It’s Fight Day for UFC Rio and we’ve got a pretty fun lineup headed our way from Brazil! The event features 12 bouts and will be headlined by a ranked lightweight clash between Charles Oliveira and Mateusz Gamrot.
Only one fighter missed weight for the event with Saimon Oliveira coming in 8 pounds over the bantamweight limit. He was fined 50% of his fight purse and told he won’t be able to weigh over 155 pounds for fight day.
My favorite UFC Rio picks are Joel Alverez, Vitor Petrino and Bea Mesquita. My favorite betting “underdog” of the card is Gamrot, who’s currently listed as a -110 pick em on multiple books.
Alverez is finally making the move up to welterweight and gets a very winnable matchup against Vicente Luque. Alverez has won his last 3 fights and should look good in this one not having to make the cut all the way down to lightweight.
I expect Alverez to use his height and length to control range and he should be more dangerous anywhere this one goes. Unless Luque lands big early, I think Alverez can put him away in the first two rounds.
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Vitor Petrino looked good in his debut at heavyweight in his last fight, picking up a first round submission win over Austen Lane. Petrino should land the bigger shots and be able to hold his own if Thomas Peterson attempts to wrestle. I expect Petrino to find a KO/TKO win sometime pretty early in this one.
Mesquita is making her UFC debut and love the matchup she’s getting here against Irina Alekseeva. Mesquita is an extremely accomplished grappler and has put together a solid 5-0 MMA record with her last 4 wins coming in LFA.
I expect Mesquita to try to get this one on the ground early and often while working for submissions. Alekseeva hasn’t been stopped in her 3 previous losses, but I think there’s a good chance Mesquita can submit her in this spot.
For the betting card, I’m keeping things extremely light since there’s just not a ton that I’m loving this week for the bets. I took a flyer on Gamrot to Win Inside the Distance (+240 for .5 units) and Mesquita by Submission + Gamrot ML (+230 for .5 units). That’s two bets for 1 unit total.
In the main event, it feels like Oliveira is getting back in there a bit too quickly to make sure he got to compete in front of his home fans. Gamrot took this fight on short notice, but he stays in fight shape pretty much constantly so that’s not much of a concern here.
I think Gamrot can avoid the submission threat of Oliveira and should be able to grind him out down the stretch.
This card should be pretty entertaining overall, but definitely not an easy one for the picks/bets in my opinion. A lot of the Brazilian fighters, particularly on the main card, have pretty difficult matchups and several of the heavier betting favorites haven’t shown they’re too trustworthy.
Be sure to check back next weekend for UFC Vancouver and then we have UFC 321 to cap off the month on October 25. Hope everyone enjoys the fights today and best of luck on the bets!
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