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Fighter Notes:
Fight #11
Vinicius Salvador
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Salvador had been scheduled to make his UFC debut against Daniel da Silva Lacerda back in December, but Da Silva botched his weight cut and dropped out. And prior to that he had been set to make his debut in October 2022 against Kleydson Rodrigues, but Salvador dropped out. So this will be his third attempt at making his debut.
Prior to those last two fights falling through, Salvador landed three knockdowns in a wild second round knockout win on DWCS against Shannon Ross, which is Salvador’s fourth straight knockout win in the first two rounds. He’s only been to one decision in his career and all 14 of his wins have come early. He’s a kill or get killed type of fighter and he’s 5-3 in his last eight fights, with all but one of his career fights ending early.
Now 14-4 as a pro, Salvador has 13 knockout victories and one submission win. Thirteen of his 14 wins occurred in the first two rounds and he’s only seen the third round twice in his career (1-1). He has nine first round finishes, four in round two, and one in round three. He’s also been knocked out twice, submitted once, and lost the only decision he’s ever been to (2018). Salvador turned pro in 2014 and started out fighting at 135 lb, before dropping down to 125 lb in 2017. However, after going 1-2 in his next three fights after moving down to 125 lb, he moved back up to 135 lb in 2019. He then took all of 2021 off before returning to 125 lb in 2022, where he’ll remain for his UFC debut. While Salvador has knocked out four straight opponents, he’s been fighting some dubious competition, with two of those four knockouts coming against opponents fighting for the first and only time professionally, and another coming against a suspect Shannon Ross, who was competing with a ruptured appendix and blood poisoning.
Overall, Salvador is a wild brawler with a background in jiu-jitsu and boxing. He grew up training with Amanda Ribas in Brazil and even she calls him crazy, which says a lot. He throws a lot of big looping punches and has a ton of power at 125 lb. Despite his jiu-jitsu background, his grappling leaves something to be desired and he hasn’t looked great on the mat from what we’ve seen from him. He relies on landing knockouts to win fights and he always makes for exciting matches.
Victor Altamirano
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Coming off his first UFC win, Altamirano rebounded from some early adversity in his last fight after getting dropped to land a R1 ground and pound finish against the extremely fragile Daniel da Silva Lacerda. Prior to that, he lost a split decision in his UFC debut against Carlos Hernandez, after winning a split decision on DWCS against Carlos Candelario. He’s won five of his last six fights, with the only other loss of his career coming in a 2019 second round submission. Other than his recent TKO win, his only other finish in his last eight fights came in a weird situation in a 2020 second round submission, 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.
Now 11-2 as a pro, Altamirano has two wins by R1 TKO, four submissions, and five decisions. The only time he’s ever been finished was in a 2019 R2 submission, while he also has one decision defeat. He’s never been knocked out, but he did get dropped in the first round of his last fight. Prior to his recent R1 win, he had seen the second round in seven straight fights, with five of those going the distance.
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, and he looks to have solid cardio. Between his two UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, he’s landed five takedowns on 12 attempts (41.7% accuracy), while he’s been taken down by his opponents 7 times on 25 attempts (72% defense).
Fight Prediction:
Altamirano will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 70” reach. Salvador is six years younger than the 32-year-old Altamirano.
Look for Salvador to come out aggressively, but if he can’t find a knockout early then we expect Altamirano to take over in the back half of the fight, with a decent chance of landing a late finish, most likely by submission. Salvador likes to throw big looping punches and we did see Altamirano get dropped in the first round of his last fight, but he immediately recovered and has never been knocked out in his career. We could definitely see a scenario where Salvador lands a knockdown, but then Altamirano locks up a triangle choke off his back. This should be a fun fight that could go either way, but we’ll say Altamirano wins by second round submission.
Our favorite bet here is Altamirano’s ML at +100.
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DFS Implications:
Salvador’s recent second round knockout win on DWCS would have been good for a ridiculous 136 DraftKings points and 158 points on FanDuel, as he landed an absurd three knockdowns in less than two rounds of action. His aggressive fighting style is perfectly suited towards DFS production, and win or lose, his fights almost always end in the first two rounds. While Salvador comes into every fight looking for a knockout, he hasn’t shown much in terms of grappling, which will be problematic for him as he begins facing tougher and more well rounded competition at the UFC level. So he’ll likely face some growing pains as opponents look to attack him on the mat opposed to partaking in the brawls he would prefer. That likely leaves him as a KO or bust option who has a really high ceiling when he can land knockouts, but will struggle to win or score well when he can’t. The odds imply he has a 51% chance to win, a 37% chance to land a finish, and an 18% chance it comes in round one.
Altamirano is coming off a teed up finish against a fragile Daniel da Silva Lacerda, where Altamirano scored a slate-breaking 134 DraftKings points in a R1 ground and pound TKO. He did get knocked down in that fight and had to battle through some early adversity before landing a plethora of ground strikes on his way to the stoppage. So while he’s never been knocked out, that does raise some questions regarding his durability and will now face an aggressive brawler here who will be looking to take his head off. With that said, it’s another favorable matchup for Altamirano to score well if he can avoid getting knocked out and three of Salvador’s four career losses have come early. Altamirano doesn’t appear to have a ton of power, but he’ll have the grappling advantage here and just needs to get the fight to the ground to find success. While he hasn’t been overly impressive, he’s got a good shot at finding another finish here in a fight we expect to end early regardless of who wins. At his cheaper price tag, it’s tougher to see Altamirano finishing Salvador and getting left out of winning lineups and even in a decision win he could score enough to be useful, and his DWCS decision victory would have been good for 109 DraftKings points and 104 points on FanDuel. The only annoying thing here is that Altamirano’s recent scoring explosion should prevent him from going low owned. Regardless, whoever wins this fight should score well and likely ends up in winning tournament lineups. The odds imply he has a 49% chance to win, a 23% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #10
CJ Vergara
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Looking to bounce back from a second round submission loss, Vergara has slipped to 1-2 in the UFC, with his lone win coming in a close split-decision against a debuting Kleydson Rodrigues. Prior to the win over Rodrigues, Vergara lost a close decision to Ode Osbourne in his November 2021 UFC debut. However, after securing his lone UFC win against Rodrigues, Vergara got dominated on the mat and submitted by Tatsuro Taira in his last fight. Prior to making his UFC debut, Vergara knocked out five straight opponents, with four of those finishes coming in the later rounds.
Now 10-4-1 as a pro, Vergara has six wins by KO and four decisions. Both of his early losses have ended in rear-naked chokes (R1 2018 & R2 2022). He also has two decision losses on his record. One of those decision defeats was a split-decision against UFC fighter Jonathan Martinez and the other occurred in his UFC debut. He’s often struggled to hit 125 lb with multiple weight misses on his record and he’s competed up at 135 lb some in the past, as well as having multiple Catchweight fights. He’s missed weight in two of his three UFC fights and is always a guy to monitor closely at weigh-ins.
Overall, Vergara looks to be more or less of a one-dimensional striker who likes to push the pace, but doesn’t offer much in terms of offensive grappling. Between his three UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, he’s been taken down six times on 23 opponent attempts (73.9% defense), while he failed to attempt even a single takedown of his own. Outside of his submission losses, he’s looked pretty durable to this point, as he went the distance against two dangerous strikers in his first two UFC fights. He’s not an explosive athlete or an especially talented fighter, but he’s got some dog in him and shows up ready to fight, albeit oftentimes overweight.
Daniel da Silva Lacerda
4th UFC Fight (0-3)Da Silva had been scheduled to fight Vinicius Salvador in December, but dropped out due to a botched weight cut.
Likely getting his final chance in the UFC, Da Silva has been finished in under six minutes in all three of his UFC fights and has still never even seen the third round in his career, let alone require the judges. 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 next match, before getting finished against in the first round by Victor Altamirano in his most recent fight. To Da Silva’s credit, he landed a knockdown 30 seconds into the first round, but Altamirano immediately recovered and returned to his feet. Da Silva continued to push forward and landed a big spinning backfist, but Altamirano was able to eat it. Altamirano then landed a body shot that dropped Da Silva to the mat and Altamirano ended up on top. Altamirano then went to town with ground and pound as Da Silva tried to throw up submissions. Da Silva continued to eat shots until the fight was eventually stopped in the back half of round one.
Now 11-4 as a pro, Da Silva has five wins by KO and six by submission. He’s been knocked out three times and has one submission loss. He’s never seen the third round, with 13 of his fights ending in round one (10-3) and two ending in round two (1-1). He’s just 3-4 in his last seven 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. He’s looked incredibly fragile so far in the UFC and his defense is essentially non-existent. He’s only landed one of his three takedown attempts in the UFC, while no one has tried to take him down.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’6” but Da Silva will have a 2” reach advantage and is five years younger than the 31-year-old Vergara.
This looks like a make or break spot for both of these guys and we fully expect the loser to be cut. Da Silva has looked like a total fraud so far in the UFC and lacks any sort of durability or cardio. So while Vergara hasn’t looked like much of a finishing threat at the UFC level, this is a teed up matchup for him to get a finish, as long as he can survive the early attacks from Da Silva. It’s hard to ever completely count Da Silva out in the first round based on his fighting style, and a random first round submission win wouldn’t be entirely shocking. However, we fully expect him to try and fail and then get beat up as he gasses out. Look for Vergara to knock him out either late in round one or early in round two.
Our favorite bet here is “CJ Vergara R1 or R2 KO” at -105.
