UFC Fight Night: Munhoz vs. Edgar is an unassuming card with the potential for high entertainment value. With plenty of fresh talent mixed in with several familiar veteran names, the event will introduce us to the next crop of UFC prospects and maybe even give us a glimpse of our future contenders. Sitting at the top of the event is the headlining fight featuring Pedro Munhoz taking on Frankie Edgar, who will be making his bantamweight debut. Let’s take a look at some facts and figures that could aid you in selecting your DraftKings fantasy MMA lineups.
DraftKings users can enter for their chance to win big prizes in Saturday’s fantasy MMA $400K Throwdown contest, which pays out a guaranteed $400,000, including $100K to first place. Set your DraftKings MMA lineups here: MMA $400K Throwdown [$100K to 1st].
DraftKings users can also get in on the UFC action by betting on DraftKings Sportsbook or by downloading the DK Sportsbook app.
Strikers
Pedro Munhoz ($9,000)
Pedro Munhoz is a volume striker with flashes of knockout power over his 23-fight resume. Fighting from the orthodox stance, he’s an aggressive pace-setter that averages 5.29 strikes per minute at a 42% accuracy rate, but sacrifices defense to land at that rate, absorbing 6.17 shots per minute. Against an aging Frankie Edgar ($7,200), who has lost a bit of his speed and is experiencing a decreasing work rate over the last several years, Munhoz should still have the edge in the standup. He’s also had a little over a year to shore up his weaknesses since losing to Aljamain Sterling last June where he was soundly outworked. Note: Munhoz is an outstanding grappler with nine submissions on his resume and a black belt in BJJ, placing him on our submission threats list, as well.
Mike Rodriguez ($8,900)
Mike Rodriguez is an active, wild southpaw with power and explosive capability. He lands 4.30 strikes per minute at a 52% accuracy rate while absorbing only 3.42 shots per minute. ”Slo Mike” counters well and puts together good combinations that have left eight opponents unable to see the end of the fight, albeit that is over lower level regional competition. His biggest win is over Adam Milstead, so he will definitely be put to the test against Marcin Prachnio ($7,300) who has faced excellent competition while fighting under the ONE Championship banner.
Daniel Rodriguez ($8,700)
Editor’s note: Takashi Sato has been taken off Saturday’s UFC Fight Night card. Daniel Rodriguez will now face Dwight Grant.
Daniel Rodriguez is a powerful volume striker averaging 8.60 strikes per minute at an accuracy rate of 48% while absorbing 6.81 shots per minute. His work rate in his last fight against Gabe Green was outstanding, seeing him land 175 of 345 total strikes—all of them significant. He has great timing and the stamina to look as fresh at the end of a fight as he did at the beginning. Rodriguez possesses legitimate power with 10 of his 12 wins coming via knockout, which also makes him a candidate for the knockout kings list. The ridiculous pace he sets could prove to be the key against Takashi Sato ($7,500) who is willing to stand and trade, often absorbing more than he throws.
Mizuki Inoue ($8,600)
Mizuki Inoue is an orthodox volume striker with excellent boxing, averaging 6.20 strikes per minute with an accuracy rate of 45%. She does sacrifice defense, as so many do when that active, absorbing 8.20 shots per minute. Her opponent, Amanda Lemos ($7,600), would appear to be a volume striker as well, but a closer look at her record shows that her inflated stats are over a four-minute time frame where she landed 8 of 12 significant strikes. When Lemos faced Leslie Smith, she was soundly outworked over the nearly eight minutes they fought. Both women are defensively porous, but Inoue is the better, more active striker here. Note: Inoue holds nine submission wins, making her a candidate for our submission threats list.
Knockout Kings
Alonzo Menifield ($8,300)
Alonzo Menifield is a vaunted striker with eight of his nine wins coming via knockout. He lands 3.75 strikes per minute at a 47% accuracy rate while absorbing the same exact same amount. Alonzo is an orthodox fighter with a stiff jab and good takedown defense against lesser competition. He has clear cardio issues, though, and this was made clear in his last fight with Devin Clark where he lost a unanimous decision. He was doing great in the first round, then ended up gassed by round two. It was his first fight to go longer than the 5:32 mark. This also places him in the gas guzzler category where his opponent, Ovince Saint Preux ($7,900) also resides.
Takashi Sato ($7,500)
Editor’s note: Takashi Sato has been taken off Saturday’s UFC Fight Night card. Daniel Rodriguez will now face Dwight Grant.
Takashi Sato is a polished striker with 11 of his 15 wins coming by way of knockout. He’s faced better competition than his opponent, Daniel Rodriguez ($8,700), and has a much more composed style. Takashi puts together great combinations, is wickedly fast and accurate and has very good footwork. He has the stick-and-move game down to a science, but Rodriguez is a great counter puncher, so he’ll have to really watch out for Daniel’s big left. This bout is my pick for fight of the night and should provide plenty of excitement for action-hungry fans.
Dwight Grant ($8,800)
Editor’s note: Calen Born has been taken off Saturday’s UFC Fight Night card. Dwight Grant will now face Daniel Rodriguez.
Dwight Grant is a heavy-handed striker who takes way too much time getting a feel for his opponent. There’s being patient and then there’s Dwight Grant. Fortunately, he has big bombs that turn the lights off in the power plant—seven times out of ten wins, to be exact. If numbers are your jam, try these on for size: Between Zach Ottow (split-decision loss) and Alan Jouban (split-decision win), he only landed 63 significant strikes in six rounds. Six rounds! If there were a category for “prone to inactivity,” he would be a shoe-in. Against late replacement newcomer Calen Born ($7,000), he’ll probably be a little more willing to throw down. Let’s hope.
