ToutMaster 2016 (presented by MMAOddsbreaker.com and TheMMA-Analysis Podcast) continued on Saturday (February 27, 2016) with UFC Fight Night 84 in London, England. After Fight Night 84, here’s the updated overall top 20:
With a few upsets on the card we saw a shakeup of the standings with a new leader in PaulShag. Upon losing his top spot, godofmma quoted the great Arnold Schwarzenneger saying, “I’ll be back.” ToutMaster number three Sean Carey was very confident in his performance thus far, “I’m obviously head and shoulders above everyone else in Toutmaster, sources say all of their wives and kids are rooting for me, and I can’t blame them.” BigBilBar7MMA maintained a spot in the top 10 and his happy with his year as a whole, “Felt like I missed out on this card with some picks I changed up last minute but I’m still in striking distance and have made a good start to the year!” New to the top 10 this week is Indiana’s WesReynolds who has developed a strategy for how to look at ToutMaster, “Obviously in a contest like the ToutMaster, you have to take some shots on underdogs like Bisping, but it’s also key to not overthink these fights. Even in the overly saturated market of UFC running too many shows, I always try to look at each fight and the reason why it is booked. Is it to just have an exciting fight, establish a legitimate contender order or to get someone over, like the Breese-Nakamura fight, where they obviously want to build up Breese a little bit? Dana White always says Zuffa is in the ‘fight business’ and yes they are, but it’s also the ‘entertainment business’ and they have to try to make stars by booking easy wins for guys. It doesn’t always work out how they would want but it does give some insight into how these shows are put together.” To check out the full standings, click the following link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bNP42Mmel6cSyvazGaflXEUekAE9ayoXf0eeffKHOa8/edit#gid=383318574 Some additional notes on the first card
- Favorites to win: 10
- Underdogs to win: 3
- Biggest Underdog to win: Michael Bisping (2.60 points)
- Biggest Consensus Pick: Arnold Allen (99) / Marlon Vera (16) and Scott Askham (99) / Chris Dempsey (16)
- Biggest Consensus Pick (2016 Record): 4-2
- Most Contentious Pick: Thibault Gouti (60) / Teemu Packalen (55)
Next event is UFC 196 on Saturday, March 5 with Conor McGregor moving up to 170 pounds to face Nate Diaz.