Week 11 NFL Moneyline Underdogs
Mike Randle
Welcome to my betting breakdown for UFC 265: Gane vs. Lewis, which goes down this Saturday night in front of a sold out crowd at the Toyota Center in Houston, Texas! After last week’s card was one of the lesser offerings in recent memory, this week is a pretty stacked PPV card. In the headliner we have a matchup between undefeated phenom Ciryl Gane and Houston’s own Derrick Lewis with an interim belt on the line. While the main event isn’t the best title matchup I’ve ever seen, the entire main card features names like Jose Aldo, Pedro Munhoz, Michael Chiesa and Vicente Luque, who are guaranteed to put on exciting fights.
With 13 fights currently on tap for Saturday, I have bets on five separate fights and may even add some more plays as we approach the opening preliminary bout at 6 p.m. EST.
You can find all my plays free in the FTN Bets Tracker. I’ll be writing this best bets article weekly with extended breakdowns for up to three of my best bets and occasionally some leans if I don’t have three plays. I will be in the FTNBets Discord for about two hours before the early prelims this weekend to answer any questions that readers have. We'd love to continue building the community through Discord.
UFC Vegas 33
Rafael Fiziev vs. Bobby Green Betting Odds
Odds: Fiziev -300 vs Green +240
This is a spot that I’ve had circled on the calendar since the fight announcement, and I’m really excited that it’s coming this weekend as our featured prelim. Fiziev appears to be one of the consensus favorite prospects across all of MMA right now, and I understand why. He was knocked out in the first minute of his UFC debut against Magomed Mustafaev but has since rallied for a three-fight win streak including a knockout over Renato Moicano in his last time out, which was his toughest test to date. He passed that test with flying colors. Fiziev is an extremely strong kicker and has shown solid takedown defense to this point in his career. However, he’s taking on Bobby Green, who may not wow you in any one aspect of MMA, but at 34 years old this is a guy who has essentially fought elite lightweights for the last 10 years dating back to Strikeforce, and he has faced the likes of Edson Barboza, Dustin Poirier, Clay Guida and Lando Vannata. If somebody was a top-10 lightweight in the last decade, they probably fought Bobby Green. Stylistically, Green has extremely underrated boxing with a nice jab and solid output metrics, and he is also usually able to mix in his wrestling as well. The main knock on Green is that he isn’t much of a finisher, and that oftentimes leads to him getting into competitive matchups that come down to the judges.
In terms of how I see this matchup playing out, I do expect Fiziev to have success early on in the fight with his kicks to the body and legs. Fiziev kicks extremely hard and is a solid muay thai striker. However, Bobby Green is historically very difficult to out-strike and reliably pressures his opponent and uses his boxing to score points. If Fiziev can’t get Green out of there in the first round, I expect things to be extremely competitive down the stretch of this fight and favor the cardio and experience of Green, should this fight get into deeper waters. I knew I wanted to bet Bobby Green in this spot, and I think his moneyline holds value, but I prefer to play him in the Decision-Only (If Finish No Action) market at +200, which means that if he loses via early knockout here our bet will be refunded. If this fight goes 15 minutes, there’s no way that Green as a 2/1 underdog won’t be valuable.
Bet: Bobby Green DECISION ONLY Moneyline (If Finish No Action) +200 1.5x until +185, 1x until +160 (DraftKings)
Michael Chiesa vs. Vicente Luque Betting Odds
Odds: Chiesa -110 vs Luque -110
I’m super pumped about our featured bout of the evening at UFC 265, which features a matchup between Chiesa, who is riding a four-fight win streak largely in thanks to his dominance on the ground, and Luque, who is 9-1 in his last 10 UFC fights and always brings a large dose of violence to him in the Octagon. Instead of breaking down these guys’ styles individually, I think we can save some time by accepting that this is a fairly binary matchup. What I mean by that is if Chiesa can get Luque to the ground and hold him there, the Maverick is going to win this fight decisively. Chiesa has never made huge strides as a striker, but he has always relied on his elite wrestling and grappling to win fights. He averages over 3.5 takedowns per 15 minutes and has racked up 10-plus minutes of control time in each of his last three fights. However, if Chiesa can’t get Luque to the ground, he’s in an absolute world of trouble. Luque has been in a ton of brawls and hits extremely hard, while he figures to have a rather massive striking advantage in this particular matchup.
