MMA Fighting - #470 – Dustin Poirier, Israel Adesanya, Greg Jackson, Paul Felder

Episode Date: February 25, 2019

On this episode of The MMA Hour, Luke Thomas speaks to Dustin Poirier about his interim lightweight title fight with Max Holloway, how the fight came about, more; Greg Jackson about Jon Jones’ title defense at UFC 235, coaching Jones, more; Israel Adesanya about his interim middleweight championship fight at UFC 236 against Kelvin Gastelum, the state of the division, more; Paul Felder about the status of his health following his bout with James Vick at UFC Phoenix, what’s next for him, more. We also take your questions on the latest news in MMA on Sound Off and A Round of Tweets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Get no frills delivered. Shop the same in-store prices online and enjoy unlimited delivery with PC Express Pass. Get your first year for $2.50 a month. Learn more at pceexpress.ca. Support for this podcast comes from Healthnetics. Do you have nagging aches and pains from your younger, more athletic days? Health Netics CBD is a premium brand CBD that may help take care of aches and pains, as well as relieve anxiety and sleeplessness.

Healthnetics products are all natural, THC-free, made in the USA, and undergo third-party lab testing to ensure quality and purity. All CBD is not the same. Order today with a money-back guarantee at healthnetics.com and use promo code sports for 20% off. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. It is Monday, the 25th of February 2019, and this is the MMA Hour, everybody. Welcome.

My name is Luke Thomas. I am the host of this program. Thank you so much for joining me. I greatly appreciate it. Hope you had a great weekend. Let's kick this week off right. So how we're going to do it? Full lineup of guests today. Number one, we're going to be joined to talk about his UFC 236 interim title fight. We're going to talk to Paul Felder as well, fresh out of the hospital literally yesterday. And we'll talk to trainer and and coach extraordinaire Greg Jackson as he gets ready, or I should say he gets John Jones ready for his title fight on Saturday, UFC 235 as well. Plus, you're going to be my guest, not one, but two different ways. I'm going to take your tweets for a round of tweets using the hashtag the MMA hour.

Thank you so much to everybody who sent one. And your calls as well, 844-866-2468. We'll get to you guys on the soundoff. I'm told the calls were tremendous, and I'm told the tweets were voluminous. So keep them coming. Those are two of my favorite segments. I actually really like talking to you all. So please, please, please keep that up.

And thank you to everybody who did. Yeah? Okay. I hope you had a great weekend. I know I did. I did a lot of sleeping, which I don't normally do. So I feel mostly refreshed, although I didn't sleep last night. So what are you going to do?

But neither here nor there. We're here to talk about the stuff in mixed martial arts action this week. As always, don't forget, don't forget, don't forget. The Monday morning analyst is just a YouTube exclusive. If you're listening on the audio side, I'm going to cut this part out. I encourage you to go to YouTube if you are listening on the audio side to not just the soundoff and the interviews and the tweets, but come back to the side as well. But want to make sure everyone had a seamless experience. All right, we'll do the tweets a little bit later.

How about let's do this? I spoke to one Dustin Poirier yesterday. We had a nice conversation about this upcoming UFC 236 interim title situation. how it happened, what it means, and everything in between. Here is my conversation with Diamond. And I'm joined now by UFC lightweight contender, Dustin Poirier. Dustin, thank you for your time. Let's get right into it.

You're going to be facing Max Holloway for an interim title. If I'd asked you this question, how do you feel about facing Max Holloway for interim title a week ago? Would you have thought I was a crazy person? Did you even know this was a possibility? No. this wasn't even like in the realm of when I said we're sitting back and getting frustrated and think about the fights that could be available and think about even thinking outside the box you know this was a fight I never put together it really just came together out of nowhere

and here we are man contract signed it's happened April 13th let's talk about the fight first of all it's a rematch it's a rematch with several years more than several many years in between. Could you even watch the first fight for like, I mean, is it, the first fight to me, I don't know how you feel, Dustin, it feels so different for not just you, but for him as well. You guys are completely different fighters at this point. Is it even worthwhile to go back and look at it? No, we're completely different fighters and completely different people. I mean, seven years is a long time and seven years of fighting the best guys in the best organization in the world, the biggest organization in the world, I mean, it hardens you.

It makes you, you don't stay seven years without evolving. It doesn't happen. You know, you get, you get pushed out of the company if you don't. So we both grew. We both took losses and came back from them. We both made the adjustments. And here we are. Seven years later, man, fighting for the gold strap. Well, I'm sure you're appreciative of the opportunity. And I know you take Max seriously as an opponent, it is a little weird that they went with him versus Tony Ferguson. What, like, what do you make of him jumping up to the weight class?

And here's why I bring it up. It's not like it's not a good fight. It's a phenomenal fight. It's just, what happens if he wins? I just worry that there could be chaos across a couple of weight classes. What do you make of that? Yeah, that's a, you know,

lightweight is already mixed up so bad right now. So I don't know. You know, I've said it before. I'm not a matchmaker. I don't call the shots. I just prepare and fight the guys after I signed the contract. So, you know, I was getting frustrated with the whole situation of lightweight. And that's just what it is.

And I don't know what to say. I'm not a matchmaker. I don't know the logic behind the decisions they make. But I'm happy with this one. The belt is an interim belt, but here's the question I'm going to ask. you happier with this fight or are you happier with what would have been the Nate Diaz fight? I know it fell through, but what I'm saying is at this point in time, which one were you happier with? They're both huge fights, but for sure, this right here, this fight here.

I'm probably to put that goal around my waist, man. It's going to be, you know, a crucial part of my career, a crucial part of my legacy. And after I get that, that belt out there on my waist, April 13th, one more step. to fight the current champ and make it real be the undisputed world champion that's the goal when I set out to start fighting

that was the goal the goal is never about money you know obviously motives change when you when you're 30 years old and you have a kid and stuff like that now I'm fighting for money and fighting for my family

and fighting for a lot of other reasons but when I set out to start fighting when I was 17 years old it was to be a world champion and then you know back in there where a whole lot of organizations and even still to this day, the most prestigious is the UFC, you know, title. And in a lightweight division, you know, arguably the toughest division in the sport,

the most stacked division in the sport, to be the champion in that division is huge, and it's a goal. And I owe it to my family to make it happen. What's interesting is, well, let's get into the two of you. I'll ask you about him in a second, but let's talk about you first. You mentioned you guys fought seven years ago, and it went, your way pretty easily. You mounted triangle with an arm bar from there as well.

It doesn't get a whole lot more dominant than that. How much do you think you've changed? I realize that the weight class is different from that fight to this one. But when you think about your technical evolution, what are the biggest areas of growth? My defensive fighting, my range, my fight IQ, my wrestling. I'm better everywhere. I mean, like I said, I'm a completely different person, man.

Seven years fighting the best guys you sink or you swim. And I've been swimming, you know, I've been swimming with the sharks for a while now. And him, obviously, he's improved everywhere as well. But if you think about your biggest area of concentration with him, it's what? You know, I haven't started breaking down a lot of stuff yet, a lot of footage yet. I'm leaving that up to my coaches right now. I don't want to get, you know, I just want to listen to them and work hard and stay focused. I will eventually study some tape and start to pay attention to small things.

right now, I'm not even worried about that. What is kind of interesting, though, is you've got to put together a championship caliber camp on, would you call this short notice? What kind of notice would you call this seven weeks out? You know, the crazy thing is I came to South Florida seven weeks ago, and I just stayed here. I didn't go back home. I felt like something big was coming. I didn't know what was going to happen.

I didn't know if the Nate fight was going to be rebooked. I didn't know if I was going to fight Tony. You know, the suspensions weren't even handed down yet. I just came down here at the end of December because I felt like something big was coming. And I was correct. You know, here we are, fighting for the belt. So I've been in the gym.

I've been an American top team. I don't come out here and hang out. When I'm in South Florida, I'm training, resting, training. I'm working on my craft out here. Very tediously, man. That's what I come out here for. So I've been out here for seven weeks training, got another seven to go.

It's perfect timing. This is perfect. That's interesting. So now you get to focus on the particular opportunity and the needs that are entailed. But what you're telling me is the past seven weeks, you've been doing the kind of what, like general training, just the kind of getting better training overall. Is that right? Exactly.

I feel like when I'm in camp, you know, you do get better in places, but you're focused on the task at hand. So now since I got the contract and it's signed and it's locked in, my task at hand is beating Max Holloway by any means necessary, you know, in fighting for 25 minutes if I need me to do that. And so I'm just focused on everything I need to do to win every round, to try to win every minute of every round and prepare myself the best I can for April 13th. But before that, before I had a contract in the name, I'm doing jihitsu. I'm kickboxing. I'm boxing.

I'm having fun, you know, trying new stuff, working on different things. Just trying to evolve, trying to keep my game going. I'm just being a student. I come out here and be a student. That's what I did. How do you feel physically? I know you had that hip issue, but it's, you appeared to have taken care of that.

You tell me your training, so it sounds like you're in great shape, but for the fans who are listening, how was that condition now and what is your general level of, not merely fitness, but injury woe? You know, I'm not injured. I have slight discomfort every now and then in my hip still, but nothing's stopping me. Yeah, I'm good to go.

I'm as close in this game, man, in fighting, I'm as close to 100% as you. you can get it. Do you think down the road, and we're talking whenever you hang them up or whenever there's a break, do you think you'll have to get surgery on it? Yeah, I think eventually I'm going to have to go in there and get it scoped out, just cleaned out, you know, I have some bone shavings and stuff in there that and some other stuff going on inside my hip, I might have to get it cleaned out. I don't know when that's going to be, but probably a few years, you know.

Now, when you had that protest on Twitter a few days ago, it's so funny that it happened and then here we are today talking about your title fight, but let's go back to that moment. It sounded like you were at the end of your rope there. What had happened? You know, the crazy thing is, so I had actually booked a flight home. I'd actually booked a flight home for today. And obviously, I changed my flights and stuff, but yeah, I was planning on going home.

I was like, I'm just going to go back to, you know, I've been out here seven weeks, eight weeks. Nothing's happening. There's no clarity in the division, and I was just going to go back home with my family for a little bit. But we got the call perfect timing, dude, and here we are, man. Boy, that is funny. They got you right in the nick of time. I mean, I guess you would have turned around no matter what, I suppose, right? But the timing of that.

Yeah, the timing that's kind of funny. Let me ask you a question, man, because we don't know what happens behind the scenes. and I know there's some stuff that just can't be devolved, but let me ask it this way. Is taking to social media and voicing your concerns, is that an effective strategy? Because it feels like it is. You know, it's a live billboard, I guess I can say,

to the MMA community. And, you know, nowadays people run with everything. This, you know, MMA journalists and media and fans and everything, as soon as you put something out there, stories and write-ups and articles, and people are retweeting it, and it's getting posted all over. Like, that's just the way the MMA community is. A lot of stuff spreads and travels through social media. I guess that's just not even M.A.

That's just world. Now the world's moving forward, but just to clear it up, like me on social media saying, you know, that I was at the end of my rope and all this stuff, it was just timing. That was just, this would have came together if I wouldn't have said that. This fight still would be happening. You know, it was just crazy timing that it happened, right? right after that.

But, you know, I do see guys get fights, you know, get other guys interested in fighting them on, you know, saying stuff to other fighters, and then they start going back and forth and the fans kind of run with it. And sometimes the UFC does make the matchups happen. So I just feel like, like I said, it's just a live feed for the world. And MMA media runs with anything they can grab on to. I hate to say that's true, but it is in fact quite true. That is the world in which we live in.

You're at this point in your career now. What are you? You're 30 years old. And you've been fighting for a while, though. So you're not a young 30 in that sense, but you're not an old one either. You're right in a good spot. Are you glad that the title opportunity is coming now as opposed to, let's say, two years previous? Certainly two years from now would be bad.

But is there something about this time in your life that is actually the time it works out really well? Yeah, I was actually telling my wife that. I said, you know, I wouldn't have been ready for it. Two, three years ago, I just wasn't ready for it. Right now, it's perfect timing. I just feel really good mentally, physically. I'm in a good place. I know what I can do.

I know how dangerous I am. I know what I'm capable of. And it really couldn't have come in a better time. I really feel like I'm hitting my stride. And coming into my prime as an athlete. Now, the only interesting part about this is, this will be your first fight in 2019. You last fought in July. Let's assume you win, right? Habib won't be ready until, gosh, November, something like that. It could be a while before he's back out there.

