With a pair of cancelled fights, the UFC’s 100th trip to the Apex is down to just a 12-fight card. Massive value has also opened up with an $8,000 fighter getting a new opponent and now going off as a -800 favorite.
That means the story of the slate will be staying unique with your lineups in the other five spots — or choosing to fade the clear value.
The event starts at 4:00 p.m. EST on ESPN+.
We have built out a full player-projection model using the FantasyLabs Tools and Player Models 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 bout 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 of which fighters we should target based on the game type – maximizing ceiling in GPPs, for example. We’ve also added ownership projections by yours truly to help find leverage spots for GPPs.
You can check out the projections for every fighter on Saturday’s card in our UFC Models.
Main Event
Carlos Prates ($9,600) vs. Neil Magny ($6,600)
When the UFC has a burgeoning welterweight star, they get booked against Neil Magny. This will be the fourth straight fight for Magny against a much younger opponent, with Magny going off as at least a +300 underdog each time.
It doesn’t always go according to plan, as the 33-fight UFC veteran is 1-3 in those bouts. However, he got starched in the first round the last time around and is making a relatively quick turnaround after getting TKO’d in late August.
Which makes this a tailor-made matchup for Prates. The Fighting Nerds product is an aggressive striker with knockouts in all three UFC victories and hasn’t seen a third round since 2019.
While the +550 moneyline price on Magny feels a bit disrespectful, it’s also hard to play him for DFS, even in cash games. That’s because Magny’s biggest edge is in cardio, but the likeliest Prates win comes in the first round or two.
This makes both fighters fairly boom-or-bust, as Prates either gets an early win or no win at all, while Magny provides little floor. I’d rather not stack this one for cash games (and we have some massive value elsewhere), but I’ll have a tiny sprinkle of Magny in my GPP portfolio.
The Easy Chalk
Mansur Abdul-Malik ($9,300)
Mansur Abdul-Malik was one of the more impressive prospects to come out of this season of the Contender Series, picking up a second-round ground and pound victory over a more experienced opponent in Wes Schultz.
His UFC debut doesn’t appear to be any tougher, as he draws Dusko Todorovic ($6,900) on Saturday. Todorovic is 3-4 in the UFC but has three wins came against opponents with a combined 3-14 UFC record. Todorovic has been stopped in three of four losses and hasn’t fought in more than 18 months due to multiple torn ACLs.
That’s a problem against Abdul-Malik, an extremely athletic former D-1 college wrestler. Todorovic might have a more well-rounded skill set, but it won’t matter if Abdul-Malik overwhelms him with speed and power.
His wrestling background gives him plenty of takedown upside to go with his -225 stoppage odds, so it’s hard to go wrong here. He’ll be a staple in my lineups of all kinds.
The Upside Play
Bernado Sopaj ($9,000)
The fight between Sopaj and Ricky Turcios has been elevated to main event status for UFC Vegas 100 despite the lack of Octagon experience for both men. They’re a combined 2-3 in the UFC, with Sopaj dropping his short-notice debut in March.
Turcios is 2-2 with a pair of split decision wins, making him a solid fighter to build a name from. He’s a well-rounded volume fighter with a BJJ black belt and a ton of activity on the feet. However, he doesn’t have any truly elite abilities, while Sopaj is considerably more powerful and explosive.
Sopaj looked great early in his debut, picking up three takedowns and landing heavy strikes in the first half of his fight. Then he ran out of gas, and was badly beaten up and finished in the third round. The hope here is that his cardio is better with a full camp, but that’s not necessarily a given.
That’s what makes him an upside play rather than a comfortable spend-up option. We could see a repeat of his debut — or he could get Turcios out of there early. For more on how I see this one going, check out my betting preview of the fight. For DFS purposes, I’ll have a ton of Sopaj in GPPs, but he’s too risky for cash games.
The Value Play
Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos ($8,000)
I considered bumping up Zaleski to the “easy chalk” section of this piece, as he’ll be the most owned fighter on the slate by a massive margin. That’s because his original opponent, Nicolas Dalby, backed out after DFS salaries were released, leaving Zaelski as high as -850 on the moneyline against replacement opponent Zach Scroggin ($6,700).
Zaleski has been in the UFC for nearly a decade and turns 38 a few days after the fight. However, he hasn’t seem to have hit an age cliff yet — though it could happen at any time. Scroggin is 7-0 in regional competition (and 7-0 as an amateur) but hasn’t faced much high-level opposition.
The smart play is to trust the market and load up on Zaleski, but I’ll have some exposure to Scroggin as well. Any win obviously gets him to the optimal lineup at his price tag, while rostering him creates massive leverage on a smaller slate. Either way, one (or even both) of these fighters should be in every lineup you build.
Cody Stamann ($7,300) fits the more traditional value profile this week as well. He’s seen some light line movement his way, and his fight is the likeliest on the card to go to a judge’s decision. If you’re looking to save salary at two spots in cash games, he’s a solid option.
The Contrarian Choice
Renier de Ridder ($9,100)
Former two-division ONE FC champion Renier de Ridder is making the jump to the UFC this weekend and comes in as a solid favorite over Gerald Meerschaert III ($7,100). It’s an interesting first matchup for Ridder, who shares some stylistic similarities with GM3 but has massive edges in athleticism.
“The Dutch Knight” has black belts in both Judo and BJJ and was a regional high school wrestling champion in his native Netherlands. GM3 has all but one of his 12 UFC wins via submission and is a fellow BJJ black belt but lacks the ability to dictate where this fight takes place.
Neither man is what I’d classify as a good striker, but Ridder has the power and speed to dominate that realm should he choose to keep it standing. He also has the wrestling and Judo to rack up takedowns should he go that route. Both give him plenty of upside.
He’s likely to be the odd man out among the $9,000 (male) fighters on the card from an ownership standpoint, but his upside is just as high as anyone. That makes him an interesting play if you can find the salary to get there.
On the salary-saving side, I like both Antonio Trocoli ($7,600) and Klaudia Sygula ($7,400) at their respective prices. I have both as likelier to win than their odds imply, and I will mix and match them into lineups to allow me to roster more 9K fighters.
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The Swing Fight
Charles Radtke ($8,500) vs. Matthew Semelsberger ($7,700)
The UFC Vegas 100 undercard has a fun fight between two power punchers, Matthew Semelsberger and Charles “Chucky Buffalo” Radtke. Neither fighter is likely to ever crack the UFC Rankings, but both are known for putting on a show.
Radtke was knocked out by main event fighter Carlos Prates in his last fight but picked up a knockout win over Gilbert Urbina before that. Semelsberger has landed knockdowns in seven of his 10 UFC appearances.
This could just be a matter of who lands first, as both men have the power to end things quickly and somewhat questionable durability. Both have a bit of grappling upside, though I don’t expect either to use it.
Given the relatively close nature of this fight, I prefer to save the salary for Semelsberger, but I’ll try to find the flexibility to get up to Radtke in some lineups as well.
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