In the co-main event of tomorrow night’s UFC Vegas 15 card, we have a light heavyweight contest which features a former title challenger. Anthony “Lionheart” Smith (33-16) will be taking on Devin “Brown Bear” Clark (12-4) in his 50th professional fight.
That number is truly astonishing considering the former UFC title challenger is only 32 years old. Nevertheless, Smith will be making the walk for the 50th time as he’s looking to bounce back after two consecutive losses in the octagon.
Clark on the other hand is looking to break into the UFC‘s top 15. The Jackson-Wink product has won back to back fights to push his overall record to 12-4. Clark has been tested in his UFC career against some of the best including Aleksandar Rakic and current champ, Jan Blachowicz.
Of course, Clark came up short in both of those fights. However, I’ve seen a lot of improvement in his last couple of outings. Sure, the competition level wasn’t extremely high, but he seems to be heading in the right direction.
Smith on the other hand is heading in the wrong direction. Two consecutive losses for Smith have had him contemplating his UFC career. Smith looked fantastic in the first couple of rounds against Glover Teixiera. However, since then, he’s been dominated in seven rounds since.
UFC Vegas 15 Preview
When thinking about the UFC Vegas 15 co-main event, this should be a win for Anthony Smith. However, the key word in that sentence is that it should be Anthony Smith. I really think Smith has a very solid overall game.
We’ve seen him look good on the feet and he’s shown off good submission skills in the UFC. However, he just looked completely out of it in his last fight against Aleksandar Rakic. Sure, he was hurt with leg kicks, but mentally he looked checked out.
Tomorrow night will all come down to which Anthony Smith we get. Devin Clark is going to push forward and try to take Smith down. We’ve seen Smith fold to the point where he accepts getting taken down then shows no urgency to get back up.
If that happens tomorrow night, we are going to see Clark pickup another decision win. However, if we see some urgency out of Smith, I think he can score enough points on the feet and win some scrambles to get the decision.
I think that this fight is going to go the distance. Again, UFC Vegas 15 will come down to which Anthony Smith we get. I think he’s going to show just enough urgency to squeak out an extremely narrow split decision, but I’m not confident in that pick.
Prediction: Anthony Smith by Split Decision