MMA Fighting - BKFC KnuckleMania Post-Fight Show

Episode Date: February 6, 2021

With BKFC’s KnuckleMania in the books, MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck, Damon Martin and E. Casey Leydon break down the top storylines of Friday night’s event, including Britain Hart’s unanimous decision win over Paige VanZant in the main event, along with Chris Leben’s first-round KO victory in his retirement fight.  Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Damon Martin: @DamonMartin Follow E. Casey Leydon: @ekc 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

With Instacart, you get groceries that over-deliver. Like when you get groceries that are the same prices in-store. With no markups that select retailers, you get in-store products for in-store prices, and the only thing that isn't in-store is you. That means you could order in-store products at in-store prices while you're in sweatpants, in spin class, in stuffy work meeting, in anywhere but in-store.

So download the app today and get $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. Service fees exclusions in terms apply. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Well, good evening, everybody. It's Friday night in some parts. It's Saturday morning in some parts as well. It's Saturday morning where I'm at,

and BKFC's knucklemania just came to an end, and we saw Paige Van Zant fight gallantly and valiantly in her BKFC debut, but unfortunately she was on the wrong end of a unanimous decision to a very gritty and very game. Britain Heart, huge win for her. And we wish her a big heartfelt congratulations. It was a fun night of bare-knuckle action in Florida. It was a crazy event.

Had a little bit of everything. And we're going to talk all about it with all of you guys. I am Mike Heck being joined by Damon Martin, who is here. We don't have video of Damon, but his melodious voice will be here. Damon, how are you, sir? Damon? Damon, hello? Damon is so enthralled with the event.

You are muted, Damon. I see you're muted. It's on your side. I can't unmute you, sir. Hey, man, everything went so well. Oh, we figured that out. Until we press live. Well, how are you, Casey?

I'm doing wonderful, sir. You know, just Friday night. Talking about some fist fighting. Oh, dude, I am a, I am not Josh Gross. I am not Mr. Grumpy. I enjoy. I enjoy a good fist fight for a bag of money. So, yeah, I had some issues of the event, but overall, very fun.

Damon. All right. Can we hit Damon up on? Yeah, I'll message him right now. I just, I just said. Oh, okay. Yeah, he is, I haven't missed yet. Yeah, he is muted, but that's from his end.

he has no idea why. What? Should we have him like hop out and hop back in maybe? Yeah, if you can just log out and log out again. If you can hear us, Damon. Okay, he just logged out. Okay, cool. While we await for his arrival,

Britton Hart comes through with a big win against Paige Van Zant. And it seemed like early on, Casey, when... Damon, can we hear you? Can you hear me now? There we go. Yeah. It was because I complained about the music because I was like I like the music, but we just watched BKFC, so I felt like it should have been like five-figure death punch or something coming in. Welcome to the post-fight show, Damon.

So, all right, I'll start with you now that you're here. Britton Hart gets a big win over Paige Van Zand. Page showed a lot of gusto in the fight. She showed she could take some shots. she can land some shots. The fifth round, she showed a little bit of urgency, and that was definitely her best round of the fight. But what did you think of the performance page,

making her BKFC debut? There were a lot of questions. Did you think outside of not getting the win, do you think she answered a lot of those questions from some of the critics who questioned her decision to sign with BKFC? To a point. I mean, you know, I think obviously she avoided like a brutal knockout,

which would have been probably the worst way for her debut to go. But obviously, she said, still lost. And outside of that fifth round, it was a fairly lopsided fight. I mean, Britain was landing to better punches. She looked more comfortable in the pocket. You know, Paige used a lot of footwork in the opening round, but then even when she got in the clinch, like she couldn't really land the punches. Britain was hitting her to the body. She just never really let her hands go. It looked like she focused a lot on her defense, which prevented her from eating too many punches, but she did have a pretty good mouse under her eye. And Britain had a stinger of her right hand that just

kept clubbing page all night long. So not a bad showing at all, but obviously a disappointing, you know, night for her that she didn't get to win, but she did stick around to the final bell. And, you know, to her credit, Britain Hart's, you know, now a four-time veteran of BKFC. So they didn't throw her, you know, like a give-me opponent for her debut. Yeah, Britain has come a long way. She has absolutely paid her dues and she gets better and better with each fight. What did you think of the main event, Casey, Britain Hart's performance, even Paige Van Zanzan's performance?

