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MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

Family certainly comes first for Johnny Walker — especially when it comes to how he scored his brother’s UFC debut on Saturday.

In a heavyweight preliminary bout at UFC Vegas 90, Valter Walker made the octagon walk for the first time against Lukasz Brzeski at the UFC APEX. Brzeski, winless in three promotional appearances prior to Saturday’s card, picked up a unanimous decision nod in the bout after winning the third round on all three judges’ scorecards.

Valter controlled much of the contest with his grappling, but had little to show for it when it came to the significant striking stats, which favored Brzeski.

Unsurprisingly, Johnny—who was in his brother’s corner—was not pleased by the decision and he expressed his discontent on social media.

The charismatic UFC light heavyweight contender didn’t seem alone in scoring the fight for this brother as seven of 12 media members scored the bout 29-28 for Valter over Brzeski on MMA Decisions.

Valter, 26, entered his UFC debut at 11-0 and exits the cage coming off a loss for the first time in his career.

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Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Lightweight veterans Bobby Green and Jim Miller this weekend (Sat., April 13, 2024) inside T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada for UFC 300.

There’s nothing I appreciate more than two long time veterans with just left in the tank. Green has been fighting consistently since 2008 and is 37 years old, yet that didn’t stop “King” from blitzing unbeaten up-and-comer Grant Dawson for a 33-second knockout win last year. He’s back in the rankings for the third time now despite no longer being at his peak — a clear display of talent and skill alike.

Miller, meanwhile, is defying all expectations. At 40 years of age, Miller has seemingly fully recovered from his longterm battle with Lyme disease — how is that even possible? — to win five of his last six fights, all via stoppage.

Let’s take a closer look at the betting odds and strategic keys for each athlete:

Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Green vs. Miller Betting Odds

• Bobby Green victory: -195
• Jim Miller victory: +145
• Odds via DraftKings Sportsbook

Photo by Josh Hedges/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

How Green Wins

Bobby Green is a sharpshooter. Even late in his career, he’s still tremendously quick with great reaction time, two traits that are hugely beneficial in controlling distance and picking off his foes with sharp counters. In addition, Green’s always been an underrated wrestler, able to hold his own against everyone not-named Islam Makhachev.

Speed kills, and per usual, it’s Green’s great advantage and key to victory in this fight. Jim Miller is an aggressive Southpaw who likes to pressure and fire counters in combination. His stance will make Green’s jab a bit more difficult to land, but fortunately, Green can adjust by working his own right-handed jab more often.

It shouldn’t be hard to bait Miller forward — that’s his natural inclination. Green’s goal is to be first and third in combination, meaning he pokes Miller with a jab/quick cross, evades or blocks the return fire, then sticks Miller with two more punches before exiting safely. If Green is both initiating and finishing exchanges, he’s going to rack up a ton of points, and the speed differential only grows as the slower fight takes more and more shots.

Photo by Mike Roach/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

How Miller Wins

Miller comes for blood. “A-10” found knockout power late in his career, which has served as the perfect compliment to his high-level jiu-jitsu. Despite his age, Miller looks as durable and well-conditioned as ever, able to push the pace and stay in the face of young, dangerous opposition.

Slowing Green down a bit is Miller’s key to victory. In recent years, Green’s famous durability has declined to more human levels, and Miller certainly hits hard enough to stun him. The problem will be finding his chin without getting touched up in the process.

Miller’s solution should be kicks and body work. Miller has a great left low kick, which he’ll fire to the inner thigh against Orthodox opponents and low calf against fellow Southpaws. Green switches stances, so Miller should hammer both targets, punctuating combinations (even if they miss) with that low left leg blast.

In addition, Green relies a lot of head movement. While he’s slipping and rolling, the torso remains a fairly static target. In the words of Ray Longo, Miller would be well-advised to “punch a hole in his f—king chest.”

Photo by Al Powers/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images

Green vs. Miller Prediction

This is a great match up, and each man has a clear avenue to victory.

Though Green has suffered more losses than Miller in the last few years, he’s also been fighting a higher level of competition. Dating back to 2020, Green has only lost to ranked Lightweights, and he looked quite good in several of those fights, such as the back-and-forth brawl versus Rafael Fiziev.

Conversely, Miller has mostly been feasting on unranked opposition. I love watching Miller knock out Contender Series randoms as much as the next guy, but I cannot help but feel that Green’s recent record would be STELLAR if he were facing the same opponents as “A-10.”

Green has been fighting at a higher level for a while, and I think he demonstrates the difference at Miller’s expense.

Prediction: Bobby Green victory (-195)

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MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

The wonderful world of Czech Republic freak show MMA remains as vibrant as ever.

