UFC 319 Preview

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Readings.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Luca Fury, and welcome to my main event preview
for UFC three nineteen that is headlined by Drikus du
plus Ce defending his UFC middleweight title against Kamzat Chimayev.
That's going down this Saturday, August seventeenth. I'll be breaking

(00:21):
down that main event matchup here on the free podcast.
But remember I do have a bunch more content, including
the official bets over on my Patreon that's patreon dot
com Slash Furies fight picks. More on that later though.
As for this event and the main event, specifically, good
stylistic matchup there in the headliner. Fun fight on paper,

(00:43):
probably should be fun in practice, should get some good
chaos there. The rest of the card though, actually also
pretty good as well. One of the better pay per
views for the UFC. We have pretty much all meaningful
fights here on the main card. Obviously do play in
SHAMAIAV and the headliner comine event Laron Murphy against Aaron
Pico Pico coming over from Bellatore. Then you have Jeff

(01:07):
Neil against Carlos Pradess That should be a great matchup
between strikers. Jared Kananier against Michael Page another matchup between
strikers there too, and then in the main card opener
we have Tim Elliott against kay Asakura as well, another
meaningful matchup. So sometimes at the UFC we get, you know,
like maybe one good fight at the top and then

(01:29):
kind of some filler. At least we actually have meaningful
fights top to bottom the main event. Interesting, not just
because obviously the style, dynamic and everything is a good
one there. But there's kind of been reports that Shamaia,
I guess, is going to retire if he wins the belt.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
He has refuted them and interviews this week. Not sure
if he's just trying to misdirect, but interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:54):
If he were to actually win the belt and retire,
that would obviously throw a monkey wrench into the middleweight
division plans there. I don't know what the UFC would
do next. I guess you would throw Dricus in there
with somebody. But I guess we will see what happens
there with Chamaiev if he even wins the belts here
he has favored.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
To do so. Though.

Speaker 2 (02:13):
It's interesting in the case of Drecus, when he first
was fighting in the UFC, everybody thought he was very
flawed and had a lot of issues and he's kind
of improved, but he still has a lot of really
bad flaws about his game. Israel Adisni refers to him
as the best shitty fighter that there is, and in

(02:35):
a way he's kind of right. Like you look at
the dude's technique, it's kind of awful in some ways.
He's so sloppy. He like gases for a round and
then he has energy again the next he finds a
way to make things work. But he is certainly an
interesting beast. And then on the flip side, JAMIAV can
almost not be any more different. He's very technical with

(02:55):
the grappling. He is all business. He's not going out
there trying to be sloppy and get it any kind
of brawls. We saw him bral obviously against Gilbert Burns,
but that was not by choice. It was because he
actually just was in for a tough fight there. That
is never his choice. He always wants to go out
there instant takedown, back, take, try to work for a choke.

(03:17):
So we do have kind of opposite styles in that sense.
Also opposite styles and the fact that Draca is primarily
a striker. Shamaia primarily a grappler. I did think it
was interesting. I saw a clip speaking of Israel. He
was on a podcast with Henry Sajudo and they were
comparing Dracas to Morob, but they said that Marob was

(03:42):
a better striker than Drecus. I could not possibly disagree more.
Marob Devasvilli is not a good striker now, Dracas, he's sloppy,
but he is objectively a better striker. I don't know
what either them we're talking about. It was Israel who
said it, and then Shodo agreed and said, like, oh yeah,

(04:03):
for sure, No, absolutely not so Drecas. He definitely is
a better striker here. It basically is a striker versus
grappler matchup, but also Cardio is going to be an
interesting one too, so there's a few different dynamics that
play here. I do think it's actually a very very
interesting matchup. I am excited to see it play out
real quick before I get to my breakdown. As reminder, again,

(04:25):
a bunch more content over at patreon dot com Slash
Furies five picks, including the rest of the fight breakdowns.
I just put up a new episode of Lucas Lecsher
talking about the UFC's new deal for Paramount and why
as an MMA fan, I would not be getting too
excited about it. I think there are some good things,
but I think there's also a lot of very bad
things that are going to come with that. I explained

