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Fight Day Scratches: Sherman/Parisian is OFF!
Fighter Notes:
Fight #12
Tamires Vidal
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making her UFC debut, Vidal has technically won five in a row, but her second most recent win came in a DQ for illegal knees against a terrible Ailin Perez in a fight that Vidal was losing badly. Prior to that, Vidal won a pair of decisions and all seven of her pro fights have made it out of the first round, with five seeing a third round.
In her last fight, Vidal took on a boxer in Queila Braga and struggled to find her range as she swung at air with big overhand rights. Braga was much lighter on her feet, while Vidal struggled to find her range. After getting outlanded for the first four and a half minutes, Vidal was able to take the fight to the mat with 30 seconds left in the round. She immediately leaned back into a guillotine, but was unable to finish it and the round ended. Vidal was able to get the fight back to the mat two minutes into round two and after a minute on top she leaned back into a heel hook attempt, which she was eventually able to complete against an opponent with little to no grappling experience.
Now 6-1 as a pro, Vidal has two submission wins, three decisions, and one DQ victory. Both of those submission wins ended in the second round. Her only loss was a 2019 R3 submission against UFC fighter Karol Rosa in Vidal’s second pro fight. Vidal is 4-0 in fights at 145 lb and 2-1 in fights at 135 lb, with one of those two wins being her DQ victory. Her only real win at 135 lb came by heel hook submission in her last fight against a one-dimensional striker.
Overall, Vidal is a low-level fighter who doesn’t appear to have any business being in the UFC. She throws wild looping right hands but rarely connects on any and doesn’t look like much of a striker. She’s a BJJ brown belt and has no problem forfeiting top position to lean back into guillotine or heel hook attempts, which is a risky strategy at the highest level. It’s unclear why the UFC would bring Vidal onto the roster, unless their plan is for her to move back up to 145 lb and simply be a body in an understaffed division. However, she’s only 5’5” so who knows.
Ramona Pascual
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Moving back down to 135 lb for the first time since 2019, Pascual lost a pair of decisions at 145 lb in her first two UFC fights and is still in search of her first win with the organization. Pascual made her UFC debut on just eight days’ notice and lost a decision to Josiane Nunes after nearly getting finished after she got knocked down twice. She then got massively outlanded by Joselyne Edwards in her last fight in another decision. Prior to joining the UFC, Pascual faced a series of low-level opponents, with her last win coming in an Invicta 150 lb Catchweight match against a super suspect short-notice replacement with just two pro fights on her record. The fight lasted just 60 seconds and not very much happened. As soon as Pascual connected with anything, her opponent looked overwhelmed and quickly dropped to the mat and the fight was stopped. Just prior to that win, Pascual took on an opponent who was making her pro debut and fighting up a weight class at 145 lb. So her wins have come against terrible opponents with little to no experience and now she’s fighting on the biggest stage.
In Pascual’s last fight, Edwards relied heavily on her kicks and was content with outlanding her way to victory opposed to pushing for a finish. However, Pascual was able to hurt Edwards late in round one with a combination of body kicks, knees and punches as she had her best moment in the fight. Edwards responded by looking for a takedown to buy time to recover and was able to survive the end of the round. Edwards pulled away in striking in the later round and finished the fight ahead in significant strikes 164-63 and in total strikes 175-65, while stuffing 10 of Pascual’s 11 takedown attempts, but failing to land any of her own three attempts. Pascual’s only successful takedown came right at the end of round two and she was unable to do anything with it.
Now 6-4 as a pro, Pascual has four wins by KO, one by submission, and one decision. She’s been knocked out once, submitted once, and has two decision losses. Pascual has fought anywhere from 134 lb to 150 lb in the past, and said going into her 145 lb UFC debut that she planned on dropping back down to 135 lb following that fight. While she did try to make that happen, a few weeks before her fight with Edwards Pascual requested that the fight be moved to 145 lb because she didn’t think she could make 135 lb. Pasual will now try again to make the cut down to 135 lb.
Overall, Pascual is a low-level fighter who relies mostly on her size and wrestling but didn’t appear at all dangerous on the mat in her debut where she had a huge size advantage against the 5’2” Josiane Nunes. Pascual has looked slow and very hittable on the feet and has been prone to getting knocked down. Despite being 34 years old, she only has 10 pro fights on her record, and she exclusively fought a very low level of competition prior to joining the UFC. She’s from Hong Kong and has a rugby and Muay Thai background, but she’s been training out of Syndicate MMA since March 2021 when she moved to Las Vegas. She’s just a BJJ purple belt and while we’ve yet to see her have to fight off her back in the UFC, both of her early career losses came on the ground. Interestingly, Pascual recently talked about how she’s prepared to point her way to victory in this fight, so take that for what it’s worth.
UPDATE: Pascual missed weight by 1 lb!
Fight Prediction:
Pascual will have a 2” height advantage, but Vidal will have a 2” reach advantage. Vidal is also 10 years younger than the 34-year-old Pascual.
It’s amazing that either one of these two was able to make it into the UFC, let alone both. They’re both low-level fighters with no credible wins on their records, which makes it tougher to predict how this will play out. Pascual looks like the more dangerous striker, especially with her knees out of the clinch, but Vidal looks like more of a submission threat if the fight hits the mat. Pascual looked bad in bottom position earlier in her career, and if she finds herself on the mat in bottom position she very well may get finished. However, if she can keep the fight standing, she should hold the advantage, although she’s also been very hittable and Vidal loves to throw big looping right hands. These are both fighters we’re typically looking to bet against, but Pascual at least has two fights of UFC experience working in her favor. We have two variables in play that add some uncertainty to both sides of this already uncertain fight. On Pascual’s side of things, she’ll be moving down to 135 lb for the first time since 2019, which has the potential to detract from her chin or cardio. And on Vidal’s side of things, she’s making her UFC debut, and we don’t know how she’ll react to her first appearance in the big show. We generally see fighters struggle more often than not in both of the scenarios, but overall that just makes this an even more volatile spot. The most likely way Vidal wins this fight is by taking Pascual down and finishing her on the mat. So if Pascual can keep that from happening, she should be able to win the striking exchanges and pull off the upset. While she has a history of landing finishes, if her plan really is to try and outpoint her way to victory, then a decision win shouldn’t surprise anybody. Neither one of these two have great cardio, and we’re not convinced either of them will have the energy to finish the other beyond the second round. While they’re both terrible enough to get finished in the first two rounds and this is a highly volatile matchup, we’ll say Pascual outlands her way to a decision win.
Our favorite bet here is “Pascual DEC” at +240.
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DFS Implications:
Vidal has given us absolutely no indication that she belongs in the UFC and doesn’t really excel anywhere. We suppose her best attribute is her grappling, but she’s not a good wrestler or a high-level submission specialist. She’s completed two submissions in her career and one of those was against an opponent fighting professionally for the first and only time and the other was against a boxer transitioning to MMA. Vidal’s striking looks basically limited to a big overhand right and she doesn’t have great cardio. The thing really working in her favor is that she’s facing an opponent who’s also pretty terrible. If Vidal can get the fight to the mat and end up in top position, she does have the potential to go to work and find a finish, but that’s the only path to success we see for her. The odds imply she has a 56% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Pascual showed some improvements in her last fight, but at 34 years old she’s getting a late start in her career and it’s hard to know how much we can really expect her to grow from here. She’s now moving down to 135 lb, where she hasn’t competed since 2019, which also adds some uncertainty to the mix. The drop in weight has the potential to impact both her chin and cardio, making it even harder to trust her than it already was. Working in her favor, she’s facing a terrible opponent making her UFC debut, so if Pascual was ever going to win a UFC fight, this would be the time. She has shown decent power on the feet, especially with knees out of the clinch, and Vidal isn’t a great striker. Pascual recently stumbled through her last right in an interview and said she just needs to point her way to victory opposed to looking for a finish, which certainly isn’t encouraging for her DFS scoring potential, but what she says and what actually happens in the fight are two very different things. The line has moved in her favor, pushing her close to a pick’em, which should drive her ownership up some despite her being 0-2 in the UFC. She scored 46 and 32 DraftKings points in her recent two decision losses, so she’s yet to show the ability to score well without a finish, but five of her six career wins have come early. Ultimately, we’re treating this as a high variance spot, with the most likely outcome being a lower scoring decision, but it’s possible for either fighter to find a finish and put up a big score, as they both like to get fights to the mat. The odds imply Pascual has a 44% chance to win, a 17% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #11
Jake Hadley
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Coming off his first career loss in his recent UFC debut, Hadley is 13 months removed from a second round submission win on DWCS that got him to the UFC. Hadley is an English grappler and a former Cage Warriors champion. He’s still just 26 years old and only turned pro in 2018, so he’s still relatively early in his career. Three of his last four wins have come early, with a pair of late round rear-naked chokes and a R1 TKO.
In his last fight, Hadley got put on his back 30 seconds into the first round after his opponent, Allan Nascimento, caught a kick and tripped Hadley to the mat. Hadley did a good job of using his jiu-jitsu to escape bottom position as the two exchanged positions on the mat for the next couple of minutes. However, Nascimento ended up back on top midway through the round and at that point he was able to control Hadley for the remainder of the round. Similar to round one, Nascimento took Hadley down 30 seconds into round two and was able to control him for almost the entire round, until Hadley finally returned to his feet in the final minute. Hadley looked for a guillotine early in round three, and while he wasn’t able to finish it, he did at least use the attempt to end up in top position on the mat. As Hadley tried to gain full back control, he got too high and Nascimento was able to reverse the position. Hadley was able to return to his feet in the final 80 seconds and then looked for another choke as Nascimento shot for another takedown, but again was unable to complete it and once again found himself in bottom position, where Nascimento would finish the fight in an impressive grappling performance. Nascimento finished ahead in significant strikes 19-8 and in total strikes 36-26, while landing two of his four takedown attempts with 9:27 in control time and three reversals. Hadley had no official takedown attempts, but did have one reversal and 3:50 in control time, along with one official submission attempt.
Now 8-1 as a pro, Hadley has two wins by TKO, four by submission, and two decisions. Both of his two TKO wins occurred in the first round, as did his first two career submission victories. His last two submissions each came in the later rounds and both of his career decision wins occurred in five-round title fights—one for the EFC Flyweight belt and the other for the Cage Warriors Flyweight title. He’s coming off his only career loss, which ended in a three-round decision. Five of his last six fights have made it out of the first round, with four seeing round three, and three going the distance.
Overall, Hadley is most dangerous with his grappling and has an active guard off his back as well as solid top pressure. He’s got decent striking, but has tended to leave his body exposed with defending strikes in the past, which is something he’ll need to clean up. He also stands very upright, which makes it tougher to defend takedowns, and he’s been taken down four times on seven attempts (42.9% defense) in his last two fights. He only attempted one takedown of his own in those matches, although he did land it. Considering his age, we should be seeing improvements from Hadley between every fight, so it will be interesting to see if he’s improved upon his takedown and striking defenses.
Carlos Candelario
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Also looking to bounce back from a smothering decision loss in his own recent UFC debut, Candelario has lost two straight after dropping a close split decision on DWCS against Victor Altamirano in August 2021. Candelario has just one win since 2017, after he took off all of 2018, 2019, and 2020. That lone win came just a few weeks before Candelario went on DWCS and ended in a decision, as have all of Candelario’s most recent four fights. Prior to taking four years off, Candelario had another appearance on DWCS, where he won a decision but unfortunately tore his ACL in the victory, which began his extended layoff. After briefly retiring during his lengthy recovery, Candelario finally decided to give it another shot in 2021, almost four years to the day from his win on DWCS. In a fight that took place up at 135 lb, opposed to 125 lb where his other three most recent fights took place, Candelario won a decision against an undersized and struggling opponent in Miguel Restrepo, who was also coming off a three year layoff of his own and has now lost five of his last six fights. That was actually the second time those two squared off after Candelario submitted Restrepo in the second round of a 2017 match.
In Candelario’s last fight, he took on a young debuting grappler in Tatsuro Taira. We saw a slow start with minimal striking, with each fighter landing one takedown in the first round. Taira never actually attempted another official takedown in the match, but was able to land two reversals and a knockdown in the later rounds, as he didn’t need to land a takedown to take control of the fight on the mat. Candelario really struggled to get anything going in the fight as he got controlled for nearly seven minutes, although he did finish with three reversals. Taira won every round and finished ahead in significant strikes 57-9 and in total strikes 89-21 as he cruised to a unanimous decision win. Taira also had three official submission attempts, while landing one of his five takedown attempts. Candelario ended up landing two of his five takedown attempts and had three and a half minutes of control time himself, with one submission attempt.
