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Late Scratches: Alen Amedovski vs. Yaozong Hu is OFF!
Fighter Notes:
Fight #13
Alen Amedovski
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Amedovski came into the UFC in 2019 with a perfect 8-0 record, with all eight of his wins coming by knockout in the first two rounds, including six in R1. However, the majority of those wins came against opponents with little to no experience, who entered with records of 0-5,4-0, 0-0, 0-1, 3-0, 0-0, 4-0, and 7-1. In his 2019 UFC debut, Amedovski took on decision machine Krzysztof Jotko and got dominated for three full rounds. In one of the more pathetic statistical performances you’ll see, Amedovski landed just six total strikes in 15 minutes, while Jotko landed 43 significant strikes and 111 total strikes. Jotko also went 4 for 4 on takedowns and amassed over nine and a half minutes of control time. Amedovski looked completely helpless off his back and seemed a little undersized for the Middleweight division.
In his second UFC fight, Amedovski took on John Phillips and provided the Welshman with his only UFC win in six attempts. That fight lasted just 17 seconds as Phillips knocked Amedovski out nearly immediately as the two immediately met in the center of the Octagon. Amedovski had been scheduled to face Bevon Lewis in January 2020, but ended up withdrawing and now hasn’t fought in nearly two years.
Amedovski has done literally nothing to impress us so far in the UFC and showed that he can be dominated both on the mat and standing up in his first two UFC fights. He’s truly had one of the worst possible two fight starts to a UFC career you could have.
Hu Yaozong
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Making his pro debut in 2016 at Heavyweight, Yaozong landed three straight finishes to start his career with a first round Guillotine Choke followed by a pair of knockouts in the later two rounds. His first two wins took place in some sort of multi-day tournament as they came just one day apart, which further diminishes his already limited experience, as he really just competed in two events leading up to his UFC debut. However, the UFC had a card taking place in Shanghai, China in 2017 and needed a Heavyweight to fill in on short notice against 1-2 Cyril Asker and it appears the 22-year-old Yaozong was in the right place at the right time in his home country of China and was awarded the opportunity to join the UFC despite having just one year of pro experience and just three fights under his belt. Yaozong went for a standing Guillotine Choke early in the fight but was unable to complete it and did little else the remainder of the match before getting submitted midway through the second round. Yaozong was somewhat undersized at Heavyweight as he weighed in at just 232 lb for that fight.
Following the early loss in his UFC debut, Yaozong took a year off and dropped down to Light Heavyweight (205 lb), before returning in November 2018 to fight on another card taking place in China, this time in Beijing. Yaozong took on Rashad Coulter, who was also dropping down from Heavyweight to Light Heavyweight after getting knocked out in the first two rounds of his first three UFC fights. Coulter wasn’t able to fully complete the drop in weight as he missed the mark by two pounds for that fight. Coulter knocked Yaozong down midway through the first round with a right hand, but Yaozong was able to recover and appeared to steal the momentum in the second and third rounds. However, the judges gave Coulter a unanimous decision victory and he narrowly came out ahead in significant strikes 98-92 and 108-98 in total strikes. Yaozong missed on his only takedown attempt but did finish with nearly five and a half minutes of control time.
Yaozong looked terrible in his first UFC fight but actually seemed much improved for his second. However, in March 2019 Yaozong tested positive for a banned substance and was suspended for 10 months. An investigation into the matter concluded that the positive test was the result of a dietary supplement he had been taking. So that suspension is at least part of the reason why we now haven’t seen Yaozong fight in nearly three years. He’s also now dropped down another weight class and will be competing at Middleweight (185 lb) for the first time in his career. Despite the long layoff, Yaozong is still just 26 years old. This will also notably be the first time Yaozong has ever fought outside of China.
Yaozong hasn’t looked that explosive in the past, but has been fairly durable. While only one of his five pro fights has gone the distance, his last four have all made it out of the first round, with two making it to the third. Outside of a standing Guillotine Choke, which he appears fond of, we haven’t seen much grappling out of Yaozong, but he does have a background in Greco-Roman wrestling. So there’s at least the potential for him to utilize more grappling at some point and this next matchup at least appears to be the perfect opportunity.
Considering his extended layoff and drop down to Middleweight, it will be essential to monitor Yaozong closely at weigh-ins.
Fight Prediction:
Yaozong will have a 5” height advantage, but Amedovski will have a 2” reach advantage. Yaozong is also seven years younger than the 33-year-old Amedovski.
Yaozong is bigger, younger and appears more durable than the undersized Amedovski. He also will have the grappling advantage as Amedovski is a one-dimensional striker, who’s never won a fight that lasted longer than nine minutes. This is clearly a low-level, high-variance fight between two 0-2 fighters who are both coming off extended layoffs, but it’s somewhat surprising that Amedovski is even the favorite. He’s done nothing since joining the UFC that indicates he has the ability to win fights at this level and now he’s going against a former Heavyweight who’s never been knocked out, albeit in a super short career. We like Yaozong to pull off the upset, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see the fight go the distance. If it does end early, Yaozong has said he likes to go for Standing Guillotine Chokes, but his size advantage could also allow him to land a knockout. It’s also not impossible that the weight cut takes a toll on him and Amedovski lands a knockout—like we said, high variance fight.
Our favorite bet here is Yaozong’s moneyline at +120. We also like his submission line at +1400 and his decision line at +600 as longer shots.
DFS Implications:
Amedovski amazingly has just 9 total DraftKings points combined between his two UFC fights and that’s still one more point than the total number of strikes he landed in those two matches. Despite the odds being pretty close and only getting closer after pricing was released, DraftKings curiously priced Amedovski all the way up at $9,000, which should keep his ownership incredibly low. That’s pretty much the only reason to play him in tournaments other than the fact that he’s going against an 0-2 fighter who hasn’t fought in three years—although you could also argue that his 8-0 pre-UFC record with eight knockouts at least presents some theoretical upside. The odds imply he has a 53% chance to win, a 33% chance to get a finish and a 16% chance it comes in R1.
Yaozong hasn’t given us much to get excited about, but he did land 92 significant strikes in his last fight and showed he could take a punch, which is far more than we can say about Amedovski. What’s more interesting here is that Amedovski’s two UFC opponents put up DK/FD scores of 98/70 and 127/115. The first set of scores came in a smothering grappling-heavy decision, while the second was a 17 second first round KO. Yaozong hasn’t shown his grappling at the UFC level so it remains a mystery, but there is the potential for him to take advantage of Amedovski’s ineptitude on the mat and grind his way to decision. In that scenario Yaozong would be a much better DraftKings play compared to FanDuel. He also has the potential to land a finish, in which case he would return value on both sites. Keep in mind, this is a high variance fight with a wide range of potential outcomes, with both fighters 0-2 in the UFC and coming off extended layoffs. Yaozong notably started his career at Heavyweight, before dropping down to Light Heavyweight in his second UFC fight and now all the way down to Middleweight, so it will be interesting to see the size advantage he holds on fight day. Yaozong is clearly mispriced at just $7,200/$11 where he’s the 4th cheapest option on DraftKings and the 6th cheapest on FanDuel despite being close to a coinflip in terms of the odds. That will definitely drive his ownership up some, but we still expect him to be relatively low owned in tournaments. Overall we like Yaozong as a cheap value option on both sites, but prefer him on DraftKings. The odds imply he has a 47% chance to win, a 29% chance to get a finish and a 13% chance it comes in the first round.
Fight #12
Zhalgas Zhumagulov
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Coming off a pair of close decision losses in his first two UFC fights, Zhumagulov’s most recent loss came against a slick submission specialist in Amir Albazi. Zhumagulov’s last seven fights have now all gone the distance, including four five round bouts. Albazi outlanded Zhumagulov 68-59 in significant strikes and 94-74 in total strikes, while also landing a pair of takedowns on three attempts and accruing over three and a half minutes of control time. Zhumagulov went just 1 for 3 on his takedown attempts.
Prior to that recent loss, Zhumagulov fought to a close/questionable decision loss in his July 2020 UFC debut against Raulian Paiva. Zhumagulov opened slowly in the loss but seemed to improve as the fight went on. He actually outlanded Paiva 66-52 in significant strikes and 73-56 in total strikes, while landing 2 of 11 takedown attempts, while Paiva had no attempts. It seemed like the decision likely should have gone Zhumagulov’s way, but all three judges ruled it 29-28 for Paiva.
Before he joined the UFC, Zhumagulov had won four straight decisions with the last three going five rounds. While seven of his 13 career wins have come early (6 KOs & 1 Submission), his last early win was a R2 KO in 2017. It’s now been over four years since he finished anybody and ten of his last 11 fights have gone the distance. Also, six of his seven career finishes came in his first six fights against highly suspect opponents. The records of those opponents were: 0-0, 0-1, 0-0, 0-0, 2-0, and 3-0.
Four of his five career losses have ended in decisions and the only time he’s ever been finished was a 2015 R2 KO. He has notably never been submitted. We also shouldn’t have to worry about his cardio late in fights, as four of his last five fights before joining the UFC were five round decisions.
Jerome Rivera
4th UFC Fight (0-3)Queue up the revolving door gif as Rivera tries to see how quickly he can speed through his time in the UFC. He’s also tested three different weight classes so far in his three UFC fights. Rivera is now fighting for his job and he’ll need an impressive win if he wants to have any chance of ever fighting again in the UFC. He made his UFC debut last September on short notice against Tyson Nam and got knocked out early in the second round. That fight took place at Bantamweight (135 lb), but Rivera has spent most of his pre-UFC career at Flyweight (125 lb). Nam has notably fought at both Flyweight and Bantamweight throughout his career, but has gone 0-3 in the UFC in three decisions at Flyweight, while he’s gone 2-0 with two knockouts at Bantamweight. Nam finished ahead 36-30 in strikes, while neither fighter attempted a takedown. Nam was also clearly the one doing more damage with his strikes, which showed when he knocked Rivera out 34 seconds into the second round.
Next, Rivera dropped back down to Flyweight and was booked to fight Ode Osbourne on January 20th 2021, but Osbourne withdrew and Francisco Figueiredo stepped in to make his UFC debut. Figueiredo ended up winning a low-volume unanimous 29-28 decision. Rivera actually led in significant strikes 31-29 and in total strikes 85-39, but missed on all five of his takedown attempts, while Figueiredo landed 4 of his 6 attempts and finished with over seven minutes of control time. Rivera’s striking looked a little better in his second UFC fight, but still left a lot to be desired.
Following his second UFC loss, Rivera then curiously stepped in on short notice to fight Ode Osbourne just 17 days later after Osbourne’s original opponent dropped out. It obviously helped that Rivera had previously prepared for Osbourne, but fighting twice in just over two weeks is a tough task. That fight also notably took place all the way up at Featherweight (145 lb), so Rivera didn’t have to worry much about the weight cut after fighting at Flyweight (125 lb) a couple of weeks earlier. However, while Rivera ballooned up to 145 lb for the match, Osbourne had spent his entire career bouncing back and forth between 135 lb and 145 lb. So you would think moving up in weight so quickly put Rivera at a disadvantage and it showed when Osbourne knocked him out in just 26 seconds.
Seven of Rivera’s 10 pro wins have come early, all by submission. Four of his five career losses have also come early, with three KOs and one submission. It’s worth noting that one of those KOs came when he dislocated his elbow in what appeared to be a freak accident against the cage. His second KO loss came in his short notice UFC debut against Tyson Nam up a weight class and his third came in a quick turnaround, short notice fight up two weight classes against Osbourne. His one submission loss came in R3 of a 2017 LFA fight. The first decision loss of his career came in his second UFC fight against Figueiredo.
Fight Prediction:
Rivera will have a massive 6” height and reach advantage.
This will be Zhumagulov’s easiest UFC fight to date, which is clear if you look at the odds as he opened as the second largest favorite on the slate. It’s rare that you see an 0-2 fighter open as a -375 favorite, but that just shows you what the oddsmakers think of Rivera. The line has come down some throughout the week, but that’s not entirely surprising considering how wide it opened. Zhumagulov has never been submitted and showed he can stay out of danger against a submission specialist in his last fight, so it’s hard to see Rivera getting a finish here. While it’s possible Zhumagulov can knock Rivera out, we also think that’s unlikely, as Rivera has only ever been truly knocked out when he’s competed at heavier weight classes. Now going against a decision machine in Zhumagulov, we’re expecting another decision loss for Rivera in this one.
The best bet here is the “Fight Goes the Distance” at -182. We’d like to bet Zhumagulov’s decision line, but at -115 there’s really no value there. Instead we’re looking at “Zhumagulov Wins by KO” at +500 and “Rivera Wins by Decision” at +550.
