MMA Fighting - BTL | Conor McGregor vs. Max Holloway 2, UFC 329 Burning Questions, More

Episode Date: July 6, 2026

It's officially UFC 329 fight week, and that means the countdown to Conor McGregor's return to the #UFC octagon is down to its final days. McGregor faces Max Holloway in a rematch to cap off Saturday's massive event in Las Vegas, and a lot of the big questions that come from the fight are in the aftermath — where does either go with a win, or a loss this weekend? On an all-new special Monday edition of Between the Links, the panel discusses all things UFC 329, McGregor's long-awaited return following a five-year absence, what's at stake for Holloway in this rematch that he's heavily favored in, Paddy Pimblett facing Benoit. Saint Denis in the co-main event and how much of a must-win this fight is for him after his loss to Justin Gaethje earlier this year, other big stories ahead of the event and around the MMA news cycle, and more. Join MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Jed Meshew as they answer your questions all show long. Follow Mike Heck: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@m_heckjr⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 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

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You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. From M.MA Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. And now, your host, my... The iconic voice of Esther Lid welcomes you to a brand new edition of BTL. Happy Monday to us all. Going a little bit early. A lot going on this week, obviously, with UFC 329, off to Vegas tomorrow to meet the man himself,

Jose Young's, but, you know, with all the 329 festivities and everything that's going on during fight week, we wanted to make sure you had a show. So here we are on this Monday. The sun is just right through the sunroop, just clobbering me. So you're just going to have to deal with it. But joining me to answer your questions, talk UFC 329, the return of Connor McGregor and much more is Mr. No Grayery himself, the hot take kid from MMA fighting. Jedbushu. How are you, buddy? If I'll stand up. but even good you might hear my voice is a little a little haggard um you know having the fourth of july on a saturday it's lovely it really is is perfect in that you get saturday and sunday i mean i

worked both days but got to got to have a lot of fun saturday evening and then sunday you can mostly decompress i feel a little bit better than i sound sounds like you had a very good we can do. But I do have one major question for you, Mike, outside of you've slacked me something. Oh, I'm definitely not coming through my mic. That's what the issue is. Oh, yeah. But you know, well, now I sound better. I still sound better. So much better. Because my voice is mostly one. But I have an important question for you, Mike, and it's this. Are we drafting at this show for our head-dead matchup? Because there won't be a watch party. At least not one with me on it.

I don't think it's happy to do it. I just don't know if we are. I don't think it's happening. It might. If we can pull something out of the hat, maybe we can find some sort of studio in Las Vegas. I'm looking, but I'm not like looking too much.

Because it, you know, just is, but it is not the same without you, you know? Oh, thank you. We could draft, and just for funzies. Like, how much,

how many fights do we draft? Because you would think a card, this we'd probably do I don't know if we do the whole middle prelims or at least half of them I think we probably would we would either start at gable or garbrand in one of those two fights I don't think we'd show up for Luke Riley Kaikamaka no it just feels like that's not one we would do but I am happy at the end of this to do a draft you were behind by a good bit so this would give you an opportunity to pick up some Ws. And I will still, so by now I think everybody knows.

If not, I am about to take off for most of the rest of this week or today and tomorrow. And then Wednesday I head out on my annual trip, which I tried to plan around UFC White House. That ended up not happening on July 4th weekend. So I, you know, I'm still going to be watching the event this weekend, though. So like I'll still be following along. So I think it's totally fine for us to draft at the end of the episode. Okay. We can definitely do that.

Well, let's get to the peeps. And let's see what they're all about here. Kangal Zaya, thank you. What would be a bigger deal before Connor fights this weekend? Him announcing his return six months ago or Habib announcing his return. Which one would generate more views and hype? It won't be a bigger deal for Connor for him announcing his return. Or maybe six months after.

I don't know. Trying to understand that. So am I. Cangle, if you're around and could clarify, I'd love a little more. Going off this, I mean, the answer, based on, like, just the most big picture view of it, right, Mike, of, like, which is bigger, Conner's return is bigger, right? Like, it's, I love Habib, he's one of my favorite fighters of all time. But, like, Connor is just a much bigger deal.

And you, Mike, you see that this week. Like earlier today, I saw, I think the UFC put out a press release that Friday's ceremonial way in is going to be on big CBS. Yes. Right? They're not doing it on the YouTube. They're doing it on CBS. They didn't do that for the White House card.

You know, they didn't do that sort of, this is a, you look at the ticket sales for a Conner fight. Granted, they weren't, couldn't really sell tickets to the White House, but like, you look at the ticket sales for the Conner fight, and they're going for an astronomical fee. Connor McGregor is the biggest thing in the business. And so as much as I love Habib, and it would be big if he suddenly said, I'm going to take one more.

Coming out of retirement, I'm going to take one more. It'd be huge. This is bigger. Yeah, and I still don't think he's going to do it. So, yeah, we'll see.

I mean, God, Connor winning, it just changes everything, right? If he goes out there and beats Max Holloway, and if he does, that means he's going to finish him,

more than likely. Like, it changes everything. Like, let me ask you this. Who gets hurt the most here? Like, who gets hurt the most if Connor wins on Saturday? I mean, I think it's, I think Max, but I mean, you can make arguments for a lot of people. I only just last week started to consider what if Connor wins, which is very silly, right? Like, obviously, it's very silly, especially this year.

