 What is crack-a-laden everybody welcome on into the heat check fantasy podcast powered by Number fire that is right here on the fan dual podcast network and number fire comm today We are getting you set for UFC 249 coming up this Saturday a full slate of action for DFS coming your way We're gonna learn the ins and outs of the sports with Austin Swain. My name is Jim Sonnis I am a senior writer and analyst for number fire comm joined here as mentioned by Austin Swain You can find him on Twitter at a swing three He does number fires UFC DFS coverage also does NASCAR and NBA so Austin Kind of an interesting time for you UFC kicking things off NASCAR is a week after that. How you doing today? Yeah, I'm doing great Jim I I definitely am excited I don't know why why I was picked so luckily that my next sports happened to be coming back first from quarantine But I'm excited about it. It'll be fun to get real life humans playing sports. It'll be a lot of fun Yeah, and it's gonna be a wild stretch because UFC has a bunch of cards coming up right away And then NASCAR has I think like seven races in 11 days one of DFS for all those But like you can bet on those and that's still pretty exciting I'll take that happily the problem that I have Austin is I know literally nothing about UFC I am superbly squeamish. I cannot deal with any sort of blood So I know nothing about this. So I'm not gonna give literally any advice I'm gonna lean on you and I hope you're okay with that. Yeah, that's that's totally fine with me You know, I've I've been hardcore into UFC for for about five years now So, you know, I think the sport at first glance if you're watching at a bar with some buddies It looks like kind of barbaric, you know, people punch at each other There's blood coming out But there's actually a lot of science and actually a lot of statistics behind the fighters and how they're performing in there So a lot of fun to bet on and a lot of fun for fantasy as well Statistics music to my ears So we're talking UFC 249 here, we're gonna go through the rosters on Fandall how scoring works Fandall is Just recently offering UFC just started right before the quarantine light lit up So it is a new sport will go through Fandall scoring rules will go through the roster slots How scoring works where you can find data all that stuff lock is at 6 30 p.m. On Saturday night But first Fandall sportsbook is now available in Colorado. But what's a sportsbook with no sports? Well, it's Fandall anything book Fandall's newest free game each day You will pick one free prop like the weather stocks anything you pick it, right? You win five bucks in site credit then play again tomorrow play Fandall anything book free only on Fandall sports book Must be 21 plus max bonus is $50 visit fandall.com slash audio for terms gambling problem call 1-800-522-4700 All right, so let's dive in here to UFC 249 before we discuss the actual card for this weekend I need to know the basics because I I know nothing about UFC and I'm guessing a lot of you listening are getting into UFC in order to really amp up your you know your DFS play once again, maybe you've gotten sick of playing league of legends or Top chef whatever it may be we've got over on Fandall right now So we're gonna try to give an introduction to USC while also sprinkling in thoughts on the slate So awesome to start things off. You're very basic when you look at Fandall How does scoring work for UFC DFS? You know, that's that's a great question Because there are a lot of different elements But I think the first place that you'll want to always start when looking to pick who who to roster if you're a Fight is who's gonna end up actually winning the fight. That's the important thing That's what most people bet on and if you look at Fandall scoring breakdown Say a guy's incredibly dominate in a 15 seconds. He knocks out his opponent He'll get a hundred points for finishing his opponent in the first round If it if the fight goes the entire distance because neither fighter can really gain that type of physical advantage You only get 20 points if the fighter actually ends up winning and there's a variety of different bonuses in between But winning quickly is not the only thing that you're targeting when looking at a roster here on Fandall A fighter can be a valuable DFS play because of the stats that they can earn throughout the fight Those are called significant strikes which are any strikes at distance or hard ones that are on the mat or when they're clenched together There's also takedowns Which are kind of like tackles of an opponent if somebody's a wrestler They may look to shoot for more of those and you actually get points on Fandall for if a takedown is denied So good takedown defense also can earn you points as well If somebody's into Brazilian jujitsu or a different type of martial art like that They get points for trying to choke or submit their opponent as well meaning that they end up tapping The otherwise they're gonna end up with a broken limb or get choked out unconscious So you get points for attempts at those as well I think the best way to do it is if you look in real practice at the scoring system on Fandall The very last pay-per-view card back in May UFC 248 you on a JJ check She was in the co-main event with Wei Lei Zhang. She scored 186 significant strikes, but lost She still got 112 points as a DFS play there And then you take a look at the main event that followed right after a couple of guys that were not nearly as active Israel Adesanya won the title. He won the belt, but only landed 48 strikes He only got 28 points in a decision win So you can see the great disparity from somebody who actually lost their fight to have it to someone who won their fight And that makes a huge difference when choosing which fighter to roster writes And it's I mean that's horrifying these these words like sound horrifying like takedown Like a significant strike you get point six points for for significant strike. That's right You get five points for a submission attempt