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Fight Day Scratches: None
Fighter Notes:
Fight #12
Victor Altamirano
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Looking to bounce back from a split decision loss in his recent UFC debut, Altamirano has now gone the distance in three straight and four of his last five fights, with three of those four decisions being split. Prior to losing a split decision in his recent debut, he won a questionable split decision on DWCS in August 2021. His lone finish in his last seven fights came in a weird situation in a 2020 second round submission win, where he landed an illegal up kick and the ref paused the fight. When the ref reset the position Altamirano immediately wrapped up a triangle choke to land a finish in a fight he had been losing.
In his last fight, Altamirano steadily landed more striking volume as the fight went on and also didn’t complete any of his four takedown attempts until the third round. Both guys in that fight were making their UFC debut following wins on DWCS and they each fought somewhat tentatively. Carlos Hernandez finished ahead in significant strikes 84-79, while Altamirano led in total strikes 92-90. Altamirano landed one of his four takedown attempts, while Hernandez landed two of his nine attempts. Control time was also almost dead even at 1:27-1:22 in what was a close fight.
Now 10-2 as a pro, Altamirano has one win by KO, four submissions, and five decisions. The only time he’s ever been finished was in a 2019 R2 submission, while he’s coming off his only decision defeat. His last seven fights have all made it out of the first round, with five of those going the distance (4-1) and the other two ending in second round submissions (1-1).
Overall, Altamirano is a BJJ brown belt, but seems a little too comfortable working off his back in a closed guard. While he does have four submissions on his record, three of those came in his first four pro fights against opponents who entered with records of 0-0, 0-0, and 1-1. Altamirano won the vacant LFA Flyweight belt in a five-round decision just before going on DWCS in 2021, so cardio shouldn’t be a concern for him.
Daniel Da Silva/Lacerda
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Coming off back-to-back early losses in his first two UFC fights, Da Silva has still never been to the third round in his career. He made his UFC debut in October 2021 against Jeff Molina, and looked dangerous early in round one as he threatened submissions from various positions, but Molina was able to weather the storm and finish the round landing ground and pound. Molina dropped Da Silva 20 seconds into round two as Da Silva appeared to be fading quickly, and Molina was easily able to force a stoppage through ground and pound on the mat as Da Silva simply covered up. Da Silva followed that up with a quick first round submission loss to a suspect Francisco Figueiredo in his last match, making it really hard to have much confidence in Da Silva moving forward.
In his last fight, Da Silva landed a takedown in the opening minute but wasn’t able to do anything with it. As Figueiredo looked for an armbar off his back, Da Silva was forced to scramble and Figueiredo took advantage of that to grab his leg and immediately lock up a kneebar. The fight lasted just 78 seconds and only 10 total strikes were landed. That was the first time Da Silva has ever been submitted in his career.
Now 11-3 as a pro, Da Silva has five wins by KO and six by submission. He’s been knocked out twice and has one submission loss. He’s never seen the third round, with 12 of his fights ending in round one (10-2) and two ending in round two (1-1). He’s just 3-3 in his last six fights, with all but one of those ending in round one. Da Silva turned pro in 2017 at 135 lb, but quickly moved down to 125 lb.
Overall, Da Silva is a BJJ brown belt and primarily a grappler, but also likes to throw a decent number of kicks. He has solid submission skills and will also look for ground and pound on the mat, which is where a chunk of his KOs have come from. All six of his submission wins have come in the first round either by armbar or triangle choke and he’s incredibly active off his back hunting for submissions, while he’s more so looking for ground and pound from top position. His biggest issues are his cardio and durability and he’s clearly an offensive minded fighter who’s sole focus is on finishing fights quickly.
Fight Prediction:
Altamirano will have a 2” height advantage, but both fighters share a 70” reach.
On one side of this matchup we have a fighter in Da Silva who quickly slows down in fights and has never been past the second round, and on the other we have a fighter in Altamirano who appears to get stronger as fights go on. While that leaves some overlap in the middle where either guy could finish the other in round two, it seems clear that Da Silva’s path to victory is to win this fight early, while Altamirano just needs to hang on and wait for Da Silva to wilt so that he can finish him later. While Altamirano hasn’t looked especially dangerous, Da SIlva has serious durability concerns. We expected more out of Da Silva in his last two fights, but our confidence in him is about gone, and he’s quickly running out of opportunities to show he belongs in the UFC. While it wouldn’t be surprising to finally see Da Silva find a finish here based on his track record, it’s more likely that Altamirano can survive the early attacks and either land a finish of his own later in the fight.
Our favorite bet here is “Da Silva Under 1.5 Rounds” at +425.
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DFS Implications:
Altamirano hasn’t really impressed us yet, but this is a high-ceiling matchup as he faces an opponent who’s been finished in under six minutes in both of his UFC fights and who has never been past the second round. Altamirano has looked far too comfortable off his back at times, which hurts his production, but he does have an active guard. He’ll mix in takedowns and lands a decent amount of striking volume, which is encouraging for his DFS scoring potential, but we’re mainly interested in playing him due to how fragile Da Silva has looked in his first two fights. Just keep in mind, Da Silva specializes in first round finishes, so Altamirano has a non-existent scoring floor if he loses this fight. The other reason to like Altamirano here is that he projects to be pretty low owned in tournaments, with everyone focussed on the expensive studs. The odds imply he has a 59% chance to win, a 41% chance to land a finish, and a 21% chance it comes in round one.
Da Silva has never been past the second round and 10 of his 11 wins have come in round one, so he clearly has tons of upside. However, he’s been finished easily by both of his first two UFC opponents, who have both fought to decisions in their other four combined UFC fights. Da Silva hasn’t looked even a little durable, and we also have concerns with his cardio. So overall, he’s a R1 boom or bust play with a high theoretical ceiling that he’s yet to show at the UFC level and a non-existent floor. Altamirano has only been finished once in his career and this doesn’t look like a great matchup for Da Silva to find a finish, but with so many massive underdogs on the slate, Da Silva’s one of the few that has a more reasonable chance of winning. Because of that and his history of finishes, we expect him to be somewhat popular. The odds imply he has a 41% chance to win, a 26% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #11
Aoriqileng
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Coming off his first UFC win and likely fighting for his job here in his fourth UFC appearance, Aoriqileng lost a high-volume decision in his April 2021 UFC debut to Jeff Molina. Aoriqileng had mostly been fighting at 135 lb before that, but dropped down to 125 lb for his debut and stayed at the weight class for his second UFC fight. In that fight he lost another decision, this time to Cody Durden who took him down 5 times on 10 attempts and controlled him for over five minutes. After starting off 0-2 in the UFC, Aoriqileng moved back up to 135 lb for his last fight and finally notched his first UFC win with a R1 TKO over a highly questionable Cameron Else, who has been finished in under six minutes in both of his UFC fights and five of his six career losses.
In that last fight, Aoriqileng looked crisp with his striking and dropped Else with a solid body shot less than two minutes into the fight. He then punished him with ground on the mat for a minute before the fight was eventually stopped. Things ended with Aoriqileng ahead 37-6 in significant strikes and 49-7 in total strikes, while he also landed his only takedown attempt in the fight.
Now 22-9 as a pro, Aoriqileng has seven KOs, one submission, and 14 decision wins. He’s never been knocked out, but he’s been submitted twice, and has two decision losses.
Overall, Aoriqileng is a fearless striker who has no problem walking through the fire to land shots of his own. He’ll also mix in takedowns, but doesn’t look like much of a submission threat on the mat and is primarily looking for ground and pound. He’s been taken down five times on 10 attempts in his three UFC fights, with all of those attempts coming from Cody Durden. Aoriqileng averages 6.65 SSL/min and 7.77 SSA/min, second most on the slate.
Jay Perrin
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Looking to bounce back from a decision loss to Mario Bautista in his UFC debut, Perrin originally tried to crack the UFC roster through DWCS in 2019, but lost a close/questionable decision and was forced to return to the regional scene. However, after winning his next two fights the UFC decided to give him a shot.
In his last fight, Perrin came in looking to grapple, but it was Bautista who ended up landing four takedowns on six attempts, while Perrin was only able to land two of his five attempts. Prior to that fight, Bautista had just one takedown in his first four UFC fights. Bautista finished ahead in control time 6:30-1:45, while also leading in significant strikes 72-42 and in total strikes 112-57. After taking the fight on just five day’s notice, Perrin faded down the stretch and Bautista cruised to a unanimous decision, winning every round of the fight.
Now 10-5 as a pro, Perrin has two wins by KO, four by submission, and four decisions. The only time he’s ever been finished was via a 2017 R3 guillotine choke, but he also has four decision losses, with two of those being split decisions in 2015 and 2016. Since the 2017 submission loss, he’s won 7 of his last 9 fights. He had two five-round decision wins over that stretch for the Cage Titans’ FC Bantamweight belt. His last 10 fights have all made it out of the first round, with six seeing a third round, and five going the distance.
Overall, Perrin is a durable grappler who’s constantly looking to get fights to the ground. He struggled both to land takedowns and control his opponent when he did get the fight to the ground in his debut, so it will be interesting to see how he looks here with more time to prepare. Perrin trained some with Merab Dvalishvili for this fight, which is encouraging for his growth, but who knows how much of an impact that will have. It’s rare to see Perrin put up big striking numbers, so if he can’t control this fight on the mat then he’ll have a tough time pulling off the upset.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’7” but Aoriqileng will have a 2” reach advantage.
Perrin seems to be everyone’s underdog darling this week, but we need to see more out of him before we buy into the fact that he can actually compete at the UFC level. He’s still very green both with his striking and his grappling, but he will aggressively look to take opponents down, which is encouraging for his chances. While Aoriqileng got taken down five times by Cody Durden, he was never in danger on the mat in that fight and still almost won a decision. Also, Durden looks like a better wrestler than Perrin, so we can’t just assume Perrin will find the same success here. On the feet, Aoriqileng is the much better striker, and for as long as he can keep the fight standing, he should be the one doing more damage. He throws good uppercuts that will be especially useful here as they’ll make it tougher for Perrin to shoot for takedowns. Aoriqileng’s striking defense is pretty non-existent and he’s content walking through punches to land shots of his own. Perhaps he’s improved that part of his game, and he’ll need to if he wants to hang around the UFC much longer. Both guys are in need of a win here, as Aoriqileng is 1-2 in the UFC and could be fighting for his job, while Perrin is trying to avoid falling to 0-2. We expect Perrin to find some success in getting the fight to the ground, but don’t really see him doing a ton once he gets there. Aoriqileng should come out ahead in the striking, but we don’t see either guy finishing the other and expect this to end in a close decision that could go either way. Forced to choose, we’ll give Perrin the slightest of edges to win based on his grappling advantage, but this feels like a coin flip.
Our favorite bet here is “FGTD” at -175.
