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Fighter Notes:
Fight #11
Emily Ducote
4th UFC Fight (1-2)Looking to bounce back from two straight decision losses, Ducote has gone the distance in all three of her UFC fights, after landing back-to-back KO/TKO wins in Invicta title fights just before joining the organization. After easily winning a decision in her UFC debut against a one-dimensional grappler in Jessica Penne, where Ducote landed a ridiculous 51 leg strikes, she then got outclassed in a pair of high-volume striking battles against tough opponents in Angela Hill and Lupita Godinez.
Now 12-8 as a pro, Ducote has three wins by KO/TKO, four submissions, and five decision victories. All three of her KO/TKO wins occurred in the first two rounds over her last seven fights. Three of her four submission wins occurred in rounds two and three, with her only first round submission ending in a 2017 rear-naked choke. She’s never been knocked out, but was submitted once in the 5th round of a 2017 Bellator Flyweight title fight and has seven decision losses. Ducote followed that Bellator submission loss up with two more losses in Bellator at 125 lb, before leaving the organization and dropping back down to 115 lb in 2019, where she’s since gone 6-3. She started her career at 115 lb in 2015, but moved up to 125 lb in 2016 and four of her eight career losses came at 125 lb.
Overall, Ducote is a Taekwondo black belt and a patient counter striker. She wrestled in both high-school and college and is also a BJJ black belt who will look for armbars off her back. However, she hasn’t mixed in much offensive wrestling lately and has only taken down one of her last eight opponents, while not even attempting a takedown in five of those eight fights. In her three UFC fights, she attempted six takedowns, but failed to land any of them, while her opponents only got her down once on 11 attempts (90.9% defense). The winner in all three of her UFC fights has landed 116 or more significant strikes and she averages 6.64 SSL/min and 8.38 SSA/min, both the second most on this slate. Sitting on a 1-2 record, she’s likely fighting for her job here and she said she needs to, "Get the win by any means necessary."
Ashley Yoder
11th UFC Fight (3-7)Yoder hasn’t competed in 27 months and we assumed we had seen the last of her after she lost her last two and four of her last five fights. The UFC had other plans, and apparently resigned her a while back, before she underwent a pair of surgeries and then recently went on some reality show. All 10 of her UFC fights went the distance, with three of those decisions being split (1-2). Her last win was in late 2020 against a terrible Miranda Granger, who went 1-3 in the UFC. Her prior two UFC wins came against Syuri Kondo and Amanda Bobby Brundage, who respectively went 1-3 and 2-4 in the UFC. So we’ve yet to see Yoder defeat any legitimate competition and she failed to win a single round in either of her last two fights against Jinh Yu Frey and Angela Hill.
Now 8-8 as a pro, Yoder has four submission wins and four decision victories. All four of her submission wins came via armbar in her first six pro outings, with the first three ending in round one and the other in round two. Only one of those was against an opponent with a winning record. To Yoder’s credit, she’s never been finished and all eight of her career losses went the distance. However, she’s also never faced a powerful striker in her career who could really threaten to knock her out.
Overall, Yoder is a one-dimensional grappler and doesn’t offer much in the striking department. She just got done filming a reality show and her background is in cheerleading and lifeguarding. Her resume reads more like a Penthouse Forum than a qualification to compete at the UFC level. To her credit she is a BJJ black belt as well, but she’s never submitted anybody at the UFC level. She only averages 3.08 SSL/min and 3.76 SSA/min. Despite being a pure grappler, Yoder has failed to land more than two takedowns in any of her last eight fights, and looking at her entire 10-fight UFC career, she landed 12 of her 40 takedown attempts (30% accuracy), while her opponents got her down on 7 of their 23 attempts (69.6% defense). Yoder has recently been training with Angela Hill in San Diego, and seems to be floating around to different gyms opposed to having one consistent team around her. Yoder would not go into detail about either her recent surgeries or the reality show she went on, other than to say it will be airing soon. Perhaps her return to the UFC is just a PR stunt to get more eyes on the show, who knows. Either way, we were shocked to hear that the UFC had given the 35-year-old Yoder a new contract.
Fight Prediction:
Yoder will have a 5” height advantage and 6” reach advantage, while being six years older than the 29-year-old Ducote.
This is a similar matchup to the one Ducote had in her debut against Jessica Penne, another tall, one-dimensional grappler. Ducote dominated that fight and had no problem stuffing all of eight of Penne’s takedown attempts, while nearly finishing her with leg strikes. We expect this to go similarly and Yoder’s skinny lead leg will be there to get kicked. Ducote knows she needs to win at all costs, so she’ll likely fight smart and not get overly aggressive looking for a finish, especially since Yoder has never been put away. So the most likely outcome is that Ducote wins a decision. However, Yoder has been away from so long and she has the potential to look terrible and three of Ducote’s last five wins did end in KO/TKOs. Whether she catches Yoder with a head kick, locks up an armabar, or gets a rare leg kick TKO, there are multiple ways for Ducote to end this fight early. However, those are all lower percentage outcomes and we’ll say Yoder is able to survive to lose a decision to Ducote. Unfortunately, the oddsmakers agree and that line is unplayable so either stay away or take a stab on her ITD line.
Our favorite bet here is “Ducote ITD” at +330.
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DFS Implications:
Ducote has yet to score well in DFS and only put up 77 DraftKings points in her lone decision win. While she has the ability to put up big striking totals, she’s yet to land a takedown or a knockdown in the UFC and has just 11 seconds of control time following nine full rounds inside the Octagon. That leaves her reliant on landing a finish to score well, and at her high salary even if she does get a finish she could still get priced out of winning tournament lineups. Because of that, not many people will be willing to play her, as everyone will click on Terrance McKinney instead. That means Ducote will be a massive leverage play with tournament winning upside if she somehow outscores McKinney. Working in Ducote’s favor, Yoder is 35 years old, 3-7 in the UFC, hasn’t fought in 27 months, had two surgeries since she last competed, and just took part in a reality show. If that’s not something you’re willing to attack then we don’t know what is. Ducote is also fighting for her job here so we should see her leave it all out there. The odds imply Ducote has a 76% chance to win, a 22% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Yoder has averaged 86 DraftKings points in her three UFC wins, all of which went the distance. However, those all came in very favorable matchups against low-level opponents and Yoder hasn’t won a fight since 2020. She’s 35 years old, coming off multiple surgeries, and just filmed a reality show. She relies entirely on her grappling to win fights and has gone the distance in all 10 of her UFC matches. Her grappling-heavy style is a better fit for the scoring system on DraftKings compared to FanDuel, but now she’s going up against the 90% takedown defense of Emily Ducote, who has a wrestling background and is also a BJJ black belt. So this looks like a really tough spot for Yoder to find success and she’s littered with red flags. The only reason to consider playing her is that she has the potential to serve as a value play on DraftKings in a decision win and she’ll be low owned. The odds imply Yoder has a 24% chance to win, a 7% chance to land a finish, and a 3% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #10
Chris Gutierrez
11th UFC Fight (7-2-1)Gutierrez had been scheduled to fight Montel Jackson last week but Jackson pulled out and Gutierrez was rebooked against Alatengheili on this card.
Coming off his first loss since his 2018 UFC debut, Gutierrez recently lost a decision to longtime UFC veteran and fellow calf kicker Pedro Munhoz. Prior to that, Gutierrez landed a walk off flying knee R1 KO against the corpse of Frankie Edgar, after knocking out Batgerel Danaa in the second round just before that. After getting submitted in the second round of his 2018 UFC debut against a really tough Raoni Barcelos, Gutierrez went 7-0-1 in his next eight fights, leading up to his recent loss to Munhoz. Six of his 10 UFC fights went the distance 4-1-1, while he also landed a second round TKO via leg kicks against Vince Morales in 2020.
Now 19-5-2 as a pro, Gutierrez has nine wins by KO/TKO, one submission, and nine decision victories. He’s never been knocked out, but has been submitted once to go along with four decision losses. Seven of his nine KO/TKO wins occurred in the later rounds, and he tends to wear on his opponents as fights go on, largely by chipping away at their legs.
Overall, Gutierrez is a one-dimensional striker who’s known for his violent leg kicks, but will also mix in knees and spinning elbows. He doesn’t offer much in terms of grappling and in his 10 UFC fights he only landed three takedowns on eight attempts (37.5% accuracy). However, his takedown defense has been pretty solid and he’s only given up nine takedowns on 35 opponent attempts (74.3% defense). For a guy that’s rarely looking to grapple, he doesn’t land a ton of striking volume, averaging 4.75 SSL/min and 2.76 SSA/min, and has only once landed more than 77 significant strikes in a UFC fight. He has really good footwork, and does a great job of being elusive, as he’s a tough guy to track down.
Heili Alatengheili
7th UFC Fight (4-1-1)Alatengheili had originally been preparing to fight Rani Yahya on this card, but Yahya dropped out on September 20th and then this matchup was put together on October second after Gutierrez lost his opponent last week.
Thirteen months removed from a low-volume decision win over Chad Anheliger, Alatengheili showcased his striking early in that match and had Anheliger hurt in the first round, but was unable to get him out of there and instead cruised to a unanimous 30-27 decision win. Prior to that, Alatengheili notched his first early win in the UFC when he knocked out a terrible Kevin Croom in just 47 seconds, after fighting to four straight decisions (2-1-1) in his first four UFC fights.
Now 16-8-2 as a pro, Alatengheili has five KO/TKOs, three submissions, and eight decision wins. He’s been knocked out three times, submitted once, and has four decision defeats. Two of his knockout losses occurred early in his career back in 2014, in his 4th and 6th fights, with the other coming in 2017. His lone submission loss came in a first round armbar in 2015. Alatengheili’s last 15 fights all ended in either knockouts (4-1) or decisions (7-1-2).
Overall, Alatengheili is a well-rounded fighter with a wrestling background,but is often content with keeping things on the feet, especially early on in fights. He’s not a high-volume striker by any means and only averages 2.94 SSL/min. He typically throws one, sometimes two punches at a time and rarely strings together long combinations. He does have decent power, but he’s far from an elite striker and absorbs more strikes than he lands, as he averages 4.58 SSA/min. After going 7 for 20 on takedowns in his first two UFC matches, he’s only landed two takedowns on just three attempts in his last four matches.
Fight Prediction:
Gutierrez will have a 4” height advantage and 1” reach advantage.
