T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas will host UFC 303 on Saturday night. The headliner was supposed to feature Conor McGregor, the one-time UFC Lightweight and Featherweight Champion, along with Michael Chandler, the former three-time Bellator Lightweight World Champion.
An injury to McGregor forced the postponement of that main event, but the top of the card will still bring plenty of intrigue as Alex Pereira will defend his UFC Light Heavyweight belt against former champion Jiri Prochazka.
Jiri Prochazka formerly held UFC’s light heavyweight crown – as well as the first Rizin Light Heavyweight belt. This is a rematch of the duo’s tilt at UFC 295 in November, when Pereira took the vacant title after knocking Prochazka out in the second round.
Read on to get the full fight card and our sports betting predictions on the top two tilts.
UFC 303 Betting Pereira vs Prochazka 2 Odds & Preview | MMA Odds
Alex Pereira -155 vs Jiri Prochazka +130
Pereira (10-2, 7-1) vs Prochazka (30-4-1, 4-1) shows just how confident Pereira is, as he has signed off on a title defense at the last moment to save a major card – for the second time in 2024.
He built his kickboxing reputation before coming into MMA, which meant that he already had a rivalry going with Israel Adesanya before he joined UFC. When they met for a title fight in UFC, Adesanya was ahead on the cards, but Pereira delivered a knockout for the win in the last round.
Adesanya did get revenge in a rematch six months later, and Pereira moved up to 205 pounds. His grappling and wrestling were decent enough to help him survive as a light heavyweight, but his striking prowess remained his greatest strength.
In 2024, his knockout of Jamahal Hill at UFC 300 took just over three minutes, so he has plenty in the tank for a rematch that was set for August but will now take place this weekend.
Prochazka appeared to be the successor to Jon Jones in the UFC’s light heavyweight division after debuting in 2020 as an athletic knockout artist. He uses his size, vision, and athleticism to deliver punishment while evading as much damage as possible, without focusing much on a defensive strategy.
Jiri first three UFC fights were all victories – a knockout of Volkan Özdemir, a finish of Dominick Reyes, and a war against Glover Teixeira for the title.
He was training for a second bout with Teixeira but suffered a major shoulder injury that led to his vacating the title. When he met Pereira for the vacant belt, Pereira delivered the knockout after using leg kicks to soften him up.
His last fight came at UFC 300 against Aleksandar Rakic, who used the same strategy of leg kicks to get ahead before Prochazka came back to get the finish. Since Prochazka hasn’t changed his strategy yet, it’s hard to expect a different outcome this time around.
UFC 303 Betting Pick: Pereira wins via knockout
Brian Ortega +114 vs Diego Lopes -135
Ortega (16-3, 8-3) vs Lopes (24-6, 3-1) is another fight that came together at the last moment. Lopes waited for years to get his chance in UFC and then finally got his debut against Movsar Evloev.
Lopes made the most of a difficult opponent, making an impression despite losing on the cards. Lopes uses an aggressive style, and he kept trying to submit Evloev.
Even though it didn’t work, his tenacity drew respect. Since then, he has finished Gavin Tucker, Pat Sabatini and Sodiq Yusuff, giving him the skins on the wall to merit a rise in competition when he takes on Ortega.
Ortega is one of UFC’s best grapplers, and one of his tricks involves using a submission to cement a comeback from being way down on the cards. Interestingly, in his first six wins before his 2018 title shot, he didn’t win a single round in the minds of the judges.
That title fight came against Max Holloway, who kept the fight upright and just wore Ortega down. Since then, injuries and inconsistency have plagued him. He did beat the Korean Zombie two years later, but his game had changed significantly, moving grom a grappling-heavy approach to a striking game that showed promise.
He got another title shot, against Alexander Volkanovski, and he almost delivered a guillotine choke for the win…but fell short. Furthermore, he lost his next fight, against Yair Rodriguez, and got injured in the process, going onto the shelf for two years.
When he finally returned, he rolled an ankle in warmups before almost getting knocked out in the early minutes of the fight. Incredibly, he fought back to win via submission in the third round.
Expect Lopes to swarm Ortega early, but also expect Ortega to respond. You won’t finish Ortega unless he gets injured or you whale on him for 20 minutes. Since Lopes’ offense involves grappling, I like Ortega here.
UFC 303 Betting Pick: Ortega wins via submission.
Main Card at Pay Per View
- Alex Pereira vs Jiri Prochazka (UFC Light Heavyweight Championship)
- Brian Ortega vs Diego Lopes (Featherweight)
- Anthony Smith vs Roman Dolidze (Light Heavyweight)
- Mayra Bueno Silva vs Macy Chiasson (Women’s Bantamweight)
- Ian Machado Garry vs Michael Page (Welterweight)
Preliminary Card at ESPN / ESPN+
- Joe Pyfer vs Marc-Andre Barriault (Middleweight)
- Cub Swanson vs Andre Fili (Featherweight)
- Charles Jourdain vs Jean Silva (Featherweight)
- Payton Talbott vs Yanis Ghemmouri (Bantamweight)
Early Preliminary Card at ESPN+ / UFC Fight Pass
- Michelle Waterson-Gomez vs Gillian Robertson (Women’s Strawweight)
- Andrei Arlovski vs Martin BUday (Heavyweight)
- Rei Tsuruya vs Carlos Hernandez (Flyweight)
- Ricky Simon vs Vinicius Oliveira (Bantamweight)
Ready for his moment ⚔️#UFC303 | @Jiri_BJP pic.twitter.com/B0cHJyv8Ca
— UFC (@ufc) June 27, 2024
UFC Betting Odds For Today
Xbet Betting Lines for the UFC
UFC 303 Betting Pereira vs Prochazka 2
Love betting MMA? | Xbet Sportsbook offers up to date MMA Lines
