Here are the sports gambling lines for the Nate Marquardt versus Sam Alvey middleweight match on the preliminary card of the UFC on Fox 23 event this Saturday, January 28th at the Pepsi Center in Denver:
Nate Marquardt 1½ (-140) +125
Sam Alvey 1½ (+120) -145
As you can see from those sports betting odds – courtesy of SBG Global sportsbook – Marquardt is what we refer to as the underdog. The Great – as he is called, which is really an ironic name as we’ll see later – is a savvy veteran who has won almost as many fights as Alvey has been in, but his salad days are far behind him. Marquardt has always been good, but he was never ‘great’ (or Great, if you will). As the good brothers at Bloody Elbow wrote, “he won’t ever be fighting for a world title again.” And the last – and only time, if we don’t count Pancrase of Strikeforce – he fought (and lost) for one was in 2007. Most recently, Marquardt – who, to his credit, had never lost two back-to-back fights – lost three straight in 2014, and two in a row in 2015. After that, he beat CB Dollaway, lost to Thiago Santos, and defeated Tamdan McCrory. And that brings us up to speed. Per BE, “Marquardt also showed he still has most of his wrestling chops against McCrory.” That includes the overhead chop, the Mongolian chop, and the backhand chop (Wooo!)
As for the sports gambling lines favorite, Alvey is in the midst of a three-bout winning streak. However, Smile’n has an even more impressive streak than that. He has never taken down an opponent in his UFC career, and only one opponent has taken him down. What are the sports betting odds of that? Nevertheless, Alvey has knocked out 11 guys and submitted 16 – like Chris Jericho, the arm bar is one his favorite holds. According to BE, Alvey “also struggles when his opponent keeps the fight on the outside.” Well, of course; it must be hard to fight some dude that’s outside the octagon. Additionally, “it’s really simple to beat Alvey… if you have the right tools.” While we don’t question the effectiveness of a ball-peen hammer to the head, we believe the UFC does not allow weapons in their fights… yet. BE sums it up by saying that “it feels academic, but … Marquardt has made it difficult to bet against him recently.” Well, the sports gambling lines beg to differ, but then again we have seen our fair share of sports betting odds upsets. As a matter of fact, Marquardt entered his October 2016 battle with Tamdan McCrory as the underdog, and we know how that went for the latter. MMA Mania, on the other hand, has Alvey by knockout in the first round – reasoning that Marquardt may not be as impervious as he looks, and that one of Alvey’s well placed demolishing shots is all it takes for the ‘Great’ to crumble down to the ground. Which still doesn’t count as a takedown.