Tim Elliott and Ryan Benoit will tangle in a flyweight bout on the main card at UFC on ESPN 13 Wednesday at the UFC’s Fight Island facility on Yas Island, United Arab Emirates. The prelims kick off at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN/ESPN+, followed by the main card set for 10 p.m. ET.
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The southpaw Elliott (16-11-1) enters with a two-inch height advantage, but his reach is two inches shorter than his counterpart. As such, he’ll likely be looking to get this fight to the mat early and often, as the canvas is where he does his best work. He owns a sparkling 4.31 to 0.20 takedown-average advantage over Benoit (10-6), a 55.70 to 16.67 takedown-accuracy percentage and a 1.18 to 0.20 submission-average advantage, too. Elliott enters on a three-bout losing skid, as his opponents have turned the tables on him lately. He was submitted by UFC newcomer Brandon Royval May 30 at the UFC’s APEX Facility on the Woodley-Burns card. Previous to that defeat, he suffered a unanimous decision loss to Askar Askarov Jan. 18 and a submission loss Oct. 12, 2019 to Deiveson Figueiredo. In fact, Elliott is 1-4 in his previous five bouts, with four of the past five finishing inside the distance, too.
For Benoit – a.k.a. “Baby Face” – the Janjira Muay Thai team member has alternated wins and losses in each of his past 10 fights as a pro, including 3-2 at the UFC level. His last time out was a disappointing split-decision loss to Heili Alateng on the Edgar-Korean Zombie card Dec. 21, 2019, a bout Benoit felt he should have won. He has been chomping at the bit ever since. The fact both fighters are desperate for a much-needed win should make this a very entertaining bout.
Tim Elliott vs. Ryan Benoit betting odds
Odds via BetMGM; access USA TODAY Sports’ betting odds for a full list. Lines last updated Tuesday at 6:35 a.m. ET.
ELLIOTT (-125) is favored on the 2-way line, and rightly so. While he has had a difficult time of it recently, Benoit (+105) hasn’t exactly lit the world afire lately, either. The latter has been rather inconsistent, showing out in some rounds, while completely disappearing in others. Elliott’s tremendous work on the mat will be the difference in this one. In fact, taking ELLIOTT BY KO/TKO, DQ or SUBMISSION (+340) on the 5-way line could be a rather lucrative way to go.
In addition, while the books are fully expecting this one to be decided by the judges, I am really impressed by Elliott’s body of work on the ground. Recently, he has gone to the mat and been overcome by his opponents. Either way, he isn’t going deep into the night, and that makes the UNDER 2.5 ROUNDS (+140) price rather attractive, too.
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