UFC Fight Night 194 Preview & Predictions

Main Event: Marina Rodriguez vs. MacKenzie Dern

About as clear of a binary match-up as they come, either Dern gets early sub or gets outpointed to oblivion. Dern can snap something up any time the fight goes to the ground and although her stand-up is still relatively wooden, at least she has been improving it. 

After Ribas sort of exposed her in 2019, Dern has been putting in very solid performances, with only Jandiroba surviving to a decision against her. Rodriguez has been controlled on the ground by Esparza and even went to a draw against Calvillo, so there is definitely a good chance of grappling domination here. Dern doesn't even need to score takedowns with regularity, arguable all she needs is one if she gets it early enough in the round. 

Think we hammer Dern here all night long.

Prediction: MacKenzie Dern & Dern ITD & Dern Sub

Confidence in winner: 3

Co-Main Event: Randy Brown vs. Jared Gooden

Gooden is a powerful guy, if he can get his foundations even better he will be a big problem. As for Randy Brown, we know he is rangy and tricky to deal with, but also somewhat fragile. 

I feel Gooden has more upside here, likely via finish. Brown ought to be better minute winner if he does not get hurt. KOing Stolze doesn't tell us that much in the end though so this one could go either way, I just feel like Brown has much more evident weaknesses to expose and less margin for error here.

Prediction: Jared Gooden ITD

Confidence in winner: 2

Tim Elliott vs. Matheus Nicolau

Elliott is probably more shopworn than people realize. Up there in age, gassy, probably durability on the slide and he never was defensively a savant anyway. Tricky to deal with sure, but Nicolau has shown enough so far to consider him world class. I'd expect him to beat Elliott up pretty bad here, maybe even get him out of there.

Prediction: Matheus Nicolau & Nicolau ITD

Confidence in winner: 4

Sabina Mazo vs. Mariya Agapova

Forever PTSD for Agapova managing to lose to worst fighter in UFC? Not only lose but get finished in under 1.5 rounds. Jeez. Mazo got defeated last time around via top controlling decision and Agapova can beat her via similar route if she can just pace herself better.

At the same time Mazo is the better stand-up fighter and probably done at least something in effort to try to sort the issue out. All in all I would say it's probably fight with thin margins so I rather just punt small on the underdog than try to get fancy. I would favor Mazo in general but think Agapova has the skillset to bother her if she just doesn't gas herself out immediately.

Prediction: Mariya Agapova

Confidence in winner: 1

Chris Gutierrez vs. Felipe Dias Colares

Colares has some grappling upside here, I guess, but on the feet it should be a massacre. Colares kicks hard but defensively... he has no defence. He just has legendary chin and absorbs everything, but sooner or later one of these guys is gonna come and put so much punishment on him that the chin is gonna crack. Is Gutierrez that guy? I don't know but I expect him to be getting off from round one and the damage might accumulate for a late finish. Gutierrez isn't big power puncher and his biggest finishing threat is leg kicks and kicks in general. 

The fact that Gutierrez managed to largely outstrike a tricky, long and skilled striker like Ewell is very impressive, Colares should be much easier challenge on the feet. 

Colares' win condition is really either getting lot of clinch and grappling going or finding a sub or a KO, and Chris has never been KOd so I don't exactly think it's high probability outcome. Frankly I think Gutierrez is just gonna defend the takedowns and punish him. 

Prediction: Chris Gutierrez & Gutierrez ITD

Confidence in winner: 4

Alexander Romanov vs. Jared Vanderaa

Romanov should have lost his 0 last time, he got exposed, but Vanderaa is gonna be another can for him to King Kong smash. 

Prediction: Alexander Romanov ITD

Confidence in winner: 4

Charles Rosa vs. Damon Jackson

Rosa's performance against Minner was brutal, but at least Jackson isn't as good at top control... then again actually neither isn't Minner, I honestly don't know what happened in that fight. Still I think that it was one off very poor performance from Rosa, he didn't show up as he was supposed to and market probably over-reacting to that. 

Rosa is tough to finish, whereas all Jackson's fights have been finishes and he would be 1-2 in UFC if he didn't pull a sub out of his ass against Bektic that was coasting to victory in a dominant fashion in their match.

Oddly enough although my impression is that Jackson is more shopworn, it's actually Rosa that's the older fighter here. All in all Jackson probably top controls at least to one round win, Rosa probably wins at least one round and I'd expect one round to be weird to score. Probably another one where you are better off taking small shot at the underdog.

Lupita Gonzales vs. Silvana Gomez Juarez

My first instinct was that this probably would heavily favor Gonzales, as she is not bad even if she lost her debut and her opponent is coming in on short notice. That being said Juarez actually has very solid record, 10-2 with 8 finishes and both losses coming to girls who are in UFC, and both after over 15 minutes of fighting. 

So she should be good enough to hang here unless she is out of shape. Just looking at the body composition she does not look any worse off than Gonzales, so this ought to be interesting. It's two decent female fighters as far as low-level fighters go anyway. Probably take a shot at whoever is the underdog, but if it's close enough I still side Lupita to edge close decision most of the time. 

Prediction: Silvana Gomez Juarez

Confidence in winner: 2

Steve Garcia vs. Charlie Ontiveros

Both of these guys debuted in the UFC as short notice replacements and took a loss. Not much to take from Garcia's debut, aside that he obviously is good at surviving submission positions and is evidently tough, but aside that he just got mostly dominated in grappling while exhausted for 15 minutes. 

As for Ontiveros, he fought Holland and got finished in the first round... after also being dominated in grappling. At least Garcia has the excuse of being gassed and being against solid grappler, but getting out-wrestled by 2020 Holland is something that has aged badly. Not to mention it seems Ontiveros is prone to looking for way out, whereas to beat Garcia you pretty much have to put him unconscious.

Wouldn't wanna bank on that, given that based on statistics Garcia is the more heavy-handed of the pair. All in all I am not going to over-complicate this, Ontiveros will probably struggle to keep this on the feet and either give up to wrestling pressure from Garcia or lose a decision via getting top controlled. Low confidence pick due to limited quality tape.

Prediction: Steve Garcia

Confidence in winner: 2


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