MMA Fighting - Between the Links: Lewis vs. Gane Interim Title Fight, Sean O'Malley's New Opponent, Jake Paul's Donation

Episode Date: July 2, 2021

This week on Between the Links, host Mike Heck is joined by MMA Fighting's Jed Meshew and Alexander K. Lee as they discuss the booking of Derrick Lewis and Ciryl Gane for their UFC 265 main event with an interim heavyweight title on the line and what that means for current champion Francis Ngannou, and even Jon Jones, the MVP from this past weekend in the combat sports world, Sean O’ Malley getting a new opponent in Kris Moutinho for his UFC 264 bout next Saturday, Jake Paul and Triller donating to UFC fighter Sarah Alpar’s GoFundMe, and more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Alexander K. Lee: @AlexanderKLee Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from the Audible Original, the Downloaded 2, Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Roscoe Cadulian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever. Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Roscoe Cadulian in this follow-up to the Audible original Blockbuster. The Downloaded, it's a thought-provoking sci-by journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, What are you willing to lose to save the ones you love?

The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. To the Vox Media Podcast Network. From M.MA Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. now your host, my... Yes, indeed, the iconic voice of Esther Lynn welcomes you to a brand new edition of Between the Links. Thanks for checking out the show this week.

We enter a rare weekend off for all the major MMA promotions, but there's still a lot to discuss this week. I will just preface this right off the bat by saying, I've fallen a little bit ill. My voice is not where it once was, so I'm going to be struggling a little bit. Please deal with it. if I squawk or squeak a little bit or if I cough into the microphone,

I'm going to do the best I can to battle through this thing because we have ourselves a little bit of a grudge match, if you will. We're coming off the tag team extravaganza last week on the program, but we have ourselves a one-on-one matchup, a rematch. Friends become enemies, enemies become friends, lots of storylines. So let's introduce the competitors first, a gentleman that is ready to continue on the road, to proving to the world that he belongs in the virtual BTL arena, that he can one day become a champion himself.

Let us say hello once again to the Prince of Positivity. Alex K. Lee, my best friend, how are you? That intro music. Turn my headphones up. This will not stay this way for long, my friends. I am doing great, my best friend, thank you for asking this. I'm going to feel even better after, no, no, this, this. Nope, this one, this one.

Hit. After that number changes there on the left. we feel real good about it. There you go. And back once again, coming off his victory last week, the winningest player in the history of this program,

multi-time, BTL champion, multi-time defending interim BTR champion and one half of the inaugural BTL tag team champions of the world after he and Fernando Precius got the victory over Sean Al-Shadi and Jose Young's last week on the show.

Also from M.AFighting.com, Mr. Jedmishu. Happy Thursday, my friend. There's only one place you could be at this hour. there is and i'm so glad that you decided to pick a k because part of me when i said the answer that won the inaugural btel tag team champions last week part of me was just thinking about twisting the knife on ak for his use of kamar usman in the worst possible way i just showed my class and my skill level by taking usman and just turning him and myself as a result into yet another champion so i'm really glad to have a

here to laugh at him for his inability to do what I can do. That was like the nicest shade I've ever heard in my entire life. It was so calm, cool, and collected. AK, do you have a rebuttal before we get into the MMA debating? I don't watch any episodes that Jed is on, so I have no idea what he's not. You've never seen this program. Listen, when Jed is not featured, Mike, I love the show. When I see those three letters, when I,

I see JED in that headline. I'm just like, I don't know if I can deal with this. So whatever Jed said, I'm sure he's right. But whatever he says today, he's going to be wrong. He's facing up with this guy. So it's good to know you've watched like four episodes. Look at that. And the ones I'm on.

And the ones I'm on, I guess. Yes. Jose Young's is a Bill Cosby sweater is back in our lives. So let us kick things off because we could talk about the banter between you guys for a long time. But let's begin with some news that I and probably everybody hearing the sound of my voice did not expect to hear earlier this week. We have ourselves a heavyweight title fight on August 7th in the main event of UFC 265, but it does not involve the current reigning heavyweight champion, Francis and Ganu, Derek Lewis and Cyril Gan, who just got a win in the main event of

UFC Vegas 30 this past Saturday against Alexander Volkov. They're going to meet for an interim heavyweight title in Houston. So, AK, I want to know what your reaction to this piece of business. especially since it appears from all accounts that the plan was to book in gano versus lewis on september 25th and let me add a little caveat to this a k okay because i talked to cyro gone like two hours ago he told me that this fight was on the table before he fought alexander volkov he said before he stepped into the cage even the day before that this was an idea this was something they basically said like do your job get a win and you're going to be in the spot what is your reaction to all of this right now?

I mean, yeah, that doesn't surprise me at all. I think they've been trying to figure out how to screw John Jones and screw Francis Ngano, you know, since whenever these discussions start. I mean, it's this, the Ngano Jones and all the pay discussion and all that. This has been going on for, it feels like a year now. I know at least it's been in talks for every year, but the meat of it has sort of been going on for, I guess, maybe the past six, seven months. So that does not surprise me at all. Say what you want about the UFC.

I do think they have a plan, a contingency plan when it comes to these sort of things. So, I mean, good for them, you know, for giving us the heavyweight championship match that we all wanted. Derek Lewis versus Studio Gunn, I mean, these people are just knocking the doors down for it after Gone's last two performances and after, you know, Lewis's most recent wins. So, yeah, look, they really have their hand on the pulse of the, like, it's just stupid. It's just stupid. I'm sorry. I hate to, no, I'm sorry. Guys, you know, I don't like to use that kind of language. I apologize for all of our young listeners out there. This is dumb.

I don't know why it would still be a thing. I imagine most of our listeners and viewers are too smart to ever like follow the narrative. I'd never want to hear this stuff. Oh, the UFC, they'll do everything. Everything they can to put together the best. They'll bend over. I mean, it hasn't been true forever. It's certainly not true now.

This is the quintessential example of this not being true. and I'm not saying UFC doesn't put on on average the best fights in the world. No question. No question. That's indisputable. If you take every year, if you look at the whatever, the top 50 fights in MMA, 35, 36 minimum will probably be in the UFC. All right?

That's just, okay, I acknowledge this. But again, that's a matter of just how talented this roster is, right? There's some of these divisions you can throw it, you know, throw a dart at two random names. You're getting a fight of the night candidate. That's just how it is. It's just how they have all the talent. But when it comes to booking these big matchups, man, they play around a lot.

They trifle, as the kids say. And in this case, this was clearly an example. Again, Mike, as you just said, that they had this planned all along. They are completely ready to move on from something that's just not convenient or cost effective for them to book. And in Ghanu, John Jones.

And apparently even in Gano, Derek Lewis, was a bridge too far. So we know publicly from what they've been saying that has something to do with their scheduling, to there's there's this battle of wills that's going on and and I don't like it I understand it but I don't like it so I

I hate that this becomes such a negative thing for Derek Lewis and Cedalagan because if the fight had just been made like a non inter, you don't put the interim title fight on it people would think it's a cool matchup right it'd be a little surprise they'd be like what the hell happened to then Ganu Lewis fight but now

you've almost put this thing on them where whoever wins the belt people are just going to make fun of it I mean I'd be happy forever, but the reaction is not going to be what they're hoping for, I don't think. And I don't know. Again, I say it's just frustrating to see. And I don't think the UFC's going to learn anything from it. I don't think the fans who support the UFC are going to care. I think they're just going to move on for it.

But I want people to care, Mike. I want them to learn from this, and I want them to care, and I want them to know these fights don't happen because of Dana White, Hunter Campbell, the UFC, all these guys. So it's frustrating. Jed, what do you make of this? Because I've gotten to hear many sides of this saga, one of which, as I just mentioned, from Cyril Ghan. The other was from Eric Nixick, the head coach of Francis Ngano,

who basically was told by Francis Nganu's manager, hey, does September 25th work for you to get Francis ready for this fight? Because this is what we're going with. That's what the plan was. They were going to do in Ghanu versus Lewis on September 25th. And then they just pivoted last minute, right before the main event of UFC Vegas 30, and now we got this interim title fight on August 7th.

What is your reaction to all of this? So in principle, I agree a lot with what AK said. A lot of it's dumb, not super... It's just kind of dumb and whatever. And there's definitely some portion of this, which is them playing hardball because Inganu has been vocal about thinking that he's underpaid because he is underpaid.

And, you know, I think really, though, honestly, the simplest explanation is usually the right one, and I know that many people view the simple explanation here being, well, Dana is just trying to stick it to them, but actually there's a much more simple explanation. And it is, they looked at their upcoming fight cards and realized that UFC 265 needs a headliner. And for all you people out there saying, well, Amanda Nunes is fighting Julianna Pena. Amanda Nunes is not a, she's not a UFC headliner. That's just facts. She is the greatest female fighter of all time.

