MMA Fighting - BTL | Dana White Quadruples Down In Jon Jones Debate, Borralho Shines, Ngannou vs. Ferreira

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

UFC CEO Dana White just won't quit Jon Jones when it comes to the debate on the greatest fighter of all-time, as well as the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world currently. Despite constant push back from the rest of the MMA community, White is keeping his feet planted on Jones topping both lists without question. In the end, is he actually right? On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel discusses White's recent post-fight press conference following DWCS on Tuesday, being adamant that Jones is in a league of his own, and what he could be planning for the future in order to prove his theory right. Additionally, topics include Caio Borralho's big win over Jared Cannonier at UFC Vegas 96, his callout of Dricus du Plessis, what is likely next for the surging middleweight, how much the PFL press conference featuring Francis Ngannou and Renan Ferreira generated anticipation for their October matchup, Max Holloway's underdog promo, and more. Host Mike Heck is joined by MMA Fighting's Jed Meshew and The Mac Life's Oscar Willis. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Follow Oscar Willis: @oscarswillis Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Live from M.M.A. Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. And now, your host, my... The iconic voice of Esther Lynn welcomes you to a brand new edition of BTL. Like the lady said, I am Mike Heck. Thank you for joining us on another Thursday in the middle of a rare week off for the UFC. But no worries, still a lot to talk about on this week's program. So let us introduce the combatants.

This should be a fun one, ladies and gentlemen. First, let's say hello to the hot take kid himself, Mr. No Gray area, the master of the belly flop and the Baron of Boop, along with 18,000 up with big names, been given from MMAfighting.com, Jedbushu. Hi, buddy. How's Atlanta? Some big golf in your city this weekend, eh?

There's some fairly sizable golf going down, actually very close to where I live, too. It's like I could ride my bike over to East Lake. Um, that's great. College football is about to start on Saturday. Clemson's about to get the boots from my dogs. And, uh, as we make our inexorable march to, you know, championship number three of the Kirby era. It's going to be great.

Great week. Happy to be here. It's great to have you here and making his second appearance on the show. The first in this particular format, first time he was on. He joined us right before UFC 292 from a hotel lobby in Boston, Massachusetts, along with our friend Jose Youngs. This man is. also heading to Spain in October, and he's going to be competing at BKFC 67 against Ben the Bain Davis. What in the effing world is going on here? From the Mac Life in every event,

this man can travel through throughout the year. He is the great Oscar Willis. Where is he? There he is, you handsome devil. How are you? I'm good, thank you. There's no golf here in Las Vegas, but I'll be hitting some holding ones today. Oh, my God. Jesus. Ah, you're perfect for the show. You're perfect. Real quick, Oscar, we talked, like, briefly on WhatsApp, text it a couple times, but you know how it is in this sport.

You get overwhelmed and you forget about stuff. How the hell did this fight happen? You versus Ben Davis, BKFC? I didn't see this coming from a mile away. I know you teased some things when we did the way in the stream before, I think, 305 or 304. I don't remember which one it was, but didn't see you take it a BKFC fight. Yeah. there's this uh there's this phrase in the ukina mutata it's called for the bans and uh i just decided

i would do a bare knuckle fight for jokes really i just thought it'd be a fun way to spend my summer and uh yeah so i hit up ben i was like hey would you like to get hit in the head for money and he said okay and then we worked it out with bkFC and it came together it's pretty cool wow how has co-owner connor mcgregor reacted to all this he must be beside himself is he going to be there ringside watching this go down i believe he's going to be there ringside watching it go down yeah and uh so i'll get some of that legendary corner work that he does you know when he's like shouting at eddie and a chat member which i'm sure won't be distracting and then uh he i think he called me a mad a mad bastard and he said amazing and that was about it but it was cool i think he's excited about it

i think we're all excited about it i don't it's still unbelievable to me jad what did you think when you saw this news i mean How are you going to handle the bane pressure? I mean, that trademark pressure that took him to victory in karate combat. Do you think the equalizer can manage it out, you know? I mean, it's going to be tricky, right? He looks like he looks like he looks forward to being in control. So maybe I'll just have to push back on that and just take one step back,

straight down the pipe. Bob's your uncle. Easy. When you not been out, are you then going to call for a platinum, Mike Perry or are you a couple of fights away from shooting that high? Well, obviously, look, you know, Conner's an owner of BKFC, I wouldn't want to take out their biggest start this soon. So I'll probably leave Mike alone for a while. No, actually what I was thinking about was being a real dick and getting a belt made, BMF, baddest media fella, winning the fight and then immediately retiring.