Because there have been a couple times this year where I was just like, yeah, this is the outcome. It's preordained. I know it. And then that hasn't happened. Obviously, Sean Strick and Justin Gage is the biggest examples. But there have been a number of times. I'm like, yeah, this is overwhelmingly likely to be one outcome. And this year has been a bit chaotic in some respects.

And so Connor is not like a massive underdog to Max, but in my head he's an enormous one. And so I hadn't really considered it because I just don't think it's going to happen. I still don't. But if we're, you know, doing our job or whatever and consider. considering the other viewpoint, a Connor win is so weird. And, like, I think the biggest loser is Max, because for Max to lose to Connor,

coming off the Charles Oliver loss, like, I don't know what that signifies for the remainder of his career, but it's not very good, right? Connor hasn't fought in five years. He hasn't won a fight in six years. You don't see fighters do this, right?

He's coming, it's his first fight since a catastrophic injury, and as much as like he has had time to properly heal that injury and he's fully recovered from that, go listen to Chris Wybin talk, right? Like when he came back from a similar injury, he had many operations, many subsequent problems with it, but he's just like, yeah, man,

there's a mental thing about now your leg when you're competing that you have to get over because it is just sort of, it gets ingrained in you. All of this really, I mean, and the stylistic matchup in general massively favors, Mac. So if he loses this, I think it's really, really detrimental to him.

And so I'll pick him because I think he's actively losing something. Everybody else who loses in a Connor win, it's an opportunity cost, right? They have lost the opportunity to face Connor McGregor because Connor win probably

shifts his bracket of where he's fighting. Connor, like Connor loses to Max. I think there's a pretty good chance he gets to Ilya to Poria. next. If Patty loses to BSD, I think that's also very much in play, right? Like those are a couple of other options you can maybe, you know, look at, but those seem

to be the frontrunners to me. If Connor wins, you could still see it to purry a fight. That's possible. If Patty loses, then he's not going to fight Connor if Connor wins. But if Connor wins, you're talking more Justin Gaci. like that will be in the conversation now in a way it's not shit it wouldn't be fair and i would hate it is the makachev and or i'm machado gary are in the conversation yep so you know it's just the guys who might get him if he loses they're the ones who lose out but i think max like

loses a lot with the loss on saturday yeah i would say like of the guys that are waiting for a title shot it's it's probably michael morales who i didn't even think of that everybody else yeah i mean i think armin would be like a quality answer but armin is so busy doing r a f like he's fine like he'll just be like okay like of course he wants to get in there and fight again but it's not the end of the world mike morales it doesn't have that kind of schedule right now so he's definitely going to have to fight again if not twice more with connor jumping in so yeah pretty crazy what a result that would be uh joseph marisha ruffie being reported as the backup by wrong to think this fight won't happen to that cage door slam shut.

So just to clarify, it's great that we have a wily veteran like Guillermo Cruz working with us because it seems like Ruffie's video was not like, hey, the UFC called me on the phone and said I'm the backup fighter. From what Guillermo told us, it was more of him saying, hey, I'll be there. So if something happens, I'll be around. like I'm throwing my name in the hat to be the backup. So just clarify, there is no backup fighter right now. Like, it's not like as, I mean, who knows?

Maybe something changed over the next couple days. But as of this very moment, at least if you translate that video, that video is like, hey, if I'm needed, I'll be there. It's not the UFC called me and I'm the guy. So we got to make sure we clarify that. Yeah, that took on like a life of its own. And I think maybe it's just because it's a translation. But like when I saw the headlines to it,

and actually saw it. I was like, he's just saying stuff. Like, this isn't, this isn't the thing. And good on him, you know,

put your name out there, get the opportunity. That's how you get opportunities. But he is not needed. Like, it's a non-story. Connor and Max are fighting on Saturday. I don't think that there's a thing in the world

that would prevent that from happening at this stage. Yeah. Well, T-Rex finally get his first performance of the night or fight of the night with King Green. No. I mean, it's He's never one of a bonus at all

Like ever It's insane It's a crazy stat He's never won a bonus And now there is part There's partly a reason for it And it's partly just very bad luck I think it's mostly very bad luck

But the thing about Terrence McKinney Because this came to light to me Either his last fight Either the Kyle Nelson fight Or maybe it was the Chris Duncan fight or it was like, how is this, he doesn't have any bonuses.

That's given what, like, who he is a fighter. But the thing is you go and look at his resume, he fights in a lot of premium events, which is like, if he was in the apex doing this, he'd get a bonus every time

because he's in the apex, right? Like, there's less competition for these bonuses. But he's fighting at UFC 329. And so, like, he will win or lose very quickly

against King Green. Of this, I have no doubt. Let's say he wins. Okay, well, I think we can probably chalk up the main event fighter, one of them. Whoever wins the main event, probably get a performance bonus, right? Either Max is just going to beat Connor down or Connor's going to K.O. Max. So there's one bonus gone.

Benoit Sondon, he's fighting. That dude gets bonuses every time, and Patty Bimbled's also super exciting. Like, those two dudes are in for bonuses. Lonnie Kavanaugh, Brandon, or Evol. Like, Gable Stevens is going to slaughter Alicia Ellison. Like, he's probably, there's just a lot of people. in the events he fights at, he's got a lot of competition.