She's the top pound for pound female fighter currently. She is a dominant champion and a wonderful individual who cannot draw any numbers. Like, she is ironically part of two of the biggest UFC pay-per-views ever at UFC 200 and fighting round to Rousey at. I don't remember what that was off the top of my head, 207. those were two huge pay-per-views in which she main-evented but she wasn't supposed to really main-event 200 that happened last minute and 200 was always going to sell and Rhonda Rousey obviously sold the paper views anything else that she has main-evented on has done 100k or less like she's just not a

main event fighter and that's at least from a fiscal standpoint and so they were probably looking at their schedule and go Francis is being playing a little bit of hardball and we're not super this is whatever and we need something here for this okay well Derek Lewis will draw a big crowd and probably do pretty well in Houston okay we can't make him a main event over Amanda Nunes that's insane the only way we can make him be a main event would be an interim title match or a heavyweight title match and Francis isn't going to say yes to this so Ghana will and that's where we are like I think that's a simple explanation because they run this fight back and they don't lose Francis Inganu as a main event.

Like Francis wasn't going to compete at this date. Okay, well, we can push Francis back to October and Francis can fight the winner of this person. Like, that's pretty, it just seems pretty easy. And from a business standpoint, I think that's exactly what happened. And yeah, they were a little quicker to say, let's go ahead and do this because nobody was super stoked on Inganu Lewis. like people were going to watch it, but that fight was awful the first time around, and there's still the sense of John Jones. And so they were just like, yeah, we can maybe stick it to Francis a little bit

and let kind of check him, let him know who's actually running the show. It's not him. The belt is actually more of a hindrance to his career than it is helping in a lot of ways. And so let's just set our level with him a little bit and still get to do a lot of the things we want to do. I think that's what happened. That sucks. Don't get me wrong. Everything I said is awful in almost every aspect, but I think it's that.

And that's the world we live in, man. Like, if you guys don't like it, figure out a way for fighters to either get the Ali Act, which comes with its own bag of problems, or frigging unionize, man, because otherwise this is the shit we deal with on a daily basis. So, Jed, you, thank you. You feel like this is just kind of X as O's, as Francis just pushing back a couple of months against the winner. It's just basically a number one contenders fight more than anything.

But I'm curious where this leaves John Jones. Like, and I'm also wondering if there's actually a silver lining to be found here. Like, is it possible that we could be staring down the barrel at the UFC actually giving us the fight everybody wanted to begin with? or is this all just a big, not a screw you to Francis, potentially a screw you to John Jones, but is like, is there a chance that behind the scenes,

the UFC has gotten in a room with John Jones and his advisor, and they have locked him down because they're going to lock John down before they lock anybody else down and no one's going to know about it. No. Was that me or AK? Sorry, AK's pictures.

So it's like, I thought that was cool. Production issues. No, I don't. We talked about this before. I don't think signing Richard Chaffer did shit for John Jones. I don't think Richard Chaffer is going to magically make Dana White want to make less money. And Dana White holds all the cards here. So, no, like, unless John Jones' price has dropped, he's not going to say yes.

And especially, like, right now, he probably can't. If John Jones just comes out and says, okay, yeah, for the same amount of money, because that's what he's going to be offered because he is under contract, like, that feels like, a loss for him and I just don't think he would ever do it. I think he's going to sit on the sidelines for a year. And if not, this is this extra time doesn't get us anywhere. This is just level setting Francis Inganu, letting him know who's the boss and still getting to have their cake and eat it too. And at the end of this, we're going to get Inganu versus the winner of Gane Lewis probably in October. Hell, maybe still run that back in September, just quick turnaround

number, whatever, because both Gagne and Lewis probably would be into doing that. So we'll see what happens. But no, I have no expectation John Jones fights this year because the only way he fights this year is if he gets okay with taking a lot less money. And he seems really not okay with that right now. What do you think, A.K., on a scale of 1 to 10, what do you think the chances are that my silver lining, my glass have full thoughts and hopes actually come to reality. First of all, I hate to be a stickler about this. Jed, it is, it is gone. It is Cyril,

gone. Cyril, gone. Cyril, gone. My apology, Cyril, Seril gone. Mondieu. Oh, okay, anyway. Give me a headache. I misspell your name literally every time I write it, and that's probably never going to change, so I'm sorry that I'll miss pronounce it as well. C-I-R-Y Oh, I know, but it doesn't happen the first time. I do this, like Cody Garbrandt, every time I type his name, it is Cody Gar-Brandy 100% of the time and then I have to go back. Because the Y and the T are like right next to each other,

and I screw it up literally every time I type his name. Gar-Brandi. I can't get statement. I can't figure out Cody's statement. I can never remember the two M's of the two ends. Yeah, all the two ends is impossible. It's absurd. So I'm sorry I also screw up pronouncing your name.

Mike, this question, boy, what a downer to start our show, right? Like, I wish, well, I'm going to say something that I think is going to make. Be positive. That's your job. I know. I'm supposed to be. But I'm going to, so look, in a roundabout way, this will be positive because I'm going to say something that's going to make a lot of people who are familiar with my work and my ability to predict. things correctly. Anyone familiar with that, they're going to be happy to hear this.

Because now I'm just going to say it. And Gondon Jones is just not going to happen. It's not happening. It's not happening. I have moved on. I'm sure if you, I'm sure if you catch me on any of our shows from like three months ago, I was probably all like, oh, there's too much money involved. It's definitely going to get worked out somehow.

I don't know. Maybe not this year. Maybe not like by middle of next year. Some point these two will fight. I'm going all the other way now. I don't know. I just, I don't see how it happens. They've, they've changed, you know, John Jones changed management and gone who's got CAA involved

here. I feel like, I feel like there is no more settling for less here. So in a way, that's a positive statement. Maybe we have gotten to a point where these guys will stand their ground. I don't know if you can win that battle with the UFC. I mean, we just saw George St. Pierre. He hasn't fought for the company in years and he can't take a big money fight because he's still technically under contract.

So it's a tough battle to win. But it's also to the point where I just, I don't know if they can find a middle ground now with a company. The UFC, look, they're well-oiled money-making machine. They know In Gano Jones would be a profitable fight, but it would be, is it so profitable to them that they should jump through hoops to make it happen as opposed to just maintaining the status quo? Where, again, keep mind every year, this company makes, they know how to make money. They make money hand over fist no matter what. they only have to deliver a few big fights a year. And as much as we all want to see in Ghanu Jones,

maybe in their minds or by their calculations, it just isn't one of them. So again, keep mind, everyone. I am the same person who said Conn McGregor would never fight Floyd Mayweather. So take this with a grain of assault, maybe take this as a good sign when I say, I think that the fight is in Gano and Jones is toast. All right.

Let me just ask one more thing about this, because I asked this question to Sean and Jose, when we were doing our reaction video, aka how bad is this for Stepe Meachichich? Like, he's been kind of the forgotten man in all these conversations. Like, when we talk about the heavyweight title picture, it's almost like Steepay's name isn't even in the conversation.

But in Dana White's eyes, Steepay was supposed to get the winner of Vengano and Lewis because they weren't going to give it to John Jones. They weren't going to be able to come to term. Steepa was next in line. He was on deck. So is he now literally the forgotten man? I don't think he's forgotten.

I'm sure it'll come up in conversation. at some point what is up with steepy and i'm glad you brought it up because i know we are among a group of all of us here love stepe am i you know i'm really excited i know we all have nothing but good things to say about stepe uh you know the gentleman i'm sharing space with today i cannot wait for his side because he's really i know he's going to jump to uh the former two-time heavyweight champions defense here uh i don't know see it's of course i do feel a bit bad for stepe but he does strike me as the kind of person who he's kind of going to roll with the punches let's I mean, let's put it this way.

He hasn't had time, I hadn't had a problem, excuse me, taking time off in the past. So, yes, I'm sure he'd rather be fighting. I'm sure he'd rather be getting that in-Gondi rematch right away. I also think he's kind of okay with, you know what? I'm going to let the dust settle. I don't know if he, the big question is, does he take another fight?

