Michael Bisping is making his prediction for the bout between Dustin Poirier and Michael Chandler.
There is a huge pay-per-view event on the horizon as UFC 281 is set to go down next weekend live from Madison Square Garden in New York City. The event will be headlined by a middleweight title fight between champion Israel Adesanya and challenger Alex Pereira. There is another title fight on the card, a strawweight title bout between champ Carla Esparza and Zhang Weili. Despite these two massive title fights, many fans are looking forward to another fight on the card, the lightweight bout between Dustin Poirier vs. Michael Chandler.
Former UFC champion turned commentator Michael Bisping has broken down this fight on his YouTube channel for the fans. He is making his case for both men, stating their strengths and weakness.
Michael Bisping makes his official prediction for Dustin Poirier vs. Michael Chandler
Bisping is high on the boxing from Dustin Poirier. He thinks this will play a big role in their fight. Poirer has held his own with some of the best strikers in the UFC and came out on top.
“Who do I think is going to win and why?” Bisping said. “Dustin Poirier has the better boxing as I said, he’s got the longer reach but only by one inch. When you see Michael Chandler he’s a shorter guy, but he’s got a 71-inch reach and Dustin Poirier, is a 72. So not much of an advantage there. But I just think he puts together better combinations, very fluid footwork. He likes to switch stances. He’ll glide in and out. Of course, he’s a black belt in BJJ as I said before, so that’s a threat for Chandler if it hits the ground.”
On the flip side, Bisping is very impressed with his ground game and takedowns of Chandler. So far since coming to the UFC he has two KO wins but no submission wins. The former collegiate wrestler certainly knows who to take his opponents down, but is known to throw his hands as well, as seen in his Fight of the Year loss to Justin Gaethje.
“For Chandler, he’s got to mix in takedowns that he’s got to go from the boxing to the takedowns, lots of level changes, lots of faints lots of fakes. Use the hands, set up the level changes,” he said. “I don’t think we’ll see too many kicks from either man. For Dustin Poirier throwing kicks that could open a door for Chandler to counter with takedowns.”
Bisping is making his final pick and going with Poirier to get a third-round TKO.