Now 8-2 as a pro, Candelario has two wins by KO, three by submission, and three decisions. He started his career 8-0 before losing decisions in his last two fights. All five of his finishes occurred in the first halves of fights, with four in round one and the other early in round two. He has competed at both 125 lb and 135 lb as well as a few Catchweight fights in the past. Only two of his five finishes came against opponents with winning records and he hadn’t faced much in terms of competition prior to going on DWCS.
Overall, Candelario is a former golden gloves champion and has decent boxing. He’s never been finished and has shown pretty good submission defenses, surviving three rounds against a dangerous grappler in his last fight. Between his two appearances on DWCS and his recent UFC debut, he’s been taken down 13 times on 28 attempts (53.6% defense), while landing seven takedowns of his own on 21 attempts (33.3% accuracy). He has a tendency to come on strong but fade later in fights and has never finished anybody beyond the midway mark of round two.
UPDATE: Candelario missed weight by 2.5 lb!
Fight Prediction:
Candelario will have a 1” height advantage, but Hadley will have a 2” reach advantage and is five years younger than the 31-year-old Candelario.
Both of these two underwhelmed in their recent respective debuts, as they each struggled with being controlled by their opponents. In fairness, they both had tough matchups and this looks like an easier opportunity for both guys. Hadley has struggled with being taken down and controlled and Candelario notably attempted 21 takedowns in his last two matches, landing seven of those. However, Candelario has also struggled with being controlled on the ground and Hadley is also a decent grappler. We expect this fight to play out largely on the mat and the winner will likely be determined by who’s able to control the other more. They’ve each shown the ability to reverse positions on the mat, so we could see some interesting grappling exchanges, but Hadley looks to have the better cardio and we expect him to take over as the fight goes on. While Hadley has the potential to lock up a late submission, Candelario has never been finished and his submission defense looked pretty good in his last match, so we’ll say Hadley wins a close decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Fight Ends in Split Decision” at +450.
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DFS Implications:
Hadley’s grappling-heavy approach to fighting will generally score better on DraftKings than FanDuel, as he can put up large amounts of control time but generally doesn’t land a ton of significant strikes. While six of his eight career wins have come early, he’s gone the distance in two of his last three fights and is now facing an opponent who’s never been finished. Hadley has struggled with being taken down, which is concerning as he faces an opponent who shot for 21 takedowns in his last two fights, and will make it tougher for Hadley to completely dominate the fight on the mat to the extent that he can still return value without a finish. At his high price tag, that likely leaves him reliant on being the first fighter to ever finish Candelario to return value. The odds imply he has a 70% chance to win, a 27% chance to land a finish, and a 13% chance it comes in round one.
Candelario just got dominated on the mat in his recent UFC debut, which isn’t very encouraging as he squares off against another grappler here. Working in his favor, Hadley’s takedown defense has been poor and Candelario has landed 7 takedowns on 21 attempts in his last two fights. That at least presents some grappling upside for Candelario, although he hasn’t finished anybody since 2017 and tends to slow down later in fights. Hadley has also never been finished in his career, making an early win for Candelario unlikely. Candelario also tends to slow down later in fights, so he’ll need a fast start if wants to pull off the upset. The most likely way he wins this fight is by taking Hadley down and controlling him, which will score better on DraftKings than FanDuel, but he’s still unlikely to put up a big score on either site unless he dominates this entire fight on the ground, which is unlikely. Hadley will constantly throw up submissions off his back if you give him any room to work, which will make it tough for Candelario to be very busy from top position, limiting his scoring potential. You’re likely looking for him to serve as a value play in a close grappling-heavy decision win if you play him. The odds imply he has a 30% chance to win, a 12% chance to land a finish, and a 5% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #10
Johnny Munoz
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Likely fighting for his job here, Munoz has alternated wins and losses over his last four fights and his only win in the UFC so far came against a terrible Jamey Simmons. Prior to that, Munoz lost a decision to Nate Manes in his UFC debut, and most recently got knocked out in 68 seconds by Tony Gravely.
His last fight ended so quickly that it's hard to take too much away from it, as Munoz got knocked out by Gravely just 68 seconds into the first round. Gravely never even had to attempt a takedown in the fight and finished Johnny Munoz with an amazingly short right hand as Munoz shot for his first takedown. Gravely finished ahead 5-2 in significant strikes and 6-2 in total strikes.
Now 11-2 as a pro, Munoz has two wins by KO, seven by submission, and two decisions. While his first six finishes all occurred in the first round, his last three have all come in round two. He’s coming off his first early loss in a R1 KO, with his only other defeat ending in a decision in his UFC debut. Prior to his recent first round loss, Munoz had seen the second round in five straight fights.
Overall, Munoz is a one-dimensional grappler/BJJ black belt, and multi-time IBJJF world champion. He started training judo and jiu-jitsu at a very young age as his father was also a fighter. He doesn’t offer much on the feet, but is good at finding submissions on the mat. He’s landed four takedowns on 20 attempts (20% accuracy) in his three UFC fights, while he got taken down himself on the only attempt against him, which came in his UFC debut.
Liudvik Sholinian
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Fourteen months removed from a decision loss to Jack Shore in his UFC debut, Sholinian previously went on The Ultimate Fighter and won a decision in his first fight on the show before losing a decision to Ricky Turcios in his second fight. Despite getting knocked off the show, the UFC gave Sholinian a short notice opportunity in a terrible matchup against Jack Shore.
In Sholinian’s last fight, Shore nearly finished the fight with an arm-triangle choke in the first round, but was unable to complete it as he fought through a torn bicep. Shore was mostly content with keeping the fight standing from that point on and only landed one more takedown in the fight. Clearly up after two rounds, he sort of coasted down the stretch opposed to hunting for the late finish that we’re used to seeing out of him. He still outlanded Sholinian 43-10 in strikes in the third round, but he never really pushed for a finish. When it was all said and done, Shore led in significant strikes 92-19 and in total strikes 104-33, while landing 2 of his 8 takedowns with four and a half minutes of control time. Sholinian failed to land any of his four takedown attempts in the fight.
Now 9-2-1 as a pro, Sholinian has one win by TKO, three by submission, and five decisions. He’s never been finished, with both of his losses going the distance. When looking at his record, it’s important to keep in mind the level of competition he had been facing prior to joining the UFC, as 7 of his 9 career wins have come against fighters with no previous pro experience.
Overall, Sholinian remains somewhat of an unknown as he’s been so inactive and only has one UFC fight to his name. He was a former member of the Ukrainian National Wrestling team, but hasn’t looked overly impressive and failed to land any of his four takedown attempts in his recent UFC debut. He’s been taken down twice on eight attempts (25% defense). While Sholinian was put in an impossible spot on short notice in his UFC debut, getting knocked off TUF isn’t a great look and his padded record from earlier in his career is also concerning.
Fight Prediction:
Sholinian will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 71” reach. Munoz is three years younger than the 32-year-old Sholinian.
While neither one of these two have been impressive, we at least know Munoz is a solid grappler. Sholinian built a career out of facing opponents with no experience and then washed out of The Ultimate Fighter before getting dominated in his UFC debut and now hasn’t fought in 14 months. Perhaps he’s improved his striking enough over that time to be a problem for Munoz on the feet, but Munhoz looks like the much more dangerous grappler, which will make it hard for Sholinian to execute his wrestling-heavy game plan without running the risk of getting submitted. We like Munoz’s chances of finding a submission win in the first two rounds, most likely in round two.
Our favorite bet here is “Munoz SUB” at +260.
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DFS Implications:
Munoz is a BJJ black belt and always dangerous looking for submissions on the mat. Now he’ll face a wrestler who’s typically looking to get fights to the mat, so this looks like a good matchup for Munhoz to get some submission opportunities. He is coming off the first KO loss of his career, so we could see him be a little more tentative and he’s also likely fighting for his job here. Therefore a slower start wouldn’t be that surprising, as Munoz will likely want to be careful he doesn’t get clipped shooting in again. He doesn’t do the best job setting up his takedowns, so if Sholinian opts to try and keep this fight standing, Munoz could have a tough time getting it to the ground. With that said, we haven’t seen enough of Sholinian at the UFC level to fully evaluate his takedown defense and he did get taken down twice in his debut, but that was against a really solid wrestler in Jack Shore. If Munoz starts slow and the fight makes it out of the first round, he may struggle to return value at his higher price tag with a later finish and he only scored 91 DraftKings points in his last second round submission win. The odds imply he has a 68% chance to win, a 32% chance to land a finish, and a 15% chance it comes in round one.
Sholinian scored just 13 DraftKings points in a decision loss in his UFC debut and has given us no indication that he’s a UFC level talent. His background is in wrestling, which presents some theoretical upside, especially on DraftKings, but now he’s facing a dangerous BJJ black belt, which will make it risky for Sholinian to look for takedowns. While Munoz showed a suspect chin in his last fight, Sholinian only has one TKO win on his record so he’s not the most likely candidate to knock Munoz out. However, that’s probably the only way he scores well here, leaving him as a hail mary KO or bust option. The odds imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 10% chance to land a finish, and a 4% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #9
Polyana Viana
8th UFC Fight (3-4)Happy just to make it to Vegas for this fight, Viana was one of the three Brazilian fighters to be stuck in Brazil amid rioting as she struggled to board a flight before eventually making it out Tuesday night. Viana is coming off a decision loss to a fellow Brazilian armbar specialist in Tabatha Ricci, after her previous three fights all ended in first round armbars (2-1). All three of Viana’s UFC wins have ended in first round submissions, while she’s lost all three of the decisions she’s been to in the UFC. She’s also been armbarred herself in the first round once in the UFC. Viana’s three UFC wins came against a debuting Maia Kahaunaele who never fought again, Emily Whitmire, who’s been submitted in all five of her career losses, and Mallory Martin, who’s been submitted twice and went 1-3 in the UFC before being cut.
In her last fight, Viana got taken down five times on 10 attempts by Ricci, who had no problem testing Viana on the mat as she landed her first takedown in the opening seconds of the fight. While Viana didn’t have any official takedown attempts in the fight, we did see her pull guard early on to get the fight into her comfort zone of working off her back to look for submissions. However, Ricci is a BJJ and Judo black belt and was able to defend all of the submissions Viana could throw at her and never even let her get close enough to locking something up to have an official attempt. Ricci was able to control Viana for nine and a half minutes in the fight, although Viana finished ahead in significant strikes 36-33 and in total strikes 126-72. Ricci went on to win a unanimous 29-28 decision.
Now 12-5 as a pro, Viana has four first round wins by KO/TKO, including one over Amanda Ribas prior to joining the UFC, and eight submission victories, with seven coming in round one and one in round two. Six of her submission wins have ended in armbars, while she also has two rear-naked choke finishes. She’s also been armbarred once in the first round herself, and has lost all four of the decisions she’s been to. She’s never won a fight that lasted longer than seven minutes and 12 of her 17 fights have ended in the first round. While she does have four KO/TKO wins on her record, three of those came in her first four pro fights and she hasn’t knocked anybody out since 2015 when she finished Amanda Ribas. Polyana came into the UFC with a 9-1 record, but has since gone 3-4 as a one-trick pony. Viana has fought almost her entire career at 115 lb, but did move up to 125 lb for one fight in 2019, which is when she suffered the only early loss of her career in a first round armbar.
Overall, Viana is a dangerous grappler who loves working off her back. She’s a BJJ brown belt and former jiu-jitsu world champion, as well as a 21-time Brazilian jiu-jitsu champion. She also won the Jungle Fight Strawweight belt back in 2015. Viana has actually finished ahead in striking in all three of her UFC decision losses, but her biggest strength is also her biggest weakness as she’s such a good defensive grappler that she spends large amounts of time on her back. She almost always finishes way behind in control time and her style of fighting simply isn’t conducive to winning on the score cards. She’s basically a female version of Paul Craig. She’s only landed 3 of her 9 takedown attempts (33.3% accuracy) in her seven UFC fights, but will pull guard to try and get the fight to the mat, which generally doesn’t register as a takedown.
Jinh Yu Frey
6th UFC Fight (2-3)Looking to bounce back from a questionable split-decision loss to Vanessa Demopoulos, Frey has gone the distance in four straight fights (2-2) since getting submitted via armbar in the third round of her 2020 short notice UFC debut against Kay Hansen. Frey split a pair of decisions against two strikers in Loma Lookboonmee and Gloria de Paula following the loss in her debut, and then did the same against a pair of grapplers in Ashley Yoder and Demopoulos most recently. She’s shown she can strike against grapplers and grappler against strikers and is generally looking to attack her opponents’ weaknesses.
