The featherweight championship will be on the line at UFC 194 on Saturday night when defending champion Jose Aldo goes toe-to-toe with interim champion Conor McGregor in a main event unification bout that has moved to a pick’em at sportsbooks monitored by OddsShark.com.
The long-awaited clash between the rival champions has been months in the making, and it originally was scheduled to take place at UFC 189.
However, Aldo was forced to withdraw from that contest due to a rib injury, and he was replaced by Chad Mendes, who McGregor finished with a second-round technical knockout to claim the interim crown while paying out at the sportsbooks as -190 chalk.
With that victory, the colorful Irishman extended his current win streak to 14, and he enters Saturday night’s McGregor vs. Aldo matchup at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas with a perfect 6-0 record since joining the UFC in 2013, and an 18-2 overall professional record.
It has been almost 14 months since Aldo last stepped into the Octagon to defend his title. The 29-year-old also faced Mendes in his last fight, claiming a unanimous decision in the UFC 179 main event that was later proclaimed the 2014 Fight of the Year, earning the victory as a heavy -260 betting favorite.
Aldo, who first claimed the old WEC Featherweight crown in 2009 before being promoted to UFC champ when the rival MMA circuits merged in 2010, last went down to defeat over a decade ago, falling to Luciano Azevedo in his lone fight as a lightweight.
The Brazilian has strung together 18 straight victories since, all as a featherweight, including seven successful title defenses as UFC champion.
However, unlike McGregor, who has ended 13 of his last 14 bouts inside the distance, six of Aldo’s last eight contests have gone the full five rounds, with his last win by TKO coming over Chan Sung Jung in the fourth round of their UFC 163 battle, topping the “Korean Zombie” as a strong -750 favorite.
In other UFC 194 betting action, UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman puts his belt and perfect 13-0 professional record on the line when he battles Luke Rockhold in the co-main event as -145 chalk.
Rockhold, winner of four straight since falling to Vitor Belfort in his UFC debut, gets his title shot as a respectable +115 underdog but will have his hands full against the “All-American,” who ended Belfort’s night with a first-round TKO at UFC 187, paying out as a heavy -525 favorite.
Thumbnail photo via UFC.com
