Sydney, Australia is the host city for this week’s UFC 325 a fight card populated with ten legitimate UFC matchups and four ‘Road to the UFC’ fights.
Sydney will utilize the larger thirty-foot octagon, and these battles will be held in front of an always raucous Aussie crowd.
Start time in the USA is 2PM PST for early prelims, 4PM PST for Preliminary fights then 6PM PST for the main card which will be the norm for these Paramount events,
As an aside, this column handicaps UFC fights only so this week we have ten bouts populated with an international set of combatants. Nine Aussie athletes (and Fiziev from Phuket, Thailand) will benefit from the lack of travel while fighters from the US, Mexico Brazil and Wales will need to commute into Australia for their confrontations all against local Aussie fighting talent.
Travel to any foreign fight slate is an important factor especially regarding fighter weigh-ins as plane rides bloat passengers. Another factor is WHEN athletes arrive to any foreign location for altitude and time differences are real factors in fights and must be addressed by athletes and handicappers alike.
Handicapping this or any foreign event means understanding that often local/regional athletes can be paired in somewhat favorable matchups to both encourage the crowd to be hysterical as well and more importantly to spread the UFC’s brand in that geographical area.
In other words, there can be great advantage being a local/regional athlete when the UFC travels abroad,
Last week favorites went 8-3 in the UFC after realizing a 330-154-18 (65.7%) result in 2025.
Alexander Volkanovski -160 vs. Diego Lopes +145 Featherweight (145lbs.) Title
This is an immediate rematch of a championship battle that transpired last April in Miami where Volkanovski retained his featherweight title via a unanimous decision.
Current number two ranked Diego Lopes debuted in the UFC in May of 2023 and took current UFC featherweight Mosvar Evloev, currently the division’s number one ranked fighter to a razor tight split decision loss …on a five-day notice!
Since that decision loss, Lopes, who has leapfrogged over Evloev for this SECOND title opportunity has dominated five highly decorated featherweight adversaries leading into that championship opportunity last April against Vokanovski where he was exposed on several levels.
In that bout Volkanovski, then thirty-six displayed keen footwork, world class wrestling and a depth of fight experience in remaining one step ahead of thirty-year-old Lopes on his way to a definitive unanimous decision win.
Lopes, a BJJ blackbelt training in Mexico will still hold that five-year youth advantage coming into this return fight, he remains six inches the taller fighter and he’ll possess an inch of reach advantage over the champion but I question what he has accomplished physically in the last calendar year to close the skill gap between he and Volkanovski.
In fact he was displaying similar difficulty keeping up with his last opponent Brazilian Jean Silva before Silva ran into a spinning elbow that ended the fight.
Lopes has substantial power and while he is tough, durable and steps into this bout after that stunning knockout victory over Silva, my judgement is that what he needed to refine and improve the most, namely his footwork and quickness in order to compete with the current champion have not been addressed appropriately from last year to this.
Volkanovski has not fought since these two last tangled as well he competes in his home country Australia as opposed to the travel he incurred for their last fight in the Latino mecca that is Miami, Fl.
Volkanovski’s intelligence, his cardio, the completeness of his mixed martial arts weaponry and his deft strike defense together with his nimble footwork and depth of five round championship experience still provide him advantage over anyone in the division let alone a young but hungry warrior he beat soundly less than one year ago.
Volkanovski opened -130/-135 for the first bout between these two and closed at -155/-160.
For this championship bout Volkanovski opened -150/-155 where this line sits currently.
Total in this fight: sits 3.5Rds -130 at some shops and 4.5 Rds. -110 at others.
When I see these early differences in totals, the end result almost always ends up being a fight lined at 4.5 rounds. There is advantage to be had if one considers attacking that 3.5 Rds. Over -130 (DK).
Mauricio Ruffy -120 vs. Raphael Fiziev +100
Ruffy, the organizations fourteenth ranked lightweight arrives to Australia prepared to rectify the beating he incurred at the hands of Benoit Saint-Denis last September. Prior to that fight Ruffy, a Fighting Nerd from Brazil who is a long, lean striking machine displayed tremendous aptitude, speed, and refined precision in decimating several worthy adversaries.
Not decorated with any awarded belts, Ruffy does display lighting fast Capoeira tendencies which include spinning heel kicks, flying knees and an overall aggressive display of striking aggression.
What exposed the aggressive flamboyant striker in that last fight was his complete inability to grapple, wrestle or defend the takedown, a weakness that will soon need to be addressed ..but not for this bout.
For this fight Ruffy draws a great dance partner in Rafael Fiziev who is the striking coach at Phuket, Thailand’s Tiger Muay Thai, a gym that is world renown.
