MMA Fighting - #477 – Israel Adesanya, Luke Rockhold, Maycee Barber

Episode Date: April 15, 2019

On this episode of The MMA Hour, Luke Thomas speaks to Israel Adesanya about his epic win at UFC 236 over Kelvin Gastelum, picking up the interim middleweight title, Jon Jones’ recent comments, more; Luke Rockhold about his next fight at light heavyweight, his war of words with Anthony Smith, more; Maycee Barber about her health, wanting to fight Paige VanZant, 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

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. It is Monday, April 15th, 2019, and this is the MMA hour. Welcome, everyone, on this tax day. If you live in Los Los States Unitos, hope you paid your taxes. What a show we have for you guys today in the wake of UFC 236. We have so much to get to. So let's see here. How about your new interim middleweight champion?

He's going to be here, Israel, out of Sonia, at 1230. Then at one, he wasn't at that big press conference before. or UFC 236, but he was mentioned a few times. So we wanted to catch up with him. Luke Rockold will be here at 1 o'clock, East Coast time. And then let's see. At about 2 o'clock, we're going to talk to Macy Barber.

She's got a call out that she wants to get public. So we'll see what she has to say. Plus, as always, you're going to be my guest. Not one. Two ways. We have taken your tweets using the hashtag the MMA hour. Keep sending them, Gibronies. And also your calls.

844-866-24-68. We'll get to that around the 130 mark for the sound-off. So a round of tweets, sound-off, three guests. And, of course, the thing we're about to get here in just a second. I hope everyone had a great weekend. I know there were some challenges with the ESPN Plus, part of the broadcast for pay-per-view. So we'll talk a little bit about that, I'm sure, today as well.

But what an epic, epic Maine and co-mate event. What a phenomenal night of fights overall. All right. We got Autisani on Skype. We're going to set up the camera here and make sure everything's good because I ask a lot from the production crew here.

Man, what a fight. One of the best fights really in UFC title history. Frankly, one of the best middleweight fights I think I've seen in a long time. And one of these fights where I just don't know how

when it's over, you can have a lesser opinion of either guy. I see some people, look, I can imagine other middleweight divisional rivals wanting to do that, but I don't know how

un, not unbiased, but on, people who don't have skin in the game, I just don't know how you can come to that conclusion. It's just too much. All right, let's go to him now. He's your interim UFC middleweight champion of the world and he joins us now here on the MMA hour. Israel ought to sign. You look at him. The champ is here. Hi, champ. So, man. You look, you know what? You look good, man. How do you feel? Jesus Christ. I don't know. Well, first it was a dragonfly, but now it's some kind of other bug. in the room. The bugs love you.

It's really funny. Yeah, I know, right? Yeah, I feel like a champ, man. Like I said, since day once I go into this game, I mean, Luke, come on. I know you were a believer. You saw what I could do. You were watching from an unbiased view, watching the skills. Fuck all the talk. Fuck all the hype.

And fuck all the, you know, oh, they're pushing them too fast and this and that. They want him to be chapped. Skills pays the bills. And it's real Israel. So, yeah. I mean, let them hate, Luke, let them hate. They're just, you know, salt bail out. I'm just going to put the salt on their wounds because they're like, oh, but we're going to fight you.

And so, dude, some of them would say they gave him two, three, and four. I don't know who the fuck gave him the third round. How in the world do you give him the third round? Luke, tell them how I don't understand. I'm, they're hopeless. Like you said, they're hopeless. So let him hate because guess what? If you ain't got haters, you ain't doing it right.

You know what I've noticed, Israel? It's like, I can think of no better, someone told me this, like, there's no. no amount of success you can have in this world without drawing a degree of negativity. You're a living proof of that. 100%. Facts. Before me, there was Jesus, but I'm not saying I'm not saying I'm even close. I'm just saying no matter who you are, you're going to have haters.

So I just welcome it now. And they're going to come from all angles and they're going to attack me with their selective outrage on certain things. So, yeah, I don't even care now. I'm just like, I've never cared really, but it really, like, after a while, I still get surprised that like, are you like, were you born as an abortion or something? I don't understand, you know? All right, so let's talk about some of the things in the fight itself.

Have you gone back and watched it? And if so, what did you take from it? I watched it twice now. I've watched it twice. And, man, fucking cajones. I got them cajones, man, honestly. Both of us do. But you look, the camera was on me right before the fifth round.

And I said right, I looked at him. And I was like, I'm prepared to die. And then it cut to him, so I can't, I think I said after the I, Bia, like, heart of a line. Like, I was ready to, I was willing to go out on my shield at that point. And I took him out on the shield. Like, I dropped him, I think. The whole fight, excuse me, the whole fight, I rocked him six times or seven times. Two of them was subtle.

And then he shot for the takedown right after, you know, because he's, he's game. But he rocked me twice. You know, never put me on my ass, you know, the first time the cage. I had my wits about me in the cage saved me. I got a good balance, but yeah, twice and I rocked them seven times, six times. Fuck, what a fight, what a night. And what a guy, honestly, what a guy,

what a dance partner he is. Like, that's the shit that legends are made off, you know? Fights like that. That's some movie type shit. That's some rocky type shit. And in the end, I wish I'd used my right hand rather than the left elbow at the last 10 seconds because he was right there,

lined up for it, but yeah, fuck. Wow. Wow. That's it. All right. Let's talk about Kelvin Gaston. I have to tell you, I had great respect for him before. Anybody who puts himself in a title position, you have to take seriously.

And even though you were the better man that night, and certainly there can be no doubt about that. I have to tell you, I was amazed at his boxing. Putting the punches together, his slipping was extraordinary. Yeah. Were you, like halfway through that fight being like, he's a little tougher than I thought he was? not i already knew he was tough but he was a little harder to hit than i thought he was um early on but then later on i found my rhythm with the right hand the kicks fuck i had some shit for him with the kicks but he he wouldn't let me get them off you know and at one point this this is his fault

but also my stupidity i let him sudden to hit me with the jab my distance i know dog viny one of my trainers he's going to be he was just like distance cunt fucking that's what he always says to me anyway from the day one. But I should have known my distance for that jab, and he had it from the hip. He was firing it. The left hand, I took care of pretty well, but the jab, he was able to land.

So that's why this set of my face is a little bit puffy. I look like a dumpling right now. Yeah, you look all right, though. By the way, is anything, nothing's broken, right? Just a little swollen. Nope, just swore. I'm just swollen. I'm just swore.

I mean, everything's swollen right now. The checks, too. Yeah, I can, Dave, you know what? let me put that. I know you're not going to reveal what you got. Dude, I'm just going to say this. And I, if you're not getting paid, if you're not getting paid ditty money for a fight like that, something is wrong with the war. Oh, all right.

This fight really cemented my status as, okay, like even Dana said, you know, Israel's a big start after this fight. They're going to keep talking about this fight. So we'll sit down before the Robert Whitaker fight. I know I get paid for viewpoints because we don't really have ESPN plus. Oceania, so definitely getting paper viewpoints for that next fight. And we're going to sit down and renew

the contract to review it and see what's fair is fair. I mean, they, two fight of the nights. I mean, they've never done that. Shout to Max Holloway and Dustin Porriette. What a fucking fight. I had to go back and watch that as well. Crazy shit. But, yeah, I mean, trust me. We're working. We're working behind the scenes. And the UFC, they love me, and

I respect them too. All right, let's talk about that fifth round. Got to tell you, man, that was one of these moments where as an observer, you're like, it's gut check time for one of these guys. And then to come out of that round and put your stamp on it, I have to tell you, Israel, here's one thing I've noticed. There are, of course, still some skeptics for whatever reason. However, you converted a lot. You converted a lot of skeptics with that fifth round. You went out there and just took that fight by the scruff of the neck.

What was your mindset heading into that? Did you know you had to go and just put on an epic performance in that fifth round to win? I don't do points. I don't do rounds. I know I want to touch them and rack up the points. I understand that. But I don't do like, I'm down this round.

I don't think about that while I'm in the fight. You see a lot of guys ask, you know, did I lose that round? And usually never told me, or you lost that round, or he just told me, this is what we need to do. This is what we need to do.

Do this. He never like, you know, you need to do this. You need to do that. You never like, let me know you're losing this fight or anything, because we're never losing. And I watched the fight now objectively,

even if it wasn't me, objectively, I had round two. and round three. And he had around one and round four. So round five, it was down to it. But for me, when I was in round five, all I knew was like, fuck, I got rocked.

All right. And I just remember, like, Eugene said to us, we've got to go to that place. We've got to go to that place. You know, when you're on the air dine, you know, when you're on the air dine, you know, stay focused. You have to think, even what,

because a lot of times you want to coast when you're on the airdine, well, you have to stay focused and know that because you can see your heart rate is one of the heart rate monitor. You can see it going up. So he said you've got to go to that place. And then Brad Riddell, shout out to Brad.

He won this weekend as well. He said, he always says to me when we're there, like, go numb. Embrace the darkness, you know. And a lot of these guys, they just adopted the darkness. I was born in the darkness. So for real, man, I kept on saying that like embrace the darkness. Embrace the darkness. And I kept on saying, I have vehicle.

I had vehicle. And that fifth round came, he came at me. But then I started to catch him. I started to pop him. Guess who got pops in his shots now, man? I always had pop my shots, but yeah, I started to tap him. And then there's one point I rocked him, and I was just like, come on. And I walked him down and then he might have shot or something.

But I was, I wasn't taking the back step. I went at him. And, bro, he's tough. He's tough to finish. Fuck, I dropped him like four times in that last round. I think no one's ever done this to me ever, but no one's ever done that to him either. Where does this rank on your combat sports accomplishments? This has got to be the top of the food chain, man.

Definitely. I mean, I said Anderson was one of the, probably the hardest fight that I've had, not just like the chest match we have, but for me, the mental barrier I had to overcome before the fight to fight to fight. But this fight, the mental barrier I had to overcome during the fight and the physical, you know, barrier as well. So, yeah, this was the hardest fight of my life. I mean, and, dude, me and him, we shared something in there. And for me, I'm grateful that I still have my wits about me. I'm still lucid. Um, yeah, props to him, man. He's a great dance partner, and I'm pretty sure I'll defend my belt against him another time. It's almost the perfect culmination, Israel, of the last 14 months and this ride you've been on. Now that you're almost certainly going to get a break now, which is long overdue. Uh, you've put off a thousand vacations at this point. But can you talk about the last 14 months?

I'll be honest. Skepticism, I don't know. I guess it's the right word. It's not that I didn't believe in your abilities. You know I do. But there was like one fight. after the other where you were like, I'm going to take a break and then you wouldn't. And I've seen a lot of fighters trip up along the way.

Somehow you maintain focus. I'm wondering how you did it. For me, it's my team and my friends and family that people I keep around me, you know, you have to have the right people in your life who want the best for you. And people in my position, you know, you get a lot of leeches who don't want the best for you necessarily and they'll be looking for ways to, you know, to plot your downfall. So, yeah, I find times in me. between training to have fun and still live.

You know, I still hang out with my friends. I might go to a bar once in a while, you know, go to the movies, go do something crazy like an illusion or whatever. But I put, when it's time to work, I work hard and I work smart. So yeah, but my foot's been on the pedal. I've taken my break, my foot off it a little bit

over the last 14 months, but now it's just time to just fucking pull the hand break and just train because when you're training the way i've been training you're training i've been upskilling during in between the fights but you know you also have that pressure of a fight coming up so i'm doing the VO2 max the a lactic capacity a lack the power lactic capacity all that kind of stuff but now we're just going to take all that away and you just train for purely skill and i'm just going to have fun getting better man because it's some shit i did in that fight that i was like man you guys I didn't even know. You know I can throw up the triangles like a fucking gangster.

