UFC Fight Night: McGregor vs. Siver

Conor McGregor (16-2) vs. Dennis Siver (22-9)

Conor McGregor looks to continue his movement up the featherweight ladder as he takes on Dennis Siver at UFC Fight Night in Boston on Sunday.

McGregor promised to make his presence felt when he came to the UFC, and he has absolutely kept his promise with 12 straight victories. Three of his four matches in the UFC have ended in the first round, including his last match against Dustin Poirier on Sept. 27, a fight that lasted only 1:46. McGregor is the type of fighter that the fans love, because he is going to go out there and make the bout very exciting. Siver has a different fighting style than McGregor, but he is 7-3 in his past 10 fights, including a victory against Charles Rosa by way of unanimous decision on Oct. 4. At 36 years old, Siver is not going to get many opportunities to fight a guy like McGregor. He will have to come out prepared and not let his opponent's aggressiveness get to him. However, that will not make a difference against McGREGOR, who is on a mission to win the featherweight title, and he will inch closer to that fight with a dominating victory against Siver.

"The Notorious" McGregor has 16 wins on his resume, with the majority of them (14) coming by way of knockout. He also has one win by both decision and submission (RNC), and has totaled 12 first-round finishes in his career. McGregor will have many advantages in this fight, but his biggest strength is the ability to knock out his opponent. The 26-year-old from Dublin averages 4.6 significant strikes landed per minute, while Siver averages 3.8. McGregor's grappling (3.41 takedown average) is also much better than Siver’s 1.04 takedown average, which is going to make it very difficult for Siver to get the victory. If McGregor comes out and is focused, the heavy underdog has little change of pulling off the mammoth upset.

For Siver, this is a very difficult matchup because he doesn’t appear to have any strengths over McGregor. He does have much more experience of the two combatants, and enters this fight with 22 victories in his career. Siver, who hails from Russia but currently fights out of Germany, has shown he can win in many different ways. He has eight wins by decision, with seven victories by both knockout and submission. Seven of these wins have been first-round finishes, and he has won by five different submission techniques (2 RNC, 2 armbar, 1 guillotine, 1 heel hook and 1 choke) For Siver to have a chance to win this fight, he is needs to be the aggressor and never let up. The odds are definitely stacked against him, but the thing about the UFC, is it takes just one second for a match to be over.