UFC Predictions: UFC Fight Night: Derek Brunson vs. Darren Till
This weekend sees the UFC back in its Las Vegas APEX center for UFC Fight Night: Derek Brunson vs. Darren Till.
This UFC Fight Night card features a major middleweight clash in the main event, as well as a number of European-based stars up and down the card.
Overall, it looks like an event that could be well worth watching, even if the name value isn’t all that high.
With that in mind, here are the predicted outcomes for UFC Fight Night: Derek Brunson vs. Darren Till.
#1. UFC middleweight division: Derek Brunson vs. Darren Till
Despite the fact that Jared Cannonier recently laid down his own title credentials by defeating Kelvin Gastelum, there’s a chance that the next UFC middleweight title challenger could emerge from this fight.
That probably won’t be the case if Derek Brunson wins, as the veteran already holds losses to both current champ Israel Adesanya and the division’s top contender Robert Whittaker.
However, Darren Till has been talked up by Adesanya as an interesting foe. So if ‘The Gorilla’ can win, there’s every chance he’ll make his way to the front of the queue.
So can the native of Liverpool, England, pull this off? Or is Brunson a bit of a nightmare match for him? It’s actually hard to say.
Everyone is well aware of the style that Brunson brings at this point. An excellent wrestler, Brunson is more than capable of blanketing a foe, as he did to Chris Leben in his UFC debut. But over the last few years, that hasn’t been his style at all.
Sure, he played that card to defeat Kevin Holland in his last bout – putting him on a four-fight win streak – but for the most part, Brunson is a straight-ahead, aggressive striker who loves to rush his opponents with brute force.
In many ways, Brunson fights in the way that the likes of Dana White would’ve loved Tyron Woodley to do. He’s explosive, quick and powerful, and he knows it – meaning that if he can rush an opponent and force them back, he’s usually going to knock them out. And if he can’t do that, then he’s always got his takedowns to fall back on.
The problem he has had is with more accurate strikers who are able to dodge that early rush and land clean counters on him. We saw this when he was knocked out by Adesanya, Whittaker and by Jacare Souza in 2018.
Till is an intriguing opponent for Brunson largely because he definitely has that kind of countering ability in his arsenal.
‘The Gorilla’ gained a reputation as a knockout artist after taking out Donald Cerrone in 2017, but in reality, that isn’t usually his game. Till hits hard – Jorge Masvidal confirmed that after their fight – but he’s much more of a point-fighting based striker who’s also more than happy to work from close quarters.
At middleweight thus far, he showed that he isn’t likely to be outmuscled, as he beat Gastelum in a clinch war, and to be fair, he did well against Whittaker too despite being outpointed.
The big question here then is does Till have the skills to catch Brunson coming in, or is he more likely to succumb to either the rush of power strikes or the takedown?
Given Till’s skills on the feet, he’s probably more likely to pull off the former. After all, while Brunson has defeated strikers in the UFC before, they’ve tended to be slower, older strikers, or those who were willing to meet him head on.
‘The Gorilla’ will need to play this perfectly – he can’t afford to eat a big shot from Brunson given his power – but if he can stay out of range, keep elusive and catch his foe coming in, he can definitely win.
The Pick: Till via second round TKO
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