Paige Van Zant I'm gonna I'm making a lot of trying to look inside of her head here but I think she was fighting not to lose I don't think she was fighting to win especially at the beginning of the fight I think it took her a few rounds

I don't know if it's ring rust I don't know if she's just she's just maybe just uncomfortable of the environment because I'm familiar with the environment I mean obviously she is unfamiliar of the environment but it just took her way too long to get warm in there

and it wasn't too that Like, I predicted Brittenland was going to win this, but I thought the path of victory for Paige to win was just her pure, just aggression and just go forward, go forward, and just use that toughness and just blah, blah, blah. But we really didn't see that until the fifth round. When if that, the page in the fifth round when it showed up in round one, we have a completely different fight. But that wasn't the case. Page, I think that Damon said it wasn't the worst case scenario. she gave a respectable performance tonight, for sure. Just, she's got to get better.

She has, I don't know if they, she didn't get knocked out. But, yeah, just, we, I mean, no one ever really thought Patri was a great stand-up striker, especially for her hand in the first place. So I think that's why we were all a little bit shocked as even was happening in the first place. But, yeah, Mr. Brent Hart looked very good tonight and Paige looked rusty, I guess. Did you guys, you guys heard the rumors, right?

About like going into this, there was a rumor that they were talking about potentially matching her up against Rachel Ostevic. Did you guys hear that rumor? There was a rumor going around. Yeah, yeah, there was a rumor that like, and I don't mean any offense. I'm not saying this like as a dig to Rachel Ostevic, but like I feel like Paige would have done a lot better with somebody with a, you know, an equal zero and zero record because you could tell like I think she was so focused as as casey said not to lose like she was so focused on her defense of not eating punches that like she had her hands held high good job doing that good footwork you know she never got hit with like a really really big shot britain did tag her a few times but she never got really blasted but she never really let her offense go and you feel like maybe that's that that nervousness of you know throwing bare knuckle for the first time like you feel like maybe if she would have fought someone with you know another oh and oh no fussing you feel like you feel like maybe if she would have fought someone with you know another oh and oh fuck you feel like you feel like

or maybe it would have gone differently. But again, Britain's a, you know, three-time fighter. She went, you know, three, she went five rounds with Beck Rawlings in her debut. She just won a fourth round TKO. So, I mean, she had, like, legit barrenuckle experience. And, man, I got to tell you, watching these fights. And I've watched a lot of bare-knuckle fighting challenges. But, like, every time I watch it, like, I'm flinching and clenching.

Like, because it's just like, man, like, you know it's, like, so real when they're throwing these punches. So you're kind of like, yeah, like, that's not easy to step into. Yeah. I mean, that first, the first fight on the main card, Charissa Sagala and Taylor Jenkins, good God. Those two, good for them. That fight was crazy. It looked like two completely different people when it was all of a sudden done.

But yeah, it's one of those sports that like you watch it. It's like, man, this is raw. This is real. This is like, this is what it's all about. One thing you could tell why it was so real. And two of the fights toward the end, Chris Lieben's opponent and there's another one I forget. but they got punched in the face and both them thought they lost their eye you know they both thought they got eye poked you know and but it turned out no that's what it feels like when you get a bare

knuckle right in your eyeball you know so uh yeah it's it is a different type of pain to get hit of a bare fist even versus just because no knuckles are sharp you know so they really dig in so especially those like we hit right here like in those eye socket yeah is is a very painful feeling for So, Damon, you are obviously more experienced in this realm than I am. I will say that there was only one media member that covered the Valor BK event in South Dakota a couple of years back, and it was I. So I watched Mark Godbear almost killed Jack May that night, and that was a very interesting night of fights. But the big story coming out of this event was not Britain heart beating Page Van Zandt, but there was this mystery woman. who came into the ring at the end

and started a skirmish with Britt and Hart and then Britton Hart just cut this tremendous promo at the end that just I couldn't get enough up. Like I wanted to go on for 15 more minutes. It was that good. Do you know who this woman was, Damon? So it is another person from BKFC and I'm falling short right now

trying to come up with her name, but it is somebody else from BKFC. She was ringside and I want to say it was because I think they had a fight either earlier in the night or it was the last event, and I think it's her, but I can't remember. The name is, like, completely escaping me. But it is a BKFC person.

