Santos vs Hill UFC Fight Night betting picks – Saturday, August 6

Jamahal Hill will be looking for a third-straight win this Saturday night when he takes on Thiago Santos in the main event of UFC Vegas 59. Here’s a preview for this light heavyweight bout, along with our best bet for this interesting matchup.

Light Heavyweight: Thiago Santos (+270) vs Jamahal Hill (-330)

Jamahal Hill (10-1-0) picked up his second straight first-round knockout win and his second straight Performance of the Night bonus with a thrilling knockout victory over Johnny Walker in February. Six of Hill’s last seven wins have come by way of knockout, though one of those was later overturned to a no contest when Hill tested positive for marijuana use after the fight. Hill has climbed to No.10 in the light heavyweight rankings and has a golden opportunity to crack the top ten with a win in this one.

Thiago Santos (22-10-0) was 8-1-0 with seven knockout wins prior to his split decision loss to Jon Jones at UFC 239. Santos suffered a handful of serious leg injuries in that fight and hasn’t been the same since, going just 1-3 over his last four fights. His one win since returning from injury came via decision against the aforementioned Walker last October, but that was followed up by a decision loss to Magomed Ankalaev in March.

Santos vs Hill betting predictions

If Jamahal Hill were fighting the pre-injury version of Thiago Santos this Saturday, we’d be in for a thriller that would almost certainly end in a knockout one way or the other. But at 38 years old and with losses in four of his last five bouts, Santos simply isn’t what he used to be. You can never completely rule out a fighter with his talent and experience, but there just isn’t a very compelling argument to be made against Hill, who has been outstanding of late and is just entering his prime at 31 years old.

One thing you can’t take away from Santos is his toughness, though. Santos fought Jon Jones to a split decision with a shattered leg, and his last two losses to Ankalaev and Aleksander Rakic both came by decision. While we see Hill doing enough to win this fight convincingly, we’re going to predict that his knockout streak comes to an end on Saturday night and that it will be the judges that award him this victory.

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