DFS Implications:
Zhumagulov has given us no indication he can score well in a decision after he posted DraftKings scores of 32 and 39 in his recent two losses, which would have been good for just 62 and 69 DK points had the decisions gone his way. He’s dead middle on this slate in terms of significant strikes landed at 4.17 per minute, while absorbing 4.0 per minute. He’s gone 3 for 14 on takedown attempts in his first two UFC fights, so there’s both the potential to boost his score with takedowns landed and his opponents’ score with takedowns defended. The best thing he has going for him is that he should be incredibly low owned at his ridiculously high price tag. He also gets an opponent who’s been knocked out in two of his last three fights—just keep in mind that those KOs came at 135 lb and 145 lb, while this fight is at 125 lb. Zhumagulov hasn’t knocked anyone out in over four years and will be giving up 6” of height and reach in this matchup. Overall, he needs a finish to be useful in DFS and the odds imply he has a 74% chance to win, a 24% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Rivera has been struggling mightily since joining the UFC, but found the most success in his one fight to take place at his normal 125 lb weight. At 5’10” he’s tall for the division, which should help him against the 5’4” Zhumagulov. However, Rivera has never knocked anyone out and Zhumagulov has never been submitted, so this looks like a tough spot for Rivera to get a finish. He only landed 31 significant strikes in his one UFC fight to go the distance and has yet to land a takedown in three UFC fights, so it’s hard to see him scoring well in a decision. With that said, Zhumagulov has just a 33% takedown defense, so if Rivera does look to grapple more it’s possible this is the matchup where he finds more success. There’s also a chance he defends multiple takedowns as Zhumagulov leads the slate in missed takedowns per 15 minutes at six. So there is a slight chance Rivera could be useful as a value play in a decision if he can either rack up control time on DraftKings or takedowns defended on FanDuel. The odds imply he has just a 26% chance to win, a 14% chance to get a finish and a 6% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #11
Brad Tavares
20th UFC Fight (13-6)Coming off his first win since 2018, Tavares won a low-volume decision against Antonio Carlos Jr. as he led in significant strikes 54-34 and total strikes 73-57, while also stuffing 11 of Carlos Jr's 12 takedown attempts. Prior to that fight Tavares underwent ACL surgery, which is part of why he had a 14 month layoff between his last two fights.
Leading up to his recent win, Tavares lost his previous two fights in a 2019 R1 KO loss to Edmen Shahbazyan and a 2018 R5 decision loss to Israel Adesanya. Prior to the pair of losses, Tavares had won four straight from 2016 to 2018 with three decision wins and a 2018 R3 KO against Krzysztof Jotko. Tavares struggled leading up to those four wins as he lost three of four fights in 2014 and 2015, getting knocked out in the first two rounds in two of those.
Tavares has been in the UFC since 2010 and of his 19 UFC fights, 14 have gone the distance. His last 11 wins have all made it to the third round with 10 ending in decisions. His only early win since 2011 was the R3 KO of a questionable Krzysztof Jotko. On the other side of things, three of his last four losses have come by knockout.
While he does have five KO wins and two submission victories on his pro record, six of those came in his first seven pro fights and he only has one early win since 2011. Also, despite going to a ton of decisions, he’s only landed above 50 significant strikes in two of his last 13 fights and he still totalled just 54 and 70 in those two instances. He also has just three takedowns in his last 11 fights and only one in his last five.
Omari Akhmedov
15th UFC Fight (9-4-1)Prior to his recent R2 submission win over Tom Breese, Akhmedov had been to seven straight decisions and looked far more tentative then he did against Breese. Akhmedov finally opened things up and looked great as he beat Breese up on the mat for the second half of the first round before submitting him with an Arm-Triangle in round two. Breese was able to briefly take the back of Akhmedov at the end of the first round but he couldn’t actually do anything with it.
After starting his career at 185 lb and even fighting at 205 lb a couple of times in 2011, Akhmedov dropped down to 170 lb in his second UFC fight and was welcomed to the Welterweight division with a first round Guillotine Choke Submission loss against Gunnar Nelson. Despite the rough start at the new weight class, Akhmedov bounced back with a decision win followed by a R1 TKO victory. However, he was then knocked out in the third round in back-to-back fights, before again bouncing back with a pair of wins, this time both by decision. After going 4-3 at Welterweight, he decided to move back up to 185 lb where he then fought Marvin Vettori to a draw. Then he won three straight decisions before losing one to Chris Weidman in 2020. He then rebounded with his first finish since 2015 in his most recent match. So while he has been finished three times in the UFC, all three of those instances occurred down at 170 lb and he’s gone 5-1-1 at 185 lb with a pair of early wins and the other four fights ending in decisions. He looks extremely durable and strong at 185 lb.
Akhmedov does have 13 early victories among his 21 career wins, but most of those came early in his career. Sixteen of his first 19 pro fights ended early, while seven of his last eight fights have gone the distance. Also, his last 10 fights have all made it out of the first round. He’s been submitted twice in his career, both times by Guillotine Choke, and has been knocked out twice in the third round. Akhmedov has notably landed 10 takedowns in his last four fights, but doesn’t land much striking volume and has never landed more than 64 significant strikes in a fight.
Fight Prediction:
Tavares will have a 1” height and reach advantage.
This sets up as a low-volume striking battle that most likely ends in a decision. Akhmedov has gone the distance in seven of his last eight fights and Tavares has gone the distance in 14 of his 19 UFC matches. We have seen Tavares get knocked out in three of his last 10 fights, so there’s a chance Akhmedov can land his second straight finish here, but we’re still expecting a decision. Akhmedov likes to mix in takedowns, but Tavares has a legit 79% takedown defense and defended 11 of 12 attempts in his last match. That could result in chunks of time spent in the clinch along the fence which would further contribute to a lack of striking volume. We like Akhmedov to pull off the upset and win a decision here.
Our favorite two bets here are “Fight Goes the Distance” at -192, Akhmedov’s moneyline at +138 and “Akhmedov Wins by Decision” at +280. If you want to take a longer stab consider “Akhmedov Wins by KO” at +850 or “Akhmedov Wins by R1 KO” at +2100.
DFS Implications:
Tavares is as gross as it gets in terms of DFS scoring. His last six wins have been good for DraftKings scores of 56, 81, 73, 57, 54, and 57. He’s only landed one takedown in his last five fights and averages just 3.04 significant strikes landed per minute. Priced at $8,600, he needs an early finish to return value and has just one of those in the last decade. Even that lone R3 KO victory scored just 81 DraftKings points and 99 points on FanDuel, so really he likely needs a finish in the first two rounds to score well. We don’t have any interest in playing Tavares, but he will at least go low owned and pretty much every week we see a gross low owned play end up in the optimal lineup. The odds imply he has a 60% chance to win, a 23% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Akhmedov once scored well in a grappling-heavy decision win (100 DK points), but has scored just 68, 61, 58, and 73 DK points in his other four most recent decision wins. He averages just 2.95 significant strikes landed per minute and while he averages 2.6 takedowns landed per 15 minutes, Tavares has a legit 79% takedown defense. So a dominating grappling performance is unlikely here. That will leave Akhmedov reliant on a finish to score well. Working in his favor, Tavares has been knocked out in three of his last four losses, with all three KOs coming in the first two rounds. The odds imply Akhmedov has a 40% chance to win, a 15% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #10
Jennifer Maia
7th UFC Fight (3-3)A BJJ and Muay Thai black belt, Maia is coming off a five round decision loss in a title fight against Valentina Shevchenko. Maia did better than most against the champ and impressively controlled her at times early in the fight as she won the second round. With that said, Maia still lost a unanimous 49-46 decision and was outlanded 62-36 in significant strikes and 249-94 in total strikes. Shevchenko also landed 5 takedowns on 6 attempts with 9:34 of control time, while Maia went 1 for 2 with 7:51 of control time. Shevchenko was also notably returning from knee surgery for that match, which could have had something to do with her slower start.
Maia has gone 9-3 in her last 12 fights with the three losses coming in decisions against tough opponents in Valentina Shevchenko, Katlyn Chookagian and Liz Carmouche. Nine of Maia’s last 10 fights have gone the distance, with the one exception being a 2020 R1 Armbar Submission win over Joanne Calderwood to steal her title ticket. Maia does have nine finishes among her 18 career wins, but five of those came at the beginning of her pro career and she only has one finish since 2015. Four of her career finishes ended in KOs, while the other five were submissions. She’s been very durable and has only been finished early twice in 26 pro fights and both of those came very early in her career in a 2011 R2 Armbar and a 2012 R1 KO. She’s had 18 fights since then without being finished.
Despite holding a BJJ black belt, Maia has only landed two total takedowns on just four attempts in her six UFC fights. She also lands an average of just 3.34 significant strikes per minute while only absorbing 3.52 per minute.
Jessica Eye
15th UFC Fight (5-8, NC)Continuing to lose more than she wins in the UFC, Eye has lost back-to-back decisions and has just one win in her last four fights. In her most recent loss, Eye was pieced up for 15 minutes by Joanne Calderwood, who outlanded Eye 148-77 in significant strikes and 214-104 in total strikes. While it won’t show up on her official MMA record, Eye also lost grappling bouts before and after the loss to Calderwood, showing that she’s really been struggling to win anything lately. Prior to those losses, Eye lost a five round decision to Cynthia Calvillo in June 2020. Calvillo outlanded Eye 113-70 in significant strikes and 150-70 in total strikes, while landing 4 of 7 takedowns and tacking on nearly eight minutes of control time.
Eye’s only win since 2018 was a 2019 decision victory over a legit Viviane Araujo, but Eye ridiculously showed up 5 lb overweight for the fight so there definitely needs to be an asterisk next to that one. Eye landed a career high number of significant strikes as she came out ahead 98-56 on her way to a unanimous 29-28 decision win. Eye came into that fight off a R2 KO loss to Valentina Shevchenko.
Ten of Eye’s last 11 fights have ended in decisions, with the only exception being the KO loss to Shevchenko. That was just the second time Eye has been finished in her career, while the first was a 2011 R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission in Eye’s fourth pro fight.
Eye had a rough start to her UFC career, going 1-5 plus a No Contest in her first seven UFC fights. However, they let her hang around and after losing four straight from 2015 to 2016, she did bounce back with three straight decision wins in 2018, before losing three of her last four. UPDATE: It’s a little hard to quantify it, but we thought Eye looked great at weigh-ins, far better than she has in the past.
Fight Prediction:
Eye will have a 2” height and reach advantage.
This fight is tied for the most likely on the slate to end in a decision and it will likely be somewhat close based on the fact that neither of these women are dominant enough to run away with it. Maia is a more dangerous grappler, so it would be surprising if Eye looked to take this to the ground and Maia rarely looks for takedowns herself. This feels close to a coinflip and the odds appear too wide, so we’ll say Eye wins a decision here.
The safest bet is clearly the “Fight Goes the Distance” at -290, but the value looks to be in Eye’s decision line at +230.
DFS Implications:
Maia lacks the striking and takedown volume to score well in decisions, which leaves her reliant on landing a finish to return value in DFS. And with that in mind, she has just one early win in her last 10 fights, which resulted from a R1 Armbar that she threw up off her back against Calderwood in her second most recent fight. While Maia looked decent in her last two fights, we’re not excited about playing her here. The odds imply she has a 63% chance to win, but just an 18% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Similar to Maia, Eye has landed just one takedown in her last five fights and lacks the striking volume to score well in a decision. She hasn’t topped 72 DK points in her last 10 fights and her only finish since joining the UFC came in a 2014 R2 KO in her third UFC fight. Even at her reduced price tag, a decision win is still unlikely to score enough to be useful, but at least she has the ability to serve as a value play if we get a weird slate where almost no underdogs win. With that said, we’re never excited about playing Eye in DFS and this spot is not different. The odds imply she has a 37% chance to win, a 12% chance to get a finish and a 5% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #9
Dricus Du Plessis
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)These two had originally been scheduled to fight back in March, but Du Plessis was forced to withdraw and Giles ended up facing Roman Dolidze instead. So for what it’s worth, this will be the second time they have prepared for one another.
Coming off a R1 KO win in his October 2020 short notice UFC debut, Du Plessis looked tight and a little nervous in his first fight with the organization, but still managed to be the first fighter to ever finish Markus Perez early. Now 15-2 as a pro, all 17 of his pro fights have ended early and only four have made it to the third round (2-2). Eight of his wins have come in R1 and 5 in R2. Nine of his 15 pro wins have come by submission with the other six ending in knockouts. Four of his last nine wins notably ended in Guillotine Choke Submissions, which is interesting considering that Giles’ last two losses have also both come by Guillotine Submission.
Du Plessis’ last three fights have all been at 185 lb, as were the first six fights of his pro career, but in between those two stretches he fought five of eight fights at 170 lb and one at 176 lb Catchweight, with just two fights at 185 lb from 2015-2018. Following a 2018 R3 KO loss in the KSW Welterweight Championship, he moved back up to 185 lb and has won all three of his fights since in the first two rounds. He’s impressively won 11 of his last 12 fights, with only two of those making it past the second round.
We’ve only seen three minutes of Du Plessis so far in the UFC, so he remains more or less of an unknown at this level, but he’s certainly proven throughout his career and in his limited UFC action that he possesses a strong ability to finish fights.
Trevin Giles
8th UFC Fight (5-2)Giles is quietly on a three fight winning streak, which may be getting overlooked because he fainted just before a fight against Kevin Holland last August and was rushed to the hospital instead of fighting. Apparently his heart scarily stopped multiple times at the hospital while he was under observation, but he appears to have made it past the health scare. He’s now coming off a March 2021 decision win over Roman Dolidze, who was dropping down to 185 lb for the first time and took the fight on short notice after Du Plessis withdrew. Giles won a close low-volume unanimous decision, although Dolidze finished ahead in significant strikes 32-27 and in total strikes 75-43. Both fighters landed one takedown, Giles on two attempts and Dolidze on three. Giles nearly finished the fight in the third round as he wobbled Dolidze with a right cross, but strangely looked for a choke at that point instead of finishing the fight with ground and pound.