Marcin Prachnio ($7,300)
Marcin Prachnio is a former ONE Championship fighter who sports 10 knockouts from his 13 wins. The Polish slugger isn’t a big volume striker but makes up for that with power and explosion. When he arrived in the UFC, he was stopped in back-to-back losses against Sam Alvey, then Magomed Ankalaev, both in the first round. There’s no shame in either of those losses as Alvey is known to pack a serious heater and Ankalaev is a rising star with lethal head kicks, one of which Prachnio endured to his detriment. Mike Rodriguez ($8,900) is a well-matched contest for Prachnio and it will see him either rise to the occasion or melt under the heat.
Ike Villanueva ($8,200)
Ike Villanueva is a quick, heavy-handed power striker that once fought at middleweight. These days, he’s slugging it out at light heavyweight, holding 13 knockouts of his 16 wins. He won the Fury FC belt by stopping Roger Narvaez (formerly of the UFC) and then defended it against Rashad Coulter (also of UFC notoriety). Ike faces Jordan Wright ($7,900), also a big power striker, but against subpar competition (his first seven opponents had a combined record of 0-31). Villanueva will hold the edge in nearly every department that counts—speed, precision, countering, experience—so it will likely be a long night for the debuting Wright.
Carlton Minus ($8,500)
Carlton Minus comes in with a very respectable 10-1 record, with six of his ten wins coming by way of knockout. Minus has a very active jab and he throws it with some serious pop behind it. “Clutch” has capable countering to go along with his aggressive style, and he fights well from range and in the clinch. His opponent, Matthew Semelsberger ($7,700), is a wild striker who’s more than willing to throw caution to the wind to stand and bang in the phone booth. This could prove to be a costly mistake against the more technically sound boxing of Minus.
Daniel Rodriguez ($8,700; also on the strikers list)
Submission Threats
Ovince Saint Preux ($7,900)
Ovince Saint Preux is a powerful striker with a very good submission game. He’s made the Von Flue choke his own personal weapon of choice in the octagon, prompting many to rename it the Von Preux choke. “OSP” is a multi-dimensional fighter who has legitimate power, with 11 of his 24 wins coming via knockout in addition to another eight of them being submissions, so he holds the distinction of being in the knockout kings category, as well. While not smothering opponents with volume (2.60 strikes per minute at a 46% accuracy rate), he is a very capable wrestler and manages 1.27 takedowns per fight and defends them at a 65% rate. As Ovince has gotten older, especially with the wear-and-tear of his immense fight schedule, his cardio has suffered, and we’ve seen him huffing and puffing in his contests lately. This makes him a stamina risk and puts him in yet another category, the dreaded gas guzzlers, where his opponent, Alonzo Menifield ($8,300) also resides.
Joe Solecki ($8,400)
Joe Solecki is an excellent grappler with a solid wrestling acumen and outstanding jiu-jitsu. He transitions fluidly to advantageous positions and has a very heavy top game. He’s great in scrambles and holds six submission wins. Austin Hubbard ($7,800) does have better striking, but he’ll need to really pressure Solecki or get a knockout to be effective in this contest. Solecki has a bit of an inflated striking stat number thanks to his lopsided victory over Matt Wiman where he landed 56 significant strikes to Wiman’s 10. But the takedowns—four of them—were what told the tale, and the smooth passes were just icing on the cake. This is really his fight to lose.
Mariya Agapova ($9,300)
Mariya Agapova is a well-rounded star on the rise. With four submissions of her nine wins, the American Top Team product wowed fans with a nasty rear-naked choke of Hannah Cifers this past June, taking just half a round to get the job done. Her opponent, Shana Dobson ($6,800), looked to have some promise after notching a win over Ariel Beck at the TUF Season 26 finale, but since then, she’s racked up three straight losses, and just looks like she’s lost any momentum she was able to achieve after that 2017 win. Agapova is an aggressive striker and grappler, even if her defense isn’t quite rounded out yet. She is only 23 years old, so there’s plenty of time to gain experience and skill.
Mizuki Inoue ($8,600; also on the strikers list)
Pedro Munhoz ($9,000; also on the strikers list)
Gas Guzzlers
Amanda Lemos ($7,600)
Amanda Lemos is a solid athlete with power and the ability to snag a submission if she needs to. She has five knockouts and two submissions, meaning she’s finished all her opponents except the one that beat her, Leslie Smith. It was in that fight we saw her stamina take a nosedive shortly before she was finished in the second round. Against a durable volume striker like Mizuki Inoue ($8,600), who also has excellent grappling, Lemos could find herself gassed out pretty early on in the fight.
Alonzo Menifield ($8,300; also a knockout king)
Ovince Saint Preux ($7,900; also a submission threat and knockout king)
Set your DraftKings MMA lineups here: MMA $400K Throwdown [$100K to 1st].
Place your UFC bets here: DraftKings Sportsbook UFC page or by downloading the DK Sportsbook app.
Put your knowledge to the test. Sign up for DraftKings and experience the game inside the game.
For sports betting, head over to DraftKings Sportsbook or download the DK Sportsbook app.
Curious about when major leagues and events will return? Check out our DraftKings Sports Calendar for the latest updates.
I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is crooklyn949) 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 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.
If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, crisis counseling and referral services can be accessed by calling 1-800-GAMBLER (1-800-426-2537) (IL). Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER (NJ/WV/PA), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (NH/CO) or 1-800-BETS OFF (IA). 21+ (18+ NH). NJ/PA/WV/IN/NH/IA/CO/IL only. Eligibility restrictions apply. See draftkings.com/sportsbook for full terms and conditions.