UFC Fight Night 163 will get underway on November 9 from Moscow’s CSKA Arena. The main event was supposed to feature Junior dos Santos and Alexander Volkov in a heavyweight bout, but dos Santos had to pull out due to a bacterial infection in his leg. Former NFL player Greg Hardy has taken his spot, but that bout is not the co-main event. Volkov is a former Bellator Heavyweight Champion, so Hardy will have his hands full. The new main event is a featherweight tilt between Zabit Magomedsharipov and Calvin Kattar. You can catch all the action on ESPN+. We have your full fight card as well as UFC betting thoughts on some of the key fights.
UFC Fight Night 163 Odds, Preview & Picks
- When: Saturday, Nov. 9 at 11:00 am PDT
- Where: CSKA Arena, Moscow, Russia
- TV: ESPN+
- Live Stream: UFC Fight Pass
Main Card (ESPN+)
- Zabit Magomedsharipov vs Calvin Kattar (Featherweight)
- Alexander Volkov vs Greg Hardy (Heavyweight)
- Zelim Imadaev vs Danny Roberts (Welterweight)
- Khadis Ibragimov vs Ed Herman (Light Heavyweight)
- Ramazan Emeev vs Anthony Rocco Martin (Welterweight)
- Shamil Gamzatov vs Klidson Abreu (Light Heavyweight)
Preliminary Card (ESPN+)
- Magomed Ankalaev vs Dalcha Lungiambula (Light Heavyweight)
- Rustam Khabilov vs Sergey Khandozhko (Welterweight)
- Roman Kopylov vs Karl Roberson (Middleweight)
- Abubakar Nurmagomedov vs David Zawada (Welterweight)
- Alexander Yakovlev vs Roosevelt Roberts (Lightweight)
- Pannie Koanzad vs Jessica-Rose Clark (Women’s Bantamweight)
- Grigorii Popov vs Davey Grant (Bantamweight)
Zabit Magomedsharipov (17-1) vs Calvin Kattar (20-3)
- UFC Fight Night 163 Odds: Magomedsharipov -300 / Kattar +250
It features one of the latest rising stars in a UFC featherweight division that has a ton of new talent in Magomedsharipov. He worked his way through the Russian MMA scene with a number of impressive victories — not just on the cards either, as some of his wins have features submissions. In UFC, he has gotten off to a solid start against some of the lower fighters in the division. He got a significant test in his win over Jeremy Stephens in March. By winning on the cards, Magomedsharipov had to last three rounds — and so the rest of the division saw some of his strengths and weaknesses. His striking game is solid, but his wrestling is even better, as he brings both wiry strength and creativity. However, his cardio still has a ways to go, as he ran out of gas in the third round. Luckily, since the fight was moved on short notice, this fight will just go three rounds instead of the typical five rounds for a main event.
Kattar’s path to a headliner has been different. He started out in the Northeastern United States, winning in the lower tiers, but then he stopped fighting for three years. When he came back, he got the call to come to UFC as a last-minute replacement in a fight. He took Andre Fili apart in that opportunity, and then he steamrolled Shane Burgos in Boston. He is an old-school boxer, which means that his fundamentals are sound — but it also means that when it is time to get creative, he sometimes comes up short. This was a problem in his loss to Renato Carneiro, when Carneiro delivered leg kicks, and Kattar could not respond. Can Kattar make the necessary adjustments? We will see.
Final Prediction: Magomedsharipov wins via decision
Alexander Volkov (30-7) vs Greg Hardy (5-1)
- UFC Fight Night 163 Odds: Volkov -270 / Hardy +230
The fight features one of the top UFC heavyweight talents in Volkov against one of the most controversial heavyweight fighters in Hardy. Volkov had a disappointing loss to Derrick Lewis near the end of 2018, taking a knockout in the third round. Before that, though, he had a reputation for using his 6’7” frame to establish his solid reach advantage and wear opponents down.
Hardy delivers considerable striking power, and some thought he would follow the path that Derrick Lewis took to become an established fighter. However, Hardy has not developed his wrestling game, and when things go wrong in the fight, he does not battle back but instead implodes, as when he threw that knee to earn a DQ against Allen Crowder. Volkov does not hit as hard as Hardy, but he will land enough punches to bring a quick stop to this fight.
Final prediction: Volkov wins via knockout