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DFS Implications:
Aoriqileng is coming off his first UFC win in a massive DFS performance where he dropped 125 DraftKings points in a first round TKO win. That was also his first UFC fight at 135 lb, while both of his UFC losses came at 125 lb. He had mostly been fighting at 135 lb prior to joining the UFC and doesn’t appear undersized at 135 lb for what it’s worth. He’s an aggressive fighter who will happily walk through punches to land his own shots and does a good job of throwing body shots and uppercuts that should be useful as he faces an opponent who will be looking to grapple. Aoriqileng’s striking has looked sharp, and he’ll also mix in takedowns, which is encouraging for his scoring potential. Working against him, Perrin will be looking to grapple in this fight and Aoriqileng may end up defending takedowns, in the clinch, and potentially on his back for periods of time in this fight. That will make it much tougher for him to score well in a decision, and he’s likely reliant on a finish to return value. Perrin has never been knocked out and his only early loss came in a 2017 third-round submission, so the chances of Aoriqileng getting another finish here appear lower. The odds imply Aoriqileng has a 55% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Perrin’s grappling-heavy fighting style lends itself well to the DraftKings scoring system as he generally does a good job of racking up control time and takedowns. However, he was only able to land two takedowns on five attempts in his recent UFC debut, with just 1:45 on control time. If he can’t improve on those numbers here, he’ll have a hard time pulling off the upset and/or scoring well. Aoriqileng is a more dangerous striker than Perrin, but also absorbs 7.77 SSA/min (2nd most on the slate). So while we don’t see Perrin winning a pure striking battle, he does have a good chance to land a good number of strikes in between the grappling exchanges. That’s encouraging for his DFS scoring potential, especially on a slate lacking very many viable underdogs. Perrin has seen the line move in his favor, which will annoyingly drive up his ownership, but he still looks like a pretty solid tournament and low-risk play. The odds imply he has a 45% chance to win, a 23% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #10
Amir Albazi
3rd UFC Fight (2-0)Coming off a 19 month layoff after winning his first two UFC fights, Albazi’s last two scheduled bouts both got canceled. He made his UFC debut in July 2020 and submitted Malcolm Gordon late in the first round, before winning a close decision over Zhalgas Zhumagulov in January 2021.
In his last fight, Albazi showed off his striking more than he had in the past, as he outlanded Zhumagulov 68-59 in significant strikes and 94-74 in total strikes. He did also land a pair of takedowns on three attempts and accrued over three and a half minutes of control time, with most of that coming in the third round as he secured the decision with his grappling. Zhumagulov went just 1 for 3 on his takedown attempts.
Now 14-1 as a pro, Albazi has four wins by KO, eight by submission, and two decisions. Eight of those 12 finishes have come in the first round, with the other four ending round two. His last four early wins have all come by first round submission. His only career loss ended in a 2019 decision. Albazi started his pro career off at 135 lb, but moved down to 125 lb in 2017, where he stayed until his short notice UFC debut, which was fought back up at 135 lb. He dropped back down to 125 lb for his last fight, and it appears that’s where he’ll stay. Most of his career finishes have occurred up at 135 lb, so it will be interesting to see if he can be as an effective finisher at 125 lb, where he’s only landed two finishes, and three of his five fights have gone the distance.
Overall, Albazi is a slick grappler who looks to put opponents away early on the mat. He did show improved striking in his last fight, and after 19 months away we could potentially see an improved version of Albazi here. It’s also possible we see Albazi start slower if he has any ring rust to knock off, which is slightly concerning for a guy who’s generally looking to land first round submission wins.
Francisco Figueiredo
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Fresh off a first round submission win over Daniel Da Silva, Figueiredo is 2-1 in the UFC but has had a very favorable schedule thus far and this will easily be his toughest test to date. Figueiredo’s recent submission win was his first finish since 2018 and he hasn’t been very impressive. After scraping by to win a decision over a terrible Jerome Rivera in his UFC debut, Figueiredo lost a decision to another suspect fighter in Malcolm Gordon in his next match, before bouncing back with a round one submission most recently.
In his last fight, Figueiredo got taken down in the opening minute, but as he looked for a submission off his back Da Silva spun around and stuck his leg in Figueiredo’s face, at which point he immediately snatched it up and locked up a kneebar to force a quick tap. So little happened in the fight that it’s hard to take much away from it, but Da Silva was easily able to take Figueiredo down.
Now 13-4-1 as a pro, Figueiredo has three wins by KO, eight by submission, and two decisions. He’s been knocked out once (R3 2011), submitted once (R2 2012), and has two decision wins. Figueiredo has competed as high as 145 lb in the past, but had been at 135 lb until he made his 2021 UFC debut and dropped down to 125 lb.
Overall, Figueiredo is a superficial clone of his brother minus the fighting skills. He’s prone to gassing out, and lacks the elite power and submission abilities that his brother possesses. With that said, he’s a BJJ black belt and 11 of his 13 pro wins have come early, so he’s at least been able to put away low level opponents. However, he’s yet to face any real competition and this next matchup will be his toughest test to date.
Fight Prediction:
Figueiredo will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 68” reach.
Even though he’s coming off a first round submission win, Figueiredo hasn’t really done anything to impress us thus far, while Albazi has looked good in his first two fights. With that said, it is somewhat concerning that Albazi hasn’t fought in 19 months, and a slower start for him is always possible. Nevertheless, Albazi looks like the better all around fighter and has been both the more dangerous finisher early in fights and has the better cardio of the two. So as long as he doesn’t trip and fall into a submission, he should be able to win this fight however long it lasts. The bigger question for us is whether he’ll be able to lock up an early submission, as he’s said he intends to, or if Figueiredo’s defenses hold up and we see this make it to the later stages and potentially end in a decision. Figueiredo hasn’t been finished since 2012 and Albazi has never finished an opponent beyond the second round. While the submission props are interesting from a betting perspective, it’s more likely Albazi wins a decision here.
Our favorite bet here is “Albazi SUB or DEC” at -175.
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DFS Implications:
Albazi is coming off a decision win followed by a 19 month layoff and will go mostly overlooked in DFS at his high price tag with all of the big names surrounding him. While his last win went the distance, 12 of his 14 career victories have ended early, including eight in round one and round in round two. His grappling-heavy style is a better fit for the DraftKings scoring system, but his finishing upside keeps him in play on both sites. Working against him, Figueiredo is a BJJ black belt and hasn’t been finished since 2012. Figueiredo also has an 82% takedown defense, but hasn’t faced much in terms of competition so far in the UFC and was easily taken down early in his last fight. So this isn’t an ideal matchup for Albazi, but it’s also not the worst. Albazi scored just 79 DraftKings points in his recent decision win, and while it’s theoretically possible for him to score well in a grappling-heavy decision victory, he more likely needs a finish here to return value. The odds imply he has an 80% chance to win, a 37% chance to land a finish, and an 18% chance it comes in round one.
Figueiredo scored just 76 DraftKings points in his lone UFC decision win and still only 92 points in his recent first round submission victory. He will mix in takedowns, landing six of his eight attempts so far in the UFC, but doesn’t land much in terms of striking volume and will now be facing his toughest test in the UFC. Albazi has never been finished in his career and has better cardio than Figueiredo, so it’s hard to find many paths to victory for Figueiredo. He’s likely reliant on a flukey submission or a questionable decision to win and we’re pretty low on his chances to pull off the upset. The one thing he has going for him is that Albazi is coming off a 19 month layoff, so there’s always a chance he’ll have some ring rust to knock off early and Figueiredo can catch him sleeping. Just keep in mind, Figueiredo wasn’t even able to finish Jerome Rivera, who didn’t make it past the six minute mark in his other three UFC fights and is the only fighter to ever get submitted by Zhalgas Zhumagulov before being cut. The odds imply Figueiredo has a 20% chance to win, an 11% chance to land a finish, and a 4% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #9
AJ Fletcher
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Fletcher is looking to bounce back from the first loss of his career in a close decision loss to Matthew Semelsberger in his recent UFC debut. Just prior to that, Fletcher had finished five straight opponents in the first round, including a R1 flying knee KO win on DWCS in August 2021. Coming out of Lafayette, Louisiana, Fletcher has notably trained with Dustin Poirier. Fletcher is a stocky former football player, who is short for the 170 lb division at just 5’10” and his second pro fight was actually down at 155 lb, but the rest of his matches have all been at 170 lb. He hasn’t faced much in terms of competition and only three of his nine career wins were against opponents with winning records.
In his last fight, Fletcher started strong but struggled down the stretch, as he won the first round but lost the later two on all three judges’ scorecards. Fletcher landed four of his six takedown attempts in the fight and also had two reversals and two official submission attempts, while Semelsberger landed his only takedown attempt as well. Fletcher finished ahead in control time 5:42-4:55 in a fight that played out mostly on the mat. Semelsberger narrowly led in significant strikes 40-34, while Fletcher led in total strikes 87-54. Fletcher was able to take Semelsberger down 30 seconds into the first round and controlled him for almost the entire round. Fletcher landed two more takedowns in round two but wasn’t able to control Semelsberger for any amount of time on either of them. The same was true with a third round takedown landed by Fletcher, where Semelsberger quickly returned to his feet, which is likely what allowed Semelsberger to still win the decision.
Now 9-1 as a pro, Fletcher has four wins by KO, four by submission, and one decision. Six of those early wins occurred in round one, with the other two ending in round three. His only career loss came in his recent decision defeat in his debut. His lone decision win occurred in his second pro fight back in 2019 and his last seven victories have all come early. Four of his last five finishes have come by submission. One thing to keep in mind is that Fletcher’s last two early wins both came against opponents with losing records, so it’s fair to question the level of competition that he’s been facing.
Overall, Fletcher is an explosive fighter but seems to fade later in fights. While he’s constantly looking for takedowns, we’ve seen him struggle to control opponents on the mat at times. Fletcher offers a well rounded attack of both striking and grappling, but we haven’t seen the cleanest submission techniques out of him either, and while he was able to get away with that on the regional scene, it will likely be tougher for him to complete submissions at the UFC level until he cleans that up. He’s still a very raw fighter who only turned pro in 2019, so we should be seeing improvements from him between every fight.
Ange Loosa
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Alternating wins and losses over his last six fights, Loosa is coming off a decision loss to Mounir Lazzez in his UFC debut and has now gone the distance in five straight fights. The last time one of his fights ended early was in 2016, after he finished his first six pro opponents in round one. After losing a decision on DWCS in September 2021, Loosa returned to the regional scene and won a decision just two weeks before getting the call from the UFC to make his short notice debut on just four day’s notice. While Loosa lost a decision on DWCS, he became the first fighter to ever take Jack Della Maddalena to a decision, showing that he is at least very durable. Loosa also hadn’t fought in two and a half years prior to going on DWCS, so the circumstances surrounding his last two losses were both challenging.
In his last fight, Loosa was unable to land either of his takedown attempts and was massively outlanded on the feet as he lost a high-volume decision against a crisp striker in Mounir Lazzez. Loosa struggled to find his range against the longer Lazzez and the fight ended with Lazzez ahead 141-88 in significant strikes and 141-91 in total strikes. Both fighters failed to land either of their two takedown attempts and Lazzez cruised to a unanimous 30-27 decision.
Now 8-3 as a pro, Loosa has five wins by KO, one by submission, and two decisions. He’s never been finished, with all three of his losses going the distance. All of those losses have notably occurred in his last five fights. Loosa’s training partners have said he’s calmed down some after being kind of wild earlier in his career. His record backs that up, as his first six career fights all ended in first round wins, his last five matches have all gone the distance.
Overall, Loosa is a well rounded fighter who has both the ability to strike and wrestle. He’s a former training partner of Kamaru Usman, and currently trains out of Sanford MMA with guys like Gilbert Burns, so he’s gotten lots of experience outside of the Octagon. While he has power in his strikes, he misses a lot and has just a 38% striking accuracy. And while he’s durable, he absorbs a ton of strikes, averaging 8.30 SSA/min (most on the slate). It seems like he relies too much on his power and durability, which results in him getting outstruck and makes it tougher for him to win fights unless he dominates the wrestling exchanges or finishes his opponents.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’10” but Loosa will have a 7” reach advantage.
This is an interesting matchup between two raw talents who are both coming off losses in their recent UFC debuts. They both have the ability to compete on the feet and the mat, but it will be interesting to see how the grappling exchanges go. Loosa looks like the more durable of the two, but neither guy has ever been finished. Fletcher starts faster as he aggressively looks for first round finishes, while Loosa has settled into being a more patient fighter after looking more wild early in his career. While both guys have the power to finish the other, and Fletcher will look for submissions on the mat, if this goes the distance as we expect it to, then the winner will likely be determined by who wins the grappling battle. We don’t have a ton of confidence in either guy, as we have concerns with the cardio of Fletcher and the striking defense of Loosa, and this feels like more or less of a coin flip. We expect Fletcher to win the first round, but potentially slow down late, so live betting Loosa after R1 makes a lot of sense. However, forced to choose, we’ll say Fletcher wins a close decision.
