The UFC's lightweight division has long been one of the deepest in the sport. That depth will be on display once again Saturday, when Kevin Lee faces off against Charles Oliveira in the main event of the promotion's first trip to Brazil in 2020.
Lee got a much-needed victory in his most recent outing, and Oliveira is riding a six-fight winning streak that dates to 2018. Both fighters have obvious strengths, which are evident via their fight stats. However, the interaction of those strengths and advantages makes this a very interesting contest.
The following attempts to determine which style and skill set will win on Saturday.
The stats that favor Lee
In his most recent fight, Lee had an advantage in distance striking over former NCAA champion wrestler Gregor Gillespie, and he knew it. Lee outlanded Gillespie 20-9 at distance, scored the first knockdown of his UFC career and finished the fight via first-round knockout. Despite that performance, Lee still does his best work when he is able to score takedowns and work from the top position.
In the UFC, 35% of Lee's landed significant strikes have been on the ground. He lands 76% of his significant strike attempts on the floor and averages 1.36 significant ground strikes per minute. Even though he has made strides in his distance striking, he typically needs to make an impact on the ground to be successful. In his UFC victories, 46% of the significant strikes Lee has landed have come at distance. In his losses, that proportion rises all the way to 76%. When he has been forced to do the majority of his striking work from long range, he has been much less successful.
There is a good chance that Lee's ground striking attack will be successful against Oliveira. In the Octagon, 24% of Oliveira's absorbed significant strikes have been on the ground, and he has avoided only 36% of his opponents' significant strike attempts on the floor. Despite being a skilled submission grappler, he has been outlanded 119-97 in significant ground strikes.
Lee has also been able to force fights to the floor with his wrestling. He averages 3.23 takedowns per 15 minutes, which is the fourth-best rate among ranked lightweights and well above the average for the group (1.89). Lee lands only 42% of his takedown attempts, but like many accomplished wrestlers, he makes up for that by chaining attempts together and persistently forcing wrestling exchanges. In the Octagon, he has averaged 7.55 takedown attempts per 15 minutes. Oliveira has stopped 58% of takedown attempts against him, but he still allows 1.48 takedowns per 15 minutes. If Lee makes a concerted effort, it is hard to see him not ending up in top position.
The stats that favor Oliveira
Even if Lee has success with his wrestling and ground striking, he better not relax once the fight hits the floor. Oliveira attempts 2.78 submissions per 15 minutes of fight time. Not only is that the highest submission attempt rate among ranked lightweights, but it is also nearly twice the rate of Tony Ferguson (1.40), who ranks second in the category.
Oliveira has used that submission attempt rate to finish a lot of fighters. He holds the record for most submission finishes in the UFC, with 13. There are only three fighters with 10 or more, the other two being Brazilian jiu-jitsu legends Demian Maia (11) and Royce Gracie (10). Even if Lee is able to make an impact with his ground fighting, he could find himself in a lot of trouble against a grappler the caliber of Oliveira.
Although Oliveira has relied on his grappling at times, he has recently shown off some serious striking power. Through his first 23 fights in the UFC, he scored only two knockdowns and averaged 0.20 knockdowns per 15 minutes. In his past two fights, he doubled that total, with knockdowns and striking-based stoppages of Nik Lentz and Jared Gordon. In the two-fight stretch, he averaged 3.48 knockdowns per 15 minutes. This seemingly newfound power could simply be the result of a small sample, but it could also be the sign of a fighter sharpening his striking skills late in his career.
Oliveira's knockdown rate is not the only metric that has drastically improved recently. Prior to his current six-fight winning streak, "Do Bronx" had landed 2.97 significant strikes per minute and absorbed 3.04 per minute for a -0.07 striking differential. During the winning streak, he averaged 4.46 landed significant strikes per minute and absorbed only 2.99 per minute, a +1.47 differential. There are only three ranked UFC lightweights with higher striking differentials, and two of them, Ferguson and champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, are scheduled to meet in April.
The bottom line
Lee could walk into the Octagon on Saturday, control the fight with takedowns and grind away Oliveira with strikes from top position. He is an above-average takedown artist who has melted fighters with punches and elbows on the ground.
Although that is a solid strategy, it actually could get him into trouble against Oliveira. By taking the fight to the floor, Lee will be giving one of the most accomplished submission threats in UFC history the opportunity to do what he does best.
On top of that, this fight is scheduled for five rounds, which means Oliveira has 25 minutes to look for a finish. In addition to his 13 submission victories, he is also coming off back-to-back KO/TKO wins. Those 15 stoppage wins are the second most in UFC history, behind only Donald Cerrone's 16.
This is Oliveira's first fight scheduled for 25 minutes, whereas Lee lost two of his three fights that extended into the championship rounds. Look for Lee to have success early and maybe win multiple rounds. However, in the end, Oliveira will pull off the victory.
Prediction: Oliveira by submission