So, yeah, I don't think it was planned. I think we saw that with the other one with, I think it was Reggie Barnett jumping into the Datt and Wynn after he won the fight. Like, he just randomly jumped in the ring. And then we had this other girl throwing water bottles. I was like, that's what I tweeted after the fight. I was like, BKFC really needs to work on their ring side security because, like, they just got everybody hopping in the ring.

But do they? Do they really need to work on it? Because I don't know. I feel like just get on in there, guys. Like whatever COVID protocols there were, yeah, there were maybe recommended protocols. I don't think anything was actually enforced because there were like 60 people in that ring. So, uh, yeah, the whole socially distanced crowd thing, like I kept watching the crowd shots and I was like, nobody is six feet apart. Like nobody at all is six feet apart in this crowd.

They had like tables. up front. There was like 20, 25 people and then like literally like it seemed like 11 inches to their left and their right. There's another table of 20 to 25 people. But hey, listen, it's Florida. They do things a little bit differently. And it is what it is.

The co-main event was an awesome fight. Yes. That win and Johnny Bedford. That was a terrific fight. I thought that win won. It was very close. I think you probably have to go back and watch it

like when I'm not doing other things. But from what I saw, I thought that win won the fight. What did you think, Casey? The judges got that one right? Yes, they scored it right. I can't go. I can't break it down round by round, but I definitely felt that when won the fight. It was a great fight.

It was just, man, like, was it five? Are they two minute rounds, bare knuckle? Yeah, two minute rounds. So five, two minute rounds. Those gentlemen fought for 10 minutes straight. And it was nonstop. It was really exciting. It had, it was technical.

It was brawley. It just had everything. And just great performance. And clearly, they need to run that fight back. Well, I guess Reggie Burnett, but I don't know what's going on of him. But that was weird, but a very fun, weird. But yeah, I'm just kind of as a fan. I'm a big Johnny Bedford fan.

I really like watching him fight. I didn't know too much about that when. I heard good things about him. I saw the highlights. But excellent fight. just great fight and I was actually very impressed that the judges did score correctly and when I looked on Twitter most people seemed to say they had that win edging it out too so it doesn't seem like to be any sort of robbery yeah it was an awesome fight what did you

think of the title fight Damon yeah I had a three two for for that and a win no controversy they're great fight though man I because Bedford Bedford came after him early and dat tagged him up pretty hard you saw Bedford was rocked I think it was the end of the second round he was wobbled pretty hard. And then he came back. He landed some hard shots in his own later in the fight, but it just seemed like that was the more accurate fighter, better counter punches throughout the fight.

And it was weird because Johnny had so much size on him in terms of like his height and reach. Like you were kind of waiting for Johnny to actually use that, but he kept like kind of diving on the inside and like kind of negating his own reach, like not throwing straight punches. When he actually did throw straight punches, it seemed like Johnny was landing better.

But he just kept, like he was closing. his own distance. Like he kept diving in on Dat and then Dat was able to like counterpunch him. So it was a really good fight. I have a feeling. I think Johnny Bedford was like five and O going into that fight. So I feel like they're going to end up. Yeah, they're going to end up running that one back.

And I don't think he won't complain. It was a fun fight. Yeah. Reggie Barnack can wait. If you guys got some questions, I'll admit I was hype for Datwin and he fulfilled the hype and a fan of Dad's for a while now. Yeah, that was a great fight. before we get into some more questions about this event,

because there is a lot to talk about. Casey, I'm going to start with you. I know, I don't know how BKFC's, like, bonus structure is, but let's say it's similar to the UFCs, or they give like two performance bonuses and they give a fight of the night. Who are you giving it to? Fight of the night, clearly, Bedford win.

Other two performance of the nights. Chris Levin, obviously, I. You know what? Give Chris Leibon the two other performance. bonuses right there. So there you go. Chris Levin, two performance bonuses, and fight a night for a Bedford win.

