As someone whose old DDO account "TUF" was literally made in honor of the show, I'd say I am a pretty big fan of it. There was no cooler feeling then watching Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonnar throw hands in the season 1 finale. I don't know about you guys, but I feel like the UFC as an organization doesn't put a big enough spotlight on the show. Edson Barboza is a great fighter, but tbh I am not watching the fights tonight for him. I am going to watch it because I saw Ricky Turcios, Brady Hiestand, Bryan Battle, and Tresean Gore battle their asses off over the last couple months on TUF season 29. I feel like I've seen very little advertising or hype over this event though, and I feel like the UFC misses out big time by not promoting the TUF finale's like they used to. Which feels wierd to me, considering how many UFC champs have come from being contestants on the show, hell Kamaru Usman was a TUF fighter. I had no idea Tresean Gore wasn't going to be fighting this weekend, for eample until I google'd it last week. I have all the MMA news apps, and none of them headlined his knee injury. That's literally insane, because there wasn't a fight I wanted to see more than Bryan Battle and Tresean Gore. Like WTF UFC?!
Why put all that time, money and effort into the show just to put like 0 effort into advertising your TUF finale's? Not to sound like a boomer, but "Back in my day" TUF finales got just as much hype as the major UFC events. Hell, they were major UFC events. I have friends who are barely aware or interested in TUF anymore. I feel like that's a culmination of the show just not being a major focus of the UFC's marketing team, and I don't actually know why they are letting something that could be a big cash cow go to waste like that.
That said, I am excited to see the fights this weekend.
My prediction is Battle wins Gurbina, Turcios wins Hiestand based on the fights on the show. Actually really happy to see Gillmore fight Petroski, since both lost to submissions on the show and didn't get to showcase their skills. Also Gillmore seems excited to be there, and given how easily he dropped everything to be a replacement on the show he definitely deserves this. I am sure that's why Dana put him on the card. I don't really have a prediction for this fight, but am interested nonetheless.
No money really to be made from this card unfortunately, so probably won't be betting. The guys I think are likely to win are already vegas favorites lol.