Prior to that win, Giles landed a third round KO against Bevon Lewis back in November 2020. In that low-volume match, Giles came out ahead in significant strikes just 38-26, but did notably land two knockdowns and a takedown before the finish. Leading up to that KO win, Giles won another decision in February 2020 against James Krause, who took the fight on one day’s notice and fought up a weight class, after showing up at the event to corner Youssef Zalal. Krause actually came close to submitting Giles in the first round, but got beat up as the fight went on by the much larger man in Giles.
Both of Giles’ career losses occurred just before his recent three fight winning streak, and both of those losses ended in third round Guillotine Choke submissions in consecutive 2019 fights at the hands of Zak Cummings and Gerald Meerschaert. Going into those two losses Giles had a perfect 11-0 pro record and was 2-0 in the UFC. Impressively, 10 of those 11 wins came early with five KOs and five submissions. Four of those occured in R1, but those four were also all in his first six fights against opponents who entered with records of: 0-1, 4-8, 2-2, and 4-4. His last 10 fights have now all made it out of the first round and 8 of his last 9 have made it to the third round, including his most recent six. His patient low-volume fighting style certainly seems to drag fights out and makes him less likely to land a finish in the first round.
Giles made his UFC debut at 205 lb but has fought the rest of his career at 185 lb. Following his second UFC win in 2017, Giles took a year and a half off from the UFC as he went through the police academy to become a member of the Houston P.D. He lost his first two fights back in 2019 following the layoff.
Fight Prediction:
Du Plessis will have a 1” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.
Considering Du Plessis has never been to a decision in 17 pro fights and Giles has only been to three in 16 pro matches, there’s a good chance this one ends early. Giles’ only two career losses both came by Guillotine Choke, with each occurring in the third round of 2019 fights. Du Plessis notably has four wins by Guillotine Submission in his last nine fights. Interestingly, Du Plessis’ only two career losses also occurred in the third round, with a 2014 Guillotine Choke and a 2018 KO in a KSW Welterweight Championship fight. Which brings us to our next point, Du Plessis has fought at both 170 lb (4-1) and 185 lb (10-1) throughout his career, while Giles has fought almost entirely at 185 lb, but won his UFC debut up at 205 lb. So while Du Plessis will have a slight height and reach advantage, Giles has plenty of experience facing larger opponents.
A 2nd degree black belt in kickboxing, Du Plessis has power in his hands, but doesn’t appear to always get the most out of his reach, which could allow Giles to be effective with his jab. We also expect a slower start to this fight as both fighters try to feel the other out and we don’t see this one ending in the first round. Both fighters have looked more vulnerable late in fights and a mid to late round finish would make sense. We like Giles’ chances to pull off the upset, but also think Du Plessis could win this one with a submission. As the odds indicate it feels close to a coinflip, but we’ll take Giles as a slight dog.
There are a ton of interesting dart throws in this fight. On Du Plessis’ side we like his submission line at +550 as well as his R3 submission line at +3000. On Giles’ side of things we like his R2 & R3 win lines at +1000 and +1800 as well as his R2 & R3 Submission lines at +3500 and +5000 respectively. We also like “Fight Ends in R3 Submission” at +2100, “Fight Ends in R3” at +650 and “Over 2.5 Rounds” at -118.
DFS Implications:
Du Plessis’ 100% finish rate in his 15 pro wins is certainly impressive and his R1 KO victory in his UFC has resulted in him leading the DK slate in average fantasy points per fight at 110. When you combine that with his relatively cheap price tag, it makes sense that he’s projected to be pretty highly owned. While Giles has been submitted in both of his pro losses, those each came in the third round and he’s generally been a tough guy to score well against as he absorbs the third lowest number of significant strikes on average at just 1.88/minute. He also holds a 79% takedown defense and has never been knocked out or lost a decision. With that said, both of Giles’ career losses have come by Guillotine Choke and Du Plessis has finished 4 of his last 9 fights with Guillotine Choke Submissions. So there could potentially be a vulnerability there for Du Plessis to attack if Giles hasn’t cleaned things up. We don’t see Du Plessis scoring well if this does go to a decision as we expect a lower-volume striking total from both fighters, so he will be reliant on a finish for DFS. The odds imply he has a 52% chance to win, a 33% chance to get a finish and a 16% chance it comes in R1.
With all seven of his UFC fights making it out of the first round and his last six seeing round three, Giles has generally not scored great in DFS, but has been useful as a value play at times. He also did put up a massive 124 point DK score in his 2017 UFC debut on the back of five takedowns and a second round KO. However, he only has three combined takedowns in his last six fights since then and you’re relying on him to get a finish to score well. He averages just 3.26 significant strikes landed per minute, which is the 8th lowest on the slate, and his two third round KO wins still scored just 85 and 92 points on DraftKings and 113 and 121 points on FanDuel. Because he’s a slight underdog but the same price as Du Plessis on Fanduel, he should go low owned as the field always goes way heavier on the favorite when they’re priced the same as the dog. When you combine that with the fact that he’s scored better on FanDuel than DraftKings in his late finishes, he looks like a more interesting tournament play over there. Just keep in mind he still needs a finish to score well. No one has ever landed more than 44 significant strikes on Giles and he’s failed to ever eclipse 71 himself. Also, neither him nor his last five opponents have landed more than a single takedown in his last five fights, further decreasing the potential scoring ceiling in this fight. The odds imply he has a 48% chance to win, a 20% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #8
Ilia Topuria
3rd UFC Fight (2-0)Coming in with a perfect 10-0 pro record, Topuria made his UFC debut last October against Youssef Zalal and saw the third round for the first time in his career as he went on to win a decision. Topuria followed that up with a first round knockout in his most recent fight against submission specialist Damon Jackson last December.
Topuria looks like a bright up and coming prospect with a very well rounded game where he can dominate opponents both on the feet or the mat. He notched five takedowns and five submission attempts in his impressive UFC debut against an opponent in Zalal who’s never been finished. Then in his second fight, it took Topuria just half a round to show off his striking as he finished Damon Jackson midway through the fight round with a combination of punches.
Of his nine early finishes, seven ended in submissions, but the last two have both come by R1 KO. Eight of his nine finishes have come in the first round, including his last five. A BJJ black belt, Topuria looks like a star in the making, but he’s still just 24 years old and has yet to be truly tested in the UFC. The only knock on him is that he looked exhausted by the end of the third round in his UFC debut, but after taking the fight on just eight days notice and wrestling with “The Moroccan Devil” for three rounds, it’s hard to blame him. With that said, he’s yet to show us that he has a 15 minute gas tank, so if this fight does stretch into the second half things could get interesting.
Ryan Hall
5th UFC Fight (4-0)After having his last three fights get canceled, Hall now hasn’t fought in almost exactly two years, and has just four UFC fights since joining the organization in December 2015 (2015, 2016, 2018 & 2019). Despite the fact that he went pro all the way back in 2006, Hall has just nine professional fights to his name. After losing a decision in his 2006 pro debut, he didn’t fight again for six years until November 2012 when he landed a first round TKO. He followed that up with a R1 submission win in 2013, followed by a third round TKO in 2014, and then another first round submission win later that year, before getting his shot in the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter in 2015. He won a decision in his 2015 UFC debut, but then took almost exactly a year off before returning and winning another decision. He then took over a two year hiatus before returning to submit B.J. Penn in the first round with another Heel Hook submission in December 2018, which remains his only early win in the UFC. His most recent fight was a July 2019 decision win over Darren Elkins.
Since that last decision win, Hall had a May 2020 fight against Ricardo Lamas rescheduled to August due to COVID and then was forced to withdraw from the second scheduled date due to injury. Then he was booked to face Dan Ige in March 2020, but again was forced to withdraw due to injury.
Hall has been bouncing back and forth between the 155 lb division and the 145 lb division since joining the UFC. He made his debut at 155 lb, then dropped to 145 lb, then moved back up to 155 lb where he landed his lone UFC finish, and then dropped back down to 145 lb for his recent decision win where he’ll stay for this next fight. This will be the first time he’s fought back-to-back fights at the same weight class since 2014. The only loss of his career came at 155 lb in his first pro fight. Now he’s on an eight fight winning streak and is 6-0 in his career at 145 lb.
An incredibly unique challenge, Hall is a 3rd degree BJJ blackbelt who will mix in kicks on the feet, but is most dangerous rolling into leg locks, which he’s constantly attempting. That unorthodox approach to fighting results in very little striking volume in his fights. He averages just 2.32 significant strikes landed per minute (second fewest on the slate), and absorbs a slate-low 0.96 significant strikes per minute. His rolling leg lock attempts don’t count as takedowns, so he’s only landed one official takedown in his four UFC fights and that came in his 2015 debut.
Fight Prediction:
Hall will have a 3” height advantage and 1” reach advantage, but Topuria is notably 12 years younger than Hall.
This will be the second straight submission specialist Topuria has faced and he made short work of the first. Because he has such solid striking to go along with his elite grappling, Topuria can win fights both on the feet or the mat, which makes it really tough for one-dimensional strikers or grapplers to compete with him. The biggest question mark for Topuria is his cardio. Only two of his 10 professional fights have made it out of the first round and only one of those lasted longer than eight minutes. That came in his UFC debut when he won a decision against Youssef Zalal and Topuria looked absolutely exhausted late in the fight. However, he also took that fight on short notice and it was an extremely grappling heavy affair that would have worn anyone out. If he spends portions of this next fight watching Hall roll around on the mat then there will be less to tire Topuria out if this fight even makes it to the third round.
It’s so hard to predict how Hall’s fights will end as there’s nothing really to compare them to. We know he’ll be looking for Heel Hook submissions, but so far no one in the UFC has been able to make him pay for that predictability. He’s a tough guy to hit as he has no problem just flopping straight down to the mat or running away from contact. He also throws a lot of kicks to keep his opponents at bay, and wants no part of trading in a phone booth. Topuria has said he knows he’s in store for a chess match and has been planning for a “very strategic fight” where he’ll “need to have a lot of patience.” Topuria has also said “I have no respect for him in any area—on the feet, on the ground, anywhere.” So it will be interesting to see if that confidence allows him to be the first person to ever finish Hall or if it ends up getting him into trouble and falling into a dreaded Ryan Hall Heel Hook submission. We also haven’t seen anyone willing to engage with Hall much on the ground, so it will be interesting to see if Topuria is willing to do so or if he’ll simply force him back to his feet. We love Topuria in general, but this is a weird matchup that should test the mental aspect of his game. We still like his chances to win either by KO or in a decision, but it’s not impossible that Hall’s one-trick-pony approach proves successful once again against a much younger opponent and he lands another Heel Hook or steals a decision.
Hall has fought to decisions in three of his last four fights, so betting the “Fight Goes the Distance” at +138 isn’t terrible, however, 9 of Topuria’s 10 pro fights have ended early so it’s also not a safe bet. With a wide range of potential outcomes, we’re just looking to take a few stabs here. You can consider Topuria’s ITD line at +120, but we prefer his R1 Win line at +300. While a KO is more likely than a submission for him in this matchup, we do see some value in his submission line at +1000 considering he has 7 career wins by submission and just two by KO. On Hall’s side, we like his R1 Submission line at +1000 and his R3 Win line at +1600.
DFS Implications:
Topuria scored 78 DraftKings points and 89 FanDuel points in his UFC debut, but then put up totals of 112 and 131 respectively in his more recent first round KO win. Based on Hall’s fighting style, it’s hard to see Topuria scoring well in a decision here, so he’s likely reliant on another first round finish to return value as his expensive price tag. He’s stated that he plans on coming in with a patient game plan, which obviously doesn’t bode well for a quick finish. Hall has also never been finished in his career and is a 3rd degree BJJ black belt, which makes it less likely for Topuria to excel on the mat. If he opts to keep it standing then he’ll be reliant on landing a perfect one punch knockout as Hall generally refuses to stand and trade with opponents as he’ll simply roll down onto the mat. There’s still a chance Topuria overcomes everything working against him and gets the early win he needs to be useful in DFS, but it’s far less likely than normal here. It seems like pretty much everyone hates Ryan Hall, so with Topuria coming off a big first round KO win we expect him to be a popular DFS play despite this being a tougher matchup to score well. The odds imply he has a 68% chance to win, a 43% chance to get a finish and a 20% chance it comes in R1.
Hall’s low striking volume and takedown numbers make it hard for him to score well in DFS. There may not be a fighting style that gets consistently booed as much as Hall’s as he rolls around on the ground and runs from confrontations on the feet. He’s won all four of his UFC fights, but has returned DK/FD scores of just 70/71, 93/109, 50/53, and 87/45. His only decent score resulted from a first round submission and he failed to top 70 DraftKings points and 71 FanDuel points in his last two decision wins. Working in his favor, he’s one of the cheapest fighters on the slate, so it’s possible he could still serve as a value play even with a lower scoring win, but it appears he needs a finish to really score well. This is an incredibly tough matchup going against the 10-0 Topuria and Hall hasn’t fought in two years, so he has a lot of hurdles to overcome, but he should go low owned in DFS. The odds imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 19% chance to get a finish and an 8% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #7
Michel Pereira
6th UFC Fight (3-2)After toning down his antics, Pereira has now won two in a row to get his record back above .500 after starting off 1-2 in the UFC. He made his UFC debut in 2019 in dramatic fashion as he landed a first round Flying Knee KO less than two minutes into the first round.