(04:47):
why I didn't just be a negative Nancy. I explained
why on that episode. If you want to check it
out on the Patreon now, also be the cheat sheet
article going up with written analysis, also the staff picks
article later in the week, as as well as the
post fight show and most importantly already we have the
official bets up for this event and more made five

(05:07):
of our over four units last week, about seven units
a week before. Hopefully we can have another good week
here with a much better quality card. So if you
want to check out those official bets, which are all
third party tracked and verified, made almost one hundred units
last year, one hundreds of units long term, every single bet,
third party tracked and verified, can check it all out
again Patreon dot com slash Furies fight picks all right,

(05:31):
moving on to the actual fight breakdown here. As for
the betting odds, we have the challenger as the betting
favorite currently Chamayah sitting at around low two.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
Hundreds in the betting odds.

Speaker 2 (05:45):
The best available price is minus one to eighty, but
that's an outlier. The best available price besides that is
minus two ten. Then other books are all around minus
two twenty issue, so round two twenty four Chamayah. Best
available price on duplus is plus one ninety six, but
he's out there on average about minus one eighty ish

(06:05):
artus me plus plus one eighty ish, So again champion
du Plus. He has the underdog here, Challenger Chamayev as
the favorite, not something you see too often, but there
obviously is a lot of hype on Chamaiev. He for
the most part has been pretty dominant in his fights,
although there have been some performances that give me some pause.

(06:27):
You look at his good performances for starters John Phillips,
Reese McKee, Gerald meershar Lee Jing Liang. Not really much
to say about those, okay, beat guys he should have beat.
But then Gilbert Burns is his first real tough fight.
He faced adversity there, got knocked down, showed he has
some real issues with the striking defense. His striking is

(06:47):
still quite limited even to this day, but at least
we did get to see his heart shown there. He
does have not just heart, but great heart. He did
not even come close to looking like he wanted to
quit there at all, So that was nice to see,
But that still was down a weight class against a
washed up Gilbert Burns.

Speaker 1 (07:06):
Then in his next.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
Fight, he faces Kevin Holland. It was technically a catchweight
but basically middleweight Kevin Holland, zero takedown defense, poor submission defense.
There was a reason why Hamzat was a huge favorite there.
It was also super short notice for Holland, so again
not really a win that you put too much stock
like and means something, but it's not like, okay, that's

(07:29):
championship caliber stuff. His next fight he faces Kamara Oosman.
That was Tomorrow's third loss in a row. He had
obviously been knocked out by Edwards, didn't have any knees,
he was up there in age and all that, and
I actually didn't think he looked all that great there.
He won a majority decision. He definitely deserved the decision.
It was proper, but he kind of just sort of

(07:50):
lay and prayed his way to a victory there. Then,
his most recent performance that was probably his most dominant
all things considered relative to the quality of opponent and everything.
He quickly submitted Robert Whittaker about halfway through the first
round with a face crank. Remember he messed up Whittaker's
jaw on his teeth with that forced a quick pain
tap from Whittaker basically instantly. So that's probably, again like

(08:15):
his most dominant win considering the relative quality of the
opponent and all that. It's also his best win for sure.
But we've seen with Whittaker what happened just with RDR recently.
He's obviously had some up and down performances. He's clearly washed,
so even that when you kind of have to put
somewhat of an asterisk on it. So, yes, he has
been dominant with the wrestling. Yes, he has been overall

(08:37):
a pretty dominant fighter, but look at when he's faced
fighters who could actually hang with him in the grappling,
which was Gilbert Burns and Kamara Ousman. He didn't look
so dominant now, did he. And more than that, he
looked strong in the first round in both of those,
at least relative to how he looked in the last
two rounds. He noticeably fell off of a cliff. He

(09:01):
didn't completely gas and fall apart. But his offense, his dominance,
his strength, just everything is explosiveness, just dramatically worse after
the first round. It's also interesting there's been fighters like
Sean Strickland who has said after sparring and training with him,
he is indeed a completely different fighter after the first round.