six for a takedown and three for a takedown defense So a lot of different categories, but like you said, it does kind of revolve around winning So when you're doing research, are you looking at betting odds first? Where do you go first try to decide which fighters you want to roster? Yeah, absolutely A betting is the first place to start because despite the anonymous anomaly I just mentioned with you J check and Adesanya in the last pay-per-view card the conventional and positive expected value for a winning fighter It is for a winning fighter as somebody who actually ends up winning their fight whether it be a swift knockout Or it can be somebody that's really beating on their opponent building up those strikes and then they win by decision That's usually the conventional method to find a higher performing fighter If you take a look the last three UFC pay-per-view cards They all had exactly three first round knockouts and in the largest entry on draft Kings Which is another daily fantasy site that has had MMA for a little bit now the overall winner of the largest contest had all three of those fighters in Their lineup, so I'm still looking for first round knockouts The strategy still to find six winning fighters and build off of that. Hopefully my MVP would have the most points. We'll get into that later The only potential argument I would see for starting somebody who believe you would lose would be expected volume Based on the particular style of fight or if you're expecting a five-round fight for a championship fight There's more rounds. That's more points. That's more strikes available to you So really you would be looking at those rare situations, but overall I'm looking for winners man So I'm looking at those one thing that you mentioned there that is interesting for me again knowing nothing about UFC is that some matches are different lengths and that can give you the potential for additional volume Obviously, it may not break that way if the the fight ends before that but which matches on this card are Scheduled to be longer. I don't know if I'm phrasing that right. Yeah, I know nothing here You're exactly right And so just some basics and this will be explained before the pay-per-view as well if you're gonna watch on Saturday night Is the basics are is that most fights inside the acting on their three rounds long any title fights? So it's a belt potentially exchanging hands in a given weight class or the final event of the night If there are no title fights, those are all five round fights So the two we have on tap on Saturday that will be five round fights will be Henry so Hudo and Dominic Cruz They're fighting for the Bantam weight championship. That's at 135 pounds in the men's division As well as Justin Gaichi and Tony Ferguson are fighting for an interim lightweight championship. That's the main event That's also five rounds. So those two fights are five rounds for those four fighters in the player pool So how much of a bump do you give to those bouts given that they are Longer ones. Is that worth altering the way you view the fighters within those just because there's potential to go longer? Or does it not matter as much given that they're a decent odds. It doesn't even get there to begin with You're right in that it comes down to the particular style of the fight You know, I think a great these two are a great dichotomy of that and that you look at Justin Gaichi and Tony Ferguson They go in there violence violence in mind I'm not expecting a five-round fight So it may very well get less than the three rounds I would get in a normally scheduled fight and then I look at Henry so Hudo and Dominic Cruz They're a lighter weight class. So they're smaller. They're smaller guys So they don't have the same type of knockout power It may be more strategic and it may end up seeing a judge's decision I might target volume in that fight expecting a longer fight And many sportsbooks break break odds down by how the fights going to finish so you can see there's prop That's on how many rounds it's going to last what the type of finish is going to be and by whom So you can use that to kind of get a sense if you're not familiar with the fighters and their styles Kind of what the what Vegas is expecting as far as what a fight is going to look like stylistically yeah in general leaning on sportsbooks if you don't know what you're talking about probably a pretty good route for sure and Fandal sportsbook specifically does have Outcomes as well in addition to who will win and the money line there now I think one thing that's interesting here Austin that you alluded to before was all the different scoring categories and how those may be Depended on the fighter. Where can we get that data? Like where can we see how many significant strikes a fighter gets in a Typical match and stuff like that. Where can we find data on UFC? Well, it's it's very very nice and they about a year ago the UFC released their own internal stats portal at UFC stats comm it has most of the necessary stats you need to see as far as predicting an offensive output from a fighter Yeah, you can deep dive a particular fight So if you're looking how somebody did in their last matchup or against a similar style fighter You can look at the striking accuracy. You can look at striking averages per minute It can break it down by whether it was to the head or the midsection or somebody was targeting the legs Any grappling and scrambling metrics will be there as well And as well as it breaks it down by round so you can say, okay Maybe you have a gentleman who's a fighter that he's a strong starter He comes out of the gate throwing a lot of punches and kind of tires himself out or somebody who kind of lets it build over The course of the fight and get stronger as they go on I think of a guy like John Jones that many people know of he's he's the type of fighter that will get stronger as the fight Goes on by conserving energy. So you can see I think a great way You can also do it is to look by fighter So if you have a fighter