I don't know if he needs to. I think if, like I said, depending whatever happens with Gahn and Lewis, and then one of them goes to fight in Gano, hopefully before the end of the year, meochish could easily just be, you know, Dana White could just tell him to chill. We want you for a big heavyweight fight early in the year,

really kick off our calendar in January or February. So it sucks. He's out of the immediate picture, but I don't think he's losing his spot at all. I think he just has to wait. I'd be very surprised if he took another fight, if I'm being honest. Jed, I wanted to end this conversation with you because I know you love talking about Steve A

and you hold him in such high regard. Where does that put him in this conversation? Dude, he hasn't been in the conversation since the minute his head got snapped back by Francis Angano. I know he wants to be, and he, he by right should be in a lot of ways. He is the most accomplished UFC heavyweight of all time. Of that, I do not dispute. I just don't think he's that good, and I never have. And I think I'm right, and I think I have a lot of very compelling reasons for it.

But regardless of what I think he is as a fighter, he is undeniably, incredibly accomplished. And by virtue of that, he should be in the conversation. But he just won. Francis Ngano said afterwards he would fight him, but he's not all that interested. And why would he be? He just blew the bricks off the dude. So that doesn't make a ton of sense for Ghanu other than it is a trilogy. And outside of that, like, Stipe's not going to get a title shot by sitting. He has to fight again. John Jones is ahead of him. Derek Lewis was very clearly ahead of him. Now the winner of this Derek Lewis Ghani fight is ahead of them

and hell, maybe the loser's still ahead of him too. Like, Steepa's just going to have to fight somebody. And I know that goes against his, I'm the champion, et cetera, but you're not. You were the champion. You got knocked out and it's your own fault, bro. Like, that's all I can say to him.

Like, you didn't give a shit about being loved. And that's okay because you probably weren't ever going to be like massively beloved by fans. So be yourself and be true to But if you're not going to give a shit about that, then you can't come crying when, oh, they're not giving me a title. We know this shit ain't a meritocracy. It's never been one.

And you know firsthand you only got given a second shot at Daniel Cormier because you just hung around long enough and Brock kind of fell through and all these sort of things and just worked out for you. It's not going to happen again. Like if you want to be the guy who's going to get title fights off losses, you can't just be successful in the cage. in fact that actually has very little bearing to that you have to be a compelling person who people care about and stepe has never been that outside of cleveland and the ufc for whatever reason is just steadfastly against holding events in cleveland they did it at one time with stepe so like yeah bro you should have seen this coming you're going to have to fight again fortunately you're still probably going to beat the shit out of most of the heavyweights because most of them are terrible

So don't fight Curtis Blades. He'd probably beat you. But like, I don't know, most of the rest of that division, you could still probably whoop up on and then you can get a title fight again. You get one good win. You can get a title fight. But it's going to be timing related because if John Jones ever decides he's okay with less money, John is getting the fight over you.

And then you're just going to have to sit and wait and feel hard done by again. So that's it. Like, Steve is not in the conversation. And he's not going to be him until he fights somebody. Mike, Mike, my best friend, you are an accomplice to that drive-by that just happened, by the way. Steve Day had nothing to do with the initial question. And you dragged him into the line of fire.

You brought him out of the safety, you brought his name out of the safety of his house onto the street where Jed could get a clear shot at him. And I don't want to give him too much credit, but he didn't miss. He rarely does. I mean, whether you agree with him or not, I'm not saying I agree, but he certainly landed some shots there on his target.

Let's put it that way. You're an accomplice. You're responsible for this, Mike. You're responsible for this. For my shots to start landing on steep. And now the he's almost, ooh, buddy, it's Jedd-Mushu season right now. Wow. Well, we shall see where all of this goes.

This is definitely, I don't know if shock. is the very word. Somewhat surprising announcement, to say the least, but nothing really surprises me or shocks me these days if you really think about it. But let's move to all the action from this past weekend in combat sports. But the point for round one goes to,

I'm giving it to Jed, because how dare you, A.K., tried to question the way that I run this show. Okay, there's a reason that I am in the middle, the middle of the screen here, all right? How dare you? Stinkface. And there's that sour post, yes. there's the yeah I will say it is it is uh just your last thing he said it is crazy that like

how little we are shocked when something that like that happens now like i definitely when the news came up i was like i had like maybe a solid like 10 seconds of like i can't believe they do that what and then after 10 seconds it's just like oh yeah yeah okay yeah this is this is this is big this is major league mMA this is the ufc uh we know what's going on within conno and jones and them And then literally the out, again, whatever outrage or shock, whatever your emotion was, again, if you, if you're fan of the business, probably didn't last more than 30 seconds. And then we just kind of move on, move on to the next one, right? That's where we are now as, you know, as an MMA community. Look at you with the little C drop of onto the next one.

Nicely done, AK. You can listen to that on Sundays, by the way. Wink. Okay. So we had no shortage of combat sports events to. partaken this past weekend. PFL and Bellator had events on Friday. We had a new interim heavyweight champion

crown for Bellator, Valentin Moldovsky. PFL, we got Kayla Harrison just running through somebody else. Anthony Pettis drops to O and 2 in the promotion, misses the playoffs. UFC had an event. We just talked about Cyril Gahn and where that brought him. Even BKFC had an event.

And we had some big boxing headlines. There's so much to watch, gentlemen. So Jedmishu, which fighter was the combat sports world's MVP this past weekend and why? Honestly, this is tough because, like, there was a lot of fighting, but not a lot of it mattered, if that makes any sense. Like, it matters to those people that competed,

but, like, clearly the most relevant thing was Cyrano and Pete Alexander Volkov because he got a title shot immediately afterwards. But, like, other than that, that card had some fun violence on it, but it's tough for me to care too much. Like none of those, I'm not going to be remembering anything that happened there years to come. Shouts to Marcin Prachino, that was a dope body kick. But for me, I guess if we're going to go MVP, one, I will say, it's going to be on Bellator. I just want to say, I totally write about Moldovsky Johnson.

That fight was awful fun, and I stand by everything I said about it. But the MVP's got to do this call Mouche for me. I could be wrong. There's another contender that I suspect AK will take. But Liz Karmouche, like, she just came out absolutely torched Kanoly Tonabee. Watanabe. I probably said Watanabe, Wattanobe. Cyril gone.

Cyril gone. Yeah. Liz Karmouche just blew her up. Best Karmouche's looked in freaking years. Staked her claim for getting in there for a title shot. I just sort of reminded everybody that like, hey, I know that I'm not in the UFC anymore, and that's really where a lot of fans' thoughts stop is at those UFC doors. But I'm still arguably the second or third best flyweight in the world. I mean, not arguably.

Like, I think she would beat everybody that's not Chevchenko or maybe, like, or Androge. I don't think she beats Androge. and her upcoming title fight in Bellator, that will be interesting. But she's good for Liz Karmouche. She's still out here doing things, being super relevant, very good at her job, and getting better. Like I said, the best she's lived in years. And so in a week that I'm going to say it was a little bit devoid of super relevant and interesting things, Liz Karmouche kind of reasserting herself, that will take the top spot for me.

If Casey Lyden was the judge right now, we wouldn't even, go to AK because that would be his pick. You'd already play the winter music and we'd be moving on to round three. But AK... The little thing called laying in the ground one for the final round, Mike. That's right.

That's right. Putting on that butter. Laying on that butter real thick. What do you think, A.K., who is your guy? First, I know because this is a podcast, too, right? This is a podcast, too, right? I don't watch the show. This is a podcast, right? Yeah, yes. It's audio and visual.

Yes. Yes. Yes, there was a comment on free in which I do want to shout out that our listeners won't be able to see from Hardeepe Singh on YouTube who said Francis's manager was the MVP this week. So I just there, yeah, so we just put that on the spring end. But yeah, that thing that's a great. What's his name? Markle Martin or something from CAA. Yes. Yeah, him getting into it with Dana White is frigging in the public is freaking amazing.

A little juvenile, a little silly. But I thought that was hilarious. Yeah. So that's a good suggestion. Thank you, Hardee. For me, though, I'm going a little bit out of the side of the pocket here, guys. We mentioned BKFC, Mike, that was one of the events that happened this weekend. And just to get a little inside baseball for people, that was at least according to sort of our metrics on NMA fighting.com.

One of the, I think maybe the most talked about combat sports event of the weekend. I mean, credit to BKFC, I think they've building their brand really well. I think it helps. There was a lot of, you know, recognizable names. James, Tiago Alvis was on this card. Julian Lane, let me bang, bro. There's also the most fun card of the week. Sure, Pearl Gonzalez.

Yeah, Pearl Gonzalez, Joey Beltran. So they've both built up their name and also, you know, do a good job of signing former UFC people. First and foremost, so I didn't mention his name yet because it's really, he kind of has to share this with a man that stepped into the ring with him at the end, not the end of the night, but at the end of his fight, after his fight. Lorenzo Hunt is my MVP, or at least co- MVP of the weekend. For anyone who's wondering, who the hell is Lorenzo Hunt? I'm sure you guys, you're all out there. You saw the footage of Hector Lombard two-pieceing, someone who had got right into his face after he beat Joe Riggs.