So no one could ever fight me for it and then just claiming that victory for the rest of my career. like even showing up to the MMA awards being like, I didn't win journalists of the year, but I got this belt. I mean, it was phenomenal, you know, everyone would respect that,

right? I wouldn't be a loser. Story of the year. If you don't retire immediately, Casey will hunt you down. Well, exactly, that's exactly why I'd retire.

I've spied Casey and I would not take that fight. I would run like the coward that I am. Sorry, Casey. You don't get it. It's my belt. Mine forever. Casey, no sleeve.

as always just bringing that intimidation factor well oscar it's nice to see you getting in a fist fight because there are others who have been heavily debated to be the best on planet earth who haven't done a whole hell of a lot of that but we're going to get into that later on he's an active fighter yeah we're gonna you save you save that venom you saved that venom before we get there though let's put a bow on ufc vegas 96 happened at the world's most famous apex in las vegas this past Saturday. And I got to tell you, it was a fun-ass card, especially the main card, really fun fights. We had some big finishes, some storylines. It didn't feel like a slog, even though it started way later than it should have, but it ended with a great scrap between Kyle Baha'alio and Jared

Cainanier. And in the end, Baha'io gets it done, unanimouscision. And this man is now 11 in a row, Jedmishu. He's now 7-0 in the UFC. What did you think of Kyle's performance in his first main event were you blown away did you do you still have questions i guess well do i even need to answer this like we all know oscar's getting the point this frown so like it's kind of unnecessary for me to talk about kyle but uh that was dope i mean it was very silly him not shooting takedowns is one of those things where it worked out and so it's pretty cool but if he loses that fight you know if if something goes astray in the final round he gets knocked out then the conversation is hey man you're not the best defensive wrestler you probably should have done that but instead he gets the best of both worlds uh call out

whatever is bad but it's fine who cares because it doesn't really matter if your call out is that you know it is nonsensical when you deliver the best performance of your career in the biggest spot and that's what he did right like jared canineer is by far the biggest opposition cowboy has ever faced and he comes out and frankly should have been a stoppage like in any other world that is just finished in the final round when Kennedy goes limp and craters to the canvas. But I don't even remember who the referee was. He woke up and chose violence, and he really wanted to see some more shots get in.

But that's just an unbelievable performance from him. And this is the part of middleweight that I am excited for. At the beginning of this year, Mike, we're talking about his middleweight. It's middleweight sneaky, like the most exciting division. interesting division. I didn't really agree, but I did think the middleweight has an opportunity to be very interesting with a crop of guys coming up.

And now we might start to get that. This is kind of the first dude who gets to jump into the upper echelon. I mean, I guess Nasrinini Imov broke into the top five, but he's Nasraniya imov. But like Michelle Perher is going to start getting opportunities. Boehrenichols still on the come up. We have more dudes ascending or at least having opportunities to crack up. Icram al-Caraev, you know, got a chance. And once that happens and we start getting the next generation of dudes to come through,

that'll be pretty fun because we've just, we've played with all of the Polo Costa, Jared Canaanier, Marvin Vittori action figures. We've got to get some new action figures into the box. And it seems like we're about to start having that transition happen. Oscar, what say you? Where did you think of Kyle Bahalios performance? Yeah, look, I think it's the performance he needed, right? And to Jed's point, if Jared had won, it would have been a great win for him,

but then we'd have been left with the same five guys at the top of the division. You need these new blood guys to come through every so often. I don't know if, you know, Cal's call out of the champion was necessarily the right move. In the fact, it's one of those ones that sort of make you go. Okay. But the next fight, I think, will push him right to the top. I think this is where, you know, they had Sean O'Malley and they put him against PDN to just insert him into that title picture.