Our favorite bet here is “FGTD” at -142.
Check out our premium betting content on patreon.com/mmadfs for all of our other top bets.
DFS Implications:
Fletcher scored 64 DraftKings points in his recent decision loss, showing decent scoring potential for the future. His grappling-heavy approach will generally score better on DraftKings than FanDuel in fights that go the distance, but his history of finishes keeps him in play on both sites. Loosa has never been finished in his career and has also yet to be taken down on five attempts in his debut and DWCS appearance, but both of those matches were against strikers. However, Loosa does get hit a ton, averaging 8.30 SSA/min, which is encouraging for Fletcher’s scoring potential. Nevertheless, this is still a tough matchup for Fletcher and he’s unlikely to just dominate Loosa in the grappling exchanges. So in the end, he’ll likely be reliant on handing Loosa the first early loss of his career to crack tournament winning lineups unless we see him completely fill up the stat sheet. The odds imply Fletcher has a 59% chance to win, a 25% chance to land a finish, and a 12% chance it comes in round one.
Loosa’s combination of striking and wrestling make him an interesting DFS option, especially at his cheaper price tag, but he’s looked far too hittable in his last two fights. While he has powerful striking, he’s not very accurate with his hands and relies on his durability to simply absorb the shots coming back at him. That’s a recipe to get outstruck on a consistent basis, and for a guy who has fought to five straight decisions, it’s not a very good way to win. While he’s a decent wrestler, he’s only landed one takedown on six attempts between his debut and DWCS appearance, so that hasn’t been something he can rely on either. In fairness to him, he took his UFC debut on short notice after just fighting a couple of weeks earlier. So perhaps we’ll see an improved version of him here, and it’s not like Fletcher has looked exceptional either. With two fighters still in search of their first UFC win, this is a more volatile spot with a wider range of outcomes. Both guys can land powerful strikes and wrestle, but they’ve also each been durable up until this point and neither has ever been finished. Loosa scored just 36 DraftKings points in his recent decision loss, so he’ll either need to find more wrestling success or land a finish to score well. The odds imply Loosa has a 41% chance to win, a 17% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #8
Sean Woodson
5th UFC Fight (3-1)Coming off his first early win in the UFC, Woodson has now won two in a row after suffering his first career loss back in 2020. Woodson originally punched his ticket to the UFC with a R2 KO win on DWCS in 2019 against Terrance McKinney who was winning the fight up until Woodson landed a flying knee to knock him out. Next, Woodson won a decision in his October 2019 UFC debut against a suspect Kyle Bochniak, who entered the fight 2-4 in the UFC and was cut following his fifth loss. Woodson outlanded Bochniak 111-42 in significant strikes and 150-52 in total strikes, while Bochniak amazingly went 1 for 15 on takedown attempts. Following the win in his debut, Woodson suffered his lone career loss in a R3 submission against Julian Erosa, before bouncing back with his recent two wins.
In his last fight, Woodson turned it on late in the first round to finish Collin Anglin with numerous body shots. Anglin attempted one takedown, but Woodson was easily able to defend it and the entire round played out on the feet. Woodson finished ahead of Anglin 50-8 in significant strikes and 59-8 in total strikes.
Now 9-1 as a pro, Woodson has three wins by KO, one by submission, and five decisions. His only career loss came in a 2020 third round submission against Julian Erosa. Prior to his recent first round TKO win, he had seen the second round in seven straight fights, with six of those making it to round three, and five going the distance. Woodson landed a pair of first round finishes in his first two pro fights, but those came against opponents who entered with records of 0-3 and 3-4. Also, those wins took place at 180 and 185 lb. Woodson then dropped down to 155 lb for his third pro fight and then all the way down to 145 lb for his fourth pro bout, where he’s still currently residing. Five of his seven wins at 145 lb have gone the distance.
Overall, Woodson is a good boxer, who’s insanely long for the 145 lb division. He had an extensive amateur boxing career and it shows in his fighting style. Most of his opponents are looking to get him to the mat, but he has a really solid 82.2% takedown defense and has only been taken down 6 times on 39 attempts in his four UFC fights, and twice on six attempts by McKinney on DWCS. He doesn’t load up on his punches, but just consistently chips away at his opponents. He averages 5.75 SSL/min and 3.76 SSA/min.
Luis Saldana
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Squeaking out a 2-1 record in his first three UFC fights, both of Saldana’s wins have come in close decisions, while his loss also went the distance. He stole a close decision over Jordan Griffin in his UFC debut, and then lost to Austin Lingo, before winning another close decision against Bruno Souza. Saldana faded down the stretch in all three of those fights. He punched his ticket to the UFC with an early R3 KO win on DWCS in November 2020, but it came against a very suspect Vince Murdock.
In his last fight, Saldana took on a pure karate striker and unsurprisingly looked to grapple a little more. Saldana landed two of his five takedowns in the fight, with 96 seconds of control time, but wasn’t especially impressive. Nevertheless, Saldana was able to finish ahead in significant strikes 84-66 and in total strikes 88-68 in a very lackluster fight, and went on to win a close 29-28 decision.
Now 16-7 as a pro, Saldana has nine wins by KO, five by submission, and two decisions. He’s been knocked out once (R3 2016), submitted twice (R1 2012 & R3 2015), and has four decision losses. Despite all of the finishes, 13 of his last 15 fights have made it out of the first round. The last time one of his fights ended in round one was 2018.
Overall, Saldana is a low-level striker, who throws a lot of kicks and will mix in occasional takedowns. He’s shown questionable cardio in all of his UFC fights and also doesn’t really look like he even wants to be there when he’s fighting. It’s surprising he hasn’t been finished since 2016 considering how bad he’s looked later in fights, but he also hasn’t faced much in terms of competition. This will be his first true test in the UFC, so it will be interesting to see how he fairs.
Fight Prediction:
Woodson will have a 3” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
Saldana throws a lot of kicks, which should help him to overcome his reach disadvantage in this fight, but he’ll still need to overcome his massive deficit in skill. It would make sense for him to attack Woodson’s stilts, while also trying to mix in occasional takedowns, but Woodson’s takedown defense has been so good that Saldana will have a tough time getting him down. Woodson is a much better boxer and should be able to wear on the cardio of Saldana throughout the fight. We like Woodson to either land a late knockout or win a decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Woodson R3 or DEC” at -110.
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DFS Implications:
Woodson is coming off a career performance where he landed his first finish in the UFC, with an ideal late R1 TKO that allowed him to rack up 50 significant strikes before the fight was stopped. That was good for 122 DraftKings points, after Woodson hadn’t scored above 82 points in his first three UFC fights. Woodson generally lands a ton of striking volume and was an all star on FanDuel before they took away takedowns defended, as he’s defended 33 takedowns in his four UFC fights. Woodson has never even attempted a takedown in the UFC, so he relies entirely on his striking for DFS production. That makes it tough for him to score well in decisions, and five of his seven career wins at 145 lb have gone the distance. Working in his favor, Saldana fades as fights go on, which makes a later round finish more likely for Woodson. A late knockout with a high number of significant strikes behind it will typically score better on FanDuel than on DraftKings, so we’re more interested in playing Woodson over there. While Saldana has questionable cardio, he’s still only been knocked out once in his career, but he also hasn’t faced the toughest competition. We like Woodson to attack his body to expedite Saldana’s fleeting cardio, increasing the odds that he can get him out of there. However, it’s still more likely that Saldana narrowly hangs on to lose a decision and Woodson most likely fails to score quite enough to crack winning lineups in that scenario. The odds imply Woodson has a 74% chance to win, a 35% chance to land a finish, and a 16% chance it comes in round one.
Saldana has done nothing to impress us yet at the UFC level and appears to be fighting not to lose every time he steps inside the Octagon. He’s yet to top 77 DraftKings points in any of his UFC fights and will likely need a finish here to put up a useful score. While all 14 of his pre-UFC wins came early, he was fighting a much lower level of competition and we haven’t seen that finishing ability translate to the UFC. Woodson is crazy long for the division and has only been submitted once in his career and never knocked out. This is easily Saldana’s toughest test to date and we’d be shocked if he won. The odds imply he has a 26% chance to win, a 13% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #7
Jared Gordon
11th UFC Fight (6-4)After winning three straight fights in 2020 and 2021, Gordon suffered the first non-KO loss of his career in a recent third round submission against Grant Dawson. Prior to that loss, Gordon had won decisions against Chris Fishgold, Danny Chavez, and Joe Solecki. Gordon’s last five wins have all gone the distance and the last time he finished an opponent was in a 2017 R2 TKO.
In his last fight, Gordon struggled with the dominating wrestling of Grant Dawson, who was able to land seven takedowns on 17 attempts. 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.
Now 18-5 as a pro, Gordon has six wins by KO, two by submission, and 10 decisions. He’s been knocked out four times, with two in round one and two in round three, and submitted once, but has never lost a decision. All but one of his early wins occurred prior to joining the UFC, and he doesn’t look like much of a threat to finish fights at the UFC level. Gordon has competed at both 145 lb and 155 lb in his career, but all of his UFC fights have ended up either being at 149-150 lb Catchweight or 155 lb. All three of his UFC losses have come by knockout at 155 lb, while his lone early win in the UFC came in a 149 lb Catchweight match in his debut. He’s just 3-4 in the UFC at 155 lb, but 3-0 in his Catchweight matches.
Overall, Gordon is a ground and pound specialist with a suspect chin. He relies on making fights dirty and using his experience to grind out decision wins as he simply wears on his opponents. While he’s a BJJ brown belt, it’s been almost five years since he finished an opponent and close to six years since he submitted anybody. He made the switch in teams from Roufusport to Sanford MMA in 2019 following his knockout loss to Charles Oliveira and has since gone 3-1. He had planned on moving down to 145 lb following that loss, but in his next fight, his opponent, Chris Fishgold missed weight by three pounds and the fight was moved to a 149 lb Catchweight. Gordon was able to successfully hit 145 lb for that matchup prior to Fishgold missing, but for his next fight it was Gordon who missed weight by 4 lb when he was set to face Danny Chavez at 145 lb and that fight was moved to a 150 lb Catchweight. Following those two attempts at competing in the 145 lb division, which both played out as Catchweight matchups, Gordon moved back up to 155 lb for his last two fights. Gordon has been taken down 15 times on 33 attempts in his nine UFC fights and has a 54% takedown defense.
Leonardo Santos
10th UFC Fight (6-2-1)Limping towards the end of his career, Santos is coming off back-to-back early losses against Grant Dawson and Clay Guida. That was the first time Guida had finished anybody since 2017 and it’s definitely not a good look. The last time Santos won a fight was in July 2020 and even in that match he gassed out. The last time he finished anybody was in 2019, and his second most recent early win was all the way back in 2015.
To Santos’ credit in his last fight, he was moments away from finishing Guida early in the first round, but the fight was never stopped and Santos ended up punching himself out. It’s anyone’s guess why the 4th degree BJJ black belt and former 7-time Jiu-Jitsu world champion didn’t simply grab the neck of a face down Guida, but he was made to pay for that terrible decision making when Guida took him down and submitted him early in round two. Santos had nothing left at that point as he did his best Rodolfo Vieira impression. The fight ended with Santos ahead 41-18 in significant strikes and 65-50 in total strikes, while Guida landed two of his seven takedown attempts.
Now 18-5-1 as a pro, Santos has three wins by KO, nine by submission, five decisions, and one DQ win. He’s been knocked out twice, submitted once, and has two decision defeats. Prior to his recent pair of early losses, Santos had gone 12-0-1 dating back to 2009.