A huge 170 pounder, he missed weight by 1 lb for his second UFC fight and proceeded to lose a decision to Tristan Connelly, who was fighting up a weight class in his UFC debut. Pereira then took on a washed up Diego Sanchez and was unfortunately disqualified for an illegal knee in the third round of a fight he was clearly dominating. The fight ended with Pereira ahead 53-25 in significant strikes and 56-29 in total strikes, while landing both of his takedown attempts and defending all six of Sanchez’s attempts.
Next, Pereira took on Zelim Imadaev, who entered the fight 0-2 in the UFC. Pereira dominated the match as he led in significant strikes 88-23 and total strikes 88-24, while also landing his only takedown attempt. The fight appeared on it’s way to ending in a decision, however, with 21 seconds remaining in the third round Pereira was able to land a Rear-Naked Choke submission—although whether or not Imadaev actually tapped was contested at the time and it was definitely up for interpretation.
In his most recent fight, Pereira won a low-volume decision against dangerous power-puncher Khaos Williams. Pereira understandably wanted no part of a brawling striking battle with Khaos, who had knocked out his first two UFC opponents in 30 seconds or less. Pereira’s constant feinting, unorthodox movements and unique fighting style made it tough for Khaos to land many clean shots and Pereira was able to absorb the ones he did. The most action we saw in the fight came at the end of the second round where Khaos was able to wobble Pereira with a combination of strikes and then Pereira was able to take Khaos’ back and get under his neck just as the round ended. Pereira was then able to take Khaos down twice later in the third round. Khaos did a great job of getting back up to his feet on the first takedown, while the second occurred with just 30 seconds remaining in the match and Pereira spent those final seconds in top position to secure the decision.
Pereira’s constant and unconventional movement, combined with his unique combination of speed, size and power, make him a tough puzzle to crack and he only absorbs an average of 2.84 significant strikes per minute (less than half of what Niko Price absorbs). In his 38 pro fights, Pereira has only officially been finished early twice—at least by his opponents. Those came in a 2018 R1 KO against Dusko Todorovic and a 2014 R2 Armbar. However, he’s also had two “No Contests”, including the time a fight was stopped when he was “Injured by the Cage.”
While his last four fights have notably all made it to the third round, with two ending in decisions, 17 of his 25 career wins have come early with 10 KOs and 7 submissions. If we look at his nine fights prior to the recent four, six of those nine ended in the first round, one ended in R2, another in R3 and the last in R5. So of his last 13 fights, only two have gone the distance.
Despite his chaotic behavior and unusual bag of tricks, Pereira has impressive speed, knockout power and submission skills. Huge at 170 lb, he’s fought anywhere from 170 lb to 204 lb in the past. He has all the physical skills needed, and seems to be improving the mental aspect of his game. We haven’t seen him land a ton of striking volume since joining the UFC, but he does consistently outperform his opponents’ averages. Here are his five opponents’ average number of significant strikes absorbed per minute followed by the average number Pereira landed per minute against them: 3.08/3.36 (+9%), 1.93/2.13 (+10%), 3.02/4.03 (+33%), 4.35/6.01 (+38%) and 3.59/2.93 (-18%). So the only time where Pereira underperformed was in his last fight against Khaos Williams. And now after facing numerous opponents who generally don’t absorb a large number of significant strikes, Pereira gets Niko Price, who absorbs an insane average of 5.83/minute.
Niko Price
13th UFC Fight (6-4, 2 NC)Coming off an unfortunate draw against Donald Cerrone, Price was deducted a point for a pair of accidental eye pokes in the first round, and then on top of that the draw was later overturned to a “No Content” when Price tested positive for pot. Price outlanded Cerrone 150-113 in significant strikes and 167-113 in total strikes, while missing on his only takedown attempt but also defending all five of Cerrone’s attempts.
Prior to his recent NC/Draw, Price’s first 11 UFC fights all ended early, with the first 10 ending in the opening two rounds. Only 2 of his 20 pro fights have gone the distance, with all four of his career losses coming early, including three KOs and one submission. He has 10 career KO victories, three submission victories and just one decision win. He also had a 2017 R2 KO victory overturned to a No Contest for pot as well. Price has only been to the third round three times in his 20 pro fights, although two of those notably came in his last two fights.
Price has landed a ridiculous 279 significant strikes over six rounds in his last two matches, while absorbing 243. He averages 5.33 significant strikes landed per minute since joining the UFC, while absorbing 5.83/minute. He also averages four attempted takedowns per 15 minutes, but with just a 22% accuracy he lands less than one for every three he misses.
Fight Prediction:
Pereira will have a 1” height advantage, but Price will have a 3” reach advantage.
Both of these guys love to put on a good show and this will be the first time back in front of a crowd for each of them. Price forces everyone into pace-up brawls and rarely requires the judges. Five of his UFC fights have ended in the first round and another five have ended in round two. So while his last two fights have both seen the third round, with the most recent going the distance, that’s definitely not the norm for him. This should be a fun one to watch, and we don’t expect Pereira to be as cautious as he was in his last match. We like Pereira to end this early, but Price is always live to get a finish, so it wouldn’t be shocking to see him pull off the upset.
There is a ton of betting goodness in this one. The safest bet is simply “Fight Does Not Go the Distance” at -166, but that’s pretty boring. Pereira’s ITD line is fine at +155, but we prefer his R1 & R2 Win lines at +500 and +600 respectively. If you’re looking for longer shots check out his submission line at +700 or his R1 and R2 Submission lines at +1700 and +2200 respectively. We also like “Fight Does Not Start R3” at +110 or “Fight Ends in R1” at +230 and “Fight Ends in R2” at +380.
DFS Implications:
This sets up as a pace up matchup for Pereira and a pace down matchup for Price. The winners in Price’s 12 UFC fights, beginning with the most recent, have put up DK/FD scores of: 65/105 (Price’s score even in a draw), 108/149, 107/119, 105/118, 104/119, 131/124, 94/91, 102/131, 105/132, 104/118, 89/101 and 105/120. Even if we include the draw, that’s good for an average of 102 DraftKings points and 119 points on FanDuel. So essentially in every Niko Price fight the winner puts up a big score, especially on FanDuel. You’ll want exposure to both sides of this fight, but we prefer Pereira as a more contrarian tournament play to Price.
In his last four fights, where he’s gone just 2-2, Pereira has struggled to score well, especially on DraftKings. His last two wins were good for DK/FD scores of 62/63 and 86/114. However, this looks like a far more favorable matchup to put up a big score and the fact that he hasn’t been putting up usable scores on DraftKings, along with his expensive price tag, should help to keep his ownership under control. Price absorbs the second highest average number of significant strikes on the slate at 5.83/minute and also averages three missed takedowns per 15 minutes. This looks like a potential explosion spot for Pereira and the line has notably moved in his favor. The odds imply he has a 60% chance to win, a 33% chance to get a finish and a 13% chance it comes in R1.
Price immediately stands out as one of the appealing cheap plays on this slate with a huge ceiling—which is why we expect him to be heavily owned. His last five wins have been good for 107, 114, 94, 102 and 104 DraftKings points. Even his recent draw would have scored 95 DK points had the decision gone his way, and still scored 105 FanDuel points even in a draw. It’s hard to see Price not returning value with a win, but Pereira is a tough guy to hit. So there is a slight chance he comes in with another conservative game plan and ruins this fight, but that’s not what we’re expecting. The odds imply Price has a 40% chance to win, a 25% chance to get a finish and an 11% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #6
Max Griffin
12th UFC Fight (5-6)Coming off back-to-back KO wins after fighting to seven straight decisions, Griffin has said he’s changed his mental approach to fighting and is just trying to go out and have fun now. Well apparently it’s working because after having only landed one finish in his first nine UFC fights, he’s now coming off a devastating R1 KO after he previously punched the ear off Ramiz Brahimaj’s head. Prior to the freak injury, that fight did look destined to end in a decision, but Griffin was clearly way ahead. While Griffin only has three finishes in the UFC, 11 of his 17 career victories have come early with nine KOs and two submissions. On the other side of things, seven of his eight pro losses have gone the distance.
Griffin made his 2016 UFC debut against Colby Covington on the McGregor Diaz 2 card and got knocked out in the third round. That remains the only time Griffin has even been finished in his 25 career fights. He bounced back from the loss with a 54 second R1 KO victory against Erick Montano, who entered the fight 1-1 in the UFC, was coming off a submission loss, and was released from the UFC afterwards.
Following the 2016 KO win, Griffin fought to seven straight decisions, somehow only winning two of them. He started that streak with a loss to Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos, but bounced back with a win over Mike Perry. He then lost a decision to Curtis Millender, who came in on a seven fight winning streak with KOs in four of his last five. Griffin followed that up with a split decision loss in 2019, this time to Thiago Alves, who has now lost four of his last five fights with just the one win over Griffin. Griffin then won a decision against Zelim Imadaev, who was making his UFC debut, but is now 0-3 with the organization. Griffin next lost a unanimous decision to Alex Morono and a split decision to Alex Oliveira before his recent pair of KO wins.
So Griffin has struggled mightily with the judges since joining the UFC, as he’s gone just 2-5 in his seven decisions. However, two of those were split so he just as easily could be 4-3 or 3-4 and one of those was a blatant robbery. He knocked Thiago Alves down once, outlanded him 112-83 in significant strikes and 117-91 in total strikes and led in takedowns 2-0, but somehow the judges gave it to Alves. If you rewatch the fight it’s hard to fight two rounds that Alves won.
While Griffin hasn’t landed a takedown in his last two fights, he did notably land 12 in his three fights prior to that. On the other side of things, he owns a 66% takedown defense and has only been taken down three times in his last 10 fights, although Colby Covington took him down six times in Griffin’s 2016 UFC debut.
Carlos Condit
19th UFC Fight (9-9)After losing five straight fights from 2016 to 2018, Condit took nearly two years off before returning to take on a pair of older veterans in Court McGee and Matt Brown. Condit won a pair of decisions, but did drop McGee at the end of the first round in their 2020 match. Condit had been scheduled to fight Mickey Gall in December 2019, but was forced to withdraw from the match due to a detached retina.
In his last 12 fights, Condit has gone just 4-8. Other than his recent pair of decision victories, his only other two wins over that period were a 2015 R2 KO against Thiago Alves, and a 2013 R4 KO versus Martin Kampmann. The eight losses consisted of four decisions (including two 5 rounders), three submissions (Kimura, Guillotine Choke & Rear-Naked Choke), and one TKO by leg kick.
While Condit has been submitted six times in his career, he impressively has just one TKO loss on his 45 pro fight record, which occurred when Condit appeared to suffer a freak knee injury in his 2015 match against Tyron Woodley. Condit looked to hurt his right knee as he got taken down by Woodley early in the second round. After getting stood back up by the ref, Woodley kicked Condit in the left, uninjured knee causing Condit to pick up his left leg and put all of his weight on his injured right knee. The force of Woodley’s kick also caused Condit’s body to rotate on his bad knee. Condit spun to the mat in agony and the fight was immediately stopped. It was later confirmed that Condit suffered a torn ACL and partially torn meniscus.
The injury caused Condit to miss 14 months of action before he returned with a R2 KO win over Thiago Alves in 2015. For what it’s worth, Alves went on to lose 5 of his next 7 fights after that and one of those two wins was the questionable split decision over Max Griffin. Following the win over Alves, Condit lost 5 in a row before taking two years off and then returning with the recent pair of decision wins.
Condit has a very unconventional fighting style that makes him a tough opponent to prepare for and a hard guy to land strikes on. He only absorbs an average of 2.49 significant strikes per minute, which is the fifth fewest on the slate. He’s had a few fights where he put up big striking totals, but those all came in five round matches and he generally doesn’t land a ton of volume himself either, as he averages just 3.63 significant strikes landed per minute. He also has only landed three takedowns in his last seven fights, but he’s been taken down 15 times himself during that stretch.
Fight Prediction:
Condit will have a 3” height advantage, but Griffin will have a 1” reach advantage.
After going through a nightmare stretch where he couldn’t win a fight from 2016 to 2018, Condit has now righted the ship to some extent with two straight wins, but those both came against struggling older fighters. This will be Condit’s first real test this returning, so it will be interesting to see how he fares against a decent opponent. Condit has been vulnerable to being submitted, but his only career TKO loss came from a knee injury. And on the other side of things, Griffin only has one early loss in his career. So based on their history and durability, we expect this one to end in a decision. Griffin has been looking really sharp lately, so despite his struggles with the judges we’re taking him here, but we’ll definitely be sweating the decision if it gets there.
Our favorite bet in this fight is Griffin’s moneyline at -192, but you can also consider his decision line at +145 or the “Fight Goes the Distance” at -172. If you want a longer shot, check out “Griffin Wins by Submission” at +1800.
