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Late Scratches: Rothwell/Lins and Benoit/Adashev were both canceled during weigh-ins. RIBAS/HILL IS OFF!!!
Fighter Notes:
Fight #10
Carlston Harris
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making his UFC debut on a three fight winning/finishing streak, Harris has won seven of his last eight fights with finishes in five of those. One of the two decision wins came in a five round fight where Harris won the vacant Brave Welterweight belt in 2017. He nearly finished that fight with submissions at a few points in a smother grappling performance. In his next fight he immediately lost the belt in the first round via knockout. That’s his only loss in nearly five years, and the only time he’s been finished in his 19 fight pro career. He also notably has a three round decision win over UFC crazy man, Michel Pereira, back in 2015.
After losing two of his first three pro fights in 2011-2012 (both in decisions), Harris has won 14 of his last 16. Eight of his 15 career wins have come early, with four KOs and four submissions. His last four fights have all notably ended in the first two rounds. Harris has a smothering grappling heavy approach that utilizes chain wrestling and not a ton of striking volume. He’s a threat to end fights on the mat with both submissions and ground and pound and can still knock people out on the feet. We still don’t know how his skills will transition to the UFC but there’s a lot of potential here.
Christian Aguilera
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)After starting his pro career 13-6, Aguilera made his UFC debut last June in spectacular fashion as he landed a 59 second R1 KO over Anthony Ivy. That marked the 11th career KO for Aguilera in his 14 career wins, and 10th in the first round. He’s also been knocked out four times himself, all in R1. As his record indicates, the former hockey player is a pure brawler and has no grappling game.
In his second UFC fight, Aguilera’s one-dimensional fighting style was exposed as he went against a well rounded stud in Sean Brady. The fight stayed on the feet for the first four minutes before Brady eventually took Aguilera to the mat late in round one. He then took Aguilera down again early in the second round and put him to sleep with an impressive one-armed Guillotine Choke. Take it for what it’s worth, but in a recent interview Aguilera did say he’s been working on his ground game since getting submitted in his last fight. We would have been shocked if he had said he wasn’t working on his grappling after getting dominated in his last match, but until he actually shows us something in a real fight, we’re skeptical it will have improved much.
Prior to the loss, Aguilera had won three straight with two of those ending in R1 KO’s. Four of his last five and 10 of his last 12 fights have now ended early, with eight of those 12 ending in the first round.
Fight Prediction:
Harris will have a noticeable 3” height advantage and 4” reach advantage.
In what’s been accurately described as a clash of styles, Harris will be looking to get this fight to the mat, while Aguilera does everything within his power to keep it standing up. We’re skeptical Aguilera will be able to defend the relentless grappling pressure of Harris, and expect this fight to end up on the mat quickly. The bigger question for us is if and how Harris will be able to finish the fight once it gets there. A submission feels like the most likely outcome, but Harris has shown the ability to end fights with ground and pound, so that also remains in play. As long as Harris doesn’t lose his mind and try to stand and trade with Aguilera, we like him to get the finish and think a submission is the more likely outcome.
The two safest options here are Harris’ moneyline at -160 and betting the “Fight Does Not Go the Distance” at -144. We also like “Harris ITD” at +165, “Harris Wins by Submission” at +310, “Harris Wins by R1 Submission” at +750, “Harris Wins by R2 Submission” at +1100, and “Aguilera Wins by R1 KO” at +850 to hedge.
DFS Implications:
Harris’ relentless takedowns, smothering grappling style and history of finishes present the potential for a DFS explosion—especially on DraftKings due to control time and ground strikes. He still has the potential to put up a massive FanDuel score as well, his floor is simply lower if this fight goes the distance. Hopefully the fact that Harris is making his UFC debut will help him to fly under the radar to some extent, but it’s hard to imagine him not getting a decent amount of hype around the industry. We love this spot for him and think he makes for an exceptional play. The odds imply Harris has a 59% chance to win this fight, a 36% chance to end it early and a 15% chance to get it done in R1.
Aguilera is a perennial R1 KO or bust fighter, who’s brawling fighting style inherently makes for bipolar scoring with a nonexistent floor and spiked weeks when he wins. That makes it fairly easy to come up with an appropriate exposure level in DFS, as you can simply look at his chances to land a first round finish. This week the odds imply he has a 41% chance to win, a 23% chance to end it early and a 10% chance to end it in R1. Clearly those numbers indicate he has somewhat of a chance to finish the fight outside of R1, and at his price, a later finish would still be useful, but he clearly looks the most dangerous in R1 to us.
Fight #9
Tafon Nchukwi
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Coming off a decision win in his UFC debut in what was just his fifth pro fight, Nchukwi knocked out his previous four opponents in a round and a half or less. He also has a background in Muay Thai, where he went 13-1, and won a kickboxing world championship before switching to MMA.
He landed his shot in the UFC with a September R2 KO win on DWCS over a much smaller opponent in Al Matavao. Nchukwi stands 6’0” with a 77” reach and weighed in at 204 lb for that fight. Matavao is 5’8” with a 67.5” reach and weighed only 200 lb. Nchukwi was slightly outlanded by Matavao in significant strikes (55-47), but was clearly landing the more powerful blows and then brutally knocked out the smaller Matavao in R2 with a violent left kick that left him out cold on the mat for several minutes.
Nchukwi fought his first two pro fights at Heavyweight, before competing in a 225 lb catchweight bout against UFC fighter William Knight—who Nchukwi knocked out in R1. He then dropped another 21 lb for the DWCS fight and continued to drop weight as he went all the way down to Middleweight (185 lb) for his UFC debut, where he’ll stay for his second UFC match. It has to be a really tough weight cut for him as he looks massive.
In his December UFC debut, Nchukwi showed the ability to go three full rounds. He landed a solid amount of volume in that debut, as he outlanded Jamie Pickett 120-40 in significant strikes and 159-40 in total strikes. Nchukwi went 0 for 2 on takedowns, while defending three of Pickett’s four attempts. Nchukwi throws dangerous head kicks, oftentimes at the ends of combinations. He caught Pickett with one midway through the third round and followed it up with a knee to the body that dropped Pickett. The fight looked close to being stopped, but Nchukwi was unable to finish Pickett on the ground and it went to a decision shortly after. Pickett (11-5) has notably never been knocked out in 16 pro fights, and Nchukwi now gets another opponent, in Jun yong Park (12-4), who can claim the same.
UPDATE: Tafon was the last fighter to weigh-in, and while he did make weight, he was moving incredibly slowly. Take that as you will.
Jun Yong Park
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Park is coming off a smothering decision win over John Phillips, where he controlled Phillips on the ground for nearly the entire fight with over 13 minutes of control time on four takedowns, while landing 260 total strikes, but just 10 significant. Phillips is one of the more helpless fighters you’ll ever see on the mat, so the win certainly needs to be taken in context.
That was Park’s second straight decision win, after he previously defeated Marc-Andre Barriault to notch his first UFC victory. Park outlanded Barriault 77-51 in significant strikes and 83-57 in total strikes, while landing 5 of 10 takedowns. He wasn’t able to keep Barriault on the ground long in that fight, finishing with just three and a half minutes of control time.
Park made his UFC debut in 2019 against Anthony Hernandez and was submitted in the second round via Anaconda Choke. That was impressively Park’s only loss in his last 10 fights and only the second time in his career he’s been finished—the other was a R2 2016 Rear-Naked Choke Submission. His other two pro losses both went the distance. Nine of his 12 career wins notably came early, with five KOs and three submissions, but three of his four career decision wins have come in his last five fights as he’s begun to face tougher competition, so take his finishes with a grain of salt.
Fight Prediction:
Nchukwi will have a 2” height advantage and 4” reach advantage.
While Nchukwi recently dropped down to 185 lb, Park mainly fought at 170 lb until he moved up to 185 lb. So combine that with the height and reach advantage and Nchukwi will likely look a weight class above Park come fight day. Park has recently shown the ability to grind out decisions, but he appears to be facing his most dangerous opponent to date. This fight will really come down to whether or not Park can get Nchukwi down to the mat, as we don’t see him winning the striking battle on the feet. Neither guy has ever been knocked out in their careers, and there’s a good chance this goes thes distance, but if it ends early we’re confident Nchukwi will be the one left standing.
“Nchukwi ITD” at +210 and “Fight Ends in Decision” at -126 are the two bets we’re interested in.