Overall, Santos is a high-level grappler, but a low-level thinker. He has terrible cardio, yet opts to punch himself out everytime he has an opponent hurt, opposed to wrapping up their neck. He’s now 42 years old but refuses to call it quits. He did take nearly three years off from 2016 to 2019 as he battled injuries, so perhaps he’s just trying to make up for lost time, but you don’t get those years back. He’s a 4th degree BJJ black belt and a former 7-time Jiu-Jitsu world champion, but he’s only landed two takedowns in his last five fights. While he has a solid 86% takedown defense, once his gas tank goes the takedown defense goes with it. If Santos doesn’t make the choice to retire soon, the choice will be made for him.
UPDATE: Santos made weight with the help of the shame box, but looked terrible on the scale.
Fight Prediction:
Santos will have a 3” height advantage and 7” reach advantage, but Gordon is nine years younger than the 42-year-old Santos.
This sets up as the perfect storm for a cardio implosion on Santos’ side of things. We’ve already seen him gas out multiple times recently, and now he’ll be fighting at elevation against an uptempo grinder and Santos had an absolutely dreadful weigh in. If Gordon can wear him out and get him to the ground, he has the potential to land an insane amount of ground strikes. While Gordon has shown a suspect chin in the past and is now coming off a submission loss, Santos will need to land something clean early to capitalize on that before he gasses out, which in fairness is always possible. Nevertheless, we like Gordon to wear on Santo’s cardio and finish him in the later rounds, most likely in round two through ground and pound.
Our favorite bet here is “Gordon ITD” at +180.
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DFS Implications:
Gordon has averaged 107 DraftKings points in his six UFC wins, despite five of those ending in decisions. He’s only failed to score 95 or more points in one of those, and has shown a really solid floor regardless of how fights end. He’s known for his ground and pound, and therefore is typically a much better play on DraftKings compared to FanDuel, as most of those strikes don’t register as significant. On paper this may not look like the best matchup for Gordon, as he squares off against a 4th degree BJJ black belt and a former 7-time Jiu-Jitsu world champion with an 86% takedown defense, but Santos’ cardio has looked dreadful and now he’s coming off a rough weigh-in and fighting at elevation in Salt Lake City. We expect Gordon to be pushing the pace, which should further facilitate Santos gassing out and should present an opportunity for Gordon to get the fight to the ground and go to town with ground and pound. While Gordon hasn’t finished anybody since 2017, this looks like a prime opportunity for him to change that. And even if Santos is somehow able to survive, Gordon still has the potential to put up a huge score as long as he can get the fight to the ground. The one concern with Gordon is his chin, as he’s been knocked out in four of his five career losses, and submitted in the other. However, the last time he was knocked out was in 2019, so it has been a little while. That does add enough uncertainty to his floor to make it tougher to play Gordon in low-risk contests, but he looks like a great tournament pivot off of the other high-priced options. The odds imply he has a 72% chance to win, a 31% chance to land a finish, and a 15% chance it comes in round one.
Santos lacks the striking volume (2.88 SSL/min) and takedown numbers (1.0 TDL/15 min) to score well in decisions and has returned DraftKings scores of just 74, 39 and 73 in his three UFC decision wins. That’s not a typo, he once scored just 39 points in a decision win. Not to mention Gordon has never lost a decision in his career and Santos barely has the cardio to even make it to a decision these days. Santos has also never finished a fight beyond the second round and due to his lack of output, even his second round finishes have failed to really score well, totalling just 83 and 89 DraftKings points. So it’s safe to treat Santos as a round one finish or bust play for DFS purposes and his rough weigh-in has us pretty low on him. With that said, Gordon has been prone to getting knocked out throughout his career, so you’ll likely want to hedge with some Santos exposure, just in case Santos does find the button in round one. The odds imply Santos has a 28% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #6
Alexandr Romanov
6th UFC Fight (5-0)Fresh off a R1 submission win over Chase Sherman, Romanov remains undefeated as a pro and has dominated almost all of his opponents. The only close UFC fight he’s been in was when he took on another Heavyweight grappler in Juan Espino. While Romanov was ahead in that fight, Espino was able to take him down four times on five attempts and made the fight close. Both guys gassed out in the second round, and early in round three Espino landed an inadvertent low blow that Romanov appeared to take advantage of as he said he couldn’t continue and the match ended in a rare technical decision, which Romanov won on the score cards. Unless Espino had finished Romanov in the third round, we would have seen Romanov get his hand raised regardless, as two of the judges had awarded him both of the first two rounds. Romanov’s other four UFC wins have all come in the first two rounds against lower level opponents, with three submissions and one TKO.
In his last fight, Romanov took on a terrible short-notice replacement in Chase Sherman and easily cruised to a quick finish. Sherman entered as a +1100 underdog and the only debate leading up to the fight was how long it would take Romanov to finish him. Sherman might as well have been a tackling dummy, as he failed to make a dent on the stat sheet, with zero attempted strikes thrown. He got tossed around the Octagon for the opening minute before getting mounted, smashed, and submitted with a keylock.
Now 16-0 as a pro, Romanov has six wins by KO, nine by submission, and one technical decision win. Only three of his 16 fights have made it to the third round, while 11 have ended in round one, and two ended in round two. However, three of his five UFC fights have made it to the final minute of the second round.
Overall, Romanov has landed 16 takedowns on 23 attempts (69.6%) in his five UFC fights, with at least two takedowns in each of those matches. Meanwhile, the only fighter to try and take him down was Juan Espino, who landed four of his five attempts, so Romanov has shown just a 20% takedown defense, albeit in a limited sample size. It’s no secret what Romanov’s game plan is coming into every fight, but it’s easier said than done to stop him as he simply overpowers his opponents and slams them to the mat. However, we’ve yet to see him dominate another Heavyweight grappler, so this next matchup will be very interesting.
Marcin Tybura
16th UFC Fight (9-6)Looking to bounce back from an October 2021 decision loss to Alexander Volkov, Tybura had won five in a row prior to that defeat. While most of those wins came in very favorable situations, against aging, struggling, and undersized opponents, Tybura does have a decision win over fellow Heavyweight grappler Sergey Spivak that has aged well. While Tybura finished a couple of one-dimensional strikers with cardio concerns in Walt Harris and Greg Hardy with ground and pound in his last two wins, prior to that he had gone nine straight fights without landing a finish.
In his last fight, Tybura went 0 for 16 on his takedown attempts against Alexander Volkov’s improved takedown defense. The defensive grappling of Volkov appeared to tire out both guys in the fight and we saw labored efforts all around in the second half of the match. Nevertheless, Volkov won a unanimous decision as he finished ahead in significant strikes 75-58 and in total strikes 89-73, after forcing Tybura to compete in a standup battle.
Now 22-7 as a pro, Tybura has nine wins by KO, six by submission, and seven decisions. He’s been knocked out four times and has three decision losses. While all of his recent finishes have come by KO, his six submission wins all occurred earlier in his career from 2011 to 2014. Eight of his 15 UFC fights have ended in decisions (5-3) with the other seven ending in KO/TKOs (4-3). Five of those seven finishes came in rounds two and three, with the two exceptions being a 2021 R1 KO win over Walter Harris and a 2019 R1 KO loss to Augusto Sakai
Overall, Tybura is a Heavyweight grappler and BJJ black belt. He’s landed 19 takedowns on 58 attempts (32.8% accuracy) in his 15 UFC fights, while he’s only been taken down by his opponents 5 times on 28 attempts (82.1% defense). The last fighter to take Tybura down was…Derrick Lewis, who landed one of his two attempts in a 2018 matchup. However, Tybura has only had to defend four attempts since then and none in his last five matches. We saw Tybura get put on his back in his last fight as he looked for a takedown of his own, and he didn’t appear to offer much from that position. Seven UFC fighters have tried to take Tybura down, but only three of them have been successful (Derrick Lewis in 2018, Fabricio Werdum 2017 & Luis Henrique in 2017), and only one fighter has gotten him down more than once (Luis Henrique). Tybura went 1-2 in those three fights where he was taken down. He got knocked out by Lewis in the third round, while the other two both went the distance (1-1). Tybura lacks the striking ability to be competitive on the feet with anyone in the top of the Heavyweight division, but can hang on the feet against lower level strikers. With that said, he’s typically reliant on taking opponents down and beating them up with ground and pound to win fights and has landed at least one takedown in his last eight UFC wins. He’s lost the last three fights where he’s failed to land a takedown.
Fight Prediction:
Tybura will have a 1” height advantage and 3” reach advantage, while Romanov is five years younger than the 36-year-old Tybura.
Tybura is basically store brand Alexander Romanov, so this is a pretty interesting matchup, but definitely has bust potential if this plays out as a grappling stalemate. Tybura appears to have the better cardio of the two and has far more experience going late in fights, while Romanov is more explosive and aggressive. Romanov hasn’t really shown the ability to defend takedowns, although only one UFC fighter has actually tried to get him down, so it will be interesting to see if Tybura can put him on his back. However, Tybura has struggled mightily with his takedown accuracy lately, landing just three of his 25 attempts in his last four fights. And he’s only landed more than two takedowns in 2 of his 15 UFC fights. Romanov is generally very aggressive early in fights, while we’ve seen Tybura start slow at times in the past. Because of that, it’s tougher to see Tybura winning the early stages of this match and his more likely path to victory will be to outlast Romanov and takeover in the back half as he tries to win a close decision or look for a late finish on the mat if Romanov really gasses out. This is a tricky one to predict as it’s hard to know with much certainty how the wrestling exchanges will play out and how the cardio of these two will hold up. If Tybura can survive for a round and a half, we could see one or both guys gas out depending on the pace they set. That opens the possibility for a late finish or a decision win for either fighter, meaning we have a wide range of potential outcomes here. Considering how Romanov’s fight against Espino went, it’s hard to have nearly as much confidence in him as we normally would. And while he almost always finishes his opponents, we also think there’s a decent chance this one goes the distance. Forced to choose, we’ll say this ends in a close split decision and Romanov gets his hand raised, but we admittedly don’t have a great read on this fight and it’s been hard to go wrong betting Romanov ITD in the past.
Our favorite bet here is “Romanov ITD” at +100.
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DFS Implications:
Romanov has scored 110 or more DraftKings points in four of his five UFC fights, but struggled to score well the one time he faced a fellow Heavyweight grappler, when he scored just 67 points against Juan Espino in a technical decision that was stopped a minute into the third round. While that’s basically the worst case scenario in a win and he was on pace to score around 80 DraftKings points in a decision had the fight gone the full 15 minutes, that’s still nowhere close to enough to be useful. Romanov relies heavily on taking his opponents down and beating them up on the mat, but now he’ll face another Heavyweight grappler in Marcin Tybura, who has a solid 82% takedown defense and much more UFC experience than Romanov. That lowers Romanov’s floor in this matchup, although he does still have a high theoretical ceiling if he can control Tybura on the mat. Romanov is habitually massively owned, and in his five UFC fights his DraftKings ownership has come in at 59%, 74%, 41%, 68%, and 68% most recently. We did see his ownership dip the last time he faced a grappler, as the field was savvy enough to realize that was a bad matchup for him, so it’s possible we see the same thing happen here. However, he still projects to be massively owned, so if Tybura can make this a close fight and stay off his back, fading Romanov could be a massive leverage opportunity, even if Romanov wins a close decision. With that said, his wrestling heavy approach does still have the potential to score well even without a finish if he can control Tybura on the mat for the majority of this fight, so it’s certainly a scary fade. This fight could go a lot of ways, which makes this a tricky spot and it’s tougher to take a hard stand as much as we’d like to, but going under the field on him looks like the move. The odds imply Romanov has a 76% chance to win, a 49% chance to land a finish, and a 24% chance it comes in round one.
