Learning How to Pick MMA Winners Can Enhance Your Love of the Sport

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Half the fun of watching fights is trying to predict who’s going to win. We’re not in the cage trying to get a KO, so part of our excitement comes from reading about the fight and predicting who will come out on top. Unfortunately, a lot of people are as overconfident as James Toney when it comes to predicting the outcome of an MMA bout. 

Even though, just like Toney, people’s predictions get taken down time and time again, many cage-side pundits never learn their lesson. However, those who are willing to learn the complex art of MMA, study the stats, and think critically, do have a shot at improving their win ratio. And, in the process of becoming a better tipster, you can get a better appreciation for MMA as a sport.

It’s Fun to Play MMA Picking Games

In terms of friendly competition, being able to pick winners is great. Getting one up on a buddy is definitely satisfying. However, thanks to the advent of legal sports betting in the US, your picking skills can result in more than a warm feeling of satisfaction. Sports betting was available in 36 US states and counting in January 2023.

That’s actually good news for MMA fans on a variety of levels. Yes, there are legal ways to speculate on fights. However, online sportsbooks are packed with useful information. Take, for example, DraftKings. Often rated among the best betting sites for MMA, DraftKings offers odds on fights from multiple organizations, not just the UFC. For example, you can bet on Invicta FC bouts if that’s your thing. DraftKings also goes above and beyond by offering big-fight previews as well as the latest in MMA news and developments.

More Information Means More MMA Insights

Therefore, what you get as an MMA fan is a platform through which you can get fight insights from the perspective of betting experts. Then, of course, you’ve got ways to bet on fights which brings us back to our opening premise: picking winners. There are no guarantees in fighting or sport in general. Almost any fighter that steps into a cage has a puncher’s chance of winning (unless they throw hands like Ben Askren). The odds might be ridiculously small, but rarely is a fighter ever a 100% lock to win.

This makes MMA betting harder than it seems. For example, who would have picked Rose Namajunas to beat Joanna Jędrzejczyk back in 2017? Did anyone (apart from hardcore MMA fans) think Jared Gordon was going to push cheeky scouser Paddy Pimblett to a controversial decision at UFC 282? The point here is that picking fights isn’t easy, even if the result seems obvious. You can, however, give yourself a fighting chance of making it better with one simple strategy: analyzing results.

Think Critically About Results

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It’s always worth looking at a fighter’s recent results before making a prediction. Are they full of confidence thanks to a winning streak or are they riding a three-fight skid? These are important questions to ask, but don’t stop there. How did the fighter win? What type of opponent were they facing? A stand-up fighter with five wins over strikers may not do well against a grappler. Thinking about fights in this way can help you get a better understanding of the match and, in turn, MMA as a sport.

As we said, our enjoyment of MMA partly comes from our desire to predict the outcome. Even if we don’t realize it, we’re all fight analysts at heart. Therefore, the more information and knowledge you have, the better analyst you can be. The better you can be at analyzing fights, the more you’ll understand and engage with the sport. That, in theory, should make you better at picking winners but, more importantly, it should make you enjoy MMA more than you do already.