UFC Fight Night: Poirier vs. Hooker
Saturday, September, 19 – UFC Apex Facility, Las Vegas, Nevada
Colby Covington (15-2) and Tyron Woodley are a couple of welterweights looking to get their UFC careers back on track with them both coming back to the octagon after recent defeats. Covington was last seen at UFC 245 back in December when he was on the wrong end of a fight against Kamaru Usman. Woodley (19-5-1) has dropped two straight – including a defeat of his own to Usman – in a contest where he was out-thought and outperformed to the point that many questioned if he still has what it takes to compete at this level of the game.
The 32-year-old Covington had a much better overall outing against Usman. He competed well with The Nigerian Nightmare, standing up to the Welterweight Champion for four rounds before being stopped in the final stanza of the contest. His style of fighting is on that would seem to mesh with both Usman and Gilbert Burns – the other fighter to recently beat Woodley in convincing fashion – and that makes it hard to see how Woodley wins here unless he comes out with a surprising amount of motivation and he is able to use his obvious punching power to stun Covington early. We like Covington to win here at BetXChange, but there is little value unless he is taken as part of an accumulator.
A more interesting fight from a betting perspective is the one between David Dvorak (0.81) and Jordan Espinosa (0.82). The market had found it almost impossible to separate these two flyweight contenders, with the fighters being separated by just an inch in both height and reach on the side of Espinosa.
Dvorak (18-3) hasn’t been beaten since way back in May of 2012 and he is carrying a 14-bout winning streak into this contest. That is in stark contrast to the busy Espinosa (15-7) who has already had a pair of fights in 2020. He lost to Alex Perez back in January by submission, before washing that defeat away quickly with a victory over Mark De La Rosa in June by unanimous decision. This one should be a close and fun fight to watch. Espinosa is the flashier fighter, but Dvorak is a stylish and accomplished attacker and that substance will be enough to carry Dvorak to a win here.
The co-main sees veteran Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone (1.10) clash with rising up and comer Niko Price (0.60). Cerrone needs a bounce-back win in the worst way after losing four on the bounce – albeit ti pretty elite competition along the way – while “The Hybrid” is trying to find more consistency in his ability to win against fighters in the upper echelon of the division.
Another knockout loss here could be the end for Cerrone as a UFC draw with name power. He will be motivated by this and know that he needs to win against a fighter looking to get back to fighting against ranked opponents. Price is the obvious pick, but “The Cowboy” is good value at 1.10 with all the motivation in the world to put up one last stand with his career in the balance.