You know, I can fucking snatch necks like a fucking guillotine. You know what I mean? Fuck. I got some more tricks up my sleep. You guys haven't even seen my takedowns yet. You haven't even seen my, my, so little my guard game, a little bit. But I got some more tricks up my sleep, man. I'm a magician. How do you feel after the last 14 months? I mean, how different is your life at home now? You haven't been home yet. Obviously, you're still here in the in the States. But the last 14 months, is there any way to describe what it's been like? For me, I've said this.

I keep that same energy. And for me, I forget who I am all the time. I forget I'm on TV because people would just run up on me. And I'm like, what the fuck do I know? And I'm always right. Yeah, I'm famous. Hey, what's up, man? How are you?

And I'll take a picture or whatever. But I, because I still see me as just me. I walk around bare feet, you know, during the summer just because I look homeless. And people sometimes, they don't even approach. me because it did like now just another black guy but looks like him though you know because and it kind of hides me in plain sight so I'm still me but everyone around me or the people around me change so that's why the people that I keep in my circle I keep the ones that stay real and stay true and still treat me as me I don't like people coming up to me who I've known for years and they're

trying to act like groupies I'm like what is this and I check them and I don't like that I just like just you know still treat me as me because I'm still me I have that I'm the same guy I just just evolved and nothing changed with the change. I saw a little bit of it. I didn't get a chance to hear the sound because I had my phone with me and I was with family. I saw you got a bit of an impromptu Haka dance in the back after your win. Yeah. That was from John Hollis.

He's a guy from one of the team. He's like part of our team and also a junior fight. He's a heavyweight boxer who's helping Deonti Wilder right now train for his next fight. So he's out there in Alabama. So he just came down to support. And on the way back to the hotel, there was a lot of fans outside and those two. And my brother, David, as well, he was on the side. I think he kind of forgot the moves from high school, but he was on the side, just doing it as well, catching the energy.

But, yeah, for me, that was cool. And I was just already in tears anywhere. And that was just special because he was there. My teammate, BJ Bland, who was one of my main training partners for this camp, I brought him out here so he can see that we run the shit. So he was there as well. I gave him a hug. I gave my boy, Eden, my flat. made my little brother. He's a fighter as well and I gave him a hug. I was already emotional.

My cousins were there. They came out from LA to support me. And yeah, I was, fuck, I was blown away. Is that the first time your teammates have celebrated you in that kind of way? Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, all you need is to even one, that's all you need. You can feel the love and feel the vibe. And those who don't get, shut your fucking mouth if we don't understand the culture. Because I saw a lot of people from the retwets like on New Zealand. stalked there. It's all cringe. I'm like, what a fuck do you think you are? And you expect people to respect your culture, but you can't respect anyone

else's culture. So for me, I really appreciated that. Like, that was, that hit the soul for me. And correct me if I'm wrong, I believe they were there in the cage with you in their Sunday best. Were mom and dad there as well? Definitely. Mom, dad, my whole immediate family was here.

Yeah, it was just I think they weren't in the cage with me. There were, my teammates were kind of like just still in the seats and stuff, but it was just, yeah, I felt the love, put it that way. I felt the love from all areas. I know that sounds like a corny question, but do you feel like that kind of family presence lifted you in a way?

For me, yes. For me personally, yes, but I don't think about it before the fight. I look like, I look forward to it after the fight where I'm like, I can't wait until I see my mom in the cage and I already knew I was going to cry. I already knew I was going to be in tears. I knew I was going to present Eugene the belt. And for me, I just, yeah, having them there really helps. Then I have to be, you know.

But even now, I saw before Melbourne, babe, like my brother was working like crazy fucking hours to save up from Melbourne. So now I just said, nah, fuck all that. All my family members, immediate family members, people I love, I'll fly them out to my flights. So I just fly them out. I put them up in the hotel, the same as the fighters. And, yeah, because it's good to have them here supporting me. And it's good for them to see the world with me.

You know, this game has blessed me a lot where I got to tour the world as a fighter for free. You know, I just do, I pretty much just do vacations. I just walk ass along the way. Like, I'm about to come to New York now later on tonight. So, yeah, it's, I mean, it's lit. It's very lit. So I'd like the people I love to enjoy and soak and enjoy the fruits with me. You know what?

Let's talk about Eugene for a moment. For folks who may not know, your coach is Eugene Bairman. I've known Eugene a little bit. He gives me interviews, but he's very reluctant because he knows I ask a lot of technique questions, and he hates that, which I can appreciate from him. But explain who he is to the folks who may not know. He doesn't, from the outside looking in from my very limited conversations, he seems at once a technical guru and also sort of like what, like the father of the gym.

What is he? Yeah, Eugene Berman, he and Doug Viny founded City Kickboxing, I think, in 2009. maybe or 2008. And I came near in 2010. Eugene is pretty much the guy that took me under his wing and just saw like, okay, you're wild, you're crazy, but you have a lot of stuff we can work with. He never tried to make me fight like him

or fight a certain way. Also, he implores people like Twister, who's the big guy in my corner, who's one of his old teammates. He implores him. for his wisdom with the hands, with the boxing. And he gets people like Andre, who is my wrestling coach. So he gets people that are smarter than him to build us as a fighter,

not just me and my teammates as well. And he himself, he's a very, he's like the head coach, because he's very good all around with all the areas. And yeah, like you said, he's like the father of the gym. He's like the leader of the gym. And for me, that moment, every time I watch the fight, I watch it twice now, but every time I watch that fight, I'm pretty sure when I see that moment,

I'll always tear up because that. moment for me was just that was beautiful like i couldn't i couldn't wait to do that for him because i'm not always the best student put it that way you know i'm very stubborn i listen i get told off a lot um you know and but i think i've i've matured over the years ever since maybe the last a year and a half i've matured and i've been i've been a better student that i was previously you know um i still i'm always late so Sometimes. Not always just because traffic, you know, sometimes something's out of your control. Well, for me, just everything he's done for me, everything is done for me and for believing in me and for investing in me for all these years.

You know, he used to fly around the world with me and lose money because he's not taking clients. And it's like he just knew, we can do this. And I always told him like, you know, we can do this, right? And he said, yeah, fuck, I'm not going to kiss your ass, but, you know, and I knew. So for me to do that for him, it was just an honor and a privilege. and I was forever grateful. Let's talk about some of the other aspects of this whole experience for you, not least of which is there were some skeptics coming out of the woodwork.

Let's talk about first about Paulo Costa. He seemed entirely unimpressed on Instagram. Not a whole lot. I think, let me pull it up here. Paul O'Costa has decided to laugh, apparently. His words are, I guess this is translated, so understand that it might be a bit lost here. Quote, really, this is the interim fake champ. No doubt this weight division has already been better than this.

Fake chap. Does he have a belt? He wishes he was the fake champ as well. Are you serious? Carry on. Not a whole lot much more than that. Other than he says, enjoy this while you can.

I really hope that you take the real belt one day to meet me. Note, I'm not Gastilum. That's it. First of all, didn't he get popped for something recently for some assayi in a stomach or something? Stomach, he's not suspended by Yusat as far as we know. Okay, well, not yet. I just want to get him before you decided gets him. And eventually, if he climbs up the ranks like he thinks he will, eventually we'll see each other.

So he can find out, Gaslam's a tough guy. He got touched up by you. You see his face after Urii fight? He got touched up. And these guys, they all, I mean, like you said, the ones that have a stake in this, they can be skeptics because they don't want to be impressed. But, hey, even Chris Wyman gave prop. He was the one being like, oh, I think Gaslam threw up before.

the fight. And I watched that, I saw that after the fight. I never looked at the predictions before the fight. But then he still gave props where it's dude. The guy like that's just salty. He's just salty because I'm the one getting the shine. So they're trying to steal my sign. And I'm like, fuck no. Excuse me. And then I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this because this was a bit of a dust up. John Jones does not appear to be your best friend. He took to Twitter.

Did you see all of those? Yeah. So, I mean, he's a cunt. First of all, you know, my, there's two variables I never expected in this game and that was to fight silver and then now to fight John Jones. So I have to adapt to that.

And for me, I like a challenge. So he's a con and I say that because he's picking the time when I'm supposed to get the most trying to come at me because he's irrelevant. No one really cares about him. I'm everything he wished he was. I'm everything he wished he would have been

when he was beat, you know, oh, I want to thank God for, you know, Meanwhile, he's in the bathroom at whatever time. And then fucking hiding another a cage. And you can laugh, Luke. It's all right. I try to keep it. I try to keep a professional. Yeah.

But I'm hiding on there a cage. I avoid you side of. I know some things. The streets are talking. And everyone knows, you know, what's up behind the scenes. So I'm everything he wished he was. People don't have to like me, but it's hard not to like me. I mean, fuck, I just put on one of the best fights you've ever seen.

and I'm a nice guy, you know. But yeah, and I'm actually a nice guy. I'm sure to his team and his people, he's actually nice, but yeah, I don't know. The guy, put it this way. If you have said it before, if you had to beat me, you got to do it yesterday. Because Luke, you know this every single fight. I'm getting better. I'm getting better.

And there's only one reason to call me out because I know he's a man of challenges. He likes challenges. I'm no easy fight. but he knows if you want to get me right now will be the time while I'm still only a year and some change in this game imagine what I'm going to be like in two years imagine at the rate that I'm fighting

I'm going to take a break now you don't understand but imagine how I'm going to be in two years imagine eventually when I go up so he's trying to get this fight early so he has a better chance for being me but hey I'm player one and I have the controller so that fight will happen but what happened on my term if he wants to come down at 185 I mean hey

you know, fucking kill yourself and come down, but I wouldn't advise it. Eventually, either at a catcher it or something, I'll go up, but I like the sound of two belts. I like the sound of two belts, but he knows I'm getting better each fight, every single fight. I mean, look at his fight with Anthony Smith.

I expected him to finish Anthony Smith, so I wasn't really all impressed with Anthony split. I had a hard of a line as well, pretty tough guy. And, yeah, he thinks just because I had a hard time with Gastilum, that means that he'll finish. me or he'll have an easier time with me. All right.

We'll see. The only question about that would be is that you weighed in at, you weighed in at 183. He can go up to heavyweight. He's a big guy. I've interacted with him in person. He's a big guy. Can you really make 205 in a way that's competitive?

I've been in heavyweights before and I didn't have to wear heavyweight. I just like a challenge. I like, I like a test. These are the things that you see. these are the things that put you past that status of legendary and makes you immortal and that's what I want to do in this game

I want to be immortal forever and they can be like yo he's the greatest here and I kept on saying like when I beat all these middleweights look jacqueradee Yel Wyatman I think cannoneer as well these are guys that are still in line so chill motherfucker Jones let me get through the middle weights first

let me at least defend my belt a couple times a few times and cement myself I don't want to fucking go on a 16-fight or 12 title defense wrong. I don't need that. I just want to get through all the top middleweights at least once, and then I'll move up. But he's trying to jump the gun and just get me. He knows I'm a challenge. Even right now, if we fought, honestly, he'll have a better chance of beating me right now than a year or two years from now.