I'm assuming once you have the belt, you're willing to make a lot of a, you're not going to just jump at any opportunity. But I guess what I'm wondering is, do you have any sense about how long you want to wait to unify the titles? Like, does that matter as a thing you think about? you know, I have so much to do before that's even the next step for me. You know, I have so much, I don't like to look too far ahead. I have so many, many things I have to do now. I have another seven weeks of, you know, or six weeks of training camp. I have 25 minutes with one of the best, you know, fighters on the roster right now.

There's a lot of stuff that has to happen before that. But I'm down for whatever, you know, if the UFC wants me to wait until November, then that's the move we're going to do. do, but we'll see that would cross that bridge when we get to it. Right now, so many other things have to happen. Fair enough. You mentioned that you had gone to South Florida because you knew something big was going to happen. The Diaz thing fell through. Had UFC given you some kind of indication of like, well, we don't know what we're going to give you next, but we're going to do right by you. We're going to figure this out. Were you waiting on some kind of promised for them to fulfill

that? Not at all. Not at all. I had no clue. I was just hoping for the best, and I just felt like, you know, after three main event wins, two former UFC champions, you know, three finishes, I just knew something big was coming. Wow, so you just took a leap of faith and just stuck it out, even though this could have gone not badly exactly, but there's total uncertainty in the process. Yeah, and it took me about, like I said, about seven weeks. I was really hitting my breaking point. I was about to go back home.

And, of course, I train and stuff back home, but it's just not. the same. You know, I was out here, and I wanted to be starting the camp. I wanted to be preparing for a fight. And this just came together, like, at the day that I was booking my flights home. Interesting. I know you're thinking about a lot of things you have to get prepared for real quickly. Do you know who's going to corner you? Like, when you build a team for a championship fight like this, who is that? That's Mike Brown. That's Tiago Alves, Daya Davis and

my manager since day one Robert Roboetta that's who's going to be in my corner on fight night when I went to bow In terms of the strategizing How does that work in your camp?

How much input do you have? How much do you say coaches? You take care of that? You know, my... I have a good, I guess, synergy you can call it with my team, with my close team, my immediate team,

like the guys I just named. And they respect my knowledge and my view on fighting. And we kind of just talk about it. You know, I have a lot of say-so in what happens. And we discuss it as a team and break things down. And I do listen. I am a student under those guys. But at the same time, they respect my knowledge and my experience in the game.

And we put it all together, you know. When you thought about what it would be like when you got the call to fight for a UFC title and where you'd be in your career, you mentioned it's the sweet spot. But I guess what I'm wondering is, did it in your mind, did it feel like it's actually feeling now? Like how different were expectations versus reality at this point? It's crazy, man. I don't know. You know, growing up and fighting for a while, I just always thought that that day, you know, it's going to be like such a huge day. and it really felt like just another normal day,

but something in my brain flipped, something like a switch flipped. I went from just being out here, training, having fun, to that next training session. I was locked in just like that. I know the task ahead of me. I know what it's going to take off me.

And I just know, I know what it takes to be a world champion. I've been around world champions, and it's just in me. I just know what it takes to be a world champion. I'm going to show you all on April 13th. This is going to be my best performance. I can't wait, man.

I can't wait. Last question about this. I don't know every fighter is different. I don't know what has been your history, but I'm wondering, for an opportunity like this, Atlanta's not too far from Louisiana. Are you going to have your family at the State Farm Arena to come watch you or what's going to be the setup there?

Yeah, for sure. My family's going to be there. You know, it's not far from Louisiana or Florida. It's kind of a good drive because I spend probably on a normal year, half the year in South Florida. I have a place there, but I do live in Louisiana, but I split my time up between the two. So I have a lot of friends and people who are close to me in Florida, and I have obviously a lot of friends and family in Louisiana. So it's a perfect drive for both spots, man.

A lot of people are going to be up there, and I think that this is the first fight I'm going to bring my daughter to. I'm not going to bring her to the actual event and the venue fight night, but she's going to be with me all five week. I just think she's old enough now to have some fun and kind of a little understand what's going on. And for the biggest night of fighting in my life, I just want, you know, the people I do it for there with me. Well, it's going to be a hell of a night. Dustin, I know you're a busy man. I know you got a lot of training to do.

Thank you so much for your time. April 13th, can't come soon enough. Best of luck. I know you don't need it, but nevertheless. Thank you, man. I'm going to be the world champion this year. And I just want to let you know, I appreciate you, you know, just speaking the truth, really, saying all the good stuff

and giving me a push. for where you think I stand in this division over the past few weeks. You know, you said some awesome, awesome things, and I really appreciate you, man. I meant every word. Thank you, Dustin. Take care. Thank you.

There he is. Dustin, the Diamond Porre. Thank you so much to Dustin Poirier, who has, you can imagine, an insane schedule for taking some time out late last night to talk to me. So I wish him doesn't need it, as I always say, but wish him nothing but the best of luck for coming on. All right, so Danny, are we going to go to Mr. Felder?

Are we going to do some tweets? What do you want to do? You tell me back there. All right, so we're going to get a hold of Mr. Paul Filder. By the way, if you guys didn't follow Duke Rufus on Instagram, I don't know what you're doing. He posts so much cool footage Duke does of like his old kickboxing days and his brothers, Rick Rufus' old kickboxing days.

It's kind of cool, actually. Photos and videos, not just videos. Anyway, he had a photo yesterday. Paul Feldar was discharged from the hospital last night. Can you believe it? Discharged from the hospital last night. I remember he had that punctured lung after defeating James Vic at UFC on ESPN 1 and has been in the hospital ever since.

Poor guy. Golly, man. What a rough road. Some of these guys have to walk down. So he was gracious enough to make some time for us and we'll get him on here. I think either Skype or phone here in just a second. But yeah, can you imagine that? Winning a fight, he was so amped up and they're like, well, here's the deal.

You can't go home yet. First, you got to sit in the hospital four, week. No fun. By the way, a punctured lung. Like, how hard do you got to get hit to get one of those, man? That is, the sport is crazy. I've never had anything like that in my life. Good Lord. I've been in car accidents too, man. I've been in several of them. Never had one of those. My goodness. Let's drink this terrible Vox Media coffee. Mmm. Delicioso. Very good. All right, so we're going to go, is he on the phone now?

Okay. All right, so we're apparently having some Skype issues. We're going to have to go to the phone with Mr. Felder here, but they're going to call him up and get him set for me. And by the way, we've got to figure out when his next assignment for commentating is. I don't want to put too much pressure on him, but it's a relevant question. Not right away, obviously. Healing and getting some R&R is probably the right call.

But can't be that far away, right? You just want a big fight. Or maybe he's going to follow it up. Maybe we won't see him for a while on the commentating booth. So I guess we're going to have to see. With lightweight being a bit of a mess, God only knows what's going to happen. It's mostly a mess at the very, very, very top.

And Felder's on his way, but he's not quite at the very, very top yet. So maybe he's somewhat immune from this. But good Lord, man, it is going to be craziness in that division to watch him. And to watch anyone really at the top there. I asked Poirier about it. I mean, he's not thinking about Holloway winning, but the rest of us have to, at least consider it. God only knows what that's going to mean, man.

God only knows. And by the way, I did reach out to Tony Ferguson. Oh, quick note. I reached out to Tony Ferguson. I got snata. I saw a bunch of you guys reach out to Tony Ferguson on my behalf, at my behest, I should say. I really appreciate that.

Didn't do a whole lot of good in the end because he's his own guy, but what are you going to do? I appreciate it. that. All right, I appreciate this other gentleman who is our next guest. Man, he just got out of the hospital after a successful debut against James Vic, not his debut performance, but on the ESPN for the UFC. He is the Irish Dragon, the one and only Paul Felder is here. Hi, Paul. How are you? I'm good, man. How are you? I'm good. All right, well, give us the deeds. First of all, let me say this. Congratulations. Number two, let me tell you how sorry I am that you had to spend the last week

in the hospital. But I'm glad to hear you're out. And can you give us a health update? How are things? We're working with one lung now, but it's the most beautiful lung they've ever seen. No, I'm joking. Both lungs are fully functional. They had to go in there and fill off the puncture. They actually found the punctual. She's apparently a 20% chance usually when they repair these. the last lungs, they usually can't find the actual part that's causing the problem. They usually just have to stick it to your interior of your chest wall. So now my lung is kind of glued via, you know, scraping and getting it to do scar tissue to the inside of my chest.

So it will probably never fall ever again, even if it is punctured. And they were able to actually repair the staple, the actual puncture itself. So everything's out of me. It's all fixed up. It's a freak thing. I had like a bubble that had formed on my lung. But when I ate that shot from Vic, it was perfectly up against the bubble in my chest cage.

And it just, it popped it. How did the bubble form? And the doctors are telling me that guys my age, white men that are on the taller side that are athletic, it's like it's very common. And it usually doesn't cause any problems except for when you're in car crashes, basically, which is what I was in. which is a fist fight in the UFC.

Okay. When you got hit, did you know something was up? Like, at what point were you realize, like, oh, I don't feel quite right? Well, as soon as he hit me, I was like, holy shit. That was a hard knee, and I knew it was like 20 seconds left. I was looking at the clock. I thought I was ahead. I was like, man, just don't let this dude knock you out.

Just don't let this do knock you out. It was literally all this thing. But then part of me was seeing me, so I was throwing back trying to, And I stepped right into that right at me straight up and he just over it. I knew I busted my ribs where I thought I like did some cartilage damage or maybe had like a little fracture. But then like I'm doing all these interviews backstage and I'm getting shorter and shorter of breath. And I'm still walking around doing all these interviews. We tried to go to the press conference and the doctor, thank God that was there with everybody.

killed me out. We got to get the check. All right, so you went to the hospital. At what point did you start feeling better? It gets worse before it gets better. So I go to the hospital. And at this point, I had peed some blowing, which is why we wanted to get checked.

Now we're thinking maybe I bruised like a kidney. I know this is going to sound gross and weird to people that don't fight, but not just I peed blood in the hard sparring session or a fight. I'm alarmed, but I'm not too long. So we go to get my kidneys x-rayed in, like, day and everything else is fine. My head seems fine.

No other serious injuries. Well, if they don't find anything on my kidneys, they find that at that point is when they found that my lung had collapsed, like 15% at that point. Okay. So that's when things got a little scary, and so I realized I wasn't going home that next morning. And what was the worst of it all? Like, what was the, what was rock bottom in terms of pain? Like, where were you? What was the scenario? Probably, when they put the tubes in first,

they try to put this tube in through your chest. That goes in actually has a suction device to it that will pull the air surrounding your lung itself out. And what it's supposed to do is fill up your lung, your lung sets on its own. Everybody's happy, everybody goes home. You don't need surgery. But we did that for two days straight, and that didn't stick.

So, like, after surgery is when I would, It's probably the most pain I've been in a really, really, really good at all time. You know what's crazy? There's tubes sticking out of my ribs, mind you. I've just had surgery to cut through the muscles on my rib cage, gone through the bones in there, stapled things, and they scrape the surface of your lungs so that it sticks to the interior of your chest. Jesus.

It sounds super easy to a doctor until you're, trying to not take anything to the pain afterwards, and you realize quickly that you ain't manning up on this one today. Okay, so, okay, so many questions. When are you able to, I realize it's not in your mind right now because you just won, but we have to think about this. How long is the recovery process? Well, it's not as bad as like my arm.

My doctor told me basically, he's like, you know, take these to these this week. let the little cups and things heal up. And then he's like, just, you know, don't go right back to contact. We'll let you know when you can start thinking about doing that. But as far as cardio and getting back in the swimming pool and just getting running again and maybe don't padwork, probably a couple weeks. Okay, well, that's not the end of the world.

So how would you classify this in terms of injuries you had in a fight? On some level, it sounds like the worst. At other levels, the rehab's not as long. So how do you classify it? But there's the thing. As far as screwing out my celebration, I'm like weeks, as far as stressing the living shit out of my family and friends,

scaring the hell out of the UFC, and I think even Dana and MRI, he has, you know, collapsed lungs, but what? As far as that, I think as far as coming back from it, I think it's going to suck just to get my cardio back used to breathing heavy again for a little bit. I mean, I don't think it's going to be anywhere near, God forbid, I tore a shoulder or a knee or it might be up there with like less than a meniscus care surgery. Yeah, it's just so weird.

