In the main event of UFC 276, the middleweight title is up for grabs as Israel Adesanya looks to defend his belt as he takes on Jared Cannonier. The card takes place on Saturday, July 2 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
UFC 276 Opening Odds:
Israel Adesanya -300
Jared Cannonier +250
UFC 276 Current Odds:
Israel Adesanya -365
Jared Cannonier +280
Adesanya and Cannonier’s recent fights
Israel Adesanya (22-1) is coming off a decision win over Robert Whittaker back in February to defend his middleweight title for the fourth time. He also had defeated Marvin Vettori last June to get back into the win column after losing to Jan Blachowicz for the light heavyweight. He alos has title defences over Paulo Costa by TKO and Yoel Romero by decision after winning he title as he knocked out Robert Whittaker. ‘The Last Stylebender’ is also the former interim middleweight champ.
Jared Cannonier (15-5) is on a two-fight win streak as he’s coming off a vicious KO win over Derek Brunson on the same card Adesanya edged out Whittaker. On the win streak he beat Kelvin Gastelum by decision in the main event of a Fight Night card after dropping a close decision to Whittaker. Since moving down to middleweight, he’s 5-1 with wins over Jack Hermansson, Anderson Silva, and David Branch with all his wins coming by stoppage.
Are the odds surprising?
The odds are not surprising given Israel Adesanya is a fan-favorite and is usually a sizeable favorite. In his last five fights, Adesanya closed as a -310, -245, -250, -190, and -290 and he’s also never opened as an underdog in his UFC tenure. Cannonier, meanwhile, has gotten respect since he pilled off the upset win over Jack Hermansson as a a +220 underdog. Since then, he closed as a sight favourite over Whittaker, as well as being around -170 favorite over both Gastelum and Brunson. However, given he lost to Whittaker and dropped that first round to Brunson, it’s no surprise to see the betting public back the champ.
How might the odds change?
Already Adesanya is getting steamed and I expect that to be the case until fight night. When the UFC has pay-per-views, especially these big ones when other sport bettors throw their money on UFC. Adesanya is a known commodity outside the MMA world while Cannonier isn’t so people all throw Adesanya in their parlay and I expect this to close around -400 for the champ given he has looked phenomenal at middleweight.
