UFC on ESPN 10 Post-Fight Analysis

So UFC on ESPN 10 is over and done and... it was a pretty decent event. Lackluster main event aside, there were lot of fast finishes and couple of real wars. UFC continuing the trend of exciting fights since the lockdown-enforced break ended.

Main Card

As stated, the main event offered little in the way of thrills or even technical prowess. Jessica Eye went out there with very cautious fighting style, trying to do the very minimum to win rounds and it did not work when in three rounds, Calvillo got some decent ground control. Eye did not get urgent about getting up, more seemed content to defend the submission attempts. It was pretty awful performance from her against a smaller woman and it is pretty safe to say she is washed up at this point. Never really recovered from the KO Shevchenko gave her.

The Co-Main was going well for Karl Robertson, until he for some inexplicable reason initiated the grappling. He will curse himself when he watches the fight, cause as a kickboxer his best chance was at range, even though in stand-up it was largely a 50/50 fight. In grappling I suppose he wanted to showcase his newly-acquired skills, but although he has rounded out his game, it was still no match to Vettori's grappling and thus we got a quick sub.

Charles Rosa and Kevin Aguilar had a funky striking matchup that Rosa just edged by split decision. I do think it should have been UD, he got two rounds pretty clearly and had Aguilar hurt in the second round. Good cash as the underdog.

Andre Fili and Charles Jourdain also put on a fun back and forth striking battle. Jourdain still has a little bit rounding out to do, but to put this good performance against high class competitor like Fili being as young as he is, he definitely is a bright prospect in the division. Fili did deserve the win though, with his grappling giving the edge in the even fight.

Jordan Espinosa started really fast against Mark De La Rosa, throwing over 100 strikes in the first round, making me actually worry if he is gonna fade later in the fight. His cardio held up well though and he comfortably dominated all rounds. De La Rosa just was completely outmatched and does not belong to this level.

Mariya Agapova absolutely massacred Cifers... Guess the striking of Cifers only looked good cause she was fighting Dern last time around. Well Agapova was levels above and made quick work of Cifers.

Prelims

Merab Dvalishvili predictably put a massive pace on Gustavo Lopez and beat his takedown record again. His cardio is tremendous and he can get takedowns at will, but he needs to still round out his striking and ability to control to really take on the top of the division. Lopez did reasonably well considering the short notice of the fight.

The first 3 fights of the night went all fast, with over one hour of broadcast containing less than 3 minutes of actual fighting. Avila easily smashed Mazany, Tyson Nam completely put Zarrukh Adashev to sleep (he was very badly concussed cause once he woke up 5 minutes later he clearly had no idea he had already fought and was confused the fight was already over) and Christian Aguilera KOd Anthony Ivy. Exciting but perhaps a little too exciting, cause it led to terribly slow pacing for the early part of the night.

My picks

I got 7 out of 10 picks right, which is a reasonable outcome, especially considering how paranoid I felt seeing some of the odds. Though the market was particularly right about Agapova being dominant favorite over Cifers, that was perhaps my worst bet of the night... but then again there was at least big upside, but picking Eye only as small underdog was worse pick when her bad performance is accounted for.

It is hard to pick one best pick. Rosa was the most profitable one for me, but I don't think it stands out as particularly smart pick, even though it's a good catch as an underdog. Most of my winning bets were favorites, but I would raise Espinosa above others, cause he was not a massive favorite despite my assessment that he is much better than De La Rosa. Think I had the odds pegged much more accurately than the market.

So despite getting 70 % right I only got about 1.5 bets of profit, which is fine if not great. Important thing is to stay on the green, now I have back to back winning events after some setbacks in the earlier events. My SSD literally arrived while I was watching the fights, so I can put my main computer back into working order and do proper previews again next week - expect my picks to start getting better as a result.