With Jon Jones booted from UFC 200 over a potential doping violation, Brock Lesnar’s comeback fight against Mark Hunt has become the main event on the card that is set for Las Vegas on Saturday.
Lesnar’s star power and return to the Octagon for his first match since 2011 offers a lot for the curiosity seeker, but it will be interesting to see how it plays out for bettors. Hunt is now a -175 betting favorite at sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com after opening at -136.
While Hunt is the world’s No. 8-ranked heavyweight, his style falls in the range of the type of striker whom Lesnar often struggled against before leaving UFC to go back to wrestling for almost five years.
Lesnar’s odds have risen to +145 from +121. One read into that could be that oddsmakers are trying to ply bettors to make the higher-paying play, but at the same time Lesnar’s athleticism makes him a hard-to-resist underdog. Hunt will need to prove that he has upgraded his ground game from absolute liability to passable.
Whether Dana White makes good on his vow to find a suitable opponent to take Jones’ spot against Daniel Cormier, the card is still deep.
The odds for featured featherweights Jose Aldo and Frankie Edgar’s hotly anticipated UFC 200 rematch, which is for the UFC’s interim 145-pound belt, have flip-flopped all week. Edgar, who has won his last five fights, is the slight -120 favorite. Aldo, who won in the rivals’ first matchup, is listed at -110.
While Aldo is maintaining that Edgar hasn’t changed since that 2013 fight, Edgar’s recent body of work shows that he has made great strides as a striker.
Women’s bantamweight champion Miesha Tate is a big -260 betting favorite at the sportsbooks against challenger Amanda Nunes, who is a +200 underdog. Tate is a grinder with a strong track record of frustrating and fatiguing opponents, which should mean that Nunes’ chances of a technical knockout should be far and few between.
Cain Velasquez will be at a six-inch height disadvantage against Travis Browne in their heavyweight match. Velasquez is the -305 favorite, since he has proven himself to be as indefatigable as a 245-pound heavyweight can get in UFC.
Browne is listed at +245. At 6-foot-7 and 240 pounds, Browne is a potent striker. Of course, he needs to be on his feet to do that and Velasquez uses his wrestling skills to deny opponents that luxury.
