Posted on 4/2/2008 6:01:24 PM

UFC Fight Night Betting Preview

By Ryan Harkness

Lots of people might have forgotten about it due to all the UFC 83 hype, but this Wednesday features the largest UFC Fight Night in the history of the program. Top to bottom the card is stacked with nice competitive bouts, meaning that you've got a really good chance to make some good coin on educated picks. Let's take a close look at the two fights from the card that you can bet on with BetUS:

Kenny Florian -220 vs Joe Lauzon +180

Joe Lauzon is the goofy looking kid who blew onto the fight scene after knocking Jens Pulver out during his UFC debut. Lots of people considered it a fluke at the time, but Lauzon has a solid record of 16-, with 12 of those wins coming in the first round. He's a skilled submission guy who's also got striking power, and he just spent the winter holed up in Hilo with BJ Penn getting even deadlier.

Kenny Florian's 8-3 record is shorter than Lauzon's, but it has more star power spread out across it with fights against Drew Ficket, Diego Sanchez, Sam Stout, Sean Sherk, and Din Thomas. Because of this, he's getting most people's nods regarding experience. He's a jiu-jitsu guy who loves to use his elbows to cut people's faces up, and has won 4 of his 6 submission wins via rear naked choke.

The reason this fight is so hard to call is that styles make fights and these guys have very similar styles. This is almost guaranteed to turn into a ground fight and it's a very big question mark as to who can catch who in a submission first.

The reason I'm putting money down on Joe Lauzon is because he's shown over his career to have more tools in his toolbox. From armbars to chokes to leglocks, he's pulled off a variety pack of different submissions compared to Kenny's choke-centric repertoire. And while Kenny's gets the nod regarding ground and pound, Joe knocked Jens Pulver out on his feet.

Last but not least, you really shouldn't ignore Joe's time spent with BJ Penn over the past few months. Lauzon has only been training full time for a short while, and if he was good before he has taken it up several notches since then. While Kenny's greater exposure has helped him take an edge on the odds, I call Joe Lauzon as your best bet on the night.

Karo Parisyan -180 vs Thiago Alves +150

I hate to say this since I'm a huge Karo Parisyan fan, but he is a dangerous man to bet on in this fight. Karo has been on a streak lately ... a streak of decisions. Only one fight of his since 2004 has ended outside of the judge's hands. Of course, you could look at this from a positive point of view: the dude is tough as hell and has never been submitted or knocked out in the UFC.

But if there's one guy in the UFC who's got an excellent chance of stopping 'The Heat', it's Thiago Alves. The guy is 12-0 with 10 of those wins coming by knockout. He's well rounded too, with black belt cred in jiu jitsu. We still haven't seen too much of that side though since he keeps knocking people out so damned quick.

So that's the big debate here: Thiago Alves has gone through his competition like a burning hot chainsaw through butter, but he's never faced anyone at Karo Parisyan's level. Even if you think Thiago Alves is going to be a future superstar (which I do), you have to remember that Karo has hung in there with othe superstar caliber fighters like Georges St Pierre.

In the end I give the nod to Thiago ... Karo has been unable to finish less skilled fighters, which means Alves is going to have three rounds to catch Karo and knock him out. Considering it usually only takes Alves three minutes with most fighters, that should be more than enough time.

Ryan Harkness is the head editor of the mixed martial arts community site Fightlinker.com and host of the top rated MMA podcast The Low Blow.