UFC on ESPN: Barboza vs. Gaethje - Predictions and Picks

The UFC’s second show on the ESPN network – that is, not the ESPN+ streaming service – goes down this weekend from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The UFC’s debut on the network was a pretty heavy show with a main event of Cain Velasquez vs. Francis Ngannou, and while this show’s main event – Edson Barboza vs. Justin Gaethje – is just as good, the overall strength of the card essentially isn’t there.

That’s not to say this show looks bad on paper – it’s full of fighters who usually bring the action, names like Jack Hermansson, Karolina Kowalkiewicz and Sheymon Moraes – but in terms of title contention, well, it’s hard to see any title shots being won in Philly on Saturday. But hey, it’s about fight quality, right? And there should be some quality stuff on tap here.

Here are the predicted outcomes for UFC on ESPN: Barboza vs. Gaethje.

#1 Edson Barboza vs. Justin Gaethje

It’s almost hard to believe that the UFC have taken this long to put this fight together – but then again I guess Gaethje’s only been with the promotion for just under two years now. At any rate, it’s a meeting of two of the Lightweight division’s best – and more importantly, most exciting – strikers. Both men love to throw leg kicks, both men push a heavy pace, and both men have brutal knockout power.

Both men won their previous fights in violent fashion; Barboza turned out the lights on Dan Hooker in December, the Kiwi fighter constantly pushing forward like a zombie, which would’ve thrown off some opponents – but not Barboza, who just kept hitting him until he was finally done. Gaethje meanwhile landed one of the best knockouts of 2018 by switching off James Vick with a single right hand back in August.

Barboza’s striking style has always been built around his leg kicks; he’s the only fighter in UFC history to have two stoppages via them, and basically everything he throws is chambered around them, from his sweeping hooks to the head and body to his more flashy offense – like the flying knee he threw to take out Beneil Dariush in a fight he was actually struggling in.

The problem for ‘Junior’ has always been his own ability to take punishment; he’s tougher than some people have made out, as we saw when he survived hellacious beatings at the hands of Kevin Lee and Khabib Nurmagomedov to last the distance. He even came back from one such beating to narrowly edge out Danny Castillo back in 2013. But the point still stands, his chin isn’t the best and he can be hurt and stopped.

Gaethje on the other hand went a full 6 years without being stopped prior to coming to the UFC from the WSOF promotion in 2017. Over those years he developed a reputation as being one of the most reckless fighters in the entire sport – willing to take three shots to land three of his own – and it even got to the point where fans were clamouring to see him in the UFC simply before his chin finally began to deteriorate.

Since joining the UFC he has been TKO’d twice – by Eddie Alvarez and Dustin Poirier – but both of those fights were crazy wars of attrition, and it was hardly like Gaethje turned into Chuck Liddell circa 2010 overnight.

He can clearly still take a shot, it was more that Alvarez and Poirier were able to push him further than he’d been pushed before. Outside of that, he’s still the same fighter – a sneakily good wrestler who doesn’t look to use that tool, instead using it to stay on his feet and throw incredibly powerful leg kicks and punches. Sure, his defense isn’t the best, but when you hit as hard as Gaethje and can take a shot – for the time being at least – it’s all good.

I’m taking Gaethje here and it’s pretty much based purely around his insane toughness – Barboza can clearly survive a beating but he’s been fighting for a long time now, for the best part of a decade, and his chin has been cracked by less powerful strikers than Gaethje.

He also doesn’t handle pressure that well, as practically every fighter who’s beaten him – from Lee and Nurmagomedov to Michael Johnson and Tony Ferguson – were able to walk him down and force him backwards until he folded.

I think this should be an insanely exciting fight – one of the best of 2019 – as both men will come to throw down and both men will probably take a ridiculous amount of damage, but realistically Gaethje is the one who can take more and I suspect he hits with slightly more power, too. I’m taking him to take out Barboza in the 4th round.

The Pick: Gaethje via fourth round TKO

#2 David Branch vs. Jack Hermansson

David Branch is one of the UFC's most dangerous grapplers

Another import from the WSOF promotion, Branch rejoined the UFC in mid-2017 after reeling off 10 straight wins outside the Octagon, including beating the likes of Yushin Okami and Paulo Filho. Wins over Kryz Jotko and Thiago Santos – the final one by knockout, strangely enough – as well as a solid showing against Luke Rockhold had him on the verge of title contention, but then fate conspired against him.

Matched with a fellow Brazilian jiu-jitsu expert in Jacare Souza last November, Branch had the chance to leap to the front of the queue, but then Rockhold dropped out of his scheduled fight with Chris Weidman on the same show, and Souza stepped in. Late replacement Jared Cannonier stepped up to fight Branch, and subsequently knocked him out, knocking him out of title contention in the process.

