Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley Odds, Picks, & Predictions
Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley Odds
Odds at Open:
- Jake Paul opened the favorite -155 or 61% implied.
- Tyron Woodley opened the underdog @ +125 or ~ 44.4% implied.
- 4.97% Hold at Open
Current Odds
- Jake Paul current favorite -190 or 65.5% implied.
- Tyron Woodley current underdog +165 or 37.75% implied.
- 3.15% Hold at Present
Totals Betting:
- Over and under is currently set at 3.5 Rounds.
- The Over is being listed at -111 or 52.6% implied.
- The Under is being listed at -109 or 52.2% implied.
- 4.54% Hold
If you are a combat sports fan on any level, it is hard to avoid the name Jake Paul, and getting harder every day. His every tweet, antic, and outlandish statement are breathlessly reported in MMA media due to the sheer magnitude of his popularity and notoriety. Whether people love or hate Paul, the numbers are indisputable; people pay attention. If Paul is able to defeat Tyron Woodley on Sunday night in Cleveland, that trend will only be further exacerbated. Tyron Woodley is far and away the most credible challenge of Jake Paul’s young career, but he enters the fight with question marks of his own. Not unlike his friend Ben Askren, this will represent Tyron Woodley’s third career iteration as a combat sports athlete. Prior to competing with the elite welterweights of the UFC and Strikeforce organizations, Tyron competed at the Division I level in NCAA Wrestling for the Missouri Tigers, twice securing All-American honors.
The first thing you need to understand before betting this fight is that there are a tremendous amount of unknowns coming into this contest, and frankly more than I am typically comfortable with betting. Tyron Woodley has no professional or amateur boxing matches on record, so this will be the first time we see Tyron engaging with bigger gloves, in a ring, with shoes on, and without the threat of takedowns, knees, elbows, or kicks. Frankly, that’s a massive void in data that one would want available to them in order to take an informed risk betting on this fight. The distance striking metrics from Tyron Woodley across his MMA career may not be completely relevant, but in my opinion, they are the most realistic data points we can use to make educated guesses about things like Tyron’s potential punch count, activity, power, striking defense, and striking accuracy.
Here’s what jumped off the page at me about the statistics on Tyron Woodley: (at distance)
Since 2013, Tyron Woodley’s knock down ratio is 10:0 in favor of Tyron.
- Having landed only 267 strikes over this time period, Tyron’s 10 KD’s represent a 3.75% knock down rate (for) which is a very impressive measure of power. – Tyron Woodley has only been finished 3 times in a 27 fight pro career (11% of pro bouts) – 2 Finish Losses via TKO/KO – 2012 vs Nate Marquardt (elbows and punches) – 2020 vs. Colby Covington (rib injury in a grappling situation) – 1 Finish Loss Via SUB – 2021 vs. Vincente Luque (D’Arce Choke club and sub; check hook) – In his last 4 UFC bouts, Woodley was landing at nearly 35% (almost 2 full points higher than his career average of 33.1%) but recorded no knockdowns on 63 strikes landed. – Woodley has only attempted 5.7 strikes per minute at distance over the course of his career, which is very low compared to the UFC average of ~10 strikes attempted per minute. – Tyron Woodley has a negative striking differential -.78 per minute over the course of his MMA career.
For me, those stats paint a pretty damning picture for Woodley on a number of levels. If Tyron Woodley is not throwing punches, he can’t land a knockout blow. His recent career has been an unfortunate reverse goldilocks situation. After several outings where he looked down right despondent and uninterested, getting out wrestled and out grappled by Burns and Covington in lifeless defeats, he came out like a spark plug against Vincente Luque in March and actually found some success. As is typical in a Vincente Luque fight, he is obligated to take one brick to the face before he can get serious and start throwing mean, thudding counters. Tyron was giddy with excitement after hurting Luque and barreled forward with his chin as high as his hopes, getting checked for his aggression and ultimately sent on the spiral towards another defeat in that moment. While Tyron did not officially get knocked down or knocked out in that fight, he was badly rocked, lost his equilibrium, and resorted to holding himself up with the cage.
However, therein lies the danger with this fight from a betting perspective; Jake Paul is no Vincente Luque. Vincente Luque is a cracking counter puncher who has off-switched some of the most durable welterweights in all of mixed martial arts (see Belal Muhammad fight) and who currently sits at #4 in the official UFC welterweight rankings. Woodley’s 3 losses prior to that came to Champion Kamaru Usman, #1 ranked Colby Covington, and #2 ranked Gilbert Burns. While it is fair to say Tyron Woodley is no longer in his prime and no longer an elite UFC welterweight contender, it is fair to remind ourselves that Woodley was taken down seven times in his last 4 losses, spending about 38 minutes in ground positions being controlled.