While Alatengheili has looked pretty good in his last couple of fights, this will be a tough matchup for him, as Gutierrez likes to keep things at kicking range and chip away at his opponents’ legs from the outside. Alatengheili has a shorter reach and will likely struggle to find his range to counter those attacks. And while it would make sense for Alatengheili to look to wrestle, he only has three total takedown attempts in his last four fights and Gutierrez has a solid 74% takedown defense. So this looks like a pretty good spot for Gutierrez to get back on track, although we don’t expect him to take too many risks as he’s coming off a loss and generally plays things pretty safe. So while Alatengheili has been knocked out three times in his career, unless Gutierrez lands another leg kick TKO, we don’t see a finish here. We expect Gutierrez to win a tactical low-volume decision where he relies mostly on his kicking game to compromise the lead leg of Alatengheili.
Our favorite bet here is “Chris Gutierrez R2 or R3 KO” at +900.
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DFS Implications:
Gutierrez is generally not a guy we’re excited about playing in DFS as he doesn’t add much in terms of grappling (0.4 TDL/15 min) or land a ton of striking volume (4.75 SSL/min). He only averaged 68 DraftKings points in his four decision wins, failing to top 75 points in any of those. And while he does have a few knockout wins in the UFC, one of those was against a half retired Frankie Edgar, another was from a perfectly placed spinning backfist, and the third came via leg strikes against Vince Morales, who has habitually struggled in that area. So Gutierrez has previously required either dream matchups or miracle shots to find finishes, and he more often fights to low-volume decisions. He’s coming off a loss now and it won’t be surprising if he comes in with a more conservative game plan and scores 70-75 DraftKings points in a decision win. And while Alatengheili has been knocked out three times before, those were all much earlier in his career, with the last of those occurring six and half years ago. We do expect Gutierrez to beat up the lead leg of Alatengheili, so a leg kick TKO isn’t impossible, but those are very rare and tough to rely on. Gutierrez will need a hail mary knockout to be useful here and at his high salary, we could still see him get priced out of winning lineups with a later round finish. The only reason you should really consider playing him is his lower ownership and pretty safe scoring floor. The odds imply Gutierrez has a 72% chance to win, a 19% chance to land a finish, and a 9% chance it comes in round one.
Alatengheili has averaged 86 DraftKings points in his four UFC wins and only really scored well in his lone UFC finish, when he knocked out a terrible Kevin Croom in just 47 seconds and was awarded the Quick Win Bonus to score 129 points. He failed to top 80 points in any of his three decision wins, and while he has a wrestling background, he only attempted three takedowns in his last four fights. And even if Alatengheili does look to wrestle here, Gutierrez has a solid 74% takedown defense and really good footwork/movement. That will make it tough for Alatengheili to track him down and Gutierrez has also never been knocked out. So overall this looks like a pretty terrible matchup for Alatengheili, but if he surprises us and finds a bunch of wrestling success, he could serve as a value play at his cheap price tag, even if he doesn’t put up a huge score. The odds imply Alatengheili has a 28% chance to win, a 15% chance to land a finish, and a 7% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #9
Melissa Dixon
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making her UFC debut with a full camp to prepare, Dixon is 11 months removed from a R1 ground and pound TKO win with Ares FC. She had been scheduled to fight again in April, but the match was canceled after she missed weight trying to make 135 lb. She was getting pieced up on the feet in that last fight before she was able to get it to the mat and force a stoppage in the final second of the first round. Prior to that, she won a pair of decisions, with the most recent of those coming in a very slow paced match at 145 lb against a judo specialist.
Now 5-0 as a pro, Dixon has three first round KO/TKO wins and two decision victories. The first two finishes of her career came in her first two pro fights against opponents who entered with records of just 1-1 and 0-0. Dixon had one fight at 145 lb, but the rest of her career has been at 135 lb. Dixon notably lost all four of the decisions she went to as an amateur.
Overall, Dixon was painfully patient in her last decision win, but then did get forced into a more uptempo scrap in her last match, although she was getting the worst of that early on and we would have been more interested to see her opponent get a shot in the UFC. Dixon did show the ability to land heavy ground and pound in that match, but has otherwise been largely unimpressive. Dixon’s a BJJ brown belt, but has never submitted anybody and her striking hasn’t looked great. Despite already being 32 years old, she only turned pro in June 2021 and doesn’t have much experience as she got a late start in MMA. Hailing from England, she says her background is in breakdancing, so she doesn’t have a traditional martial arts background and still seems pretty green when it comes to combat sports. Considering her last fight got canceled when she missed weight, she’ll be someone to keep an eye on during weigh-ins.
Irina Alekseeva
2nd UFC Fight (0-1)Alekseeva is coming off a first round kneebar submission win in her recent UFC debut against a solid grappler in Stephanie Egger, in a fight where Alekseeva missed weight by 4 lb trying to make 135 lb. That’s Alekseeva’s only fight in the last two years and only her second match since 2019. Her second most recent fight was with Bellator in October 2021 and Alekseeva won a decision in a 130 lb Catchweight match. Prior to that, Alekseevalost a decision in a 2019 match where she was trying to cut all the way down to 125 lb, after competing at 145 lb for her first three pro fights (3-0), two of which ended in the first round.
Now 5-1 as a pro, Alekseeva has one win by TKO, two submissions, and two decision victories. Her lone TKO win came in the first round of her 2019 pro debut against an opponent who had never fought professionally before and finished her career 0-2. Both of Alekseeva’s submission wins also occurred in the first round, with the first of those coming in an armbar against a 5-5 opponent who came in on a four fight losing streak and then never fought again after suffering her fifth straight loss, and the other in Alekseeva’s recent UFC debut. Alekseeva’s first decision win occurred against an opponent who came in 0-2 and is now 1-3-1, while her most recent decision win was in her lone Bellator fight against an opponent who has now gone 3-4 in her last seven fights. So most of her wins have come against a lower level of competition, although to her credit she did submit Egger. Alekseeva missed weight by 4 lb for that Bellator fight, as she tried to make 125 lb for the second time in her career and then missed weight by 4 lb again in her last fight as she tried to make 135 lb. Whether she’s trying to game the system or is just terrible at cutting weight remains to be seen but she’s someone to keep an eye on during weigh-ins.
Overall, Alekseeva is a three-time sambo world champion and is often looking to get fights to the mat, but is also content with standing and trading for periods of time. She’s got decent grappling and will aggressively look to grab the limbs of her opponents, whether it be to go for kneebars or armbars. She started out in Judo as a kid, before adding striking to her arsenal. While she fights sort of mean and is willing to take chances, she’s kind of a lethargic striker who lacks movement and absorbs a ton of leg strikes as she’s just there to be hit and doesn’t really move in and out of space well. However, her UFC debut ended so quickly and she’s been so inactive in recent years, that perhaps she’s made changes to her game that we’ve yet to see.
Fight Prediction:
Alekseeva will have a 1” height advantage, but Dixon will have a 1” reach advantage.
Both of these two have struggled to make weight, so hopefully this fight actually happens. Neither one of them has a ton of experience, as Alekseeva only has six fights under her belt and Dixon only has five. They’re both still very green and have a lot of holes in their games. However, Alekseeva looks like the more aggressive fighter both on the feet and the mat. DIxon hasn’t done anything to impress us and can be content with a much slower paced fight where she doesn’t throw many strikes. Her defensive wrestling has looked decent, but she hasn’t shown much in the way of grappling to this point. While Alekseeva is there to be hit on the feet, Dixon is less likely than most to capitalize on that and we think Alekseeva’s aggressiveness wins her this fight. However, it’s hard to trust either one of them and since they’ve each struggled to make weight, a terrible performance resulting from a bad weight cut is possible for either of them. They both have three first round finishes on their records, with the rest of their fights going the distance. Alekseeva looks capable of finishing Dixon with a submission, and they’ve both looked hittable enough that a TKO stoppage is also in play. However, it’s more likely that this ends in a decision and we’re taking the underdog in Alekseeva.
Our favorite bet here is “Irina Alekseeva ML” at +125.
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DFS Implications:
Dixon’s lack of striking volume is concerning for DFS and she can be far too content standing and staring at her opponents. However, she is coming off a first round ground and pound TKO win, showing that if she gets opponents down she does have some upside. However, we haven’t been overly impressed by her wrestling or her striking and she only turned pro two years ago. She seems very green and is probably being brought into the UFC too early, although at 32 years old she doesn’t exactly have a ton of time to develop. Maybe she’ll surprise us and show that she’s made some improvements over the last 11 months since she last fought, but until she does, we’re not going to be very excited about playing her. The odds imply Dixon has a 56% chance to win, a 28% chance to land a finish, and a 14% chance it comes in round one.
Alekseeva is an aggressive fighter who will attack opponents with a combination of striking and grappling. However, she’s there to be hit on the feet and lacks much movement, as she’s way too content with simply eating shots, especially leg kicks. She’s often looking to take opponents down and has a background in judo and sambo, and impressively submitted a pretty solid Judo black belt in her recent UFC debut against Stephanie Egger, scoring 97 DraftKings points in the process. She’ll face a less experienced opponent here, but the oddsmakers still aren’t giving her much respect, as she enters as an underdog once again. She results in her being a cheap option in DFS and raises her chances of serving as a value play even if she can’t put up a big score. However, with just one fight in the last two years and only two since 2019, there are still a lot of unanswered questions surrounding Alekseeva, so it’s hard to fully trust her. However, the same can be said about her opponent here, so this match does come with some inherent volatility. The odds imply Alekseeva has a 44% chance to win, a 21% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #8
Terrance McKinney
8th UFC Fight (4-3)McKinney had been set to face Chris Duncan here, but he pulled out due to visa issues and Marotte was announced as the replacement on October 8th.
After losing his first two fights in 2023, McKinney finally got back on track when he stepped in on short notice and landed an 85 second first round knockout against Mike Breeden just nine weeks ago in early August. That came just four weeks after McKinney got submitted in the second round by Nazim Sadykhov, after getting knocked out in the second round by Ismael Bonfim. That loss to Bonfim is McKinney's longest UFC fight and it still didn’t quite make it to the midway point of round two. Prior to those two second round losses, McKinney’s first four UFC fights all ended in under three and a half minutes, with him winning three of those and getting finished by Drew Dober in the other. And McKinney’s last four fights before he joined the UFC also all ended in the first round (3-1), all in 72 seconds or less, after he got finished by Sean Woodson in the second round of a DWCS match back in 2019.
Now 14-6 as a pro, McKinney has still never been to the judges and only one of his 20 pro fights even made it past the midway mark of round two, which was a 2018 submission win 43 seconds into round three in McKinney’s fourth pro fight. He has six wins by KO/TKO and eight submissions. He’s also been knocked out four times and has two submission losses. Sixteen of his 20 pro fights ended in round one (13-3), three ended in round two (0-3), and one ended in round three (1-0). Amazingly, seven of those first round finishes ended in the opening minute (5-2), and his last 10 and 13 of his 14 career wins came in under three minutes. McKinney turned pro in 2017 and started off at 145 lb before moving up to 155 lb. He went back and forth between the two weight classes early in his career and even fought as high as 170 lb once, but it appears he’s settled in at 155 lb.
