Coach Conversation | UFC 327: Procházka vs Ulberg

New England Cartel Head Coach Tyson Chartier Stops By To Break Down Saturday’s Light Heavyweight Main Event

By E. Spencer Kyte • Apr. 7, 2026

“At the end of the day, fighting is not easy, but it’s simple.”

There is no better way to sum up the dynamics of a fight because stripped down, there are always only a handful of ways things are going to go, but how we arrive at those outcomes is a complicated, layered, nuanced adventure. When you add in the various additional elements that come with a championship fight, the degree of difficulty when it comes to getting your hand raised increases, but in the end, it’s still just two people stepping into the Octagon and laying everything on the line in hopes of achieving the ultimate success.

Preview The Full UFC 327 Fight Card Here

In an effort to better explain the ins and outs of each UFC championship fight, staff writer E. Spencer Kyte sits down with one of the top coaches in the sport to break down the contest with an eye towards identifying the things each combatant does well, how the fight could play out, and the key factors that stand out as the possible deciding elements in the upcoming title clash.

Ahead of this weekend’s UFC 327 light heavyweight championship bout between former champ Jiri Prochazka and streaking contender Carlos Ulberg, Kyte called on Tyson Chartier of the New England Cartel to help break down the action.

Best Trait of Each Fighter

Kyte: Okay Coach — we’ve got Jiri Prochazka and Carlos Ulberg for the UFC light heavyweight title this weekend. Ready to dive in?

Chartier: Let’s do it!

UFC 327 Countdown | Jiří Procházka vs Carlos Ulberg

Kyte: What’s the best trait of Prochazka and what’s the best trait of Ulberg?

Chartier: It’s his creative offense. The best way to put it is that it’s weaponized chaos; that’s what I think of when I see him. He’s so unpredictable, so dangerous. How do you prepare for someone like that? Do you just have everyone throw everything that is bulls*** at you in the gym? The stuff you would tell everybody, ‘Don’t throw that; it won’t work.’ But that’s all he’s throwing.

And then with Ulberg, it’s just really clean kickboxing. He’s really good at distance management, he’s got speed, a clean shot selection and he’s really efficient. So it’s his kickboxing versus the really unorthodox striking. I always love watching Jiri fight.

WATCH: UFC 327 Embedded

Kyte: Same! Zac (Pacleb) came up with the best description of it after his last fight: the old Mike Tyson quote is “Everybody has a game plan until they get punched in the face,” but for Jiri, he’s flipped it to “Jiri gets punched in the face until he figures out a game plan,” and I kind of think that’s true. He went through two rounds with Khalil (Rountree Jr.) where he was getting pieced up, getting touched up and couldn’t figure out a way in, and then in the third round, he figured out “I need to be more aggressive,” and it worked.

You mentioned how it’s difficult to prep for a guy like that because you can’t specify in the gym that you have to watch for XYZ because who knows what’s coming. How challenging is that from a prep standpoint because it’s so far out of the norm?

Carlos Ulberg of New Zealand punches Dominick Reyes in a light heavyweight fight during the UFC Fight Night event at RAC Arena on September 28, 2025 in Perth, Australia. (Photo by Ed Mulholland/Zuffa LLC)

Chartier: I think there are two approaches. One, you do have to bring in some different looks with some people that are going to make you uncomfortable, with some people that are going to throw some wild stuff in practice while still being safe with it. You’ve got to bring in some wild strikers that throw spinning stuff and jumping stuff; guys that can mimic some of those attacks. They’re not gonna move just like him, but it’s gonna make you more prepared for it.

The second thing you’ve got to focus on is yourself and your basics. You’ve got to come out and be ready for the wild, crazy stuff early — the jumping stuff, the spinning stuff, the flying stuff. How do you do that? Good basics: hands up, chin down, stay long, move your feet. Ulberg is obviously a high level kickboxer, so you’ve got to get back to your defensive basics — circle away from the power, hands up, chin down, and always be defensively sound so that if something spinning does come, you’re at least in the right area to try to block it.

