent decision win, where he landed 102 significant strikes (6.8/min), but we’ve yet to see that on any sort of consistent basis.
Ike Villanueva
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Coming off his first UFC win, it took fighting literally the worst opponent in the Light Heavyweight division for Villanueva to get off the schneid. Interestingly, neither of Villanueva’s first two UFC opponents are even in the same weight class as him. He made his debut up at Heavyweight against Chase Sherman and got knocked out in the second round and he was clearly undersized in the match as he was giving up 20 lb and 3” of height. Sherman notably was also flagged by the USADA after a positive drug test following the fight, so that fight had all sorts of weird things going on. Then he took on a Middleweight in Jordan Wright who was simply too quick for him and got a flukey doctor stoppage early in the first round. Wright caught Villanueva with a spinning heel kick to the head right of the bat. He then landed a series of violent knees to Villanueva’s face inside the Muay Thai Clinch. Split open by one of the knees, the doctor stopped the fight just 91 seconds into the first round.
Of his 18 career wins, 15 have come by KO with three going the distance. Of his 11 career losses, 10 have come early with five KOs and five submissions. The last submission came in 2016 against Trevin Giles in the third round via Arm-Triangle Choke. Before that you have to go back to 2012 when Villanueva lost back-to-back fights by Armbar submission, with one of those coming against another UFC fighter in Justin Ledet.
Villanueva had a stretch from 2016 to 2017 where he fought five times at Middleweight (185 lb), including the 2016 third round submission loss to UFC fighter Trevin Giles. He then took over two years off and when he returned he fought all the way up at Heavyweight for one fight before dropping back down to Light Heavyweight. Since returning from that two year layoff, Villanueva has fought six times (4-2) and hasn’t been in a fight that lasted longer than six minutes. And his only two losses in his last seven fights came in his first two UFC fights. Those last seven fights all ended with KOs in the first two rounds (5-2), including five in round one. That stretch perfectly sums up Villanueva as a fighter—come in swinging awkward T-Rex punches and either knock someone out or get knocked out.
Fight Prediction:
Prachnio will have a 2” height advantage and 1” reach advantage. He’s also notably five years younger than the 37-year-old Villanueva.
This is a ridiculously low level fight that has no business taking place under the UFC banner, yet here we are. Prachnio clearly has the more fragile chin of the two, while Villanueva appears to have less power in his striking. Villanueva generally does force the action, which hopefully should keep this from dragging into the third round, but we notably haven't seen anyone with as poor power as Villanueva finish Prachnio and we haven’t seen Prachnio finish anybody (in the UFC). This is such a gross fight to try and predict the outcome of, but it’s hard to justify Prachnio being a -200 favorite over anybody. We do give the edge to Prachnio to win the fight, but we also think that Villanueva has just as good a chance if not better to land a KO in the first two rounds. If it makes it past the second round, we don’t know what Villanueva’s cardio will look like since he hasn’t been in a fight that lasted longer than six minutes in four and a half years when he was fighting down at Middleweight. If it does somehow make it past the second round,Prachnio would likely take over down the stretch and either get a late finish or win a decision.
Our favorite bets here are “Under 1.5 Rounds” at +150, “Fight Ends in R1 KO” at +240 and “Fight Ends in R2 KO” at +400. We also like “Villanueva Wins by R1 KO” at +800 and “Villanueva Wins by R2 KO” at +1100 with the latter being our preferred dart throw.
DFS Implications:
Prachnio’s first three UFC fights combined to score just 20 DraftKings points, before he finally notched a win in his 4th UFC fight. However, as he doesn’t mix in any grappling he still scored just 72 DK points in his recent decision win despite landing 102 significant strikes. So he definitely needs a finish to return value, but luckily for him we don’t see this fight making it past the second round. In fact, prior to his recent decision win Prachnio hadn’t made it out of the first round in five straight fights dating back to 2016. Amazingly, Prachnio had a five year period from 2016-2020 leading up to his last fight where he fought five times with a combined cage time of just 13 minutes and 42 seconds. That’s an average of just two minutes and 44 seconds per fight. He was literally a professional cage fighter who averaged under three minutes of cage time per year for five straight years. Imagine training year round just to put on a terrible 162 second performance once a year for five straight years. Simply incredible. So anyways, back to DFS. After most of the field gagged at the thought of playing Prachnio at $6,900/$8 in his last fight, now you get the opportunity to play him at $9,000/$19. Prachnio has two things going for him. First, and most importantly, he’s going against a terrible opponent who’s been knocked out in the first six minutes in two of his last three fights and doesn’t have a ton of power to worry about. And second, Prachnio’s ownership should be really low as he’s one of the most expensive fighters on the slate and has never scored well. It will be interesting to see how much his +140 (36%) ITD line drives up his ownership, but we still expect him to be below 20% owned. Overall, the odds imply he has a 64% chance to win, a 36% chance to get a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.
Villanueva is in a similar spot as Prachnio in terms of his DFS outlook as he’s a pure striker who doesn’t incorporate any grappling, so he clearly needs a finish to score well. What he has that Prachnio does not is a serviceable chin and a much cheaper DFS price tag. Unfortunately, he also has pretty terrible striking and is 37 years old. Villanueva will likely be looking to turn this into a brawl and we expect him to push the pace early on and to go for a knockout. He tends to lead with his chin so that certainly could backfire and result in him being the one that gets knocked out, but the most important thing here is that somebody gets knocked out and you’ll want exposure to both sides. Villanueva’s last seven fights (5-2) have all ended by knockout in the first six minutes and it would be surprising if the non-existent chin of Marcin Prachnio broke that streak. However, there is a chance, albeit very slight, that both of these fighters are just so bad that they’re unable to finish the other and end up slapping each other around for 15 minutes. With that said, the odds imply Villanueva has a 36% chance to win, a 24% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #9
Warlley Alves
13th UFC Fight (8-4)Alves had been scheduled to fight Ramazan Emeev here, but Emeev withdrew and Wells stepped in on short notice as he was announced as the replacement just five days before the fight.
Alves returned from a 14 month injury driven layoff in impressive fashion in his last match as he landed a first round KO against Mounir Lazzez, who was coming off a big upset win in his recent UFC debut. Alves came out throwing heavy shots and then tied Lazzez up in the clinch just seconds into the fight. He was able to get Lazzez down just over a minute in as he continued his nonstop pressure campaign, but Lazzez was able to get back up to his feet just to find himself back in the clinch of Alves. The second Lazzez was finally able to push away from the clinch, Alves started firing machine gun body kicks to his ribs and liver and crumpled Lazzez to the mat with the third violent kick. He followed it up with ground and pound as Lazzez covered up and the fight was quickly stopped before it ever even really got started—at least for Lazzez.
After winning his first 10 pro fights, including his first four in the UFC and an impressive win over Colby Covington, Alves then lost four of his next seven fights. While eight of his 12 UFC fights have ended early, only two of those finishes came in the first round—his 2015 Guillotine Choke Submission win over Covington and his recent KO win. His other 10 UFC fights all made it to the second round, with six seeing a third round and four going the distance. His first three early wins in the UFC all came by Guillotine Choke, while his most recent two ended in TKOs. His last two losses also ended early, with a 2018 R2 KO against James Krause and a 2019 R2 Triangle Choke Submission against Randy Brown.
Before he joined the UFC Alves was 6-0, with three submission wins, one KO win and two wins by decision. So overall in his career he’s now 14-4 with four wins by KO, six by submission (including four Guillotines) and four by decision. He’s only been finished twice in his four losses, with one KO and one submission, although those two finishes were notably his most recent two losses.
Prior to his recent win over Lazzez, Alves’ previous three wins all came against struggling opponents. His second most recent win was a R3 KO against an aging Sergio Moraes, who has now lost his last four fights, with the loss to Alves being the second of those. A year before that, Alves was awarded a R2 KO (due to a corner stoppage following the round) against Sultan Aliev—who went 2-2 in the UFC with both wins coming in decisions and both losses coming by KO. Alves’ win prior to that one came in a decision against Salim Touahri, who lost all three of his UFC matches. On the other side of things, all four of Alves’ career losses have notably come against tough competition in Randy Brown, James Krause, Kamaru Usman and Bryan Barberena.
Jeremiah Wells
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Wells had been scheduled to make his short notice UFC debut last September against Miguel Baeza, but the fight was canceled after Baeza wasn’t medically cleared and Wells was forced to wait nine months to get another shot at his UFC debut. Stuck in UFC limbo, it’s now been 21 months since Wells last fought.
A BJJ brown belt, Wells looked a little tentative early in his career but seemed to be more on the offensive in his last two fights. He bounced back from a five round decision loss in early 2019 with an immediate R1 KO in his next fight. However, that win came against a 38-year-old opponent who has now been knocked out in R1 in 3 of his last 4 fights. Three months later Wells put on a smothering R2 submission performance where he dominated his most recent opponent on the ground after blitzing him early on to close the distance. That win notably also came against an opponent who has lost three of his last four fights.
Despite being 34 years old and turning pro back in 2012, Wells has just 11 pro fights under his belt with eight wins, two losses and a draw. Six of his wins have come early, split between three KOs and three submissions. All three of his KO wins have come in R1, while interestingly all three of his submission wins have occurred in R2. While his last two fights both ended early, five of his six prior to that went the distance, including three five round decisions. He’s never been finished in his relatively short career, with both of his losses coming in five round decisions.
Fight Prediction:
Alves will have a 2” height advantage, but Wells will have a 3” reach advantage.
