UFC on ESPN 5 Covington vs Lawler Odds & Preview

Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, on the outskirts of New York City, will be the site of UFC on ESPN 5 on Saturday night. This event was originally scheduled in Sochi, Russia, but the logistics fell through, and so now Prudential Center will host its eight UFC event. The main event is a welterweight tilt between former interim UFC Welterweight Champion Colby Covington and former undisputed champion Robbie Lawler. The co-main event is a lightweight bout between Jim Miller and Clay Guida. We have the full fight card as well as UFC betting thoughts on several of the bouts.

UFC on ESPN 5 Covington vs Lawler Odds & Preview

Event Info

• When: Saturday, 3 PM ET
• Where: Prudential Center, Newark
• TV: ESPN
• Live Stream: WatchESPN

Main Card (ESPN)

• Colby Covington vs Robbie Lawler (Welterweight)
• Jim Miller vs Clay Guida (Lightweight)
• Joaquim Silva vs Nasrat Haqparast (Lightweight)
• Trevin Giles vs Gerald Meerschaert (Middleweight)
• Scott Holtzman vs Dong Hyun Mia (Catchweight – 158 lbs)
• Darko Stosic vs Kennedy Nzechukwu (Light Heavyweight)

Preliminary Card (ESPN)

• Mickey Gall vs Salim Touahri (Welterweight)
• Antonina Shevchenko vs Lucie Pudilova (Women’s Flyweight)
• Jordan Espinosa vs Matt Schnell (Flyweight)
• Lauren Murphy vs Mara Romero Borella (Women’s Flyweight)
• Claudio Silva vs Cole Williams (Catchweight – 176 lbs)
• Miranda Granger vs Hannah Goldy (Women’s Flyweight)

Colby Covington (14-1) vs Robbie Lawler (28-13)

• UFC Odds: Covington -225 / Lawler +180

features a dominant wrestler in Covington, who piled up the medals at Oregon State and then has delivered win after win in UFC, with the lone exception of a 2015 loss to Warlley Alves, who was able to find a way to deliver a guillotine choke. When he beat Dong Hyun Kim in 2017, he made the step up to contender status, and then he delivered a win over Demian Maia. That win was particularly impressive because of Maia’s strength in the ground game. Covington responded by delivering a flurry of strikes that wore Maia out before moving in for the kill. After some time off for sinus surgery, Covington was stripped of his title due to his inactive status. Now, Covington returns to take on a difficult opponent in Lawler. Lawler had left UFC for Strikeforce, but then UFC brought that promotion onboard, and Lawler demolished Josh Koscheck in his return bout. He eventually won the welterweight title, defending in vivid fashion against Rory MacDonald and Carlos Condit. However, over the last three years, he has shown a slight decline. In this fight, he could take advantage of Covington’s striking defense, which is porous. Covington is durable enough to eat bombs while moving his opponent to the fence to wear him down. If Covington can hold off the storm early, he should outlast Lawler. Final Prediction: Covington wins via decision Jim Miller (30-13) vs Clay Guida (35-18)

• UFC Odds: Miller -150 / Guida +120

features a pair of lightweights who have somehow never met despite fighting 59 times in UFC combined. Guida started out as a lightweight and put together a number of impressive wins that got him close to title contention until he lost to Benson Henderson and Gray Maynard and then dropped down to 145 pounds. He came back up after a lackluster run and has added some serious striking power, as he showed when he only needed 67 seconds to knock out Joe Lauzon. Miller has had less consistency than Guida — but also seems to have a higher ceiling. However, a series of bad losses in 2015 and 2016 ended up taking place while Miller was suffering from a case of Lyme disease without diagnosis. After completing treatment, he has looked better although he has still lost quite a bit. Of course, many of those names who have beaten him recently have been in the top ranks of the UFC lightweight division, including Francisco Trinaldo, while he has beaten people on the edges of the division, such as Jason Gonzalez. Guida comes somewhere in between, which will make this an interesting fight. Miller likes to finish on the ground, while Guida has a decent ground defense. I see Guida having more endurance here and getting enough points to win. Final Prediction: Guida wins via decision