And he knows that. He's a smart man. His coach is a smart. So I don't know if it's all in him or it's his peers or whatever trying to push him. Like get him now, get him now. you know, while they're still kind of green. And yeah, hey, I've been bullied my whole life, man, even in high school. And now, look, I didn't peak in high school.

I've not even peaked yet. So when I peek, he's going to get this. Let's end on a positive note here. I'm wondering in your mind what you think it's going to be like when you get over to Nigeria with the belt and see family. Like, oh, you turned on me there a little bit. What happened? Hold up. My bad.

My bad. Someone's calling me. I think it's aerial people. Two seconds. I'll be done with you in just a second. I promise. All right. They keep calling me.

Hold up. Two seconds. Carry on. They keep calling me. Hold up. Real quick. Nigeria with the belt. What do you think is going to be like?

Oh, we're going. Beautiful. Like, there's a scene in the, oh, fucking hell. Can you see me? Yeah, I can see you. You're good. All right, cool. So there's a scene in Ali where Wolf Smith is running through Africa.

And all these kids are running after him. And that song, Sili Fiatta, Tomorrow is playing. It feels like that. That's how I feel when I think about that moment. And I honestly, man, I get chills thinking about it.

I get goosebumps thinking about it because it's time to take some gold back to Africa. All right, man. Well, look, I know you're busy. I'll let you run. Really appreciate your time. Israel is the culmination of a lot of work. Enjoy your time off and congratulations.

You're the new interim middleweight champ. Thank you so much. There he is. There he is. One of the best. Really appreciate. his time. All right. I need my coffee. I left it over there. Should I just get up and get it? Or we got to get Joe to get it. I don't know what the show producers think. I'm good to get it. All right. Let me just

go. Oi, oh, oh, oh, oh. All right, there we go. Got to get that hipster coffee with the stevia in it. Mmm. Delicioso. All right, what a performance from him. And as I mentioned before, man, look, I understand rivals, potential opponents, keeping a degree of skepticism about all of this. Yeah? However, if you're not a rival and you're not somebody who has skin in the game in that particular way, watching what he's doing and then being like, ah, there's holes in his game. Well, yeah, he's not the perfect fighter. I don't think he would even tell you that. But the steady development and the different ways in which he can attack, I think give him a lot of opportunity for growth.

All right, let's go to somebody else who's experiencing growth, moving up at a weight division, has a fight. Got a lot of people saying his name. So I said, you know, we got to get this guy on. There he is. Mr. Florida, California himself, Luke Rockhold. How you doing, sir? I'm doing well. How is, are you in sunny Florida? And warm. I asked. Can you hear me?

I'll be stuck here to the fight, so I'm just, yeah, you got me? Yeah, now I do. Yep. Yep, stuck here doing work. Just getting ready. All right, man. Let's get to it. Did you watch that press conference on, what was it, Friday? You were quite the, quite the name. What I hear, what I hear. I didn't watch the press conference.

I was doing some things, tending to the body, and I got a text message from TMZ, sent me the clip, and it's pretty funny. I didn't really realize I was still in his head that bad. So I don't know. Maybe the guy is just, you know, he's, like I said before, he's scared of the truth. I don't know, I don't know what I did to exactly provoke all that,

but I just talked talked the truth too much. What can I say? All right. Let me sort of clear things up here. When you were mentioning him, you were mentioning him like in a rivalry sense, right? Like,

in other words, what I'm asking is you don't have anything personal against him? No, it's just me coming into the division. Getting, you know, I wanted a fight. He seemed like a logical opponent.

And, you know, and then they shot him up and John picked him off as an easy fight. So he basically made the UFC take it. And I just, you know, I just didn't think much of the matchup. And obviously, I don't think the rest of the world thought much of the matchup once it happened.

All right. So why do you think he got so angry about it? I mean, I guess I understand, you know, you were, fair to say you were insulting? I can't. Maybe it's a little bit. Me? I'm not one to insult too much, am I? You and Bispeak have been pretty insulting.

Yeah, I got a problem to tell him the truth. So I don't think much of him. I don't think he's a credible character in the division, really. All right. He's about to get shut down. He's about to get beat up bad, he's going to get beat up bad, back to back and be putting his place, just like I said. You think Gustafsson's going to beat him?

Pretty easily, sure. Tell me why. Because honestly, here's the thing, didn't Anthony defy expectations in the John Jones fight in a number of capacities shutting down the takedowns? You know, went a little long, obviously. Took some damage, but not a metric ton of it. I guess so. I think it was a weird fight for John. I don't know.

Maybe he's down to his last picagram. It just doesn't have it like he used to. I don't know. So, I mean, I think he, I think he, I don't know, John didn't really fight a fight. So it's hard to say it was pretty much It was very awkward fight I couldn't even pay attention I was up

We had a box And I literally Didn't pay attention at all It was so boring I tried Do you do you Did the UFC ever try to make a fight With you and Anthony Smith

They didn't No we had some There was a little juggling Trying to figure out Who was you know Who's gonna go to Stockholm And Anthony Basically

You know Took the fight now you've got this fight with yon blohovic coming up i'm going to make this question totally unfair so i'm going to put that up in front of you as a wait as a disclaimer uh if you win this fight against yon if and win right are you opposed in all forms to fighting anthony doesn't make a lot of sense after he gets asked beat by gustavs and so um i'm going to focus on what's ahead and what's in the moment i'm going to go handle business and uh i'm going to look ahead I never really look behind.

But I guess what I'm asking is, assuming you guys are ranked in similar positions and he gets past Gustafsson, you're not opposed to any contender is what I'm talking about. If he gets past Gustafson, if he defies expectations, that's a fight I will definitely entertain. Well, I got to tell you, Luke,

my namesake here, you're coming into this division, red hot, man. Got a lot of people saying your name, got a lot of people pissed off. You got to be kind of happy about that, right? I'm happy about not cutting weight. I'm happy about eating.

I'm happy about, you know, how it feels. I've never felt like this before, and, you know, and it feels good. I'm out there. I'm going to handle business, man. It's a different time. You said never before, but. Well, Jose, you said never before, but there were times when you made 185, let's say, way back in the early Strike Force days.

You could do that with, you know, I'm not saying ease, but relative ease. Did you ever feel that good as you do now? I mean, I felt better then, of course, making the weight, but it just got harder and harder and depleted myself more and more as the years went on. And, man, I just wasn't recovering. I didn't have the strength. You can kind of see it as I go along. It's just a lack of, you know, not recovering and getting back to the full strength.

I'd say, like, even in training camp, I'd get down to a certain weight last few years. And it was just, I feel weak and depleted. You know, when I had a little extra girth, you know, I was doing a lot better. I had to handle just about anybody at any weight. And so now actually lifting and eating right and not depriving myself. It's a different, different world. I'm excited to get in there and show the world. How many more calories per day are you eating?

I've never been one to count calories. I just eat, and it feels right. That's it? I eat a whole lot. I eat healthy, man. I know my diet and I know my body and I just listen. How what it wants him, you know, you took care of that. And I don't count, well, I never want to count.

There's no sanity in counting. So wait a second, though. You are not counting your calories even when you were at middleweight? No. I don't count. I just judge portions and do what I do. Wow. I have to tell you, I'm very surprised by that.

I don't know what to say. All right, fair enough. I know what I'm putting in my body. I know my nutrition. And it's easy to operate and understand what, you know, what works and what doesn't work, puts you up, puts you up, keeps you under. How much more are you in the weight room? And I'm very curious, what kind of weight training regimen are you doing?

Like, Olympic lifts or bodybuilding style workouts? Like, what are you doing? doing a different type of weight lifting I've never really done there's so much corrective work and I'm with Mike Barwis and Barwis methods

and the same thing obviously you've seen what Robbie's doing how Robbie's been looking lately Robbie's the most crazy diligent worker in the gym I've never seen anything like it the guy's in there five days a week lifting two to three hours a day

so I do Monday, Wednesday, and we go at it man just And if you want to look into it, look into Barwest methods, man. It's a different, different atmosphere and different type of training. There's so much corrective work and detail and warm-ups and everything. It's different. How did you get, you going to see it?

How did you get hooked up with him? Greg Jones, my wrestling coach. You know, he coached, Mike coached him through three national championships at West Virginia. And then he got, he became the head strength coach for Michigan. So many others. So he came down here and opened up a big facility and, you know, just really happened to collide and everything's working out well at the right time. So this is the guy that trained in Damocon, Sue?

So, yeah, I think Balacan and so many, so many people, it's a pretty fucking cool environment. I'm not going to know. You have people, he's, he re-engineers the neurological side of people like people with car accidents and people have just lost mobility with their body or, you know, born with it without. He teaches them how to use their limbs in their body and get everything working again. And then you have the highest level of professional athletes. So we're all in the gym together and kind of feeding off each other. It's one of the coolest environments I've really been in.

And it's inspiring and motivating these. We feed off each other. You know, these guys are just trying to walk. And we're doing our thing on a completely different level. So it's a badass place to be. All right, let's assume you get the win, right? Winning maybe not necessarily so much in doubt. How about this, though?

Do you feel like coming off of the last portion of your middleweight campaign that you have a message you have to send? That there's more than just winning and losing here. There's a method to that winning. There's a level to that winning that has to be established. I'm not going to think about it. I'm going to go out there and do it. Obviously, I'm not happy with how I've been about my career lately.

and I need to, I need to, I've rethought things, and I'm coming, and this is, this is the recipe, this is the answer, light heavyweight and not compromising myself. And, you know, when I let it go, I let it go. And I'm, I've never met a man in the gym that can outdo me. So I'm just going to, you know, go out there and let this thing happen, the light heavyweight, and you guys are going to see, it's going to be fun. How much different is it in terms of either worrying about or suffering from injury at 205 versus 185?

When I say injury, obviously I'm not talking debilitating ones, but sort of nagging ones. I guess what I'm asking is how much of your experience training now is injury versus previously at 185? How much is injury coming to play now that I'm bigger now? Yeah, I guess even nagging stuff like this small, you know, twists of the ankle, soreness of the knees, anything. How much is it different at 205? It's a hell of a lot better. I'll tell you that. Obviously the extra muscle, can I keep something in time?

And a lot of those injuries happen at the end of training camp when I'm depleting myself and getting down to weight. And your body fat gets low. It's your body becomes brittle. So far less injury prone. And I'm looking forward to getting fucking slinging, slinging more of weight and some muscle. Let's talk about your opponent at Jan Blahovic, UFC 239 is when this is going to happen. Size him up for me. When you evaluate him as an opponent, what do you see?

He's well-rounded. He's a tough guy. You know, he can, he's got. He's got a black belt. He's got decent wrestling when he wants. And he's got effective striking him. I mean, he was out striking Gustafson in their fight. So you got to expect a well-rounded guy, durable.

He's been in there. So have I. So I know where he is, the big guy. I want to be faster than him. I'm going to beat him just about everywhere this fight goes. You know, I'm going to go back to an old style that I implement. And that's just coming forward. You know, now that I have my strength back, there's going to be a lot of forward movement.

Let me ask you about that old style, because it was come forward before, but you have to admit, your game is more polished now than it used to be. So when you say come forward, what do you mean exactly? I was just, I'm out there seeking, seeking to kill. Now, that was always my mentality before. And, you know, I think I just, I danced around and played too much, you know, I think the later years, latter years. So I'm going out there for the kill. And that's all I'm thinking right now.

