Francis Ngannou's Return to MMA: What to Expect & Predictions

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00:00The return of Francis Nagano.

00:01People have been waiting for a long time for this.

00:03Unfortunately, it did not look as good in boxing as we hoped.

00:06You know, he looked great against Tyson Fury,

00:08just doesn't get the decision.

00:09Maybe kind of got robbed there a little bit,

00:11and then comes out against Anthony Joshua,

00:13and things just go wrong really quickly for him,

00:15making his return back to the MMA world,

00:18where people have been thirsting for him to be.

00:20What do you see after the long layoff for him?

00:21What are you expecting for him

00:23and against this badass in Ferreira?

00:26Well, look, when we're talking betting, right,

00:28you got to look at the odds of this fight,

00:29and I'm a little thrown off.

00:31I think they're a lot wider than they should be here.

00:33You know, you talk about Francis Nagano

00:35with the inactivity in mixed martial arts,

00:38but with the heavyweight division,

00:39you don't always see the full landscape

00:41of the mixed martial arts, right?

00:42You don't always see the wrestling, the jiu-jitsu,

00:44the scrambles, the exchanges you do

00:45with the lighter divisions.

00:47So I don't know if the inactivity is going to be

00:48really a problem for him.

00:50What concerns me, though, is what you mentioned,

00:51is that knockout to Anthony Joshua.

00:53That didn't happen too long ago,

00:55and Francis has never been rocked like that,

00:57and he was legitimately knocked out.

01:00He is now fighting someone who's younger,

01:02more athletic, bigger, maybe stronger,

01:07and it's a very tough fight for Francis here,

01:10but Francis does have other paths to victory.

01:12You know, when he fought Cyril Gagnon

01:14in his last UFC fight,

01:15he fought someone in Gagnon who was a very good kickboxer.

01:18So what did he do?

01:19He turned into a wrestler,

01:20and he won by grappling, control,

01:23and doing damage on the ground.

01:24If he was to do that here,

01:27that would be the least path to resistance,

01:28but I just don't see it happening.

01:30I feel like this fight's going to be on the feed.

01:32The first couple of minutes is going to be a little bit slow.

01:34They're both going to respect their power,

01:36but I'm going to go with the underdog here.

01:37I do think Ferreira, you know,

01:39he's had a little bit of a up and down

01:41earlier on with the PFL,

01:43but his last few fights, he's looked fantastic.

01:45If he can keep this fight on the feet

01:46with that reach, that power, that athleticism,

01:49I think we may see the underdog bark here.

01:50So I'm going to go with Henning Ferreira here at those odds.

01:53They're just too wide for me

01:55to not take a shot in a heavyweight fight,

01:57where if someone hits that chin,

01:58they're going to the shadow realm.

01:59I'm going to go with the younger,

02:00more athletic fighter here.

02:03Yeah, of course, you know, as we saw so long

02:05with Nagano early in his career,

02:06which is if he gets a knockout or not,

02:08and if you can have a chin, you know,

02:10and that last, he's going to have an issue

02:12that changed with the Gaon fight.

02:13You know, I wonder, when I was looking at this fight myself,

02:16like if, you know, looking back at the Verdun fight

02:18that Ferreira lost, you know, a while ago now

02:20for him, a couple of years, but still,

02:21can he employ that same strategy?

02:23But I just said a long layoff, the knockout to Joshua,

02:26we didn't know where his chin, and also, you know,

02:27don't forget, he also suffered a terrible tragedy

02:30with the loss of his son in between there,

02:32since we've seen him, and so who knows

02:33where his head is going to be at, unfortunately.

02:35He says that's inspiring him to come back,

02:37but we'll see.

02:39That's a tough thing for anybody to deal with

02:40and keep that focus in a fight like this.

02:43Is there any other way, I mean, obviously,

02:44when you get that kind of juice, it's just easy to say,

02:46this is how I'm going to play it and stay away.

02:48Are there any other angles you like?

02:49You know, is there a round total?

02:51Is there a path to victory that you see

02:52that could, you know, give you even better odds

02:55in the prop market for this fight?

02:56Or are you just staying just straight up money line

02:58and, you know, not playing with it other ways?

03:01Oh, I think if Ferreira's going to win,

03:03it's going to win by knockout.

03:04It'd be very hard to imagine him

03:05seeing going all five rounds,

03:07winning a decision from bell to bell.

03:09So I would, you know, if the plus 260

03:12doesn't wet your beak enough, take him by TKO or KO.

03:15You know, the under over here,

03:16if it's an over under one and a half,

03:19that one, I would probably hold off on

03:21because sometimes when you see these type of strikers

03:24at power, there's a feeling out period.

03:26You may see some calf kicks to try and slow one of them down,

03:28which all of a sudden before, you know,

03:30we're in the second round.

03:31But if the two and a half round marker

03:33becomes the over under, I would play the under there.

03:36But there's enough, you know,

03:38there's enough value on Ferreira by money line by TKO.

03:41I don't even think we need to play the over under here,

03:45especially because I think if Nganu goes to the wrestling,

03:47this can go a little bit deeper than people expect.

03:49So we're hoping that this fight

03:51is the battle of the giants on the feet,

03:54not a battle of the giants on the mat

03:56because that will get a little boring,

03:57but I'm expecting a knockout here.

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