{"id":729808,"date":"2026-06-11T13:23:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T13:23:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/729808\/"},"modified":"2026-06-11T13:23:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T13:23:08","slug":"laura-sanko-josh-hokit-vs-derrick-lewis-closer-than-the-odds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/729808\/","title":{"rendered":"Laura Sanko: Josh Hokit vs. Derrick Lewis ‘closer than the odds’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Laura Sanko thinks Derrick Lewis<\/a> shouldn’t be counted out at UFC Freedom 250.<\/p>\n

Former title challenger Lewis (29-13 MMA, 20-11 UFC) takes on rising heavyweight star Josh Hokit (9-0 MMA, 3-0 UFC) Sunday (Paramount+<\/a>) at the White House in Washington.<\/p>\n

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Hokit earned the opportunity by outlasting Curtis Blaydes at UFC 327<\/a>, which was a big step up in competition after having had just two octagon fights.<\/p>\n

“It’s easy to paint a story that Derrick Lewis is really up against it, and the guy has more knockouts than anyone in the history of the organization,” Sanko told MMA Junkie. “Quite often, he finds a way to land something, and there’s something special in those hands.”<\/p>\n

According to FanDuel, Hokit is a -460 favorite over Lewis, who is a +320 underdog. UFC analyst and color commentator Sanko finds the odds too wide.<\/p>\n

“That’s not insane-insane, but that’s a pretty wide stretch,” Sanko said. “I think heavyweight, when you’ve got a guy like Derrick Lewis who has that punching power, it seems pretty wide given those circumstances. I understand why they’re wide. Josh Hokit is a real problem for Derrick Lewis on paper. He’s a real problem for a lot of guys on paper. If this gets past the first round I definitely think we’re going to see those odds grow even bigger.<\/p>\n

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“But then it’s like, ‘Remember when he knocked out (Alexander) Volkov with like five seconds to go.’ He’s the king of surprises, he’s the king of knockouts and you can’t count a guy like that out. We saw how much Josh got hit by Curtis Blaydes a few months ago. The damage he took in that fight \u2013 Blaydes has had some good knockouts, but he’s not known as this powerhouse at heavyweight. It’s closer than the odds, I think.”<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: Laura Sanko surprised by Hokit vs. Lewis UFC Freedom 250 odds<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Laura Sanko thinks Derrick Lewis shouldn’t be counted out at UFC Freedom 250. Former title challenger Lewis (29-13…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":535071,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,228796,4227,641,50192,5521,638,1302,82,640],"class_list":["post-729808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-curtis-blaydes","tag-derrick-lewis","tag-fighting","tag-josh-hokit","tag-laura-sanko","tag-mma","tag-mma-junkie","tag-sports","tag-ufc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=729808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/535071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=729808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=729808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=729808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}