that's on the card like for UFC 249 you visit say Justin Gachie's stat page in the main event you'll see he's never attempted a takedown in the UFC So which is crazy. He was an all-american wrestler at Arizona State But you can see when you see that zero point zero zero in his takedown per minute average He's not trying to wrestle. He's not trying to take things to the mat Justin Gacy's trying to throw punches from the feet at distance and knock somebody out cold And so you can kind of begin to stylistically see what a fighter really specializes and by visiting their fighter page as well So all that all that data encompass at ufc stats calm I use it primarily for my research and and I think they have just about every metric I could ask for and I think that they do have all the the scoring categories on fangirl Those are all listed in the ufc stats calm And I think the good thing is for someone like me who may not know the different fighting styles It's helpful to see How much they how often they do these various things because I know nothing about these fighting styles But Austin is you're someone who does watch ufc and you do know what these fighting styles are like What kind of fighters, you know are there fighters who can rack up a lot of fantasy points in a hurry because of their style Is there a particular fighting style? We should prioritize when looking for that. How does that break down? Yeah, there certainly are a different breeds of fighters, you know There are about three or four different general categories. I would say and that you have fighters who are typically like Gaith G They're trying to stand at range. You're trying to knock people out. They're more of a boxing type I think if Conor McGregor is a guy who's very popular Conor McGregor is a boxer. That's why he got into a match with Floyd Mayweather. He really prefers to stand on his feet You think of a guy like Khabib Nurmagomedov He's a wrestler So he's primarily trying to use his punches to set up opportunities to wrestle and get to the ground to the mat because he has strong arms and a strong core muscles that can really keep people down As well as you have submission artists I think of a guy like Crone Gracie or or maybe Charles Oliveira in his earlier days where really they're just trying to grab a hold of you so they can grab your arm and get it into a position called a submission attempt where It could potentially be broken unless the other fighter taps out and says, okay, you win So there's a really the three dichotomies of styles. There's a lot of different ones That you can see pop up in particular styles like some people like to use leg kicks as a kick boxer But really that's what you're mostly looking at to target matchups is to somebody like standing Do they prefer wrestling? Are they really not trying to throw any punches or wrestle at all? They're just trying to grab a hold of your body part and get you to submit So there's those are really the three that I would say are the big dichotomy Trio Tricot trichotomy, whatever it might be. I think that works try We'll go whichever way we want to go here. I think that what's helped me again No, it's someone going in totally new to this is having everything sorted out by the fighter and like showing You know, there are submission attempts and things like that There's significant strikes and just showing it all together so you can compare different fighters and see how they match with other Other fighters on this card because I think that's kind of the context we're looking for here So that's been helpful for me again knowing nothing about the style and USC stats You do have to account for scale because some of them are per 15 minutes and some are per minute So make sure you are accounting for that if you're putting it all in one sheet and try to calculate Fandal points per minute and stuff like that, but it is a pretty major crutch there let's go back to the wind discussion Austin because you know, you look at the salaries here for the slate and It's almost exactly based on their moneyline odds to win in descending order So that makes it tough. Are there any Fighters who you think may be undervalued by the betting market who have a legitimate shot to win any underdogs out there Who you think are pretty good DFS players because they may be under priced Yeah, certainly, you know, there there are that's the beauty of mixed martial arts is that you know that Matchmaking is getting better with UFC So underdogs have a legitimate chance to win I'd say more so now than any other time in the sport You take a look back to 2018 Which is a couple years ago But that's when they finally have the dust settled with every UFC sanctioned event around the world 33.9% of the time the underdog actually won the fight the the listed vague So you can be assured in this 12-card fight about three or four underdogs are probably going to end up winning When you take a look at underdog under underdogs I like I've already talked about the two fights when mentioned they were title fights, but you take a look at Justin Gaichi He's a guy. He's got incredible power. He knocked out Donald Soroni He's a plus 150 underdog against Tony Ferguson in the main event He's he's gotten a first-round knockout in his last three events So you're looking at the fantasy potential there But also his two losses that came before that were guys who actually ended up winning championships as well Ferguson everyone believes is of that caliber one of the best fighters in the world, but hasn't been a champion yet So it's it's been a high level of competition I think something that's important that maybe factors into MMA other than Than other fantasy sports is the fact that these guys are actually cutting 15 to 20 pounds of weight right before the fight To get down to their weight class Tony Ferguson a guy with a reputation is kind of crazy He went through with his entire weight cut last in when he was fighting for April 18th And he got on the scale of 145 pounds Not the smartest thing probably physically