Check out the latest Contender Series Week 6 odds with my picks and predictions for each bout on the Tuesday, September 17, fight card.
Season 8 Episode 6 of Contender Series streams on ESPN+ at 8 p.m. ET (5 p.m. PT) from the UFC Apex facility in Las Vegas. New Contender Series events take place every Tuesday night through mid-October.
As with all UFC Contender Series events, some of the D.C. winners – and even some of the losers – could earn an official UFC contract. In fact, the Contender Series has become the UFC's primary feeder system for new talent.
UFC President Dana White is usually cageside for each show, and after each event, the UFC boss will determine which fighters have earned a contract.
As a reminder, some sportsbooks can be slow to open Contender Series odds and betting markets, though nearly every major sportsbook eventually does post them. And don't forget that you can track your Contender Series bets in the Action App.
Contender Series Week 6 odds as of Tuesday and via DraftKings. Bet on DWCS Week 6 with our DraftKings promo code.
Contender Series Week 6 Odds & Best Bets
Middleweights: Yura Naito (-102) vs. Ateba Gautier (-118)
Fighter walkouts: Approx. 8:05 p.m. ET
The Week 6 opening bout features two middleweights with impressive records and results — but extremely questionable levels of competition.
The favored Naito is 6-0 as a pro with four five-round finishes, but he fought a debuting fighter in his last fight. Fighting exclusively for the Pancrase organization, his toughest opponent was a 19-10 40-year-old whom he defeated for the Pancrase title.
I was unable to find any full-fight video on "2 Face," but given his quick wins, his highlight reel showcased the majority of his cage time. He quickly looks for takedowns in nearly all of his fights, with solid guard passing and positional control.
He has a bit of an old-school ground-and-pound style, where he's willing to posture up from control positions to land heavy strikes.
We don't see much of that in high-level MMA anymore because it's a risky strategy that provides more opportunities for escapes from the bottom fighter. However, against lesser grapplers or athletes, it can work.
The resume for Gautier is similar, with a 5-1 pro record (four first-round finishes) and just one opponent with a record better than 1-0 at the time he fought them. That was Carlos de Souza in his most recent fight. De Souza was 46 at the time.
There's a bit more tape on Gautier fortunately. He's an aggressive striker with a muay thai background who's also competed in combat Sambo at the continental level.
While that typically implies a level of grappling ability, all of the clips I found were of him brawling, except for one occasion where he got his back taken.
His lone loss was a split decision in July of 2022 in which he was controlled extensively on the ground after defending the first takedown attempt. He was the better striker by a country mile in that fight, but given the quality of competition, I'm not reading too much into that.
Ultimately, this feels like a fairly binary fight in which Naito has a considerable edge in the grappling, but Gautier's striking ability, speed and power are a huge advantage.
My lean is to lay the juice on Naito given my feelings on grappling vs. striking, but given the binary nature, the smarter pick is under 1.5 rounds at +124. This one should end quickly whether it's Naito on the ground or Gautier on the feet.
Prediction: Yura Naito defeats Ateba Gautier via ground and pound
The Bet: Under 1.5 Rounds +124 (DK)
Heavyweights: Tallison Teixeira (-720) vs. Arthur Lopes (+450)
Fighter walkouts: Approx. 8:25 p.m. ET
Next we move to the heavyweights, with a pair of Brazilian strikers who have 12 wins and 10 knockouts between them.
The towering Tallison Teixeira is the clear A-side here. Standing 6-foot-8 tall, he lists himself as a jiu-jitsu fighter, but he clearly does his best work on the feet.
He's fought his last two bouts for the LFA promotion, picking up consecutive first-round knockouts against opponents with 2-1 records. He uses his height and length well to claim the center of the cage, keeping a steady diet of straight punches and head kicks coming at his opponents.
He's fairly patient for a heavyweight, working behind his jab rather than brawling. He can get a little loose at times, but not at the level of most young physically-dominant heavyweights.
