Just one major UFC card in February and it is Saturday night from Perth Arena in Australia (fight is Sunday Down Under) as Luke Rockhold requires on fill-in challenger Yoel Romero for the interim middleweight belt. It’s the only name fight on the card. Per usual, the main card will start at 10 p.m. ET and on pay-per-view. The prelims are on Fox Sports 1. Here’s a peek at the principal fights. The UFC made its introduction in Australia with UFC 110 in February 2010. The organization’s very first card in Western Australia, will be its 12th in the nation. Let us take a look the top UFC 221 betting odds for this particular Saturday.
UFC 221 Betting Odds, Picks & Predictions UFC 221 Betting Odds: Rockhold (+135) / Romero (-160) The Cuban Romero is the No. 1 contender in the middleweight division along with also the American Rockhold the No. 2. Rockhold is -140 in Mybookie.ag with Romero at +120 and an over/under of 1.5 rounds. So who is the champion? Australian Robert Whittaker, but he had been forced to pull against Rockhold because of injury — the most important reason why the card is in Australia was because of Whittaker. “I’ve gone into several struggles hurt,” Whittaker said this week. “I went into the Yoel Romero fight with a torn MCL, I moved to multiple conflicts with broken hands, and that is never deterred me. And through my homework and my camp, I did my hamstring — I did blow off my hamstring out — but I was ready to work around it. So we just worked around it, threw it on the wall, no explosive type of stuff, and then I got an abscess infection. That totally knocked me from the playground.” While he was formerly able to train his hamstring injury, the disease ended up departing”The Reaper” bedridden for many weeks, and Whittaker considers the weakening of his immune system might have led to his consequent battle with chickenpox as well. Chickenpox in adults can be very serious, even deadly.
When Was the Last Time Robert Whittaker Fought?
Whittaker last fought in July, beating Romero by unanimous conclusion. He hasn’t faced Rockhold. Georges St-Pierre won the middleweight title this past year over Michael Bisping at UFC 217 but vacated it since he couldn’t defend it in because time owing to his own health concerns. Whittaker subsequently won the interim belt Romero. A former UFC winner, Rockhold is coming from a TKO win over David Branch in September. Rockhold lost his title to Bisping in UFC 199 at June 2016. Concerning remarkable differential (the difference between significant strikes acquired per second and significant strikes absorbed per second ) Rockhold has a substantial edge over Romero. His striking differential in the UFC is plus-2.50, while Romero’s is now plus-0.77. However, during his UFC career, Romero has scored six knockdowns at a speed of 0.78 knockdown a 15 minutes. Rockhold only includes two knockdowns via eight-career UFC fights. Additionally, he’s been on the receiving end of three knockdowns.
Mark Hunt (13-11) vs. Curtis Blaydes (8-1)
UFC 221 Betting Odds: Hunt (+135) / Blaydes (-160) It’s a heavyweight bout with New Zealand’s Hunt ranked No. 5 in the division and Blaydes No. 9. But, Blaydes is a -160 favorite and Hunt +135. Hunt was recently cleared to return to competition. Citing”medical issues,” Hunt was hauled from November’s UFC Fight Night 121 headliner in Sydney, a decision had been made after Hunt confessed to memory loss and slurred speech at a piece he wrote for PlayersVoice.com.au titled,”When I die fighting, that is fine.” Hunt, already with a single litigation against the UFC, threatened another in the aftermath of the advertising’s decision to pull him from UFC Sydney. He called UFC President Dana White a”bald-headed prick” at a scathing Instagram post. Hunt claimed this suspension was punishment because of the civil lawsuit he filed against the company, White and Brock Lesnar regarding Lesnar’s failed test at UFC 200. Hunt’s final fight occurred in May in UFC Fight Night 110, where he conquered Derrick Lewis via TKO in a slugfest”Fight of the Night.” After enduring a TKO loss to top contender Francis Ngannou within his promotional debut, Blaydes, a 26-year-old former collegiate wrestler, has won four consecutive fights. Three of those wins — over Cody East, Adam Milstead and Oleksiy Oliynyk — arrived through knockout. Blaydes has finished seven of the eight career wins by knockout or technical knockout.
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