Jakro's MMA Musings

It's over, my slump and losing streak is over. Still made some bad bets, but nice to recover a little bit. Main Card Yea, talking about poor bets, Ortega moneyline was one of those. He was never winning this with anything else than snapping up a submission or hurting Volk, and he nearly did snap something up. Volk is hard to finish though, trait that you'd expect from a guy who has won 20 in a row, and based on tonight it's clear that top two in featherweight are in a class of their own. Ortega might be the third best, but after getting absolutely mauled by both Holloway and Volk, it's hard to see him making it back to the title contention. Seems like the gap is just too much. Similarly the gap between the champ and everyone else is just too much in women's flyweight. Valentina stared her way to a KO basically. Murphy didn't really even show up, hardly threw anything, we didn't expect her to have any chance but we did expect her to at least have a go... Stil...

Main Event: Alexander Volkanovski vs. Brian Ortega On paper Volkanovski is the better fighter, but on paper KZ was supposed to dominate Ortega as well. Ortega has consistently shown holes in his game throughout his UFC career, but he has also consistently shown improvement between fights and the time off after getting massacred by Holloway seems to have done the kid good. He is now entering his prime against Volkanovski who arguably should have lost the previous fight to Holloway. Either way Holloway, who is notorious as a pillow fist, managed to have Volk hurt couple of times during their fight. Ortega is much the harder hitter and also has very big submission threat to add, so I don't think Volk will want to mess around trying takedowns or clinching a lot here. All in all that means that Volk just has lot less weapons to employ here. I do think he will be the one striking more and hitting with more accuracy, but unless he really puts a volume on Ortega, I don't think we see t...

Very similar event for me than the last one, generally poor picks, running up a big deficit then getting saved by the main event to a milder loss that feels like a relief in the end. Main Card Yeah... I don't know why they made this match-up and why people though Spann has a chance. Sure, Smith isn't the best light heavyweight, but he is still one of the top guys, Spann is a prelim-worthy, peripherally UFC level guy that was never gonna survive 25 minutes with someone like Smith given how stupidly fragile he is. Well, guys tend to somehow survive despite being destroyed when I am on the ITD, as evidenced by the co-main. Cutelaba pretty much murdered Clark in the first round. No-one would have judged the referee if he stopped the fight after that faceplant knockdown, or the follow-up shots, or the end of the round mount GnP. No one would have judged Clark for quitting on the stool after the beating he endured, after having his teeth destroyed... but you can't be having my IT...

Main Event: Anthony Smith vs. Ryan Spann For a main event, this is genuinely awful, but whatever, Smith fights aren't usually bad anyway. The durability difference here is significant and Smith doesn't seem to get the respect he deserves. Yea he is kind of journeyman-ish, but he still has some decent skill, excellent durability and good power.  As for Spann, I don't really get on what merit he is fighting in the main event. It was barely a year ago when he barely scraped by aged Sam Alvey via split, and only bounced back to KO a fragile grappler that probably beats him 4 out of 5 times.  Smith hits a lot of volume and with 25 minutes to work with, he can clip Spann with something hard and at that point, I expect him to have the killer instinct to finish it. Prediction: Anthony Smith & Anthony Smith ITD. Co-Main Event: Ion Cutelaba vs. Devin Clark Cutelaba probably just crashes in and gets the early finish, but if not it becomes a much closer fight. Cutelaba is classic w...

It's funny how human psychology works. I took another losing event, but cause I was down to zero in my bankroll with all of my money in and managed to recover to only 4.5 bets of loss, it feels like a winning event in the end. Main Card It was a tale of two fights in the main event, with Till looking crisp and powerful on the feet but completely lost on the ground with Brunson laying absolutely devastating ground and pound on him. The fight ebbed and flowed and the finishing sequence was good example of that - Till had Brunson badly hurt on the feet, only to be taken down and submitted less than 30 seconds after that. For Brunson this means moving up to a tougher match-up, one that he is likely to get badly chinned in given his advancing years and dodgy defence. The guys above him are better strikers and can actually defend a takedown, so it is likely that Brunson gravy train is over for now. As for Till, this is proof that he is completely lost on the ground given the two wrestler...

 I obviously have not been in good form lately, but it's moment of truth - taking massive loss like last two events would basically mean me going bust and I probably aren't gonna be reloading... So time to start getting some results. Main Event: Derek Brunson vs. Darren Till Well I guess the key question here is if Brunson can impose his wrestling on Till. If they stand for 25 minutes, I don't know, I think Till just might nuke him, but most a striking match between these two would be rather low-volume and end up in a close decision large percent of the time.  Since Woodley completely schooled Till in the final good fight of his career, Till hasn't really faced anyone who tries to consistently grapple him, so we don't really know how well he would defend takedowns here. Feel like it's a fight between two pretty solid guys but ones that I don't really trust either of them. Kind of wanna pick Till by KO but then realize that he hasn't got a KO in UFC at al...