Following the money: UFC 325 betting line movements tracker | Volk vs. Lopes 2

UFC 325 is happening this weekend (Sat., Jan. 31, 2026) inside Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, Australia, and broadcast, for the second time ever, on Paramount+. Our second main event of the Paramount+ era is a UFC Featherweight title rematch pitting champion Alexander Volkanovski vs. Diego Lopes. Volkanovski won the first fight, by unanimous decision, to reclaim the then-vacant title.

Our co-main for this one has popular Kiwi fighter, Dan Hooker, taking on hopeful title contender, Benoit Saint-Denis, in the Lightweight division. Rounding out the main card is Rafael Fiziev vs. Mauricio Ruffy, Tai Tuivasa vs. Tallison Teixeira and Quillan Salkilld vs. Jamie Mullarkey.

The “Prelims” are headlined by Junior Tafa vs. Billy Elekana. Other notable fights on the “Prelims” include Cam Rowston vs. Cody Brundage and Jonathan Micallef vs. Oban Elliott. The Early “Prelims” on Saturday play host to the latest round of Road To UFC fights (just not this one).

UFC 325 PPV Main Card Line Movement Tracker

Alexander Volkanovski (-146 +4.9%) vs. Diego Lopes (+120 -4.5%)

Volkanovski’s line, for this fight, opened at -166. And that’s shortened a little, with the public thinking this will be a close contest. That feeling has seen Diego Lopes’ opening +130 start to drop a little. I think these lines will be very close to a pick ‘em by fight night.

The line movement here is the opposite to what we saw ahead of their first fight. In their first fight Volkanovski opened at -130 and closed around -140. Lopes opened at +110 and closed at around +115. The lines converging here, instead of diverging, is a notable difference. Vegas’ confidence in Volkanovski is also a lot stronger than it was in the first fight.

So, we have Vegas backing Volkanovski stronger than they did last year. And we have the public feeling less strong about him than they did last year. It will be fascinating to see who is right on Saturday.

Vegas were wrong about Volkanovski in his last fight, which wasn’t against Lopes. He opened as the -175 favorite against Ilia Topuria, but the public were right to fade him. He closed at around -120 before being stopped by Topuria.

The public are right about Volkanovski a lot. They got the first Lopes fight right and the Topuria fight. They also got the rematch with Islam Makhachev right. Volkanovski opened at +215 for that and closed at around +220. And the public were right in his most recent fight with Max Holloway, too, taking him from a -146 favorite to a -175 favorite.

The public are usually right about Lopes, too. Public money took his from -150 to -188 in his win over Brian Ortega. And he also went from -250 to -275 in his win over Dan Ige.

So, who are you with? Vegas or the public?

The public are batting 1000 with Volk. If they are right again, though, the belt will be leaving Australia this weekend.

Dan Hooker (+266 +18%) vs. Benoit Saint-Denis (-344 -6.8%)

This fight opened with Hooker at +200 odds and Saint-Denis at -265. As you can see, the public thinks this fight is more lopsided than that. Money came in on the Frenchman very quickly after the odds were released. On Dec. 18, 2025, his odds fell immediately to -318. They hopped up a little, but have been steadily shortening ever since.

This movement is clearly a result of the last fights we saw involving these two. Saint-Denis looked excellent in defeating Beneil Dariush and Mauricio Ruffy. Hooker looked totally lost against Arman Tsarukyan, a man who fights a little like Saint-Denis.

This movement isn’t as extreme as Hooker’s last few fights, though. Against Tsarukyan, he opened at +260 and closed around +500. Against Mateusz Gamrot, who he beat, he opened at +220 and closed around +320. And against Jalin Turner, who he also beat, he opened at +154 and closed at around +235. The message seems clear, the public do not trust Hooker. They were proved wrong against Turner and Gamrot, but they doubled down with the Tsarukyan fight.

The public have been hit and miss on Saint-Denis lately. He opened at -255 against Dariush, but then closed around -206. Against Ruffy he opened as the +175 underdog, but the public weren’t totally OK with that. He closed around +148 for that fight.

Saint-Denis has been inconsistent in his career and that seems to have made him hard for the betting public to pin him down. In this fight, though, it seems pretty obvious that Vegas, the public, and many pundits are all in agreement: Hooker has a very hard night ahead of him.

Rafael Fiziev (+101 +5%) vs. Mauricio Ruffy (-124 -5.7%)

There’s been some interesting activity on this line. This opened as a pure pick ‘em with both men at -110 odds. That changed immediately, though, with money coming in on Fiziev. That put him as a -160 favorite, early. More money would come in to make him a -190 favorite on Dec. 22. That would be the peak, though. Since then, money has been tricking in on Ruffy and that has brought the line close to that pick ‘em situation we had at opening.

Fiziev saw a lot of action on his previous fight, too. He opened as the -130 favorite against Ignacio Bahamondes, but the public put him into being a +124 underdog. He went on to win that fight, pretty convincingly.

Ruffy has had a fair bit of public skepticism during his short UFC career. He was actually faded on his Contender Series fight, though. In his proper debut he opened as the +150 underdog against Jamie Mullarkey, but that shifted to -225 by fight time. He got a lot of support in his fight with James Llontop, going from -700 to as low as -1000. But he was faded a little in the King Green fight and then faded quite a lot on the Benoit Saint Denis fight.

This is really a showdown between two guys whom the public have been all over the place with. Vegas has also had some issues picking the winner, too. I like Fiziev, but maybe this is an omen telling me to stay away.

Tai Tuivasa (+256 +1.7%) vs. Tallison Teixeira (-328 -2.3%)

I’m surprised Tuivasa isn’t more of an underdog here. Vegas had him at +250, which I think is generous given his time off and his four fight losing streak. As you can see, we are still pretty close to that. However, Tuivasa has had a little support this time and his line actually dipped to +233 on Jan. 23. Since then, though, it’s jumped back up to where it started.