Coming into the UFC off an extended layoff and taking a short notice fight against a longtime veteran is generally not a recipe for success. We’d be shocked if Wells wins this fight and simply surviving to see a decision would be surprising. Wells has been fighting such a low level of competition, it’s hard to even truly assess how talented he is, but let’s just say our expectations are low. He does appear to have knockout power and some sort of ground game, so maybe he’ll outperform expectations, but we’ll believe it when we see it. While he’s never been finished in his career, this will be such a massive step up in competition for him that it wouldn’t be surprising to see him just get completely overwhelmed. It would make sense for Alves to test the grappling of Wells early as he looks most dangerous on the feet early in fights. If Alves is unable to get Wells down then we would expect it to turn into a low-volume striking battle with a good chance Alves finishes Wells on the feet.
We don’t love this fight from a betting perspective and there’s not much value on Alve’s side, but you can consider his submission line at +440 or R3 Win line at +850, considering Wells took the fight on short notice. We also sort of like the value in “Fight Ends in R1 KO” at +400 and “Fight Ends in R2 Sub” at +1100.
DFS Implications:
Five of Alves’ last six wins have come early, so naturally he’s scored somewhat decently for the most part, but he’s actually only topped 96 DraftKings points in one of those wins and notably scored terribly in his lone decision victory over that stretch. Here are his DK/FD scores in his last six wins: 116/128, 84/105, 93/99, 65/55 (DEC), 91/109, and 96/108. So clearly Alves is entirely reliant on landing a finish to score well as he only averages 3.09 significant strikes landed per minute and scored just 65 DraftKings points and 55 points on FanDuel in his last decision win. Alves also scored just 84 DK points in his second most recent finish which came late in the third round, so he’ll likely need a finish in the first two rounds to be useful on DraftKings and even then there are ways it’s not enough. That makes this a tricky spot for DFS, as we have a high-variance scenario with a UFC newcomer taking on a heavily favored veteran who lands a lot of finishes, but still doesn’t always put up big scores. Based on his scoring, we do like Alves a little more on FanDuel than DraftKings, but as we mentioned, he’ll still need a finish to be useful. This definitely isn’t a safe spot for locking up a big score, but Alves certainly has a high ceiling. The odds imply he has a 67% chance to win, a slate-leading 47% chance to get a finish and he also leads the slate with a 24% chance to get a first round finish. Those finishing rates seem a little on the high side but we don’t set the lines.
The deck appears to be stacked against Wells as he makes his short notice UFC debut following a 21 month layoff against a UFC veteran who’s coming off a big R1 KO win. Wells has produced bipolar results as he has six early wins in his career, all in the first two rounds, with his other five fights all going the distance (2-2-1). All three of his career KOs have occurred in R1, while all three of his submissions have come in R2. Alves has notably been finished in the second round in each of his last two losses, but those are also the only two times he’s been finished in his career. Overall, Wells looks like a high-variance DFS play with a theoretical high ceiling but a non-existent floor. He doesn’t land much striking volume, so even at his cheap price tag a decision win likely wouldn’t score well, leaving him reliant on landing a finish. The odds imply he has a 33% chance to win a 17% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #8
Shavkat Rakhmonov
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Coming off a first round victory in his UFC debut, Rakhmonov submitted longtime UFC veteran Alex Oliveira with a late Guillotine Choke last October. Oliveira has notably now been submitted in the first round in his last two fights and has just two wins in his last seven matches—and one of those came in a split decision while the other was a decision win over Peter Sobotta who then immediately retired. So we should take the win over Oliveira with a grain of salt as he’s not putting up much resistance these days. Oliveira also missed weight by 2 lb after accepting that fight on short notice when Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos dropped out. Rakhmonov had originally been scheduled to make his UFC debut in March 2020 against Bartosz Fabinski but the event was canceled due to COVID. Then he was booked to debut against Ramazan Emeev, but was forced to withdraw in July. He finally stepped inside the UFC Octagon for the first time on his fourth scheduled opponent.
In a low-volume first round, Rakhmonov outlanded Oliveira 13-9 in significant strikes and 32-16 in total strikes. Both fighters went 0 for 2 on their takedown attempts, while Oliveira led in control time 2:04-0:44. Rakhmonov looked patient and confident early in the fight before landing a combination of strikes less than two minutes in that pushed Oliveira up against the cage and left him engaging in the clinch to try and recover. Rakhmonov looked to take the fight down to the mat at that point, but Oliveira kept it standing and was actually able to reverse the position and push Rakhmonov against the cage. Oliveira then also tried to get the fight to the ground with no success as the two maintained the stalemate along the fence. As Oliveira began to go for one final takedown attempt with 30 seconds remaining in the round, Rakhmonov carefully slid his arm under Oliveira’s neck and pulled guard for a Guillotine Choke that quickly forced Oliveira to tap with just 20 seconds left on the clock.
That marked Rakhmonov’s 13th straight pro win as he maintained his undefeated record. Impressively, all 13 of his wins have come early with seven knockouts and six submissions. He’s only been to the third round once, with eight of his wins coming in R1 and four occurring in R2. Rakhmonov is also just one of two fighters to finish current UFC fighter Jun Yong Park, which he did with a second round Rear-Naked Choke Submission in 2016.
Despite all of his early wins, Rakhmonov is somewhat of a patient fighter who’s less likely to land a ton of volume, but makes it count when he does land. At 6’1” with a massive 77” reach, he has good size for the division and will tower over his next opponent.
Michel Prazeres
14th UFC Fight (10-3)A 2nd degree BJJ black belt, Prazeres made his 2013 UFC debut at Welterweight (170 lb), before dropping down to 155 lb where he stayed until 2018 when he moved back up to 170 lb against Zak Cummings. Prazeres has now gone 2-2 at 170 lb in the UFC and 8-1 at 155 lb. Of his 13 UFC fights, 10 have gone the distance, while he won the other three by submission. His lone finish at 170 lb came in a 2018 R1 Guillotine Choke against Bartosz Fabinski, while he landed a pair of 2017 submission wins down at 155 lb. Prazeres clearly struggled to hit 155 lb as he missed weight on three different occasions in 2016, 2017, and 2018.
Appropriately nicknamed “Tractor,” Prazeres is an absolute tank at 5’6” 170 lb. Apparently he was on the Brazilian Swat team, and we can only assume they used him as a battering ram to break down doors. Although apparently his stoutness wasn’t all natural as he tested positive for PEDs back in 2019 and just finished a 2-year suspension this Spring. Now looking to return from a 28 month layoff a month before his 40th birthday, Prazeres has his work cut out for him after losing a decision the last time he stepped inside the Octagon and now going against a much tougher opponent.
In that most recent fight, Prazeres took on Ismail Naurdiev, who went 2-2 in four decisions with the UFC before being released early last year following a decision loss to Sean Brady. Prazeres really struggled to finish takedowns in that match as he went 3 for 13 against a fighter making his short notice UFC debut. Naurdiev was also able to reverse two of the takedowns that Prazeres did land. In addition to struggling with his takedown accuracy, Prazeres came out behind in the striking battle as well, with Naurdiev leading in significant strikes 63-15 and in total strikes 105-25. Late in the fight, Prazeres completely gassed out and Naurdiev nearly got a finish as he landed ground and pound as Prazeres simply covered up on the mat.
Prazeres was already showing his age and beginning to slow down in that last fight, when he was 37 years old, so it’s hard to imagine he’ll look fresher now at 39. He did notably defeat Gilbert Burns in a 2016 decision, but he looked so much better back then that it’s hard to put much stock into a win that happened five years ago. It will be essential to see how Prazeres looks on the scales coming off the PED suspension and over two year layoff. Update: He still looked really stout on the scales, so no red flags there.
Prazeres shoots for a ton of takedowns, averaging the second most attempts on the slate at 11 per 15 minutes and he also averages the second most missed attempts at 7 per 15 minutes. While he has a 50% career takedown accuracy, that number has declined to 38% in his last five fights and just 30% in his last three as he’s landed just 7 of 23 attempts in his last three matches. He also landed just 23% of his attempts in his most recent match, when he went 3 for 13.
Sitting on an impressive 26-3 pro record, Prazeres has just one career knockout win, but 11 wins by submission to go along with 14 career decision wins. He’s never been finished, with all three of his career losses going the distance. Those decision losses came in his 2013 UFC debut, a 2015 fight against Kevin Lee and then in his most recent fight in early 2019.
Fight Prediction:
Rakhmonov will have a 5” height advantage and massive 10” reach advantage. He’s also notably 13 years younger than the 39-year-old Prazeres.
Five years ago this might have been an interesting matchup, but Prazeres looked about washed in his last fight and it’s hard to imagine he’ll look better two and half years later, off the juice and a month before he turns 40. It will be hard for him to compete in a striking battle against an opponent who has nearly a foot reach advantage, so we expect Prazeres to be looking to take the fight to the ground. However, Rakhmonov has shown a solid takedown defense both in his brief debut and in his fights prior to joining the UFC. His 5” height advantage should also help him to remain on his feet. If Prazeres is able to get Rakhmonov down, then you have to worry about his defensive submissions, as he has a pair of Guillotine Choke wins and a pair of Triangle Chokes. We don’t see Prazeres winning this fight and expect to see the worst version of him, which then begs the question—can Rakhmonov be the first fighter to ever finish Prazeres? With so much uncertainty surrounding Prazeres’ current condition, this is a high variance outcome to try and predict. With that said, we like Rakhmonov’s chances to land a finish based on how bad Prazeres looked late in his last fight. However, if Prazeres hasn’t completely fallen off a cliff, there’s a good chance he at least survives the first round and we like Rakhmonov to land a mid to late finish in this one.
