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Fight Day Scratches: McKinney/Ziam if OFF!
Fighter Notes:
Fight #12
Luana Pinheiro
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Coming off an unusual win in her UFC debut, Pinheiro was awarded the victory by DQ after Randa Markos threw an illegal upkick that left Pinheiro doing her best Sterling impression on the mat. In all seriousness while it didn’t look all that bad at first, Pinheiro lay dazed on the mat for several minutes and who’s to say whether or not she was milking it or if she was seriously that hurt. She was clearly winning the fight up to that point, so she had no reason to look for a way out, but the viewing audience seemed very polarized at the time as to whether or not she was overselling the illegal strike. Regardless, Pinheiro was putting on a Judo clinic prior to the unfortunate ending, as she landed five takedowns on six attempts in just over four minutes of action. She also looked great on the feet as she landed several flurries of punches and mixed in leg strikes well. She led in significant strikes 29-18 and in total strikes 35-28, but also landed an eye poke and was warned at multiple points for her outstretched fingers. Had the fight gone the full 15 minutes, Pinheiro was on pace to land 102 significant strikes and a ridiculous 18 takedowns, although this is where we point out that Pinheiro has now won seven straight fights in the first round so we don’t know to what extent she would begin to slow down in the later rounds.
With a background in Judo, Pinheiro owns an impressive 9-1 record, with two KO wins, five by submission, one by DQ and one decision. Her only career loss was a 2017 split-decision in her third pro fight. Since that loss she hasn’t been past the first round in four plus years, as her lone career decision win came in her 2016 pro debut. Her last eight wins have impressively all occurred in round one.
Pinheiro has been training since she was old enough to walk, and started competing at just 10 years old, as she comes from a family of black belts. She punched her ticket to the UFC with a R1 KO win on DWCS in November 2020. In a fight that lasted just 168 seconds, Pinheiro only needed to land 10 significant strikes to finish her opponent and didn’t even attempt a takedown in the fight. She came in with a patient approach as she methodically felt out her opponent before finishing her with a barrage of punches midway through the first round.
Sam Hughes
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Still searching for her first UFC win, Hughes has yet to give us any indication that she belongs in the UFC and has now lost three of her last four fights going back to her LFA days. The first of those losses was against a highly suspect Vanessa Demopoulos, who submitted Hughes in the fourth round of an LFA title fight for the vacant Strawweight belt. Hughes bounced back from the loss with a R1 Guillotine Choke victory before getting called up to the UFC to take a fight on short notice against Tecia Torres.
Hughes was absolutely destroyed by Torres for five minutes as Torres outlanded her 52-20 and was on pace to land 156 significant strikes and three takedowns if it went the distance. However, following the first round Hughes claimed she couldn’t see and the fight was immediately stopped. That was just the second time in 18 pro fights that Torres didn’t go to the judges and the betting world is still on tilt about it.
That was just Hughes’ seventh pro fight and first real competition she had faced in her career after she just turned pro in 2019. She went on to lose a decision afterwards and she now holds a 5-3 pro record, with one win by TKO, three by submission and one decision victory. However, three of those four finishes came in her first three pro fights against opponents who had never fought professionally before. She also has one loss by TKO, one by submission and one decision. Hughes started off fighting at 130 lb in February 2019, but slowly worked her way down to 115 lb by July of 2020.
Hughes’ most recent loss came in a decision against Muay Thai striker Loma Lookboonmee, who’s now fought to five straight decisions and has yet to show any sort of finishing ability at the UFC level. Lookboonmee outlanded Hughes 84-49 in significant strikes, while landing four takedowns on eight attempts and stuffing both of Hughes’ attempts. Prior to that Lookboonmee had notably only landed two takedowns in her first three UFC fights.
Fight Prediction:
Hughes will have a 3” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.
This is a massive mismatch of talent and the UFC doesn’t appear to have any interest in building Hughes up as they send her into the woodchipper in this one. Pinheiro is dramatically better in all facets of fighting and she should have her choice of whether she wants to win this fight on the feet or the mat, but she’ll likely opt to go with both as she generally mixes in both striking and takedowns. We absolutely love Pinheiro to get a first round finish, and while it could come by KO or submission she’s been more inclined to finish opponents with strikes lately.
Our favorite bet here is “Pinheiro R1 KO” at +1200 (FanDuel).
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DFS Implications:
This is a dream matchup for Pinheiro as she gets to be on the good end of the biggest mismatch on the card in an absolute murder spot. She’s won seven straight and her last eight wins have all come in the first round. She looked great against Randa Markos in her debut before it abruptly ended in a DQ win after Markos landed an illegal upkick. That still scored a ridiculous 129 DraftKings points in the unusual stoppage in a far tougher matchup than this. Pinheiro landed five takedowns on six attempts in less than a round of action, while mixing in flurries of punches and looks to be perfectly suited for putting up huge DFS scores moving forward. The only knocks on Pinheiro are that she hasn’t been in a fight that lasted longer than five minutes in the last four and half years so we don’t know what her cardio would look like later in a fight, and we haven’t seen her face much in terms of experienced opponents. You could also argue that she’s sort of coming off the first time she’s ever been knocked out, but it did at least come in a DQ win and we’re not overly concerned about the lasting effects of the upkick from over six months ago. Pinheiro looks like the best play on the slate and the betting market agrees as she’s seen a massive line move in her favor. After opening the week as a -300 favorite, that number has climbed all the way to -450 late in the week. The odds imply she has a 78% chance to win, a 42% chance to land a finish and a 20% chance it comes in R1.
Hughes has yet to give us any reason to consider playing her in DFS and now she’s walking into a terrible matchup against a far superior opponent. If you play her in DFS, you’re really banking on her surviving the first round and Pinheiro gassing out late or having some sort of freak injury. We’d be really surprised if this fight made it past the first round and don’t see Hughes as having a chance so we have no interest in playing her. Despite her non-existent ownership, we can’t get behind playing Hughes even in the largest tournaments and this looks like a fighter you can safely fade. With that said, the odds imply she has a 22% chance to win, a 9% chance to get a finish and a 4% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #11
Sean Soriano
5th UFC Fight (0-4)Coming off yet another submission loss, Soriano made his return to the UFC in May 2021 after over six years away following an initial stint with the organization in his mid 20’s. He made his return as a short notice replacement fighting up a weight class against yet another grappler, and while he looked good early on in the fight, he eventually succumbed to what has been his Achilles’ heel throughout his career, his wrestling and submissions defense. This guy goes to sleep faster than a narcoleptic sloth and he made Christos Giagos look like Charles Oliveira as he wrapped up a Brabo Choke and almost instantaneously finished the fight early in the second round. That notably came just after Giagos looked lost in his feeble attempts to submit Carlton Minus despite having every opportunity in the world.
Soriano came out firing in that fight and he had Giagos somewhat hurt midway through the first round, but unfortunately was forced to pause the action due to an eye poke from Giagos. Soriano did a better job of defending takedowns early in the fight, but Giagos was authoritatively able to slam him to the mat to close the first round, as Soriano’s defenses appeared to be slowing. Giagos shot for another takedown early in the second round and after a brief scramble he ended up on top. Soriano attempted to return to his feet, but in doing so he gave up his neck and Giagos quickly wrapped it up and choked Soriano unconscious in seconds.
That was the third time Soriano has been submitted in his four UFC fights, with two of those submissions coming in the opening minute of round two and the other occurring in the closing seconds of round three. He was also submitted in two of his three losses after he was released by the UFC in 2015 and this has been an ongoing issue for him.
Soriano originally joined the UFC in 2014 when he was 24 years old, but was released in 2015 following his third straight loss. Following his dismissal, he went 6-3 outside of the organization, with eight of those nine fights ending early. He won three in a row with a pair of first round knockouts and a decision victory just before getting his second crack in the UFC. His last five losses have notably all come early, four by submission and one by knockout, however he’s never been finished in the first round in his career, with four submission losses ending in round two and another in round three. His lone career KO loss also occurred in the third round. His last three losses have notably all come by R2 Submission.
Looking at his entire pro record, Soriano is now 14-7 with seven KOs, four submissions and three decision victories. He’s been finished in six of his seven losses, with one KO and five submissions. Ten of his last 11 fights have ended early. Eight of his 11 early wins have occurred in the first round, with the other three ending in R2.
In his 2014 UFC debut at 145 lb, Soriano was absolutely dominated on the ground by Tatsuya Kawajiri, who went 3-3 in the UFC with just the one early win before being released in 2015. In a fight that lasted just under six minutes, Soriano was taken down three times on 12 attempts and controlled for over four minutes of the action. He also lost the significant striking battle 32-19 and in total strikes 62-23 before getting choked unconscious 50 seconds into the second round.
In his second UFC fight, Soriano took on wrestler Chas Skelly, who had fought just two weeks earlier, but accepted the fight on short notice. Skelly won an ultra low-volume, grapply-heavy decision, where he went 4 for 7 on takedowns and controlled Soriano for 10 of the 15 minutes. Soriano actually led in significant strikes 24-13, but Skelly came out ahead in total strikes 62-34, and attempted a ridiculous seven official submission attempts.
Soriano’s third UFC fight came against another grappler in Charles Rosa. Soriano actually led in significant strikes 69-37 and in total strikes 72-37, but Rosa landed 5 takedowns on 8 attempts, while Soriano landed 3 on 7 attempts. Rosa also led in control time 5:36-3:07. The fight was stopped with just 17 seconds remaining in the third round as Rosa locked up a Brabo Choke—although there was some question as to whether or not Soriano actually tapped and the stoppage looked a little quick in an ambiguous single tap motion. Soriano was then released following the loss to Rosa.
Soriana has fought the majority of his career at 145 lb, but has also competed up a weight class at various points including in his recent return to the Octagon. He’ll now be dropping back down to 145 lb, where he fought his first three UFC fights. It will be interesting to see how he looks back down at 145 lb, after looking like the more dangerous striker at 155 lb in his last fight.
Shayilan Nuerdanbieke
Xth UFC Fight (0-1)Looking to bounce back from a decision loss in his recent UFC debut, Nuerdanbieke relentlessly looked for takedowns against Josh Culibao, but struggled with both getting him down and keeping him there as he finished with just two official takedowns landed on a massive 14 attempts. Culibao finished ahead in significant strikes 53-17 and in total strikes 87-23 as he won a unanimous 29-28 decision. Nuerdanbieke looked the most dangerous with his grappling in the first round and may have tired himself out to some extent as he went 1 for 6 on takedowns in the first five minutes and then just 0 for 3 in the second round before closing 1 for 5 in the third. His last two early wins both notably came by R1 submission.
Nuerdanbieke is now 19-7 as a pro, with nine KOs, five submissions and five decisions. All five of his career submission victories have occurred in the first round as have eight of his nine KOs, so he appears to be a fast starter who slows down late. Of his seven losses, he’s been knocked out once, submitted four times and lost two decisions. His lone KO loss also occurred in the first round, in 2020 against Zhu Rong who’s now in the UFC.
This will notably just be Nuerdanbieke’s fourth career fight down at Featherweight (145 lb), as he’s mostly fought up at Lightweight (155 lb). Nuerdanbieke landed first round finishes in his first two Featherweight fights with a 2019 Rear-Naked Choke Submission and a 2020 post R1 retirement. His next five fights were all back up at Lightweight, before he dropped back down to Featherweight for his recent UFC debut. He’ll stay at Featherweight for this next fight as well.
Fight Prediction:
Soriano will have a 1” height and reach advantage.