Teixeira opened at -300. Vegas has been a little conservative with Teixeira’s opening lines. He was -250 against Derrick Lewis and closed at around -245. He did lose to Lewis, but the ending was a little funky there. He was just -157 to open against Justin Tafa. He closed at around -150 before quickly finishing the elder Tafa.

Quillan Salkilld (-978 -3.8%) vs. Jamie Mullarkey (+629 +14.3%)

Salkilld is our biggest favorite on the card and it’s easy to see why. Just go watch that truly sickening KO he scored on Nasrat Haqparast last time out (a fighter who has finished Jamie Mullarkey). Mullarkey is the short notice opponent and no one thinks he is winning this one.

The public have backed Salkilld in every fight so far and have been proved right to do so.

UFC 325 Late ‘Prelims’ Under Card Odds

Junior Tafa (+198 +16.1%) vs. Billy Elekana (-247 -11.9%)

Elekana opened as the slight -175 favorite, but the public really liked that. So, now he’s a pretty decent-sized favorite against Tafa, who is looking for his first win as a Light Heavyweight.

The public were wrong about Elekana in his last fight. He opened at -350 and closed to -250 before choking newcomer Kevin Christian to sleep.

Cam Rowston (-352 -4%) vs. Cody Brundage (+275 +6.7%)

Rowston is the biggest favorite of his young UFC career here, opening at -300 and getting public support to shrink that further. He was the underdog in his last fight, against Andre Petroski. He opened at +118 and the public pushed him out to +160. As you can see, they’ve changed their tunes this time around.

Brundage, who I think is a live dog, won’t be fussed about the long odds after his name. He’s fought Bo Nickal and Mansur Abdul-Malik, after all. And in both contests he did better than you’d expect a +900 and +675 underdog to do.

Jacob Malkoun (-148 +16.5%) vs. Torrez Finney (+122 -39.6%)

Finney is getting huge support in this fight. That begs the question, how many people have actually seen Torrez Finney fight?

He opened at +210 against the more experienced Malkoun and his line has dipped down all the way to +125 making him one of the biggest movers on the card.

Finney had similar support before his somehow both hilarious (and super boring) win over Robert Valentin.

UFC 325 Early ‘Prelims’

Jonathan Micallef (-136 -10%) vs. Oban Elliott (+111 +9.5%)

This opened as a pick ‘em with both men at -110. That’s since changed a little to show the public favoring the Aussie who had an impressive debut last year. It’s strange that this opened as a pick ‘em. These two were due to fight in Sept. 2025 and Elliott opened as the -140 favorite for that one.

Elliott lost big as a favorite in his last fight. He opened at -333 against Seokhyeon Ko (a late replacement) and closed close to -500. Ko then dominated him.

Micallef opened as the underdog for his debut. He was +143 against Kevin Joousset and closed at +180.

Kaan Ofli (+169 +3.3%) vs. Yizha (-208 -4.2%)

There’s not much change in this line between Ofli and Yizha. The public seem mostly fine with the assessment that the ultra fun Chinese fighter is more likely to win this than the recent The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) runner-up.

Dom Mar Fan (-152 +10.3%) vs. Sangwook Kim (+125 -22.2%)

I’m nervous about these Road to UFC fights, given how many suspect betting activity we saw in UFC last year. There’s been a bit of a dramatic swing on this one. Fan opened at -205, but that has lengthened quite a lot. The money came in on Kim pretty quickly, taking him from +175 to +145 in a matter of hours. The money for him has been slowly coming in since then.

Sebastian Szalay (-138 +13%) vs. Keiichiro Nakamura (+113 -26.8%)

There’s some odd movement on this line, too. A bunch of money came in on Nakamura early. That turned his opening +170 to -120! Money for Szalay slowly came in after that, though. That is what pushed Nakamura back into plus odds.

Sulangrangbo (-260 -91.6) vs. Lawrence Lui (+208 +50.4%)

UFC 325 Biggest Line Movements

TLDR: Here are the biggest line movements at UFC 325:

• Sulangrangbo: From +165 underdog to a -261 favorite (-91.6%) (B)
• Torrez Finney: From +210 underdog to a +118 underdog (-39.6) (C)
• Keiichiro Nakamura: From +170 underdog to +113 underdog (-26.8%) (C)
• Sangwook Kim: From +175 underdog to a +124 underdog (-22.2%) (C)
• Dan Hooker: From +200 underdog to a +266 underdog (-18%) (A)

Since I’ve been tracking line movements on UFC PPVs, a few early trends have started to develop.

A: Fighters who opened with plus odds and whose odds have then lengthened are 8-50.

B: Fighters who opened with plus odds and whose odds have then shortened, enough to give them minus odds, are 14-10.

C: Fighters who opened with plus odds and whose odds have then shortened, yet they remain at plus odds, are 3-8.

D: Fighters who opened with minus odds and whose odds have lengthened, enough to give them plus odds, are 6-5.

E: Fighters who opened with minus odds and whose odds have shortened are 5-3.

F: Fighters who opened with minus odds and whose odds have lengthened, though they remain at minus odds are 2-0.

UFC 325 Best Underdogs Bets

Brundage is one of my favorite underdogs on this card. I think his wrestling will cause the inexperienced Cam Rowston some problems. And I also think Brundage has enough fire power on the feet to do well in case there’s no wrestling in this one. If you can call Fiziev an underdog, then he’s someone who is worth a look. I think, with his maturing game, he’s a terrible match up for the one-dimensional Ruffy.

Enough about me, though. What do you think? Tell me your favorite dogs on this card.

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