UFC 251: Usman vs. Masvidal (7/11)

I meant weight difference. It happened with Grasso.
Yeah I'm not sure but I think that was a state commission specific ruling. With Rosa at 136 Melo has 5lbs on her, just a guess but I assume they let Rosa decide. I don't know how things work on "Fight Island" though.
 
Only two fighters missed weight. Paiva came in at 129 for his flyweight fighter and Melo came in at 141 for her bantamweight fight. Yikes. Mas had to use the towel and looked pretty happy he made weight but I doubt that will play much into tomorrows fight.
 
Anyone planning on ordering the PPV that would be willing to PM with me just to see how much delay I have?
 
What changed your mind?
Rewatched Volk/Mendes, Volk/Aldo, Volk/Elkins, Max/Poirer, Max/Aldo 2, Max/Stephens. I can see a progression in Volk over time where his defense and timing has increased exponentially. His eyes can see layers ahead of what's being presented to him. I've seen Holloways timing and defense deteriorate a bit over the years. I think Volks pressure and ability to disrupt momentum is a huge foil to Max's game. If his opponent wont bite on feints or show reactions to them or wont let him establish his jab he starts running out of ideas. I think Max hit his peak fighting Aldo and is staying to come down. We've seen red flags over the years. Pulled out for concussion symptoms, notorious weight cuts, severe damage taken over the past few fights. I also don't like the things Max has been saying. Obviously the zoom training which could be a lie to protect his team from being fined since quarantine is struct in Hawaii but alarming nonetheless. Max seems to think he won the first fight and was surprised to even get a rematch.

Masvidal is a bit simpler to explain. I don't think his wall walking technique will be all that effective against Usman. Usman is too strong and too good at taking your base and lacing your legs against the fence to be thrwarted by a guillotine grip and simple whizzer. Ok so just stay away from the fence right? Bendo classically brought Jorge to the fence consistently and years later, Wonderboy, Till and Diaz also had no problem backing him to the fence.
 
Rewatched Volk/Mendes, Volk/Aldo, Volk/Elkins, Max/Poirer, Max/Aldo 2, Max/Stephens. I can see a progression in Volk over time where his defense and timing has increased exponentially. His eyes can see layers ahead of what's being presented to him. I've seen Holloways timing and defense deteriorate a bit over the years. I think Volks pressure and ability to disrupt momentum is a huge foil to Max's game. If his opponent wont bite on feints or show reactions to them or wont let him establish his jab he starts running out of ideas. I think Max hit his peak fighting Aldo and is staying to come down. We've seen red flags over the years. Pulled out for concussion symptoms, notorious weight cuts, severe damage taken over the past few fights. I also don't like the things Max has been saying. Obviously the zoom training which could be a lie to protect his team from being fined since quarantine is struct in Hawaii but alarming nonetheless. Max seems to think he won the first fight and was surprised to even get a rematch.

Masvidal is a bit simpler to explain. I don't think his wall walking technique will be all that effective against Usman. Usman is too strong and too good at taking your base and lacing your legs against the fence to be thrwarted by a guillotine grip and simple whizzer. Ok so just stay away from the fence right? Bendo classically brought Jorge to the fence consistently and years later, Wonderboy, Till and Diaz also had no problem backing him to the fence.

Your analysis of Volk/Max looks eerily familiar. I am pretty sure a brilliant capper posted much of the same stuff along the way in this thread ha ha.

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Your analysis of Volk/Max looks eerily familiar. I am pretty sure a brilliant capper posted much of the same stuff along the way in this thread ha ha.

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Do the scorecards of their last fight concern you with playing -5.5 volk? I thought he won all 5 rounds, but the judges didn’t.

2 48-47’s
 
did paiva look drained on the scales? he looks huge compared to zhalgas.
 
Finally got around to some of the big name fights, usually save these for last because my gut says it'll be hard to get value on most of them at any given point just because they're the fighters everyone has actually seen fight

Petr Yan v Jose Aldo:

I've flip-flopped on this one and man I still do not feel comfortable, but I think I've chosen my side

Jose Aldo has absolutely fucking ridiculous handspeed for a 33 year old with the fight miles he has. He's also very good at pacing himself as is evident by the fact that he didn't actually look tired against Marlon Moraes (albeit in a low volume fight).

So why the fuck can't I bring myself to bet this dude as an underdog?