At his best though, Branch is a dangerous fighter in all areas. He’s not the best striker, but his boxing has improved over recent years and to be fair, the loss to Cannonier was somewhat of an aberration for him. His bread and butter though is his ground game – he’s an excellent grappler who can do incredible work from the top position, although he largely focuses on position and submission attempts than ground-and-pound.

Hermansson is an interesting match for him as he’s had somewhat of an up-and-down career in the UFC thus far, going 5-2, and this will be the first attempt to break into the upper echelons of the Middleweight division for ‘The Joker’.

Hailing from Sweden, Hermansson is a solidly rounded fighter, but his best work comes when he can get an opponent to the ground and beat on them from top position – notably he took out Alex Nicholson from this position, with frightening ease too.

A lanky fighter for 185lbs, Hermansson also stands at 6’1” and has ludicrously long arms, which he looks to use to his advantage by abusing his opponents from range. That’s unfortunately where this match looks bad for him, though.

Branch stands at 6’1” himself – he’s fought at 205lbs before – and also reportedly has a reach advantage over Hermansson, 81” compared to 77.5”. That’s a rarity for Hermansson to be facing.

Throw in the fact that Branch will be the best grappler Hermansson’s ever faced – I know he took out Thales Leites last year, but Leites was already considering retirement at that point and was way past his prime for that fight and even then, he almost had the Swede out of there with his ground game in the second round – and I can’t see him muscling Branch down and hurting him how he did to Nicholson or Brad Scott.

Hermansson will put up a fight, no doubt – and if anything it’d be cool to see him win as he’s a super-exciting fighter who’d be watchable rising up the ranks – but I think Branch is going to get him to the ground and from there he’ll be in deep, deep trouble.

The Pick: Branch via second round submission

#3 Josh Emmett vs. Michael Johnson

Michael Johnson's fleet-footed striking style should serve him well against Josh Emmett

This Featherweight clash should be interesting to watch as Johnson, a former top ten Lightweight, will be looking to break into the rankings at 145lbs for the first time by beating Emmett, who was last seen being violently knocked out by Jeremy Stephens over a year ago. Normally I’d question why a fighter would be out for that long, but after a knockout as vicious as the one Emmett suffered, a long layoff was probably a good idea.

At any rate, this one should come down to how well Emmett deals with Johnson’s fleet-footed striking style, which has largely translated well to 145lbs thus far and allowed him to defeat both Andre Fili and Artem Lobov to go 2-1 at his new weight after a disappointing loss to Darren Elkins.

Generally speaking, Johnson is an excellent striker who puts combinations together well, has decent footwork and is also able to evade the majority of his opponents’ takedowns due to his movement and wrestling.

Emmett is a far more straightforward fighter; a hard-nosed wrestler training out of Team Alpha Male, he dropped to 145lbs in late 2017 after going 2-1 at Lightweight, and then outpointed Felipe Arantes before really making a splash by knocking out former title challenger Ricardo Lamas. That put him in line for another big fight, but despite hurting Jeremy Stephens early, well, we all know how it ended for ‘The Grim Reaper’.

Emmett clearly hits hard, but it’s a little worrying that he only has 4 KO wins on his ledger out of his 13 overall. That suggests prior to his UFC run – and in his early days in the Octagon – he was more used to outpointing his opponents, something that’s going to be very difficult to do against a fighter as skilled in terms of movement as Johnson.

Where Johnson could find himself in trouble here is down the stretch. Sure, he did well to outpoint Fili and Lobov and didn’t really slow down in those fights, but neither man is likely to put the kind of pressure on him that Emmett probably will, and when Elkins put a lot of pressure on him, he folded. The same could be said for his losses to Justin Gaethje and Nate Diaz at 155lbs.

With that said, I don’t think Emmett can put the kind of volume on Johnson that Gaethje and Diaz did, and I don’t think he’s as bloody-minded as Elkins when it comes to wading through offense to keep on pushing forward, either. I’d put him closer to someone like Danny Castillo or Dustin Poirier when it comes to Johnson’s previous opponents, and both men were dealt with handily by ‘The Menace’.

This is a winnable fight for Emmett – he has to get inside, corral Johnson on the fence and make it a dirty brawl, tiring out the former Blackzilian with his pressure work, but it won’t be easy given Johnson’s skilled movement and ability to catch his opponent from angles.

I’m not sure Johnson will be able to finish Emmett off – he’s nowhere near as savage as Jeremy Stephens – but I think he’ll have enough to avoid being dragged into a filthy brawl and outpoint him.

The Pick: Johnson via unanimous decision

#4 Karolina Kowalkiewicz vs. Michelle Waterson

Michelle Waterson could be in title contention with a win on Saturday

This is some interesting matchmaking given Kowalkiewicz is coming off a brutal knockout loss to Jessica Andrade, while Waterson’s on a 2-fight winning streak and last outpointed Felice Herrig, but in a division where the next two contenders for the title look set – Andrade has her shot in May while the winner of the upcoming Tatiana Suarez/Nina Ansaroff fight is likely next – it does make sense given both women are good-looking and both put on exciting fights.

