We are looking at an absolutely stacked card for UFC 274, on May 7th. The main event is a Featherweight Title fight.
Read on below to find out UFC Best Bets for this weekend’s UFC 274!
Charles Oliveira vs Justin Gaethje – Lightweight
This one was supposed to be for the UFC Lightweight Championship but Charles Oliveira missed weight by a half a pound. Now the only person who can win the Lightweight Championship is Justin Gaethje. If Oliveira were to win this fight it would mean that the championship would be vacated. This is one of the most anticipated fights in the history of the UFC in my opinion.
Charles Oliveira comes into this fight with a record of 32-8-0 with one no contest to his name. Following the night he will be the former UFC Lightweight Champion, and the sad part is he may not even lose the fight. He has found great success in the Lightweight division as he had previously fought in the Welterweight and Featherweight divisions. He has a reach of 74 inches and stands at five feet ten inches tall. In 42 career professional fights 20 of his wins have come by submission as he is certainly a submission specialist. Nine of his wins have come via knockout and the other three have come by decision.
Justin Gaethje is in a weird situation here because if he wins he will become the new UFC Lightweight Champion. But if he loses the title will become vacant. In 26 professional fights he is 23-3, as 19 of them have come by knockout, while three have come by decision and one by submission. He has never gone the distance in any of his three losses as he either looks to finish fights or gets finished before the fight goes to the time limit. As for the result of this fight I am going with Justin Gaethje to get the win by knockout.
UFC Pick: Gaethje (+126) By Knockout (+160)
Rose Namajunas © @ Carla Esparza – Strawweight Title
This is going to be the only real title fight of the evening after Charles Oliviera missed weight and made a weird situation out of the Lightweight title fight main event between him and Justin Gaethje. Rose Namajunas is one of the most dominant UFC fighters of all time and she will be making her second defense in her second reign at UFC Strawweight Women’s Championship.
Rose Namajunas is one of the most dominant fighters of all time. She has a career record of 11-4 and five of them have come by submission and four have come by knockout while the last two have come by decision. She is on a three fight win streak heading into this one. Her last fight came at UFC 268 and she picked up a victory over Zhang Weili by split decision. It will be interesting to see what happens as she has never defended her title more than once, as she lost in her second defense in her previous reign. She comes into this fight standing five feet five inches tall and has a reach of 65 inches.
Carla Esparza comes into this fight with a career professional record of 19-6 in 25 professional fights. She stands five feet one inch tall and has a reach of 63 inches. She has a strong chin and is conditioned to go the distance, as 10 of her 18 wins have come via decision, while eight have come by knockout or submission. She is on a five fight winning streak and in her last fight she defeated Yan Xiaonan by knockout. She has not lost a fight in three and a half years and she will look to continue that streak and win her second UFC title after she defeated Rose once already to win the inaugural UFC Women’s Strawweight Championship. As for the result of this one I’m going with Rose Namajunas by knockout.
UFC Pick: Namajunas (-210) by Knockout (+390)
Michael Chandler vs Tony Ferguson – Lightweight
Michael Chandler and Tony Ferguson will meet in a lightweight fight that may determine one of the next contenders for the possibly soon to be vacant UFC Lightweight Championship. Both Chandler and Ferguson are some of the best fighters in the world at the 155 pound weight class and this is sure to be one of the best fights of 2022 in my opinion.
Michael Chandler comes into this fight with a career record of 22-7 in 29 professional Mixed Martial Arts fights. He comes into this one standing five feet eight inches tall and weighing in at 155 pounds with a 71 inch reach. He is on a two fight losing streak as his last two losses have come to the guys who were supposed to fight in tonight’s Lightweight Title fight but it’s now basically a non title fight because Oliveira missed weight.
Tony Ferguson comes into this fight with a career record of 26-6 in 32 professional Mixed Martial Arts fights. He stands at six feet tall, weighs in at 155 pounds and has a reach of 76.5 inches. Basically half of his 25 wins have come by knockout as he has a total of 12 wins via knockout, while eight have come by submission and five via decision. As for the result of this fight I am going with Tony Ferguson to win by knockout.
Tony’s MLB Pick: Ferguson (+290) By Knockout (+1000)
Are you interested in finding out more on the latest of the UFC? Then make sure you visit our UFC hub page, we’ve got all the details you need!
*Odds correct at time of publication, courtesy of Fanduel.
