State Farm Arena in Atlanta will be the site of UFC 236, whose two title fights pit Featherweight Champion Max Holloway (20-4 MMA, 16-4 UFC) against Dusting Poirier (24-5 MMA, 16-4 UFC) for the interim lightweight title.
The other title bout is Unbeaten Israel Adesanya (15-0 MMA, 5-0 UFC) against Kelvin Gastelum (16-3 MMA, 10-3 UFC) for the interim Middleweight belt.
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Holloway is the favorite for his match (u2½+125 total, -210 moneyline). His last bout was spectacular, as he broke two records for significant strikes, landing 134 in a single round and 290 in a single fight against Brian Ortega at UFC 231 back in December of 2018. The fight was ended after four rounds by doctor stoppage. For this matchup against Poirier, Holloway is moving up a class to Lightweight, and Holloway will get a chance to add more hardware to his trophy case as the winner walks away with the interim lightweight title.
The fight against Poirier (o2½-155 total, +170 money line) will be the second time these two fighters have met. Back in 2012, Poirier was expecting to fight Erik Koch in UFC 143, but both Kotch and the first backup fighter withdrew due to injury and Holloway stepped in as a second replacement. Poirier won that fight in the first round by submission.
Poirier’s last fight was a July 28th 2018 UFC Main Event bout against Eddie Alvarez. He won via TKO in the second round. He was supposed to go up against Nate Diaz later that year as part of UFC 230, but had to pull out due to a hip injury.
Poirier is more of a calculated fighter, whereas Holloway -as we saw in this fight with Ortega- is a volume fighter. Poirier will need to break the rhythm of Holloway’s combos in order to win.
In the Adesanya-Gastelum fight, the interim Middleweight title winner will have a chance at a title unification bout with Robert Whittaker sometime later this year.
New Zealander Adesanya (u3½EV total, -170 money line) is coming off a 2018 in which he recorded five wins to bring his record to 16-0. His last win was earlier this year when he defeated Anderson Silva in a unanimous decision in the third round at UFC 234. Adesanya is a very versatile fighter who doesn’t go for a one-punch knockout, preferring rather to outthink and wear down his opponent. In going undefeated, he has only one KO in that span.
Gastelum meanwhile last fought in May of 2018, almost a year ago. In that fight he took down Ronaldo Souza in round three by split decision to bring his record to 15-3. He has more experience than Adesanya in this fight, with a better grasp of wrestling and jiu-jitsu. At 5-9 he will have to get inside the 6-4 Adesanya in order to inflict damage, so a lot depends on whether or not Israel lets him get close enough to do that.