So you kind of covered it. It's strange, bro. It's strange. It's really strange. But you're not worried about a recurrence of this. No, they said that's not a thing. And they checked my lungs with a CT scan for any other bubbles and weird things like that. And they said, my doctor quote, Dr. Feinstein, shout out to him over.

there at was it Banner Hospital? Yeah. Because he's the one, first of all, that really wanted me to go in. He felt something was wrong. But he's like, yeah, once the scars never be healed up, you're going to be, your lungs are fine, and I was

freaking out. He quote told me, him in the stale, the head surgeon that did my surgery, like, you have the most beautiful lungs that we've ever seen. Not a smoker, huh? Quote, the most beautiful lungs we have ever seen. Paul Feller, what did he know?

known for? Gritty fights? No, the most beautiful lungs that the doctors have ever seen. That's a, that's a great thing to be known for, I suppose, in the end. Well, look, what a, what a crazy, you know how you fight hard, Paul? You're one of these guys where some fighters, I mean, every fighter gets banged up in a fight, of course, but some fighters, like, they get injured in training, and some fighters don't, and then some fighters get injured in fights, and some don't. You get injured in fights. That tells you, win or lose, you're out there putting it on the line. And I told everybody before this that I belonged in the goddamn top 10. I fought the guy. Nobody wants to fight. Even though he's coming off that lost to Gachie, he got exposed a little bit

there that he's a little chiny. But I didn't even beat him that way. I didn't catch him with that one, quote, lucky shot. I beat him at a game that nobody thought that I could beat him at and that's going to decision with somebody and showing that I've got the intelligence to hang with the best guys in this division. That's what you're going to see more off from me. They're always going to see me fight my ass off. You're going to see a little more strategic approach now that I'm going to be up there with a real big dog in this division. But I'm coming for them.

I tell you that now. I'm not in this to shit back. I'm in this to make a run for the belt, and that's it. When that's done, if that doesn't seem plausible to me anymore, I'm retired. So it's fair to say, I know that cuts a 155, you don't like it, but you're just so competitive at 155, Paul. I'm assuming at this point, that's the division for you. Yeah, I think this wins shield that.

You know, I had a tough loss to Perry up at 70. I felt great, but I felt great. This last weight cut was really, really good. I hired the right people, you know, and lock hard and those guys got me rehydrated. The crew that I was with, just everybody was on point. We really, really tried it the right way. I felt very strong. I was cut up out of my mind for that fight.

And that's the plan for now on. It's the really, now that they're going to be big fights coming up, I'll have the time to put into that. You know, no more short notice fights. I think I'm past that kind of stuff in my career, unless it's a title fight. You know, now it's going to be at least eight to 12 weeks ahead of time. I know that I've got to get my diet on point

and make 65 as smooth as possible. Now, you had tweeted about it. Have you had a celebratory beer yet? I have one beer pretty much But if you don't count the one that my brother snuck into the hospital for me I didn't know what it should probably know about But other than that one The old Irish hospital beer that was brought in for me

I had one last night with my family We went out and I could barely even drink it Because I'm still trying to get off of any of the narcotics and shit like that Now you're back home Oh I'm still in Phoenix Wow So when are you leaving? Wednesday afternoon, I'm allowed to leave.

What are you going to do? You're going to go see Phoenix? Yeah, we're going to go out and take my daughter right now to some butterfly sanctuary, get some lunch. And then, I don't know, we'll figure something out for tonight. Maybe there's like a show or something we can take her to. Like three and a half year olds out here now, so I've got to entertain her now. Well, don't take her to a son's game. Everyone will be sad.

All right. So let's talk about the fight itself. Now that it's over, tell me about the game plan. You mentioned that the overhand right you were looking for, you know, that wasn't necessarily all that successful. But the fight itself was, man, you were on fire. What was your objective in that fight from a strategic standpoint? Well, I wanted to get him backing up on a SEALs,

which we were able to do quite a bit and get him running. And I knew Duke's whole thing was, and I wish I would have done it more. It's something I'd actually watch the fight. and I'm getting a lot of, you know, positive things said to me, but I feel a lot of the things that I could have done a lot better, like more so than most of my other fights. I could have got him out of there with leg kicks, and I could have done it earlier than the third round.

I would have done with Duke's yelling at me to do it the whole time. It's just follow up every kick he's thrown with my own kick, and I had to butcher his leg. And that was part of the plan, was to put through his leg no matter where he went. He went to the right, we butcher it from the outside. If he goes to the left, we butcher it there. If he switches stances, I'm going to butcher the inside.

I don't care what I hit. And that was one of them. Obviously, though, coming over the top of the punches, I really wanted my left hook to land more. And spinning shit ended up not, that was not necessarily part of the plan, but it ended up being some of the most successful stuff that are true in that fight.

That's interesting. So you improvised all the spinning stuff? Yeah, I mean, we worked some spinning elbows, but I don't think we accepted them to really, land too much. Duke did. I mean, it was definitely something here. He's a genius, bro. Now I'm thinking about it. I'm like, maybe we did do some spinning

old old stuff. Did you go back and watch the fight on ESPN? Because in between rounds, you can hear Vic tell his corner that the leg kicks were just crushing them. Yeah, yeah, I heard that. And I wasn't really able to hear any of it in the hospital, but

I'm telling you, man, I wish hindsight, so he's 20-20, but I've always always wanted that leg kick finish. And it was, it was dangling right in front of me. Well, it was a solid win. It does put you, I believe, inside the top 10. Just, you know, a great, great performance by you. But I want you to put on your fighter and your analyst hat. We just had on Dustin Poirier. He's going to be fighting featherweight champ Max Holloway for the title. As a lightweight who's looking up at the top of the division, I wonder what you make of that. Yeah, we got a lot of guys trying to be double champs

right now at least, you know, he's got Poilliers, who's a solid, straight up savage, so hopefully you can shut down some of these double champ actions. I'd say I'd have to be rooting for Dustin Poeier in that one. I love Max Holloway, but these

double champs are getting getting out of hand. I think for the sake of the lightweight division, the best thing that happens there is Dustin wins, and we look and see what Kibu plans on doing. If he's sitting out, okay, forget about him, we get an interrupt, that's already there.

Then you have either Ferguson and, you know, owls in the mix there. As long as, you know, I think Poyer was definitely one of the guys that deserve a big fight. So I'm glad that he's getting that. It's just interesting that it's with somebody coming out of, from another division. Yeah, God only knows how this one's going to go.

But I want to. Now, as just this straight, you know, customer, I'm like, holy shit, I love that fight. But I'm looking at it as now somebody in the division It's like, God damn, another one of these, you know, double champ status things. Because Max, we know damn well he could win. Are you, what is your view about champ champ fights? Like, my view is basically they should be very, very rare.

I'm not against them in all cases. I'm against the overuse of them, and I feel like personally we're in that territory. I think we're pushing that limit a little bit here. I just think it's going to take away some of the specialness. of it. You know, it'll be a lure of it. First couple, okay, now it's like every champ's kind of getting their shot. That's a double chance, that's. You have a teammate who is fighting for a title this coming weekend, Tyron Woodley. He's taking on Kamaru Usman. I've got to be honest, I was looking at what people have been saying about Kamar Usman's chances, and there's a lot of dismissiveness about it. Now, don't misunderstand me. Tyrone Woodley is a defending champion for a reason. He's a spectacular talent, but Kumar Usman is no slouch himself. I wonder what you make of this matchup and what the essentials are from your vantage point.

I think it is so interesting, you know, because Tyron's obviously, I think that the standout difference between the two of them is the power and the explosiveness when it comes to the boxing department on the feet. Both guys can wrestle. We haven't really seen Tyron use it other than defensively. At least Kamal has been up on that,

and you see him training, you watch his footage. He's still very much at the forefront of trying to keep his wrestling game strong, which I think is going to be a big part of the game plan, forcing Tyrant to get back to his wrestling routes. However, Tyrant's been working with Ben again throughout this camp and really pushing his pace and his nonstop, going 25 minutes straight of and watching him in the gym with some of the guys he's bringing in that are stunt wrestlers.

So I think it's really going to play out on who hits who harder. And if they don't knock each other out, I see it going to distance. But I can see Tyron catching him with some of that power. If Usman doesn't mind his piece and cues on the way in there to try to wrestle him a little bit. By the way, have you seen any of the training with Ascreen personally? I haven't. I've seen a little clip not too long ago. From one of Tyron's cameras, just pushing a pace, you know, that's how Ben is when he trains over there. I haven't had the pleasure to really train with him too much.

but I know that that's what he likes to do. He just throws a time on the clock and they just go. There's no, it's like, what are you talking about, minute breaks in between? You just go until you're done training. Yeah, it's brutal. Yeah, that's two of those guys, just two hammers going after it. No thanks, man.

Yeah, I know. Sounds pretty crazy. By the way, speaking of all this analyst work, again, I know you're not even home from the hospital yet, but you know us in the media, we just can't help ourselves. Do you know, like, are you going to stay on the path of working your way up the contendership queue? Are you going to break in some calls on the mic? What is the, what is the 2019 plan for Paul Felder in that way?

Well, I got some, I got some shows lined up, my man. I got some things lined up. I got a lot of gigs lined up coming up. I don't know what's been announced, but I would say like six or six, six jobs lined up already. Jesus, you know, a few months period, too. so I'll be busy the next few months once I'm healed up. So it's going to be perfect to keep my mind, stretching the game, but keep my body from.

I got to give it a break, man. That was a long training camp, even without the lung injury. You know, I was a grinder, so I'm excited to get back on the mic. Yeah, I'll be doing ESPN, ESPN, ESPN, PLA, guesswork, power work, the whole nine. You know, you mentioned something about Duke Rufus. I got to work with him briefly when he was a commentator,

for glory and just a wealth of knowledge. You were saying how good it's been. You know, to me, Paul, it's like your skill set is maturing. You found the right way class. You got, as you mentioned, the cut has gone better. You and Duke are working well together. It just feels like from my vantage point, everything's kind of coming together, not really from your career generally, as the commentating would indicate, but on the on the fighting side, I don't know, man, it feels like you got like a really working formula here. Do you kind of feel like you not figured it out exactly? but, you know, you're not swimming upstream. No, yeah, and here's the thing.

This is what's great about the way it worked out and that people kind of cast me aside. Not everybody did, but, you know, the casual fans were kind of leaning towards broadcasting. People forget, and it's important, it's natural. I was on a three-billow knockout winning streak at 155 with Duke, with this new formula. Then on a week's notice, we bump up to one.

definitely we fight a savage and Mike Perry we break our arm in the first round and we still almost win that fight so people are like oh he's losing the Mike Perry people are giving me crap about that I'm like first of all the dudes if anything a power house I broke my arm

on top of that so I was never really off the path especially with Duke and them it's just it slowed down for everybody watching this whole thing play out because of injuries because you know just setbacks. But now, yeah,

that's all I wanted to do is prove to everybody. Listen, I'm a fighter first. This is my passion. I was so excited to get into that octagon. I'm so nervous backstage, feeling all those things that I've missed for, what, eight months or however long it had been,

only fighting once last year. Watching all these lightweights take all this spotlight and glory and doing all this stuff, and I've got to literally get in there and interview these guys. Guys, I want to fight. Now I'm back. I got a little set back in my lung area, but I'll cough that out and get more concerned. Well, if there were frequent flyer points for or frequent attendee points for hospitals after fights, man, you'd be having a ton of points, but you know what?

Like I mentioned, you earn them. You got out there and you fight hard and you had a great, great win at UFC on ESPN1. Rest up, Paul. Cannot wait to hear you back on the mic. I know it's not your primary job, but you're great at that too. and we really appreciate you taking some time to speak to us. Now it's beers on the road and eating out with the producers, so it's going to be a good, we're in bulking season. We're getting into the balking season now. Fair enough, Paul. Thank you so much for your time, man.

Really appreciate it. Always fun talking here, man. All right, there he goes. Enjoy the Butterfly Sanctuary with his daughter. That should be fun as well. Just don't go to the son's game. Hashtag Sean Al-Shottie. Okay, we have one more guest to get to you right here on the phone.

Anyway, we go to him now. He needs really no introduction, probably one of the most, if not the most famous coach in all of mixed martial arts. He has so much going on outside of that too, but we'll start there. The one and only Greg Jackson is here. Hi, Greg. How are you? I'm well, boss. How are you?

That's good. I haven't talked to you in a long time, man. So it is really nice to get the chance to reconnect. So I appreciate it very much. I want to say that from the top of the show. Oh, thanks, man. Let's talk about the fight. I wanted to get you on because John Jones, your understudy is here competing against Anthony Smith.

A couple of things I wanted to talk about from your vantage point. After the fight with Gustafson, the rematch, I saw a lot of people being like, yeah, you know what, John looks slow, but he got the job done. And I'm thinking to myself, that has to be the most insane take on that fight ever. Again, it's not like I didn't think he was being maybe a little bit cautious, but the bigger picture to me, Greg, was how smart it was, how strategic it was, how many lessons learned from the first fight. When you saw some of the post-fight chatter that John looked a little slow in the Gustafson rematch,

what did you make of it? Well, I guess I never really pay attention to the post-fight chatter because I'm not very internet savvy, as we all know. Anybody that knows me. So I actually don't get on and see what everybody else said about it. Slow, I would not say, would be one of the defining qualities of that fight. But everybody's got their opinion or the way they view things through their left. I wouldn't say slow.