I'm going forward and I'm executing and I'm killing motherfuckers. And anybody's in front of me. That's the game playing. Let me ask you this. John Jones versus Tiago Santos is on that UFC 239 card. How do you think that one goes? John usually finds a way he adjusts and he plays a very safe game and he'll find an opening. You know, Tiago Santos is not very good on the ground.

He's not very good wrestler. he can slaying on the feet, but John usually gets in and gets through those and exposes, you know, the situation. So we'll see. We'll see. So would you rather fight John first,

or would you want D.C. to fight John and heavyweight first? Of course, I'd rather fight John. I think, I think. If John wants to go to heavyweight, he can run up to heavyweight, but, um, lost you there for a big.

You say that again? I think D.C.'s pretty set on fighting. I said the only reason I'm here is to fight John. So, of course, that's what I want. I want John, first and foremost. Okay, so how, do you possess what you, let me ask you this. You must believe that you have what it takes to beat John. What is it that everyone else has gotten wrong that you could get right?

Just about everything. John, I don't believe there's a man in the world that can compete with me on the ground. I don't believe John is that. on the feet. I think he adjust. I think he's tactical. I think I have the skills to beat him there. I have the skills to beat him on the ground. And I think the wrestling is pretty much nullified. I don't really think it plays a bunch of a factor. All right. How many fights do you think you have to get before you're worthy of a title shot at 205, which is a bit of a weird division right now?

I don't think it's much. It takes a good performance. One? It's all about the performance of what you do and how you do. do it. So let's just wait and see and, uh, come check me out July 6th. I'm, I'm going to go put this man away. Let me ask you this. Then we can talk. Then we can talk about what's up. All right, fair enough. Uh, Luke, how often do you get recognized for the polo ads? I don't know. I don't know these days, whether it's polo or fighting. No one ever comes up to you. He's like, oh, you're the dude from the polo ad. It's more about the, uh, probably millionaire

matchmaker dating. you're still living down that infamy but hey damn bravo keeps posting me up there just butching me up so no it's uh you know I've never been shy to partaking a few ventures stuff

whatever it works you know I'm getting paid I'm making money can't say that for the rest of these guys it is very true well look we wanted to check in enjoy sunny Florida that looks like you got some boats behind you?

You got to go boating later? Not today. Not today. We're going to rest up. Rest up and do the training and handle business. All right. Well, handle business. Get some rest.

We're looking forward to your fight in July and appreciate your time. Cheers. There he goes. Luke Rockhold. Man, people have it out for John Jones today. Jesus. I wouldn't even try to go there. All right.

Let's do it now. Let's get to some tweet. Shall we? Y'all ready in the back? Let's do a round of tweets. All right. When the clock go, no, this side. When the five minute goes up, let's see.

We're waiting here. As I awkwardly point, yeah, when that starts and then the tweets go, there it is. Here we go. I am so excited for Monday's show. Can't wait. Thank you for being the only reason why Mondays don't suck. Thank you, Luke, and Jason Gara TV, and the rest of your hardworking crew. I can't wait to hear your analysis.

Well, here it goes. Next. What do you think happens with Holloway's stock after this incredible fight, incredible fight showcasing an amazing chin and heart, but still coming up short, is it going up, down, and staying the same? I would say it stays the same. It doesn't drop a whole lot for me. It dropped relative to expectations, because I think some folks thought, even I thought he would give Dustin a lot more problems. And to be sure, the volume did give Dustin problems at time, at times, Dustin said as much in the third and fourth round. But what really sort of occurred

to me was for your first jump up from one weight class to the other, even though it's 10 pounds apart. We're so used to seeing people jump up a weight class and it's no thing. Like, they're just smoking champions. But the reality is, man, there can be a big jump between Bantam and Feather and Feather and Light. In boxing, you see this all the time. Guys will jump seven pounds and there will be like, how does their punching power compare? It's tough. It's tough. To me, he needs to strategically and then gradually kind of add difficult opposition. Because I think he has to work on, not punching power, but like what Luke Rockhold is doing, overall strength development.

That takes time. You can't do that overnight. Next. True or false, Dustin Poirier was the worst matchup for Holloway's debut at 155. Worst matchup? No. I could think of potentially a worse matchup.

Maybe if Habib got all the takedowns he wanted and just wore him out and the rounds weren't even close. That would be worse. But fair to say that Justin Poirier is a real tough matchup for anybody who wants to get some. Yeah, dude, Dustin Poirier is a nightmare. We've been talking about, um, And we're not having talked much about Max and Dustin so far in the show today.

But suffice to say, man, Dustin Poirier showed up. Wow. Really worked on his boxing. And again, not using all the same trickery necessarily that, uh, some guys like Holloway use using a little bit more conventional stuff, but just having real precise, sharpened, skilled fundamentals and obviously big power. Put the two together. It's a tough competition, man.

Next. Is Tiger the greatest athlete? if our generation. Well, I know who the greatest speller of our generation isn't. But yeah, if you guys didn't see the masters yesterday, 11 years apart from one either major to the next or one master's to the next. But I was in high school when Tiger Woods,

Tiger Woods won his first masters. And then to go through all the porno scandal, seven surgeries, I think four knee, three back, or either three knee four back, to have the opioid addiction to his wife trying to hit him with a car, car to being the DUI and then to come all the way back and win in the way he did. Extremely impressive.

Next. After watching Joe Ban's fight, do you think Octagon Control should hold more weight when choosing a winner? Dwight appeared to be on his back foot and unwilling to engage for most of the fight. Should the U.S. he'd be rewarding that fighting style. The problem was you have it backwards. Joe Ban lost the fight because he didn't have Octagon control. He was chasing.

Go back and look at my tweets. I was talking about it in real time during the broadcast. If someone is in front of you, you have to kind of corral them. Not always, you saw Anthony Pettus follow, but he followed on purpose rather than cage cut. But the majority of the time you want a cage cut. When you don't do that and you can't corral them, problems emerge.

Dwight was backing up because he refused to be trapped. So it's a wash. No one had octagon control there at all. So then it comes down, well, it starts at damage and then goes to things like Octagon Control. But no, I think it's properly weighted, but Joban didn't have it. That's exactly the problem. Next. How the hell do people with poor internet connections buy the pay-per-view now?

If you have to go through the internet, didn't they reduce the buys immensely? I used to live in a rural area. It was impossible to watch anything on the internet. But I could use dish and watch paper views. I guess you have to go to a local watering hole, if possible. but the answer is, I think the UFC made a calculation. We probably can cluster around large or medium-sized metropolitan areas and get enough buys that way.

We don't really need to worry about it. Think about it. It sounds kind of awful, but how many buys are you losing by not catering to people who don't have good internet in potentially rural areas? I suspect as a portion of your pay-per-view buying audience, not many. And so you end up there. I lost track of time.

Appreciate all the tweets. I wish we had more time for him. But we don't. Let's do this now. Let's go to my friend in the back. He is, what? What is he? He is many things to me.

I don't know if he saw this, but I was watching Jeopardy. I think I was on Friday. Danny Seagregey. Did you see Jeopardy on Friday with Alex Trebek? I don't have cable, man. You don't have cable? No. Well, they had Columbia, they had Columbia as a category.

Yeah. Dude, the questions were so easy. What were some of the questions? Like, for example, let's see. So there was, obviously, you know, there's five questions. Easiest to hardest. Yeah. Easiest was the, you know, Tekandama?

Yeah. The waterfall, which I've been there, by the way, it's the filthiest thing in the world. It's disgusting. It's awful. Yeah. But it was saying it comes from a river that shares its name with the capital of the country, Bogota. Sophia Vergara, they showed a picture of her, basically asking who is she.

Mm-hmm. Then they showed a picture of Gabriel Garcia-Marquez asking who is he. You know, and they even mentioned 100 years of solitude. Gay book. Amazing. One of the best books of the 20th century. Very hard to read. Very hard to read. And I wonder if the English translation I got was any good.

I haven't read the English one, but in Spanish is like there's words that are just ancient. Because Spanish is a real old language and you just have to go back and read it again. Then they were like, what country borders Colombia on the, if you're looking at a map on the right side, Venezuela, obviously. And then the last one, it was hilarious. They were talking about, they're like, this walled city on the coast. blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And they showed a million times. I went there for vacation last year.

They showed the bar. Have you been to Cartagena recently? No. So there's this bar, Cafe Del Mar, which sits right on top of the walls right next to the ocean. I've heard about it. Bro, I got hammered up there big time, two or three times. No, Colombia.

No, I had, what was I have it up there? I forget. I bought a bottle or something. But they showed Cafe Del Mar. And I was like, how could I not know this? Your boys gotten hammered there. So I got them. I was easy.

I ran the table. All right, neither here nor there. How are the calls, my friend? The calls are good, man. Very good. We finally have a chance to do a sound off where we can breathe a little bit. We're not racing through everything. Yeah, so I'm excited about that.

We got tons of calls, and I got to get some of the calls that were evergreen left over from last episode. Perfect. So we might have time to touch those. All right. Well, you go first, my friend. Hit us up with the questions. Let's talk about the scoring of the main event of USC 236. Habib Narragamatov had an interesting take on that event,

and the caller had a question about that, so let's address it. Hey, guys, this is Ryan from L.A. Wow, that Holloway-Porye fight was awesome. Habib said he scored the fight a draw. I thought it was pretty clear that Porre had it at least three to two rounds. Do you guys think that it was a draw or that it was close, or do you think Habib is still trying to keep the possibility? of having a super fight with Max Holloway.

All right. Thank you guys. Keep up your good work. I always look forward to your show on Mondays. Okay. How'd you score it first of all? Draw? No.

I figured I had 40 a winning pretty easily. I didn't do, so I was scoring the round by round on Gastilum and, uh, out of Sonia, but after that experience, I was kind of not checked out, but I was a little,

so I wasn't scoring it, but it just appeared to me when the fight was over. that. I think you could probably give a round, maybe two to Holloway, but I think it's probably three rounds to two just on that level. And there might be some 10-8s in there. Yes. Because here's the difference. I actually went and looked at the striking totals today on the train right up. Max outstruck him in a couple of rounds numerically. Yeah. But the quality of the punches. It was in the same sense. So I was saying this, dude, Max was like pop, pop, pop, pop, and they're landing, man. Like, he can overwhelm you like that. Poirier admitted it. Yeah. But when

Poirier would land. And he would... Porre had the RPG. Like, he was... Dude, he was... I'm being dead serious. He was moving. Max looked like he was in a car crash.

His body would flail from the power. Yeah. Max just couldn't compete with that. He could do a lot of other things to compete with, not that. Yeah. I had it 49-46, Poriet. And I think I scored a... I'm pretty sure I scored a one round 10-8.

I think it might have been like a second. There was a one round where he was really touched up and like he buckled a few times. but he didn't get knocked down. But yeah. Can we say this real quickly? Yeah. Over it.

Unreal toughness for Max Holloway. Dude, that was mad toughness in that whole card. Just, dude, I was, we always thinking about it, man. That main and co-main, I haven't seen, you want to talk about two guys. Here's the thing. No one's being like, okay, but they're not the real champ. Right.

Because you're like, all right, well, maybe Habib's the real champ or maybe Whitaker's the real champ for whatever that's worth. But those two guys, whatever they got out of that, they earned. They earned that. Yeah. Real quickly, let me pull up these numbers here. This is from fight metric. And again, numerical totals, Danny.