Overall, McKinney is an explosive striker with dynamite in his hands and sugar in his gas tank. He’s also a former college wrestler and is dangerous both on the feet and the mat, but tends to slow down quickly after the first three minutes. His two biggest weaknesses are his cardio and striking defense, both of which he’s been able to mask in all of his early wins, but have come to light in his losses. He tried slowing things down some in his two losses earlier this year, but that just exposed his flaws and we saw him get back to aggressively hunting for a quick finish in his last match. Following his loss to Bonfim, McKinney moved from Spokane, Washington down to Texas and is now training with Kevin Holland and a new team. He said he made a lot of improvements to his striking since making the move, and did look crisp on the feet in his last match. However, it seems pretty clear that McKinney is who is—an aggressive finisher who can quickly put away low-level opponents but will struggle whenever he faces a step up in competition. This will be the third time McKinney has fought in the last three months, so we’ll see if that level of activity ever catches up with him. The UFC is giving him another teed up matchup here, so we’re not especially concerned at the moment.
Brendon Marotte
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making his short notice UFC debut on a week’s notice, Marotte is just seven weeks removed from a first round submission win on the New England regional scene, but has only fought twice since January 2020. His last two wins both ended early, after he fought to three straight decisions before that (2-1). The last of those decisions was split and he easily could have seen that go the other way, as he was getting pieced up in the fight. He also lost a decision just before that and overall hasn’t been especially impressive.
Now 8-1 as a pro, Marotte has five wins by TKO, one submission, and two decision victories. Four of his six finishes ended in round one, with the other two coming in round two. His only career loss came in a 2019 decision and he’s yet to be finished. However, he’s also been facing a very low level of competition and his last win came in a 155 lb fight against an 11-20 opponent who had recently been fighting at 135 lb and 145 lb. Marotte’s first four career wins came against opponents with a combined 0-2 pro record and he only has two wins against fighters with winning records. Marotte has competed at both 145 and 155 lb, but says his future in the UFC will be at 145 lb. However, his upcoming debut will be at 155 lb.
Overall, Marotte is a raw, aggressive fighter who has a ton of holes in his game and doesn’t look at all prepared to fight in the UFC. He’ll look for takedowns, but he’s a sloppy grappler who gets over eager hunting for submissions and forgets to secure positions first. We’ve seen him look for rear-naked chokes with no hooks in, only to lose the position. And while he’s aggressive on the feet, he’s also looked incredibly hittable and has a terrible striking defense. It’s pretty clear that the UFC just needed a body to fill a slot and he was in the right place at the right time to step in on a week’s notice.
Fight Prediction:
McKinney will have a 1” height advantage and 3” reach advantage.
It’s pretty obvious what’s going on here. The UFC needed to fill a slot after Duncan dropped out and brought in a low-level fighter to help build McKinney back up after he suffered two losses against more legitimate competition earlier this year. Marotte is the perfect opponent for McKinney to style on and in no way should this be a competitive fight. We’ve seen Marotte get beat up by low-level opponents on the New England regional scene and it’s highly unlikely that Marotte will be able to survive long enough for McKinney to gas out. This is the easiest matchup McKinney has gotten since entering the UFC and we fully expect Marotte to drop back down to 145 lb after getting finished in the first round in this 155 lb bout. The only question we have is whether McKinney knocks him out or submits him and both options are squarely in play. McKinney’s four UFC wins have been split evenly between first round submissions and knockouts and if Marotte’s neck presents itself before he gets knocked out, McKinney will gladly lock in a rear-naked choke. The knockout is probably slightly more likely just based on how hittable Marotte has been, but it’s close to a coinflip and if McKinney wants to he could easily just take Marotte down and submit him. Either way, McKinney will land a first round finish here and it likely comes in under half a round.
Our favorite bet here is “Terrance McKinney R1 SUB” at +220.
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DFS Implications:
McKinney has averaged 108 DraftKings points in his four UFC wins, all of which ended in the first round. However, after scoring 127 points in his UFC debut with the help of the Quick Win Bonus, he failed to top 105 points in any of his last three finishes. That can largely be attributed to the fact that he didn’t land any knockdowns in those fights, while also failing to notch a takedown in two of them. His most recent finish came in a standing TKO, but you have to imagine we’ll soon see some scoring regression in his first round finishes and he’s due for massive score in the very near future. This looks like a dream spot for him as he takes on a low-level opponent who’s stepping in on short notice up a weight class. McKinney should be able to do whatever he wants in this matchup and while there are always concerns with him gassing out, we don’t see this fight lasting long enough for that to happen. The one major downside with McKinney in DFS is that he’s always incredibly popular, which generally makes it tempting to fade him to gain leverage on the field in tournaments. However, this doesn’t look like the spot where you want to do that, as this will be the worst opponent he’s faced in the UFC. Barring a freak injury or a miracle knockout shot from Marotte, McKinney should land a first round finish and put up a big score. However, as the most expensive fighter on the card, he’ll still need to outscore all of the other high priced options, which honestly doesn’t look very hard to do when you see his scoring competition. Just keep in mind, it will be harder to create unique lineups that include McKinney in large-field tournaments, so make sure you get different with the rest of your lineup unless you want the top prize to turn into a Groupon special. The odds imply McKinney has an 82% chance to win, a 73% chance to land a finish, and a 53% chance it comes in round one.
Marotte is being sacrificed to the MMA gods in this spot as he steps in on short notice and up a weight class. Yes he has been competing at 155 lb recently, but most of his career has been at 145 lb and 150 lb Catchweights and he’s said himself that his future is at 145 lb. He’s an aggressive fighter who has shown finishing ability, but his striking defense is terrible and he’s only found success against low-level opponents on the New England regional scene. Perhaps he can clean some things up and develop into a decent fighter in the future, and he’s still just 26 years old, but this is not the spot for him. We get that McKinney death gasses after a few minutes, but Marotte is highly unlikely to last that long. Nevertheless, we can’t completely hate on anyone looking to gain massive leverage on the field by taking a couple of stabs at him and hoping for a miracle, just realize you’re lighting money on fire and this guy is walking into his own funeral. The odds imply Marotte has an 18% chance to win, a 13% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #7
Tainara Lisboa
2nd UFC Fight (1-0)Lisboa was originally set to face UFC newcomer Darya Zheleznyakova here, but Zheleznyakova dropped out and Oliveira was announced as the replacement just over 4 weeks out.
Lisboa is coming off a third round submission win in her recent UFC debut against Jessica-Rose Clark, who was submitted in her last three fights. Lisboa was able to land the more damaging shots in that low-volume fight, as Clark was forced to try and grapple, but only landed one of her seven takedown attempts. And then it was Lisboa who scrambled her way to the back of Clark late in the fight to lock up a rear-naked choke with only one hook in, although she was 40 seconds away from winning a decision anyways. That was Lisboa’s fourth straight early win and she’s yet to require the judges in any of her six pro wins. However, while her 100% finishing rate looks impressive on paper, you have to pay attention to who those wins came against. Her pre-UFC wins came against opponents entered with nonexistent records of 1-4, 0-1, 0-0, 0-0, and 0-0, and not a single one of them ever fought again. The only two times she has ever faced an opponent with a winning record was when she took on a 2-1 Lorrany Santos and lost a decision in 2020 and then in her recent UFC debut against Jessica-Rose Clark, who came in 11-8. Lisboa also has a first round submission loss to Norma Dumont on her record, with both of them making their pro debuts in that 2016 match. Following the loss, Lisboa didn’t fight again for three years after undergoing knee surgery. She returned in 2019 and has since gone 6-1, with all six wins coming early and the one loss going the distance.
Now 6-2 as a pro, Lisboa has three wins by TKO and three by submission. While her last two finishes came in the later rounds, her three before that all ended in round one, after the first early win of her career came in round three. Lisboa lost the only decision she’s ever been to and the only time she’s been finished was in her 2016 pro debut in a first round submission against Norma Dumont. Following that loss at 135 lb to Dumont, Lisboa spent three years away from fighting before returning in 2019 at 145 lb. Her next four fights were all at 145 lb (3-1), before she had a 139 lb Catchweight fight on her way back down to 135 lb for her last two matches.
Overall, Lisboa has a background in Muay Thai, but has been finding most of her finishes on the mat through either ground and pound or submissions. In her recent UFC debut, Lisboa landed 1 of her 2 takedown attemptions (50% accuracy), while Clark took her down on 1 of her 7 attempts (85.7% defense). Despite only having eight pro fights under her belt, she’s already 32 years old and got a late start in her UFC career. However, she does have Muay Thai experience prior to transitioning to MMA and actually competed against Valentina Shevchenko all the way back in 2010. While it’s hard to fully evaluate Lisboa based on the low level of competition she’s faced in her MMA fights, she’s got decent power and will look to take opponents down and finish them on the mat. While she’s found success with that approach in the past, it remains to be seen if she can continue that success once she starts facing a more legitimate level of competition. However, the UFC doesn’t appear to be in a rush to really test her as they’re matching her up with a newcomer here.
Ravena Oliveira
1st UFC Fight (0-0)Making her UFC debut with about a month to prepare, Oliveira is two months removed from a third round ground and pound TKO win, which was her seventh straight finish after she started her pro career off with a draw and a loss in 2017. She spent a lot of time pushing her opponent up against the cage in that match, but was able to land three takedowns and eventually finish the fight on the mat. Amazingly, that was the first opponent Oliveira had ever faced with a winning record and even more amazingly just the second that that even a single pro win. Oliveira’s eight opponents entered with records of 8-5, 0-0, 0-0, 0-0, 1-1, 0-1, 0-0, 0-0, and 0-1. So she’s been fighting an unbelievably low level of competition.
Now 7-1 as a pro, Oliveira has six wins by KO/TKO and one submission victory. The only decision she’s ever been to was in her 2017 pro debut, which ended in a majority draw, which she followed up with the only loss of her career in a first round submission. Oliveira has bounced between 125 lb and 135 lb throughout her career, but has competed more at 125 lb and that’s probably where she belongs. However, she’ll be making her UFC debut up at 135 lb, after competing at 125 lb just two months ago.
Overall, Oliveira looks somewhat well rounded, as she’s a decent striker and a BJJ brown belt who mixes in a good amount of takedown attempts. She’s typically looking for ground and pound on the mat, and only has one career submission. She spends a little too much time pushing opponents up against the cage for our liking and her wrestling/grappling doesn’t stand out as being exceptional. And considering how unproven she is, it’s hard to know how she’ll hold up at the UFC level. We expect her to drop back down to 125 lb for her second UFC fight and she’ll probably struggle with the physicality of opponents at 135 lb in the UFC.
