Yair Rodriguez vs. BJ Penn: UFC Fight Night 103 Odds and Predictions

Will this be the comeback fight of former two-division UFC titleholder B.J. Penn? He’ll be returning to the Octagon for the first time since 2014 to face the up and coming featherweight prospect Yair Rodriguez for the UFC Fight Night 103 main event this Sunday in Phoenix, Arizona. Check Sports Interaction’s UFC Fight Night 103 betting odds for updates.

BJ Penn vs. Yair Rodriguez

Records: Rodriguez 9-1 Penn 16-10-2
Division: Featherweight
UFC Odds: Penn +325 Rodriguez -475
Prediction: Rodriquez by KO

This will be the biggest fight of Rodriguez’ career so far. He was was the winner of The Ultimate Fighter: Latin America in 2014, and currently holds a 9-1-0 record in the UFC. Penn hasn’t fought since the summer of 2014, when he was beaten by Frankie Edgar. His last win? Not since November of 2010. He hired himself some new coaching staff in hopes of staging his comeback, giving Greg Jackson and Mike Winklejohn the formidable task.

Rodriguez has made a name for himself as a creative and unpredictable fighter, with a talent for striking and for racking up scorecard points. At 24 years of age and at the start of what could be a solid career, he will simply outfight and outlast the 38-year-old Penn, who’d need his years of experience in the cage, as well as some good old fashioned luck, to get a win here.

Joe Lauzon vs. Marcin Held

Records: Lauzon 26-13 Held 22-5
Division: Lightweight
UFC Odds: Held +110 Lauzon -140
Prediction: Lauzon by submission

If you’re a fan of grappling, this might be your favorite fight of the night. Lauzon is the better striker, so Held will try to get this fight to the mat as soon as possible to even the odds for himself. They’re both creative ground fighters, but Lauzon has almost a decade on Held, and this could be a situation where experience is the deciding factor.

Court McGee vs. Ben Saunders

Records: McGee 19-5 Saunders 19-7-2
Division: Lightweight
UFC Odds: Saunders -120 Mcgee -110
Prediction: Saunders by KO

This should be a fun one to watch, as both of these fighters have very aggressive styles. It’s Saunders fight to win, if he can do it quickly since he seems to gas out relatively quickly. Five of his last nine fights have ended in the first round. Saunders has a two-inch reach advantage and a four-inch leg advantage, which should be the deciding factor here.

Sergio Pettis vs. John Moraga

Records: Moraga 5-4 Pettis 5-2
Division: Flyweight
UFC Odds: Moraga +120 Pettis -150
Prediction: Pettis by Decision

As the younger brother of former lightweight champion Anthony Pettis, it’s hard to avoid comparing the two fighters. Sergio is a very different kind of fighter however, and has won his last two fights convincingly with his well-rounded style. Moraga told the press that if he loses to Pettis, it will be his last fight, so one has to wonder how much heart he has going into this fight. Sergio Pettis is just 23-years-old, and has his eye on eventually reaching his brother’s level in the UFC, which will motivate him further to get the win here.

Preliminary Card

Frankie Saenz vs. Augusto Mendes
Alexey Olyinyk vs. Viktor Pesta
Tony Martin vs. Alex White
Jocelyn Jones-Lybarger vs. Nina Ansaroff
Devin Powell vs. Drakkar Klose
Walt Harris vs. Chase Sherman
Joachim Christensen vs. Bojan Mihajlovic
Cyril Asker vs. Dmitrii Smoliakov