I think they'll do the same account now. I thought, yeah, it should have been stopped. Jared slumped through the floor in slow motion. And like a tower falling over, it was bizarre. And then they just let him get hit awake again. I thought that was wild. But yeah, great performance, new blood. Divisions looking nice.

So, yeah, I want to slump in like that. Are you going to follow up? Are you just going to walk off K.O. it? I'm going to do the people's elbow right away. Just straight away. you know and then uh you know and then i was thinking of even climbing the ropes run the ropes just leaping into the crowd swinging at anyone who moves i thought that would be the cool thing set up the new thing right there just you know attack even if it's an elderly lady she'll

fucking get it i don't care it's so anyone can get it there are a lot of elderly ladies at the front row bkFC events is that i'm sure i want to go back to the ddb call at oscar because which barring something incredibly weird happening, he's not getting that fight. And I think the whole world knows he's not getting that fight. And I'm not sure how you are on the does the call out matter conversation. But I felt like this is an absolute miss. When there is another very big name out there that would have stolen some headlines that we'd be talking about with praise probably on this program and a fight that realistically he could get and gain a ton from should he win. Israel Adasani was the obvious name for me. Was this sort of a wasted

call-up because I feel like with this call-out, yeah, he's going to get a big fight. He's going to fight probably the Brennan-Alan-Nassardine-imov-winner now. When he probably, with a good call-out and some good mic time, he might have gotten that Izzy fight. Yeah, I think for me, it's not necessarily, the name obviously does matter, but it's how you call them out, right? If he'd have just gone, Israel Adasana, people would have gone, that's a good call out, that fight makes sense, but he might not have got it. If he'd have been like, Israel, you know, I'm the new middleweight, you're the old guy, I'm coming to take your spot. I'm sorry, I love you, I respect you, but you're gone. I'm here. Then people would have been like, okay, let's see that fight. I think that is probably

the fight he should have called for. It makes the most sense to me. So yeah, and I think the fact that we're sitting here ignoring his call out and being like, yeah, that's nice, but no, we want to see this, shows that his call out was kind of a miss, right? If basically, if you're calling someone out, you need it to be like Michael Chan, they're calling out Connor after the Tony Ferguson fight, right? That was perfect. You need to, even, even, even need to have that or you need to do walking buckley calling out connor where it's so shit that people ridicule you and keep you in the new cycle after the fact um this one wasn't either of them it was just one of those ones where you sort of go ignore that we'll decide for you

jad did he do the thing here because i i didn't think this is very good i really didn't he didn't do the thing he did the thing last time and got the exact fight he wanted hey canineer main events let's go and he got it it was well done it was perfectly said and then he went back to the well and nobody gave a shit. He didn't do the thing. I will push back on Oscars contention that Joaquin Buckley did even failed like upwards.

Like no, never never do something so bad that you're like roundly mocked by everyone. All all media is not good media. It's just that that is a lie. It is not true. And then to then double down as Buckley has continued to do to now be beefing with

Daniel Cormier. Like it's as a, He didn't do that, which is at least that's a plus. No, he should have called Izzy. Like, that was so, such a layup for him to miss, frankly. It's a little weird. But I listen to the post show. And while I'm loath to agree with the villain, New York, Rick, I don't.

And I don't actually agree with him either. Like, I, I see where he's coming from. And I do think that this isn't the worst outcome, right? Like, yes, Izzy, is he was doing the thing. If your thing is just going to be relentlessly calling, for the champion and by the champion, I mean, Drickus 2 plus C. I can kind of get behind that. If just every call out is you've been like,

Drick is Duplessie, let's go. Drick is Duplice, let's go. Like, if you do enough of those, eventually you get there. And so if that's your gimmick, that's your stick, I'm okay with it. But no, obviously, Izzy, because I think he gets the Izzy fight. Izzy is saying he wants to compete again before the end of the year. He may still get the fight, frankly,

but you got to throw your name in the hat. and he did not do that with his callout if maybe he did it with his performance. Now that he's officially a top five middleweight in this division, at least in the UFC rankings, Jed. What's the ceiling on him? Do you look at him after this performance and say, man, he's real good if he fights for the belt?

