UFC 263 Post-Fight Analysis

Am I starting to figure out MMA? Surely not, must have been just some great variance as I got the best result I have ever gotten from a single event (as well as best single bet). Let's dissect the fights a bit as usual.

Main Card

I honestly don't understand why so many people thought Vettori has a chance here. The fight looked very similar to the first fight with Izzy outclassing Vettori on the feet and using his range and movement to make it very hard for Vettori to close the distance. Blachowicz could do it as a bigger guy since Izzy had to go to him, but as beefy as Vettori is, he simply didn't have Jan's strength and range. 

Vettori had limited grappling success but largely got blown apart on the feet. Makes me kinda wish I went bigger on Izzy - as big of a favorite he was, it seemed like he should have been bigger. So I guess we see him KO Rob again next time? Whittaker finally getting the title shot he probably deserves and that his fans have been calling for... well, sometimes you gotta watch what you wish for.

In the co-main I don't know what happened to Deiveson Figueiredo, the guy just didn't turn up at all. He hardly got going while Brandon Moreno was firing all cylinders and completely dominated his way to the RNC finish to win the title. Don't mind getting that one wrong, but how are you supposed to read that Deiveson won't show up at all? Then again, even best Fig might have gotten finished there, Moreno was very keyed in and deserves the title.

Nate Diaz was never gonna beat Leon Edwards... well he almost did. Leon's bell was rung. Guess Diaz didn't care who won, cause he instead taunted Edwards rather than going for the finish. It was the moment everyone remembers from a fight. Rest of the fight was, well... Edwards fight. Him clinically dominating the fight, systematically dismantling the opponent in all ranges, but it's just not that entertaining or convincing. 

Even Jorge beat Nate in a more impressive fashion, and that's never minding the fact that he got rocked in the end. Edwards is always gonna get overlooked unless he adds a little showmanship to his wins, and to be fair it wouldn't hurt him to become a little bit more well-spoken as well. That's irrelevant though cause that shot Nate landed late hurt his stock more than his speech impediment.

Honestly if Nate can get you rocked, Usman will kill you when he lands. Does not make a very compelling case for title contention. 

Belal Muhammad had similar performance. Clearly won, but hardly impressive against guy so far past his prime. Especially since Maia was one-dimensional even in his prime. Still I don't mind Belal kinda struggling his way to victory, less damage for Maia, but hope the Maia retires already.

Paul Craig was probably the most impressive performer of the night, pulling guard and then chaining submissions until he destroyed Hill's arm. Very satisfying win, doesn't even bother me to have been wrong. I almost picked Craig there anyway, just talked myself out of it at the last minute. In hindsight betting Craig as a big underdog was an easy play. Didn't get many reads wrong but that was definitely one and perhaps the worst mistake.

Prelims

Brad Riddell and Drew Dober went to war! Dober was so close to getting that first round finish, then slowed down ever so slightly and Riddell took the latter two rounds. The fight went pretty much exactly like I predicted it, however I never expected Riddell to be the one to mix more offensive wrestling in. Surprisingly well as well, took Dober down couple of times and it saved him in the first when he was nearly knocked out.

Eryk Anders and Darren Stewart had a horrible fight which Anders just edged. I don't really get it, Anders figured out the best path to beat Stewart in the first fight, then proceeded to fight nothing like it in the 2nd fight? The guy just seems to insist to make things unnecessarily difficult for himself. Hopefully won't have to bet on the guy again, he is somewhat skilled but as unreliable as it gets, weird decisions in the cage time and again.

Lauren Murphy somehow won a split decision against Joanne Calderwood, but hopefully they don't book him against Valentina next. Calderwood outstruck her on the feet, so Valentina will literally kill her. On paper Murphy has 5 fight win streak, but there is more than one dodgy decision in that list.

Movsar Evloev did what was expected of him against Dawodu - put the pace and wrestling on him. Strangely though Evloev faded towards the end when you would have expected it to go the other way around, and his chin was tested... He didn't fail the test, but didn't pass it with flying colors either. Definitely scary moment for us who backed him, he wasn't far off from getting finished. Still good insticts to get the takedown again to stay safe.

Pannie Kianzad beat Alexis Davis via wide decision as we expected, but it was closer fight than scorecards suggest, certainly closer than I expected.

Then we come to the best bet of the night. Perhaps best bet I have landed ever. I picked McKinney - the underdog - to win in first round. Not only did he win, and not only did he win in the first round, he ended the fight in 7 seconds with a simple one-two. Can't get it any better than that. Boom that's 10 bets up with single fight. Rest of the card was winning by only bit over one bet so shows how crucial getting that one right was for me. 

Chase Hooper fights are such a mixed bag to watch cause obviously you want the kid to be beaten since he always has silly odds and you always bet against him, but at the same time you hate to see such a young talented kid take needless beatings. Again he absorbed a ton of hard powershots, and this time he didn't score a Hail Mary submission late on. Peterson did mess around on the ground quite a bit more than I was comfortable with, but as predicted he was too good to get finished despite some scares.

Hooper shouldn't be in the UFC, he should be fighting scrubs and polishing his striking. Wait for him to be complete fighter before throwing him to the sharks, now he is just gonna wash out early cause the damage accumulates.

I could see a Fares Ziam shutout in my preview. "If Ziam can slow the pace of the fight then sure, he can win all rounds" So yeah... I called it but ultimately picked Vendramini, cause I thought he could make it an ugly fight similarly to how Madge did and how Mullarkey tried. Well it takes certain level of cardio, toughness and willpower to fight like that, and turns out Vendramini didn't have that. Again hindsight Ziam was an easy pick, though that late flurry from Vendramini could have made it a draw with better luck. 

Carlos Felipe and Jake Collier had a very close fight. I'm not gonna comment that it should have been scored the other way around, all I will say it was sufficiently close that could have gone either way, but didn't work for me. Don't regret picking Collier though, he did well for such underdog odds.

My picks

I got 10 out of 14 night, ending up little bit over 11 bets up all in all, 6 bets up from ML picks (4 of those from McKinney) and 5 bets up from prop bets (+6 from McKinney R1, -1 from Kianzad ITD and Dober R1). It was best result I have had in terms of winnings since I started doing this UFC betting thing, at least from what I remember.

I'm proud of daring to go big on the underdog for my McKinney bet. It obviously was a solid read in the end, though at the same time you have to admit some degree of luck to see your pick put the other guy out that fast. Still, I saw the offensive potency was there and that Frevola could be blitzed. 

Worst pick... Well Hill definitely. My other wrong picks all had some caveats - Collier fought to a close decision, Vendramini could have gotten a draw to bail me out, no-one saw Fig fighting such a poor fight... but Hill just fought dumb and got subbed. It was something many called right, he was untested and Craig was a tough veteran to expose the whole in his game. What ultimately put me off making the play was the fact OSP couldn't get a takedown, but then again, in hindsight, did OSP really even try? 

Craig would have been very lucrative pick there, especially if you hammered the ITD prop. That was pretty much Craig's path to victory anyway, had he not taken Hill's arm home, he would have been trying it off his back for 15 minutes, and that's not way to win rounds. 

Either way I finally managed to capture some value with my UFC bets, but even then there was still a lot of value being left on the table. Next week is a new event again, but I wanna savor this victory for some time.