UFC Fight Night 169: Benavidez vs. Figueiredo - Predictions and Picks

#2 Felicia Spencer vs. Zarah Fairn dos Santos

Fan-favorite Felicia Spencer returns this weekend

The Women’s Featherweight division is easily the most under-developed division on the UFC roster, and so it’s a breath of fresh air to see two female fights at 145lbs on the main card of this show. With that said, the nature of the division means that it’s hard to really get a handle on how good these fighters are and really break a fight down.

We saw Felicia Spencer debut in 2019 with an upset of sorts, as she easily outgrappled and submitted the highly-rated Megan Anderson in June. From there she was booked in a nightmare fight against the much larger and far more powerful Cris Cyborg, and while she did well to absorb Cyborg’s strikes and never seemed to be out of the fight, it was a clear-cut loss for her.

France’s Zarah Fairn dos Santos meanwhile also debuted against Anderson – but actually found herself completely outgrappled by the Australian kickboxer, and was eventually submitted with a nicely worked triangle choke. That’s worrying in my opinion; Anderson is clearly a developing fighter who’s making strides in her ground game, but to be dominated by an opponent who was herself dominated on the ground by Spencer doesn’t bode well.

From the footage available, more problems seem to be visible for Fairn, as she appears to be a striker by trade, but not a truly powerful one. Given that the hugely powerful Cyborg couldn’t take out Spencer then, it’s hard to imagine that ‘Infinite’ is going to be capable of pulling it off.

For me this sounds like Spencer’s fight to lose even if she’s equally unproven at the top level. My guess is that she’ll drag Fairn down early and probably slap on a first round choke to get her out of there.

The Pick: Spencer via first-round submission