DFS Implications:
We liked Griffin going into his last fight as a low-owned, underachieving favorite with the potential to explode and it worked out perfectly, but this looks like a tougher spot and he could end up carrying a little more ownership after his recent first round win. This fight most likely ends in an average volume decision, and it will be hard for Griffin to return value unless he lands a finish. Even in Griffin’s R3 TKO of Brahimaj, he still scored just 77 DraftKings points and 94 points on FanDuel, so even a late finish may not be enough. When you consider the fact that Condit has just one TKO loss (from a knee injury) in 45 pro fights, the odds of Griffin landing a knockout seem even slimmer. Condit has been submitted six times, but Griffin’s only two career submissions came in 2013 and 2014 before he joined the UFC, so that’s not super likely either. Condit is 37 years old now so maybe Griffin can keep his KO streak going, but this looks like a tough spot for him to score well overall. The odds imply he has a 64% chance to win, a 25% chance to get a finish and an 11% chance it comes in R1.
Given his cheaper price tag, Condit has a wider range of acceptable scoring outcomes. He notably notched 93 DraftKings points but just 70 points on FanDuel in his recent decision win, which was bolstered on DraftKings by a disproportionate number of total strikes compared to significant strikes. Prior to that, Condit scored just 75 DraftKings points and 85 FanDuel in his decision win over McGee. Unless pretty much all the other underdogs on the slate lose, a score in that ballpark is less likely to be useful even at his reduced price tag. Unfortunately, winning a decision is Condit’s most likely path to victory as he hasn’t finished an opponent since 2015 and Griffin has just one early loss in his career. No one has ever landed more than 84 significant strikes on Griffin and he hasn’t been taken down more than once in any of his last 10 fights, so it’s hard to see Condit filling up the stat sheet here. With that said, the odds imply he has a 36% chance to win, a 15% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in the first round.
Fight #5
Sean O'Malley
7th UFC Fight (5-1)O'Malley had originally been scheduled to fight Louis Smolka, but after Smolka withdrew due to a staph infection, Kris Moutinho stepped in on short notice.
Coming off a third round KO win against Thomas Almeida, O'Malley was moments away from another first round knockout but opted for style points over securing the victory as he prematurely walked away from Almeida after knocking him down. That frustrating sequence began with an O'Malley head kick midway through the first round. As Almeida struggled to stay on his feet following the kick, O'Malley partially landed a left hand that dropped Almeida to the mat. Instead of going in for the kill shot, O'Malley foolishly walked away as Almeida sat leaned up against the cage. Almeida then quickly returned to his feet and O'Malley nonchalauntly resumed fighting. At that point, anyone that bet “O’Malley Wins by R1 KO” was on full tilt and potentially shopping for a new TV. O'Malley did eventually get the knockout late in the third round, but you have to question his decision making and priorities. Although in his post fight interview he made it pretty clear what those are when he said, “I only have 15 minutes to perform, you know maybe a couple of times a year. When I get in there I gotta be...I gotta do something sweet.” Which is great and all, this is supposed to be entertainment and we all love seeing the big walk off KOs, but once you start forcing that every time you fight, it takes something away from the instances where it happens organically. And obviously if you’re betting on a R1 KO and he opts to prioritize style points over securing the bag that’s insanely frustrating.
In his six UFC fights, O'Malley has accrued 52 minutes and 28 seconds of Octagon time and suffered two injuries to the same leg. While it’s somewhat reassuring that he was able to go almost three full rounds in his last fight while absorbing 13 leg strikes, he didn’t look as light on his feet compared to earlier in his career and it’s hard not to still have some level of concern with the potential for reinjury. While reports seem to indicate that the two leg/foot injuries are unrelated (Lisfranc vs. Peroneal Nerve), it’s still concerning for a fighter to repeatedly injure the same body part. There was also speculation that he may have reaggravated his Lisfranc injury following the kick to his peroneal nerve. Maybe he’s fully recovered now and we’re worrying about nothing, but it’s been less than a year since the injury so who knows.
O’Malley previously hurt his right foot in the 2018 Andre Soukhamthath fight, and the doctors told him he had a preexisting fracture, which is also concerning. Then, following the fight he was suspended for six months for testing positive for ostarine. He used the time off to have hip surgery, unrelated to his foot. Then he tested positive again, but reached a settlement after he claimed the positive test was linked to a tainted supplement he had taken. Apparently that is a legitimate issue with many supplements, but you always have to wonder when athletes use the tainted supplement defense.
After returning two years later following the injuries and suspensions, O’Malley knocked out both Jose Quinonez and Eddie Wineland in the first round, in a total of three 3 and 56 seconds, and his injury history began to fade into the past.
So to sum up O’Malley’s injury history, it’s our understanding that O’Malley had some sort of a fracture in his leg going into the Soukhamthath fight before suffering a Lisfranc injury in that match. Then he took two years off (plenty of time to get his body right) and within five months suffered another injury—or combination of injuries—to the same leg.
When healthy, O’Malley looks nearly unstoppable. He had won his first 12 pro fights leading up to his loss to Vera, with eight KOs, one submission and three decisions. Eight of those nine finishes came in the first round. In fairness he’s gone against pretty weak competition outside of Marlon Vera, so we’ve yet to see him really be tested.
In his 2017 debut, he defeated Terrion Ware, who’s lost his last SIX fights and is no longer in the UFC. Then he beat Andre Soukhamthath, who’s lost three of his last five fights and is no longer in the UFC. Next he knocked out Jose Alberto Quinonez, who’s lost three of his last four fights. He followed that up with another R1 KO, this time against Eddie Wineland, who’s lost four of his last five fights, before most recently defeating Almeida, who’s lost four straight. Staying on brand, O’Malley now gets another dream matchup and he’ll probably call out Victor Rodriguez after this next fight.
Kris Moutinho
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making his UFC debut on less than two weeks notice, Moutinho is coming off a recent third round submission win over a terrible Andrew Salas, who came into the fight with a 6-5 pro record and having lost four of his last five fights. Despite landing a ton of volume and Salas fighting with his hands down, Moutinho showed a lack of KO power as Salas was able to absorb everything coming his way. Moutinho finally went for a somewhat sloppy Arm-Triangle choke towards the end of the third round and Salas tapped without a ton of resistance.
Prior to that fight Moutinho landed a second round TKO last October against an inexperienced opponent in Ashliek Ajim, who entered with just three pro fights to his name, albeit all early wins. Ajim took an early lead, landing a massive amount of strikes in the opening minutes including a dozen unchecked leg kicks and a barrage of punches that knocked Moutinho down at one point. However, Moutinho was able to show he had the better gas tank as Ajim gassed himself out in the first round. Moutinho was easily able to capitalize as he landed strikes along the cage and the fight was stopped on the feet midway through the second round.
Leading up to that pair of early wins, Moutinho was finished twice in 2019. The first of those two losses came against Moutinho’s toughest opponent to date in UFC fighter Tony Gravely, who was able to absolutely dominate Moutinho on the ground for close to four rounds before knocking him out on the mat in the fourth round. Moutinho’s only grappling defense was to go for Kimura and Leg Lock Submissions, and Gravely completely had his way with him. Following that loss, Moutinho was knocked out in the second round by Johnny Campbell, who interestingly got the TKO stoppage by throwing elbows off his back to the top of Moutinho’s head as he had him in a Triangle Choke.
Moutinho is now 5-4 in his last nine fights with all four of those losses coming early. His most recent two losses both came by KO, one in the second round and one in the fourth, while his previous two losses were both by R1 Guillotine Chokes. He’s 9-4 as a pro, with three wins by KO, one by submission and five by decision. He’s pretty much a pure striker and his only career submission win came in his last fight. He also looks very prone to being knocked down. While he doesn’t have a ton of power, he throws a good amount of volume and has decent cardio, so he’s able to maintain a high pace.
Fight Prediction:
O'Malley will have a 4” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.
Moutinho looks down to brawl, doesn’t throw many leg kicks and prefers to keep fights on the feet. Assuming Victor Rodriguez wasn’t available, the UFC literally couldn’t have picked a better opponent for O’Malley to land another highlight reel finish against. While we do still have some lingering concerns with O’Malley’s long term durability, this looks like a matchup he should dominate in with minimal risk for suffering another leg injury. Moutinho’s height and reach are identical to O’Malley’s last opponent, Almeida, and O’Malley was able to easily control the distance in that matchup and dominate the fight. This easily looks like the biggest mismatch on the card as the UFC continues to try and build O’Malley up. We like him to get another first round knockout here—at least assuming he doesn’t moonwalk away from Moutinho after dropping him.
The lines here are ridiculous with O’Malley’s moneyline checking in at -1000 and his KO line coming in at -270. That leaves us with his R1 KO line at +130 (if you can still even find it that high) and his R2 KO line at +380 as the only playable options with any return, and there’s not much value to be had here.
DFS Implications:
In his five UFC wins, O’Malley has put up DraftKings scores of 101, 105, 97, 64 and 102 and FanDuel totals of 129, 120, 111, 82 and 129. So he’s scored better on FanDuel overall and hasn’t put up any slate breaking scores on DraftKings. The reason O’Malley hasn’t put up any huge DK scores is that he’s yet to win a fight in under a minute for the quick win bonus, hasn’t landed a takedown in his last five fights, and hasn’t paired a R1 finish with more than 18 significant strikes. However, he did have two knockdowns, while landing 27 significant strikes in his R1 KO on DWCS back in 2017, so maybe he’s simply due for some variance where he has a less hyper efficient R1 finish. His R1 KO on DWCS would have scored 121 DraftKings points and 149 points on FanDuel, in what amounted to a near best case scenario win from a DFS scoring perspective with a pair of knockdowns, 27 significant strikes, three takedowns defended and a late first round finish. He’s certainly capable of a similar performance here, but he could also come out and finish this fight with just a few strikes landed. O’Malley scored 101 DraftKings points in his recent R3 KO win, but was still left out of the winning DK lineup due to his $9,200 price tag. A similar scenario is certainly possible here as well, where he’s the most expensive fighter on the slate. He did notably end up in the winning FanDuel lineup, where he scored better as he dropped 129 points. As a ridiculous -900 favorite, O’Malley projects to be the most popular fighter on the card and the majority of the field will start their lineups with O’Malley and one of the fighters from the main event. Just keep that in mind when you’re trying to build unique lineups. The odds imply he has a 86% chance to win, a 68% chance to get a finish and a 35% chance it comes in the first round.
There are really just two reasons to play Moutinho—to be contrarian in a massive leverage spot and betting on the chances that O’Malley gets reinjured. UFC debuts don’t get much tougher, and Moutinho is clearly being offered up as a sacrifice to the UFC Gods as he steps into the Octagon for the first time. At his cheap price tag, if Moutinho can somehow pull off this seemingly insurmountable upset, then he would most likely end up in winning lineups, but as the biggest underdog on the slate by a wide margin, it appears highly unlikely. The odds imply he has a 14% chance to win, a 10% chance to get a finish and a 3% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #4
Irene Aldana
10th UFC Fight (5-4)Looking to bounce back from a lopsided five round decision loss to Holly Holm last October, Aldana was outlanded 154-69 in significant strikes and 187-92 in total strikes. Holm also nearly doubled her career takedown total as she landed 5 of her 14 attempts against Aldana after only landing six takedowns in her previous 11 UFC fights combined. That’s especially impressive considering that Aldana entered the match with an elite 93% takedown defense.
Prior to that decision loss, Aldana impressively knocked out Ketlen Vieira in the first round in 2019. Aldana had won five of her last six fights after losing her first two UFC matches in 2016 and 2017 in a pair of decisions against Leslie Smith and Katlyn Chookagian. The loss to Chookagian notably came in a split decision as did Aldana’s second most recent loss, which came against Raquel Pennington in 2019.
All nine of Aldana’s fights prior to joining the UFC ended early, with her winning seven of them. Since joining the UFC, seven of her nine fights have gone the distance, with the two exceptions being a 2019 R3 Armbar Submission win and the 2019 R1 KO win against Vieira. All four of Aldana’s UFC losses have ended in decisions, but she was knocked out twice earlier in her career in 2013 and 2015.
Aldana averages the fourth highest number of significant strikes landed on the slate at 5.52 per minute and also absorbs the most on the card at 5.97/minute. Despite being taken down 5 times on 14 attempts by an incensed Holly Holm, Aldana still owns an 84% career takedown defense. Aldana also hasn’t landed a takedown of her own in her last six fights and is more or less a pure striker.
Notably, Aldana was very slow to weigh in for her last fight and looked tired and slow on the scales. So it will be important to monitor her closely at weigh-ins. UPDATE: Aldana was the only fighter to miss weight, checking in 3.5 lb over the limit!.
Yana Kunitskaya
7th UFC Fight (4-2)Kunitskaya is now on a two fight winning streak with her last five wins all ending in decisions. Her recent decision win over Ketlen Vieira ended with pretty bizarre stats. Vieira landed 3 of 8 takedown attempts and amassed over eight and a half minutes of control time but Kunitskaya finished ahead in significant strikes 47-7 and in total strikes 215-35. Kunitskaya also finished with over five minutes of control time herself despite not attempting a single takedown.
Prior to that close win, Kunitskaya notched a smothering decision win over armbar specialist Julija Stoliarenko, where Kunitskaya spent the majority of the fight pushing Stoliarenko up against the cage. All four of Kunitskaya’s UFC wins have come by decision, while both of her losses have been by KO. She did have 8 finishes earlier in her career, but those all came in 2016 or before, and six of those were in her first seven pro fights against far less experienced opponents.