In her last fight, Frey patiently picked Demopoulos apart on the feet early on, before Demopoulos landed her only successful takedown in the fight with just over a minute remaining in the first round. However, Demopoulos did literally nothing with the position and Frey quickly returned to her feet. Frey finished the first round ahead in striking and won the round on two of the judges’ scorecards, only losing in the eyes of the judge that scored all three rounds for Demopoulos and clearly was watching something other than the actual fight. Demopoulos tried harder to get the fight to the ground in round two, but Frey was able to stuff all four of her attempts, while also outlanding her on the feet. Despite finishing ahead on the numbers, two of the judges scored round two for Demopoulos, who then came out more aggressive in the third round, likely thinking she was behind in the fight. Frey again shutdown all of Demopoulos’ takedown attempts in round three, but did allow herself to get controlled along the fence for a period of time. All three judges scored round three for Demopoulos and the decision came down to a swing judge in round two and it ended in a Demopoulos split-decision win. Demopoulos closed the striking gap in round three and actually finished ahead in significant strikes 66-62, while Frey led in total strikes 81-71. Demopoulos was only able to land one of her seven takedown attempts, but led in control time 4:14-0:11, while Frey missed on her only takedown.
Now 11-7 as a pro, Frey has one win by KO, two by submission, and eight decisions. She’s been knocked out twice, submitted once, and has four decision defeats. Her last eight wins have all gone the distance, while her last nine fights have all made it to the third round, with eight of those going the distance—including three five-round decision wins with Invicta. Her only fight to end early since 2017 was in her 2020 UFC debut in a third-round submission loss to Kay Hansen. She hasn’t landed a finish of her own since 2014, and all three of her early wins occurred in her first four pro fights. After fighting her entire pre-UFC career at 105 lb, Frey was forced to move up to 115 lb when she joined the UFC in June 2020, so it makes sense that she required an adjustment period as she grew into the new weight class.
Overall, Frey is a decently well rounded decision grinder, who has shown improvements since joining the UFC. While she’s not any sort of finishing threat, she has good boxing and a really solid 88.9% takedown defense, as she’s only been taken down three times on 27 opponent attempts. She’s faced two straight grapplers, and they combined to land just one of their 15 attempts in those matches. On the other side of things, Frey has landed three of her own takedowns on nine attempts (33.3% accuracy), but is generally only looking to take down strikers. She has a masters degree and tends to fight smart, attacking her opponents’ weaknesses and avoiding their strengths. That was evident when she came in with a grappling heavy game plan against one-dimensional striker Gloria de Paula, followed by a pure striking game plan against one-dimensional grappler Ashley Yoder. She’ll face her third straight grappler here and we’d be very surprised if Frey looked for any takedowns in this match and she’s just a BJJ purple belt.
Fight Prediction:
Viana will have a 2” height and reach advantage and is seven years younger than Frey.
This fight seems pretty straightforward. Frey’s last eight wins have all ended in decisions, while Viana’s is 0-4 with the judges in her career and her last eight wins ended in round one (7 of those by submission). Viana loves to look for armbars and the only time Frey has been finished in the UFC was by armbar. We’d be surprised if this fight didn’t end in either a Viana submission or a Frey decision. Working in Frey’s favor, she has a really solid 88% takedown defense and is smart enough not to try and take Viana down. Viana has only landed three total takedowns in her seven UFC fights, and may be reliant on pulling guard to try and get this fight to the mat. If it stays standing, we like Frey’s chances of outlanding her way to a decision win, although her lack of volume generally keeps fights closer as we saw in her last fight. On the other side of things, if Viana is able to turn this into a grappling match, she’ll have a major jiu-jitsu advantage and we like her chances of locking up an armbar. For us, the deciding factor is Frey’s stellar takedown defense, and we’ll say she’s able to keep the fight standing and win a close decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Viana Sub OR Frey DEC” at -150 (DraftKings).
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DFS Implications:
Viana is a personified prop bet with binary outcomes in almost all of her fights—she either lands a first round submission or loses a decision. All 12 of her career wins have come in under six and a half minutes, with 11 ending in round one, including her last 10. So unsurprisingly she’s scored well when she wins, with DraftKings totals of 106, 95, and 111 in her three UFC victories. In her three UFC decision losses she scored 33, 40, and 33 DraftKings points, and not that she’s ever won a decision in her career, but she’s also given us no indication that she would score even remotely well if she did. Her biggest roadblock to finding a finish will be Frey’s 88% takedown defense and patient/smart fighting style. Viana has only landed three takedowns on nine attempts in her seven UFC fights, and may have a tough time getting this fight to the mat where she wants it. However, if she can get Frey down then she would have a good shot at finishing her, but she’ll need to make the most out of any opportunity she gets. Her defensive grappling approach to fighting is similar to Paul Craig’s, which generally scores a little better on FanDuel than DraftKings, as she’ll rack up submission attempts but not control time. Ultimately she’s a submission or bust play who has been 24-32% owned in each of her last three fights. The odds imply she has a 57% chance to win, a 24% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Frey has given us no indication she can score well in DFS, with DraftKings totals of just 65 and 72 in her two decision wins and just 29 and 23 in her two decision losses. She hasn’t finished anybody since 2014 in her fourth pro fight and we can’t imagine she will be looking for takedowns here against a very dangerous grappler in Viana. The only way we could see Frey scoring decently is if Viana pulls guard but isn’t able to lock up a submission and Frey ends up with a huge amount of control time. Even then, she would still be unlikely to put up too big of a score, so she would need most of the other dogs on the slate to lose. Frey only averages 3.12 SSL/min and Viana has never been knocked out, so if the fight remains standing, as we expect Frey will want it to, she doesn't land enough volume to put up a useful score. The best thing Frey has going for her is that she’ll be low owned and if she does somehow miraculously put up a big score she’ll offer tournament winning upside. The odds imply she has a 43% chance to win, a 12% chance to land a finish, and a 5% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #8
Mario Bautista
7th UFC Fight (4-2)Bautista has now won two straight since getting knocked out early in the second round of a 2021 fight against Trevin Jones. He bounced back from the first KO loss of his career with a dominant win over a short notice replacement in Jay Perrin, who was making his UFC debut, and then submitted Brian Kelleher midway through the first round in his last fight. Prior to his loss to Jones, Bautista handed Miles Johns the only KO loss of his career, in what was Bautista’s first early win in the UFC. Bautista originally made his debut in 2019 and got submitted by Cory Sandhagen in the first round, before bouncing back with a high-volume decision win leading up to the Johns fight.
In his last fight, Bautista took Kelleher down a minute into the fight, but wasn’t able to do anything with the takedown and Kelleher returned to his feet after spending less than a minute on his back. However, Bautista kept him pressed up against the cage and then took him back to the mat. He slickly transitioned to mount and forced Kelleher to give up his back, at which point Bautista quickly locked up a rear-naked choke to end the fight.
Now 10-2 as a pro, Bautista has three wins by TKO, four by submission, and three decisions. He has three first round finishes and four in round two, but three of his last four finishes have ended in the second round. Both of his losses have come early, with a second round KO against Trevin Jones and a R1 submission loss to Cory Sandhagen in Bautista’s 2019 UFC debut. Seven of his last eight fights have seen a second round, with four of those matches ending in round two (3-1), and three going the distance (3-0). Four of his six UFC fights have ended in under seven minutes (2-2).
Overall, Bautista has shown improved grappling in his last couple of fights after looking like a pure striker earlier in his UFC career. He does a good job of using all his weapons as he mixes in punches, kicks, knees, and elbows. We hadn’t seen him mix in much grappling in his first four UFC fights, as he had only landed one takedown on three attempts, but he’s landed six takedowns on eight attempts in his last two matches and has now landed 7 takedowns on 11 attempts (63.6% accuracy) in his six UFC fights. He’s also been taken down 5 times on 15 attempts by his opponents (66.7% defense). He averages a healthy 5.27 SSL/min and 3.96 SSA/min. This will be the final fight on Bautista’s contract and in a recent interview he emphasized how he needs to get a finish and make a statement in this fight.
Benito Lopez
4th UFC Fight (2-1)It’s been almost three and a half years since Benito Lopez last fought when he won a close decision over Vince Morales back in July 2019. Prior to that, Lopez suffered the only loss of his career in a first round guillotine submission at the hands of Manny Bermudez. Lopez’s only other UFC fight was a decision win in his 2017 debut and he didn’t fight at all in 2018, 2020, or 2021. During his time away, Lopez obtained his real estate license and maybe his comeback is simply a ploy to drive more business his way.
In his last fight, Lopez came out throwing a ton of leg kicks, but got dropped by Vince Morales late in the first round. Lopez was able to recover and continued to attack Morales’ legs for the entire fight, landing 39 leg strikes in the match, compared to just six head shots and nine to the body. Other than attacking Morales’ legs, Lopez really didn’t do much in the fight and we thought Morales had done enough to get his hand raised as he landed several good combinations of punches in the fight and finished and head striking 67-54 in addition to landing the only knockdown in the fight. No takedowns were attempted on either side in the pure striking battle.
Now 10-1 as a pro, Lopez has three wins by KO/TKO, two by submission, and five decisions. All five of his finishes came in the first round over a five fight stretch from 2015 to 2017, just before he went on DWCS. One of those finishes came against UFC fighter Journey Newson. All 11 of Lopez’s career fights have either ended in the first round or gone the distance.
Overall, Lopez loves to throw a ton of kicks and will also mix in flying knees. While he had a couple of submission wins early in his career, he hasn’t attempted a takedown in any of his three UFC fights or in his DWCS appearance. He’s been taken down once on two attempts in the UFC, and was also taken down twice on 12 attempts by Steven Peterson on DWCS in a split-decision win for Lopez. Lopez averages 4.49 SSL/min and 4.80 SSA/min.
UPDATE: Lopez missed weight by 2.5 lb!Fight Prediction:
Lopez will have a 1” height advantage and 4” reach advantage.
Lopez’s incredibly long layoff adds some uncertainty to his side of things here, but it’s never a good sign when a fighter has been inactive for this long. When Lopez steps inside the Octagon on Saturday, it will have been 1211 days since he last fought. We very rarely see underdogs win coming off such long layoffs and fully expect Bautista to control this fight and get his hand raised at the end. Lopez relies heavily on his legs to win fights as he spams kicks from the outside and looks for flying knees when opponents get close. As long as Bautista can avoid taking a knee to the chin he should be able to control the action here. It would make sense for him to look to wrestle to completely negate the entire striking arsenal of Lopez and we like him to find a finish in the first two rounds, we’ll say by second round submission.
Our favorite bet here is “Bautista ITD” at +165.
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DFS Implications:
Bautista has shown improvements to his grappling in his last two fights and after scoring 87 and 93 DraftKings points in his first two UFC victories, he scored 105 and 104 points in his last two wins. He only landed one takedown in his first four UFC fights combined, but has landed six in less than four rounds of action in his last two matches. Lopez has looked like a one-dimensional striker, so it would make sense for Bautista to try and get him to the mat and hunt for his second straight submission win. In a recent interview, Bautista said this will be the final fight on his contract and he’s looking for a statement finish, so he’s at least motivated to put on a good performance and end this fight early. With Lopez coming off a 3+ year layoff, this looks like a good spot for Bautista to notch another big win and put up his third straight 100+ point score. The odds imply he has a 72% chance to win, a 34% chance to land a finish, and a 17% chance it comes in round one.
Lopez scored just 52 and 73 DraftKings points in his two UFC wins, which both ended in decisions all the way back in 2017 and 2019. He hasn’t fought since July 2019 and it’s hard to know how prepared he’ll be in this matchup. Over his time away, he’s dealt with injuries, had a kid, and became a realtor. We’re expecting him to look somewhere between terrible and bad, but there’s always a chance he surprises us and looks average. He likes to throw a lot of kicks and flying knees when things get close, but has yet to attempt a takedown in the UFC. He looks reliant on landing a flying knee KO to score well and even at his cheap price tag he could win a decision and still get left out of winning lineups. The only thing he has going for him is that he’ll be low owned, but that’s not enough for us to have much interest in playing him here. The odds imply he has a 28% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #7
Miranda Maverick
6th UFC Fight (3-2)After losing a pair of decisions against tougher opponents in Erin Blanchfield and Maycee Barber, the UFC began building Maverick back up as they matched her up against a more one-dimensional striker in Sabina Mazo in her last match. Maverick predictably dominated Mazo on the mat en route to her first UFC submission win midway through the second round. Prior to that win, Maverick got absolutely dominated on the mat by Erin Blanchfield for three rounds, which was the first time we’ve seen someone manhandle Maverick like that for an entire fight. Leading up to that loss, Maverick lost a close/questionable decision to Maycee Barber, which most people scored for Maverick. Prior to that pair of losses, Maverick had been on a five fight winning streak including a pair of wins in her first two UFC fights. In her UFC debut she landed a R1 TKO due to a doctor stoppage and followed it up with a decision victory over Gillian Robertson in her second UFC fight.
