Preview: UFC 250 ‘Nunes vs. Spencer’

Welterweights

Neil Magny (22-7) vs. Anthony Rocco Martin (17-5)

ODDS: Magny (-150), Martin (+130)

Fans should be glad to see Magny in the cage so soon, given that his last fight was coming off the most inactive stretch of his career. Magny was firmly on the cut line heading into his 2014 fight with Gasan Umalatov, but that was thankfully when everything clicked into place. A dominant decision win soon gave way to a seven-fight winning streak, which has turned Magny into a going concern at welterweight ever since. Save for a 2015 win over Kelvin Gastelum, Magny has never quite gotten over the hump towards true contender status, but he has served as a solid gatekeeper for everyone else. Dominant grapplers like Demian Maia and aggressive kickboxers like Santiago Ponzinibbio have managed to run through Magny, but his long reach and effective clinch game have been enough to frustrate or neutralize many of the shopworn veterans and rising prospects the UFC has sent his way. The typically prolific Magny missed all of 2019 after being suspended by the United States Anti-Doping Agency—he was subsequently cleared—but picked up right where he left off in March by turning back the surging Jingliang Li. Now, he heads back into the gatekeeper grind, and Martin represents the latest opponent to try and make Magny a signature win.

Signed as a raw lightweight prospect, Martin was thrown into the deep end early and showed enough talent to be immensely frustrating. He could take over fights early with a grinding wrestling game but would inevitably gas late and put himself in danger. After one too many losses, Martin eventually decided to ply his trade up at welterweight, and things have worked out quite well ever since. The change came just as Martin’s striking was starting to click, and he has mostly abandoned his grappling game in favor of a counter-heavy striking style. That can make Martin’s fights a bit tedious at times—he is more in the business of neutralizing opponents nowadays, save for his 2018 knockout of Ryan LaFlare—but he has continued to overachieve, dropping only one of his six welterweight bouts. That loss was to Maia in what served as Martin’s first real shot at a breakout win. He instead looks to get his most substantial victory here against Magny.

This could be a weird fight. Magny has been successful against a vast swath of the welterweight division, but it is difficult to point to one thing he does outstandingly well on paper. Despite his long frame, his striking is based more on ineffective volume than an ability to keep opponents at range, so the best part of his game is probably his clinch, even if he only uses it as an antidote for opponents who try to initiate against him first. However, anyone with an elite pressure game has absolutely blown that apart. Maia and Rafael dos Anjos took the action to the mat in short order and scored submission victories, while Ponzinibbio and Lorenz Larkin just kept a diverse striking attack in place and put Magny through the woodchipper; the Ponzinibbio fight served as a particularly extended beatdown. Martin probably has the skills to do the same or at least enough of an approximation to win, but he has not really shown the mentality in his recent fights, relying on his counterparts to initiate their offense before countering. This could be a bit of a staring contest, with Magny throwing out ineffective offense and Martin only periodically returning fire. In what essentially amounts to a coinflip confrontation, the pick is for Magny to ride his superior output to a split decision.

Continue Reading » O’Malley vs. Wineland