Preview: UFC 286 Prelims

In a rare two pay-per-view month for the Ultimate Fighting Championship, UFC 286 on Saturday in London sees a set of prelims with a clear local flavor. The UFC did well to choose the five best fights for the main draw, but it means the undercard lacks much in terms of immediate stakes. Nevertheless, almost everything is matched interestingly, and the atmosphere should be electric with plenty of top British talent on display. It is led by flyweight uber-prospect Muhammad Mokaev, underrated featherweight Lerone Murphy and promotional newcomer Christian Leroy Duncan.

Now to the preview for the UFC 286 “Edwards vs. Usman 3” prelims:

Featherweights

Jack Shore (16-1, 5-1 UFC) vs. Makwan Amirkhani (17-8, 7-6 UFC)

ODDS: Shore (-500), Amirkhani (+400)

Shore’s rise through the bantamweight ranks was a pleasant surprise, and it will be interesting to see how the Welshman rebounds from his first career loss while also moving up to featherweight. “Tank” had a shockingly well-put-together game upon making it to the UFC in 2019, using pressure striking to build to his wrestling and take over from there, but the main worry was how Shore would fare against what figured to be faster and stronger competition. There were some rough moments—his 2021 win over Hunter Azure was a bit of a slog—but Shore proved himself surprisingly capable of dictating the terms of his fights, with a win over Timur Valiev a year ago seemingly serving as proof of concept that he could make a rise to contender status at 135 pounds. Naturally, his next fight was where all those issues suddenly came home to roost, as Ricky Simon stayed ahead of Shore for most of their bout before closing the show with an arm-triangle choke in the second round. Shore still figures to have a few years of improvement left in him and he has done well to get this far, so he deserves some benefit of the doubt that he can find a way to overcome what looks to be a clear physical ceiling. That also makes this move up to 145 pounds quite fascinating, particularly against a tough test in Amirkhani.

Amirkhani looked like a potential star after an absolutely electric UFC debut in 2015, as “Mr. Finland” scored a knockout in just eight seconds and had a particularly charismatic post-fight interview. That result was a bit of false advertising, however. While Amirkhani has often been a dynamic fighter, his best showings have typically come on the mat as a wrestler and grappler. Attempts to shore up his striking in the years since never particularly took beyond a certain level, compounded by Amirkhani’s cardio suddenly betraying him at a certain point. While he is still capable of a quick and dynamic submission victory, things have managed to go shockingly poorly for Amirkhani even after successful first rounds. That figures to be the gambit for Amirkhani here. He has the level of athleticism and power to his wrestling to cause Shore some early difficulties, but the Welshman probably just needs to be able to survive in order to turn the fight in his favor. The pick is Shore via second-round submission.

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Shore vs. Amirkhani
Morales vs. Duncan
Patterson vs. Ashmoz
Mokaev vs. Filho
Murphy vs. Santos
Duncan vs. Todorovic
Hadley vs. Gordon
Wood vs. Carolina
Klein vs. Herbert
Miller vs. Macedo