In her last fight, Maverick landed her first takedown just over a minute into the match. Mazo did look for an armbar off her back that forced Maverick to be a little cautious with her ground attack and created an opening for Mazo to return to her feet. However, Maverick quickly returned the fight to the mat. Once again Mazo was able to get back up, and once again Maverick took her back down. At that point, Maverick was able to control Mazo for the remainder of the round. Mazo was able to stuff Maverick’s first two takedown attempts in round two, before Maverick finally got the fight back to the ground two minutes into the round and immediately took Mazo’s back and locked up a rear-naked choke. The fight ended with Maverick ahead in significant strikes 19-15 and in total strikes 45-24. She landed four of her seven takedown attempts with just over minutes in control time in a fight that lasted seven minutes and 15 seconds.
Now 10-4 as a pro, Maverick has one TKO victory, six submissions, and three decision wins. Her lone TKO win came from a doctor stoppage following the first round in her 2020 UFC debut. After the first four submission wins of her career ended in the first round her last two came in the later rounds. She’s never been finished, with all four of her losses going the distance. Maverick started her pro career at 115 lb before moving up to 125 lb in her third pro fight.
Overall, Maverick is a well rounded fighter who wrestled in high-school and is a BJJ brown belt. She has improved her striking in recent years and is rarely mentioned without her “farm strength” being brought up. Her striking still isn’t exceptional, and whenever she goes against a pure striker you should be looking for her to rely heavily on her grappling, as we saw in her last fight. She’s landed 8 of her 13 takedowns attempts (61.5% accuracy) in five UFC fights, while getting taken down 10 times on 18 opponent attempts (44.4% defense). She’s only topped 50 significant strikes landed once in the UFC, which came when she landed 71 against Gillian Robertson, while no one has landed more than 46 on her. She averages 3.62 SSL/min and 2.69 SSA/min. After facing several tough opponents in previous UFC fights, Maverick now gets a teed up matchup as the UFC continues to build her back up following the losses to Blanchfield and Barber.
Shanna Young
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Coming off her first UFC win, Young defeated a terrible Gina Mazany in a second round ground and pound TKO. That was Young’s second straight fight to end in a R2 TKO on the mat, although she was on the other end of the previous one as she got finished by Stephanie Egger in October 2021. Young made her 2020 UFC debut on short notice at 135 lb against a huge Macy Chiasson and lost a lopsided unanimous 30-26 decision. She then had a baby and took 19 months off following the loss, but stayed at 135 lb in her loss to Egger. Young then dropped down to 125 lb for his last fight when she defeated Mazany and is now officially 3-0 at 125 lb in her career. However, she also had two one-round fights with Invicta in 2019 that went down as exhibition matches at 125 lb. While she won the first of those, she got submitted in the second by…Miranda Maverick. Young originally tried to make it into the UFC through DWCS, but was submitted in the second round by a terrible Sarah Alpar just three weeks prior to getting submitted by Maverick. Young’s only two wins in her last five fights were against Mazany, who is 2-5 in her last seven fights, and then in Invicta against Maiju Suotama, who has lost four straight.
In Young’s last fight, Mazany looked for a takedown 30 seconds into the first round, but Young was able to keep the fight standing. Mazany continued to look for takedowns, but Young was able to fight off the attempts. As Young’s confidence grew as she was able to dictate the action and keep the fight standing, Mazany appeared to be fading in the second round and a look of panic started to show up on her face. She then finally landed a takedown on her fifth attempt, but got too high on Young’s back and ended up getting reversed. Mazany was able to briefly return to her feet, but failed on a trip attempt and again found herself in bottom position. Young then took her back and landed ground and pound as Mazany simply covered up and the fight was stopped. Young finished ahead in significant strikes 49-48 and in total strikes 62-57. Mazany only landed one of her five takedown attempts, and while Young never attempted a takedown, she was able to reverse Mazany’s late attempts to end up on top and find a ground and pound finish.
Now 8-4 as a pro, Young has two wins by TKO, three by submission, and three decisions. She also has one TKO loss, one official submission defeat, and two decision losses. Her other submission loss was in an exhibition match, so it doesn’t show up on her official record. Eleven of her 12 pro fights have made it out of the first round, with eight seeing round three, and five going the distance. Her last three fights to end early were all stopped in round two (1-2). Three of her five early wins came in round three, but we should take her early wins with a grain of salt, as they all came against a low level of competition. Young has bounced between 125 lb and 135 lb throughout her career, but all four of her official pro losses occurred at 135 lb. Her exhibition match submission loss to Maverick was at 125 lb however.
Overall, Young is a low-level fighter who has had to deal with multiple hip surgeries over the years. She’s a karate black belt but just a BJJ blue belt, and really struggles off her back. Her best weapons are her kicks and she finds the most success when fighting on the feet at distance. However, her opponents generally recognize that and are looking to take her down. She’s been taken down 8 times on 20 opponent attempts (60% defense) between her three UFC fights and DWCS match. In those four fights, she failed to land either of her own takedown attempts and has averaged 3.67 SSL/min and 5.15 SSA/min.
UPDATE: Young missed weight by 1 lb!
Fight Prediction:
Young will have a 4” height advantage, but both fighters share a 65” reach. Maverick is six years younger than the 31-year-old Young.
Not only is this a theoretical nightmare matchup stylistically for Young, these two actually fought each other in a 2019 Invicta exhibition match and Maverick submitted Young in just 155 seconds. Since then, Maverick has improved as a fighter, while Young has struggled mightily, dealt with hip surgeries and had a baby. Barring a freak injury or hail mary armbar, it’s really hard to see Young winning this fight and we expect Maverick to have her way with her on the mat. The only question is whether or not Maverick finds a finish or grinds out a grappling-heavy decision. The fact that she’s already submitted her once in the past is encouraging for her chances of doing it again and Maverick has never finished an opponent with ground and pound, so that’s a less likely finishing method. We like Maverick to lock up a submission to secure the win once again and don’t expect this fight to be close.
Our favorite bet here is “Maverick SUB” at +140.
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DFS Implications:
Maverick is averaging 106 DraftKings points in her three UFC wins and still scored 99 points in her lone decision victory. Both of her finishes were good for exactly 110 points, so she’s shown both a solid floor and ceiling. This sets up as the most favorable matchup of her UFC career as the UFC is simply using Young to build Maverick up and we’re once again expecting a statement performance out of her. She’s actually already submitted Young once before, although that was in an Invicta exhibition match and doesn’t show up on their official pro records. Young was also submitted by a terrible Sarah Alpar on DWCS just a few weeks before that loss to Maverick and then went on to lose her first two UFC fights. Look for Maverick to try and get this fight to the mat early, control Young, and work her way towards a submission. A grappling-heavy win can still score well on DraftKings, but Maverick will need either a finish or an absurd number of takedowns to score well on FanDuel. Both of those are squarely in play and Young’s 60% takedown defense isn’t overly imposing. We expect Maverick to land a submission and put up a big score on both sites. The odds imply she has an 83% chance to win, a 45% chance to land a finish, and a 22% chance it comes in round one.
Young is a karate style fighter who really struggles off her back and this is a terrible matchup for her. While Young was able to finish Gina Mazany in her last fight, no one’s mistaking Mazany for Maverick and it’s never a surprise to see Mazany get finished as she consistently struggles with her cardio and durability. The only real reason to consider playing Young is that she’ll be incredibly low owned in tournaments, but she’ll still need some sort of freak occurrence to take place to pull off the upset. She will be the bigger fighter and has spent the majority of her career at 135 lb, while Maverick actually started her career at 115 lb, but we’re not getting too hung up on those numbers and Maverick is known for her strength. Young is nothing more than a contrarian leverage play and has the lowest chances of any fighter on the slate of winning. The odds imply she has a 17% chance to win, an 8% chance to land a finish, and a 3% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #6
Shayilan Nuerdanbieke
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Nuerdanbieke has bounced back from a decision loss to Joshua Culibao in his May 2021 UFC debut with two straight decision wins and has now won four of his last five rights. His first UFC victory came in a dream matchup against Sean Soriano, who’s completely helpless on the mat. However, Nuerdanbieke’s most recent win came against TJ Brown, who’s a decent wrestler himself, so the victory was far more impressive.
In his last fight, Nuerdanbieke showed improved striking as he dropped TJ Brown with a right hand a little over a minute into the first round. Then as Brown looked for a takedown, Nuerdanbieke was able to reverse the position and end up on top. While Brown looked for an armbar off his back, Nuerdanbieke was able to escape the position as Brown looked to transition to a leg and the two ended up tangled together on the mat before things returned to the feet. Nuerdanbieke landed a takedown late in the round to finish in top position and landed another takedown to start round two. Brown was able to reverse the position midway through the round, but Nuerdanbieke was then able to reverse it again as the two continued to go back and forth on the mat. Brown continued to look for submissions off his back, but was unable to complete any. Nuerdanbieke landed another takedown in round three and controlled Brown for two minutes before getting reversed in the final 90 seconds. Brown tried to push for a finish but ultimately ran out of time and Nuerdanbieke won a unanimous 29-28 decision. Nuerdanbieke finished ahead 47-42 in significant strikes and 86-58 in total strikes. He landed three of his six takedown attempts and led in control time 7:32-2:54, while Brown landed one of his two attempts. Both fighters finished with two reversals, while Brown had four official submission attempts.
Now 38-10 as a pro, Nuerdanbieke has 18 wins by KO, 10 by submission, and 10 decisions. He’s been knocked out twice, submitted six times, and has two decision losses. The majority of his career fights have ended in the first round, but he was fighting a ton of questionable competition prior to joining the UFC, so his record should be taken with a grain of salt. Nuerdanbieke has spent most of his career fighting at Lightweight and has even spent some time up at Welterweight. Only four of his pre-UFC fights were at 145 lb (4-0), but that’s where he’s fought all of his UFC matches.
Overall, Nuerdanbieke relies heavily on his wrestling, but did show improved striking in his last match. However, Nuerdanbieke still hasn’t looked like any sort of finishing threat at the UFC level, and relies largely on controlling his opponents to win fights. In his three UFC fights, he’s landed 9 of his 28 takedown attempts (32.1% accuracy), with at least two takedowns landed and six or more attempts in all of those fights. On the other side of things, he’s been taken down three times himself on five attempts from his opponents (40% defense). While his striking looked improved in his last match, he still only averages 1.80 SSL/min and 2.89 SSA/min.
Darrick Minner
6th UFC Fight (2-3)Looking to bounce back from a pair of defeats, Minner is coming off a decision loss to Ryan Hall after getting finished in a R2 TKO against Darren Elkins just before that. Minner came out hot against Elkins, but gassed out in the second round and got finished with ground and pound. Prior to that, Minner won a grappling-heavy decision over Charles Rosa, after landing a 52 second R1 guillotine win over T.J. Laramie to notch his first UFC win. He lost his February 2020 UFC debut in a second round submission against Grant Dawson leading up to the pair of wins.
In his last fight, Minner took on the puzzle that is Ryan Hall and as while he was able to go 15 minutes with him, he was unable to ever get much offense going. Hall rolled into a leg lock a little over a minute into the fight, and while Minner was able to escape the initial attempt, Hall continued to attack his legs. Minner was able to escape and return to space, but then curiously took Hall down. Again, Minner was able to survive scrambles with Hall on the mat, but he finished the round with his back on the mat and was simply playing defense in the grappling exchanges, even when he was in top position. Hall finished ahead in significant strikes 40-26 and in total strikes 163-56 on his way to a unanimous decision win. While Hall failed to land either of his takedown attempts, he finished with three reversals and a ridiculous seven submission attempts, while leading in control time 5:37-4:58. Minner landed his only takedown attempt in the fight and also had one reversal.
Now 26-13 as a pro, Minner has one win by TKO, 22 submissions, and three decision victories. All but two of his finishes have occurred in the first round. He’s also been knocked out three times, submitted eight more, and has two decision losses. Five of those early losses occurred in the first round while six occurred in round two. Only five of his 39 pro fights have made it to the third round and all of those went the distance. Minner fought at 135 lb early in his pro career, but has been up at 145 lb and 155 lb since 2017, and has settled in at 145 lb since 2019.
