Cleveland better be ready. It’s been an absolutely amazing year for the city of Cleveland with Miocic becoming the heavyweight champion of the world and then Lebron James and company bringing an NBA title to the city as well. For a city that never seemed to have much luck in the world of sports, 2016 has been quite the year. Now Cleveland gets to have their hometown hero, Stipe Miocic, headline a UFC PPV card in his hometown.
For a card that hasn’t been getting a lot of main stream love seeing as it comes on the heels of UFC 202, this is a pretty solid card from top to bottom. You have the current champ, Stipe, taking on Alistair Overeem in the main event, and also the ex-champion Fabricio Werdum in the co-main trying to get back in the win column against Travis Browne. Add in the hype surrounding CM Punk’s first professional MMA fight against Mickey Gall and you have a card that I think could actually sell fairly well. I’m predicting 700k PPV buys. And let’s not forget Urijah Faber is back in the octagon after his title shot loss to Dominick Cruz against Jimmie Rivera who is one of the biggest prospects in the division. Rounding out the main card is a battle between a couple of women’s strawweight contenders (#6 and #7) who both know how to finish fights in Jessica Andrade and Joanne Calderwood. All-in-all it’s a great main card for a PPV event.
I’m using odds from BetOnline.ag below. Check out our full BetOnline review here.
Stipe Miocic vs Alistair Overeem
The trend of heavyweight champs losing their title defense in front of a home crowd is one that Stipe is going to try to end on Saturday. Stipe is probably the best boxer in the division and he throws heavy hands whether he’s moving forward or backwards. Overeem has really upgraded his game to fight a much smarter style with a wide variety of techniques. He’s had to adapt after being knocked out in 3 of 4 fights between 2013 and 2014. Since losing to Ben Rothwell in the first round back in September of 2014, Overeem has strung together four impressive wins with knockouts of Struve, dos Santos and most recently Arlovski, while dominating Roy Nelson to a decision win in that span as well.
Overeem has improved a ton over his last several fights and his new fight IQ really showed through against Junior dos Santos last December. Dos Santos is a guy who is probably the most similar to Stipe in the division and Overeem was able to handle him with a variety of techniques and fighting smart to stay away from the KO power. I think Overeem has the ability to win this fight if he can avoid getting KO’d early.
Play: Overeem +120
Travis Browne vs Fabricio Werdum
Browne is an athletic guy, but I have to think he’s regressed since his decision loss to Werdum by moving to the Edmond Tarverdyan camp, where careers seem to go to die. In his last 5 fights Browne is 2-3 and the wins were a TKO over Brendan Schaub who retired afterwards because he realized his chin was glass and then a TKO win over Matt Mitrione after eye poking him several times during the fight.
This fight is close to a layup for Werdum who should easily bounce back from his loss to Miocic in Brazil. If Werdum fights smart and doesn’t chase like a wild man again like he did against Miocic he should have no trouble with Browne.
Play: Werdum -200
CM Punk vs Mickey Gall
I give CM Punk, aka Phil Brooks, a lot of respect for trying his hand at MMA. It looks like he really put in the work and became a mixed martial artist based on the docu-series Evolution of Punk, but I think he bit off quite a bit more than he can chew in this fight with Gall. First of all, Mickey Gall is a 24 year old who has been training in the different MMA disciplines almost his entire life, so even as a 24 year old he has far more experience than the 36 year old Punk. Add in the fact that he’s far younger with that experience and you have a guy who’s body is in better shape and has probably not been through as much physically as an ex-pro wrestler. Then add in the fact that Mickey Gall is obviously a far better athlete than CM Punk and I cannot see any way that Punk wins this fight.
I’m actually pretty high on Mickey Gall these days and I think he will be able to hold his own against solid UFC fighters even after getting through the CM Punk chapter of his life.
Play: Gall -450
Jimmie Rivera vs Urijah Faber
It’s very tough for me to bet against Urijah Faber when he’s an underdog in a fight against someone who isn’t a champion (or Frankie Edgar). If you take out the featherweight fight against Frankie Edgar, Faber has won 12 non-championship fights in a row and he’s 9-0 in the UFC in non-title fights. Yes, he looked underwhelming against Dominick Cruz, but Cruz has the ability to do that to people.
Jimmie Rivera is a very solid fighter, but he’s not Dominick Cruz. He is 3-0 in the UFC, but he hasn’t been up against anyone even close to the level of Faber and he even needed a split decision to beat Pedro Munhoz last November.
I have to go with Faber here as a slight underdog. Until he starts losing non-title fights I have to believe he the ultimate gate keeper.
Play: Faber +100
Jessica Andrade vs Joanne Calderwood
Andrade looked like an absolute beast in her strawweight debut against Jessica Penne at UFC 199. She simply overwhelmed Penne en route to a second round TKO win. Andrade was too small at bantamweight and now that she is the bigger girl in her fights I think she could bulldoze her way right to a title shot.
Calderwood is a great fighter coming off a very impressive win over Valerie Letourneau, but this is a really tough fight for her. She’s a similar build to Penne and although she is a more skilled striker than Penne, I still think Andrade wins by utilizing the same style she did against Calderwood. I expect Andrade to come forward with a ton of punches and to overwhelm Calderwood en route to another win and a jump up the strawweight rankings.
Play: Andrade -138
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