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UFC Vegas 48 Betting Preview: Odds, Props Update

Liam Heslin Mon 2/21 5:58am PT
Johnny Walker
(Image Credit: Imagn/USA TODAY Sports)

MMA betting expert Liam Heslin previews the action for the main event at UFC Vegas 48. Get the best odds and other betting tips for Walker vs. Hill.

The UFC is back in our lives once again for a Saturday showcase in the light heavyweight division, featuring Johnny Walker and “Sweet Dreams” Jamahal Hill in tonight’s UFC Vegas 48 card. Both fighters are ranked in the top fifteen of the division, and they are trying to distance themselves from losses and advance towards relevant top ten matchups.

Johnny Walker was defeated in his last bout by number five ranked Thiago “Marretta” Santos over the course of a tepid five-round kickboxing match in October of last year. Jamahal Hill on the other hand is coming off a resounding win over Jimmy Crute in December. Hill became the first man to ever finish Jimmy Crute with strikes, knocking him out in brutal fashion and destroying his face in the process. However, Hill was technically finished due to strikes in the first round of a June bout against esteemed divisional grappler and number eleven ranked Paul Craig (the fight should have been ruled a technical submission as Hill’s elbow was dislocated by an armbar long before the referee intervened). That is a performance he would like to distance himself from, as it halted an otherwise steady rise through the division, besting the likes of Ovince St. Preux and Klidson Abreu (funny enough, Abreu actually submitted Walker in the second round of their 2015 bout) en route to his first UFC main event showcase.

UFC Vegas 48 Odds Preview

Most of the early books to price this fight opened Jamahal Hill around the -240 favorite tag (~70.6%), with the comeback on Johnny Walker sitting at around +190 (~34.5%). The line has had a bit of tug of war since then, with Hill getting as high as -300 (75%) in some places. Currently, the market average price on Jamahal Hill sits at -252 (~71.6%), with the average comeback on Johnny Walker hanging at +203 (33%).

The trend in the line movement has been that early action pushed the price up on Hill, and ever since the price has been slowly but steadily creeping down on Walker market-wide (since late January).

Johnny Walker

Walker finds himself in the relatively unfamiliar position of being the betting underdog in this UFC Vegas 48 match, having closed the favorite in 5 of his 7 bouts. Walker has a UFC record of 4-3, and that includes 3-2 as a betting favorite and 1-1 as a betting underdog. He lost his last bout against Thiago Santos as a short underdog in a closely contested decision, so it seems he was priced appropriately by the market in that fight.

The other fight where he was priced an underdog was his UFC debut against Khalil Rountree, so it is again understandable why the unknown commodity (at the time) in Walker was priced as the dog.

The market has incorrectly priced Walker as a favorite twice in recent bouts. Corey Anderson knocked out Walker in the very first round in November of 2019, and he had an ugly grappling affair with Krylov in March of 2020 in which he was soundly defeated and he completely gassed. The low pace of the Santos fight kept it competitive, but he was unable to hurt Santos and threaten him with a finish despite the fact that Santos is 38 and well past his prime.

Certainly the wide nature of the line is some reason for pause in the highly volatile light heavyweight class. Walker has outperformed his odds expectation, but only by a small margin. If you flat bet Johnny Walker on the money line through 7 UFC bouts, you would have netted around an 8% ROI. 

Jamahal Hill

On the other side of this main event is Jamahal “Sweet Dreams” Hill, another highly respected commodity on the betting market.

Hill has closed a favorite in every UFC bout since his debut against Darko Stosic except for his last fight against Jimmy Crute. Hill has closed at an average price of -144 (~59%) despite winning at an 83% clip through 6 UFC bouts (5-1). When Jamahal Hill lost to Paul Craig, he did so as a -235 (~70%) favorite on the money line.

Hill’s overconfidence cost him dearly in the Craig fight, as he was willing to engage in a grappling match and ended up getting caught and submitted quickly by arguably the second-best grappler in the division behind the champion Glover Teixeira. However, in his other UFC fights, he has met or exceeded his money line expectations in large part, delivering brutal early knock outs of Ovince St. Preux (~ -170) and Klidson Abreu (~ -140) as a short favorite.

Simply put, Hill has delivered for his backers thus far in the UFC. If you flat bet on Jamahal Hill on the money line in every UFC bout he has had, you would have netted greater than a 50% ROI. Even excluding the underdog performance against Jimmy Crute, Hill has returned 33% ROI as a UFC favorite through a 6 fight sample size. 

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