Ofli vs – In UFC Baku prelims, the resurgent Ofli looks to make it a third straight Octagon win when he faces Reyes, who opened his UFC career with a successful debut in February. Betting has Reyes favored at -160, but Ofli’s momentum—and the way he answered earlier set
The matchup feels built for a fork in the road. Ofli steps back into the Octagon hunting his third straight win. while Reyes arrives with the kind of fresh momentum that comes from a successful UFC debut just months earlier in February. In Baku’s prelims. it’s Reyes who starts slightly ahead on the betting board. listed at -160. with Ofli a +135 underdog.
Ofli’s path to this fight runs through a season people still remember: he came out of Season 32 of “The Ultimate Fighter.” At the “TUF” finale. he was already 31. which made him look like a late bloomer—but he didn’t lack for raw tools. He’s stocky and powerful, with an aggressive style that doesn’t confine itself to one lane. He looks for big punches on the feet, then tries to wrestle and grapple opponents into the dirt.
His early UFC run didn’t flatter that approach. He dropped his first two bouts to fellow finalist Mairon Santos and Muhammadjon Naimov. Against Santos. Ofli’s hard-charging offense on the feet left him face-first into Santos’ superior firepower for six minutes and change. The loss to Naimov went a different direction: Ofli was outmuscled and outgrinded by a foe who was both a bit bigger and a more efficient wrestler. Those defeats made the limitations of his skill set and approach feel obvious.
Since then, though, Ofli has bounced back with two straight wins over Ricardo Ramos and Zha Yi. The Yi fight wasn’t the kind of victory that felt reassuring—he won. but the decision is described as terrible. Even so. the result puts him in position where he could go over .500 in one of the UFC’s toughest divisions.
Reyes’ story is shorter on the UFC timeline but vivid in its own way. Like Ofli, he entered top-level competition after arriving later than usual. He won on Dana White’s Contender Series last fall. then made his UFC debut as a 32-year-old rookie in February. In that debut. he faced Douglas Silva de Andrade. survived adversity on the feet. and then turned the fight in a brutal way on the ground—hammering the Brazilian nearly unrecognizable with ground-and-pound to earn a first-round TKO.
Reyes fights with a bigger, steadier posture. He works at a consistent pace and tends to build throughout a fight. with leg kicks and diligent body work designed to wear opponents down and drag them into deep waters. He’s not described as particularly skilled offensively or defensively as a wrestler, but he is a good submission grappler. The risk with his style is that he can sometimes spend too much time attacking from his back when he might be better off getting back up.
That question mark mattered less against Silva de Andrade. Against him, Reyes was all business on the ground, and the outcome suggests he may have turned a corner.
Ofli remains the slight underdog, but the matchup carries a more complicated shape than the odds alone. The betting line is tied to what happened with Zha Yi. because the preview makes clear that if the Yi decision had gone the other way. the line would probably have been a good bit wider. Still, the pick leans toward Ofli.
The reasoning comes down to how both men handle size and how they adjust after trouble. Reyes may be the bigger fighter. but he doesn’t typically use his size in bully performances that have troubled Ofli in the past. And while Ofli did lose the decision to Naimov earlier. the preview emphasizes that he took over the fight and started winning once he ramped up his work rate and aggression—something that the rest of his performances have since reflected.
The pick for UFC Baku prelims is simple: Ofli by decision.
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UFC Baku Ofli vs Reyes UFC prelims Reyes odds Ofli underdog Mairon Santos Muhammadjon Naimov Zha Yi Douglas Silva de Andrade