DFS Implications:
Even in a decision, Nchukwi was still able to score a respectable 101 DraftKings points and 113 points on FanDuel in his recent debut. However, that required a knockdown and an above average amount of striking volume, with 120 significant strikes and 159 total strikes. From what we’ve seen from him in limited tape, he does generally throw a decent amount of volume, but not enough to keep up the pace he recently set. In his second most recent fight, which came on DWCS, he was on pace to land 100 significant strikes and 105 total strikes. So if he hadn’t landed a knockdown in his last match and sustained the pace from his DWCS fight, he would have scored just 76 DraftKings points and 89 points on FanDuel. Based on that, we can’t count on him to again score well in a decision and Park only absorbed significant striking totals of 59, 51 and 5 in his three UFC fights. Although, the 59 came in his R2 submission loss in his UFC debut, which was on pace to end up at 92 over the course of 15 minutes. There’s also a decent chance that Park takes Nchukwi at least once, which will further limit Nchukwi’s ability to put up a big striking total. Therefore, Nchukwi very likely needs a finish here to be useful in DFS and Park has notably never been knocked out in 16 pro fights. There is a good chance that Nchukwi will bolster his FanDuel score with takedowns defended, making him a better play over there. Nevertheless, the odds suggest Nchukwi has a 57% chance to win, a 30% chance to get a finish and an 11% chance to end it in R1.
Park’s last fight legitimately may have played a major role in DraftKings’ decision to change their entire MMA scoring system. He put on a dominating ground and pound performance against John Phillips, where Park went 4 for 4 on takedowns, amassed over 13 minutes of control time and landed 260 total strikes. However, only 10 of those strikes went down as significant, allowing the lopsided performance to slip through the cracks under the old scoring system, which didn’t account for total strikes or control time. So while that effort was good for 128 points under the new DraftKings rules, it totaled just 67 points at the time under the old rules. By no means are we suggesting that we’ll see a repeat performance here, and while Park is nicknamed “The Iron Turtle,” John Phillips (7% takedown defense) is the true turtle on his back. Nchukwi stopped 3 of 4 takedown attempts in his UFC debut and is a much tougher opponent to ground. However, Park was able to take Marc-Andre Barriault (72% takedown defense) down five times on 10 attempts in his second most recent fight, so you have to imagine it will be a big part of his game plan against a power striker like Nchukwi. With such limited tape and data on Nchukwi’s defensive grappling, it’s difficult to say how it will hold up, but Park’s path to victory in this fight is to get it to the ground and control the fight there. He does have three submissions on his record, but the last one came nearly four years ago and he didn’t look to be great at landing submissions against Phillips. Park’s mostly just looking to hail down pitter patter ground strikes and control his opponents on the mat. Because of that, Park is more likely to score well on DraftKings, especially if his last performance is of any indication. After putting up 93 and 128 DraftKings points in his recent two decision wins, it will be interesting to see where his ownership ends up. The odds imply Park has a 43% chance to win this fight, a 19% chance to end it early and a 8% chance to finish it in R1.
Fight #8
Ludovit Klein
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)After landing a 76 second R1 KO in his recent short notice UFC debut, Klein’s only misstep with the organization so far has been missing weight by 4 lb for his first fight. Obviously it will be extra important to monitor him at weigh-ins because of that. Klein is known for his violent left head kicks and showed why in his debut as he landed one flush to the face of Shane Young and then followed it up with a flurry of punches to put Young out. Despite that fight lasting just over a minute, you could see how patient Klein is as he stalks his prey to time his kill shots.
Klein has now won eight fights in a row and owns a 17-2 pro record. Impressively, only one of those 19 fights went the distance, which came in a 2018 decision win. Eight of his pro wins have come by KO and eight by submission, but his last seven finishes have all ended in knockouts, while his submission wins occurred earlier in his career—including six in his first six pro fights. Nine of his 16 finishes occured in the first round. His two career losses also occurred in the first round—both in 2017—one by KO and the other by submission. So despite his patient striking, his fights generally end in the first five minutes.
In his last fight before joining the UFC, he knocked his opponent down in R1 with a vicious head kick and then finished him with hammer punches. In the fight prior to that, he knocked his opponent out cold with another high kick and then it was more of the same in his recent debut. So you can see why there’s so much buzz about his devastating head kicks. In his recent fights he hasn’t seemed to have any interest in taking opponents to the ground, as he appears to have fallen in love with striking—and for good reason.
Michael Trizano
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Coming off a 2 year layoff, Trizano has been battling with a series of injuries, including two knee injuries and then an ankle injury that forced him out of a scheduled fight against Rafael Alves back in February. Trizano got his shot in the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter, which he ended up winning via split decision in the final match.
His last win came in another low-volume split decision win, this time over Luis Pena. Trizano led in significant strikes 51-23. Both fighters landed one takedown, Trizano on two attempts and Pena on nine. Trizano consistently ducked his head to his right to avoid punches in that fight, which is notable because that will play perfectly into Klein’s left head kick if Trizano continues that tendency. Following the fight, Trizano was asked if he would stay at 155 lb or drop down to 145 lb. Trizano responded that he would probably stay at 155 lb, saying there was no weight cut, and implying that he liked that and didn’t want to do any unnecessary work.
Despite what he said following the win over Pena, after winning his first two UFC fights up at 155 lb, Trizano dropped down to 145 lb for his last fight and proceeded to get submitted by Grant Dawson in the second round. For the record, Trizano has gone back and forth between 145 lb and 155 lb throughout his pro career, and has gone 4-1 at 145 lb, 3-0 at 155 lb and 1-0 at 150 lb.. Three of his four early wins notably came at 145 lb. After fighting three straight grapplers in his first three UFC fights, it will be interesting to see how Trizano responds to the explosive striking of Klein, but our expectations are low.
Fight Prediction:
Trizano will have a 4” height advantage but Klein will have a 1” reach advantage.
It would be shocking if Trizano won this fight. Unimpressed by anything we saw from him prior to his extended layoff, we can’t imagine he’ll look sharper after two years away. The only question for us is when will Klein finish Trizano. Klein is so patient that we can’t just assume it will come in R1—although that’s the most likely outcome. Either way, look for Klein to dominate this fight and finish Trizano in the opening two rounds.
Klein’s moneyline at -250 is easily the safest option here, but his ITD line of +120 looks like a solid bet also. We also like his R1 Win line at +360 and R2 Win line at +600.
DFS Implications:
Klein is an absolute killer with his head kicks and we expect him to easily win this fight. However, his patient fighting style isn’t ideal for DFS scoring and leaves him reliant on a R1 finish to return value when you account for the fact that he’s priced as the most expensive fighter on both sites. And even with another first round KO, he’s far from a lock to end up in the optimal lineup, as he’ll still need to outscore the other top priced fighters. He’s so hyper efficient that he’ll need either multiple knockdowns, a finish in the first 60 seconds on DraftKings, or for the majority of the other top priced fighters to fail to really pay off in this spot—all of which are possible. It’s not hard to imagine a scenario where he gets another early finish but doesn’t score quite enough to crack the optimal lineup, just look at his last performance—he landed a near flawless R1 KO and still scored “just” 104 DraftKings points. While that still could be enough to end up in winning lineups, he could easily be outscored by the other top priced fighters. Don’t get us wrong, there’s still a really good chance he finishes as one of the highest scorers on the slate and we actually really like him to get a KO in the first two rounds, but he’ll be 40%+ and we’re always looking for leverage opportunities. Maybe most importantly, the odds imply his chances for a R1 finish are less than half of his projected ownership. So if he doesn’t end up outscoring the other top guys then this looks like a great leverage spot. The odds imply he has a 68% chance to win, a massive 40% chance to finish it early, but “just” a 16% chance to end it in R1.
Trizano failed to top 66 DraftKings points in either of his two decision wins and now faces a much tougher opponent. He looks reliant on landing a finish to score well, and the last time he won a fight early was November 2017. We couldn’t be much less excited about playing Trizano here, but the odds do imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 13% chance to finish things early and a 6% chance to end it in R1. Those all seem overly optimistic if you ask us, but hey anything can happen in a fight.
Fight #7
Kyle Daukaus
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Coming off his first UFC win in two attempts, Daukaus defeated another DWCS alum in Dustin Stoltzfus. Daukaus was able to control Stoltzfus for the majority of the match as he totaled nearly nine minutes of control time while winning the significant striking battle 64-32. He also landed two takedowns on seven attempts while defending all seven of Stoltzfus’ attempts. Daukaus did a good job of controlling the distance in the stand up game as he successfully took advantage of his reach advantage. With that said, Daukaus is still somewhat of an awkward striker and needs to improve his technique. He’s also overly tentative at times and needs his corner to coerce him into throwing his hands.
