Featherweights
NR | Cub Swanson (27-12, 12-8 UFC) vs. NR | Darren Elkins (26-9, 16-8 UFC)ODDS: Swanson (-210), Elkins (+175)
Somehow, this fight between featherweight stalwarts has not happened yet. Rumors of Elkins’ demise have been greatly exaggerated, which has basically been the story of his career. After carving out a niche as a tough grinder, Elkins put together a six-fight winning streak from 2015 to 2018 that had him legitimately in title contention, highlighted by an all-time great comeback against Mirsad Bektic in early 2017. Elkins then suffered a one-sided beating at the hands of Alexander Volkanovski during the Aussie’s rise to the title, and the next few years saw some rough performances from “The Damage,” clearly losing fights and wearing every bit of his decade-plus career in the process. Elkins has rebounded with wins over Luiz Eduardo Garagorri and Darrick Minner to show that he is still capable of overwhelming opponents at a certain level, and he is actually the younger and less experienced fighter here. Swanson has followed a similar path to Elkins in the grand scheme of things, albeit as a battle-tested striker and not a hard-nosed wrestler. A few marches up the featherweight ladder fell just short of a title shot, and Swanson suffered his own four-fight losing streak from 2017 to 2019. However, Swanson did face some strong competition during that time and had plenty of impressive moments, so it was not a surprise when he rebounded with wins over Kron Gracie and Daniel Pineda to get back on track. Swanson’s most recent fight was a stunning loss. The surprise was not so much that he lost to Giga Chikadze but that the Kings MMA export won in just 63 seconds, becoming the first man to knock out Swanson since Jose Aldo memorably did so—in just eight seconds—back in 2009. Still, while Swanson can sometimes let his output wane if he is forced to focus on keeping a fight standing, he has been competing at a high enough level and looking fast enough that he should be able to pick apart Elkins when the Team Alpha Male rep tries to pressure. It is good to have this fight in the books, but the pick is a clear Swanson victory via third-round knockout.
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