UFC Vegas 115 Predictions:

Last week’s fight slate from Seattle was the UFC’s seventh of fourteen straight fight cards. This week, they return to the quaint confines of the UFC’s Las Vegas Meta APEX, where fight fans can witness a 12-fight event populated with some of the most obscure names on the roster.

When providing fight fans with some 42 to 44 events each year, there are bound to be fight cards that stack up less favorably than others. In this instance, the production’s Las Vegas 115 event, which drops Saturday at 2 p.m. PT, is a fight slate that demands selective betting. 

Last week, underdogs finally barked as favorites ran 6-6-1. They stand 82-29-1 on the year or 73%, which is still quite high. The good news is that dogs are not dead. The dog pitched last week in this digital column, Yousri Belgaroui +100, finished his overmatched opponent in the third round of their battle.

Belgaroui’s win allows us to add another unit of profitability to this column’s tally, which currently stands 6-7, -1.60u.

Let’s get to the fights!

Chris Duncan -195 vs. Renato Moicano +165 

Embed from Getty Images

Lightweight (155 pounds) main event

Chris Duncan is a Scottish mixed martial artist whose fighting acumen improves each day and each fight. 

Duncan, 15-2 professionally and 6-1 in the UFC, is a well-rounded fighter who incorporates effective striking and improved grappling into his fight arsenal. He is forward pressing, aggressive, and throws each elbow, strike, or kick with the intent to injure. 

Duncan’s finished 11 of the 15 professional athletes he’s faced. He arrives at this fight prepared to match up against an acquaintance, Renato Moicano, who happens to train at the same gym Duncan does, ATT in Florida.

The fact that these two know each other and have trained together is not entirely uncommon among UFC combatants. However, this is the second time in three fights that the UFC has had Duncan face off against a training partner/fellow gym member, as he earned a physically brutal decision bludgeoning over Rębecki in August last year.

Renato ‘Money’ Moicano is one of the more gregarious athletes in the organization in that his mixed martial arts game has been and was resurrected because of his intellect, his persona, and his yapper.

Moicano was one of the few athletes who understood very early how important popularity, magnetism, and colorful presentation could be when folded into the direction the UFC had taken. He transitioned himself from a mousy, awkward submission fighter to a verbose, podcasting UFC character who spews, taunts, and recites when any microphone is available to him.

Moicano metamorphosized his persona in short order and became Money Moicano, a loud, turgid, ranting personality that fans gravitated to immediately. 

Moicano’s transformation has captured the imagination of the fans and the UFC, for his change of personality also corresponded with a change in his fighting results. Moicano rattled off four impressive wins from 2022 to 2024 before his schtick was thwarted by then-champion Islam Makhachev in a title fight waged in 2024. 

Moicano, now 36, never would have received that lightweight championship opportunity last January had Money Moicano not been introduced just a couple of years earlier.

On Saturday, Moicano, the personality and the BJJ/Muay Thai black belt, takes on a Scottish badger in Duncan, with each man quite aware of the other’s fighting weaponry, tactical prowess, and strength. 

Money Moicano opened a -220 favorite in this fight to Duncan’s +180. However, the public is not buying into Moicano after his loss to Makhachev and another to Beneil Dariush in June of last year. The line has turned in this fight, and now Duncan is the favorite at -190 with the takeback on Moicano +165. 

This fight revolves around Moicano’s ability to clasp onto Duncan, negate his striking power, his forward pressing aggression, and then grapple with Duncan.  Moicano’s advantage lies on the ground, in the grappling. The question is, can he get Duncan there?

For Duncan, this fight is about keeping the Brazilian on the feet and forcing Moicano into a stand-up war where the power, will, and toughness of the Scottish fighter may shine. What Duncan can’t do is get wild. He cannot allow himself to get caught up with belligerent forward pressure. That will give Moicano the chance to clasp and hold. 

No, Duncan must be his forceful self but measured until he can soften the thirty-six-year-old up for a round or so with hooks, crosses, knees to the body and elbows to the dome. 

It’s true that Moicano has been in with a higher level of opponent. He’ll sport slight height/reach advantages. However, Duncan arrives with tremendous momentum and the striking ability to crumple the Brazilian should he catch him. 

Moicano’s personality and drawing power did a lot to get him this main event opportunity, while Duncan’s striking power, toughness, and determination have earned him his place in this main event. 

Duncan wearing the favorite’s tag is accurate in my opinion. 

The fact that this line has moved so much and in such a short time tells me that perhaps the mates at the fight gym and ‘others’ from Florida who watch these two train have had some impact on the price of this fight. 

Pass.

Total in this fight: 2.5 Rds Over -160

Tabatha Ricci -115 vs. Virna Jandiroba -105 

Women’s Strawweight (115 pounds)

Seventh-ranked Tabtaha Ricci is a tiny, explosive athlete with black belts in Muay Thai and BJJ. Ricci, called ‘baby shark,’ has a fight game that is sharp and tight

Unfortunately,  Ricci lacks size, as she would surely be a championship contender if there were a lighter division than 115 pounds in the UFC. Instead, she is forced to grind her way to decisions against larger competitors because of her compact physical structure. In fights, she is tenacious and throws strikes/kicks in volume.

Third-ranked strawweight Jandiroba is also a black belt in BJJ with a green/white prajied in Muay Thai.

Jandiroba will be the larger lady in the cage, standing two inches taller and holding a three-inch reach advantage. At 37, she will be the older fighter but the more experienced combatant entering this fight after a championship loss to Mackenzie Dern last October. 

Once the dance begins, Ricci still has much to overcome as the slightly undersized aggressor has yet to face the elite of the division. 

Meanwhile, Jandiroba is large for strawweight; she is deeply experienced against the division’s elite, and she’s mean. 

It’s likely that she is looking to put that last fight behind her and begin a new run. Jandiroba will do all she can to transition this fight to the floor, where her size will be most effectively leveraged.

Interestingly, Jandiroba opened -190, so I read the trajectory of each lady a bit differently than the market seems to. Nonetheless, it’s Jandiroba if I’m picking fights, and this must be the basement price unless I am missing something like an amputation. 

UFC Vegas 115 Best Bet: Virna Jandiroba -105

Total in this fight: 2.5 Rds Over -440

Friday, the ‘Bout Business Podcast drops both at GambLou.com and across all podcast platforms. Thank you for reading, and enjoy the fights!ank you for reading, and enjoy the fights! 

The post UFC Vegas 115: Duncan vs. Moicano Odds, Picks, Predictions and Best Bets appeared first on VSiN.