Not absolute totals. Numerical totals, Max Holloway got barely outstruck. No, that's not quite true. A little bit outstruck in the first round. Same in the second. Outstruck him in the third. Outstruck him in the fourth. And then got outstruck in the fifth.

So you could maybe give third and fourth maybe to Holloway. And again, that's not quality of punches. But even the rounds where it's close. I think third was definitely Holloway's strongest. In fact, when it hit at the end of the third, like there was a, I remember I tweeted something like, okay, yeah, Poria is up clearly, but there's also a clear momentum shift. Like, Max Holloway started, you know, really putting it on Porre. And you saw Porre start wrestling a little more, which can be a bad sign.

You know, not always. But, you know, certainly, you know, he didn't want a whole lot to do with the striking. So he started, you know, engaging in the grappling. Here's a question you should keep in mind. I've watched a lot of tape on Max, and I've watched a lot of tape on, oh, not Dustin, actually, but Max. He heats up over fights. Remember we went over that with the Hagler comparisons?

Now, here's where he's not like Hagler. The power was just not the same upper weight class, but in his native weight class, it's pretty good. Here's my point. Remember I told you how he heats up, round of a round, of a round, of a round, of a round, of around, so here we go. Max Holloway landed 30 in the first, 32 in the second,

53 in the third. So now you're like, okay, here we go. Here's the problem. 42 in the fourth, 24 in the fifth. it looked to me like he peaked in the third and then dropped off. And it looks to me like that third and fourth round, that is the Max Holloway sweet spot. Not saying he can't heat up to the fifth, but there might be, might, might be reason to believe that's where he really does his best work. And if you can survive that, you might have a chance at a rebound.

Yeah, for sure. All right. So, yeah, have a bit interesting scorecard there, but, you know, nonetheless, I don't think, I think he was actually giving his thoughts. I don't think he was trying to, as this caller suggested, you know, kind of leave it open for a super fight with Max Holloway. I don't think that was the case. All right. Let's address what would happen if, well, I'll just play the call.

Hey, Luke and Danny, it's Darren calling from Canada. Watching this fight Saturday night, as close as they were, it really got me thinking, what happens in an interim title fight if there's a draw? with the co-main and Maine being as close as they were, a draw occurring seemed really plausible. I'm assuming that no belt would be awarded, and would that mean that there would likely be rematch.

So we can address other questions, but I didn't think about that. What happens if, because the fights did go to decision, right? I think the, I mean, I think there were clear winners in my books, but I know some people had some interesting scorecards. What happens if it ends in a draw, like, it's not a defending champion? No, there's no belt awarded. you just that's it

that would literally be like the worst case scenario be terrible but that's the risk you run doing these kinds of things man but look it's the risk you run with technically any bout but yeah you would just get that if you have the title on the line

like you still have a champion at the end oh right because no one took it from the other one that's right so you just do another interim time yeah that's it that would that would be exactly what you got oh man that'd be the worst now imagine here's the worst no that's not the worst case scenario because imagine you got to the end you're like

I don't know man it's pretty close imagine if it wasn't close It was pretty clear somebody won. And then the judges foobart it. Then you'd be like, oh my God. You'd be like, what is happening? No way. Right.

I'd be bad. All right. Well, let's talk about what happens now. Like, wait, this brought some resolution to Lightwood Division a little bit, I guess. So let's discuss that. Hey, it's Michael Chastain from Athens, Georgia. Went to the fights last night. Still can't wrap my head around what happened.

I'm still coming down from it. But Porre won the interim belt. Dana says that he's going to fight next against Abeeb. There's so many other options. Amay fans love the Tony Habib matchup. Connor 2 could make more money than it. The first one, Gaghi's right there. If you were Dana White, how would you set up the next half of this year

to kind of lay out the top five and thin things out and straight it out better? Thanks to take my question. Love your show. By the way, you've ever been to Athens, Georgia? No, I have not. Two best cities in Georgia. The three best. One, wherever Jedmishu is not.

Two, Athens. Three, Savannah. Those are your three best cities. Athens is amazing. It's an amazing place. All right. This is more your kind of thing. You love to strategize and plan.

I'm out here, yeah. So let's see what you got. What do you think? All right. Well, the thing is, the whole division is a mess. So whatever route you go, you're going to end up, by default, you're going to have to screw somebody over. So I just want to state that, you know, there's no getting around to that.

So I think, you know, Tony Ferguson probably has the best resume as far as a body of work. I mean, the dude's been deserving of a title shot for like years now. You know what I'm saying? Porier just kind of recently came into that picture. However, I do think the fact that, you know, he's the active fighter and he just won the bell. I think that puts him ahead. And also, we don't really know where Tony Ferguson's mind is at the moment. Like, you know, we had some issues, you know, last month, you know, at home.

So I kind of don't want to put somebody in the cage, you know, if you're going through issues like that. So I say you do, you know, Habib and Poria as soon as possible. It looks like September. Great fight. Amazing fight. So I say you do that fight. And I think Tony Ferguson, I don't want to see him in another fight. I know I wouldn't mind if he gets another fight because I understand, like, this is his job.

He does need to make money. But in a perfect world, dude, sit out, let your body rest, relax, you know, take care of whatever you need to take care of home. And you just get the winner of Porre, Habib, you know, possibly later this year, early next. But if he does want to fight, I don't think Connor McGregor will fight him. So I think probably the next best thing after that, it would probably be a fight with Nate Diaz. As far as, like, what it does to his brand. Yeah. Got to get Nate Diaz back in the mix, man.

Yeah, you got to get Nate Diaz back in the mix. Jeez, you're so right. I wasn't even thinking about that. I'm such an ADS fan. I completely forgot because he's just been kind of on ice a little bit. Oh, you're so right. That would be so much better. That would be so much better.

Wow, good call. Put that in California. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or Vegas, whatever. His people will travel for that. A free tip there for the U.S. There you go. Danny Segarra, matchmaker at large.

And look, some people suggested just engage you because he's starting a title campaign. Can't forget about him. You can't forget about him. But, man, I just feel like putting, Tony Ferguson in that situation. No matter how the fight goes, if you're in a fight with Justin Gajie, you're going to get some damage.

How about this? How about Gachi versus the winner of Iaquinta and Cowboy? Yeah, I'm about that too. Yeah. I equinta, uh, uh, Geji, sign me up. Bro.

Yeah. That would be tremendous. Yeah. Tremendo. But I do, I would like to get, and also, you know, Connor's been claiming for a rematch, bro.

Nah, I don't want to see that. I have no, I have no interested. Competitive wise, like competition wise, it doesn't interest me. think his performance granted a rematch. And also getting it by being awful about someone's religion or married ones. It's like

if we're going to reward rematches based off of that, I might just check out from this business. Yeah. I also don't, I'm not down to see that buildup. Like people are like, it's BS you tune in. Obviously it's my job. But like, man, it just got ugly, man. I just don't want any part of it. I mean, look,

rivalry sell and they're good for the sport. But I'm just saying not generally, but for one night, got Adasanya and Gastlam. Had a little bit of back and forth, but not much. But then you had Poirier and he had Holloway. And again, I'm not telling you you can rely on that level of sales to boost your business. But what I am saying is, wasn't it a nice respite from your mom is this and your, you know, whatever?

It was so refreshing, man. And they all still got after it. Yeah. There were fantastic fights. And look, I have no problem with trash track and stuff as long as it's like, for example, the John Jones D.C. rivalry. I love it. But it was more towards the individual. They were going after each other, not, you know, beyond that, religion, et cetera.

So, yeah, man, I just don't want to see it. So I'd love to see Conrad Greger back. Don't get me wrong. But, you know, maybe a pedist fight. I don't know. Against any, any lightweight, I think it'd be fun to watch it. Sure. Except Habib.

I don't think he should be fighting for a title. Sure. Yeah. All right. Well, we're talking about Conmer Greger, so let's keep that going. Wait, before I play this, do you have any suggestions on how you would play out the rest of the year? No, I don't do those kinds of things. People are, again, this is why I don't, I mean, I've been in this business a long time.

If I really wanted to break fight news, that was a thing I would have developed. But I don't, it's not that I don't care. That's not the right word. I just don't find it that interesting. Yeah. So, no. If your prescription, I sign off on it. All good.

All right. Sounds good. All right, let's move on. This is Aubrey from Richmond, Virginia. Hey, so in light of the fight on Saturday night between Plurier and Pallet, Daniel White has said that the next fight to make is Khabi versus Porre. I'm just really curious to know if you're willing to play odds makers. What are the odds that in between now and September, Floree gets screwed over and stripped of the interim belt, and Connor McGregor fights Kib Nervigna Madoff and a rematch? I'm really curious to know your thoughts on that.

How likely is that to happen? Thanks for taking the call. Right. So great, great call. This is the topic. We went back and forth on in the MMA beat. Yeah. So to your point, if past is prologue, it seems unlikely.

Mm-hmm. But I have to tell you, I mean, Adasanya Whitaker seems like I can't imagine they would put anything in front of that. No. What would be better? It's the fight that is healthy for the division. Yeah. It's the fight that's the biggest fight.

make at 185. And that region. And that region, yeah. But with Connor McGregor, the most popular fighter in the sport, it's a bit of a wild card. Yeah, it is. Danny, what do you think? Again, if past this prologue, like we've talked about, should be fine. I have to tell you, though, part of me does wonder if McGregor comes back and really

begins to twist some arms, what might happen? I think there's a chance. I think there's a possibility, but I would throw, I'm not very good with odds, but I would still throw it in the plus. I think it's less likely to happen. One, because the UFC signed with ESPN, you know, their pay-per-view partner now. So, you know, apparently they're getting a pretty healthy amount per pay-per-view. So they don't have as big of as incentive now as to sell, right?

Because any pay-per-view that they put on, they're going to get some money for it. So the idea of, oh, we got to, you know, break a million. We've got to put on the biggest fights possible. I don't think they have that much pressure now with this new deal. So that's one. Two, I really do think, you know, although a lot of people are like, oh, yeah, the UFC loves this. Like, you know, it's messed up, all the trash talk and whatever, but the U.S. loves it.

I do think part of me really do things that the UFC is getting kind of tired of it. And the U.S.C. understands that it is crossing some boundaries they don't want to get into. So I think with McGregor, it's possible, man. It's possible. But I think it's more unlikely than it is to happen. I think it's unlikely. And as it stands unlikely, to your point, they have immunized themselves from fighter pressure.

Yeah. I do wonder, though. I do wonder. Pardon me, because, again, if it was anybody but Connor McGregor, I'd be like, ah, forget it. But now I'm like, uh, Conner McGregor, he's his own thing. He's powerful. Yeah. All right.

What's next? All right, well, let's talk about the co-main event, uh, which kind of, you know, not to, not, I'm not throwing any shape to the main event, guys, but the common event just fell, you know, super special. It felt big, man. It felt big. That was some heroic shit from Israel, Osama, and Kelvin, dude,

and not to take anything away from the main event, because that many one was fantastic as well. Were you, honestly, before you play this question, were you with me a little bit? Like, I had real respect for Kelvin Gastilum. Yeah. But you heard Israel Adasania said he was surprised at how hard he was to hit. I showed you slipping all those bunches, getting into range.

Dude, that was impressive. People look at slipping like it's not a big deal. That is, your timing has to be perfect. Yeah. I was, I walked away being like, dude, Kelvin Gaston's going to get people problems for years. I thought Kelvin was going to wrestle him a lot. And the fact that, like, he was out striking him, like, in the first couple of rounds,

like he was having a lot of success, rocking him. I was like, oh, snap. And, you know, he's got the range disparity. Dude, Kelvin Gaslam is a real threat. It's a real threat to anybody. He should hold his head high. Yeah. I was impressed.

