UFC Vegas 117 DFS Breakdown: Model, Preview, Picks for Allen vs. Costa, More Saturday Fights

With the MMA world more focused on the MVP card on Netflix, the UFC is phoning it in to an extent with their offering from the Apex on Saturday. However, that’s the only MMA event this weekend with DFS contests, which rewards those willing to put in the work.

We have the standard 5:00 p.m. ET start time for the 13-fight card, headlined by ranked featherweights Arnold Allen and Melky Costa.

We have built out a full player-projection model using the FantasyLabs Tools and Player Models to help put together some winning DFS lineups in UFC. You can use our optimizer to build optimal lineups using these projections.

The model, created by our own Sean Koerner, is based on 10,000 simulations of all the fights. He then pulled the DraftKings score from each bout to create floor, median, and ceiling projections for every fighter. Here is how he defined each projection:

• Floor: Fighter has an 80% chance of going over this score, 20% chance of going under
• Median: Fighter has a 50% chance of going over this score, 50% chance of going under
• Ceiling: Fighter has a 20% chance of going over this score, 80% chance of going under

These should give us a better sense of which fighters we should target based on the game type – maximizing ceiling in GPPs, for example.

You can check out the projections for every fighter on Saturday’s card in our UFC Models.

Main Event

Arnold Allen ($8,600) vs. Melky Costa ($7,600)

While it’s not the most star-studded main event, we’ve got a fun featherweight scrap between Arnold Allen and Melky Costa, two fighters who bring it every time out. Allen has fallen on hard times recently with a 1-3 record over his last four, but those losses came exclusively to top-five fighters, and he arguably deserved the win over presumed title challenger Movsar Evloev.

After starting his UFC tenure at 1-2, Costa has won six straight, with four finishes plus a “fight of the night” in one of his decision wins. The Brazilian has the classic Chute Boxe style, with aggressive Muay Thai and solid jiu-jitsu. When it’s going well, that style forces opponents to either withstand the barrage on the feet or force the grappling with a dangerous opponent, neither of which are necessarily ideal options.

Allen is probably the better wrestler here, but my expectation is that he uses those skills defensively and tries to use his superior strength and durability to win a striking match. Allen has never been finished in his career nor even knocked down, while Costa has been stopped four times, including twice in the UFC.

Allen should have a considerable cardio edge as well, with prior five-round experience. Costa seemed to slow in the third round of his last decision win, dominating the first two rounds but running out of gas late. That makes this something of a binary fight, with the more explosive Costa having success early but Allen taking over late.

That makes it a tremendous stack for cash games, since both men will have periods where they score well. For GPPs, I’ll be about even on Allen, Costa, and “none of the above.” A decision for either man with limited grappling might not make the optimal lineup.

The Easy Chalk

Modestas Bukauskas ($8,300)

It feels like we’ve gotten fewer of these situations recently than we did a few years ago, but we have a late-replacement fight announced after salaries were confirmed, leading to a “Free Square” situation on Modestas Bukauskas.

Originally slated to fight Rodolfo Bellato, Bukauskas was listed as a -130 favorite on Monday, leading to his $8,300 price tag. Now he’s the heaviest favorite on the slate against Christian Edwards ($6,900). Edwards is 8-4 as a pro and comes in on a one-fight winning streak, so he’s not exactly a top prospect.

To illustrate the difference in opponent quality, Bellato’s most recent fight was a first-round knockout win over Luke Fernandez. The same Luke Fernandez that beat Edwards for the CFFC title before getting called up to the UFC. Bukauskas will be massively owned, but I’m not fading a -325 favorite at his price tag.

The Upside Plays

Thomas Gantt ($9,100)

One of the reasons Bukauskas is especially attractive is that we don’t really have many heavy favorites on the card. In fact, we have the inverse situation with Thomas Gantt, who is facing Artur Minev ($7,100) as a less prohibitive favorite than he was against his original opponent.

As about a -205 favorite, Gantt isn’t truly “worth” his $9,100 price tag. However, it’s not his chances of winning that are relevant here; it’s how he’s likely to go about it. Gantt is a former D1 All-American wrestler who is mentored by Daniel Cormier, while Minev is an undefeated prospect known for his striking.