Tybura has averaged 93 DraftKings in his nine UFC wins and has scored at least 81 points in all of those, with 90 or more in six of them. His grappling heavy style is a good fit for the DraftKings scoring system, but now he faces a fellow Heavyweight grappler, which makes this a tougher matchup for him stylistically. Tybura’s wins have generally come in favorable spots, which this is clearly not. However, Romanov was taken down four times on five attempts by Juan Espiono, so there is some reason to think Tybura can find some grappling success despite his 32% career takedown accuracy. While this looks like a tough spot for Tybura to get a finish, he’s still averaged 89 DraftKings points in his five decision wins, so he has the potential to serve as a value play at his cheaper price tag even without a finish. While Romanov will be incredibly popular, Tybura projects to be fairly low owned, so he has the potential to be a solid leverage play if he can pull off the upset. The odds imply he has a 24% chance to win, an 11% chance to land a finish, and a 4% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #5
Tyson Pedro
8th UFC Fight (4-3)Coming off a teed up first round KO win over Isaac Villanueva in April 2022, that was Pedro’s first fight since December 2018 after he dealt with multiple knee surgeries following a R3 TKO loss to Mauricio Rua in his second most recent fight. After winning his first six pro fights all in the first round, including a 2016 submission win over Khalil Rountree in Pedro’s UFC debut, followed by a 2017 R1 TKO win over Paul Craig, Pedro made it past the first round for the first time in his career and lost a 2017 decision to Ilir Latifi. Pedro bounced back in February 2018 with a first round submission win against Saparbek Safarov, but was then submitted himself in the first round by OSP in June 2018 leading up to his loss to Rua. In both of his last two losses, Pedro looked close to winning the fights in the first round, but was unable to close things out.
In his last fight, we saw a slow start without much volume being landed in the match. However, as soon as Pedro started landing leg strikes, Villanueva looked to be in serious trouble. Pedro dropped Villanueva with a leg kick late in the round and the fight was quickly stopped with five seconds remaining in the first round as Pedro followed up with ground and pound. Pedro finished ahead 22-4 in striking, with no takedowns attempted or clinch work in the match. Pedro was content to patiently strike from the outside, and did a good job of evading anything coming back his way.
Now 8-3 as a pro, Pedro has three wins by KO and five by submission, with all eight of his victories ending in the first round. He’s 0-2 in fights that have lasted longer than five minutes, with a 2018 R3 TKO loss where he suffered a knee injury and a 2017 decision loss in his only trip to the judges. He also has a 2018 submission loss to OSP on his record, and is just 2-3 in his last five fights.
Overall, Pedro holds black belts in both Japanese and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, as well as Kempo. While he’s a solid grappler, Pedro has only landed two takedowns on eight attempts in the UFC and both of those came in his UFC debut. Since then he’s gone 0 for 6 on his attempts and never attempted a takedown in his last fight, despite having a major grappling advantage on paper. He’s a solid but patient striker and throws good leg kicks, as she showed in his last fight, but he only averages 2.89 SSL/min and 2.36 SSA/min. He’s still never won a fight that lasted longer than five minutes, but he’s only seen the second round twice in his career and got injured in one of those.
Harry Hunsucker
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Dropping down to Light Heavyweight for the first time in his career as he searches for his first UFC win, Hunsucker weighed in at 249 lb for his UFC debut and 238.5 lb for his most recent match. Hunsucker really struggled with the leg strikes of Tai Tuivasa in his UFC debut and after absorbing three in the opening 30 seconds of the fight he was already grimacing in pain and got put down with a big right hand immediately after, in a fight that lasted just 49 seconds. He was then finished again, this time by Justin Tafa, who was coming off a pair of decision losses and hadn’t looked especially dangerous in either of those.
In that last fight, tried to start with some leg strikes of his own, but didn’t set them up and got clipped with a counter left hand that momentarily sat him down. Hunsucker responded by looking to grapple, but got his neck wrapped up and put on his back. As Hunsucker returned to his feet he looked for a Kimura and had Tafa in danger momentarily, but Tafa survived and returned to his feet. The two stood and traded for a moment, with Hunsucker trying to connect on big lopping punches and then attempting another takedown, but Tafa shucked him off and landed a huge left head kick to knock him out less than two minutes into the fight. Both fighters only landed five strikes in the fight, while Hunsucker failed to land his only official takedown.
Now 7-5 as a pro, Hunsucker has three wins by KO and four submissions. He’s been knocked out in all five of his losses and has never been in a fight that lasted longer than four minutes. Hunsucker has been finished in the first round by elite level world-beaters like Don’Tale Mayes, Jared Vanderaa, and most recently Justin Tafa. He’s legitimately one of the least durable fighters we’ve ever seen and has proven he can make anyone look good.
Overall, Hunsucker is all offense and blows his load early in every fight. He has a tiny gas tank, a glass chin, fragile legs, and no toughness. He folds at the first signs of adversity and is purely being used to prop up other fighters as he winds down his first and only UFC contract. His record is extremely padded against some really questionable opponents, who entered his fights with records of 1-9, 0-0, 2-5, 1-0, 15-17, 9-14 and 4-3. Surprisingly for a man of his stature, four of his seven finishes have come by submission and he’s a third degree black belt in Taekwondo, a 2nd degree black belt in Krav Maga, and a BJJ brown belt. His last two submission wins have come by manipulating his opponents’ arms in kimura and keylock finishes. It will be important to monitor Hunsucker closely at weigh-ins as he moves down to Light Heavyweight for the first time in his career.
Fight Prediction:
Pedro will have a 1” height advantage and 4” reach advantage, while he’s also three years younger than the 33-year-old Hunsucker,
It feels like the UFC is picking on Hunsucker by letting him get assaulted by a gang of Australians in Tai Tuivasa, Justin Tafa, and Tyson Pedro. They’re also clearing using Hunsucker to prop up Pedro here, after giving Pedro another freebie in Ike Villanueva in his last fight. The fact that Hunsucker is moving down from Heavyweight to Light Heavyweight adds some uncertainty to this fight, but it’s still really hard to imagine he’ll actually look good. He’ll likely struggle with the speed of Pedro and still struggle to absorb damage. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Hunsucker try to grapple, as he’s proven he can’t hang on the feet and will likely get picked apart from the outside and dominated with leg kicks if things stay standing. Both fighters like to attack the arms of their opponents in grappling exchanges, so seeing this fight end in a kimura or armbar if Hunsucker turns it into a grappling match would make a lot of sense. With that said, a Pedro first round knockout is still the most likely outcome based on how fragile Hunsucker is.
Our favorite bet here is “Fight Ends in Submission” at +350.
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DFS Implications:
All eight of Pedro’s career wins have come in the first round and Hunsucker has never even made it to the four minute mark in any of his 12 pro fights, which is all promising for Pedro’s DFS potential. However, Pedro is also a very patient fighter and Hunsucker is moving down from Heavyweight to Light Heavyweight for the first time, so there’s always the chance he’s a little more durable. So if this fight does somehow escape the first round, Pedro will have a tougher time returning value as the most expensive fighter on the slate. At his high price tag, there are also lots of ways Pedro gets a first round finish and is still priced out of the winning lineup. Five of Pedro’s eight career wins have come by submission, yet he hasn’t landed a takedown in his last six fights, so if Hunsucker looks to engage in the grappling, as he often does, then it’s entirely possible we see Pedro lock up a defensive submission and score in the 90s on DraftKings. So while this is another dream matchup for Pedro and he has a massive floor as the biggest favorite on the slate, with his low striking volume and lack of takedowns, it’s not hard to find ways for him to get an early finish and still fail to crack winning lineups. He projects to be very popular, which is why we’re more focussed on how he fails opposed to succeeds, but there are obviously lots of ways he puts up a massive score here as well and he has one of the more insane ITD lines we’ve seen in a while. He looks like a staple in low-risk lineups and you’ll still want a healthy amount of exposure in tournaments. The odds imply he has an 84% chance to win, a 77% chance to land a finish, and a 49% chance it comes in round one.
Hunsucker has never even made it to the four minute mark in 12 pro fights, let alone out of the first round, so there’s a really good chance the winner here lands a first round finish. With that said, Hunsucker has also never fought down at Light Heavyweight before, which adds some uncertainty to the equation. Hunsucker has looked incredibly fragile at Heavyweight, but he will aggressively come into fights looking to land bombs and snatch up submissions one mat. Pedro has also never won a fight that made it past the first round (0-2), but appears to have much better cardio than Hunsucker, so we’re not really counting on Hunsucker surviving early and taking over late. Hunsucker is really a low-level R1 or bust fighter in an incredibly tough spot as the biggest dog on the card. He has a zero point floor, but a high theoretical ceiling if he can pull off the hail mary upset. He’ll also be a massive leverage play if he somehow wins this fight, but we fully expect him to get murdered early in this one. The odds imply Hunsucker has a 16% chance to win, a 10% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #4
Lucie Pudilova
8th UFC Fight (2-5)Pudilova originally joined the UFC in 2017 when she was just 22 years old. She lost a decision to Lina Lansberg in her debut, but bounced back with decision wins over Ji Yeon Kim and Sarah Moras. However, she then lost four straight, with decision losses to Irene Aldana, Liz Carmouche, and Justine Kish, and a submission loss to Antonina Shevchenko. At that point, the UFC cut ties with Pudilova following a January 2020 loss and she returned to fighting in the Czech Republic. She’s since gone 5-1, with all six fights going the distance, and the UFC has decided to give her another shot.
In her last fight on the regional scene, Pudilova looked a little more aggressive than she did in her last UFC match when she lost to Justine Kish in a painfully low-volume 2020 decision. However, we still saw Pudilova try to stay on the outside and strike from distance. She hasn’t really added any grappling to her game, although she landed a late takedown in the fight. However, shen then immediately gave up the position and returned to her feet and had no clue what to do on the mat.
Now 13-7 as a pro, Pudilova has two wins by KO, two by submission, and nine decisions. She’s never never been knocked out, with her one early loss ending in a 2019 R2 submission against Antonina Shevchenko, which was the last time any of Pudilova’s fights have ended early, as her last seven have all ended in decisions. Pudilova’s other six losses have all gone the distance. The last time Pudilova finished anybody was 2016
Overall, Pudilova is a one-dimensional striker who tries to stay on the outside and strike from distance. She has a solid jab and good speed/quickness, but after looking aggressive early in her first stint with the UFC, she was too tentative in her more recent matches. She landed more volume in her first few UFC fights, but failed to land more than 33 significant strikes in any of her last three UFC matches. She’s only landed one takedown in her seven UFC fights, and ended up getting submitted in that fight. She appears to have the physical tools to be a successful striker, but hasn’t quite put it all together mentally. Perhaps getting a second chance in the UFC, and on a PPV card no less, will have her fighting more aggressively, but that remains to be seen.
Wu Yanan
6th UFC Fight (1-4)Looking to snap a three fight skid, Yanan’s only UFC win came in a 2018 R1 submission against Lauren Mueller, when Yanan was fighting down at 125 lb for a two fight stretch. Yanan made her UFC debut at 135 lb in 2019 and lost a decision to Gina Mazany, before moving down a weight class and notching her lone UFC win over Mueller. Yanan then lost a split decision, also at 125 lb, before moving back up to 135 lb in 2021 and losing decisions against Joselyne Edwards and Mayra Bueno Silva. This will be the first time Yanan has fought twice in a calendar year since 2017, and she only has two fights since 2019.
In her last fight, Wu Yanan was outlanded by Bueno Silva 87-62 in significant strikes and 88-75 in total strikes. Yanan landed the only takedown in the fight, but Bueno Silva immediately looked for a submission off her back and appeared close to locking it in before Yanan escaped. While Yanan threw more volume in the fight, she only connected on 62 of her 218 significant strike attempts and Bueno Silva went on to win a unanimous decision.