Prior to the recent win, Daukaus suffered his only career loss, which came in his June 2020 UFC debut in an exhausting decision against a tough Brendan Allen. Both guys left everything on the mat in a hard fought match that left both men bloodied and battered. Allen narrowly came out ahead in significant strikes 41-34, but Daukaus finished ahead on total strikes 92-79, takedowns 3-0 and control time 7:44-5:37. A large part of that was due to Daukaus controlling the back of Allen for nearly the entire third round, as Allen clearly won the first two rounds.
Kyle Daukaus has largely been overshadowed by his Heavyweight older brother Chris, who burst onto the UFC scene with three R1 KO’s since last August. Kyle actually also fought at Heavyweight for a brief period of time as an amateur MMA fighter, before dropping down to Light Heavyweight and then eventually Middleweight. By the time he went pro he already had four fights at Middleweight. Interestingly Kyle and Chris are both 6’3” with a 76” reach, so while Chris appears significantly bigger when you watch them individually (not just in weight) they actually have similar frames.
Daukaus was 9-0 coming into the UFC, with eight of those wins coming by submission. His one pre-UFC fight to go the distance was his 2019 DWCS match, which wasn’t quite enough to get him a UFC contract. However, after landing a pair of R2 submissions following that fight he did eventually get the call up (obviously).
Of Daukaus’ 10 career wins eight have come early, all by submission, and he’s never landed a knockout. His other three fights all ended in decisions, with him winning two of those. Despite 80% of his wins coming early, he only has one first round finish in his last nine fights and none in his last six matches. His only other two career R1 wins came in his first two pro fights, against opponents who entered with records of 0-1 and 2-3. All three of his career decisions have occurred in his last five fights.
Phil Hawes
3rd UFC Fight (2-0)The last time we saw Hawes he spent the majority of the fight pushing Nassourdine Imavov up against the cage and trying to take him down. That was a little surprising after Hawes knocked out Jacob Malkoun 18 seconds into his October UFC debut, but it just shows you really never know what you’re going to get out of Hawes. One judge in Hawes’ last fight notably ruled the fight a draw. Hawes was clearly compromised late in the match as Imavov had him on wobbly legs and nearly finished him. Hawes’ only other two fights to make it out of the first round in the last seven years both ended in second round losses. In fact, prior to his recent decision win, he had never won a fight that lasted longer than six minutes—although in fairness, he had never been in a fight that lasted longer than eight minutes.
Prior to the somewhat disappointing decision win, Hawes had finished five straight opponents in the first round with four KOs and one submission. So he’s still on an impressive six fight winning streak, with his last loss coming in a 2017 R2 KO on DWCS against Julian Marquez.
An explosive striker, seven of Hawes’ nine wins have come by KO. However, Hawes’ background is actually in wrestling, where he competed collegiately at Iowa State. He has two submission wins on his record—a 2019 R1 Rear-Naked Choke and a 2014 R1 Armbar.
Both of Hawes’ career losses came in the second round. His first loss was a 2016 Guillotine Choke. He then got knocked out in his next fight via head kick at the hands of current UFC fighter Julian Marquez. That second loss came in his first of two appearances on DWCS. After the loss, Hawes didn’t fight again for almost two years before coming back in mid 2019. Apparently he spent some time traveling the world, competing in grappling matches and training in Thailand. He’s also notably trained with Jon Jones in the past.
Fight Prediction:
Daukaus will have a 3” height advantage but Hawes will have a 1” reach advantage.
While it made sense for Hawes to look to wrestle Imavov, who’s a pure striker, we expect him to come in with a more striking heavy game plan against a grappler like Daukaus. With that said, look for the first guy to get hurt on the feet to immediately try to turn this into a grappling match. Hawes is always dangerous as a striker, but his striking defense is also a liability and Imavov had him wobbled in their last match despite getting controlled for over 11 minutes of the action. Hawes looks very vulnerable after the first round, and if he can’t get the first round finish against Daukaus—who’s never been finished in his career—then we expect Daukaus to take over in the later rounds and potentially get a finish of his own. We think that’s the more likely scenario here.
We expect this fight to play out in one of three ways, either Hawes wins in R1, Dauakus wins in R2/R3 or it ends in a decision. So we like “Hawes Wins in R1” at +500, “Daukaus Wins in R2” at +850, “Daukaus Wins in R3” at +1200, Daukaus Wins by R2 Submission” at +1500, “Daukaus Wins by R3 Submission” at +2100, and “Fight Goes the Distance” at +124.
DFS Implications:
At Daukaus’ mid-tier price tag, a grappling-heavy decision win has the potential to still put up a usable score on DraftKings, but he would likely need a large number of takedowns defended on FanDuel to score well in a decision—which is not impossible if he gets Hawes hurt on the feet. Daukaus hasn’t landed more than 68 significant strikes in his two UFC fights and DWCS appearance, but does have at least two takedowns in each of those fights. It’s hard to imagine him putting on a striking clinic, so don’t expect him to score well off striking volume alone, but he does have the ability to fill up a stat sheet. A finish would almost certainly propel him into the optimal lineup on each site, and Hawes looks pretty questionable in the later rounds. We also project Hawes to be incredibly popular, which makes Daukaus a solid leverage play for tournaments. The odds suggest Daukaus has a 54% chance to win, a 33% chance getting a finish and a 15% chance of getting it done in the first round.
Hawes put up a big score (obviously) in his R1 KO win in his UFC debut where he totaled 128 DraftKings points and 116 points on FanDuel. He still scored decently on DraftKings in his recent decision where he totaled 96 points largely due to control time and total strikes, but that was only good for 63 points on FanDuel. We don’t see him having such a lopsided grappling result in this next match as he goes against another highly skilled grappler in Daukaus. That leaves him more or less reliant on a first round finish to score well in DFS as he hasn’t landed a finish beyond the first round since his second pro fight in 2014. Despite appearing to be a R1 or bust DFS play, we project Hawes to be the highest owned underdog on the slate and for his ownership to more than triple his implied chances of getting the first round finish. The odds suggest Hawes has a 46% chance to win, a 28% chance to get it done early and just an 11% chance to land a R1 finish. His ownership projects to be above 40%. So he makes some sense in low-risk contests, but looks like a great leverage fade in tournaments.
Fight #6
Amanda Ribas
6th UFC Fight (4-1)THIS FIGHT IS OFF!!!
After winning her first four UFC fights in convincing fashion, habitually suspiciously happy Ribas finally suffered her first UFC loss in a R2 KO against Marina Rodriguez. Ribas controlled the fight on the ground for the second half of the first round, however, Rodriguez caught her with a clean right hook to the chin that dropped Ribas early in the second round and Rodriguez went to town with her ground and pound—and that’s when shit got weird.
As Rodriguez rained down strikes from above on a shelled up Ribas, Herb Dean came charging in and appeared to make contact with Rodriguez, seemingly stopping the fight. Rodriguez pulled up, and walked away seemingly victorious only to turn around and see a real life I-didn’t-hear-no-bell meme Ribas wobbling back to her feet. Both ladies appeared to look at Herb Dean confused—Ribas unsure what dimension she was in and Rodriguez pointing at him to say he had stopped it—but Dean claimed he never did. So Rodriguez quickly went back to work landing elbows and punches before Dean quickly stepped in to stop things for real just moments later, as he appeared to realize the mess he had caused. After the fight, you could see in super slow motion that Dean appeared to be going in to stop the fight, but at the very last second changed his mind and tried to juke his way out of making contact with Rodriguez. It was clearly not his best work and everyone watching/participating seemed to think that he had initially stopped the action.
Going into that fight, Ribas was 9-1 as a pro and 4-0 in the UFC, with a pair of submission wins to go along with two decision victories—including one against Mackenzie Dern. Ribas was essentially previously thought of as an invincible submission ninja with solid striking skills, but now people will surely question both her striking defense and offense after the momentary slip up. Regardless of how her striking stacks up—and in fairness it was likely overvalued before and unvalued now—the BJJ black belt is clearly the most dangerous on the ground.
She won her 2019 UFC debut with a R2 Rear-Naked Choke Submission against Emily Whitmire, who’s now 2-3 in the UFC with all three losses coming by submission in the first two rounds. After that Ribas defeated Mackenzie Dern in a decision. Dern has submitting almost everyone that comes near her in the 115 lb division, but has had the most trouble with other high-level grapplers like Ribas (Decision Loss), Jandiroba (Decision Win) and Yoder(Decision Win). Ribas then won another decision, this time against Randa Markos, and followed that up with a pink slip submission win against a terrible Paige VanZant. So while her 4-0 UFC start was still impressive, the submissions both came against lower level opponents and the decisions came in favorable stylistic matchups. She hadn’t faced any dangerous strikers until Rodriguez, so this next match against another solid striker in Hill will be important to gauge if Ribas’ recent loss was a blip in the radar or a crack in the foundation.
