UFC 109 Welterweight Betting – Matt Serra vs. Frank Trigg

We haven’t seen Matt Serra in the octagon for nearly nine months after he fell to 9-6 SU with back-to-back losses against two of the greatest welterweights the UFC has ever known. Matt Hughes and Georges St. Pierre put Serra back down the ladder and now we’ll see if Serra can rebuild his career for a third time. Serra will literally start from the bottom of the ladder when he meets the aging Frank Trigg.

Trigg is 19-7 SU in his career and ended a four year absence from the UFC when he got belted by Josh Koscheck at UFC 103. It wasn’t exactly the return that Trigg was expecting, though he definitely filled our ears with plenty of material for the bulletin board. The always lippy Trigg has done a better job of keeping his trap shut leading up to his bout with Serra. That, or we just stopped listening.

Serra’s career has been filled with expectations that he hasn’t particularly lived up to. At 35-years old, Serra holds a record of 9-6 SU and early wins over B.J. Penn and St. Pierre catapulted him to a level he was never really supposed to be in. His career has been highlighted by a lightweight and welterweight championship. Yet there’s hardly anyone in the UFC that trains as hard as Serra does, and after two straight losses Serra is now getting a fight that he knows he can win.

Despite being a known and accomplished jiu-jitsu and submission specialist, Serra has never really been able to bring those tactics in to the octagon. For whatever reason, he prefers to swing for knockouts. That’s what killed him in the fights against Hughes and St. Pierre, but getting torn apart like a mauled lamb won’t be a fear that Serra will have to overcome in terms of UFC 109 betting.

Trigg is a brawler and nothing but. In nineteen lackluster wins, the loud mouthed Trigg has won just six fights by submission and daring Serra to prove he still has talent on the ground is not the kind of opinion a lumpy 37-year old fighter will try to validate. Likely still enraged by his loss to Koscheck, Trigg will try to win the crowd over by throwing overhand lefts and rights, trying to land a lucky punch and score a nice victory and a sweet pay cheque.

But that’s just not going to work. While this fight doesn’t really mean anything on the grand scale, especially with Serra’s prime certainly behind him, it will be a stern reminder that Serra’s career has been more opportunistic than lucky. Serra will play Trigg’s game in the standup and will score a knockout, hopefully shutting Trigg up for good.

Furious Free Pick: Matt Serra -140 OVER Trigg +110