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DFS Implications:
Vergara failed to top 83 DraftKings points in his first three UFC fights and is just 1-2 with the organization, but his past scores are meaningless as he takes on Da Silva/Lacerda/whatever. It’s rare to see a fighter as defensively terrible as Da Silva, and he consistently fades a few minutes into every fight. So as long as Vergara can avoid getting finished by Da Silva in the first round, he should have one of the most teed up finishes you could ever ask for. If Vergara can’t finish Da Silva with a contract on the line in front of his home crowd, then he has no reason being in the UFC and deserves to be cut. Look for Vergara to land a knockout in the first two rounds and at that point it will just come down to whether or not he outscores the other high priced options, but this is a dream spot for him. The odds imply he has a 68% chance to win, a 57% chance to land a finish, and a 33% 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 upside. However, he’s been finished easily in all three of his UFC fights and looks like one of the least defensively sound fighters on the roster. He also doesn’t appear to have any sort of a gas tank and if can’t find a finish in the first round he should get knocked out in round two, if he even makes it that long. 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. Working in his favor, Vergara has been submitted twice in his career, including in his last fight. If Da Silva can get this fight to the ground, he could lock up a submission, but it still feels like a longshot. At his cheap price tag, it’s hard to see Da Silva getting left out of winning lineups if he pulls off the upset and whoever wins this match should put up a big score. The odds imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 27% chance to land a finish, and a 15% chance it comes in round one. The odds imply he has a 32% chance to win, a 26% chance to land a finish, and a 13% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #9
Trevin Giles
11th UFC Fight (6-4)Coming off a worst fight of the year candidate against Louis Cosce, Giles has not looked good since dropping down to 170 lb for his last two fights. He outlanded Cosce 25-10 in significant strikes over the course of 15 minutes, and honestly it didn’t even feel like that many strikes were landed. The two guys basically stared at each other for the first two rounds before Giles landed two takedowns in round three and Cosce also landed one. We saw just a single significant strike landed over the final five minutes, with only four being thrown. Prior to that head scratcher, Giles got knocked out in the first round of his Welterweight debut against Michael Morales, after getting knocked put just before that in his final fight at Middleweight by Dricus Du Plessis. Those are the only two times Giles has been knocked out in his career, but he’s also been submitted twice in the UFC, both times by guillotine. Seven of his 10 UFC fights have ended early (3-4), however, three of his last four wins went the distance
Now 15-4 as a pro, Giles has six wins by KO, five by submission, and four decisions. He’s been finished in all four of his losses, with two KOs and two submissions. Both of his submission losses came by R3 guillotine choke, while both of his KO losses came in the opening round and a half. After spending almost his entire career at 185 lb, and even taking a fight all the way up at 205 lb in his UFC debut, Giles moved down to 170 lb for his last two fights. Twelve of his last 13 fights have seen the second round, with nine making it to round three, but only four requiring the judges.
Overall, Giles is a methodical striker who only averages 2.90 SSL/min and likes to keep his hands low. He’s a BJJ brown belt and will mix in occasional takedown attempts, but after landing all five of his attempts in his UFC debut, he’s only landed six of his last 14 attempts in his most recent nine fights, failing to land more than two takedowns in any of those matches. With that said, he does have a solid 57% takedown accuracy. On the other side of things, he’s only been taken down 8 times on 30 opponent attempts (73% defense) and no one has ever gotten him down more than twice. Giles was born in San Antonio, Texas and trains in Houston, so he should have the home crowd behind him.
Preston Parsons
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Eleven months removed from his first UFC win, Parsons went to the judges for the first time in his career as he defeated a tough short notice replacement in Evan Elder, who was making his UFC debut on just a few days’ notice up a weight class. Parsons was able to land four takedowns in the fight with almost eight minutes of control time, while outlanding Elder 75-27 in significant strikes and 121-34 in total strikes. Prior to that decision win, Parsons lost his own short notice UFC debut in a R1 TKO against Daniel Rodriguez.
Now 10-3 as a pro, Parsons has only been past the second round once in his career, which was in his recent decision victory. His other nine pro wins all ended in submissions in the first two rounds, including eight in round one and one in round two. Two of his three losses ended in R1 TKOs, with one of those coming against Mike Perry in 2015 in Parsons’ third prio fight, and the other against Daniel Rodriguez in his 2021 UFC debut. His only other loss was a 2017 second round submission. In addition to fighting Mike Perry early in his career, Parson also had a fight against UFC fighter Ignacio Bahamondes, who Parsons submitted in the first round. He started his career at 155 lb but has been at 170 lb since 2016.
Overall, Parsons looked like a one-dimensional grappler early in his career, but has improved his striking some over the years and also added a lot of muscle. Don’t get us wrong, Parsons still relies primarily on his grappling, and we saw what happened when he was unable to land takedowns in his UFC debut against Rodriguez. Parsons holds brown belts in both BJJ and Taekwondo, and nearly locked up multiple arm-triangle attempts in his last fight, finishing the match with five official submission attempts. Parsons owns and trains out of a small gym called Elevate MMA in Jacksonville, Florida that he opened up in 2020. It sounds like the only other UFC fighter there is Steven Koslow, who recently lost his short notice UFC debut and is a one-dimensional grappler. Trey Waters, who lost on DWCS, also trains there, but the level of sparring partners is pretty low. The fact that Parsons owns it and teaches most of the classes seemingly makes it impossible for him to go train at a bigger gym for any extended period of time, which is concerning for his personal growth moving forward in the UFC, at least for the time being. Parsons said he broke his hand in each of his last two fights, which contributed to his long layoff going into this one.
Fight Prediction:
Giles will have a 1” height advantage and 3” reach advantage.
It’s hard to know what to make out of Giles these days. He’s been knocked out in two of his last three fights and then refused to engage in his last match. He’s only landed one finish since 2017, while his opponents have finished him four times since then. He’s shown decent hands at times, but his chin has been sort of suspect lately and he put up no resistance to being taken down in the the third round of his last fight. It’s also hard to know how good Parsons actually is, as his only UFC win came against a short notice opponent who was making his debut up a weight class. We’ll give the striking advantage in this one to Giles, but the grappling advantage to Parsons. However, Giles doesn’t land enough volume to run away with a fight from striking alone, and only has one early win since 2017. Because of that, it’s hard to have much confidence in him and we’ll say Parsons gets the win here, either by submission or in a grappling-heavy decision.
Our favorite bet here is Parsons’ ML at -110.
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DFS Implications:
Giles has failed to top 92 DraftKings points in his last nine fights and scored just 58 DraftKings points in a 15 minute staring contest decision win in his last outing. Prior to that he got knocked out in back-to-back fights, so our confidence in him is at an all time low. He only averages 2.90 SSL/min and has only landed six takedowns in his last nine fights. Now he’ll be going against a wrestler who will be looking to take him down, control him, and submit him, leaving Giles as nothing more than an early KO or bust option. The only reason to consider playing him is his low ownership. The odds imply he has a 50% chance to win, a 34% chance to land a finish, and a 17% chance it comes in round one.
Parsons is coming off a grappling-heavy decision win that was able to score well on both DraftKings (108 points) and FanDuel (114 points) with the help of five official submission attempts. However, if you take away all of those submission attempts he only would have scored 89 FanDuel points, so he’ll generally be more reliant on landing finishes over there. That generally hasn’t been a problem for him, and all nine of his previous wins had ended in submissions, although he’s yet to finish anybody at the UFC level, albeit in just two fights. He owns a small gym that he trains out of, so he doesn’t have a ton of high-level training partners to sharpen his skills with, but he’s a pretty good grappler and not entirely helpless on the feet. Giles has a 73% takedown defense, but has been taken down at least once in 6 of his 10 UFC fights and hasn’t looked great off his back. He’s also been submitted twice in the UFC, so there’s no reason to think Parsons can’t lock something up here. Giles has also looked bad in his last few matches and moved down from 185 lb to 170 lb for his last two fights. So as long as Parsons is able to take him down, he should be in a good position to score well. The odds imply Parsons has a 50% chance to win, a 32% chance to land a finish, and a 16% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #8
Steven Peterson
8th UFC Fight (3-4)Thirteen months removed from a brawling split-decision loss to Julian Erosa, Peterson has gone the distance in all but one of his seven UFC fights. The lone exception was a 2019 R2 KO against Martin Bravo, who went 1-3 in his UFC career. Peterson originally tried to crack the UFC roster through DWCS in 2017, but lost a split decision to Benito Lopez and was forced to return to the LFA for a fight before getting called back to make his debut in Texas against Brandon Davis in 2018, where he lost another decision. Peterson then won a split decision over Matt Bessette, who finished 0-2 in the UFC, before losing two more decisions against Luis Pena and Alex Caceres, with the latter of those also coming in Texas. He then landed the spinning back fist KO against Bravo before taking all of 2020 off. He returned in 2021 and won a grappling-heavy decision over Chase Hooper, leading up to his recent split-decision loss to Erosa. So between his DWCS match and his seven UFC fights, he’s been to seven decisions (2-5), with three of those being split (1-2).
Now 19-10 as a pro, Peterson has five wins by KO/TKO, eight by submission, and six decision wins. His last three finishes all come in the second round, but while 13 of his 19 career wins have come early, he’s only landed one finish since 2017. He’s only been finished once in his career (2013 R1 KO), with his other nine losses all ending in decisions. He’s just 6-9 with the judges in his career, with 6 of his 15 decisions being split/majority (2-4). He fought mostly at 135 lb before joining the UFC, but then moved up to 145 lb in 2017, where he’s stayed since.
Overall, Peterson is decently well rounded, but doesn’t stand out anywhere. He gets hit more than he lands, averaging 5.17 SSL/min and 5.97 SSA/min, and has been outlanded in five of his seven UFC fights. Between his seven UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, he’s completed just 12 of his 41 takedown attempts (29.3% accuracy), while his opponents have taken him down on 9 of their 25 attempts (64% defense). We’ve seen his takedowns landed and attempted decrease over the course of his career, while his takedowns allowed have increased. In his first four UFC fights, he landed nine takedowns on 26 attempts (34.6% accuracy), while only getting taken down by opponents once one seven attempts (85.7% defense). However, in his last three matches, he’s only landed one of his three takedown attempts (33.3% accuracy), while he’s been taken down on 8 of 18 opponent attempts (55.6% defense). He’s a BJJ brown belt and trains at Fortis MMA in Dallas Texas, but said he vowed to ever fight in Texas again after losing two UFC decisions there earlier in his career that he thought he won (he was outlanded handedly in both fights). Apparently after sitting out for over a year he was willing to go back on his word. Has missed weight for his last two fights (3 lb and 2.5 lb) despite fighting at 135 lb earlier in his career, but claims to have worked with the UFC Performance Institute to get that issue on control and said he was walking around 10 lb lighter coming into this matchup. Nevertheless, he’s always a guy to keep an eye on during weigh-ins.
Lucas Alexander
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Looking to bounce back from a first round submission loss in his recent short notice UFC debut, Alexander only lasted 122 seconds in that fight before the dangerous Joanderson Brito locked up a rear-naked choke. Alexander slipped as he threw a kick 30 seconds in, which allowed Brito to take his back and never let him go. Prior to that, Alexander landed a second round TKO via arm injury against former UFC fighter Jacob Kilburn, who has now lost five straight fights, with four of those losses ending early. Alexander won five straight before making his UFC debut, with his last three wins all ending in late round TKOs. Meanwhile, his last three losses have all ended in first round submissions.
Now 7-3 as a pro, Alexander has three wins by TKO and four decisions. His last two TKO wins ended in round two, with his other ending in round three. All three of his losses ended in first round submissions, and he’s yet to lose a decision. Five of his last six fights have seen the second round, but his last four all ended early.
Overall, Alexander is a crisp striker who throws good calf kicks and can mix up his stance to keep opponents guessing. He’s looked for a couple of no hooks rear-naked chokes in past fights, but he’s overall not much of a grappler and struggles with his defensive wrestling. He has somewhat of a bizarre striking style at times, channeling unusual movement to try and throw his opponents off their game. This will be his first full camp in the UFC, so we’re interested to see what improvements the 27-year-old has made.