Yeah, Chris Levin had basically two knockouts. So, yeah, you should get a performance. Oh, can we talk about, oh, sorry. Yeah, yeah. We'll talk about Chris Levin's fighting. I want to talk about Chris Levin's fight in a moment, but yeah, go on. Yes, we will.

I would give it to Levin. I'd give it to John Chalbeck too. That dude looked awesome. I know he fought a fellow Massachusetts guy who, I don't know. He was a little out match, but he was like the quintessential Massachusetts fighter

where he just took a beating but kept coming and then still landed shots as awkward as they looked. But man, that Chalbeck kid, that was his first barrenuckle fight. He looked awesome.

He looked really, really good. Even Chris Lytle was like... He knocked out the guy from the mustache, right? Is that... Yeah. Yeah, he fought the guy the best guy.

Yeah, sorry. A lot of these names are new to me, so I'm trying to, yeah. He fought Greg pro bono. I, I tell you what, I think I agree that Nguyen and Johnny Bedford get fighting a night, but I'm going to throw out like another one, because I thought the earlier fight just because it was a battle,

and even though it was kind of lopsied, it was still a fun fight, was the Taylor Starling, Carissa Seagullo. Finally, that was a really fun fight to kick off the card. And the other one I want to mention, I would agree. Chris Leavitt, of course, naturally you give it to him. And obviously I would say, because I don't think you have to get a knockout to get a performance bonus. And it's one thing I wish the UFC would actually change.

But I would say, Britton Hart, obviously, got to give her a performance bonus for doing what she did. But the other way I would mention is Haim Gazzali. Belator Ventron, 47 years old. Getting a knockout. That was crazy. I actually messaged David on Slack. I'm like, holy shit. Ham Gonzalez is on this card.

And, man, that was so crazy. That was awesome. I remember interviewing Ham Gonzali before his last Belator fight, because him and his son fought on the same card in Connecticut. It was that night. It was that Bellator event where, like, every fight. ended in a finish. It was like a clean sweep finishes from start to finish. And like his son like broke the submission record, like the quickest submission in Bellator

history. Oh, I didn't know that was the son. Okay. And now we meant, I'm putting it all together now. I remember that now. Yeah. Wow. Cool.

Was that the, was that the Mitch Rion? Was that the, why am I, the Russian? The Russian. Why am I not thinking his name? I mean, I can. Hairton off. Hairtonoff? Yeah.

Carrotano. Oh, there you got. Carrasol. That's the one. Yeah, that was the main event. I remember that. Yes, it was that card. It was a fun one.

And I remember interviewing him and he was like, yeah, this is my last fight. And then I'm going to, you know, do some other things. Find some other things that I love. I'm like, all right. Well, like what? He goes, I would have to do bare and knuckle fighting. I'm like, what? You are such a savage.

Yeah. He's like, I was like, like, you're just such a savage. He goes, yeah, I just want to try it. I was like, you're like 45 years old. I was like, don't you want to like not fight anymore? he goes, you know, listen, I'm still young enough. I could still go. I want to try it.

And damn it, you look pretty damn good tonight. I was about to say, because it said he was 47 years old, and the dude had like a six-pack. I'm like, I don't know what protein shakes he's drinking, man, but man, Florida Commission. Yeah, whatever, yeah. Florida, Florida, gonna Florida. Yeah, Florida is Florida.

Hey, but good for him, good for him. Yeah, that was a fun one too. Like, that was because he, if I remember, the night kind of is a blur now, but he got knocked down early and he comes back and gets to the knockout. So that was a really cool fight. Yeah, you come back. Like, it was, I tell you, I'm not, I'm not, listen. I know bare knuckles is not for everybody.