The UFC continues to throw grapplers at Soriano, forcing him to prove he can defend takedowns and submissions before allowing him to compete in a striking battle. This is yet another classic striker versus grappler matchup that simply boils down to whether or not the terrible 14% takedown accuracy of Nuerdanbieke can overcome the poor 53% takedown defense of Soriano. Overall this looks like a favorable matchup for the grappler in Nuerdanbieke as he goes up against an opponent in Soriano who has looked helpless on the mat. However, Nuerdanbieke really struggled to get his opponent to the ground in his debut and struggled even more to keep him there, so he’ll need to show improvements in both of those regards. Soriano should have a considerable striking advantage on the feet, and as is the case in most of his fights he just needs to remain upright to have a good chance of landing a knockout. Both of these two notably do their best work early in fights and appear to slow down some in the later rounds. Soriano has never finished an opponent beyond the second round and only one of Nuerdanbieke’s 14 early wins has come later than that. So while we like the chances that this fight ends in the opening 10 minutes, it most likely goes the distance if it makes it to round three. Both guys are fully capable of winning this match and Soriano will have a massive striking advantage as long as it’s standing, but we will pretty much always bet on any grappler going against him, so give us Nuerdanbieke with the upset submission win here.
Our favorite bet here is “Nuerdanbieke Wins by Submission” at +900.
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DFS Implications:
Soriano was notably just 7% owned at $7,100 as a +170 dog in his last fight and now sees his price jump all the way up to $9,000 on DraftKings. We expect him to once again go low owned, although not to the same extent as before. He’s now 0-4 in the UFC with three of those losses coming by submission and he has consistently looked like a massive liability on the mat. Obviously he’s never scored well in DFS as he’s still searching for his first UFC win. He does have crisp striking on the feet where he should hold a sizable advantage in this match, but going against a one-dimensional grappler like Nuerdanbieke, we’re not expecting this to play out as a striking battle. So Soriano will need to make the most of his opportunities in the striking exchanges as Nuerdanbieke will be looking to get him to the mat early and often. Considering that Soriano continues to struggle to defend takedowns and submissions, you have to assume that has been his primary focus in training, but this isn’t a new problem for him and at some point you simply have to say he’s not built to defend grappling. With that said, it’s possible he’ll show signs of improvement after taking his last fight on short notice and up a weight class, and if he can keep this fight standing he has a good chance to land a knockout. We like this fight to end early and Soriano makes for an interesting low-owned tournament play in a fight we want to target. So it makes sense to be over the field on both sides of this one in tournaments as neither fighter projects to be very popular. The odds imply Soriano has a 70% chance to win, a 37% chance to land a finish and an 18% chance it comes in R1.
Nuerdanbieke’s grappling-heavy approach lends itself well to the DraftKings scoring system, but he really struggled to land many takedowns in his debut as he finished with just two on 14 attempts. While that shows the potential for a grappling explosion, he’ll need to make major strides in his efficiency to do so. Luckily for him, he now faces an opponent who was once submitted by a shrunken turtleneck and this looks like a near ideal matchup for Nuerdanbieke to excel as an underdog. Soriano has been submitted in five of his seven pro losses including three of his four UFC fights. So if Nuerdanbieke can get this fight to the ground he should have a great chance to land a finish. However, if he’s unable to land a takedown he’ll be in real trouble on the feet as Soriano is a far superior striker compared to Nuerdanbieke, so this is far from a safe spot. Overall, we expect either Nuerdanbieke to dominate this fight on the mat or for Soriano to easily control it on the feet, and it just comes down to whether or not Nuerdanbieke can get Soriano down. While we like Nuerdanbieke’s chances to improve his takedown accuracy and land a submission, you definitely want to have exposure to both sides here in a fight with a wide range of outcomes and a high ceiling on both sides. The odds imply Nuerdanbieke has a 30% chance to win, a 16% chance to land a finish and an 8% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #10
Cody Durden
3rd UFC Fight (0-1-1)Looking to bounce back from his first UFC loss, Durden started off well in his December 2020 defeat against submission ninja Jimmy Flick, but succumbed to the old Flying Triangle Choke midway through the first round. Durden landed both of his takedown attempts and quickly pulled ahead in striking early in the fight as he outlanded Flick 21-6. We also saw Durden notch 81 seconds of control time and take Flick’s back early, but he was unable to put him away on the mat and Flick returned to his feet and turned the tables to land a finish of his own.
That was Durden’s first loss in his last nine fights although his UFC debut just before that ended in a draw against Chris Gutierrez. Prior to joining the UFC Durden had landed seven straight finishes, alternating between TKOs and submissions, with five of those finishes coming in the first round. Looking at his entire career, Durden is now 11-3-1 with 10 of his 11 wins coming early, including five KOs and five submissions. While he’s never been knocked out, he has been submitted twice. Eight of Durden’s 10 early wins have come in the first round, while he also has one in each of the later rounds. His lone decision victory was all the way back in 2016 in his third pro fight, and he’s generally fighting for a finish.
A former two time wrestling state champ, Durden dominated the first round in his UFC debut, but after taking the fight on short notice and absorbing a heavy low blow, he seemed to fade later in the fight. Considering he had previously only been to the third round three times in 13 fights, it’s fair to question his cardio. That debut took place at 135 lb before Durden dropped down to 125 lb for his most recent fight.
This next match will just be Durden’s third pro fight down at 125 lb and he lost the first two in a 2017 decision and then a R1 submission in his most recent fight.
Aori Aoriqileng
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Also hoping to bounce back from a loss, Aoriqileng lost a decision in his UFC debut to Jeff Molina in a crazy high-volume brawl. The fight was close early on with both guys looking for takedowns out of the clinch and Aoriqileng landing one in all three rounds. After a lower volume first round with Molina leading 18-17 in significant strikes, things heated up in round two, with Molina again inching out the striking 44-42. Then Molina went full god mode in round three as he outlanded Aoriqileng 127-57 in round three to finish the fight ahead 189-116 in significant strikes and 210-125 in total strikes. Aoriqileng was content walking through punches with non-existent head movement and with a zombie-like approach to fighting. He finished three for four on his takedown attempts, while stuffing Molina’s only official attempt.
Prior to making his UFC debut, Aoriqileng was on a six fight winning streak, with four of those ending in the first two rounds, with three KOs and one submission. He’s now 18-8 as a pro, with five KOs, two submissions and 11 decision wins. While he’s never been knocked out, he has been submitted three times to go along with five decision losses. However, two of those submission losses came in his first four pro fights, back in 2016, and he has only been finished once in his last 22 matches (2017 R3 Rear-Naked Choke). One of his three decision losses notably came against UFC fighter Kai Kara France.
He’s essentially fought his entire career on the Chinese regional scene, with the only exceptions being a pair of 2016 fights in France. Therefore, he hasn’t fought the most experienced competition, and with just one UFC fight under his belt, the jury is still out on him.
Aoriqileng has spent most of his career fighting between 128-134 lb, but actually made his 2015 pro debut all the way up at 160 lb. He dropped down to 125 lb for his UFC debut, where he has previously only fought once before, which ended in a 2016 R1 KO win. So he’s now 1-1 at 125 lb as he prepares to fight for the third time at the weight class.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are listed at 5’7” but Aoriqileng is clearly taller if you watch faceoffs. He’s also listed as having a 2” reach advantage.
This a matchup between two fighters who are each searching for their first win in the UFC. Neither guy has ever been knocked out, but they’ve each been prone to getting submitted. Durden looks to be far more of an offensive submission threat, so he’s in a better situation to capitalize on that weakness. Aoriqileng protects his hands with his face when it comes to striking defense, but he has shown a zombie-like durability that allows him to absorb massive amounts of strikes and keep on pushing forward. So a knockout appears to be a less likely scenario and we like Durden to win by submission, with it likely coming early in the fight.
Our favorite bet here is “Durden Wins by Submission” at +600 (DraftKings).
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DFS Implications:
Durden has yet to make any noise in DFS, but he’s also had a couple of tough matchups and now appears to get a more favorable one. While Aoriqileng demonstrated his toughness in his recent debut, he’s been submitted three times in his career and Durden is a former state champion wrestler with five submission wins on his record. We saw Durden take Jimmy Flick down twice in the opening minutes of his last fight and we expect him to again be looking for an early takedown here as he consistently hunts for early finishes. While the jury is still out on both of these guys when it comes to whether or not they can be successful at the UFC level, we like this fight to end early and Durden has a solid chance to land a finish on the mat and put up a big DFS score. If it doesn’t end early, it’s also possible Durden could still score well in a decision, as he lands a solid number of takedowns and Aoriqileng absorbs the most strikes on the slate, albeit in a one fight sample size. The odds imply Durden has a 59% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Aoriqileng is coming off a high-volume decision loss where he still scored 67 DraftKings points despite the decision not going his way. So had he gotten the nod that would have been good for 97 points, which shows a solid floor if he can pull off the upset here. He went 3 for 4 on takedowns in that last fight while landing 116 significant strikes, and he should have the striking advantage in this next matchup if he can keep the fight standing. This looks like an under the radar fight to target and we want to be over the field on both guys with our exposure. The odds imply Aoriqileng has a 41% chance to win, a 19% chance to get a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #9
Terrance McKinney
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Coming off one of the most electric UFC debuts you can have, McKinney stepped in on short notice and knocked out Matt Frevola in just seven seconds, although he then appeared to hurt his knee celebrating. It’s hard to take much away from the victory that we didn’t already know before, as McKinney has now landed four straight first round knockouts with three of those ending in 17 seconds or less. McKinney has amazingly only ever been in one fight that lasted longer than seven minutes and has never been to the judges in his 14 fight career.
Impressively, 12 of his 14 fights have ended in the first round, with seven of those ending in the first minute. He’s 11-3 as a pro, with five KOs and six wins by submission. He’s also lost twice by TKO and been submitted once, although one of his TKO losses resulted from a leg injury early in his career, and his other two early losses came against fighters who are currently in the UFC in Sean Woodson and Darrick Minner.
McKinney originally tried to crack the UFC roster through DWCS in 2019 and nearly submitted Sean Woodson as he controlled his back for essentially the entire fight until Woodson was able to escape and land a Flying Knee KO early in round two. McKinney then suffered another loss in his next fight against submission ninja Darrick Minner. McKinney got Minner to the ground, but the dangerous submission specialist was able to quickly throw up a Triangle Choke and force McKinney to tap. We didn’t see McKinney fight again for 17 months following the pair of disappointing losses.
After taking a year and a half off, McKinney exploded back onto the MMA scene in the Spring of 2021 with what appeared to be improved striking as he landed four straight first round KOs over a four month period, with the most recent two coming just a week apart in his final LFA fight and his June UFC debut.
In the first of those finishes, McKinney won with a 16 second R1 KO against a suspect Dedrek Sanders, who was coming off a pair of early losses and is now 3-3 as a pro. McKinney landed a violent left head kick that dropped Sanders and then finished it with ground and pound.
Then less than two months later, McKinney landed another ultra quick KO with a 17 second finish in April against a 37-year-old opponent in Luiz Antonio Lobo Gavinho, who’s only loss in his previous six fights came against Cory Sandhagen. McKinney again went for a left head kick and landed his shin to the head of Gavinho to start the fight and immediately finished it with aggressive ground and pound.
Next, McKinney was in a significantly longer fight that made it all the way to the 72 second mark before McKinney finished it with his third straight first round KO. That was enough to get him a shot in the UFC and his skills appeared to translate seamlessly as he landed a knockout in just seven seconds. So his last four fights amazingly lasted a combined 112 seconds.
With a college wrestling background, McKinney clearly has a solid grappling base that he utilizes with a kinetic pace, but his striking has also really improved in the last couple years. For such a lean frame, he definitely has knockout power, which he’s put on full display in 2021.
McKinney turned pro in 2017 and started off at 145 lb before moving up to 155 lb in his fourth pro fight. He’s also fought as high as 170 lb and has dropped back down to 145 lb at a couple of different points. All three of his career losses have notably come down at 145 lb, whereas he’s fighting at 155 lb now. His most recent fight before joining the UFC was actually at a 160 lb Catchweight and he only has five career fights officially at 155 lb, which ended in a 2018 R3 Submission Win, a 2019 R1 Submission Win, and three 2021 R1 KOs.