Still unlucky, like, given what he's done. But yeah, I think it's unlikely he is a bonus winner this weekend. For as I am, was at the apex. Eric Gonzalez was at the apex. Mike Breeden was at the apex. Brandon Marat was at the apex. All of those were at the apex and he still didn't get a bonus. But when was his last time he fought at the apex?

His last apex fight was the Brandon Marat fight. October 2023. Okay. But his debut, like, the crazy thing is his debut, it was UFC 23, but like, he had a seven-second knockout in his debut and he still didn't get a bonus. Yeah, that one is, I think that one might be the wildest one. We're just like, how, how does that not get a bonus, you know? Like, that's insane.

Like Moreno got a bonus. Moreno obviously won the belt, so he got a bonus. there. Paul Craig, Jamal Hill got a bonus and then Brad Radell, Drew Dober, got fight in the night. Yeah, Terrence McKinney should have gotten that over Paul Craig. Yeah, that was the weird,

there was so much heat on that fight between those two guys and then Paul Craig like broke, or it looks like at the time he ripped Jamal Hill's arm out of its socket. It turned out he was fine, but yeah, pretty wild, man. And then like even the Seattle card, he had

like a 20-second knockout on the Seattle card and still didn't get one, because that card was one of the six cards, one of the best fight nights of all time. So, yeah, crazy. Definitely wild, definitely a little unlucky. You know, if this is the one good on him, but he's got a lot of dudes who get bonuses to compete with right now.

Like, Sandhagan Batista can be fight of the night. You know, like, I think it's just, it's, it's an uphill, uphill sledding. Yeah. Interesting. George's getting upset. Does the UFC want Connor to win? Two fights left and unlikely to resign. I think they don't care.

I think the next fight will be designed for somebody to put him down. I think this fight makes sense in the UFC's mind because it's positive for them either way. Max Holloway wins. They love Max. People love Max. He's back in the mix, right? Like he's elevated.

Max is, I think Max should be near the end of his career. But age-wise, he's not that old. so, you know, if they elevate him and he gets, they have another few years with him as a, you know, Dustin Poier level star, great for them. If Connor wins, they have an outside chance of putting him in a title fight, and then if he wins the title fight,

they get to keep him. Like, that's how it works. And then if he doesn't win the title fight, they've elevated their champion to a star level. I think the next fight will be more indicative of them, you know, clearly not wanting him to win, but I think that they truly are ambivalent to him winning or losing in this one. If they wanted him to lose, they probably would in general prefer him to lose

because they know it's so unlikely that he comes back. That's why the Carlos protest stuff was sort of floated, but this is the one they don't care. His next fight will be one he cannot win unless he resigns before then. Yeah, and then he just has to say yes and fight. Or we could just be waiting around until he gets like, what he wants and another DS type of situation. And who knows?

So this is going to be kind of interesting throughout the week. Because you know Connor's going to talk about it. Dana, well, maybe Dana won't talk about it. I mean, he probably won't talk about it at like the press conference, but maybe he does like his little car wash thing with his buddies and does talk about it. So yeah, I don't know. It's an interesting story. I know you're, you'll be watching, but you're going to be doing it.

So this is why I really want to ask you this question. Where are your vibes at? Because you're not looking at this through the lens of, hey, I'm doing a watch party and I'm like covering this card. You're looking at it as, hey, I'm going to be with my buds, like just watching this card as a fan.

I mean, obviously you'll have a little bit of that lens because people probably asking you a million questions about the fight and all the other fights. But are you like, like, where's their vibes check for this one? Are you like, are you fired up for 329?

I'm actually pretty fired up for it. This is generally the most excited. I've been for a fight card. and I can't remember. And it's not because it's Connor. It's honestly because it's the first fight card in forever I haven't watched. Like I haven't had to work. That's a good fight card.

Right. Because normally if I'm not working a fight card, it's, I got one apex weekend off. And then I'm not watching that, right? I'll go back and watch Sunday. But I'm like, I'm not, I'm going to, I have a rare Saturday night off. I would like to use it. For me, my like, this weekend, I am with a bunch of my friends hanging out. We pull up this thing that I need for this.

my answer. So I'm with a bunch of my friends hanging out. And then on Saturday, there is the Norway England World Cup game will be at 5 p.m. be a little bit before this event starts. Me and my buddies will, with a couple of English guys. So we'll be watching that World Cup game. There's an evening game that we will also turn on. The fights will be on by then, but I'll throw that up on a second screen. And I just get to, for the first time, a really long time, totally be a fan. And I mentioned this last week. I was very surprised at how good

this card is because I hadn't really taken a deep look at it because it's a Connor card. It's like, oh, it's a Connor card. 329 will just kind of be filler because you don't need to support him with anything. But then I looked at it and this card rips, dude. I think every fight on the main card is

some level of awesome, right? The middle prelims. Two of them are, well, one of them is a good important fight. One of them is super bruspect. One of them is going to be fun. And the other is like pretty strong, pretty

solid. Lucrariqa Kekamaka 3 is pretty solid. And the undercard not bad, right? Like there's, the Ryan Gandra Zach Rees is like the biggest throwaway fight on the card. Everything else is pretty good man. And so like I am pumped to not have to work this

thing and to just be able to have a few beverages, watch fights, be a bit of a bozo. Have a lot of fun, man. So I am like, and I've had some of my friends talk about like this, like the very casual interest. It's a Connor fight that will always draw it.