I'd say very methodical, very calculated, and very effective would be the way I would I wouldn't say slow at all. As a matter of fact, I think he got hit way less that fight. If he was slow, he probably would have got hit a lot more. So I'm not so sure that that assessment would hold up under any kind of scrutiny. Certainly empirically, if you're very slow, it does in his very good hands, you would be eaten alive. So I wouldn't say the slow would be the defining quality that I would have brought out of that.

No, me neither. I didn't agree with it at all. I thought that there was so much high-level gamesmanship going on that, you know, again, maybe if he was being physically cautious, that it was probably a good reason. So from your vantage point, the Gustafson rematch, I mean, could it have gone any better? I suppose it could have gone 30 seconds. But from everything he did do, it went pretty goddamn well, didn't it? Yeah, I thought it went extremely well.

He followed the game plan exactly, did everything that we needed to do, and got a great finish that he was not able to get in the first fight. The first fight was such a competitive fight. I felt we wanted, but it was certainly competitive. I felt that we pretty well dominated the second fight. So if anything, I see a lot of improvement in John. But I think people, you know, I want to, I mean, every time somebody does, performs well,

I think that there's a natural inclination to try to find something wrong with it. And if you have the tools in front of you, you say, well, I think you look a little slower. I think it's very human. So I think that, well, in my opinion, we did a much better job the second time than we did the first. I think that people will naturally want to try to find something wrong with it. And that's fine. I mean, that's part of M&A, right? It's the entertainment and the argument, the debate.

Well, I think you slow. No, he's not slow. All of that stuff is why people love to watch it. All right. So let's talk about his growth. the two big indications of it are he fights Cormier, it goes five rounds, he rematches, it goes half the distance.

He fights Gustafson, it goes five rounds, he rematches, it goes half the distance. So that tells me there's a lot of growth. But here's the question I'm asking. How much more is possible? That's a good question. I actually think quite a bit more. Working with him as often as I do

and getting to know him, not just the person, but technically as well, He actually has a lot more to go, which is scary, I think, in a lot of ways. I think that he reminds me of a Sugar Ray Robinson. At any time that Sugar Ray Robinson got a rematch with somebody, it was short where they have to. He just has this internal Fight IQ computer that starts to really download stuff, and he learns and he studies, and he gets better each and every time. So I really feel that if you give John a rematch, you're in a lot of trouble,

and even if he wins it. So there's a little bit of that, and then there's a little bit of, yeah, it's just, it's his personal growth. He's just, he's getting better in all areas, always expanding, always pushing new ideas and new things. As long as you do that, you're always going to stay current. You might get caught here and there, everybody does,

but I think overall you're always going to stay kind of on that cutting edge if you have that attitude of always trying to add things to your game, and he certainly does. How has he changed as a student from the time he joined the team to now? You know, that's one of the remarkable things about him. And actually he had in common with George St. Pierre, because he's still very studious. Like, he's never come in acting like he knows everything or he's got it on.

I mean, obviously, he's one of the best mixed martial arts fighters of all time, if not the best. And so for a guy like that to still come in humble, still wanting to learn, still believing in new techniques that we're showing him as a team, I think, says a lot about him. And one of the main reasons why he's still really at the tip of the spirit. because he comes in with that same kind of student attitude. I think he really likes it.

It makes them happy to learn and to grow and to be pushed mentally. I think it's something that did he enjoy. So he hasn't changed a bit that way. What's interesting, though, is when a fighter, you can tell when they've begun to mature, not just for Jones, but anyone, they find the right pieces around them and then they build on that. So he's had you for a while and Mike Winklejohn and Brandon Gibson, but he added Tusa as well as Izzy for the rest.

wrestling, like what does it say about a fighter's maturation when they find a team and just stick to it? Yes, it means that they get along. But I'm talking about, like, how far along your development do you need to be before that's something that is not really available, but a good idea? Well, I mean, it's an individual thing. Some fighters need that. Some fighters don't. But I think with us, we need specialists in every area to keep John growing, right? And I can only do so much.

And listen, two-sons jist-s is way better than mine. Winkle Town's kickboxing and striking is way better than mine. Izzy's wrestling is on way, way better than mine. So we have to bring in these people that are so much better at everything and not be afraid of that and make sure that we all work together as a cohesive unit. That's super important. So having these specialists around you to push you in the individual aspects and then having generalists that kind of push you in a framework aspect is super, super important.

One can't really work without the other. So I think it's a very symbiotic relationship to have a lot of specialist coaches that all know MMA. I mean, they're not stupid. They know MMA. But they're really good in their specialized area and to bring that in a cohesive hole and then take that cohesive whole

and kind of push it forward with a grand strategy plan is basically, I think, the key to Warren and the keys to John's success for sure. Do you like the quick turnaround? I do and I don't. There's times for it, and there's times for it. Like, I always, Cowboy drives me crazy when he wants to fight every 15 minutes. And I'm like, let your body heal it.

You know what I mean? Like, I just want him to rest a little bit. With John, it's yes and no. I think this time he was so motivated after that Guffson fight went so well and so perfectly for him that he wanted to do it again. It's been, you have to understand. I mean, with all the out-of-the-cage troubles that he's had, he hasn't been able to fight like everybody else.

So I think he's just back in it, just loving it. And it's so excited to do it. He's wants to do it again. I just want to do it again. So I think in that case, it's certainly appropriate, but it's a case-by-case basis for sure. From your vantage point as a coach, how do you view his time outside of the cage? And what I mean by that is the negative part, obviously, is you're not competing. And obviously, there is a bit of a scandal attached to it.

On the positive side, you're not taking a ton of damage either. So he still has another chapter to add to it. So now that the time off appears to be behind him, how do you assess its impact? Well, I think it's going to add to his longevity. I think that he's going to be able to go a little bit longer just because he didn't have any huge wars, really, in that time frame. Like a lot of people put their body and their brain and even just their motivation through. So I think it's going to be a positive thing on the back end. I think that he's going to be able to go a few more years over the top where he might not have had even fighting three or four times a year for the last couple years.

Let me just ask you something question not related to this fight. You have seen MMA before it was MMA, before there was even NHB. And you see it now on ESPN, and it's a wonderful thing. But I'm wondering from your vantage point, I also feel it's kind of weird that there are like, there's more weird people in the sport now than ever, which is kind of crazy because there's always been really weird people. From somebody who's seen MMA develop into something and now solidify itself in the firmament of sports, how do you view the state of MMA today?

Well, I think it's a good thing. I mean, listen, we're making money. That's the big difference. Like it, and not everybody's making money yet. And I think that down the road, as things change and grow and evolve on the management side and on the promoter side and the company side, I think that eventually everybody will make more money. But listen, it's mainstream now. I think that's great. There's a lot of really good positive things that have come out of.

I mean, when Dana did the ultimate fighting show, that was really a game change or the ultimate fighter TV show change. changed a lot of stuff, really got us mainstream. So there's been a lot of big, I think, blessings to MMA now. There's always been crazy people in MMA. There always will be crazy people in MMA because fighting itself, combat itself, is such a intense process that you get a lot of guys that aren't very mentally stable, but feel that they can keep their demons in their head quiet when they're doing that when they're doing MMA or doing the martial arts or fighting.

You get a lot of weird people that are so afraid of combat, They overstudy it. So you get the spectrum, and I think that will always be there. And you just get the crazy people that like to fight. Those people always be there. But now there's a lot more professionalism. There's actual athletes with actual plans, with actual career goals in mind. And I think that's a beautiful thing, too.

So if anything, I'm very grateful to be a part of where MMA is now as compared to where it was. It was really cool in the Wild West days when you would go and you would know what the was with the origin of rules meetings were. You would go to these, you know, states or countries, and you had no idea. You might be had a little bit. Maybe they got over something off the Internet where, okay, you can do elbows here, but not there. So you have all these rules meetings and stuff, which we still do, even with unified rules. But the origin of that was that we never knew what was going on.

And I think there was a thrill to that and a fun to it. But I like it much better now that it's regulated, that it's taken seriously that athletes from other sports will come over to our sport and, you know, make that transition. think that's a great thing. So let's talk about Anthony Smith. You know, what stands out to me is in terms of technical application of strategy, you know, John's pretty close to the top of the game, if not peerless, but Anthony Smith will take risks, and that can work against him, but it can also work for him. When you assess what the greatest challenge is that Smith poses, what do you think it is? Well, for me, the dangerous thing about Anthony Smith is he has nothing to lose, so he can really open up and risk stuff.

And remember that I've been, I've seen some serious upsets. The very first time that I started working with George St. Pierre, I'd worked with him a little bit. But his head coach at the time, Victor, let me be in the corner when we lost to Matt Sarah knocked him out. And that was not supposed to happen at all, right? I mean, Matt Sarah was, he won a reality show and blah-da-da-da. It was one of the best Cinderella stories I've ever seen. So, like, I've been there when the person that was supposed to dominate gets beaten. And that, to me, is the biggest deal is that that fearlessness, that kind of, that danger that he presents there.

Because I actually trained Anthony Smith. I know he's a great fighter. I know he's very capable. So he's a guy that he's a sleeper guy. Like, we have to take him very seriously. If we don't, we can get in big trouble really quickly. So keeping that in mind, that's the biggest challenge for this fight. He has nothing to lose.

He really, I mean, if he loses, who cares? They can really open up and throw bombs and do all kinds of craziness. So we have to be ready for that. Was there any tell ahead of time that something was going to be off with St. Pierre fought Sarah, where you just caught as surprised as everybody else was? Well, I mean, George had obviously been enjoying himself a little bit because, again, you take the guy's lightly, right? Like he was supposed to beat Matt.

But I hadn't worked with George enough at that point to really know him to say, oh, we better watch out, you know what I mean? I just kind of started working with him at that point. He just come into camp, so I didn't see any of the warning signs. And then you just, I mean, I'm as guilty of it as anybody. I just have reckless belief in my guys. Like, oh, we'll sort it out. You know what I mean?

Like, oh, I will, you know, okay, we have all these circumstances, but we'll find a way. And I kind of felt like that when he first got hit. I was, you know, George's will stuff it out. But, man, that was Matt Sarah's night. I love Matt so much. And that was his night. He earned that one for sure. Hmm.

By the way, do you want to see John go to heavyweight at some point, or are you, you know, neutral about the whole up or down, light heavyweight? I'm neutral. I mean, I'll be excited to you. I just like the challenge is right. And I think that John needs to challenge himself constantly. So I'd like to move. I'd like it. If he doesn't want to do it, that's fine. If he does, that's fine. My job is just whoever they put in front of him, I've got to try to figure out the best way to beat him. Again, let's assume that the USADA issues are behind him. My question for you, again, as a coach, were you worried the impact it would have on him in terms of,

and I mentioned it before, sort of the scandal of it. Every website talking about it, every show talking about it, it's all over ESPN, that that weight might derail him. Like, what were your concerns when that whole process was going down? No, not really, because he has, like all great champions, he has the ability to kind of overcome that stuff. It wasn't his first scandal in his young life, right? Like, I mean, he's been through the ringer as far as being young

and partying and doing all this stuff that, that, you know, young guys, young athletes do. So he's been through the ringer with all of that, and he's never really affected him. I mean, people like that have that kind of thread where there can be a lot of drama outside the cage. I would think of, like, the best of dealing at that was, obviously, Muhammad Ali, right? I mean, he might be going to jail, and he has all the more things going on, or there's always all this drama with everybody around him. Everybody hates him because he was a black Muslim at the time, and none of that ever derailed.

