Geoff Neal and Carlos Prates meet on the main card of UFC 319 at United Center in Chicago. Check out this quick breakdown of the matchup from MMA Junkie analyst Dan Tom.
Neal (16-6 MMA, 8-4 UFC) will look to make it back-to-back victories following a first-round finish of former lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos at UFC 308. The result ended a two-fight skid against Shavkat Rakhmonov and Ian Machado Garry. Prior to those setbacks, "Handz of Steel" won a split decision over Santiago Ponzinibbio and finished Vicente Luque in consecutive fights. ... Prates (21-7 MMA, 4-1 UFC) suffered his first UFC loss in April by decision against Ian Machado Garry. Prior to that, Prates left a trail of wreckage in stoppages of Trevin Giles, Charles Radtke, Li Jingliang and Neil Magny.
Filling out the main card is a striker's delight at welterweight between Geoff Neal and Carlos Prates.
Aside from this being a tricky southpaw vs. southpaw affair, I'm also a big fan of both fighters, so picking this one was difficult.
On one hand, I Neal is a traditionally durable power puncher whose offensive output will keep him as both a knockout and scoring threat for all three frames. So if this fight extends, Neal will probably be live due to Prates' sometimes lower-output approach.
However, when looking at past performances of Prates against fellow southpaws, the Fighting Nerds product appears to be incredibly comfortable fighting other lefties - even showing the ability to still find his favored killshots to the liver.
I don't like picking against Fortis MMA fighters, but I'll officially side with Prates to score another body-knee knockout by the end of Round 2.
The oddsmakers and the public favor the Brazilian fighter, listing Prates -235 and Neal +194 via FanDuel.
Neal and Prates are expected to walk to the cage at approximately 11:10 p.m. ET. The fight broadcasts live on ESPN+ pay-per-view.