Now 13-5 as a pro, Yanan has six wins by KO, five by submission, and two decisions. She’s been knocked out once, by Yana Kunitskaya in 2016, with her other four losses going the distance. It’s important to keep in mind that all but one of her finishes came prior to joining the UFC against extremely inexperienced opponents who entered her fights with records of 0-0, 0-0, 0-0, 0-0, 0-2, 0-0, 0-0, 0-1, 0-3, and 0-0. So truly one of the more padded records you’ll ever see as those 10 pre-UFC finishes came against opponents with a combined 0-6 record, with seven of them making their pro debuts.
Overall, Yanan is a low-level fighter who relies mostly on her striking but has landed three takedowns on 10 attempts in her five UFC fights. She throws a decent number of strikes, but doesn’t connect on many, and has just a 40% striking accuracy. Yanan amazingly threw 218 significant strikes in her last fight, but only connected on 62 of them (28%). It’s surprising that Yanan is even still in the UFC considering she only has one win in five appearances, but considering the UFC just brought Lucie Pudilova back, they must be short on warm bodies in the women’s 135 lb division.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’8” but Pudilova will have a 1” reach advantage.
This is a low-level women’s MMA fight, but if both women agree to both forward and throw down it could make for a fun fight. They both should be desperate for a win, with Yanan barely hanging onto her job and Pudilova getting a second chance with the organization. The last time Pudilova was on a PPV card she put on the most exciting performance of her career, even if it came in a split decision loss. In fairness, that was against a much tougher opponent in Irene Aldana, and Pudilova will get an easier matchup in her return. It’s interesting that the UFC moved this fight onto the PPV card after it originally wasn’t—either they know something or are just providing a chance to grab a beer in between bangers. While we have very little confidence in either one of these two, we like Pudilova to come out ahead in the striking exchanges and Yanan will be more reliant on her grappling to win. Considering Yanan has never landed more than one takedown in a UFC fight, we like Pudilova to win a decision here, but wouldn’t be at all surprised if it was split, as five of her 15 career decisions have been split (4-1).
Our favorite bet here is “Pudilova DEC” at +130.
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DFS Implications:
Pudilova is a one-dimensional striker who has only topped 64 DraftKings once in seven UFC appearances. She was cut from the organization following four straight losses from 2018 to 2020 and will now be returning for the first time. That adds some volatility to this spot, but she’s also fought to seven straight decisions, so it’s unlikely we see this end early. The only time Pudilova scored well in DFS was in a 2018 decision win over Sarah Moras where Pudilova landed the only two knockdowns of her career. Yanan has never been knocked down in the UFC, so another multi-knockdown performance appears unlikely. We’ve seen Pudilova fight aggressively and tentatively in the past, so who knows which version will show up here. She’ll have no chance of scoring well in a decision unless she comes out ultra aggressive, and there’s a good chance she’ll still struggle to score well even if she does. She’s only landed one takedown in the UFC and ended up getting submitted in that fight, so you can’t rely on her adding anything with grappling. While this is a decent matchup for her to put up a big striking total, Pudilova will still likely need a finish to end up in tournament winning lineups. The odds imply she has a 57% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Yanan is just 1-4 in the UFC, with her lone win coming in a first round submission against a terrible Lauren Mueller, who went 1-3 with the organization before getting cut and has now lost four straight. That finish was good for 101 DraftKings points, but Yanan has failed to top 53 points in any of her four decision losses. While Yanan will look to mix in occasional takedowns, she’s never landed more than one in a fight and relies mostly on her striking. This would be a good time for her to grapple more as she faces a one-dimensional striker in Pudilova, but Yanan has just a 30% takedown accuracy and we’re not convinced she has a grappling-heavy win in her. It’s certainly possible we’re wrong, as she’s still just 26 years old and theoretically should be improving, but we’ll believe it when we see it. At her cheaper price tag, it’s possible Yanan can serve as a value play in a decision win, but it will likely require only a couple of other underdogs on the slate to win. The odds imply she has a 43% chance to win, a 15% chance to land a finish, and a 7% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #3
Merab Dvalishvili
10th UFC Fight (7-2)Dvalishvili landed his first early win in the UFC in a September 2021 R2 TKO over a freefalling Marlon Moraes. Prior to that, Dvalishvili had won six straight decisions, after losing his first two UFC fights. The last two of those decisions came against tough opponents in Cody Stamann and John Dodson, and Dvalishvili has continued to find success with his wrestling-heavy approach even as he’s begun fighting tougher competition. With that said, we have seen the number of takedowns he’s landed come down significantly in recent fights, as he’s averaged 4.19 TDL/15 min in his last three fights, after averaging 8.67 TDL/15 min in his first six UFC matches. His attempts have also come down but to a lesser degree, as he averaged 13.32 TDA/15 min in his last three fights, after averaging 17.33 TDA/15 min in his first six fights. So he’s averaging 23.1% fewer attempts in his last three fights, and landing 51.7% fewer takedowns, as his accuracy has dropped from 50% in his first six UFC fights to 31.4% in his last three. That’s not exactly surprising considering he’s been facing much tougher competition, but it is noteworthy, especially as he prepares to face an opponent with the toughest takedown defense he’s seen yet.
In his last fight, Dvalishvili landed his first takedown 70 seconds into the first round, but Moraes was able to quickly work his way back to his feet. Midway through the round, Moraes had Dvalishvili badly hurt on the feet, but appeared to punch himself out going for a finish. Through a combination of durability and retreating, along with the help of a long leash from the referee, Dvalishvili somehow survived and eventually pinned an exhausted Moraes up against the fence and then took him down and went to work with ground strikes on the mat in a completely insane turnaround. Both guys were able to survive the round, but Dvalishvili was clearly the fresher fighter in round two and landed an early right hand as he took Moraes back to the mat less than 30 seconds into round two. He then spent the next four minutes landing non stop ground strikes as he shutout Moraes 38-0 in significant strikes and more impressively 142-0 in total strikes in round two. The fight was finally stopped with 35 seconds remaining in the second round, with Dvalishvili ahead in significant strikes 69-29 and in total strikes 246-34. He also landed all four of his takedown attempts with six minutes of control time.
Now 14-4 as a pro, Dvalishvili has three wins by KO, one by submission, and 10 decisions. He’s never been knocked out, and the only time he’s ever been finished came in a weird post round three technical submission loss to Ricky Simon in 2018. His other three losses all ended in decisions, with two of those occurring in his first three pro fights.
Overall, Dvalishvili is a relentless wrestler with an endless gas tank. He’s also improved his striking over the course of his UFC career, but chain wrestling is still where he butters his bread. He’s landed 63 takedowns on 139 attempts in his nine UFC fights (45.3%). However, after landing 52 on 104 attempts in his first six UFC fights, he’s only landed 11 on 35 attempts in his last three fights as began facing tougher competition. During his media day interview, Dvalishvili talked about how he went to Spain during his time off and trained some with Ilia Topuria, so it will be interesting to see if that has any noticeable effect on his game. Dvalishvili unsurprisingly leads the slate in takedowns landed at 7.3 per 15 minutes, but now he’ll face the 90% takedown defense of Jose Aldo.
Jose Aldo
20th UFC Fight (13-6)After getting left for dead following three straight losses in 2019 and 2020 that culminated with a life-shortening beating against Petr Yan in 2020, Aldo has resurrected his career with three straight decision wins against Marlon Vera, Pedro Munhoz, and Rob Font in his last three fights. Aldo started his career off going 25-1, before getting knocked out in just 13 seconds by Conor McGregor in 2015. That began a downward spiral for Aldo as he went just 3-6 from 2015 to 2020 and began talking about getting close to retirement. In fairness to Aldo, those six losses came against Conor McGregor, Max Holloway (twice), Alexander Volkanovski, Marlon Moraes and Petr Yan. Four of those were title fights and another came against the future Featherweight champ in Volkanovski. He’s now focussed on getting a title shot at 135 lb before hanging things up, and a win here has the potential to get him there.
In Aldo’s last fight, Rob Font actually finished way ahead in terms of pure striking volume, as he outlanded Aldo 149-86 in significant strikes and 193-96 in total strikes, but Aldo was landing the more impactful shots and nearly had Font out of there at multiple points, as Aldo finished with two knockdowns and nearly nine minutes of control time, despite failing to land his only takedown.
Now 31-7 as a pro, Aldo has 17 wins by KO, one by submission, and 13 decisions. He’s been knocked out four times, has one submission loss, and two decision defeats. His last three wins have all gone the distance, and he’s yet to finish anybody since he dropped down to 135 lb in 2019 following a decision loss to Alexander Volkanovski in Aldo’s final Featherweight fight. Since moving down a weight class, four of Aldo’s five fights have ended with the judges, with the other ending in a 2020 R5 TKO loss to Petr Yan.
Overall, Aldo is a BJJ and Luta Livre black belt and has looked great recently as he enters his 39th professional fight after turning pro all the way back in 2004 a month after his 18th birthday. He has a 90% career takedown defense and he’s impressively only been taken down 10 times in his last 27 fights and the only person to get him down more than once was Frankie Edgar who landed two in 2013. However, since moving down to 135 lb, Aldo’s takedown defense has dropped a little down to 75%. He’s still only been taken down 3 times on 12 attempts in his five Bantamweight fights, but three of the four opponents to try and take him down have landed one of their attempts. Looking at his entire career, Aldo averages just 3.61 SSL/min and 3.74 SSA/min. However, since dropping down to 135 lb, those numbers have grown to 4.12 SSL/min and 5.60 SSA/min. Another thing that has changed for him recently that could contribute to those numbers is that he started training with the Brazilian Marine Corps boxing program for his last few fights, and his striking has looked crisp.
UPDATE: Aldo made weight on his second attempt with the help of the shame box, but looked bad on the scale.
Fight Prediction:
Aldo will have a 1” height advantage and 2” reach advantage, while Dvalishvili is four years younger than the 35-year-old Aldo.
This is a fascinating matchup, as we have one of the most prolific wrestlers in the division taking on a fighter in Aldo who has one of the best takedown defenses in the division. We saw Dvalishvili get hurt by Marlon Moraes early in his last fight, but recover and come back to win the fight after Moraes gassed out. If Aldo’s takedown defense holds up, he should have the advantage on the feet and is the more powerful striker. However, Dvalishvili will put a pace on him that will test his gas tank, both in the wrestling and striking exchanges. Also keep in mind, this card takes place at elevation in Salt Lake City (4,226 ft), which should benefit the fighters with better cardio and may increase the chances for late round finishes if one fighter gasses out. If this fight goes the distance, and we think it most likely will, we expect Dvalishvili to land more volume, in addition to tacking on a few takedowns, while Aldo is more likely to lead in damage. We like it to end in a close decision that could go either way, and we don’t know what to expect out of the judges in Utah, but we’ll say Dvalishvili does enough on the stat sheet to get his hand raised.
Our favorite bet here is “Dvalishvili R3 or DEC” at +115.
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DFS Implications:
Dvalishvili has been a DFS wrecking machine, averaging 126 DraftKings points and 109 points on FanDuel in his seven UFC wins. The only time we’ve seen him struggle to score well on DraftKings was in his decision win over John Dodson, where he landed a career low two takedowns on 20 attempts and also only landed 50 significant strikes. With that said, he also struggled to score well in his first two UFC decision wins on FanDuel, where the scoring system isn’t quite as friendly for him. Nevertheless, he’s put up huge scores on both sites in four of his last five fights, and now he’s priced at just $8,200 on DraftKings. However, this will be the toughest test of his career as he squares off against the legendary 90% takedown defense of Jose Aldo, who’s only been taken down 10 times in his last 27 fights and the only person to get him down more than once was Frankie Edgar who landed two in 2013. We have seen Aldo get taken down once in three of his last five fights since moving down to 135 lb, but he’s still shown a 75% defense in those five fights. So this will be a much tougher spot for Dvalishvili to rely entirely on takedowns to score well and he’ll likely need to also put up a solid striking total to really score well.