Outside of Rakhmonov’s moneyline, the safest bet here is his ITD line at +125, but we wish there was a little more value in it. We also like his KO line at +250 and his R3 KO line at +1300 if you’re looking for a dart throw.
DFS Implications:
Rakhmonov scored decently in his UFC debut with 100 DraftKings points and 119 points on FanDuel, but with no takedowns or knockdowns landed it still could have been better. That’s the one downside of winning by Guillotine Choke. He did show that he definitely has what it takes to compete at the UFC level and has legitimate power and grappling, but we also saw less than five minutes of him so there are still several unknowns. Based on both his debut and fights prior, Rakhmonov doesn’t throw a ton of striking volume as he lands below three significant strikes per minute. He does mix in some grappling, but it’s unlikely to be enough for him to score well in a decision. He should score better on FanDuel through takedowns defended in this matchup, as Prazeres averages seven missed attempts per 15 minutes, which is the second highest on the slate. That could keep Rakhmonov in play on FanDuel even with a third round finish, whereas we expect he’ll need to end things in the first two rounds to be useful on DraftKings. Rakhmonov has also notably seen a big line move in his favor. The odds imply he has a 72% chance to win, a 38% chance to end it early and a 16% chance it comes in R1.
Prazeres is littered with red flags as he’s almost 40 years old, coming off loss, a PED suspension and a 28 month layoff, and is at a 5” height and 10” reach disadvantage. His grappling heavy game plan generally makes him a better play on DraftKings than FanDuel, but still doesn’t guarantee he’ll score well. In his last eight wins he’s scored 115, 62, 73, 95, 114, 84, 106 and 48 DraftKings points. Breaking that down further, his three submission wins scored 115, 95 and 114, while his five decision wins scored 62, 73, 84, 106 and 48. So he had one solid score in a decision, which came on the back of seven takedowns and over seven minutes of control time back in 2016, but he’s generally struggled to score well without a finish beyond that. Once we factor in his diminishing takedown accuracy along with all of the previously mentioned red flags, it’s hard to see Prazeres succeeding here, but even if he somehow wins a decision he’s still not a lock to make the optimal on either site. For what it’s worth, the odds imply he has a 28% chance to win, a 15% chance to land a finish and a slate-low 6% chance he gets it done in R1.
Fight #7
Kennedy Nzechukwu
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Kennedy is stepping in on short notice after Ed Herman dropped out of this fight. Kennedy was announced as the replacement 12 days before the fight.
Relying on his durability, size and strength to win fights, Kennedy actually fought his first pro bout at Heavyweight before moving down to Light Heavyweight thereafter. After starting his pro career off with a pair of wins, one by KO and another by decision, Nzechukwu made an appearance on DWCS in just his third pro fight back in 2017. However, despite winning a decision Kennedy was relegated back to the regional scene. He followed up the decision win with a pair of knockouts in the first two rounds over his next couple fights, and was then invited back on DWCS in 2018. That time Kennedy capitalized on the opportunity and landed a R1 KO via head kick, which was enough to earn him a UFC contract.
Coming into the UFC with a perfect 6-0 record, Kennedy then took on Paul Craig in his UFC debut and got submitted in the third round via Triangle Choke. Paul Craig ridiculously went 1 for 16 on his takedown attempts and nearly submitted Kennedy in the first round via Armbar, but Kennedy overall did a good job of defending takedowns and submissions. Kennedy was notably deducted a point late in the fight for an eye poke, which may have caused him to push harder late in the fight, when he was eventually submitted. Kennedy was leading in significant strikes 40-25 and in total strikes 47-31, while Craig was pretty much just looking for takedowns and submissions the whole time.
Kennedy bounced back with a decision win in August 2019 with the help of two point deductions to his opponent, Darko Stosic, for three heavy groin strikes. Two of the judges ruled the fight 28-27, so had Stosic not been deducted two points he would have won 29-28 on those two scorecards. Stosic went 4 for 10 on his takedown attempts and came out ahead 60-50 in significant strikes and 63-50 in total strikes. Stosic notably lost three straight decisions before getting released from the UFC.
Following his first UFC win, we didn’t see Kennedy back inside the Octagon for 19 months until he took on Carlos Ulberg. In an absolutely crazy fight, Ulberg unloaded on Kennedy early on while Kennedy simply covered up and took it. After absorbing everything Ulberg could throw at him, Kennedy eventually started landing his own shots as Ulberg began to gas out. By the second round Ulberg was fighting with his hands by his side and Kennedy made him pay for it as he dropped Ulberg out with a right hook to the chin and followed up with a barrage of ground and pound. Ulber landed an insane 146 significant strikes in just over eight minutes of action, which was on pace for an unsustainable 263 significant strikes over the course of three rounds. After the slow start Kennedy finished with 82 significant strikes landed of his own, which was on pace for 148 over the course of three rounds.
Kennedy has never been knocked out in his nine pro fights, with his only career loss coming from the third round submission against Paul Craig in his UFC debut. Five of his eight pro wins have come by KO and three have ended in decisions. He’s been taken down 5 times on 26 attempts so far in the UFC, and has done a good job of getting up quickly when he has been taken down.
Danilo Marques
3rd UFC Fight (2-0)After not fighting for two and a half years from 2018 to 2020, the now 35-year-old Marques made his UFC debut last September against a winless Khadis Ibragimov, who’s now 0-4 in the UFC. The slow paced snoozer saw just 35 combined significant strikes landed between the two fighters (19-16 in favor of Ibragimov) over 15 minutes of “action”. Marques relentlessly pursued takedowns, but was only able to finish 4 of 16 attempts. He did finish the fight with over seven minutes of control time, and continuously looked for submissions, but failed to ever get close to landing one.
Following the win in his debut, Marques most recently took on Mike Rodriguez, who owns just a 41% takedown defense and had previously been submitted twice—including in his previous fight. Marques shot for his first takedown of the match just eight seconds into the fight and while Rodriguez was too slow to stop it, he did get back to his feet relatively quickly—just not for very long. Rodriguez ended up spending basically the entire round in the clinch or on the mat but did finally escape in the final 30 seconds. Then, he was able to keep the fight standing for the first minute in round two, before Marques got it back to the ground 90 seconds in as Rodriguez appeared to be fatiguing. Marques spent the rest of the fight on top of Rodriguez before ending the fight with a Rear-Naked Choke with just eight seconds remaining in the second round. He finished ahead 29-16 in significant strikes and 55-34 in total strikes, while going 4 for 7 on takedowns with over seven and a half minutes of control time. He also ended with two official submission attempts.
Marques is a one-dimensional grappler with no real striking skills to speak of. Prior to joining the UFC, he did win his previous two fights, but he had exclusively fought questionable competition. Here are the records of his opponents in his last four wins before joining the UFC, beginning with the most recent: 5-4-1, 0-16, 5-9, 0-3. His last fight before joining the UFC also notably took place at 185 lb opposed to 205 lb where he normally competes.
Nine of his 11 career victories have come early, including five by submission. He also has four KO wins, but all four of those came in his first six fights against highly suspect opponents with records of 0-1, 0-2, 2-4, and 0-8. Only one of those opponents ever even fought again and that was the 0-8 punching bag who’s been knocked out in R1 seven times in eight fights. In his second most recent loss, Marques showed a suspect chin, getting KO’d in R1 by 7-7 Marcio Telles who had lost 3 of his previous four fights.
Marques has now gone 8 for 23 on takedowns across his first two UFC fights while landing just 45 combined significant strikes. So to use the stats to perfectly summarize how this guy fights, he lands just under two significant strikes for every takedown he attempts.
Fight Prediction:
Marques will have a 1” height advantage, but Kennedy will have a 6” reach advantage.
This fight simply comes down to whether or not Kennedy’s 78% takedown defense holds up and if he does get taken down can he quickly return to his feat. We’re betting that it does and he can. Kennedy will also throw heavy downward elbows as opponents look to take him down, which adds to his chances of him landing a knockout. While Kennedy is still very raw, he’s insanely durable and incredibly strong. He’s able to make up for a lack of technique with brute strength, which will definitely limit his ability to climb the ranks, but can win him fights over low level opponents like Marques. We expect Marques to shoot for nonstop takedowns in this match and for Kennedy to continuously stuff them while landing elbows, knees and punches that are likely to eventually drop Marques or get the fight stopped for a cut. It’s also somewhat possible that it goes the distance, in which case we still like Kennedy to win in a decision. The only way Marques wins a decision here is if he finds the same success in quickly getting the fight to the ground and keeping it there that he did in his last match, and we don’t see that happening. That means Marques’ only chance to win will be to land a submission and we don’t see him controlling Kennedy long enough on the ground to pull that off, but obviously it’s not impossible.
Our favorite bet here is Kennedy’s moneyline at -120. You can also consider his KO line of +190, but it’s a little light on value. Considering all five of his career KOs have come in the first two rounds, we prefer his R1 KO line at +550 and his R2 KO line at +800. His decision line at +350 is also interesting. On Marques’ side, we’re only interested in his submission line at +300 and his R1 and R2 submission lines at +700 and +1100 respectively.
