It’s Fight Day for UFC 319 and we absolutely can’t wait for this one tonight! The card will be headlined by one of the most anticipated fights of the year when Dricus Du Plessis attempts to defend the UFC Middleweight championship against undefeated contender Khamzat Chimaev.

There were a lot of changes to the lineup throughout the week, with three fights being added then multiple dropping off. Bryan Battle missed weight by 4 pounds after moving up to middleweight causing his fight with Nursultan Ruziboev to fall through yesterday. That left 12 fights remaining on the lineup.

UFC 319 Favorite Picks

My favorite picks on this card are Khamzat Chimaev, Baisangur Susurkaev, Michal Oleksiejczuk and Alibi Idiris. My favorite potential betting upsets are Jessica Andrade and Lerone Murphy.

Chimaev is finally getting his shot at UFC gold, and despite DDP being on a fantastic run of his own, it feels like “Borz” is inevitable at this point. Du Plessis has beaten a string of former champs, but no one who has challenged him with the wrestling that Chimaev is likely to unleash. All of DDP’s recent big wins have been over strikers, Derek Brunson is the last decent wrestling threat he faced, and he struggled early in that one.

You’ve probably seen the stat by now that no one has stayed on their feet longer than 60 seconds against Chimaev and I don’t think DDP will be able to do much better. Chimaev is going to get this one on the ground and I think he’ll be able to put away Du Plessis relatively quickly and most likely in the opening round.

Susurkaev is making history after being signed from DWCS on Tuesday and making a four-day turnaround to compete on tonight’s card. If Susurkaev can go out and deliver another big performance, he’s already on a trajectory to stardom in the UFC with Dana White being very high on him after “saving” the first episode of DWCS.

Opponent Eric Nolan is coming in to debut on short notice and moving up in weight against an undefeated fighter with a 75% KO/TKO rate. I think Susurkaev will find a big shot sometime in the first two rounds for the win in a fight that was clearly set up for him to succeed.

Oleksiejczuk is making his second walk to the octagon since switching to The Fighting Nerds for his training and I think it’s really going to pay dividends here. Working with Caio Borralho has hopefully improved Michal’s ground game, as well as his takedown/submission defense.

Oleksiejczuk should be the more dangerous striker by a margin, and I think he’ll be able to keep this one mostly on the feet for a KO/TKO at some point.

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Alibi Idiris is competing in the flyweight finale for TUF 33 against Joseph Morales and love him in the spot. Morales is former UFC who has earned his way back after 3 straight wins and a strong showing on The Ultimate Fighter, but I expect him to struggle against the powerful striking of Idiris. I think Idiris will land the more impactful shots to either pick up a clean decision or a late stoppage.

UFC 319 Betting Card

For the betting card this weekend, we have a mix of props and small parlays and going in heavy on Chimaev. The prop bets are Chimaev to Win Under 1.5 Rounds (+165 for 1 unit), Chimaev by R1 Submission (+350 for .5 units), Andrade by Decision (+275 for .5 units), and Hooper by Submission (+175 for .5 units).

The parlays are Kai Asakura ML + Chimaev to Win in R1/2 (+204 for .5 units), Oleksiejczuk by KO/TKO + Chimaev to Win U1.5 Rounds (+395 for .5 units) and Idiris ML + Susurkaev to Win U1.5 Rounds + Chimaev to Win U1.5 Rounds (+397 for .5 units). DraftKings has a 50% parlay boost available that will boost that last parlay up to +597 if you have it in your area.

That’s a total of seven bets for 4 units. If you aren’t as comfortable loading up on Chimaev, some other spots I really liked but ultimately didn’t play on tracked bets were MVP and Carlos Prates. I think both of them should be pretty safe plays for tonight, but I struggled deciding on methods. I have both fighters’ moneylines attached in some untracked parlays.

Other Notes

Overall, this should be one of the more entertaining cards of the year so far and the main event should be electric. The crowd energy in Chicago has been insane for the press conference and ceremonial weigh-in, so I’m expecting them to be pretty intense tonight as well.

If you want to get hyped up before the card, we added a bunch of YouTube Shorts to our OddSmokerMMA channel with highlight and finish reels for some fighters on this card and plenty more, some of which I linked throughout here. Be sure to Subscribe if you haven’t already as that’s something we’ll likely continue doing in the future.

Remember that Dana White’s Contender Series is back, and after a largely lackluster opening episode, hopefully this second one will deliver. We also will have an early start time next weekend for UFC Shanghai, so be sure to check back earlier than usual for those picks. As always, best of luck on the bets and we hope everyone enjoys the fights tonight!

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