Angela Hill
17th UFC Fight (8-9)Clearly and understandably frustrated after she lost her last two fights of 2020 in split decisions, Hill bounced back with a lopsided unanimous 27-30 decision win over Ashley Yoder less than 2 months ago. Hill outlanded Yoder 77-34 in significant strikes and 97-53 in total strikes, while defending four of Yoder’s six takedown attempts and tacking on one of her own on three attempts. In a fight that Hill needed to keep on the feet and Yoder needed to get the ground, Hill did a good job of dictating the action.
Hill is essentially a decision machine as only four of her 17 UFC fights have ended early—2015 R1 Submission Loss to Rose Namajunas, 2019 R1 Submission Loss to Randa Markos, 2019 R3 KO Win against Ariane Carnelossi (due to a doctor stoppage), and a 2020 R2 KO Win against Hannah Cifers.
Hill originally joined the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter in just her second pro fight. However, after winning a decision in her 2014 debut she lost back-to-back fights with a decision loss to Tecia Torres and R1 submission loss to Rose Namajunas. Hill was then released by the UFC following her 2015 submission loss and went on to win four fights in a row in Invicta—including a pair of knockouts in the first two rounds. She was then re-signed by the UFC in 2017, where she fought to five straight decisions upon her return, alternating losses and wins. Hill then suffered what is just her second early loss in her career with another R1 submission, this time an Armbar against Randa Markos.
Since that 2019 submission loss, Hill has gone 5-3 with two KO wins (R2 & R3) and six fights that ended in decisions. Now 13-9 as a pro, five of her 13 wins have come by KO, while eight have been by decision. Only one of her five KO victories came in the first round and that was back in 2016 in Invicta. Three of her knockouts have come in R2. On the other side of things, she’s never been knocked out herself, but has been submitted twice. With a Muay Thai background, Hill is a pure striker who will want no part in a grappling battle.
Hill has a 77% career takedown defense, which has always been solid, but has gotten even better over time. In her 17 UFC fights, she’s only been taken down 18 times on 78 attempts. And 10 of those 18 takedowns came in her first five UFC fights on 34 attempts (71% takedown defense during that period). In her last 12 fights she’s only been taken down eight times on 44 attempts (82% takedown defense). And in her last six fights, she’s only been taken down five times on 30 attempts (83% takedown defense). Prior to getting taken down twice on six attempts by Yoder in her last fight, Hill had gone 11 straight fights without being taken down more than once, including defending 17 of Michelle Waterson’s ridiculous 18 attempts in their September 2020 five round fight.
Here are all of Hill’s UFC opponents (beginning with the most recent) and how they have fared on takedowns against her:
Yoder 2 for 6
Waterson 1 for 18
Gadelha 1 for 4
Lookboonmee 1 for 1
Cifers 0 for 0
Carnelossi 0 for 1
Xiaonan 1 for 1
Esquibel 0 for 3
Markos 1 for 1
Casey 1 for 6
Moroz 0 for 2
Nunes 0 for 1
Yoder 3 for 6
Andrade 2 for 3
Namajunas 1 for 1
Torres 2 for 12
Kagen 2 for 12
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’3” but Ribas will have a 2” reach advantage and is nine years younger than the 36 year-old Hill.
It would be surprising if Ribas looked to keep this fight standing up for long after getting knocked out in her last match, however, Hill’s takedown defense has been very solid. With that said, her last four opponents to attempt a takedown all landed one, so if Ribas can be hyper efficient with whatever opportunity she gets on the ground, she still has a legitimate shot at submitting Hill. However, if Hill can keep it mostly on the feet and avoid getting submitted if it does go to the ground, then she certainly has a solid chance to point her way to a decision here. And with Ribas fighting again less than four months after getting KO’d, who knows if her chin/mind is all the way recovered—assuming her mind was ever all the way there in the first place. We still like Ribas to bounce back and win this fight, possibly via submission, but more likely in a decision, however, Hill is definitely live.
The safest bet here is that the “Fight Ends in a Decision” at -230, but it’s tough to get excited about that line. Ribas’ moneyline has already been bet up to -188, so it’s a little bit less exciting now as well. “Hill Wins by Decision” at +220 is interesting as is “Ribas Wins by Submission” at +380 and “Ribas Wins by R1 Submission” at +950. If you think Ribas’ chin remains dubious, check out “Hill Wins by KO” at +850 or R2 KO at +3100.
DFS Implications:
In her four UFC wins, Ribas has been a consistently solid but an unexplosive DFS scorer with DraftKings totals of 101, 105, 75 and 106. Her two decision wins scored 105 and 75 points, so she’s definitely not a lock to score well in a decision, but has shown the ability to still get there. At her price, her typical 105 point performance is still on the fringe of what constitutes a usable score and relies on other high priced fighters failing. She has seven takedowns across her four UFC fights, with at least one in every match, but no more than one in her last three bouts. She’s also never landed a knockdown in the UFC and now goes against an opponent who’s never been knocked down in 17 UFC fights, so don’t count on one here. That alone puts her at a noticeable disadvantage when compared to some of the knockout threats priced around here. Hill is a willing participant to throw down in a brawl, but coming off a knockout it’s less likely than normal that Ribas will be looking to do the same. We expect her to be looking to take this right to the ground more than ever, although it’s certainly possible that she’ll have no choice but to stand and trade if Hill’s takedown defense holds up. Overall, this looks like a tough spot for Ribas to return value, but her paths to ending up in winning lineups are either with an early submission or by filling up the stat sheet and getting a late submission or winning a high-volume/grappling heavy decision. Even then, she’ll still need the other high priced fighters to not go off, so it’s tough to be overly excited about her prospects. The odds imply she has a 62% chance to win, a 23% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Hill throws a decent amount of striking volume, but has never landed more than one takedown in her 16 UFC fights. She also rarely finishes an opponent and even when she has, it’s always come in the later rounds. Her one big performance predictably came against Hannah “DFS Life Giver” Cifers, while her other seven most recent fights all made it to the third round. In her last three decision wins, she’s scored 77, 64 and 77 DraftKings points, which even at her reduced salary would likely only return value if all the other underdogs fail. So she really only makes sense as a process of elimination play, unless you think she knocks Ribas out. And even a third round KO wouldn’t guarantee her a spot in winning lineups, as her last one of those still scored just 84 DraftKings points. So while Hill may jump out as a value play at $7,400 after topping the slate at $9,400 in her last fight, she’s still far more likely to bust for DFS even in a win. It makes sense to have a little exposure, but we wouldn’t get carried away. She does look like a slightly better play on FanDuel, where she’s relatively cheaper and can score from takedowns defended. The odds imply she has a 38% chance to win, a 15% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance to end it in R1.
Fight #5
Gregor Gillespie
8th UFC Fight (6-1)Gillespie had been scheduled to fight Brad Riddell seven weeks ago back on March 20th, but the fight got canceled on the day of the event when someone on Riddell’s team tested positive for COVID.
A former NCAA D I National Champion wrestler, Gillespie is coming off an extended 18 month layoff following his first career loss. Gillespie entered that November 2019 loss against Kevin Lee with a perfect professional record of 13-0 (6-0 in the UFC), but finished it unconscious on his back.
Kevin Lee came in with the clear gameplan of focusing entirely on preventing takedowns. He utilized a super low, forward leaning, wrestling style stance. Less than three minutes into the fight he caught Gillespie with a right cross followed by a vicious left head kick that left Gillespie snoring.
Prior to the loss, Gillespie had won all six of his UFC fights, with finishes in the first two rounds of the most recent five. He came into the UFC in 2016 7-0 as a pro with six finishes, including three R1 KOs, two R1 submissions and a R2 submission win. His only two fights to make it to the judges both occured in 2016, in his UFC debut and fight just before that.
In his 2016 UFC debut, Gillespie landed 5 takedowns on a ridiculous 19 attempts, and amassed 11 minutes of control time. The win was against Glaico Franca, who came into the fight 1-1 in the UFC and was released following his second loss. Gillespie followed that up with a 21 second R1 KO win in 2017 over Andrew Holbrook, who was knocked out in the first round in three of his last four UFC fights before getting dropped by the UFC after his loss to Gillespie.
Following the quick KO, Gillespie then landed his first submission in the UFC with a 2017 R2 Arm-Triangle Choke against Jason Gonzalez, who’s lost three of his last four fights and is no longer with the UFC. Gillespie went 4 for 6 on takedowns with nearly six minutes of control time in that match.