DFS Implications:
Kennedy’s nonexistent grappling leaves him reliant on landing a finish to score well, although on FanDuel he should get double digit takedowns defended if this fight goes the distance, so he could still score decently in a decision over there. It’s a whole different story on DraftKings, where he only scored 50 points in his lone UFC decision win and just 25 points in his late R3 submission loss. Kennedy has only shot for one takedown in the UFC, which he missed, and we don’t see him shooting for any here. His mid range DFS prices make him an appealing play on both sites, as there’s a good chance he gets a knockout against a suspect talent like Marques, but Kennedy is definitely a better play on FanDuel as Marques leads the slate in takedowns attempted at 14 per 15 minutes and takedowns missed at 9 per 15 minutes. While Kennedy’s ownership will be higher after his recent high scoring R2 KO victory, we still really like him here for all contest types. He’s also seen the line move in his favor, which adds to the value in his DFS pricing. If he can combine multiple takedowns defended with an early KO, Kennedy has a sneaky chance at being the highest scoring fighter on FanDuel, where he’ll surely go underowned at MVP. The odds imply he has a 55% chance to win, a 33% chance to get a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.
Marques is a one-dimensional grappler who offers little to nothing on the feet. He generally accrues a ton of control time, with over seven minutes in each of his first two UFC fights, as he’s constantly looking for takedowns. So despite his putrid 34% takedown accuracy, Marques is constantly engaging in the clinch and pushing opponents up against the cage while he looks for takedowns. That means he’ll generally score better on DraftKings the longer fights go. To support that notion, his decision win in his debut scored 70 DraftKings points, but just 54 points on FanDuel. His recent R2 submission win scored well on both sites, totalling 121 DraftKings points and 126 points on FanDuel. Those scores show that he needs an early win to really go off, but can potentially salvage his DraftKings score in a decision to some extent through control time. This looks like a tough matchup for Marques as Kennedy’s 78% takedown defense is nearly twice as high as Marques’ last opponent, Mike Rodriguez, who had just a 41% takedown defense and has historically struggled with grapplers. Hopefully the field chases Marques’ last result as we don’t see that happening again here. However, if we’re wrong and Marques is able to get Kennedy down and keep him there, he could end up being a decent DraftKings value play. And if he can finish this fight with a submission, he should end up in winning lineups on both sites. But again, we don’t see it happening and we like Kennedy to win this fight. With that said, the odds imply Marques has a 45% chance to win, a 30% chance to get a finish and a 12% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #6
Renato Moicano
11th UFC Fight (6-4)Coming off yet another early KO loss, Moicano has now been knocked out in three of his last four fights, with his last five fights ending in six minutes or less and four of those not making it out of the first round. His only win since 2018 was a 44 second R1 Rear-Naked Choke Submission win over human-turtle Damir Hadzovic, who was once submitted by a wet towel. That was Moicano’s first fight after moving up to the 155 lb Lightweight division, after he had previously fought his entire career at Featherweight (145 lb).
Following that win, Moicano most recently took on a dangerous Muay Thai striker in Rafael Fiziev. Moicano was far too willing to keep the fight on the feet and only shot for one half hearted takedown three minutes into the first round. Fiziev was able to easily stuff it to keep the fight standing. A minute later he dropped Moicano with a violent combination of punches to end the fight.
Moicano originally joined the UFC in 2014 and won his first fight with a R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission against Tom Niinimaki, who finished 1-3 in the UFC and was released following the submission loss. Moicano then went on to win a pair of decisions against Zubaira Tukhugov and Jeremy Stephens, before being submitted via Guillotine Choke by Brian Ortega in R3 of his fourth UFC match. Moicano was ahead of Ortega 109-65 in significant strikes before succumbing to the submission.
Moicano bounced back from the disheartening 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.
The win over Swanson appears to have been where Moicano’s career peaked. In his next fight, he went on to get knocked out early in R2 by Jose Aldo in February 2019. Despite the loss, he was awarded a main event spot against The Korean Zombie in his next match. The Zombie dropped Moicano 30 seconds into the fight with a clean right hand that Moicano never saw coming. 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 where he’s since gone 1-1 with neither fight making it out of the first round.
Moicano is now 14-4-1 as a pro. He’s never won by KO, but has seven submission victories on his record, with the last six coming in the first two rounds. His other seven career wins all went the distance. All four of his career losses have occurred in his last seven fights and all four came early, with three KOs and one submission.
Jai Herbert
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Looking to bounce back from a R3 KO loss in his July 2020 UFC debut, Herbert was thrown straight to the wolves in his first UFC fight as he went up against longtime veteran Francisco Trinaldo. To make matters more difficult, Trinaldo showed up 4 lb overweight for the fight and didn’t even appear to try and hit the 156 lb mark as he prepared to move up to 170 lb for his next fight. Herbert’s kinetic pace and reach advantage gave Trinaldo some trouble early on, as Herbert throws his jab out like he’s poking you with a broomstick from across the Octagon. He also follows up that prodding jab with a lightning fast right cross. However, Trinaldo was able to close the distance and get Herbert down to the mat a minute in. As Herbert looked to return to his feet, Trinaldo attempted a standing Guillotine Submission, but Herbert was able to escape danger and return to his feet. However, Trinaldo was able to keep Herbert pinned up against the cage and returned him to the mat a minute later. While he was able to work his way back to his feet, essentially the entire first round was spent either in the clinch or on the mat, which is definitely not where Herbert wants to be.
Herbert started the second round fresh and dropped Trinaldo with a cattle prod right hand just six seconds in, which was notably just the third time Trianldo had been knocked down in 22 UFC fights up until that point. However Trianaldo was able to recover as he bear-hugged Herbert and then was forced to give up his back as Herbert looked for a Rear-Naked Choke. Trinaldo was able to use the time on the mat to recover and eventually return to his feet, but Herbert dominated the round.
Early in the third round, Trinaldo caught Herbert with a left hand to the dome that dropped Herbert with a delayed cartoon-like reaction. Trinaldo stood above the fallen Herbert with his fist cocked waiting for Herb Dean to call the fight but Dean bizarrely forced Trianaldo to land a few more unnecessary shots while Dan Hardy understandably lost his shit in the commentary booth. Up until that point, Herbert looked great in the fight and just happened to get caught with a clean left hand—it happens. While we didn’t see a huge amount of strikes landed, Trinaldo led 30-21 in significant strikes and both fighters landed just 37 total strikes. However, that can largely be attributed to the fact that we saw over six and half minutes of combined control time in a fight that lasted 11 and a half minutes. Herbert is most comfortable in open space, so he’ll just need to figure out how to stay out of the clinch moving forward so he can fully utilize his reach and explosive striking ability.
Herbert started his amateur career at 170 lb before dropping down to 155 lb in 2014 just before going pro, where he's stayed since. He had been scheduled to fight Drakkar Klose back in February, but was forced to withdraw and wait four more months to step back inside the Octagon. Herbert has only been to one decision in his 12 pro fights, which came in a 2018 win. His other nine wins have all come early, with eight KOs and one submission. Only one of those nine finishes came after the second round, with his first five early wins occurring in R2, but three of his last four ending in R1. Prior to the recent KO loss in his UFC debut, his only other career loss came by R1 KO in 2016 against Rhys McKee, who's now 0-2 in the UFC, but notably has been fighting up at 170 lb opposed to 155 lb where Herbert competes.
Fight Prediction:
Herbert will have a 2” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
While Moicano’s best chance to win this fight will come on the ground, he can fall in love with his striking at times, despite the fact that he’s never knocked anyone out in his career. If Moicano does win, it will most likely come from an early submission, but we’re taking Herbert to pull off the upset here and he’s notably never been submitted in his career. We don’t see this fight making it past the second round and love’s Herbert’s chance to land a first round knockout.
We love the lines in this fight. Our favorite two bets are “Herbert ITD” at +340 and “Herbert R1 Win” at +750. We also like his moneyline at +200 and his R2 Win line at +1200. On Moicano’s side, we like his R1 Submission line at +500. You can also consider “Fight Ends in R1” at +220.
DFS Implications:
The average length of Moicano’s last five fights is just three minutes and nine seconds after four of those ended in R1 (2-2) and one ended in R2 (0-1). He’s been knocked out in his last three losses, and has landed Rear-Naked Choke Submissions in his last two wins. Two of his last three fights lasted under a minute. The winners in those five fights have put up DK/FD scores of 109/128, 122/112, 133/122, 80/91, and 115/133. The one lower score in that group resulted from an early R2 Jose Aldo KO that didn’t include a knockdown, so essentially a worst case scenario, but it's clear the winners in Moicano’s fights generally put up huge scores. With that said, his three decision wins have scored just 49, 73 and 77 DraftKings points, so he is still reliant on landing a finish to score well, but it’s been over three years since one of his fights went the distance. Moicano has fought really tough competition throughout his career, with his four UFC losses coming against Brian Ortega, Jose Aldo, The Korean Zombie, and most recently Rafael Fiziev, but he definitely looks like a fighter on the decline so we shouldn’t assume he gets back in the winning column against a far less proven fighter in Jai Herbert. This will just be Moicano’s third pro fight at 155 lb after he spent his entire career previously fighting at 145 lb. Now going against bigger opponents the odds of him getting knocked out are even more likely. Moicano’s a capable striker, but this looks like a spot where he’ll need to get the fight to the ground quickly and hunt for a submission if he wants to avoid getting knocked out for the 4th time in five fights. The odds imply he has a 68% chance to win, a 42% chance to get a finish and a 17% chance it comes in R1.
