Sportsbook.ag UFC Fight Night 73 Betting Preview: Teixeira vs St. Preux

Glover Teixeira looks to rebound from losing two straight matches when he goes against Ovince St. Preux, winner of seven of his last eight bouts, at UFC Fight Night 73 in Nashville.

Glover Teixeira (22-4-0) vs. Ovince St. Preux (18-6-0)

Five Round Light Heavyweight Bout

Sportsbook.ag Line: Teixeira -115, St. Preux -115

 

Teixeira took MMA by storm after starting his career 2-2, managing to rattle off 20 consecutive victories between 2006 and 2013 with the last five of those coming in the UFC circuit. Those five wins have come in a few different ways with two TKOs, two submissions and a unanimous decision. As he moves up the ranks though, his streak has come to an end, and the No. 4 ranked light heavyweight fighter has been defeated in each of his last two visits to the octagon, first to Jon Jones in a battle for the Light Heavyweight Championship where a unanimous decision decided his fate over five rounds and a similar result came when he faced-off against Phil Davis over three rounds. The second-degree Brazilian jiu-jitsu holder worked hard to get to this point and will be itching to get back to his winning ways against OSP.

Speaking of St. Preux, the 32-year-old fighter from Miami, FL comes into this bout following a stretch of very strong fights as he has taken just one loss since mid-2012 (7-1). Each of his victories came before a decision needed to be made either by TKO (4), submission (2) or technical decision (1). In that stretch he earned “Performance of the Night” accolades twice and knocked out his opponent in the first round at his two most recent fights; one of which ended in a mere 34 seconds against Mauricio Rua in late 2014. St. Preux is an athletic beast with a blue belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu and should be able to give anybody in his weight class a run for their money.

 

Teixeira is an aggressive fighter who will throw out a ton of punches as well as take quite a few. Overall, he is averaging 4.15 significant strikes per minute at 41% accuracy, while taking nearly the same amount (3.67 SApM) with opponents landing their strikes at 42% accuracy. He’s been dominated in his last two outings though, with a meager 62 significant strikes landed in eight rounds as Jon Jones and Phil Davis have unloaded a blistering 187 significant strikes on his body.

 

He was also on the mat a ton during that stretch, being taken down 12 times between the two bouts as Jones even had two submission attempts. Those takedowns were rare against some of the better fighters in the division, and before those fights, Teixeira had not hit the mat in any of his first five UFC bouts. He did not have a takedown during the two losses, but in his career he has been able to average a solid 2.32 takedowns per 15 minutes in the octagon with 50% accuracy.

 

The aggressiveness that this Brazilian-born fighter possesses could certainly result in a very quick end to this fight, but he will need to put his most recent two losses behind him in order to do so.  

 

St. Preux takes things much slower than his opponent in this one, landing 2.63 significant strikes per minute, but does so at a much better accuracy (50%). His last two fights have been so quick that he has outstuck his opposition by just 11 (27-16), and actually was on the losing end of that category (45-50) in his previous four bouts; in which he went 3-1. He has not taken too much damage in his career, with a low 1.73 significant strikes landing per minute against him at 49% accuracy, so he should be on the fresher side of the two fighters.

 

In his career he is getting 1.70 takedowns per 15 minutes in the octagon, but has seen that number decrease recently with just five takedowns in his last seven matches. Other than being taken down nine times in his loss to Ryan Bader about a year ago, he has hit the mat once in his last eight bouts and has an overall takedown defense of 66% in his career.

St. Preux can also get things done quickly like Teixeira, but seems to have a more versatile arsenal of tricks, so it will be interesting to see who gets things done when the bell rings in Nashville.