Fares Ziam
4th UFC Fight (2-1)A painfully patient striker, Ziam has landed a total of 96 significant strikes in his three UFC fights, which have all ended in decisions. That’s “good” for just 2.13 SSL/min, which is amazingly low for a kickboxer who doesn’t grapple much.
After losing a decision in his UFC debut, Ziam has won a pair of incredibly close decisions, one of which looked like he lost and the other could have even been ruled a draw—and was by one of the judges.
His most recent decision win came against Luigi Vendramini. Ziam did a good job of using his length, movement and feints to keep Vendramini at range and force a slower paced tactical battle for the first two rounds, before Vendramini finally just threw caution to the wind in round three as he aggressively blitzed Ziam with strikes and found himself in top position on the mat as Ziam looked overwhelmed by the aggression. Vendramini then spent the next few minutes in top position advancing his position, landing ground and pound and hunting for submissions. However, Ziam was able to return to his feet in the final 90 seconds and circle away from contact to narrowly survive the round. That demonstrated that Ziam is comfortable when he can dictate the pace, but is far less composed when he’s being pressured.
In his second most recent decision win, Ziam took on Jamie Mullarkey in October 2020. Mullarkey led in significant strikes 47-20 and total strikes 54-29, while landing 5 takedowns on 11 attempts. Ziam landed just 1 takedown on 5 attempts. Mullarkey also led in control time 6:56-1:12, yet somehow ended up losing a unanimous 28-29 decision in a complete head scratcher. So Ziam should probably be 1-2 in the UFC at this point.
Ziam made his UFC debut in September 2019 and spent almost the entire fight pushed up against the cage or on his back. He ended up landing just 10 significant strikes. To his credit, his opponent didn’t do much either, landing just 21 significant strikes and going 3 for 12 on takedowns, while Ziam went 0 for 4.
Ziam notably started his pro career off at 185 lb, before dropping down to 170 lb for his third pro fight. After two fights at 170 lb, Ziam then dropped down to Lightweight (155 lb), with a 159 lb Catchweight loss in between.
With a kickboxing background, Ziam won five straight fights just prior to joining the UFC, with four finishes over that stretch. While he’s exclusively fought to decisions in the UFC, nine of his 12 career wins ended early, with five KOs and four submissions. He’s never been knocked out, but he has been submitted twice, which came in a pair of 2016 R1 Rear-Naked Chokes. His long legs and lanky frame make him tough to get down, as you can never lift him very far off the ground. His third career loss came by decision in his UFC debut. So overall, 11 of his 15 pro fights have ended early, but three of his four decisions have come since joining the UFC.
Fight Prediction:
Ziam will have a 3” height advantage and 2” reach advantage.
This is a really tricky one to break down as McKinney has never been to the judges in his 14 fight career, while Ziam is coming off three straight low-volume decisions and throws more feints than strikes. Ziam appears to have mastered the art of slowing down fights and making things tough on his opponents. He’s got good size and length for the division and is constantly feinting and moving to make it tough for his opponents to close the distance on him. He also has a pretty solid 68% takedown defense so overall he’s very defensively sound. He’s never been knocked out and his two submission losses both occurred five years ago. He appears far more concerned with remaining defensively sound than putting on a good show, which makes it incredibly difficult to predict any of his fights will end early. With that said, he’s now facing the exact opposite style of fighter in Terrance McKinney, who has never been to a decision and is only focussed on finishes. So clearly something will have to give here.
McKinney’s lone career KO loss came against another lanky Lightweight who also used to fight at a higher weight class in Sean Woodson, so there are some comparisons you can draw there in terms of reasons to think Ziam catches McKinney being overly aggressive and hands him the second KO loss of his career. You could also make the argument that McKinney will look to utilize his wrestling more, as Ziam has never been knocked out but has been submitted twice. Or that McKinney will blitz Ziam the way Vendramini did in the third round of their last fight and potentially land something clean to knock Ziam out for the first time in his career. And it’s also plausible that Ziam is able to slow this fight down the way he normally does and force McKinney to see the judges for the first time in his career. While we hate laying out every possible scenario and saying anything is possible, this truly could go any of those ways. Forced to choose, we’d be surprised if this went the distance and expect McKinney to force the action and either land another KO or get knocked out trying. It feels like both fighters are due for some variance, so seeing Ziam land his first KO victory in the UFC would not be surprising at all, but that’s far from a confident pick.
Our favorite two bets here “Ziam Wins by KO” at +340 and “McKinney R1 Win” at +340.
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DFS Implications:
McKinney is coming off about the best UFC debut you could ask for as he landed a seven second R1 KO and has now knocked out four straight opponents in a combined 112 seconds. That most recent KO was good for 127 points on DraftKings with the help of the Quick Win bonus, which should have the field chasing his boxscore. He now gets a tough matchup against the hyper-defensive Fares Ziam, who has never been knocked out and has fought to three straight low-volume decisions. There are a wide range of outcomes here and it’s far from a favorable matchup, which makes it a trickier spot to determine your DFS exposure. McKinney has a background in wrestling to go along with his explosive knockout abilities, so he has the ability to win fights both on the feet and the mat, but he’s been content with relying on his striking as of recently. If that trend continues then you’re likely relying on another first round finish for him to return value and you can expect him to be a fairly popular play. However, it’s also possible McKinney mixes in some grappling and can still score well with a later finish. Based on his history of lightning quick finishes, we don’t feel like he’s a guy you can fade completely, but this also looks like a prime sell-high opportunity in a bad matchup. Additionally, based on the odds, McKinney is overpriced while still projecting to carry a large amount of ownership into a tough matchup, which are all arguments for going under the field on him. With all that said, we don’t hate punting here and simply matching the field on your exposure and taking stands elsewhere as McKinney has proven he has one of the highest ceilings on the slate. The odds imply he has a 50% chance to win, a 40% chance to land a finish and a 19% chance it comes in R1.
Ziam is an uninspiring low-volume striker with an underwhelming ground game. Once again the line has moved in his favor just as it did in his last fight, and he went on to win an incredibly low scoring decision in that previous matchup. He scored just 46 and 67 DraftKings points in his two decision wins and has made it abundantly clear that he needs a finish to score even remotely well. He averages a putrid 2.13 SSL/min and has only added one takedown in nine rounds of UFC action. He does have two things going for him in this spot. First, he’s clearly mispriced at just $7,800 despite being the favorite at most books. And second, McKinney has never been to a decision in 14 pro fights and is generally looking to force the action. So it will be interesting to see which style prevails between the aggressive nature of McKinney and the defensively minded Ziam. With a kickboxing background and five KOs on his record, Ziam is certainly capable of knocking McKinney out, which is the only way we see him returning value even at his cheaper price tag. The odds imply he has a 50% chance to win, a 24% chance to land a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #8
Loopy Godinez
4th UFC Fight (0-0)Fighting for the third time in just six weeks, Godinez watched what Kevin Holland did last year and told him to hold her beer. Lookboonmee had been scheduled to face Cheyanne Buys Vlismas, but Cheyanne dropped out after testing positive for COVID and Loopy jumped in on less than two week’s notice.
This will be the second straight time Godinez has filled in on short notice after she took her last fight up a weight class just a week after landing a R1 submission win on October 9th. That last one didn’t end up going Godinez’s way as she struggled to get her larger opponent Luana Carolina to the mat and finished just 2 for 15 on her takedown attempts. Just like this next matchup, Godinez entered her previous fight as the favorite despite stepping in on short notice. While she was able to control Carolina against the cage for the majority of the fight, the judges didn’t place any value in that as they gave Carolina a unanimous 29-28 decision victory. Carolina did outland Godinez 53-23 in significant strikes and 86-45 in total strikes, but Godinez was the only one doing anything in terms of grappling and it was sort of a weird fight to score that could have gone either way.
Prior to that loss, Godinez put on a dominating wrestling performance a week earlier, as she landed five takedowns with three and half minutes of control time in a fight that lasted just over four minutes. She finished it with an Armbar submission, which is just the second finish of her career and the first submission.
Godinez fought the majority of her amateur career at Flyweight (125 lb), but has almost exclusively competed at Strawweight (115 lb) since turning pro, with the one exception coming in her last fight where she notably tipped the scales 4.5 lb under the 126 lb Flyweight limit.
In her April 2021 UFC debut, Godinez suffered her first career loss in a questionable split-decision. The loss came against one-dimensional grappler Jessica Penne, who spent the entire fight looking to take Godinez’s back. The fight ended with Godinez ahead in significant strikes 40-31 and in takedowns 3-1 while Penne led in total strikes 98-68. It seemed like Godinez had done enough to win, but two of the judges disagreed in what was somewhat of a weird fight. So we’ve now seen Godinez lose two close decisions in three UFC fights, and you can easily argue she should be 3-0 or at the very least 2-1. She’s now 6-2 as a pro, with one KO, one submission and four decision wins. Her only two losses came in her two UFC decisions.
Prior to losing the split-decision in her UFC debut, Godinez was 5-0 as a pro. Four of those fights ended in decisions, while her lone finish over that time came in a R1 TKO in her second pro fight. She came close to landing a second KO win in a 2019 match, when she dropped her opponent just as the third round ended. The broadcast team even thought she had landed a KO, but it turned out the clock ran out before the fight could be stopped, so it went down as a decision.
In her last fight before joining the UFC, Godinez took on Vanessa Demopoulos in a five round LFA Strawweight Championship fight. Godinez started off the fight fast, showing off her crisp boxing skills and she later dropped Demopoulos in R4 and Demopoulos looked lost for a few seconds. Godinez also showed her awareness to stay out of danger against the submission specialist in Demopoulos, and went on to win a decision in a hard fought brawl that left both of their faces split open. In her fight prior to that, Godinez took on a pure striker in Lindsay Garbatt, and showed she can adjust her game plan based on her opponent, as she went 4 for 5 on takedowns against the one-dimensional striker.
Loma Lookboonmee
5th UFC Fight (0-0)A former Atomweight (105 lb), Lookboonmee only moved up to Strawweight (115 lb) in her 2019 UFC debut where she’s since gone 3-1. Now 6-2 as a pro, her last five fights have all ended in decisions and the only early win of her career was a 2018 R2 TKO in her second pro MMA fight. The only early loss of her career was a 2018 R1 Armbar Submission in her third pro fight, with her second career loss coming in a decision against Angela Hill in her second UFC fight. She’s gone 5-1 in decisions, although outside of her loss to Hill we haven’t seen her face much in terms of competition.
Lookboonmee is coming off a decision win against a terrible Sam Hughes, where Lookboonmee outlanded Hughes 84-49 in significant strikes, while landing four takedowns on eight attempts and stuffing both of Hughes’ attempts. Prior to that Lookboonmee had notably only landed two takedowns in her first three UFC fights, so it will be interesting to see if she’s working on incorporating more grappling in general or if that was game plan specific. Lookboonmee is notably a Muay Thai champion and the first Thai fighter to join the UFC.
At 5’1” Lookboonmee is a little undersized, but she did say that she added 9 lb of weight between her first and second UFC fights and looked a little thicker so she might be making the necessary adjustments. Nevertheless, she’ll still be at a height disadvantage against almost all of her opponents.
Lookboonmee is a patient, but solid striker and averages 5.27 SSL/min (5th highest on the slate). She’s been taken down once in each of her first three UFC fights before stuffing both of Hughes’ attempts in her last match, but still owns a solid 76% takedown defense. It will be interesting to see how that holds up against Godinez who has shown a relentless pursuit of takedown recently.
Fight Prediction:
Godinez will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters share a 61” reach.