I'm not going to sit here and say that, you know, it can be, you know, tough to watch it moments and it can be brutal and things like that. But it is fun, man. Like I said, they've had a few fun events. I mean, listen, if you didn't enjoy the buildup to, you know, Ardlobub and Pauli Malagiajee, I mean, that was one of the biggest fights of 2019. You know what I mean? Like, I don't, you know, like, say what you will about Bear Knuckle. that was a huge buildup and that was fun and they've had some I mean obviously the jason night art of lobaugh fights have been fun so like I said it's not for everybody I'm not going to tell you to like you know you have to go buy their events or anything but they've had some fun events I agree oh big shout out to Dylan Kleckler too he had a nice body shot K.O. early on against Chris Jensen so that was a good finish that was brutal oh that straight shot right to the ribs oh that was awesome he was Dunskey like right away that does that does that was a good finish that was brutal oh that was a good thing Dylan Cleckler, go look at his record, man.

That guy is very successful. Great MMA career. Doing really well in BKFC too. So who lost? A Hawaiian kid that lost of the... Zach Zane. Zach Stane. All these guys that are fighting Bear Knuckle,

they come from such unique, different kind of organizations. Like, I didn't realize he was the guy that was supposed to fight Nick Newell and Bellator. Yep. And Nick Newell got COVID. And so he had, oh, that's all bare knuckle, you know.

So it's just, it's so interesting how each fighter's journey to get there is. That's the, that's kind of, you know. That was, that was a reaction. Mike mentioned it, but that was a reaction of us talking earlier. When he was in fighting, he literally mess with me, he's like, oh, my God, he's fighting. And so you just never know. Oh, and also, we probably want to talk about this, but Lorenzo Hunt, the guy that knocked out, Ra Morrow and that kind of kind of

it was kind of a boring fight to the knockout. Did he have glitter on him? I swear he like he looked like he had some glitter lotion on him. Like he was like just shiny. He had the two the two dancers come out of him but then it clearly wasn't choreographed correctly because the dancers came out first

and then they came back to the beginning. Like they did the walk out twice. It was like I love a good shit show so that was great. They walked so they danced and walked so quickly. Like they were out of the shot immediately. And Lorenzo Hunts is there dancing by itself.

It was great. The whole thing was great. The showmanship. And listen, the arena looked great. Like, it looks like a big deal. It looks like a big deal. Like knucklemania was like the perfect name for it because it was like a WrestleMania-esque setup for an event like that. It was, it looked great.

It looked great. Yeah. So I don't know if you know, Mike. I've been to like two, I've been to two bare knuckle events. I was at the first one and, no, I was at three. I've been at three. I was at the first and second one, and is that the Artem Polly one. And, dude, like, I know people want to shit on Baruncle, man, but they're live, it's, they're fun.

It's, it, it makes, the fighting is fun. I don't know. It's just this. Let me, let me say this also, and this is a tough one because, and Casey and Mike, you both know this, because we've covered a lot of, like, non-UFC Bellator shows over the years. Production on a regional or, like, a first time, second time kind of like show can be really, really rough. And I know this wasn't a first time BKFC show. This is obviously they've had, whatever, it is, 16, 17 big cards, but, like, a big pay-per-view like this.

Like, production value was great. I mean, the video looked great. Kudos to Fight TV and the other people who are produced the pay-per-view. Like, I never had a problem all night. There was no buffering, no problems with the pay-per-view. view. The camera work was great. Like it wasn't there wasn't like any of that kind of like B league stuff you expect out of a card when you see something that's not, you know, UFC or Bellatory when they've been doing it for years and years and years. You kind of expect

to be like, you know, kind of a C level show. And it looked great. Production was great. Sound was great. Like little things that can kind of, I won't say ruin a show that can definitely bring it down a notch. They got all that across the board. And Dave Feldman, the president, I've interviewed him many, many times. He gets it, man. And he understands the sport. He gets it, puts on a good show. And again, it's not for everybody. I'm not going to tell you it is.

But it's fun. And I hope for those who are watching who play the ponies and bet, I hope you didn't listen to Mystic Zach, because if you did, you probably lost some money tonight. I just want to throw that out there. Good old Mystic Zach coming in and trying to make some picks and stare people in the right direction. But yeah, it was a good event overall.

