Jairzinho Rozenstruik and Augusto Sakai will clash in the next big UFC event. This Saturday night, we have the UFC Fight Night 189, and the headline of this spectacle will be the bout between these two heavyweights. This is an extremely important match for either of them, as it might determine the flow of their respective careers. The loser will for sure stay in the middle echelon of the division, while on the other side, the winner could get a chance to measure himself with one of the best heavyweights in the world. And that opens many doors. BetXChange gives you an exclusive preview of this clash.
Preview
Rozenstruik is a terrifying puncher who has an 11-2 record, with 10 of those wins coming via TKO. Behind Francis Ngannou and Derrick Lewis, he is probably the only puncher with the ability to KO his rival with a single hit. Alistair Overeem knows that perfectly, as he lost against Bigi Boy almost two years ago, having eaten a strong overhand right that sent him to la-la land several seconds before the end of the bout.
His fast rise was stopped with two recent defeats. The first was against Ngannou in a title eliminator back in May 2020, when the Predator smashed Rozenstruik in just 20 seconds. It was one big lesson for the Surinamese fighter. After that, Rozenstruik bounced back, defeating the former champion, Junior dos Santos, via TKO in the second round, but experienced another loss, this time against Cyril Gane, who was better after a unanimous decision.
It was a very dull match, with both fighters trying to stay out of one another’s reach for all five rounds and providing a little action. Eventually, Gane collected more points, keeping his record perfect and pushing Bigi Boy down in the rankings.
Augusto Sakai had a good run until he ran into Alistair Overeem, who beat him in the latest match. The Brazilian didn’t have a single loss since coming to the UFC and was considered a potential elite. But it seems that he has a lot to prove.
He was on a six-match winning streak before suffering a TKO loss against the veteran, who was considered to be on a severe decline. Now, either Overeem bounced back and improved enormously, or Sakai isn’t that good. He previously defeated Chase Sherman and Marcin Tybura via KO. Still, the other two battles in the UFC ended with his victories after split decisions vs. Andrei Arlovski and Blagoy Ivanov.
He is a solid fighter, but without any specific skill, that would make a difference in the octagon. Even though he has a good record, many doubts surround his name, and the fight against Rozenstruik is a nice chance for him to shut down all the critics.
Prediction
In our humble opinion, Rozenstruik is a better fighter than Sakai. First of all, his punches are much harder, and there is no doubt that at some point, he will find a way to hurt the Brazilian. The second is the fact that he fought much better opponents than Sakai. Bigi Boy had the opportunity to meet the top guys of this division and had mixed success, but still, his rivals were much harder. Because of that, our pick is Rozenstruik to win. The odds at BetXChange are 0.73 on this suggestion.