This is an interesting matchup between two fun-sized fighters who are each solid strikers. While Godinez has been far more aggressive with her wrestling, Lookboonmee did notably go for 4 for 8 on takedowns in her last fight, so she appears to be working on improving her grappling, but Godinez will still have the advantage on the mat. That will leave Lookboonmee looking to keep this fight standing as she tries to outland her way to a decision victory. Despite Lookboonmee owning a solid 76% takedown defense, we expect Godinez to find wrestling success against a significantly smaller opponent than the one she last faced and we like Godinez to win a decision.
Our favorite bet here is Godinez’s ML at -160 (DraftKings).
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DFS Implications:
Godinez scored just 37 and 44 DraftKings points in two close decision losses, which still wouldn’t have been enough to be useful had the decisions gone her way. However, she exploded for 127 points in her R1 submission win, so she’s been a very bipolar DFS producer. While we expect this next fight to end in another decision, it is possible Godinez puts on another dominant wrestling performance against the undersized Lookboonmee, although Lookboonmee does notably have a 76% career takedown defense. We don’t see Godinez landing enough volume on the feet to score well in a decision if this turns into a striking battle, so you’re relying on either a finish or a dominating grappling performance for Godinez to be useful in DFS, both of which are possible. The odds imply she has a 59 % chance to win, a 17% chance to land a finish and a 7% chance it comes in R1.
Lookboonmee is coming off her best DFS performance to date, where she scored 91 points in a decision, but that came in a dream matchup against Sam Hughes and now she’ll face a much tougher opponent in Godinez. The fact that Lookboonmee wasn’t able to finish Hughes tells us that she’s unlikely to finish anybody at the UFC level and we don’t see Lookboonmee out wrestling Godinez. That leaves Lookboonmee reliant on outstriking her way to a decision win here, and she only scored 65 and 78 DraftKings points in her previous two decision victories. So even at her cheap price tag, we don’t see how Lookboonmee ends up in winning lineups unless she wins and every other underdog on the slate loses. The odds imply she has a 41% chance to win, a 13% chance to get a finish and a 4% chance to end it in R1.
Fight #7
Natan Levy
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Just over a year removed from a third round submission win on DWCS, Levy enters the UFC with an undefeated yet brief 6-0 pro record. After turning pro in 2018, Levy’s first five pro wins all came in the LFA, where he submitted his first two opponents early in the first round before winning three straight decisions. It’s worth pointing out that his six wins have come against opponents who entered with records of 0-0, 2-1, 3-3, 1-0, 5-3 and 6-0, so he hasn’t faced much in terms of experienced competition. He was also nearly knocked out on the feet in his second most recent fight but was narrowly able to survive and use his grappling to buy time to recover as he still won a decision.
Levy is a Karate and Kung Fu black belt and he throws solid kicks, but he also likes to get fights to the ground and hunt for submissions. In his recent DWCS win, he appeared content with resting from top position at times and while he finished with eight and half minutes of control time in a fight that lasted just under 11 minutes, he only landed 18 significant strikes and 40 total strikes to go along with two takedowns. So he wasn’t very active on the mat when it came to striking. He landed an Arm-Triangle Choke submission just a minute into the third round and finished with two official submission attempts, so he’s more looking for submissions on the mat then ground and pound. That lines up with his record as he has three submission wins, but none by KO/TKO.
His debut would have come sooner, but Levy was forced to withdraw from a scheduled fight against Austin Hubbard in April after suffering an injury, so it’s now been a year since he last fought. Levy trains out of Syndicate MMA in Las Vegas and makes his debut alongside teammate Joanne CalderWood.
Rafa Garcia
3rd UFC Fight (0-2)Coming off a pair of decision losses in his first two UFC fights, Garcia has now fought to four straight decisions dating back to when he was competing for Combate Americas. Interestingly all four of those fights were against current or former UFC fighters, as his two fights prior to joining the UFC were against Humberto Bandenay, who previously went 1-3 in the UFC, and Erick Gonzalez, who just got knocked out by Jim Miller in his UFC debut. Despite their time in the UFC, neither one of those two are very impressive fighters.
In his recent decision loss to Chris Gruetzemacher, Garcia started decently and had Gruetzemacher hurt early in the first round, but Gruetzemacher was able to recover and Garcia really slowed down in round two as Gruetzemacher went on to win a unanimous 29-28 decision and pull off a large upset. Garcia landed 5 of his 12 takedown attempts in the fight with over six and a half minutes of control time, but Gruetzemacher led in significant strikes 100-72 and in total strikes 176-90 and was the only one doing damage in the later rounds.
In his prior short notice UFC debut, Garcia took on power puncher Nasrat Haqparast and looked decent in a pure striking battle, but was still outlanded in significant strikes 99-52 and 99-54 in total strikes. He also went 0 for 3 on his takedown attempts and had just 21 seconds of control time against the 84% takedown defense of Haqparast.
Prior to losing his debut, Garcia had been 11-0 as a pro with one KO, seven submissions and three decision wins. However, many of those wins came against very questionable competition and five of his seven submission wins notably occurred in his first five pro fights. He started his career at 145 lb, but moved up to 155 lb in 2018, where he’s stayed since. He has decent striking, but lacks head movement and looks pretty hittable. With that said, he’s never been finished, so he’s been durable thus far.
Fight Prediction:
Levy will have a 2” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.
While these two fighters have different styles, they’ve produced very similar results. Neither of them have ever been finished in their careers and they both are looking to finish fights with submissions, with only one KO win between them. While Levy comes in with more of a kick-heavy approach, Garcia is primarily a boxer on the feet. They both generally use their striking to set up takedowns and it will be interesting to see how the grappling exchanges play out as Garcia has defended all three of the takedowns attempted against him so far in the UFC and Levy stuffed the only takedown attempted against him on DWCS. Neither of these two have been overly impressive on tape, but we expect Garcia to come in desperate for a win after losing his first two UFC fights and he has over twice the pro experience that Levy does. Levy is also making his UFC debut off of DWCS and hasn’t fought in just over a year, which just adds to his uncertainty. With Garcia coming off four straight decisions and three of Levy’s last four fights also ending in decisions, this one likely also goes the distance and we’ll give the slight edge to Garcia to win, although it’s far from a confident pick.
We’re not really excited about many of the lines here, but our favorite value bet is “Fight Ends in Submission” at +280.
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DFS Implications:
Levy is making his UFC debut following a year layoff with a perfect 6-0 record, but three of his last four fights have ended in decisions, with his most recent ending in an early R3 submission victory. That finish still would have scored just 82 DraftKings points, in what was a low-volume grappling heavy affair. So Levy hasn’t given us much to get excited about when it comes to his DFS outlook. Also working against him, Garcia has never been finished in 13 pro fights. After opening the week as a -120 favorite, Levy has since seen the line flip to him being a slight underdog, which should drive his ownership way down in DFS after DraftKings priced him as the favorite. His low ownership is really the one reason to consider Levy for tournaments. The odds imply he has a 47% chance to win, a 21% chance to land a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Garcia attempted a notable 12 takedowns in his last fight, while landing five of them, but was still unable to get the win as he faded after the first round. Now he faces a UFC newcomer who’s coming off a yearlong layoff which makes this a higher variance spot, but overall it doesn’t stand out as an exceptionally great matchup from a stylistic standpoint. With that said, Garcia is clearly underpriced on DraftKings where he’s just $7,700 despite being a -125 favorite after seeing the line move in his favor after DraftKings pricing was already released. So that will drive his ownership way up but also makes him a solid play in low-risk contests. We’re less excited about him in tournaments where he’ll be very popular, but he did notably score 69 points in a decision loss in his last fight. We’ve yet to see Levy face much in terms of competition, which makes it tougher to gauge how he’ll do at the UFC level, but a lower scoring decision is still probably the most likely outcome. The odds imply Garcia has a 53% chance to win, a 21% chance it comes early and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #6
Pat Sabatini
3rd UFC Fight (2-0)Sabatini had been scheduled to face Gavin Tucker here but Gavin withdrew and Tucker Lutz stepped in at the end of October.
Extending his winning streak to four, Sabatini is fresh off a first round Heel Hook submission win over Jamall Emmers after defeating Tristan Connelly in a decision in his UFC debut. Emmers was able to land a couple of clean shots on Sabatini that put him on his backside where Emmers was able to quickly take full mount and then transition to his back where he looked for a choke. However, Sabatini used the time to recover and scrambled his way to a Heel Hook attempt, while Emmers looked for a Toe Hold. Clearly the more dangerous submission specialist, Sabatini won that battle and forced a tap from Emmers.
In his April 2021 UFC debut against a tough grinder in Tristan Connelly, Sabatini saw the judges for the first time since 2018. Connelly notably was moving all the way down from 170 lb to 145 lb, but generally fights at 155 lb and has competed at 145 lb twice in the past. Sabatini controlled Connelly for the majority of the fight as he finished with just under 10 minutes of control time, with one knockdown and one takedown on five attempts. He led in significant strikes just 26-19, while Connelly actually led in total strikes 87-73 and also landed his only takedown attempt. Sabatini had previously been scheduled to make his UFC debut back in February, but his opponent missed weight by the equivalent of a small child and the fight was canceled.
A submission specialist, BJJ black belt, and former D1 wrestler, 12 of Sabatini’s 15 wins have come early, with 10 submissions and two KOs. All of those finishes occurred in the first two rounds and all of his fights to last longer than 10 minutes have gone the distance. Six of those submissions were by Rear-Naked Choke, while he also has three Heel Hooks and an Armbar. The only time he's ever been “finished” came in a 2020 TKO due to a gnarly dislocated elbow. He’s only lost one other fight in his last 15 matches, which ended in a 2018 split-decision and he now holds a 15-3 pro record with his third career loss coming in a 2015 decision in his third pro fight. Six of Sabatini’s 10 submission wins have come in the first round, but four of his last five have ended in round two.
In his last fight before joining the UFC, Sabatini got his opponent to the mat early and spent nearly the entire first round hunting for submissions in control on the ground. Ten seconds into the second round he had his opponent right back down on the mat and submitted him soon after with an Armbar.
In his fight prior to that, Sabatini was returning from the dislocated elbow he suffered in a February 2020 match. Sabatini looked no worse for the wear and finished his opponent on the feet this time, showing that he also has some striking ability. Sabatini also notably submitted current UFC fighter Tony Gravely back in 2015 in the first round with a Rear-Naked Choke.
Tucker Lutz
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Coming off a win in his UFC debut, Lutz extended his winning streak to 12. Since losing in a R3 TKO in his 2015 pro debut, Lutz hasn’t lost a fight with six KOs, two submissions and four decision victories. While two-thirds of those wins have come early, his last three victories have all ended in decisions. Also notable, only two of his eight finishes came against opponents who entered with winning records.
Lutz went on DWCS twice in 2020 and both of those fights went the distance. Despite failing to land a finish, the UFC did award him a contract following the second victory and he made his debut against a struggling Kevin Aguilar in May 2021. Lutz outlanded his way to a decision win over Aguilar, who has now lost four straight fights. Lutz finished ahead in significant strikes 99-81 while landing 3 of his 4 takedown attempts and stuffing both of Aguilar’s attempts. However, Aguilar did finish ahead in total strikes 132-114 and did better in the third round as Lutz began to slow down.
Lutz made his first appearance on DWCS in September 2020 and won a unanimous 30-27 decision in a striking battle. He didn’t attempt a takedown in the fight but led in significant strikes 96-47 and total strikes 107-49. He started a little slow in the match but seemed to improve as the fight went on. Early on, he looked very hittable, with his chin high and very little head movement. His opponent seemed to slow down after the first round and Lutz took over. However, the performance was not enough to get him a UFC contract.
