Shin Haraguchi vs Zhu Rong Chris’ Pick: Haraguchi by decision. What I think the odds should be: Haraguchi -300 Zha Yi vs Kaiwen Li Chris’ Pick: Zha by decision. What I think the odds should be: Zha -175 Rei Tsuruya vs Niushiyue Ji Chris’ Pick: Tsuruya by decision. What...
Nassourdine Imavov vs Roman Dolidze Imavov is very similar to Marvin Vettori, except Imavov has more power. I also expect Imavov’s cardio to be better than Dolidze’s too. Expect this fight to be similar to Vettori vs Dolidze. Chris’ Pick: Imavov by decision. What I think the odds should...
Sean Strickland vs Dricus du Plessis Everybody was shocked when Strickland upset Adesanya. I wasn’t. Adesanya doesn’t have the top of the scale 80 grade striking that the narrative says he has. What I was surprised by was that Strickland got better. Adesanya does have 75 striking for sure....
Magomed Ankalaev vs Johnny Walker 2 I was thinking maybe Smith’s striking was starting to regress going in to his fight with Ryan Spann. Everybody saw it as a coin flip fight. Then Smith out strikes Spann 90 to 50. Wow. So Smith’s striking hasn’t gone anywhere. Is still...
Leon Edwards vs Colby Covington The difference between the second Edwards vs Usman fight vs the third one is fascinating. You can obviously see in the third fight, Usman isn’t the same guy. Lacked confidence. Wasn’t able to bully Edwards. Most tangibly speaking, Usman didn’t seem to have the...
Yadong Song vs Chris Gutierez Ok. Once and for all, Gutierez’s striking is a 70. He out landed Heili Alateng 110 to 38. I was blown away seeing Song have the ability to stuff most of Simon’s take downs. Wrestling is a 75 now. Also had Simon’s striking a...
Beneil Dariush vs Arman Tsarukyan Despite Dariush being knocked out by Charles Oliveira in his last fight, I can’t ignore his fight before that, against Gamrot. I know Gamrot has 70 striking. And Dariush out struck him 52 to 29. As much as my knee jerk reaction to picking...
Brendan Allen vs Paul Craig Craig looked great in his 185 lb. debut, although I think him knocking out Muniz on the ground had more to do with Muniz gassing out than Craig’s grappling being a 75. I’m very confident Silva has 70 striking. I’m confident Allen has 70...
Jiri Prochazka vs Alex Pereira Once and finally for all, I’m convinced Blachowicz has 70 striking and 70 wrestling. The wrestling was close to a 65 in the Magomed Ankalaev fight, but there’s no way Pereira’s wrestling is worse than a 65. Pereira’s 75 striking grade at middleweight carried...
Derrick Lewis vs Jailton Almeida This fight is pretty straight forward. Lewis is going to have one shot at the start of the fight to knock Almeida out. And he could, he might. He has a chance. But if he swings and misses, Almeida takes him down and will...