UFC Vegas 40 DFS Picks

Welcome to my DFS breakdown for UFC Vegas 40: Ladd vs. Dumont! The UFC is back in action at their apex facility this weekend with an 11-fight card headlined by Women’s Featherweight clash between Aspen Ladd and Norma Dumont, Brazilian strawweight contenders. While the main event is certainly not the best offering we’ve ever gotten from the UFC, the undercard presents some matchups I think will be fun fights despite neither competitor holding much of a noteworthy name. However, we know that the quality of fights doesn’t mean a ton for DFS, and what does matter is the AMOUNT of fights we have this weekend, which is only 11. With fewer fights than normal, it’s important we remember that while crafting lineups. Ownership will be inflated across the entire player pool, and we may have to focus more on raw point projections and win equity, as opposed to maximizing pure upside, just because there may not be six “ceiling” outcomes this weekend. I’ll be in the FTNBets Discord leading up to Saturday’s slate to discuss last-minute changes and additional general slate strategy!

If you’re interested in DFS and betting takes for every fight on this card, you can check out The Undisputed MMA Show with Jon Kelly and me.

In this weekly article, I will outline three fighters who present strong floors and ceilings for your DraftKings lineups. 

High-tier: Julian Marquez $8800

I mentioned in the open how on slates with less than twelve fights we sometimes need to sacrifice the idea of hunting “upside” or “ceiling” performances from fighters in favor of just chasing win equity and getting six fighters who get some sort of win bonus on the card. However, I think the main card fight between Marquez and Jordan Wright presents a ton of fantasy upside. Oftentimes when discussing point projections in MMA DFS we focus on wrestling-heavy fighters since they provide the best combination of floor/ceiling in the player pool. But we also know that the fight outcome that most correlates to ceiling performances is first-round finishes. While this fight is not expected to have much grappling, an early finish is very much expected. The Under 1.5 Rounds prop is currently -140 for this fight, and some books have this fight at approximately a 50% chance to finish in Round 1. Marquez is a deserved favorite in this spot and has finished all his previous wins while having a matchup against Wright, who has historically struggled with his durability. Marquez carries the most upside on this slate and is just the fifth-most expensive fighter. While I’ll be smashing Marquez this weekend, in lineups without him I’ll be hedging with Wright, who carries a similar upside (although it’s not as likely to come through) and is just 7.4K.

Mid-tier: Jim Miller $8700

This is another play that is really focused on early win equity with future hall-of-famer Jim Miller looking to secure his 22nd win inside the Octagon. Miller is a -225 favorite over UFC newcomer Erick Gonzalez this weekend, and the most interesting part of that line is that Miller is favored significantly despite having a very narrow path to victory at this point in his career. What I mean by a narrow path to victory is that dating back over the last five years, Miller is 5-9, but four of his five wins have come via first-round submission. This is a large step down in competition for Miller, as instead of facing an elite lightweight like Dustin Poirier, Dan Hooker or Charles Oliveira, he is facing a newcomer who has struggled with grapplers prior to the UFC. Miller is not a lock to win this fight whatsoever as a 38-year-old well past his prime, but if he does win it very likely comes via early takedowns and some sort of finish. 

Low-tier: Andrew Sanchez $7900

Normally, for the lower-tier portion of this article, I like to focus on really cheap “punt” options to allow us to jam in high-priced fighters in our DFS lineups, but this is a week where I am taking a more balanced approach and can afford to play multiple fighters in the mid-range. My favorite underdog this week is Andrew Sanchez, who is a small betting underdog to Bruno Silva in a fight that is favored to end inside the distance and a spot where I disagree with the market perception of both fighters. In my opinion, Sanchez is a top-20 middleweight with a solid all-around skill set, and many of his losses have come due to cardio dumps at the beginning of his career. Sanchez is a competent wrestler, and although he doesn’t attempt to wrestle as much as I’d like to see him do, he also has good hands that have been consistently improving over the course of his career. On the other side is Silva, who despite winning his UFC debut against Wellington Turman in a similar style to this one, is somebody who I am just not that high on. Silva carries a ton of knockout power in his hands and is worth some exposure to if running multiple DFS teams this weekend, but outside of his power I simply don’t see many aspects of MMA that he’s really good at. He’s low-volume in terms of offensive output and has really struggled to defend takedowns historically. I think Sanchez is your classic small-underdog that carries a lot of wrestling upside and may be overlooked in DFS.