It certainly wouldn’t be shocking to see this matchup resemble Dvalishvili’s fight against Dotson, where Dvalishvili scored just 74 DraftKings points and 62 points on FanDuel. With that said, this matchup will take place at elevation in Salt Lake City, and if Dvalishvili can wear on Aldo’s gas tank, he has the potential to fill up the stat sheet late in the fight if Aldo slows down. This is a really tough spot to predict what will happen, but what we do know is that Dvalishvili’s floor is much lower than normal, even if he still has a high ceiling. He’s unsurprisingly extremely popular every time he fights, and in his last three fights his DraftKings ownership has checked in at 54% > 45% > 39% (most recent). It is interesting to see that it’s gone down in each of those fights, but keep in mind the first two of those were on 11 fight cards, while the most recent was on a 13 fight card. At his cheap price tag, we expect him to be incredibly popular here, despite this being the toughest matchup of his career. The odds imply he has a 56% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Aldo has really struggled to score well in three-round decision wins, scoring just 76 and 60 DraftKings points in his only two UFC fights to end in three-round decisions. He’s been a lower volume five-round fighter for essentially his entire career, with 14 straight five-round fights from 2009 to 2017. However, after losing to Max Holloway twice in 2017, he’s been fighting mostly in three round fights, with six of his eight matchups scheduled to go just three rounds. He is coming off a five-round decision win that scored 103 DraftKings points, which will likely boost his ownership as much of the field overlooks the fact that it came in a longer fight. Aldo’s lack of striking volume and takedowns even makes a later round finish unlikely to score well, as he has averaged just 85 DraftKings points in his four second round KO wins going back to his WEC days, and scored just 74 points in his lone third round KO win. While Dvalishvili will be looking to push the pace, which theoretically boosts the scoring potential for everyone involved, Aldo will also have to focus on defending takedowns for the entire match, and no one has ever landed more than 58 significant strikes on Dvalishvili. In Dvalishvili’s two UFC losses his opponents scored just 55 and 79 DraftKings points. Overall, Aldo looks like a R1 KO or bust play in DFS, but if he pulls that off he’ll be a massive leverage play against the ever popular Dvalishvili. The odds imply he has a 44% chance to win, a 20% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #2
Paulo Costa
8th UFC Fight (5-2)Moving back down to 185 lb after forcing Marvin Vettori to move their last fight up to 205 lb at the last minute, Costa is coming off the first two losses of his career after he was previously knocked out in the second round by Israel Adesanya. Costa hasn’t been very active since 2017, fighting just once a year from 2018 on. He hasn’t knocked anybody out since 2018 when he finished Uriah Hall in the second round. In fairness, his last three opponents since then have just one combined KO loss between them.
All five of Costa’s UFC wins have come against struggling and/or aging opponents, many of whom were at the tailend of their careers. He made his 2017 UFC debut against then 35-year-old Garreth McLellan who came in having lost three of his last four fights and has now lost five of his last six with three of those losses ending in KOs. Then Costa faced Oluwale Bamgbose, who was 1-2 in the UFC at the time and finished his UFC career 1-4 with three KO losses. Next Costa took on a 34-year-old Johny Hendricks in his final UFC fight. Hendricks had lost four of his previous five matches. Following the win over Hendricks, Costa defeated Uriah Hall, who had lost three of his last four fights with two R1 KOs coming into the fight. That win aged the best of all of Costa’s victories, which is saying something. Costa’s most recent win was in a close 2019 decision against a 42-year-old Yoel Romero, who came in having lost two of his last three and has now lost four straight and five of his last six.
In his last fight, Costa had a slow start and already looked to be breathing heavy in round one, but had a better second round as he hunted for a finish. Unfortunately for him, an eye poke cost him a point after he won the round on all three scorecards. Vettori won rounds three and four, but Costa surprisingly was able to go five rounds and even won the 5th round despite his cardio concerns. The fight ended with Vettori ahead 190-163 in significant strikes and 214-172 in total strikes. Both fighters landed one takedown, Vettori on five attempts and Costa on one.
Now 13-2 as a pro, Costa has 11 wins by KO, one by submission, and one decision. He’s been knocked out once and has one decision loss. Costa finished nine straight opponents in the first round to start his MMA career, but his last six UFC fights have all made it to round two, with four ending in second round knockouts (3-1) and two going the distance (1-1). He’s only been past the second round twice in his career, but both of those instances were in his last three fights.
Overall, Costa is a high-volume power puncher with 12 of his 13 wins coming early, with all of those finishes ending in the first two rounds. He averages 6.85 SSL/min (most on the slate) and 7.02 SSA/min (4th most on the slate). He’s also a BJJ black belt, but has only landed one takedown on two attempts in the UFC. However, he has a solid 80% takedown defense and has only been taken down 4 times on 20 attempts in his seven UFC fights. Obviously it will be important to monitor Costa closely on the scale after his weight debacle in his last fight.
Luke Rockhold
11th UFC Fight (6-4)Fighting for the fight time in the last three years, the last time the 37-year-old Rockhold stepped inside the Octagon he competed up at Light Heavyweight for the first time in his career and got knocked out by Jan Blachowicz in the second round. The rest of his career has been spent down at 185 lb, where he’ll be making his comeback in this upcoming match. The last time Rockhold competed at 185 lb was in a 2018 R3 KO loss to Yoel Romero for the interim Middleweight belt. Rockhold’s only win in his last four fights came in a 2017 R2 TKO over David Branch, who lost four of his last five fights before retiring in 2019. Rockhold did win the Middleweight belt in a 2015 R4 TKO over Chris Weidman, but then immediately lost it in a 2016 R1 KO to Michael Bisping in his next fight. Rockhold had originally been scheduled to run it back with Weidman, but he withdrew and Bisping stepped in on a couple of week’s notice, yet still managed to pull off the massive upset. More recently, Rockhold had been booked to make his return to the UFC in November 2021 against Sean Strickland, but withdrew due to a herniated disc, and will now try again nine months later.
In his last fight, Rockhold attempted to move up to 205 lb, but struggled to get Jan Blachowicz to the mat as he failed to land any of his five takedown attempts in the first round. The first half of round one was spent with Rochold pushing Blachowicz up against the cage, before the two fighters returned to space. Blachowicz hurt Rockhold badly right at the end of the round. Rochold came out aggressive in round two, but Blachowicz finished him with a violent combination of punches early in the round. The fight ended with Blachowicz ahead 30-14 in significant strikes and 38-17 in total strikes.
Now 16-5 as a pro, Rockhold has six wins by KO, eight by submission, and two decisions. All five of his career losses have come by KO, with three in round one, one in round two, and one in round three. All 10 of his UFC fights have ended early, with four ending in round one (2-2), four ending in round two (3-1), one ending in round three (0-1), and the other ending in round four (1-0).
Overall, Rockhold throws heavy left kicks and is also a BJJ black belt. While he has a decent ground game, he’s only landed 5 takedowns on 16 attempts in 10 UFC fights (31.3%). His official numbers also include his Strikeforce days for what it’s worth. He’s been very prone to getting knocked out and holds his chin high up in the air. We generally don’t see huge striking totals in his fights, as he averages 4.18 SSL/min and 2.43 SSA/min.
Fight Prediction:
Rockhold will have a 2” height advantage and 5” reach advantage, but Costa is six years younger than the 37-year-old Rockhold.
It rarely works out well for aging fighters who attempt to mount UFC comebacks following multi-year layoffs, but Rockhold intends to give it a shot here. Both guys in this matchup have lost their last two fights and are desperate for a win. They also both throw heavy body kicks and are BJJ black belts. Rockhold’s last few finishes have all come on the mat either by ground and pound or submission, while Costa does his best work standing and has a solid 80% takedown defense. So while we could see Rockhold try and get it to the mat, Costa will be looking to knock him out on the feet. We like Costa to knock Rockhold out in the first two rounds.
Our favorite bet here is “Costa R1 or R2 KO” at -110.
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DFS Implications:
Costa has averaged 99 DraftKings points in his five UFC wins, with four of those ending in knockouts. His lone decision win was good for 87 points, which shows a solid floor, but still not a high enough one to end up in tournament winning lineups without a finish. His last three KO wins all occurred in the second round and his only first round finish in the UFC came in his 2017 UFC debut. With just one takedown landed in seven UFC fights, he relies entirely on his striking to score well, and while Costa leads the slate with 6.85 SSL/min, Luke Rockhold only averages 2.43 SSA/min. However, Rockhold has been knocked out in all five of his career losses, hasn’t fought since 2019, and hasn’t won a fight since 2017. So while this may not be the best matchup for Costa to land a ton of volume, it does look like a great opportunity for him to get back on track with another knockout win. Just keep in mind, Costa hasn’t knocked anybody out since 2018, and struggled mightily with his weight the last time he fought—to the extent that the fight was moved from 185 lb, to 195 lb, to 205 lb over the course of fight week. Costa is also coming off the first two losses of his career and it’s been three years since his last win, which ended in a decision against Yoel Romero. So there are plenty of red flags on both sides of the aisle here, but it’s much more likely that the 31-year-old Costa bounces back than the 37-year-old Rockhold. If Rockhold can slow the pace down and survive the first five minutes, Costa may have a tougher time putting up a really big score without a multi-knockdown performance, but we like Costa’s chances to land a knockout in the first two rounds, which gives him both a solid floor and ceiling. The odds imply he has a 74% chance to win, a 57% chance to land a finish, and a 28% chance it comes in round one.
Rockhold is now 37 years old and looking to mount a comeback over three years after he last fought and has been knocked out in three of his last four fights. These situations rarely work out, and the UFC didn’t do Rockhold any favors with the matchup in return. Rockhold’s last several wins have come by getting opponents to the mat and either finishing them with ground and pound or looking for submissions. Costa is a BJJ black belt with an 80% takedown defense, which will make things difficult on Rockhold. Also, the only time Costa has been finished in his career was when he got knocked out by Israel Adesanya in 2020, so he’s been pretty durable overall. Rockhold, on the other hand, has been very prone to getting knocked out, with all five of his career losses ending in KOs. That leaves him with a nonexistent floor in this matchup and a low chance of hitting a ceiling. All 10 of Rockhold’s UFC fights have ended early, and the last time he required the judges was in 2012 when he was still with Strikeforce. The odds imply he has a 26% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #1
Kamaru Usman
16th UFC Fight (15-0)Usman is on a 19 fight winning streak and is undefeated in the UFC, but his opponent pool has been getting a little stale lately as he’s faced both Colby Covington and Jordge Masvidal twice in his last five fights. Usman originally won the Welterweight belt in 2019 against Tyron Woodley in a five-round decision victory. He then defended it in a R5 TKO victory over Covington the first time those two fought. Next he won a decision over Jorge Masvidal before knocking Gilbert Burns out early in the third round of a 2021 match. Usman then granted rematches to both Masvidal and Covington, knocking Masvidal out in round two and then winning a decision over Covington most recently.
In his recent win over Covington, we saw a slower start than their first fight with far more takedown attempts, mostly from Covington. However, late in round two Usman dropped Covington twice and looked close to having him out of there. Covington appeared to recover between rounds, and Usman didn’t look to press the action early in round three, despite how the second round ended. Round three was closer and Usman nearly had his 100% takedown defense penetrated, but the stat keepers gave him the benefit of the doubt on one that was close and ultimately didn’t award Covington any completed takedowns on his 11 attempts. After losing the first three rounds, Covington outlanded Usman in round four to bank his first round in the fight. Both fighters had their moments in round five, but Usman led in striking and ultimately won the round and got his hand raised in a unanimous decision. Usman finished the fight ahead in significant strikes 123-107 and in total strikes 158-119, while landing his only takedown attempt and defending all 11 of Covington’s attempts.
Now 20-1 as a pro, Usman has nine wins by KO, one by submission, and 10 decisions. His only career loss occurred in his second pro fight in a 2013 R1 rear-naked choke. Sixteen of his last 17 fights have made it past the first round, with the one exception being a 2017 R1 KO win over Sergio Moraes. While six of his last nine wins have gone the distance, he’s knocked out three of his last five opponents.