Fight Prediction:
Alexander will have a 1” height advantage and 3” reach advantage. He’s also five years younger than the 32-year-old Peterson.
The ultimate question in this fight is how much does Peterson look to wrestle and how effective will he be when he does? We’ve seen his takedown attempts wane over the course of his UFC career and after he landed 11 takedowns on 38 attempts between his DWCS appearance and first four UFC fights, he’s only landed one takedown on three attempts in his last three matches. And while he’s got a good team around him at Fortis MMA, we just saw one of his training partners, Damon Jackon, amazingly not look to rely on his grappling advantage over Dan Ige and go on to get knocked out. We’ve also seen other Fortis fighters like Alex Morono and Miles Johns abandon their wrestling, but who’s to say if that trend continues here. We generally see Alexander’s opponents target his poor defensive grappling, and Peterson would be wise to do the same. However, we haven’t seen Peterson submit anybody since 2017, before he joined the UFC, and even if he can get Alexander down, he may not be able to put him away. The larger cage in San Antonio should also help Alexander to evade takedown to some extent.
If Peterson were smart, he would be wrestling his ass off in training and come in with the game plan of grinding this fight out on the mat for 15 minutes if he can’t find a submission sooner. However, we’re not at all confident that he’ll come in with that approach. We just saw Peterson involved in a high-volume Fight of the Night brawl in his last match, although Peterson was ineligible for the 50K bonus because he missed weight. Perhaps he’ll be chasing that lost money here with another brawling performance here, and if that happens we like Alexander’s chances of winning a pure striking battle. Alexander looks like the cleaner, more powerful striker and Peterson has been very hittable, averaging 5.97 SSA/min, the second most on the slate behind only Daniel Da Silva. While Peterson gets hit a lot, he’s only been finished once in his career, which was all the way back in 2013. There’s a good chance his durability will continue to hold up, lowering the chances that Alexander knocks him out. Ultimately, our prediction is that Peterson will look to wrestle some, but not enough to secure two rounds. He’ll then finish behind in striking and lose a close decision that he claims he won, while going on to blame the judges and saying that’s why he never wanted to fight in Texas again. Give us Alexander in a close decision.
Our favorite bet here is “FGTD” at -105.
Check out our premium betting content on patreon.com/mmadfs for all of our other top bets and to be notified throughout the week when and where these lines are available.
DFS Implications:
Peterson has shown a decent scoring floor through a combination of striking and grappling, but has yet to put up any really big scores. He totalled 96 and 80 DraftKings points in his two UFC decision wins, and scored 100 points in his lone early win with the organization, which ended in a 2019 R2 KO. His second most recent finish was all the way back in 2017, before he joined the UFC, and he hasn’t looked like much of a finisher at this level. While we saw him attempt more takedowns early in his career, he’s landed just one on only three attempts in his last three matches and has just a 29.3% career takedown accuracy. He appears to have fallen in love with his striking, and landed a career best 148 significant strikes in his last fight, but still got outlanded by Julian Erosa. Keep in mind, Erosa averages 6.27 SSA/min and is rarely in a boring match. Prior to that, Peterson had never landed more than 74 significant strikes in a UFC fight, so he has not been a guy you can rely on to score well from pure striking volume. However, he’ll now face an opponent who struggles with his defensive grappling, and if Peterson can tuck his pride and rely on his wrestling, he has the potential to land a submission or grind out a decision win on the mat, which could still score decently on DraftKings. The only problem is that we don’t have much confidence in his ability to do that and he’ll be fighting in front of his home Texas crowd, so he’ll likely be looking to put on a show. That will leave him more reliant on landing an unlikely knockout, which we’d be surprised to see. Six of his seven UFC fights have gone the distance and at his higher price tag, it will be tough for him to crack winning lineups without a finish or a completely dominant grappling performance. The odds imply he has a 57% chance to win, a 32% chance to land a finish, and a 16% chance it comes in round one.
Alexander is a one-dimensional striker who struggles with getting taken down, controlled, and submitted, which makes it tough to trust him, especially when he’s going against opponents with any sort of grappling skills. While Peterson isn’t some world class grappler, he is a BJJ brown belt who’s generally looking to mix in takedowns to some extent. At the very least, that has the potential to slow the fight down some and make it tougher for Alexander to put up the huge striking total he would need to score well in a decision. That will leave him more reliant on landing a knockout, and Peterson’s only career KO loss was all the way back in 2013. At Alexander’s cheaper price tag, it is possible he could serve as a value play in a decision win without putting up a really big score, but that will just depend on how the other dogs on the slate do. The odds imply he has a 43% chance to win, a 21% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #7
Tucker Lutz
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Sixteen months removed from a decision loss to Pat Sabatini, Lutz has gone the distance in four straight fights. Including two DWCS appearances at 155 lb and his two UFC matches at 145 lb. Following the pair of decision wins on DWCS, Lutz made his debut against a struggling Kevin Aguilar in May 2021. Lutz outlanded his way to a decision win over Aguilar, who came in on a three fight skid and never fought again following his fourth straight loss. Lutz finished ahead in striking and tacked on a few takedowns, but he kind of limped to the finish line and it wasn’t the most impressive win. Then he got absolutely dominated on the mat for three straight rounds by Sabatini, who took Lutz down five times and controlled him for 11 minutes while hunting for submissions. The only positive for Lutz was he managed not to get submitted.
Now 12-2 as a pro, Lutz has six wins by KO/TKO, two submissions, and four decision victories. The only early loss of his career came in a R3 TKO in his 2015 pro debut, with his one other defeat being his recent decision loss. Prior to his recent loss, he had won 12 straight fights, with eight of those wins coming early. However, you have to question the level of competition he had been facing, as only two of those eight finishes came against opponents with winning records and he had been fighting exclusively on the unheralded Maryland regional scene. Lutz started his pro career at 145 lb before moving up to 155 lb in 2018. He said after his second DWCS appearance that his future would be 145 lb but he had been dealing with a nagging chest cartilage injury that he needed to take care of first. He lived up to his word and both of his UFC fights have been at 145 lb, where this next one will also be.
Overall, Lutz has a background in kickboxing and is also a BJJ purple belt and wrestled some when he was younger. It seems like a lot of people are higher on Lutz than we are and he hasn’t done much to impress us in his career. He does a decent job of blending his striking and grappling, but hasn’t stood out anywhere. He’s never finished any legitimate competition and now hasn’t fought in a year and a half. Between his two UFC fights and his two DWCS appearances, he’s landed 8 of his 12 takedown attempts (66.7% accuracy), while getting taken down by his opponents on 7 of 24 attempts (70.8% defense).
Daniel Pineda
11th UFC Fight (4-5, NC)It’s now been 21 months since the 37-year-old Pineda last competed. Following a June 2021 No Contest against Andre Fili, Pineda got suspended when he tested positive for Adderall, despite being prescribed it by a doctor. He then suffered a lower body injury that he wouldn’t go into detail on, but said the doctors told him it would take a year or a year and a half to recover from. Pineda originally joined the UFC in 2012, but after going 3-4 with three first round submission wins, three decision losses, and one R1 KO loss, he was released in 2014. He then returned to the regional scene, before getting re-signed by the UFC in 2020. He took on Herbert Burns in his return, who missed weight by 3.5 lb and looked terrible on the scale. Pineda finished Burns in R2 via ground and pound and Burns hasn’t won a fight since. Pineda then got knocked out by Cub Swanson in the second round of a December 2020 match and was about to get knocked out by Andre Fili in his most recent fight before an accidental eye poke stopped the match early in round two, resulting in a No Contest.
Now 27-14 as a pro (plus three No Contests), Pineda has a 100% finishing rate with nine wins by KO/TKO and 18 submission victories. He’s also been knocked out three times, submitted six times, and has lost all five of the decisions he’s been to. All six of his submission losses came prior to 2011 and his last seven losses have all ended in either knockouts (3) or decisions (4). He turned pro all the way back in 2007, but has only seen the third round eight times in 44 pro fights. Pineda’s last 11 fights have ended early, with his last 10 ending in the first two rounds, and he hasn’t been to the judges since 2016. Pineda has fought a decent amount at both 145 lb and 155 lb, and even competed all the way up at 170 lb early in his career.
Overall, Pineda is an aggressive bonus hunter with a kill or get killed mentality, with all 27 of his pro wins coming early. He’s a BJJ black belt and also throws a lot of kicks as he constantly pushes forward. He hasn’t looked very durable, and when he’s unable to find a quick finish of his own, it generally results in him getting beaten up on the feet and/or taken down. Since returning to the UFC in 2020, he’s been taken down five times on six opponent attempts (16.7% defense), while landing just two of his own 11 takedown attempts (18.2% accuracy). Both of those numbers are worse than his career averages (22% takedown accuracy and 42% defense). At 37 years old and coming off a long layoff due to a suspension and an injury, it’s fair to wonder how much he has left at this stage in his career. This is the final fight on Pineda’s contract and he said he’s willing to gamble by fighting out his deal, which he’ll be doing in front of his home Texas crowd. So look for him to try and put on a show and he said he plans on pushing forward with constant pressure and this fight will not go the distance regardless of who wins.
Fight Prediction:
Lutz will have a 1” height advantage and 3” reach advantage. He’s also nine years younger than the 37-year-old Pineda.
Neither of these two have fought since 2021 and they’re both coming off long layoffs, so it will be interesting to see how much ring rust they have to knock off. Pineda is an aggressive, but aging finisher with durability and cardio concerns, while Lutz is a young guy still in search of his identity as a fighter. Lutz hasn’t finished anybody since 2019 and that came against a 2-2 opponent on the Maryland regional scene. However, while Lutz hasn’t looked like much of a finisher in his last four fights, Pineda always forces the action and hasn’t been past the second round since 2016. Lutz has looked fairly durable and if Pineda isn’t able to take him down and look for a finish on the mat, then Pineda could make Lutz suddenly look like a finisher in the striking exchanges. This is one of those spots where we wish we could bet against both guys, but forced to choose we’ll still side with the younger, more durable of two in Lutz. Pineda is always live for an early finish, but it’s more likely that Lutz is able to survive early and take over the longer the fight goes. It’s tough to say if Pineda will fall apart to the point that Lutz is able to find a finish or if Lutz will be one of the very few fighters that actually goes the distance against Pineda. We actually think the latter is more likely than either of their records would indicate, and we don’t see Pineda quitting here and Lutz hasn’t looked very dangerous anywhere. We’ll say Lutz wins a close decision where Pineda starts strong but fades late, but this is a pretty volatile fight that could go multiple ways.
Our favorite bet here is “Lutz DEC” at +310.