If he does get the DDP fight, he has a very good chance to win. Do you feel like he's a perennial top 10 guy? Like, how do you view him now? top 10 guy but that's the majesty of drink his two plus C mic anyone who fights him could win like nobody will watch a ddp find me like that guy can't be beaten like actually i see how he can be beaten he just doesn't get beaten it is he exists in all phases at all times and it's amazing so could Kyle brai beat him absolutely could Kyle bari will come out and just get molly walk because

drink his dupluses he's a hoss yeah like he's been doing it to better people in car barallio frankly so he absolutely has a chance to win the belt i wouldn't pick him because i won't pick anyone to beat ddp but i would never be astonished if they beat him by the same token i mean what we saw saturday is that caro barallio we know he's a very good grappler like we we are very aware of that at this point in time and we saw a develop like his striking game has developed he was rocking the shoulder roll a lot. He was moving on angles, which is stunning. You very rarely see people moving in and out on angles. Look, there's a lot that he could still work on, but he has a complete, well-rounded game that is a legitimate problem in all phases. So I think the dude is certainly

going to be hanging around the top 10 for the next few years. And if catches the right breaks, skit has a good night at the right time. Yeah, he could win the belt. I don't think he's going to be the next long reigning middleweight champion. But shit, most people were thought that about DDP like three years ago and he's not there yet, but he's not that far away from it either. So, you know, he's good. He's a really good fighter. I enjoy watching him fight. What's Bally O's ceiling, Oscar? What would you, what would sort of your gauge after this win over Jared Cannonier? I'm a big believer in momentum in MMA and that team, the fighting nerds have like a lot of momentum right now. So, yeah, obviously where his ceiling is related to that. I don't know.

I think it's a funny division, right? Like Jed was saying, anyone could realistically beat DDP unless he falls on top of you and somehow knocks you out with it, which is what he seems to do. But I think with Cal, if he did fight Israel, the Israel that fought DDP, I would still pick that Adisania. But I mean, I think against Costa, you would probably pick Kyle. I think against, I even Strickland. The middleweight's a weird one. There's all these fighters that look terrible. yet still win. So I don't really know what you can't really judge him against them because you'd say like, oh, Strickland, he could beat Strickland.

But then Strickland will, you know, do that and, you know, beat him over five round. So his ceiling, I'd say five. I'd say he's in the top five, whether he can beat that next echelon of Adesina, Strickland, Wittaker and DDP. I'm not sure yet. But yeah, I think he's the top five. He could definitely win a weird decision against Sean Strickland because anyone can do that as well. he can just not do enough

and you can win a bad split decision that happens all the time sports wild that's middle weight it's fun Kyle Bajalio typically a guy who just goes for the W

doesn't care what it looks like this time a little bit different so we'll see where he goes from here I know we're going we're going up to heavyweight we're going to the big talking point of the week the point for round one goes to

Jed put that finger away you get the point one to nothing how about that That was ridiculous. That was very smart. Somehow you got confetti. Hustk fighting somebody. How do I get a point?

Oscar is going to get, there'll be points coming to Oscar's way, don't you worry. He's fist fighting Bain, and as he noted, Bain has all the momentum right now. I'm fisting Bain. It's,

you know, you know, you're going to get it for that. Come on. How are you doing this? And demonetize the, Got it. Oh yeah, sorry, guys.

This is my strategy from a rival outlet. I just come on and sabotage your show. Well done. Well done. Ontario, the weight is over. The gold standard of online casinos has arrived. Golden Nugget online casino is live. Bringing Vegas-style excitement and a world-class gaming experience right to your fingertips.

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Gambling problem call connects Ontario 1866-531-2-6-00-19 and over physically present in Ontario. Eligibility restrictions apply. See golden nuggettcasino.com for details. Please play responsibly. Well, let's get to this topic of the week and somehow, some way this just continues to be that. Guys, I don't know if you're aware of this. I want you to bring everybody up on the screen right now, Casey, if you could. Dana White, where is everybody?

