My picks for UFC Austrailia on FS1 tonight are in:
-Derrick Lewis: This is Lewis’ 12th fight in the UFC? Wow, time flies. Dangerous fight for Lewis. Mark Hunt is not washed up and is highly motivated to stick it to the UFC. But Lewis has less wear and tear on his body. Less fight mileage. Really close fight. But I have to go with Lewis who has shown to have a chin and posses scary power. Lewis is on his way to getting a title shot at heavyweight in the next year.
-Derek Brunson: I’ve never bought into Dan Kelly being a top contender. He’s a one dimensional fighter and he’s never fought anyone as explosive and athletic as Brunson. I know Kelly is coming off a win over Rashad Evans, but Evans is a shell of his former self and has been struggling to stay healthy. Brunson is in his prime and should have a win over Anderson Silva on his resume.
-Ross Pearson: This fight has no business being on the main card. I predict that neither fighter will be in the UFC 2 years from now. Dan Hooker is average. Pearson almost beat a pretty good prospect in Stevie Ray last time out. Pearson is winding down his career but he’ll have enough to beat Hooker.
-Henrique da Silva: UPSET SPECIAL. There’s a new wave of top young light heavyweights making their way into the UFC that will be challenging for the title. Tyson Pedro. Jordan Johnson. Paul Craig. And I believe da Silva deserves to be included in that group as well. The odds for this fight are plain nuts. Absolutely nuts. da Silva should be a -200 or -300 favorite, but amazingly, Ion Cutelaba is the 3 to 1 favorite. da Silva has lost his last 2 fights, but both have been against what I believe are future title contenders in Craig and Johnson. Cutelaba fought nobody on the regional scene. He has a 1-2 record in the UFC. I know Cutelaba is only 23 years old so he should continue to improve a lot. And his loss to Cirkunov is understandable in a debut fight. But Cutelaba couldn’t finish his only win in the UFC against Jonathan Wilson (and da Silva finished Wilson). And if we’re to believe Cutelaba is a top prospect, he should have beaten an OK fighter on Jared Cannonier. I see da Silva winning this fight big.
-Tim Elliott: The jury is out on whether or not Elliott is a top 3, top 5 flyweight in the world. He put up one of the best fights against Demetrious Johnson with his awkwardness. It’s possible he’s gotten a lot better the past couple years since his losses to Ali Bagautinov and Zach Makovsky. But I’m pretty confident in Elliott being good enough to beat Ben Nguyen, even though Nguyen is quietly one of the better 125 lbers in the division.
-Alex Volkanovski: Volkanovski is easily the best prospect fighting tonight. I see him as a blue chip guy who could be fighting for the featherweight title in the next few years. He’s that good, finishing other elite prospects outside the UFC. Mizuto Hirota poses some challenges in that he’s a veteran and could try and make this a boring fight (i.e. grappling, pushing against the fence, slowing the fight down), but I see no reason for Volkanovski not finishing Hirota. Volkanovski will be headlining future UFC Austrailia shows.
-Damien Brown: Vinc Pichel is flying halfway around the world for his first fight in 3 years. Octagon rust is real and he’s not really a great prospect to begin with. Brown has a 2-1 record in the UFC and is coming off a solid win over Jon Tuck. This is really a fight I’d bet a little more money than usual, being it’s a pick em.
-Luke Jumeau: One of the toughest fights to pick on the card. Dominique Steele is 1-3 in the UFC and it’s rare for the UFC to keep a fighter with that type of record. Jumeau is making his UFC debut coming off a win over former UFC fighter Vik Grujic. I don’t think Jumeau is that good of a prospect, but I think even less of Steele. Coin flip type fight though. I could totally see Steele just taking Jumeau down and laying on him for 15 minutes.
-John Moraga: Ashkan Mokhtarian is another fighter going against low quality competition to pad his record. He’s cutting down to 125 lbs, but he’s never fought anybody remotely close to the level of Moraga. Plus there’s the jitters to deal with for Mokhtarian. Moraga should finish this fight.
-Zak Ottow: Easy fight to pick. Ottow is going to look good finishing the fight. Ottow is a decent prospect and I haven’t been impressed at all by Kiichi Kunimoto.
-JJ Aldrich: Chan-Mi Jeon has been 5-0 outside the UFC and won 4 of those 5 fights by knockout and looks like possibly a top prospect. But unfortunately, 4 of those 5 wins came against fighters making their pro debut. And the other win was over a fighter with a losing record. Aldrich isn’t an elite fighter, but she has plenty experience against solid competition. Plus Jeon missed weight cutting down to 115 lbs for the first time. Aldrich will win this. I’m actually surprised Aldrich is only a -165 favorite.
-Dong Hyun Kim: This is possibly the worst fight in the UFC so far this year when it comes to caliber of fighters. Kim sits at 1-2 and his opponent Thibault Gouti is 0-3 in the UFC. Gouti has been finished in all 3 of his UFC fights. Kim has looked better and is moving down to 155 lbs for this fight, so that tilts things in his favor for me to pick him.