That was Lorenzo Hunt. And it's an amazing clip you haven't seen it. Guys, please find it on our site because he kind of walks up and it escalates so quickly. I think he kind of went up there, I think, oh, get in his face, talk a little smack. Almost immediately, Lombard just smashes him. And Lorenzo Hunt very wisely kind of backs away with his hands up, almost like, oh, whoa, this is like real? This is like people can punch each other for real in here?

And it's a great clip. I don't approve of violence outside, unsanctioned violence people. I'm strongly against it. But like a former NBA player, Matt Barnes, once said, violence is never the answer, except sometimes it is. and in this case it was both the answer and I'm sorry to say quite entertaining. So that to me was like the funniest moment. It happened after, by the way, a very strange finish with, and I think Jed will approve of this where Lombard beat Joe Riggs for a BKFC title.

And in the final flurry. I'd be a lot of proof of after Lombard and Joe was fighting in general. But I think it turned into as good as we could hope for because he grabs Briggs his shorts in the middle of this flurry and the referee catches it but a little too late and then Lombard gets in like a K-O punch and that's how the fight ends. There's really nothing the ref could do about it.

So it was I mean that was I mean that Tiberos was hilarious. It was but Lombard and Lorenzo Hunt these guys are my MVP's. I thought I just thought it was just so entertaining the whole scene and I think Hunt and Lombard are kind of

probably can meet somewhere in the future their way I don't know if they're in the same weight class, but they shouldn't be too far off from meeting that up. So there you go. He has a viral moment. He sets up another big BKFC fight. Well done.

Hector Lombard. Well done. Lorenzo Hunt, my MVP's, co-mbes of this busy weekend. So are you saying, A.K., on this past weekend, was BKFC the winner of like all the promotional events?

Did they win the event? Did they win the weekend? I mean, I mean, I think they kind of did. And let's not forget, they had the press conference for Paige Van Zand and Rachel Ostevich on Friday. So it was a really, really big promotional weekend. Even just, you know, just counting the event that actually went down on Saturday. Again, four title fights.

That went over very well, I think, with anyone who decides to tune in. Or again, at least read about the event, at least check highlights. All this stuff for like a still relatively young promotion, like the BKFC is good. I know sometimes people will see. maybe the raw buys and be like, oh, BKFCs, you know, that didn't do as big as they thought. It's like, you know, social media impressions and things like that. These are all metrics that people look at now when they're sort of, you know, deciding to, whether a business is success, whether they're going to invest in an organization.

That's a big thing. You know, it's not all just about pay-per-view buys when we're talking about major sporting organizations. So, yeah, I'll go as far as to say those two led BKFC to a weekend victory over Beltor. UFC, PFL, that's right, PFL was on Friday, boxing. And probably, I'm probably underselling the boxing. Like I said, I just maybe wasn't in tune with that. But everything outside of that, I think BKFC, clear winner. Agree, Jed?

I mean, yeah, promotionally, for sure. They put on the most entertaining event, like, easily. And yeah, they did good numbers, probably. I just assumed that A.K. was going to call Kayla Harrison the MVP of the weekend because of all the fighters that contributed this past weekend, like everyone knew she was going to just obliterate Cindy Dandois. That wasn't ever in question. But she did what she was supposed to. She keeps marching inexorably towards another title in a million dollars. And she, you know, solid on the mic. Like she's laying the foundation to be a star in this sport. So that's probably, that's why I assumed I was trying to give that one. to AK by taking Karmouche. You know, I know he needs help to win rounds, but then he be carefuled into BKFT. And some dude who, he said that guy who got

boxed up by Hector Lombard, he said his name like seven times, and I legitimately have no idea who that dude is. Like, so good choice. You also can't pronounce Sidial Gahn. So this is clearly another issue. This is, I think this is a jet issue, not a, not a Hector Lombard. I'm not talking about you not knowing the guy,

Hector Lombard gave the two-piece to is not a me issue. But, you know, agree to disagree in this instance. I will say, I'm glad you brought up Kayla, though, because one thing I do like about her mic skills now is she's someone who said, she knows her limitations. You're not going to see her trying to cut like a big Michael Chandler rehearsed promo. I mean, she has some lines prepared for sure. She dropped like Game of Thrones line. I'm sure she had that thought of ahead of time.

But otherwise, she keeps it short. she keeps it sweet. I think she might be, you know, maybe coming off as like all business, I think maybe is kind of the persona that she's pushing forward now. She did that with this promo and with her promo and her first

PFL fight this season. So yeah, she'd be up there. But I also, I'll just shut out my honorable mentions while I'm here. We shouldn't discount some of the fighters on that UFC car. I know we're kind of overlooking it. But I thought, yeah, Timor Vallev,

Timor Vallev, how many Barcellos, a great fight. Hadzovich Madero is also a great fight. You already mentioned Karmouche. And also from the PFL,

actually, I have to mention Larissa Pacheco because, look, I know there's no one. People are clamoring for a third Pacheco-Harrison fight

as much as they're clamoring for like the Kamotsi Jacques-A trilogy to finally be completed. Again, I understand this. I understand this. But Pacheco has at least made herself really look like

a dangerous fighter. I mean, at 155, I know it's not really that you know a big division so far but she had a huge huge knockout of olena kolesnik the fight was as short as it was was super entertaining um so she actually was my standout from pfl almost more so uh than kela harrison so shout-out so la rest of jaco amazing knockout it was a very busy weekend no doubt about that no major event this weekend in the m a world although titan fc has a very interesting card on friday cfc i believe has two events this weekend on fight pass so you got some good cards to watch but

We are on the road to UFC 264, which we will sort of touch on next, and we'll talk about it at length next week on the show. But the point for round two goes to my best friend is on the board, one-to-one. Nicely done. Thanks for a lot. Before we hit record, I was like, before we hit record, I was like, this seems like around AK is going to win. And I was absolutely correct.

So let us move on to our third topic of regulation. We found her earlier this week that Lewis Smolka suffered an undisclosed injury. He's scratched from UFC 24 next Saturday against Sugar-Shon-O'Malley. And then it seems like every Bannamweight under the sun raised their hands and threw their name in the hat. From the roster, outside of the roster, it seems like anyone who could possibly weigh in at 135 pounds, even guys at 125, some 45ers potentially in the UFC outside of the UFC wanted this fight. So they go outside of the roster to New England professional fighter Chris Motino, who has competed pretty much his entire career for CES, a New England regional promotion that is on Fight Pass.

Reasley Faw for CFFC. He had a great submission win also on FightPass. But the winner, AK, is Chris Matino of the Sugar Sean sweepstakes. What do you make of this booking? I have no problem with this booking whatsoever. It was a cool story. Don't get me wrong to see all these guys calling him out. It got people excited that O'Malley was probably still going to remain on the card.

People were thinking, oh, my gosh, is Marab de Valshvili, you know, going to step up and just end the hype here. You know, he's obviously a blue chip guy at 135. And then Tim Elliott volunteered. You know, they're like, oh, yeah, I mean, kind of a high risk, low reward guy, but he's a name. You know, people thought that was cool. Ricky Simone was definitely leading the pack there for a while. There's some back and forth. Amali does a little video kind of saying.

you know, where are you at? It looked like that as many possible. We know now that it sounds like Simone's team. It's something they wanted to negotiate maybe a catch weight, which I think makes a lot of sense. So I don't want to hear anyone giving Simone and his team crap for saying, oh, why didn't he just take 135? It's like, guys, he's a top 15 guy taking a fight on short notice. Why can't we meet halfway? Who cares? It's a short notice fight. Who cares if it's at 135? Anyway, that's probably another discussion. But good for Chris Boutinho. Let people make fun. Let people make fun of like, oh, these guys are can. He's being set up. O'Malley only gets fed cans or whatever. It's, I just, I don't know if Jed's going to agree with me on this one, but I will say,

I feel like people just need, don't have a strong history of how, like, stars get built up. Look at any star. And I get it. Once you get to the UFC level, there's a different expectation. O'Malley is relatively inexperienced for like what we consider to be like a top, you know, for a guy who's become so famous, he's relatively inexperienced. I want people to know this. He's certainly well beyond the Christmas of the world. This is not an ideal matchup. I'm not saying it is. I'm not saying, oh, yeah, good.

This is like, if you book this matchup for real, it would be fine. No. But on short notice as an emergency, as a way to, I don't want to say, no, I'll just say it as a way to protect Sean O'Malley. This is the way you go with it. You don't throw him in there with a Marab. You don't throw him in there with Ricky Simone. We all know the reality is they're trying to build this guy up. They are very invested in Sean O'Malley.

