The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s latest booking at the UFC Apex brings a decent slate of prelims to the table on Saturday in Las Vegas. The top few bouts at UFC on ESPN 53 were matched for entertainment, as they feature some reliably exciting veterans. “The Ultimate Fighter” Season 31 winner Kurt Holobaugh looks to bring the heat to Trey Ogden in the featured slot, while Ricardo Ramos takes on Julian Erosa and Miles Johns faces another recent reality series alum in Cody Gibson. From there, it offers usual smattering of Dana White’s Contender Series graduates hoping to find their footing on the UFC roster.
Lightweights
Trey Ogden (16-6, 1-2 UFC) vs. Kurt Holobaugh (20-7, 1-4 UFC)ODDS: Ogden (-155), Holobaugh (+130)
“The Ultimate Fighter” is quite long in the tooth at this point, but at least the most recent season provided a path for Holobaugh to return to the UFC. This marks Holobaugh’s third stint with the promotion, and he had been one of the better fighters to make it the Octagon without picking up a win. He was brought over in the Strikeforce sale and quickly cut in 2013, then ran into what wound up as a tough slate of competition against Raoni Barcelos, Shane Burgos and Thiago Moises upon his return in 2018. Outside of that, the Louisianian kept an active schedule on the regional scene and won a whole lot more than he lost, bringing plenty of violence along the way. Holobaugh just keeps forcing things until something happens, and in the case of “The Ultimate Fighter 31” final in August, that wound up as an armbar against Austin Hubbard that finally earned him his first UFC win. For his first post-reality series fight, Holobaugh takes on Ogden, a fellow crafty veteran but one with a much different style. While Holobaugh looks to press forward and overwhelm his opposition, Ogden is a much more practiced neutralizer. Tall and long for the division, Ogden is content to stay safe and take advantage of what his opponent presents; and while aggressive opponents can often take rounds from “Samurai Ghost,” Ogden is still capable of putting together a dominant performance through repeated opportunity, as he did in his last fight against Nikolas Motta. Holobaugh’s hard-charging style could cut either way, but given that “The Ultimate Fighter” winner can match Ogden in terms of size and also figures to be a talented enough grappler not to get neutralized on the mat, the bet is that Holobaugh can win some close rounds even if his counterpart makes sure the fight is not pretty. The pick is Holobaugh via decision.
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Ogden vs. Holobaugh
Ramos vs. Erosa
Johns vs. Gibson
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