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After a rare weekend off, the UFC is back at its APEX facility next Saturday for UFC Vegas 28: Jairzinho Rozenstruik vs. Augusto Sakai.
UFC Vegas 28 is a heavyweight-dominated card, with both the main event and co-main event featuring the UFC’s big men.
Overall, it lacks a bit of name value, but this should be an exciting and fun show to watch if things go to plan.
Here are the predicted outcomes for UFC Vegas 28: Jairzinho Rozenstruik vs. Augusto Sakai.
#1 UFC Heavyweight division: Jairzinho Rozenstruik vs. Augusto Sakai
Both of these heavyweight contenders are coming off losses. But due to the fluid nature of the division, either man could become a title contender with a strong win here.
Jairzinho Rozenstruik’s UFC career, in general, has been a fascinating one.
Bigi Boy was just 6-0 in MMA when he entered the octagon for the first time in 2019, but he did have an extensive background in professional kickboxing.
And right away, we saw flashes of that as he put away his first three opponents by KO or TKO. Rozenstruik landed pinpoint-accurate strikes that didn’t even appear to be that heavy.
In fact, his KO’s of Allen Crowder and Andrei Arlovski were reminiscent of the kind of thing Mark Hunt would’ve produced in his prime.
A big and somewhat controversial, come-from-behind win over Alistair Overeem put him in title contention. However, 2020 went badly wrong when he was violently KO’d by Francis Ngannou.
Since then, Rozenstruik has KO’d former UFC heavyweight champion Junior Dos Santos and recently lost a bit of a snoozer to Ciryl Gane in a more technical fight.
Essentially, if a fighter plays into Rozenstruik’s hands – gets too wild or too aggressive and comes forward recklessly – then he’ll probably knock them out in violent fashion with a shot that, at first, looks inconsequential.
But there’s also a clear path to defeating Bigi Boy. You either take Rozenstruik down, as Overeem did for most of their fight, or pick at him from the outside and keep things technical, as Gane did.
So can Augusto Sakai pull either game plan off?
The problem for the Brazilian here is likely to be on the feet. Sakai is a lumbering character in comparison to Rozenstruik, who is surprisingly fleet-footed.
Sakai’s UFC record is genuinely excellent – 4-1 with his only loss coming to Overeem. But all of the said wins came against slower opponents with the exception of Arlovski.
And Arlovski, for all his speed and explosiveness, doesn’t possess the sniping skills of Bigi Boy.
So the likelihood of Sakai being able to outstrike Rozenstruik standing, as Gane did, is somewhere between slim and none.
Could he land a KO shot? Possibly. Anything can happen in the UFC. But it’s not likely.
That leaves Sakai with the ground option. But to be honest, based on what we saw of Rozenstruik's ground game against Overeem, it’s hard to imagine Sakai taking Bigi Boy down and working him over for a decision.
Overall then, the style here seems to favor Rozenstruik, who will probably catch Sakai when he gets sloppy and land something nasty to put him away.
Nobody’s knocked Sakai out on the feet yet, but there’s a first time for everything.
The Pick: Rozenstruik via second-round KO
#2 UFC Heavyweight division: Walt Harris vs. Marcin Tybura
This fight is probably more likely to produce a finish of some kind than the main event. After all, Harris, win or lose, is one of the most prolific finishers in the UFC right now.
At 37 years old, it’s no longer appropriate to label the Big Ticket as a prospect in the UFC. Instead, it’s better to see him as a highly flawed fighter who’s capable of taking out anyone on his day, making him a lot of fun to watch.
Overall, Harris is 8-7-1 in the UFC, with all of his wins coming via KO or TKO.
Right now, he’s coming off a pair of bad losses, going down to Alistair Overeem and Alexander Volkov. Had things gone even slightly differently, though, he would’ve knocked Overeem out, putting him at 4-0-1 in his last five.
Essentially, Harris is ridiculously fast for a big man and hits remarkably hard too. However, his ground game is painfully lacking. Fabricio Werdum made him look like a rank amateur in their fight and he’s not all that durable.
Tybura, on the other hand, is excellent on the ground, particularly if he can get an opponent underneath him from mount. He’s punished numerous opponents that way, including Greg Hardy and Andrei Arlovski.
The Polish native’s issue has largely been with his lack of explosive speed. He’s a decent technical striker but has struggled at times with quicker opponents, particularly Derrick Lewis in 2018.
And to be fair, Augusto Sakai and Shamil Abdurakhimov aren’t the quickest and even they got the better of Tybura on the feet.
However, based on Harris’ waning durability and panicky ground game, it’s hard not to favor Tybura here.
Harris can almost certainly take him out in a rush in the early going. In fact, if he did so, it wouldn’t be a surprise at all.
However, the smarter money is on Tybura simply staying out of range, taking Harris down and either TKO’ing him from the top or submitting him. The former is probably more likely.
The Pick: Tybura via second-round TKO
#3 UFC Vegas 28: The Main Card
In the middleweight division, Roman Dolidze faces Laureano Staropoli. Quite how these two have made the main card is anyone’s guess given their combined record of 4-3, especially as they’re 0-3 in their most recent fights.
Staropoli is a flashy striker with a tendency to land wild strikes while moving in and out – think a poor man’s Yair Rodriguez. Meanwhile, Dolidze is a little more unproven in the UFC.
Overall, this one is a toss-up, to be honest, but it feels like Dolidze’s grappling is probably going to pull him through for a decision win.
In the welterweight division, Miguel Baeza takes on Santiago Ponzinibbio. This is a huge test for Baeza, who is unbeaten in the UFC at 3-0 and has looked tremendous thus far.
Caramel Thunder is an expert grappler, but he’s also an excellent striker with brutal knockout power. The question here is whether he has enough to get past a wily veteran like Ponzinibbio, who’s been around the top of the division for years.
However, the fact that Ponzinibbio didn’t look like his old self in his most recent fight, a KO loss to Li Jingliang, is a huge red flag here. It's even more pertinent as he hadn’t fought since 2018 prior to that. So with that in mind, the pick is Baeza via TKO.
At middleweight, Dusko Todorovic takes on Gregory Rodrigues, a late replacement for Maki Pitolo.
Prior to his recent loss to Punahele Soriano, Todorovic looked very much like a dangerous prospect, with 10 wins to his name, all by stoppage.
Given Rodrigues’ so-so 9-3 record and late notice, it’s likely that Todorovic will get back into the winner’s circle here, probably by TKO.
Finally, at middleweight, Tom Breese faces Antonio Arroyo. Once considered a top prospect, Breese has slipped recently, largely because his durability has proven to be questionable. However, he still possesses excellent skills, including a tight ground game and a ramrod jab.
Arroyo is more of a flashy fighter, but he doesn’t possess the technical skills of Breese. This should come down to whether he can catch the Englishman with something heavy or wrap him up on the ground.
However, Breese’s technical smarts and experience should pull him through for a decision in what is a close fight to call.
#4 UFC Vegas 28: The Preliminary card
Picks in bold
UFC flyweight division: Montana de la Rosa vs. Ariane Lipski
UFC heavyweight division: Tanner Boser vs. Ilir Latifi
UFC welterweight division: Francisco Trinaldo vs. Muslim Salikhov
UFC lightweight division: Alan Patrick vs. Mason Jones
UFC flyweight division: Manon Fiorot vs. Maryna Moroz
UFC featherweight division: Sean Woodson vs. Youssef Zalal
UFC lightweight division: Claudio Puelles vs. Jordan Leavitt
UFC featherweight division: Makwan Amirkhani vs. Kamuela Kirk