Overall, Minner rarely makes for a boring fight and will relentlessly pursue submissions, throwing up one guillotine after the next and transitioning to armbars in between. The only TKO win of his career was all the way back in 2013, and he relies on submitting opponents in the first two rounds to win fights. He only has one decision win in his last 23 fights, which came against Charles Rosa, who excels at losing decisions. Minner’s teammate. TJ Brown, just fought Nuerdanbieke, so this will be the second straight fight that Minner’s coach, James Krause, prepares for him. Minner has landed 8 of his 9 takedown attempts in his five UFC fights, but did miss on both of his attempts on DWCS in 2019, which factors into his 72.7% takedown accuracy. He’s also been taken down 3 times on 9 opponent attempts in those six fights (66.7% defense).
Fight Prediction:
Nuerdanbieke will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 69” reach. Nuerdanbieke is four years younger than the 32-year-old Minner.
Minner has to be drooling over this matchup as he excels at submitting opponents and specifically locking up guillotines. Now he faces a wrestler who’s been submitted six times in the past and should provide plenty of opportunities for Minner to lock up a choke. Obviously Nuerdanbieke’s team knows who they’re fighting and will try to devise a game plan to prevent Nuerdanbieke from getting submitted, but he relies so heavily on his wrestling that it will be hard for him to remain out of danger. Nuerdanbieke did show some improved striking in his last fight, but he also only has a 40% takedown defense so far in the UFC and if he tries to change things up and not take Minner down, then Minner (72% takedown accuracy) will just look to take him down. Unless Nuerdanbieke surprisingly starches Minner on the feet, which is very unlikely, look for this fight to end up on the mat early and often. We like Minner’s chances of locking up a submission in the first two rounds, with a round one guillotine being the most likely outcome. However, if he fails to complete a submission, we’ve seen him gas out in round two in the past and get finished himself at that point, so that’s also in play if he can’t get Nuerdanbieke out of there early. With that said, we like Minner to land a first round submission here. One thing to keep in mind when betting submission specialists like Minner is that if he breaks Nuerdanbieke’s arm in an armbar and the ref doesn’t immediately stop the fight, then it will often go down as a TKO instead of a submission. We’ve been screwed on this in the past with Paul Craig and Virna Jandiroba, so it’s always worth comparing the submission and ITD lines (or R1 vs. R1 SUB).
Our favorite bet here is “Minner R1” at +650.
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DFS Implications:
Nuerdanbieke’s grappling-heavy fighting style is a much better fit on DraftKings than FanDuel, and he scored 105 and 99 DraftKings points in his recent two decision wins, but just 78 and 54 points on FanDuel. He needs a finish to score well on FanDuel and all three of his UFC fights have gone the distance. He hasn’t looked like any sort of finishing threat so far in the UFC and he’ll likely need Minner to gas out, which in fairness is definitely in play. While Nuerdanbieke has shown the ability to control opponents on the mat and grind out decision wins, Minner is a really dangerous submission threat, making that a dangerous strategy to execute here. While Nuerdanbieke’s high price tag makes it tougher for him to end up in winning lineups without a big score, the fact that Minner’s fights so rarely see a third round keeps him in the tournament play discussion. Nuerdanbieke’s striking also looked improved in his last fight, and if he can survive the first half of the fight, we could see him take over in the latter stages. He’s also been consistently low owned on DraftKings in his first three UFC matches (14%, 18% & 16%), which adds to his tournament appeal assuming that trend continues. His high price tag and dangerous opponent should help to keep his own ownership in check here, despite his recent two solid scores in decision wins. The odds imply he has a 64% chance to win, a 37% chance to land a finish, and an 18% chance it comes in round one.
Minner is coming off two straight losses, but put up massive DraftKings scores of 111 and 122 in his two UFC wins and is now very affordably priced in a favorable matchup where he should have plenty of opportunities to look for submissions against a wrestler in Nuerdanbieke. The field has struggled to pin down Minner in the past, and he was only 16% and 20% owned on DraftKings in his two wins, while he was then 30% and 13% owned in his recent two losses. It will be interesting to see where his ownership checks in here, but he stands out as an obvious value play so we’d be surprised if he completely flies under the radar. We’ve seen Minner gas out and get finished in the second round, but he also won a high scoring decision over Charles Rosa, so he has shown the ability to go three rounds at times, although it rarely happens as only five of his 39 pro fights have made it to the third round. That’s a pretty strong indicator that there’s a good chance this fight ends early, and the winner should score well. The odds imply he has a 36% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #5
Grant Dawson
8th UFC Fight (6-0-1)Undefeated in his last 10 fights, Dawson, the only time Dawson didn’t come out victorious over that stretch was in a draw against Ricky Glenn in his second most recent fight. Following the disappointing result, Dawson made the switch to American Top Team after spending eight years at Glory MMA & Fitness, and Thiago Moises is now one of his main training partners. The move appeared successful, as Dawson became the first fighter to ever submit Jared Gordon in his most recent match. Prior to the draw, Dawson was 5-0 in the UFC with three finishes, but all seven of his UFC fights have made it out of the first round, with two ending in round two, two more being stopped in round three, and three going the distance. His last four matches have all made it to the third round, but he has two finishes in the final minute of fights, including a last second knockout of Leonardo Santos. That was also Dawson’s first UFC fight up at 155 lb after he started out at 145 lb with the organization. However, most of his pre-UFC fights took place at 155 lb, although he’s gone back and forth between the weight classes throughout his career,
In his last fight, Dawson landed a career best seven takedowns on 17 attempts against an opponent in Jared Gordon who’s a good wrestler himself. Prior to that, Gordon had only been taken down eight times in his first nine UFC fights combined. Gordon was on the defense throughout the fight and never even attempted a takedown of his own, while he was controlled for over seven minutes. Gordon did finish ahead in significant strikes 77-54 and in total strikes 111-98, but Dawson was primarily focussed on looking for submissions and eventually found one late in the third round as he locked in a rear-naked choke in the final minute of the fight to hand Gordon the first submission loss of his career.
Now 18-1-1 as a pro, Dawson has four wins by KO, 12 by submission, and just two decisions. His only career loss was a 35 second R1 KO in 2016. Three of his four career KO wins have come in round two with the other ending in round three. Five of his last six finishes have ended in submissions. Of his 12 submission wins, seven ended in round one, four came in round two, and his most recent ended in round three.
Overall, Dawson relies heavily on his wrestling and tends to wear on his opponents opposed to finishing fights quickly. He’s a BJJ brown belt and two-thirds of his career wins have come by submission. Between his seven UFC fights and his DWCS match, Dawson has landed 25 takedowns on 72 attempts (34.7% accuracy). Over that same stretch, he’s only had five takedowns attempted against him, with three of those being landed (40% defense). No one has ever gotten him down more than once, and Dawson finished all three of the opponents to land a takedown against him. Dawson relies on overpowering his opponents, so it will be interesting to see how this next matchup goes as he squares off against an Olympic wrestler.
UPDATE: Dawson missed weight by 1.5 lb!
This isn’t the first time Dawson has struggled on the scale, as he missed weight by 3.5 lb in a 145 lb fight against Darrick Minner in 2020. Dawson went on to submit Minner in the second round. Dawson also missed weight for another 145 lb fight by 3.8 lb back in 2015, before he joined the UFC, and went on to win that fight in a first round submission. This is the first time he’s ever missed weight fighting at 155 lb from what we can tell.
Mark Madsen
4th UFC Fight (3-0)Still undefeated, the 38-year-old Madsen is coming off three straight decision wins, after landing a first round TKO in his 2019 UFC debut. His last two opponents in Vinc Pichel and Clay Guida were both 39, whereas now he’ll be facing a younger fighter in this next matchup. Madsen’s 2019 UFC debut came against a suspect Danilo Belluardo, who’s been knocked out in three of his last four fights and Madsen’s previous finish came against an opponent fighting for the first and only time as a pro. The other four finishes of Madsen’s career came in his first four pro fights, with two of those occurring back in 2013 and 2014 when he was fighting at 168 lb. Those early four finishes came against opponents who entered with records of 0-1, 0-0, 1-0, and 9-8. So overall, four of Madsen’s six finishes have come against opponents with one combined pro win and the other two were against an opponent who’s been knocked out in four of his last five fights and one that has been knocked out in three of his last four. We’ve yet to see Madsen ever finish anyone even remotely decent.
In his last fight, Madsen came out patiently attacking the lead leg of Vinc Pichel, before landing his first takedown attempt towards the end of the round. However, Pichel was able to return to his feet fairly and Madsen did nothing with the position. Pichel finished the round ahead in striking 24-18, but all three judges gave the round ro Madsen. Pichel again led in striking in round two, while also being the first fighter to ever take Madsen down. Madesen also landed a takedown of his own in the round and two of the three judges gave the round to Madsen again, despite finishing well behind in striking and finishing the round on his butt. Pichel again led in striking in round three, but Madsen was able to take him down and control him for the majority of the round and all three judges awarded the round to Madsen. The fight ended with Pichel ahead in significant strikes 68-39 and in total strikes 88-57, while Madsen led in takedowns 3-1 and in control time 5:10-0:48. Two of the judges curiously scored the fight 30-27 for Madsen, while the other had it 29-28 for him. It seemed like a close fight that could have gone either way.
Now 12-0 as a pro, Madsen has three KO/TKOs, three submissions, and six decision wins. All six of his finishes occurred in the first round, while all six of his fights to see round two ended in decisions. His last three fights and six of his last eight have gone the distance, with his only two finishes over that stretch occurring in his UFC debut and the fight prior.
Overall, Madesen has tons of wrestling experience, but switched to MMA late in his career and is still working on improving his striking. While he did have a pair of pro MMA fights back in 2013 and 2014, he didn’t really fully commit to MMA until after the 2016 Olympics and his third pro MMA fight was just in 2018. He started off competing at 170 lb until he joined the UFC and dropped down to 155 lb. He had previously wrestled at 163-165 lb. This will be the first time Madsen has competed twice in the same year since joining the UFC, as he’s dealt with various medical and personal issues, including a broken jaw in the Austin Hubbard fight followed by a staph infection. Madesen relocated from Denmark to Arizona to train full time at Fight Ready prior to his last two fights, and he has shown improvements to his striking in those matches. Prior to turning pro in MMA, Madsen had a distinguished wrestling career where he won an Olympic silver medal in Greco-Roman Wrestling. In his four UFC fights, Madsen has landed 12 of his 18 takedowns attempts (66.7% accuracy), but has only attempted more than three takedowns in one of those fights, and we saw him tire out in that match. On the other side of things, Vinc Pichel is the only fighter to ever try and take Madsen down and Pichel was able to land one of his two attempts.
Fight Prediction:
Dawson will have a 2” height advantage, but both fighters share a 72” reach. Dawson is 10 years younger than the 38-year-old Madsen.
This is an interesting matchup between two wrestlers, who have rarely faced many opponents looking to take them down. With that said, neither of them has been very efficient at defending the rare takedowns they do face, as Madsen has been taken down on 50% of the two attempts he’s gone up against and Dawson has been taken down on 60% of the five attempts against him. Those sample sizes are so tiny it’s hard to fully gauge the defensive wrestling of either guy, but Dawson is at least a BJJ brown belt and is more of a submission threat than Madsen. It’s always possible that this turns into more of a striking affair than expected if both guys end up respecting the wrestling of the other, but Dawson has never shied away from looking to take grapplers/wrestlers down in the past, so we’d be surprised if that changed here. We’ve seen both guys struggle at times with their cardio late in wrestling-heavy fights, but we would still give the advantage there to Dawson. The one concern with that is he missed weight, so that could slow him down late in this fight potentially. This strength on strength matchup adds some volatility to the mix and it’s hard to know for sure how the wrestling exchanges will go, but we like Dawson to wear Madsen out and finish him in the later rounds, most likely in a round two submission.
Our favorite bet here is “Dawson R2 or R3 SUB” at +750.
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DFS Implications:
Dawson has averaged 103 DraftKings points in his six UFC wins and is coming off a career performance where he scored 123 points in a third round submission and became the first fighter to ever submit Jared Gordon. That was also the first time Dawson had prepared for a fight at American Top Team, after spending the previous eight years at Glory MMA & Fitness with James Krause. He landed a career high seven takedowns following the switch, and looked great at the new gym. Now he’ll face another tough test in the undefeated Mark Madsen, who’s a former Olympic wrestling silver medalist and has only been taken down once in his career. However, Madsen is 38 years old and has shown questionable cardio late in wrestling-heavy fights in the past, so we still like Dawson’s chances of finding success on the mat and wearing him out as he works to another late finish. The fact that Dawson missed weight is of some concern, especially since we don’t know the underlying causes for the miss. He missed weight badly twice trying to make 145 lb earlier in his career and still won both of those fights by submission, which is encouraging for his chances here despite the miss. Nevertheless, that does make this a somewhat more volatile spot, and also increases the chances that Dawson gasses out late in the fight. Dawson is always popular amongst the field, which is something to keep in mind when building tournament lineups. The odds imply he has a 67% chance to win, a 29% chance to land a finish, and a 14% chance it comes in round one.