There's certainly good reasons why he has a connection with the fan base, especially a certain demographic. He's young. He's cool. Again, I don't get it. I'm not hip. I'm not with it. But the kids tell me he's a very popular fighter.

And inside the cage, super exciting. I think undeniable, undeniably exciting. So you're trying to build him up. Just give him someone he can style on. It's not a resume builder, but you can worry about that stuff later. He has plenty of ranked bantamweight fights ahead of him to build his name up. So I have no problem with it. Could it have been cooler to see him fight, a Tim Elliott or Ricky Smilk?

Even like a Ray Borg? Sure, I'm all for it. I think it'd be cool. But I got no problem with them bringing in a enhancement talent to keep Sean O'Malley on next Saturday's card. If people are come for outrage, you've come to the wrong man. Congrats to Chris Moutinio for getting the fight.

Sean O'Malley, hopefully you take care of business, get yourself a highlight, real finish. That's what people expect. And we move on. We move on and gets another top 15 guy in the future. There are certain things about this episode that I'm going to remember for a long time,

and one of which is the look on Jed Michoud's face when AK said, I have no problem with this booking. Clearly, Jed does not agree with this. Let us get your thoughts, Mr. Michoud on this booking between Sean O'Malley and the soon-to-be newcomer Chris Motino. This is horrible matchmaking. It's hot trash. I agree in principle with actually some of the things AK said. Giving him Rob Volishvili, like that would be horrendous. That's bad matchmaking anytime, certainly on short notice. Because you are trying to build this guy up. Again, I'm with AK. Like, this kid is a star. People like him. I don't get it at all.

but I'm not the target fan base or whatever. So that's fine. You want to build this guy up. Don't keep him as far away from Morab to Halsh feeling as you possibly can, especially on short notice. But you can't do this. This is MVP Bellator style shit right here. Like, hey, the huge knock is that MVP might be good.

We don't really know because he fought one good dude in his old career. and that dude sparked him. Like it's, you have got, you gotta take the training rules off at some point. And I know that doing that on short notice is not the best idea. But there's a huge piece of land between short notice Marab Ghalisvili and no-name dude who, like, this is just obviously and blatantly stupid. Like, this isn't even a guy who has some, you know, regional hype to him or whatever. and we're going. It's a New England fighter.

This card's in Vegas. Like, what the shit is going on? This is dumb as hell. Like, Tim Elliott was perfect. Can you really tell me how different Tim Elliott and Louis Smolka are, like as fighters? No, neither of them are ranked dudes. It would have been a fine step up. Like, yeah, Sean O'Malley's in fighting a flyweight who's bouncing away class or whatever,

but that's still a super winnable fight that actually will matter because Tim Elliott, you know, doesn't suck at fighting and we know what he brings to the table. He's got veteran savvy, he's toughness. He can wrestle and grapple a bit. It would make Sean O'Malley show that he is improving, and it is a win that matters, even if it's not a great marquee win or whatever. Like, this win is a throwaway.

If Sean O'Malley does anything other than totally style on this dude on Saturday, or not this Saturday, like, next Saturday, like, what the hell are we doing here? Like, that's a setback for him on. honestly. And it's not unreasonable for that to happen. Like, you remember when Tony Ferguson was supposed to beat the shit out of Landovinata and then it looked like Landovinata might actually kill him? Like, that's what we're doing here in a, like in a smaller universe. No name, like fights against no name fighters or debutantes, they carry with them a lot more risks than everybody really

wants to imagine because everybody just thinks, oh, MMA, like this guy's, he's better, he's going to win, despite the fact that we know crazy things happen all the time. The margins are really small in this sport. And oh, by the way, Bannon Wade's a really freaking good division. So even people who you might not have heard of or aren't good, they're actually probably really damn good at least at one thing. And maybe that night's just their night. Like, this is not a super safe booking for him because a loss here is pretty catastrophic.

Like a loss to Tim Elliott on short notice is explainable. A loss to this dude is not. And so, yeah, maybe he wins because he's supposed to. And maybe even looks good. But like the best case scenario you get is that Sean O'Malley is on a Cona McGregor pay-per-view. Sean O'Malley is basically Conner McGregor, like a dollar store discount Conna McGregor. Like that's the, his fighting style. Everything about him is that.

So that's what you want to build him off that. You want to keep him on this card. But if he doesn't absolutely blow the doors off the place, it's a huge letdown. And it's just not great. Like, there were a number of people they could have picked better than this dude. And, like, Tim Elliott just volunteered. That's, like, that's not even other people they could have called up. And I'm like, hey, come be a sacrificial lamb for this guy.

Like, this is just bad matchmaking. And I hope to shit that more that Chris Mortino comes in and pulls off the upset of his life. Because it would be the funniest thing in the world. It's interesting because, I mean, Chris's guy haven't fallen for a while. while. The guy's style is actually perfect for this situation because he's not going to get intimidated by Sean O'Malley. He's going to go right after him. And as happy as I am for Chris's his team, I think even he understands what he's doing next Saturday. And I think the odds will kind of agree with him. And I think a lot of people know, like the UFC is putting you in this vision because they feel like Sean's going to style on you. And I think that could be some motivation. I don't think the fight lasts very long. I think he just makes it a fun scrap for as long as it lasts. So we will see. if the sugar show continues on, AKA, would you like to add to this? Yeah, Mike, look, strangeer things have happened.

I mean, at a base level, as Jed is saying, every fight is risky. Again, especially when it's someone people aren't familiar with, who knows. But I think he's such a lower risk than a Tim Elliott. Even a Ray Borg, I think, is a much, much, much higher risk than Chris Muteinio. Again, no disrespect. What? You have to get real wins over real people.

And Tim, you're acting, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're acting like, no, no, you're acting like his only, no, no, no, no, you're acting like he's only, no, no, no, no, no, he's only fought cans. Did he not just knock out Thomas Almeida? Did he, did he not knock out any, didn't he fight Marlon Chio Barrett? No, no, no, no, did these fights not happen? Did these fights not happen?

Why do you, why do you say he's only fighting can't? Why you say he needs, he, oh, now it's time to step up. He stepped up, he stepped up already. He stepped up already. Where, where, this is revisionist. We're pretending like these fights didn't happen. People can, no, you can, now you can question, did he catch these guys at their best? That's another discussion.

And that's fine, that's fine. But these are names. These are names. These are names. These are credible fighters. I agree with you on the point. There's a huge gap between a Chris Mutino and a Tim Elliott of Ray Borg. I guess we can't run over, you know, the names of all these guys already.

But, but it's, there is so little reward to beating a Tim Elliott, to beating a Ray Borg. Rickie Simone would be another story, but like we said, there's a bunch of other reasons why that didn't happen. But when it comes to being this dude, Tim Millie, he's a flyweight. Tim Elliott, he's a flyweight. But that's what I'm telling you. He's a flyweight.

You're risking a guy who can outgraple him and make him look bad on the ground. You're not meant to be something. But what, and that's exactly what people are going to say. You're right, Jed. That's exactly what people have said if he lost to Tim Elliott. If he loses to Chris Matino, it's bad. I think it's just as bad.

but I'm saying it's a lower risk. It's way worse. Sure, but he's much more likely to beat Chris Moutinho than he is Tim Elliott. And if you don't agree with that, you are just not watched either guy. You don't know anything about either guy. I'm sorry. I decided to say you don't know anything about either guy. I believe that Joe Malady is very talented and can beat Tim Elliott who's like 50 and a flyweight.

Exactly. So what does he gain from that? He either loses to a flyweight. He either loses to a flyweight on short notice or he knocks out a flyweight. Whoopty freaking do. That is what I'm talking about you. How can you say, how can you say, how can you say there's a big reward? Such a big reward gap between freaking Tim Elliott, who I respect.

Hammer and tongs with the greatest fighter we've ever seen. Hammer and Tongues. Hammer and Tongs? Guys, you all have fight past. You can watch the Tim Elliott, Demetius Johnson, fight yourself. Amazing fight. It's not, he's not going hammer and tongs, Demetrius Johnson. Quit it.

Stop it. Don't lie to America. You're very convincing. Don't lie to America. You're very convincing. Don't lie to America, all right? that's another story. Did he not win two rounds against DJ?

Jed, you can convince people, don't lie to them. That's another story. You can convince people, don't lie. Did he not win two rounds against DJ? Yeah, that's great. But you're acting like it was just back and forth like more. So he won two rounds against three rounds. How the last three rounds go?