It’s all easier said than done, but those are the things I would focus on if I were preparing someone to fight a guy like this, but it’s a tough task.

Watch This And Every UFC Event On Paramount+

Kyte: It feels to me like — there’s not a recipe because the only guy that has beaten him in the UFC is Alex Pereira and he has crazy power — if you’re picking a style to face this guy, I would want it to be Carlos Ulberg; I would want it to be super-fundamental, super-technical, big and long where he’s got power, but he’s also comfortable point-fighting you. If I’m Ulberg — and this gets into Path to Victory — it’s I need to lead when I can and then like you said, be really defensively responsible to where if this has to be a the most low-key 50-45 where you’re protecting, but landing the better shots in a low-output fight, okay.

Full Fight | Jiří Procházka vs Aleskandar Rakić

Path to Victory

Kyte: We may as well just dive right in here since we’ve already started touching on it. For Ulberg, I think it’s be you — be long, be technical; work your jab, work your kicks because I don’t think Jiri is looking to take you down. I would want that super-technical guy. It didn’t work for Khalil because as good as he did, he’s a power hitter with really good Muay Thai, but it’s more power based. I think you either have to have the Pereira power or Ulberg, maybe, where you can be that super-technical dude.

Chartier: I was thinking about that because he got beaten by the kickboxer twice (Pereira) and Khalil Rountree was doing well with him until he got beat, so that style has shown it can work against him, so I’m interested to see how this plays out with Ulberg because he’s got really pretty kickboxing.

If you look at when Jiri fought Alex, he took him down in the first fight and then he got stopped. But he did take him down and was having success. I would not be surprised if Jiri does test his ground game. I know he’s been training at the UFC PI in Mexico City since February, and that shows me he’s looking to push a pace, be in great shape for this fight, which means he’s probably going to mix in some grappling.

I think he’s got to make it messy, keep with his extended exchanges, and break rhythm, and I do think he has to mix in wrestling.

Kyte: Give him something else to think about.

Carlos Ulberg of New Zealand reacts after his victory over Da Woon Jung of South Korea in a light heavyweight fight during the UFC 293 event at Qudos Bank Arena on September 10, 2023 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC)

Chartier: Why kickbox with a kickboxer? Rather than just going chaos versus technique, why not mix in something else?

Ulberg, obviously, it’s keep the fight on the feet, control range, control the tempo of the fight and stay super-defensively responsible. You can’t find yourself out of position. You always have to be ready to go because sometimes Jiri can get way out of position, but if you’re not ready to go, you’re not gonna be able to capitalize on that. Manage distance, stay there to be in the fight, but be ready to counter because he does find himself out of position often.

Kyte: I think it’s a relatively straightforward matchup, but there is nuance in there too. I really like your point about Ulberg needing to be ready to capitalize to take advantage of some opportunities because if you get playing — I think of the fight with Alonzo Menifield, which was 12 seconds of just swinging wide hammers, super-chaotic where if you do any of that with Prochazka, he’s gonna catch you, so you’ve got to just be more like the Jan Blachowicz fight.

Except the guy on the other side is gonna be jumping around like a spider monkey, which is what he has to do, because he really is at his best when he’s kind of spazzing out.

Chartier: I get back to mixing in the ground game. He did well with Glover (Teixeira) on the ground, and you have to be pretty good to even be able to put yourself in a position to do that with Glover on the ground. If he can do that, you’ve got to assume you’re gonna have an advantage there over a kickboxer, whose ground game is more of an anti-ground game. You’ve to to assume that you’re probably gonna have an advantage there.

Full Fight | Carlos Ulberg vs Da Woon Jung

Kyte: Right. Even if you just get him down for a second, it creates opportunities to land in the transitions, plus he’s working.

X Factor

Kyte: Okay, so what’s the x-factor here?