Madsen has settled into grinding out close, slower paced, lower scoring decisions after a hot start to his UFC career that included a first round TKO win that scored 106 DraftKings points, followed by an eight takedown performance that scored 91 points in a decision win. Since then, he’s scored just 71 and 74 DraftKings points in his last two slower paced decision wins, landing a combined three takedowns in those fights. Now he steps into the toughest test of his career and it will be interesting to see how Madsen looks when it comes to defensive wrestling. It’s hard to see him completely dominating Dawson on the mat, and even if he finds some success with that early he’ll likely gas out midway through the fight. Madsen doesn’t have much power in his striking and Dawson is a better grappler, so it’s also hard to see Madsen finishing Dawson, unless Dawson completely gasses out before Madsen does due to the weight miss. Madsen is always highly owned, checking in at 37% and 40% owned in his last two matches, so it’s always safe to assume he’ll be popular. That further lowers his tournament appeal and we don’t have much interest in playing him here. The odds imply he has a 33% chance to win, a 10% chance to land a finish, and a 4% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #4
Tagir Ulanbekov
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Coming off a close decision loss to Tim Elliott, Ulanbekov had a five fight winning streak snapped. All three of his UFC fights have gone the distance, and all three of those decisions have been close. Prior to his recent loss, Ulanbekov fought to a grappling-heavy split-decision win over Allan Nascimento, after defeating Bruno Silva in a decision in his October 2020 UFC debut.
In his last fight, Ulanbekov got taken down by Elliott a minute into the first round. He was quickly able to return to his feet, although Elliott appeared to land an illegal knee as Ulanbekov was getting up. Elliott continued to push the pace as he landed three takedowns in the rounds and then dropped Ulanbekov with a big looping left hand in the closing minute. Ulanbekov survived the initial blitz from Elliott to see a second round and Elliott continued to ignore the rules as he blatantly grabbed Ulanbekov’s glove to hold him in place as he landed strikes. Ulanbekov was able to land his first takedown of the fight in round two and control Elliott for a minute and a half in the round. Ulanbekov finished the fight strong, outlanding Elliott in round three, while landing another takedown with three minutes of control time, but all three judges scored the fight 29-28 in favor of Elliott. Ulanbekov finished ahead in significant strikes 90-79, while Elliott led in total strikes 117-111. Ulanbekov landed 2 of his 10 takedown attempts and led in control time 4:55-0:52, while Elliott landed 3 of his 9 attempts.
Now 13-2 as a pro, Ulanbekov has one win by TKO, six by submission, and six decisions. Both of his losses have also gone the distance, with his earlier career loss coming in a five-round split decision against Zhalgas Zhumagulov. His last 11 fights have all made it out of the first round, with nine of those seeing the third round and seven going the distance.
Overall, Ulanbekov is a teammate of Khabib and another one of these Russian wrestlers who relies on takedowns and control to win fights. He only averages 3.42 SSL/min and 3.36 SSA/min, but has attempted at least five takedowns in all three of his UFC fights, landing 11 of his 26 attempts overall (42.3% accuracy). He’s also been taken down 7 times on 18 opponent attempts (61.1% defense). He does have the ability to compete on the feet, but he generally does so just to set up takedowns. He’s extremely skinny, which leaves him prone to getting his lead leg beat up, which is just all the more reason for him to get fights to the mat early and often.
Nate Maness
5th UFC Fight (3-1)Maness has curiously decided to drop down to 125 lb for the first time in his career after suffering his first UFC loss in four Octagon appearances. He actually made his debut all the way up at 145 lb in August 2020, and had previously fought as heavy as 155 lb. Following a decision win in his debut, Maness landed a second round submission in a 140 lb Catchweight fight against Luke Sanders. He continued to cut weight as he then landed a second round KO win against Tony Gravely at 135 lb, leading up to his recent decision loss to the undefeated Nurmagomedov. It’s surprising that Maness opted to move all the way down to 125 lb, as he was already tall at 135 lb, standing 5’10”. In fairness, all three of his wins were close, and he got his jaw broken and barely avoided getting knocked out by Gravely.
In his last fight, Maness got completely dominated in all faucets, as Nurmagomedov was able to take Maness down three times on four attempts and control him for nearly 11 minutes. Nurmagomedov landed a takedown in each round as he patiently ground out a decision on the mat. He finished ahead in significant strikes 74-2 and in total strikes 128-46.
Now 14-2 as a pro, Maness has five wins by KO, three by submission, and six decisions. The only time he’s ever been finished was in a 2019 R3 KO, two fights before he joined the UFC, with his one other career loss coming in his recent decision defeat. His eight finishes have been split evenly across the first two rounds, and he’s never finished an opponent beyond the second round. While five of his last seven fights have ended early, all but one of those fights made it out of the first round, with three ending in round two and another in round three. He’s fought anywhere from 135 lb to 155 lb in the past, but most of his career has been spent down at 135 lb, and he’ll now be making his 125 lb debut.
Overall, Maness is an offensively minded brawler who has good size and length for the 135 lb division, let alone at 125 lb. However, he’s looked pretty hittable, so it will be interesting to see how his chin holds up after the weight cut. While his striking defense hasn’t been great, his takedown defense has been solid, at least against everyone not named Nurmagomedov. Maness has only been taken down six times on 27 opponent attempts (77.8% defense) and three of those takedowns were by Umar Nurmagomedov in Maness’ last fight. On the other side of things, Maness has landed three takedowns of his own on four attempts (75% accuracy).
Fight Prediction:
Maness will have a 3” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.
This is your typical grappler versus striker matchup, with the wildcard being Maness cutting down to 125 lb for the first time in his career. Maness just lost to Ulanbekov’s teammate Umar Nurmagomedov, so there should be some additional familiarity there. We expect the fight to largely be determined by how Maness’ takedown defense holds up. While it’s been solid for most of his career, he struggled to stay on his feet in his last fight, albeit in one of the toughest matchups you could ask for. We could also see him struggle with the speed of 125ers, so just because his takedown defense was solid at 135 lb, doesn’t guarantee it will be the same at 125 lb. Maness also looked like a skeleton on the scale, and we have serious concerns about how his chin will hold up following the brutal weight cut. While Ulanbekov is an unlikely candidate to really test Maness’ chin, crazier things have happened. Maness has shown a nack from hanging around in fights and finding mid round finishes, so it’s not impossible he can catch Ulanbekov with something and land another knockout here, but Ulanbekov has never been finished in his career and the showed the ability to weather a storm and keep on going in his last fight. Maness’ weight drop adds some uncertainty to this matchup, but we like Ulanbekov to get the win. We typically expect Ulanbekov to grind out decisions on the ground, but if Maness looks terrible after the weight cut, we could see Ulanbekov find a finish here.
Our favorite bet here is Ulanbekov’s ML at -210.
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DFS Implications:
Ulanbekov’s wrestling-heavy attack will generally perform better on DraftKings than FanDuel, and he scored 93 and 85 DraftKings points in two decision wins, but just 60 and 78 points on FanDuel. He doesn’t land many ground strikes and is more so looking for submissions, which makes it tough for him to put up a really big score without a finish on either site, but he’s shown a solid floor on DraftKings at least. While he hasn’t been overly impressive so far in the UFC and now he’s facing an opponent with a solid 77% takedown defense, the fact that Maness is dropping down to 125 lb for the first time in his career adds some sneaky upside for Ulanbekov, as it should increase his potential for landing a finish and could leave Maness compromised coming into the fight. While that’s far from a certainty, it does make Ulanbekov a more interesting tournament play. Ulanbekov has only been 25% and 11% owned in his last two fights, and now coming off a loss we could get him at low ownership in a high-upside spot, which is all you can ask for in a large favorite who’s seen the line move in his favor. The odds imply he has a 67% chance to win, a 23% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Maness put up DraftKings scores of 104 and 100 in his last two wins, which both ended early, after scoring 73 points in a decision win in his debut. He’s excelled as an underdog, but is now cutting down to 125 lb for the first time in his career and it’s hard to know how he’ll handle the cut. While it’s not impossible the cut goes smoothly and he has no side effects, there’s a good chance his chin and cardio will be compromised and he may also find himself at a speed disadvantage at the lighter weight class. That makes him a risky play, and this also looks like a tough matchup in general for him to score well as he faces a wrestler who has never been finished in his career. Ulanbekov will be looking to control Maness on the mat, which will make it tough for Maness to score well without a finish. The odds imply he has a 33% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #3
Chase Sherman
14th UFC Fight (4-9)Fresh off his first win in his last five fights, Sherman knocked out Jared Vanderaa in the third round of his last fight after losing four straight and getting submitted in the first round of his previous two matches. Sherman was actually cut for the second time by the UFC following a submission loss to Jake Collier earlier this year, but they brought him back on when they needed a short notice sacrifice for Alexander Romanov, who submitted Sherman in just 131 seconds. Prior to suffering the pair of submission losses, Sherman dropped a pair of decisions to Parker Porter and Andrei Arlovski. In his first stint with the UFC, Sherman went 2-5 from 2016 to 2018 and was cut in September 2018 following his third straight loss. He then landed three straight first round knockouts outside of the UFC and was brought back in 2020. He defeated an undersized Ike Villanueva in his return, but was then popped for PEDs and suspended for nine months. He lost four straight after returning from suspension, before getting his first win since May 2020 in his last fight.
In Sherman’s last fight, Vanderaa weirdly opted not to shoot for a single takedown, despite being a BJJ “black belt” and going against an opponent in Sherman who has proven he’s completely helpless off his back. Sherman took an early striking lead in the fight, outlanding Vanderaa 46-29 in round one. Vanderaa had a better second round and narrowed the striking gap, but Sherman’s cardio held up better than it had in previous fights and midway through the third round Sherman connected with a long combination of punches that had Vanderaa nearly out on the feet and forced to cover up along the cage as the fight was stopped. Sherman finished ahead 137-109 in striking, with no takedowns attempted in the fight and zero seconds of control time between them.
Now 16-10 as a pro, Sherman has 15 wins by KO and one by decision (2017). He’s been knocked out four times, submitted twice, and has four decision losses. Sixteen of his 26 fights have ended in the first round (12-4), three ended in round two (2-1), two ended in round three (1-1), and five have gone the distance (1-4). While Sherman was able to find some success outside of the UFC in 2018 and 2019, he’s gone just 2-7 in his last nine UFC fights.
Overall, Sherman is a low-level Heavyweight and a one-dimensional striker. He’s historically faded after the first round, but is coming off the first third round finish of his career and was able to avoid gassing out in his last match, so maybe something’s changed. The only success he’s found in his career is knocking out super low-level opponents, and 13 of his 15 career KO wins have come outside of the UFC. He’s only finished 3 of his 13 UFC opponents: Jared Vanderaa, who went 1-6 in the UFC, Isaac Villanueva, who’s a Light Heavyweight that went 1-5 in the UFC, and Rashad Coulter, who went 1-3 in the UFC. Sherman averages an identical 6.51 SSL/min and SSA/min, as he’s generally involved in high-volume brawls. Sherman has never even attempted a takedown in the UFC, let alone land one, while his opponents have taken him down 7 times on 21 attempts (66.7% accuracy). He’s looked terrible on the mat and is 0-5 in UFC fights when he’s been taken down. He was quickly finished on the ground in three of the last four matches where he got taken down.
Josh Parisian
5th UFC Fight (2-2)Coming off a career saving win, Parisian kept his UFC hopes alive with a second round TKO win over a terrible Alan Baudot (0-4 in the UFC), after Parisian started off 1-2 in the UFC. Prior to his recent ground and pound victory, Parisian got absolutely dominated on the mat against another low-level Heavyweight in a recent third round TKO loss to Don'Tale Mayes. We also saw Parisian get beat up on the mat by Parker Porter in a decision loss in his UFC debut, so it’s been an ongoing issue for him. Following the loss in his debut, Parisian won a close split decision against Roque Martinez, who went 0-3 in the UFC before being cut. That sloppy split-decision win could have gone either way, but you don’t need to take our word for it. In his post fight interview, Michael Bisping asked Parisian, “How confident were you that you would get the decision?” Parisian responded, “Uhhhhh…I’ll be honest, I wasn’t super confident. I thought I worked really hard. But I wasn’t sure because of the cage control. Sometimes he had…I think he had me on the wall more. And then when I did have him on the wall he was punching me in the face.” To which Bisping responded, “Yeah he definitely punched you in the face a few times.” Parisian initially tried to crack the UFC roster through DWCS in 2018, but despite landing a first round KO he didn’t get a contract. Following that initial appearance on DWCS, Parisian took a shot at The Ultimate Fighter. However, he didn’t last long as he was knocked out in the second round of what counted as an exhibition match so it doesn’t show up on his pro record. He returned to DWCS in 2020 and landed another first round KO, which that time was enough to get him a contract.
