UFC 181 Date: December 6, 2014 Arena: Mandalay Bay Events Center City: Las Vegas, NV The Ultimate Fighting Championship will be live from Las Vegas this Saturday night with UFC 181, which will be headlined by a pair of title fights. The main card will be live on Pay Per View at 10pm ET, with preliminary action preceding it on FOX Sports 1 at 8pm ET and UFC Fight Pass at 7pm ET. If interested in wagering on these proposition plays, or any other plays for this fight card, you may do so at Several Bookmakerss. My prop plays for UFC 181 are: Lightweight bout: Abel Trujillo (+230) vs Tony Ferguson (-250) Ferguson by Submission (+323) 1u to win 3.23u I think the two most likely outcomes to this match-up are Ferguson by Submission and Ferguson by Decision. I slightly favor him getting the tap, which makes this for a great bet, considering the return on the submission prop is greater than the return on the decision prop, which is currently at +247. The line for Ferguson to win by T/KO is at +260, suggesting that he has a greater chance of finishing the fight via T/KO than he does by submission. I disagree, because more than half the time he hurts Trujillo on the feet, I think he will close it with a choke, rather than going for the TKO stoppage. If his opponent is hurt and gives up an opening for a submission, he often opt to take that instead of recklessly going for a stoppage via strikes, as he could get viciously countered, which was the case for Jamie Varner when he took on Trujillo. Again, I think Ferguson by Submission is the most likely outcome to this match-up, so considering the fact that the return on the submission prop is greater than the return on the decision and T/KO props, this makes for a very solid bet. For a full write-up on this 155 pound contest, please refer to my fight article for the match-up. Bantamweight bout: Francisco Rivera (+440) vs Urijah Faber (-510) Rivera by T/KO (+1403) 0.2u to win 2.8u This is a good hedge to make if you’ve made any plays on Faber, such as my recommended two-way parlay of Faber and Corey Anderson. Light Heavyweight bout: Corey Anderson (-365) vs Justin Jones (+328) Anderson by Decision (+199) 1 to win 1.99u Simply put, I believe this to be the most likely outcome to this 205 pound scrap. Jones is an undefeated RFA fighter making the way into the Octagon, stepping up a weight class to take this fight on short notice. He is a solid prospect, but I believe that to be in the middleweight division. In this match-up, I think Anderson’s size and especially wrestling advantage to be too much for him. That said, I think his toughness will keep him in the fight and Anderson won’t be able to finish him, thus taking the win via unanimous decision on the judges’ scorecards after three rounds of action. I have a feeling this could be a boring fight in which Anderson uses his superior wrestling to grind Jones out, but it’s more likely Anderson will be looking to finish and it will be Jones’ toughness that takes the fight to the distance. Women’s Bantamweight bout: Ashlee Evans-Smith (-185) vs Raquel Pennington (+170) Fight Goes to Decision (-175) 1.75u to win 1u Regardless of who gets her hands raised in this women’s 135 pound scrap, I think it is going to be after three hard-fought rounds of action, with Bruce Buffer reading the scorecards. I expect these ladies to produce a very fun fight and in fact included this fight as one of my three value-bets for the evening’s ‘Fight of the Night’ honors.
