MMA DFS Numbers Game: Stats from UFC Fight Night: Woodley vs. Burns

While everything points to a slow crawl toward normalcy amid the current pandemic, the UFC kept churning bouts this past weekend. Mixed Martial Arts moved to the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada, with the world getting a chance to watch one last card before UFC 250.

Now that the fights are over and we have the data from those involved, it is time to look at the numbers and see what happened. I will try to highlight some of the feats accomplished in these bouts.

In this article, I'll be using the DraftKings' scoring system when discussing fantasy points (DKFP). Don't stop checking our MMA Content here at RotoBaller, and give me a follow on Twitter @chapulana!

UFC Fight Night 177: Tyron Woodley vs. Gilbert Burns

We got to experience a full 25-minute fight between former champion Woodley and now-contender Burns this weekend, although it was this close to ending early due to Gilbert's dominance over Tyron. During the time the fight went on, Burns outperformed Woodley 138 to 64 in strikes attempted while landing 83 of them (74%) compared to Woodley's 28 (64%). That success rate is the second-highest ever in Burns' career, and the best if we don't count his win against Demian Maia (he only fought for 2:34 minutes with a 13-16 landed-attempted strikes ratio).

In an unsurprising development, Woodly barely attempted any takedowns against Burns. It's been a constant during his career, only attempting three or more twice in his career, with the last time in occurring back in 2018. He wasn't successful in any of his two attempts against Burns, who, on the other hand, attempted eight and took Woodly to the mat a couple of times for a 25% success.

Woodley's striking outcome was very underwhelming. His 28 strikes landed were the second-fewest (Antonina Shevchenko landed 23) among fighters who went the distance. Still, Woodley's fight was part of the main event, so he had 10 more minutes of octagon time than the rest of the fighters, yet he couldn't do anything with it.

UFC Fight Night 177: Billy Quarantillo vs. Spike Carlyle

Both Quarantillo and Carlyle put on a 15-minute masterclass of efficiency. While the volume wasn't overly high, the ratios were over the top for both fighters.

• Quarantillo attempted 66 strikes and landed 49 of them for a great 81% rate. Carlyle also attempted 66 strikes while landing 37 for an excellent 63% rate.
• While Quarantillo attempted three TDs and landed two (67%), Carlyle was a demon, bringing the game to the ground with six TD attempts and three successful ones (50%).

Had it not been for DraftKings' winning bonus (30, thanks to a Decision, in this case), Quarantillo would have finished with fewer DKFP than Carlyle, who racked up 60.5 DKFP on the night. Quarantillo, bonus excluded, could only get 45.5 himself.

Carlyle's ground management was great. While he could only get 18.5 DKFP through strikes, he was able to get 12 via Advances, 15 on Takedowns, and 15 more on Reverses/Sweeps. Carlyle is one of only four fighters to get three reverses during the past year.

UFC Fight Night 177: Daniel Rodriguez vs. Gabe Green

Although this was an undercard fight, it truly made some history this past weekend, so I can't let it slip through the cracks. Daniel Rodriguez's 344 attempted strikes rank as the 36th-most all-time (there are 9,028 fighter-stat lines in my database) and in the 99th percentile. Gabe Green, his opponent, attempted 273 (138th-most, inside the 98th percentile).

As impressive as that sounds, though, two other fighters have attempted more strikes in 2020: Zhang Weili (408) and Joanna Jedrzejczyk (360) fought each other in early-March, and both broke that mark.

Rodriguez also became one of only 13 fighters to land more than 50% of his strikes while attempting at least 340 of them. It should also be considered that Rodriguez threw all of that volume in a 15-minute flight, and not a 25-minute one.

UFC Fight Night 177: Other Notes

• Jamahal Hill put Kidson Abreu to sleep faster than anyone, logging just 111 seconds of octagon time before winning by KO. Just 14 landed strikes (of 24 thrown) were enough to get him the win. The huge DK-bonus (90 DKFP) for ending the fight that early let Hill finish as the second-best play of the slate (117 DKFP, only behind Daniel Rodriguez's 125.5).
• Mackenzie Dern ended her fight by defeating Hannah Cifers with just five landed strikes. Such low-volume would have killed her upside, but the 90-DKFP bonus boosted her to 92.5 DKFP on the night. Without the bonus, Dern would have ranked dead-last (2.5 DKFP) among winners in all of the event's fights.
• Of the 9,028 fighter-stat lines in my dataset, only 573 of them accounted for at least 10 takedown attempts. Tim Elliott reached that mark this past Saturday and became the 12th fighter to do so in 2020. He is the only fighter that has attempted 10+ TDs this year in two different bouts, losing both (he was successful only 40% and 27% of the time on those Takedown attempts).
• Katlyn Chookagian became the first fighter (man or woman) ever to attempt more than 100 strikes (108), land at least 80% of them (73), and also was 100% successful on takedown attempts (3-for-3) while going for three or more. She defeated Antonina Shevchenko in 15 minutes via decision.

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