Avery Perri

Two divisional titles are on the line at UFC 317 this weekend.

The pre-fight narrative: Ilia Topuria battles Charles Oliveira for the vacant lightweight title, and the former is heavily favoured in his divisional debut. Before that, Alexandre Pantoja aims for a fourth consecutive flyweight title defence. 

Check out my UFC 317 predictions for the June 28 event in Las Vegas, featuring a pick on the main event and one on Brandon Royval.

UFC 317 predictions overview

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UFC 314 predictions made at 1:30 p.m. ET on 06/26/25.

Go to full UFC 317 betting markets.

UFC 317 predictions

Best Bet: Royval to win (-103)

Royval is a slight underdog against the up-and-coming Joshua Van, but I’ll gladly side with the veteran here.

Raw Dawg has fought for the flyweight belt before, losing to Pantoja by unanimous decision. That was the second time he was defeated by the current champ since 2021 — but other than that, he owns a spotless 5-0 record.

Van is taking this fight on short notice after Manel Kape was forced to withdraw with a broken foot.

The 23-year-old is on a four-fight winning streak, but has struggled to flash finishing power in the UFC. Five of his seven wins in the promotion have been by decision, with a late third-round KO mixed in.

Royval has only been knocked out once in 24 career fights and is an elite grappler, with a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and nine submissions to his name.

Van is a classic brawler, landing a blistering 8.20 significant strikes per minute. So Royval’s path to victory here is pretty clear: utilize his reach, press in tight for knees and elbows, and capitalize on a takedown opportunity when it comes.

I also think Van might run out of steam quickly.

He fought a three-round war against Bruno Gustavo da Silva on June 7 and had another three-round bout against Rei Tsuruya the month before that. Fighting that many times in a short span should catch up to him eventually.

Key stat: Royval is 3-1 in his last four fights as an underdog.

Quick pick

Topuria vs. Oliveira over 1.5 rounds (-137): Oliveira was once the lightweight king, but he had that title taken from him after losing to Islam Makhachev at UFC 280.

Now, he has a chance to reclaim the throne against Topuria, who is one of the most exciting fighters on the promotion.

The Georgian cleaned out the featherweight division and has a perfect 16-0 record coming into this fight.

He has elite finishing skills, winning six of those by knockout and eight by submission. Still, I think he will have his hands full in securing an early finish against Oliveira. 

Topuria hasn’t secured a finish in under 1.5 rounds since March of 2022 (five-fight stretch) when he knocked out Jai Herbert 1:07 into the second round.

He needed three rounds to put out Max Holloway at UFC 308 and just over 1.5 against Alexander Volkanovski, who was moving up a weight class, in the fight before that.

Oliveira’s last two fights went to a decision, and he has only been finished once since 2017 — by Makhachev.

Of course, there’s a chance Oliveira knocks out Topuria, but that’s coming in at +480. Topuria has seldom been knocked down and has an elite takedown defence (92%).

The Toronto Blue Jays and Cleveland Guardians play out their rubber match on Thursday afternoon.

The pregame narrative: Toronto looks to avoid consecutive series losses after dropping yesterday’s game in extra innings. Kevin Gausman (4.60 ERA) gets the ball for the Jays while Tanner Bibee (3.86) starts for the Guardians.

Check out my Blue Jays vs. Guardians predictions, including Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Jose Ramirez.

Blue Jays vs. Guardians predictions

Parlay: Guardians +1.5 | Guerrero over 1.5 bases | Ramirez 1+ hits (+425)

Guardians +1.5 (-190): Gausman’s seesaw season has continued, and it’s straight up hard to trust him at the moment.

• Gausman in May: 2.81 ERA, .215 OBA, 27% K rate, 1% BB rate
• Gausman in June: 7.65 ERA, .291 OBA, 24% K rate, 13% BB rate

The righty’s command issues stick out the most to me. He walked just one batter across five starts in May and has already issued 12 free passes in four starts in June.

