UFC Fight Night 179: Dricus du Plessis vs. Markus Perez Picks, Odds, and Predictions

Markus Perez and Dricus du Plessis fight Saturday during UFC Fight Night 179 at Flash Forum.

Markus Perez enters this fight with a 12-3 record and has won 50 percent of his fights by submission. Perez has split his last six fights and is coming off a November loss to Wellington Turman. Perez is averaging 2.75 significant strikes per minute with an accuracy percentage of 48 percent. Perez is averaging 1.08 takedowns with an accuracy percentage of 26 percent. Perez is coming off a decision loss at UFC Fight Night 164, a fight where he was far more accurate with the strikes but was taken down twice. Perez now looks to avoid back-to-back losses for the first time in his career. Perez grew up training Kung-Fu, and he’s a bitemn belt in BJJ and a black belt in Muay Thai. Perez is an accurate striker on his feet and loves mixing in leg kicks and has a solid ground and pound. Perez can also be a bit unpredictable on his feet and has a nasty spinning back elbow knockout victory. Perez has six career submission victories with two of them coming via the arm-triangle choke. This will be Perez’s first career fight in Abu Dhabi.

Dricus du Plessis enters this fight with a 14-2 record and has won 64 percent of his fights by submission. du Plessis has won five of his last six fights and is coming off a December win over Brendan Lesar. du Plessis will make his UFC debut in this fight, as we last saw him at EFC Africa 83 where he won the EFC Middleweight Championship. du Plessis will be replacing Rodolfo Vieira, who had to step out of this bout due to a rib injury. du Plessis is a 26-year-old South African who has a 76-inch reach and has finished all 14 of his victories. In fact, all 16 of du Plessis’ fights overall have been finishes. du Plessis is an exciting striker with knockout pop in his hands, but he’s produced nine submission victories and four of those wins have come by the guillotine choke. du Plessis doesn’t waste a whole lot of time finding his rhythm in the octagon and his takedown ability is sure to give a lot of fighters in this division trouble. This will be du Plessis’ first career fight in Abu Dhabi.

Perez is the more proven fighter on the UFC stage obviously and he probably has the edge on the feet due to his creativity and unpredictable style. However, du Plessis is a potential star in this division if he stays in the UFC, as he’s aggressive, is excellent and clan with his takedowns, and he finishes fights. At only 26 years old, there’s a lot of potential with du Plessis and it won’t take long for people to take notice. Perez has been hit or miss these last couple of years and now has to prepare for a different fighter on short notice who is also a tougher matchup.

I’ll lay the reasonable price with du Plessis winning his UFC debut.