I think we're going to have a great weekend though. Yeah. There is a lot of excitement for this. I talked about this last week when I was doing the heck of a morning edition. I've had more people ask me about this one than the White House card. It's just, oh yeah, Connor's fighting on Saturday. I'm watching it. Like, I'm definitely watching it.

So it is passing the mom test. expect things to ramp up over the next several days. So the UFC is going to, the UFC is going to do the thing that we always ask of them. They're going to try their asses off this week to make this, to make sure every eyeball possible is watching it. So, uh,

and that's all we want. That's all we want. Uh, this is for you, Jed, more than anybody. Uh, George got upset.

Thoughts at Sanhagan at minus 145. I expected to be a bigger favorite fighting Mara Batista. I think these odds are exactly correct. But people know I have a love-hate relationship with Mario Batista. He's earned his name back. He's fully in possession of his own name. But I've never doubted the man's skills. Unlike Amin's a hobby, Batista is actually a very good fighter.

And he has looked really good. Like, I know he lost to Umar. He was extremely competitive in that loss to Umar, you know, and that's freaking Umar. Um, he looked very good against Olivera. he just has, outside of losing the Josealdo, which he should have lost to Joseo Alto, he has looked really, really strong. And while Sandhagen has been very good,

I have always felt that Sandhagen got a little bit more love than he deserved as far as being a fighter, certainly from the MMA, you know, intelligence here or whatever. I, of course, San Dagen is a very, very good fighter. Do not get me wrong. And he's really, like, he has a good, smart approach to the game, and he's fun and interesting to watch. But I've always felt that he was like clearly a second tier fighter, right?

Like he's not a champion. Every time he's faced a championship level fighter, he has looked good and lost. And Mario Batista is, frankly, in that same tier right now, right? Like he is not quite elevated to that. But I think he's a little bit younger. He certainly feels like he's been with us for less time. And so I think this is just a super competitive matchup in all phases. right like sandhagan i think is a little bit longer but batista has as a higher volume you know

thing like output going on the grappling exchanges should be fun both men can wrestle but they're not like elite wrestlers and scramble i think this fight is very very close i wouldn't mind if it was just a stone pick them honestly because i think it's very competitive so uh maybe sanagan wins and looks great. I think this is 29, 20 he did either way. This is such an interesting fight because I think there's a world Mario would get this fight, and he got it. And he's doing it in the featured bout of a Connor McGregor card of probably the most watched event of the year and probably the most watched event. Could be the most watched event they've ever had in like North America. Like it is very possible at this point. And Mario

Batista is on there fighting a guy who he debuted against on super short notice and got finished. and has worked his way back. I didn't think they'd put him in this position, but here he is. How do you view sort of the stakes for Mario here? Like, if he loses, is this, do you put him in, like, must win territory here? Like, and I guess the same for Sanhagen.

Like, what are the stakes for these two guys in this fight? I think there's much more must win for San Dagen than it is for Batista. I think if Batista loses, he's just, he's just a new Corey Sandhagan. Right? Like he's just like, man, super talented guy. We generally like him. Seems like a good dude. Nobody has anything bad to say about him.

Every time he's come up against a top four or five level fighter, he's lost. And that's sort of where he go. But Sandhagen, again, didn't really change that at all, right? Like he just sort of got a little bit lucky in timing as far as getting, he won enough fights. He lost to the right opponent to lose to the champion was making multiple defenses. and so he was ready and got in there. Batista could still find a way to fight for a belt like that. Whereas for Sandhagen, he loses, he's, you know, one and three over his last four.

Now he's not lost to the established top contenders of Umar and Marab. But now he's also lost to Batista. There are just so many bodies in front of him. He, a loss for Sandhagen, he really becomes gatekeeper to the stars. And he probably is that anyway, but like there's at least. least an outside chance he can get back there. He can find another way back that dies with a loss of Batista. Batista, he becomes, you know, a little bit of a journeyman for the moment, but not one

without a destination. He still can get his way to a title. He'll just need to sort of keep chipping away. Yeah. I'm looking at, what am I looking at here? Somebody lost somebody in fantasy. I'm trying to see who. Oh, you're talking the Deani Barbosa fight.

Yes. Veronica Hardy is not fighting Deani Barbozo. Who has either? Guy has Deani Barboso. Oh, okay. She's taking on promotional newcomer Anna Malasano. All right, so this is good news for Guy. AK seems to believe, I think, that Anna is a tough product.

So AK seems to believe in her, but I don't. I don't have any, I don't have any honest concept about this. Is she on this season? Buddy, I don't. I got, I got nothing to proffer. Yeah, I don't either. I've never heard of her. I just pulled her up.

So she has a loss to Carly Judice as an Amy. And that's a acceptable loss. Five and one fighting a lot of Fury FC fights. Honestly, so this is just the exact same situation as John Garza, who's stepping in against Free Boschra. She's like, oh, okay, here you go. She is the Fury FC champ. So, I mean, I've never seen a fight

but looking at her resume. Seems like she could be a scrapper. All right. Some fantasy implications right away. Mike and Jed, two things that that's okay from Masters. Thoughts on Riffie's the backup. We already kind of touched on that. He's not the backup.

Thoughts on Farid's opponent. I'm glad he's able to stay on the card. So, yes, we sort of tease this. He's fighting John Garza, who is, like Jed said, a Fury FC vet. I think his last like four or five fights have been with them or some sort of share of a Fury car, maybe a Challenger series event. I don't know a ton about him. He is fun.

