Main card
Welterweight Championship bout: Canada Georges St-Pierre (Current Champion) vs Josh Koscheck
Striking advantage: St-Pierre
Wrestling advantage: St-Pierre
Submission advantage: St-Pierre
KO Advantage: Even
Mental advantage (from winning previously): St-Pierre
Cardio advantage: Even
MMA IQ: St-Pierre
Fighting in Hometown: St-Pierre
Experience: Even
I don’t see how on paper Koscheck wins this fight the second time around. However, Koscheck is an extremely tough individual and always has the puncher’s chance. I’m going to skip that chance and take St-Pierre. GSP is a heavy favorite, but I still think he is going to win.
Heavyweight bout: Netherlands Stefan Struve vs Sean McCorkle
Two giants here. However, Struve has more experience and has shown to have a really tough chin. Couple that with his long jab and good Thai clinch work plus his excellent submission game. I give a heavy edge to Struve.
Lightweight bout: Jim Miller vs Charles Oliveira
I think Oliveira has the striking advantage here. I’m going with Chuck.
Lightweight bout: Joe Stevenson vs Mac Danzig
Not sure Mac Danzig brings enough to the table to beat Joe Stevenson. Should be an excellent fight though.
Welterweight bout: Thiago Alves vs John Howard
Thiago Alves against John Howard. Interesting matchup. Thiago provides a lot of standup weapons against Howard who is dangerous in the clinch and on top when on the mat.
I lean towards the favorite here, but I could see Howard getting takedowns and winning a decision just the same. Haven’t seen odds for this yet.
Preliminary card
Lightweight bout: Mark Bocek vs Dustin Hazelett
Going to be interesting fight against two jiu-jitsu aces. Hazelett likely to have a significant reach advantage. Bocek is a zombie who is hard to finish. Neither one is probably going to submit the other and neither one is going to KO the other. I lean towards Bocek because he never stops moving forward. That is enough to take a decision.
Middleweight bout: Jesse Bongfeldt vs Rafael Natal
Pass
Welterweight bout: Matt Riddle vs Sean Pierson
Unfamiliar with Pierson. Riddle has been impressive though.
Middleweight bout: Joe Doerksen vs Dan Miller
I don’t see anything Doerksen can do take Miller out here. Miller not be able to do anything to Doerksen either though. Depending on how bad odds are skewed, I like Miller. If they are outrageous its worthwhile to go the other way. Evenly matched fight, Miller has better cardio.
Welterweight bout: TJ Grant vs Ricardo Almeida
Another close match. The always gritty TJ Grant will put up a good fight against Ricardo Almeida who was choked out by Matt Hughes in 20 seconds, but he won’t finish Almeida and I lean towards Almeida getting the sub.