Interestingly, they brought him back on the show just two months later to give it another shot. That second fight turned into more of a grappling match, and despite promising Dana White a finish in his next match after his first performance, this one also went the distance. Lutz actually came out behind in both significant strikes 37-34 and total strikes 96-61, but he did lead in takedowns 4-2 and control time 7:51-3:23.
Lutz started his pro career at 145 lb before moving up to 155 lb in 2018. He said after his second most recent fight that his future would be 145 lb but he’d been dealing with a nagging chest cartilage injury that he needed to take care of first. Lutz dropped down to 145 lb for his debut with no issues and that appears where he’ll stay.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’8” but Lutz will have a 2” reach advantage.
Sabatini is so slick on the mat that we don’t see Lutz being able to survive if/when this fight hits the deck. While Lutz has never been submitted and is on an impressive 12 fight winning streak, he’s never faced anyone like Sabatini and we expect him to struggle to remain competitive in the grappling exchanges. Lutz’s only hope will be to keep this fight standing and force Sabatini into a striking battle, but we like Sabatini to win by submission in the first two rounds.
Our favorite bet here is “Sabatini Wins by Submission” at +420.
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DFS Implications:
Sabatini is a slick grappler who’s only required the judges in 3 of his 15 career wins, with 10 submission victories and two KOs. All 12 of his finishes have occurred in the first two rounds, which is ideal for DraftKings DFS production. Working against him when it comes to his ceiling, Sabatini is so dangerous with his grappling that he’s capable of churning out hyper-efficient wins with few to no stats behind them as we saw in his last match where he landed a first round submission but his only ther stat was a single significant strike. That still appears to be more of an outlier performance, but it is a reminder that he can grab a leg and force a tap with a Heel Hook without even landing a takedown. That win came from defensive grappling off his back, but in general he’s an offensive grappler that should tack on takedowns and control time, so we’re not overly concerned about his recent 90 point DraftKings score in a R1 submission win. If anything, that should suppress his ownership as he’s yet to demonstrate a ceiling and is now significantly more expensive than in his last fight. While this isn’t necessarily a favorable matchup, we still like Sabatini’s chances to land a submission in the first two rounds and fully expect him to put up a career best score. If this fight does go the distance his grappling heavy style should score better on DraftKings than on FanDuel. The odds imply he has a 55% chance to win a 26% chance it comes early and a 12% chance it occurs in R1.
Lutz’s recent 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. 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 and at his cheap price tag that could still be enough to be useful. However, this is easily the toughest matchup of his career, and we don’t expect Lutz to be able to land a ton of strikes on Sabatini and he would be foolish to try and take him down. So if Lutz is somehow able to win a decision, he’ll likely end up scoring less than he has in the past. That leaves him reliant on landing a finish to be useful in DFS and the only time Sabatini has ever been finished came from a freak injury when he dislocated his elbow, so Lutz’s scoring outlook is bleak. Hopefully the field chases Lutz’s 93 point score at his cheaper price tag, and it seems like some people are curiously calling for the Lutz upset win here, likely due to the fact that he’s won 12 straight fights. We don’t have much interest in playing him. The odds imply he has a 45% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish and a 9% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #5
Adrian Yanez
4th UFC Fight (3-0)Finally facing some real adversity for the first time since joining the UFC, Yanez faced a flashy finisher in Randy Costa and took Costa’s best shots and kept moving forward. Costa tagged Yanez with 57 significant strikes in the first round alone and looked perplexed when Yanez appeared unphased. All six of Costa’s career wins have come by R1 KO, so it’s understandable he would be confused when he finally faced an opponent who simply wouldn’t go down. After getting outstruck 57-33 in the first round, Yanez bounced back in round two as he outlanded Costa 31-12 in the opening minutes before putting him down for good just before the midway mark. That was the first time we’ve seen Yanez in trouble in his three UFC fights and he proved he has what it takes to walk through fire undeterred.
Yanez has now won seven straight fights with six of those ending in knockouts, including three in round one, two in round two and one in round three. He’s a patient striker who stalks his prey and methodically murders the opposition. Still just 27 years old, Yanez looks like a future contender in the 135 lb division. His only loss in his last 10 fights came in a five round split-decision in a 2018 LFA Championship bout against UFC fighter Miles Johns. His other two career losses were a 2017 split-decision and a 2014 decision in his second pro fight. So he’s never been finished and two of his three losses came in split-decisions.
Yanez punched his ticket to the UFC with a 39 second first round knockout win on DWCS in 2020 and then followed it up with three more knockouts against progressively tougher competition in Victor Rodriguez, Gustavo Lopez and Randy Costa. He’s an exceptional counter puncher and an all around great striker. He has a BJJ black belt, but it might as well be a souvenir as he almost never feels the need to use it. He’s 14-3 as a pro, with nine wins by KO, two by submission and three in decisions. His late father was a boxer and Yanez seems primarily focused on carrying on in his father’s footsteps by using his striking to win fights. If he was ever going to look to grapple it would have come in his last fight against a pure striker who was piecing him up in the first round, but Yanez never so much as feinted a takedown.
Davey Grant
9th UFC Fight (4-4)Looking to bounce back from his first loss in his last four fights, Grant lost a decision to Marlon Vera after knocking out his previous two opponents. Vera outlanded Grant 105-83 in significant strikes, 112-95 in total strikes, 2-1 in takedowns and 5:15-1:54 in control time. Grant started off the fight well as he outlanded Vera 41-30 in the first round, but Vera bounced back and Grant seemed to be fading late in the match. Vera was incredibly close to locking up a submission at a couple points late in the third round, but Grant was able to survive to see a decision.
Now 13-5 as a pro, Grant has still never been knocked out, but has been submitted in four of his five losses with his only decision loss coming in his most recent fight. He has three wins by KO, eight by submission and two decisions. Grant made his way into the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter back in 2013, but after getting submitted via Rear-Naked Choke in the second round of his 2013 debut, we didn’t see him step back inside the Octagon for two and a half years until he defeated Marlon Vera in a 2016 decision.
Since his 2016 decision win over Vera, Grant has gone 3-3. In his next fight after defeating Vera, Grant was submitted in the third round via Armbar before taking all of 2017 off. He returned in 2018 and was submitted again, this time just 59 seconds into the first round from a Triangle Choke, and then once again didn’t fight for over a year before returning in 2019 to win a decision. He returned in 2020 to land his first UFC knockout against a struggling Martin Day, who was coming off nearly a two year layoff and has now lost all four of his UFC fights. That was the first time Grant had won two consecutive fights since joining the UFC. He kept that momentum going with a more impressive second round knockout of Jonathan Martinez in his second most recent fight, but was then most recently defeated by Vera in a rematch of their earlier fight.
Fight Prediction:
Grant will have a 1” height advantage, but Yanez will have a 1” reach advantage. Yanez is also notably eight years younger than the 35-year-old Grant.
Grant had an impressive little late career resurgence leading up to his recent decision loss, but he’s not a true contender in the division like Yanez. With that said, Grant has sneaky power in his striking and is incredibly tough. He’s never been knocked out but he has been prone to getting submitted. While we’ve concluded Yanez has no desire to grapple, there’s always a chance Grant shoots for a desperation takedown and Yanez wraps up his neck to defend it. Outside of that we expect Yanez to either land a late KO or more likely win a decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Yanez R3 or Decision” at +200.
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DFS Implications:
Yanez is a consistent DFS producer, but his lack of grappling keeps his DFS ceiling somewhat in check, especially on DraftKings. He hasn’t landed a takedown in his last four fights going back to DWCS even before he made his UFC debut. However, he has landed knockouts in all of those fights and returned DraftKings scores of 106, 81 and 107 in his three UFC matches. His 81 point performance came in early R3 KO with low striking volume, but he did land a pair of knockdowns in that fight, so it actually could have been worse. Yanez’s high DFS price tag leaves him reliant on a finish to score well and it likely needs to come in the first two rounds to be useful on DraftKings in tournaments. He always makes for a solid low-risk play based on his reliable floor, but there are lots of ways he fails to crack the winning tournament lineup. Now going against an opponent who’s never been knocked out, this looks like a tougher matchup for Yanez to land his 5th straight finish, but he’s certainly capable of getting it done. The odds imply he has a 74% chance to win, a 47% chance to get a finish and a 24% chance it comes in R1.
This is an incredibly tough matchup for Grant as he goes against a red-hot opponent who’s never been finished and comes in on a seven fight winning streak. While Grant’s last two wins have both come by KO, it’s really hard to see him knocking Yanez out, but hey, anything’s possible in a fight. We don’t see many paths to victory for Grant here, but you could at least argue that he’ll be low-owned and is a leverage play against one of the most popular fighters on the slate. Also, 11 of his 13 career wins have come early. The odds imply he has a 26% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish and a 6% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #4
Taila Santos
5th UFC Fight (3-1)Coming off a lopsided decision win over a 38-year-old Roxanne Modafferi, Santos dominated the fight everywhere it went as she finished ahead in significant strikes 55-18 and in total strikes 118-43, while also landing all five of her takedown attempts with over eight minutes of control time and stuffing all four of Modafferi’s attempts. The only thing Santos wasn’t able to do was get a finish and she appeared to be tiring late in the third round, which made a late finish unlikely.
Just prior to her recent win, we saw Santos dominate Gillian Robertson and Molly McCann on the mat and while her background is in Muay Thai, Santos has not been shy about taking opponents down and holding them there. With that said, she’s still just a BJJ blue belt and only has two submission wins on her record, which both came in 2015.
Now 18-1 as a pro, Santos has 10 wins by KO, two by submission and six decision victories. Her only career loss came in a split-decision in her UFC debut. While all three of her UFC fights have gone the distance, as did her DWCS match before that, Santos came into the UFC in 2019 with a perfect 15-0 record that included 11 R1 finishes as well as one in R2.
However, in her UFC debut she lost a split-decision to a highly suspect fighter in Mara Romero Borella, who’s now lost five of her last six fights. Borella was able to control Santos on the ground and against the fence for extended periods of time in the first two rounds, which is obviously concerning. Santos looked better in the third round but it was too little too late as she ended up losing the decision.
Santos was previously fighting at 134 lb right before joining the UFC, but she then dropped down to 125 lb where she’s stayed since. She has only fought four times since 2016, after she took some time off following a 2016 fight to have a baby. Overall she has proven herself to be a powerful fighter who can compete on the mat or the feet, but it remains to be seen if she can be much of a finisher at this level. Now she gets an opponent who has been somewhat prone to getting submitted but has never been knocked out.
Joanne Wood
14th UFC Fight (7-6)After just recently tying the knot with coach John Wood, Joanne Calderwood has officially shortened her name to Joanne Wood after failing to take our suggestion that she go with the hyphenated option of Calderwood-Wood or at least compromising and going with Jojo Wood-Wood. Anyways, onto face punching.
Wood is coming off a highly questionable split-decision loss to Lucky [as fuck] Lauren Murphy. Murphy clearly won the second round against Wood, as Murphy controlled her on the ground for almost the entire round. The third round was unmistakably won by Wood as she outlanded Murphy 59-35 in significant strikes and stuffed all three of her takedown attempts. All three judges agreed on both of those rounds. Where opinions differed were in the first round, where Wood outlanded Murphy 55-29 in significant strikes and 64-40 in total strikes, while stuffing Murphy’s only takedown attempt. So apparently the judges thought Murphy did more damage as Wood nearly doubled Murphy’s number of significant strikes landed in the round. Anyways, we’re definitely not still bitter.
Prior to that, Wood had a career best striking performance in a decision win over Jessica Eye, Wood came out ahead 148-77 in significant strikes and 214-104 in total strikes. Eye went 1 for 4 on takedowns, while Wood went 1 for 3. That marks the 6th time in 13 UFC fights that Wood has landed over 100 significant strikes and fourth time in her last five matches, with the only exception being a R1 submission loss.