Kunitskaya’s last four losses have now all come early, with two KOs and two submissions. Her only other career loss came in a decision in her third pro fight back in 2010. She was most recently knocked out by Aspen Ladd in the beginning of the third round in their 2019 fight. Before that, Kunitskaya suffered a R1 KO loss in her 2018 UFC debut against Cris Cyborg. A year prior to joining the UFC, she was submitted in the second round via Rear-Naked Choke, and in 2016 she was submitted in the first round via Armbar. The last time Kunitskaya finished an opponent early was in 2016 when she knocked out Wu Yanan in the second round, before either of them were in the UFC.
Kunitskaya actually started her pro career at 145 lb and even once fought as high as 154 lb. However, since 2016 she has been competing at 135 lb. She’s engaged to Thiago Santos so she’s used to “training” with bigger, stronger fighters and it sort of shows in her clinch heavy fighting style. Since 2018, she’s controlled her opponents for a ridiculous 50.52% of the time. For comparison, Kamaru Usman checks in at 47.79%.
Fight Prediction:
Aldana will have a 3” height advantage, but both fighters share a 68” reach.
This is an interesting matchup between a pure striker in Aldana and a fighter in Kunitskaya who does her best work out of the clinch. If Aldana can keep the fight out in space and stay out of the clinch she should be able to win the striking battle and potentially even land a knockout. However, if Kunitskaya can tie her up and push her up against the cage then there’s a good chance she can win another decision here. Aldana’s weight miss is definitely concerning, although it’s also unclear how hard she actually tried to hit the mark. We’ve seen far worse weigh-ins, so it doesn’t automatically mean Kunitskaya will win this fight, but it does seamingly tilt things in her favor.
There’s absolutely no value in any bet that uses the word “decision” here, so we’re treading lightly. The two stabs worth taking are “Aldana ITD” at +440 and “Aldana Wins in R1” at +1000.
DFS Implications:
In her last three decision wins, Aldana put up DK/FD scores of 80/98, 78/91, and 96/98. Her two early wins in the UFC scored 110/128 and 79/111 points, so she has consistently scored better on FanDuel regardless of the outcome and has a tougher time returning value on DraftKings. She’s fought to six 3-round decisions in the UFC and has landed 108 or more significant strikes in half of those. However, she hasn’t landed a takedown in her last six fights and is clearly reliant on striking and finishes to score well. With that in mind, none of Kunitskaya’s previous six UFC opponents landed more than 58 significant strikes on her and she only absorbs an average of 2.62 significant strikes per minute (7th fewest on the slate). That will likely leave Aldana dependent on a finish to put up a usable score on either DFS site, but she does have somewhat of a chance to return value on FanDuel in a decision depending on how things shake out around her. The odds imply she has a 52% chance to win, a 17% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Kunitskaya has been a major beneficiary of the new DraftKings scoring system, as she accrues a large amount of control time and strikes that don’t register as significant. She’s almost always a much better play on DraftKings compared to FanDuel. Her recent two decision wins prove that as she scored 92 and 109 DraftKings points, but just 63 and 55 points on FanDuel. That leaves her reliant on a finish to score well on FanDuel and reliant on racking up massive amounts of control time and total strikes, as she has in her last two fights, to score well in a decision on DraftKings. Aldana is more mobile and won’t be looking to engage in the clinch the way Kunitskaya’s last two opponents were, so this is a worse spot for Kunitskaya to score well compared to her last two fights. She’ll also now be more highly owned after putting up back-to-back solid scores. This looks like a good time to sell high on Kunitskaya, but if you are going to play her, make sure it’s on DraftKings. The odds imply she has a 48% chance to win, a 13% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #3
Tai Tuivasa
9th UFC Fight (5-3)Tuivasa is coming off back-to-back R1 KO wins against one guy in his last UFC fight and another one in his first. His most recent fight lasted just 49 seconds against a joke opponent in Harry Hunsucker, who was making his UFC debut on short notice after Don'tale Mayes dropped out mid fight week. Hunsucker actually landed two clean shots early in the fight, but Tuivasa landed a few leg strikes that quickly incapacitated an ill-prepared Hunsucker. Tuivasa then dropped him with a right hand and finished the fight with ground and pound as Hunsucker simply shelled up. It was a non-UFC level fight, but apparently people want to draw conclusions from it. Hunsucker has now been knocked out in the first round in four of his 11 pro fights, so take a number Tai.
Prior to that giftwrapped KO, Tuivasa knocked out Stefan Struve in what was his final UFC fight. Struve came in having lost four of his last five fights and had already been finished nine times in his career—but he’s super tall so maybe people just overlook that. Leading up to that pair of teed up first round finishes, Tuivasa had lost three straight fights, including a pair of losses in the second round and a decision loss.
Impressively, Tuivasa started his pro career off with six straight first round KOs before getting the call up to the UFC and extending that streak to eight in his first two UFC fights. In his 2017 debut, Tuivasa knocked out Rashad Coulter, who came in 0-1 in the UFC and finished 1-3 before getting released in 2018. Coulter has now lost four of his last five fights—all by KO in the first two rounds. Tuivasa then landed another first round finish, this time against Cyril Asker, who went 2-3 in the UFC before getting released in 2018 (all three of his UFC losses were by R1 KO). Tuivasa then made it out of the first round for the first time in his career and won a close, low-volume decision against Arlovski, before getting knocked out in R2 by Junior dos Santos of a 2018 main event. He then lost a decision to a tanky Blagoy Ivanov, before getting manhandled by Sergey Spivak on the ground and submitted in the second round of a 2019 fight.
He bounced back from the trio of losses with the recent pair of first round KOs, but we’ve yet to see Tuivasa knockout any legitimately tough opponents in his career. So while 10 of his 11 career wins have come by R1 KO, his first four wins were against opponents who had never fought professionally before and his last four KOs came against opponents on their way in or out of the UFC. His other two career KOs came against a guy in the midst of losing 7 of 8 fights and a random 5-4 fighter who was knocked out in the first round of his last two fights before retiring in 2017. So Tuivasa has legitimately never knocked out anyone that’s even remotely impressive.
Tuivasa has no ground game and it showed in his fight against Sergey Spivak. He was once asked what his favorite grappling move is and responded, “Get up.” To his credit, he is decent at getting up. He has no interest in going to the ground after knocking an opponent down and would much prefer to let them also get up as well. That should bode well for his next opponent who also has no ground game.
Greg Hardy
9th UFC Fight (4-3, NC)Coming off the first early loss of his career—not counting disqualifications—Hardy essentially conceded towards the end of the second round against a surging Marcin Tybura, who’s now won five straight. Hardy won the first round but then gassed out midway through the second and was entirely helpless off his back once Tybura took him down late in the round. So while Hardy clearly has a 6-7 minute gas tank, he can still do a ton of damage in the first halves of fights. WIth that said, his last five fights have all made it past R1, which leaves him just a 1-2 minute window to get a finish before he’s just looking to survive to see a decision. Four of his six career knockouts have come in the first 57 seconds, another occurred 135 seconds into the first round and his most recent came just over a minute into R2, with Hardy looking exhausted at that point. So he’s never landed a finish beyond the 6:12 mark. His lone decision win came against fellow future tri-athlete Yorgan De Castro.
Hardy made the switch from the NFL to MMA in 2016 and had his first pro fight in 2018 on the Contender Series. He won that fight with a 57 second R1 KO, which he followed up with a 17 second R1 KO—again on DWCS just seven weeks later. Still not deemed ready for the UFC, he took a fight on Xtreme Fight Night a month and a half after that and landed his third straight R1 KO—this time in 53 seconds. Following that KO victory, the UFC decided to give him a shot four months later.
In his UFC debut, Hardy made it to the second round for the first time in his career. He was promptly disqualified in R2 after landing a brutally blatant illegal knee to a grounded opponent. Referee Dan Miragliotta was visibility disgusted and you could hear him immediately react with “Are you fucking kidding me?!” on the broadcast. Whether it was a lack of self control or just complete unawareness of the rules, this should at least give you some reason for pause before clicking Hardy’s name in DFS.
To his credit, Hardy bounced back with another quick R1 KO against a fighter who looked like he didn’t want to be there. Hardy actually looked a little more composed in his second UFC fight and then he followed that win up with another first round KO, which marked his 5th R1 KO in six pro fights, and second in the UFC. Another fight that could be counted with just the second hand on the clock, this one lasted only 45 ticks.
Hardy’s next fight brought him back under the microscope as he was caught using an inhaler in between rounds 2 and 3—which is a clear violation of the rules. Hardy said he asked if that was allowed and was given permission, but apparently there was some confusion during that process. Hardy won the fight in a decision but that was later overturned to a No Contest. He claimed he wanted to go the full 15 minutes in that fight to “showcase his skills as a fighter.”
Following the No Contest, Hardy stepped in on short notice just 22 days later to replace Junior Dos Santos against Alexander Volkov. Hardy appeared to injure his right hand in R1 limiting his striking for the remainder of the fight. This was Hardy’s first true test in competition, and while he didn’t win, he at least didn’t embarrass himself. The fight ended in his second straight decision after his first six pro fights all ended early. He seemed content with the pace he set in the two decisions, opposed to the more aggressive style he demonstrated in his earlier KO victories. Following the loss to Volkov, Hardy went on to win a decision against Yorgan De Castro, making it three straight low volume decisions in a row.
He finally broke that decision streak in his second most recent fight against Maurice Greene, with a R2 KO. Hardy was credited with both his first knockdown and his first takedown in that fight. He seemed far more aggressive in that fight and actually looked like he actually wanted to finish the fight early, but he couldn’t keep that momentum going in his recent loss.
Fight Prediction:
Hardy will have a 3” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
A matchup between two average Heavyweights, it’s somewhat surprising the UFC opted to put this fight on the main card—but who cares where they put it, we're watching all of the fights regardless. The Tuivasa hype has gotten out of control, but he’s also never been finished in the first round, which is when Hardy can still breath normally without hyperventilating. While Hardy has just one finish beyond the first round in his career, Tuivasa has none. So if this does make it past the midway mark, we could be looking at Heavyweight patty cake for the second half of the fight as both fighters try to simply make it to the finish line. We’ll give the cardio advantage to Tuivasa based on the process of elimination, but these two are both built for power, not distance. We like Hardy’s chances to pull off the upset if the fight ends in the first seven minutes, but if it makes it to the second half Tuivasa has a better chance to win a decision.
Our favorite bets here are “Hardy Wins by R1 KO” at +650, “Hardy Wins by R2 KO” at +1200, “Fight Ends in R1 KO” at +190, “Fight Ends in R2 KO” at +380 and “Tuivasa Wins by Decision” at +440.
DFS Implications:
This is the ultimate recency bias spot. Everyone seems to think Hardy is helpless and Tuivasa is a world beater after their recent results against opponents on opposite ends of the spectrum. With that said, Greg Hardy is the guy that shows up to ruin every DFS slate. Whether you bet on him, against him, or fade him, one thing’s for sure—Greg Hardy will find a way to screw you in DFS more often than not.
Tuivasa will undoubtedly go over owned in DFS after back-to-back slate breaking performances. Most of the field doesn’t care that both of those came against opponents one fight removed from not being in the UFC. Tuivasa has never finished an opponent beyond the first round and scored just 65 DraftKings points and 70 FanDuel points in his lone career decision win. He’s your prototypical R1 or bust Heavyweight, who’s now going against an opponent who’s never been finished in the first round. This looks like a great time to fade Tuivasa on both sites, despite his modest price tag. The odds imply he has a 57% chance to win, a 37% chance to get a finish and an 18% chance it comes in the first round.
Fading Tuivasa actually looks like a pretty easy call here, the tougher question is whether or not to play Hardy. It looks like a decent buy-low spot, but you’re still relying on him to land a finish in the first seven minutes before he begins to hyperventilate. Tuivasa has been finished in the second round in two of his last five fights, although one of those was from a submission. So it wouldn’t be that surprising if this turned into another disappointing decision where the winner fails to put up a useful score, but Hardy definitely has the ability to land an early knockout—just not to score well in a decision. The odds imply he has a 43% chance to win, a 27% chance to get a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #2
Stephen Thompson
17th UFC Fight (11-4-1)Coming off a pair of decision wins, including an impressive five round win over Geoff Neal, seven of Thompson’s last eight fights have gone the distance with the one exception being a 2019 R2 KO loss to Anthony Pettis. That remains the only time Thompson has been finished in his 21 pro fight career. Thompson hasn’t finished anyone himself since 2016 when he landed a first round knockout against Johny Hendricks. Of his 16 career wins, eight have come early with seven KOs and one submission. Three of his four career losses have gone the distance.
In his recent five round decision win over Neal, Thompson landed a career high 171 significant strikes while only allowing Neal to land 85. Despite being 38 years old, Thompson has now set new career highs in significant strikes landed in back-to-back fights after he landed 138 in just three rounds against Vicente Luque in his previous fight. Prior to the 2019 decision win over Luque, Thompson was knocked out in the second round by Anthony Pettis and beaten in an ultra low volume five round 2018 decision against Darren Till. Thompson beat Jorge Masvidal in a three round decision before the loss to Till, but failed to beat Tyron Woodley in two title fights before that (one loss and one draw).