Herbert is in a perfect spot for DFS in terms of his ownership relative to his chances of putting up a big score. He’s coming off a low-volume KO loss in his UFC debut, so the only score on his DK stat sheet is a measly 28 points. He also now checks in as a +200 underdog, and is priced as the cheapest fighter on the slate. His striking numbers haven’t caught up to his true abilities, as his only UFC fight was spent mostly in the clinch. That will also help to keep his ownership lower as projection systems struggle to properly evaluate him (similar to Choi last week). Hopefully we don’t see the line move in his favor, because if it does his ownership will also rise. Herbert has a huge ceiling, that surely the sharper portion of the field will understand, but the majority will not. Herbert has only been to one decision in 12 pro fights, and eight of his nine early wins have come in nine minutes or less, with three of his last four wins ending in R1 knockouts. A former Cage Warriors Lightweight Champion, Herbert held the belt until he vacated it when he joined the UFC and Mason Jones filled the void. Herbert is an exceptional striker with lightning quick hands and a massive 77” reach—5” longer than Moicano’s. We love his chances to land a first round knockout and he’s easily our favorite underdog on the slate. The odds suggest he has a 32% chance to win, a 21% chance to get a finish and an 8% chance it comes in R1. Those numbers are all way too low.
Fight #5
Tim Means
24th UFC Fight (13-9, NC)Stepping in on short notice after Dalby’s original opponent, Sergey Khandozhko, withdrew due to an injury, Means was announced as the short notice replacement on June 15th. Means was originally scheduled to fight Danny Roberts last week, but Roberts withdrew and Means was forced to wait a week to find a new opponent.
Means is coming off back-to-back decision wins after his previous four fights (2-2) all ended in the first 2 rounds, including three in round one. Means has gone 4-4 in his last eight fights and hasn’t won three in a row since 2014-2015. He does seem to be hitting his stride right now, as he’s won four of his last six matches, but his last two losses did both notably come early. Also notable, Mean’s recent two decision wins both came against opponents who missed weight badly, Staropoli by 3.5 lb and Perry by 4.5 lb.
With a lengthy pro career that started all the way back in 2004, Means now owns a lengthy 31-12-1 pro record, with 19 of his career wins coming by KO and five by submission. Only seven of his 31 wins made it to the judges. Seven of his 12 losses also came early, including two by KO and five by submission, with the remaining five ending in decisions. A really tough guy to knock out, the only person to knock Means out since 2004 was Niko Price in R1 of a 2019 match.
Means throws a solid amount of striking volume as he averages 5.16 significant strikes landed per minute, which checks in as the 6th most on the slate. He landed 128 significant strikes in his recent decision win over Mike Perry and 129 significant strikes in a 2018 split-decision loss to Sergio Moraes in 2018.
Nicolas Dalby
8th UFC Fight (3-2-1, NC)Coming off a questionable decision win over Daniel Rodriguez, Dalby was outlanded in significant strikes 83-50 and in total strikes 105-58, while Dalby went 0 for 7 on his takedown attempts. Prior to that, Dalby was finished in the first round by Jesse Ronson, who dropped Dalby early in the fight and then submitted him with a Rear-Naked Choke. However, that finish was overturned to a “No Contest” after Ronson tested positive for a banned substance. That was the first time anyone had finished Dalby in his 25 pro fights, and all three of his official losses have ended in decisions.
After going 13-0 to start his career, Dalby originally joined the UFC back in 2015 and won a decision in his debut. However, after going 1-2-1 with four decisions in his first four fights the UFC released him. On a two fight losing streak, Dalby signed up with Cage Warriors just to lose a third straight decision in 2018. That’s when he was finally able to right the ship with three straight early wins via R2 Rear-Naked Choke, R3 KO and a R4 KO.
His last fight in Cage Warriors was stopped and ruled a No Contest due to an “Unsafe Surface” caused by the sheer amount of blood on the mat. The string of early finishes, combined with the notorious bloodbath match got him back on the UFC’s radar, who re-signed Dalby in late 2019. Dalby won his first fight back in a low-volume decision over Alex Oliveira before losing to Ronson.
Dalby has not shown the ability to finish opponents at the UFC level, with all three of his UFC wins ending in decisions. So while 10 of his 19 career wins have come early, all of those finishes occurred outside of the UFC. Of those 10 finishes, he has only three career R1 wins, with the last one coming in 2013. In his last 14 fights, 13 have made it out of R1, and 12 have made it to the third round, with eight going the distance.
Fight Prediction:
Means will have a 3” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.
Means is far more vulnerable to being submitted than knocked out, but Dalby notably has just one submission win in the last eight years, which came outside of the UFC. Dalby also doesn’t have a single official submission attempt in his seven UFC matches. Dalby also lands far less significant strikes than Means as he averages just 3.2 landed per minute to Means’ 5.16, which will make it tougher for him to point his way to a decision. So overall this looks like a tough spot for Dalby to get a win. With that said, he somehow convinced the judges in his last match to hand him a decision in a fight where he was massively outstruck, so maybe his karate style fighting style can fool the judges once again. Dalby has also been a really tough guy to finish, with just the one early loss on his record, which was later overturned to a “No Contest.” Therefore we expect this one to end in a decision, with Means landing more strikes and getting the nod.
Our favorite bets here are Means’ moneyline at -142, his decision line at +180, “Fight Goes the DIstance” at -164 and “Over 2.5 Rounds” at -186.
DFS Implications:
While Means is coming off a pair of decision wins, he still managed to score 90 and 103 DraftKings points and 109 and 98 FanDuel points in those fights. However, his third most recent decision win only scored 58 DraftKings points and 73 points on FanDuel, so he doesn’t always score well in decisions, but he’s certainly shown that he’s capable. He also has a history of landing finishes with DraftKings scores of 111 and 110 in his last two early wins. So overall Means has consistently scored well with 90 or more DK points in his last four victories and 103 or more in three of the four. However, this does look like a tougher matchup to score well as Dalby’s unusual Karate style stance has allowed him to never absorb more than 83 significant strikes and he’s only been finished once in his career. Means will be less likely to put up a huge striking total, so he’s more reliant on landing a finish than normal. The odds imply he has a 56% chance to win, a 21% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Dalby is an anemic DFS producer who’s only topped 69 DraftKings points in one of his seven UFC fights, which came when he totaled a still useless 86 points all the way back in his 2015 UFC debut. This looks like a tough spot for Dalby to get a finish, so he’ll be reliant on volume to score well, which is not something we’ve ever seen from him. He averages just 3.2 significant strikes landed per minute and only has one takedown in his last five UFC fights. He also failed to top 57 significant strikes landed in those five matches and has given us absolutely no reason to think he can score well in a decision. In addition to that, Means has only been knocked out once in the last 17 years and Dalby has just one submission win in the last eight years. Overall, Dalby looks like one of the grossest plays on the slate, which probably means he’ll somehow stupidly sneak into the optimal lineup through a completely bizarre turn of events. In all seriousness though, Dalby is a terrible DFS play on both sites. With that said, the odds imply he has a 44% chance to win, a 17% chance to get a finish and an 8% chance it comes in the first round. Dalby notably has seen a decent line move in his favor for what it’s worth.
Fight #4
Andre Fili
17th UFC Fight (9-7)Coming off a smothering decision loss to Bryce Mitchell, Fili has now gone to the judges in 9 of his last 10 fights. The only fight to end early during that time was a 2019 R1 KO win over Sheymon Moraes, who was released by the UFC following the loss. The last time anyone finished FIli was in 2016 when Yair Rodriguez knocked him out in the second round. And while his UFC record might not blow you away, it’s important to look at who he’s lost against: Bryce Mitchell, Sodiq Yusuff, Michael Johnson, Calvin Kattar, Yair Rodriguez, Godofredo Castro, and Max Holloway.
While Fili has settled into being a decision machine at this point in his career, 15 of his first 19 pro fights didn’t make it to the judges. He’s now 21-8 a pro with nine KO wins, three by submission and nine decisions. He’s been finished four times in his eight losses, with two KOs and a pair of submissions. One of those TKO losses occurred in the 5th round of a 2010 match and resulted from a knee injury. The only other time he’s lost by KO/TKO came in the previously mentioned 2016 Yair Rodriguez match. Both of his submission losses came in his first four UFC fights in 2014 and 2015 with one of those coming against Max Holloway.
Fili sporadically lands takedowns with totals of 0, 5, 3, 0, 0, 2, 4, and 5 in his last eight fights. He notably doesn’t land a ton of striking volume and hasn’t topped 49 significant strikes in any of his last four fights.
Daniel Pineda
10th UFC Fight (4-5)Essentially the exact opposite of Fili, Pineda hasn’t been to a single decision in his last 10 fights and amazingly all 27 of his career wins have come early with nine KOs and 18 submissions. Of those 27 victories, 17 didn’t make it out of the first round. Of his 14 career losses, three have ended in knockouts, six by submission and five in decisions. However, all six of his submission losses came prior to 2011. Since rejoining the UFC last August, both of his fights have ended in second round knockouts with him winning his first fight back over Herbert Burns before losing most recently to Cub Swanson.
Swanson had Pineda hurt at multiple points in that fight before knocking him out less than two minutes into the second round. Swanson finished ahead 46-21 in significant strikes while landing his only takedown attempt successfully defending one of Pineda’s two attempts. Pineda made it clear upon his return to the UFC that he’s here to put on a good show and hunt for bonuses, and so far he hasn’t disappointed.
Prior to his recent loss, Pineda put on a clinic against Herbert Burns. In what was his first fight back with the UFC after over six years away, Pineda outlanded Burns 57-10 in significant strikes and 173-35 in total strikes in just under 10 minutes time before landing a late second round KO. Burns went 3 for 4 on takedowns, while Pineda went 1 for 2. Pineda also led in control time 6:13-2:39 and landed a reversal as he beat up Burns on the ground. Burns notably missed weight by 3 lb for that fight and looked terrible on the scale, so that should be factored in to some extent when considering how good Pineda looked.
Pineda originally joined the UFC in 2012 and 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 period 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.
Fight Prediction:
Fili will have a 4” height advantage and 5” reach advantage. He’s also five years younger than the 35-year-old Pineda.
