Caio Borralho vs Reinier de Ridder Prediction, Pick, Odds for UFC 326 (Saturday, March 7)

Caio Borralho vs. Reinier de Ridder Odds

Check out the Caio Borralho vs. Reinier de Ridder prediction for UFC 326 on Saturday, March 7, along with my betting preview and breakdown.

A bit of the shine has come off both Caio Borralho and Reinier de Ridder, with Borralho suffering his first loss in a decade last September and de Ridder tasting defeat for the first time at middleweight a month later. Both were potentially a win away from a shot at the middleweight title heading into those fights, but now have to climb back up the rankings. Both could argue that extenuating circumstances played a part in the losses, but only one of them can right those wrongs at UFC 326.

Here's my Borralho vs. de Ridder pick and prediction.

Tale of the Tape

Caio Borralho is the leader of the "Fighting Nerds" team that had an extremely impressive run, but has largely stumbled upon facing top-five fighters for the first time. That includes Borralho himself, who won seven straight fights before losing a possible title eliminator last fall against Nassourdine Imavov.

Unique among his camp — and elite UFC fighters generally — Borralho doesn't really have a single dominant attribute. He's solidly above average across the board, with the ability to strike or grapple when the situation calls for it. However, he's not elite in either dimension. That cost him in his loss to Imavov, who was able to stuff all five of Borralho's takedown attempts while simultaneously outstriking him on the feet.

Of course, that fight was in Imavov's adopted home city of Paris, while Borralho flew in from Brazil. "The Natural" also splits his time between coaching and cornering his stable of pupils/teammates, a role that has him frequently traveling around the world rather than locking in for his own training. I wouldn't be shocked if a decade from now we think of Borralho more as a coach than a fighter, akin to ATT head coach and former WEC champion Mike Brown.

That speculation speaks to his fight IQ, though, which might be the exception to my "lack of elite attributes" assertion. Outside of the loss to Imavov, Borralho has been able to find the shortest path to victory in all of his fights, whether that be a heavy dose of grappling against strikers like Michal Oleksiejczuk and Armen Petrosyan, or an emphasis on striking against a grappler like Paul Craig.

The latter path is fairly obviously the correct option against de Ridder, an elite Judo and BJJ black belt with 14 submission wins in 24 pro fights. Borralho is the much cleaner and more powerful striker of the pair, and also possesses far better defense. Even following the loss to Imavov, he's absorbed just 2.5 significant strikes per minute while defending 60% of his opponent's strikes.

He's a textbook striker fighting behind a solid high guard, and working his way up from jabs and leg kicks into more powerful shots as he finds openings. He won't wow you with his speed or flash technique, but he does everything well and has a solid sense of when to load up for big shots and when to chip away at his opponent's defense.

That's a stark contrast from de Ridder, who throws caution to the wind on the feet while hunting for takedowns and big knees to the body, with the occasional awkward punch thrown in for good measure. He seems disinterested in earnestly defending himself, instead banking on his chin to carry him through until he's able to get the fight to the ground.

His striking largely works because his opponents are so concerned with defending takedowns and denying clinches that they forget about his strikes. He finished Bo Nickal with a knee to the belly at the end of a sequence of clinch strikes that was initiated by Nickal dropping his level to defend a takedown but eating a knee instead.

"The Dutch Knight" is coming off a strange performance against Brendan Allen, where he dominated the first round but then completely gassed out and didn't answer the bell for the fifth round. The positive side of that is his domination of Allen, one of the division's best grapplers, on the ground in Round 1. Only having one round of cardio is the obvious negative takeaway.

In a rare occurrence, I'm actually inclined to believe de Ridder's "excuse" for running out of gas, though. He's a massive middleweight, and that was his fifth fight (and weight cut) in 11 months. The toll that it took on him could easily explain the diminished gas tank there. Plus, this fight is just three rounds, so de Ridder really just needs to win two and survive a third, even if cardio remains an issue.

Ultimately, though, I expect this fight to come down to who can manage the range better. With his Judo background and powerful clinch shots, a close-quarters fight favors de Ridder. At range, the cleaner striking of Borralho should take over.

Borralho vs. de Ridder Pick, Prediction

Reinier de Ridder has obvious enough strengths and weaknesses that it's easy to make a case for him beating, or losing to, nearly any top-20 or so middleweight in the UFC.

As such, I'm almost always going to jump on his moneyline when it's north of +200 odds, as the path to victory for him is so clear. I wouldn't say I'm confident he wins this fight necessarily, but if they fought 100 times, I'd expect de Ridder to win at least 40 of them.

Plus, this line has moved in considerably this week despite Borralho getting more than two-thirds of Tapology predictions, which is a strong indicator as to who the smart money is on. Some books have de Ridder as short as +185 odds, but we can still get +220 at DraftKings, which I'll gladly take. Should it continue to move, I'd play RDR down to +190 or so odds.

Billy's Pick: de Ridder +220 (DraftKings)

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