to dehydrate yourself and then again have to do it to cut down to weight again here Three weeks later But that's just pretty typical Tony Ferguson fashion, but he could be physically hampered because of that And so a guy like gay shoe hits that hard. It's something. I'm definitely concerned about for Ferguson as a favorite So I like gaichi there as was the code main event as well Dominic Cruz is he's only $12 on fan duel and he's a plus 200 underdog right now He's one of the best ever to fight at 135 pounds, but it's been three years since Dominic Cruz fought He's fought off a variety of injuries He's a voice familiar to MMA fans because he does a lot of broadcasting for them as well He got this title fight three years out of Retirement for a reason and that's because Cruz is one of the best ever do it he'll fight Henry Sehudo who's only five feet Portal he's a very small guy. He usually fights at 125 pounds But crew but he's moving up to 135 where he actually has the belt. He stepped in as an interim there Cruz I in my opinion. I think Cruz should be favored in this bout But we just don't have any we don't have any tape on him and so because it's been three years We have no idea what he's gonna come out of retirement looking at but he's a much bigger fighter He's not afraid to wrestle in Sehudo. That was his claim to fame as he was a gold medalist as an Olympian as a Wrestler he can wrestle with Sehudo and he's actually larger which will make it harder for Sehudo to gain top control on him Striking it striking cruises the numbers are a five by foreign cruises favor Cruises is around three and a half strike significant strikes per minute As well as it's against better competition, you know, TJ Dillishaw two-time champion of the world Cody Garbrand Was the one who beat Dominic Cruz But a lot of great Strikers that cruises used to facing and so who does just not really been on that level take a look at so who does last two fights mighty Mouse Johnson not even in the UFC anymore They traded him away imagine imagine getting traded out of the NFL that was Demetrius Johnson He was traded out at the UFC for Ben Ascrin who has since flamed out And Marlon Marias has looked pretty pretty terrible in his last couple of fights in that he had the lead on So who don't ended up getting knocked out and then you take a look after that He lost to Jose Aldo on an out on a weight cut that Aldo was looking like he was about to pass out at weigh-ins from How bad the weight cut was Aldo almost ended up beating him So the competition level questionable for Sehudo as the champion So I really like Dominic Cruz in this fight overall, you know, like it's anytime you say I think this underdog probably should be favored in my personal opinion That's a guy you're looking to target for a Fandal roster. Yeah, Dominic Cruz Plus 180 and just $12 on Fandal Justin Gaichi is $15 and plus 150. So interesting names to consider there in Gaichi's Significant strike numbers poppin. They're poppin on the spreadsheet again. I know nothing about this But hey, I know that we're the spreadsheet. It's a pretty good there Let's talk one more thing one more question you're about winning because I think that is kind of the crux of Building a lineup, but I think that it can be difficult on Fandal where you have the Salary set essentially by the win odds Does that make you stride to be a bit more balanced with your lineup or do you feel Confident enough in your ability to find underdogs who can win where you're okay going a little bit top Have you may be getting up some of those higher-priced fighters? Yeah, um, you know, especially in cash or low or lower stakes tournaments I'm definitely looking at the caliber of the stud that I have Wins targeting value plays, you know If I have a stud that I can trust you take for example somebody like Valentina Shivchenko Nobody's run around against her in a year and she's only lost to one woman in the UFC She's gotten at least two takedowns and four of her last six fights She has a pretty high floor about her scoring output And I know those two fights with Amanda Nunes that she lost actually still went the distance and she still scored some Points I have a very high floor with a somebody with Shivchenko. I have a high body of work I've seen her fight before I would really target stacking her in a spot that I like her in because I know what type of Outpook I'm getting I think I go back To a month that may have scarred certainly scarred me as an MMA veteran and daily fantasy players at UFC 241 Gentlemen by the name of Devonte Smith was a minus 750 favorite sounded like from all sources and experts It's a shoe in that he's gonna end up winning He got knocked out cold in the first round by his opponent comma worthy as a minus 750 favorite And he had a huge significant strikes per minute marker 6.88 like you said it was popping off the charts But he only had two fights in the UFC at that point and the sample size of just a few minutes of fight time wasn't large enough for For us to really get an idea of how he's how he was gonna match up Stylistically so finding value plays is always gonna be in an X in exact science because if you're brand-new to MMA DFS I can't wait for the first time you experience where your fight fighter statistically should have won the fight on the judges score cards And then it goes the other way and so you don't end up getting the win bonus on the decision So it's always in an exact science So I'm always building around my confidence of studs and starting there And then I sprinkle in my value plays based on if I feel like it has a legitimate shot to score Well, yeah, and then furthermore is the winning odds of the underdog as well And I think that based on the way you've talked about this slate Specifically, it sounds like we'll have options in the cheaper end where you may be able to go a little bit Top-heavy here too, and hopefully that's not the same Davante Smith who was playing for the tip may vipers in the Michigan We'll hope it's a different dude. Okay, so