And I think the real champions can take all that stuff in stride and, you know, be just, you know, that's just the game. They're okay with it. So I wasn't, I'm never worried about any of that stuff derailing him because he showed throughout his career that he's able to overcome that kind of stuff. Hey, let me ask you this. You know, one thing I love about the fight game is learning where people come from. And I don't mean just their families, but I mean the territories they come from. You have represented New Mexico harder than almost. anyone else, not in an outward kind of showy way, but just sort of by being who you are,

there's this thing you've launched, the New Mexico experience. Now, what is this? You're trying to get people to come, not merely to Jackson's or even a part of that, but to the state more generally. What, what is this? Yeah, so thanks for rigging that up, boss. Yeah, I am a very proud New Mexican, so I am trying to share all of the cool. We get a really bad rap here. We're very high on a lot of bad lists, I'll put it that way, violence and poverty and that kind of thing. So I have access to a lot of media

and celebrities and different people, and so I'm just trying to spread the good word of our state. We've got, every time I go to an event now, I take three businesses, one from northern New Mexico, central to Mexico, and then from southern New Mexico, and I just try to tell everybody I know about them how great they are. We've got these guys,

and we have so many cool things about New Mexico. Let me say that. It's such a beautiful. beautiful place. It's such amazing people. And so I want to help the business out. I want to do something tangible. I work a lot better if I have a cause, you know, something to dig my teeth into to help other people. And so that's kind of my thing. I'm not getting paid for it or anything. It's all volunteer. And this time we have Serventus food, which does this amazing chili. We got Barathe Golf. A lot of the Gulf does, like, you can put the T's and the Gulf Tees in your hat,

which I think is really cool. And we've got these amazing Touse energy bars that have been eating like crazy. They're so good. So that's at this time. And then, of course, the New Mexico logos, which is our local sports college sports team. So, yeah, I push it a lot. I'm really excited about representing New Mexico and really excited about just getting the word out of a place that, like, last time I flew from New York, I was informed that I would need a passport to fly to New Mexico because, well, because. So once I informed that we're actually a state, we're right next to Texas and next to Arizona, you're like, I don't think, are you sure?

I'm like, yes, sir, I'm very sure. I'm an American citizen. used to. So just that kind of thing where, you know what I mean? We want to be known for more than just breaking bad. Are you, let me ask you this, are you thankful or resentful of breaking bad and better call Saul? I'm both. I'm not resentful. That's a strong word. There's been a boom to our economy. We need all the money we can get right now. Our economy is not great. So that has been great. it's also been, you know, it's been good to be at least recognized as something, maybe in the United States. The downside, obviously, is that everybody asking, you know, is there really mess everywhere, you know,

because it does have kind of a negative portrayal of our state when that's the only portrayal available, not like Texas, where you can, you know, there's 18 different versions of Texas. So I'd say that I'm more grateful than anything just because there will be economy and, you know, But it's positive impact on the, I'm sorry, the job of the positive impact on the economy. But, yeah, it would be nice if we had like a cool show, I don't know, about flamenco dancing or the art culture here or anything else. That would be cool. Probably not as entertaining, though. Before I let you go, one quick thing, I got, I did a little digging, and I found out that you had trained Steve Irwin, whose Google Doodle had done a, you know, when you go to Google.com, they do the artistic rendering.

and they had done one to commemorate not Steve's death, but it was the anniversary of it, and they wanted to do some, yeah, yeah, it was his birthday, yeah, but of course he has passed. In any event, PETA had gone out of their way to say something pretty negative about him. Now, here's the thing. I don't know how you feel, Greg. It's a longer debate. I am utterly against the horrors of factory farming.

I'm against agag laws. It's bad for the environment. It's bad for the economy. It's bad for everyone. But I did feel like they really stepped over the line with that one. You knew, Steve. What did you make of him as a person and PETA going out? after him.

Did Peter go after Steve, really? That's funny. Yeah. They said that they didn't like hammer him, but they kind of said that the way in which he interacted with animals was, let's call it light abuse. Right. Okay. So there's several things with that.

And one is, you know, in a perfect world, I'm sure that things would be more perfect. Human beings don't care about what they don't touch, feel, or interact with. And the old shows of like, here's the majestic moves from far away. way isn't doing anybody favors. And at the end of the day, we need laws, we need to protect these animals, we need people to care. So people already care. They're preaching to the choir. You know what I mean? Like, okay, that's great. Like, yeah, absolutely, we should treat animals well with respect. But that's like, you know, Bob Dylan going and singing about peace to a bunch of hippies, like, yeah, okay, great. That's cool. However, we need to change the minds of the people that might not feel

that way. So that's what Steve did well. Steve would pull you in. People that wouldn't care about animals at all, all of a sudden were fascinated by this guy that was risking his life and limb on their behalf. So you've got a guy that's saying, listen, look at how beautiful these animals are. But don't look at them from a distance. That's not going to talk anybody into anything. Like, again, in a beautiful, perfect world, everybody would love it. But that's just not the way it works. So if you actually want to make conservation work, you have to make people care.

If you've got to make people care, you've got to shock them out of their seats. And Steve did exactly that. So it's ridiculous. And that's what always happens with these movements. saying thank you, Steve, for your contribution. Thank you, Steve, for helping out all of the humanitarian work he did for, well,

I guess, really, in the humanitarian, whatever it is. Helping animals out for one side and just pointed to the other. They say, thank you for the fight. They have to nitpick and be upset, and that's what always happens, right? That's why with these intergroups, no one can get along. Like that old Monty Python, they

think it was a Life of Bryant, right? No one knows none of the revolutionary groups could get along. They all thought of themselves as much as they thought, everybody else. So just seeing that is always a negative thing for me because why are you going to go after one of your own? Because he didn't do it the exact, exact way that you would have done. I know I'm going to get hammered by PETA people. But you know what? Like we're all in for saving animals. Even hunters do a great job in helping that economy. And if you can't see that, that there are people with another point of view that might not be your own, but you have a common goal,

then for me it's just noise. You live in a cartoon where, you know, maybe we can work there where Everybody gets to where they love animals, and that's not needed. But until then, it's kind of needed. That's my, I'm sure, to all you Peter people that are going to hammer me with comments and stuff, yes, I get it. But in my opinion, this is the real world. Steve was a warrior. I knew him.

I had the heart of gold. He was one of the best people I've ever met in my entire life. And he really, really did care about the animals. And I think he was right in trying to make humans care. When you go to his zoo, they weren't. walk around with the animals, you can touch them, you can pet them, you get to know them, then when you go home, you say, you know what, I really like that animal. Maybe you hear about a law that's going to protect hippos or whatever else it is, then I'm all for that.

You know what, Greg, can't add much to that. I wish you nothing, but you don't need it, but good luck. No, no, no, it's good. I agree with all of it. And, you know, obviously you got a big challenge, and so does John at UFC 235. Thank you so much for your time and your insight. Can't wait to see what you guys have in store on Saturday. Thanks, brother. Appreciate it. There he goes. One of the best in the business. All right. Not a moment to waste.

Let's get right into it. Time now where you are my guest for the sound off. All right. Let's turn our attention to my man. There he is. Look at that. Quick on the draw. Yeah, you caught me by surprise here.

I thought we were going to go to a round of tweets. No, I want to get this out. We'll do the tweets last. I want to make sure we got, I want to calibrate this segment the best we could. So good weekend, my friend? Good weekend, yes. Did you enjoy a UFC Prague?

I did. Yeah. I actually liked the cards during the day. It's nice for a change. I was hung over, so it was fine for me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good way to arrest. Just have some fights in the background, recover.

All right, so how are the calls? The calls were really good. Yeah. You told me they were quality. Yes, very quality. People are stepping up, and it's crazy. All right, you have selected the best, huh? Yes, I have.

My friend? Well, let's get started. Let's do it. Yeah, let's do it. Hey, guys, this is Sasha from Victoria, BC, Canada. And my question is about Luke Rockhold. We're still waiting for him to make him to make a lot of, his debut at light heavyweight.

And I'm wondering, given Santos' performance, do you think that that would be a good initial matchup, or do you think it would be too much for Luke? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts. Thanks so much, guys. Bye. Danny, I'll go to you on that one first. What do you think?

You like that one or no? I'm all about it. I'm in. Yeah? You like it? Yeah. I mean, he even threw some shade to Santos after the fight. He tweeted, sloppy Santos has easy money.

No, ha, easy money. Did you read the replies? Well, I can assume what they are. It's a graveyard. Yes. It's a graveyard. I assume there's a lot of pictures of Michael Bisping there. Yeah.

And Yolo Romero, too, yeah. Yeah. I mean, people are just like, you know, there's a lot of people out there that just like hating on Luke Rockwood. But the fact is, he's a skilled mixed martial artist that could easily go on and win a title, you know? I mean, I know he was obviously a former middleweight champion, but, you know, he's not done yet. And with this move to light heavyweight, who knows? I mean, you see what guys like Anthony Smith. and Santos are doing and not to throw any shade at them but like you know when they were all of them

were at 185 uh luke rockhold was was was was above them right i mean he became champ at one point so you can only imagine what he he could do at one uh 205 so which is just pretty pretty interesting no i agree uh i kind of thought that they would have gone a bit of a rockhold anderson silver direction at 205 i thought that was a better call than that versus canineer but ufc has other plans So if that's the way they're going to go, are you asking me, do I like Tiago Santos versus Luke Rockhold? I absolutely do. I love it. So given that they didn't go the Anderson Silva direction, I don't see why you wouldn't book Tiago Santos versus Luke Rockhold.

Yeah, and I think for Luke Rockwell, it would have been perfect for him to, like, verse one of these, like, older legends as well. Because he, I'm not saying he's an older legend, but he kind of fits a little bit into that space more than others because, you know, he did fight in Strike Force. And he's a little bit of an old school guy. He's been around for a bit. And you wonder, you wonder could he get back to his piece? peak or has his peak past. Just sort of still wrestling with that. That would have been a great way to see.

Yeah. But, you know, look, he beats Santos. He's in the thick of it at light heavyweight. Yeah, I mean, the light heavyweight line is so short. This is something that baffles me. Like, look at what Anthony Smith has done. Like, next week, like this weekend, he's fighting for the title. Let's say you would have given the same trajectory to Luke Rockhold.

So Rashad Evans, Shogun Huah, and who do you beat last? Ozdemir. I don't know. I kind of like Rockhold. the chances against all those three, you know? 100%. You could think he could be fighting for the title this weekend if he would have gone up to 180, 205, you know, any earlier.

So, yeah, it's pretty bizarre, right? Fighters can be stubborn, man. They can be stubborn. But, you know, he did make the switch. Same goes with Chris White Man, Leo Romero. I mean, the line's so short. Yep, so we'll see what these guys do. But in short, yeah, I'm down for that fight.

Okay, cool. Me too. All right, let's talk about Peter Yang. Oof. What's all blue? Michael from New York. I got two questions. for you. First off, how good is Peter

John? And what do you think is and who you think you should fight next? And the second question is, how good is Tiago Santos position for the White Heavyweight Division? He's considered an actual title challenger to John Jones or, you know, if you want.

And who do you should fight next? Me personally, I would love to see Tiago Santos versus Alexander Dustin. I think fight would be, okay. All right, thanks, really appreciate it. All right, man. So, first things first, Peter Yoneman.

Dude, he is incredible. Dude, he's legit. He put it on, John Dodson. Early was a little competitive, and then he just put some distance between him. It reminded me of, like, somebody giving Usain Bolt a run for his money for the first three seconds, and then Bolt just pulls away from the pack, and then there's nothing you can do at that point. Yeah.

God, he's so dynamic. The stance switching, the speed. And by the way, he'll get hit in the pocket. not often, but sometimes it doesn't deter him at all, the cage cutting, just the pressure he puts on guys, and he thrives in that space. He forces you to play speed chess, like those dudes up in Washington Square Park. You ever seen those guys? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Have you ever played with him, by the way? No. I did it one time. I got torched. Really? I was drunk, but I got torched. If you don't know how to play, I do how to play chess, pretty good, pretty well, but I don't know how to play speed chess.

I can't make calculations like that, and those guys can. Oh, my God, I got embarrassed up in Washington, Square Park. So he does something like that, but not in a gimmicky way. He has a full understanding of striking. So I don't know how you felt, but John Dotson's hair got increasingly like frizzled and frazzled was just because, dude, he was getting, he was getting hands put on him. And John Dotson's chin, by the way, is amazing. Folks don't think give him enough credit for that, but Peter Yon, Yan, whatever you pronounce it, is phenomenal, phenomenal talent. Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen John Dotson get knocked out, right?

I've seen him get dropped. What fight? I think when he fought Pat Runez. Okay. Back in the UFC. Like his UFC career, I don't think he's ever gotten dropped or hurt badly, right? From what I remember.

I've seen him take big punches and kind of like circle out and cover up. Yeah. But to your point, not like. Yeah, I mean, he's got a great chin. He's versed, you know, the who's who. Yeah. And yeah, Santos versus, we kind of touched a bit on this with the Rockhold question. But Santos versus Alexander Guffisson.

Any interest in that? Would you prefer the Luke Rockhold route? Where do you stand? Okay, so at light heavyweight, here's who he is defeated. This being, this being Tiago Santos. He lost to David Branch at middleweight, right? Then he goes up to light heavyweight. He beats Eric Anders on short notice.