Well, he's extremely hittable. Throughout his fight with Moraes, Aldo was constantly getting tagged. I know what you're thinking - Moraes didn't drop him once, the most did he was stun him early in round one with a headkick he didn't see coming during a slow start, surely this tells us that Aldo's chin will hold up and Yan will gas himself out en route to a late TKO/decision. There's several reasons I'm not so sure about this:

1. Fisticuff-cakes - Yes Aldo got tagged a lot by Moraes and yes he stayed on his feet the whole time... But most of those shots were punches, and contrary to popular believe Moraes doesn't actually have much power in his hands. Moraes has a crazy fast switch kick which he can throw with no telegraphing and this is responsible for most of his knockouts. Moraes also isn't super accurate with his striking - He throws hard in roughly the right direction and does damage through the sheer force he puts into his strikes, which is also why he tends to gas early. By contrast, Yan has 'fuck you' power because of his accuracy - He lands his punches exactly on the button (and also with power behind them). He has a nice knee from the Thai clinch and high kick too, but watching his fights you'll see pretty much all of Yan's knockdowns come from his fists, and that doesn't bode well for a guy who eats knuckles like Dulce de Leche

2. Head movement - Aldo is good at moving his head just off the line of punches. Unfortunately for him, Yan has stupid good spacial awareness and is willing to overextend slightly to land a power shot (see: Rivera R1). It's not directly comparable because Rivera doesn't really do head movement, but Yan does always seem to know where his opponent is in relation to himself and exactly how far he needs to throw his strikes to get his shot off

3. Pressure - Both Yan and Aldo are pressure fighters who excel at backing their opponent against the cage using their footwork. We know Yan will continue to pressure even when his opponent has power - He got back up after Dodson knocked him down and just kept moving forward. At 135 this is a bit of a question mark for Aldo - He visibly didn't respect Moraes's power at all, but Yan has much stronger hands than Moraes does. It's likely we get a phonebooth fight, but if anyone else has opinions on this I'd be interested in hearing them

4. How powerful is Aldo at 135? When Michael Johnson moved to 145, he lost his one shot ability. Aldo hit Moraes with a bit of eyeshadow, but never came close to knocking him down. Even at 145, Aldo's only knockouts since he stopped using leg kicks have been from either body shots or an accumulation TKO. At 135 he's visibly trying to use less energy, and Yan makes it clear if he does get hurt that he is not done (either via strong wrestling or just never stopping throwing)

5. Cardio - Aldo's knows how to last a 5 rounder... But Yan does as well. He did look visibly tired at the end of the Rivera fight, but you have to imagine he'll adjust for a 5 rounder since he's fought two of them before (initial split loss to Magomed Magomedov, then the UD win in the rematch)

At his 3.0/+200 price, I really wanted to be able to sell myself on Aldo. As unpopular as I'm sure this will be, I just can't see what he offers that Dodson didn't. Yan via multiple knockdowns en route to a late finish or decision
 
Been reading these forums and a few youtube accounts religiously for awhile while forming my own opinions on fights. Im a huge boxing gambler and for a few years now Ive began betting mma big as well. Its my main source of income. Hit every fight but 2 last week and had 500 on erosa +400 , as well as 50 on erosa +900 by ko or sub. These are my picks , the more stars, the more confident the bet. The only card i lost on this year was the Eye-calvillo card. But i bet the house on vettori (i always do), so actually wasnt a bad day. So this first time posting, lets see how it goes lol good luck all.

Usman ***** (near lock bet)
Holloway ** (id lean holloway at even odds, +195 i have to bet it)
Yan *** (aldo cant out fight him. he needs a KO, its possible)
Namajunas **** (think rose wins 8 or 9 out of 10 fights vs andrade, mindset is always concern, think she has anxiety but still betting her fairly big)
Ribas who cares, ill put a small method on PVZ
Volkan ***** (cant say lock, but Im taking him -150 range HUGE) (abu dahbi heat concerns and afraid of the unkown w prochazka)
EZ dos santos ** (getting plus money now)
Danny Henry ** (amirkhani rd 1 or its henrys fight,henry size adv. should be much tighter line getting henry +180)
Bogatov * (no confidence, small bet on the dog vs 40 yr old incredible fighter, KOing ray doesnt tell me he still the santos of 5+ years ago)
Tybura * (not confident. i was fading tybura vs romanov. i may just skip fight and wait to fade tybura next time)
Paiva ***** (im still very upset on having paiva +220 vs kara france, hes a future contender. even the bontorin fight was quite unlucky
Melo * (i liked the value, but the weight miss is concerning. prob skip)
Martin Day **** (just think its Days fight, hes the better fighter. will pay the -170)

big bets are volkan, day, paiva, rose, and Usman dropping to -230 is a gift in my opinion. will bet henry bigger if he approaches 2x the money. will bet holloway more if day loses. i have the under in yan/aldo, didnt look at method of victories or the other over unders yet, these are just my winners
 
Do the scorecards of their last fight concern you with playing -5.5 volk? I thought he won all 5 rounds, but the judges didn’t.