Chartier: Who can dictate the tempo of the fight.

If Ulberg can take the middle, slow it down and make it a chess match, it’s a big advantage to him. If Jiri can get him moving backwards, make it crazy, it’s a big advantage to him. I’m really interested to see who can take control early and dictate the tempo of the fight. Whoever can do that early is probably gonna win. Obviously, people can get caught and stuff like that, but that will be the person that is winning the fight until it ends.

Kyte: To me — and not that I disagree, but for me, I don’t care what the pace is, it’s just who can have the greater success sticking to their structure? Jiri is gonna Jiri, but if you’re Ulberg, can you be effective while he’s doing all this stuff around you? If you can let him do all this stuff on the outside, refrain from chasing him, and just hit your spots — it’s can you make him fight a more slower paced, technical kickboxing match and/or avoid getting sucked into too many of his frenetic exchanges?

Jiří Procházka trains at the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas, Nevada, on September 23, 2025. (Photo by Zac Pacleb/Zuffa LLC)

Chartier: He’s just so unpredictable; I love watching him fight.

Kyte: The Roundtree Jr. fight is the perfect example because Khalil was doing everything right — keeping it simple, banging home good shots, attacking the legs, not getting sucked into Jiri’s stuff. He’s up 2-0, clean, and then Jiri decided “I’m gonna turn of the berserker to 11,” and it’s like what do you do?

One Coaching Curiosity

Kyte: What’s are the curiosity points for you in this one?

Chartier: There are two things and they’re both on the Ulberg side. I want to see how his ground game holds up, if tested, because we haven’t seen much of it, especially not against a high-level guy. And then I wanna see how he deals with championship rounds. I know he’s won a main event, but we haven’t seen him go into a hard fourth round.

We know Jiri can do it, plus he’s got the strength of schedule on his side, so I’m really interested to see these two things with Ulberg, especially later in the fight. Even if it just stays an “on the feet” fight, how does he look in the fourth round because going beyond 15 minutes is long.

Full Fight | Jiří Procházka vs Glover Teixeira

Kyte: I just wanna see what he looks like against an elite guy.

Chartier: Yeah — it’s been Menifield, (Volkan) Oezdemir, Blachowicz, Reyes, so he’s not fighting the elite guys right now.

Kyte: Reyes is 36. Blachowicz hasn’t won a fight since the injury TKO win over (Aleksandar) Rakic and hasn’t had a full-on win since he beat Izzy (Adesanya). Oezdemir is solid, but he’s one of those dudes — and I hate saying this because you can only beat the guys they put in front of you and he’s won nine straight, which is a tremendous achievement, but Dominick Reyes isn’t the same as this dude. Prochazka has been the No. 2 or No. 3 light heavyweight in the world for the last five years. Maybe he rises to the occasion and he’s one of those dudes where he just needs to be in there with one of these elite guys to show he’s super-elite too.

I just need to see that if he can beat one of these guys at this elite tier because he just hasn’t yet.

Chartier: For sure. Maybe he steps up, maybe he shows it, but I would have liked to see it too.

Kyte: It should be fun though. I can’t wait for this one.

Chartier: Same. I love watching Jiri fight.

Kyte: We all do. Thanks for this!

Chartier: Any time.

UFC 327: Procházka vs Ulberg took place live from Kaseya Center in Miami, Florida on April 11, 2026. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!

Up Next

Carlos Ulberg’s Winning Streak

Light Heavyweight Carlos Ulberg Get His First Opportunity To Claim Championship Gold When He Faces Former Champ Jiří
How To Watch And Stream UFC 327: Procházka vs Ulberg

Find Start Times And Fight Card Info For UFC 327, Live From Kaseya Center In Miami
Results + Scorecards | Zuffa Boxing 05

Results, Highlights, Scorecards And More From Zuffa Boxing 05: Cortes vs Garcia, Live From Meta APEX In Las Vegas On