In 2018, Gillespie landed another R1 KO, this time with just 14 seconds left in the round against Jordan Rinaldi, who went 2-3 in the UFC and hasn’t fought in two years. Gillespie landed one takedown on two attempts and almost four minutes of control time, just a minute shy of controlling every second of the match.
He then got another R2 Arm-Triangle Choke submission win in 2018 against Vinc Pichel, who was easily Gillespie’s toughest opponent to date. Gillespie went 7 for 9 on takedowns with almost eight minutes of control time against Pichel.
Gillespie started 2019 off with a R2 KO of Yancy Medeiros, who’s now lost his last three fights. Gillespie went 6 for 11 on takedowns and accrued nearly nine minutes of control time in a fight that ended just one second before the second round was over. If you watch the fight, Gillespie appeared to throw several borderline illegal knees to the head of a downed opponent. After a solid start to 2019, it couldn’t have ended much worse for Gillespie, as he was then violently knocked out by a Kevin Lee head kick, and he didn’t fight at all in 2020.
So to summarize the UFC records of the opponents Gillespie has defeated: 1-2 (no longer in the UFC), 2-3 (no longer in the UFC), 1-3 (no longer in the UFC), 2-3 (no longer in the UFC), 6-2, 6-7 (but has lost his last three). Essentially a bunch of guys on their way out of the UFC and Vinc Pichel. So we’re not trying to be overly down on Gillespie, but we don’t think any of his wins came against opponents as dangerous on the ground as his next one.
Diego Ferreira
12th UFC Fight (8-3)Coming off his second career decision loss to Beneil Dariush, only two humans have ever defeated Ferreira in a fight—Dariush and Dustin Poirier. While Dariush won a pair of decisions over Ferreira, Poirier is the only person to finish Ferreira, and he did so with a 2015 R1 KO.
Following the loss to Poirier, Ferreira won six straight before his second loss to Dariush in his last fight. Three of those six wins ended in decisions, but he also mixed in a pair of KOs in the first two rounds in 2018, and a 2020 R2 Rear-Naked Choke submission win over Anthony Pettis. Five of his eight UFC wins have come early, all in the first two rounds, with two submissions and three KOs.
In his last fight, Ferreira was taken down five times on 15 attempts by Dariush, while Ferreira missed on his only take down attempt. Dariush also led in significant strikes 62-54 and in control time 7:23-0:58 in the grappling heavy decision. That was the most times Ferreira has been taken down in his career, with the previous high checking in at three. He’s also notably only been taken down a total of 14 times in his 11 UFC fights, while landing just six of his own.
A 3rd degree BJJ black belt, Ferreira is very dangerous on the ground, both in top position and off his back, but we’ve never seen him face a wrestler like Gillespie. Of Ferreira’s 17 career wins, 10 have come early with three KOs and seven submissions.
UPDATE: Ferreira missed weight by 4.5 lb and looked really rough, but the fight is scheduled to proceed.
Fight Prediction:
Ferreira will have a 2” height advantage and 3” reach advantage.
This sets up for a tactical grappling match between a relentless wrestler and a dangerous submission specialist. We just saw Ferreira get controlled on the ground for most of a fight by a BJJ black belt in Dariush, so it will be interesting to see if Gillespie’s wrestling style produces the same results. Ferreira is getting up there in age at 36 years old and with three of his last four fights going the distance, maybe he’s a little less dangerous now than in the past. We don’t see him consistently stuffing the takedowns of Gillespie, so Ferreira will likely need a finish to win this fight. He’s dangerous enough wherever the fight goes to make that happen, but we don’t see it being the most likely outcome. We expect Ferreira to be tough enough to prevent a finish, but for Gillespie to win a decision in the end.
There’s not much value in Gillespie’s decision line at +105, but his moneyline at -188 appears to be the safest bet. We also like betting this fight ends in R1 at +410 or R2 at +650 as neither of these fighters have ever landed a finish beyond the second round. If you want to take a stab at something longer you can consider “Gillespie Wins by R1 KO” at +1200 or “Gillespie Wins by R2 KO” at +1900.
DFS Implications:
In his six UFC wins, Gillespie has averaged 124 DraftKings points and 120 points on FanDuel. With 11 of his 13 career wins coming early, and massive takedown and control time numbers, it’s impossible to ignore Gillespie’s upside. He’s put up DraftKings scores of 146, 128, 117, 121, 129 and 105 in his UFC wins and his last 6 fights have all ended in the first 2 rounds. However, he recently turned 34 and hasn’t stepped inside the Octagon for 18 months. He also apparently had very limited training available during the pandemic as he lives in New York, where most places were shut down. His one UFC fight to end in a decision scored 105 DraftKings points, largely based on control time, but just 75 points on FanDuel. So at least on FanDuel, he likely needs a finish to pay off, and at his high DraftKings price it’s still no sure thing that a decision would score enough to be useful. Ferreira is a really tough guy to put away and while Dariush laid on a grappling heavy performance in their last fight, it still scored just 95 DraftKings points and 90 points on FanDuel.
Gillespie has also been very fortunate with the timing of his last three finishes as they came with 1, 54 and 14 seconds remaining in the respective rounds, which allowed him to rack up stats while still maximizing his round bonuses. He did have one big score that came earlier in the second round, but that was his one fight where he was able to land both a knockdown and several takedowns. Another one of his finishes came in just 21 seconds, so it was awarded the quick win bonus on DraftKings. So overall, the timing of his finishes has had a sizable impact on why he has been able to put up such massive scores in his last five wins. That’s not to take away from his monster ceiling, it’s just to point out that he’s yet to really see any negative variance come his way. Eventually that’s bound to change. So in summary, this is a tougher matchup than normal for Gillespie, he needs a finish to put up a really big score (especially on FanDuel), and he appears due for some negative variance on the timing of his finishes if he does end up getting one. So he can definitely score well, but expecting him to match the 128 point average that he’s put up in his last five wins is likely unrealistic. Don’t get us wrong, he still looks like a great play. The odds imply he has a 62% chance to win, a 22% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance to end it in R1.
Ferreira has scored well when he’s landed an early finish—which he’s done in three of his last five wins—but has never scored well in decisions. If Ferreira can finish Gillespie early, he’s essentially a lock to end up in optimal lineups as his recent finishes have scored 106, 110, 112 and 98 DraftKings points. Gillespie’s nonstop grappling should give Ferreira ample opportunity to look for submissions, just keep in mind Gillespie has never been submitted. The rough weigh-in is also a major concern to Ferreira’s chances of performing well. The odds imply Ferreira has a 38% chance to win, an 18% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance to end it in R1.
Fight #4
Marcos Rogerio de Lima
12th UFC Fight (6-5)De Lima is coming off a R1 submission loss, thus continuing the patterns of him alternating wins and losses over his last 10 fights AND having his last five losses all coming by submission. Only one of his 11 UFC fights has made it to the judges, which was a 2018 decision win, while eight of his fights ended in R1 and the other two in R2.
Following a 2017 loss to OSP, De Lima moved up from Light Heavyweight to Heavyweight. In his four fights since, he’s 2-2 while slowly bulking up (253 lb > 255 lb > 257 lb > 258 lb). His first Heavyweight fight came against Adan Wieczorek in a decision win, which is the only time De Lima has seen a third round in the UFC. Wieczorek hasn’t fought again since that 2018 match. De Lima was then submitted in R2 by Arm-Triangle Choke in his next fight against Stefan Struve. De Lima bounced back with his second win at Heavyweight with a R1 KO against a super suspect Ben Sosoli.
Most recently De Lima took on Alexandr Romanov and was once again submitted, this time in the first round. De Lima landed some good shots early, and Romanov wanted no part of a striking battle as he immediately and relentlessly looked to get the fight to the ground. De Lima was able to get up once, but Romanov was able to get him back down later in the first round and submit him with a rare Forearm Choke.
De Lima is a very aggressive striker but has just a 43% takedown defense, which contributes to why he’s so often submitted.
Maurice Greene
8th UFC Fight (4-3)Greene made his way into the UFC with a R1 Triangle Choke Submission win on The Ultimate Fighter, following a five round decision loss against Jeff Hughes in the LFA. Following the submission win, Green avenged his loss to Hughes with a three round decision win—as both fighters had joined the UFC at that point. Greene then KO’d a lethargic Junior Albini in R1, which remains his only KO victory in the UFC to date. He followed it up with a R1 KO loss in 2019. Then he was matched up against Alexey Oleynik, and despite surviving a R1 submission attempt, Greene just delayed the inevitable and was eventually submitted late in the second round.
