Curtis Blaydes vs. Josh Hokit Prediction, Pick, Odds for UFC 327 (Saturday, April 11)

Curtis Blaydes vs. Josh Hokit Odds

Check out the Curtis Blaydes vs. Josh Hokit prediction for UFC 327 on Saturday, April 11, along with my betting preview and breakdown.

Love it or hate it, Josh Hokit has certainly drawn plenty of attention to his UFC 327 main card matchup against Curtis Blaydes with all of his fight week shenanigans. Beyond his…outspoken personality, Hokit is also an interesting prospect in a lackluster heavyweight division. A former D1 wrestler and football player, he's 2-0 in the UFC with two first-round knockouts. Of course, a matchup with the former title challenger and perennial top-five heavyweight Curtis Blaydes is a massive step up.

Here's my Blaydes vs. Hokit pick and prediction.

Tale of the Tape

What makes this fight interesting to break down is all of the unknowns around Josh Hokit. Including his bout on the Contender Series, he's been given three straight matchups against opponents where he had massive edges in both athleticism and wrestling. As one would expect, Hokit relied on those tools to put his opponents away quickly, without having to showcase a broader skill set.

While he's arguably a slightly better wrestler and athlete than Blaydes, those margins are much narrower this time around. Blaydes is an above-average athlete for the division and a former junior college national champion, whereas Hokit was a second-team all-American at Fresno State.

Much of that will be mitigated by the considerable size gap between the two. Hokit weighed in at 233 lbs for this fight, while Blaydes was his typical 261 lbs. Blaydes also holds a nearly seven-inch reach edge, which is especially valuable in the full-size cage used during traveling events. Hokit's typical approach of winging massive punches on his way in is much harder with that kind of reach disparity, and his lighter weight means shots that do land might not put Blaydes away.

This fight is likely decided by who can find success with their grappling, though. Wrestling for MMA, with it's inclusion of strikes and a cage, is an entirely different animal than pure wrestling. Neither man has been forced to defensively wrestle all that much in their MMA careers, though naturally, the more experienced Blaydes at least has some practice in that department.

The bad news is that he was taken down nine times by Jailton Almeida and has just a 31% takedown defense overall. The good news is that eight of those nine takedowns came in the first round — meaning Blaydes got up seven times — and he absorbed precisely zero significant strikes in the process. Plus, he was able to knock out Almeida in the second round when the Brazilian went back to the well and forgot to defend strikes while hunting a takedown.

With Blaydes able to right himself repeatedly against a much better overall grappler, I don't see Hokit being able to hold him down here. Especially since Hokit aggressively hunts finishes from the top, which provides more escape opportunities than Almeida's control-based approach. Of course, just escaping doesn't score any points in MMA, so it's the other side of the equation that's relevant for Blaydes.

Blaydes' best hope is to run Hokit into the fence, where his extra weight and MMA experience will be the most useful. He can wear down the explosive newcomer by pinning him to the cage, and eventually wall wrestle his way into top position. We've never really seen Hokit on his back, but odds are he doesn't have a ton of idea on how to escape a position he rarely finds himself in, especially against somebody Blaydes' level.

Of course, to get there, Blaydes needs to survive some exchanges on the feet. He's the more technical boxer with solid head movement, but I do worry about his durability at this stage in his career. All five of his UFC losses have come via knockout, and at 35 with ten years in the promotion, the damage is beginning to add up. In Blaydes' defense, those knockouts came to Francis Ngannou (twice), Derrick Lewis, Sergei Pavlovich, and Tom Aspinall, so he's not getting put down by scrubs.

Another sneaky issue for Blaydes here could be the cardio. He's faded significantly later in some fights, and is carrying almost 30 extra pounds of weight. While we haven't seen Hokit outside of the first round in the UFC, he does have a third-round finish in his pro debut. His typical all-out style doesn't lend itself to extended fights, but if he's able to temper that here, he could actually be the fresher fighter down the stretch on the off chance we get there.

Blaydes vs. Hokit Pick, Prediction

While I believe Hokit has a solid future as a ranked heavyweight, this particular fight is too big a step up too soon. It's also a uniquely difficult matchup given the wrestling pedigree of Blaydes, as Hokit won't have that trump card in the way he would over many of the division's ranked fighters.

While a quick Hokit knockout isn't out of the question, Blaydes should have the experience to defend any early blitzes and implement his game plan, picking apart Hokit at range before taking him down along the fence.

However, I also expect some casual interest in Hokit as we approach fight night, since he's certainly done a good job drawing headlines this week. For that reason, I'm picking Blaydes, but I will be waiting until Saturday afternoon before putting in my bet. The best odds at the time of writing are -120 on BetMGM, but use my Playbook Link to get the best odds closer to fight time.

Billy's Picks: Curtis Blaydes -120 (BetMGM)

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