Fight Prediction:
Lisboa will have a 2” height and reach advantage and is six years older than the 26-year-old Oliveira.
These two are similar in many ways, as they’re both Brazilian strikers who like to get fights to the mat and look for ground and pound. They each have eight pro fights on their resumes and a 100% finishing rate, but their records are extremely padded, which makes it hard to truly evaluate them based on their regional tape. Oliveira is the smaller fighter who has fought at both 125 and 135 lb, while Lisboa has competed at 135 lb and 145 lb. So while Oliveira likes to bully her opponents, push them up against the cage, take them down, and finish them with ground and pound, she’ll likely have a tougher time executing that game plan against the larger fighter in Lisboa. If Oliveira tries to go that route, she may find herself getting reversed and put on her back where Lisboa will be looking to finish her with either ground and pound or a submission. And if the fight stays standing, Lisboa should have the power advantage as the large fighter. So overall this looks like a tough matchup for Oliveira, although both of these two are unproven, which does add some volatility into the mix. While neither one of these two have blown us away, Lisboa is the rightful favorite and should win the fight. The main question we have is whether or not she can find a finish. It’s certainly possible, but it’s more likely she wins a decision here.
Our favorite bet here is “Lisboa/Oliveira FGTD” at +138.
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DFS Implications:
Lisboa is coming off a third round submission win in her UFC debut that was only good for 82 DraftKings points, as she spent half the fight getting controlled and failed to make much of an impact on the stat sheet. And while she was able to complete a submission in the final minute of the fight, keep in mind that it came against Jessica-Rose Clark, who’s been submitted in three straight fights. Nevertheless, Lisboa gets another favorable matchup here against a UFC newcomer with a padded record, who’s fighting up a weight class. Both of these fighters are largely unproven, which makes it a more volatile matchup, but that doesn’t detract from the scoring upside. While Lisboa has a Muay Thai background, she likes to take opponents down and finish them on the mat. And if she can successfully execute that gameplan she has a ton of scoring upside. However, Oliveira likes to push opponents up against the cage, and we saw Lisboa get controlled for half the fight in her recent UFC debut, so it’s also possible this turns into a boring clinch stalemate along the outside of the Octagon. That leaves a wide range of potential scoring outcomes and with two unproven fighters, it’s hard to predict exactly how this one plays out. At her expensive price tag, Lisboa should end up relatively low owned, which adds to her tournament appeal. The odds imply Lisboa has a 74% chance to win, a 46% chance to land a finish, and a 24% chance it comes in round one.
Oliveira has spent her entire career beating up on opponents with little to no experience and has mostly been competing at 125 lb, but will be making her UFC debut at 135 lb. She’s got okay striking and will look to take opponents down and finish them with ground and pound, which when successfully executed would score well in DFS. However, she spends a lot of time holding opponents up against the fence and her wrestling hasn’t looked all that great. She’ll be going up against a larger opponent here and Oliveira will likely have a tougher time exerting her will in this matchup. However, neither of these two have been overly impressive and they both lack experience, so the potential for one of them to look terrible and the other to capitalize on that is certainly there. With that said, Oliveira seems undersized for this matchup, which leaves us less excited about playing her. However, at her cheap price tag, if she can hold Lisboa up against the fence and land a bunch of clinch strikes, it’s still possible she could serve as a value play even in a decision win. The odds imply Oliveira has a 26% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish, and a 6% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #6
TJ Brown
8th UFC Fight (3-4)Looking to bounce back from a second round submission loss to a decision machine in Bill Algeo, Brown has lost two of his last three fights and is fortunate even to be 3-4 in the UFC. After losing his first two fights with the organization in 2020, Brown won a questionable split decision over Kai Kamaka, that easily could have gone the other way. Brown then won another decision over a terrible Charles Rosa, who stepped in on short notice, before losing a decision to Nuerdanbieke Shayilan. Brown bounced back with a third round submission win over a debuting Erik Silva, leading up to his loss to Algeo. So his three UFC wins came in a controversial split decision against an opponent who used to fight down at 135 lb, a decision over a short notice replacement, and a third round submission over a debuting opponent.
Now 17-10 as a pro, Brown has four wins by KO/TKO, 10 submissions, and three decision victories. He’s been knocked out three times, submitted four more, and has three decision losses. While he’s only been to six decisions in 27 pro fights, four of his last six matches went the distance, and his last eight fights all made it to the second round, with six seeing round three. Brown fought mostly at 155 lb early in his career before dropping down to 145 lb in 2017.
Overall, Brown is a BJJ black belt and loves looking for arm-triangle chokes, with seven of his 10 submissions ending in that method. He grew up training with Bryce Mitchell and relies heavily on his wrestling, but is also a somewhat dangerous striker. He’s an offensively minded fighter and has been prone to getting both submitted and knocked out. After starting 0-2 in the UFC, Brown moved his camp to Glory MMA and Fitness with James Krause and showed some improvements after the move, but was then forced to find a new home when Glory got shut down. Brown spent some time training down in Mexico after that but has mostly stayed at home in Arkansas at a smaller gym. Between his seven UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, Brown landed 24 of his 43 takedown attempts (55.8% accuracy), while his opponents got him down on 14 of their 22 attempts (36.4% defense). With so much wrestling in his fights, we never see big striking totals and he only averages 3.63 SSL/min and 3.14 SSA/min. The only time Brown has lost a UFC fight after landing more than one takedown was in his UFC debut when he got submitted in the third round of a fight he was dominating. In a recent interview, Brown talked about how he’s struggled with alcohol abuse but has now been sober for the past four or five months. We’ll see if that makes any noticeable difference in how he looks on Saturday as he fights out his contract and tries to make his case for why the UFC should resign him.
Darren Elkins
28th UFC Fight (17-10)Now 39 years old, Elkins is 10 months removed from a lopsided decision loss to a really tough Jonathan Pearce. Elkins said he tore his meniscus and MCL early in the fight and fractured his fibula later in the match, but once again showed his toughness as he gutted it out for 15 minutes in a fight where he took a beating and had plenty of opportunities to quit. Prior to that, Elkins was the one who dominated for three rounds in a wrestling-heavy decision win over Tristan Connelly, who hasn’t won a fight since 2019 and got cut following the loss to Elkins. Just before that win, Elkins got knocked out in the first round by Cub Swanson, which was only Elkins’ second early loss since 2013. Elkins landed two finishes of his own leading up to that loss, with a third round submission over a terrible Luiz Eduardo Garagorri and a second round TKO against the infamous Darrick Minner. Elkins lost four straight fights leading up to that pair of wins and is just 3-6 in his last nine outings.
Now 27-11 as a pro, Elkins has nine wins by KO/TKO, five submissions, and 13 decision victories. He’s been knocked out four times, submitted once, and has five decision defeats. He had a couple of fights up at 155 lb earlier in his career, but has competed at 145 lb since 2011.
Overall, Elkins is a brawling uptempo wrestler who weaponizes his cardio and toughness to put a pace on his opponents to try and drown them in deep waters. He’s a BJJ brown belt and former college wrestler and in his last 10 fights he landed 21 of his 69 takedown attempts (30.4% accuracy), while his opponents got him down on 9 of their 27 attempts (66.7% defense). He has double digit takedown attempts in three of his last six fights, landing more or more in his last two wins to make it past the second round. While Elkins is pushing 40, he still has the cardio to outlast opponents and his style is especially effective against opponents with suspect cardio.
Fight Prediction:
Elkins will have a 1” height advantage, but Brown will have a 1” reach advantage and is six years younger than the 39-year-old Elkins.
Elkins is coming off knee surgery and will turn 40 next May, which is obviously concerning. However, he’s still won three of his last five fights and has the ability to melt opponents with his pace, while absorbing an obscene amount of damage. While there’s no way of knowing how Elkins will look following knee surgery, if he can regain his past form then this looks like a good stylistic matchup for him. Brown has just a 36% takedown defense, has shown a suspect gas tank at times in the past, and has been prone to getting finished. Elkins would have eaten his lunch a year or two ago, it’s just a matter of whether or not we’ll see the same Elkins now. It’s entirely possible he’s gone off a cliff at this stage in his career and his last fight was not pretty. Just keep in mind he said he tore his knee up on his first takedown attempt in that fight and it was against a much tougher opponent than Brown. While it’s hard to trust an aging fighter with a ton of mileage who’s coming off knee surgery, if he can simply survive the first round and a half we’ll likely see Brown begin to slow down from the pressure of Elkins, at which point Elkins can take over and either find a late finish or grind out a wrestling-heavy decision win. Brown did recently say he quit drinking and will be fighting for his job, so maybe a better version of him shows up, but he’s just 2-2 as a favorite in the UFC and historically finds ways to lose. So we’ll take the dog shot on Elkins here and say he either locks up a late submission or grinds out a decision win.
Our favorite bet here is “Darren Elkins ML” at +165.
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DFS Implications:
Brown has averaged 99 DraftKings points in his three UFC wins, despite two of those going the distance. His wrestling-heavy approach will typically score better on DraftKings than FanDuel, but he’s shown the ability to score well on both sites as he does a good job of filling up the stat sheet. However, he’s far from a safe play and loses more often than he wins. He’s been very prone to getting finished and 7 of his 10 career losses came early. He’s got a low fight IQ, a questionable gas tank, a dubious chin, and poor submission defense, despite allegedly being a BJJ black belt. That makes it impossible to trust him, but when he can overcome all of those deficiencies, he’s shown the ability to push a pace and rack up takedowns. Now he’s facing a 39-year-old veteran in Elkins who’s coming off knee surgery and also likes to push a high wrestling pace so this fight should be highly conducive to DFS production. Both guys are littered with red flags, but whoever wins should score well. Brown will be fighting for his job here and recently said it’s the final fight on his contract. He also talked about how he had been drinking too much but has now been sober for several months, so it’s possible we see an improved version of him. The odds imply Brown has a 61% chance to win, a 32% chance to land a finish, and a 16% chance it comes in round one.