Thompson is a pure striker who does a great job at avoiding taking damage. He lands an average of 4.24 significant strikes per minute while absorbing just 2.8 per minute. He also has a legit 78% takedown defense as he floats around the Octagon like he’s on an air hockey table. His unique, word-class karate style is incredibly tough to prepare for.
Before turning pro in MMA, Thompson was impressively 57-0 as a kickboxer with 40 KO’s and has a karate background with various black belts. Despite getting up there in age, Thompson still looks as good as ever and gets a pass from us in terms of any age concerns.
Gilbert Burns
17th UFC Fight (12-4)Burns is looking to bounce back from a third round KO loss to Usman in his recent title shot, but he was an emotional wreck following the loss and who knows where his head is at right now. He looked good early on in the fight and landed a big right hand early in the first round, but Usman showed why he’s the champ as he took everything Burns had to offer before hurting him badly in the second round and then knocking him out to start the third.
Prior to his recent loss, Burns was on a six fight winning streak since getting knocked out by Dan Hooker in R1 of their 2018 match. Four of those six wins have come in decisions, while he also knocked out Demian Maia in the first round of their 2020 match and submitted Mike Davis with a Rear-Naked Choke in the second round of their 2019 fight. However, Burns’ last four wins came against opponents who have since gone 0-4 in the UFC, and his record has not aged well. We’re not trying to take anything away from Burns, he’s a solid fighter, but you can’t ignore that fact.
Burns fought his 2014 UFC debut at 170 lb, but then dropped down to 155 lb for his next 10 fights. He moved back up to 170 lb in 2019 against Alexey Kunchenko, where he’s been for his most recent five fights. He's now 5-1 at 170 lb in the UFC, with four decision wins and a R1 KO victory. At 155 lb Burns went 7-3 with four wins by submission, two by KO and one by decision. Two of his four UFC losses have come by decision, with his two early losses coming in a R1 2018 KO against Dan Hooker and the recent R3 KO loss to Usman.
A 2nd degree BJJ black belt, Burns impressively won all seven of his fights prior to joining the UFC in the first round, with three KOs and four submissions. However, since joining the UFC, he has just three R1 wins in 15 fights.
Fight Prediction:
Thompson will have a 2” height advantage and 4” reach advantage.
When you combine Thompson’s height and reach advantages with his kick-heavy karate fighting style and elite movement, it will be hard for Burns to close the distance. Then you factor in Thompson’s 78% takedown defense with Burns’ 35% takedown accuracy and it’s hard to see Burns’ finding much success at getting the fight to the mat. It doesn’t help any that Burns is coming off a momentum-crushing, dream-shattering knockout loss to Usman as he fought for the title this past February. Burns seemingly has everything working against him and we like Thompson to win a decision here.
Our favorite bet here is “Thompson Wins by Decision” at +150.
DFS Implications:
Based on his pure striking offense and ability to defend takedowns, Thompson looks like a much better FanDuel play compared to DraftKings. Most of his fights end in decisions and it’s tough to return value on striking alone. His last two three round decision wins scored 96 and 68 DraftKings points and 115 and 80 points on FanDuel. Burns averages four missed takedowns per 15 minutes (2nd highest on the slate), which should help to boost Thompson’s FanDuel score and we much prefer him there compared to DraftKings. It’s not impossible for Thompson to knock out Burns, but it’s certainly unlikely. It’s been five and a half years since he knocked anyone out and he’s now 38 years old. With that said, he came somewhat close to finishing a super tough Vicente Luque back in 2019. Still, we expect Thompson to come up just short in terms of his DFS scoring in a decision win to be useful in GPPs on DraftKings, but he has the potential to still get there on FanDuel in a high-volume fight. Just keep in mind Burns only averages 3.04 significant strikes absorbed per minute, while Thompson’s last two opponents averaged 5.78 and 4.68. So barring a ton of takedowns defended, Thompson may still struggle to be useful on either site, but we still like his chances better on FanDuel. The odds imply he has a 59% chance to win, a 19% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Burns has shown a wide range of DFS scoring as he’s scored anywhere from 54 to 106 DK points in decision wins. However, in general he’s reliant on landing a finish to score well and Thomson is incredibly tough to score well against. Thompson has only been finished once in his career, absorbs just 2.8 significant strikes per minute on average and has a 78% takedown defense. We don’t see Burns winning a decision or putting up a good score even if he does, which leaves him reliant on landing a finish to score well. We also expect him to be one of if not the most popular three-round underdog on the slate, which makes him an even less appealing DFS play in tournaments. The odds imply he has a 41% chance to win, a 25% chance to get a finish and an 11% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #1
Conor McGregor
14th UFC Fight (10-3)We’ll start by recapping their most recent fight:
In their recent rematch, Poirier came in with a smart game plan knowing that simply trading punches with McGregor was not his path to victory. Poirier looked to land leg kicks early and often and also mixed in his grappling as he took McGregor down just over 30 seconds into the first round. However, he wasn’t able to do anything with the takedown and McGregor returned to his feet 30 seconds later. The two traded strikes in the clinch along the side of the Octagon for the next two plus minutes before finally returning to space for the final 100 seconds of the round. McGregor landed a few clean punches, but Poirier was able to absorb them and offer back several heavy leg kicks. There was no doubt that McGregor was landing the more damaging punches, but while he does a great job of staying just out of punching range with his opponents that leaves him squarely in kicking distance.
Poirier started the second round with a heavy leg kick that stumbled McGregor and his leg clearly looked compromised at that point. However, McGregor responded with a pair of head strikes that looked to hurt Poirier. The two continued to trade calf kicks for punches, while McGregor occasionally mixed in a kick of his own. However, Poirier’s chin looked to be holding up better than McGregor’s calf and by a minute and half into the second round McGregor began trying to catch the leg strikes coming his way as a last ditch effort. However, McGregor wasn’t able to do anything with the two he caught as Poirer kept his balance before retrieving his leg both times. A little over two minutes into the round, McGregor’s leg looked completely trashed and everyone seemed to know it. That’s when Poirier pushed forward with a barrage of punches as McGregor was essentially immobilized. Landing several clean shots, Poirier soon dropped McGregor and the fight was stopped.
Now looking back to how McGregor’s UFC career got started:
After a decorated run in Cage Warriors where he won both the Featherweight and Lightweight belts in back-to-back fights, McGregor joined the UFC in 2013 and landed a 67 second first round KO against Marcus Brimage, who came into the fight 3-0 in the UFC but finished his UFC career 4-4. Next, McGregor took on a 21-year-old Max Holloway who already had five UFC fights under his belt and was 3-2 with the organization with losses to Dennis Bermudez and Dustin Poirier. After McGregor’s first 15 pro fights all ended in the first two rounds, he saw a third round for the first time against Holloway and spent the second half of the fight grappling as he kept Holloway on his back. McGregor has landed five takedowns in his 13 UFC fights and four of those came against Holloway as McGregor finished the fight going 4 for 5 on his attempts with nearly six and a half minutes of control time on his way to victory in the first decision of his career.
McGregor’s only other career takedown occurred in his next match against Diego Brandao in 2014, in what was McGregor’s first UFC main event, which just so happened to take place in his home country of Ireland. Brandao entered the fight 4-2 in the UFC and was coming off a first round KO loss to Dustin Poirier. The aforementioned takedown was really more of a reversal as Brandao looked for a takedown himself. After doing some damage on the ground, the fight briefly returned to the feet before McGregor knocked Brandao out late in the first round.
Then in September 2014 in McGregor’s fourth UFC fight, he took on Dustin Poirier, who was already 8-2 in the UFC with the only early loss of his career coming in a fourth round submission against The Korean Zombie. In a fight that lasted just 106 seconds, McGregor won by TKO as he dropped Poirier early in the first round with a glancing left hand behind the ear and then laid down heavy ground and pound before the fight was quickly stopped. Poirier led in strikes 10-9 in the short match, interestingly 7 of his 10 landed strikes were leg kicks, which is nearly four landed leg kicks per minute. In comparison, Poirier landed 18 leg kicks in seven minutes and 32 seconds of action in their rematch, which is 2.39/minute. Note that this fight took place at 145 lb, while their recent rematch was at 155 lb.
Following the win over Poirier in 2014, McGregor landed three straight knockouts in 2015, starting with a pair in the second round against Dennis Siver and Chad Mendes, followed by a R1 win over Jose Aldo. The lopsided win over Siver propelled McGregor into an Interim Featherweight Title Fight against Mendes. After staying off his back in his first five UFC fights, Mendes took McGregor down four times on seven attempts, including three in the first round where he landed a slicing left elbow to open a cut above McGregor’s right eye. After spending over five minutes on his back, McGregor dropped Mendes with a stiff left hand and the fight was quickly stopped as McGregor landed ground and pound on the face down Mendes with just three seconds remaining in the second round. McGregor had been scheduled to face the champion in Aldo for the title in that spot, but Aldo withdrew due to a rib injury, which is why Mendes stepped in and an interim title was put on the line. Following that win, McGregor finally got his shot at Aldo five months later and knocked him out in just 13 seconds. As Aldo came in to land a left hand McGregor face planted him with a faster left hand and capped it with a couple of hammer fists for good measure. Aldo had previously been on an 18 fight winning streak that included seven straight title fight victories and had never been knocked out, but has now gone 4-6 in his last 10 fights with four KO losses.
After winning the Featherweight belt and his first seven UFC fights at 145 lb, including six KOs in the first two rounds and four in R1, McGregor then decided to try and win a second belt up at 155 lb against the current Lightweight Champion in Rafael Dos Anjos. However, Dos Anjos withdrew just two weeks before the event due to a broken foot and the UFC decided to match McGregor up with Nate Diaz instead. Filling in on short notice, this fight was then moved all the way up to 170 lb and no belt was on the line. While Diaz did have five earlier fights in his career at Welterweight (170 lb) and has now also fought his most recent five fights there, his other 23 pro fights (17 in the UFC) all occurred at 155 lb. So while it was still a massive jump up for McGregor to go from 145 lb to 170 lb, Diaz—who took the fight on 11 days notice—was also moving up a weight class himself after fighting his last eight matches at 155 lb. Both fighters weighed in under the limit with McGregor checking in at 168 lb and Diaz tipping the scales at 169 lb. Diaz is notably 3” taller than McGregor and is noticeably larger, but the whole moving up two weight classes narrative does deserve some context.
In his first of two fights against Nate Diaz in 2016, McGregor appeared to be leading the dance and landing more damage for the first round and a half, but Diaz flipped the script midway through the second round as he appeared to wobble McGregor and began to turn it on. The damage being inflicted forced McGregor to shoot for a takedown with just over a minute left in the round, but Diaz used a Guillotine attempt to reverse the position and then quickly took McGregor’s back and submitted him with a Rear-Naked Choke. That loss broke a 15 fight winning streak that dated back to McGregor's sixth pro fight in 2010.
Five months later they ran it back and that time it lasted a bit longer. McGregor dropped Diaz less than two minutes into the fight, but Diaz quickly recovered and returned to his feet. McGregor relentlessly attacked Diaz’s lead leg throughout the fight, but especially early on, as he landed 40 total leg strikes across 25 minutes. McGregor again dropped Diaz early in the second round and again Diaz quickly recovered and was stood up. However, then McGregor dropped him again in the first minute of the second round, although to some extent Diaz appeared to be baiting McGregor to go to the ground with him. McGregor refused to join him on the mat and instead smartly told him to stand up each time. However, McGregor looked to be slowing down later in the second round and Diaz took advantage of that. That carried over into the third round, where McGregor looked gassed and Diaz took over. However, then Diaz slowed down in the fourth round as McGregor found some level of renewed energy. The fight ended in a razor thin decision win for McGregor with two of the judges ruling it 48-47 in his favor and the other ruling it a 47-47 tie. Diaz led in significant strikes 166-164 and in total strikes 252-197, but went just 1 for 7 on his takedowns attempts while McGregor missed on his only attempt. McGregor also notably landed three knockdowns, all in the first six minutes of action, while Diaz notched close to six minutes of control time, mostly spent in the clinch along the fence. Following the fight, Diaz said he wasn’t coming back until he got a third fight with McGregor and he stood by that for three years before finally returning in 2019 against Anthony Pettis. He took home over two and a half million dollars from his two fights against McGregor, so he didn’t really have to fight if he didn’t want to. McGregor said he would be open to the trilogy, but only if it took place back down at 155 lb, but it never materialized.
After splitting a pair of fights against Diaz at 170 lb, McGregor then returned his focus to his previous goal of winning championship belts at two weight classes. However, after recovering from a broken foot Dos Anjos lost the belt to Eddie Alvarez in July 2016, so McGregor would now be going after Alvarez who would be defending the belt for the first time. The two squared off in November 2016, just three months after the second Diaz fight. McGregor dropped Alvarez a minute into the fight and then again midway through the first round as he masterfully controlled the distance and picked Alvarez apart. McGregor also stuffed all three of Alvarez’s takedowns before knocking him down again with a combination of punches three minutes into the second round and quickly having the fight stopped as he teed off on him with ground and pound. This 2016 history-making victory appears to have been where McGregor’s career peaked.
While McGregor became the first UFC fighter to hold two belts at the same time, he failed to successfully defend either one of them even a single time. First, he was stripped of the Featherweight belt due to inactivity, which is fair considering he never fought again at Featherweight after winning the belt against Jose Aldo in 2015. McGregor had announced his plans to take some time off as he awaited the birth of his first child, however, during his nearly two year hiatus from the UFC from 2016 to 2018 what McGregor was really doing was chasing a life changing 30 million dollar plus payday in a 2017 boxing exhibition against Floyd Maywethear.