(09:22):
So I think, based on the tape, based on something
like fighters who have trained with him saying it, I
think that's something that we can say is probably a
real factor and should be a concern and a five rounder.
He just comes out so aggressive and soul full's full force.
It's not surprising that he would start to wilt a

(09:42):
bit after that and tire out a bit. So like again,
like he gases, but it is not the same pace
and tempo. This is not like a fluffy Hernandez who
we just saw last week go out there with up down, up, down,
taking your opponent down over and over, letting him back
up or not necessarily letting them back up, but they
get back up and you hire them out doing that.
But meanwhile, Hernandez does not tire out doing that. He

(10:03):
has the cardio to go the entire time doing that.
Morob who we talked about earlier. He could shoot fifty
takedowns against pyotr Yan and have cardio for days even
at the end of the fight, go back and time.
Do you know other guys like Kabib who's retired, he
would chant Russell shoot takedown after takedown, failing on a
bunch before eventually getting it, and then still be able

(10:24):
to hold them down though, and also still be able
to have the pace and the cardio.

Speaker 1 (10:27):
Down the stretch.

Speaker 2 (10:29):
It's a concern if you have a fighter like a
Chimayav who can't even keep up at his own pace.
He's dictating it, he's in top position, his opponent is
the one carrying his weight, and he still can't keep
up his own pace even in three rounders.

Speaker 1 (10:47):
Let alone a five rounder.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
Now the first time we'll see him potentially in rounds
four and five. I mean that is that is a
concern for me. That is a real concern for me.
He could be sort of a one round one round
to wonder here where we know based on the style
of Drecus, which is just basically create this car crashed
as chaos, he thrives in that. Maybe he does get

(11:09):
dominated early by Chamaiev, but We've seen him overcome tough situations,
situation where it looks like he's gassed and done, and
then all of a sudden he's fresh somehow the next round.
I would trust his cardio, his pace down the stretch
much more than I would at Chamaiev's. So CHAMAIAV not
great striking. Yeah, he had showed some power when he

(11:30):
knocked out Gerald Meherschard. Okay, whatever it's Gerald Meherschard doesn't
matter really, not relative to this. Maybe he can show
some power here against Dracus, then I'd be like, Okay,
now he's actually shown some power against a real high
quality fighter. That's different, But as of now, I'm not
ready to say he has any real threatening power. His
striking offensively and defensively is very poor. I mean, I

(11:52):
guess you're say very poor. Defense is very poor. Offensively
it's not good, though certainly not good. I wouldn't say
very poor. He has some level of offense, but it's
still on the resoundingly mediocre side. I would say for
the offensive side of the striking. Wrestling offensively and defensively,
he's obviously strongly or good grappling of course as well,
at least while he's fresh, but the striking in the

(12:14):
cardio are concerns, And so what happens if he doesn't
have the cardio to be shooting and securing and maintaining
the takedowns and now he's forced to strike, probably not
gonna be good things. In the case of Drecus, he
it's weird. He's kind of good at everything, but also
bad at everything. Like his technique is not good anywhere.

(12:37):
He is sloppy at literally everything, striking, wrestling, grappling, everywhere,
he is sloppy, sloppy, sloppy everywhere. However he makes it work.
He has a decent level of durability. He has enough
cardio where he can have like these rounds where he
looks bad but then has a second wind. Like I mentioned,

(12:58):
he is sloppy with the tape down, but once he
gets them he's a good guard passer and is dominant
with ground and pound or submission attempts or actually getting
submissions as well.

Speaker 1 (13:08):
We see him submit high level fighters.

Speaker 2 (13:11):
He also puts on this frenetic, chaotic pace that fighters
who have had good cardio themselves don't seem to be
able to keep up with. And even if at times
he shows some cardio issues. He overall shows to have
good cardio by the end, at least decent enough cardio
better than his opponent. Most importantly, early in his career
he showed some bad issues with gassing, but he's definitely

(13:32):
improved that, but again still has like roundswear.

Speaker 1 (13:36):
Heel gas.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
It's very strange, has to like take a round off
and recover. So he's kind of a hard fighter to
get a good read on les. You know, as I mentioned,
israel Aasani himself said he's the best shitty fighter there is,
and it's kind of true.