let's go back to Fandle here where we have an MVP bonus And if you haven't been playing like Single match football or playing League of Legends anything like that You may not know what an MVP slot is but on Fandle you get a 1.5 X multiplier for the player the fighter You put in that MVP slot So let's say a fighter scores 30 Fandle points, and I don't know if that's realistic or not But let's say they score 30 that sounds a little low regardless you multiply that by 1.5 X They would get 45 and the salary to use the player in your MVP slot is the exact same as if you want to use them in any other Slot so essentially what you're doing is you're picking the highest scoring fighter on the entire slate Austin for you who stands out as being an option for that MVP slot Well, you know, it's it's not incredibly sexy if you're doing similar single game NFL You pick a guy like Omar Jackson or Patrick Mahomes most expensive player in the player pool They usually have a pretty high floor as well as combining that with a good ceiling as well And I know it's gonna be somewhat an interesting to do the same here But the first guy that comes to mind the most expensive player in the in the player pool. It's Ryan span He's facing Sam Alvi Ryan spans $22 on Fandle, which is the highest price of any fighter in the pool But I think he might be worth it It's the first fight of the card at 205 pounds. So right when it locks at 630, these guys will be walking out for their fight Spanned. He's a big athletic striker. He's won his first five MMA events He's not he's not really a ground. He doesn't really have any ground game that's been tested He eat down to win over Luis Henrique doing that And he likes to try to he likes to try to knock opponents to the ground using his fists and then look for Submissions to finish. That's a good way of changing things up in case your opponent thinks you're hunting your One knockout potential. He's undefeated in UFC and he takes on a very very well-known veteran of the sports smiling Sam Alvi not incredibly not incredibly Technical not incredibly athletic, but he's just as tough as a $2 stake You know, he's gotten by on grit and just very savvy Knowing when to shoot and when to strike but now he's aging as a veteran. I have my qualms with span as a prospect He's pretty untested in the UFC, but all these aging and if you take a look at less his take down Take down attempts per minute. It's in the point three area He's not really ever trying to get the ground get the fight to the ground get on the mat Wrestle do anything like that. He's really just gonna stand up and strike and unfortunately for him in this match up He's facing Ryan span who's he's bigger. He's taller He's he's more athletic at this point in this career because of his age and things related to that It really a good wrestler one day is going to knock span off his game and probably derail his hype train a little bit But all these not really built with that sort of toolkit the thing that the thing that I would be afraid of for Alvi is that he does have that toughness and If if span ends up not knocking him out in the first round I'm worried for Alvi that this might pile up significant strikes Against him as he continues to keep fighting through just to make it to the end of the decision But span should have no problem keeping his distance at the feet mixing in his combinations And should greatly improve on if you look at him statistically He's only got 3.26 significant strikes per minute So you say I feel nervous about paying $22 for a guy like that because the fight you can you can tell what the styles going to be You look at spans last few fates He's got a couple of quick knockouts in there as well as a wrestling match So he hasn't really been able to do what he wants to do which is strike at distance and Alvi will let him do that Okay, so Ryan span $22 on fangirl. He is minus 440 on the money line Nobody else is shorter than minus 330. So a pretty major gap between Ryan span in the field So like you said sometimes the most expensive fighter is the most expensive fighter for a reason and the other higher salaried fighters You are considering for this card. Yeah, I love Francis and Ghanu at $20 I think he's the best play on the entire slate very similar reason why I love Ryan span It's because I can predict the fight stylistically You know he and Jair Rosen strike neither of them are wrestlers or submission artists In fact a MMA fans will remember Francis and Ghanu's volume fight against Derek Lewis Only 31 total strikes in the fight and then gone who only had 11 of them mostly because it was just a wrestling match with no Punches being thrown Fans were booing at the end of the fight because there was no action daring it That's not the case which are gonna get with Rosen strike and in gun who they're both gonna stand at distance You know, unfortunately, there is a little bit of a drawback in that this fight when they're standing toe-toe They're not gonna throw a lot of punches, but one whichever one connects with a face is going to be very very hard These are two large men both sitting Upwards of six foot three and over two hundred and forty five pounds They're big guys and typically at heavy weight like these guys are fighting at one punch is usually all it takes in in Ghanu the reason he's a minus 280 favorite on the board if you look at them statistically Rosen strike actually got has more Significant strikes per minute. It's against much lesser competition in Ghanu's fight guys like steep a Mio chitch and Alstra and They both fought Alistair over him, but Derek Lewis as well He's fought guys that have fought for the belt Rosen strike took five full rounds to dispense of Alistair over reamed a couple years after in Ghanu fight him and got it took about five seconds or closer to that Okay, so in Ghanu certainly with the common opponent there did much much better against Alistair over him I think it's a level of competition gap where Rosen strike probably took this fight because it's good money to fight