After not fighting at all in the UFC in 2017, McGregor was then stripped of the Lightweight belt in early 2018 and Khabib was awarded it following a win over Al Iaquinta. That Summer, McGregor announced he was returning to the Octagon to fight Khabib for the 155 lb belt. In that fight, Khabib unsurprisingly shot for his first takedown just 15 seconds in. McGregor initially did a pretty good job of defending it, but Khabib never gave up and eventually finished it. The remainder of the first round was spent with Khabib exerting his signature top pressure along the fence. With McGregor focused on preventing takedowns, Khabib dropped him with a right hand early in round two, but McGregor quickly returned to his feet and two traded a few punches before Khabib again took him down to the mat and landed violent ground and pound for several minutes. McGregor did return to his feet in the final minute of the round but only to be pushed up against the cage until the round ended. Both fighters looked to be tiring in the third round and we didn’t see Khabib attempt a takedown in the opening 90 seconds. Khabib then began to look to get the fight back to the mat, however, McGregor was able to defend the attempts and remain upright so the two continued to trade strikes. Khabib was finally able to return the fight to the mat with just over a minute remaining in the round, but only for a second as he continued to push McGregor up against the cage. The first minute of the fourth round remained on the feet before Khabib landed a takedown on his first attempt in the round. While he was exclusively looking for ground and pound earlier in the fight, Khabib was clearly hunting for a submission at that point. Khabib was eventually able to take McGregor’s back and finish the fight with a Neck Crank Submission midway through the fourth round. Following the victory, chaos ensued as Khabib got in it with McGregor’s Jiu-Jitsu coach, Dillon Danis. What began as a heated verbal exchange quickly escalated as Khabib jumped the cage and charged into the crowd. That was quickly broken up but then a maylay pursued inside the Octagon with all of the Nurmagomedovs coming out of the woodwork to get a piece of the action like a clown car of Dagestani grapplers.
Months of litigation followed the chaotic finish to the super fight, before the Nevada State Athletic Commission finally handed out a nine month suspension and $500,000 fine to Khabib and a six month suspension and $50,000 fine to McGregor. Initially, McGregor requested a rematch with Khabib, but then in March of 2019 he announced he was retiring via social media. However, few believed that retirement to be genuine and 15 months after the loss to Khabib McGregor stepped back inside the Octagon to take on Donald Cerrone at 170 lb in 2020, which was the first time in five years McGregor was fighting in a non-title fight WHILE not already owning a belt. Neither of his matches against Nate Diaz were for a title, but he was the Featherweight Champion at the time.
Similar to when McGregor took on Diaz at 170 lb, Cerrone was also moving up to 170 lb himself after fighting his previous four matches at 155 lb. Cerrone had split his career between 155 lb and 170 lb, starting off at 155 lb before moving up to 170 lb in 2016 for a 10 fight stretch until he dropped back down to 155 lb in 2019 for four fights leading up to the McGregor fight. Obviously it’s always easier to move up a weight class if your opponent is also moving up. However, Ceronne did have a 4” height advantage in the match. Although none of that mattered as McGregor finished Cerrone in just 40 seconds. After starting with several heavy shoulder strikes, McGregor landed a violent head kick 20 seconds in followed by a barrage of heavy punches that forced Herb Dean to stop the fight.
That January 2020 win over a washed up Cerrone is McGregor’s only victory inside the Octagon since winning the Lightweight belt in 2016 against Eddie Alvarez. In June of 2020 McGregor once again claimed he was retiring, but once again proved talk is cheap as he then accepted his recent match against Dustin Poirier in January 2021 a year after he knocked out Cerrone. Following his recent loss, McGregor was handed a six-month medical suspension and the rematch was scheduled shortly after that ended on this coming card.
McGregor has now notably lost 2 of his last 3 fights and is just 3-3 in his last six matches. Five of his last six fights have made it past the first round, with that six fight period of his career notably coming immediately after he moved up from 145 lb. So while McGregor was unquestionably the king of the Featherweights, he’s gone 2-1 at Welterweight (170 lb) and just 1-2 at Lightweight (155 lb) just deserting the Featherweight division.
While McGregor has gone 3-1 in his four UFC title fights, he’s interestingly never put an undisputed belt on the line. Both of his championship belts were stripped from him due to inactivity as he pursued financial paydays over championship defenses. If McGregor were to win this fight and then reclaim the belt against Charles Oliveira, it would be interesting to see if he would simply retire at that point or put his belt on the line for once. The closest thing he’s ever done to defending a belt was when he faced Jose Aldo for the Featherweight title after winning the interim belt against Chad Mendes on short notice.
In his 27 pro fights, the only three fighters to take McGregor past the second round are Khabib Nurmagomedov, Nate Diaz and Max Holloway. Two of those ended in decisions (2-0) and the third a R4 submission loss. Both of McGregor’s pre-UFC losses came by R1 submission in his first six pro fights. His first two UFC losses also ended in submissions, in the second and fourth rounds. The only time he’s ever been knocked out came in his last fight and he’s never finished an opponent beyond the second round.
Here’s a breakdown of McGregor’s 13 UFC fights:
McGregor’s 10 UFC Wins:
5 R1 KOs (2013, 2014, 2014, 2015 & 2020)
3 R2 KOs (2015, 2015 & 2016)
1 R3 Decision (2013)
1 R5 Decision (2016)
McGregor’s 3 UFC Losses:
R2 Submission (2016)
R4 Submission (2018)
R2 KO (2021)
Dustin Poirier
26th UFC Fight (19-5, NC)Poirier joined the UFC in January 2011, over two years before Mcgregor made his debut. After starting his pro career at Lightweight (155 lb), Poirier dropped down to Featherweight (145 lb) for the first time in his UFC debut. He stayed at 145 lb for his first 11 UFC matches, where he went 8-3. He won his first two UFC fights with a pair of decisions, before landing back-to-back submission wins in 2011 and 2012. He was then submitted himself by The Korean Zombie in 2012 before landing another submission win of his own later that year. He then lost a decision to Cub Swanson, but bounced back with three straight wins, including a decision victory followed by his first two UFC KO wins. Then he faced McGregor in 2014 and lost by TKO as the fight was stopped in the first two minutes.
Following that loss to McGregor, Poirier moved back up to Lightweight where he’s since gone 11-2 plus a No Contest. Six of those wins ended in knockouts, four went the distance and one came by submission. Both losses over that stretch also ended early, with a 2016 R1 KO loss to Michael Johnson and a 2019 R3 Submission loss to Khabib.
Since 2017, Poirier is 7-1 plus a No Contest, while McGregor is just 1-2 over that same period. So Poirier has clearly been more active and successful inside of the Octagon over the last four years. While they’re both 32 years old, Poirier appears to have peaked later in his career, while McGregor has been milking his past success since winning his second belt back in 2016.
Poirier is a BJJ black belt and 7 of his 27 pro wins have come by submission. However, six of those seven submission wins occurred in 2012 or earlier. With that said, he does have seven official submission attempts in his last five fights. He also has 13 knockouts and seven wins by decision. Of his six career losses, two have come by KO, two by submission and two by decision.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’9” and 32 years old, but McGregor will have a 2” reach advantage.
Considering this will be the third time these two have fought, this may be less helpful than normal, but there are several shared opponents between these two and they’ve had remarkably similar results. Both of them have decision wins over Max Holloway, R1 KO wins over Diego Brandao, R2 KO wins over Eddie Alvarez and submission losses to Khabib (Poirier in R3 & McGregor in R4). Poirer also has a 2016 win over Joseph Duffy who you may have heard submitted McGregor back in 2010 in their Cage Warrior days. They’ve also now each knocked the other out, so overall they seem relatively closely matched when it’s all said and done.
Poirier shocked the world with an upset win back in January as he relentlessly attacked McGregor’s lead leg, which was the perfect game plan against the wide stance of McGregor. However, now McGregor should come into this next fight 100% focussed on not allowing that to happen again and this matchup basically comes down to which gives out first, McGregor’s calf or Poirier’s chin. Poirier came into both of their previous two fights with leg heavy attacks as he landed seven leg kicks in less than two minutes in their first fight (3.95/min) and 18 in seven minutes and 32 seconds of action in their rematch (2.39/minute).
A key difference from the first time these two fought back in 2014 to the most recent match and this upcoming one is they’re now fighting at 155 lb. The move up in weight class appears to have helped Poirier, as he looks far stronger and more durable at 155 lb. Poirier went 8-3 at 145 lb in the UFC, but has since gone 11-2 plus a “No Contest” at 155 lb. He made the switch immediately following his loss to McGregor in 2014 and never looked back. Poirier also notably fought his entire pre-UFC career at 155 lb where he went 8-1 in 2009 and 2010 before dropping down to 145 lb when he joined the UFC in 2011. McGregor, on the other hand, has just three UFC fights at 155 lb: a 2016 title fight against Eddie Alvarez that he won with a second round knockout, a 2018 R4 submission loss to Khabib and the recent R2 KO loss to Poirer. It’s not that he looks bad at 155 lb, but it doesn’t appear to have helped him any.
Since leaving the Featherweight division, McGregor has gone just 3-3 and has only one win in almost the last five years. That’s reason enough to think Poirier has a chance to win on top of the fact that he just beat him. However, McGregor still appears to be the more dangerous striker and is more likely to land an early knockout. Poirier might throw a wrinkle in his game plan, but overall it shouldn’t change much—attack the lead leg of McGregor, incorporate some wrestling early, and simply survive the first round. McGregor has never finished an opponent beyond the second round and everyone knows it. Poirier will look to play it smart and simply wear on McGregor. On the other side of things, McGregor’s game plan is more of an unknown. Obviously he’ll try to prevent absorbing as many leg kicks, but there are multiple ways to go about that. We like McGregor’s chances to land a knockout in the first two rounds, but he doesn’t look or sound the same as he used to and Poirier is certainly capable of picking him apart with leg strikes again given the opportunity. We’re still doubling down on McGregor, but it’s far from a sure thing.
Our favorite bets are McGregor’s ML at +100, his R1 Win line at +470, his R2 Win line at +650 and the “Fight Ends in R2” at +270.
DFS Implications:
The last time these two fought, McGregor was 68% owned on DraftKings and Poirier was just 28% owned. While we expect the combined ownership to remain about the same (96%), the two fighters now project to be similarly owned. While it’s hard to imagine the winner not scoring well, there are several ways it could happen, whether it’s from an early second or third round finish or another eye poke/illegal strike stoppage. While those are not the most likely scenario, there’s still greater than a 4% chance that this fight somehow gets left out of the optimal lineup. So as gross as it sounds, it makes sense to build a few lineups that fade this main event as that’s the ultimate leverage play on this slate. For anyone still reading, don’t get us wrong, we expect the winner to put up a big score here and you do still want to have a ton of exposure—just slightly less than the field.
McGregor has now gone just 3-3 in his last six fights, but in those three wins he scored 133, 116 and 135 DraftKings points and 123, 139 and 172 points on FanDuel. He totalled a ridiculous seven knockdowns in those three wins while defending 9 of the 10 takedowns attempted by his opponents. He also put up DK scores of 127, 104, 107 and 104 in his previous four wins, so when he wins, he puts up big scores. McGregors averages a solid 5.32 significant strikes landed per minute, which is the sixth highest on the slate. The last time he fought to a decision was in a 2016 five round win over Nate Diaz and McGregor landed 164 significant strikes, so he can still put up huge numbers without a finish. The only way we see McGregor not scoring well is if Poirier is able to control him early on in the fight and then McGregor lands an early R2 or R3 knockout with very little striking volume and knockdowns behind it. It’s far more likely he puts up another big score, but one thing to keep in mind is that two of McGregor’s last three big scores have come on the back of multi-knockdown performances and Poirier hasn’t been knocked down a single time in his last nine fights. McGregor also notably has just one UFC victory in a fight where he failed to land a knockdown and that came all the way back in 2013 against Max Holloway in a three round decision. With all that said, we still really like McGregor here and he’s slightly our preferred play in this main event. The odds imply he has a 47% chance to win, a 38% chance to get a finish and a 16% chance it comes in R1.
Similar to McGregor, Poirier generally scores well in DFS, with the biggest difference being knockdowns. While McGregor has seven knockdowns in his last three wins, Poirier has just two in his last nine fights. He’s still scored 101 or more DK points in his last seven wins, but he’s failed to top 113 points in any of those. We expect him to come in with a conservative game plan, so he’s an unlikely candidate for the quick win bonus on DraftKings and it would be surprising if he led the DraftKings slate in scoring. His last three wins have notched DK/FD scores of 108/125, 112/153, and 113/133, so he does have a better chance at being the highest scorer on FanDuel in a win. We expect Poirier to put up a good score on both sites in a win, but weird things happen all the time. With that said, he averages the third most significant strikes landed on the slate at 5.59/minute, while also landing an average of 1.5 takedowns per 15 minutes. So he should still score well if this somehow goes to a decision, which two of his last four five round fights have (112 & 113 DK points). The odds imply he has a 53% chance to win, a 38% chance to get a finish and a 10% 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