Women's Strawweights
Amanda Lemos (13-3-1) vs. Mackenzie Dern (13-4)
Odds: Lemos (-130), Dern (+110)
What to make of Dern? Dern came to the UFC in 2018 as a particularly hyped prospect, and rightfully so; essentially trained to grapple since birth, Dern had a decorated resume in that realm before transitioning to mixed martial arts and twisting her opponents into knots. Her first few years on the UFC roster were an exercise in frustration, though. Dern showed a baseline toughness and horsepower that only added to her potential as a prospect, but her spotty wrestling and willingness to meander through fights led to her underachieving in most of her fights. Still, Dern was talented enough that an opportunity for a submission victory would usually present itself at some point during her fights, at least until she started regularly getting main events and fights against the top ten; at that point, Dern would show flashes against the likes of Marina Rodriguez and Xiaonan Yan, but mostly show a lack of urgency while coasting to a disheartening decision loss. That made her dominant victory over Angela Hill in May such an unexpected potential breakthrough; there was even more worry about Dern's mindset than usual thanks to some personal strife, but those issues seemed to motivate her into the most focused and aggressive form of her career, resulting in a five-round beating that suggested Dern might finally be realizing her potential as a contender. But her next fight, a November loss to Jessica Andrade, was on the shortlist of most deflating performances in recent memory; Dern apparently completely changed her camp leading into the fight into Andrade, which in turn apparently undid all of her newfound gains, leaving her to lose a slugfest with Andrade that only raised more questions about her career going forward. Seemingly all of Dern's fights nowadays feel like where the rubber needs to hit the road, and this is another one, since this next fight against Amanda Lemos is both dangerous and winnable.
Lemos is coming off her own deflating performance, as she got little done in a title fight against Weili Zhang last August, but it's an impressive achievement that "Amandinha" got to that point given where her UFC career started. Lemos was a career bantamweight that got signed as a late replacement back in 2017, showing little in a loss to Leslie Smith before failing a drug test and vanishing for the next two and a half years. Lemos's eventual return fight didn't garner much notice heading in, but then she ran through Miranda Granger while looking like a completely different fighter; Lemos was suddenly an absolute powerhouse in her new weight class, overwhelming Granger in close quarters and choking her unconscious. Lemos continued to prove herself as an impressive physical force in her next few fights, including scoring some particularly brutal knockouts for a strawweight, though her approach does seem contingent on big individual moments; her 2022 win over Rodriguez, which clinched her title shot, is a particularly instructive example, as Lemos got little done in a slow-paced kickboxing match until she landed the right shot and blew the fight wide open for a third-round finish. But against Zhang, who quickly got to business with her wrestling game and rarely gave Lemos room to breathe, those opportunities simply didn't come. Given Dern's most recent performance, Lemos should be able to get the fight that she wants, though the shame of it is that a win is right there on the table for Dern; even if she can't fully get a wrestling game going, Dern could fill a lot of space and win rounds just by staying aggressive and throwing out volume, particularly since she has both the strength and durability to make that effective. Given how inconsistent Dern's career has been, there's a decent chance that she simply snaps back into her best form and gets everyone's hopes up once again; but given how hard she is to trust, the pick is Lemos via decision.
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Lemos vs. Dern
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