Then he beat Jimmy Manoa. Then he beat Jan Blahovic. And by the way, he stopped all of them with strikes. Jan Blahovic, for folks who may not remember, has a pretty great record. He had beaten Devin Clark, Jared Kennanier, Jimmy Manoa, Nikita Krillov, and then he just lost to Tiago Santos. Now, he lost to Gustafson, but Gustafson had to wrestle him. Like, Gustafin was getting tuned up on the feet a little bit.

I would love to see that fight. I would love... Tiago Santos has put himself in a position where it's like, wow, an action fighter who might be pretty good. What on earth will ever will we do with this gentleman? Anything, anything you can do with him. I just thought of this, Johnny Walker. I know it's Brazilian versus Brazilian, but...

Oh, that'd be amazing. That'd be fun fight. All right, let's move on. Let's talk about a legend of the sport. Hey, Luke and Danny. This is your shut call from Los Angeles. My question is about GSP. Will he unretire if he does get the fight he wants?

Because the reason he did retire from what it looks like the main reason is because he didn't get the fight he wanted. So when he unretire, if he did get the fight he wanted. All right. Thanks. So Brian Campbell on the MAB, he's like, yeah, I don't know about this retirement. And I can't blame him. M.A. retirements don't seem to. lost, don't seem to last very long.

Do you think GSP will ever come back? I treat it like the lottery, where if I won the lottery, I would quit my job. Now, what are the chances of me winning the lottery? Not great. You know what I'm saying? It's something like that where if some kind of miraculous event happened, where within a reasonable time, because remember, he's not far from 40 at this point. That's right.

If something happened in short order, maybe. But the likelihood of that is pretty slim. and by the time it could come around, he might be too old. So I would say if he wins the lottery, yeah, he'll come back. But the chances that are not at all good. Dude, I don't know. At the beginning when it was first reporter that he... You think he might?

No, I think he won't. I completely had a 180 on this. At the very beginning, I'm like, hmm, this might be a negotiation tactic. You know, GSP's a very smart guy. But then once he was up there, he gave his whole speech, he took questions from the media. and then just seeing like all the response on like social media like the garden tweeted him like all these you know celebrities were tweeting at him and kind of paying their respects like it's it seemed very official very legit and I don't know how you can be like again as you said he doesn't have much time left so I don't think he can be like six months later hey guys you know just kidding I feel like it'll go against like what he stands for how he carries himself it would just go against everything so I really I really think this is it for just be yeah but heads of state were tweeting him Justin Trudeau. Justin Trudeau is tweeting.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, dude, he's a Canadian superhero. Would you want a tweet when you move on to your next job from Yvonne Duque? Sure. Fair enough. Fair enough. Yeah, I'll just. Yeah.

He's not the most popular man in the world. Justin Trudeau is still reasonably well liked. Yeah, for sure. All right, what's up? All right. Well, let's answer one more question about GSP. Okay. Hey Lou, hey, Danny.

This is Brent from Fort Worth, Texas. I'm a big fan of the show. Texas is a Florida call the show. George C. Pierre. What UFC fighter, besides Joyce Gracie, I would say, has done more for the sports than George St. Pierre. Yes, keep up the good work.

Thank you. That's an interesting phrasing. Done more for the sport. Now, what do you mean more for the sport? Do you mean financial returns, attention, interest? I'm guessing Well, when you're comparing to GSP

I feel like you have to compare Like everything Like attention to sport And also like bringing in like You know Like a good light to it You know So I would say

He was a good ambassador I would say Her exit often defines her A little bit more than it should You got to give Ronda Rousey credit Because breaking that gender barrier Again she wasn't the first female fighter But she was the first widely set

Well I guess Gina Carana was the first widely celebrated. But, I mean, truly crossover star was probably Rhonda Rousey in the way in which she was, you know, pulling on pay-per-view in the way that she did. And the way in which that changed people's attitudes towards MMA when you had the first mother in the octagon, that being Katzangano and all these different things. That was a major, major change. Now, it's debatable who's more.

George certainly contributed an enormous amount. We talked about that on the MMA beat, you know. Yeah. But you got to give Rousey some credit. too. I really feel like that's important. Yeah, Rousey's a big one. She, she, you know, brought a lot of attention to the sport. And, you know, at the time, like, I know her exit was maybe, like, left a little bit of a sour

taste and in a lot of, you know, with a lot of fans. But, like, during her run, man, she was everywhere. She was out there promoting the sport. And really, like, people, some people even just were fans of Ronda Rousey, just Ronda Rousey, just Ronda Roussey as a person, not even MMA. Like, they would just follow her career. Right. So, yeah, she did a lot. I would say, like, around that era, too, the GSP era,

I were throwing there Chuck Liddell. He was, he was, like, a superstar. Like, he was in all the commercials. He was, like, the MMA, you know, ambassador. Like, he represented MMA at that time. And he was, like, MMA celebrity, sort of. So, you know, he did a lot of awareness for the sport. And look, Conner's done a lot, too, but let's just be factual.

He's also been a little bit polarizing. Yes. And that, you know, you're talking about GSP was not really polarizing in that way. And Rondo was polarizing at the end, but had these major contributions across important demographics. Yeah, I look at my YouTube numbers. And even, like, within, like, the polarizing aspect, like, they're still very different. Right.

By the way, I look at my YouTube numbers. On my YouTube channel, my audience is 96% men. You know, Rhonda brought in an audience that I just, you can't find without some kind of powerful figure changing things. So, yeah, I'd include her as well. For sure. Well, let's talk about, you know, keep the train rolling and talk about women's MMA. So a lot going out at 135. Yes, indeed there is.

Hi, Luke. Hi, Danny. This is Dinah from North Carolina. I had a quick question. Now, it's rumored that Howie Holm will face Amanda Nunes for the next 135-pound title shot. Well, the last time Holly's had a notable win at 135 was when she won against Rhonda in 2015. Now, I don't know beating Bech-Cohia after losing three in a row should warn a title shot, do you think? My question is, why does she get the opportunity when you have people like Ketland Vieja or even Jermaine Duranmi who hasn't even had the opportunity to fight for the title at 135?

What are your thoughts? Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. Bye. So I don't think it's official yet, but it looks like that's where things are setting up. Holly Holme v. Amanda Nunes. Do you like it? Do you think another woman should have gotten the chance to fight the champ?

Where do you stand there? Kittlen Vieira would have been a fine choice. She's undefeated. She's undefeated. Here's the deal. It's true that since beating Ronda Rousey, this is Holly Holmes' resume. Ready? She lost to Misha Tate.

She got submitted. She got just outclassed by Valentina Shivchenko. She lost very controversially to Germaine Durand to me. Then she came back and stopped Betchkoheya in the third round. She lost to Chris Cyborg, but that was reasonably competitive, I thought, ish. And then she beat Megan Anderson. That was the big one. When she beat up a weight class,

the perceived either top contender or something approximating the top contender, and did so by using the parts of her game that are very much outside of her comfort zone. It was extremely impressive. Now, what those will mean when she fights Amanda Nunes, I don't know. Here's the deal. Let's just be real about it. Is she the most deserving contender? Absolutely not.

Is it a fight that would be interesting? Yes. Could it be very competitive? Yes. And will it do better than, like, you know, Ketland Vieira versus Amanda Nunes, quite obviously. So that's why they're making it if they in fact make it I also feel like you know as you mentioned like in the Chris Cyberg loss and even like in a few other losses like the germane Durandumie loss like she's proved that she's elite like in every single one It's it's not like we've seen I mean maybe the Valentina Shifchenko and you can make a case for that one but other than that one like you know she's proved that she's pretty legit like you if she steps out she steps down in competition and fights like a Bechkoheya you know she's you know what she can do so that's why you know and giving her start as well. That's why she kind of just stays at this top. And that's why she's fighting for the title.

But yeah, it kind of sucks for Caitlin Vieira, who's been putting in the work undefeated on a crazy streak, you know? I hate for these fighters who don't make a lot of median noise. Yeah. Because they have to put themselves through the grinder. And then there's Tony Ferguson, who both puts himself through the grinder and makes media noise. And it's still in a position where they're asking them to just do a lateral move. So it's a cold world, Danny Seguro. It is. It is. All right.

All right. What else we got? One more? Yeah, we'll do one more. All right. All right. Let's talk about predictions. And somebody has a question for you as well. These are terrible.

Okay, all right. My predictions always suck. Good morning, Luke and Danny. This is Alex calling from Orlando, Florida. A quick question. Florida, Texas, bro. Number one. Who would you favor in the Max Holloway and Dustin Poirier fight and why?

two, Luke, if you could name three of your all-time favorite metal bands, who would they be? Thanks, guys. You're the highlight of my Monday, and I hope you guys have a great week. That's a tough one. All right, so where do you want to start? You want to start with the predictions first? Yeah, he kind of threw me off. What were they for?

I was down now I'm thinking about all the metal bands. Predictions, Poreo Holloway. Oh, God. Dude, I didn't realize when this fight got booked. Like, I kind of forgot that they had fought already. Seven years ago. Yeah. Seven years ago.

So it's kind of like an interesting storyline. Man. You guys, I've done the Monday morning analyst on Max. I couldn't have a higher opinion of them than I already do. Man, that's a tough one. Wow. At 155, Poirier has gotten so much better defensively and with range. He's got better power than Max.

On the other hand, Max has an incredible chin, and he just slowly takes things from you round over. round. Dude, that is a really competitive fight. That's a really interesting fight. I'd probably lean somewhat Holloway, but very, very carefully, like, that is not, that's not one of these fights. You're like, man, so-and-so's going to win. Yeah. Like, ooh, I'd be, I would not do that. What about you? For the first part, where do you lean? Dude, I have no idea. I feel like I'm kind of leaning towards Holloway, but I do think there's something to be said about sort of like the mental edge of like, yo, I already be.

you type thing. And, you know, it is Poir's division. It is a division where he feels more comfortable and Max Hollow will be going up. And I know Max Hollowie is not a small dude, but Poirier is super tough as well. I really don't know how that one's going to go, but I don't know. I think I'm going to go with Poria. Yeah, I think, dude, I can't his, after what he's done, you'd be a dumbass, not you I'm saying the proverbial you. You'd be a dumbass to just not take him seriously. I mean, look at the damage he withstood against Gagie. I know.

And deep into the championship rounds, too, man. So, I mean, if you would, I would say, like, Max Holloway is way more precise and way more of a technician than Gagia is, but out of, like, just pure power and who can deliver more damage, I feel like Gagie probably takes that. Who's more strategic with their damage? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Big time. That's a, dude, here's a thing. I'm a little bit worried about what that might do to the division if Max wins. and he doesn't drop into the title or even if he does what that might do. On the other hand, that fight is going to be the shit. Yeah. It's going to be amazing. As a fan, you can't complain.

But division-wise, yeah, you can, there's a few things there that are a bit concerning. It really should have been poory and Tony Ferguson, yeah. But Ferguson doesn't want that interim thing. He doesn't want the bell. Yeah, I guess we're going to see what happens with that. Do you want to get into another argument about that or I'm just kidding? I don't mind. People think I don't like arguing.

I like arguing. All right. Give us your three metal bands. What? Dying fetus, famine, starvation. What do you got? I like how you just name plagues on human existence. Yes.

Well, it's kind of changed over time. So I used to be when I was a kid, before I really discovered death metal, I was, like every kid in the 80s and 90s, I was big into Metallica. But then once the black album came out, that was fine, I guess. And then everything kind of changed. So number one all time is Pantera. I just, I don't know how anyone might. age could go in any other direction. When I saw vulgar display of power in that record store in Marietta, Georgia, and then I flipped it on and I heard it. It was like, it was like taking the

red pill, man. That was one of the most transformative musical experiences I have ever had, far and away. So Pantara would want. You're asking me like my favorite metal band today, easily dying fetus. Their album selection is, I mean, where do you want to go? Wrong one to fuck with the sentent depravity. I mean, these are, they have grotesque impalement. Like, it's just so much good work. And by the way, I know you're going to laugh over there, Danny. Google drum teacher dying fetus.

There's this guy who's a drum teacher who watches them play. And then he breaks down their drum technique. Super sophisticated. I know you hate the music, but it is kind of cool to watch a technician, watch another technician. That's pretty cool. And then I guess I don't really have a super diehard third. I said on the last week that one of the other best metal albums of the year was Rivers of Nile,

where I always know my name. It's a, there's a guy in the band, it's a death metal band. There's a guy in the band who plays the saxophone. It's ridiculously inventive. Hail of Bullets is a band no one's really heard of before. Cattle Decapitation is good. Bloodbath is good. These names, man. These names.