Fiziev too packs great power in his diversity of strikes, kicks, elbows, and knees. What makes this fight so fascinating is that neither of these cats can even spell wrestling. Spectator’s watching this artillery launch will witness a short, compact, explosive Kyrgyzstani in Fiziev who holds a blue belt in BJJ compete against a man similarly equipped in UFC weaponry, however one who will stand thee inches taller, will hold a three-and-a-half-inch reach advantage, and will be three years the younger combatant.
Once this fight begins my best advice is to not blink, for Ruffy will strive to maintain distance and bludgeon the incoming Fiziev with numbing strikes which will emanate from every angle, and limb.
Fiziev for his part has matrix-like defense and it will be his chore to navigate his way inside on Ruffy which will mute Ruffy’s length/effectiveness and simultaneously allow Fiziev to unleash his own artistic yet devastating array of knees, elbows, fists, and kicks onto the Brazilian athlete.
The clash of body types and the relative similarities in how each of these dominators wants to win should be epic watching.
In the end, it is Fiziev, 7-4 in the UFC, who has been in with the more qualified and capable set of opponents, it’s Fiziev who has the benefit of little travel as well he’ll have the crowd on his side.
Ruffy, 3-1 in the UFC will need to navigate that trip from Brazil, make weight then fight the regional athlete in Fiziev in Fiziev’s hemisphere. But with that said, youth, speed, flash, and dynamic may well rest on the Ruffy side.
This bout opened a dead pick-em (-110 each man) and current fight lines can be found from Ruffy -120 to Fiziev -115.
Shop wisely my friends!
Total in this fight: 2.5Rds Over -175
Strong lean over
Quillan Salkilld -1000 vs. Jaime Mullarkey +700 Lightweight (155lbs)
It’s not often we write up a fight with such a cavernous spread difference between combatants, but this fight is going to be the fight that ignites the crowd for this event.
Salkilld is a dead finisher having earned KO’s or submissions in seven of his eleven professional bouts.
He was originally matched up with a Chinese mixed martial artist that was going to accommodate both he and the crowd in China’s RongZhu, a Sanda kickboxing based fighter who is aggressive and powerful.
Rong Zhu was forced to pull out of the fight.
Salkilld pleaded with the UFC to keep him on the card because as one may expect, being an Aussie and competing in front of one’s home compatriots is an honor and Salkilld wanted to remain on the event desperately.
The UFC with it’s deft ability to always keep fight cards populated, found fellow Australian fighter Jamie Mullarkey to jump into this event on but a couple of weeks of notice.
While Salkilld is a finishing machine, Mullarkey unfortunately is a man who gets finished.
Mullarkey, an uber aggressive power striker has twelve fights of experience in the UFC realizing a 6-6 record however, he’s been brutally finished in four of his last eight bouts and the few victories he’s enjoyed were to athletes most of whom no longer compete in the organization.
Props for this fight are not available yet, but this total is listed 1.5 Rds. -165 Under.
It is safe to advise Salkilld via finish in this fight and further even look to Salkilld via KO/TKO/DQ in order to attempt to pry a price out of a fight where the result is almost certain.
Jacob Malkoun -220 vs. Torrez Finney +190 Middleweight (185lbs.)
This is the dinosaur fight.
Not that these guys are old, but each is a wrestling based fighter and in this new Paramount age of violence, finishes and frenzy fifteen minutes of two men rolling on the canvas is not only distasteful to the UFC but the crowd as well. Too bad.
None the less these two will face off in what I handicap to be the wrong man may be favored fight.
Malkoun, 4-3 in the UFC has had an inconsistent UFC career which may be the result of grotesque inactivity.
After three bouts in 2022, Malkoun fought once in 2023 and once in March of 2024, so he’s been on the shelf and in the gym since then.
Evolution in the fight game takes place in the gym yes, but also in the octagon under the bright lights.
The inactivity of Malkoun is of great concern here despite the fact that he’s primarily a wrestler with some degree of danger in his hands.
In Torrez Finney we get a sawed-off American wrestling talent who is as stout as he is tall.
Finney is mad athletic for his build and has had a deep history in competitive wrestling, but his strikes are telegraphed, wide and easy to evade.
Once this fight begins I believe it will be difficult for Malkoun to try to fend off the unrelenting forward pressing wrester that is Finney.
Finney wants to win fights at this early stage of his career, so he will simply sell out in the wrestling then hope to reign damage on the Aussie from the dominant top position.
While Malkoun should hold a striking advantage, it may be difficult for him to create enough space to breath let alone throw a punch.
The difference in wrestling prowess is too wide for the Australian Malkoun to overcome as I handicap this bout.
Finney +190 (circa)
The lines to this fight are all over the board so shop accordingly to capture the best price on Finney available.
Total in this fight 2.5Rds. Over -200
Strong lean over
Friday the ‘Bout Business Podcast drops across all Podcast platforms, it’s also available at GambLou.com
Thank you for reading and enjoy the fights!