Greene then took on a portly Gian Villante, who was moving up to Heavyweight from Light Heavyweight for the first time, and simply looked like a really out of shape 205er. Greene’s length gave Villante some trouble early on, but Villante started to figure him out as the fight went on. Villante dropped Greene in the third round and looked incredibly close to finishing the fight with ground and pound, but instead appeared to punch himself out as Greene narrowly survived. As Greene lay on his back with Villante on top of him, Greene was somehow able to clench the exhausted face of Villante so tightly to his chest that Villante actually tapped out of nowhere. The finish had everyone stumped, including the broadcast team, and saved Greene from losing his third straight fight.
In his most recent match, Greene took on Greg Hardy who’s one of the few fighters who can almost match the size of Greene. Hardy was nearly able to finish Greene early in the first round, but appeared to tire himself out and couldn’t finish it on the ground after knocking Greene down. He knocked Greene down again early in the second round and this time was able to get the stoppage through ground and pound. And it’s a good thing for Hardy as he could barely breathe he was so exhausted at that point.
Greene has now lost three of his last four fights, all early, and it easily could have been four if not for his miracle submission win against Villante. Six of Greene’s seven UFC fights have ended early, including his last five in a row. Green is 4-3 in the UFC, but 9-5 as a pro. Seven of those nine wins have ended early, with two KOs and five submissions. Three of his five losses have also come early, with two KOs and one submission.
Fight Prediction:
Greene will have a 6” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
Both of these fighters are poised to capitalize on the biggest weakness of the other. De Lima has been incredibly prone to being submitted, as that’s how his last five losses have come. And despite his massive size, Greene is more of a submission threat then a risk to knock anyone out. And on the other side of things, De Lima aggressively looks for KO’s and Greene’s striking defense is extremely suspect. This almost feels like it sets up too perfectly for either a De Lima KO win or a Green Submission win, but it’s hard to see many other outcomes. And between those two possibilities, a De Lima KO win is far, far more likely. We expect a De Lima KO win in the first half of this fight.
Our favorite bet here is “De Lima Wins by R1 KO” at +390 (or R1 Win at +300). You can also consider his R2 KO line at +650. On Greene’s side, you can hedge if you want to with “Greene Wins by Submission” at +600 and/or his R1 & R2 Submission lines at +1600 and +2100 respectively.
DFS Implications:
De Lima has scored at least 95 DraftKings points in his last four finishes (108, 95, 130, 113), while he put up 80 points in his lone UFC decision win. This looks like a prime spot for him to land another finish, as he goes against an opponent who’s been finished in the first two rounds in three of his last four fights. De Lima is an aggressive striker who will force the action from the start, and Greene really struggles against that type of fighter. With 10 of De Lima’s 11 UFC fights ending early, including eight in the first round, you can understand why the odds say this is the most likely fight on the slate to end early. The odds suggest De Lima has a 64% chance to win, and a slate-leading 50% chance to end it early and 24% chance to get it done in R1. It will be interesting to see if the fact that he’s coming off a loss keeps his ownership from getting stupidly out of control, in addition to the fact that he’s only scored above 95 DraftKings points in one of his last seven fights. If his ownership does creep into the 40’s then this could also be a leverage opportunity, but a tough one to swallow at that. We’re as much betting against Greene as we are on De Lima, which is always somewhat of a risky proposition, but we really like this spot for De Lima to get the early finish.
Similar to De Lima, only one of Greene’s UFC fights has gone the distance and his last five have all ended early. In his three UFC finishes, Greene has scored 70, 126 and 94 DraftKings points, while he only put up 59 in his lone decision win. His two usable scores both came in first round finishes, while he only scored 70 points in his most recent win, which ended in a third round submission. He’s never ended a fight in the second round, but at his price that would surely score enough to return value. To be real, Greene is such a gross play, but you pretty much have to have some exposure here since De Lima is a finish or get finished type of fighter. On paper, this looks like a great spot for Greene to get a submission win. Five of his seven career finishes have come by submission as have De Lima’s last five losses. However, Greene has not only never landed a takedown in the UFC, he hasn’t even attempted one. And having any confidence in Greene winning this fight requires you to have not watched any of Greene’s past fights. It’s hard to tell if there’s some sort of Trading Places type situation going on with him, but if that is the case then somewhere out there is the most badass seven-year-old debutante you’ve ever seen. Greene flinches from sudden movements and lets out an audible gasp from loud noises. Nevertheless, the odds imply he has a 36% chance to win, a 24% chance to end it early and a 13% chance to finish it in R1.
Fight #3
Geoff Neal
7th UFC Fight (5-1)After the December 19th Chimaev/Edwards fight was canceled, Neal/Thompson was promoted to the headliner spot after it had originally been scheduled to go three rounds. That looked like a really tough spot for Neal going in, and as we expected Thompson dominated the fight and pointed his way to victory as he outlanded Neal 171-85 in significant strikes and 191-110 in total strikes.
Prior to that fight, it had been just over a year since Neal knocked out Mike Perry 90 seconds into the first round, Neal had then originally been scheduled to fight Magny on August 29th before suffering a life threatening health scare a few weeks before the fight. Neal spent a week in the ICU hooked up to a dialysis machine after suffering severe septic shock and being told his heart almost failed. It’s unclear what caused the condition, but as far as we can tell he is now recovered.
The 30-year-old Neal had won his last seven fights prior to his recent decent loss, with six early finishes over that period—including four in R1. He only has three losses in his career, with his second most recent one coming in 2017 when he fought up a weight class against Kevin Holland and got knocked out in the third round. That fight occurred prior to the two joining the UFC and remains the only time Neal has ever been knocked out. Ten of Neal’s 13 career wins have come early, including eight KO’s and two submissions. His third career loss was a R3 Rear-Naked Choke Submission in Neal’s third pro flight back in 2013. So both of his career early losses came in the third round.
Neal got his shot in the UFC with a R1 KO on DWCS against Chase Waldon, who never fought again following the loss. Neal followed that up with a R1 Rear-Naked Choke Submission win his UFC debut against Brian Camozzi who is 0-3 in the UFC after that loss and also hasn’t fought again since. Neal’s third UFC win came against Frank Camacho, who’s lost 4 of his last 5 UFC fights, with his last two ending in R1 losses. In his first real test in the UFC, Neal went up against Belal Muhammad and ended up winning an average scoring decision. He then went up against a couple brawlers in Niko Price and Mike Perry, who he finished in the second and first round respectively. Neal remains the only person to ever knock out Mike Perry and it only took him 90 seconds to do so.
Neal is a pure striker with explosive hands. He’s only attempted a takedown against one of his six UFC opponents, when he went 2 for 4 on his attempts against Niko Price. He typically fights at 170 lb, but has fought three pro fights at 185 lb where he’s gone 2-1. Only 6 of his 16 fights made it to the third round, and he’s only been to four decisions. Nine of his last 11 fights have ended early, including five in R1, three in R2 and one in R3. After suffering his first loss in the UFC and over the last 4+ years, we expect Neal to be hungry to reprove himself as a future contender in this next fight.
Neil Magny
25th UFC Fight (17-7)Prior to losing a smothering five round decision to Michael Chiesa in his last fight, Magny had won three straight decisions in 2020 after taking 16 months off following a R4 KO loss to Santiago Ponzinibbio in November of 2018. Magny has won five of his last seven fights, with four of those wins ending in decisions.
Since joining the UFC in 2013 he’s fought 24 times with 13 of those going the distance, however five of his seven UFC losses have come early. He was submitted in R1 via Triangle Choke of his 2013 match against Sergio Moraes. Then in 2015, he was submitted in R2 by Demian Maia via Rear-Naked Choke, and then knocked out by Lorenz Larkin in R1 of a 2016 fight. Rafael dos Anjoes also submitted him in R1 via Arm-Triangle Choke, and then his most recent loss was the R4 KO at the hands of Santiago Ponzinibbio. So in summary, he’s been submitted three times in the UFC and knocked out twice. He was also submitted once prior to joining the UFC. His last four losses prior to his recent decision notably all ended early.
He’s won 14 of the 16 decisions he’s been involved in as a pro (some dubiously), with 11 of those wins coming in the UFC. Four of his 10 early victories notably came prior to joining the UFC. He only has two early wins in his last 14 fights, and those came against a very low level of competition in Craig White, who’s no longer in the UFC and has lost his last four fights since losing to Magny, and Hector Lombard, who’s lost his last five fights since losing to Magny.
To go along with his seven career KO wins, Magny has three career submission wins. However, two of those came prior to joining the UFC and he only has one submission victory in the last decade, which was a 2015 R3 Rear-Naked Choke.
