SquirrelPatrol's Takedowns: UFC 290: Volkanovski vs. Rodriguez
John Breslin (squirrelpatrol) is one of the best DFS players in the game, having amassed over 75 Live Final seats. Get a glimpse into his process by checking out some of his contrarian MMA DFS picks for the upcoming UFC event.
Welcome to the weekend and to SquirrelPatrol’s Takedowns for UFC 290: Volkanovski vs. Rodriguez. We hit on two of our underdogs in this article last week and it helped me take down a tie for first place in the main UFC contest on DraftKings (along with 44 other people). This week we have a unique 13-fight card with some of the biggest upcoming stars in the UFC along with two 5-round title fights. We’ll need to work particularly hard to find savings on this card with some of the large favorites so appealing (and expensive), so let’s dig into the slate and see if we can find some overlooked picks to get us to the top of the leaderboard with our GPP lineups:
MMA DFS Picks: SquirrelPatrol’s Takedowns for UFC 290: Volkanovski vs. Rodriguez
Yair Rodriguez
DraftKings: $7,000
FanDuel: $13
Alexandre Pantoja
DraftKings: $7,500
FanDuel: $15
I expect both underdogs in the 5-round main events to be popular, and while that would normally cause me to shy away – especially with their ownership potentially exceeding their odds to win their fight – in this case the math adds up to use them heavily in your lineups this Saturday. The higher-priced heavy favorites on this card all have the chance to be slate-breaking, and with the five-round fights likely to go to the distance, even a losing fighter like either Yair Rodriguez or Alexandre Pantoja could land on the optimal lineup. I prefer Yair Rodriguez (+290) to Pantoja (+170) both because of the savings (increasing the likelihood of landing on the winning lineup in a high-paced loss) and because of the higher striking volume.