I think this if I brought his stock up. It better. Yeah. It better. In the end, you were facing a really special guy. But Kelvin's special, too, man. That guy is good. All right.

For sure. All right. Let's do this. Hey, Luke, Walter, from New Jersey. just a quick question about Israel, Adashania, and Gasolam. You have that fight, which is most likely going to be the fight of the year.

And then if you turn back the clock to Ortega and Holloway, how were those two fights similar and how are they different and which one gets the nod for a fight of the year? Thanks for all of your time and everything you guys do. Thanks. Well, okay.

Well, first of all, the Ortega Holloway fight was December of 2018. All right, but let's say he's Counting it the end of year kind of thing. So Kelvin and Adasine and Israel was more competitive. Yes. Because it was uncertainty headed into the fifth. Yep.

That fifth round drama by Adasanya answering the call. Bro, I got chills after I was watching this. And then, you know, Gasselm doing his best to hang in there. Even, you know, everyone's like, why didn't Mark Goddard stop it? I wouldn't have complained had he at certain points. Yes. But you heard D.C. talking about it. Kelvin was still wrestling.

He wanted it, man. to the final bell. Dude, I was so impressed with him. Also, you got to keep in mind that Kelvin rocked them several times throughout that fight. If that didn't happen, then you go, okay, you might want to stop this because Kelvin hasn't shown the ability to, you know, be hurt and then maybe come back with something. Now, Kelvin, Kelvin was in there, man. Kelvin was a threat the entire time. Here's the difference.

We actually had Hennar Gracie on the show prior to the Ortega fight, and Hedder said something that I thought was true. Ortega is still putting his game together. And obviously his ground game is phenomenal. But even in that case, it's a little bit true. He likes to thrive in the middle of other people making errors, a little bit of scrambles, a little bit of chaos on the feet. He really does a lot of good work from there because he takes chances. And sometimes he blows through guys like he did against Frankie Edgar. And sometimes he has to work out a little bit and then make a move at the end like he did against Hanato Moikano.

Holloway is the opposite. Holloway isn't merely a better striker, but he is much more strategic and patterned and tactical in his approach where everything is very much when he's doing well, under control. You had in the case of Adasania and Gastilum two people who are under control

who are trying to apply that control to the other one. That is not what you saw in Ortega and Holloway. What you saw was that steady control by Holloway over time break him down and then open the floodgates. And at that point, he just sort of ran over him. Very different fights in that regard. Yeah.

And I think also for me, the fights that I like the most are fights that have storylines in it. Yeah. Like, I'm not talking about leading up to it, the fight itself having a storyline. I think at some point during that Ortega fight, we knew who the winner was going to be. Like, it was, like, don't get me wrong. Retega was in there firing, trying his best and making it very exciting. But at one point, it was a one-sided beating, right? Like, it was like, okay, man, Max Hollow is really on his way to

victory here. While the, you know, Gastilum, uh, a Sanya fight, it was, it was a gamble almost the entire time, you know, until the fifth, you know, the fifth got pretty, pretty one-sided there towards the end, but the fight was extremely competitive. And I would say it's a fight of the year so far. Would you agree? Yeah, that one was, that one was special, man. You don't see a whole lot of those very often. And I made this point before, all four guys in your main and co-main, elite, literally title contenders in their 20s.

Dude, that is the sweet spot. Everyone's like, oh, I'm 34, I'm in my prime. Motherfucker, you are not in your prime. You are not in your prime. And we see this all the time in MMA. I'm 35. I feel the best I've ever felt. Best training camp I've ever heard. You're just lying to yourself.

It's not possible. Your testosterone's been going down naturally year over a year. No, not the case. But these guys, they're all in that that perfect stage of development. clarity and skill. Yeah. All right.

Amazing fight. I'm still. I watched it again on the train and I was like, geez, man. Getting pumped. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good fight to watch if you want some energy, man. Bro, why does no one hit me up all day until I get on the air?

My wife just hitting me up. What is happening here? All right. Is everything good? Yeah. No, no. If the baby was here, I would just drop the headphones and go. No, no.

Baby's not here. You know, people just harassing me. All right. Let's talk about, let's keep talking about Adasania. This listener brought an interesting question. Hey, Luke and Danny. My name's Hayden. I'm calling from Phoenix, Arizona.

I have a question about Israel, Adasania. So I've been on this hype train since his UFC debut. And like Lucas said many times, it's more exciting to be a fan on the come-up than it is once they're finally of the champion. And honestly, during the first four rounds, of the Kelvin Aspline fight, I was kind of doubting myself like, wow, I don't think he's as good as I thought he was. And then that fifth round happened, and I think he showed something to everybody that he is a truly phenomenal fighter. So my question to you, Luke, is what's his

upside? Do you think he could be one of these like GSP, even Anderson Silva type guys that just goes on a run and destroys everybody? Or do you think he's going to have troubles? Let me know. Okay, we'll always remember everybody has troubles. Even the great St. Pierre had troubles. Even Fadour has had troubles. Anderson Silva. The only guy who hasn't really had troubles was John Jones. I'm talking about in the cage.

Now the Hamel thing, whatever you want to say about that, Gustafsson gave him trouble, but not enough to really cross the finish line there. And so we saw what happened in the rematch. But he got pushed. Here's the deal in MMA. So far, Izzy was pushed. But I mean, when I say pushed, I mean like losing the majority. of the bout and you've got to pull out a Hail Mary.

Yeah. Which is kind of what he did a little bit, John Jones. And the first Gustafin fight, obviously he just crushed him in the second. Yeah. Somebody is going to put it on Israel-A-Sanya. I mean, put it on him. Someone is going to. And how he answers that will tell you his upside.

Yeah. We don't really know yet. Now, obviously, if you have a belt around your shoulder, you're pretty dang good. Israel-A-Sania is pretty dang good. Is he George St. Pierre good? Time will tell. I would read into it what I saw in this fight. Gastilum is just, I think, a lot better than folks realize.

He was certainly better than I thought. And I thought it was good. He is very good. But as everyone noted, he was able to make Adasanya, fourth and fifth round adjustments. Danny, that's what won him the fight. Let's see what happens against a Romero. Let's see what happens against Acosta or somebody else.

Let's see how he looks against some of these are Wydenman. That will give us a broader picture to make a big judgment. But is he obviously talented? Is he going to be a force to be reckoned with for years to come? That at a bare minimum, we can say. Yeah. And, you know, you mentioned, like, getting different looks, right? Getting the Jacker, getting the gas, the white man.

Like, that's super important. But that's usually once you're at the top. Let's see what he does against Robert Whitaker. And if he does get past them, that's when we, you know, that's when his legend work begins, right? When guys are looking at you and the guys that are coming up are aiming at you, rather than, you know, the other way around.

So, yeah, it's going to be interesting. But, man, there was, and even in this interview that you had today, like, he was like, wait till you see my takedowns. Wait till you see my submissions. Like, were you not surprised with that guillotine and that triangle? Yeah, for sure. Dude, the guy's getting so much better by fight. I thought for sure he was going to get past.

His guard, understand how that triangle happened. Yeah. He had to maintain guard retention. There was a guard retention act in there. The way you passed, because that's my favorite pass, as a big guy is when I drive my shoulder and I do what the old Henzzo Gracie bit is. You ever heard this?

If you want to pass that way, Hensor Gracie goes, make the guy smell his knee. So I drive all my weight so that their knee goes right to their face. I like to plant it on their face. And then I began to turn the angle and I,

while maintaining pressure. And he couldn't. Adasanya kept just enough space and then just the right angle to stay in front and then he could relaunch. Because remember, he had to ply the triangle twice.

Yeah. Dude, there was a lot happening there. I was like, you got, I thought he had him in the triangle. After he took how many punches? Like, dude, super impressive. Very. Super. Dude, a year ago, he beat Marvin Vittori. Like, that's a completely different fighter, just one year. And let's keep in mind, he's been busy and he, like, he mentioned in your interview, like, yo, I've just been like kind of worrying about the fights and, like, getting ready for fights. Now he's going to take some time off to actually improve his skill. That's quite scary. And Vittori held him down. Yeah.

Kelvin Gaston could not hold him down. Kelvin Gaston's a much better wrestler. Yeah, for sure. All right, let's talk about another. I mean, these two fights were amazing, but there was a few other guys in that card that had super impressive performances. So I thought they were worth mentioning.

Okay. Let's talk about another fighter. This is Parker from Virginia Beach. I was wanting to know your thoughts on Cunale Roundtree's performance. I personally thought that is striking like 10-fold better. and that he overall performs the best I've ever seen him. So I just wanted to know your thoughts on it. I'm a big fan of the show and keep doing what you're doing.

All right. First of all, step up your audio quality. Yeah, was he gone from Virginia Beach or Saturn? I couldn't tell. The moon, perhaps? Yeah, maybe. Nonetheless, a good question. So Khalil Roundtree, man.

Okay, here's the difference with Kalil Rauntree. Yes, he's gotten better, but people I don't think are assessing this the right way. Yes, Khalil Roundtree got a lot better. I grant you. But it's not really, did he like majorly change his skills? Yeah. I don't see that as the defining reason why he won that. I want you to flashback six years ago.

What was the knock on Dustin Poirier at the time? There was two of them. One was that he had bad cardio. If you don't believe me, Google it. It was out there. One was that people said he had bad cardio and two was that he was a brawler. Yeah. What was the difference in this fight with Max He was?

Holloway. Yes, he's gotten a lot better. But the difference is he didn't brawl with Max, not very much anyway. He's a little more responsible with his skill sets. That is it. That is it. That was exactly the right word, Danny. Kalil Roundtree has always been a talented striker. And yes, he got better. No doubt about it. But that was a dedicated, disciplined, in your words, responsible management of the fight. Kalil's always been talented. But he's putting it together in terms of an in-fight application. of it. Yep. That's the result.

This is the guy we saw at LFA tearing people's heads off. Yep. I am so happy to see the result that we saw. Not that I have anything against Eric Anders, but it is nice to see a guy fulfill his potential. Yeah, for sure. And I think also something that's not being talked about enough

is it's this cardio. Like you said, like, sure, it's his management and skills. Like he's always been good. But also, like, once he was in there, like, we've seen him in fights where like, you know, he's completely gassed out. Now I feel like, I don't know if it's exactly that attributes to being responsible with his cardio, but like, dude, he was just, because he was having a steady output throughout the entire time. And I think that's key.

I think, I don't know what changes in Thailand he made that attribute to that. But yes, some of it is responsibility, but a lot of it is just, I don't know, maybe clean up technique as well. But like, dude, the fact that he can strike for a long period of time, like 15 minutes, bro. He's going to be a force to be reckoned with it. he keeps that up? Because his problem was he would always just go there and just, not wildly, but not in terms of managing resources. Yeah. And using the most of his, he wasn't using the most of his ability against Johnny Walker or, you know, whoever else. This time he was applying himself. Yeah. And you can see what a, what a revelation that is.

I'm so happy for him. Yeah. He's really found something in Thailand. And, you know, hopefully it keeps improving. And it may have just been himself. I mean, yes, skills. But like, We saw the, you know, we saw the... We did, but remember the ties. When they do tieboxing, if you never watched, you ever watch tie boxing, like actual tie boxing? Sometimes, yeah. They start slow.