He will bring the fight to Farid, which is I think everything he would kind of need in this situation. Farid, I believe this is the last fight on his deal, something to that effect. So it is important, as you have seen throughout the last eight. 18 months or so, Jed, that winning is not enough. You've got to go out there and be fun. So perhaps this might not be a terrible thing, getting this particular opponent for Fareed Basharat. Yeah.

So when this happened, I wrote it up for us. And I was like, again, like the previous person, I'd never seen Garza fight when found some videos just to like check him out. Right? Because he has things that if you just look at him on paper, make you go, okay that could be interesting 23 years old um 6 and 1 in his professional career pretty robust amateur career as well like a lot of amy fights not all wins but like he's he's experienced for being 23 years old and then when watching like yeah he's he's raw

he's got some work to do to develop but he's also a kid so that's fine but uh he seems like a very fun fighter and he was slated to i looked this up he was slated to fight for the Fury FC belt. Obviously this sort of jumps that. But like he's a dude who you would just expect to be on Contender Series and being a guy

that they give a favorable matchup on Contender Series so they can sign him and build him. Instead he gets to shortcut that but he has to take on a really good prospect slash ranked fighter in Farid Bashrod. So a huge opportunity for him to immediately get

a ranked guy coming in. probably loses. I think Basharat is at this point just a more polished fighter, but I think Garza can be really fun. To your point, though, I think the question here is probably around Basharat, and like how does he look in this fight? Because it's not getting any favors to get a last-minute opponent right this. But is his brother, did his brother get let go? I believe so, yeah.

Yeah, Javid got bouncing like, they're not the same person. obviously they are different human beings. If you've ever worked in any company, I one time had to fire people. My job before this, I had to do layoffs. I had to fire 10 people for my team. And I had a brother and sister do a working for me that lived together.

Like they were roommates and siblings. And I fired one of them and kept the other. And I made sure, like the first thing I said to the sibling, who was not getting fire was like, hey, you're not going anywhere. I don't want you to misunderstand this. I'm really sorry about this. But like, if you fire somebody's brother or sister,

you got to think you might at least consider letting the other go. So it wouldn't be a firing, but maybe they don't resign him. So Basra probably has an onus on him to do something special here against the tough late-notice opponent. Either way, it's going to be a fun fight. Yeah. Bosharat, yeah, what an interesting story. Guy probably should have fought a ranked dude a billion times by now and still hasn't.

It's just, I mean, obviously this is different because there's a short notice opponent, but even so, like, who is he supposed to originally fight? Ethan Ewing. Oh, yeah. The prospect killer? Yeah, that was actually a sick fight. It was a sick fight. Yeah, it was a sick fight. Yeah, it was a sick fight.

Also, Boshra, like, if Ewing posted a video, did Sarsal, I assume he didn't see it, where he was like, I got injured like two months ago. I was just trying to tough it out. And it was like I was ready to fight. Like, I'm like 50% I was going to fight. And he was like, oh, so you were a loss then. And finally your team convinced you that that was stupid. So tough scenes because, you know, Fried Bacherot could have had an easy walkover win against the guy who's got a little bit of buzz to him.

And now he's got a tougher fight, it seems like, against a short notice of bonnet, who no one knows. Yeah, Javid is now with the professional. Fighters League. So he's he's back in the back in the employment room. So good on him. If Farid doesn't get resigned he'll be there momentarily. Yes, he will. John, which M.A. fighting staff members' fantasy team is the most to gain from UFC 329?

We pull up the old teams. Let's see what we got going here. Guy has one, two, three, four. Guy has four fighters fighting, so probably Guy. Yeah. I'm looking at Jose. Jose doesn't have a lot going on.

Damon doesn't have a lot going on. You had two, you said? I have Gable and Connor. I've got Damien, BSD, Luke Riley, Adrian Yannias. That's four. I have five. I have Lonnie Kavanaugh. So I've got to be the answer,

because there's no way anybody has more than five. A.K. It's got Sanhagen and Wang Tong. And that's it. That's it. So me, I didn't realize I'd even drafted five from that event. It's like, oh, okay. No wonder I'm tuning in this weekend. I've got a lot to gain. Wow.

Snazzy, there's a big chance USA's World Cup ends tonight. There's a zero percent chance, America, baby. I'm sorry, how many freedoms does Belgium have? Do they have 250? is that's how many freedoms we have. Ra. Ra. Ethan Ewing, future goat.

Big news in the RAF world. We'll get to that in a second because we mentioned Sean Brady. Why is Sean Brady not fighting a UFC 330? By the way, it is early. But a week after UFC 330, Sean Brady, I think we have our answer. Sean Brady is headlining RAF 12. That is the big one-year anniversary show. and he's wrestling Jordan Burroughs in the main event of that card.

I can't lie to America. I expected a little bit more here. No disrespect to Sean Brady. I think Sean's a great fighter. I expected like just a lot more out of this event. I mean, who knows? Maybe we have to wait a couple weeks because RIF does that thing where we don't know what main events are until we get to like the next event. So depending on what happens with Arm and Colby, that could kind of determine the big match.

up for here. But what's your reaction to this? Jordan Burroughs getting Sean Brady. This is out of nowhere for me. Super out of nowhere. Like super, super out of nowhere. I don't like it.

I was going to be a little maybe be a little bit more tactful. I think it's silly. Sean Brady is not even like a huge name. He's the name for us, but nobody generally outside of this knows him. He doesn't from a wrestling background.

