We’re on the eve of UFC Vegas 104 tomorrow at the Apex in Las Vegas and it looks like a pretty fun card on paper despite lacking a bit in star power overall. The event will be headlined by a middleweight rematch between the returning Marvin Vettori and Roman Dolidze and also features 12 other bouts. Diyar Nurgozhay missed weight by 4.5 pounds for his UFC debut, definitely not a great look and particularly if he loses. Chidi Njokuani (1.25 pounds over) and Josias Musasa (0.5 pounds over) also missed weight for the card, although Musasa was attempting to cut his weight at time of posting.

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My favorite picks on this weekend’s card are Kevin Vallejos, Da’Mon Blackshear, Diyar Nurgozhay and Carli Judice. My favorite potential betting upsets are AJ Cunningham, Ryan Spann and Priscilla Cachoeira. Be sure to visit our MILLIONS profile to catch “The Problem’s Picks” from Chris Duncan with his favorite spots for this card also.

Vallejos is 14-1 with 12 wins coming via stoppage entering his UFC debut and the matchmakers gave him an excellent spot for a statement debut against Seung Woo Choi who has been stopped in five of his seven losses. I expect Vallejos to put some heavy shots on Choi early to get a stoppage win in the first two rounds. Vallejos’ only career loss was to Jean Silva, so I’d definitely keep an eye on him.

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Blackshear is looking for back-to-back wins here and I love the matchup for him against Cody Gibson. While Gibson is tough and durable on the feet, I expect Blackshear to have success getting this one to the ground where he’s a very dangerous submission threat. I think he’ll be able to get Gibson out during the latter rounds via sub.

I didn’t love the fact that Nurgozhay pulled up nearly five pounds over the limit, but as long as he isn’t injured, I don’t think it affects anything more than his perception. Riberio is a dangerous fighter, but he’s 1-2 in the UFC and the win was a split over Caio Machado. Nurgozhay should be able to put a sixth stoppage loss on Riberio’s record here.

Judice is looking for her first UFC win and I love this spot for her against Yuneisy Duben, who is making her UFC debut off a highlight reel KO on DWCS. While Duben has plenty of power in her striking, Judice has shown to be durable enough to withstand the early threat while landing a high volume of her own striking. I wouldn’t be surprised if Judice gets this one done via KO/TKO down the stretch or clean on the cards.

For the betting card this weekend, we have three straight bets and a couple of parlays. The straight bets are: Judice by KO/TKO (+250 for .5 units), Blackshear by Submission (+300 for .5 units) and AJ Cunningham ML (+500 for .25 units). The parlays are Nurgozhay to Win in R1/2 + Vallejos to Win in R1/2 (+251 for .5 units) and Judice ML + Nurgozhay ML + Vallejos by KO/TKO + Kevin Holland ML + Carlos Ulberg ML (+708 for .5 units, the last two legs are on next weekend’s UFC London card).

I really like Cunningham coming down in weight to 135 after making his UFC debut at lightweight. He was mostly picked apart by Ludovit Klein in that one, but I expect him to look a lot better here after some time away and moving to Factory X and coming down 20 pounds to bantamweight. I also wanted to get a cross-card parlay in this week and liked the two spots there from the London card.

Holland hasn’t looked great recently, but opening as an underdog is disrespectful. If he shows up motivated, and he should, I think he gets this one done. I’m also really high on Ulberg, who has excellent and well-rounded striking to cause problems for Jan Blachowicz as he returns from a lengthy layoff and two shoulder surgeries. That’s a total of five tracked bets for 2.25 units this week.

Overall, this should be a pretty good card this weekend with potential for quite a few stoppages too. We got back in the win column on the bets last weekend with UFC 313 after a rough stretch for the previous few events, so hopefully we can string together the success into this week too. Special shoutout to NextMMA.com for letting us sponsor their UFC Vegas 104 fight card for this week, if you haven’t checked them out, I highly recommend it. Best of luck on the bets and hope everyone enjoys the fights tomorrow!

Chris Duncan’s Top Picks for UFC Vegas 104

We’re one week out from Chris Duncan putting on a show at UFC London when he faces Jordan Vucenic on the main card! Be sure to tune in next Saturday for a banger and check out his social media accounts for a raffle for your chance to win an official UFC walk out tracksuit that you can get him to sign! We’re extremely proud to be sponsoring Chris and can’t wait to see his work during camp come to fruition next weekend!

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