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#2 Heavyweight: Ben Rothwell vs. Ovince St. Preux

Ben Rothwell will welcome Ovince St. Preux to the Heavyweight division for the first time

If this fight sounds a little bizarre on paper, it’s because it is bizarre. ‘OSP’ has never fought at Heavyweight before, and yet his first foray into the weight class sees him facing a man in Ben Rothwell who has to cut weight to make the 265lbs limit.

Sure, Ovince St. Preux is only an inch shorter than his opponent, but unless he’s packed on a ludicrous amount of muscle – or fat – the likelihood is that he’ll be wildly outsized when the two men step into the Octagon. But will that really matter?

It’s honestly debatable. The variance in punching power is usually the key factor when a Light-Heavyweight moves up to Heavyweight, with the UFC’s biggest fighters tending to hit a lot harder than their lighter counterparts. And indeed, Rothwell hits tremendously hard; of his 37 wins, 28 have come by knockout.

With that said, despite fighting some heavy hitters since joining the UFC in 2013, OSP has only been stopped by strikes once – by Jimi Manuwa in 2016. He doesn’t have the greatest chin in the world, but nobody could really accuse him of having a glass jaw, either.

That could bode well for him, given Rothwell’s own struggles as of late. ‘Big Ben’ has never been the most dynamic fighter, even at his peak, but since his return to action from a USADA suspension in 2019, he’s looked worryingly slow on his feet.

Sure, he TKO’d Stefan Struve in December, but that fight was highly controversial, as Struve looked to be the much better fighter before he was hurt by a pair of bad low blows that led directly to the stoppage. Before that, Struve had been piecing him from the outside, just as Andrei Arlovski had done a couple of months prior.

If OSP can find a way to simply dodge around Rothwell’s attacks and pick him apart with strikes, then I don’t see why he can’t win this fight. The problem with that, though, is that St. Preux isn’t the most natural striker himself.

Sure, he has a handful of TKO wins on his record – 11 to be exact – and he stopped ‘Shogun’ Rua in 2014, but his main strengths are on the ground, and while Rothwell is no wizard on the mat, it’s not exactly easy to put him on his back.

Overall I see this fight becoming a plodding one; St. Preux just isn’t nuanced enough on his feet to dance around and pick Rothwell apart. And while ‘Big Ben’ is less likely to land the clubbing sledgehammer blow he’ll need for a TKO these days, I do think he’s got enough to avoid OSP’s takedowns. It should be a close one to call, but I suspect Rothwell will land enough heavy strikes to get the nod from the judges.

The Pick: Rothwell via unanimous decision