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DFS Implications:
Lutz’s decision win in his UFC debut was good for a respectable 93 DraftKings points as he landed a decent number of significant strikes and tacked on three takedowns, but then he got smothered on the mat in his last outing and only scored 18 points in a decision loss. His two decision wins on DWCS would have scored 83 and 75 DraftKings points, so he’s shown that he can score reasonably in decisions, but hasn’t shown he can return value at his high price tag. He hasn’t fought since November 2021 and hasn’t finished anybody since 2019, when he was taking on low level opponents on the Maryland regional scene. His last four fights have all gone the distance as he’s begun facing tougher competition, and the only reason to be optimistic in Lutz’s scoring potential is his matchup. He’s facing a 37-year-old opponent in Pineda who hasn’t been past the second round since 2016 and is coming off an injury and long layoff. Pineda got demolished in each of his last two fights, but was facing much tougher opponents than Lutz. Pineda isn’t very durable and fades as fights go on, and we’re typically looking to target his fights in DFS. So even though Lutz hasn’t looked very dangerous lately, this is a good spot for him to find his first UFC finish. With that said, we don’t really know what either of these two will look like after such a long time away, so this is a pretty volatile spot that could go a lot of ways. Lutz was hilariously 44% owned on DraftKings in a terrible spot in his last fight and the field seems pretty high on him for unknown reasons. After losing that fight and taking 16 months off, it will be interesting to see where his ownership checks in now in a much more favorable matchup, but also at a much higher price tag. He likely needs a finish to crack tournament winning lineups, but if Pineda completely falls apart late in the fight that could allow Lutz to rack up stats in the back half, giving him a slight chance to still score well even in a decision. The odds imply Lutz has a 71% chance to win, a 49% chance to land a finish, and a 27% chance it comes in round one.
Pineda always has a huge ceiling in DFS with DraftKings scores of 137, 103, 106 and 108 in his four UFC wins, but he only has one UFC victory since 2013 and is now 37 years old and coming off an injury and long layoff. That makes it tough to know how he’ll look, and he got the shit kicked out of him in his last two outings. However, he should come in with maximum motivation to put on his best performance, as this is the last fight of his contract and he’ll be fighting in front of his home Texas crowd. However, Lutz hasn’t been finished since his 2015 pro debut and doesn’t look like an easy guy to get out of there. Pineda also has durability and cardio concerns, so he looks reliant on landing a finish in the first round or two if he wants to pull off the upset. Working in his favor, this is a step down in competition for Pineda, after he took on Cub Swanson and Andre FIli in his last two fights. Pineda is ultimately a boom or bust option, and if he wins, he’ll almost certainly secure a spot in tournament winning lineups. The odds imply he has a 29% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #6
Chidi Njokuani
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Looking to bounce back from his first UFC loss, Njokuani nearly finished Gregory Rodrigues in round one after he split his face wide open, but Rodrigues was able to survive with a long leash from the doctor and came back to finish Njokuani early in round two on the mat. Prior to that loss, Njokuani couldn’t have started much hotter in the UFC, as he landed back-to-back first round knockouts. The first of those came in a 16 second R1 finish in his February 2021 UFC debut over Marc-Andre Barriault, who had previously never been finished in his career. He followed it up with a late first round knockout of Dusko Todorovic in his next match, which was Njokuani’s fourth straight knockout win dating back to a 2020 R2 TKO win in the LFA followed by a 2021 R3 TKO on DWCS to punch his ticket to the UFC.
Now 22-8 as a pro, Njokuani has 14 wins by KO, one by submission, and seven decisions. Nine of his KO wins occurred in round one, one came in round two, and four ended in round three. He’s been finished in seven of his eight pro losses, with four KO/TKOs and three submissions. He’s 7-1 in decisions, but lost the last decision he went to, which was back in 2019. Five of his seven early losses came in the first round, while the other two occurred in round two. Njokuani primarily fought at 170 lb until 2017 when moved up to 185 lb. He’s gone 5-3 since making the switch, with six of his last seven fights ending early.
Overall, Njokuani is a really dangerous striker who’s tall and long for the division. In addition to his 22-8 pro MMA record, Njokuani went 12-1 as a kickboxer. Despite allegedly being a BJJ black belt, Njokuani's biggest weakness is his grappling and we’ve seen him struggle with being controlled both on the fence and on the mat in the past. That’s how his last four losses occurred, with the recent R2 ground and pound TKO, preceded by a 2019 smothering decision loss, a 2018 R1 submission loss, and a 2017 R1 ground and pound TKO loss. Between his three UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, Njokuani has been taken down on 4 of 14 opponent attempts (71.4% defense), while he failed to land his only takedown attempt. Now he’ll face another opponent with a wrestling background, so it will be interesting to see if Njokuani can keep the fight standing. Njokuani was born in Dallas so he’ll be fighting in front of his home Texas crowd and he said he already signed a new contract, so he won’t have that hanging over him as he enters his fourth UFC match.
Albert Duraev
3rd UFC Fight (1-1)Duraev just had a 10 fight winning streak snapped in a post R2 TKO due to a doctor stoppage after his eye swelled shut against Joaquin Buckley. Prior to that loss, Duraev went to the judges for just the third time in his 19-fight pro career, where he won a decision in his 2021 UFC debut. Duraev surprisingly didn’t even attempt a takedown in the first round but started looking for takedowns in the later rounds after getting dropped in the opening seconds of round two. However, he was only able to land 1 of his 9 takedowns in the fight. He gassed out late in the fight after nearly finding a finish on the mat late in round two. Duraev originally punched his ticket to the UFC with a first round submission win on DWCS just six weeks prior making his debut, but hadn’t fought in three years prior to that. He won the Russian ACB Middleweight Championship belt in 2017 in a striking battle that only ended up on the mat once Duraev hurt his opponent and forced him to look for a takedown, at which point Duraev reversed it and finished the fight with ground and pound. Duraev also previously won the ABC Welterweight title in 2016, as he’s fought at both 170 lb and 185 lb throughout his career.
Now 15-4 as a pro, Duraev has three wins by KO, nine by submission, and three decision wins. All four of his career losses have come by KO/TKO in the first two rounds and only 5 of his 19 pro fights have made it to a third round. Duraev has competed at both 170 lb and 185 lb for periods of time in his career. He’s gone 6-1 at 170 lb and 9-3 at 185 lb. One of Duraev’s three KO losses came against decision grinder Ramazan Emeev, who hasn’t shown the ability to finish a hot meal since joining the UFC.
Overall, Duraev is a Russian grappler who does his best work on the mat landing ground and pound and hunting for submissions. However, he’s shown a non-existent fight IQ and he’ll forgo takedown attempts and duke things out on the feet, where he’s been far less impressive. He has yet to land a takedown in the first round of a UFC fight on just two attempts. Between his two UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, he’s landed just 4 of his 19 takedown attempts (21.1% accuracy), while he’s been taken down himself on 1 of 2 opponent attempts (50% defense). Duraev has shown a suspect chin and a fragile orbital so far in the UFC, getting knocked down three times in his last two fights, with his orbital swelling up badly in both fights. Duraev trains out of Xtreme Couture and is one of Sean Strickland’s primary sparring partners, which helps to explain why he lets his ego dictate his game plans.
Fight Prediction:
Njokuani will have a 4” height advantage and 5” reach advantage.
This looks like a grappler versus striker matchup, except the grappler wants to be a striker and the striker is allegedly a BJJ black belt. That muddies the water some and Duraev has proven he can’t be trusted to make rational decisions. He obviously should grapple here, but the same could have been said in each of his last two fights and both times he waited until he started tiring out to start looking for takedowns. Perhaps his recent loss will motivate him to look for more early takedowns here, but we certainly can’t bank on that. If he doesn’t get this fight to the mat quickly, Njokuani should be able to knock him out on the feet. Both guys have shown cardio concerns, which adds some additional uncertainty to the mix, but we like someone to get finished here and the winner should be determined by whether or not Duraev can get it to the mat and keep it there. If Duraev actually fights smart for once, he has all the tools to win this fight. However, if he does the same thing he did in his last two matches, he’ll likely get knocked out in the first round. That makes it hard to predict this one, and forces us to guess on whether or not he’ll continue to fight like an idiot. Considering he’s already done it twice, we’ll say he fails to get the fight to the ground early and Njokuani knocks him out early in the fight.
Our favorite bet here is Njokuani’s ML at -150.
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DFS Implications:
Njokuani has yet to make it past the seven minute mark in a UFC fight, with all three of his fights ending in knockouts (2-1). He scored 108 and 130 DraftKings points in his two wins and was close to landing another knockout in his last fight. However, he then faded quickly in round two and got finished with ground and pound on the mat. So whoever has won his fights has scored well to this point. His lower striking volume and lack of grappling leaves him reliant on landing knockouts to score well, but working in his favor, Duraev has been knocked out in the first two rounds in all four of his pro losses. One concern with Njokuani in tournaments is that he has been very popular in the past, with his DraftKings ownership checking in at 54% and 37% in his last two fights. Now we get a card without many appealing high priced options and Njokuani should once again be highly owned, despite losing his last fight. The odds imply he has a 59% chance to win, a 44% chance to land a finish, and a 22% chance it comes in round one.
Duraev has all the potential to put up massive DFS scores through his wrestling, but continues to look to keep fights standing early on to assure his opponents break his orbital every time he steps inside the cage. We keep waiting for him to come in with a smart game plan, but have yet to see it. That makes it impossible to trust him, but the theoretical scoring ceiling is still there. Now he’ll face his third-straight one-dimensional striker, so he’ll still have the opportunity to wrestle early if he so chooses. Perhaps his recent loss will motivate him to fight a little smarter, but that remains to be seen. Despite attempting zero takedowns in the first round of his UFC debut, he still went on to score 90 DraftKings points in a decision win, which at his cheaper price tag could still be enough for him to serve as a value play here. So if he can avoid getting knocked out, he has a good shot at cracking tournament winning lineups. Just keep in mind, he’s been knocked out in all four of his career losses and is now facing an incredibly dangerous striker. That leaves him with literally a zero point floor, but a huge ceiling if he can get this fight to the mat and go to town with ground and pound. Whoever wins this fight should score well, and it’s unlikely to make it to the judges. The odds imply Duraev has a 39% chance to win, a 28% chance to land a finish, and a 15% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #5
Manel Kape
6th UFC Fight (3-2)Fresh off a decision win over David Dvorak, Kape has now won three straight after losing his first two UFC fights. He made his UFC debut in early 2021 and fought four times that year. He then had been scheduled to face Sumudaerji in April 2022, but tested positive for “a trace amount of the long-term metabolite of the steroid dehydrochloromethyltestosterone (DHCMT)” and was pulled from the card and banned from competing in Nevada for the next six months. However, the UFC took no disciplinary action so he was still allowed to compete outside of Nevada. Therefore the UFC put him on a Singapore card, but the universe upheld Nevada’s decision and Rogerio Bontorin dropped out of a June 2022 fight due to a botched weight cut. Just before failing the drug test, Kape landed back-to-back first round knockouts against Ode Osbourne and Zhalgas Zhumagulov, after losing a pair of unimpressive decisions in his first two UFC fights. Prior to joining the UFC, Kape landed three straight second round knockouts in Rizin and won the vacant Bantamweight belt in the last of those. It took a full year after the Zhumagulov TKO win for Kape to finally get back inside the Octagon, which was in his recent decision win over Dvorak. In that fight, Kape got taken down and controlled for two minutes in the first round of his last fight, but reversed the position with a Kimura and nearly finished the fight with it before time ran out. He then knocked Dvorak down in round two and nearly got another finish, but couldn’t quite complete it and ultimately. Kape’s decision win there was his first time getting his hand raised by the judges since 2013, in his fourth pro fight, and he had lost the previous four decisions he had been to.
