After a pretty dang good PPV we head to Qatar for a fight night headlined by Arman Tsarukyan vs Dan Hooker in what should be a title contender eliminator, unless Hooker wins and then I think we see Gaethje or Paddy get the title shot. The co-main is also has massive implications as former champ Belal Muhammad squares off against Ian Machado Garry in a bout for the #1 contender for the welterweight division. We had Spivac pull out, but Salsa Boy stepped in on 3 days notice and flew out to Qatar, so we get Waldo vs Shamil at heavyweight. 14 fights total, should be a good card all around.
Without further delay, let’s get going on our Saturday morning UFC Qatar slate sleuthing. In this article I will be identifying some of my favorite plays on the slate and will split them up into different categories. Let’s crush this event together!
TOP PLAYS
These plays are the higher owned fighters on the slate that I believe have a good chance to meet or exceed their value. These plays should be great to use for your low risk contests such as double-ups, 50/50’s, and small-field single entry contests. They should also make a nice core to build around for your multiple-entry contests.
Abdul Rahjman Yahkaev | $9800 | -1800 | 34%
Not much to say here, he is juiced to the gills and favored to win by first round finish. He needs it to be later in the round with a lot of strikes, or early for the quick finish bonus to pay off, and his price point of 9800 is the only reason he is not 50%+ owned.
Arman Tsarukyan | $9500 | -500 | 47%
Arman is going to drag Hooker to the mat over and over and over until he gasses him and wins. He is not going to stand and trade shots with Hooker, so I fully expect to see Arman wrestle heavy and often the entire fight and wear Hooker out en route to finding a finish. He could very well ride out every round with top control and not finish the fight en route to a boring decision, but either way his upside with DK scoring is phenomenal here.
Myktybek Orolbai | $9000 | -240 | 34%
Hermansson is moving down a weight class, and gets set up against the machine who just marches forwards and shoots takedowns in Orolbai. He averages almost 6 takedowns per fight, and is 10 years younger than Jack so I fully expect a typical Orolbai fight of pressure, takedowns, and trying to find a finish. The weight cut will probably hurt Jack’s chin and he is coming off a KO loss, so I think we see a nice DK score here.
GPP PIVOTS
These plays are the fighters that I think have potential to give you leverage over the field in your large-field tournaments and mass multiple-entry contests. They are best used as pivots from similarly priced, more heavily owned fighters. If they win, you then have leverage over the field.
Volkan Oezdemir | $8900 | -225 | 22%
These guys both have big power, are almost identical with their offense wrestling/grappling analytics, but the difference here is Volkan has had good wins in the UFC and I think we either see him win by KO when Menifield takes a risk, or a boring decision where they trade shots and Oezdemir outstrikes him. The KO power is why he is a GPP pivot.
Ian Machado Garry | $8800 | -250 | 13%
They may be the two most hated welterweights ever who have actually been good fighters. Belal coming off losing his title, and Garry coming in knowing he needs a statement win for the title shot against Islam. Garry is by far superior on the feet, has tremendously improved his grappling in the last couple years since moving to Chute Boxe and I think we see him piece Belal up. Belal is going to shoot takedowns early and often, and I would not be surprised to see Ian catch him on the way in and finish him with a TKO stoppage.
Denzel Freeman | $8600 | -195 | 25%
This is a big American wrestler vs Polish BJJ practitioner. Both are mediocre real life fighters, but the fight is -600 to finish inside the distance, and Freeman has fought tougher level of competition in LFA and PFL, so I am going to side with him to navigate any tricky submission attempts by Bujlo and find a finish here.
LIVE DOGS
Due to the salary based nature of DraftKings daily fantasy, you will need an underdog or two in your lineup. Below you will find my favorite underdog plays on the slate along with the contest types that I prefer them for. These fighters are supposed to lose based on the betting odds, but have a better chance of providing value in my opinion than their salary suggests.
Bezkat Almakhan | $8200 | +110 | 18%
This fight has swung to Topuria being the betting favorite, and I think Bezkat is very live to find a finish. This is one of those fights where it seems like the name of Topuria is driving his odds and ownership more than the actual skill, as Aleksandre looked mediocre in his last fight whereas Almakhan had a nice finish. Give me the guy at lower ownership with finishing upside.
Alex Perez | $7500 | +180 | 17%
He is a little chinny, but Asu the midget is not really known for his power shots. He will have to fend off the relentless takedown attempts that Almabayev will shoot, but I think he is a better overall fighter at this point in their careers and has better standup. He will mix in wrestling of his own, and Asu only has a 50% takedown defense.
Bogdan Grad | $7100 | +210 | 23%
Riley is coming in with some big hype bc of where he trains, but how many times have we seen someone who looked good on the Contender Series step into the cage against someone with UFC experience and get starched? Bogdan will work in takedowns, he averages 3 per fight so far through his 2 fights, and if he can keep Riley from piecing him up on the feet and making this a drag him to the mat kind of night, I think we see him pull an upset.
FADES
One of the most important parts of multiple-entry lineup construction is reducing the number of “bad” lineups that you enter. To achieve this you will want to remove some fighters from consideration, or at least come in significantly under the field on those fighters. Below you will find the fighters that I will be fading from my lineups.
Waldo/Shamil | $8500/8400 | N/A | 23% / 21%
I think we see this fight take place on the feet, with low volume, and no finish. That means the winner would project to score around 65 DK points without a finish.
Ismail Naurdiev | $8500 | -140 | 20%
I think Loder will stick to him like glue with the wrestling and try to mitigate the KO power Ismail has against him. Would not surprise me one bit if Loder pulled an upset and won off control time without a ton of strikes and scored like 70 points.
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