How the last three rounds go? That dude is down an accomplishment. How the last three rounds go? Go into New England, bro. Who's going to rock him like a Patriot's at? That's the year? How the last three rounds go? How the last three rounds go, the DJ, Tim Elliott fight go?

Yeah. He lost the last three rounds go. Do you know how many people have won rounds against that's Hamer and Tongs? That's Hammer and Tongs? I'm giving you a chance to change your wording here. I'm giving you a chance to change your wording. I know what you mean.

I know what you mean. I'm just giving you a chance to change your wording here. Because it ain't hammering tongs. That ain't the correct. That ain't the crack raising. That ain't the crack raising. That seems to me matter a lot more than some dude from Boston. It won't.

It won't. If you think, if he beats, you know how it may fans think. He beats Tim Elliott, he gets the exact same criticism. Oh, he knocked out a flyweight. Or he goes to a decision with a flyweight. There's so little to gain between. Why sacrifice a guy and let's think about the other side of it.

Why put an L on Tim Elliott or, again, not my Cuban, I don't know, Rob, but why bring in a contracted guy to the UFC? Just to take a loss, that's what you bring in new guys for. If the goal, the main goal of this is to build Sean O'Malley and just keep him on this Connor McGregor card, then it doesn't matter who you get. And that's why I'm not saying they couldn't have done better, but I'm saying I have no problem with this particular. It's not a travesty or anything that they brought in some newbie. I think it has the same effect as him fighting almost anyone on short notice, except for again, maybe Marab, Ricky Simone,

which were, again, Maraub was never going to happen. Ricky Simone, we know just didn't work out. So that's my case for it. It is that it's- Louis-Smolko, renowned Bantam-Wa. But I'm saying, so how much worse is this than the original? interchangeable people. Nobody would have to be in a different.

Exactly. Exactly. And you, thank you, Jed, again, thank you for this. You know what? You helped me last round. Thank you for help me this round as well. Interchangeable. Exactly.

It didn't matter who Sean Malley. It doesn't matter who Sean O'Malley. You just said interchangeable. It doesn't matter who Sean O'Malley fights at 264. It just matters that he fights on 264, that he stays in the card. You're right. Listen, listen, listen, listen, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is people, not all of the world and Louis Smolka.

I said Louis Smolka and Tim Elliott are interchangeable. This is, that was fun. That was fiery. This is why I put it on Twitter. This is like, were they ever friends to begin with? Maybe not. That was a hell of a round, John, but we have to move on. We have to move on.

AK's all about meritocracy unless it comes to freaking Sean O'Malley, then bring in the jobbers for him. I don't get it. It's a short notice fight. Oh, yeah, bringing in Tim Elliott on a 125 on a short notice, really maintaining that meritocracy. That's how that works. Come on, man.

That is much more meritocracy. That's how that works. The point for round three after one of the more fiery rounds on the history of this program goes to, I mean, how can I not give it to Alexander K. Lee for that? I mean, I'm telling you. The guy yelled. It is as good as this dude from Boston that you know that I've never heard of. My blood is boiling the shoe.

It's because AK became maybe the first person in the history of Blue Yeti microphones to actually hoist the microphone off of its table and use it like a handheld mic. I'm flush. I need the full minute. I need the full minute in my corner. I'm flushed. That was. I'd never seen you like that.

that before. I'm a little, I'm a little perturbed. I don't even know if I'm going to disagree with you on onto the next one ever again. Chris Moutinho. Chris Moutinio. That's what it took. Wow. All right. So we're going to wrap things up with something we've done in the past, a pot-perie round, if you will, a mixed bag of lingering topics that we're going to get to, we're going to get to as many as we can, as much as time allows. But we're going to begin Jed Michoud with philanthropist Jake Paul, along with Triller, donating. a combined $30,000 to UFC fighter Sarah Alpar's GoFundMe page. And this was really cool to see for Sarah.

I'm actually, I was actually in that middle of interviewing Sarah Alpar when she told me about Jake Paul donating. So you got to see like my actual reaction to this before Jake even tweeted out that he made the donation. So I thought that was really cool. The, the Triller thing was great. She was touched by all of it. So what do you make of this move by Jake Paul and Triller to change this UFC woman?

life like this, Jed. This is definitely something to behold. Look, on a personal is not the right word, on a like direct note, it's great. Like, I'm super happy for her. This is, like, it's a heartwarming thing. On a professional business note, this is awesome because it is,

Jake Paul is, you can hate him and that's fine. I was not a big fan. I'm still not a big fan of him as a person in general, but he is just pitch perfect and the role he is adopted in playing. Like, I love that he has just become the absolute fuck you to Dana White. I just, hey man,

you aren't paying your fighter shit and I'm going to call you out on it constantly because they won't because you have the power of the pin over their contracts, but you don't own me. It's awesome. And I hope he continues to do it forever because it is both like super, needed just in life and it's really great for everything he's trying to accomplish here. And doing it in ways like this that are to tangibly help, fighters who need help. Like everything that he said about this is right.

Like it is, this is not new. We'll be super clear. Like this has been going on for a while. But it is genuinely shameful that any fighter in the UFC has a job that's not full-time fighter. And it never ceases to baffle me when the UFC, even like promotes that as well stepe me itchich is still a full-time firefighter and i know stepe is actually one of the dudes who like could not do it he is financially solvent in that way but like

you just shouldn't be talking about oh here's here's this guy who has to work at dairy queen to make ends meet like that's that is catastrophically awful and says volumes about your little business that this is you purport to have the best fighters and the best athletes in the world and they're living on scraps. So yeah, it's super great. Shouts to Triller for being like, hey, Dana, you, for no good reason, like literally no reason of any value whatsoever, you decided George St. Pierre can't fight Oscar De La Jolla in a boxing match that would have been dumb and fun as hell.

So we're just going to make you look like an absolute jackass. I know Dana doesn't care. He's got $500 million or whatever, but it warms the heart to see people take shots of Dana white because he deserves them, man does he deserve them. What do you think? What did you think of all this, AK? We have, you know, she's starting this GoFundMe and, you know, people, articles are being written about it and then Jake Paul comes in, then Triller comes in,

and those two alone made her goal for the entire year. What did you make of this heartwarming story? I love the gamesmanship of it. I mean, look, Triller and Jake Paul, they know how to pull out these stunts. They know how to time them. Again, as Jayh kind of mentioned, say what you want about Jake Paul as a person. There's plenty not to like, plenty to find absolutely deplorable. But in this situation, it's almost like it reminds me of Jose Canseco kind of being the one to blow the lid off of, you know,

PEDs and steroid usage in baseball. It's like, oh, gosh, it has to be this guy. You know what I mean? And the reasons for doing it might not be completely altruistic. You know, Jose Canseco was selling a book at the time. And with Jake Paul, if you want to be really serious, you. cynical about it. It's, you know, it's a publicity thing. It's keeping his name out there. But even the most cynical view of it, it's still, they still helped out, Sarah Alpar. They still helped out this

fighter. I feel it's still bringing awareness to this issue, which again, I think, I don't want to insult our listeners and our viewers, I think a lot of people are aware of this, but to see someone kind of from the outside shine a light on it and be so vocal about it. And it was such a platform. I mean, again, I know he's not, he's not for everybody. He's a very, very, very famous person Jake Paul is. So for him to do that, again, whether it's because he's benefiting from it or not, it is bringing attention to this to this thing. And we can only hope, again, being as optimistic as possible, we hope this leads to some sort of change. But, and I've said this, but I don't, I have to phrase this because I don't want to call anybody out, but he is helping publicly.

He is helping UFC fighters more than UFC fighters are helping other UFC. fighters. And I'm not saying, and I don't want to make it sound like, oh, every UFC fighter is supposed to, you know, pick each other up. It's a super competitive individual sport. Obviously, not everyone is going to give money to their tenure, someone they could potentially fight someday or their teammate could fight or just someone they don't like. They've got their own stuff to worry about. That's not on them, okay, you know, but some of the higher tier people, like a John Jones, for example, who's only kind of in the last couple of years really started chiming in about fighter pay. You know, what if that, what if that had happened early? You know, what if he had been a voice for this? And again, he's got to look out for himself. We completely know why. But the fact that is Jake Paul, who's the one who's coming forward, it's a bit of a shame. And I wish that the M.M.A. The fighters, the community in general, that they could find a way to sort of band together.

But until they do, yes, there's a reason why a lot of combat sports fans are now looking to Jake freaking Paul as a virtuous voice in this fighter pay argument. I cannot believe we're saying this. Yet it is the truth. It is the truth. The voice of the voiceless, Jake Paul. Look at this. Turning M.MA on its ear and he's not even in the sport.