Elkins is now 39 years old, has gone just 3-6 in his last nine fights, and is coming off a torn meniscus and MCL. While he’s the poster child for CTE, he wears it like a badge of honor and will never quit inside the Octagon. He said he tore his knee up immediately in his last fight, and still endured a 15 minute beating to make it to the judges. He averaged 103 DraftKings points in his 17 UFC wins, and scored 117 or more in all of his last three victories. His wrestling-heavy style is a better fit for the DraftKings scoring system compared to FanDuel’s, but he’s shown the ability to score well on both sites and his last decision victory was good for 117 DraftKings points and 100 points on FanDuel. While it’s hard to know how much Elkins has left in the tank at this stage in his career, this is a great stylistic matchup for him as Brown has just a 36% takedown defense and has been prone to gassing out and getting submitted. Just keep in mind, it’s entirely possible that Elkins has gone off a cliff at this stage in his career and we don’t know how he’ll look after knee surgery and 10 months away. That leaves this as a volatile matchup with a ton of upside and whoever wins will have a really good shot at ending up in tournament winning lineups. The odds imply Elkins has a 39% chance to win, a 21% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #5
Christian Rodriguez
4th UFC Fight (2-1)Rodriguez is coming off a decision win over the previously undefeated Raul Rosas Jr., where Rodriguez was able to endure the initial blitz of Rosas in round one and then take over in the later rounds as Rosas slowed down. Prior to that, Rodriguez landed a first round submission against a low-level debuting opponent in Joshua Weems, who was stepping in on short notice. Just before that, Rodriguez made his own short notice UFC debut up a weight class against a really tough/huge wrestler in Jonathan Pearce. While Rodriguez lost a decision in that fight, he gave a good account of himself and nearly locked up a submission at multiple points. Rodriguez originally tried to crack the UFC through DWCS, but wasn’t awarded a contract following an October 2021 decision win over Tracy Cortez’s older brother, Reyes Cortez Jr. Following the DWCS victory, Rodriguez returned to the regional scene for one fight, but after landing a first round submission win the UFC brought him on when they needed someone to fill a slot on short notice.
Now 9-1 as a pro, Rodriguez has three wins by TKO, four submissions, and two decision victories. He has five first round finishes, although three of those occurred in his first three pro fights. He also has a second round submission win and a third round TKO. Three of his last four finishes have come by submission and all three of his TKO victories occurred in his first five pro fights. He’s never been finished himself and his only career loss came by decision in his short notice UFC debut up a weight class. Rodriguez has fought anywhere between 135 lb and 150 lb in his career. He’s 5-0 at 135 lb, 2-0 at 140 lb Catchweight, 1-1 at 145 lb, and 1-0 at 150 lb Catchweight.
Overall, Rodriguez is a young, well-rounded fighter who doesn’t really stand out as being exceptional anywhere, but is really solid everywhere. He does a good job of just touching up his opponents, without loading up on his strikes and he’s also a BJJ purple belt. His one weakness has been his takedown defense and he’s been taken down multiple times in all three of his UFC matches and in his DWCS fight. In his four fights, his opponents got him down on 13 of their 39 attempts (66.7% defense), while Rodriguez landed just three takedowns of his own on five attempts (60% accuracy). However, while his wrestling is a work in his progress, his grappling has looked solid, both defensively and offensively. He likes to look for chokes in the grappling exchanges and has also done a good job of protecting his own neck. He’s only 25 years old and has just 10 pro fights, so he’s still very early in his career and he’s shown improvements every time he steps inside the Octagon. Rodriguez missed weight by a pound and a half in his last fight, so he’ll be a guy to keep an eye on during weigh-ins.
Cameron Saaiman
4th UFC Fight (3-0)Keeping his undefeated record intact, Saaiman is fresh off a first round ground and pound TKO win over a terrible Terrence Mitchell, who was making his UFC debut on relatively short notice and is about as durable as a wet paper bag. Prior to that, Saaiman won a majority decision over Mana Martinez, who was cut following the loss after going 2-2 in the UFC in four decisions. Saaiman dominated the fight but was deducted a point in the first round after he landed back-to-back low blows. He nearly lost another point in round three for an eye poke and fouls have been a real issue for him in his UFC career so far. He landed a really blatant illegal knee in his UFC debut that would have resulted in a DQ if his opponent hadn’t agreed to continue fighting after explaining to Chris Tognoni that he in fact was “not a bitch.” Saaiman ironically then went on to finish Steven Koslow with a series of legal knees in the third round of that fight. Saaiman landed another third round knockout just before that on DWCS, although that also came against a lower-level opponent who was quickly fading. Saaiman has only required the judges twice in his short career—a five-round EFC title fight win just before he went on DWCS and his win over Martinez.
Now 9-0 as a pro, Saaiman has six KO/TKO wins, one submission, and two decision victories. Prior to his recent R1 TKO win, he had seen the third round in four straight fights, with two of those going the distance and the other two ending in third round KO/TKO wins.
Overall, Saaiman is a young 22-year-old South African former K-1 kickboxing champion, who’s been training with Dricus Du Plessis since he was a young teenager. Saaiman only turned pro in MMA in December 2019 and is still developing both physically and technically, but he throws good, snappy kicks and has decent hands. He doesn’t have a very imposing frame but seems to make the most of what he’s got, and will mix in takedowns and look for both ground and pound and submissions on the mat. Between his three UFC fights and his DWCS match, Saaiman landed 4 of his 6 takedown attempts (66.7% accuracy), while his opponents got him down on 7 of their 12 attempts (41.7% defense). Saaiman also loves looking for guillotine chokes and does a good job of using them to reverse positions and gain top position on the ground. He also has great cardio, which has allowed him to take over later in matches. Given his age, he should be making improvements between every fight and he’s definitely a kid to keep an eye on. His first three UFC fights were all at T-Mobile arena in front of huge crowds on PPV cards, alongside his mentor/teammate Du Plessis. This will be Saaiman’s first UFC fight at the Apex and without Du Plessis on the card. However, Saaiman did fight at the Apex when he went on DWCS.
Fight Prediction:
Saaiman will have a 1” height advantage, but Rodriguez will have a 4” reach advantage and is three years older than the 22-year-old Saaiman.
It’s kind of a shame that the UFC matched these two up against one another at this stage in their careers, as they’re both bright young prospects, but now one of them will have to lose. Rodriguez looks to have a grappling advantage, but he doesn’t shoot for many takedowns, so it’s hard to rely on him capitalizing on that. However, he has faced nothing but grapplers so far in the UFC, so maybe he’ll look to utilize more of his own grappling against a striker like Saaiman, but that remains to be seen. Saaiman is the flashier and more active striker and is fully capable of winning a striking battle if this remains standing. Neither guy has ever been finished, or even lost a fight at 135 lb, and we expect this to end in a close decision that will likely hinge on the amount of grappling success that Rodriguez has. We’re not convinced that he’ll lean as heavily on his grappling as he should, so we’re inclined to take Saaiman at plus money, likely in a close decision, but this fight could definitely go either way and it should be a good one.
Our favorite bet here is “Cameron Saaiman DEC” at +290.
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DFS Implications:
Rodriguez is coming off a big upset win over Raul Rosas Jr., but despite finishing with seven and a half minutes of control time, Rodriguez only scored 71 DraftKings points in the decision win, as he didn’t land a ton of strikes and only attempted one takedown. Prior to that, Rodriguez notched a first round submission win, but only scored 96 DraftKings points, as he failed to land any takedowns or knockdowns. So while he’s been fairly impressive to this point in his UFC career, that hasn’t really translated to huge DFS scores. In fairness to him, he’s faced a series of grapplers who have all been looking to take him down, control time, and try to submit him, so most of his career has been spent on the defensive to this point. Now he’ll face a striker in Saaiman who has just a 41% takedown defense, which creates the potential for Rodriguez to be more on the offensive. Whether or not Rodriguez comes in looking to wrestle is uncertain, but the potential for him to find success on the mat is at least there. However, unless Rodriguez just dominates this fight from start to finish on the ground, which is unlikely, it will be tough for him to score well without a finish and Saaiman only averages 2.48 SSA/min. Considering neither of these two have ever been finished and they both have a 59% striking defense, it’s easy to see this ending in a lower scoring decision. The odds imply Rodriguez has a 59% chance to win, a 26% chance to land a finish, and a 13% chance it comes in round one.
Saaiman has impressively averaged 113 DraftKings points in his three UFC fights, scoring 105 or more in all of those. Two of those ended in TKOs, scoring 116 and 118 points respectively, but even in his lone decision win he still scored 105 points. Just keep in mind, his two finishes came against low-level short notice debuting opponents, and his decision win was against a one-dimensional striker who got cut following the loss, so Saaiman has been the beneficiary of very favorable matchups. He’s primarily a striker, but will mix in occasional takedown attempts and also likes to look for guillotines when opportunities present themselves. One weakness has been his subpar 41% takedown defense, which creates the potential for him to get controlled on the mat for periods of time. He’s also facing a major step up in competition here, so you’ll probably want to temper expectations some despite Saaiman’s past scoring success. With that said, at his cheaper price tag he may not need to put up another huge score to sneak into winning lineups, although that will all depend on how many other underdogs win. Saaiman’s past scoring success will drive his ownership up, which will make it tougher to create unique lineups that include him and somewhat lowers his tournament appeal. Saaiman has also been incredibly prone to committing fouls, whether it be illegal knees, low blows, or eye pokes. He’s been deducted a point in two of his three UFC fights, which hasn’t come back to bite him yet but raises the potential for a draw or a DQ. The odds imply Saaiman has a 41% chance to win, a 19% chance to land a finish, and a 9% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #4
Michel Pereira
9th UFC Fight (6-2)Winner of five straight with the last four of those going the distance, Pereira is 17 months removed from a high-volume split-decision win over Santiago Ponzinibbio in May 2022. Pereira was then booked to face Sean Brady in March 2023, but Brady pulled out. After that fight fell through, Pereira was set to face Stephen Thompson in early June, but the fight got pushed back to late July. Pereira then missed weight by three pounds, at which point Thompson refused to fight him. That prompted Pereira to move up from 170 lb to 185 lb for the first time in the UFC and he was then scheduled to face Marc-Andre Barriault on this upcoming card. However, Barriault dropped out and Petroski was announced as the replacement just over a week out. Pereira has mostly fought against strikers so far in the UFC, and we’ve yet to see him face any high-level wrestlers. Prior to beating Ponzinibbio, he won decisions over Andre Fialho, Niko Price, and Khaos Williams.
Now 28-11 as a pro, Pereira has 10 wins by KO/TKO, seven submissions, and 11 decision victories. The only time he’s ever been knocked out came in the first round of a 2018 fight against Dusko Todorovic, before they joined the UFC. That just so happens to be the last time Pereira competed at 185 lb, although he did have a 190 lb Catweight match and a 205 lb open weight fight right after that, before dropping back down to 170 lb for his 2019 UFC debut. Pereira had one other fight at 185 lb (R3 KO Win) shortly before the loss to Todorovic, but he had been fighting at 170 lb up until that point. Pereira also has one submission loss on his record, which came in a 2014 R2 armbar. He also has eight decision losses and one by DQ. His only UFC fight not to make it to the third round was his 2019 debut against a fragile Danny Roberts where Pereira landed a first round flying knee KO. Pereira’s only other UFC finish was a late third round 2020 submission against a terrible Zelim Imadaev, who went 0-3 in the UFC. However, prior to joining the UFC, Pereira had eight straight fights end early.