Yeah, bloodbath is good. I don't really have a die-hard third, but those two for sure are standouts for me. Cool. Sounds good. What's your favorite death metal band? You know, Cannibal Corpse is always a... You know what? I'll say this. Lamb of God is considered metal, right?

It's a metal. I wouldn't call it death metal, but it's a metal. I like... Land of God's great. I like them a lot. I like a few songs from... When I was growing up, there was a few songs that I kind of like... By the way... I wouldn't say I'm a fan. Do you know what their original name was?

No. It's either one of the two. I can't quite get it right. It's either burn the priest or burning priest. One of the two. But they... I think they had trouble getting shows, and they were like, maybe we should change that.

So they went with Lamb of God. They're from Richmond, Virginia. Oh, really? I did not know that. Which, by the way, last thing, name another famous metal band from Richmond, Virginia. You ever heard of Guar? I feel like I have, yes. They're the ones that put on all the prosthetics?

Google their videos. I've seen something. They have a bar. Last thing on this. They have a bar in Richmond. It's actually right by my sister's house. It's called Guar Bar, where you walk in, there's nothing but horror movies playing on the TV. there's blood, blood, splattered everywhere.

The food is out of control. The drinks are amazing. The clientele looks like you're walking into the Moss Isley Cantina in Star Wars. It is one of the best bars in the country, Guar Bar. It actually sounds fun. It's awesome. And it's nothing but Slayer, Pantera on the speaker.

All right, we got to do some tweets, don't we? Yes, we do. Good job with the calls, my friend. Good job today on the show. I know we were trying to get everything. settled and it was kind of a craziness. You did a great job today. Thank you.

I'll see you on Thursday, right? Yes, Thursday for the NBA beat. There we go. Time. Thank you so much. Time, good, sir, for a round of tweets. Clock starts when the first one goes up and there it is. Let's see the clock.

Let's see the clock. There we go. Go ahead and there we go. All right. Do you think super fights at a catch weight would be a good way to solve the problems associated with champ champ fights? The UFC would avoid log jams in both weight divisions and the fires would still get the distinction of being a superfight champ.

Yes and no. One of the issues is it would solve. the problem that you're bringing up. But Pride used to do these with like Marcus Aurelio, where it wouldn't be a catch weight, but they would just have them fight someone and it wouldn't be for the championship. And then they'd lose. And then you go back and there'd be another fight for the championship and they'd retain it. And you'd be like, but you just lost. Granted, that was in the same weight class, but you get a similar kind of problem where, yes, it solves this problem you're addressing, but it creates some other image issues where they wind up losing. But I do think

that's a better system than what they're doing now. Next. Does my medication need a or was the production of UFC Prague on a new level? Finally, the commentators noted Marco Polarois was still on the canvas, then updated us that he had left the Octagon unassisted, very happy with the ESPN era so far. Plus, I agree, I love the black and red production elements that they use. Plus, they had noted when fighters were on suspension for PED issues. They had done that as well.

I appreciate that. All you need is just a little bit of honesty to just, what we don't want is North Korea. All you have to do is not be that. ESPN, I'm telling you, they're off to a phenomenal start. I'm really appreciating what they're doing. Next. If Anthony Smith somehow pulls out this win over John Jones,

does he overtake Matt Serra for the greatest upset in UFC history? I don't know exactly what the numbers would be in terms of the betting odds, but it would be right up there. It would be right up there. That would be, or I think the biggest one would be Holly Holm of Ronda Rousey. But if you're asking, would this be truly one of the great historic upsets, in UFC and MMA history? Easily. Next.

Would you be in favor of a percentage of pay penalty to the opposition for doping violations similar to missing weight? Here's the big issue with this. I don't have one. What I want is for the fighters to decide if that is something that they are okay with. I have no strong opinion about this.

I certainly wouldn't be against it. If fighters liked it, then I would in no way argue. argue against it. Sure is I guess my answer, but what we really need is stop asking me. Let's ask the fighters, the fighters, what do they want? They're the ones who have skin in the game. Next, if Ben wins and Woodley loses, does Ascran deserve a title shot? Let's see how he wins and let's see how Woodley loses in that scenario. But would I rule it out? No, I would not rule it out. Next. If Max wins, who gets the first crack at Habib? Max or Tony?

Tony Ferguson deserves the next shot at the title. I don't care. And I have the utmost respect for Max Hollow. I could not respect him more. He is a king among kings. He's a legend among we are living in the blessed era. But I am sorry, dude. You have got to give Tony Ferguson what he is owed. whole argument about like just get out there and prove it and good things will come your way. Dude, what do you think he's been doing? How many times does he have to do it before that argument becomes true? It's just an excuse to delay title shots. No.

Tony Ferguson, Tony Ferguson, Tony Ferguson. This is the easiest question to answer in the world. Tony Ferguson, Tony Ferguson, Tony Ferguson deserves the next title shot. Not up for debate. Next. Anthony Smith, Tiago Santos, and Israel Adasanya are three guys who cut less weight and are very active. Obviously, they have been winning, but a year ago, none of them were ranked. What lessons should other fighters take from them?

Well, here's another one, Paul Felder, and that cut down to 155, it's a little bit hard on him. Here's the question, are you more competitive cutting the weight or not? If you're not, go up. That's the lesson there to infer. Next. Which of the two fighters do you think have evolved more since their first fight? Max Holloway are Dustin Poirier. Well, the person who made up the most ground is Max Holloway. Remember, he didn't just lose. He got a mounted triangle arm bar from Dustin Poirier. So from that point, more ground has been covered by Max. But to think that Dustin hasn't evolved is totally false.

He's made enormous strides. Next. Favorite non-title fight from UFC 235, Ascran Zabit or Walker. Gotta be Ascran's debut. One more. Big fan to show, Luke, what are your thoughts on referees being quick on the stoppage in main event fights? Recent fights like Dilshal-Sahudo, a little quick but not terrible. Velazquez and Ghanu, not quick, have left me unsatisfied as we did not get to see a decisive finish in very important fights. The key here is this.

It's not, there are grades to a stoppage. Do they get an A? Did they get a B? Did they get a C? Did they get a D? but in that is a past-fail scenario. So the question you have to ask yourself is, was the Dilleshaw stoppage an A?

No. Was the Velasquez and Gano stoppage in A, A-minus B-plus, something like that, whatever you want to call it? But the point being is, are they still passable? And both of those are still defensible. Both of those are still passable. The Dillishaw-Sah-Sah-Hoodo stoppage was not great,

but it wasn't a failure. So what do you want to see? I would like to see more decisive finishes, but that job is different. understanding the range of what's acceptable might help you temper some of those concerns. All right. One more interview. I spoke to Israel Adasanya yesterday in my home studio. We had a lot to talk about. You're going to like this one. He has a lot to say about Kelvin Gastilum, about the title and a whole lot more. Here's my conversation with Stylebender. And welcome back to the show, Israel Adesania. Israel, how are you?

I'm Gravy. What's up, man? Let's get to a UFC 236. You're going to be fighting in an interim title bout against Kelvin Gaston. A lot of different ways I'd like to parse this. I guess the first one is this. Your feelings about it being an interim title. Where are you on that? I've said this on record, Luke.

Fuck the belt. I don't you will fuck about the belt. It's just a trinket you collect along the way. So at least when it's said and done, I can say I was interim champion. And I can say I was the unified champion as well. So everything just makes for the story. It makes a good story, so I'm not really fussed about it. Interim, real.

It's just, yeah, just a belt. Then again, you did have that video on social media this week, a couple days ago, where it was a belt, I guess, from UFC 221. It is alluring for you, obviously. Yeah, it looks good. I'll say it looks good on black skin. You see I wear gold all the time, so I collect gold like a magpie. What's a magpie?

A magpie is a bird that likes to collect shiny things. It's a black bird. Is it black Charlotte? Black and white. It's a black and white bird. So, yeah. And they like shiny things. All right.

So you're like a magpie. Learn something new every day, I suppose. Kelvin Gastilum a little bit here. He has an interesting style, right? When you think of him as a fighter, if you had to classify his style, how would you do it? Kelvin Gastilum. There's many ways I can classify. fire style. I like it. He's improved.

One thing I can say is he's improved over the, has run in the UFC from, you know, being an ultimate fighter and now being a, you know, a contender. It's style, it's very Mexican. If honest, I could say, it's very Mexican.

Like, you know, you have the Mexican style of boxing. He has a Mexican style of MMA and like a smart Mexican style. He doesn't just brawl or look for wars. He's calculated with the way approaches the game, but again, like I said, they haven't fought anyone like me. They haven't seen anyone like me, and it's the same rhetoric. But when I say it's not just talk or like me

reading out of statement, I'm speaking it because it's facts. None of them have seen anyone like me. So, yeah, I look forward to this test. And I even think he, I said he was, he was going to lose to Robert Whitaker and I was going to stand out of Robert Whitaker in the aftergone. But I think he's the easier fire out of the, out of the both of the. him. So I'd rather get this one out the way and then take a rub with the next. So you have to imagine, let's start with his striking. When you mentioned it's a Mexican style, what does that mean? Boxing heavy

kind of in your face, forward pressure, volume punching. Is that what you mean? Yeah, boxing heavy. He likes to use his hands. Kicks, yeah, he's not so good with kicks. Maybe he can get better at low kicks. Good tip for Kelvin, work on your low kicks. But yeah, very boxed and heavy. Lucha Libre, I know he can wrestle.

He's probably some NCAA. something something for America. I don't know. He's 10 planet black belt, I'm pretty sure. So, yeah, but the Mexican style, I just feel the way he moves, the way he faints,

the way, he even has like a bit of a karate thing to him lately. I've noticed his last fights. Maybe that's how he starts off. I don't know if it's him and Suhudo because they mean, I don't know they're like buddy-budis,

so they've kind of got this karate. They might have some kind of secret weapon they're doing with some karate or some taekwondo or whatever because of the way they stand and when they start the fight. But then with Suhudo, he's able to keep that going through the whole fight

with Gastilam, he kind of fades, he kind of fades and goes back to his natural movement when he stops faking the karate shit. But yeah, it's a good puzzle to solve. And I can't wait. This is what I do. I solve puzzles every single time. And even after the last game, the last game was probably my hardest fight I had to do, you know, saying that in hindsight. Because it wasn't really about fighting Anderson Silver for me. It was about fighting.

my younger self, you know, in a way, like I was fighting Superman. So it wasn't really about fighting silver. It was like fighting me. If that makes sense. I don't know. It's a weird paradox. But yeah, so I've done that. Everything else is easy.

How validating of a win is it? I mean, forget the belt for a second. I mean, for you, in terms of the puzzle that you have to solve here, you're saying your last one was harder, but let's sort of talk about the wider perspective. There's the boxing issue. And as you alluded to, he does have some credible wrestling in that division as well. So you get the win over him. What does that say about you?

I mean, for me, it's just, it doesn't, I don't want to say it doesn't mean anything because it's beating another warrior from another part of the world, you know? But after I beat him, guess what? They're going to still say the same shit. Oh, he ain't fought this guy yet. Or he hasn't fought this yet.

He hasn't. When I get the belt, they'll say the same thing. And the next one, when I defend the belt multiple times, they'll keep talking shit. So, yeah, what does it say about me? It could say a lot or I could say not many. So, yeah, I just want to get this one done and keep progressing forward, keep moving forward with the game. But, yeah, it'll put some people on notice.

I'll probably get some new fans when I beat him. And people are like, okay, fine, I'm on the bandwagon now. He beat Calvin. But also, I don't care. I don't care what they say. I just want to keep fighting people and winning. Okay, but let's go back to the wrestling for a second. How does his wrestling in your mind differ from any opponent you face to date?

So the two guys who really sort of tried to do that with you, Brett Tavares a little bit, but more Vittori and Wilkinson. Whereas not merely level, but sort of style-wise. And Brunson as well. Brunson-Trial. Brunson, too, yeah. Yeah, but he was weak as shit. And, yeah, with him, I feel he is going to be one of the hardest opponents I've faced lately.

not the hardest, but one of the hardest because of the troubles he presents. But his wrestling, I haven't seen too much of it lately because he's been knocking everyone now. He's been standing and banging. But

two seconds, I'll say by to my mom real quick. Yeah. And take over. I've had to finish your internet. Yeah, of course. Don't drive while you're... I won't, I promise. Love you, my.

Bye, mom. Say bye. Mrs. Adasadha. And then, yeah, so with him, I think he, I think he'll have to go back to his wrestling definitely because he knows everyone else has failed. Everyone else has failed with me. But let me think, let me ponder on this a little bit more.