At least just somebody like a Colby Covington, big name. They do have an amy. Like, Sean Brady is a grappler, but Jordan's going to attack him very easily and quickly. You know, maybe Sean can do something to build the profile of this. But really, it is just weird that he's not fighting at 330. Like, that feels so straightforward a thing to do. You just put him on that card.

We'll see. REO's last couple of steps haven't been my favorite, but nobody bats a thousand. You know, maybe they're just working through a bit of a pitch here. We'll see where it goes. They've got the event this weekend. That's so pretty,

if you're a wrestling fan, it's their best event so far. Yeah, it's good. Not sure why they're doing it on Saturday. Feels like probably should do that as a Friday thing, but not my call. Yeah, it just did not move the needle for me at all.

It's like I'm going to watch Jordan Burroughs wrestle for two minutes maybe before he tech fall Sean Brady. Like it's just going to be a walkover. But we'll see. Yeah, that I was I was not ready for that. Absolutely not ready for that. So we'll see what Sean does. I mean, Sean is a ball. It's possibly still does fight a 330, right?

Like it's not prohibitive. But it does feel pretty unlikely. Yeah, I don't know. I don't think he's going to fight. I mean, him, Pratchez would make sense, but yeah, maybe he's just not fighting on that card.

I don't know. Unless it's like Mike Malott or whatever. I don't know. Yeah. And even then, like, to bounce back a week later and wrestle. It's risky.

At a very, it's not impossible, but very risky. Yeah. So we'll see what happens there. Still waiting on Joe Piper news as well. But there are, I think there's only 10 fights announced for that event.

So there's possible. They're going to announce like three or four more for sure. Masters. I'm also intrigued by Cody Garbrand, Adrianian. An important fight for Cody. Speaking of Cody's Durden has signed a new four-fight deal, if I'm not mistaken. I don't mind it. He's fun.

Good for Cody Durden. Yeah, good for Cody Durden. I didn't even know that. Contender series rapidly approaching favorite announced competitors on this season. I really like the John Coos. Who's fighting the season? Yeah, I love the John Cooneman getting his getting another opportunity. that dude is is really good just asked justin gaiti how good that that dude is uh john's one of his

main training partners and yeah excited to see him compete hopefully makes it to the fight he did not make it last year um he's gonna probably win and get signed uh because he's dudes real good and he's fought good dude so uh i've seen like a clue who's i could not tell you a name competing yeah it's almost better to just go into the tuesday nights and just watch and have a great that is largely how I try to. There are some who I've seen, like, but it's never because, like, I saw that they're fighting here. It's like, oh, okay, we'll get the card for Tuesday.

Oh, I know that dude. He fought an LFA or whatever. Yeah. ACBJJ was pretty awesome. Brennan won, we're not one as well. REL Roses did this thing. It was cool. I did not see a second of that.

I did see that REL won. I saw some highlights of the Roses, Magamette Sharapov fight. it just sort of came out of like, I don't know, maybe this is all me. I just wasn't really paying attention. And then it was like, oh, Raul Ruses is grappling the other Magumacharapov brother. And he said some very complimentary things about Sabit and some stuff happened. I saw a couple of highlights and that was it.

Lazy. Connor versus Max, Joe Lozon fighting at Fenway. Diego Brando and Andre Fialio picked up wins this weekend is 2026, truly the year of the throwback fighter. Apparently, man. I saw, did Viala win? I did not pay it. I did not actually check the,

the outcomes of the Fiala won. What was he? That was the Aries fight card. Wow, good for Andre Fialo because it's funny a dude I thought maybe could be something. At the Ares event, but I haven't actually look at the.

Oh, no, he lost. He lost. He lost the Jordan Zibo. Okay. I was about to be like, I thought, I thought Jordan Zeebo. people might be okay.

Not like, I mean, it just looks like a pretty decent French prospect. So that makes more sense. Brando did win. I saw the highlight from him when he's like, good on him, man. The Connemax thing is still weird. Like this whole week is just going to be strange that we're back to kind of. It was a weird fight, right? It wasn't like a, was it a bot?

Was it a bear, like a bare knuckle fight or something that Diego fought in? Or is it an MMA fight? Um, I want to say MMA, but I would not. I just saw the clip from, I assume Caposso or somebody being like, Diego Brandau, a million years old, still doing the thing. It was a modified rules boxing fight at Nomad 15. I do not know what the rule modification was. But he did get a knockout, so.

But he knocked out Zuman Zuma Bekhov. Yes. But shout out to Diego Brando. who's won four fights in a row. Yeah. Including beating Kai Kamaka the third who is competing this weekend. I didn't think you won that fight,

but still, it's a good win. Diego really wants to get a shot back with the UFC. If you're a bunch of cutting going on, we're getting a fence put up. I heard a little bit of it. So just a heads up. Yeah.

Meas your twice cut once. Damn right. How intrigued you by Patty BSD? Thoughts on the staff rumors. It seems like there's always staff rumors lately. It's like a trend. I didn't even see the staff rumors.

