The World Series of Fighting 10 event is scheduled for this Saturday at the Hard Rock Casino in Las Vegas and features three title bouts. The main event sees the vacant Middleweight title filled as David Branch takes on Jesse Taylor, and the card features Featherweight and female Strawweight title defenses as well.
Right now heading into the fights, Jesse Taylor is favored at (-160) over David Branch, who returns at around (+120). The match marks the finals of the WSOF’s long running Middleweight tournament, which saw Branch defeat Danillo Villefort and Paulo Filho, while Taylor beat Elvis Mutapcic to advance. Taylor is on a strong winning streak and owns an experience advantage over Branch. The winner likely gets a future date with former UFC top contender Yushin Okami down the line.
In the featherweight title bout, champion Georgi Karakhanyan is roughly a 4 to 1 (-420) favorite over challenger Rick Glenn, who comes back at (+300). This match looks to have ‘crowd pleaser’ written all over it. Neither man has lost in years, as both are owners of impressive winning streaks (Georgi at 9, Glenn at 7. Glenn is actually 11-0-1 in his last 12 outings). Karakhanyan owns the experience advantage, and his competition level is considerably higher than that of Glenn. Don’t look for Glenn to be scared of Karakhanyan’s aggression. Give Glenn a chance the longer the fight goes, as Karakhanyan has never been in the championship rounds (4 and 5) either, and Glenn has shown a penchant for finishing fights late.
The women’s strawweight champion Jessica Aguilar is a big time (-600) favorite over challenger Emi Fujino (+400). Throughout her career, Aguilar has stuck to her guns, insisting on fighting at 115 lbs. Early in her career, matches at 125 and more were available, but Aguilar insisted on competing at Strawweight. Her years of perseverance see her now as probably the best 115 lb woman fighter in the world. The UFC has announced they are adding this weight class to their women’s divisions, and it would be a travesty to not have Aguilar aboard. Fujino is a tough competitor who will put on a show, and she has faced extremely solid women fighters in her career fighting in Japan, but look for her first fight outside of her home country to end badly for Fujino.