They have somewhat similar styles, too – Kowalkiewicz loves to get inside and throw combinations from close range or the clinch, while Waterson is equally happy to put combinations together, albeit from a longer range than her Polish foe. ‘The Karate Hottie’ is happy to stay on the outside, stick and move and use her kicks to keep her opponents at bay – so can she do that to Kowalkiewicz?

It’s a bit of a tricky one to call. Kowalkiewicz was arguably the opponent who gave Joanna Jedrzejczyk the most problems before Rose Namajunas took her out – she knocked her down after all and had her in deep trouble for a while.

She’s an excellent technical striker and I’m not sure that Waterson will be able to keep her at distance – Herrig waded in and caught her with close-range shots at times and I’d suggest Kowalkiewicz is a slightly better striker than Felice.

The issue for Kowalkiewicz may be Waterson’s ground game. She might be nicknamed ‘The Karate Hottie’ but if anything, Waterson’s ground game has been more impressive in her UFC run.

She submitted Angela Magana and Paige VanZant, and also outworked Cortney Casey on the ground to take the decision in that fight. And she showed against VanZant that she’s quite happy to take the fight to the ground early, as she choked ’12 Gauge’ out in the first round. She was also able to hit a couple of takedowns on the fleet-footed Tecia Torres, too.

Kowalkiewicz meanwhile got herself into tons of trouble on the ground in her UFC debut against Randa Markos, and she was thoroughly outclassed and submitted by Claudia Gadelha in the other fight that we saw her taken down in.

That doesn’t bode well for her here in my opinion, as she’s got to get inside Waterson’s range to hurt her with strikes, and that could end up allowing Waterson to get hold of her for the takedown.

The longer Waterson remains standing with Kowalkiewicz, the trickier this fight becomes for her, but I don’t think ‘The Karate Hottie’ is a low-IQ fighter and I suspect she’ll look to strike from distance before surprising the Polish fighter with a takedown once she tries to get inside. And if Waterson gets into a dominant position, I think this one is over.

The Pick: Waterson via first round submission

#5 Paul Craig vs. Kennedy Nzechukwu

Can Scotland's Paul Craig overcome explosive newcomer Kennedy Nzechukwu?

Last time we saw Scotland’s Paul Craig, he was involved in a back-and-forth grappling match with Australian prospect Jimmy Crute – who was able to submit the Scotsman with a third-round kimura after being in trouble himself at points. The loss put Craig at 2-3 in the Octagon, and in all honesty, it’s hard to see him improving on that given the issues surrounding him.

The problem for Craig is that while he’s clearly an excellent grappler, he’s just not a top-level athlete, and that’s cost him against less experienced fighters like Tyson Pedro and Khalil Rountree, who both took ‘BearJew’ out with violent strikes. Sure, he submitted Magomed Ankalaev last year, but that was an all-time great comeback win and he’d been taking a beating up to that point.

Nzechukwu is a total wildcard really – footage on him is quite sparse outside of his appearance on Dana White’s Contender Series in 2018, but it’s quite clear that unlike Craig, he is an explosive athlete who’s also huge for 205lbs. His head kick knockout of Dennis Bryant was pretty brutal, for instance, and it looks like he’ll have a big speed advantage against Craig too.

Sure, Craig could drag the Nigerian to the ground and maybe outgrapple him or catch him in a submission, but the problem is that he doesn’t have great takedowns and while Nzechukwu is relatively inexperienced, it isn’t like Craig is Demian Maia or Kron Gracie – he was TKO’d by Pedro while on the ground, after all.

In the end I just don’t think Craig wins this fight due to Nzechukwu’s speed and athletic advantage. Nzechukwu may well look fantastic here but if he does, it’s probably not a sign to rush him up the ranks as he’s too inexperienced, but I definitely think he’s got this one in the bag barring a major mistake from him probably stemming from ‘Octagon shock’.

The Pick: Nzechukwu via first round TKO

#6 Sheymon Moraes vs. Sodiq Yussuf

Brazilian striker Sheymon Moraes will have his hands full against Sodiq Yussuf

This one’s my sleeper pick for Fight of the Night should Barboza/Gaethje fail to impress (not likely, but still!) as both men have shown huge potential in their brief UFC showings, and will likely come to trade strikes until one guy goes down. Which one will that be? Well, it isn’t an easy fight to pick at all.

Moraes has more experience; a Brazilian kickboxing champion, he’s 11-2 in his MMA career with the only losses coming at the hands of Marlon Moraes and Zabit Magomedsharipov – hardly something to be ashamed of. Most recently, he defeated Julio Arce in a total bloodbath at UFC 230 – one of 2018’s most underrated fights in fact.

