Embed from Getty Images

Preview

In the Flyweight division, we have a clash between Alex Perez and Matt ‘Danger’ Schnell. Perhaps the third times the charm, as both were scheduled to face each other in May and then August. Returning to the octagon for the first time in 2021, Perez will look to rebound from a title fight defeat to Deiveson Figueiredo. A fight in which Perez looked good early, but eventually succumbed to a submission. Still ranked 4th in the Flyweight division, Perez remains in a good spot to get another crack at the title sooner than later. Meanwhile, Schnell will look to rebound from his defeat to Rogerio Bontorin in May. Prior to the loss, Schnell had caught some fire, winning five of his last six fights. 

Prediction

Despite losing to Rogerio Bontorin, Matt Schnell is presented with an opportunity to rebound against a top five ranked opponent in Alex Perez. An early Christmas gift for Schnell, who had a run halted with losses in two of his last three fights. Regardless, the ninth ranked Schnell has an opportunity to catapult himself right back in the title picture with a win. A solid grappler with ground skills, Schnell more than often opts to strike. While he has good boxing, is fast and throws with volume, Schnell’s durability is always something that’s worrisome. As for Perez, he is a well rounded fighter that can win a fight on the feet or with his wrestling. With six stoppages in his last eight wins, four of which came via submission, Perez is a fighter that is evolving into a more dangerous version of himself each fight.

As for a prediction, I have Perez winning. While Schnell has the submission chops to make this interesting, especially given Perez’s woes with submission defense, I don’t really believe he’s got another path to victory in this fight. Perez is the better striker, wrestler and isn’t the one with the questionable chin. Having seen Schnell stopped via strikes in three of his four losses in the UFC, there isn’t much confidence he can handle opponents with some power. So with that said, I predict that Perez wins via knockout.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.