UFC 269 Post-Fight Analysis

It was another event where I stared into the abyss of going bust still going into the final fight, yet somehow ended up only losing 4 units. I concluded my tweeting after the event with the words "I am not stupid, just lazy and undisciplined", which I guess doesn't sound so good either, but you can fix bad discipline and laziness, whereas stupid cannot be fixed. Let's go through the fights individually and see the error in my ways.

Main Card

One fight where I get absolutely full marks is the one that saved the night, the main event. My analysis, as succinct and simple as it was, was spot on, and all my picks hit as well. There were some fights on the card where I got the analysis pretty much right but still ended up losing everything, but let's get to that in a bit.

So Oliveira and Poirier were very competitive on the feet, it was probably 60-40 for Poirier but very close, both were dealing ton of damage to each other in the early going and were unwilling to concede and inch. Poirier seemed to have power advantage, but Oliveira was stinging him with some shots as well. Ultimately it was the fact that it was similar dynamic to Khabib that decided the fight.

Poirier got submitted once he started to slow down a little and could not consistently maintain the distance. That was the reason I didn't see him as the favorite, even with better striking the fact that there would be Oliveira's UFC elite submission game to even out rounds meant that I had to always favor Oliveira in the big picture. Still could have gone either way in those wild early exchanges. Finally a main event ended inside the distance.

In the co-main... I am still trying to digest it. It was kinda the poorest performance we have seen from Nunes. Or was it? I mean she did start wildly swinging with Cyborg too... It's kinda weird to see someone considered to be the female GOAT to be found out to have poor fight IQ all along. I don't know. Power hides deficiencies I suppose. Good job on Venezuelan Vixen to fight high pace fight that she needed to drown Nunes, now I suppose she needs to repeat it to retain the title.

I guess also the time for Valentina to move up to get the bantamweight title is starting to be ripe. I mean it's not like there's any challengers at flyweight. I probably should have bet Pena just based on the number but I figured betting her was just hating money... How wrong was I. Still I saw her as much inferior fighter and that's how it certainly seemed in that first round. But I suppose if she doesn't get killed early, she always has advantage over Nunes by just putting a pace on her. 

Geoff Neal vs. Ponz was fight where I did adequate job with my analysis, was probably too brave to hit ITD and R1, I don't know, those certainly were live. Close fight, could have gone either way as well, but think Neal did enough to earn that decision.

KKF vs. Cody No Chin... well again full marks for me. All bets correct and correct analysis. I was worried there would be somewhat timid approach, and to be fair it was bit more timid than expected, but they were always gonna end up on some exchanges. Good timing, accuracy and power from Kara-France to knock Cody out once again. Him sustaining all those shots against Font and staying up was a fluke after all.

Sean O'Malley started the PPV with a gimme fight against Raulian Paiva and got the job done in style as expected. Once again full marks for me. If I didn't have that embarassing big bet on Nunes, I would give an A for myself for this main card. Then again I only had a big bet in that fight cause I was chasing, and I had correctly had some concerns in my preview about Nunes having been off for a while. Then again did she lose because of that, or because someone finally put her in a fight that had crazy pace? Oh well, it was still a very good main card for me, unfortunately it was preceded one of the worst of all-time prelims for me.

Prelims

Josh Emmett beating Ige on a close decision was the only pick I got right since the opening fight of the night. He didn't get the job done inside the distance like I had hoped for, but that wasn't a bad shout anyway since Ige did get badly hurt in the first round. Emmett is a problem against anyone cause of his power.

Dom Cruz fought like Dom Cruz does, evasive and good counter-striking. He does get nuked sometimes, and that indeed happened with Munhoz too, but he managed to build himself back into the fight and win latter two rounds. That was one of those fights that sting, cause I analyzed it correctly, but ended up weighing too heavily on Cruz' waning durability and bet on a guy who gets hit too much and doesn't have the savvy to give Cruz problems. 

Tai Tuivasa v Sakai could have gone either way, Sakai had some early good moments and there seemed to be enough slow moments too for it to go the distance, but it's two big boys colliding so finish was always gonna be likely. Not much to say about that, probably not the greatest bets but not terrible, it's not like Tuivasa winning would be foregone conclusion in any case.

Jordan Wright also warranted a bet on himself at dog odds given he had Bruno Silva hurt and dominated early on. Still bets on guys who make lot of defensive mistakes are always gonna be volatile, and Wright does those and got KOd in those early wild exchanges. In hindsight missed obvious ITD play there.

Andre Muniz is real deal and I have to stop betting against him. I mean he kinda has one process, one chain of positions he keeps going through, but he keeps breaking people's arms or as happened here, getting them to tap early. Poor analysis from me there and simply wrong pick. 

Miranda Maverick was another pretty dogshit pick, I need to drop her fight IQ rating drastically. She fought like a retard, having good moments on the feet but then senselessly initiating the grappling against a girl who kept consistently top controlling her on the mat. Great show from Blanchfield though, one to watch for future.

Speaking of terrible fight IQ, we laughed last time about those embarrassing, fundamentally unsound rolls Ryan Hall does... well they worked like magic against Darrick Minner. Minner was competent enough grappler to survive positions on the mat with Hall but ended up easily decisioned as his coaches yelled in disbelief as he kepts engaging Hall on the mat. 

I wasn't of course surprised that Minner was retard, I called it in my preview that I didn't trust him not to grapple with Hall. Yet I still somehow ended up picking him. Hall was the obvious play there, I really don't know what kind shortcircuiting ended up making me play Minner there and Hall only via submission. Hall ML and Hall by submission were the bets to make, but I could have thrown Minner ITD in there as a back-up and probably still made some money. 

Randy Costa was another awful pick. To be fair I didn't know he would come out trying to measure himself, which just made him have no rounds instead of at least having good one round before he slows down. Still Kelley was obvious pick in hindsight as the cardio guy, and great game plan to completely shut Costa out even in first round and not allow him to pace the fight. 

First fight again almost full marks, I think I did under-estimate Cachoeira a little bit, she is definitely solid striker, had Robertson at least in some mild trouble early on. 

My Picks

I'm too lazy to count them. I did actually end up winning on moneyline bets, but cause I took over 4 units of loss in the prop bets, it was a losing night overall. 

I always tell myself not to bet a ton of props, yet for some reason always end up having huge exposure on them. That's one way I am undisciplined. Something for me to look to improve next year should I survive through the rest of the UFC events for the year.

Best bet was probably KKF, but bet sizing and overall analysis included I'd say Oliveira was spot on. Worst bet easily Nunes ITD. It had some chance of hitting, but at the chalk odds, fuck it. I don't know what I thought Randy Costa was either. I need to remove these big fuck-ups and I will be solid at this.