Ufc 145 Haven't had any MMA discussion on here in a while; thought I might post my thoughts to see if it sparks any discussion.
24301 RASHAD EVANS PK+360
24302 JON JONES PK-460
I can not resist the temptation to play on Evans here. Going against Jones who many have already said is the most skilled and possibly best light heavyweight ever it is understandable why he is such an underdog. I think that Evans has been fighting well and working hard since his loss to Machida and he does have to power to be able to KO Jones if he can catch him. I feel that it is going to take someone with some power that can trade punches with Jones for him to be beat. I thought Rampage might have been that guy, but really Rampage has not been the same fighter in quite some time and I do not think he came into the fight with Jones in very good shape. Machida almost got Jones down with a clean punch, but did not have the power in his punches to knock him out. I feel that with Rashad knowing Jones as he does will give him confidence and I think we see an aggressive Evans realizing that he will have to try and end this fight early. Evans was not overly impressive against Davis, but he was able to control the fight against the bigger fighter. I think Evans can win; its a long shot but at this price I am going to take a shot.
24305 CHE MILLS PK+445
24306 RORY MACDONALD PK-545
No play here. I would think the only chance Mills has is to catch Rory and KO him. Rory is very good and really should be undefeated. I see you can get + money on this going over 1.5 rounds which is something I would look at as Mills might be undervalued by many here.
24309 BEN ROTHWELL PK+225
24310 BRENDAN SCHAUB PK-285
I think we probably see the best of Schaub here against a fighter that is not know to be well conditioned. I like Schaub to win inside distance at about -150
24321 MICHAEL MCDONALD PK-105
24322 MIGUEL TORRES PK-125
I am going to play on the young McDonald here and really it has everything to do with the even-ness of this line with the public backing that I am sure Torres will receive. This may go up a bit and get McDonald at plus, I will take another small shot on a dog as Torres has not been able to "finish" an opponent in the UFC yet. This is the fight that everyone expects to go the distance, I have looked at taking inside 2.5 rounds for +175 or McDonald inside distance at +295, both live options but I have not ponied up yet.
24313 EDDIE YAGIN PK+450
24314 MARK HOMINICK PK-600
No play here. I know nothing of Yagin other than he was unimpressive in his UFC debut and this seems to be another picked opponent to get Hominick back on track, although he slipped up against his last easy opponent.
24317 JOHN ALESSIO PK+280
24318 MARK BOCEK PK-350
Again not going to pass up this dog mainly because it is a good spot for Alessio to get back into the UFC as he stepped in for the injured Wiman. Alessio has been around and he will probably have the advantage standing up. Not sure Bocek deserves quite this much respect yet and this line has to be a bit inflated due to the fact that Alessio is a relative no-name stepping in here. I again am looking at the under 2.5 rounds at +140. I was shocked to see Alessio is +600 inside distance. I will probably bet that small.
I will see if I have time to write anything more about the prelims. I do think the Escudero/Danzig fight could be a very good one and I am leaning a bit to Escudero at +150. There is also the Girggs/Browne fight which I think by this time Griggs has become such a public dog that getting Browne at -280 is actually a good price. Browne could be the next up and coming heavyweight that will probably get some much higher profile fights after this one.Getting the under 1.5 at -130 seems logical in that fight as I do not think these guys are going to feel each other out. Browne is a beast and very powerful and should be able to end this early.
Ok, thats it for now.
