UFC Fight Night 151: Iaquinta vs. Cowboy - Predictions and Picks

#4 Brad Katona vs. Merab Dvalishvili

TUF winner Brad Katona is looking for his third UFC victory

This is the first main card showcase for TUF 27 winner Katona – a Canadian native who fights out of the SBG Ireland camp with Conor McGregor, et al – as he takes on Georgian fighter Dvalishvili, who trains out of the vaunted Serra/Longo camp. And it’s a quite fascinating fight on paper too, between the cold, calculating Brad Katona and the absolutely wild Merab Dvalishvili.

Serra/Longo is a bit of a strange camp in that they produce a ton of great fighters, but not many of them actually fight in a similar style. Chris Weidman is all about long strikes and slick grappling, Al Iaquinta is almost entirely a boxer, Aljamain Sterling has his own unique style, and so on. Dvalishvili is different again as his game seems almost entirely based around power.

His takedowns are strong and he’s capable of throwing his opponents around; he throws wildly heavy punches, all hooks and haymakers, and even on the ground his submissions look more based around his brute strength than technique, although it’s clear he does have some good grappling skills, too.

Katona meanwhile deploys a similar style to his teammate Gunnar Nelson, particularly on the feet. From the footage I’ve seen he isn’t as karate-based as Nelson but he definitely prefers the hop in, hop out style of striking, catching his opponents off-guard with his movement and counter game. He also has decent enough takedowns, although we haven’t really seen too much of his submission game outside of a late – and almost successful – choke attempt against Matthew Lopez in December.

Essentially here, this for me comes down to whether Katona can stop Dvalishvili from getting hold of him early on. I’m pretty convinced that Dvalishvili can outgrapple and outpower Katona if he can close the distance and get inside, and while there’s always the chance that a fighter as wild as the Georgian could leave himself open to something nasty – as he did in his loss to Ricky Simon – if he can play it a little safer then I could see him outgrappling Katona to a decision.

With that said, Katona seems like much more of a cerebral fighter, and his movement and footwork should give him a decent chance of avoiding the early rush from Dvalishvili and being able to pick him apart from the outside. And if he can land a takedown of his own on the Georgian then I could definitely see him outworking Dvalishvili from the top, putting him in a position that he just isn’t used to.

I could look stupid here if Dvalishvili comes right out and steamrolls Katona but I just can’t trust the guy due to his wild nature and so I think Katona’s going to pick him off for the full 15 minutes en route to a judges’ decision.

The Pick: Katona via unanimous decision