But my one thing that I will say about, bear knuckle that I wish they would do better. And it's just for like for our sake and for theirs as well, put some clips on social media. When there's a big finish, put those clips on social media so we can put them up there and promote your card and get you some extra views, especially if you're monetizing your social media, which you probably are with the amount of followers you have. Put some clips up there so we can share them so we can do some stuff with them. Like we wanted to like write up some of these finishes and we couldn't find them anywhere unless

like someone ripped off the video and we didn't want to do any gimmick infringement type stuff. So just put some clips up there. Other than that, tremendous night for them. But we have to talk about Chris Levin. We do have to talk about Chris Levin. Before we go to Chris Levin, I have to my gripe, and I'm hoping Bear Knuckles is listening. Man, two issues.

Just from a very video production standpoint, it was killing me. And regional promotions do this all the time. They go to the dang jib camera, the overhead camera, way too much, way too much. There were so many times you were probably watching it. And these guys are punching each other, these or ladies punching each other, you're creating the crap at each other. And there's a camera guy this close to them. Yet we're at this big jib camera about 30 feet away.

It was just like killing me. Like there's camera guys right there. I want to be right there. Because that's the charm of bare knuckle is that it's kind of brutal. And you want to see these little fists punch them in the face. You want to hear that. And Mr. Director, I know I know you have a tough job. I know lots of things are going on,

but just cut to the, cut to the better cameras faster. Please, please, please. All right, Mr. Lieben. Sorry. There you go. Sorry. All right.

Chris Levin, Damon. What a performance. He basically got two knockouts and ended. It was like the perfect Chris Leban exit. Like he had a wild firefight with a very tough guy, gets the win, rides off into the sunset, cuts a Chris Levin-esque promo at the end.

It was great. It was just like the perfect way you want to go out. So what does you do you? you think of his win and you know at this point it kind of like looking back at his career and all the legendary fights he had and all the wars what's kind of his legacy in your mind i mean it's i know you know again i'm not saying that everyone should go out of their career as a bare knuckle fighter but it's kind of like the perfect ending for chris leaven because he was always kind of that blood and guts you know you know kind of you know throw until one guy falls over kind of fire that's just

who he was and the win-l loser draw you know if you were getting into a fight with christ but it was going to be a fight. And so it's kind of perfect for him to go out as a bare knuckle fighter or 40 years old. And, you know, Chris has fought a lot of demons in his career, man, inside and outside the arc guy. He talked about in his post-fight speech. He was very, very brutally honest about that.

And when you see a guy at 40 stepping in there for one last fight, you kind of, you're kind of, you know, you're kind of cringed a little bit. You're like, man, I kind of expect the worst because, you know, sadly, so few fighters in combat sports. This goes across boxing, MMA, whatever. rarely do they go out standing and rarely do they go out in a memorable way that's a good way.

You know, usually you're like, oh, God, man, I wish you would have stopped or, oh, man, you know, you don't want your last image of a guy being, and listen, the guy's a legend, obviously, be like Anderson Silva, man, seeing him down on the canvas, getting knocked out by your eye haul.

Like, that's just not the image. I wish I had that guy for his last fight. There's so few George St. Pierre moments where a guy goes out on a win, or Habibner Maghrebatov where a guy goes out on a win. So seeing Chris leaving out there, throwing punches one last time, knocking a guy out basically twice in one fight. It lasts a minute, seven.

He doesn't really take any damage. I really, again, perfect way for him to go out. And I know it's an MMA or a combat sports retirement. So that pretty much means nothing in this sport. But I hope he is done. I hope that's, you know, I hope he can gladly go out with that kind of win. Yeah, I'd like to see him roughing some of these fights. You know what I mean?

Let's get him a license or at least get a job with BKFC. I think he deserves it. I think he was asking for one. He was asking for one post fight. I hope to someday be rocking a BKFC polo and walking around here. He absolutely should get him on as an ambassador of some kind. But, Casey, your thoughts on Lieben's win and, you know, the legacy he leaves behind in the sport. I've been a big fan of Leibin.

He kind of seems that he's part of that – it's weird because he's actually part of that generation of MMA fandom that I kind of – Actually, I kind of hate, and I kind of, you know, trashy shirts, you know, like, hey, let's just just bleed. But if you are going to go that way, go to Chris Levin Way, you know, just go all out. And so that's why I really appreciate him. He, he, he, I don't think we're going to see fighters like him at a high level, I don't know, in the near future. He, he's a rarity. And, um, and I've met him, I met him a few times. Nice guy.

