2024 is in the books, and it was a very successful year for the UFC. This year, four new champions were crowned in the promotion. A bettor on DraftKings Sportsbook turned $10.08 into $20,468.89 with a nine-leg parlay containing only UFC future bets. Below, I detail how this bettor cashed this unbelievable UFC parlay.
It all started at UFC 297 in Toronto, Canada in Janaury 2024. Dricus Du Plessis beat Sean Stickland to begin the year and became the new UFC Middleweight Champion. In February, Ilia Topuria defeated former 145-pound king Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 298 to become the new UFC Featherweight Champion.
On September 14, Merab Dvalishvili beat Sean O’Malley to become the Bantamweight Champion. Former Flyweight Champion Valentina Shevchenko beat Alexa Grasso in the co-main event of Noche UFC to become a two-time champion. Shevchenko was the biggest underdog bet in this parlay, as she was +350 to become a champion once again.
At the beginning of each year, you can bet on who will be the UFC Champion by the end of the calendar year. However, the tricky part is that each fighter’s path to retaining a title or winning a championship differs.
Jon Jones started and ended 2024 as UFC Heavyweight Champion after beating Stipe Miocic at UFC 309 in Madison Square Garden. Islam Makhachev defended his championship against Dustin Poirer at UFC 302 in Newark, New Jersey, on June 1. Makhachev was the biggest favorite in this parlay at -300 to finish 2024 as champion. Both of these champions only defended their titles once in 2024.
Zhang Weili beat Yan Ziaonan at UFC 300 in the co-main event to retain her title. Weili was -125 to close the year as Women’s Strawweight champion. The champion with the most title wins was Alex Periera. He didn’t just defend his title three times against Jamahal Hill at UFC 300, Jiri Prochazka at UFC 303, and Khalil Rountree at UFC 307; he knocked all of them out. Shockingly, Periera was +200 to be UFC champion entering 2025.
A nine-leg parlay is tough no matter the sport, but to do it with UFC future bets is a different level of difficulty. That is because this single bet lasted the entire 12 months in 2024.
This parlay came down to UFC Flyweight Champion Alexandre Pantoja at UFC 310, the last PPV of the year. He successfully defended his flyweight title twice this year. He beat Steve Erceg by unanimous decision at UFC 301 and submitted UFC debutant Kai Asakura at UFC 310.
This bettor picked five favorites (Pantoja, Dvalishvili, Shevchenko, Weili, and Makhachev) to be UFC Champions by the end of 2024. But the other four fighters were not projected to hold gold entering the new year. Jones had the third-best odds behind
Sergei Pavlovich & Jailton Almeida. That is interesting because Pavlovich ended 2023 with a loss. Almeida went 1-1 in 2024.
Topuria had the second best odds to end the year as champion only behind Volkanovski. El Matador snapped Volk’s six-fight win streak in UFC batamweight title fights. Du Plessis had the fourth highest odds in the middleweight divison to finish 2024 with gold. Khamzat Chimaev, Israel Adesanya, and Bo Nickal all were ahead of Du Plessis. In the light heavyweight division, Jiri Prochazka and Magomed Ankalaev both were ahead of Pereira.
All odds provided by DraftKings Sportsbook, lines and odds subject to change.
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I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is ryanwohl) and may sometimes play on my personal account in the games that I offer advice on. Although I have expressed my personal view on the games and strategies above, they do not necessarily reflect the view(s) of DraftKings and do not constitute a representation that any particular strategy will guarantee success. All customers should use their own skill and judgment in building lineups. I may also deploy different players and strategies than what I recommend above. I am not an employee of DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information.
