UFC 289 Odds: Canada Hosts Fight Night
Living in the Great White North isn’t for the faint of heart. The weather can be brutal during the winter months, and so can those little black flies that come out in the summer, whether you’re in North Ontario or anywhere else above the 49th Parallel.
No wonder we’re always getting into fights. Canadians love hockey and combat sports so much, we mix the two together like peanut butter and chocolate. Saturday night is officially reserved for fighting, but on June 10, it won’t be Hockey Night in Canada at Vancouver’s Rogers Arena: It’ll be UFC 289, the first UFC card north of the border in nearly four years.
Bodog Sportsbook has strong ties with Vancouver, so we’re extra pumped to see the top fight promotion in the world. Here’s a preview of what you can expect this Saturday with a look at the UFC 289 odds.
UFC 289 Heads to Canada
The COVID-19 pandemic was especially tough on fight fans in Canada. We were getting used to the UFC coming to town and putting on great shows; when UFC Fight Night 158 touched down in Vancouver back in September 2019, it was the 31st live UFC event ever held in this country.
We’ve hosted some of the biggest moments in the history of the sport. Believe it or not, it’s already been 12 years since 55,000+ fans packed Toronto’s Rogers Centre to see their hero, Georges St-Pierre, successfully defend his Welterweight title against Jake Shields. It’s still the largest crowd ever to attend a UFC show in North America.
Vancouver has played host to five UFC events thus far, all five at Rogers Arena – although it was still branded as GM Place when UFC 115: Liddell vs. Franklin came to town. That was June 2010, six months after Vancouver City Council voted to allow regulated MMA shows within their borders. Over 17,500 fans saw Rich Franklin knock out Chuck Liddell at the end of the first round.
That 2019 Fight Night card with “Cowboy” Donald Cerrone and Justin Gaethje in the main event (Gaethje won by first-round TKO) drew the largest crowd in Vancouver since UFC 115, with over 15,000 fans in attendance; expect even more for UFC 289 now that we’re (hopefully) in the post-pandemic years.
UFC 289 Odds
Sadly, Vancouver doesn’t get quite the same treatment as Toronto when it comes to the depth of talent on the card. But there’s no shortage of star power in the main event, which will feature perhaps the greatest fighter in the sport today.
Women’s Bantamweight Title: Amanda Nunes (c) vs. Irene Aldana
There have been only four dual champions in UFC history: Conor McGregor, Daniel Cormier, Henry Cejudo, and Amanda Nunes. Of this foursome, Nunes (22-5 lifetime, 15-2 UFC) is the only one to do it twice, retaking her Women’s Bantamweight belt from Julianna Pena last July at UFC 277. Nunes has also been the reigning Featherweight champion since 2018, when she stunned the world by knocking out Cris Cyborg in just 51 seconds.
Irena Aldana (14-6 lifetime, 7-4 UFC) is the next woman to get a crack at Nunes’s Bantamweight title, and she’s got her work cut out for her; Nunes is the –350 UFC odds favourite as we go to press, with Aldana the biggest underdog on the card at +275. But this should still be an entertaining fight. Aldana has racked up multiple performance bonuses over the years, and a sneaky submission win is certainly within her grasp.
Lightweight: Charles Oliveira vs. Beneil Dariush
The co-main event for UFC 289 should be a banger, too. Charles Oliveira (33-9, 1 NC lifetime; 21-9, 1 NC UFC), the former Lightweight champion, will face Beneil Dariush (22-4-1 lifetime, 16-4-1 UFC) in a match that was supposed to take place at UFC 288, but was postponed after Oliveira pulled out with an injury. This will be his first fight since dropping the Lightweight strap to Islam Makhachev last October at UFC 280.
Dariush, meanwhile, hasn’t lost inside the Octagon since 2018. His eight-fight win streak includes a unanimous decision over ex-champion Tony Ferguson at UFC 262; Dariush is the slight favourite for this bout at –125, with Oliveira priced at +105. Again, both of these fighters have taken home their share of performance bonuses, so we should be in for an exciting high-level chess match between these two submission specialists.
Greatest Ever Canadian Sports Events
Fight fans have great hopes for what’s about to go down at UFC 289, but the combatants will have a hard time cracking our top five list of the greatest sporting events this country has ever hosted:
- Terry Fox Marathon of Hope: Fox runs over 5,000km across Canada on an artificial leg to raise money for cancer research. Now millions of Canadians do the Terry Fox Run every year.
- 1976 Summer Olympics: A bit of a white elephant, but also the most prestigious sporting event ever held in Canada.
- 1988 Winter Olympics: Calgary plays host for one of the most successful Games of them all.
- 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games: Roger Bannister and John Landy run the Miracle Mile at Vancouver’s Empire Stadium.
- 1951 Stanley Cup Finals: Bill Barilko scores the overtime winner for the Toronto Maple Leafs at Maple Leaf Gardens as they beat the Montreal Canadiens in five.
No matter who comes out on top at Rogers Arena on June 10, you can bet the crowd will be one of the loudest the UFC has ever seen – and you can bet on all the action right here at Bodog Sportsbook. Visit our UFC odds page for the latest lines, and we’ll see you in Vancouver.