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The UFC heads back to The Prudential Center in Newark, NJ from a jam-packed UFC 302 PPV event.
Headlining this fight card is none other than the undisputed lightweight champion Islam Makhachev who's looking to defend his title for a record-tieing 3 times when he takes on fan favorite and former interim lightweight champion Dustin "The Diamond" Poirier.
For this article, we are taking a look at a welterweight matchup that should bring a ton of fireworks between "Rudeboy" Randy Brown and Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos. We take a look at this fight and give out our prediction and pick for this Brown-dos Santos matchup.
Randy Brown (18-5)Β is coming off back-to-back victories and the dismantling of Muslim Salikhov with a brutal first-round knockout. That now gives Brown 6 wins in his last 7 fights with his only loss against surging welterweight contender Jack Della Maddalena.
Brown is exceptionally tall standing at 6'3" with a long reach of 78" which will give him a 4" height advantage and a 5" reach advantage over Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos. He uses his length to his advantage in all of his fights, as he utilizes his long limbs with front kicks and a crisp jab to keep his opponents at the end of his strikes.
In this particular matchup against dos Santos, he will need to do what he does best which is to counter his opponents as they come within range and then mix in the grappling to keep them honest. While dos Santos is as tough as they come, he hasn't looked like the same fighter we once saw beating Benoit Saint-Denis to a bloody pulp back in 2021.
As long as Brown can avoid taking the big shots from dos Santos and stays on the outside he can potshot his way to victory even potentially getting the finish to extend his winning streak to 3.
Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos (24-7-1)Β was once considered a legitimate title challenger in the welterweight division but injuries and a long layoff did him in. Now at age 37, his best years are behind him but he's still a tough fight for anyone in the welterweight division as we saw in his most recent fight against Rinat Fakhretdinov.
In that fight against Fakhretdinov, he was getting out grappled for the first two rounds but he maintained his cardio, and as Fakhretdinov faded in round 3 that is when dos Santos went for the kill.
He almost got the finish but ultimately didn't get it and the fight ended with dos Santos getting a 10-8 round 3 having the fight ended in a majority draw.
We forget what Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos did to Benoit Saint-Denis in Saint-Denis' UFC debut where he beat him to a bloody pulp for 15 minutes. Injuries paved the way for a two-year layoff and while he is 1-0-1 in his last 2 fights since returning from the layoff he hasn't looked like the same fighter during his run in the welterweight division.
Dos Santos has a well-rounded skillset that's going to give Brown some fits in this matchup. His pressure is going to need to come in handy as that is going to need to break Brown as the fight progresses. If dos Santos can avoid staying at distance with Brown and get in his preferred range to land his shots he can then land on Brown and keep his winning streak live.
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This is a fantastic main event fight for this UFC 302 event. Both fighters will be looking to extend their winning streak to 3 wins in a row when they take on each other this Saturday night.
Ultimately, it's going to be Brown who's going to be the one getting the better of the exchanges on the feet and being able to keep this fight at his preferred range, and from there Brown will keep dos Santos at the end of his strikes and being the busier fighter outstriking dos Santos for the majority of this fight to get the nod on the judge's scorecards.
FINAL BROWN-DOS SANTOS PICK & PREDICTION: RANDY BROWN (-184)
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