But we'll squeeze in one more. We get time for one more. I want to go back to this past Saturday, gentlemen, because we saw the ending to the co-made event between Tanner Bozer and Ovin St. Prue. Bozer obviously has a great first round. He gets taken down in the second. Was in a tough spot for a few moments.

Then there's fence gate, or cage gate, as he called it. where the broadcast thought that Tanner Bozer grabs the fence. Upon replay, extra viewings, he did not grab the fence. Jason Herzog moved in, appeared to make contact with OSP. Tanner gets up, stops the fight with the knee and the punches and so forth and so on. So OSP tells us not long after that that he's appealing this, not because of the fence or anything like that, but because Herzog went in there and made contact without pausing the action.

So AK, I know you sort of touch on this and on to the next one, but I'll ask you again, maybe some, maybe your tune has changed over the last couple days. Does OSP have a gripe in your opinion? Not saying, is this going to get overturned? But does he have means to file this appeal? Does he have a gripe? Yeah, yeah. I'm with team OSP on this one.

And nothing against Bozer because it's my understanding. The meat of their complaint is, yeah, it kind of stemmed from some confusion over the fence grab. But they're really trying, what they're really going to file, I don't know if they've already filed, going to file their appeal over is that the referee touch. OSP during sort of that fight ending flurry, which caused like just even the slightest hesitation. And I'm sure people will watch and say, well, did it really make a difference? Yeah, man. Yeah, in a frigging fight, the referee touched you for a second.

You hesitate when someone like a Bozer is throwing bombs at you. It's going to matter that half a second, a quarter of a second could make a difference in a fight. That's just dangerous. So I think the complaint is completely legitimate. Again, not not defense grab. I hope. I know, again, I know you spoke to Tanner Bowes. He's kind of cleared that up saying, the replay clearly showed it.

His hand was in a fist. There's just no way he could have grabbed. He could have possibly grabbed the fence. Daniel Corme was very outraged about it in the moment. I'm sure once he saw the footage, I don't think he would correct himself in the broadcast, but I would hope that he saw the footage later and realized he was an error in calling out what he thought was an illegal move by Bozer. So that's a non-factor defense grab, but the referee touching you. And by the way, I think Jason Herzog, fine official, consistently, very good.

I think in this case he had an off moment. There was just some confusion in there. And yeah, I think if you get touched by the referee, that's a pause in the action or a stoppage of a fight. And if OSP says that that was his understanding what happened there, when Herzog touched him, I believe him. I believe him. I think he thought there was going to be a pause at the very least.

And it might have caught. I don't know if he wins the fight, but I don't know if he loses the fight there in that situation. I don't know if he gets finished in the second round. What do you think, Jed? Does he have a grape? Well, I'm glad AK brought up Daniel Cormier because Cormier is right. Can't grab the cage. You can grab towels, but you can't grab the cage.

Yeah, as far as the gripe here, no. I mean, sure. Like, 100%. Jason Herzog screwed the pooch here. You don't touch the fighters unless you're stopping the action. I just don't see how that affected this fight. Not like the broader outcome. Like literally in the micro, I don't see what happened here.

AK wants to say, yeah, a half second can make a difference from Tanner Bozer's throwing bombs. That's totally true. Tanner Bozer wasn't throwing bombs because Tanner Bozer was on at the three-point stance with OSP leaning on top of them when the stoppage came in or the touch, not the stoppage. And when I watched it, I haven't rewatched it a bunch. I watched it, you know, the evening of and the replays. It didn't look to me that OSP stopped fighting or that that touch from the referee. really created a window for Boehser to then get out. Like they were there for another couple of seconds and then Boer pivoted out and OSP

was gassed and then he got got. Like it's, sure, he has a gripe insofar as Jason Herzog should not have done what he did. But that's not enough of a gripe to get anywhere. Like if I were the commission and be like, yeah, I'm not going to overturn this win for Tanner Boser because Herzog touched you for. a half second because I just don't think that it was substantive. And we all know it's not getting turned over.

So if OSP wants to spin his wheels and take his time, he can do that. He's a grown man who gets to make those choices. But my advice to OSP would just be don't do that. Value your own time. And you can be mad about it, but go throw rocks into the ocean or whatever it is you do. to deal with it because you know, like, you know that what you are doing is fruitless. And I don't mean, oh, well, it has a chance or whatever. This can accomplish something.

And like, this will accomplish absolutely nothing. You are not going to get the win overturned by, there's no world he even thinks that. And you're not going to get punishment handed down to a referee. That doesn't happen. It's not a thing. Nor does Jason Herzog deserve it. Yeah, he screwed up in this instance. But it's one of those things where you just go to.

and be like, hey, Jay, man, don't do that. Like, it's not like, ah, we need to find you, whatever. Again, it wasn't a super substantive thing. It was a mental lapse by Jason Herzog, who's normally a very good referee. And filing an appeal just kills trees and time for no benefit whatsoever. OSP, value your time. Maybe just spend all the time you do back in the gym because you haven't looked super hot lately. And if you're going to continue fighting, you should maybe just work

things that can actually help your career as opposed to waste a lot of administrative time and paper. I can I say I love the environmental message there. Shout out. Shout out of, I love the environment. I can't hate on that. I can't hate on that. The paper usage, it's a strong, I didn't see him going there. That's a strong counter.

That's a strong counter. But, Chad, I will just add this. For once, Jed, would you think of the children? This is about the principle. This is about the principle of a man being. done wrong. Sean O'Malley deserves to fight no name.

Oh, you're still sad. I won the round, bro. I won the round, bro. That's two rounds ago, bro. Oh, no, that's last round. That's last round. It feels like two rounds ago. Please teach me about principle.

Listen, someone's got to think of the children. OSP and his team are doing this for the children. Look, there's zero. I don't want to say zero chance. There's 0,000,000, however many zero is one chance that this gets overturned. it's it's because i think you have to prove i think when you're trying to get one of these these things overturned you have to prove like either like like gross incompetence

assassination to get something yeah grossing it's like gross incompetence or some sort of like i don't go as far as say corruption you have to kind of prove that they had like some you know this that's the way it is with uh with judging that you know that there was some influence i to say sorry and uh that's again jason harrizaga has a very outstanding reputation i don't see how they would blemish it with this. So it's not getting overturned. But I'm just saying, I do think it's the principle of it if people care about that at all. So I apologize to the trees. I apologize to the trees. The paper may have, hopefully not too much paper is wasting this appeal. OSP, come on, you know, we live in a paperless world, email, you know, put that stuff on the cloud.

Don't use the fax machine. Let's try and save some power there too. And, you know, just OSP, be ready when this doesn't go anywhere. Yeah, be ready. We got some audio. Mike, we got some audio. Yeah, Mike, we have issues on your microphone. Kick, kick Mike out. I'll take over the mistake.

There's a hum disconnect. We can out on it. It's just sounding crazy. Ooh, this is fun. Technical difficulties. We'll have it. We'll have a fix in a second. I'll host the final.

question, Mike, don't worry. I got this. Uh-oh. No, hold on. Chad, just give him one second. Otherwise, we will go with your question. All right, Mike. I'm actually talking again, Mike. How about now? Oh, there you go. Hey. I see, I knew it. No problem. That's why I don't, you know, I don't fall through under pressure. Things happen. Sometimes we get storms here in the Berkshires. Sometimes the Wi-Fi likes to mess around a little bit. kicked me out of the room for a second. And I'm glad you guys were sort of still bickering

because nobody even noticed that I like got kicked out of the room and came back in. So it was great. From, oh, damn it. Okay. So the point for round four from what I heard anyways, and this is some good stuff, it goes to Captain Planet himself, Jedmishu.

It is tied to. I didn't think about the paper. Gosh. Stupid. Ah, the paper, obviously. Should have gone the other... Yes. I thought of the paper.

The planetaires are proud. The planetaires are proud after that response from Jeddman's shoes. That means it's time for the knock-out-around. I will admit, it has been a crazy day. Lots of interviews, taking care of the dog and the kid and all that stuff. So, I thought of this question momentarily, but the knock-around for those who are new to the program, I'm going to ask one question,

a.k. there's going to be 35 different doors to choose from. No, I'm just kidding. It'll literally be one. question. Just one question. Very simple. Probably the simplest question I've ever asked in the show. Each competitor will have one minute to give their response and explain their answer. Once that is done with the help of the live studio audience, we will turn on over to the judge, the jury, the executive producer, E. Casey Liden to render the final decision. And we will crown a winner for this week. I don't know what that means. I don't know if there's going to be an interim title after this or an actual title. I don't know. But this is just a good old fashioned grudge match. You see Casey Liden, the baddestash in MMA media on the

the bottom right hand corner of your screen. I am the title. Well, I mean, technically you come into this with the champion's prerogative because you are coming off of a victory in the tag team extravaganza. You are one half of the inaugural BTL tag team champions. So what would you like to do here, Jed? If I pin one half of the tag team champions, do I earn a tag team title show? It's very possible.

