Preview: UFC 277 ‘Pena vs. Nunes 2’

Light Heavyweights

#4 LHW | Magomed Ankalaev (16-1, 8-1 UFC) vs. #5 LHW | Anthony Smith (36-16, 11-6 UFC)

ODDS: Ankalaev (-500), Smith (+400)

It is starting to feel inevitable that Ankalaev will find his way to a light heavyweight title shot, so it would be nice if the Russian could recapture some of the form that made him such an exciting prospect. Ankalaev was one of the top rising talents in the world when the UFC picked him up in 2018, a fact which made his debut all the more memorable. Ankalaev essentially beat Paul Craig pillar to post for about 14 and a half minutes, only for Craig to clamp on a desperation triangle choke to somehow force Ankalaev to tap with just one second remaining. However, Ankalaev rebounded with an impressive redemption tour. Known mostly as a wrestler with vicious ground-and-pound, it was nice to see Ankalaev string together some knockouts during his rise back through the ranks. Since Ankalaev has started facing ranked opposition, the excitement has mostly come to a halt. Nikita Krylov’s aggression caused him to shrink a bit, and wins over Volkan Oezdemir and Thiago Santos drove home Ankalaev’s focus on control and comfort with a slow pace above all else. It does appear at times that Ankalaev has the skills to blow his opposition out of the water but instead lets them hang around, which makes for an interesting dynamic heading into this fight against Smith.

Smith’s climb up the light heavyweight ladder was a fun story. Cut from the UFC after one loss as a middleweight in 2013, “Lionheart” worked his way back to the promotion three years later and started a campaign as an entertaining middle-of-the-road fighter. Then Smith decided to move up to light heavyweight in 2018, and somehow, it took him less than a year to become the division’s top contender. Conventional wisdom was that Smith’s winning streak to make it to his crack at Jon Jones was mostly fool’s gold—Rashad Evans and Mauricio Rua were clearly past their prime, and Oezdemir was still basking in the glow of a similarly flawed winning streak that earned him his own title shot. After Smith clearly lost his title shot, the thought was that he would fall back into the light heavyweight pack quickly afterwards. Things seemed well on that way after one-sided losses to Glover Teixeira and Aleksandar Rakic in 2020, but Smith has quietly rebounded with three straight wins, suddenly finding himself on the fringes of the light heavyweight title picture once again. Smith is an odd fighter to analyze, as there is a frailty to his game that often gets blown apart, but once he finds an opening to turn the fight around, he is difficult to stop, although he has usually come back from the brink of defeat in order to do so. If Ankalaev keeps up his recent form and refuses to put his foot on the gas pedal, it is easy to see Smith settling into a groove that lets him find some effective moments of offense and possibly steal this fight. With that said, everything hinges on Ankalaev giving up every advantage, and even then, the Russian is a hard enough hitter that he can probably sit on a lead even while in unimpressive form. If Ankalaev ever decides to pivot back to the wrestling that made him such a hyped talent to begin with, he could turn this into an absolute mauling. The safest bet is that Ankalaev manages to thread the needle and comfortably win while also having an uninspiring performance. The pick is Ankalaev via decision.

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Pena vs. Nunes
Moreno vs. France
Pavlovich vs. Lewis
Pantoja vs. Perez
Ankalaev vs. Smith
The Prelims