Holloway vs Allen Odds & Preview: Can The “Almighty” Punish The “Blessed”?

Featherweight Contenders Throw Down in Kansas City

April 12, 2023 178 3 minutes readUFC News

Holloway vs Allen Odds & Preview: Can The “Almighty” Punish The “Blessed”? — photo taken from sportskeeda.com

Holloway Favored Against Unbeaten Allen
Where is Holloway Headed?
Allen Finally Gets His Spotlight

Holloway Favored Against Unbeaten Allen

The former featherweight champion returns to lead the UFC Fight Night’s main event in Kansas City. And as it usually is the case, he is favored as per the Holloway vs Allen odds. Holloway has only lost to one man in the division in nearly 10 years: the current champion, Alexander Volkanovski. But Holloway is in no man’s land and will be the elite gatekeeper as top contenders like Allen look to break through.

UFC Fight Night

Holloway vs Allen

Date, time: Saturday, 5:30 p.m. ET
Location: T-Mobile Center, Kansas City, MI
Broadcast: ESPN, ESPN+ (Prelims)

Where is Holloway Headed?

With three losses to the champion, the last one being lopsided, Holloway will not be fighting for the belt as long as Volkanovski holds it. So where does that leave Holloway? The Hawaiian can only keep fighting and turning back other top contenders while hoping for someone, like Yair Rodriguez later this year, beats Volkanovski.

Holloway will be one of the first to challenge the new champion. That is if he even stays in the division.

“For sure [lightweight was tempting],” Holloway told ESPN. “For this next fight, no, but it’s always tempting to go there. You got killers up there and those fights excite me. We just see what happens. It’s always great to go up a weight class when you got a belt around your waist so we’ll see what happens.”

A move up in weight can be a boon to fighters as they get older. Several greats like Jon Jones and Georges St-Pierre moved up and won championships as relatively “old” fighters. Holloway is still just 31. But he has been through so many wars and has absorbed nearly 800 significant strikes in his last five fights alone.

Holloway’s “Blessed” chin has held up. He is one of the toughest UFC fighters and has not even been knocked down in 26 UFC fights. It’s one of the reasons he’s constantly favored.

Against Allen, Holloway is priced at -180 per the Holloway vs Allen odds. It’s around the same price as when he fought Calvin Kattar at -160 coming off two consecutive defeats to Volkanovski.The champ beat the brakes off Holloway in their last fight. Even if he’s still young, one can only wonder if Holloway is still as sharp as he once was. He will need to be against Allen.

Allen Finally Gets His Spotlight

Most casual fans may not know who Allen is. The “Almighty” has lived up to his nickname and is 10-0 in the UFC. However, he’s been relatively inactive. Ten fights in nearly eight years with the promotion is roughly one fight a year. Injuries and fight cancellations have slowed his momentum. But Allen is here.

This will only be Allen’s second time as an underdog since he debuted. He was +115 against Sodiq Yusuff in his first “big fight”. They were the co-main event to UFC on ABC 2 and Allen outclassed his fellow blue-chip prospect. But even with wins against Calvin Kattar and Dan Hooker, fighting the former champion is a big step up hence the Holloway vs Allen odds.

“He’s going to throw about a million punches, kicks, knees and elbows,” Allen said told MMA Junkie at a backstage interview during UFC 286. “He’s going to try and take my head off. He’s going to keep peppering me like I’m a German sausage or something, and I know what he’s going to do.”

Holloway averages 7.24 significant strikes landed per minute at a 47 percent accuracy while Allen averages less than half: 3.4 at a 42 percent clip. Holloway also set the UFC record for most significant strikes landed in a fight with 445.

To beat Holloway and claim his biggest scalp, Allen will need to mix it up against Holloway, who allowed just nine successful takedowns (outside the Volkanovski fights) since his loss to McGregor back in 2013. If Allen can be the exception to this, he’ll find a way to prove the UFC Fight Night odds wrong.
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