Julien Leblanc

Picked to win, with the analyst recommending viewers go watch his regional tape to understand why.

Making his UFC debut, largely unknown outside the Canadian regional scene. Good, genuinely fun-to-watch striker with tons of volume, good combinations mixing punches and kicks -- not the cleanest technically, but consistently thrown together in long, continuous strings rather than clean textbook combos. Good kick arsenal, good knees, very exciting with good killer instinct, and a hard pace to keep up with. Good grappler too -- active from his back with some triangles on his record (a trick the analyst notes works better against lower-level competition than at the UFC level), decent takedowns often generated by overwhelming opponents standing rather than pure technical entries, willing to attack submissions whether to finish or just to create space, and a good cage push that functions as a natural extension of his striking pressure.