Neal has notably never been taken down in the UFC, but was taken down once on DWCS, which is why his takedown defense is listed at 92%, instead of 100%. Since that DWCS fight in 2017, three opponents have attempted to take Neal down. Camacho went 0 for 2, Muhammad went 0 for 7, and Price went 0 for 2.
Fight Prediction:
Magny will have a 4” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
Prior to his recent five round smothering decision loss, Magny’s last four losses had all come early (2018 R4 KO, 2017 R1 Submission, 2016 R1 KO & 2015 R2 Submission). We expect Neal to aggressively hunt for an early knockout in this one, but Magny has notably fought to four straight decisions since returning from a 16 month layoff following a fourth round KO loss in 2018. Nevertheless, we like Neal to finish Magny in the first two rounds.
All of our favorite bets here are based around Geoff Neal getting a finish in the first two rounds. Our favorite three bets are “Neal ITD” at +155, “Neal R1 Win” at +430, and “Neal R2 Win” at +650. For longer shots, look at “Neal Wins by R1 Submission” at +3100 and “Neal Wins by R2 Submission” at +4500, just keep in mind a knockout is far more likely (hence the odds).
DFS Implications:
Neal has finished four of his six UFC opponents as he’s gone 5-1 with the organization. All of those finishes occured in the first two rounds with DraftKings scores of 98, 114, 105 and 106. All four of those finishes have notably come in the first halves of rounds, but none have come in the first 60 seconds of the fight, so he’s yet to benefit from a late round finish or a quick win bonus and he appears due for some positive variance to come his way. He’s impressively landed five knockdowns in his last four wins, and has the potential to lead this slate in scoring if just a few things go his way. We really like this spot for Neal and think he’s a great play on both sites. His 92% takedown defense should boost his FanDuel score even further, as there’s a good chance Magny will want to get this fight to the mat if it lasts long enough. The odds imply he has a 63% chance to win, a 34% chance to end it early and a 15% chance to get a R1 finish.
Outside of one flukey performance, where Magny landed a million significant strikes through ground and pound on a helpless Hector Lombard in a fight that should have been stopped much sooner, Magny has never been a huge volume striker or power puncher. He’s bolstered his scores at times with takedowns in bunches, but has also failed to land a takedown in five of his last 10 matches. With 14 of his 24 career wins ending in decisions, including 7 of his last 9, Magny appears to be more or less a decision machine who’s dependent on landing multiple takedowns to make up for his average striking volume if he wants to score well. We did see him score 100 DraftKings points in a decision win against Robbie Lawler last August in a grappling heavy one-sided match, which would likely be his path to victory in this fight as well. However, we also saw Magny get dominated in the grappling department in his last fight, so maybe he’ll be more inclined to stand and trade than he might otherwise be, who knows. Magny also scored 99 DraftKings points in another grappling heavy decision win against Jingliang Li last March. However, in between those two respectable decision scores he totaled just 63 points in a decision win over Anthony Rocco Martin, where Magny failed to notch a takedown. Neal has notably stopped all 11 takedown attempts against him so far in the UFC so he’s a very tough guy to get to the mat, which dramatically lowers Magny’s DFS floor. The odds imply Magny has a 37% chance to win, a 12% chance to get a finish and a 5% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #2
Donald Cerrone
37th UFC Fight (23-12, NC)Cerrone had been scheduled to fight Diego Sanchez, but Sanchez was forced out of the fight and released by the UFC and Morono stepped in on less than a week’s notice.
How do you know when it’s about time to hang it up in the UFC? How about when you run out of fingers on one hand to count how many consecutive losses it’s been in a row? Okay, to be fair Cerrone didn’t technically “lose” his last fight, but didn’t he really? He was outlanded 150-113 in significant strikes and 167-113 in total strikes, while going 0 for 5 on takedowns. The fight ended up being ruled a draw as Niko Price was deducted a point for a pair of accidental eye pokes in the first round, and then it was later overturned to a “No Content” when Price tested positive for pot [now we’re just one step away from it being flipped to a Cerrone win based on seniority]. However, in terms of what we take away from the fight Cerrone was outclassed by Price on the feet and stuffed when he tried to get it to the ground.
Prior to that fight, Cerrone lost a close low-volume decision to Anthony Pettis, where Pettis narrowly won the striking battle 63-62 in significant strikes and 81-62 in total strikes. Cerrone went 2 for 8 on takedowns, while Pettis was 0 for 1. Cerrone had three brutally tough fights before that with KO losses to Tony Ferguson, Justin Gaethje and Conor McGregor, so it’s hard to give him too much grief for any of those.
Cerrone has now fought an insane 53 pro fights since 2006 and 36 UFC fights since joining in 2011. He only has four wins in his last 13 fights and is 38 years old, so any given fight very well could be his last. Of his 36 career wins, 27 have come early, with 10 KOs and 17 submissions. Eight of his 15 losses have also ended early, including seven KOs and one submission.
Cerrone has fought at both 155 lb and 170 lb throughout his career, but his last three fights have all been at 170 lb. His four before that were at 155 lb. His last win at 170 lb came in a 2018 match against Mike Perry which Cerrone won via R1 Armbar Submission. It appears he’ll stay at 170 lb to finish his career.
Alex Morono
13th UFC Fight (7-4, NC)After putting up a career performance against former Chimaev chew toy, Rhys McKee, last November, Morono lost a low-volume decision to Anthony Pettis just a month later. Morono had Pettis in trouble early as he was immediately able to get Pettis’ back following a Pettis slip, but was unable to capitalize on the position. Pettis was able to control the distance for most of the fight from there on out and nearly finished Morono late in the third round with a head kick that left him wobbled. Morono narrowly hung on to lose a decision as he went just 1 for 5 on takedowns and was outlanded by Pettis 50-31 in significant strikes and 80-50 in total strikes.
Just a month earlier Morono put on a striking clinic in a three round decision win where he outlanded Rhys McKee 176-124 in significant strikes and 208-133 in total strikes, while going 3 for 3 on takedowns. So he’s shown he can put up big numbers in the right matchups. Prior to that, Morono had been quickly knocked out by Khaos Williams just 27 seconds into their February match 2020.
Morono had won three in a row before that KO loss to Khaos, including a 2019 decision win over Max Griffin, a R1 KO and another decision. Morono knocked Griffin down late in the second round of their fight and looked incredibly close to getting the finish, but couldn’t close the show.
His 2017 “No Contest” against Niko Price was originally a R2 KO loss, but it was later overturned to a “No Contest” when Price tested positive for pot [again]. So Morono’s record doesn’t really tell the full story, as he’s really been KO’d three times and not twice. Morono did drop Price in the first round and looked decent before getting knocked out in the second.
Morono has just two early wins in the UFC—a 2018 R1 Guillotine Choke and a 2019 R1 KO. In his entire pro career, he has five KO wins and six by submission. However, three of those submissions were R1 Armbars very early in his career. Prior to joining the UFC, Morono had eight R1 wins, three by KO and five submissions (3 Armbars, a Guillotine Choke & a Triangle Choke). He also had a R3 KO win. He has never been submitted, but has been knocked out twice—or three times if you count the “No Contest”.
At his media day interview, Morono said he expects Cerrone to come in looking to wrestle, but Cerrone notably hasn’t landed more than two takedowns against anyone in his last 27 fights and only accomplished that number twice. Cerrone also only has a 33% career takedown accuracy and has only landed five takedowns in his last 10 fights. So even if Cerrone does look to get the fight to the mat at some point, it’s unlikely to become a dominating grappling performance.
Fight Prediction:
Cerrone will have a 2” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.
This has the potential to turn into a high-volume brawl, as it was really Pettis and not Morono that forced his last fight into a lower-volume decision. Morono looked vulnerable to head kicks in that last fight, so he’ll need to be careful to avoid the dangerous high kicks of Cerrone in this match. Cerrone appears to be dropping off pretty quickly at this point in his career, but this still represents a step down in competition for him—in addition to the fact that Morono is coming in on short notice. So there are some reasons to think Cerrone has one last win left in his tank. With that said, we think Morono can win a volume driven decision as long as he can successfully defend head kicks and takedowns. However, if Cerrone catches him with something clean he has the potential to finish this early. Also, if this ends up being close after 15 minutes, look for the judges to potentially sway it in Cerrone’s favor as a potential retirement present. So Morono will need a decisive win to assure victory here and can not get caught stargazing along the way.
The safest bet here is that the “Fight Goes the Distance” at -210. The other two worth looking at are “Morono Wins by Decision” at +230 and ”Cerrone Wins by KO” at +750.
