Preview: UFC Fight Night 194 Prelims

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Heavyweights

NR | Alexander Romanov (14-0, 3-0 UFC) vs. NR | Jared Vanderaa (12-5, 1-1 UFC)

ODDS: Romanov (-485), Vanderaa (+385)

Romanov is one of the more fascinating additions to the UFC’s heavyweight roster in recent memory. Heading into his UFC debut a little over a year ago, a quick look at Romanov’s record gave the impression that he would wash out of the UFC quickly. He faced a weak level of competition in his native Moldova while sometimes competing above the heavyweight limit, and his wins mostly consisted of his quickly overwhelming opponents, sometimes with an array of unorthodox chokes. However, Romanov does seem to have some interesting talent. He is surprisingly agile for a man his size, as shown by his willingness to throw some ill-advised but flashy strikes, and he is actually a fairly adept wrestler and grappler with an impressive amount of cardio. After running through Roque Martinez and Marcos Rogerio de Lima to start his UFC career, “King Kong” finally did get that cardio tested against Juan Espino. After a back-and-forth grappling battle that tired both men, Romanov was clearly the more exhausted of the two before a low blow stopped the fight in the third round and gave him a technical decision victory. Romanov can still probably make this wrestling-heavy approach work against most of the division, but he will need to continue to work on his conditioning going forward to become a true contender. The Espino fight makes things interesting heading into this bout.

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Vanderaa lives up to his “Mountain” nickname as a massive man—a fact that accounts for much of what he brings to the table. Even through his contract-earning win over Harry Hunsucker on Dana White’s Contender Series, Vanderaa seemed to offer little except size, durability and a willingness to lean on his opponents until they became fatigued or overwhelmed. A debut loss to Sergey Spivak was not particularly promising, as the undersized Moldovan still outwrestled Vanderaa without much trouble. Still, Vanderaa managed to win a surprisingly striking-heavy performance against Justin Tafa his last time out. Romanov should be able to overwhelm Vanderaa early, but it becomes a matter of whether or not he can finish the fight before getting exhausted from trying to throw around such a large man. Thus far, Vanderaa has not fared well under that level of pressure against larger opponents. The pick is Romanov via first-round stoppage.

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