There are always staff rumors. I don't, I just don't pay any credence to them at this point in time. Yeah, but in regards to the fight, how excited are you for it? I mean, I am very,

very interested in this. We did a write-up this week, like our, you know, our precursor, whatever you call it, for this event. And it was the,

of the other fights, one's the most intriguing. Like I said, earlier. I think many, many fights in this court are very good. The Patty BSD fight is the one I'm probably the most interested in because some people have already started to do this and credit to them. And I even started to come around a little bit, but like, if Patty wins or if Patty just loses admirably,

we really need to reconsider our views on him, right? Because, like, he is an ugly fighter, make no mistake. He just is. There are parts of his game that are very, very pleasing to watch, but he can be an effective striker. It's an abomination to watch in a lot of circumstances. But, like, again, things aren't one-to-one. I recognize that I'm painting with a very broad brush here.

Ilya, who's one of the very best fighters in the world and among, you know, was tracking towards all-time great status, got thumped up by Justin Gaci. And Patty Pimble did significantly better against him. Not just an outcome, by the way, but in process. Like, Tuporia, Patty did go listen to Jack Slack talk about this.

Patty came in with like very specific counters triggered to Justin Gagee that were super effective. DePoree just didn't have that shit. He came in trying to do his same old game plan. It almost worked, credit to him, but Justin was a more prepared fighter for that fight. We have to acknowledge that while Patty is flawed and probably, certainly early in his career, his stardom and fame exceeded his ability. He has gotten better and is a very good fighter.

And if he beats BSD, it won't be that BSD sucks. It'll be that Patty's good and we've got to stop underrating him. but he also might not be BSD BSD himself is a man who has had some setbacks and while we can hand wave his setbacks away saying he wasn't training they're still real and so like I'm pretty fascinated by

this I think Benoit should win the golf between the two as physical athletes is vast Patty is big BSD is big and athletic like Patty is an enormous lightweight BSD is is quite large and also like could do a combine, you know. So like he he should win.

But Patty can be trixie. And Patty is tough as nails. And BSD has sort of slipped on the banana peel. Like it's an intriguing matchup. And even if it ends of not being that intriguing, you know what it will be like? Fun is shit because these two dudes are almost never boring. Yes. this is a fascinating fight because the takes on him are unbelievable.

There's no, I've seen outside of like maybe you and I, and there was a time for a while during the build of Patty Pimbled where I was like, just don't let him anywhere near Ben Wausantini. After watching the Gachy fight and watching what he did like the last few fights, you've seen the improvements and you've seen like just him getting more physical and bigger. But it's just, there's no gray area at this fight. Everything I see on Twitter is like, oh, Patty's, going to kill him or BSD's going to run them over.

This fight's not competitive. We'll see. I think I'm very interested in this fight. Very, very interested in this fight. And especially if Patty wins, like, where do they go? Speaking of where do they go? X. Duran, Max only has rematches left over. After a win, would Max be more interested in a rematch for the belt,

rematch against Ilya, or rematch for the BMF title? So that does create some interesting thoughts here for Max Holloway because Justin Gache is the champion and Max two years ago was the man who left Justin Gachi face down in the greatest highlight in UFC history

in a lot of people's eyes where does Max go with a win here? If you had to put on your on to the next one futuristic glasses let's live in a world where Max Holloway beats Connor McGregor, what are you picking? I think it might be I don't think he gets a good fight after

this and I don't think that any of those are what happened here right I wouldn't it's not impossible I think it'd be very very difficult for them to book Justin Gachie versus Max Holloway if if Justin was calling for it more you could convince me it there's a little more juice but Justin is sort of downplaying that rematch I think he'd take it if it was the option but he doesn't seem like super incentivized into that fight and so Max just lost to Charles I think it's a very very tough sell

to give Max that title fight despite the winner over Gagchi it's just a really tough one right maybe it could be Armin but like is that what's that do for anybody

Armand we saw Charles tackle Max Armand will just tackle Max that'll be it there's not a BMF rematch nobody wants to see Charles Max two or three nobody's interested in that.

And that's where you get into the like, all right, so it's not going to be a big name guy, right? It's going to be a fun fight. I think the fights that would make the most sense to me in some respect, BSD or Patty, whoever wins that fight, you just kind of do the, oh, well, these two guys won, they're on a similar timeline. That fight would make sense in a very traditional standpoint. or then it's somebody else like Kill and Saul Kill just got booked to who do you get booked against Mike? Matush.

Gamrot. Yeah, if Salt Kill beats Matush, anybody going to be upset about that? Or I think the most likely scenario if Max wins is that it's Riffy. You do Max Holloway versus Maricio Riffey is why he's throwing himself out as a possible guy.

Right? Like here he's just getting his name in the mix. Who turns? their nose up at Max Holloway coming off of winning against Marisa Ruffy. Not a soul. Nobody alive is upset about that. So, you know, there could be like a Diego Lopez, I think would be fun.

That would be very fun. But that also feels like that's a really big... I think Lopez shouldn't get a top five guy in his lightweight move just because, like, we don't need him to be fighting for a belt again. That's just silly. So, like, he should have to fight somebody

like, it's all killed or whatever. But Ruffy got a lot of shine to him. I think Max win. Murphy's next. Is UFC not holding their usual fan X experience in Vegas for international Fight Week this week? I haven't looked into it, but I remember hearing they weren't because of the White House being so recent. So yeah, they were planning on it. They announced it. And then all the White House stuff happened. Now they're not doing it. There's so much, there's so much going on for Fight Week

that it's almost like a good thing. I liked doing the UFCX when I was covering those because they did the radio row, but they did all that at the White Week. White House. So that was what they that was basically their UFCX. So they put a lot of resources and time into that. So makes sense. Yeah. So it doesn't look like they're doing it. Let's see what else we got. R S 40 max should retire winner lose. He's made a lot of money so he's good and he's a streamer too. I don't think that's going to happen. But I mean I think he should retire. He will not. Like, I think Max has done enough.