I could absolutely see Minev stopping Gantt early, but if Gantt wins, it’s likely due to an early submission or by piling up takedowns. Depending on the strength of Minev’s get-up game, double-digit takedowns could be in the cards here.

Gantt might be less-than-dominant from a real-life perspective but still post a massive DFS score, and the negative value on him due to the opponent switch means he’ll be the least popular of the $9,000+ options, making him an excellent GPP choice.

Nicolle Caliari ($9,000)

I’ll be interested in the ownership on Nicolle Caliari, as she projects extremely well in her fight against Shauna Bannon ($7,200) that opens the card this weekend. Caliari lands almost three takedowns per 15 minutes, while Bannon has a terrible 40% takedown-defense rate, and the favorite has finished all eight of her pro wins. However, the field typically rosters female fighters at a lower rate, especially at strawweight.

Caliari has previously competed at flyweight in the UFC, where she was clearly overmatched in her loss to Carly Judice. Her other loss was a split decision against Ernesta Kareckaite, who is also a massive flyweight at 5’9″. Now back to her pre-UFC division, Caliari gets a much easier matchup in Bannon.

I like Caliari to get the finish here, and Sean Zerillo came to the same conclusion as we discussed on our UFC Betting Preview podcast. That would obviously give her a solid score, especially on a slate with most fights favored to see the judges. Even without a finish, she could also make the optimal with takedowns and control time, making her one of my favorite options at the top of the salary range.

The Value Plays

Polyana Viana ($7,500)

I have no idea why Polyana Viana is a heavy underdog against Alice Ardelean ($8,700) on this card. Sure, Viana has lost three in a row, but all were against top-15 competition in Tapology’s divisional rankings. Ardelean is 2-2 in the UFC, but those wins were both decisions against fighters with a combined 1-7 UFC record.

Viana is both younger and more experienced and has been a dedicated UFC athlete for nearly a decade. Ardelean is a social media influencer who uses her fight career to promote her other ventures and isn’t especially skilled in any one area.

Plus, like Caliari, Viana has a 100% finish rate in her career wins, so it’s likely that a win here also comes with a solid score. There’s a chance she’s gone downhill due to her losing streak, but given the quality of competition, I’d say it’s likelier that she rebounds here. She’s an excellent salary saver who should also be extremely contrarian given the line movement against her.

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The Contrarian Choice

Juan Diaz ($7,000)

The lone $9,000+ fighter I didn’t mention earlier was Malcolm Wellmaker ($9,200), the most expensive fighter on the slate. That’s because he’s taking on Juan Diaz, who makes his UFC debut after an impressive appearance on the Contender Series.

Diaz is an extremely durable grappler, which might be the perfect recipe for beating Wellmaker. Wellmaker was himself a highly touted prospect coming off the Contender Series, and he opened his UFC tenure with first-round knockouts of Cameron Saaiman and Kris Moutinho. Then he fought Ethan Ewying on short notice, with Ewying picking up three takedowns and pulling off the upset.

A similar path is there for Diaz, who comes in with a wealth of grappling ability and experience. He’s never been finished in his career, is four years younger, and has been fighting longer than Wellmaker, who had his amateur debut after Diaz had already turned pro.

Wellmaker has the physical tools to make this pick look extremely wrong, but if Diaz doesn’t get knocked out, he’s live for the upset. At his price point and ownership, that would be huge for DFS.

The Swing Fights

Ivan Erslan ($8,800) vs. Tuco Tokkos ($7,400)

The best stoppage odds on the slate belong to the light heavyweight fight between Ivan Erslan and Tuco Tokkos, with the current line about -240. This is an extremely binary fight between the hard-swinging Erslan and a grappler in Tokkos, which should lead to a big score for the eventual winner.

Erslan is 0-3 in the UFC, but 10 of his 14 pro wins have been knockouts. He’s also so limited in his grappling that even a striker like Navajo Stirling took him down three times en route to a decision win. Tokkos is 1-2 in the UFC but landed three takedowns on Stirling in his fight against him.

That makes this a very clear striker-vs-grappler matchup, with the added benefit that both men are also extremely vulnerable to the other one’s strengths. I like Tokkos relative to his price and likely ownership but want some exposure to both sides of this fight.

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Pictured: Modestas Bukauskas
Photo Credit: Imagn