In his last fight, Parisian got dropped from a short punch in the first round, but was able to survive off his back after Baudot went to the mat with him. Parisian was able to return to his feet and land a takedown late in the round. He finished the round landing ground and pound as he stood over Baudot, while simultaneously looking back at the referee, imploring that the fight should be stopped to no avail. Parisian landed another takedown 30 seconds into round two and again went to work with ground and pound. Baudot looked helpless off his back as Parisian continued to land ground and pound, however, Baudot was able to return to his feet midway through the round. Both guys looked exhausted at that point, but Parisian was able to drag him back to the mat, although he almost ended up in bottom position as he looked for a trip but practically ended up pulling guard. He was able to scramble to top position on the ground and worked to full mount where he used the last of his remaining energy to force a stoppage with unimposing ground and pound. The fight ended with Baudot ahead in significant strikes 49-42, but Parisian ahead in total strikes 102-56. Parisian landed three of his four takedown attempts and finished ahead in control time 3:09-1:43 on his way to a second round TKO finish.
Now 15-5 as a pro, Parisian has 11 wins by KO, two by submission, and two decisions. Eight of his knockouts have come in round one, while the other three ended in round two. Both of his submission wins came in the second round in his first four pro fights (2015 & 2016). Both of his career decision wins have been split/majority. He’s been knocked out twice (R2 2017 & R3 2021), submitted once (R1 2019), and has two decision losses (2015 & 2020). Prior to making his 2020 UFC debut, he hadn’t required the judges in 10 straight fights (8-2), with eight of those fights ending in round one and two in round two. He’s now alternated wins and losses for his last five fights and is coming off a win.
Overall, Parisian is a large low-level Heavyweight, who gasses out later in fights, throws sloppy punches, and is terrible off his back. He tends to mix in more kicks than most Heavyweights, but by no means is a great kicker. He’s been taken down 8 times on 14 attempts (42.9% defense) in his four UFC fights and two DWCS appearances. He’s landed four takedowns of his own on 13 attempts (30.8% accuracy) in those six fights, with all of those attempts coming in his last three fights as he’s begun to mix in more wrestling lately. He also averages 4.97 SSL/min (5th most on the slate) and 5.11 SSA/min (6th most on the slate).
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 6’4” but Parisian will have a 1” reach advantage.
This is your quintessential low-level Heavyweight fight. Both guys are terrible off their back and tend to gas out later in fights, especially when they’re forced to wrestle. Sherman is the more dangerous boxer, while Parisian recently discovered his best path to victory is taking opponents down and beating them up with ground and pound. That would be an excellent strategy for him in this matchup, the only question will be whether or not he can successfully get the fight to the ground. Working in his favor, the last five opponents to try and take Sherman down have all landed at least one takedown and Sherman went on to lose all five of those fights, quickly getting finished on the mat in three of the last four when he was taken down. That’s encouraging for Parisian’s chances, although keep in mind he does have just a 30% takedown accuracy and is by no means a great wrestler. If Sherman can keep the fight standing, he has a good shot at knocking Parisian out, but we’ll say Parisian does get the fight to the ground and finds a finish in the first two rounds.
Our favorite bet here is “Fight Ends in R2 KO” at +400.
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DFS Implications:
Sherman is a low-level Heavyweight who relies on landing knockouts to win fights and has gone just 1-4 in his five career decisions. In his lone decision win, he scored 75 DraftKings points, while he’s averaged 111 points in his three UFC knockouts. All three of those finishes occurred in the later rounds, and he’s shown the ability to score well with late round finishes backed by his striking volume, but has never attempted a takedown in the UFC. He’s lost four of his last five fights and is 0-5 in fights where he’s been taken down even once. If Sherman can keep this fight standing, he has a good shot at landing a knockout, but if he gets taken down there’s a really good chance he gets finished on the mat. That leaves him as a boom or bust DFS option and there’s a really good chance the victor in the fight ends up in winning tournament lineups. The odds imply Sherman has a 55% chance to win, a 35% chance to land a finish, and an 18% chance it comes in round one.
Parisian is coming off a massive scoring performance where he scored 119 DraftKings points and 118 points on FanDuel in a second round ground and pound finish in a dream matchup against an undersized fraudulent Heavyweight in Alan Baudot. Now Parisian gets another great matchup in Chase Sherman, who’s helpless off his back, and this sets up as another great opportunity for Parisian to find a finish on the mat. Just keep in mind, Parisian is not a good fighter and has a limited gas tank. He’s always at risk of getting finished himself, leaving him as a boom or bust DFS option who’s been finished in three of his last four losses. He only scored 79 DraftKings points in his lone UFC decision win, indicating that he’ll likely need a finish here to be useful, unless he controls Sherman for the entire fight on the ground on his way to a decision win. The odds imply he has a 45% chance to win, a 29% chance to land a finish, and a 13% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #2
Neil Magny
28th UFC Fight (19-8)This matchup was actually scheduled for mid October, but Rodriguez was forced to withdraw due to an elbow infection, which he’s presumably taken care of since.
Looking to bounce back from a second round submission loss to Shavkat Rakhmonov, the 35-year-old Magny had fought to six straight decisions (5-1) leading up to the recent defeat. However, he could easily be on a two fight losing streak and have lost three of his last four, had he not won a close/questionable split decision over Max Griffin just before losing to Rakhmonov.
In his last fight, Magny almost immediately got put on his back after Rakhmonov caught a kick and used it to push Magny to the mat. That’s where the fight stayed for the entire round, as Rakhmonov did a good job controlling the position and doing damage. All Magny could do was try for a futile leg lock to try and escape the position, but Rakhmonov was never in any danger. Rakhmonov returned the fight to the ground early in round two and continued to dominate Magny on the ground with ease. With 10 seconds remaining in the round, Rakhmonov leaned back into a guillotine and forced a tap with just two seconds remaining in the round. The fight ended with Rakhmonov ahead 19-11 in significant strikes and 56-21 in total strikes. He also landed both of his takedown attempts with 9:06 in control time in a fight that only lasted 9:58. It was a completely lopsided performance where Magny never got anything going.
Now 26-9 as a pro, Magny has seven wins by KO, three by submission, and 16 decisions. He’s only submitted one opponent since 2011, which came in the third round of a 2015 fight. He’s also only knocked out two opponents since 2015 (2016 & 2018) and hasn’t finished anybody in his last eight fights. On the other side of things, he’s been finished in seven of his nine pro losses, including two KOs and five submissions. Three of his five submission defeats occurred in the first round, with the other two ending in round two. One of his two KO losses also ended in round one, with the other ending in round four. Despite all the early losses, Magny has only been finished twice since 2017 and has only been knocked out once in his last 12 fights. Magny has impressively gone 16-2 in his 18 career decisions.
Overall, Magny wears on his opponents with a combination of striking and grappling as he weaponizes his cardio and generally wins the later rounds. While he generally doesn’t put up huge significant striking totals, averaging just 3.59 SSL/min, he tacks on 2.3 TDL/15 min to help grind on his opponents’ gas tanks. However, in his last five fights, Magny has only landed 8 of his 29 takedowns attempts (27.6% accuracy), down from his career average of 40% takedown accuracy. And while he attempted 19 takedowns in his last three fights, he only landed three of those (15.8%). Magny doesn’t get hit a ton, averaging just 2.16 SSA/min in his career, but his biggest weakness has been his defensive grappling and his 57% takedown defense isn’t anything to write home about. Three of his last four losses came against solid grapplers in Shavkat Rakhmonov, Michael Chiesa, and Rafael Dos Anjos, and Magny has generally done better against strikers.
Daniel Rodriguez
9th UFC Fight (7-1)Just eight weeks removed from a controversial split-decision win over an undersized Li Jingliang, Rodriguez appeared to take exception with the fact that everyone said he lost the fight—which it definitely appeared he did. Leading up to that dubious win, Rodriguez took 13 months off as he underwent multiple hand surgeries following a decision victory over Kevin Lee. However, now that he’s healthy, he’s jumping right back there as we’ve often seen him do in the past. He’s been the king of short notice fights since joining the UFC, with the majority of his fights coming on short notice or with last minute opponent changes. His only loss in eight UFC appearances came in a close/questionable decision loss to Nicolas Dalby, and since then he’s won four straight. He’s also won 13 of his last 14 fights, with his last seven fights all ending in either first round knockouts (2-0) or decisions (4-1).
In his last fight, Rodriguez had actually been scheduled to face Kevin Holland in a 180 lb Catchweight match, but after Chimaev missed weight by 7.5 lb the entire main card turned into a game of musical chairs and Rodriguez got matched up on less than 24 hours’ notice against Li Jingliang instead (who weighed in at 170.5 lb). Following his long layoff, Rodriguez started slow in the match, and Jingliang took an early striking lead, finishing ahead 27-20 in the round. However, two of the three judges curiously still scored the round for Rodriguez. Round two was closer, with Rodriguez leading in striking, but Jingliang landing the more impactful shots and tacking on a takedown at the end. Again, two of the three judges scored it for Rodriguez, while one gave it to Jingliang. Round three was also close, but Rodriguez again finished a little ahead in striking. That was arguably Jingliang’s worst round and ironically the only round that two of the three judges scored in his favor. There wasn’t a single round in the fight that all three judges agreed on, with all three scoring the fight differently on a round by round basis. One judge gave Rodriguez the first two rounds, another gave him the last two rounds, and the third had Jingliang winning the last two. The fight ended with Rodriguez ahead 88-78 in significant strikes and 89-78 in total strikes, while Jingliang landed the only takedown attempted in the fight.
Now 17-2 as a pro, Rodriguez has eight wins by KO, four by submission, and five decisions. Three of his knockouts ended in the first round, three more ended in round two, and one ended in round three. While his last two submission wins occurred in the later two rounds, the first two of his career came in round one. He’s never been finished, with both of his losses ending in decisions. While 12 of his 19 pro fights have ended early, four of his last five and five of his eight UFC fights have gone the distance. He also has a pair of first round knockouts and a second round submission win in the UFC.
Overall, Rodriguez is a high-volume striker, who averages 7.75 SSL/min (most on the slate) and 5.35 SSA/min (4th most on the slate). It’s rare to see Rodriguez shoot for a takedown and even rarer for him to land one, as he’s only completed one of his four attempts in eight UFC fights. On the other side of things, Rodriguez has been taken down 7 times on 26 opponent attempts (73.1% accuracy). However, he notably went on to win all four of the fights where he gave up a takedown, with the last three of those ending in decisions.
Fight Prediction:
Magny will have a 2” height advantage and 6” reach advantage.
If one more judge in Magny’s second most recent fight had scored round two for Griffin—a round Griffin led in striking, while stuffing all of Magny’s takedown attempts—then Magny would be on a two fights skid and would have lost three of his last four and we would likely be looking at his recent record very differently. The UFC felt so strongly that Griffin won that fight that they actually paid him his win bonus despite losing a split decision. Magny got dropped in the first round of that fight and largely struggled to keep up the fight, but was able to rely on his grappling in the third round as Griffin slowed down. That’s been a common trend for Magny in his last five fights, as he won the three where he was able to control the grappling exchanges, but lost the two where he was the one being controlled. Magny is just 2-4 in his last six fights where he was unable to land a takedown. One of those wins was against a debuting Craig White, who finished 0-2 in the UFC and has lost five straight fights beginning with the loss to Magny. The other was against Anthony Rocco Martin, who was cut from the UFC following the loss. On the flipside, he’s won 16 of his last 17 fights where he landed at least one takedown. Magny has been finished in five of his last six losses, and while he’s been more prone to getting submitted in his career, he was knocked out in two of those five early losses.