Yes. I would say yes. That's, yes. It's a new point, but I would say yes. All right. So, Jed, who's going first? Now remember, Yeah, but remember

AK likes to go first. That's his jam. I know. Please let me go first. Please. But only do a really mean thing to him, I'm going to let him go first so he can feel very good about himself. Yeah.

Okay. AK is very excited about this. Maybe he might hoist the microphone off the table again. Going first. All right. So, AK, I'm going to make this very simple, okay? We have just officially turned the calendar to July. It is now a new.

month in the UFC. There's multiple events, a lot of big fights coming our way, including Sean O'Malley versus Chris Boutinho, which you're very excited about. So the question is, very simply put, what is the best fight for the month of July? What's the fight that you got circled on the calendar above all else? All right? One minute on the clock. We're waiting for the timer. There it is. Your time starts now. Oh, Mike. You are my best friend. You really, you really cued this up for me. Look, I have said this publicly. I cannot back down from it now.

And it's happening right at the end of July. So it's just making it in. The one to watch this month is Petrucio Pitbull, A.J. McKee, featherweight Grand Prix final two-division champion Patricia Pitbull facing the unbeaten A.J. McKee has never lost before. He is a Bellator. A.J. McKee is a Bellator product born and brashiel. They hyped him up, obviously the son of a fighter.

They hyped him up from the first day he was signed. They built him up perfectly, giving him just the right competition, the right prospects. A leveled up that competition would need to be. He's gone from winning decisions to highlight real finishes. And Patricia Pitbull, maybe one of the top, like, five or six pound for pound guys today. He's a two-division champion. He beat Michael Chandler. He's been near unstoppable, 145.

There's money on the line. This is the fight to watch. Patricia Pitbull, A.J. McKee, July 31st. All right. A.K. was ready for this one. Said it was teed up. Jed Michoud immediately regretted his decision of exercising the champion's prerogative. But this is why Jed is the winningest player of all time.

Sometimes you make mistakes, but sometimes you're able to bounce back in a big way. So can he do it here? One minute on the clock, what is the best fight coming up in July, that we should all circle on our fight cards. One minute starts right now. A.K.'s I'm not here to dispute everything he said, because that fight is awesome. I'm tuning in.

I'm there with bells on. I love me, some AJ McKee. He might be the best featherweight in the world. But his answer's just not quite right. A lot of people are going to think we're going to go with Connor McGregor, because when Connor McGregor fights, it's an event, Dustin Boyd, best lightweight in the world. I'm not. What I'm going with, it's a bit theoretical here, but it's the only way I know how to be.

and it's Fight Circus 3, baby. That's right. Fight Circus has been postponed twice. It got better after the first one. It got postponed. It had the phone booth Muay Thai fight. They had to postpone it because of COVID. Then it was going to be a phone booth left-wide fight.

Lethway, however you say that I'm not going to pronounce things. Mike, head butts and everything in a phone booth. It got postponed again because of COVID-19. I think that's going to happen finally in the month of July, and we're finally going to get the phone booth, lethway, might be phone booth knife fight by that point. Who knows, but I'm there for it. Oh, that's great.

That's great. Wow. Casey's got a big decision to make after those two answers. So lots of good fights coming up in July. Not one mention of T.J. Dillishaw versus Corey Sanhagen. Not even a single, not even, nothing on Wonderboy and Gilbert Burns. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

But that's fine. Are they fighting in a phone? Tush. we will let the answers come in. Of course, let me just remind you. There is no big event this week. So no preview show, no post-fight show, no people's pre-fight show, no people's pre-fight show. Because there's no people's pre-fight for anything because there's no fights coming up this weekend.

However, again, shout out to Titan FC. Shout out to CFFC. There is action coming up this weekend, if you so choose to watch MMA. With that being said, let us turn it out over to Casey Leiden to render the final decision. We get Jed. We got AK, both with compelling answers. AK was on fire. He lifted the blue Yeti microphone off of his desk.

That is literally in the instructions to never do. But he did it. Jed Mishu brought out fight circus, an event not even on the calendar at this moment. Who wins? Who's the winner of this incredible matchup? Well, first off, thank you, gentlemen. It was a splendid competition. Just a level mixed martial arts debate.

Wow, um, we have, I mean, AK, that means just on a personal note, that is, that is one of the biggest fights I'm looking forward to all year is that Belichore Featherweight fight. But the theoretical knife phone booth fight, oh man, I made my decision. Your winner is AK Lee. Oh my God This streak Wow I'm about to follow the field Mike

The Treesio people And A.J. McKee are fighting on July 31st But we know that as the main event That fight won't actually happen Until August 1st Because it'll happen after midnight Because I'm filing my opinion

10 minutes ago Why didn't you I didn't think I need it? But like OSP, I'm filing the on the principle of matter. That fight will not take place in July. Thus, he's eligible to him. Wow.

All the children watching, I want you to be like Jed. He's standing up for what he believes it, and I respect that. I respect that, and you should all respect yourselves. This is a massive moment in the BTL career of Alex K. Lee,

and with that, my friend, here we go. Look at the graphic. Here we go. Here comes the graphic. Here we go. That's a temporary W. Four!

That is a temporary W. Because my feel will stay. That was hard earned. This man pushed me to the... I snapped. I definitely snapped at some point. I'm going to have to watch this one back because I don't remember...

There's definitely a stretch of where I don't remember what happened. It's just darkness. And then I came back. And I saw that I'd won the round. So, Jed... Look, sorry, Mike, should I use my time here to... Yes, yes. Listen, this is...

Jed pushed me, all right. My best friend, you pushed me as well with your amazing questions. And also, thank God, for giving me some of a final question I could actually answer properly. Jed, for letting me go first. Because if you had gone first and said a bit bull, AJ, I would have been screwed. But, yes, and for making me be a better BTL competitor. So thank you for that, Jed. So that is my, I am just grateful to Jed.

And everyone in an NBA fighting, the producer Casey, and our returning family guys, Sean Al Shadier, Hawaii, everyone, I'm just super happy. I wanted, this is a victory for all of us. And all of us, everyone, by the way, in the comments, who keeps saying that I won last time, I won the time before that, who said I won today.

I cannot do it without you guys. You guys are the real champions. Mwa. Jed, what do you have to say? Besides the fact that you're going to be writing a letter to the BTL Championship Committee. Look, AK said that I would have chosen Pitbull McGee, and I wouldn't have because I would never choose an illegal fight because I'm a clean fighter. That's how I play the game, Mike, one way, honest, and in fan of heavyweights and awkward, weird MMA.

That's what I went for, and I should have been rewarded. And just to be as clear as possible, I will do the accounting this month. And when, when fights work happens in July and AK's choice happens in August, I'm going to demand that be changed. It should be changed in principle now. But when all is said and done and I'm proven correct, I'm going to need that to be fixed because that is an undeserved loss on my record. Jed, the class, the class as always, I admire you, sir.

I admire how you always handle these things with your. unique a plum. Look, as we always say in Miss Fisday, Kay, if you're not cheating, you're not trying. But I thought that our team here would weed out the cheaters like you. And that's not what they did. They allowed you to cheat your way to a title. You are the Al Jermaine Sterling of this promotion. Thank you. Thank you. I am, I don't even like Peter John, so I'm not sure why I went on that. That was the topic. But you get the point. I should have won this trash. But I am a man of my word. Can you?

Yeah. So you pick yourself a tag team partner and me and Fernando will put the pause on you. We'll give you that word. Jed, can you do one thing for me? Cyril Gunn. Cyril Gunn. Serial gun. Serial.

I'm doing nothing to you now ever been training to rip that ass next week when I get Nanda by my side to de-up our belts. Oh, man. I love this. A mystery tag? It's tag titles on the line. We get Jed and Fernanda versus AK and a mystery partner. This is amazing. And that's all going to go down next week right here on between the links.

We are getting out of here. Big shout out and thank you to all of you for watching and listening to the program. Next week's going to be a big one. Tag titles and right before UFC 264. In fact, right before the UFC 264 press conference featuring the notable names on this card, Connor and Porier and Thompson and Burns should be an electric episode. So we'll see you then.

So for Casey, Jed. AKA I am Mike Heck. Thank you for watching. We'll see you next week between the links. Good night, everybody. This has been Between the Links and an MMA fighting production on the Vox Media Network.

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