Prior to that decision win, Wood watched her title shot disappear in an attempt to stay active when she opted to accept a fight with Jennifer Maia, in an everything to lose, nothing to gain nightmare scenario. In fairness to Wood, she was waiting on Valentina Shevchenko to recover from knee surgery, with no clear time table for a return. They had originally been scheduled to fight back in June 2020, but Shevchenko pulled out due to injury. Not knowing when Shevchenko would finally be healthy enough to fight, Wood accepted the Maia fight, which took place two months after that fight with Shevchenko had originally been scheduled to happen. Wood had already been waiting for an extended period of time, with her previous fight happening all the way back in September 2019. It was really just an unfortunate lose lose situation for Wood, and in a worse case scenario outcome Maia submitted Wood in the first round via Armbar, which is the third time Wood has been submitted in the UFC. Those are also the only three times she’s been finished as a pro.
Wood came into the UFC in 2014 fighting in the Strawweight division (115 lb). However, after going 2-1 in her first three fights she decided to move up to Flyweight (125 lb) for a fight, which she won by R3 KO. She moved back down to 115 lb after the win, but lost two straight to Jessica Andrade and Cynthia Calvillo, and then decided 125 lb was looking a whole lot better and moved back up. She’s now fought her last seven fights (4-3) at 125 lb, bringing her UFC Flyweight record to 5-3. Two of her three submission losses notably came down at Strawweight (2015 R1 Armbar & 2016 R1 Guillotine Choke), while both of her UFC early wins came at Flyweight (2016 R3 KO & 2018 R1 Submission). However, five of her last six fights have now ended in decisions.
Prior to joining the UFC in 2014, Wood had a perfect 8-0 record with four KO wins and four by decision. Her seven UFC wins have consisted of five decisions, a R3 KO and a R1 Triangle Choke Submission. Her lone UFC KO win came against Valerie Letourneau who got dropped by the organization in 2016 after three straight losses, including the one to Wood. The submission win came against Kalindra Faria, who has also lost her last three fights and hasn’t fought since. So it seems like Wood has really only been able to finish lower level competitors.
Wood averages the second highest number of significant strikes landed on the slate at 6.75/minute, but also absorbs the 5th most at 4.5/minute. She’s outlanded her opponents in significant strikes in all of her UFC fights that have made it out of the first round (9), including in her three UFC decision losses. She has alternated wins and losses for six straight fights and is now coming off a loss.
This will notably be the second straight fight John Wood has prepared a fighter to face Taila Santos as he also coaches Roxanne Modafferi who recently lost a decision to Santos.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’6” but Santos will have a 3” reach advantage.
This has the potential to be a fun Muay Thai striking battle on the feet, but it’s far more likely that Santos will be once again looking to get the fight to the mat where she can control Wood on her back. We’ve seen Wood get taken down in each of her last two fights and 11 times in her 13 fight UFC career. She’s not terrible at defending takedowns and still owns a respectable 63% takedown defense, but we saw her get controlled for an extended period of time by Lauren Murphy, which ended up costing her the fights—well that and terrible judging. It’s possible the coaches at Syndicate were able to learn from Modafferi’s recent loss to Santos and come in with a solid game plan to prevent takedowns, but there’s a good chance Santos will find a way to get this fight to the mat, which gives her an edge in winning a decision. For as long as it remains on the feet, we expect Wood to land more strikes while Santos may land the more impactful blows. There’s a slight chance Santos could finish the fight with a submission on the mat, but we’re expecting this to end in a close decision, with Santos likely getting the nod.
Our favorite value bet here is “Wood Wins by Decision” at +500.
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DFS Implications:
Santos is coming off a career best performance from a DFS perspective where she scored 114 DraftKings points in a decision win after scoring 78 and 96 points in her previous two decision victories. She completely filled up the stat sheet in her recent fight and now steps into a pace-up matchup in another fantasy friendly spot. Wood should force the action on the feet, which will elevate Santos’ striking numbers, while we also expect Santos to once again be looking for takedowns. While a finish remains unlikely, this is another prime opportunity for Santos to score well in a decision, and while we expect Wood to put up more resistance than Santos’ last opponent on the feet, we’ve seen her get controlled on the mat for periods of time and be prone to getting submitted. This looks like a high floor, high ceiling spot for Santos if she wins, in a fight we want to target on both sides. It would be surprising to see the winner of this one not score well, especially on DraftKings where Santos has a chance to again rack up control time and ground strikes. The odds imply she has a 75% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
Wood looks like a solid value play at just $7,000 on DraftKings and $8 on FanDuel. Her last six wins have scored 108, 96, 89, 96, 139 and 138 DraftKings points. She also scored 69 DK points in a decision loss to Chookagian, which would have been good for 99 points had the decision gone her way and 55 points in her most recent decision loss, which would have been good for 85 points with a win. Averaging the second most significant strikes landed per minute on the slate at 6.75, while also landing an average of 1.6 takedowns per 15 minutes, Wood has a solid floor and a huge ceiling in DFS. She’s also proven she doesn’t need a finish to score well. Coming off a loss and having dropped two of her last three, we could see her going somewhat overlooked here. While this looks like one of the tougher matchups she’s had in a while, Wood has the ability to pull off a high-volume decision upset if she can remain on her feet, which is no easy task against Santos. The potential for her to spend periods of time on her back is somewhat concerning for her DFS production, which is entirely dependent on volume, but we still like Wood as a cheap value play. The odds imply she has a 25% chance to win, a 9% chance to get a finish and a 4% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #3
Kyung Ho Kang
10th UFC Fight (6-2, NC)Coming off a 19 month layoff, Kang enters this fight on a three fight winning streak and having won six of his last seven fights. His last two and three of his last four fights have gone the distance, but he does have three submission wins since joining the UFC, which all occured in his last six fights. However, all three of those finishes came against very questionable opponents.
Kang lost a pair of decisions to start his UFC career in 2013, although the split-decision loss to Alex Caceres in his UFC debut was overturned to a No Contest when Caceres tested positive for THC. Kang bounced back with a 2014 R3 Arm-Triangle Choke Submission to notch his first UFC win, but just keep in mind it came over journeyman Shunichi Shimizu, who was fighting for the first and only time in the UFC and has since gone 7-16-1. Kang then won a split-decision later in 2014, before taking three and a half years off from 2014-2018 to fulfill his mandatory South Korean military service.
He returned to the UFC in 2018 and landed a first round Triangle Choke Submission against Guido Cannetti, who is 2-4 in the UFC with all four of those losses coming early, three by submission, and who has been submitted a total of four times in his career. Kang then lost a split-decision to Ricardo Ramos, before landing another first round submission in 2019, this time by Rear-Naked Choke. That early win came against another shaky talent in Teruto Ishihara, who’s no longer in the UFC, has lost five straight and seven of his last eight fights, and has been finished in the first round in three of his last four matches. Since then, Kang has won a pair of grappling-heavy decisions against Brandon Davis, who’s 2-6 in the UFC, and Pingyuan Liu who’s 2-2 in the UFC and hasn’t fought since 2019 following his second straight loss.
In his decision win over Brandon Davis, Kang trailed in significant strikes 77-50, but led in total strikes 120-114 and landed 3 takedowns on 6 attempts with over six minutes of control time, while Davis landed his only attempt. Davis notably chewed up Kang’s lead leg as he landed 28 leg strikes. In his most recent decision, Kang trailed in significant strikes again, this time just 25-20, while also coming out behind in total strikes 114-108. However, he landed 3 takedowns on 7 attempts and amassed a ridiculous 12 minutes and 23 seconds of control time and won his second straight split-decision. Clearly the judges view control time very differently, as one judge ruled it 30-27 in Kang’s favor, while another ruled it 28-29 against him.
Kang has good size for the division and started his pro career at 154 lb in 2007, but has been at 135 lb since 2011. He’s now 17-8 as a pro, with two wins by KO, 11 by submission and four decisions. The only time he’s ever been knocked out was in the first round of his third pro fight back in 2008. The only time he's ever been submitted came in the first round of a 2011 match via Triangle Armbar. He also has five career decision losses, one DQ loss and a No Contests in his UFC debut that was really another decision loss. All of his UFC fights have ended in submission wins or decisions. Interestingly, five of Kang’s six decisions since joining the UFC have been split (3-2), so you never know what you’ll get out of the judges in his fights—even more so than normal.
While Kang has proven himself to be a dangerous submission threat, he’s curiously listed as just being a BJJ blue belt, which was somewhat surprising. He has decent striking, but has never landed more than 65 significant strikes in a fight and averages just 2.52 SSL/min (6th fewest on the slate). He does average 2.5 takedowns landed per 15 minutes and has a 59% takedown accuracy to go along with a 71% defense. He now hasn’t fought since December 2019.
Rani Yahya
19th UFC Fight (12-4-1, NC)Looking to break the Bantamweight submission record in this matchup after tying it in his last fight, Yahya recently submitted Ray Rodriguez, who’s now 0-2 in the UFC after getting submitted in both of his UFC fights. Yahya completely dominated Rodriguez on the ground in a fight where we only saw 11 combined significant strikes landed (8-3 Rodriguez). Rodriguez went 2 for 4 on takedowns with seven minutes of control and led in total strikes 42-15 before ending the fight with an Arm-Triangle Choke just over three minutes into the second round.
A second degree BJJ black belt and Muay Thai black belt, Yahaya is really a one-dimensional submission specialist and only uses his striking to set up takedowns. All 21 of his career finishes have come by submission, while his other six pro wins ended in decisions. In 38 pro matches, he’s only been finished three times—twice by KO and once by submission. Those came in a 2006 R1 Guillotine Choke, a 2007 R2 KO and a 2009 R1 KO. No one has finished him since 2009, two years before he joined the UFC. His other seven career losses have all ended in decisions. He has seven submission wins in the UFC, while 10 of his 18 UFC matches have gone to the judges, including all four of his losses with the organization. His one other UFC match ended in a No Contest due a clash of heads 39 seconds in. His last four wins have all been by submission, including two in the first round.
Now 36 years old, Yahya has been a pro for nearly 19 years. Age is really the only concern with him if you’re looking for cracks in his foundation as he’s a three time world BJJ champion and Abu Dhabi gold medalist and offers elite grappling skills and proven durability.
Looking more closely at his finishes, 11 of his last 17 submission wins have come in the first round, four have come in the third round, and just two have come in R2. He likes to get opponents to the mat quickly and hunt for submissions early, but if that fails he tends to patiently wear on the opposition before finishing things late. He’ll get opponents to the ground any way he can, whether that’s by traditional takedowns, pulling guard or grabbing an ankle. Because of that, his takedowns landed are solid, but not overwhelming at 2.9 per 15 minutes.
Yahya has never landed more than 59 significant strikes in a fight and has only topped 40 twice. He’s also never absorbed more than 57 significant strikes, which came in his second most recent match. He occasionally puts up big takedown numbers, but less so recently. He only has eight takedowns in his last seven fights and only four in his last four matches. He’s also never landed a knockdown.
Similar to Kang, Yahya also started his pro career at 154 lb and started his UFC career at 145 lb where he went 4-2 in his first six fights with the organization. However, he dropped down to 135 lb in 2014 where he’s since gone 8-2-1 plus a No Contest. Also similar to Kang, all of Yahya’s UFC fights have ended in submission wins or have gone the distance. And just to reiterate, the only time Yahya has ever been submitted came in 2006 R1 Guillotine Choke.
Fight Prediction:
Kang will have a 3” height advantage and 6” reach advantage.