Rodriguez has shown the ability to operate at a high pace for three rounds, so Magny is less likely to simply wear him out and will need to control Rodriguez for periods of time to separate himself in this matchup. While Rodriguez has a solid 73% takedown defense, three of his last four opponents have gotten him down at least once, so it’s certainly not impenetrable. Neither guy looked very good in their last fight, and they’ll both be looking to put on more impressive performances here. We don’t see Magny finishing Rodriguez and for Magny to win he’ll need to keep the striking numbers close, control the distance in space, and control Rodriguez for periods of time on the cage and/or the mat as he grinds out a decision win. Conversely, Rodriguez will need to keep this a striking battle, stay off the cage, and outland his way to victory either over the course of three rounds or in a less likely knockout. There’s also always a smaller chance that Rodriguez can lock up a guillotine if Magny shoots for a lazy takedown, although Rodriguez’s last submission win came in his 2020 UFC debut over a highly submittable Tim Means. We expect this to end in a close decision that will hinge on the amount of grappling success that Magny can find, but we’re leaning towards Rodriguez pulling off the upset.
Our favorite bet here is “FGTD” at -190.
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DFS Implications:
Magny has averaged 82 DraftKings points in his last five wins, which all ended in decisions. He’s shown a wide range of scoring outcomes in those fights with totals of 75, 72, 100, 63, and 99. His two big scores both required four takedowns, 5+ minutes of control time, and 116+ total strikes, showing that he can score well without a finish through grappling and control in the right opportunity. The most recent of those came against Robbie Lawler back in 2020. Since then, Magny has failed to top 75 DraftKings points in his last four fights, failing to come even close to really scoring well. At 35 years old and just 2-2 in his last four fights, you have to wonder if he’s now on the decline towards the end of a lengthy career. While this next matchup does set up as a good opportunity for Magny to land more striking volume, Rodriguez has a pretty solid 73% takedown defense and it would be surprising for Magny to be able to control him for enough time to put up a big grappling driven score. We also don’t see Magny finishing Rodriguez, so he’ll need a combination of grappling and striking to try and squeak out a decent score with the judges, but we’re still expecting him to come up a little short of cracking winning lineups even if he does win. The odds imply he has a 51% chance to win, a 15% chance to land a finish, and a 7% chance it comes in round one.
Rodriguez scored just 65 DraftKings points in his recent split-decision win over Jingliang, after averaging 102 points in his first six UFC wins. In his three early wins in the UFC, he’s averaged 111 DraftKings points, while that number drops to 86 points in his four decision victories. He was able to score 106 points in a high-volume brawl in his first UFC decision win, but has scored 65, 88, and 85 points in his last three decision victories. Now he faces a rangy opponent who will likely be looking to tie him up in the clinch and who only averages 2.16 SSA/min. That lowers the chances that Rodriguez can score well in a decision, and leaves him more dependent on landing a finish to really score well. With that said, at his cheaper price tag, it’s still possible he scores enough to serve as a value play even in a decision if he can stay out of the clinch and keep this a striking battle, but he’s a riskier play than normal and didn’t look great in his last fight. He’s historically been very popular (even when he’s not mispriced), although he’s also now coming off the worst DFS score of his career, which could bump his ownership down some. When you combine his high ownership and lower scoring projection without a finish, we’re not overly excited about him in large-field tournaments, but if only a few dogs on the slate win then he’ll still likely end up in winning lineups. He also makes for a slightly better play on FanDuel than DraftKings and also should have a solid floor for low-risk and small-field contests. The odds imply he has a 49% chance to win, a 24% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #1
Marina Rodriguez
10th UFC Fight (6-1-2)After going 2-1-2 in her first five UFC fights, Rodriguez has now won four straight but is coming off a close/questionable three-round decision win over Xiaonan Yan. Prior to that, Rodriguez won a pair of five-round decisions over Mackenzie Dern and Michelle Waterson-Gomez, after landing her only finish in the UFC in a R2 TKO victory over Amanda Ribas. Rodriguez’s other eight UFC fights have all gone the distance, and you have to go all the way back to a 2018 R1 TKO win on DWCS Brazil to find her second most recent finish.
In Rodriguez’s last fight, Yan took an early lead in striking in addition to landing a takedown late in the first round to win the first five minutes on all three judges’ score cards. Round two was dead even in significant strikes (14-14), with Yan holding a narrow lead in total strikes (22-20) and tacking on another takedown and leading in control time 1:29-0:28. Nevertheless, two of the three judges scored it for Rodriguez, in what was ultimately the pivotal round in the fight. Rodriguez led the dance in round three, outlanding Yan 40-18 in significant strikes and 41-19 in total strikes to squeak out a close split-decision win. The fight ended with Rodriguez ahead 72-56 in significant strikes and 79-66 in total strikes, while Yan led in takedowns 2-0.
Now 16-1-2 as a pro, Rodriguez has six wins by KO, one by submissions, and nine decisions. While she does have seven finishes on her record, five of those came in her first six fights against less experienced opponents and 11 of her last 13 fights have gone the distance. She’s never been finished, with her only career loss ending in a 2020 split decision against Carla Esparza.
This will be the 3rd five-round fight of Rodriguez’s career, with her previous two both ending in decision wins in her second and third most recent fights.
Overall, Rodriguez is a very solid Muay Thai striker, but she doesn’t offer anything in terms of offensive grappling as she’s only landed one takedown on five attempts in nine UFC fights and hasn’t even attempted any in her last six matches. She did also land her only takedown attempt on DWCS Brazil, which factors into her 33.3% career takedown accuracy. On the flipside, she’s been taken down 15 times on 44 attempts by her opponents (65.9% defense), with all nine of her opponents attempting at least one takedown against her. Seven of those opponents landed at least one takedown against her and she’s been taken down one or more times in six straight fights. Rodriguez throws a decent amount of striking volume, as she averages 5.03 SSL/min while only absorbing 3.07 SS/min, but she generally doesn’t put up huge striking totals. Instead, she relies more on calculated power to pick her opponents apart and uses her length well to control the distance.
Amanda Lemos
9th UFC Fight (6-2)Fresh off a second round submission win over Michelle Waterson-Gomez, Lemos has won six of her last seven fights since dropping down to 115 lb following a R2 TKO loss at 135 lb in her 2017 UFC debut. A few months after the loss in her debut, Lemos was hit with a lengthy suspension after she tested positive for steroids and ended up taking 29 months off before returning to the Octagon. During her time away, she dropped two weight classes and returned from her suspension at 115 lb in 2019. After looking undersized at 135 lb, she has looked great at 115 lb. She won five straight at the new weight class, including three first round finishes. She was then submitted for the first time in her career by Jessica Andrade with a standing arm-triangle choke, but bounced back with a submission win of her own most recently.
In her last fight, Lemos came in with a patient approach, not looking to rush things early on. She began landing some shots as she settled in, but then got taken down in the final minute of round one, before reversing the position in the closing seconds of the round. Waterson-Gomez shot for another takedown 90 seconds into round two and Lemos quickly jumped guillotine and forced a tap. The ref never even saw the tap, so credit to Waterson-Gomez for acknowledging it happened after Lemos mercifully let go of the guillotine. The fight ended with Waterson-Gomez ahead in significant strikes 29-20 and in total strikes 35-20, while she landed one of her two takedown attempts with 68 seconds of control time.
Now 12-2-1 as a pro, Lemos has seven wins by KO, three submissions, and two decision victories. Eight of her 10 finishes have come in the first round, while she’s coming off her only second round finish and also has one in the first minute of round three. Both of her losses have also come early, with a 2017 second round TKO in her UFC debut, which took place at 135 lb, and a R1 submission loss at 115 lb. Since moving down to 115 lb, four of her seven fights have ended in the first round (3-1), with one ending in a second round win and the other two going the distance (2-0).
This will be the 2nd five-round fight of Lemos’ career. The first was earlier this year, back in April, and Lemos got submitted in the first round by Jessica Andrade.
Overall, Lemos is unquestionably the most dangerous in round one, but she did still look somewhat dangerous in the third round against Hill and landed a second round finish in her last fight. While she’s primarily a striker, she will look to lock up submissions on the mat, and loves to defend takedowns with guillotines. Now 35 years old, Lemos got a late start in MMA as she didn’t turn pro until 2014 when she was already 27 years old. That should mean she has more tread left on the tires than your typical 35-year-old fighter. She’s a powerful but patient striker who relies more on landing big shots than a ton of volume, but once she gets an opponent hurt she’ll unload to try and finish fights. She’s landed five knockdowns in the UFC and may be the most powerful Strawweight in the world. While Lemos has landed four takedowns on seven attempts (57.1% accuracy) in her eight UFC fights, four of those came in her first three UFC fights and she’s gone 0 for 3 on her attempts in her last five matches, failing to even attempt a takedown in four of those matches. On the other side of things, she’s been taken down twice on 11 attempts by her opponents (81.8% defense), and no one has ever gotten her down more than once in a fight.
Fight Prediction:
Rodriguez will have a 2” height advantage, but both fighters share a 65” reach and are 35 years old.
This fight was only recently elevated from three rounds to five after Movsar Evloev withdrew from the previously scheduled headliner against Bryce Mitchell and Mitchell was also removed from the card. The change was announced just two weeks ago during the UFC 280 broadcast, which is actually when this matchup was originally scheduled to take place before it got pushed back two weeks. With so little time to adjust for the additional rounds, it’s fair to wonder how prepared either of these two are to go five-rounds, but especially Lemos who has never been in a fight that made it past the third round and has had cardio concerns at times in the past. Our expectation is that both of these Brazilian Muay Thai strikers will be looking to pace themselves to some extent, which should help to preserve their cardio as in a high-stakes striking battle as they both try to stake a claim for the top contender spot in the division. Neither one of them has landed a takedown in their last five respective fights and we’d be shocked if Rodriguez looked to grapple here. It’s not impossible that Lemos will look to change things up with a takedown attempt at some point in this fight, but that would just further reduce her already limited gas tank, so we’d be somewhat surprised to see it happen. If the fight plays out as we expect it to in a tactical striking battle, then cardio could play less of a role than many are predicting. With that said, we do still give the advantage to Rodriguez the longer this fight goes and expect her to outland her way to a decision win if Lemos is unable to put her away early. Considering Rodriguez has never been finished in her career, we’re taking her by decision in this spot, but we’re expecting a closer fight than the odds suggest.
Our favorite bet here is “FGTD” at +106.
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DFS Implications:
Rodriguez is a dangerous Muay Thai striker but doesn’t offer anything in terms of offensive grappling and has only landed one takedown in nine UFC fights and none in her last six. That leaves her more reliant on landing finishes to score well and eight of her nine UFC fights have gone the distance. She only scored 61 DraftKings points and 63 points on FanDuel in her recent three-round decision victory and even if we extend those numbers over five-rounds, we’d still only be looking at 82/92 DK/FD points. She won a pair of five-round decisions just before that, but scored just 89/106 and 85/95 DK/FD points in those two victories. So she’s consistently come up short when it comes to scoring well, and at her high price tag she’ll either need a well-timed finish, a multi-knockdown performance, or to far exceed her career striking numbers. Considering this fight was moved from three rounds to five just a couple of weeks ago, we’re not expecting a crazy high pace from either fighter, as they’ll both likely be looking to preserve their gas tanks to some extent. That will make it tougher for Rodriguez to crack tournament winning lineups and this looks like another fadeable main event as the most likely outcome is for Rodriguez to win a decision and score around 85 DraftKings points. The odds imply she has a 66% chance to win, a 31% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Lemos has averaged 100 DraftKings in her six UFC victories and landed first round finishes in three of those six wins, She also landed a second round submission victory in her last match, although that scored just 83 DK points. However, she scored just 68 DraftKings points and 62 points on FanDuel in her last three-round decision win and even if we extend her numbers in that fight over five rounds, they would still only be good for 93/90 DK/FD points. So overall she’s been reliant on landing finishes to score well, with 8 of her 10 career finishes ending in the first round, another in the first half of round two, and the final one in the opening 30 seconds of round three. She doesn’t have the best cardio and tends to slow down later in fights, which is obviously concerning as she steps into a five-round fight. She’s never actually been in a fight that lasted longer than three rounds, so it’s hard to know what exactly her championship round cardio will even look like if this fight makes it that far, but the expectations are low. Rodriguez only averages 3.07 SSA/min, so cardio aside it will be hard for Lemos to put up a huge striking total, which likely leaves her reliant on being the first fighter to ever finish Rodriguez to both win this fight and score well in DFS. However, if she ends up getting the same judges that scored Rountree vs. Jacoby last week, then who knows what will happen in a decision. At her cheap price tag, if she somehow wins a decision there’s a good chance she could still serve as a value play, it’s just hard to see her winning a decision. Therefore we’re more focussed on her chances of landing a finish, and if that happens it would be hard to see her getting left out of winning lineups. The odds imply she has a 34% chance to win, a 23% chance to land a finish, and a 7% chance it comes in round one.
Good luck to everyone this week, we hope you win big! Tag us on Twitter @dfs_mma with your winnings so we can see how you did!
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