UFC Vegas 78: SA’s JP Buys v Marcus McGhee Preview and Prediction

It’s last chance saloon for South Africa’s JP Buys as he looks to earn an elusive first win inside the world-famous Octagon when he meets Marcus McGhee in a bantamweight bout at UFC Vegas 78 on Saturday night.

“Young Savage” will step into the spotlight in the featured preliminary fight of the event taking place at the UFC APEX in Las Vegas. The card is headlined by a welterweight clash between top contender Vicente Luque and former 155-pound champion Rafael do Anjos.

PRELIMS (from 10 PM SA time):

JP Buys (3.80) v Marcus McGhee (1.28) (Flyweight)

Whereas countrymen Dricus du Plessis and Cameron Saaiman are undefeated in the UFC, Buys (9-5) remains winless in the world’s pre-eminent mixed martial arts promotion after three trips to the Octagon. 

He was knocked out by Bruno Silva in his UFC debut in March 2021, dropped a decision to Montel Jackson six months later and was TKO’d by Cody Durden last June. He’s had to wait over a year for another opportunity to break his duck and it’s make-or-break time.  

Because of his winless run, Buys is behind the eight ball. Without the luxury of waiting for a favourable match-up, he instead had to take whatever fight he was offered. 

This meant not only does he have a tough match-up, but he’s also moving back up from flyweight (125 pounds) to bantamweight (135 pounds) as a replacement for McGhee’s original opponent, Gaston Bolanos, who was forced to withdraw at the end of June. 

As a former EFC interim flyweight and bantamweight champion, Buys has had success in both divisions, but it’s a different story altogether in the UFC where the 10 extra pounds at bantamweight bring with it a different breed of fighter, hence why he’s a big underdog. 

His last fight at 135 was the decision loss to Jackson, a man who looked at least two weight classes bigger than him, and he has another much bigger opponent in front of him. At 5’5″, he’s three inches shorter than the American, who has a two-inch reach advantage. 

The latter is especially worrying for the Buys camp as McGhee is a knockout artist. The man known as “The Maniac” is 7-1 with a 100% finish rate that includes six knockouts. 

He showed the evolution in his game when he submitted Journey Newson on just three days’ notice in his UFC debut in April, bagging a performance bonus in the process, but he’ll look to keep it standing. In addition to his punching power, the 34-year-old throws more volume than Buys as well.

The Brakpan-born battler has good striking and knockout power in his own right. Like McGhee, he has a kill-or-be-kill mindset and all of his wins are by stoppage – five by submission and three by knockout (plus one by DQ), six of them coming in the first round. 

Defensively, though, he’s been found wanting in the UFC and every second he stands with McGhee is a risk. As an African champion wrestler and high-level jiu-jitsu practitioner, Buys is the more decorated grappler and his best path to overcoming the odds is to take the fight to the ground. 

After all, McGhee’s lone loss, to Rafael do Nascimento in the LFA last June, was by submission. That said, he has solid takedown defence, so it’ll take some doing for Buys to ground him, something Bolanos was unable to do at UFC Vegas 72. 

With a grappling gameplan, Buys – who’s faster and younger at 27 – could single-leg McGhee to the ground or take his back to sink in a rear-naked choke, so in that sense, it’s worth backing the South African boytjie. 

However, the most likely outcome is that the power, volume and accuracy of McGhee’s striking will – unfortunately from a South African perspective – see him stop Buys. 

Prediction: McGhee by knockout. 

Best Bet: McGhee by KO/TKO/DQ.

Quintin van Jaarsveld

Quintin Van Jaarsveld is a former MDDA-Sanlam SA Local Sports Journalist of the Year and a former three-time Vodacom KwaZulu-Natal Sports Journalist of the Year. Formerly the sports editor and Outstanding Journalist of the Year award winner at The Fever Media Group, deputy editor at eHowzit, editor at SARugby.com and senior staff writer at Rugby365.com, he boasts over 15 years’ experience and is currently a freelance sports writer.