Now 18-6 as a pro, Kape has 11 wins by KO, five by submission, and two decision victories. He hasn’t submitted anybody since 2018 and his last five finishes have all come by KO/TKO. While he’s never been knocked out, he’s been submitted twice and has four decision losses, with two of those being split. Nine of his 16 finishes have come in round one, three ended in round two, three finished in round three, and the other occurred in round four. Five of his last eight fights ended in the first two rounds. All six of his career losers have made it to the third round, with both of his submission losses occurring late in round three. Kape has fought between 125 lb and 135 lb in the past, but more so at 135 lb until he joined the UFC where he’s fought exclusively at 125 lb—or at least tried to. He notably missed weight by three pounds for his third most recent fight.
Overall, Kape started his training in boxing as a child because his father was a boxer. He’s a quick striker who can throw flurries of punches, but he can be overly patient at times and his fight IQ is questionable. He likes to showboat a good amount and seems to prioritize that over pushing for finishes at times. In his five UFC fights, he’s landed two of his seven takedown attempts (28.6% accuracy), but all of those attempts came in his debut and he hasn’t shot for a takedown in his last four matches. On the other side of things, he’s been taken down on 4 of 13 opponent attempts (69.2% defense). The last two opponents who tried to take him down both landed two of their attempts. While he’s a BJJ black belt, his defensive wrestling still leaves something to be desired. He’s still just 29 years old and looks like a promising prospect, but there are still some things he needs to clean up if wants to truly contend for a title like he says he does.
Alex Perez
10th UFC Fight (6-3)Perez has been submitted in the first round of his last two fights, but in fairness those losses came against two of the best Flyweights in the world in Alexandre Pantoja and Deiveson Figueiredo. Neither of those fights even made it to the two minute mark, with Figueiredo locking up a guillotine and then Pantoja taking Perez’s back on the feet and securing a rear-naked choke. Other than getting submitted, Perez’s biggest issue has been inactivity and canceled fights and he’s only fought once since November 2020. Following the loss to Figueiredo, Perez had six booked matchups fall through, with only two of those being Perez’s fault. And following his loss to Pantoja, Perez had two more fights fall through, so amazingly, eight of his last nine booked fights have been canceled. Perez’s last four fights have ended in the first round and the last time he saw round two was in a 2019 decision in a 135 lb fight, opposed to 125 lb where he normally competes. Prior to his loss to Figueiredo, Perez landed a R1 TKO by leg strikes against Jussier Formiga after submitting Jordan Espinosa in the first round.
Now 24-7 as a pro, Perez has five wins by KO, seven by submission, and 12 decisions. He’s been knocked out once, has five submission losses (three by guillotine), and one decision defeat. All six of those early losses occurred in round one. Perez has won 11 of his last 14 fights, with eight of those fights ending in the first round (5-3), one ending in round two (1-0), and five going the distance (5-0). Two of Perez’s nine UFC fights have been up at 135 lb, both of which he won, including a R2 submission in his 2017 UFC debut and a 2019 decision over Mark De La Rosa. After dropping down to 125 lb and winning a 2018 decision in his second UFC appearance, Perez’s last six fights down at 125 lb have all ended in the first round (3-3). Perez also landed a first round submission win on DWCS, which was also at 125 lb.
Overall, Perez has a background in wrestling but is also a decent striker and he throws really heavy leg strikes. He has only been taken down twice on nine opponent attempts between his nine UFC fights and DWCS appearance (77.8% defense), but has only faced one attempt in his last five matches. On the other side of things, he’s landed 11 takedowns of his own on 25 attempts (44% accuracy). With so little Octagon time in the last few years, it’s tougher to know what we can expect from Perez at the moment, making him somewhat of a wildcard.
Fight Prediction:
Perez will have a 1” height advantage, but Kape will have a 3” reach advantage.
Both of these two have been prone to getting submitted in the past, with seven submission losses between them. Kape has faster hands, while Perez is the superior wrestler and throws more damaging leg kicks. Perez has only fought once in the last two and a half years and hasn’t been past the first round in four years, so it’s tougher to know how he’ll look in a longer fight. However, he’s won 12 of the 13 decisions he’s been to in his career, with his only decision loss coming in 2012 in his fifth pro fight. Kape has also lost two of the three decisions he’s been to in the UFC, and if this goes to the scorecards Perez has a solid shot at pulling off the upset. However, we rarely see Perez’s fights require the judges. Kape nearly pulled off a first round submission and then a second round knockout in his last fight, but was unable to complete either. While we’re normally expecting him to knock opponents out, Perez has looked far more vulnerable to being submitted, making it trickier to predict how this one plays out. If Perez can get it to the ground, he’s got a shot at locking up a submission or grinding out a decision win, but there’s also a chance Kape could submit him on the mat. On the feet, it will likely come down to the crisp boxing of Kape versus the damaging leg kicks of Perez. We could see this fight ending in a variety of ways, but there’s a good chance someone gets finished in the first round. We’ll lean towards Kape finding a finish, but this is a dicey spot and Perez is definitely live if he can regain his past form.
Our favorite bet here is “Fight Ends in R1” at +180.
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DFS Implications:
Kape has been a R1 KO or bust option in DFS so far and he’s yet to top 72 DraftKings points in a UFC fight that has made it out of the first round. He lost a pair of decisions in his first two UFC fights, but even if those had gone his way he still would have scored just 61 and 58 DraftKings points. He finally won a decision in his last fight, but only scored 72 points. However, he does have two late R1 KO wins in the UFC and was able to score 108 and 131 DraftKings points in those finishes. He only averages 4.46 SSL/min and hasn’t even attempted a takedown in his last four matches, so while we’ve yet to see a later round finish from him in the UFC, he could have a tougher time returning value at his high price tag with a second or third round finish. Perez has been far more prone to getting submitted than knocked out and should be looking to wrestle, which both lower Kape’s chances of finding the first round knockout he needs. With that said, Kape is a BJJ black belt and has the potential to lock up a submission and a knockout is still on the table. The field hasn’t been in love with Kape, and we’ve seen his DraftKings ownership come in at 19%, 17%, and 24% in his last three fights. If that trend continues, it adds to his tournament appeal, but on a smaller slate we expect him to be higher owned here compared to past fights. The odds imply he has a 61% chance to win, a 41% chance to land a finish, and a 19% chance it comes in round one.
Perez has consistently scored well when he wins, as he’s averaged 107 DraftKings points in his six UFC victories. Even in his two decision wins, he still managed to score 97 and 87 points as he averages 2.8 takedowns landed per 15 minutes. Four of his six UFC wins have come early, with his last three finishes occurring in the first round. However, he’s been submitted in the first round in each of his last two fights and hasn’t won a match in nearly three years. He’s been so inactive in recent years that it’s hard to gauge his current form, and now he faces another dangerous opponent. However, this is a better stylistic matchup for Perez than his last two, and we could see him find wrestling success. That adds to his DraftKings appeal, but he’s also live to land a finish. At his cheap price tag, a win of any kind would likely be enough for him to be useful, especially on DraftKings. Just keep in mind, there’s a good chance he gets finished in the first round, so his scoring floor is non-existent, as can be seen in the eight combined points he scored in his last two matches. The odds imply he has a 39% chance to win, a 26% chance to land a finish, and a 12% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #4
Maycee Barber
9th UFC Fight (6-2)Coming off a low-volume, clinch-heavy decision win over Jessica Eye, Barber has won three straight fights, with her last five matches all going the distance. She hasn’t finished anybody since 2019, before she suffered a knee injury in 2020. Prior to defeating Eye, Barber won a grappling-heavy decision against Montana De La Rosa, after getting her hand raised in a close/controversial split decision against Miranda Maverick. The last time Barber lost a fight was against Alexa Grasso in early 2021, in Barber’s first fight back following knee surgery. Barber came into the UFC in 2018 following a third round TKO win on DWCS, and proceeded to land three more TKOs against Hanna Cifers, J.J. Aldrich, and Gillian Robertson leading up to a knee injury suffered in a decision loss against Roxanne Modafferi in 2020. Barber’s confidence seemed shot after the injury, but she’s slowly been getting it back every time she steps inside the Octagon. In 2021 she moved from Roufusport to Team Alpha Male, and the change seems to be doing her some good and putting more of an emphasis on her wrestling. She also lives and trains with a UFC wrestler in Cory Mckenna, and has looked more willing to wrestle in her last few fights.
Now 11-2 as a pro, Barber has five wins by KO, two by submission, and four decisions. She’s never been finished and both of her losses ended in decisions. Barber’s two submission wins both came in the first round of her first three pro fights. Her last five finishes have all come by TKO, with two ending in round three, two in round two, and one in round one.
Overall, Barber has proven herself to be a dangerous striker and has been rounding out her game with more of an emphasis on wrestling lately. After landing just one takedown in her first four UFC fights combined, Barber has landed five takedowns on 15 attempts in her last four matches. Said in a recent interview that she's planning on moving back down to down to 115 lb after this fight, which is surprising to hear and makes you wonder if she’s coming in with the ideal focus and mindset on the matchup in front of her, or if she’s already focussed on the future. She also said just signed a new six fight deal and really wants a finish here after going to five straight decisions.
Andrea Lee
10th UFC Fight (5-4)Ten months removed from a decision loss to Viviane Araujo, Lee started strong in that fight by landing an early knockdown, but then got smothered on the mat for the rest of that fight. She’s now just 2-4 in her last six fights and has lost the last four decisions she’s been to. Prior to her recent decision defeat, she landed a pair of second round finishes with a submission win over Antonina Shevchenko and a post R2 TKO over Cynthia Calvillo, who quit on the stool. Leading up to those finishes, Lee had gone the distance in her first six UFC fights, winning the first three of those before losing the next three. Two of those three losses came in split decisions, including an infamous Houston decision against Lauren Murphy that many people thought Lee won.