It's hard to get much of a read on his opponent. Arthur Lopes has just one fight in the last six years, a 20-second ground-and-pound victory against a 3-4 opponent. Prior to that, he fought as a welterweight.
While I'm certainly not one to fault anybody for putting on weight in their late 20s and early 30s, when coupled with the extended layoff, it's a bit strange to see him already called up to the Contender Series.
With all of that said, heavyweight MMA is a high-variance event, so I'm not going to lay -700 on a favorite. Lopes will likely turn this into a brawl, giving him a puncher's chance in the early going.
My official pick is the heavy favorite to get the job done, but I'll be taking an extremely small (0.2 unit) sprinkle on Lopes in Round 1 at +2100 on FanDuel, while looking to buy back on Teixeira live if Lopes does enough to even the odds but doesn't find a finish.
Prediction: Tallison Teixeira defeats Arthur Lopes by knockout
The Bet: Arthur Lopes R1 +2100 (FanDuel)
Welterweights: Benjamin Bennett (-105) vs. Joey Hart (-125)
Fighter walkouts: Approx. 8:55 p.m. ET
We follow up the widest odds on the slate with what should be a competitive match between two promising welterweights.
Benjamin Bennett is 6-1 as a pro, with the loss coming to current 2-0 UFC fighter Trey Waters. He was also booked to fight Khamzat Chimaev in 2018, though fortunately for Bennett that fight fell through.
Either way, those both speak to his willingness to fight tough competition. He compiled an 18-4 amateur record before jumping to the pros, including multiple one-night four-man tournaments. (He won the title in one of those, and lost the other to 12-2 UFC contender Brendan Allen.)
All that experience screams "UFC Ready," and I didn't even mention all of the future UFC fighters on his record. He trains out of Elevation Fight Team in Colorado with tons of UFC competitors around his weight class, which should only further help his development.
He showed his well-rounded game in his last fight at LFA 186, winning a clear unanimous decision with a measured approach. His strength is his grappling, but he uses tight striking to set up his wrestling and facilitate takedowns.
That's the strength of learning grappling for MMA rather than an extensive wrestling background, as he transitions between striking and grappling very well. The grappling threat also opens up striking opportunities, creating a virtuous cycle.
He'll need to be sharp with those transitions against Hart, a dangerous striker who's 6-0 with six knockouts. While not as experienced as his opponent, Hart also had a 12-fight amateur career before jumping to the pros.
Hart is a long, smooth striker who does excellent work from the thai clinch when opponents force their way into close quarters. That's a tough combination to solve, as typically the way to beat longer fighters is on the inside.
Despite the knockouts, he's not a hugely explosive "one shot" finisher. Even his first-round knockouts were the product of flurries of punches, rather than one clean strike finishing the bout.
That should give the durable Bennett plenty of opportunities to get this fight to the mat, where Hart is untested, at best. I'll take a slight underdog with the better experience and fight camp every time.
Hart might have the higher ceiling, but Bennett is the more complete fighter right now.
Prediction: Benjamin Bennett defeats Joey Hart by decision.
The Bet: Benjamin Bennett -104 (FanDuel)
Bantamweights: Aaron Tau (+154) vs. Elijah Smith (-200)
Fighter walkouts: Approx. 9:25 p.m. ET
The fight I'm most excited about this week is the bantamweight pairing of Aaron Tau and Elijah Smith.
Tau is the next in a long line of oceanic fighters on this season of the Contender Series, hailing from New Zealand. Unsurprisingly, he trains out of City Kickboxing, giving him access to elite coaching (Eugene Bareman) and plenty of high level training partners.
He has finishes in six of his eight wins, with five knockouts and a submission. His strength of schedule is on the weaker side, but he's fought a couple of fighters with reasonable records.
The general level of competition in the region is fairly high though, so a 5-5 opponent in Australia or New Zealand means more than it does in some places.