Um, I've been to amateur MMA shows. He's refs, my friends fights and things like that. Oh, by the way, has a ref? He is, he is, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he like, like, he, like, bro, this isn't, this isn't, this isn't, like a UFC championship fight. These are, like, amateur guys. That's kind of, we're good, Chris, but, but, but Chris, he's a great guy.

And, um, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm just happy he just, he looks like, he looks, he looks happy. And as a fan, um, um, it's just, um, um, um, he looks, um, he looks, um, he looks happy. just feels nice and I'm glad he got the win and yeah I'm just he seems to be in a good place and and I'm just happy of life and where he is so yeah yeah I agree good on him congratulations huge wins the perfect way to go out and uh hopefully he's he stays out he's done enough in this in combat sports and we can we can go from there but good event overall do we have any uh any other questions thoughts on uh on knucklemania I haven't seen oh by Can I just say, because you just pulled up that comment before, the referee in that fight did a tremendous job, tremendous job, because, I mean, I didn't even see it.

But the way that that dude reacted, yeah, Trent, love the ref of the replay in the leaving fight. His opponent kept saying it was an eye poke when it was clear as day. It was a clean punch to the eye, and that if he couldn't continue, it would be a TKO. Yep, referee did a great job there because I was convinced he was poked in the eye until I saw the replay. It looked like an eye poke. It kind of looked like an eye poke, but he saw the replay. And did the ref look at the replay? Either way, I don't know if he looked at the screen or like, ah, you know,

he did one that was like. Yeah, I think he did look at it. The unofficial replay, instant replay. But yeah, it was good. Who, I lost my train thought. Ah, go on. For post-fight, just kind of throw it out there. Pageman Zey had just posted on her Instagram, a photo of her post-fight.

She said, humble in victory, humble and defeat. That's her post-fight. I don't know if she actually did the press or not. I haven't heard, but yeah, so there you go. So, you know, still smiling. But, you know, kudos her. Like I said, a lot of people doubted her going into it. And like I said, I don't know if she's ever going to be a bare-knuckle superstar.

I don't know if she's ever going to be a champion BKFC. But, you know, she went out there and did her thing. She showed up. And I don't mean this is an insult. But, like, BKFC did her no favors, giving her somebody like Britton Hart, who was as tough as nails and, you know, had a ton of experience. And I think it would have been better. And again, you know, when I talk about it.

to Page before the fight, she said, I wanted a tough opponent. I had no problem with Britt and Hart being the opponent, but I think they would have been better served, giving her somebody a little less experience. But the fact that she did go five rounds and actually closed out the fight stronger than she started it, you know, says well about Paige. And, you know, obviously she's, I assume she's going to keep going to be KFC. So I think that bodes well for her future that she, you know, maybe she kind of got that experience under her belt. She knows what it's like now. She actually went out there and won that fifth round. And, you know, maybe she'll just be better going forward.

Yep. Couldn't have said it any better. And it looks like she knocked in a few of Britain's teeth, too. And Britain was like, she knocked my teeth in. What did Brin say the end about? I am, what did she say? Like, I'm not a fighter. I'm a feeling.

Is that what it was? Yeah. Oh, I'm not a fighter. I'm not a person. I'm a feeling. I don't know what that means. I don't know. I don't know if the edible is.

kicked in right after the fight or what. But that's going to be, you know, we kind of have this end of the year. End of the year, I just want to make sure we remember that one. I'm not a fighter. I'm a feeling or I'm not a human. I don't know. It was amazing. I don't know.

What about? What about fear? What about fear is the pathway to the dark side and I'm the dark side? That was awesome. That was tremendous. Tell what you said. I said that to Mike during the show. Tell what you said.

I literally cried laughing at my computer with your response. I said I just reserved a time to get that tattooed out of my chest. Oh, yeah. I was crying laughing at that response. I'm going to get that in old English right here. Right below my no regrets tattoo. I am a Britain heart mark. I'm a Britain heart mark after tonight.