Win or lose, Pineda’s fights are almost always fun to watch. He exclusively looks for finishes and his last nine fights have ended in the first two rounds. So something will have to give here as Fili has gone the distance in 9 of his last 10 fights. It wouldn’t be surprising if Pineda’s pace up style brings the best out of Fili and forces a finish here. Pineda’s last two losses have both come by R2 KO and while Fili hasn’t landed many finishes lately, he does have nine KOs on his record. Pineda couldalso turn this into a grappling match, but if it remains on the feet look for Fili to pick Pineda apart as he utilizes his 5” reach advantage. Overall we like Fili to win this one, either with a KO in the first two rounds or by decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Under 2.5 Rounds” at -112, but we also like Fili’s R1 and R2 KO lines at +650 and +850 respectively.
DFS Implications:
Fili has generally not scored well in DFS as 9 of his last 10 fights have gone the distance and he only averages 3.73 significant strikes landed per minute. However, this looks like a great buy-low spot in a pace up matchup and Fili has sneaky upside on both DFS sites if he can pull off the finish. We should see a combination of striking and grappling that could allow him to fill up the box score and hit a rare ceiling. He’ll still need a finish to put up a big score, but he has shown he can flirt with 100 points in a decision as well. Either way, we like Fili’s chance to land a finish here far more than normal. The odds imply he has a 67% chance to win a 33% chance to get a finish and a 13% chance it comes in R1.
Pineda always has a huge ceiling in DFS with DraftKings scores of 137, 103, 106 and 108 in his four UFC wins, but he’s far less likely than normal to hit it here. Fili hasn’t been finished in five years and is solid both on the feet and the mat. Pineda was insanely 44% owned in his last fight, and while that number will likely be cut in half here, he could still be a fairly popular underdog play after his 137 point performance last August. He projects to be over owned relative to his chances of landing a finish and he’s amazingly never won a decision in his 43 fight pro career. With that said, the odds imply he has a 33% chance to win, an 18% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #3
Raoni Barcelos
6th UFC Fight (5-0)Blazing in on a nine fight winning streak, Barcelos is coming off a hard fought decision win over a solid opponent in Khalid Taha, who entered the fight 13-2 as a pro. That followed another decision victory against another tough opponent in Said Nurmagomedov, who came in with a 13-1 career record. Barcelos has now won all five of his UFC fights, and while the last two have gone the distance, his first three all ended early. He landed a third round KO in his 2018 debut and followed it up with a second round submission and then a second round TKO. He’s now 16-1 as a pro, with his only career loss occurring in a 2014 R2 Rear-Naked Choke.
Barcelos tends to wear on his opponents as fights go on and his last eight matches have all made it out of the first round, with five of those making it to round three, four ending in decisions and two resulting in 25 minute decisions prior to joining the UFC. All three of his early wins in the UFC notably occurred after the nine minute mark. Ten of his 16 pro wins have come early, with eight KOs and two submissions. While five of those ended in the first round, three of the R1 wins occurred in his first three pro fights against opponents who entered with records of 3-2, 0-8 and 4-5. Another one of his first round finishes came in his 6th pro fight back in 2013 and he’s only finished one fight in the first round in his 11 fights since then.
In his most recent match, Barcelos set a career high in significant strikes landed as he came out ahead 120-49 over Taha, while also leading in total strikes 129-68. Barcelos went 2 for 4 on takedowns, while Taha missed on his only attempt. In a fight that felt somewhat closer watching it than the results indicate, Barcelos cruised to a unanimous 30-27 decision win.
Barcelos’ last three scheduled fights since that decision win over Taha were all canceled. He had been booked against Dvalishvili in December after fighting just a month earlier, but the fight was canceled due to a medical suspension. Then he was scheduled to face Raphael Assuncao in February, but Assuncao withdrew and was replaced by Marcelo Rojo. However, then Barcelos tested positive for COVID and was also forced to withdraw.
Starting his career at 145 lb, Barcelos dropped down to 135 lb following his UFC debut and doesn’t appear to have any plans of ever moving back up. He’s had no issues making weight since the drop and looks great at Bantamweight. A BJJ black belt with a wrestling background, Barcelos is a well rounded fighter who has solid striking, wrestling and submission skills. He’s landed at least two takedowns in four of his five UFC fights.
Timur Valiev
3rd UFC Fight (1-0, NC)After starting his pro career 16-2 and having never been finished, Valiev made his UFC debut last August and came out firing. In just under seven minutes of action, Valiev landed 66 significant strikes (9.45 SS/min). He crumpled Jones to the ground in the first round with a kick to the body and looked to be on the verge of ending the fight right there. However, with a long leash from the ref, Jones was able to hang on to see a second round. Valiev came out a little less explosive in the second, but still seemed to be controlling the fight—at least until Jones caught him with a clean right hook to the chin and jumped on top to finish him. That was the first time Valiev had ever been finished early and he looked confused as he attempted to drunkenly fight his way through the stoppage.
The UFC cruelly stripped Jones of the victory after he tested positive for THC following the fight. Remember, he took that fight on just three days notice. So living up to his nickname, “Lucky” Valiev got a fresh start with his UFC record as that early loss now goes down as a “No Contest.”.
Valiev had originally been scheduled to make his UFC debut three weeks earlier against Jamall Emmers, but was forced to withdraw. Then he was set to face Mark Striegl on August 22nd, but Striegl withdrew the week of the fight and Trevin Jones stepped in on just three days notice. Given the short notice, the fight was moved from 135 lb to 140 lb catchweight. Jones was visibly the bigger fighter, which appeared to translate to knockout power.
In his second UFC fight, Valiev had been scheduled to fight Julio Arce, but Arce withdrew and Martin Day stepped in on short notice. So once again Valiev took on a short notice opponent and fought up at 145 lb instead of his normal 135 lb. After getting knocked out for the first time in his career, Valiev unsurprisingly tapped into his Dagestani roots and came in with a much more grappling-heavy gameplan. The first couple of minutes remained on the feet, but from that point on Valiev dominated in the clinch and on the mat as he finished with over 11 minutes of control time and four takedowns on six attempts. He also led in significant strikes 55-8 and in total strikes 115-24 in the completely lopsided unanimous decision win (30-25, 30-25, 30-26).
Valiev has fought at both 135 lb and 145 lb earlier in his career, but the majority of his fights have been at 135 lb, including his last two fights prior to joining the UFC. However, his last two fights came against short notice replacements and he fought his debut at 140 lb Catchweight and then his most recent fight at 145 lb. He’ll now be dropping down to 135 lb for the first time in the UFC and it’s been a year and a half since he last fought at Bantamweight.
A BJJ brown belt, 10 of Valiev’s 17 career wins have ended in decisions, including four of his last five. He has five career wins by KO and two by submission. However, four of the five KOs and one of the two submissions came early in his career, in 2015 or prior. In his last 10 fights, he has one win by KO and one by submission with six decision victories. He also has a decision loss and a R2 KO loss overturned to a “No Contest” over that period.
Fight Prediction:
Barcelos will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters have a 67” reach.
Facing his third straight opponent with at least 13 career wins and two or less career losses, Barcelos has grown accustomed to taking on incredibly tough opponents. However, for Valiev this will be something new in the UFC after he faced a short notice UFC newcomer in his debut and then took on a struggling Martin Day in his last fight who also took the fight on short notice. It’s somewhat surprising that the UFC even put Valiev in this spot as the talent difference in this one compared to his last match is night and day, no pun intended, but that clearly shows that the UFC thinks highly of him. Valiev fought current UFC fighter Chris Gutierrez twice prior to joining the UFC and they split a pair of decisions. Barcelos notably submitted Gutierrez in the second round of a 2018 bout, so there’s your common opponent comparison for those interested. Both of these fighters are really talented and it’s sort of a shame that one of them will have to suffer a loss at this point in their UFC career, but Barcelos looks like the more dangerous grappler in addition to being a serious threat on the feet. When you combine that with his increased UFC experience and tougher recent opponents, it’s hard to see him losing this fight. The tougher question to answer is how will Barcelos win? A first round finish is unlikely, so if Barcelos does get a finish, a late R2 or early R3 win would be the most likely scenario. However, it’s more likely Valiev survives to see a decision. Either way, we expect Valiev to put up a good fight but for Barcelos to extend his winning streak to 10.
The safest bet is Barcelos’ moneyline, but at-230 that’s not very exciting. Our favorite long shot is his R2 Win line at +1000, but you can also consider his R3 Win lines at +1400 or his decision line +115.
DFS Implications:
Barcelos’ recent decision win scored 96 DraftKings points and 112 points on FanDuel, showing that he can still score decently without a finish. However, that’s far from a sure thing considering he only scored 64 DraftKings points and 63 points on FanDuel in his previous decision win. We’ll need to see another high-volume brawl with grappling mixed in for him to pay off with another decision win, but he’s proven he can consistently score well even with late round finishes as he totaled DK/FD scores of 112/127, 113/116, and 110/135 in his first three UFC wins. The first two of those ended late in R2 and the last ended in R3. We do expect this to be a pace-up fight with Barcelos checking in with the highest average of significant strikes landed on the slate at 5.59/minute and Valiev right behind him with 5.5/ minute (second highest on the slate). Barcelos also averages 2.2 takedowns landed/15 minutes, which is the fifth highest on the slate. And Barcelos holds an elite 85% takedown defense, so he should be able to further boost his FanDuel score with takedowns defended, unless his black belt scares Valiev off from attempting any. Overall, Barcelos is almost always someone you want to have a healthy amount of exposure to in DFS and this instance is no different. It’s definitely a tough matchup, which is never ideal in terms of the likelihood of a ceiling performance, but we’re expecting a high paced brawl and the winner should put up a decent score even in a decision. And don’t forget, Valiev was knocked out by a short notice debuting replacement fighter in his second most recent fight, so a finish here for Barcelos is still very possible. The odds imply he has a 66% chance to win, a 24% chance to get a finish and an 11% chance it comes in R1.