Now 13-6 as a pro, Lee has three wins by KO, five by submission, and five decisions. The only time she's been finished was in a 2016 R3 rear-naked choke in her 6th pro fight, prior to joining the UFC. Her other five career losses all went the distance, with three of those losses coming in close split decisions against Roxanne Modafferi, Joanne Wood, and Lauren Murphy. Only one of her last 18 fights has ended in the first round, and her last 12 have all made it to round two, with nine of those seeing the third round, and eight going the distance.
Overall, Lee is a karate black belt and a high-volume striker (5.43 SSL/min) and also holds brown belts in both judo and BJJ. In her nine UFC fights, she’s landed 14 of her 28 takedown attempts (50% accuracy), while she’s been taken down 20 times on 46 opponent attempts (56.5% defense). All eight of the opponents who have tried to take her down have landed at least one of their attempts, with six of those eight landing multiple takedowns against her. Defensive wrestling continues to be one of her weaknesses and she’s lost the last four fights where she’s been taken down more than once. Lee was born in Texas and has gone 1-1 when fighting in her home state, but lost a controversial split decision in her one trip to the judges there.
Fight Prediction:
Lee will have a 1” height advantage and 4” reach advantage, while Barber is 10 years younger than the 34-year-old Lee.
Barber has relied more on her wrestling and clinch work in recent fights and Lee’s biggest weakness is her defensive wrestling. So while this should be close when it comes to the striking exchanges, we expect Barber to set herself apart in the grappling exchanges. That won’t make for the most exciting fight, although it is possible we see Barber find a finish on the mat. Just keep in mind, Lee has never been knocked out and her one submission loss was all the way back in 2016. Barber only has one official submission attempt in the UFC and hasn’t actually submitted anybody since her third pro fight, back in 2018. So while there’s a slight chance that Barber could find the finish she says she wants here, it’s much more likely she grinds out another clinch/grappling-heavy decision win.
Our favorite bet here is “Barber DEC” at -110.
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DFS Implications:
Barber has historically been a KO or bust fighter who has relied on TKO stoppages to return useful scores. Her three finishes in the UFC were good for 111, 93, and 105 DraftKings points, while her three decision wins scored just 63, 79, and 54 points. However, she’s shown a newfound commitment to her wrestling, which presents some theoretical upside on DraftKings for her, even in fights that go the distance. While we’ve yet to see her put together a completely dominating grappling performance, this is a decent spot for her to show it as Andrea Lee has struggled when it comes to defensive wrestling and just got dominated on the mat in her last fight. And after fighting to five straight decisions, the DFS field has shown little interest in playing Barber, as she was just 11% owned the last time she fought, with an identical $9,100 price tag, and 12% owned just before that when she was $9,000. So on a smaller slate where it’s important to find low owned plays to prevent highly duplicated lineups, Barber looks like an interesting contrarian tournament option. And while we don’t put a ton of stock into predictions fighters make, she at least claimed she really wants to find a finish here. The odds imply she has a 70% chance to win, a 24% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Lee landed late/post second round finishes in each of her last two wins, so naturally she scored well in both of those with DraftKings totals of 104 and 116. Prior to that, she had fought to six straight decisions in the UFC, never topping 88 points. However, she notably scored 71 points in a decision loss, showing that she does have the potential to score decently even without a finish as that would have been good for 101 points had the decision gone her way. She averages solid striking volume 5.43 SSL/min, but struggles when it comes to defensive wrestling. That can make it tougher for her to put up big striking numbers if she’s getting controlled for extended periods of time. This looks like a tougher matchup for Lee, as Barber only averages 2.64 SSA/min and has been looking to control opponents more lately, whether it be on the cage or the mat. Barber has also never been finished, further limiting Lee’s likelihood of scoring well. At Lee’s cheap price tag she still has the potential to serve as a value play if she can win a decision, but this is not a spot we really like for her. The odds imply she has a 30% chance to win, a 10% chance to land a finish, and a 4% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #3
Nate Landwehr
6th UFC Fight (3-2)Landwehr had been scheduled to face Alex Caceres here, but he dropped out and Lingo was announced as the replacement 12 days out.
Coming off a pair of massive upset wins, Landwehr showed in his last fight he cares more about putting on a show than landing a finish and he easily should have finished an exhausted David Onama, but was too busy pandering to the crowd. Onama nearly knocked Landwehr out in the first round, but Landwehr was able to survive and take over in the later rounds as Onama’s cardio went off a cliff. Prior to that, Landwehr outlasted another opponent in Ludovit Klein who gassed out in the back half of the fight. Landwehr landed the only submission of his career in the third round of that fight and then Klein moved up a weight class afterwards as the cut down to 145 lb seemed to be zapping his cardio late in fights. Landwehr originally made his UFC debut in January 2020 and got knocked out in the first round by a suspect Herbert Burns. Then he bounced back with a decision win in a high-volume bloody war against Darren Elkins before getting knocked out again in the first round, this time by Julian Erosa, leading up to his recent two wins.
Now 16-4 as a pro, Landwehr has eight wins by KO, one by submission, and seven decision victories. He’s been knocked out twice (R1 2020 & R1 2021), submitted once (R2 2015), and has one decision loss (2013). He’s won the last seven decisions he’s been to, despite three of those being split/majority. Landwehr’s last four and seven of his nine career finishes have come in the later rounds, with five in round two and two in round three. He hasn’t finished anybody in round one since 2016.
Overall, Landwehr is a brawling striker who averages 6.37 SSL/min and 5.56 SSA/min. However, he did recently start adding some grappling to his game, and after failing to attempt a takedown in his first three UFC matches, he’s landed four of his six attempts in his last two fights (66.7% accuracy). On the other side of things, he’s only been taken down on 3 of his 22 opponent attempts and has a solid 86.4% takedown defense. The emergence of his grappling lines up with when he started training at a bigger gym in MMA Masters, and clearly they were able to help him round out his skillset. 0After starting his career on the Tennessee regional scene, Landwehr went over to Russia in 2017 and fought for M-1 Global, where he won the Featherweight belt and then defended it twice before making his UFC debut. This will be Landwehr’s second straight fight in front of a big crowd, and he’s definitely the type of fighter that feeds off the energy of the audience, sometimes a little too much. After failing to push for a finish in his last fight, it will be interesting to see if he makes a more concerted effort here to end this one early or if he once again milks his full 15 minutes in the limelight.
Austin Lingo
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Lingo had been scheduled to face Ricardo Ramos two weeks ago, but Ramos missed weight so badly the fight was canceled after Lingo had already made weight. Lingo didn’t have to wait long to book a new matchup and was announced as the replacement here two days after his last fight was scheduled to take place. Lingo said he stayed on weight during that time and doesn’t seem too concerned with having to cut weight twice in a two week span, but you never know what effect that will have.
Once again looking to get back inside the Octagon for the first time since August 2021, Lingo has struggled with fights falling through and prior to Ramos dropping out two weeks ago, Lingo had two fights booked in 2022, but he ended up dropping out both times. He’s coming off a pair of decision wins over low-level opponents in Luis Saldana and Jacob Kilburn, after losing a decision to Youssef Zalal in his UFC debut. Zalal was notably able to take Lingo down six times on 12 attempts with nearly seven minutes of control time, while also landing three times as many strikes. Lingo nearly landed a R1 KO against a terrible Jacob Kilburn in his next fight, but wasn’t able to put him away.
Now 9-1 as a pro, Lingo has three KO/TKO wins, two by submission, and four decision victories. All five of his early wins ended in the first round of fights in 2018 and 2019 against low-level opponents. He’s never been finished, with his lone loss coming by decision in his UFC debut.
Overall, Lingo is an aggressive one-dimensional striker who pushes forward and relies mostly on his boxing to try and knock opponents out. He’s a black belt in Taekwondo, but just a BJJ purple belt. In his three UFC fights, he’s landed two takedowns on three attempts (66.7% accuracy), while getting taken down by his opponents seven times on 35 attempts (80% defense). Just keep in mind, his takedown defense looks better on paper than it actually is, as a desperate Jacob Kilburn (5% career takedown accuracy) landed just one of his 18 attempts against Lingo. Youssef Zalal (31% career takedown accuracy), was able to take Lingo down six times as he landed 50% of his attempts against. Lingo now hasn’t fought in 19 months, but will be fighting in front of his home Texas crowd, where he lost his UFC debut. While this will be his fourth UFC fight, he said he already signed a new contract, so he’s not fighting for a new deal here.
Fight Prediction:
Lingo will have a 1” height advantage, but Landwehr will have a 2” reach advantage. Lingo is six years younger than the 34-year-old Landwehr.
This sets up as an action-packed fight between two aggressive strikers. Landwehr is the more experienced of the two, with twice as many pro fights to his name, and has also been more active than Lingo, who didn’t fight at all in 2022. Lingo is technically stepping in on short notice, but had just been preparing for a fight, so it’s really just the aspect of cutting weight twice in two weeks that is concerning. Lingo hasn’t done much to impress us so far in the UFC, but he did win his last two fights and has never been finished as a pro. Landwehr has looked more vulnerable to getting finished, but he’s also been facing tougher opponents. Ever since he started training at MMA Masters in Florida, Landwehr has looked to mix in more grappling, and his new go to move on the mat is to look for an Anaconda choke. Lingo has looked vulnerable to being taken down, so it would be smart for Landwehr to look to grapple more, but Landwehr isn’t known for his smart decision making. We expect him to once again be looking to put on a show and entertain the crowd in a back and forth brawl. Landwehr has been dropped three times in his five UFC fights, so Lingo has a puncher’s chance here, but we like Landwehr to win with either a later round finish or in a high-volume decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Landwehr Wins & Over 1.5 Rounds” at +100.
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DFS Implications:
Landwehr’s fights are generally more exciting than his DFS scores, and he’s only topped 92 DraftKings points once in five Octagon appearances. He’s won two brawling decisions, that returned scores of 84 and 104, while he only totaled 92 points in his lone early UFC win, which ended in a third round submission. He’s still searching for his first UFC knockout, with his last KO/TKO victory coming all the way back in 2018 before he joined the organization. However, he’s been knocked out in the first round in two of his three UFC losses, and was also badly dropped in the first round of his last fight. That leaves both his floor and ceiling pretty uncertain, despite being the most expensive fighter on the slate. After failing to attempt a takedown in his first three UFC matches, he’s landed four of his six attempts in his last two fights. When you combine that with his high striking volume (6.37 SSL/min), that presents a recipe for scoring success, especially when facing an aggressive one-dimensional striker. However, Landwehr fights like an idiot and can’t be trusted to make smart decisions or to push for finishes when opportunities present themselves. He’s a complete wildcard who cares more about putting on a show for the crowd than securing wins. That opens up more ways for him to lose or simply fail to fully capitalize on advantageous situations. So while he has the potential to score well here, there are lots of ways he gets priced out of winning tournament lineups. The odds imply Landwehr has a 67% chance to win, a 39% chance to land a finish, and a 19% chance it comes in round one.