Overall, Pereira came into the UFC as a barbaric wild man, but has since toned down his antics immensely. Sure he’ll still throw in a random back flip into full mount from time to time, but those circus maneuvers have become few and far between opposed to the central focus of his game plan. He does a good job of utilizing movement to avoid taking much damage and throws solid body kicks to maximize his massive frame and keep his opponents at bay. Pereira holds black belts in both BJJ and karate and has impressive speed, knockout power, and submission skills. He was always massive for the 170 lb division, so he shouldn’t be undersized as he moves up to 185 lb, although he will no longer tower over most of his opponents. In his eight UFC fights, Pereira landed 11 of his 20 takedown attempts (55% accuracy), while his opponents were only able to get him down on one of their 18 attempts (94.4% defense). While he failed to attempt any takedowns in his last fight, he landed at least one in six straight fights before that, with multiple takedowns landed in four of those matches. Just keep in mind, Pereira has faced one striker after the next and has yet to face a decent wrestler. Pereira had been preparing to fight at 170 lb on July 29th, but will now be competing at 185 lb just 11 weeks later, so you have to wonder if he added much size for 185 lb or if he will just be cutting way less weight. We lean towards the latter, but it will be important to monitor him closely at weigh-ins.
Andre Petroski
6th UFC Fight (5-0)Petroski stepped into this matchup with very little time to prepare, as he was announced as the replacement just over a week out and said he was out in Thailand when he got the call doing some training at Bangtao Muay Thai & MMA with the Hickman brothers but also sort of vacationing. He also didn’t waste any time getting back inside the Octagon after his last fight, as he’s only eight weeks removed from a split-decision win over Gerald Meerschaert. We saw far less grappling in that match compared to Petroski’s previous UFC fights, as he was content with standing and striking against a glass-chinned dangerous grappler like Meerschaert. Prior to that August win, Petroski dropped out of a May matchup against Armen Petrosyan due to a partially torn rotator cuff. Petroski’s second most recent win came in a grappling-heavy decision over a BJJ black belt in Wellington Turman, who Petroski tok down eight times on 11 attempts with eight minutes of control time. While Petroski’s last two fights both went the distance, he landed back-to-back submissions just before that, after notching a third round ground and pound TKO in his 2021 UFC debut. Just before making his debut, he went on The Ultimate Fighter, but got submitted by Bryan Battle in his second fight on the show.
Now 10-1 as a pro, Petroski has four wins by KO/TKO, four more by submission, and two decision victories. Four of his finishes occurred in round one, two ended in round two, and two came in round three. His only official career loss came in a 2020 R2 TKO, but he was also submitted in the second round on TUF, although those fights are technically counted as exhibition matches so it doesn’t show up on his official record. Petroski made his 2018 pro debut at 170 lb, before moving up to 185 lb for his second fight, where he’s stayed since.
Overall, Petroski is a BJJ brown belt and former college wrestler. He trains at Renzo Gracie Philly with a bunch of other solid grapplers like Pat Sabatini, Sean Brady, Jeremiah Wells, Joe Pyfer, and Kyle Daukaus. Petroski has shown somewhat dubious cardio at times, but has managed to power through that to remain undefeated in the UFC and seven of his last eight fights made it out of the first round, with four of his last five seeing round three. He’s talked about how he started swimming and biking to improve his cardio, as he acknowledged that was an area of weakness for him. Considering he’s won two straight decisions, it does look like he’s made some improvements. Before his last fight, Petroski said the UFC gave him a six fight deal right off the bat, which is very unusual as almost everybody only gets four fight deals. That was the fifth fight on his contract and he said he hoped to renegotiate after that match. Presumably, he got a new contract before stepping in here on short notice, although we haven’t heard anything official on that. In his five UFC fights, Petroski landed 18 of his 33 takedown attempts (54.5% accuracy), while his opponents only got him down twice on seven attempts (71.4% defense).
Fight Prediction:
Pereira will have a 1” height advantage and is two years younger than the 32-year-old Petroski.
There are a lot of variables in play with this matchup. Pereira is moving up from 170 lb to 185 lb for the first time in the UFC, without much time to adjust to the new weight class, and after fighting a series of one-dimensional strikers he’ll now face a relentless wrestler. And on the other side of things, Petroski is stepping in on short notice, and after facing a series of fellow grapplers he’ll now go up against a well-rounded striker in Pereira, who can also grapple and is a BJJ black belt. So this will be a new test for each of them and there are red flags on both sides. Petroski has shown cardio issues in the past and taking this fight on short notice could just exacerbate that, while we don’t know how Pereira will adjust to the new weight class. Pereira has also tired at times, but not having to cut the extra weight could help with that. Pereira has always been kind of a weight bully at 170 lb, but now that he’s facing larger opponents, perhaps his 94% takedown defense won’t be as impenetrable. Part of that defense can be attributed to his constant movement, but the smaller cage should help Petroski when it comes to tracking Pereira down. Pereira is a much better striker than Petroski and will have a decent shot at landing a knockout if he can keep the fight standing, and either guy is capable of submitting the other on the mat—although Pereira only has one submission win since 2018. Pereira will likely be looking to implement a stick and move approach to land shots from the outside while making it harder for Petroski to close the distance and take him down. He likes to throw a lot of kicks up the middle, but he’ll need to be more careful throwing those here or Petroski could catch one and use it to take him down. We do expect Petroski to find some success in landing takedowns, but they may not come easy. Ultimately, this is a volatile matchup that could go a lot of ways and it has the potential to get sloppy late if both guys gas out. While Pereira has won four straight decisions, the potential for him to get controlled on the mat for periods of time somewhat lowers his chances of winning a decision here. So if he is going to win, as the odds suggest he will, he may be more reliant on landing a finish than normal. Petroski should be forcing the grappling exchanges, which increases the potential for someone to get submitted here or for Petroski to win a decision if that fails to happen. While moving up a weight class is concerning for Pereira, he’s the more well-rounded fighter and had a full camp to prepare, while Petroski stepped in on a week’s notice. So despite this being a volatile matchup, we lean towards Pereira and we’ll say he finds a finish, most likely by submission.
Our favorite bet here is “Pereira/Petroski Fight Ends in SUB” at +440.
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DFS Implications:
Pereira has failed to top 91 DraftKings points in any of his last five wins, with the last four of those going the distance. And in his last finish, he only scored just 86 points in a 2020 third round submission victory. The only time he’s broken the century mark was in his 2019 UFC debut when he landed a first round KO against Danny Roberts. While Pereira’s mix of grappling and striking generally provides a decent scoring floor, and he’s averaged 77 DraftKings points in his four decision victories, he just hasn’t shown much of a ceiling lately and will now be facing a wrestler who will be looking to take Pereira down and control him, while hunting for submissions. That lowers Pereira’s floor and even if he does lock up a submission off his back, it has the potential to not score especially well. Working in Pereira’s favor, Petroski stepped into this matchup on short notice and has already demonstrated cardio concerns in the past. That raises the potential for him to gas out, which raises Pereira’s theoretical scoring ceiling. So in the end, this is a volatile matchup with a wider range of potential scoring outcomes, but Pereira likely needs a well timed finish to return value. The odds imply Pereira has a 64% chance to win, a 42% chance to land a finish, and a 23% chance it comes in round one.
Petroski is 5-0 in the UFC and has generally scored well, averaging 100 DraftKings points in his wins, but is coming off the worst scoring performance of his career. He relied far less on his wrestling in his last fight, which makes sense, as he took on an opponent in Gerald Meerschaert who’s very dangerous on the mat and very fragile on the feet. Petroski was able to drop Meerschaert in the second round, but couldn’t put him away and ultimately scored just 79 DraftKings points in a split-decision win. However, Petroski scored 104 DraftKings points in his previous decision victory, when he landed a career best eight takedowns with eight minutes of control time against Wellington Turman. And prior to that, Petroski finished his first three UFC opponents. We don’t imagine Petroski will want to partake in a striking battle against Pereira, so he should be looking to wrestle more in this matchup. And at his cheap price tag, he won’t need to put up a massive score to end up in winning lineups. The main concern with him is that he took this fight on just over a week’s notice and already has some cardio concerns, so it’s unclear if he’ll have the gas tank to go 15 hard minutes on the mat. And Pereira is a BJJ black belt, so finding a submission could be tougher for Petroski. That makes it hard to really trust Petroski, but if he does win, he’s got a really good shot at ending up in tournament winning lineups. The odds imply Petroski has a 36% chance to win, an 18% chance to land a finish, and an 8% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #3
Adrian Yanez
7th UFC Fight (5-1)Looking to bounce back from the first early loss of his career, Yanez got knocked out in the first round by Rob Font last April. Yanez started strong in that fight and did some early damage, but Font bounced back and found the finish midway through the round. Prior to that, Yanez landed a first round knockout of his own against Tony Kelley and was 5-0 in the UFC with four of those wins ending in knockouts. And before suffering that recent loss, Yanez had won nine straight going back to his regional days. Seven of those nine victories ended in knockouts, with the other two ending in split decisions. His second most recent loss was in a 2018 split decision in an LFA five-round title fight against Miles Johns. Interestingly, his last three and four of his last five decisions were split. The most recent of those came against Davey Grant just before Yanez knocked out Tony Kelley.
Now 16-4 as a pro, Yanez has 10 wins by KO/TKO, two submissions, and four decision victories. Five of his knockout wins ended in R1, three came in R2, and two occurred in R3. Both of his submission wins came early in his career in 2015 and 2016. He’s been knocked out once himself and has three decision losses. His first two amateur fights were at 145 lb, before he dropped down to 135 lb in 2013 where he’s pretty much stayed since. He did have one more fight at 145 lb in 2015, which he won by first round submission.
Overall, Yanez is a patient but active striker who averages 6.75 SSL/min. He’s got crisp boxing and had shown a solid chin up until his recent early loss. He does a good job of countering, but his striking defense has arguably been his biggest weakness, and he averages 5.89 SSA/min (3rd highest on the slate). He has a BJJ black belt, but it might as well be a souvenir as he almost never feels the need to use it. 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. He hasn’t shown any interest in going to the ground, with zero takedown attempts in his six UFC fights or his DWCS appearance. He’s also never been taken down in any of those fights, on just seven attempts. When asked about if he was excited about this matchup, Yanez said not really and explained that he and Martinez had become friends after hanging out at International Fight Week. But he had also been asking for a fight for a while, so he was in no position to turn down whatever got offered to him. Yanez also said he wouldn’t be pushing for a finish and an ideal scenario would be a three round war where he wins a decision and they both get 50K for Fight of the Night. He also said he wants to fight smarter and not get carried away looking for finishes.