Yussuf on the other hand had a decent showing on the Contender Series, but then blew away everyone’s expectations by smashing Suman Mokhtarian in December, garnering some comparisons to the likes of Melvin Guillard and Tyron Woodley (when he decides to punch rather than wrestle) in the process.

The Nigerian is a tightly-coiled ball of muscle, springing into offense with scary speed and explosiveness before settling back and resetting.

It’s that tendency to fight in bursts that has me a little worried here; Moraes, assuming he doesn’t get his lights turned out early, will put a hell of a lot of pressure on Yussuf, far more than Mokhtarian would ever have been capable of doing.

If Yussuf ends up being forced onto his back foot, how will he react? Especially when you consider that Moraes appears to be the more technical striker?

I’m slightly favouring Moraes here, as I think he can put enough pressure on Yussuf to take him out of his usual rhythm. Yussuf appears to have the sheer power to take out anyone in the Featherweight division, and so you can’t count him out here – he could easily catch Moraes with something horrible and get rid of him quickly – but Moraes is super-tough, as evidenced by his fight with Arce, and I think he’ll have a little too much for the less experienced Yussuf.

The Pick: Moraes via unanimous decision

#7 The Prelims: ESPN card

Longtime UFC veteran Ross Pearson headlines the prelim card

As with the previous ESPN show, the top half of the preliminary fights will be shown on ESPN before the main card. Headlining the prelims is a Lightweight fight between veterans Ross Pearson and Desmond Green.

England’s Pearson has been in the UFC now for almost a decade, but he’s fallen on hard times recently – losing 5 of his last 6 fights – and his durability appears to be on the wane.

Green meanwhile probably has his back to the wall too after going 1-3 in his last 4 fights. This one is tricky to call as Pearson hasn’t done as badly against grapplers as he has done against strikers recently, but I think Green has more mileage left in the tank so I’ll take him by decision.

At Featherweight, TUF: Latin America 2 winner Enrique Barzola faces off with Kevin Aguilar. Aguilar has a gaudy record – 16-1 – and he won his UFC debut last year, but Barzola is one of the more underrated fighters in the division in my opinion, chaining his takedowns and wild striking together ala Diego Sanchez in his early days. I like Barzola to grind out another victory here, putting him on a 5-fight win streak.

In the Middleweight division, Kevin Holland returns to face tough veteran Gerald Meerschaert. Holland bounced back from his loss to Thiago Santos to choke out John Phillips in November, and remains one of the toughest men on the roster.

Meerschaert should be a tough match for him – he’s finished all of his Octagon victories and is well-rounded, but I’m not sure he can put enough offense together to take out Holland, who I think can outwork him on the stretch for a decision.

At Strawweight, former top-ranked fighter Jessica Aguilar takes on Marina Rodriguez. Five years ago this likely would’ve been a gimme for Aguilar, but it does appear that she’s past her best now as evidenced in her losses to the likes of Weili Zhang and Cortney Casey.

Rodriguez on the other hand looked excellent in her UFC debut against Randa Markos, coming away with a draw. Aguilar could perhaps outgrapple her but I simply don’t think she has too much left; I’ll take Rodriguez via second-round stoppage.

#8 The Prelims: ESPN+ card

Former Flyweight title challenger Ray Borg makes his Bantamweight debut this weekend

The early prelims for this show will be shown on the ESPN+ streaming service, rather than Fight Pass – an interesting move that makes me wonder about the future of that service, but that’s another article.

Topping the bill, reportedly at least, is a Bantamweight fight between former Flyweight title challenger Ray Borg and a late replacement opponent, Casey Kenney. Kenney looks like an excellent prospect – he’s 11-1 and was a dual-weight champion in LFA, but as a natural Flyweight I find it hard to see him defeating Borg, who’s an excellent fighter in all areas, even beating Jussier Formiga in 2017.

I think Borg outworks him for either a submission or decision.

At Strawweight, Maryna Moroz faces newcomer Sabina Mazo, a student of Rafael Cordeiro at Kings MMA. Mazo looks like an interesting prospect, and the fact that she has two 5-round decision victories on her ledger bodes well, but the fact that she’s a striker worries me in a fight with the rangy Moroz, who’s only really lost to grapplers and a fellow long striker in Angela Hill. I like Moroz to use her striking to win a decision here.

Finally, Alex Perez takes on Mark De La Rosa at Bantamweight. It’s an intriguing one as Perez had a lot of hype around him going into his fight with Joseph Benavidez, but was pretty violently stopped in the end, while De La Rosa is a solid 2-1 in the UFC thus far. I like Perez here though, from what I’ve seen he seems slightly better in all areas, and I’ll take him to use his striking for a late TKO.