Lingo is more or less of a one dimensional striker, but he will occasionally mix in a takedown or two and has landed two in his three UFC matches. While his 9-1 record with five first round finishes looks good at first glance on paper, he’s faced a lot of low-level opponents and still hasn’t been unable to finish anybody in the UFC. He’s coming off a 19 month layoff, and will now be cutting weight for the second time in two weeks, both of which are concerning. All three of Lingo’s UFC fights have gone the distance, but Landwehr has looked prone to getting knocked down and finished. Lingo seems like he has decent but unexceptional power, and at least has a puncher’s chance of landing a knockout. He’ll also be fighting in front of his home Texas crowd, and we’ve seen some atrocious Texas judging in the past. At his cheap price tag, he could still serve as a value play in a high-volume decision win, and we expect to see a high-paced fight. The odds imply Lingo has a 33% chance to win, a 21% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #2
Holly Holm
14th UFC Fight (7-6)Now 41 years old, Holm is 10 months removed from a close/questionable five-round split-decision loss to Ketlen Vieira, which is the only time Holm has competed in the last 29 months. Her second most recent fight was all the way back in October 2020, when she won a five-round decision over Irene Aldana. Holm’s last three and five of her last six fights have gone the distance, with the one exception being a 2019 R1 KO loss to Amanda Nunes. The last time Holm finished anybody was in 2017, when she knocked out Bethe Correia in the third round. Prior to that finish, Holm had lost three straight and then went on to lose her next match after the finish, and she’s now just 4-6 in her last 10 fights since she knocked out Ronda Rousey to win the belt in 2015. Four of her last six losses have come in title fights. Following the win over Aldana, Holm dealt with a kidney issue followed by a knee injury and was forced to withdraw from both of her booked fights in 2021, before returning in 2022. In that recent loss, Holm spent extended periods of time pushing Vieira up against the cage landing clinch strikes, which the judges apparently didn’t put much value in.
Now 14-6 as a pro, Holm has eight wins by KO and six decisions. She’s been knocked out once, submitted once, and has four decision losses. All eight of her finishes ended in the later rounds, with five coming in round two, two in round three, and one in round five. Six of those eight KO/TKO wins came in her first seven pro fights before joining the UFC. In her 13 UFC fights, she’s gone 5-4 in decisions, landed a 2015 second round knockout of Ronda Rousey, a 2017 third round knockout of Bethe Correia, was submitted in the fifth round of a 2016 match against Miesha Tate, and was knocked out in the first round in 2019 by Amanda Nunes. While the majority of Holm’s UFC career has been at 135 lb, she also had three fights up at 145 lb (1-2). All three of those 145 lb matches went the distance, including a pair of 2017 title fight losses against Germaine de Randamie and Cris Cyborg. Her one UFC win at 145 lb came in a three-round decision against Megan Anderson, who was making her UFC debut.
Overall, Holm is a former professional boxer who also has kickboxing experience. She relies mostly on her striking and has never submitted anyone in her career. However, she attempted 20 takedowns between her last two fights, after only attempting a total of 22 in her first 11 UFC matches. In her 13 UFC fights, Holm has landed 11 takedowns on 42 attempts (26.2% accuracy), while she’s been taken down by her opponents 7 times on 33 attempts (78.8% defense). Nine of her 11 completed takedown attempts came against one-dimensional strikers in Irene Aldana and Megan Anderson, and she failed to land a takedown in her other eight most recent fights. She’s only been taken down twice in her last eight matches, although she only faced 11 attempts over that stretch, with four of those opponents not even attempting a takedown. Her last two opponents who have tried to take her down have each landed one of their attempts. She only averages 3.24 SSL/min and 2.86 SSA/min, although after failing to land more than than 77 significant strikes in any of her first 11 UFC fights, she landed 154 (6.16/min) and 96 (3.84/min) in her last two matches, both of which were five-round fights.
Yana Santos
8th UFC Fight (4-3)Eleven months removed from having a baby, Yana Santos (formerly Yana Kunitskaya before she married Thiago Santos), will be stepping back inside the Octagon for the first time since getting finished with ground and pound by Irene Aldana in the first round of a July 2021 match. Prior to that loss, Santos had won a pair of clinch/grappling-heavy decisions, after getting finished with ground and pound in the third round of a 2019 match against Aspen Ladd. Her UFC career has been perfectly symmetrical and prior to that second most recent early loss Santos won two more decisions, after again getting finished with ground and pound in the first round of her 2018 UFC debut against Cris Cyborg. So her UFC career has gone GNP loss, two decision wins, GNP loss, two decision wins, GNP loss. Her last win came in a close/controversial decision against Ketlen Vieira, who took Santos down three times and controlled her for eight and a half minutes, but didn’t land many strikes on the mat, while Santos never stopped throwing rabbit punches, outlanding Vieira 215-35 in total strikes despite getting controlled for over half the fight.
Now 14-6 as a pro, Santos has seven wins by TKO, one by submission, and six decision victories. All eight of her early wins came in her first 11 pro fights from 2009 to 2016 and she doesn’t have any finishes in the UFC or even in her Invicta days just before that, although her last finish did come against a UFC fighter in Wu Yanan. Her first seven early wins ended in round one, while she finished Yanan 32 seconds into round two. Her last five wins have all ended in decisions. However, her last five losses have all come early, with three knockouts and two submissions. Three of those ended in round one, one came in round two, and the other was in round three. The only other loss of her career was a decision in her third pro fight and she’s won the last six decisions she’s been to. Kunitskaya actually started her pro career at 145 lb and even once fought as high as 154 lb. However, since 2016 she has been competing at 135 lb.
Overall, Santos’ typically comes in with the game plan of controlling opponents along the fence and making fights ugly. In her four UFC wins, she finished with control time totals of 5:09, 13:16, 2:51, and 9:53. While in her three losses, she finished with control time totals of 0:11, 3:52, 2:21. That’s ominous coming into this next matchup as Holm has historically been a very tough opponent to control. Santos averages 4.28 SSL/min, but hasn’t landed more than 47 significant strikes in any of her last four matches. In her seven UFC fights, Santos has landed 8 of her 15 takedown attempts (53.3% accuracy), but has only landed one takedown in her last four fights, and failed to attempt a takedown in three of those recent matches. On the other side of things, she’s been taken down 7 times on 14 opponent attempts (50% defense), and all but one of the opponents to try and take her down have been successful.
Fight Prediction:
Holm will have a 2” height advantage and 1” reach advantage, while Santos is eight years younger than the 41-year-old Holm.
This is the ultimate narrative matchup to see which is tougher, winning a UFC fight in your 40s or just after having a baby. Perhaps those will cancel each other out in this fight, but they also make this a more volatile spot with uncertainty on both sides. These two also actually trained together six years ago according to Santos, so they should be familiar with one another. Santos generally wins fights by controlling opponents in the clinch, but Holm has been very tough to control. The only two opponents to control Holm for more than 84 seconds in any of her 13 UFC fights were Valentina Shevchenko, who had still had just 2:43 in control time over 25 minutes in 2016 and Misha Tate who had 5:05 in control time over 23:30, also in 2016. Holm also spends a good amount of time controlling opponents in the clinch, so it will be interesting to see how those clinch exchanges go, and by interesting we definitely boring. Santos has not been at all durable in the past and also has a history of giving up as soon as she gets put in a compromised spot on the mat. In all three of her UFC losses, she’s simply covered up on the mat from ground and pound, forcing the referee to step in and stop the fights. So if Holm can turn back time and land another head kick, we could see her get a ground and pound finish without doing a whole lot to earn it, most likely in the later rounds. However, the more likely outcome is for this to end in an uneventful decision, with Holm favored to get her hand raised—although who knows with the Texas judges, especially if we do see large amounts of clinch time.
Our favorite bet here is “Holm R2 or R3 KO” at +800.
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DFS Implications:
Holm has spent most of her UFC career fighting in five-round fights and this will just be the 5th three-round match she’s had with the organization, with the previous four all ending in decision wins. She only averaged 71 DraftKings points in those four decision victories, with three scores of 65 or less and one of 107. That one decent score came in a 2018 grappling-heavy decision over a one-dimensional striker in Megan Anderson, who was making her UFC debut. Holm landed four takedowns and controlled Anderson for nearly 11 minutes, while landing 143 total strikes. While that scored well on DraftKings, it was only good for 77 points on FanDuel. Holm has now only competed once in the last 29 months, and didn’t look very good in that May 2022 questionable five-round decision loss to Ketlen Vieira, where Holm was largely content with pushing Vieira up against the cage. Holm does have two finishes in the UFC—the infamous 2015 R2 KO win over Ronda Rousey that scored 101 DraftKings points and a 2017 R3 KO that only scored 65 points. Holm has never finished an opponent in the first round in her entire career. So at her high price tag it’s hard to see Holm cracking tournament winning lineups unless she lands a well timed knockout in the first two rounds or absolutely dominates Santos on the mat for three rounds. It’s been almost six years since her last finish, and almost five years since her dominant grappling performance over Megan Anderson. That makes it really tough to have much confidence in the 41-year-old to score well here, but we expect that to be the common sentiment, so she should go somewhat lower owned. Although, her inflated scores from all her five-round fights and name appeal could keep her from being quite as low owned as she otherwise would be. Working in her favor, Santos has been finished in all three of her UFC losses and we don’t know exactly what she’ll look like after just having a baby. So if Holm has one miracle finish left in her, this could be the spot. Just keep in mind, even if she gets a finish she could still get priced out of winning tournament lineups or fail to score enough to be useful, as we saw in her 2017 R3 KO win where she only scored 65 points. There is also a glimmer of hope that Holm could find more grappling success than expected, as she attempted 20 takedowns in her last two fights against a pair of opponents with 90% and 93% takedown defenses. She was still able to land six of those attempts and will now face the 50% defense of Santos. The odds imply Holm has a 68% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish, and a 10% chance it comes in round one.