They do. And they heat up. That's exactly what you need to slow Roundtree down. Because he comes out, you know, he comes out like, do you ever see Mad Max Fury Road, the dudes who are spray painting their mouths, you know? He comes out like that. He's like, I can't wait to see Valhalla. He's spray pain in his mouth.

Just going berserk. And if he could just be a little more reserved, take it. a different attitude. Look at what he can produce. Amazing. Dude, light heavy weights picking up, man. Slowly but surely, these guys are putting it together, for sure. All right.

Let's talk about Kelvin a little bit. Hey, it's Josh calling from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Just curious to know what you think about Kelvin's performance and what kind of adjustments he could make in the future. If he would possibly have a chance to beat Adasania with given adjustments, or do you think Adasanya just is too much for them and too quick to adapt. Thanks for your call, guys. Take care.

There were, I'm not a coach, so I'm utterly unequipped, ill-equipped, I should say, to be overly, you know, diagnosing problems. I will say one thing that stuck out to me, Danny. Yeah. He would have Adasanya hurt and then go for the takedown. Yeah. That was a backbreaker, man. I wonder if the fight would have been different had he,

Not done. Now, maybe he was hurt. Maybe he was tired. And I don't know what the answer is. But I was just watching it real time. I'm like, no, no. Yeah. You have him hurt, man. Polish him off.

Yeah, there was a time where, like, Izzy, like, fell back against the cage and he immediately, like, shot and just kind of pressed him when, you know, at a sign he was clearly hurt. Yeah. But, you know, with that being said, I think, I think it's also not a fair assessment because we've seen him with, like, a great killer instinct in other fights, like, say, like, the Tim Kennedy fight or, like, other fights where, like, you know, he knows, he knows, he's got somebody hurt and then he starts putting it on them.

You know, you can't always be perfect. You know what I'm saying? But something I would like to see him do a little more is wrestle. I think he's got great wrestling. He's displayed that before in his previous fights. And, you know, I think if he mixes it up a little more, I think, you know, it'll open up his striking. Again, I'm not a coach as well, but...

One other thing. Remember how he landed the head kick and what the third of the fourth? Oh, yeah. That was crazy. Okay, but the reason why I showed you, the reason why he landed because he hadn't thrown it all the entire round. Exactly. And they just completely fooled a guy like Adasanya,

which, by the way, hard to fool a guy like Adasanya. Yeah, I mean, Silva tried to fool him how many times and you can get nothing. So this is my point about Gasolam, was like, God damn, that is really good. This is going to sound like a general ignorant statement. But I do wonder, Danny, I wonder if slightly upticking the amount of kicks he throws merely as a disguise, you don't have to like, I have to land this kick.

It has to be the kick upon which I win this fight. But just as a general mix might open up. the hands more, might do some more, just adding, because like, here's the thing. I'm looking at the things he did well. I don't know how to add much to it, to be honest with you. Yeah, he put on a really good performance. So you've got to add other things that he's not doing and then wonder, to your point, I'm saying kicks or saying wrestling, he can do them already, maybe just sharpen him up,

add him a little bit more. Yeah, for sure. All right. Let's discuss, this was a bit of a hot topic. I'm not really about it, but let's discuss it anyways. All right. That felt it would be interesting. Hey, guys. It's Ricardo from Toronto.

I just got back from the fight. I have a two-part question, so hopefully can answer them. First of all, wow, Israel had an amazing inspirational way tonight. He showed an amazing heart and the skills of a champion. But first of all, do you guys think that we ever see the John Jones fight come to fruition for him in the near future? Should he beat Robin's next fight? The guy is incredible, so congratulations to him if he's listening to this. And also we saw a close fight where Max came up a bit short

And we saw the power difference between him and Dustin Regardless of the result I still think there's question marks there Do you guys really think Dustin is more likely to dethrone Khabi than Max would be given that opportunity I'm just curious on your thoughts on the lightweight title fight to come Thanks guys take care Jones at Asana dude

I'm about it but like years down the line Yeah not anytime soon Yeah John's got business at heavyweight and Izzy's got business at middleweight. Yeah. Come on. Is he weighed in at 183 pounds. Like people were talking about it like, oh, John would beat him. I'm like, well, John might beat him.

John's the most talented fight I've ever seen. Yep. But also he's huge. Folks don't realize that. He's a big man. Dude, yeah. So, and Izzy is not like some small fry, but they're not the same size, even a little bit. So just on that level alone, that's a hard fight to make. And they both have, they're just not on a collision course.

Not anytime soon. Yeah. Dude, they both got their hands for it in their own weight classes. Yeah. By the way, Israel-Asonia has to fight Robert Whitaker. Like...

What do you have? Like he's some bump in the road. Bro, he is ridiculous. So, you know... Yeah. I was a little surprised John lashed out the way he did, though.

Yeah, same here. I don't know why, though. I don't know if there's something behind the scenes. I wonder if it was like... I wonder if it was like the Silva goat... Or no. You know how Jones and Silva are tight? Yeah.

Well, I don't, I don't, but... They seem to be pretty tight. Yeah, I've seen videos of them being together and they seem pretty friendly. So I wonder if, like, beating him and then calling out John was like... But I mean, a lot of guys have beaten Anderson Silva. I don't know.

I don't know what to say, you know, I don't know. I was a little bit surprised. Yeah, I was surprised. Also, I think also something... I mean, I don't know this to be true, but what out of sign you said was interesting, like, oh, John might want me now. Like, you know...

Sort of acknowledging there's a growth. To be had you. I mean, and it could be a potentially big fight, like, down the line. Let's say, like, John Jones just keeps, you know, wrecking everybody, you know, two years from now, at Asana, let's say he gets past Whitaker and just wrecks everybody at middleweight. And two years, it could be a pretty big fight. So, you know, just planting the seeds, you know what I'm saying? Yeah.

Yeah, but right now, it, no. Yeah, way too early. What was the second part of that question? Dustin's chances against Khabib. Does he have better chances than Max Holloway does? I mean, Max, in some ways, was a worse matchup for Habib, which is to say, The great cardio. I think...

I don't know. If they're watching this fight, I do have questions. Well, hold on. I'm not saying like... I'm not saying in every way Max is a worse matchup. I'm saying in some particular ways.

First of all, I've been saying this for a while. I'm not saying Dustin Porrier is the same takedown threat as Habib. But I've been trying to shout out how good Max Holloway's takedown defenses. It is hard to take him down. Very hard to take him down. So that's one.

Second of all, I don't think that the same kind of power punching window finding that... Finding that Poirier was able to stop and hurt Max with, not like stop him in the fight, but like just really slow him down. That's not the kind of thing Habib can do. So to me, the volume at which he could get off would be a big deal.

For Poirier, though, he presents somebody who obviously has been facing just about every kind of opponent, has good takedowns himself, or take down the defense, I'm saying, and obviously a much bigger punch, which could be a game change or two. Look, I'll say this.

I favor Habib in that contest. I'm not, I was just sort of speaking candidly. But the reality is there's been a lot of guys I thought would win. And I thought Israel, you know, I thought it was probably going to beat Gasselam. I didn't think gas was going to look that way and look at it. And I didn't think, by the way, I didn't think Poria was going to beat Max. Oh, right? Again, I was on the fence about that one.

I knew both would be close. Yeah. But I didn't think the first round he would just rough him up that way. Dude, MMA's crazy. Yeah, it's crazy. I was on the fence that one, but I will say we do little staff picks at the site. And I did pick Poria to win. Very good.

Yeah. Very good. I thought he was going to maybe finish him. him like the fourth round or something like that like i i just thought that you know pori would pack the bigger punch and you know i mean gaiji has crazy output similar to to you know holloway in that sense i'm like he's dealt with guys that put up crazy output and who hits harder gaigi or holloway i would say probably gaugie so um yeah that that's what i was kind of basing my pick on but yeah and i think there's something to be said about what uh dustin porier said at the press conference they asked them

he was asked like, oh, what do you think it takes to beat Habib? And he says the right amount of crazy. Dude, Porriya, Pori is the type of guy that he's saying, like, I'm okay with not coming out of the cage the same. Like, I'm okay with leaving a piece of myself in there. Like, I want this. Dude, Poria is a super determined guy. And you need that because Habib will drag you into the deep water.

Certainly will. All right. You got one more for us? Yeah, let's talk about Max Holloway's future and how he looked at 55 and where he goes next. All right. Luke, Danny, how you doing? This is George from New Jersey.

colon again. So much happened this weekend. I know I got one more. I just want to talk about Max. Max moving up from 145 to 155. You know, he is taller than Dustin, but Dustin obviously has filled out at 155. Whereas you can see Max, you know, he's big, he's bigger than he is at 145, but his body is just not framed out and filled out like Dustin's is. Do you think it'd be beneficial for Max to stay at 155 and let his body fill out and acclimate to that weight class or would you prefer to see him go back down to 145 and do his work there all right thanks guys okay so i don't really have a preference for what he chooses although there are some great fights in either weight class yep so i guess it would depend on the matchup dany but i would say this he needs to get and again like i'm qualified to make this point but i do think this is true otherwise i wouldn't say it it seems to me what we've noticed is there's a way to to go into a weight class and there's a way to get out of a weight class. And it has to be a slow, deliberate, considered process. And it takes time.

Dustin Poirier is a better fit at 155 than he was at 145. But to me, it wasn't until he had many camps under his belt with Phil Daru, Daru, I was mispronounce his name, where he really got the maximum use out of his body for that weight class. People were talking about how big his back look. But go look at the exercises he does on Phil Daru's Instagram. They're not traditional bodybuilding or even Olympic lifts. They're highly specialized for him, for that weight class, for that purpose.

And it takes time to do that. So if Max wants to do that, because it looked to me like there was a pretty clear, not merely power punching differential. I agree. There was a strength differential. But there wasn't a technique. I mean, there was a bit of a technique differential because they do different techniques. But what I'm saying is in their own way, they're pretty skilled tacticians.

Yeah. but the physicality of the weight class was bearing down on max. Yeah. That has to be addressed one way or the other. I agree. I think, you know, to this caller's point, Dustin, Dustin kind of had a long, I mean, Dustin has already have had how many fights at lightweight? Like, he is a lightweight now.

He's a true lightweight. This was Holloway's first fight at 155. And man, what a tough fight to make, you know, a move up, right? You're getting a super tough fight. And yeah, yeah, he definitely looked like a 45 or at 155. Although he is big at 45, there is, you know, there is a difference between the two. I would like to see Max Holloway go down to 45 just because, like, you know, he is the champion there, and there are a couple of fights left there for him.

But eventually at some point, I think he should compete at 155 just because it's overall healthier for his body. And, you know, we want the best for all the athletes involved as far as their health is concerned. But yeah, if he does make that move to 55, take your time, you know, pack on the stuff. the muscle that you need to pack, you know, get acclimated to the weight class. Not just bodybuilding stuff, the right kind of muscle. Yeah. And also, you got to spend a lot of time competing at that way, right? This was the first training camp that Max Holloway competed for 55, right?

You got to do that several times for, you know, for you to start getting, you know, because I'm guessing there, with packing a little bit of extra weight, your timing does have to change a little bit, right? Your body does move a little bit. That's why you can't just do it all at once. Exactly. Yeah. It has to be a slow process.

