Holly Holm is finally ready to make her UFC debut. The promotion announced on Tuesday that Holm will take on Raquel Pennington at UFC 184, which is scheduled to take place February 28 at Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. It’s not yet known if the bout will take place on the main card or the prelims, but a main-card slot seems likely. Holm and Pennington were scheduled to meet at UFC 181, but an injury to Holm forced her to withdraw from the bout. Pennington instead fought Ashlee Evans-Smith and scored a first-round bulldog choke submission in what was an impressive performance. The submission win by Pennington in her last bout could actually help Holm backers, because now there’s a little hype behind Pennington and those who think Holm won’t be able to stop Pennington’s takedowns will likely be backing her now. Personally, though, I am not going to read that much into the Evans-Smith fight. It was a great win for Pennington, and it saved her job in the UFC for now anyways, but I really think Holm is going to be way too much for her and probably get a stoppage victory. As for a line, we’ll see how the betting public takes it, but don’t be shocked if Holm is -400 in this spot. UFC Fight Night 61 Gets Two New Bouts Two new bouts were added to UFC Fight Night 61, which takes place February 22 at Ginasio Gigantinho in Porto Algere, Brazil. The first is a bantamweight bout between Yuri Alcantara and Frankie Saenz, which is an absolute squash match. I just don’t see any way Saenz wins this fight, and it should be another destructive win for Alcantara, who I believe should be around a -500 favorite in this fight. The other new bout is a featherweight bout between Tiago Trator and Mike de la Torre, which Guilherme Cruz of MMAFighting.com reported. Trator wasn’t ultra impressive in his UFC debut, but dropping down to 145lbs should help him out, I would imagine. As for de la Torre, he lost to a juiced-up Brian Ortega in his second fight after dropping a split decision to Mark Bocek in his debut, and overall I don’t think he has a high ceiling. However, he should be more competitive in this fight against Trator. Still, I would favor the Brazilian quite heavily here, probably around -300.
