The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is the world’s largest Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) promotion company located in Las Vegas, Nevada. Founded in 1993, MMA is a full contact sport that combines fighting techniques and skill that are used in fights between two people in a competition. Fighters can use grappling and striking techniques and the aim is to beat the other fighter by knockout, submission, TKO or the fight can go the distance in which the win is based on overall points.
The UFC events are showcased worldwide and include 8 weight divisions for the men and 4 weight divisions for the women. It has become a very popular sport to place bets on and many punters can regularly find attractive bets, whether you like to support the underdog with a risky bet or play it somewhat safe. Bookmakers around the world from the US to Ireland offers betting on UFC and many stars have often appeared as mascots for these brands. Most recently Conor McGregor has worked with some of the larger Irish betting brands like Bet Ireland. Betting on the UFC is not easy as it can be so unpredictable. Every fight is different and one little mistake from the favourite can cost them the match and this means betting on the winner can be a difficult choice.
There have been many big bets placed on the UFC over the years along with even bigger returns. Here are some of the biggest UFC betting wins:
The Biggest Winning Bet in MMA History
On 6th June 2020 in Las Vegas, an anonymous bettor placed a staggering $1 million bet on Amanda Nunes in a UFC 250 match against Felicia Spencer. Nunes is a featherweight and bantamweight champion and had previously won the last 10 of her matches prior to this match up.
Nunes was nicknamed ‘The Lioness’ and is the best MMA fighter of all time. She was the favourite to win this match -600 and was named victorious after 5 tough rounds. The $1 million bet was placed with William Hill and the lucky punter cashed in on $166,666.70 with the biggest bet currently known to be ever placed on the UFC and won.
Nunes found out about the bet and later joked; “Now he’s very happy, he’ll probably go and drink something. He should ask me to go with him.”
The Biggest Loss
The first $1 million bet on a UFC fight was placed by Dana White in 2007 on former middleweight champion and the favourite Jermain Taylor to win vs. Kelly Pavlik but he was knocked out in the 7th round and the bet was lost.
Holly Holm vs. Ronda Rousey
One of the biggest bets placed on an underdog, the UFC 193 fight in Melbourne did not disappoint. Dave Oancea, also known as “Vegas Dave” is a big name in the world of sports betting and is known somewhat as a professional bettor. On 14th November 2015, Ronda Rousey was named as the favourite to beat Holly Holm as she was currently on a winning streak of 6 fights. She was at the top of her game but Dave thought differently. Dave placed a $20,000 bet on Holly Holm to win 11:1 and she caused a massive upset when she actually won with a KO which landed Dave $240,000 winnings.
This was the first UFC event in Melbourne and it had the biggest crowd in UFC history with 56,214 people watching in the stadium. It was the first fight Rousey had ever lost in her UFC career and the fight was named The Upset of the Year for 2015 by MMA website Sherdog.
Drake’s Big Bets
Drake, the Canadian rapper, is known for his sports betting prowess and regularly posts on social media his betting slips for the UFC.
On 23rd July 2022 during the UFC Fight Night in London, Drake placed a bet of £1,912,792.23 on Paddy Pimblett and Molly McCann to both win. They both won and Drake received a payout of £3,101,401.33 and promised to buy them both Rolex watches.
Another big win for Drake was during the UFC 285 when he placed a £207,730 bet on Jones to be Gane which earned him £1.41 million.
The UFC is an unpredictable sport to bet on, but if you get it right you can win big.