I want to get your actions. Okay. There they are. He thinks John Jones is the best fighter of all time, and he thinks John Jones is the best fighter on planet Earth currently. And boy, this took on a whole new meeting Tuesday night after the contender series. Data has quadrupled down on this. I believe this is a 12 to 15 minute back and forth with members of the media. And let's be honest, we say it all the time, especially on this show.

These conversations about pound for pound and goat are dumb because it's based on what you believe it's true and it's all really subjective but i was i had a great time watching this on wednesday as members of the media battle back against this take especially the pound for pound topic and it led to this debate about this debate about whether or not john jones should even be considered an active fighter when guys like islam machochev and alex perr et cetera have been putting in the work the past several years and fighting two three times a year well john has only had one fight since the Oscar, I'm glad you're here because you were in the room. You were there.

You've been there for a lot of these pressers where this friggin topic comes up. What was it like on Tuesday night? Paint us a word picture. Well, first of all, I want to shout up. You said the media were battling against Dana. It was really Kevin. I only and I hope someone's giving a wellness check to make sure he's still alive. And I had him killed this morning.

But yeah, it was, I thought the scrum had sort of run its course. And then it erupted into this. like legitimate debate and frankly i was quite i wanted to go home because i was bored so i was like oh my god let's wrap this up but uh no it was very interesting to see and fair play to kevin for actually telling dana like oh you're just talking over with me right now we're not even speaking and dana had to back back down i thought that was wild um yeah i'm kind of come at this from three angles in terms of dana's motivation one part of me thinks that there's an element of like john's the greatest please fight one more time john's the greatest please fight one more time

another part of me thinks that maybe he's really being a good promoter building john up while you have tom aspinall there to make that fight bigger in the background like we're sort of denying this good guy his actual opportunity and dana's picking the bad guy and so it sort of makes that fight bigger maybe that's the thing or thirdly i think dana just um realizes the media disagree with him and so therefore he's going to die before he agrees with us and so this is like his new thing could be any of them jad what did you think of it because i believe you you work Tuesday night you recap the contender series and then if you're on contender series duty that means you watch the dana scrum and see if things come out of it and you probably

watch this live as it happened right what did you think of it oh sure did uh i think oscar's right i think he's just dug his heels in and recognizes that uh the media disagrees with him and so he is now just just really really driving in uh it was very weird like Because Dana knows that this is happening. He's aware of the narrative. And so he kind of opened the whole thing with a, have you guys heard, John Jones is the greatest fighter of all time?

Like a, like a legitimately amusing joke to kind of break the ice there. And then I don't know how we got back here. Because no new information is being brought to this argument. Nothing new is happening. It is just the same, well, John Jones isn't fighting people. Well, he's the greatest fighter.

of all time. If you don't think so, you're dumb. And so it seemed like we would get through without. And frankly, thank you, Dana, because if you hadn't done this, it would have been a pretty tame, like boring post-contender series scrum. But once the train gets going, he's going to ride it all the way to its conclusion. Once I only asked the first kind of follow up and then it was like, well, we're in this room now and we're going to be here until this is done. I guess this is This is it. We're locked in here with him now and we're going on this ride. And the ride is very silly and his arguments are just like objectively untrue.

But that's fine. Like you can have the opinion. My issue with all this has never been that what Dana is saying is wrong. I disagree with strong. It's the contention that if you disagree with him, you're an idiot and all like shouldn't have a valid, like you don't have a valid viewpoint. sometimes hyperbolicly i may say something like that but i recognize inherently that opinions are opinions and dan is like no this is this is a fact and it's not a fact john jones is not the best pound fighter in the world because he hasn't fought in 17 months so like it just is what it is man it was

weird i hope the next one of these maybe we can talk about something different but i don't think so man it feels like this is just going to be every contingency series scrum is john jones pop up and we do this in perpetuity until John Jones beats that old retired firefighter and then leaves the sport. I got to tell you. Like I see, I see social media just, just ripping on Dana and think he's just a moron for this. I think this is like the most entertaining he's been in years. Honestly, like, we're getting, we're getting like 2015 Dana with this argument alone, which is insane. And it is, it's just theater. I'm enjoying it. especially, and I get it because I, I hand up, I am a stubborn prick myself.