He has made plenty of money. Like, this should be a Terrence Crawford, Dustin Poier. I should just walk away while I still have it around me, but he's not gonna, so. Yeah. Moot point. Uh, shall we, shall we bust into the draft here? Well, we have, uh, 10 or so minutes. We certainly, we certainly can.

So we, have we decided, are we going to go to Garbrant, Yanez? Or to Steveson Ellison. So one, two, three. I mean, it's one, just one fight, right? Correct. Yeah, we can go Garbrandt, Janus, I think. We'll do eight fights. Nice even eight.

So. Hold on. I'm going to get my note-taking apparatus down. Mike, I'll let you decide. Would you like to go first, or would you like to have the wheel? All right. You go first. I'll take the two.

Oh, I'm surprised. I thought. Oh, no, no, no. I changed my mind. I changed my mind. I changed my mind. I just want to be like, you've really got to get a win.

The late. I got to get a win. I got to get a win. I'll take. I forgot. I forgot we're picking Gable and, uh, yeah. I'll take Gable Steve's and please. I was so confused.

Like, I was like, well, I've got one on the board. I'll go ahead and take Gable Steve. I'll take Gable. I lied. That makes sense. I am going to, I'll take the one I drafted a ground. I'll take Adrian Yannias.

You can have Cody Garbrandt. Sure. And then, man, I think there are a few good options available. This is very tough. This is very tough. Look, I've been saying since this fight was announced, and I'm sticking with it. and if I'm wrong, I'll be wrong.

I just feel that Max Holloway is going to run him over. Give me Max Holloway. You can have Connor. All right. Interesting. So now I have to pick two. You've got two. Golly.

These are all very difficult. I'm going to take, I'm going to take Lonnie Kavanaugh. That was the other guy I was debating instead of Max. And I will take, golly. I'll take Corey Sanhagen. I'm not very confident in that.

I mean, I'm confident enough to have him in this spot, but I'm more confident in him than I am in any of the co-main eventors or the light heavyweight fight or the lightweight fight. You've savilely saddled me with Mario Batista, a man whom I have previously had issues with. Yes. I'm going to take BSD,

I think Benoiton, and he is going to beat Patty. I'll take BSD. BSD is also one of my children, so, you know, we got to do that. And then the last choice is, so we've got King Green Tarrant McKinney remaining or Whitaker Krillov remaining.

That's tough. That's a really... I'm going to go Bobby Knuckles. I am not remotely confident in that. God, man. But he's a slight favorite. I don't want to have to choose a Terrence McKinney fight. I want you to have to decide which side of the McKinney fight.

Oh, man. Oh, man. I got to look at this. I got to look at this. Who is, I have to go back into the annals of time with the Terrence McKinney. If McKinney, he win in four minutes, he wins. If he can't, he loses. His wins are Kyle Nellis.

Wilson, Borchoff, which, you know, Slava Claus is very easy. Very, there's a very clear path to victory. And boy, did Terrence take it. Uh, he did lose a Chris Duncan. He lost to Esteban Rivavich. He's lost to Zem Satticoff. He's lost to Ishmael Bonfeme. He's lost to Drew Dober.

I'm going King Green here, Jed. I'm going with King Green. Uh, and I need. I think that's the one I would have taken to on us. Yeah. I just need King Green to, to get to round two. And I feel really good about this. There is a real.

There's a world where Green gets iced out in 17 seconds, but I will go with the Wiley Veteran just based on the strength of schedule and level of competition, especially these past few years. King Greens look pretty good. I'll go with King. And that's a good pick. We've done it. Eight fighters, or eight fighters each, there we go.

Yes. We have done it. We have done it. And we've done the show. We did it in less than an hour. There's just so much going on. I will... My voice cannot do much more.

Yeah, I can't do much more voice-wise. I'm about to talk to Henry Suhudo, speaking of RIAF, who is getting ready to wrestle Marad Walsh, really, in Georgia, the country of Georgia this Saturday at noon, and we'll see what happens there. I forgot that was in Georgia. Yeah. A little more sense of it.

Yeah. So it'll be early in the day. So if you are a combat sports fan, if you are a wrestling fan and a UFC fan, it's going to be quite the day for you on Saturday. You get R.A.F, which is a really good card. I mean, Armand's going to win in 14 seconds, but the rest of it's really good.

You get a lot of gold medalists on the card, some really intriguing matchups. And then it's UFC 329, where it's just going to be wild. Like, this feels, this feels for the first time in a long time, like International Fight Week. Like, this feels like International Fight Week.

That's true. You know, the last few years, like UFC 290 is one of the best cards UFC's ever put together. Like that ruled. Yeah, that was really good. Yeah,

we've had some like good, solid like just deep lineups, but not the star power. But we got to hear, man. Got to hear. With the last few IFWs have been

overshadowed by other events. True. And this one could have been. Like White House could have sucked up all the energy in the room. Yeah. But then you got Connor. So here are back to backs.

Yes. All right. Well stick with us. Semifighting.com all week long. Jose and I will both be in Vegas. Jed, enjoy your golf trip, my friend. And we'll see you guys next week here on BTL. Love y'all.

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