Alright, I wanna get this at least started because the final ppv for the UFC in 2021 is pretty stacked. 2 Major title fights plus a bunch of name value even through the pre-lims. UFC 269 Oliveira vs Poirier and Nunes vs Pena.
Oliveira won Khabib's vacant belt in a great fight with Michael Chandler. He's got the longest journey to a belt in UFC history (28 fights) with a style that is like Tony Ferguson but with more sanity and less reckless abandon. We're talking pace, volume, and lengthy striking with elite grappling skills that mean fighters can't just shoot across gaps and clinch to close space.
Poirier...do I gotta explain? He would have fought Chandler for that vacant title if not for making bank on a Conor rematch. He's treated like the uncrowned king by many and has earned that status by beating a lot of the best at LW and having a similarly long journey to a title shot. He's the inverse of Oliveira. An elite striker with power striking and underrated grappling that he only really utilizes when absolutely needed.
Both guys can fight you anywhere, both are tough, both have STACKED resumes of opponents. This is close to a guarantee of a great fight.
Nunes vs Pena is a tougher sell. Pena won TUF a long time ago and had a lot of hype, but she suffered a bad knee injury and then took a second extended break for pregnancy. She was an elite wrestler, tough as nails, with limited but decent striking that could get her inside to force grappling. Pace and pressure are her gifts. But everything has slipped a bit since the knee injury and she was already a fairly flawed fighter. Nunes needs no intro, she's the GOAT female fighter and has KO'ed the other women in the discussion besides Joanna and Rose who are too small to fight her. Nunes' biggest weaknesses have historically been cardio and pressure, so Pena does have a template to win...but Nunes hasn't gassed in a long time, has refined her entire game, and seems more likely to keep the fight standing and get a KO/TKO.
But the entire card is stacked and there's a lot to be hype about. Let's start wit some embeddeds and the Countdown. I'll try and get to listing some other hype names and fights in the next couple of days along with predictions.
Here's some of the build-up, in link form.
Here's the card:
Charles Oliveira (c) vs. Dustin Poirier
Amanda Nunes (c) vs. Julianna Peña
Geoff Neal vs. Santiago Ponzinibbio
Kai Kara-France vs. Cody Garbrandt
Raulian Paiva vs. Sean O'Malley
prelims:
Josh Emmett vs. Dan Ige
Dominick Cruz vs. Pedro Munhoz Augusto Sakai vs.
Tai Tuivasa Jordan Wright vs. Bruno Silva
early prelims:
André Muniz vs. Eryk Anders
Erin Blanchfield vs.
Miranda Maverick Alex Perez vs.
Matt Schnell Ryan Hall vs. Darrick Minner
Randy Costa vs.Tony Kelley
Gillian Robertson vs. Priscila Cachoeira
I've bolded some names worth knowing from the prelims too. Some you'll almost definitely be familiar with, others are worth looking into because they're entertaining, promising prospects, or something along those lines that I can hopefully get into later.
Anyway, gimme your predictions fam...Poirier or Oliveira? FotN? Prospect of the night? What you guys looking for?