I was confident in picking Jake Paul to defeat Ben Askren because despite my love and respect for Ben as a competitor, his hip (which has since been surgically replaced) was clearly limiting his speed and mobility. Moreover, Ben never had devastating power nor effective volume striking. He had very few paths to victory in a boxing match. Tyron Woodley was more willing than Ben Askren to stand and strike in his MMA career, and he was infinitely more successful at doing so. Tyron Woodley was selected by Jake Paul for this fight because it creates a legitimate intrigue in the outcome of the fight (because people want to see Paul lose) but it is still a winnable fight for Jake that presents him some natural advantages.
If there is one thing you can bank on Jake Paul doing, it is picking a fight that is appropriate to his level of readiness. In 2018, he took on an amateur boxing match with Deji that saw Rd. 5 before Deji’s corner saw fit to throw the towel. Paul didn’t walk through Deji by any means. He ate a few counters and got his nose busted up in that fight. Since then, he has taken on three professional bouts, each with a greater air of credibility (i.e. “former professional athlete” Nate Robinson), and delivered spectacularly so far, securing 3 early KO’s. I don’t expect Jake Paul to walk through Tyron Woodley in the first round as he has with past opponents unless Tyron Woodley’s chin is completely shot, which we do have to recognize as a legitimate possibility.
Weight Class: Fight will be contested at Cruiserweight (200lbs.)
- Jake Paul has weighed in at
(181.9 lbs) vs. Deji on 8/25/2018
(191.8 lbs) vs. AnEsonGib on 4/6/2020
(189 lbs.) vs. Nate Robinson on 11/29/2020
(191.5) vs. Ben Askren. 4/18/2021
- Tyrone Woodley*
Competitive wrestler at 165lb. Weight class (2x All-American for Missouri)
Tyron competed at 170lb. (Welterweight) for the duration of his MMA career.
His last two UFC bouts he weighed in at 171lb., the maximum limit for WW.
Age:
- Jake Paul is ~24.58 Years Old (DOB = 1/17/1997)
- Tyron Woodley is ~39.38 Years Old (DOB = 4/17/1982)
- Jake Paul is approximately 14.8 years older than Tyron Woodley.
Paul vs. Woodley Picks
I believe the two biggest factors in this fight will be the size and the youth of Jake Paul, who should be able to maintain range with a jab, weigh on Tyron in the clinch, and use volume and footwork to tire out the older fighter with a questionable gas tank. Mass and size play a big role in punching power and durability, and I believe Paul will be the bigger, heavier athlete, and therefore the punching power of Tyron is not necessarily determinative of who will win by KO. In addition, massive age advantages favor younger fighters across combat sports, and 39 and above is the age cohort of fighters most likely to lose via KO by a country mile. I think if this fight somehow sees the scorecards, it could be interesting, as Woodley may land the more significant shots even if he doesn’t land more volume than Paul. I am intrigued by this fight, but ultimately lack the confidence in either fighter to back them on the money line. I believe Jake Paul should be priced around the 60% indication (-150) based on what we know (matches the market opening price), and I assume that the basic anthropomorphic features of Paul are what is driving the betting action in his favor. The amount of unknowns and variables in this fight would lead me to stay away or bet small for fun on either side. I think unfortunately for the betting public, Tyron is being priced about appropriately and the extra juice you would have to lay on Paul at this point means there may be no value in betting this fight. Because of my uncertainty, I would lean towards the over 3.5 rounds on the totals market, but at a greater than 50% indication I honestly have no interest in taking a side.
What I can say for sure is that I will be attending this fight in person, and I am expecting fireworks. Gone are the days of the Triller Fight Club parading around their lack of seriousness about their own product. Now, Paul has aligned himself with the much more credible Showtime Sport, home of actual boxing and serious sports coverage. For Paul, this fight represents a massive opportunity to return home to Ohio and leave Cleveland as a bonafide combat sports star. For Tyron Woodley, it represents a boxing match with a very solid and well matched undercard featuring the likes of Tommy Fury (half-brother of World Champion Tyson Fury), Amanda Serrano, Daniel Dubois, and Ivan Baranchyk. I hope that everyone enjoys the card, and if you do decide to bet it, do so within reason (smaller bet sizes) and potentially target the prop market. I truly believe that finding a meaningful edge on this fight will be difficult to do, but I wish good luck to everyone trying to do so.
The Pick: Jake Paul defeats Tyron Woodley via standing TKO against the ropes in Rd. 5
The Bet: PASS THIS FIGHT or BET AT YOUR OWN RISK. Difficult fight to handicap
Image Credit: Imagn