Jonathan Martinez
13th UFC Fight (9-3)Coming off probably the biggest win of his career, Martinez pulled off the upset in a hardfought decision over Said Nurmagomedov, who seemed to tire out midway through the fight. Martinez actually finished behind in striking and takedowns, but was still able to squeak out a unanimous 29-28 decision. Prior to that, Martinez notched another big win when he knocked out Cub Swanson in the second round. Just keep in mind, Swanson was dropping down to 135 lb for the first time in the UFC and his body did not hold up well at all. Leading up to that finish, Martinez won three straight decisions, after getting knocked out by Davey Grant in the second round of a 2021 match. All 12 of Martinez’s UFC fights have seen the second round, with 10 making it to round three, and eight going the distance. All four of his UFC fights to end early have come in late round KOs (3-1), with two third wins, and two fights that ended in round two (1-1). His only two losses in his last 11 fights were a questionable 2020 split decision against Andre Ewell and a 2021 R2 KO against Davey Grant.
Now 18-4 as a pro, Martinez has eight wins by KO/TKO, two submissions, and eight decision victories. He’s been knocked out once (R2 2021), has two decision losses, and one DQ defeat. Martinez has fought at both 135 lb and 145 lb, after fighting all the way down at 125 lb early in his career. He’s struggled hitting 135 lb at times, notably missing weight by 4.5 lb against Frankie Saenz in 2020, and dropping out of a 2021 matchup due to a botched weight cut. However, he seems to be getting things under control lately, so hopefully his weight struggles are behind him.
Overall, Martinez is a patient striker who loves to throw knees and kicks, but doesn’t really add a lot in terms of grappling. He destroyed the legs of Cub Swanson and Vince Morales and he notably trains with another violent leg striker in Chris Gutierrez at Factory X in Colorado. Martinez struggled with getting taken down earlier in his career, as he was grounded three times in each of his first two UFC fights, but has since only been taken down five times in his last 10 matches on 27 attempts and holds a 69% takedown defense. And he won’t have to worry about getting taken down in this one as he squares off against a striker.
Fight Prediction:
Martinez will have a 1” height advantage, but both fighters have a 70” reach and are 29 years old.
This sets up as a fun fight between two strikers who know each other well and are friends. That adds a unique dynamic to the mix and it will be interesting to see what impact that has. It could result in this looking more like a sparring match, as both guys will obviously want to win, but they may go a little easier in terms of looking for finishing shots. Yanez relies on his boxing, while Martinez comes in with a kick-heavy approach, so whoever controls the distance will be in a good position to succeed. Martinez is coming off a big win, while Yanez is fresh off a disappointing loss, so it seems like a decent buy-low spot on Yanez and sell-high on Martinez. Yanez is the busier striker and as long as he doesn’t get his lead leg chewed up too badly, we like his chances of outlanding his way to a close decision victory.
Our favorite bet here is “Yanez DEC” at +420.
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DFS Implications:
Yanez is a solid striker who averages a slate-leading 6.75 SSL/min, but has yet to attempt a takedown in the UFC or land more than 100 significant strikes in a fight. That leaves him reliant on landing knockouts to really score well in DFS, and he finished with just 70 DraftKings points in his lone UFC decision win. He also scored just 81 points in a third round TKO win back in 2021, despite notching a pair of knockdowns in that fight. However, 7 of his last 9 wins have ended in knockouts and he averaged 109 DraftKings points in his three UFC KO wins that ended in the first two rounds. So he has clear upside, the question is just whether or not we see it in this matchup. He made it sound like he has no problem fighting to a decision against his buddy in Martinez here, and after recently suffering the first early loss of his career, we could see a more patient approach from him. He should still have a solid scoring floor based on sheer striking volume, which keeps him in play for low-risk contests. However, this doesn’t look like a great spot for him to hit a ceiling performance, as Martinez has also only been finished once in his career and is generally content with grinding out decisions. Yanez is also typically pretty highly owned, which also lowers his tournament appeal, especially on this smaller slate. The odds imply Yanez has a 51% chance to win, a 31% chance to land a finish, and a 16% chance it comes in round one.
Martinez has averaged 79 DraftKings points in his nine UFC wins, but has only topped 76 points twice. Six of his nine wins went the distance and he’s never scored more than 76 points in a decision, while totaling 67 or fewer points in four of his last five decision wins. He also scored just 68 points in a third round knockout win back in 2019, although scored 115 or more in his last two early wins. Both of those high scoring performances came against aging UFC veterans in very favorable spots. Now Martinez will face a young, tough opponent in Yanez, who did just get knocked out in his last fight, but has never been finished any other times. These two are also friends and it’s always possible they take it a little easy on one another in more of a sparring style fight. Yanez at least made it sound like he’s totally fine going the distance, which is where most of Martinez’s fights end up anyways. Martinez looks like a KO or bust option and we’re not very excited about playing him. The odds imply Martinez has a 49% chance to win, a 28% chance to land a finish, and a 14% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #2
Jennifer Maia
12th UFC Fight (6-5)Maia recently strung together back-to-back victories for the first time since 2019, as she won decisions over Casey O'Neill and Maryna Moroz, after losing a pair of decision to Manon Fiorot and Katlyn Chookagian. Maia landed a career best 145 significant strikes against O'Neill, and actually shot for four takedowns, but didn’t land any of them. O'Neill curiously only attempted one takedown of her own, in what was an absolutely terrible game plan. Prior to that, Maia landed what had previously been a career high in significant strikes (109) against Moroz, while not attempting any takedowns. Maia has now gone the distance in six straight and 14 of her last 15 fights, with the one exception being a 2020 R1 submission win over Joanne Wood, who’s been submitted in five of her eight career losses.
Now 21-9-1 as a pro, Maia has four wins by KO/TKO, five submissions, and 12 decision victories. It’s been over 11 years since anyone was able to finish Maia, with her lone KO loss coming in a 10 second 2012 R1 KO. She’s also been submitted once, which occurred in the second round just two fights prior to her KO loss. She’s gone 23 fights since the 2012 KO without being finished. Her other seven losses all ended in decisions.
Overall, Maia has been very durable for the last decade and her striking and movement have both looked better lately, despite her being 35 years old. While she’s a BJJ black belt, Maia has only landed three total takedowns on just 14 attempts in her 11 UFC fights (21.4% accuracy). On the other side of things, Maia has been taken down 15 times on 35 attempts (57.1% defense). While she didn’t get taken down in either of her last two matches, she had been taken down at least once in five straight fights leading up to that. She’s also a Muay Thai black belt and appears mostly content with relying on her striking. While she seldomly lands many takedowns, Maia did show against Joanne Wood that she can use her Jiu-Jitsu to look for submissions off her back if she’s taken down by her opponent.
Viviane Araujo
10th UFC Fight (5-4)Looking to bounce back from a pair of decision losses, Araujo has lost three of her last four fights. In fairness to her, those losses all came against tough opponents in Amanda Ribas, Alexa Grasso, and Katlyn Chookagian. In the midst of those losses, Araujo defeated Andrea Lee in a grappling-heavy decision win, and Araujo has gone the distance in eight straight matches after landing a third round knockout in her 2019 UFC debut. Prior to her string of decisions, Araujo’s first eight career fights all ended early.
Now 11-5 as a pro, Araujo has three wins by KO/TKO, four submissions, and four decision victories. She’s been knocked out once (R1 2017), and has four decision losses. After fighting at 115 lb early in her career, Araujo made her UFC debut at 135 lb, before dropping down to 125 lb for her second fight, where she’s stayed since. We’ve yet to see any of her 125 lb fights end early.
Overall, Araujo is a BJJ and Luta Livre black belt. She’s landed at least one takedown in seven of her nine UFC fights, with 17 total takedowns landed on 35 attempts (48.6% accuracy). On the other side of things, she has a solid 82.6% takedown defense and has only been taken down 4 times on 23 opponent attempts in the UFC. In addition to being a good grappler, she’s a crisp striker with decent power. However, she tends to get hit a decent amount and averages 5.45 SSA/min, while landing 4.63 SS/min of her own. She’s been outlanded in significant strikes in seven of her last eight matches, despite winning four of those eight fights. The one other concern with her is her cardio, and we’ve seen her slow down late in fights. However, she went five rounds against Grasso in her second most recent fight, which is encouraging.
Fight Prediction:
Both fighters are 5’4”, but Araujo will have a 4” reach advantage.
Maia is coming off an impressive decision win where she set a career high in significant strikes landed, but it’s hard to know if that’s because she’s made actual improvements or if it was just because Casey O'Neill has looked very hittable on the feet. O'Neill also for some reason wasn’t looking to grapple, which was a huge mistake. Araujo said coming into this fight that she’s been working on her wrestling and we saw her absolutely dominate Andrea Lee on the mat in her last win. Maia has just a 57% takedown defense and lost three of the last four fights where she gave up even in a single takedown. Maia also hasn’t looked like any sort of finishing threat, as she’s made it to the judges in 14 of her last 15 fights. That should give Araujo plenty of time to try and get this fight to the mat, and it’s not like Araujo is helpless on the feet either. The main concern with Araujo has been her cardio and we’ve also seen her get rocked at times. Both of those factors make it a little tougher to trust her, but Maia hasn't knocked anybody out since 2015 and Araujo hasn’t been knocked out since 2017. So we’re more concerned with Araujo gassing out and losing a decision, but at plus money we’re still willing to take a shot on her and we like her chances of winning a decision.
Our favorite bet here is “Viviane Araujo ML” at +136.
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DFS Implications:
Maia has set new career highs in significant strikes landed in each of her last two fights, but still only scored 92 and 78 DraftKings points respectively in those two decision wins. She rarely lands any takedowns and only has one early win in her last 15 fights, which came in a first round submission against the highly submittable Joanne Wood in 2020. Now she’ll be facing a BJJ black belt who’s never been submitted in Araujo, and a submission is far less likely. Araujo will likely be looking to wrestle some, which could limit Maia’s ability to put up another huge striking total, and Maia likely needs a finish here to return value. The only reasons for optimism in Maia are that Araujo has shown cardio and durability issues in the past, and is now 36 years old. Maia will also be low-owned in DFS, which adds to her tournament appeal, but she’s still a tougher sell. The odds imply Maia has a 59% chance to win, an 11% chance to land a finish, and a 5% chance it comes in round one.