So you don't lose all the other. traits you had. Dude, and GSP has talked about this extensively. Like, he's probably the guy that, like, first brought this to my attention, like, years ago. Like, when they're like, yo, when are you going to move up to 185? Just do a one-off and fight, you know, Anderson Silva. And he was just like, nah, man, this takes time. Like, there's so many things I have to do to prep, you know, so. By the way, I got to tell you, I find it crazy that Luke Rockhold didn't count his calories. Does you find that wild? I suppose, yeah. Find any weight loss or weight gain expert, Dr. Mike Isratel, Chad Wesley Smith, let's see.

I mean, God, I could go, these are two Renaissance periodization guys, but I could go on and on. Like the number one thing they tell you is to count calories, either to go up or to go down. That has to be measured exactly. Now, at 205, it's probably less of an issue. But when you were back at middleweight, you weren't counting calories? Like, I don't know. I find that crazy. Yeah, it's kind of crazy. All right. Well, look, we got one more interview to get through. Great job, my friend. and we'll catch up with you soon. Appreciate it.

All right. There he goes. Danny Sigoro. Give him a follow on Twitter. He looks like Alessandre Pantoja. All right. Appreciate every guest we've had today. Israel,

Alessania, Luke Rockhold. And appreciate you guys tuning in. Don't ever forget. We take your tweets using the hashtag the MMA hour. We take your calls at 844-866-24-68. I have to get out here. But we have one more interview for you. I spoke yesterday to Macy Barber.

She was like, I got this person. I really want to fight. I said, all right. Well, I've got a show. Why don't we put the two together? So here is my conversation with Macy Barber. All right, and I'm joined now by UFC strawweight contender, Macy Barber. Macy, let's sort of get right into it. I see the cast that's on your hand there.

Give us a health update. What happened there? What is the prognosis? Give us all the details. So basically, I fractured my thumb, and they had to go in and put four pins in to hold it in place after they fixed it. So they fixed it last week and put me in a cast, so I'm in it for about five weeks, and then I get my pins pulled on May 7th, I believe. And then they said about eight to 10 weeks, and I'll be completely healed.

So they said that it's a difficult surgery to get everything back to normal. But once you do get everything back to normal, it's a really quick recovery. So there's like the two sides of it. It's difficult, but it's really fast to recover. So I guess it's kind of like a blessing. to have that trick of february. So wait a second. The whole thing is 8 to 10 weeks or it's 8 to 10 weeks once you get the pins removed? No, the whole thing.

So the first five weeks is with the pins and then the second five weeks is without. And that's just doing like movement stuff with my hands. This happened as a consequence of the Aldrich fight? This was. Yeah, I did it in that fight. I think I did it in the first round. I remember, you know, it was as soon as I hit her, it was like my whole hand was like hot and tingly. and I was like, oh, no, something's wrong with it. But it didn't really hurt because of the adrenaline.

So that was a good thing. And then at the end of the fight, you know, we were taking my gloves off, and I was feeling everything crunch in there. And I'm like, it's definitely broken. So, yeah. Now, before we get to some other matters here, let me just ask you, are you at all worried about your hand health long term? Usually when you break your hand early,

that can be a little dicey for long-term abilities. No, I mean, I broke my other hand before. So I think just working on, you know, strengthening the bones and obviously it's a cause for concern that I'll have to, you know, just work on the strength of my hands and my bones for sure. So long term, it just means that I need to make them stronger. All right. Fair enough. Drink the milk, I suppose. It's really hard.

All right. So let's talk about this. So if you had an ideal time to come back to the octagon in terms of the calendar, what would it be? So any time at the end of August or September. I definitely want to fight in September at the latest. I've already talked with several people, and I would be cleared to fight within 10 weeks. So if we do 10 weeks from now,

it puts me at like June 16th, and then another 10 weeks, and I'll have a full camp. That would be August 31st, or a later date would be fine too. But I think that's perfect. And I've said it before, but I think that a really good fight for me would be Paige Van Zandt

to come off the back and fight her later. All right, so let's talk about that. Why her? Why her? Because she's already said no. And that's a really good fight, you know, for me anyway. And I know that she doesn't want to fight me. Last I checked, she was number 14 in the division of the flyweight.

And since we're both in the flyweight division, I feel like it's a good fight. why do you think she said no because she doesn't want to fight me she doesn't want to lose you know she she wants to keep building her name and getting wins under her and this is a fight that she could

possibly lose you know and she knows that so I think that's why also given my history in fights I go to finish and I usually cut people up so she also doesn't want to

have her face damaged. Now, when she said no before, when was that? So the last time that she said no, I offered to step up against Rachel when she was going to fight Rachel Ostevic. And I contacted Mick when they were looking for opponents. And I said I would fight her. And he thought it was a great idea. And so he threw it out to her and they turned it down.

So we're in the same division now. So you can't keep saying no. at some point we're going to have to fight. Yeah, right, of course, because you had fought at 115, and I think the Aldridge fight was at 125, right? If I'm not mistaken. Yeah. Yeah, it was.

Yeah, I've got bad habits. I'm still calling you a straw weight, when it's actually a bit of a flyweight consideration. Okay. Okay, so let's talk about a fight like that. Give me a sense of, I know what you do, but like, and I know two pages credit, you would agree with this.

She's also a bit of an action fighter, right? For sure, she is. She's definitely, she's a high-paced fighter, and she would, she's got skills and she's very athletic, but I'm mean, you know, and I can, I go to finish. And she doesn't thought a ton of girls that go out to just finish, you know. There's one thing about being a fighter who is technically good, and then there's someone who has, like, a malicious intent to finish a fight, and I possess that. And there's only a few girls that possess that. And I know that I'm one of them. And I feel like Tatiana Suarez is another girl who's a finisher.

You know, she goes out to hurt you. And we're free and far between us fighters that fight like that. So besides you and Tatiana, because I think that's an interesting point. Or actually, you know what? How about this? Male or female. Who are some fighters like that? I don't know.

Honestly, I don't, I haven't. There's not a lot of fighters. that go out to just, you know, finish and they just have this mean, I'm going to finish you, and it's not over until one of us is having a hard time either getting up or getting, you know, out of the fight. So, gosh, there's a lot of entertaining fighters,

but I don't know if I've seen very many people that, you know, you're just like, wow, they just go out to finish. I don't know if I haven't yet. Dustin Poir is a pretty good candidate, right? especially after last night. Okay, there you go. Yeah, he's a, he's a killer for sure. That was a amazing fight.

The fact that, you know, Max would swing and he would hit, and he had the technique, you know, but every time he would hit Dustin, he would just, he'd hit him, but Dustin wouldn't have a real reaction because it's just the power difference was so significant. And then Dustin, every time he hit Max,

you know, Max's head would like pretty much fly back. And that's just a power difference. So that was impressive. What do you make of the idea of getting a fight with Van Zamp being so difficult because she's got some popularity from obviously something she's done in the octagon, but candidly probably a lot more from outside of it. Nothing wrong with that, but I think that's a statement of fact. And so as a consequence, she knows everyone's going to try and make a name off of her.

She's going to be real judicious with who she picks. Right, yeah, there's that, you know, she probably is turning it down also because she doesn't see the, she can make the point of it's not a very valid fight for her because of the name that she has. But if we're talking about skills, I mean, everyone has to fight everyone at some point. I mean, she had to fight up in terms of, you know,

she went and fought Michelle Waterson, and if you're looking at it, she had to fight up to get to where she's at, and Michelle had to fight down. So if we're thinking about it, I want to fight up to get to where I want to be, and I have to show that I have the skills, the webpage has to fight down, you know?

Like, you can't always fight someone who's way above you. You know, you have to fight. Sometimes you're going to have to fight people back to prove that you are where you need to be. Now, I believe she had her own health issues, right? She's got to, I don't know if she has a similar problem to you, but a similar problem in the sense of she can't come right back to the ox gun,

if I'm not mistaken. What do you know about that? Yeah, I think she has a fractured arm. And the last I checked she had rebroke it, where her pins are. So hopefully she gets that figured out and hopefully she's healing well again. But

she made the statement. She wants to fight in summer and so do I and I think that's good. Now if we could get that to work out, that'd be perfect. But I hope she at least heals up and comes back because there's a lot of girls not just me that would like to fight her.

Not only because we believe that we are more skilled than her, but we also see this start potential that, you know, you can build off of that name. So that's a lot of followers that she has that would be eyes on the fight and only get you more publicity as well. So let me ask you here very quickly if I can. You were a straw weight now, a flyweight, but there's two title fights coming up, one for each

of those weight classes. Let me pick your brain on this one if I can. You got Rose Namibunis taken on Jessica Androge. How do you see that one going? You know, I think Rose obviously is a more technical fighter, but, um, Actually, I saw the size difference. Holy moly. I didn't realize how small Andrage is.

But I also believe that Androge is a pressure fighter. You know, she pressures in. She's just one of those girls that no matter how many times you hit her, she's just going to keep coming forward. So I think, you know, if Rose can deal with the pressure, she'll be fine. But Andrage might break her. You know, the pressure might break her, the mental pressure. because Rose has been broken before,

and it doesn't matter how technical you are as a fighter or how hard you can hit. If you don't have the mental game on point every single time, then if you break, you break yourself. So she's, we'll see. But I think if technically Rose could win, but mentally, you know, if Andrage can get inside and put the pressure on her, then Rose will break.

And then in the flyweight division, you have Schifchenko taking on Jessica. Again, your sense of things there. You know, I like Jessica I and I like Valentina as well. Valentina, I think, wins this fight as much as I would like to see Jessica come out with the win. But I just, you know, Valentina is just a strong, solid fighter. I mean, she's not lacking anywhere. And so it's going to take a really good athlete and a really good fighter to win that fight.

and, you know, Jessica's got wrestling and she's got all that stuff, but so does Valentina. And I feel like that's almost something that we don't get to see as much because Valentina does so much of the Muay style when she stands up and fights other girls. You know, they only get through the striking or they go to the decisions through the strikes. So Valentina is not bad on the ground at all.

So if Jessica tries to wrestle with her, that could end up in Valentina's favor as well. When you think about your path to the title, because we all know about your ambitions and relative to your age and what you want to do, and of course you have many steps in front of you before we even get there, but I'm just wondering in your mind when you think about it, is that a path to Valentina

or do you say to yourself, who knows who's going to have the title by the time that happens? Honestly, you know, who knows? Because I could see myself fighting at 125 this fight and maybe not in the next fight. You know, I would like to see myself go and give it another shot at 115 again. The nutrition and the metabolism is something we've been working at.

So it could be a path to Valentina. I feel like Valentina at the 125 division, Valentina is going to stay champ for a while. At the 115 division, you know, if, let's just say that Andrage gets the win, then she wins. Then I think that Tatiana Suarez is going to be the one that is the path to her. You know, we've been paying a lot of attention.

And it was even said last night in the fights in the women's strawaway division, nobody has wrestling like Tatiana and the first thing I saw when I said when I saw that was I was like not for long because we're working on that wrestling now so we're going to make improvements

and we're going to change that it's not going to be Tatiana has the best wrestling in the Strawadee Division it's going to be Macy Barber has the best wrestling in the Strawade Division but you know it could be also after her so we'll see you know that anything can happen

as we saw last night anything can happen and we'll see what happened. All right, well, I know you've got a lot of traveling to do. I have some work as well myself. It was always good to catch up with you and check in. Hope you get that page van Zant fight, and I guess we'll have to see in your words what happens next. For sure.

Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate you. Thanks, Bacy.