This will be Usman’s nine straight five-round fight and seventh consecutive title fight. Five of his wins in his previous five-round fights have gone the distance, while the other three ended in knockouts (R2, R3 & R5). Here are the results of his previous eight five-round fights:
2021 R5 DEC Win vs. Colby Covington (Title Fight)
2021 R2 KO Win vs. Jorge Masvidal (Title Fight)
2021 R3 KO Win vs. Gilbert Burns (Title Fight)
2021 R5 DEC Win vs. Jorge Masvidal (Title Fight)
2021 R5 KO Win vs. Colby Covington (Title Fight)
2021 R5 DEC Win vs. Tyrone Woodley (Title Fight)
2021 R5 DEC Win vs. Rafael dos Anjos
2021 R5 DEC Win vs. Demian Maia
Overall, Usman is an elite wrestler and a BJJ black belt, but he’s also grown to be more comfortable with his striking as his career has progressed. He’s landed 50 takedowns on 102 attempts in his 15 UFC fights, but has only landed more than two in one of his last six fights. And after landing just three knockdowns in his first 10 UFC fights, he’s notched seven in his last five matches, with three knockouts over that stretch. It is important to point out that the fights where hasn’t been landing takedowns have been against other grapplers, and now he’ll go up against a striker.
Leon Edwards
14th UFC Fight (11-2, NC)Fourteen months removed from a June 2021 five-round decision win over Nate Diaz, Edwards has only fought twice in the last three years, with his only other match during that period ending in an early round two No Contest against Belal Muhammad due to an inadvertent eye poke. Prior to his fight against Muhammad, Edwards had four straight fights canceled due to COVID in 2020 and 2021—one against Tyron Woodley and then three against Khamzat Chimaev. Leading up to the series of cancellations, Edwards defeated Rafael dos Anjos in a 2019 low-volume five-round decision, where RDA went 0 for 5 on his takedown attempts and finished behind in significant strikes 92-81, while Edwards went 3 for 10 on his own takedown attempts. That came just after Edwards won a low-volume three-round split decision over Gunnar Nelson, where Edwards led in significant strikes 31-9. Nelson led on takedowns with three landed on four attempts, but Edwards also took the high-level grappler down twice on three attempts.
In his last fight, Edwards showed us that he could even make a Nate Diaz fight boring. Diaz had averaged 6.98 SSL/min and 6.43 SSA/min in his five fights prior to facing Edwards, but in his fight against Edwards those numbers plummeted to 3.04 SSL/min and 3.08 SSA/min as Edwards narrowly finished ahead in significant strikes 77-76. While Diaz actually outlanded Edwards 130-83 in total strikes, Edwards was able to take Diaz down four times on five attempts with just under five minutes of control time, while Diaz didn’t attempt any takedowns of his own in the fight. Edwards controlled the first three rounds through a combination of striking and grappling, and was able to split Diaz open in a couple of different spots with slicing elbows in round three. He continued to amass damage in round four and knowing he was ahead, his corner told him to play it safe going into the final round. Edwards looked well on his way to coasting to a zero adversity decision win before Diaz clipped him with a left hand with just over a minute remaining in the fight and Edwards had to hang on for dear life down the stretch. Of course instead of immediately pouncing on Edwards for the finish, Diaz simply pointed at him or else he might have been able to get Edwards out of there.
Now 19-3 as a pro, Edwards has six wins by KO, three by submission, and 10 decisions. He’s never been finished, with two of his losses going the distance and the other ending in a 2012 DQ for an illegal knee. One of his UFC losses came in his 2014 UFC debut in a split decision against Claudio Silva, while the other was a 2015 three-round decision against Usman in Edwards’ fourth UFC fight. Ignoring his 2021 No Contest, Edwards has won nine straight fights and his last 11 matches have seen the third round, with nine going the distance. The only time one of his UFC fights ended in the first round was in a 2015 R1 KO in his second Octagon appearance. Eight of his 11 UFC wins have gone the distance, while he also has two third round finishes (2016 & 2018).
This will be the 5th five-round fight of Edwards’ career. He won decisions over Donald Cerrone (2018), Rafael dos Anjos (2019), and Nate Diaz (2021) in three of his previous four, with the one other ending in a second round No Contest due to the eye poke against Belal Muhammad. So Edwards remains undefeated in five-round fights, but all of those wins have come by decision. All of those decision wins have been slower paced, with significant striking totals of 84-60, 92-81, and 77-76. In those 15 rounds, Edwards averaged just 3.37 SSL/min and 2.89 SSA/min, while getting taken down once on 14 attempts (92.9% defense) and landing seven takedowns of his own on 19 attempts (36.8% accuracy). Edwards controlled those three opponents an average of 17.4% of the time, while getting controlled 9.3% of the time.
Overall, Edwards is a patient low-volume striker who’s only landed above 53 significant strikes in three of his 14 UFC matches, which unsurprisingly were in his three five-round decision wins, where he put up totals of 77, 92, and 84. He’s talked about how he’s improved his grappling over his UFC career, and the number snack that up. In his first seven UFC fights, he was taken down 15 times on 45 attempts (66.7% defense), while landing 8 of his own 29 attempts (27.6% accuracy). Over his last seven fights, he’s been taken down 5 times on 22 attempts (77.3% defense), while landing 13 of his 41 attempts (41.9% accuracy). The only opponent to get him down more than once in his last seven fights was Gunnar Nelson, who landed three of his four takedown attempts, but only nine significant strikes in the match and Edwards won a split decision.
Fight Prediction:
Edwards will have a 2” height advantage, but Usman will have a 2” reach advantage. Edwards is five years younger than the 35-year-old Usman.
The first time these two faced off was in December 2015 when Edwards was just 24 years old and Usman was 28. Despite being four years younger, Edwards had three UFC fights under his belt at that point, while Usman had just won The Ultimate Fighter and was making his second UFC appearance. At that time, Usman was a pure wrestler and Edwards was a pure striker, and Usman simply outgrappled his way to victory with 6 takedowns landed on 13 attempts with nearly 11 minutes of control time. Since then, both fighters have become much more well rounded, so we don’t want to get too caught up with how the last matchup played out. With that said, Usman still has a major wrestling advantage, while Edwards will rely on his striking to win this fight.
While neither of these two have ever been knocked out, Usman has the better chin, so Edwards will need to be careful both in defending takedowns and in the striking exchanges. If Usman gets Edwards thinking too hard about defending takedowns, he could see an opening for a knockout blow. Usman has still never been taken down in his career, so while Edwards has rounded out his game and consistently landed takedowns later in his UFC career, he’ll likely need to rely entirely on his striking to win this fight. Edwards has only landed one knockout since 2015, which came in 2018 against an unimpressive Peter Sobotta, who only fought once more before returning. So it’s tougher to see Edwards knocking Usman out and really his only path to victory is to keep the fight standing and outland his way to victory. That’s always tougher to do in a title fight as the judges will give the benefit of the doubt to the current champion in close rounds, so Edwards will need to decisively win three rounds in this fight to snatch the belt. As long as Usman can mix in a few takedowns and keep things close on the feet, he should be able to comfortably win a decision here if he’s unable to knock Edwards out.
Usman has only failed to land a takedown in four of his 15 UFC fights. Three of those ended in knockout victories and the other was a decision win against Demian Maia, where Usman was defending takedowns for the entire fight, as Maia went 0 for 15 on his attempts. Interestingly, 9 of the last 10 fights where Usman has landed at least one takedown have gone the distance, with the one exception being his R2 KO win over Jorge Masvidal in their grudge match. So if Edwards does keep the fight standing, which seemingly is what he needs to do to win, history would indicate that it’s more likely Usman knocks Edwards out than wins by decision. We’re still expecting Usman to be looking to grapple more here than he has been in his last few fights, but we also think Edwards will do a better job of defending takedowns compared to when they fought back in 2015. While both the oddsmakers and the public like Usman to win by decision here, we actually like his chances of handing Edwards the first KO loss of his career.
Our favorite bet here is “Usman KO” at +270.
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DFS Implications:
Usman has improved his striking over the course of his UFC career, and with that we’ve seen him rely less on his wrestling as time has gone on. His control time and takedown numbers have gone down recently, but his knockdowns and striking totals have risen. Regardless, he’s been a consistent DFS producer throughout his career and has shown the ability to score well even when he doesn’t wrestle. He’s been in eight straight five-round fights, averaging 131 DraftKings points in those matches. The only opponent to keep him from scoring well was Demian Maia, who spent the whole fight trying (and failing) to take Usman down on 15 attempts. That occurred in the first five-round fight of Usman’s career and since then his average has jumped to an insane 139 DraftKings points. However, his scoring has relaxed a bit lately, as he’s “only” averaged 107 DraftKings points in his last three fights, after averaging an other-worldly 162 points in his previous four. Just keep in mind two of those last three fights came against other grapplers in Gilbert Burns and Colby Covington, whereas now Usman will be taking on a striker in Leon Edwards.
If Usman was ever going to get back to wrestling more, this would be a good time to do it. However, he’s 35 years old now and there are questions surrounding the status of his knees, so we also can’t assume he’ll put on a vintage wrestling performance. Edwards has also improved as a grappler over the years and won’t be as easy to takedown as the first time they fought. Also, Edwards has a knack for slowing fights down, averaging just 2.62 SSL/min and 2.15 SSA/min, in addition to solidifying a 70% takedown defense. So in general, he makes for lower scoring fights for everyone involved, and if this does remain on the feet it will be tougher than normal for Usman to score well. Usman has relied heavily on knockdowns to prop up his scores lately, landing seven in his last five fights, with at least two in three of those. That’s a really tough pace to maintain and Edwards has only been knocked down once in his UFC career. Usman relies on filling up the stat sheet to score well, which he’s exceptionally good at, but he hasn’t finished anybody in the first round since 2017. If Edwards can keep the fight standing, and slow the pace down as he typically does, Usman will have a tougher time putting up another big score. With that said, if he does come in with a grappling-heavy gameplan, he’s also shown the ability to put up face melting numbers. Overall, he has a wider range of potential outcomes, which makes this a slightly tricky spot for tournaments, but his solid floor means he’s still a great low-risk play. The odds imply he has a 77% chance to win, a 29% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Edwards has consistently underwhelmed in DFS, but at his cheap price tag he doesn’t need to put up a huge score to end up in winning lineups. The bigger concern is that he’s facing the best Welterweight in the world after nearly blowing it late in his last fight against an aging Nate Diaz. Even in that dream matchup, Edwards still scored just 91 DraftKings points in a five-round decision win, and the only time he’s hit the century mark since 2015 was in a last second 2018 R3 KO win over Peter Sobotta. Edwards averages just 2.62 SSL/min, while Usman averages only 2.59 SSA/min, and while Edwards has generally done a good job of mixing in takedowns later in his UFC career, Usman has yet to ever be taken down. Edwards’ path to victory looks to be to win a low-volume tactical striking battle, while making sure he doesn’t get taken down. He has averaged just 86 DraftKings points in his previous three five-round decision wins, and amazingly scored just 68 points in a 2018 five-round decision win over Donald Cerrone, showing a non-existent floor even in five-round fights. It’s already asking a lot for Edwards to pull off the upset, but the fact that he could do so and still score poorly makes it even tougher to get excited about playing him. Usman has never been taken down, knocked out, or even knocked down in his career, and you couldn’t ask for a tougher matchup at 170 lb. So despite the fact that Edwards would be a massive leverage play against the ever popular Usman, we’re not overly excited about playing him in DFS. The one thing we will say is that at 35 years old Usman is bound to hit a cliff at some point in the not too distant future and it may be hard to see it coming until it’s too late. The odds imply Edwards has a 23% chance to win, a 15% chance to land a finish, and a 5% 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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