The Viewer's Guide to UFC 258 (Patreon)

By Carrion Toole (@powertooles)

This Saturday, February 13th, the UFC is returning to their Las Vegas Apex Center for a PPV card headlined by a long-anticipated title fight between welterweight champion Kamaru Usman and former teammate Gilbert Burns. However, since we've already released a preview for the main event, I'll be taking a quick look at some of the other working-class fights that need some shine. 

To start off, let's look at the co-main event of the evening, a women's flyweight bout between young up-and-comer Maycee Barber and 5-year UFC veteran Alexa Grasso. Barber is entering this fight off the back of not just her first professional loss but also a tear of her ACL—both occurring against Roxanne Modafferi. At only 22-years-old, Barber has her sights set on becoming the youngest UFC champion in history. To do that, she would need to put together some big wins quickly and secure a title opportunity all this year. With Jon Jones winning the UFC light heavyweight title at 23, the pressure is certainly mounting on the fiercely determined Barber. 

Alexa Grasso has no intention of making that easy. Grasso is fighting for the second time at flyweight to chase her own championship aspirations after moving up from strawweight. Grasso found inspiration from fellow Mexico-born fighter Brandon Moreno who fought to a draw against Deiveson Figueiredo (c). Her goal is to become the first Mexican-born UFC champion. As with every fight, though, one of their dreams will have to cede to the other. 

Elsewhere on the main card, we have a middleweight bout between Kelvin Gastelum and Ian Heinisch. Gastelum is currently looking down the barrel of a three-fight losing streak as he heads into this fight. While there's no embarrassment nor shame in losing to the quality of opponents that he's faced, no one is safe from an unceremonious cut from the roster, and the pressure is undoubtedly on. Heinisch, however, is coming off one of the biggest wins of his career after landing a quick first-round TKO of Gerald Meerschaert. A similar win over Gastelum would just be another step up and an even bigger name on his record. 

Jim Miller and Bobby Green meet in a lightweight matchup between two old guards on very different paths. Miller has been putting in some work as a division gatekeeper, leaving him with a rather mixed record the last few years, and is eyeing a potential retirement fight by the time UFC 300 rolls around. Still, he wouldn't be content to leave the sport without reminding us, and himself, what he's capable of. On the other hand, Green is an incredibly solid fighter who has always seemed to lack the urgency to reach the sport's top heights. Now late into his career, he's riding a solid three-fight win streak with no intentions of stopping. 

The evening's featured prelim will be a middleweight fight between undefeated jiu-jitsu phenom Rodolfo Viera and the young lion Anthony Hernandez. A chance for Hernandez to rebound from his loss to surging Kevin Holland, or for Viera to continue his streak of finishes and possibly become the next big thing at middleweight. 

While this card might not have big-name matchups one would expect from a UFC PPV, there are many intriguing possibilities as we head into the event.