This is an interesting matchup between two submission specialists who are both good at controlling opponents on the ground. Kang has controlled his last five opponents for an average of 42.17% of the time, while Yaha is right behind him at 41.86% control time. That will make the ground exchanges quite interesting as both of these two are accustomed to exerting heavy top pressure while they hunt for submissions. Kang will have the striking advantage, but Yahya is the more experienced grappler and has competed twice since Kang last fought. It would make sense for Kang to utilize his striking advantage here instead of coming in with his normal game plan of taking the fight to the mat early. He has a solid 71% takedown defense, so he should be able to force Yahya to stand and trade with him opposed to putting himself at risk on the ground with one of the more dangerous submission specialists. As long as he comes in with that mindset, we like him to win a decision here, but if Yahya can coerce him into a grappling match then this fight will turn into a coin flip. Yahya finds creative ways to get fights to the mat, so we wouldn’t be surprised to see him create a few opportunities to land submissions, but we’re leaning Kang wins this one in a decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Fight Ends in Submission” at +260 (FanDuel).
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DFS Implications:
This fight had originally been scheduled for July 31st, where Kang was priced at $8,500 on DraftKings and Yahya was $7,700. Now rescheduled less than three months later, Kang is down to $8,200 and Yahya is up to $8,000.
Kang’s last two decision wins have been good for 93 and 100 DraftKings points and his three UFC submission wins have scored 118, 102, and 117, so he’s clearly shown a high ceiling and the ability to score well on DraftKings in decision wins. However, he also dominated the ground exchanges in those recent two decisions and this fight should play out a little differently. We expect Kang to be more likely to want to keep this fight standing where he should have a clear advantage against Yahya so his DraftKings floor is lower than in recent fights. It’s certainly possible that Yahya forces him into grappling exchanges and we still see heavy amounts of control time, but it’s far less likely than normal that Kang will be the one looking to take the fight to the ground. With DraftKings scores of 93 or more in his last four wins and with three of those scores reaching triple digits, it will be interesting to see where Kang’s ownership ends up at his reasonable $8,200 price tag as there are lots of good plays to choose from. With a lower chance to either land a submission or dominate in control time, Kang’s DraftKings bust potential is higher than normal in this matchup. Generally he’s a safer play on DraftKings compared to FanDuel based on his grappling upside, but that may not be the case on Saturday and he’ll likely be reliant on landing a finish to score well on either site. The odds imply he has a 49% chance to win, a 23% chance to land a finish and a 10% chance it comes in R1.
While Yahya’s last four wins have all come by submission, he’s still failed to top 103 DraftKings points in any of those, with scores of 103 (R2 Sub), 92 (R1 Sub), 102 (R3 Sub), and 101 (R1 Sub). He failed to land above 17 significant strikes or more than two takedowns in any of those four wins, and with zero career knockdowns his ceiling is somewhat capped. However, priced as the underdog in this matchup, that's of less concern here as he still should return value if he can land a submission. However, that could be tough going against an opponent who’s only been submitted once in his career and not at all in the last decade. Yahya averages an anemic 1.57 SSL/min and while he does land 2.9 takedowns per 15 minutes, he has just a 33% takedown accuracy. In his last two decision wins, Yahya scored just 88 and 70 DraftKings points and will have a tougher time being useful if this goes the distance. Yahya saw the line flip in his favor late in the week and is one of many mispriced favorites on the slate now. The odds imply he has a 51% chance to win, a 29% chance to land a finish and an 15% chance it comes in R1.
Fight #2
Sean Brady
5th UFC Fight (4-0)Brady had a pair of scheduled fights with Kevin Lee fall through this Summer as Lee initially withdrew in July due to a rib injury and then Brady withdrew in August due to a severe staph infection in his foot. That infection was bad enough that Brady was actually concerned he might lose his foot for a while.
Stretching his undefeated record to 14-0 in his most recent match, Brady landed his second straight submission victory after winning decisions in his first two UFC fights. That recent finish came in a R3 Arm-Triangle Choke against young UFC veteran Jake Matthews who entered the fight 10-4 with the organization and 17-4 as a pro. Despite Matthews being a BJJ black belt with seven submission wins on his record and entering on a three fight winning streak, Brady, who’s also a BJJ black belt, had a clear advantage on the mat. Matthews was able to catch a kick while simultaneously landing a right cross that put Brady on his back midway through the first round. However, Brady immediately recovered and reversed the position to end up on top, where he worked his way towards another one-armed Guillotine attempt and ultimately finished the round in dominant position. Brady returned the fight to the ground 90 seconds into the second round and again spent the remainder of the round in top position hunting for a Guillotine. Then Brady wobbled Matthews with a left hook early in R3 and a minute later had him biting him so hard on a takedown feint that Matthews actually fell forward and then Brady was able to grab his neck and work around to his back on the mat. Brady continued to dominate from top position as he worked his way to an Arm-Triangle Choke and quickly forced a tap. It was a one-sided dominating performance by Brady and he continued to showcase his well rounded game both on the feet and the mat.
With that third round finish, Brady has now been past the first round in eight straight fights, with six of those seeing a third round and four ending in decisions. His last first round finish came in a 2017 Guillotine Choke prior to joining the UFC.
Brady won his 2019 UFC debut in a decision against UFC journeyman Court McGee, who’s only been finished once in 30 pro fights. Brady outlanded McGee 119-107 in significant strikes and also landed two takedowns, while defending all six of McGee’s attempts. Brady interestingly only weighed in at 167.5 lb for that 170 lb fight.
In his second UFC match, Brady took on Ismail Naurdiev, who was released by the UFC following the loss after going 2-2 in four decisions with the organization. Brady won a more grappling heavy affair, landing four takedowns and nearly eight minutes of control time, while also winning the significant striking battle 47-37 and total strikes 125-38.
Following his second straight UFC decision win, Brady took on one-dimensional power puncher Christian Aguilera in his second most recent fight. Brady outlanded Aguilera 34-16 in significant strikes and 65-17 in total strikes. He also landed a pair of takedowns and tacked on a couple minutes of control time, before eventually submitting Aguilera in the second round with an impressive one armed Guillotine Choke.
Of his 14 career wins, Brady has three KOs and four submissions to go with seven decisions. However, four of his last five finishes have come by submission and he loves to choke opponents out, especially with his impressive one-armed Guillotine Choke. His last four finishes have all occurred in the later rounds, with two in the second round, one in the third and one in the fourth. However, the first three finishes of his career all ended in round one.
Michael Chiesa
17th UFC Fight (11-5)Coming off his first loss since moving up to 170 lb in 2018, Chiesa was submitted by Vicente Luque midway through the first round. Chiesa came in patiently looking for a spot to get a takedown as he circled the Octagon against Luque. Chiesa was able to land a couple clean shots as he evaded contact, but Luque immediately responded and briefly dropped Chiesa to the ground. Moments later Chiesa shot for a double leg and then took Luque’s back on the mat and quickly wrapped up a Rear-Naked Choke. However, Luque was able to escape and turn into Chiesa on the mat to reverse the position and then quickly locked up a Brabo Choke to force a tap.
While Chiesa is known for landing submissions of his own, he’s also now been submitted in four of his five pro losses, with his only other career loss ending in a 2014 R2 doctor stoppage TKO. Chiesa owns an 18-5 pro record with 11 wins by submission and seven decisions. He’s never lost a decision and he’s never knocked anyone out.
Prior to that recent loss, Chiesa was 4-0 since moving up from Lightweight (155 lb) to Welterweight (170 lb) in 2018 following a pair of submission losses. He spent the first 10 years of his pro career down at 155 lb. After making the switch, he landed a 2018 R2 submission win against Carlos Condit, a 2019 three-round decision win over Diego Sanchez, a 2020 three-round decision win over Rafael dos Anjos and a 2021 five-round decision over Neil Magny, before losing his most recent fight. All five of Chiesa’s career losses have occurred in the opening two rounds, with two in the first round and three in round two.
His last win came in a five-round smothering decision over Magny in January 2021, where we saw just 36 combined significant strikes landed across 25 minutes of grueling grappling, with Chiesa finishing ahead 24-12. He did better on the ground, finishing ahead 93-52 in total strikes, while landing 4 of 6 takedowns and over 15 minutes of control time, but he never really threatened with any submissions. It took him three minutes into the first round before he shot for a takedown, which he landed and then spent the rest of the round in top position. He cruised to a unanimous 49-46 decision win from that point on.
Chiesa is a pure grappler and submission specialist, who’s never been involved in a high-volume striking affair. He’s landed 20 takedowns on 26 attempts in his last five fights since moving up a weight class, which is good for a 77% accuracy rate, up from his 68% overall career accuracy.
Prior to just 36 combined significant strikes being landed in his five round win over Magny, we saw just 23 combined significant strikes landed in Chiesa’s previous three-round decision over Rafael Dos Anjos. Chiesa smothered RDA (58% career takedown defense) for the duration of the 15 minute fight with 10 minutes of control time and only used his striking to set up takedowns, which he landed six of on eight attempts.
Chiesa pumps out his jab in space as a range finder, but really doesn’t offer much on the feet and is a one-dimensional grappler who averages just 1.87 SSL/min and 1.72 SSA/min. However, he lands a good amount of takedowns at 3.6 landed per 15 minutes.
Fight Prediction:
Chiesa will have a 3” height and reach advantage.
This sets up as a terrible matchup for Chiesa as Brady will have a huge striking advantage and should have no problem competing on the mat. We expect Chiesa to open the fight as he often does circling around the outside of the Octagon using his jab as a rangefinder to try and set up a takedown. We’ve yet to see anyone take Brady down in the UFC as he’s stuffed all seven of the attempts that have come his way, but Chiesa looks like the best grappler he’s faced in his career, so this does pose a new challenge. We expect Brady to be up for the task, and expect his power to be too much for Chiesa to handle. We like Brady to find Chiesa’s neck once this fight reaches the mat and force a tap as he chokes Chiesa out, most likely in the second round. Look for this one to start slow but finish abruptly with Brady extending his winning streak to 15 with his third straight submission victory.
Our favorite bet here is “Brady Wins by Submission” at +300 (DraftKings).
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DFS Implications:
Brady has been as consistent as it gets in DFS with DraftKings scores of 104, 104, 99 and 105 in his four UFC fights. He’s proven he can score well both with a finish or in a decision, and the only thing he hasn’t shown us is a massive ceiling. Chiesa hasn’t absorbed more than 27 significant strikes in his last nine fights and has only been taken down a combined four times during that nine fight stretch, but he’s notably been finished in the first two rounds in all five of his career losses, including four submissions. So while he’s a tough guy to accumulate stats against, he’s been prone to getting finished early in fights, which makes up for that. That does mean Brady could struggle to score well without a finish, however, so it’s tougher to see him returning value at his higher price tag if this goes the distance. However, we expect to see a large amount of grappling, so he projects to score better on DraftKings than FanDuel in a decision. With that said, we like Brady to finish this fight with a submission and he looks like a solid play in all formats. The odds imply he has a 61% chance to win, a 36% chance to get a finish and a 15% chance it comes in R1.
Chiesa has been a major beneficiary of the “new” DraftKings scoring system as he racks up massive amounts of control time and now scores points off his ground strikes that don’t register as significant. He’s also looked good since moving up to Welterweight and has had no problem with both getting his opponents down to the ground and then dominating once there. Since his move up in weight he’s put up DraftKings scores of 9, 101, 91, 110 and 103 after failing to eclipse 97 DK points in his previous six fights when he was fighting down at 155 lb. He can’t score well on FanDuel without a finish as his most recent win scored 101 DraftKings points, but just 64 points on FanDuel. While his last three wins have ended in decisions, 11 of his 18 career victories have come by submission. However, now he gets an incredibly tough matchup against an undefeated Sean Brady and this looks like a really tough spot for Chiesa to succeed. Some of MMA Twitter appears to be riding the narrative that Chiesa will perform better as he shares the card with his former wrestling pupil Terrance McKinney, who Chiesa coached when McKinney was in high-school, but we don’t see that making a difference. The odds imply Chiesa has a 39% chance to win, a 20% chance to get a finish and a 9% chance it comes in the first round.