Speaker 1 (13:50):
He's so sloppy, but he makes it work.

Speaker 2 (13:54):
And so when I look at the dynamic of this matchup,
I see a big positive and a negative for each fighter.
The positive for Drecas is if he can get this
down the stretch, he probably has the advantage. If he
can survive the early onslaught for Tremaiah of the early
dominant grappling from him, he probably will be able to

(14:15):
tire him out, or at least Chamaiov just will tire
himself out down the stretch, and we probably could see
Dracas finishing him at some point based on not necessarily
durability issues. Although again, Gilbert Burns of all people, dropped
this man clean if he did Drecas can. But also,
more importantly, the cardia. Once you get the cardio going,
you can have a standing tko. You could have him

(14:37):
turtle up and get TKO'ed. You could also just have
his chin become more susceptible to being hurt when he's
tired as well. So that's the big advantage I see
for Drekas is. Obviously, yes, the striking is his advantage,
but while they're fresh, I think Tamaiav's going to be
able to get takedowns on him.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
The big advantage that I see.

Speaker 2 (14:57):
For Chamaiah is that early go he is so dominant
and also technical with his grappling and skilled at actually
getting the finish that when you look at a guy
like Drikas, who is so chaotic, so sloppy, those guys
oftentimes get curb stomped by the technician. You look at

(15:18):
the sloppy brawlers when they're a striker and then they
face the technician striker, Oh they get they get the
floor mopped with them. Look at Anthony Joshua versus Francis Agano,
perfect example, an mma Francisaigan, who has never been a
technical boxer ever ever, but he has had incredible intangibles,

(15:39):
explosive tremendous speed for a heavyweight and massive one hit
or quitter power even by heavyweight standards, And when you
combine that, those intangibles basically just allowed him to nuke everybody.
But he was again never a technician, and he never
faced a clean technician on the feet either an MMA
because it didn't really exist in the heavyweight division. Well,

(16:01):
then he faces it an Anthony Joshua and boxing, And
keep in mind Antony Joshua known for having a total
glass draw with poor defense himself.

Speaker 1 (16:09):
So if there was a high level boxer that Anthony or.

Speaker 2 (16:12):
That Ankanu was gonna one hit or quitter or get
lucky against, that was gonna be it. Outside of say
Tyson Fury, who took the fight totally lightly against him
was the worst version he's basically everitten of himself and
still beat Anghanu. But like in terms of the best
version of a high level fighter, Anthony Joshua was like
the one he was gonna beat because of the chin

(16:33):
in defense issues and what happened he made Francis look
like he was some bum that they pulled out of
the stands, completely annihilated him, knocked him down, and then
knocked him out cold with one punch. And that's what
happens when a sloppy sort of brawler goes against a
real technician many such cases. The same also applies in

(16:56):
the grappling, and when you have a guy like Drikas
who is good against guys who are not the type
of wrestler or grappler that Chamaiah is, I don't think
that his good grappling really applies so much here, at
least while they're fresh, and so he's used to just
doing stupid, sloppy things even on the mat that he's
able to get away with. But also he gets put

(17:18):
in precarious positions repeatedly because of those foolish things. Well,
Chamaiav's the type of guy to lock up the BRABO,
lock up the RNC, or at least just get some
sort of dominant position and maybe even punch him out.
That's the type of stuff that could happen.

Speaker 1 (17:33):
To Drikas here.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
On top of that, if he doesn't actually get stopped
in the early going, it could be such a dominant
first round or two for Chamaiah that he already has
two rounds in the bank. He just has to win
one of the last three, and he can do that
and then he wins a decision.

Speaker 1 (17:49):
He struggles more in the later.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
Goings, maybe even faces some adversity, but just wins one
of the three rounds and he has it in the bag.
I think that is the most likely outcome one of
those two situations. Either he gets it done early or
he holds on and ekes.

Speaker 1 (18:04):
It out late.

