GDT: UFC on ESPN: Emmett vs. Murphy/PFL 2025 World Tournament: First Round 1

[MMC]

Date: April 5, 2025
Venue: UFC Apex
City: Las Vegas, Nevada
Time: 9 pm ET/6 pm PT
Viewing: ESPN, Sportsnet

MAIN CARD (ESPN, Sportsnet)

Featherweight bout: Josh Emmett vs. Lerone Murphy
Featherweight bout: Pat Sabatini vs. Joanderson Brito
Bantamweight bout: Cortavious Romious vs. Chang-ho Lee
Heavyweight bout: Kennedy Nzechukwu vs. Martin Buday
Middleweight bout: Brad Tavares vs. Gerald Meerschaert
Middleweight bout: Torrez Finney vs. Robert Valentin

PRELIMINARY CARD (ESPN, Sportsnet)

Flyweight bout: Ode Osbourne vs. Luis Gurule
Bantamweight bout: Davey Grant vs. Daniel Santos
Women's Flyweight bout: Diana Belbita vs. Dione Barbosa
Welterweight bout: Rhys McKee vs. Daniel Frunza
Women's Strawweight bout: Loma Lookboonmee vs. Istela Nunes
Bantamweight bout: Victor Henry vs. Pedro Falcao
Women's Strawweight bout: Vanessa Demopoulous vs. Talita Alencar​

 

[MMC]

Date: April 3, 2025
Venue: Universal Studios Florida
City: Orlando, Florida
Time: 10 pm ET/7 pm PT
Viewing: ESPN2

MAIN CARD (ESPN2)

Welterweight tournament bout: Jason Jackson vs. Andrey Koreshkov
Featherweight tournament bout: Jesus Pinedo vs. Adam Borics
Welterweight tournament bout: Logan Storley vs. Joseph Luciano
Featherweight tournament bout: Jeremy Kennedy vs. Movlid Khaybulaev

PRELIMINARY CARD (ESPN+)

Welterweight tournament bout: Mukhamed Berkhamov vs. Thad Jean
Featherweight tournament bout: Gabriel Braga vs. Frederik Dupras
Welterweight tournament bout: Giannis Bachar vs. Masayuki Kikuiri
Featherweight tournament bout: Nathan Kelly vs. Tae-kyun Kim​

 

[MMC]

Umalatov misses weight, out of the tournament, Luciano filling in against Storley. Sucks because this should've been the year he finally wins it all.

 

[MMC]

PFL has confirmed that these tournaments will set up #1 contenders for the belts. I think this is ultimately the best solution for them to move forward with, no reason for them to have both Bellator and PFL belts and keeps the titles being defended more often than just one title fight a year without the champions having to go through the tournament gauntlet.

 

[CDJ]

Luciano has decent front chokes, he might be live against a wrestler like Storley (I still favor Storley tho)

I like a lot of the underdogs on the ufc card. Only 3 I don’t really like are Belbita/Buday/Ode

Gurule was my favorite prospect coming off the contender series- not super dynamic and could run into some trouble in the first against Osborne but

1) he is pretty good everywhere and is a phenomenal scrambler

2) great cardio, great pressure

3) durable

IMO he’ll be a top 10 flyweight, possible even top 5 eventually. Trains with Royval.