Francis in Ghanu. He's a very popular guy very a lot of fun to watch because he is nicknames the predator And he looks just absolutely jacked out there. So, you know, it's a good money fight for him But I don't like his on-standing actually end up winning it Vicente Luque is another guy that I target. Yeah, he's $18 on Fandall He just got a striking class in his last fight from Stephen Wonderboy Thompson Who's one of the best 170 pound strikers to do it takes a giant step back in competition and not only fight IQ on Saturday He's facing Nico the hybrid price price is the UFC fan favorite He's he's typical. He's a typical warrior. You know, I'm going in there I'm ready to die if I have to and he's just gonna throw punches. He's he's not guys out from his back He's knocked them out with a kicks upward from his from his feet You know, he's just a crazy circus kind of fighter, but he doesn't have a very high fight IQ So Luque is a Brazilian. He's very he's very technical trains with the trains with one of the top camps down in Brazil He's incredibly smart fighter and you take a when Nico price bought a guy like Luque last he got knocked out by Jeff Neil Luque a pirate pile up the significant strikes to 163 of them when he when he brutalized Brian Barbareta If and he actually knocked him out and finished that before it went to decision and he broke platinum like Perry's nose And Perry really hasn't been the same since he landed 84 strikes in that fight So Luque is a guy who has a good combination of power and volume He's taking on a guy that doesn't always put himself in the best position I think worst-case scenario Luque is probably gonna point his way to a decision just by knowing how to accumulate those points a little better But if price isn't careful Luque can really really pack a punch as well So I think you have a good good shot at a knockout there with Luque to be sent a Luque is 18 dollars minus 270 on the money line Which is shorter than most fighters in that range. So that definitely makes him intriguing from that perspective I want to go back to Francis and gani. It sounded like based on the weight level here You're expecting potential the potential for a short match. Does that? incentivize you to consider in Ganyu at the MVP slot if you're trying to pivot off of the span or Does the the lack of striking and the lack of lack of potential volume lower the upside of in Ganyu What's the kind of balance there? Oh, well, absolutely I think that well, I mean I I don't think that it lowers the volume because certainly You know, you're looking at the length of the fight being short for either way I'll have exposure to both sides of this matchup in tournaments by the way because Rosen strike He's a big guy too, you know, he could get and then all of a sudden you differentiate yourself with Rosen strike as well in some lineups probably not in an MVP slot But I would go to in Ganyu at MVP. I have a longer track history on him than I do span So I'm a little bit less nervous about Any sort of unforeseen complications or anything like that. I know what product I'm getting from in Ganyu at that point Certainly, I think he's worth considering pivoting off of as well The one place I would not pivot off of is to Calvin Cater I think Cater is $19 on Fandle, correct me if I have that wrong. He's 18. Yeah. So yeah, he's 18. So Calvin Cater He's a tremendously technical fighter probably looking at a decision win there And so because Cater because Cater's never really trying to knock you out. He's trying He's a very technical striker Well, it tries to out point his opponent sometimes in the process of brutalizing them They do get knocked out but he's really mostly trying to point and win decisions That's a place I wouldn't go but any type of knockout potential is certainly something you could argue Making a case for the MVP slot. That's really what you want either one a first round knockout in your MVP slot Or you want just some sort of brutalization that that encompasses over a hundred significant strikes If you take down attempts where really the opponent was just largely outclass the problem is This bike card because of the long layoff because of the quarantine stuff the matchups are too good to really have that large of a disparity You'll see you'll see odds as high as minus 1,000 on some cards But you saw only largest favorite a span at minus 440. So the fights are all pretty tight You had mentioned Rosenstreich potentially getting exposure to the other side of the Ingani imagine He's only $10 if you want to go that way on fangirl as well Any mid-tier fighters who stand out to you potentially better than what their salaries would indicate? Well, you take a look if you're brand new to MMA Maybe you play NFL DFS and that's why you happen to be lurking around fangirl these parts Draft just happen you're looking for some sports stuff. You might remember former Panthers and Cowboys defensive end Greg Hardy He's blackballed. Yeah, he's blackball. Yeah, he's blackballed out of the NFL some really uncomfortable hate behavior and some domestic abuse Allegations baggage like that's unfortunately never scared Dana white Dana white's a massive promoter He's very much just like an old-school classic boxing Boxing promoter and you take a guy like Hardy. He's very polarizing and Hardy draws viewers to the television That's why he's had a spot on pay-per-view cards despite being relatively untested as an MMA fighter And the thing that's interesting about Hardy is that he's actually had a better MMA career than somebody probably would have expected His last effort was actually his best. He lost to Alexander Volkov, but Alexander Volkov is a ranked heavyweight He's number seven in the entire world and he stood toe to toe to him and he definitely lost his fight He lost the decision, but he looked like he belonged in that fight. It didn't look like he was outclassed in any way He he toasted Juan Adams as well and was on his way to doing that to Ben Sassoli before an illegal need disqualified Hardy from