With an (interim) title fight headlining the card, UFC 265 looks to be one of the most exciting cards of the year. DFS lineups lock at 6 p.m. ET, so we have plenty of time to get dialed in before lock.
We have built out a full player-projection model using the FantasyLabs tools to help put together some winning DFS lineups in UFC. You can use our optimizer to build optimal lineups using these projections.
The model, created by our own Sean Koerner, is based on 10,000 simulations of all the fights. He then pulled the DraftKings score from each fight to create floor, median and ceiling projections for every fighter. Here is how he defined each projection:
- Floor: Fighter has an 80% chance of going over this score, 20% chance of going under
- Median: Fighter has a 50% chance of going over this score, 50% chance of going under
- Ceiling: Fighter has a 20% chance of going over this score, 80% chance of going under
These should give us a better sense as to which fighters we should target based upon the game type — maximizing ceiling in GPPs, for example.
You can check out the projections for every fighter on Saturday’s card below.
UFC DFS Model
The Easy Chalk
Ciryl Gane ($9,400)
Everything is pointing toward “Bon Gamin” in the main event. Our projections like him so much, his floor is higher than the median projection for 20 of the other 26 fighters. He also leads the pack in ceiling, median, and pts/sal by a long shot. Gane is the more well-rounded fighter, with a third of his wins coming by submission, a third by knockout, and a third by decision, compared to an 80% knockout rate for his opponent, Derrick Lewis.
Gane also brings a very high work rate to the bout, as he strikes and attempts takedowns at a rate well above most heavyweights (his striking attempts are above the average for the entire UFC, which is extraordinarily rare for heavyweights). This fight being scheduled for five rounds is another boost to Gane, who attempted more strikes per round in the championship rounds of his past two fights than in the first three rounds.
The only potential knock on Gane is his lack of explosive one-punch KO power, but that could actually be a benefit here if he’s able to rack up points as the fight continues.
While Lewis is certainly capable of ending the fight at any time, Gane’s measured style should serve him well as the fight wears on and allow him to have the gas left in the tank to turn it on when needed. I will be heavily exposed to Gane here, and I would advise you to do the same.
Alonzo Menifield ($9,200)
In contrast to Gane, Menifield brings all of the stopping power to his match-up with Ed Herman. With eight of his 10 professional wins coming in the first round (the other two ended in the first 40 seconds of the second round), Menifield is highly likely to pick up the 90-point bonus for a first-round stoppage. As a -240 favorite, he trails only Gane in median projection.
The matchup seems, at least on paper, to be a great one for Menifield, as his opponent is 40 years old and likely on the downside of his career.
The knock on Menfiield is his gas tank, as both opponents who survived the first 5:40 of bouts with him were victorious, but betting markets don’t think we need to worry too much about that this time, as he’s a -140 favorite to win inside the distance.
Call it a hunch, but I also think his team is likely to have worked with him on being more judicious with his output early, although I don’t think we’ll get a chance to see it this weekend.
The Upside Plays
Pedro Munhoz ($7,600)
Our models absolutely love Munhoz’s ceiling from a price-considered standpoint here.
At 91.2 points, you’d have to pay $900 more in salary to find anybody better. This is a hard fight to predict, with sportsbooks listing Munhoz as a very slight underdog, but I understand the upside case here.
Munhoz has an above-average knockdown rate while attempting over 60 strikes per round and went over 100 fantasy points in four of his last five wins. His opponent, Jose Aldo ($8,600), also appeared to be over the hill, at least until his last fight, having dropped three straight before beating Marlon Vera in January.
Essentially, if Munhoz wins here, he’ll end up with a must-have fantasy score. His salary is easily the best bargain on the slate when compared to implied odds of winning and makes it much easier to fit both Menifield and Gane in your lineups if that’s where you are starting your builds. While an Aldo victory certainly wouldn’t shock me here, I’ll be using a healthy dose of Munhoz in my lineups.
Johnny Munoz ($,9100)
Johnny Munoz is a heavy favorite (-300) in the opener on Saturday in a fight that’s a -165 favorite to end inside the distance.
Betting markets are expecting a finish here, and our models are giving him the second-highest ceiling projection on the card. Much of this is likely due to his absurd takedown rate, as he attempted 16 in his lone UFC fight, which could quickly add up on the fantasy scorecards.
While it’s a little scary paying up this high for a fighter who has yet to win a UFC bout, Munoz makes a lot of sense in lineups where he can fit if you think betting markets are on the right side of this one.
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The Contrarian Approach
Ode Osbourne ($7,200)
This fight should be explosive, with neither fighter having spent much time waiting to hear from the judges during their career (five times combined in 33 fights.)
As I outlined in my best bets feature, Osborne is larger and has a better UFC record, than Manel Kape ($9,000) but is significantly cheaper. His Ceiling projection of 72.9 doesn’t stand out on the whole, but at his price and expected ownership, he has one of the better chances of ending up in the optimal lineup by the end of the night.
Derrick Lewis ($6,800)
Given his popularity, I’m not entirely sure “The Black Beast” will totally qualify as a contrarian play here, but he’s the cheapest fighter on the card and a +260 underdog, so we’ll see.
I don’t have a ton to say here, as everyone reading this likely knows the case for Lewis. He’s not really more skilled than his opponent in any aspect of mixed martial arts, but that’s been the case for him numerous times in his career and he’s found a way to win, usually in devastating fashion anyway.
I fully expect Gane to be victorious here, but there’s no way 6 p.m. ET rolls around without me having a few Lewis lineups out there anyway.
The Swing Fights
Michael Chiesa ($7,700) vs Vicente Luque ($8,500)
This fight is a pick’em everywhere I look, and it’s hard to argue that the line is off. As the seventh- and eighth-ranked welterweights, both men are winners of four of their last five.
I don’t have a strong feeling about who I expect to win, but Chiesa represents the better DFS play here. Betting markets are generally more efficient than DraftKings’ salaries since they move, so when we see a gap this wide in a pick’em fight, the cheaper guy is clearly the better value.
I also expect ownership to side slightly with Luque, as 61% of Tapology predictions are coming in on him. Regardless, this gives us a bit more leverage with Chiesa on our roster.
The case for Luque centers around a higher ceiling.
With significantly better odds to win the fight before the final bell (+200, compared to +375 for Chiesa), our projections also give him an 18-point edge in the ceiling column. This becomes an exercise in conditional probability, as the odds of Luque making the optimal, given that he wins, is probably higher than Chiesa’s, while the odds of shipping first place by yourself, given that Chiesa is in the optimal (and your lineup) should be higher.
This is a long way to say that I’m going to be exposed to both guys, but I couldn’t fault you for any combination of either of them.
Casey Kenney ($8,200) vs Song Yadong ($8,000)
These fighters combine for the most attempted strikes of any fight on the card, with the exception of Penne vs. Kowalkiewicz, a fight that is almost twice as likely to go the distance. Kenny is roughly a -125 favorite, so this is a bit of an inverse of the Chiesa vs. Luque fight, as DraftKings pricing implies a closer fight than the betting markets.
Kenney, then, represents the better value here since we don’t see a lot of favorites priced this low. While the projections are higher on Kenney across the board, I do think Song has a better chance of getting to his ceiling. He attempts more strikes and has shown more power than Kenney, who is yet to land a knockdown in his UFC career.
I’m likely to have one of these guys in all — or very close to all — of my lineups as they could end up in the optimal without too big of a score given their price points.
I can even see a case for pairing them together in cash, as if they both keep up their usual outputs and the fight goes the distance as expected, the score from whoever loses won’t bury your lineup.
Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images.
Pictured: Ciryl Gane.