What makes breaking down this fight so fascinating is there is a severe lack of data on how Luque fares against grapple-heavy opponents. Despite him having 16 UFC bouts, there just aren’t a ton of statistics or visuals that we’ve seen of Luque being forced to defend takedowns in bulk. Because of that, I can’t say with full confidence that I know how this fight will play out, but I can say that I have seen guys like Randy Brown and Derrick Krantz be able to take down Luque and have some success against him in the grappling portions of those fights. Of course, Luque came up victorious in both those fights, but I do think that the blueprint that Chiesa needs to follow to win this fight is going to be available. That said, Luque is extremely dangerous both on the feet and with his front choke series, which makes this a difficult fight for Chiesa to navigate, because there just isn’t a ton of room for error. So while Chiesa will face some dangers in this matchup, I’m going to use the limited data we have on Luque and have some confidence in Chiesa being able to get a clinch/grapple-heavy fight going here and grind out a victory.
Bet: Michael Chiesa +125 1.5x until +115, 1x until +110 (BetMGM)
Ciryl Gane vs. Derrick Lewis Betting Odds
Odds: Gane -360 vs Lewis +290
(This breakdown comes from my UFC 265 – Gane vs. Lewis Betting Odds, Picks and Preview, but now includes my bet on the fight).
This is a matchup that not many saw coming together, but the UFC desperately needed a headlining matchup for a Houston PPV card, and so they called on Derrick Lewis to save the day. This matchup is considered an interim title bout, with the winner likely going on to face current heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou to unify their belts later this year or early next year. Gane enters the matchup as a large favorite, and that makes a decent amount of sense considering that over the course of his nine professional bouts he’s shown almost no holes in his game. Gane is relatively new to MMA, with his professional debut taking place in the summer of 2018, so he’s vaulted himself to the top of the sport in just about three years. Lewis, on the other hand, has been fighting under the UFC banner since 2014 and is tied for the UFC record with 12 knockouts within the promotion. Stylistically, Lewis is most known for his uncanny power punching ability which is oftentimes the great equalizer in his fights, as he doesn’t have great striking or grappling metrics and historically has had trouble with his gas tank. That doesn’t seem to matter for Lewis though, as he has time and time again come back from spots where he was losing just to land a knockout blow and grab a victory. Gane, on the other hand, is quite the opposite as Lewis and is a rarity for the heavyweight division. Gane relies on footwork, technical boxing ability and speed in a division that often lacks fighters with that unique skill set. Gane also has some grappling ability, with 33% of his victories coming via submission, though he has landed less than one takedown per 15 minutes inside the UFC Octagon.
On paper, this figures to be a matchup that lines up well for Gane, as he is the more well-rounded martial artist who carries advantages in nearly every aspect imaginable within the sport outside of pure punching power. He has a more diverse set of attacks on the feet and is surely a better grappler than Lewis should he close the distance successfully. However, Lewis is somebody who I’ve just come to accept will defy the odds time and time again, and at -400 I’m not sure there’s any value in betting Gane straight, despite all the advantages he holds here. Instead of looking at the moneyline, I instead am attacking the total in this fight, which is set at 4.5 rounds. I like the under in this spot and think we’re getting a discount due to Gane (who is expected to win this fight almost 80% of the time) winning his last two five-round bouts by decision. By betting the under in this spot, we embrace the full range of outcomes that Derrick Lewis provides: 80% of his career wins have come via knockout, and not all of those fights were against guys as skilled as Gane. If Lewis wins here, I’d say there’s at least a 90% chance that his win will come via knockout. Additionally, Lewis is also susceptible to being hurt, and has been finished in five of his seven career fights. Lewis historically has not dealt well with getting hit to the body, and Gane is known for landing strikes to all three levels: head, body and legs. He landed a combined 75 strikes to the body/legs of Alexander Volkov in his last fight. Gane is a conservative striker who doesn’t take too many risks trying to get his opponents out of the cage, but it’s just hard to see a scenario where Lewis survives for 25 minutes (he never has gone the distance in a five-round fight before) without winning by knockout or getting finished by Gane on the feet or on the ground.
Bet: Ciryl Gane/Derrick Lewis Under 4.5 Rounds -160 2x until -165, 1.5x until -180, 1x until -205 (DraftKings)
