lol have you watched Belcher fight?

He has Marquardt syndrome, the curse of well roundedness where they fight their opponents' fights. He grappled with Palhares, traded punches with Akiyama, etc. He is a talented guy so he often makes it work but I definitely see him trading on the feet for extended periods with Belfort. Even if he tries to grapple, it's not like he has the type of wrestling to ground Belfort at will.

Some decent looking props out.

Holloway by 3 round decision +175 gonna play that since if he wins it will almost certainly be a decision since he couldn't even finish that can despite battering him around the ring at will.

Okami inside distance +139 is attractive since I think there's a good chance he will finish Roberts. He was on the verge of finishing Boetsch a few times and I can only assume Roberts is easier to finish than Boetsch (has been finished a couple of times on the regional circuit). A ground and pound stoppage or RNC seems reasonably likely.

Cerrone inside distance -150. If Cerrone wins, I expect he will mostly win by tapping Guillard after dropping him.

Also looking at Edgar by 5 round decision +241. Don't ever see him finishing Henderson.

I like the other side, Belfort has much better hands and will likely KTFO Belcher standing. Belfort is seriously underrated. He knocked out Rich Franklin remember and his only loss since dropping in weight was to Anderson.

You can get Edgar at like +170 anyway and would you have ever in a million years thought Edgar could finish Maynard? I picked Edgar to win the third fight but never thought he'd get the finish. I prefer the straight up play here but the other props look good. Bendo has been dropped before, Edgar could get a TKO stoppage if he's having a good night. Granted a decision is more likely, but still.

I'm planning to bet Edgar/Shields at the next card and undecided on Guillard and Lawrence. Thoughts on bet now vs wait for Edgar and Shields? Frankie's odds seem to be getting better and better, while Shields seems to be getting worse.

Guillard and Lawrence both seem to be getting better too. I'm leaning towards waiting on all of them and just betting on fight day if I decide to play them

How about Bisping over Stann, would you bet now or wait? It seems to be fluctuating back and forth

I'm also considering Rampage over Texeira if the odds keep getting better, I mean, Texeira is a good prospect and Rampage is past his prime but Rampage is heading towards +300 territory if the line keeps moving and I don't think he's that much of a dog (plus he probably won't want to get embarrassed like against Bader with the weight then losing)

I really like Max Holloway at even odds.

Logically I should too on Holloway and that's where the smart money is going but I can't help but shake a feeling that Lawrence is better than his fights so far have indicated, and will improve faster than most.

Bisping/Stann I have no clue where the money will come in but I think I will be looking to bet Bisping.

Shields is massively overrated here. Herman by decision at +392 is awesome, or straight up if you are a little squemish about the variance.

Guillard +255 is great too. Wtf Cerrone can't/won't take him down, Guillard is just automatically going to be schooled on the feet? When does that happen? Cerrone could well be the favorite but that line is way too high.

Henderson by unan decision +170 is a great bet too.

I like the Henderson prop.

What you have to remember about Cerrone vs Guillard is that there is a big difference in the quality of their chins. If Guillard hurts Cerrone, he will most likely recover and keep fighting. If Cerrone hurts Guillard, he will most likely submit him shortly thereafter. Given the fact they will probably spend most of the fight exchanging on the feet, that doesn't bode well for Guillard.

I've gotten the impression we won't be seeing the same fighter we saw against nate diaz where he's trying to prove a point in the standup. From the videos I've seen, it looks like Cerrone is ready to take this fight to the ground as soon as possible.
While I think Guillard has better boxing, is more fluid, is faster and hits harder, Cerrones sturdy chin, better gastank and ground game is going to be enough to take this fight. Think the fight is going to look a lot like when Cerrone faced paul kelly.
Though I think guillard is too much of a underdog odds wise and I'm going to bet on him.

Also, word is that apparently Cerrone used to wreck Guillard when they sparred at Jackson's.

Isn't Guillard very susceptible to being choked, and isn't Cerrone very good at choking? Seems like a bad matchup for Guillard.

I'm even happier betting on Cerrone now after Guillard missed weight.

Time for round 2 of my database-driven picks. I was thinking I wouldn't release these until after I've got all my money down, and I still have some to get on atm. I bet in a syndicate so it's hard to get enough on sometimes. But **** it, nobody is tailing me anyway, right?