Combined with the fact that he’s giving up plenty of contact, I struggle to see the Jays running away with this one.

Bibee isn’t exactly on a Cy Young run, but he’s been much more consistent and has a 3.86 ERA across four starts this month. The Guardians covered a +1.5 run line in three of those games.

Toronto is also 3-8 vs. a -1.5 line in its last 11 games.

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MLB SGP legs

Guerrero over 1.5 bases (+120): I backed Guerrero to go over 1.5 bases yesterday and he delivered with a towering solo shot in the fourth inning.

It was around this time last year when Guerrero got scorching hot, and his last eight games indicate we’re in for another big summer:

• .357 batting average
• .786 slugging percentage
• three doubles, three home runs
• 61% hard-hit rate

Bibee profiles as the type of pitcher who should give up contact. He has a 69th-percentile walk rate (7.0%) and 38th-percentile K rate (20.3%).

Guerrero is 4-for-8 against the righty with a home run.

Ramirez 1+ hits (-235): Let’s close out this parlay with what should be a layup.

Ramirez ranks sixth in MLB in batting average (.318) and has a hit in six of his last seven games. He ranks in the 95th percentile for xBA (.304), too, and has a 96th-percentile K rate (10.8%).

Ramirez has struggled against Gausman in the past — he’s 4-for-23 lifetime against the righty — but I like his chances of besting the struggling pitcher tonight.

Blue Jays vs. Guardians predictions made at 9:00 a.m. ET on 06/25/2025.

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Max Scherzer returns to the Toronto Blue Jays’ rotation on Wednesday against the Cleveland Guardians.

The pregame narrative: Scherzer threw just three innings in his Jays debut before landing on the injured list with right thumb inflammation in late March. The 40-year-old is back in the mix, though, after a pair of stellar rehab outings in Triple-A. Cleveland counters with hard-throwing righty Gavin Williams.

Check out my Blue Jays picks vs. the Guardians for June 25, featuring Scherzer and Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

Blue Jays picks vs. Guardians

Best Bet: Guerrero over 1.5 total bases (+125)

Toronto’s offence has been humming along nicely, and that’s without Guerrero playing near his ceiling.

It looks like the $500-million man has found something, though. Check out his stats since the beginning of Toronto’s last homestand (seven games).

• .360 batting average
• .720 slugging percentage
• Three doubles, two home runs
• 60% hard-hit rate

That’s an encouraging sign, considering Guerrero has been hitting the cover off the ball all year (96th percentile hard-hit rate, 54.5%) with underwhelming results. Baseball Savant defines a “hard-hit ball” as a batted ball with an exit velocity of 95 mph or higher.

Guerrero ranks in the 100th percentile for xBA (.324) and in the 92nd for xSLG (.540), so I’m hoping he can continue turning those expected numbers into real results.

Williams isn’t an ideal matchup for a bases prop because of his propensity to walk batters.

The righty has a fifth-percentile walk rate (12.9%) and has given up 16 BBs in his last five starts. But the righty’s arsenal is something Guerrero should get after.

He throws an upper-90s fastball 43% of the time, and Guerrero has a .374 xBA and .613 xSLG vs. four-seamers above 95 mph.

Key stat: Guerrero is 5-2 against this line in his last seven games.

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Quick pick

Scherzer over 4.5 strikeouts (-106): This is a bit of a risky pick considering Scherzer’s injury history.

But the veteran wouldn’t be returning to the lineup if he wasn’t ready, and he’s coming off an electric Triple-A start:

• 4.1 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 8 K

Scherzer has always been an elite swing-and-miss arm, ranking in the 80th percentile or higher for K rate in every full season since 2015.

He also gets to go up against a struggling Guardians lineup. Cleveland has the sixth-highest K rate (24.5%) and fourth-lowest wRC+ (86) over the last 30 days.

Toronto also used five relievers last night, and four of them threw 10-plus pitches. A little length out of Scherzer would do wonders for this wager.

Blue Jays picks made at 9:52 a.m. ET on 06/25/2025.