John Brannigan/Sherdog illustration
Heavyweights
Blagoy Ivanov (18-3) vs. Augusto Sakai (14-1-1)Now that he has a few UFC bouts under his belt, Ivanov is a dark horse to make a run in the heavyweight division. The Bulgarian basically proved everything he could outside of the UFC, first with a strong run in Bellator MMA and then with a reign as heavyweight champion for the World Series of Fighting. However, there was some question as to how that all would translate into the UFC, and to its credit, the promotion wasted no time finding out, slotting “Baga” opposite Junior dos Santos in his Octagon debut. Ivanov did not do much besides prove his toughness—which was already known, given that this is a man who survived getting stabbed in the heart—but looked good in his three subsequent appearances in 2019. Against Ben Rothwell and Tai Tuivasa, Ivanov proved to be increasingly comfortable with a strong counterstriking game, and he always has his sambo background on which to fall back. Ivanov’s last fight resulted in a close loss to Derrick Lewis, who unfairly showed up in shape and as somewhat of a normal fighter. Even so, there is enough here to like Ivanov’s future, particularly since he is relatively young for the division at 33 years old.
Brazil’s Sakai finds himself in a similar position, lurking on the fringes of heavyweight relevance, even if he has followed much more of a typical prospect path. Just 29 years of age, Sakai stalled out a bit in Bellator thanks to the efforts of Cheick Kongo but quickly landed on his feet with the UFC, earning a contract on the lone Brazilian season of Dana White’s Contender Series. Sakai is surprisingly nimble for a man of his size and physique, but he still went under the radar in his first few UFC bouts, using his high-volume, low-power striking style to take some fine if not overly impressive wins over Chase Sherman and Andrei Arlovski. In September, Sakai finished Marcin Tybura in under a minute, raising some hope that something may have clicked and he had turned some sort of corner.
Given that neither man is a particularly huge hitter for heavyweight and both are quite durable, there should not be much tension in this one, even if it is a well-made bout. Sakai is the fleeter fighter and should be able to throw more volume, but again, Ivanov has grown more and more comfortable throwing some hard counters and combinations in response to his opponents; plus, the Bulgarian has the grappling advantage in his back pocket. This feels like a split decision in the making, with Ivanov hitting the harder strikes but Sakai landing more. Flip a coin. The pick is Ivanov via decision.
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