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UFC Fight for the Troops
December 10th, 2008 6 PM PST
Josh Koscheck Vs. Yoshiyuki Yoshida
UFC Betting Pick: Josh Koscheck
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UFC Welterweight fight: Josh Koscheck Vs. Yoshiyuki Yoshida
Yoshiyuki "Zenko" Yoshida (10-2-0) is one of the best fighters that you've never heard of. A look at his fighting history tells a lot of the story. He lost two majority decisions, one of them certainly questionable, early in his career. Something must have clicked in his head that told him: Never leave it in the hands of the judges. Since then, he hasn't lost, and has ended every fight by the end of the second round. He's young, powerful, and talented. At 170 pounds, he's actually one of the heaviest fighters to come out of the Tokyo Yellow Mans school, known more for producing fast lighter-weights like the Shooto featherweight superstar Noboru "Kijin" Asahi.
One of the problems with handicapping a fight like this is successfully comparing the apples to the oranges. Delving into Zenko's history, we see that he's finished some very impressive competition, like Luis Santos (31-4-0), Katsuya Inoue (17-6-3), and Akira Kikuchi (16-4-0). These guys are stars in Pancrase and Shooto. But somewhat randomly, he's fought some cans as well. That happens a lot more overseas than it does in the U.S., where personality and home town heroism have as much to do with selling tickets as anything else. Suffice it to say, Zenko has met the big challenges and destroyed them. So far.
He has excellent stand up, a good ground game, and he tends to end fights suddenly and brutally. Watch his GCM / Cage Force fights and you'll see a well rounded athlete with nerves of steel. I would have a hard time betting against Zenko.
Josh "Kos" Koscheck (11-3-0) is well known by now. He is rapidly becoming a gatekeeper at 170, keeping Hazelett and Sanchez away from victory road. But a couple of unfortunate losses against top of the pecking order fighters have kept Josh from breaking through. He remains in that muddled field of talented contenders, but not ready to challenge the belt holder GSP, who he lost to in '07 while Serra briefly held the title.
Nobody doubts Josh's intensity, or his heart. If anything, you have to doubt his flexibility. He's a wrestler with some kickboxing training, and that has been enough to control and batter a lot of opponents. But when faced with a top of the food chain, well rounded opponent, the tools just aren't in Kos' toolbox. He goes from grinding out a decision win, to suffering through a decision loss. If he could finish, if his threats were more than pure strength and balance, then Josh would be scary. But that just hasn't been the case, sadly.
Nobody is saying that Koscheck doesn't stand a chance; but look at the facts. He's going to have to grind out a win against an opponent who just doesn't let things come down to the judges' decision. He's going to be focused on getting this to the ground, against a fighter that is very talented on the ground. Josh may win, but only by taking a lot of risks and getting a little lucky in the process. He'll probably get caught. I put his win percentage in the low 40's.
Bottom Line: The beautiful thing about talented fighters coming from the east is that you can probably find some good betting odds out there. Odds follow local knowledge, and with smaller events like this, the bias tends to be towards the North American fighters. Zenko has a better than 55 percent chance to win this one, so if you find good odds, go for it!
Close, but probably a 2nd round armbar for Yoshida.
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