the fight So, you know, he takes on Jorgen de Castro in this fight I have all of two minutes of date on Jorgen de Castro He made his MMA debut last fight against Justin Tafa and knocked him out cold Again, these guys are back at heavyweight, which is a really a fan favorite because you have the shorter potential there You have bigger guys hitting harder Hardy though, I have some date on and he's an efficient striker 4.77 significant strikes per minute as pronounced athletic advantages A lot of that coming from, you know, being an NFL body fighting in MMA four inches of height He'll have on on de Castro He'll have 15 pounds and at least six inches of reach at heavyweight and I think he's gonna be quicker too He's training with American top team, which is one of the top MMA gyms in the country So, you know, he'll be even better than he was against Volkov And if the guy that fought Volkov shows up to fight a prospect like Jorgen de Castro, Greg Hardy is gonna be in for a very successful evening It's just he they're not on the level of ranked heavyweights yet And so Hardy might be trending that direction though. And so that's interesting for the former NFL player Interesting anybody else in that range who you really like if I would rather lose money than use Greg Hardy You mentioned I guess like Tony Ferguson and Justin Gaetje are kind of in this range, too Are they the other guys who kind of stand out to you around here? Yeah, absolutely. I think also in this rain, which are range what you could be looking at is I Certainly kind of targeting a kind of higher volume fight between Donald Cowboy Seroni and Anthony Showtime Pettis You certainly because of the potential lack of defense involved both Unfortunately have had their Kate faces caved in their their longtime MMA stars But the lack of defense makes for a potential large striking output I'll have plenty of exposure to both signs of that match up as well I think I think you look at a guy who's a slight favorite as well kind of like Hardy is a joker a Suza He's facing Uriah Holland in a matchup that I can't quite put my finger on stylistically in that Jockery is a he's a Brazilian kickboxer So he mostly likes to work at range with his legs and Uriah Hall He picks a new style every time he's in the Arctic on it It certainly plays to his level of competition in that he'll perform really well If he gets a higher ranked fighter and then he's lost had some bad losses over the course of his career So if you don't if you'd rather lose money than play Greg Hardy, those are a couple So you can kind of look at in that same type of balanced pricing tier. Yeah, jacada Suza If you're looking for him on UFC stats certain to that name and the fan to a player pool He's under Ronaldo, which caused me a lot of confusion on Friday Eventually, so we're working on it. What about value plays you talked before about like Dominic Cruz potentially fitting there He's $12. Is he the main value option for you on this late? Yeah, certainly Like like I said, you know, if if I had a and I'm not an odds maker for a very good reason But if I had looked at this fight stylistically and I checked all the boxes about physical advantages higher IQ level of competition Really, the only thing Dominic Cruz is missing his recent footage or form You know if we had a fight from six months ago and he looked even 90% of himself He'd probably be a minus 250 favorite over a guy like Henry Soho that he's much bigger than we just I think the Unknown there. The assumption is ring rust. He's gonna be worse than the last time we saw him, but I keep going back to When George St. Pierre came out of retirement to fight Michael Bisping Michael Bisping liked guy Questionable level champ, you know, we weren't sure of his path to the belt That's I get those same type of vibes with sehudo George St. Pierre came out of retirement We were worried about the rust there and he really quickly dispensed of Bisping because there were levels to the fighting game there And I feel like something similar is going to happen with Dominic Cruz where I really feel like he's the one to build around Against sehudo you have the five round floor there as well since it's a longer fight with Cruz So even if he ends up taking a tough decision, you have the the baseline points there in cash or lower-stakes tournaments So I'm really building around Cruz primarily a couple of underdog options to keep your eye on as well though It's in a couple of prelim fights. These won't be on the pay-per-view card. They'll be before on ESPN plus Michelle Watterson, her nickname the karate hottie. She's been floating around the women. Yeah, great nickname, right? She she's been floating around the women's MMA title picture for a while now Incredibly well-rounded fighter you take a look. She's facing Karla Esparza Karla Esparza. She's five two and which is the Which is an incredibly tiny for a hundred and twenty five pound fighter She let usually attacks likes to wrestle and water since more of a striker at distance You can see that with her three point three five strikes per minute as far as is only at two point two two Which is very very low And so I I feel like Watterson with her physical advantages. She's a couple inches taller She'll have probably a weighted advantage realistically inside the octagon They'll both weigh in at a hundred and fifteen Watterson will probably be bigger when she rehydrates I feel like as far as is gonna have a tough time controlling her with her wrestling like she usually tries to do and the level of Competition hasn't been close Watterson's been fighting Joanna J check her on the title picture Esparza just barely got by Alexa Grasso in her last fight, which is which is lower end of the top ten So I like the competition disparity there Watterson's actually an underdog. She's only $13 on fan duel The only reason why I'm not pulling the trigger on her They're like I would a guy like cruises. I'm a little worried about the low scoring potential Just over time women's women's fights usually see