DWCS 92 preview: four unbeaten prospects, model only trusts two
Dana White's Contender Series 92 features four undefeated prospects on Tuesday night, and our model likes two of them a lot more than the other two.
Four fighters walk into Tuesday night's Dana White's Contender Series 92 without a loss on their record. Our model is only comfortable with two of them.
DWCS 92 runs Tuesday at the Apex in Las Vegas, streaming on Paramount+, and the card has already survived one full bout falling out (Camila Reynoso vs. Hailai Wushamo, scrapped) and a late opponent swap in the co-main slot. What's left is five fights, four of them built around a fighter carrying a zero in the loss column, which is exactly the kind of card where one good performance turns into a UFC contract by Wednesday morning.
The clearest case belongs to Akbar Abdullaev, the 13-0 Kyrgyz lightweight who lost his original opponent, Anthony Figueroa, and got Ednilson Santos on short notice instead. Santos is 14-7-1 and has been around long enough to know how these nights go for the house favorite. Our model gives Abdullaev a 94 percent win probability, which tracks with a gap that lopsided in experience and finishing power against a veteran taking the fight as a replacement. This is about as close to a formality as Contender Series gets, and Abdullaev's job now is just not to let a short-notice opponent turn into a long night.
Prediction: Abdullaev by finish, inside two rounds.
The other lock, on paper, is Igor Cavalcanti, a 13-2 Brazilian middleweight who gets Peru's Oscar Ravello (13-3-1). Cavalcanti is the betting favorite at minus 354 and the model has him at 75 percent, and there isn't much in either man's resume that argues against it. Ravello is live at plus 273 the way live underdogs always are on this show, where a puncher's chance is the entire pitch, but this reads as the safer of the two "big favorite" fights on the card.
Prediction: Cavalcanti by decision.
Where it gets interesting is the featherweight fight between two unbeaten records that are pointed in opposite directions on the odds board. Tyshawn Williams is 8-0, Antônio Monteiro is 18-5-1, and despite Williams carrying the zero, the market and the model both like Monteiro, 63 percent and minus 248 respectively. That's the kind of gap that should make you look twice at a perfect record. Eight wins is a real sample, but eighteen wins against a mix of competition Monteiro has actually finished people against is a bigger one, and the model is picking résumé depth over an unblemished record.
Prediction: Monteiro by decision.
The last of the four unbeaten prospects is Luis Hernandez, 7-0, in a middleweight fight against France's Hugo Guillon (7-1). This one is closer to a coin flip than the numbers suggest: the model has Hernandez at 73 percent, but the odds only have him a modest favorite at plus 144 underdog pricing on Guillon, not the blowout gap you'd expect if the model's confidence were fully shared by the market. Somebody is wrong here, and on a card this thin on data, that's usually the number, not the model.
Prediction: Hernandez by decision, closer than the model thinks.
That leaves the show's original main event, Mayton Perea (8-3) against the unbeaten Zevan Hunt (7-0) at welterweight, still slotted as the header even with two other fights and a scratched bout ahead of it in the news cycle. The model gives Perea 67 percent, and the odds have him a modest favorite too, minus 119 to Hunt's minus 103, close enough that either result should surprise nobody.
Prediction: Perea by decision.
Four zeroes on one card is a lot even by Contender Series standards, and the model isn't buying all four. Lock in your own picks at the pick'em, and follow the results live at the event page Tuesday night.