This spot is about as tough as it gets for Valiev and it will be a massive step up in competition for him. While the odds of him winning are not great, if Valiev can somehow pull off the upset he should put up a solid score. Both guys like to push the pace and we expect this to be a high-volume brawl with some grappling mixed in. Now just $7,400 on DraftKings and coming off a dominating decision win where he scored 104 DK points, Valiev will carry a healthy amount of ownership and the fact that the line has moved in his favor will just add to that. So while we don’t expect him to be low owned, he’s certainly one of the more talented underdogs on the slate, he just also has one of the toughest matchups. He’ll most likely end up in winning lineups with a win so you’ll want to have some level of exposure. The odds suggest he has a 34% chance to pull off the upset, a 14% chance to finish it early and a 7% chance to get a first round finish.
Fight #2
Tanner Boser
7th UFC Fight (3-3)Looking to avoid a three fight skid after starting 2020 off with a pair of early KO wins, Boser is fighting for the second time in just three weeks after he lost a split decision to Ilir Latifi back on June 5th. He was announced as the late replacement on June 16th for Maxim Grishin with just 10 days' notice. If you watch Boser’s recent interviews, this seems to be an emotional response (he’s pissed) to a somewhat controversial split-decision loss that Boser clearly felt should have gone his way. He definitely looks motivated/desperate to get back in the winning column.
Boser’s last 21 fights have all either gone the distance (14) or ended in knockout wins (7). Four of those knockouts have notably come in the second round, while two have come in the first and one occurred in the fourth. The only time he's ever been finished in his 27 career fights came six seconds into the first round of a 2015 match, back in his seventh pro fight. His other seven career losses all made it to the judges. Of his 19 career victories, 10 have come by KO and seven have gone the distance. While he does have a pair of submissions on his record, those came in his second and fifth pro fights back in 2013 and 2014 respectively.
In his recent decision loss, Boser outlanded Latifi 45-10 in significant strikes and 84-51 in total strikes. He also almost finished the fight in the second round as Latifi appeared to think he was poked in the eye but the fight played on and Boser hammered him on the mat. Able to survive, Latifi finished the fight going 2 for 3 on takedowns with over six and a half minutes of control time. The decision looked to come down to who the judges thought won the first round, where Boser was the one landing all the strikes, but Latifi was able to get him to the mat and control him for a couple of minutes without doing any damage.
In his second most recent loss, Boser actually doubled the striking output of Arlovski 68-34, and neither fighter attempted any takedowns, landed any knockdowns or amassed any control time. However, the judges still awarded Arlovski a unanimous 29-28 decision win in a fight that looked closer than the stats would lead you to believe.
Prior to the pair of decision losses, Boser landed consecutive KO victories, with a R1 win against Philipe Lins followed by a R2 knockout against Raphael Pessoa. Boser’s first two UFC fights both went the distance (1-1), after he joined the organization in 2019. Prior to getting taken down twice by Latifi, no one had landed a takedown on Boser in his first five UFC fights, although only two were attempted during that time—one by Ciryl Gane and one by Raphael Pessoa. We’ve also only seen one knockdown in his six UFC fights, which occurred when Boser knocked out Philipe Lins. None of Boser’s opponents have landed more than 65 significant strikes and Boser has only landed above 68 significant strikes once, which came in his UFC debut when he landed 93.
As an undersized Heavyweight, Boser relies on his speed to outmaneuver his typically larger and slower opponents. Now he faces his second straight former Light Heavyweight, so it will be interesting to see how he adjusts. Boser weighed in at 242 lb for his most recent fight, while OSP checked in at 240.5 lb for his only Heavyweight match, so these two could end up being around the same size, but that will be something to monitor at weigh-ins. UPDATE: Boser weighed in at 240 lb, while OSP checked in at 230 lb.
Ovince Saint Preux
24th UFC Fight (13-10)OSP had been scheduled to fight Maxim Grishin, presumably at Light Heavyweight, but Grishin dropped out and OSP agreed to take on Boser at Heavyweight on short notice. The matchup makes sense as both guys could probably compete in either division if they wanted to, however, OSP moving up a weight class on short notice should benefit Boser as he’ll be fighting at his normal weight, while OSP simply won’t be cutting weight.
This will just be OSP’s second time competing at Heavyweight, as his other 38 pro fights have all been down at Light Heavyweight. His first attempt at competing with the big boys came in May 2020 when he took on Ben Rothwell. In a lower volume fight, Rothwell outlanded OSP 56-42 in significant strikes and 86-46 in total strikes. Rothwell also landed 1 of 3 takedown attempts while accruing nearly six minutes of control time on his way to winning a split decision, but OSP did land a knockdown. OSP tipped the scales at 240.5 lb for that first Heavyweight fight.
After the failed attempt at moving up to Heavyweight, OSP moved back down to 205 lb and looked better than he had in a while. He took on one dimensional power puncher, Alonzo Menifield, who had previously never been finished before getting face planted with a clean left hook in the second round against a retreating OSP.
Four of OSP’s last five fights and 9 of his last 11 have ended early, but his last six fights all made it out of the first round. Four of his last five matches have notably ended in the second round, with him winning two of those. For what it’s worth (not much), he’s alternated wins and losses over his last five fights and is coming off a loss.
Most recently, OSP was knocked out by Jamahal Hill last December in the second round. OSP missed weight by a pound and a half in that fight. Hill outlanded OSP 68-36 in significant strikes with neither fighter attempting a takedown. The fact that OSP didn’t attempt any takedowns against a pure striker in Hill, makes us wonder if he’ll attempt any in this next match against Boser. OSP now hasn’t attempted a takedown in his last three fights after going 5 for 19 in his three fights prior to that.
OSP holds a 25-15 record in his 40 pro fights, with 12 KO wins, eight submissions and just five decision victories. All eight of OSP’s career submission wins have come in the first two rounds, with five occurring in R1 and three ending in R2, however, three of his last five have notably come in the second round. OSP has lost the last four decisions he’s been to. Six of his 15 pro losses have come early, with three KOs and three submissions. He has just three wins in his last eight fights, two by submission and one by KO. His five losses over that recent stretch include a pair of submission and decision losses followed by his recent TKO loss.
Fight Prediction:
OSP will have a 1” height advantage and 5” reach advantage, but Boser is nine years younger than the 38-year-old OSP.
We don’t see the move up to Heavyweight doing OSP any favors and this will be an incredibly tough matchup for him to get a finish against a fighter in Boser who’s only early loss of his career came over six years ago. OSP has also lost the last four decisions he’s fought to, so he generally doesn’t fare well with the judges. There’s always a slight chance he gets the fight to the ground and lands a submission, but it’s still unlikely. We expect Boser to come in hungry for a win and to either knock OSP out in the second round or point his way to a decision win here.
The safest bet here is Boser’s moneyline at -184 followed by his decision line at +165, but we also like the value in his R2 KO line at +900. On OSP’s side our favorite two bets are his R1 and R2 submission lines at +1400 and +1800 respectively.
DFS Implications:
Despite his above average striking volume, Boser remains an early KO or bust Heavyweight with no grappling to boost his scoring. He generally makes for a better play on FanDuel where he can prop up his score with takedowns defended and significant strikes are more heavily valued. He can’t return value in a decision on either site though, so you’re still relying on a finish for him to score well. Coming off two straight losses, this does look like a decent buy-low spot for DFS and Boser is now affordably priced at just $8,300 on DraftKings. OSP was just knocked out in the second round of his last fight and a similar outcome is certainly possible here. The odds imply Boser has a 62% chance to win, a 27% chance to land a finish and a 10% chance it occurs in the first round.
While OSP’s last six wins have all come early, none of them have scored especially well in DFS. His last six fights all made it to at least the second round and his methodical approach reduces the chances of his fights ending quickly or for much volume to be landed. That generally leaves both him and his opponents reliant on landing a late second round finish to score decently as there’s a lower chance for fights to end in R1 and not enough striking volume for a third round finish to score well. OSP hasn’t attempted a takedown in his last three fights, but did land five on 19 attempts in his three fights prior to that. So the potential to score from grappling is there, but the floor is not. We expect this to be relatively low-volume in terms of striking and OSP’s last third round finish scored just 66 DraftKings points and 94 points on FanDuel. The FanDuel score was inflated by six takedowns defended and Boser has yet to attempt a takedown in the UFC. If you take those away, that score would have just 76 points on FanDuel, so OSP likely needs a finish in the first two rounds to be useful on either site. We’re not excited at all about playing OSP here. The odds imply he has a 38% chance to win, a 21% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #1
Ciryl Gane
5th UFC Fight (5-0)Fresh off a paradoxical five round decision win, which could best be described as his most impressive victory and the least impressive performance of his young career, Gane defeated Jairzinho Rozenstruik in a frustratingly slow paced 5-round snoozer. In Gane’s defense, he did what he needed to do, while Rozenstruik appeared to just mail it in. The 25 minute high-stakes staring contest ended with Gane ahead in significant strikes 102-42 and 128-49 in total strikes, and honestly it felt like far less watching the fight. Gane also went 2 for 14 on takedowns while accruing roughly four and a half minutes of control time. Despite the lackluster performance, clearly all that mattered for Gane was getting the win, which propelled him from the #7 ranked Heavyweight to the #3 spot, which Rozenstruik previously held.