2 48-47’s

Yes a little. I do have his ML at -190 too. But my thinking with diverting some to the -5.5 is that I think Max is gonna be more aggressive which will leave him open to maybe get smoked by the more powerful guy. A Volk finish isn't out of the question at all imo. And getting +145 vs paying -190 on some of my $ is worth the risk that we similar scoring.

I also think sometimes judges are tilted toward the champ in close rounds. Esp a long reigning champ like Max was. If we saw the exact same fight this time, I think it's VERY likely that the scoring would be much more tilted toward Volk.
 
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Been reading these forums and a few youtube accounts religiously for awhile while forming my own opinions on fights. Im a huge boxing gambler and for a few years now Ive began betting mma big as well. Its my main source of income. Hit every fight but 2 last week and had 500 on erosa +400 , as well as 50 on erosa +900 by ko or sub. These are my picks , the more stars, the more confident the bet. The only card i lost on this year was the Eye-calvillo card. But i bet the house on vettori (i always do), so actually wasnt a bad day. So this first time posting, lets see how it goes lol good luck all.

Usman ***** (near lock bet)
Holloway ** (id lean holloway at even odds, +195 i have to bet it)
Yan *** (aldo cant out fight him. he needs a KO, its possible)
Namajunas **** (think rose wins 8 or 9 out of 10 fights vs andrade, mindset is always concern, think she has anxiety but still betting her fairly big)
Ribas who cares, ill put a small method on PVZ
Volkan ***** (cant say lock, but Im taking him -150 range HUGE) (abu dahbi heat concerns and afraid of the unkown w prochazka)
EZ dos santos ** (getting plus money now)
Danny Henry ** (amirkhani rd 1 or its henrys fight,henry size adv. should be much tighter line getting henry +180)
Bogatov * (no confidence, small bet on the dog vs 40 yr old incredible fighter, KOing ray doesnt tell me he still the santos of 5+ years ago)
Tybura * (not confident. i was fading tybura vs romanov. i may just skip fight and wait to fade tybura next time)
Paiva ***** (im still very upset on having paiva +220 vs kara france, hes a future contender. even the bontorin fight was quite unlucky
Melo * (i liked the value, but the weight miss is concerning. prob skip)
Martin Day **** (just think its Days fight, hes the better fighter. will pay the -170)

big bets are volkan, day, paiva, rose, and Usman dropping to -230 is a gift in my opinion. will bet henry bigger if he approaches 2x the money. will bet holloway more if day loses. i have the under in yan/aldo, didnt look at method of victories or the other over unders yet, these are just my winners

Nice write up, you seem to bet big bucks. Hope you cash some of those, agree with most of them.
You said you´re a big boxing gambler, I´m very curious what do you find different with mma vs boxing? Is it the same process you use, or is it ver ydifferent betting boxing? I thought we markerts were much more efficient there. Whats your style to bet on boxing like the research part if you´d share it?
 
Nice write up, you seem to bet big bucks. Hope you cash some of those, agree with most of them.
You said you´re a big boxing gambler, I´m very curious what do you find different with mma vs boxing? Is it the same process you use, or is it ver ydifferent betting boxing? I thought we markerts were much more efficient there. Whats your style to bet on boxing like the research part if you´d share it?
i live in new york, been boxing most my life. never fully committed to it wen i was younger and was supposed to go pro. i know alot of whats going on in the boxing community as far as promotions, whos "supposed to win", and even the occasional insider info. for example my friend was in keith thurmans camp for pacquiao. thurman didnt even spar the whole month leading up to the fight his hand was busted. he went thru w the fight to get paid. healthy thurman wouldve won. i bet pacquiao before the line took off. in boxing there are actual locks sometimes w a promoter backed boxer against a non KO fighter where i lay down some real cash. i just love the fight game. ive only really started loving and respecting mma over the last few years like i do boxing. UFC the way they pay their fighters is a disgrace tho
 
also, ive noticed a lot of top guys taking volkan and day, especially volkan. needless to say, if i lose my bet on day, im gona double down on volkan most likely. law of averages. but yea Volkan/Day are consensus picks. i, personally, absolutely love Paiva and his line dropped to -160 on one of my books. and im thinking about a very sizeable henry bet over amirkhani
 
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