have less fantasy points and the reason why they're more technical They're but they're better quality mixed martial arts But it's not it's not quite the same fantasy points as a first round knockout or just a brutalization of the other dude But so that's why I'm a little trepidatious, but I really like Watterson to win outright Especially I think I think last check on them on the odds on Friday. She was about plus 135 I really like the outright bet on Michelle Watterson there and then I turned to a really strange fight that I Hope it's not the first fight you turn in and see if you're if you're an MMA fan because you might turn it right back off It's gonna be Alexia line who's a 42 year old Russian against Fabrizio Verdo 42 year old Brazilian 42 just as it is in the NFL or any other sport incredibly aged these guys have been around fighting for a long long time They're on the back nine of their careers. They both might be playing whole 18 together But we're doing we he was knocked out cold last fight by Alex Volkov Greg Hardie's last opponent as well Align it actually beat a much lesser opponents in Marie screen. I don't really know what physical condition I'm getting either fighter in at this point at 42 years old But what I do know is that a line it has a style I can trust He is nicknames the boa constrictor because he actually throws punches to set himself up for opportunities to just simply get his Hands on you and as soon as he gets his hands on you He's got an 80 inch reach for a 205 pound person, which is it which is a gigantic year That's what you're looking at with an NFL defensive and pterodactyl exactly Yeah, and and so what he's doing is he really tries to get a submission attempt there And so I think that we're doomed at 42 years old isn't gonna have the athleticism to keep his hands off of him And so you'll get a line if he's only $9 in the fan to a player pool But what I'm talking about is that if he can get his hands on him and somehow get a first-round submission win Then obviously you're looking at least at least a hundred and seven fan to a points out of $9 That's tremendous value if Olinik everything goes according to plan problem is in his last five fights He has gotten that submission three times. He's also gotten his skull cracked in twice So it's kind of a it's a two outcome fight here But I like Olinik's chances against the athleticism ridden Verdume in that fight as well and this shows a value of pulling those stats from USC stats.com because that fighting style shows up In the stats he's he has the most submission attempt for 15 minutes and then he fired her on the entire card He is also second or third in takedowns for 15 minutes So like that shows up in the stats So it's kind of nice to have that crutch to lean on if you're like me and know nothing about the style of these Fighters Olinik nine dollars plus two sixty on the money line there anything else on this slate Austin We have not covered yet I think we've gotten some quality options in each tier but anything else you want to add here Yeah You know the card because of because of the long lay off the card is loaded with absolutely great matchups If you're a fight fan or or new to fighting you're gonna let a lot of different tastes of different styles The fight should be very close which it which is good You don't want a bunch of fights where it's kind of a non non competitive three-round beating Down you know you take a look we talked a little bit about a guy like John Gray Suze against your eye I talked I don't really stylistically know what I'm getting from a guy like your eye a haul or what the fight's gonna look like I'm fascinated, but there's also a potential they just lead potential They just lead on each other and I get less than 50 points from both fighters So you fade a fight you kind of fade a fight like that I think certainly it'll be very intriguing that we have two title fights with very very live underdogs So that should absolutely a play to the interest of this card as well I'm very fascinated by the Fandall scoring system I think that they covered pretty much any statistics or Basises that you could have in an MMA fight. So you're not really Behold into one type of style you can get points with a submission artist You can also get points with a striker on their feet as well So a very very intrigued to see how it's gonna go and and I'm very excited to see some real life human sports again That's for sure. I am as well. It'll be great like having the WNBA and the NFL draft is fun I've enjoyed the discourse around those however Actual sports which involves actual stuff happening. I am very much pumped for and it will be a whole lot of fun That is Austin Swame Make sure you find him on twitter at aswame3 his helper for this card will be up. I believe you said thursday, right? Absolutely. Yeah, I got one more thing. Yeah, I'm a born and born and raised Denver native Very excited. We were the 14th state to to lead live sports betting here and open up Fandall sports book And a lot of things like that. So very proud of my state legislatures and uh, very happy about that development Absolutely, very happy day. It's a good time to be Austin Swain. That's for sure Uh, man, and you just get this perfectly with like UFC and NASCAR coming back. Absolutely I might need to visit With proper social distancing being taken into account as well Let's make sure you follow Austin on twitter at aswame3 again to a NASCAR ufc and nba over at numberfire.com I am Jim Sonnis combined me on twitter at Jim Sonnis j i m s a n n e s You can also follow the fan dual podcast network at fan dual podcast big Thank you to Calvin Theobald our video producer for one of the videos side of things here today Thank you Cal as always and thank you to everyone for tuning in. Hopefully you can enjoy this ufc card because There are a lot more coming up. We'll have NASCAR podcasts next week pump for that It's gonna be a whole lot of fun. We'll talk to you then. This has been heat check fantasy podcast powered by numberfire