The mixed martial arts (MMA) fantasy website Kountermove is back with another freeroll for MMAOddsBreaker.com readers. If you’re not familiar with how the site works, here’s a brief snippet from the site owners, themselves.
Kountermove brings the traditional fantasy format to MMA. Accumulation of points and a salary cap make fantasy MMA more intriguing than your basic “pick ’em” contest. With other industry pros on the site it is the place to be if you know your MMA. The game is fairly simple on its face, games are played over a single night during one event. Prior to the event, players get a total of $25,000 fantasy dollars to pick five fighters for your team. Each fighter is given a specific salary by Kountermove. Kountermove assigns a value for each fighter based on how we believe the fight will go. Points are scored if a fighter scores a finish, wins a round, lands significant strikes, knocks an opponent down, scores takedowns, secures dominant positions or attempts submissions. The more dominant your fighters’performance, the more points you’re going to score. If you score more points than your opponents, then you win the money.
To enter the free $200 tournament for MMAOddsBreaker.com readers, just click the link below: https://www.kountermove.com/join/36432-ufc-182-mma-oddsbreaker-200-tourney-on-ufc-182-jones-vs-cormier-T-free/ If you don’t have an account, don’t worry, you can create one for free, but do it quickly, spacing is limited! If you’re interested in a few pointers on potential fighters to pick, I’ll be offering my analysis and potential picks to click. In case you have your doubts, I have a very nice track record of success with the website, having won plenty since its inception. Before I get to my picks, remember that to get the best value out of your team, you have to try to get an average of $5000 per fighter with your team of five fighters and your $25,000 salary cap. That means if you want to pick a big favorite from UFC 182 like Jon Jones ($5700) you have to balance it out by picking some underdogs that you think will perform above and beyond. Sometimes it’s not worth it to pick the overwhelming favorite. Without further ado, here are some of the picks that stand out for me: Cody Garbrandt ($4700): Garbrandt enters the Octagon with a bit of hype as an undefeated bantamweight out of Team Alpha Male. The Ohio boxer has a decent wrestling base and some serious knockout ability on the feet. All five of Garbrandt’s professional bouts have finished via TKO inside the first six minutes so if history repeats itself against Marcus Brimage, he could very well be walking away with a huge 100 point first round bonus in his UFC debut. It won’t be easy because Brimage is a tough out, but Brimage was demolished in the first frame by Conor McGregor a while back. I’m not trying to compare Garbrandt to McGregor, but Garbrandt does pack a big punch and swarms well the second he connects hard. The potential for a first round finish is definitely there and the risk might be worth the reward in this case. Underdog Pick of the Night Mats Nilsson ($4300): This pick is more of a fade of Omari Akhmedov than a pick of Nilsson. Nilsson made his UFC debut last year and was finished in the first round by middleweight Luke Barnatt, but he’s now dropping to 170 pounds. Akhmedov has looked for for about 30 seconds of his UFC career thus far and has been repeatedly hurt in fights and ougrappled. I feel Nilsson will have a technical striking advantage and will be at least as good if not better on the ground than the Russian fighter. The only advantage Akhmedov clearly has is pure punching power, but he is a very sloppy striker and it’s not super likely he’ll connect due to his lack of technique on the feet. As long as Nilsson is wary of his defense, he could definitely pull off the upset and allow you to put some heavy hitters on your team. Fighter to Avoid Brad Tavares ($4700): Tavares is an interesting case in the middleweight division. Still just 27 years old, he has the potential to turn things around, but he enters this bout against Nate Marquardt on a two-fight losing streak. Tavares was dominated by Yoel Romero and then knocked out by Tim Boetsch. His chin is definitely not something you can trust, but my biggest problem with Tavares right now is his lack of finishing ability. Tavares has only finished one fight in his UFC career, one of his first against Phil Baroni. Most of his bouts seem to be filled with point-fighting from distance, or slow, grinding dirty boxing in the clinch. That’s not a recipe for a lot of points. Even against a fighter with a fading chin like Nate Marquardt, I don’t think Tavares will land a knockout here and he could very well wind up getting finished himself. Stay away. Complete UFC 182 Preview If my fantasy preview isn’t enough for you, Fight Scientist Reed Kuhn, MMA Oddsmaker Nick Kalikas and myself did an extensive preview of the fight card on The Premium Oddscast, which was posted earlier this week. Feel free to check out our latest episode. There’s plenty of combinations for great teams with 11 total bouts this event: UFC 182 Preview
Thanks for reading and good luck!