DFS Implications:
Cerrone was 30% owned by the field in his last fight as an underdog against Niko Price, so it will be interesting to see how popular he is as the favorite in this match. It’s been a couple of years since he won a fight or put up a usable score, but obviously the field loves chasing ghosts. We’d be surprised if Cerrone wasn’t over owned once again. This is a step down in competition for him, but the ultimate question is how much he actually has left. Had he won the decision in his last fight, he still would have scored just 77 DraftKings points and 91 points on FanDuel, which isn’t overly encouraging considering that was a high-volume brawl. Cerrone didn’t land any knockdowns or takedowns in that fight, which is what he would need in addition to 100+ significant strikes to return value in a decision. So while it’s not impossible for him to score decently if this goes the distance, he more likely needs a finish to really pay off. The odds imply he has a 63% chance to win, a 23% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance to win in R1.
Morono needs to turn this fight into a high-volume brawl if he wants to be useful in DFS as we don’t really see him getting a finish here. An encouraging sign, we just saw Niko Price land 150 significant strikes on Cerrone while defending all five of his takedowns. If the decision had gone his way, he would have scored 95 DraftKings points and 125 points on FanDuel, despite not landing a knockdown or a takedown in the decision. That gives some hope for Morono’s scoring chances in a decision. Morono is just two fights and six months removed from landing a ridiculous 176 significant strikes on a low level fighter in Rhys McKee, so he’s at least shown that he’s capable of such things. Taking the fight on less than a week’s notice is definitely of some concern for his cardio later in the fight, but it’s hard to say exactly how much of an impact it will have. The odds imply Morono has a 37% chance to win, a 16% chance to end it early and a 7% chance to end it in R1.
Fight #1
Marina Rodriguez
7th UFC Fight (3-1-2)Both of these ladies normally fight at 115 lb, but this fight was made on less than a week’s notice so it makes sense they moved it up to 125 lb—especially considering Rodriguez’s tougher travel circumstances coming from Brazil.
Rodriguez landed her shot in the UFC with a R1 KO on DWCS in 2018, but then fought to five straight decisions. Somehow, two of those ended in draws. She then landed her first UFC finish with a R2 KO against a really tough Amanda Ribas in her last match. We talked about that match a little more in the Ribas write-up (above), but essentially Rodriguez was controlled on the ground for the second half of the first round and then was forced to knock Ribas out not once, but twice, as Herb Dean indecisively crowded the puncher as he flip-flopped on whether or not to stop the action. Rodriguez took it in stride and finished Ribas for real moments later.
With a 13-1-2 pro record, Rodriguez has never been finished early and her only career loss came by split decision in her last fight against Carla Esparza. While six of her 13 pro wins ended in decisions, she does have six KOs and a submission win. However, five of those six finishes came in her first six fights against less experienced opponents who entered with records of: 2-0, 0-2, 2-0, 4-3, and 4-5.
Rodriguez is a very solid striker who is much more comfortable on her feet. She’s landed just one takedown in her six UFC fights, but has outlanded her opponents in significant strikes in five of those six matches. She notably has been taken down nine times in her last three fights, which has been her biggest weakness so far in the UFC.
Michelle Waterson
11th UFC Fight (6-4)Coming off a close five round decision win against Angela Hill in a September main event that it kind of looked like she lost, Waterson has fought to seven straight decisions. Her last fight to end early came over four years ago in a R2 Submission loss to Rose Namajunas in her third UFC fight. Her first two UFC fights also ended in decisions, with a 2015 R3 Rear-Naked Choke win followed by a 2016 R1 Rear-Naked Choke victory. Since then she’s gone 4-3 in her seven decisions, with three of those coming in split decisions. Two of those seven fights were five rounders. She has been knocked out once in her career, but it came prior to joining the UFC, in the second round of a 2009 fight.
Waterson throws lots of kicks to try and keep her opponents at bay, but has notably absorbed 131 and 180 significant strikers in her two five round UFC decisions. While she attempts a decent number of takedowns, she’s never landed more than three in a fight and only landed a total of 4 on 35 attempts in her last five matches. Those numbers are heavily skewed by 1 for 18 and 1 for 9 performances in her last two five round fights, but last we checked, this one is scheduled to go five rounds as well.
Here are Waterson’s takedown results in her last five matches, beginning with the most recent:
1 for 18
0 for 0
1 for 9
2 for 4
0 for 4
Her career takedown accuracy is just 34%, so she’s not in a great position to capitalize on Rodriguez’s vulnerable 59% takedown defense.
Fight Prediction:
Rodriguez will have a 3” height and reach advantage.
We probably have the best comp we could ask for in Waterson’s last fight, where she took on another pure striker in Angela Hill in a five round fight. Rodriguez is a more powerful and dangerous striker than Hill, but also doesn’t have nearly as good of a takedown defense. Waterson shot for a ridiculous 18 takedowns in that match, but only landed one against the 77% takedown defense of Hill. Rodriguez notably has just a 59% takedown defense and has been taken down nine times in her last three fights—and it likely would have been more had she not KO’d Ribas a minute into the second round of her last fight. Waterson laughably claimed she was looking forward to a stand up striking battle, but her past actions speak louder than her words. In her second most recent fight against a pure striker in Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Waterson went 1 for 9 on takedowns. Even if Waterson truly does have the mindset that she wants to keep this standing up, look for that to quickly change after she gets cracked in her dome a few times. Rodriguez will make a grappler out of anyone with her crisp strikes and sharp elbows.
We can’t ignore the fact that this fight was booked on less than a week’s notice and it’s been reported that Rodriguez had a rough time just getting her visa and making it to the fight after enduring 20 hours of travel and not arriving in Las Vegas until Thursday morning, so it’s not surprising she wanted to fight at 125 lb instead of her normal 115 lb as cutting weight in an airport seems challenging. This will also be Rodriguez’s first five round fight of her career, while Waterson has gone five rounds in two of her last three matches and didn’t have to endure any of the travel nightmare that Rodriguez went through. Rodriguez has never been finished in her 16 pro fights, so unless she’s simply exhausted if this gets to the championship rounds, we don’t see Waterson getting it done. So look for Rodriguez to either land an early KO, likely in the first two rounds, or for this fight to go the distance.
We like “Rodriguez Wins by KO” at +450, but our favorite two bets are “Rodriguez Wins by R2 KO” at +2000 and “Rodriguez Wins by R1 KO” at +1400. “Waterson Wins by Decision” at +290 is really the only line worth considering on the comeback unless you want to consider her submission line, which we don’t.
DFS Implications:
After she hadn’t scored above 83 DraftKings points in her previous seven fights, it made sense that Waterson was just 28% owned on DraftKings in her recent 5 round decision win as a near coin flip +107 underdog, priced at $8,000. However, in the narrow victory over Hill, Waterson scored 100 DraftKings points and 103 points on FanDuel. So now that she’s coming off a triple digit performance and priced at just $7,000, it will be interesting to see where her ownership ends up as a +175 underdog. She notably only scored 40 DraftKings points in her previous five round decision loss, so even if that decision had gone her way she still wouldn’t have put up a usable score. However, if she wins this fight it likely means she had some grappling success as it’s harder to imagine her winning a pure standup battle. It’s also possible that the short notice nature of this match causes some cardio issues for Rodriguez late in the fight that Waterson could capitalize on. So if she wins, she’ll likely return value, especially on DraftKings where grappling stats are more valuable. The odds imply she has a 34% chance to win, a 12% chance to get a finish and a 4% chance to end it in R1.
Rodriguez lands a decent amount of volume and is always a threat to knock opponents out on the feet, but is a liability in the grappling department. In her last six fights she’s spent 33% of the time being controlled by her opponent, which is the main area of her game she needs to improve on. Waterson has a pathetic takedown accuracy of just 34%, but keep in mind Rodriguez literally had no time to prepare for this fight and work on any specific takedown defense techniques. With that said, Waterson doesn’t really do anything special in her takedowns so maybe that’s less important than it might be with certain other fighters. If Rodriguez can keep this fight standing up, we like her chances to land an early KO while she’s still the freshest. However, it’s important to keep in mind that Rodriguez scored just 88 DraftKings points in her recent R2 KO of Ribas, and at her top-tier price tag she’ll need to outscore the other high priced fighters on the slate to be useful. Rodriguez looks like a better play on FanDuel where she has the potential to defend a ton of takedowns. The odds imply she has a 66% chance to win, a 22% chance to get a finish and a 7% chance to win in R1.
Good luck to everyone this week, we hope you win big! Tag us on Twitter with your winnings so we can see how you did! @dfs_mma