The wrestling starts before you even engage in the clinch. I've said this already, and this is one thing people don't know. The wrestling begins on the feet with a stand-up, And, I mean, you look at our stats. I mean, I've got like a 90-inch reach on them. I think I've got like a seven-inch height advantage, something crazy. So I tower over him. So for him to even get close to clinch me, he has to get past my striking.

And, yeah, and I think even if he wants to try and wrestle straight away, he might try and bum-rish me and wrestle straight away. But they feel uncomfortable. Like, even they know There's a point in the Brad Tavares fight Where I scrambled his brain It was fun, like a little sequence Because I faint, faint, faint, faint And I forced him to throw his left hand

Because he was Southport Things like that I make them second-guess themselves And I feel like I'm going to do that with Kelvin Even if he thinks he wants to wrestle me I feel like I'm going to make him second-guess himself And then he's going to panic And then I'll just keep picking him off

And eventually he'll fall You know, I talk to your coach Eugene Barerman about something you just said. And since he said to me, it has stuck in my brain like Gondam style, like an earworm and I can't get it out, namely about fainting. He said that there's a gap in MMA. And the reason why you guys in New Zealand are having such success,

among other reasons, is that in MMA, people don't really take seriously how important fainting is, how essential it is, and why it's essential to success. I wonder if you could elaborate on that. When you look around the game, obviously, you must share some of his vision as well. Why, why isn't fainting taken as seriously by everyone else? So when I first started watching striking even, some of the, quote-unquote, premier kickboxing

organizations or even some of the best kickboxes in the world at the highest level, they don't faint. They don't show nothing. they all, even the Dutch style as revolutionary as it was and maybe in the late or mid-2000s, you know, because, but they don't, they don't faint, they don't know how to give different looks

and it's really, it was shocking. So we're taking advantage of not just that, or a lot of other things, a lot of other things you guys don't know. Hey, I got to give you credit, man, your breakdown. Does someone else help you with that, or is it just you? That was 100% me, hand to God. That was all by myself. I'll

round of applause for Luke fucking hell yo straight up like the thing is you you're like

you're like you're shining light on some things on certain things but it's it's harder for you to know what we're doing because you're not in the camp

but you're like you're shining light on some things and it's like hmm he picked up on that okay okay it's interesting so I got I'm sort of the smart coaches were as well the smart ones will know but like I was wondering because I watched the wrestling one the wrestling was really good it really showed my progression over time but then this

one I was like hmm someone else is helping him I'm sure and you're like the face of it but I'm impressed I am very impressed my man honestly well I'll be I'll be honest most of time I can take footage and I can watch it once or twice and more or less have an idea what's happening with that fight And I'm being dead serious, it may have taken 20 times before I even could get a beat on it. So I'll say this. It took way more research. Man, one of my last videos, I think, before the bell was just showing how close it was. Because a lot of people, you know, as much, I don't really kill what people saying like I at the end of the day.

But when I see people saying, oh, that was a boring fight. Why did they get fight at a night? I'm like, I've said this before. I could get fight than night. You don't have to be beat up. to get fighter the night. You don't have to be in a, like a brawl and suckam,

Moroccum, whatever, to be in a fighter than night. You can be in a technical fucking match, like a finesse, you know, and still have fighter than night because it was entertaining.

So that video, when I posted it, was just to show how close some of those strikes were because some, those are the only ones. There were some of them, like,

literally just put a little shine on my lip. And he said, I did the same thing with my toes on his lip. You know what I mean? So, Yeah, a little bit. And even if you listen to it, if you watch some of the fight on headphones,

some of the kicks that miss, if you turn it up on your headphones, it sounds like a blade when I kick him and the misses. If it was anyone else, they'll get concussed, but like, or even knocked out, flattened out, but you can hear when the wind just goes past it just like a fucking katana. And it's just those for me just make me like, whoa, that was close. I mean, it's not my fault that we're both good and one of us didn't suck. that we can just fucking bam, bam, bam, bam. We still have some of those moments,

you know, in the second round he jabbed me twice that made me, ooh, shake and bake, shake and bake. But, yeah, that was a fun match to be in, and, yeah, I can't remember what the question was, but I'm just, I'm rambling now. It's okay. I'll bring it back on this one. You guys, usually it's the higher weight class,

if there's two titles, the higher weight class gets the main event spot. You guys have the co-main event spot. Any reaction to that? Oh, that's where Max Holloway. Now, Max Holloway, I think just because he's been in the company longer, He's on a longer wing streak. He's, I want to say a bigger name for now. I wouldn't say the, like, how do I quantify that?

My stock is rising fast, man. So, I mean, after this fight, I'll probably surpass him in stock. But in Shots and Max Holloway, he's another guy I love to watch. And I'm glad to be on this card with him. Look, if I could be the first fight of the night, I would take that spot, honestly. So then I can just sit back and watch the rest of the fights. Unfortunately, I can't now at this level. So I have to settle for being a co-or of the main event.

So even him being above me doesn't really make a difference. I'd rather be the first fight, early fight in the night so I can just get it over with and enjoy the rest of the night. All right, man. Well, here's the other part. 16 months. So you've got these five fights in what's going to be in 16 months.

Dude, if you have a title in 16 months, interim or otherwise, I don't think I've even seen a rise like that in the UFC before. And that includes some great names. Part of this is just writing momentum. I get it, but is part of this at this point strategic to start setting these records?

We're not trying. Like, I don't chase the numbers. They chase me. I don't chase money. They chase me. Like, I'm just, I love fighting. I love fighting at the end of the day. Fuck. Okay, we're cool. So it's just you and me right now. I'm just say it.

Like, a guy like Carter McGregor, one thing I really appreciated when he first got into the game and one thing why he inspired me was because he has love for fighting. His love for fighting. And eventually, I don't know if, and it just kind of became not just about fighting, but about the money and about selling numbers and breaking records, like you say, and pay-per-views and all that kind of stuff. But one thing, I don't know, I can't say, because I don't know the guy that well, but one, I don't even know the guy, but one thing I can say is, like from what I see lately from the way he's, not the way he's training, but the way he's posting his trainings, I feel like he's kind of maybe getting back to that. that same mindset.

It's about fighting at the end of the day. We're warriors. We're gladiators. We're modern day fucking badass. A fighter walks in the room and everything, you know, people are like, ooh,

because everyone's trying to be a tough guy, but we don't have to do shit because we're tough guys, and everyone knows it. So I feel like he's getting back to that, that mindset of the young economy who just loves to fight, who just wanted to be the best in the world and fuck everyone up.

Fuck. I just want to fuck everyone up. I want to I'm not a fucking asshole or dick or anything unless they deserve it but I just want to beat the best guys I just want to fight

and be remembered as the best who fought everybody and beat them and then the money the numbers the records they all chase me so it's not a really there's a little bit of strategy to it but I think that's too

I don't want to go too deep I'll keep that with myself with the way I played a game because look 16 months and I'm already like I've headlined a couple of shows and I'm on the way to it I'm not, I won't say I'm at the top yet

but like I just keep rising Even when I'm at the top I don't feel like I'm at the top I keep rising It just keeps, I just want to have these moments These key moments These key fights And that's about it

So yeah, 16 months Five fights Or not 16 months How long was that? Like a year, five fights, 14 months, it's crazy It'll be 16 Sorry, it'll be 14 I should say

If you end up If things go your way in Atlanta Yeah, definitely So, fuck, I mean, who else? You know, I think Conner, like, in five fights, he did. Yeah, I think he did it around the same time. But he did the ACL tier. Yeah, it was what?

It took a long time. That's why he did after Max Holloway. So, yeah. But the thing is, that's the thing, like, one thing, when I get that belt, there's a guy, I really want to rub it in his face because when Connor got his belt off Chad Mendez, because he's an Irish guy as well. And he was really hype because he went over and watched it. and at the gym, you just came up to me, and he's like, man, let's see how long it takes you to get your belt.

I was like, wait, what? I was like, no, it's different. He's on his own journey. I'm on my own journey. Like, this is the beautiful thing about the sport. We're trying to get to the same place, maybe, but we're on different paths. So when I get that belt and I get the next one off Rob, I'm going to remind him and be like, do you remember when he said that? Because, you know, I'm petty like that.

Super petty. And they don't ever remember they said it probably. But yeah, it's not about me trying to be better than this person who's not even in my weight class or anything. I'm really just trying to just create great moments. Like I said even on the Misha Tate one podcast, I talked about that photo at the end of the first round. When Anderson's there, I hit him with a rock least dance and I got my hand out like, come get some. That photo right there, I'm going to frame that. And that photo is just going to be iconic in martial arts history by the time I'm done with what I'm doing.

A couple more for you, and I'll let you run here. I know you got stuff to do. So the interesting part here, as I was looking up your name on Google, and it showed that Paula Costa, Bohaschina, had said that they had offered him also the opportunity to fight Kelvin, which would be not uncommon, but that they gave it to you for a lot of reasons. But he had indicated that you had initially turned it down, this fight with Kelvin. Is that true? No, what? Hell no.

I turned it down. That's what he said, yeah, initially. And then they went back to you, and then they were like, oh, no, they gave it to you that. But isn't he been scheduled to fight UOL for how long? Yes. Exactly. So how to fuck would they even offer him a fight when he's already scheduled to fight YOL

and Yowel's not injured or anything? He's added to a Brazilian podcast. See how they're fucking lying? It doesn't even matter anyway. Guys like that, him, Chris, they just try to get some shine because the spotlight's on me right now. And I'm, hey, I'm glistening.

And when that gold's on me, it's going to shine right into the eyes as well. Like I said, they can come line up and find out how overrated I am once I'm the champ. So, yeah, I don't know. At least, maybe it might be lost and translisten or some shit, but, like, no, I didn't even leave Melbourne.

I didn't leave Melbourne before they offered me that fight. And I was like, shit, I'm still in Melbourne. Let me go chill for a second. And then I'll take the fight. But then I was like, I think it was a day later. I was like, okay, fine, let's go. I get itchy knuckles really quick, like, really quick. And I was still kind of, I was still kind of like,

not banged up, but I was just like, you know, after the fight you have to deal with, everything that goes with it and, you know, you're a little bit, like, I think my eye was a little bit of hurt from that jab and then pee pulling and all that kind of shit. But yeah, I never turned it down, not even once. I want to fuck when I turned on the chat. I just said, look, is it for the interim belt? There was just, you know, you know how negotiations go. So that's all I can say about that. Negotiations, you have to kind of, a lot of things happen. I'm still a fan of the UFC, but when I wasn't in the UFC and just being a fan, I used to watch the UFC and wonder what happens behind the scenes.

And watching like the embedded and watching a lot of stuff with Rousey and her rise, McGregor's rise, John Jones's rise, Silver's rise, made me realize that so much is going on behind the scene that we don't know about. You can just speculate. But now I'm here and I'm negotiating with the people I used to watch. I know how the game's played. And like I said, I'm player one. I'm playing the game.

Yeah. Last one for you. I appreciate your time. Camara Usman fights this coming weekend for the Welterweight title. Now, this is interesting because a Nigerian American, and obviously you're a Nigerian Kiwi and however else you guys self-identify, is it bittersweet because he could be the first Nigerian champ

or is it awesome that there's two that can happen back-to-back months? Hey, sorry of them bitter at all. It's sweet. It's delicious to me because I just, I mean, it takes nothing away from me. That's the thing. There's just crabs in the buckets, mentality with people where it's like, oh, no, okay, I wanted to be the first Nigerian UFC champion. It's like, no, if he becomes a first Nigerian UFC champion, his win is my win too. Not really, but it is because fuck, that's good for us.

It's 180 million people and counting who are going to hear about it, you know, and they're going to be ecstatic. Like now, even I saw a comment one time on my Instagram, some guy was like, oh, we'll all these Nigerian fans a year ago. What the fuck blocked? Because that kind of shit doesn't fly with me. I'm like, people, yeah, I get it. You're a hipster.

Oh, I used to follow him before it was cool. But I just don't like that kind of attitude. So, yeah, Camaro's win is good for me. And I'll happily take being the second Nigerian UFC champion, you know. So I don't, there's no shade, there's no bitter. That's that crabs in the bucket mentality. This whole world is cursed with people. there's like a finer amount of goodness of money or whatever or fame or clout or you know they

think it's finite but no it's infinite if you want yours go get it it's out there and no one's shine is taken away from yours because it's infinite seriously it's like self-love it's infinite i'm gonna see in your fight in april thank you so much my man my appreciate all right big thanks to all of our guests today and big thanks to you for watching keep you Keep sending those tweets using the hashtag the MMA hour. Keep calling 844-866-2468. Until next time, donks, stay frosty.