{"id":595819,"date":"2026-04-09T14:27:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T14:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595819\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T14:27:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T14:27:11","slug":"ufc-327-picks-experts-expect-jiri-prochazka-to-finish-carlos-ulberg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595819\/","title":{"rendered":"UFC 327 picks: Experts expect Ji\u0159\u00ed Proch\u00e1zka to finish Carlos Ulberg"},"content":{"rendered":"

The UFC light heavyweight championship will be up for grabs Saturday, when Ji\u0159\u00ed Proch\u00e1zka<\/a> takes on Carlos Ulberg<\/a> in the UFC 327 main event at Miami’s Kaseya Center. The current light heavyweight champion, Alex Pereira<\/a>, is vacating the belt to move up<\/a> and fight against Ciryl Gane<\/a> for the interim heavyweight championship at the White House in June.<\/p>\n

Proch\u00e1zka, who held the belt from June to November 2022, will make his fourth appearance in a UFC title fight. Proch\u00e1zka has beaten his past two opponents by third-round knockout. He is ranked No. 3 in ESPN’s divisional rankings<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ulberg, ESPN’s No. 4-ranked light heavyweight, enters the fight riding a nine-fight winning streak. He is making his first UFC title fight appearance.<\/p>\n

A panel of three former UFC fighters offer their picks and insight for the UFC 327 main event.<\/p>\n

Light heavyweight title fightExpertPickMethodDustin Poirier
MMA analyst
Proch\u00e1zkaTKODin Thomas
MMA coach
Proch\u00e1zkaTKOMichael Chiesa
MMA analyst
Proch\u00e1zkaTKOExpert takes<\/p>\n

The chaos and unpredictability of Ji\u0159\u00ed’s fight style over five rounds will be too much for Ulberg. Ji\u0159\u00ed has experience in big spots, and I could see that getting to Carlos. The footwork and speed of Carlos make him dangerous, and he reads distances well. Even with that, he needs to catch Ji\u0159\u00ed with something to beat him, and Ji\u0159\u00ed’s defense has gotten better. — Dustin Poirier<\/a><\/p>\n

The chaos and unpredictability of Ji\u0159\u00ed’s fight style over five rounds will be too much for Ulberg. Ji\u0159\u00ed has experience in big spots, and I could see that getting to Carlos. The footwork and speed of Carlos make him dangerous, and he reads distances well. Even with that, he needs to catch Ji\u0159\u00ed with something to beat him, and Ji\u0159\u00ed’s defense has gotten better. — Din Thomas<\/a><\/p>\n

Ulberg has momentum. But if it wasn’t for Alex Pereira, Proch\u00e1zka might be the longtime, reigning light heavyweight champion right now. It’s hard to pick against Proch\u00e1zka. He’s been near-perfect, in devastating fashion, for a long time. He doesn’t dominate every fight from start to finish, but he finds ways to win, and we’ve seen him overcome adversity. His experience will be the difference-maker. — Michael Chiesa<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The UFC light heavyweight championship will be up for grabs Saturday, when Ji\u0159\u00ed Proch\u00e1zka takes on Carlos Ulberg…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85],"class_list":["post-595819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}