This week I looked at the odds when I was originally looking at the fighters in my database and made a note of them. Because my strategy is based on market bias in closing lines I didn't bet them then. When I checked back a couple days later, 6 of 7 lines (Hayden the exception) had moved against me, including three (Holloway, Kuiper, Perez) that had been converted from dogs into faves. NOT COOL. Will be taking the bets earlier next time and spreading my money around sites to get enough on.

Anyway here's my plays and the odds I got. In addition to giving the plays a star ranking, which is based on estimated overlay, I'm recommending a number of units (1-3) based on overlay and how short the odds are. Basically so I can keep more predictable records. I'll be scoring the plays up against the lines I got, some of which might not be available anymore.

Away we go:

YTD: 4-2 +0.96u (13u) +7.4%

2-star plays

Henderson v Edgar (3 units) 1.527
Kuiper v Hamman (2 units) 1.930 (BEST BET)
Perez v Stone (2 units) 1.88

1-star plays

Holloway v Lawrence (1 unit) 1.965
Hayden v Bermudez (1 unit) 3.61
Pague v Camus (2 units) 1.562
Lentz v Mitsuoka (1 unit) 1.266

No bet:

Cerrone v Guillard
Shields v Herman
Okami v Roberts

Am iffy about calling anything a 3-star play. I'm not as pumped about any of these plays as I was about De Fries v Thompson last week. Line movement on Perez was so brutal, 2.13 when I first checked and I ended up with 1.88, I have to assume value is still there though.

I have insane amounts on Hendo and some on Herman

I'll be on Shields and Edgar probably. Not the best betting card. I'm on the other side to most people ITT on this card, I don't mind Lawrence for some reason just a gut feeling when logic says Holloway.

Looks like the Edgar line is getting better and better, and Shields is starting to as well.

No bets down yet other than Cerrone/Guillard to last over 1.5 rounds as a slight fav, but I plan to bet Shields/Edgar/Lawrence probably last minute as all 3 seem to be getting better at the moment. If Lawrence improves the way he should he'll be a beast at FW, he has the most potential of anyone on the season (although Chiesa could easily be a mid level LW I think Lawrence is the only future potential champ from his season, however unlikely it is)

Should be on for the sweats tomorrow anyway. Might play a few undercard fights too, but no lines are really jumping out.

I hope Cerrone's fight IQ is as bad as I think it is, because if he goes chasing FOTN, my over 1.5 is a lock.

I don't think any fighter is chasing fotn tbh, it just happens that their fightstyle is of that type, like garcia and nam pham, 2 brawling type of fighters, or when 2 elite fighters face off and both of them are hard to finish, anytime Hendo, Edgar etc faces fighters that are in the top.
Sometimes though, fighters can get emotional, like Cerrone vs Nate, on paper Cerrone should have taken that fight but he fought emotionally and didn't gameplan correctly which led to his loss. There's nothing saying he's going in with any sort of those emotions into this fight. I mean it's not like he's going to tag Guillard and then not rush him to finish him bc he wants to prolong the fight so their odds of getting FOTN increases.

Edgar? Cmon.. the only thing "competitive" about last fight was their heart..

Yeah, this. Seems like the "controversy" was manufactured afterwards, with Hendo looking pretty superior throughout the fight. Don't see why this one should be any different. Hendo's been sick ever since Pettis.

Lines "getting better and better" is usually not good news, it generally means you are wrong. The data is a little shaky but generally my database shows that line movement in a direction means that there is still value left at the end. That is, if Henderson is getting shorter, the line the fight closes at will still generally be value for Henderson.

The only "controversy" talk is coming from edgar and his camp, no one else is really saying it was a controversy. The only reason he got a rematch is because he had to rematch BJ and Gray. With that said, the match was still competetive in that sense that no fighter completely shut down the other fighter, no round was close to a 10-8 round and I personally remember as scoring it 48-47 so if Hendo had given away 1 round it would have been a draw.

Though you have to look at the individual cases, there's a huge difference between this fight and the Rampage vs Bader fight for example. The line there moved in Baders direction because Rampage came in overweight and rumors of a injury. However, in this case I think it has more to do with people favoring one fighter over the other or some other subjective reasons.

I'm not sure why people are so high on Cerrone's chin, Diaz, who isn't a power puncher by any stretch, had him badly wobbled in the opening minutes. I guess Cerrone gets credit for fighting on, but Guillard has tons of power. Just seems like a closer fight than 3 to 1.