Another Saturday night, another UFC Fight Night card. But, hey, I’m not complaining – it means another night to win ourselves some money. Plus, I’m on a sort of nice 14-11 streak picking all the fights on the past two UFC cards, so we’ve got that going for us.
This week’s card features a banger of a featherweight main event plus the finals of the two weight classes on the most recent season of The Ultimate Fighter. Yes, The Ultimate Fighter is back for some reason. Full disclosure – I value my time left on this mortal coil, so I no longer watch TUF. However, my co-host on the The MMA Gambling Podcast does watch the show still so I’ll be trailing his picks.
Battle of the Kickboxers in the Main Event
But first things first, we’ll begin with the main event. It’s a dandy of matchup between long-time UFC stalwart (November 2010 debut) Edson Barboza and upstart Giga Chikadze. Both men like to stand and trade, both men have explosive, dynamic power, and both men are former professional kickboxers.
So, who am I backing in this close (on paper) matchup? I’ll take the very slight underdog (10/11) Chikadze. He’s got a little less wear on his tires, he’s won eight straight (including going a perfect 6-0 in the UFC) and he’s a little younger. Getting him for underdog money looks good to me.
THE GIGA KICK
has landed in Vegas
@Giga_Chikadze
[ #UFCVegas35 | This Saturday | Live on @ESPN & @ESPNPlus ] pic.twitter.com/XKFQQb4lrd
— UFC (@ufc) August 25, 2021
The next two fights on the card are the aforementioned TUF finals. The middleweight finals pits Bryan Battle against last-minute injury replacement Gilbert Urbina. Short notice replacements don’t fare too well in the UFC historically, as I mentioned in my recent guide to betting on the UFC. Additionally, Battle is bigger, and Urbina lost on the show and is only in this spot as a replacement. I’ll take the chalk in Battle at 4/7.
I’m going chalk in the TUF bantamweight finals also and backing the 4/7 ‘Pretty’ Ricky Turcios. Turcios has twice as many pro fights as his opponent on Saturday, Brady Hiestand, plus my co-host thinks he’s going to win, so that’s good enough for me.
Underdog Betting Picks
Ok, live dog time. I’m going against that last minute replacement stat I mentioned earlier and I’m taking replacement Daniel Rodriguez at 6/5 in his welterweight fight against Kevin Lee. Lee has never won a fight at 170 pounds and is only up at this weight class because he consistently missed weight at lightweight. ‘D-Rod’ is the bigger man here, is the better striker, and is a sparkling 5-1 in the UFC.
I also like Abdul Razak Alhassan in his recently arranged matchup against Alessio Di Chirico. ‘Judo Thunder’ has lost three straight, but Di Chirico hasn’t done much better, going 1-3 over his last four. Plus, Alhassan is the more active striker of the two and has dynamite in his limbs, winning all 10 of his pro fights via (T)KO.
‘Smile’n’ Sam Alvey very well may be fighting for his job this weekend, having gone 0-5 (1 NC) over his last six fights, so I think he’ll be the more motivated fighter in this middleweight battle against Wellington Turman. Plus, he’s a slugger with great power, and Turman has been knocked out in his past two fights. Alvey at 21/20 looks good.
My lock pick of the week is Dustin Jacoby at 8/15 in his light heavyweight fight against Darren Stewart. Jacoby, in his second stint in the UFC, has gone 2-0-1 since getting a second shot at the big time. Meanwhile, Stewart is 0-2 (1 NC) over his last three fights. Jacoby is the bigger man (Stewart is usually a middleweight) plus the much better striker in this fight, so he’s the pick.
*All odds correct at time of writing.