Preview: UFC Fight Night 228 ‘Fiziev vs. Gamrot’

Featherweights

#10 FW | Bryce Mitchell (15-1, 6-1 UFC) vs. #12 FW | Dan Ige (17-6, 9-5 UFC)

ODDS: Mitchell (-205), Ige (+170)

Even if he never winds up making the charge into championship contention, Ige’s UFC career has still been a rousing success. Unsigned after a win on the first season of Dana White’s Contender Series, Ige stepped in as a late-notice replacement in 2018 and did not have much in the way of expectations. After dropping a fun debut against Julio Arce, Ige ran over Mike Santiago and then just kept winning, racking up six straight victories on the back of a well-rounded and relentless game. Ige earned his first UFC main event against Calvin Kattar in 2020—a loss that exposed one of the main issues with Ige’s approach thus far. In part due to his physical limitations and partially by stylistic choice, Ige’s blitzing approach does not come with a ton of range tools, sometimes leaving him on an island against an opponent who can consistently keep him at bay. After obliterating Gavin Tucker in just 22 seconds, Ige went on a three-fight losing streak that was quite frustrating, if only because the Hawaiian kept showing some improvements that paid few dividends against an elite level of competition; a narrow decision loss to Josh Emmett in 2021 is a result that still stings from an Ige standpoint. However, 2023 has seen Ige re-affirm himself as a top featherweight knocking on the door of the elite. Damon Jackson and Nate Landwehr each had little answer for Ige, whose power seems to be really clicking. Jackson eventually got annihilated in the second round, while Landwehr absorbed a great deal of damage over 15 minutes. Now, Ige gets another chance at the biggest win of his career, this time in a longstanding grudge match against Mitchell.

Mitchell’s public persona makes it quite easy not to take him seriously, but that overshadows the reality that “Thug Nasty” is quite a crafty and effective fighter. Mitchell made it to the UFC via “The Ultimate Fighter” in 2018, and the scouting report was that the Arkansas native was a fairly one-dimensional grappling specialist. While that may have been true at the time in a broader sense, it also underrated exactly how effective Mitchell was on the mat, as he consistently hung with some tough opposition even before scoring a rare twister submission on Matt Sayles at the end of 2019. During that time, Mitchell also started building out an unorthodox but effective striking game, fighting at range with a messy approach at times while also possessing an impressive level of natural accuracy. His wrestling won the day against Edson Barboza, but it was still a feather in Mitchell’s cap that he was able to outmaneuver and knock down one of the sport’s most feared strikers on the feet. Of course, Mitchell’s last fight, a December loss to Ilia Topuria, does raise some cause for concern. Mitchell was apparently ill heading into the fight and did look particularly flat, but Topuria’s combination of grappling skill and lack of fear allowed him to mostly cut through the Barata MMA rep’s game, eventually scoring a second-round submission. That is an interesting blueprint for Ige to follow. If nothing else, he has the level of durability to pull it off after going toe-to-toe with some hard hitters and never looking the worse for wear. However, the bet is that this fight never gets much above a simmer and results in a lot of frustration for Ige. Mitchell should be able to dictate a range and outmaneuver Ige, leaving the Hawaiian unable to get inside and win the types of striking exchanges that would serve him the best. That also comes with the expectation that Mitchell can find some modicum of wrestling success against Ige, though a blowout would be a surprise. While there is some cause for intrigue if Ige can stuff a few takedowns, the pick is Mitchell via decision.

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Fiziev vs. Gamrot
Mitchell vs. Ige
Rodriguez vs. Waterson-Gomez
Battle vs. Fletcher
Jourdain vs. Ramos
The Prelims