Fight #1
Miesha Tate
11th UFC Fight (6-4)This fight had been scheduled for October 16th, but Tate tested positive for COVID and it was pushed back five weeks.
Now 35 years old, Tate recently came out of retirement following nearly a five year layoff to usher the 44-year-old Marion Reneau off into her own retirement in adherence with the UFC’s strict one in, one out policy. Reneau seemed to already have one foot out the door and put on an uninspiring performance in her UFC swan song as she allowed Tate to be the first person to ever finish her, with the fight ending via ground and pound in the third round. Tate’s striking actually looked somewhat improved in the match and she came back in better shape than when she left. She also showed she can still wrestle as she was able to land three takedowns on six attempts with nearly six minutes of control time as she outlanded Reneau 65-25 in significant strikes and 110-48 in total strikes.
After facing Holly Holm, Amanda Nunes and Raquel Pennington in her previous three fights, you could certainly argue that the step down in competition aided in improving Tate’s optics, but her lack of ring rust following the half decade layoff was still impressive. The three takedowns she landed against Reneau tied the most she had ever landed in a UFC fight. She’s only landed a total of seven in her other eight UFC fights and has just a 32% takedown accuracy.
Tate won the Women’s Bantamweight Belt with a R5 submission victory over Holly Holm back in 2016, but then immediately lost it to Amanda Nunes in a first round submission. She followed that up with a decision loss against Raquel Pennington later in 2016 and then announced her retirement from MMA immediately following the fight.
Tate has a background in wrestling, and averages just 2.13 significant strikes landed per minute, while absorbing just 2.68 per minute. She lands an average of 2.2 takedowns per 15 minutes on 7 attempts.
Of Tate’s 19 career wins, four have come by KO, seven by submission and eight ended in decisions. Five of her seven career losses have notably come early, with a pair of KOs and three submissions. However, the three submissions came against Amanda Nunes and Ronda Rousey (twice). Tate started her pro career at 145 lb before quickly dropping down to 135 lb. She originally turned pro all the way back in 2007.
This will be Tate’s 6fth five round fight of her career, with three of those coming in the UFC and two occurring prior to that in Strikeforce. Her first five round fight was in 2011 and she won with a R4 Arm-Triangle Choke to claim the Bantamweight Strikeforce Belt. She then immediately lost the belt in the first round of her next fight via Armbar submission against Ronda Rousey. Two fights late Tate joined the UFC and despite losing by R3 TKO in her debut, she again challenged Ronda Rousey for a Bantamweight Belt, this time under the UFC banner, and again got submitted with an Armbar, although this time it occurred in the third round of what was Tate’s third career five round fight. After bouncing back with four straight decision wins, Tate was then granted another title shot, this time against Holly Holm and Tate landed a R5 Rear-Naked Choke to win the Bantamweight belt. However, just as she had done in Strikeforce, Tate then immediately lost the belt in the first round of her next fight, which in fairness came against Amanda Nunes by Rear-Naked Choke. So she’s gone just 2-3 in five round fights, with all five of those ending in submissions.
While Tate has a 52% takedown defense on paper, that number is skewed by a 3 for 19 performance by Rin Nakai (18% career takedown accuracy) in 2014. If we remove that fight, Tate has been taken down 14 times on 19 attempts (74%) in her other nine UFC fights. So she’s seriously struggled to defend takedowns for the majority of her career.
Ketlen Vieira
8th UFC Fight (5-2)Alternating wins and losses over her last four fights, Vieira’s only two career losses have both occurred in her last three matches. After starting her pro career off with 10 straight wins, including wins in her first four UFC fights, Vieira was knocked out in the first round by Irene Aldana. She bounced back with a decision win over Sijara Eubanks before most recently losing a close decision to Yana Kunitskaya that many people thought she won. Vieira notably missed weight by 2 lb for that fight.
In that last fight, Vieira quickly looked to get Kunitskaya to the mat as she shot for an early takedown and stuck with it before briefly getting Kunitskaya down but struggling to keep her there. However, she clearly had no interest in a striking battle and returned the fight to the mat in the center of the Octagon midway through the round. Vieira appeared to be hunting for an Arm-Triangle Choke and wasn’t landing many strikes on the ground, but did control Kunitskaya for the final minutes of R1 and easily won the round. As Vieira looked to get the fight back to the mat early in the second round, Kunitskaya was able to reverse the attempt and end up on top. Vieira looked for submissions off her back but was unable to lock anything in and that resulted in Kunitskaya spending essentially the entire round on top and easily tying the score at one round a piece. The third round is when things got interesting. Vieira was able to land a takedown in the opening 30 seconds, but again was entirely focussed on looking for a submission and wasn’t landing any ground strikes. She took Kunitskaya’s back midway through the round, but Kunitskaya was able to pepper Vieira with over the shoulder punches as she simultaneously defended the Rear-Naked Choke. So despite having the dominant position, it was Kunitskaya that was landing strikes while Vieira racked up control time. Then, in the final 20 seconds Kunitskaya was able to turn into Vieira, posture up and rain down heavy ground and pound, which is likely what stole her the decision after getting controlled for nearly nine minutes in the match on three Vieira takedowns. Kunitskaya was able to split Vieira open with an elbow in that final stretch, so she had all the optics going in her favor to finish the fight.
Vieira has gone the distance in five of her seven UFC fights, and while she has six finishes on her pro record, five of those came in her first five pro fights against opponents who entered with non-existent records of: 0-0, 0-0, 0-1, 0-0, and 0-0. Two of those faux pros were fighting for the first and only time, and another fought just once more in another losing effort. Looking at her entire pro career, she’s 11-2, with two KOs, four submissions and five decision wins, with five of her last six wins coming in decisions. Her only finish since 2015 came in a 2017 R2 Arm-Triangle Choke against Olympic wrestling silver medalist Sara McMann. Tate notably defeated McMann in a decision two years earlier. A BJJ and Judo black belt as well as a Brazilian national wrestling champion, Vieira loves to look for leg locks from defensive positions and Arm-Triangles from top position.
Vieira holds a 92% takedown defense and has only been taken down once on 14 attempts in her seven UFC fights. That lone crack in her otherwise perfect takedown defense came against Sara McMann, who landed one of her five attempts. Since then, Vieira has only had to defend three attempts in her last four fights, but she’s shut down all of them.
Fight Prediction:
Vieira will have a 2” height advantage and 3” reach advantage.
With Vieira’s background in wrestling, Judo and Jiu-Jitsu and Tate’s in wrestling, we expect this to be a slow-paced grappling heavy affair. With that said, oftentimes when two grapplers square off we see more striking than expected as the two look to capitalize on the others’ perceived weakness. While Vieira has a solid 92% takedown defense, we could see Tate outscrambling her in the 50/50 positions to end up in top position. While it’s unlikely this fight ends in a TKO, 10 of Tate’s 26 pro fights have ended in submissions, including all five of her previous five round fights. Both ladies are capable of submitting the other, although Vieira has notably never been submitted, while Tate has been submitted three times in her career—all by Rounda Rousay and Amanda Nunes. It seems like the UFC wants to build Tate up for a potential title run, so it would be a little surprising if they gave her this matchup and didn’t think she had a good shot at winning, but the odds notably moved against her early in the week after she opened as a -120 favorite. Vieira’s 92% takedown defense obviously poses a significant challenge for Tate to get this fight to the ground, but we did see Vieira spend the entire second round on her back in her last fight, despite not giving up an official takedown. This will also be the first five round fight of Vieira’s career and we saw her miss weight and lose the second and third rounds in her last fight after starting hot. Both of Tate’s career wins in five round fights came by submission in the 4th and 5th rounds respectively, so seeing Vieira tire late and Tate capitalize with a late submission would not be surprising at all. And Tate’s last four early wins have all come in the third round or later. So while it’s possible Vieira’s size and takedown defense will prove to be too much for Tate to handle when it comes to wrestling, we sort of like Tate’s chances to win with either a late submission or in a decision. We could see Vieira winning the first round or two and then begin to fade and for Tate to stage a comeback victory.
Our favorite bet here is “Tate R4, R5 or Decision” at +165 (FanDuel).
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DFS Implications:
This will be the seventh women’s main event in the past 17 months. We’ve seen an even split between favorites and underdogs win in those previous six fights, with half of the winners failing to score enough to crack the winning DraftKings lineup.
If we look back at Tate’s previous five five round fights, including the two prior to joining the UFC, her DraftKings scores were 89 (R4 Sub W), 11 (R1 Sub L), 24 (R3 Sub L), 80 (R5 Sub W) and 1 (R1 Sub L). So she’s gone 2-3 in five round fights with all five ending in submissions. However, the three losses notably came against Amanda Nunes and Rounda Rousey (twice), so it doesn't get much tougher than that. Potentially of greater significance than her record in those fights, she scored just 89 and 80 DraftKings points in her two wins, which both ended in late submissions. She only averages 2.13 SSL/min and has never landed more than 65 significant strikes in her last 18 fights, including when she was fighting for Strikeforce dating back to 2008. However, her striking did look slightly improved in her most recent fight where she set a career high with 65 significant strikes landed after previously never landing more than 58. Vieira has notably only been taken down once in her career and owns a 92% takedown defense. Overall this looks like a tough matchup for Tate to score well and she’s proven not once but twice that even with a late finish in the championship rounds of a fight she can still score poorly on DraftKings. In fact, the only time Tate has ever scored above 84 DraftKings points in the UFC (the 89 point score was in Strikeforce) came in her last fight where she scored 106 points as she set a career high in significant strikes and total strikes while matching her career best in takedowns landed since she joined the UFC. That performance came against 44-year-old Marion Reneau (50% career takedown defense), who had already announced her retirement and clearly had one foot out the door. So while Tate certainly appears to be a better DraftKings play compared to Fanduel based on her wrestling heavy fighting style, there are tons of ways for her to fail at returning value, even at her midrange price tag. It will be interesting to see where her ownership ends up after the line moved against her early in the week resulting in her being overpriced, but she was notably 30% owned on an 11 fight card, priced nearly identically at $8,200 in her recent three-round fight following nearly a 5 year layoff. The odds imply she has a 49% chance to win, a 19% chance to get a finish and a 6% chance it comes in R1.
Four of Vieira’s five UFC wins have ended in decisions, and even in her lone UFC finish that ended in a R2 submission win, she still scored just 89 DraftKings points. She averages just 2.66 SSL/min and is going against an opponent in Tate who averages just 2.68 SSA/min so we don’t expect to see a ton of significant strikes landed. Vieira has landed at least one takedown in six of her seven UFC fights and has averaged 42.59% control time in her last four matches. Also notable, Tate’s 52% takedown defense drops all the way down to 26% if we remove the 3 for 19 outlier performance by Rin Nakai in 2014, as Tate was grounded 14 times on 19 attempts in her other nine UFC fights. So that bodes well for Vieira’s chances of landing takedowns, however, Tate is primarily a wrestler despite her struggles to defend takedowns, and she has good scrambling ability on the mat. So seeing Vieira put on a one sided dominating grappling performance would be somewhat surprising, but she is notably a Judo and BJJ black belt and a former Brazilian national wrestling champion. It wouldn’t be surprising if the similar skill sets of these two ladies canceled each other out to some extent, as they both do their best work on the mat. That lowers the scoring potential for each of them and we could easily see this fight busting, but there’s still the potential for lots of takedowns and control time and each fighter is capable of submitting the other. This will also notably be Vieira’s first five round fight in her career and she missed weight by 2 lb for her last match, so we have some concerns with her cardio if this fight makes it to the back half. The odds imply Vieira has a 51% chance to win, a 25% chance to land a finish and a 8% chance it comes in R1.
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