I thought and I thought the way they built it up with promo like before the card started they made britain look like the ultimate baby face and like page van zan was coming in to like you know destroy everything bkfc built and britain heart was like defending the sport like i was like wow they like position page to be a heel here this is this is interesting but uh yeah wow i mean it was just a fun event yeah and really good job just from a promotion standpoint i felt bk bkfc did for promoting this main event and just the the event as a whole Um, I mean, tomorrow's, of course, apparently there's some UFC fights tomorrow night. And tomorrow's card freaking rules.

But yet, I felt at least coming into this, I don't know. I mean, I'm sure by Monday, everyone was going to forget about, you know, things that go. But it just felt there was more excitement for the tonight's card than tomorrow's card, even though on paper tomorrow's card freaking rules. But it's just, yeah, good, just good job by Dave Filman and on the BKFC crew. That's all. You know, we all know because we've all been in this sport for a long time. You know how hard it is to break through the kind of noise of combat's force to actually get people to pay attention. I mean, look how many, I mean, think about like a guy like Andre Ward, how great of a boxer he was.

Like, no one ever really watched it. Like, no one cared. Like, he was like one of the greatest boxers, but he could not draw a crowd. People just didn't care when he fought. And there's so many great fighters like that. Like, you think about that, even UFC fighters, like you think about some of the best. Like, no one tunes in to watch him. No one is buying their paper.

interviews, kFC, whatever they're at now, whatever is, like 16, 17, 17 shows. They had the Artem Jason Knight fight, which everyone was talking about afterwards, maybe not the night of habit, but afterwards they were talking about yet Arden and Pauley, which was, I mean, anyone that says that wasn't one of the biggest fights for that year's lying. That was a massive fight. The attention paid to that fight and that car was huge. And then tonight, like the lead up to page Vance's debut, I mean, that was a big deal. I mean, they've had three, at least three really memorable.

cards and it's hard for any promotion not name UFC or even Bellator for that matter to break out with one good card. They've had three really memorable cards that were like really buzzy and like kind of transcended the like hardcore people in the sport. Like that's that's an accomplishment, you know? And I feel like I know they're fighters too. I know their stories. And like I guess like you said, like that's that's it.

That's an accomplishment. You know, like I feel like I knew who Reggie Barnett was. I know Johnny Bedford now more has a BKFC fighter than a UFC fighter. I know Brent Hart now, you know. I know, I feel like Joey Beltran is like a bigger star now, you know. Now I'm interested in that win, you know. It's just, it's cool. I don't know.

Good job. Yes. I've said this before, before we wrap things up here. Sean Wheelock is a treasure. He is a great play-by-play guy. I've always been a fan of Sean Wheelock. He does a great job. He knows the rules.

he's good at educating people on the sport as well, which there were some different things about the judging and how things worked out in the bare-knuckle word that I wasn't even aware of, but Sean was very good at explaining that. And he does such a great job. Chris Lytle did a great job as well. And even Yuli Diaz when he stepped in there,

talking about his record-breaking K-O, he did a nice job as well. But it was just a fun show. And not that it matters, but Chris Lytle, like, seriously, what the nicest people ever in this sport, I love Chris Lyle. That guy's great, and it's so cool to see him doing commentary.

He's such a good guy to eat. He does a good job. Like, I was actually really impressed by that. I even enjoyed, I even enjoyed the little, they did a little breakdown of, um, um, bare knuckle techniques and what works in boxing in MMA and bare knuckle. They did that little, little video package. And just good stuff. I am, I'm very, very positive tonight.

This is rare, yeah. It was good. Even though we, we, we had BKFC, we had Jose Canseco taking dives and rough, Rowdy. I mean, this is a memorable Friday night. But at this point, I think we'll wrap it up here because, listen, we get another day of this tomorrow. The UFC is back. UFC Vegas 18. Incredible main card. I'm very excited for it. I'm excited for the 5 p.m. Eastern start time for the prelims. It's just going to be a lot of fun. And we're going to talk about it with all of you around 4.30 Eastern before the fights. We'll talk about it afterwards. And go to bed, everybody. Go to bed and bask in all of knucklemania's glory. Page knows the rules now. There you go. So for Damon, for Casey, I am Mike Heck. Good night, everybody.

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.