As is the City Kickboxing hallmark, his standup game includes a heavy dose of feints. Unlike many of his teammates, he fights moving forward, overloading his opponent's defense with feints to various levels.
He carries his hands a bit lower than I'd like, relying on his movement to avoid shots rather than blocking. That's a high-risk, high-reward style relative to blocking shots.
He's extremely strong for the division, having split his career between bantamweight and featherweight. That's most apparent in his grappling, where he explodes through his shots leading to big slams. I like how that looks to judges, though I worry about the energy costs if he gets extended.
His stocky build also leaves little room for opponents to hunt underhooks or grab his ankles from the bottom, helping his top control.
It will be interesting to see if he goes to the wrestling against Smith. Smith has a classic boxer/wrestler style, with solid technical boxing that he uses to set up takedowns.
He has a lightning quick shot that he can hit from range due to his length, though his frame leaves more room for counters and escapes from his opponents.
Already 6-1 at age 21, he has four knockouts and a submission among his wins. Those KOs came mainly on the ground as well, with good ground-and-pound.
That record isn't from crushing cans either, as he took out a fellow prospect, 8-1 Josh Walker, in his last fight. That's an edge over Tau on paper, at least.
It's worth nothing that Smith took this fight on less than three week's notice after Tau's original opponent (Quang Le) got the call up to the UFC.
One of the bigger edges I saw on paper for Smith was cardio, which will be somewhat negated by not putting in a full camp.
That factor, plus my trust in the City Kickboxing system, has me comfortable taking Tau at plus-money. If we can find Tau inside the distance props at +300 or better, I'll also be adding a half-unit there.
So far, the best line in that market is +275 on BetWay, but it's the only book offering it at the time of writing.
Prediction: Aaron Tau defeats Elijah Smith via Ground and Pound.
The Bet: Aaron Tau ML +200 (BetMGM)
Lightweights: Dylan Mantello (+140) vs. Ahmad Hassanzada (-180)
Fighter walkouts: Approx. 9:55 p.m. ET
The final bout of the night features two returning DWCS combatants, with Dylan Mantello losing by submission on Week 7 last year. I mentioned (and profited on) his habit of slow starts in that bout, which he lost by first-round submission.
He gets points for fighting the choke to the bitter end rather than tapping, though the loss hasn't aged well with Kaynan Kruschewsky going 0-2 in the UFC. Mantello has picked up a flying-knee KO victory in the interim.
He showed off his rangy striking in that bout, defending most of the takedowns from his shorter opponent before landing the flying knee against the fence.
Ahmad Hassanzada's previous trip to the Apex was in 2022, where he was knocked out in the third round by Nazim Sadykhov. That looks like a "better loss" (such that it exists) in that he was more competitive, and his opponent has had more success in the Octagon (2-0-1 UFC record).
He trains out of Team Alpha Male in California but is originally from Afghanistan, with an 11-3 pro record. He joined the camp shortly before his previous DWCS appearance and will likely have made considerable improvements.
Like Mantello, he's very long for the division, but is far more aggressive and explosive at length. I prefer that style against the fellow tall fighter, as neither man will have a major edge in sniping at range.
He's also the more assertive offensive grappler, landing a pair of takedowns on Sadykhov. Doing so consistently at this level (and without gassing out) will require some technical improvements, but that feels like a relatively safe bet.
I'm going to trust the more dynamic fighter from the superior camp (with apologies to Longo and Weidman MMA) in Hassanzada in this one.
I'm comfortable laying the juice on his moneyline, with the caveat that I'll be taking a live sprinkle on Mantello if we have the opportunity at big plus money.
The biggest flaw in Hassanzada's game is cardio, so it's worth hedging the pre-fight bet if the price is right.
Prediction: Ahmad Hassanzada defeats Dylan Mantello via decision.
The Bet: Ahmad Hassanzada -170 (Caesars)