On Saturday, while top-tier MMA promotions like the UFC, Cage Warriors, and KSW all had fight cards going, the smaller, less reputable Red Face 3 event took place at Praha Unyp Arena in Prague. Featuring a number of specialty fights and influencer fights, Red Face also brought back the spectacle of early Pride era freak show fights with a matchup between alleged “judo champion” Drobenka Kotlarova and actor and influencer Regina Labajova, which featured a massive size difference.

Kotlarova failed to put her significant advantage to use as she was unable to track Labajova down, walking around the cage in pursuit with her hands down. Finally, Kotlarova charged in and tripped, nearly knocking herself out along the fence.

Labajova allowed her opponent up and the bout continued. Not long afterwards, the television actress shoved her larger foe down and finished the bout with a forearm choke. Then, in a show of good sportsmanship, she checked on her fallen foe who was being given water and a canned beverage of some sort. And afterwards they were all in good spirits.

Check out the rest of the absurd spectacle below.

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Valentina Shevchenko is inarguably one of the greatest female fighters in the history of mixed martial arts.

Though she may no longer sit atop the women’s flyweight division, ‘Bullet’ is by far and away, the greatest fighter the 125-pound weight class has ever seen. Defending her belt a record-setting seven times, Shevchenko recently posed with all seven of her titles on social media — each representing one of her iconic defenses.

The visual was reminiscent of Demetrious Johnson’s iconic photo with his own collection of UFC gold.

“7 title defense, 7 amazing events alongside the best #UFC MMA fighters of the world,” Shevchenko wrote on Instagram. “Thank you @ufc, Now all my belts with me!!!”

Making her promotional debut in 2015, Valentina Shevchenko worked her way up the bantamweight ladder before making the jump to flyweight where she won nine straight fights, including a title-winning performance against 2024 UFC Hall of Famer Joanna Jędrzejczyk.

She would go on to defend the title against the likes of Jessica Eye, Liz Carmouche, Katlyn Chookagian, Jennifer Maia, Jessica Andrade, Lauren Murphy, and Taila Santos.

Along the way, she etched her name in the history books, claiming a slew of records, including the most title wins, most consecutive title defenses, most takedowns landed, most control time, and the most total strikes landed in women’s flyweight history. She was also named the World MMA Awards’ 2022 Female Fighter of the Year.

Valentina Shevchenko will look to reclaim the crown

Valentina Shevchenko’s time at the top of 125 came to an end on March 4, 2023, when she suffered a shocking fourth-round submission loss at the hands of Guadalajara native Alexa Grasso. Six months later, ‘Bullet’ came up short of reclaiming the crown during the UFC’s Mexican Independence Day celebration, going five rounds with Grasso only for the fight to be scored as a split draw.

The women are expected to run it back a third time later, but first, they’ll go toe-to-toe as coaches of The Ultimate Fighter 32.

Until then, check out highlights from Valentina Shevchenko’s iconic flyweight title reign below:

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MMA: Mixed Martial Arts

Chris Curtis showed heart, grit, and determination throughout his 25 minute battle with Brendan Allen in the main event of UFC Vegas 90, but it was his walkout song that had the MMA community scratching their heads.

Prior to his split decision loss to Allen at Saturday’s card at the UFC APEX, Curtis walked to the octagon to Sean “Diddy” Combs’ track “Bad Boy For Life.”

Combs is linked to an ongoing investigation into allegations of sexual assault and sex trafficking, which led to authorities raiding the rap mogul’s Miami and Los Angeles homes this past month. The song choice was deemed ill-timed by many in the space, and following the loss, Curtis explained how he landed on the walkout music.

“I’m getting some weird looks so I’ll explain the walkout for you guys before I go to bed,” Curtis stated on Twitter. “Last night at dinner, I got a call saying my walkout song (The Rumbling by Stim) wasn’t approved by the execs.

“I was low-key kinda pissed, so I went with Diddy thinking, ‘There is no way they’ll approve this then…,’ but I’m petty and a smart ass. Jokes on me, they definitely approved it so we just went with it. Diddy is terrible, but it was kinda hilarious. I’ll do better in the future.”

Curtis fought valiantly throughout the battle with Allen but ultimately came up short on two of the judges’ scorecards, and may have suffered a torn hamstring in the final seconds of the bout.

Despite the effort on short notice, Curtis feels his missed some opportunities to capitalize.

“Watched it back 4 times now,” Curtis said. “This one is going to sting for a while. Not mad at Brendan. He didn’t score the fight. But yeah… that was a huge opportunity. I made mistakes, but I thought I did enough. This one hurts.”

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