Araujo has averaged 84 DraftKings points in her five UFC wins, with the last four of those going the distance. She was able to score 91 and 93 points in her last two victories, but only because she landed multiple takedowns in each of those. She was unable to find the same level of grappling success in her previous two decision wins, and only scored 65 and 71 points respectively in those two fights. So it seems clear that she either needs a finish or a grappling-heavy decision win to score well. Working in her favor, Maia has just a 57% takedown defense and got taken down by five of her last six opponents who tried to get her down. Maia also averages 4.78 SSA/min, so Araujo has the potential to fill up the stat sheet in this match if she can both find grappling success and avoid gassing out. While there is some concern that wrestling success will result in her gassing out, she went five rounds with Alexa Grasso in her second most recent fight, after dominating Andrea Lee on the mat for three rounds just before that. At Araujo’s cheap price tag, we’re willing to gamble that she’ll come in with at least two rounds of cardio (hopefully three) and find success getting this fight to the mat, as she said she’s been working on her wrestling. Araujo doesn't need to put up a huge score to have a good shot at serving as a value play and doesn’t project to be prohibitively popular. The odds imply Araujo has a 41% chance to win, a 14% chance to land a finish, and a 7% chance it comes in round one.
Fight #1
Sodiq Yusuff
8th UFC Fight (6-1)Just over a year removed from the first submission win of his career, Yusuff has been recovering from herniated discs in his back that kept him out of action. His last win came just 30 seconds into the first round against Don Shainis, who was making his short notice UFC debut and ended up getting cut after going 0-2 with the organization. Prior to that, Yusuff fought to three straight decisions, with wins over Alex Caceres and Andre Fili, separated by a 29-28 loss to Arnold Allen. That loss to Allen remains Yusuff’s only defeat in his last nine outings, dating back to 2017, before he joined the UFC. Yusuff punched his ticket to the UFC with a 2018 decision win over Mike Davis on DWCS. Yusuff then landed first round knockouts in two of his first three UFC fights and all seven of his UFC matches have ended in either first round finishes (3-0) or decisions (3-1).
Now 13-2 as a pro, Yusuff has six wins by KO/TKO, one submission, and six decision victories. His last five finishes all occurred in the first round, after the first two of his career came in the first half of round two. He’s never finished anybody beyond the midway point of the second round. The only time he’s ever been finished himself was in a 2017 R1 KO in a Titan FC Featherweight Championship fight. The one other loss of his career came in a 2021 decision against a really tough Arnold Allen. Yusuff fought some at 155 lb earlier in his career, but has competed exclusively at 145 lb since 2017. It’s often discussed how he cuts a lot of weight to get down to 145 lb.
This will be the 2nd five-round fight of Yusuff’s career and first in the UFC. His only previous five-round fight was a 2017 Titan FC match that ended in a first round knockout loss and he’s never seen the championship rounds in his career.
Overall, Yusuff is a powerful striker, but generally doesn’t add much in terms of offensive grappling. Between his seven UFC fights and his DWCS appearance, he only landed one takedown on eight attempts (12.5% accuracy), while his opponents got him down on 6 of their 20 attempts (70% defense). However, he is coming off the first submission win of his career, he has three official submission attempts in his last four fights, and he’s talked about how he comes from a jiu-jitsu gym. Yusuff averages 5.29 SSL/min, but failed to land more than 73 significant strikes in any of his seven UFC fights, after landing 111 against Mike Davis on DWCS. Yusuff has a really solid right outside leg kick that was on full display when he destroyed the lead leg of Davis in that match.
Edson Barboza
29th UFC Fight (17-11)Barboza recently snapped a two-fight skid with a first round knockout win over Billy Quarantillo. That’s Barboza’s only win in the last two and a half years, and he previously lost a smothering decision to Bryce Mitchell after getting knocked out in the third round by Giga Chikadze. Barboza competed at 155 lb until 2020, when he dropped down to 145 lb following a pair of losses to Justin Gaethje (R1 KO) and Paul Felder (S-DEC). Barboza then lost another close split decision in his Feathweight debut against Dan Ige, before bouncing back with a decision win over Makwan Amirkhani and a third round knockout of Shane Burgos. Three of Barboza’s last four fights ended in knockouts (2-1), however, prior to his recent first round knockout win Barboza had seen the third round in six straight fights, with four of those going the distance (1-3). Sixteen of his last 18 fights made it out of the first round and he’s coming off his only first round finish since 2014.
Now 23-11 as a pro, Barboza has 14 wins by KO/TKO, one submission (R1 2009), and eight decision victories. He’s been knocked out four times, submitted twice, and has five decision defeats. His last two, and four of his last five wins ended in knockouts, while three of his last four losses went the distance. Barboza has gone 3-3 since dropping down to 145 lb in 2020.
This will be the 4th five-round fight of Barboza’s career, and he was finished in all of his previous three. The first of those losses was against Kevin Lee in a 2018 R5 doctor stoppage TKO. The next ended in a 2019 R1 KO against Justin Gaethje, and the most recent was a 2021 R3 TKO against Giga Chikadze. Only once in his career has Barboza seen the championship rounds, which was when he got finished by Kevin Lee in round five, after losing rounds one, two, and four in that fight.
Overall, Barboza is a legend in the sport who’s known for his violent kicks, but doesn’t offer much of anything in terms of offensive grappling, although he does have a solid 75% takedown defense. However, that number has dropped down to just 50% in his six fights at 145 lb, where he’s been taken down eight times on 16 opponent attempts, while failing to attempt any takedowns of his own. Despite being a pure striker, Barboza typically doesn’t land a ton of volume and only averages 4.00 SSL/min. Only once in 28 UFC fights has he landed more than 98 significant strikes and he landed 33 or fewer significant strikes in four of his last five matches. However, he makes the strikes he does land count and we often see opponents wilt in rounds two and three against him through an accumulation of damage. Barboza is now 37 years old, is just 4-7 in his last 11 fights, and had knee surgery leading up to his last match. While all of that is somewhat concerning, everytime you count this guy out he shows he still has some more left in the tank and he looks absolutely shredded coming into this matchup.
Fight Prediction:
Barboza will have a 2” height advantage and 4” reach advantage, while Yusuff is seven years younger than the 37-year-old Barboza.
These two are very similar stylistically, as they’re both strikers who throw violent leg kicks and rarely land any takedowns. They both used to fight up at 155 lb and each cut a lot of weight to get down to 145 lb. Barboza is the taller and rangier fighter, who also may have the speed advantage. However, he’s also significantly older and has a lot more wear and tear on his body. All of Yusuff’s career finishes have come in under a round and a half, with the last five ending in round one, while six of Barboza’s nine UFC finishes came in the later rounds, with four ending in round three. Yusuff got knocked out in the first round of his only previous five-round fight, while Barboza lost via KO/TKO in all three of his previous five-round bouts. Yusuff is coming off a yearlong layoff resulting from multiple herniated discs in his back and it remains to be seen if that will negatively impact his performance here, while Barboza is 37 years old and could hit a cliff at any point in this stage of his career. They also each cut so much weight that the possibility of a tough weight cut and subsequent compromised chin remains in play for each of them. And considering Yusuff has never been past the third round and Barboza has only seen the championship rounds once, it’s hard to know how their cardio will look if this fight makes it past the third round. That leaves a decent amount of uncertainty on both sides of the aisle. We’re expecting a somewhat lower volume kickboxing match, with a good chance someone gets knocked out. We can see arguments for either fighter and both guys appear live to win. There’s enough uncertainty that we understand taking the plus money on the taller, longer, and more experienced fighter in Barboza, who has fought more recently and isn’t coming off a back injury. However, he just hasn’t been wearing damage especially well recently, as he got dropped twice by Giga Chikadze and even more alarmingly, once by Bryce Mitchell. Barboza looks absolutely massive right now if you look at his social media, and the amount of weight he has to be cutting is pretty concerning for both his cardio and durability. So while tempting, Barboza at plus money seems like a trap and we think Yusuff knocks him out early.
Our favorite bet here is “Sodiq Yusuff KO” at +260.
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DFS Implications:
Yusuff has been a R1 finish or bust DFS play throughout his first seven UFC fights. He has three first round finishes with the organization, where he averaged 113 DraftKings points. However, his other four UFC fights all went the distance (3-1), with Yusuff averaging just 74 points in those three wins, and failing to top 79 points in any of them. While all of those decisions were in three-round fights and and now he’ll have five rounds to work with, if we extend his numbers in those fights over the course of five-rounds, he still only would have averaged 103 DraftKings points and that’s assuming he could keep up the same pace for 25 minutes. He’s only landed one takedown in the UFC, which leaves him reliant on striking and finishes to score well. All seven of his career finishes have come in under a round and a half and he’s never seen the championship rounds before. He’s also coming off a yearlong layoff and multiple herniated discs in his back, which leaves a lot of uncertainty with him. However, Barboza is now 37 years old, has been finished in 6 of his 11 career losses, and has been knocked down three times in his last three fights, so there’s a good chance Yusuff can get him out of there early and score well. However, at his high price tag, a finish in the later rounds may not be enough for him to return value unless he lands multiple knockdowns. And if this defies the odds and goes the distance, it’s far from a lock that Yusuff will score enough to crack tournament winning lineups. The odds imply Yusuff has a 60% chance to win, a 37% chance to land a finish, and a 14% chance it comes in round one.
Barboza has averaged 80 DraftKings points in his 17 UFC wins. Breaking that down between finishes and decisions, he averaged 99 points in his nine finishes, but just 59 points in his eight decisions, all of which came in three-round fights. He failed to top 66 points in any of those eight decisions and even if we extend his numbers in those fights over the course of five rounds, he still only would have averaged 79 DraftKings points and wouldn’t have topped 90 points in any of them. So he’s given us zero indication that he can score well without a finish. He hasn’t even attempted a takedown in any of his six fights since he dropped down to 145 lb in 2020 and only averages 4.00 SSL/min. Barboza has headlined three UFC cards in the past and got knocked out in all three of those fights and is now 37 years old and just 4-7 in his last 11 matches. He only made it to the championship rounds once in his career, which was when lost via R5 TKO due to a doctor stoppage against Kevin Lee in 2018. None of that is overly encouraging, but he’s still a good enough striker that you can’t count him out when it comes to landing a knockout. Yusuff has been knocked out once before, which was in the only other five-round fight of his career. And now Yusuff is coming off a year layoff after he suffered herniated discs in his back, so it’s possible he comes in with some ring rust. Barboza only has one first round finish in his last 18 outings and doesn’t always score especially well with finishes in the later rounds, but at his cheaper price, he doesn’t need to put up a huge score to sneak into tournament winning lineups. However, if we get multiple dogs winning on this slate, it will be tougher for Barboza to end up in winning DraftKings lineups in a decision win, despite his cheap salary. The striking-heavy style of fight that we’re expecting to see here will typically score better on FanDuel than DraftKings, so both guys look like better plays over there. The odds imply Barboza has a 40% chance to win, a 30% chance to land a finish, and an 11% chance it comes in round one.
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