Santos generally accrues large amounts of control time and clinch strikes in her wins, which has allowed her to score well on DraftKings, but not on FanDuel. She’s never finished anybody in the UFC and now just had a baby and hasn’t competed since July 2021, when she got finished with ground and pound in the first round. Holm has been a tougher fighter to control throughout her career and the only hope for Santos will be that the 41-year-old Holm has completely fallen off a cliff at this late stage in her career. That’s certainly possible, but even if we get a much worse version of Holm here, Santos is still unlikely to land a finish. Box score watchers may see Santos as a perceived value play on DraftKings at her cheap price tag against an aging opponent, but we don’t have much interest in playing her. The odds imply she has a 32% chance to win, an 11% chance to land a finish, and a 5% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #1
Cory Sandhagen
12th UFC Fight (8-3)After losing a pair of five-round decisions to Petr Yan and T.J. Dillashaw, Sandhagen bounced back in his last fight with a post R4 TKO via doctor stoppage against Song Yadong in his last match. Sandhagen split Yadong open above his left eye early in the fight and it was surprising the fight didn’t get stopped sooner. Interestingly, two of the three judges had the fight even after four rounds, despite Sandhagen leading in strikes in all four rounds. Prior to his losses to Yan and Dillashaw, Sandhagen knocked out a pair of washed up vets in Frankie Edgar and Marlon Moraes, after suffering the only early loss of his career in a 2020 first round submission against Aljamain Sterling.
Now 15-4 as a pro, Sandhagen has seven wins by KO/TKO, three by submission, and five decision victories. All three of his career submission wins occurred in the first round, but two of those occurred in his first three pro fights and he’s only submitted once of his last 16 opponents (Mario Bautista in 2019). Seven of his last eight finishes ended in KO/TKOs. Three of his knockout wins occurred in round one, three more came in round two, and his recent R4 TKO victory was the first time he’s ever finished an opponent beyond the nine minute mark. He’s never been knocked out himself, with his only early loss coming in a R1 submission against Aljamain Sterling in 2020. His other three losses all went the distance. Sandhagen fought his first pro fight at 135 lb in 2015, but then moved up to 145 lb for his next eight matches from 2016 to 2018. Following his 2018 UFC debut at 145 lb, Sandhagen dropped back down to 135 lb where he has stayed since.
This will be the 5th five-round fight of Sandhagen’s career and his fourth in a row. The first time he was scheduled to go five rounds was against Marlon Moreaes in October 2020 and Sandhagen landed a second round TKO. His next fight was only scheduled to go three rounds, which was when he knocked out Frankie Edgar in 28 seconds. He followed that up with a pair of five-round decision losses, leading up to his R4 TKO win. So four of his last five fights have been scheduled to go five rounds, with his last three all making it to the end of round four. While he lost both of the five-round decisions he’s been to, he finished ahead in significant strikes in each of those, and many would argue the decision against Dillashaw could have gone his way.
Overall, Sandhagen is a high-volume striker who has never been outlanded in a UFC fight that lasted longer than 90 seconds, and averages 6.15 SSL/min and 4.21 SSA/min. In his 11 UFC fights, he’s landed just six of his 29 takedown attempts (20.7% accuracy), while he’s been taken down by his opponents 13 times on 36 attempts (63.9% defense). We saw him look for more takedowns than normal in his last fight and 14 of his 29 total takedowns attempts in the UFC came in that one match, although he was only able to land one of those attempts. That was likely game plan specific since he was facing a one-dimensional striker in Song Yadong, but it will be something to monitor moving forward. While Sandhagen isn’t a great offensive wrestler, he is a BJJ brown belt and is a decent grappler on the mat who will go for all types of submissions off his back. He also trains at altitude in Colorado, which should be beneficial.
Marlon Vera
21st UFC Fight (14-6)Continuing to show improvements, Vera has won four straight and is 10-2 in his last 12 UFC fights. The two losses over that stretch came in close three-round decisions against Jose Aldo and Song Yadong. While two of his last four wins went the distance, his other eight most recent victories came early. We’d be remiss not to point out that two of his last three victories came against aging fighters in Frankie Edgar and Dominick Cruz, but in between those two fights he put Rob Font’s face through a meat grinder as he easily cruised to a unanimous decision win, despite absorbing an other worldly 271 significant strikes (3rd most all time in a UFC fight). Vera has amazingly landed three knockdowns in each of his last two fights and seven in his last three fights. The last time Vera lost a fight was in December 2020 in a unanimous 29-28 decision against Jose Aldo.
Now 20-7-1 as a pro, Vera has eight wins by KO, eight by submission, and four decisions. He’s never been finished, with all seven of his career losses going the distance. He’s gone just 3-6 with the judges in the UFC, but won the last two he’s been to after going 1-6 in his first seven decisions with the organization. Eleven of his 14 UFC wins have come early. Of those 11 finishes, four ended in submissions, with one coming in round one and three occurring in round two. His other seven UFC finishes came by KO/TKO, with two ending in round one, one in round two, three in round three, and one in round four. Only one of his last nine fights ended in the first round (O’Malley leg injury), while his last five matches have all made it to round three, with three of those going the distance. While Vera’s 16 career finishes have been split evenly between knockouts and submissions, his last four early wins all came by KO/TKO, with three of those ending in round three or four.
This will be the 3rd five-round fight of Vera’s career, with his previous two ending in a decision win and a R4 KO victory in his last two matches. His cardio and durability both looked great in those fights and he seems to be built for five-round bouts. He’s historically been a slow starter and has lost the first round on the judges’ score cards in his last six fights that made it to round two. However, with five rounds to work with, losing the first round is far less impactful than in a three-round match.
Overall, Vera is a BJJ black belt and a well rounded fighter who’s been extremely durable. Despite having 20 UFC fights under his belt, he’s still only 30 years old. He absorbs more significant strikes than he lands, as he’s averaged 4.28 SSL/min and 5.01 SSA/min in his career. That leaves him reliant on damage opposed to volume, which hasn’t been an issue for him lately. In his last 10 UFC fights, Vera has only landed five takedowns on 10 attempts (50% accuracy), while his opponents have taken him down eight times on 26 attempts (69.2% defense). Both of those percentages slightly outperform his career numbers of 42% takedown accuracy and 68% defense. He didn’t even attempt a takedown in his last three fights and the only opponent he’s gotten down in his last six matches was Davey Grant. So we’re generally not expecting much wrestling from Vera, even though he’s a BJJ black belt and a decent grappler. One annoying thing with Vera is that he doesn’t always go in for the kill after hurting his opponents and likes to showboat at times, which is how Rob Font was able to survive to see the scorecards.
Fight Prediction:
Sandhagen will have a 3” height advantage, but both fighters share a 70” reach.
This sets up as a damage versus volume matchup, which is par for the course for both of these guys. Neither of them have ever been knocked out, but Vera looks like the more durable of the two, and also the more powerful. However, Sandhagen is a sharp striker with the height advantage, and is most dangerous with his elbows and knees. We saw that in his last fight as he attacked Yadong with a series of elbows and split him open above the eye, which ultimately stopped the fight. Those slicing attacks are tough to account for, but it only takes one well placed slicing elbow to potentially bring a doctor stoppage into play. That would be the most likely way for Sandhagen to become the first fighter to ever finish Vera, but it’s still an unlikely scenario. On the other side of things, Vera has numerous ways to finish opponents, but his last two early wins both came by head kick. However, both of those knockouts were against aging opponents, and Vera’s other three most recent fights all went the distance. Considering these two guys have one early loss between them in 47 combined pro fights, we’d be somewhat surprised if this fight ended early and they’re both extremely tough. We expect to see a 25 minute war with Sandhagen landing more volume, but Vera doing more damage. Both guys are decent grapplers, but this should remain mostly on the feet, with only occasional takedown attempts mixed in.
Keep in mind, this card is in Texas where judging has historically been terrible. Also, Sandhagen has lost both of the five-round decisions he’s been to, despite finishing ahead in striking in both of those. Not to mention, leading Song Yadong in striking in every round of his last fight, two of the three judges scored it 2-2 going into the 5th round before the fight was stopped just before the final round started. So in the past, judges have been reluctant to score rounds for Sandhagen off volume alone, and if you back him you’re essentially relying on a volume-driven decision win, while laying the chalk, in a state where judging has been all over the place. That’s definitely not the side we want to be on here. Vera has a better shot at finding a finish, will land the more damaging blows, and can be had at plus money. This seems like another obvious spot to take the five-round dog and we like Vera to win the fight either with another late knockout, or more likely by decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Vera ML” at +150.
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DFS Implications:
Sandhagen is a high-volume striker who averages 6.15 SSL/min and will mix in takedown attempts sporadically, but has a poor 20% success rate. This will be his fourth straight five-round fight. He lost decisions in the first two of those, but still scored 79 and 60 DraftKings points in the losses, and did even better on FanDuel where he returned totals of 107 and 82 respectively. His high striking volume generally allows him to score better on FanDuel than DraftKings, although he scored exactly 97 points on both sites in his recent post R4 TKO via doctor stoppage win where we didn’t see quite as much striking volume from him, albeit against an opponent who only averages 3.93 SSA/min. We expect to see more strikes landed from Sandhagen here, as Vera averages 5.01 SSA/min and absorbed the third most significant strikes in any UFC fight (271) against Rob Font in his second most recent match. Sandhagen’s striking volume gives him a solid floor, but the only time he’s topped 97 points in his last eight fights was when he landed a 28 second R1 knockout against the corpse of Frankie Edgar, which scored 126 DraftKings points with the help of the Quick Win Bonus. While he did attempt 14 takedowns in his last fight, he only landed one of those. Also, he should be less excited about taking a BJJ black belt in Vera to the mat, opposed to a one-dimensional striker in Yadong. Vera has never been finished in his career and looks extremely durable, which will leave Sandhagen reliant on putting up a huge striking total to both score well and win this fight. He’s certainly capable of doing so, but he’ll also need to avoid taking too much damage from Vera and/or getting screwed by the Texas judges to get his hand raised. It’s certainly not the most comfortable path to victory for a favorite. The odds imply Sandhagen has a 61% chance to win, a 17% chance to land a finish, and a 5% chance it comes in round one.
Vera has impressively landed three knockdowns in each of his last two fights, which is entirely unsustainable. He had previously only landed six total knockdowns in his first 18 UFC fights combined and Sandhagen has only been knocked down once in 11 Octagon appearances. And despite landing three knockdowns in his last fight, Vera still only scored 95 DraftKings points, albeit against Dominick Cruz, who only averages 2.61 SSA/min and has an 83% takedown defense. We expect to see better striking numbers from Vera here, but he still only averages 4.28 SSL/min in his career and has only landed two takedowns in his last six fights, failing to even attempt any in his last three matches. That will leave him reliant on either another outlier performance or a well timed finish to really score well in this fight, and a finish won’t come easy, as Sandhagen has never been knocked out. That means Vera will need to put up a big striking total and be the one landing the more damaging shots to get his hand raised, but we like his chances of making that happen. At his cheap price tag, he doesn’t need to put up a massive score to crack tournament winning lineups, and we’re expecting a high-paced, five-round war, so both fighters should have decent scoring floors and ceilings. The odds imply Vera has a 39% chance to win, a 27% chance to land a finish, and a 10% 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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