Speaker 2 (18:06):
I think overall those two combined outcomes his combined chances,
all things considered, for Tremaiev, I would favor him in
the matchup. I do think he deserves to be the
more likely winner and the betting favorite, but I don't
think it deserves to be quite as much as the
odds are saying. I would put it out about minus
one fifty sixty forty for tremiav. Sixty percent imply odds

(18:27):
for him again minus one fifty I in my estimation,
I think that's about accurate, given his propensity to get
the job done early, but also then maybe dominate early
and then do just enough at some point later on
to still win a decision. But I don't think he
should be minus two twenty ish over two to one here,

(18:49):
given the potential that if he doesn't get the job
done in the first round or so, he might just
be totally effed given what we've seen from his slow
down of pace, and then potentially even some partial issues
over five rounds here, and so maybe we get a
situation where Chamaiev dominates round one, but it's not enough
for ten to eight. He goes out there, does enough

(19:12):
kind of grinds out round two, but then you see
he's just like really falling apart by the end of it,
and then actually either loses the last three or gets finished.

Speaker 1 (19:23):
That's also a possibility. Like I said, I could see him.

Speaker 2 (19:26):
Hanging on in the later stages, or I could see
this him losing the later stages or even getting finished.
I don't know which is actually going to happen, because
we haven't seen the dude in five rounds. We've only
seen him slow down noticeably in three. So when you
factor everything in, I think the single most likely outcome

(19:46):
is probably Chamaiev to get the job done early given
all the flawed technique and sloppiness of Drikus, but even
factoring in his potential to still hold on late, I
still again only put it about sixty forty, so I
have to favor Chamaiah in terms of who I'm going
to predict here. I will predict him to get a
grappling based win, but and also probably most likely by stoppage.

(20:12):
I should say most likely sub but possibility could be
a TKO on the mat, but the odds right now
have I'm at around minus two twenty ish best available
minus one eighty, so automatically no bet on him. Well,
the best available price on do plus see You on
the flip side is plus one ninety six. Like the
worst available price, there's still slight value and it's like

(20:33):
plus one sixty, so.

Speaker 1 (20:36):
It's still earlier in the week.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
I'm gonna have to double back on this fight before
I make my final decision as of right now, though,
if all things stand as is, I think it's sixty
to forty Chramaia if he would be my official prediction,
automatically dogger pass situation, and I would have to get
to the window on the doll Like if I'm getting
plus one ninety six and a guy that I think
should only be plus one fifty, I'm a complete idiot

(21:00):
for not betting that. That goes against all gambling logic.
You shouldn't be betting if you're doing that. So if
my percentages and the lines stay where they are, I
will have to bet Dricus by the time the fight
rolls around. But even then, my official prediction would still
have to be Chamaiah, because again minus one fifty sixty forty,

(21:20):
that's where I think the actual win percentage is. So
I know some people hate when you pick one side
but then bet the other, but there are certain cases
where that is actually the proper thing to do. I
know it sounds kind of weird, but I just explained
why that is. Betting odds matter, So Chamaiah by sub
will be my official prediction. Automatic dogger Pass might end

(21:43):
up getting to the window on a duplus C by
the time it's all set and done, and that.

Speaker 1 (21:49):
Will do it.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
For the free episode of the podcast, remember a bunch
more content over at patreon dot com. Slash Furies Fight
Picks have the official bets for this card and more.
Also have the rest of my podcast breakdowns, a bunch
of written content and Breakdowns staff picks, the post fight
show following the event, and also the new episode of

(22:12):
Luca's lecture that just went up as the time this
recording earlier today, so check it all out again Patreon
dot com slash Furies Fight Picks. Most importantly, all the
official bets are there, third party tracked and verified. Four
point something units last week, seven units a week before,
almost one hundred units last year, one hundreds units, hundreds

(22:34):
of units long term, Every single bet third party tracked
and verified, so they could be no denying or fudging
those results. Again, check it all out Patreon dot com
slash Furies Fight Picks. Hope to see you over there. Otherwise,
good luck on all of your bets this week. I
hope you profit. Until next time. I'm Luca Fury and

(22:55):
thank you for listening.