That was notably just Gane’s eighth pro MMA match after previously competing in Muay Thai from 2016-2018. Gane turned pro in MMA in 2018 and has won all eight of his fights since, with three KOs, three submissions and a pair of decisions. His two career decisions have notably both come in his last three fights as he continues to face tougher competition. Only one of his first four pro matches made it out of the first round, with the other ending in round two. However, none of his most recent four bouts have ended in R1 and three have made it to the third round.
In what was just his fourth pro fight, Gane made his UFC debut in 2019 against Raphael Pessoa, who was also undefeated and making his UFC debut. Gane submitted Raphael Pessoa towards the end of the first round, in a low volume affair where Gane led just 15-9 in significant strikes in just over four minutes of action.
Gane followed up that first round victory with his first ever trip beyond the second round, which came against questionable talent Don'Tale Mayes. Gane commanded the fight and finished Mayes 14 seconds before the third round ended with his second straight submission win, this time by Heel Hook. He very nearly finished Mayes at the end of the first round, but ran out of time—although the ref definitely could have stopped it.
He then fought another mobile Heavyweight in Tanner Boser in his third UFC fight and made it to the judges for the first time in his MMA career. Gane was unable to take Boser down on his only official attempt, but finished ahead 65-32 in striking on his way to a unanimous 30-26 decision win.
After fighting four times in 2019 (including once prior to joining the UFC) Gane only fought once in 2020 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.
When he finally got back inside the Octagon he knocked out Junior dos Santos in the second round last December before defeating Rozenstruik in February. Gane landed a solid amount of volume against Dos Santos, leading in significant strikes 59-10 before finishing the fight midway through the second round.
Immediately after Gane’s recent boring decision win, Dana was quoted saying, “Everybody’s talking about Ciryl being this big contender, but look what Francis Ngannou did to Jairzinho. This was his [Gane’s] coming out party and his chance to show the world who he is. He won, but let’s leave it at that. He won.” So knowing his boss wasn’t happy with his last performance, we could/should see a more aggressive Gane in this next one.
Alexander Volkov
10th UFC Fight (7-2)After Volkov’s first seven UFC fights all made it to at least the third round, with two going into the championship rounds, he’s now knocked out his last two opponents in round two. In fact, only one of his last 14 fights has ended in the first round, with that one expectation being a 2016 R1 KO just before he joined the UFC. Four of his last five fights before joining the UFC also made it to the third round, which means 11 of his last 14 have seen the third round, with 7 of those 14 ending in decisions (4-3), six ending in knockouts (5-1) and one ending in a submission (1-0). The only time he’s been finished since 2013 came in a three round fight he was dominating against Derrick Lewis. Volkov controlled essentially the entire fight, outlanding Lewis 121-39 in significant strikes. However, with 11 seconds left in the final round Lewis turned the tables with a late KO out of nowhere. That was just the second time Volkov has been knocked out in 41 pro fights, although he has also been submitted twice.
Volkov rebounded from the shocking loss to Lewis with a decision win over Greg Hardy, who was filling in on short notice after Junior dos Santos withdrew. Following the win over Hardy, Volkov suffered a smothering five round grappling-heavy decision loss to Curtis Blaydes. Volkov had no answer for Blaydes’ wrestling, but was nevertheless the visibly fresher fighter by the fifth round and looked to have a sliver of hope to maybe land a knockout towards the end—at least until Blaydes took him down one last time. Blaydes finished the fight ahead 69-31 in significant strikes, while Volkov actually outlanded him in total strikes 127-116. But more importantly Blaydes landed a record setting 14 takedowns on 25 attempts and nearly 20 minutes of control time.
Volkov again bounced back from a loss, this time with a second round KO win over a struggling Walt Harris, who’s notably been knocked out in the first two rounds of his last three fights. Volkov outlanded Harris 45-16 in strikes in just over six minutes of action.
He then followed it up with an even more impressive win as he put an end to the UFC career of Alistair Overeem, who had knocked out four of his last five opponents. Volkov just dominated Overeem and had his face split wide open before dropping him just seconds before the Over 1.5 Rounds props could hit [definitely not still bitter]. Despite being 32 years old with 41 pro fights under his belt, Volkov legitimately still looks to be improving at this stage in his career. His biggest weakness in his game is his grappling, which was made clear against Blaydes, but he did stuff the two takedowns attempts in his last two matches against Harris and Overeem.
This will be Volkov’s fifth 5-round fight in the UFC. Here are the results of his first four: 2017 R3 KO win vs. Struve, 2018 R4 KO win vs. Werdum, 2020 Dec Loss vs Blaydes, and 2021 R2 KO Win vs Overeem. He also competed in four fights scheduled to go five rounds before joining the UFC: 2012 Decision Win, 2013 R1 KO Loss, 2016 R3 KO Win and 2016 R1 KO Win. With a pair of five round decisions under his belt, he’s shown he has the cardio to go a full 25 minutes.
Volkov is now 33-8 as a pro, with 22 wins by KO and three by submission. He’s been finished in half of his eight career losses, with two KOs and two submissions. However, the two submissions occurred early in his career in 2009 and 2010, and one of the KOs was also back in 2013. The only time he’s been finished in his last 18 fights was against Derrick Lewis with 11 seconds remaining in the last round.
Volkov notably used to fight a little bit lighter, but has slowly been gaining weight for the last decade. He fought most of his UFC career around 245-250 lb but notably bulked up to 265 lb following the dominating grappling loss against Blaydes. Since the weight increase he’s landed back-to-back second round knockouts and you could argue he’s looked better than ever.
Fight Prediction:
Volkov will have a 3” height advantage, but Gane will have a 1” reach advantage. Volkov also weighed in 20 lb heavier at 265 lb compared to Gane at 245 lb.
Volkov has over five times as many pro MMA fights as Gane, so it will be interesting to see how much of an impact that makes in this high-stakes five round fight that will help to set the order at the top of the Heavyweight division. Both fighters offer serious power on the feet, but Gane looks more dangerous on the ground. It’s hard to take away too much from Gane’s last fight in terms of his durability over five rounds as Rozenstruik didn’t land much, but he has great movement and has never been finished, knocked down, or really even looked to be in any danger since joining the UFC. Volkov has also been extremely durable throughout his career, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see this one go the distance. With that said, when you jam two Heavyweights into the small Octagon at the Apex, there’s always a good chance someone gets knocked out. Considering Volkov’s last nine fights and Gane’s last four have all made it out of the first round, we’d be surprised to see a first round finish here. So if this does end early look for it to come in the middle to later rounds. If Volkov can keep the fight standing, we think he certainly has a chance at pulling off the upset, but if Gane can mix in some grappling, look for him to take the lead. Both guys appear to have the ability to finish the other in this fight, and we’re not taking a really strong stand on this one, but we give the edge to Gane as he’s the quicker, more explosive fighter and should also have a grappling advantage.
There’s not a ton of value in the lines here. Our favorite option is simply Gane’s moneyline at -155, although we considered “Volkov Wins by Decision” at +460 as well as the fight ending in R2, R3 or R4 at +650, +850 and +1000 respectively.
DFS Implications:
Gane has been a consistent DFS producer with 94 or more DraftKings points in four of his five UFC fights. While he didn’t put up a huge score in his recent five round staring contest, he still managed to score 94 DraftKings points and 93 points on FanDuel in a very lackluster match, which shows a reliable floor—at least in five round fights. His one other decision in the UFC scored just 56 DraftKings points and 59 points on FanDuel, but that came in a three round fight so it’s not as relevant. Gane notably shot for a ridiculous 14 takedowns in his recent win, but only landed two of them. While that appears game plan specific as he’s gone 0 for 1, 3 for 3, 0 for 1, and 0 for 1 in his other four UFC fights, it would once again make sense for him to look to take Volkov down in this matchup. And while Rozenstruik has an 80% takedown defense, Volkov’s is somewhat lower at 66%. In addition to the likelihood of contributing to his DFS scoring with grappling, Gane lands an average of 5.04 significant strikes per minute, which check in as the 7th most on the slate. He’s also never lost a fight (8-0) and has finished six of his eight opponents, so overall Gane sets up to score well in a win. While there’s a decent chance this fight goes the distance, we still expect Gane to score well in a decision victory. The odds imply he has a 58% chance to win, a 28% chance to get a finish and an 8% chance it comes in the first round.
While Volkov has mostly been an underwhelming DraftKings scorer due to his lack of grappling and first round finishes, it’s hard to imagine him not returning value with a win in this fight based on his reduced price tag. He’s only scored above 92 DK points twice in nine fights, but three of his lower scores came in three round decisions, which we don’t need to worry about here. In his other four UFC wins he’s scored 102, 88, 92 and 123 points. Those did all end in knockouts and we haven’t seen him win a five round decision yet in the UFC, but if we extrapolate his three round decision numbers over the course of five rounds, he would have totals of 95, 114 and 87. While a score in the high 80’s or low 90’s isn’t great, it’s still likely enough to be useful at his price depending on what the other dogs do. He also should score even better on FanDuel, where significant strikes are more valuable and he should tack on several takedowns defended. While Volkov only has two takedowns in his last five fights, he averages a decent amount of striking volume with 4.88 significant strikes landed per minute, which is the eighth highest on the slate. Coming off back-to-back impressive R2 KO wins, recency bias will likely drive up Volkov’s ownership potentially close to where Gane ends up, which is certainly a knock against him in tournaments. The odds imply he has a 42% chance to win, a 23% 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 with your winnings so we can see how you did! @dfs_mma