UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs Lewis Tips, Predictions and Preview

Jan 5, 2024

UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs Lewis will take place at the UFC APEX in Las Vegas on Sunday, February 21 at 12pm AEDT.

Here are our best bets and predictions for the main card and prelims for UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs Lewis on ESPN. Read on for Blaydes vs Lewis tips.

Curtis Blaydes Last 5 Fights 🥊

Date	Result	Opponent	Method
June 20, 2020	Win	Alexander Volkov	Decision (unanimous)
January 25, 2020	Win	Junior dos Santos	TKO (punches)
September 7, 2019	Win	Shamil Abdurakhimov	TKO (elbows and punches)
March 23, 2019	Win	Justin Willis	Decision (unanimous)
November 24, 2018	Loss	Francis Ngannou	TKO (punches)

Derrick Lewis Last 5 Fights 🥊

Date	Result	Opponent	Method
August 8, 2020	Win	Aleksei Oleinik	TKO (punches)
February 8, 2020	Win	Ilir Latifi	Decision (unanimous)
November 2, 2019	Win	Blagoy Ivanov	Decision (split)
March 9, 2019	Loss	Junior dos Santos	TKO (punches)
November 3, 2018	Loss	Daniel Cormier	Submission (rear-naked choke)

Curtis Blaydes vs Derrick Lewis

Curtis Blaydes is the #2 ranked Heavyweight behind champion Stipe Miocic and number one contender Francis Ngannou. Blaydes will have to settle for staying number two if victorious, but that will be much better than a loss that would see Derrick Lewis leapfrog him in the rankings.

‘Razor’ has been close to the title shot in the past; he defeated Alistair Overeem via TKO back in June 2018 but his momentum would stop when Ngannou only needed 45 seconds to deliver a TKO result against Blaydes. Since then, Blaydes has won four fights, including victory over former UFC Heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos and Alexander Volkov who has since beaten Walt Harris and Overeem within two rounds in both fights.

Victory on Sunday could see Blaydes get a shot for the belt against the winner of Miocic vs Ngannou.

Squaring off against Blaydes is a man who has had a crack at the UFC Heavyweight Championship. Lewis enjoyed a three-fight win streak, which included a Decision victory over Ngannou. Fighting for the title, Lewis was completely outmatched by one of the UFC’s biggest stars in Daniel Cormier at UFC 230. Cormier locked in a rear-naked choke in the second round and ‘The Black Beast’ was vanquished.

Back-to-back losses would ensue with dos Santos stopping Lewis via TKO in the second round. Lewis has come back from that with three-straight wins, including victory over Aleksei Oleinik.

In the Heavyweight division, a single punch can change the outcome of a fight and Lewis has no shortage of stopping power with 19 knockout wins. Lewis has worked on his takedown defense but this will be another test with Blaydes averaging 6.63 takedowns per 15 minutes.

When it is all over on Sunday, Blaydes is likely to have his hand raised as the winner. Blaydes has a massive grappling advantage over Lewis. Repeated takedown attempts will wear Lewis down, whether successful or not, and Blaydes can then implement his brutal ground and pound game to stop the fight with a combination of punches and elbows.

UFC Fight Night: Blaydes vs Lewis Main Card Predictions

The co-main event is a UFC Women’s Bantamweight bout between Ketlen Vieira (11-1) and Yana Kunitskaya. The favourite simply looks too good in this fight.