Brandan Goes Solo for UFC Saudi Arabia. Santino focuses on UFC 303

With Santino traveling to Saudi Arabia to corner Kelvin Gastelum, Brandan will be on solo patrol for this week’s UFC card. Look out for the solo podcast over the next day or so, and get all of his breakdowns for the Middle East card.

Since Santino wont be able to record for the UFC Saudi card, his focus will be on UFC 303. He will be posting breakdowns for each UFC 303 card this week—giving a jumpstart to lines for next week’s PPV card.

Although all of the other fights will only be broken down on the Patreon, Santino wanted to share his thoughts on the Brian Ortega vs Diego Lopes fight that was just announced as the co-main event for UFC 303.

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Brian Ortega +115 Diego Lopes -135

Brian Ortega (+115) vs Diego Lopes (-135)

This fight stood out to me the moment it was announced. I love this fight. Both guys are very crafty on so many levels, and the match up, itself, is so interesting because of the similarities between these two top featherweights.

Diego is getting a huge step up, and a fast track to a title shot/top 5 ranking if he wins. He is the beneficiary of the UFC marketing machine here, and has all upside with the match up. If he wins, he continues to get the push, and the money and the bags. If he loses, he lost to a top guy in the division and will likely still be ranked in the top 10. Win-win.

On the other-side, I was surprised to see Ortega take the fight. He (seemingly) could sit out for a title shot, yet he decides to take on a tough, hungry, lower-ranked fighter. What’s his upside? Rumor has it: Fat, fat bag$! And he does the UFC a favor when in a pinch. The UFC LOVES favors. It doesn’t hurt when your manager is Tiki—one of Dana White’s good friends—when Conor falls off the card and the UFC experiences an “oh shit” moment. “Hey, Dana, good friend. Brian will step in and save the day. Just cash him out and give him the next shot at the title if he wins.” I’m assuming the conversation was that word for word. (I can’t back that up with any actual information!)

Brian Ortega:

Brian Ortega has a bit of a history of a slow starter, as well as a (almost, maybe) Homer Simpson. He gets hit a lot, and people try to go in for the kill and gas. But Brian’s a winner, and he consistently finds ways to get his hand raised after facing adversity. The difference between him and other Homer Simpsons, though, is that he’s not just weathering cardio until they death gas, and coming on, but finding submissions and knockouts after being down on the scorecards.

Ortega’s a massive featherweight—the biggest I’ve ever seen. He’s not fast. He’s not dynamic. His offensive striking has gotten better over the years. I don’t want to say it’s “good” but it’s definitely effective. He fights way above his technical striking abilities. His long punches help him to work his way into the clinch, where I believe he’s most effective in the stand up game. He does a good job of landing knees and elbows from the clinch, and finding the bodylock/entrance into his grappling. He almost defiantly refuses to move his head. That would lead most fighters to have an upside-down record, but the traditionally granite chin of Ortega has kept him in fights, long after most would have died. The granite does seem to be cracking a bit—they all do—but he can still take a good one.

Brian’s clear best attribute is his ground game, but he has to get the fight to the ground first, which he hasn’t always been great at through traditional manners of wrestling. However, his wrestling has gotten significantly better over the years, and his body-lock takedowns and his clinch/trip takedowns on the cage have worked well lately—most recently against Yair Rodriquez. Once on top, Ortega must feel like a cinder block on an ant, as his best work comes from this position. 

The top game of Ortega generally starts with elbows and ground and pound. Then comes the pass into mount. Then chokes. If he can’t get the fight to the ground on his terms, he’s happy to jump guillotine as we’ve seen versus Cub Swanson and unsuccessfully against the former champ, Volk.

Now enters the young, up and comer… 

Diego Lopes:

Lopes burst onto the scene as a last minute replacement against Mosvar Evloev last year in a bout that saw him find early success, but lose a unanimous decision. Since his debut, he has racked up three first round finishes against decent competition. I say decent, as he fought an aging Gavin Tucker, a grappling specialist with less-than-stellar striking in Pat Sabatini, and then fought Super Sodiq, who’s a solid win with zero asterisks by his name. Prior to his UFC stint, he had a rough patch that saw him lose a decision to Joanderson Brito on Contender, and then a subsequent loss to Nate Richardson. After racking up a few wins, he answered the last minute call from the UFC.

Lopes is a finisher. He’s sending everything full force in round one, and letting the dust settle as it may. He is a submission specialist with fast hands and an uppercut anyone would be happy to add to their arsenal.

Lopes’s sub game is sub first, sub later, sub now. Position? Who cares about that—go for the sub. He’s all attack. From his back, he has a great armbar/triangle/omoplata game. His mobile hips and fast twitch muscles make him dangerous from the bottom. He also loves his guillotines from the scrambles, but unlike Dustin Poirier or the likes, he prefers neck-only guillotines/power guillotines. Both his guillotine game and his back bjj game complement his striking, as he isn’t worried about being taken down, so he can sit and put everything into his punches and kicks. That recklessness has cost him in the past, though. Mosvar took him down off of catching kicks, and Brito was easily able to get under him and control the fight on top due to the “light it all and watch it burn” strategy.

Lopes striking is mostly predicated on punching, though he will utilize calf kicks. His boxing is very serviceable and, like Ortega, chooses to use go all offense and leave the defense to catching punches on the chin and hoping it holds up. His best punch is that short, right uppercut. It appears to have a death touch, as he barely moves his arm and people are on the ground questioning their life decisions. He mixes the right uppercut with a straight right, and will regularly fake the right uppercut, and then throw a straight right instead ala Sean O’Malley—not a bad guy to emulate, if you ask me.

The hole in Lopes game is clearly the defensive wrestling. It works out for him well often, but I’m not sure he’s going to want to live and die by his BJJ guard against one of the best BJJ practitioners in the sport.

When the dust settles…

I initially loved Lopes in this spot. A fast, dynamic striker who can match Ortega’s BJJ. Lopes is a fast starter, who hurts people early, and Ortega is a slow starter who gets hurt early. But after watching tape, I think Ortega gets his bag and the title shot. I think Ortega is going to endure some adversity early, but I believe Diego has to put Ortega’s lights out in round one. If he doesn’t, can he keep Ortega off of him for the next two rounds? I’m not sure he can.

This fight is going to be fireworks whether standing or on the ground. Both fighters all are all gas. All offense. But I believe Ortega knows how to win a bit more. I really like Diego, but at the highest level of this sport, you have to have wrestling—both offensive and defensive wrestling. Dictating where the fight goes is paramount to winning within the top 10, and I like Ortega’s ability to dictate this fight, slightly more than I like Diego’s ability to finish Ortega.