When I have my feet buried in and you think you got me all wrong, I'm just going to dig in deeper. Like, that's just how I am. And I've done this on this show and many other shows. And so I get where he's coming from. But, Jed, I want to go back to you because I couldn't get this out of my mind as I'm watching this on Wednesday. Because you brought it up here last week. That steep Mietichich beating John Jones, my point. be the funniest result in UFC history, especially now.

If that happens, if we go into MSG and Steepa just goes in there and melts John, does he pivot right to Steepay? I mean, he is in so deep with this one right now, isn't he? What does he do if Steepa goes in there just jaw jacks, John Jones at Madison Square Garden? It would be, I can't overstate this. My favorite thing that's ever happened in this sport. the amount of joy that will flood through my body. And I may actually levitate.

Like I may physically levitate off the ground from pure elation if that happens. It won't. Stipe is an old retired firefighter who hasn't fought in like half a decade. So he's not going to do it. But if it happens, I think the only answer Dana can then go is just go on the offensive and not be like this was dumb. Like, see, I told you this fight was meaningful. you guys were all stupid in counting out Stepe

But he's the goat He's the greatest heavy weight of all time And you were all idiots who are like he should fight John should fight Tom Aspinall Barry Stepe under the bus Look at him he's fine And now steep is retiring and shit Tom Aspinall you now have to be the greatest fighter of all time

Because the only way we know how to promote Is by saying you're the best fighter ever But he'll just go on the offensive And kind of he'll smart from it Like there's no way he won't feel that that pain but he will just come out swinging in response. And it will just be fun to watch him flail around and to watch John Jones. God, can you imagine the tweets?

The social, like over under on John Jones tweeting some form of, I dared to be great at like three minutes after the event. That's what happens when you dare to be great. fought the greatest takeaway of all time for the first time I've been defeated and actually I was injured coming in my peck never recovered or whatever like you god oh the shot in front I would have it would be the best I need it I need if you are out there God and I'm sure you are and I know you're a BTL listener because everyone is do this one for me this one solid it's all I'm asking man one time dealer I'm using it right now I feel like if

loses they should do a public safety announcement and get the public like away from the city that he's in i feel like it's a danger to everyone around him new york city yes just in general do like he look how he behaves when he wins you know it doesn't look like the most like self-confidence on people sometimes or you know i'd be a bit concerned if he lost a fight there's a lot of people getting elbowed in the head in the club that might a lot of cop cars getting dented very possible Oscar, when this fight inevitably happens, we assume November, Madison Square Garden. If steepa knocks out John Jones in the first round, and as you typically do when you go to these events, you want the Dana Scrum after because he's going to say a bunch of stuff, he's going to react to things.

And people love to hear him react. How fast will you run to that press room to make sure you have a front row seat for this? Because you probably will anyways, you're Oscar freaking Willis. But will this be like the most excited you will be for a Dana's? scrum in a long time if steepa knocks out john jones well dan is never better than when he's in a really bad mood that's when he's the funniest that's when i enjoy it the most that's when you ask him like an annoying question and sit there just like until he answers because he knows that you're like winding him up it's my favorite part of this job to be honest and uh so if we had the belal

win post press conference and then the stepe win post press conference in one calendar year that's a good year forever met you can say what you want about the sport right now but two dana white upset press conferences, that's amazing. And then if you have Mike Tyson, not April knocking out Mike Tyson the day before as well, that's a double whammy. So yeah, it'll be good. I don't know if it'll happen, but it'll be curious. I'll be curious if John spoke. If John also, by the way, they would book the rematch in the Oxigone. Like neither John nor Stipe would get to see a doctor before they were fighting again in January. You know, so. And then they would just be like, right, now Spike's deepase drink. John wins will get the

trilogy. Tom, sit down. You know, they would just make. sure that never happened say um i think they would have a decent contingency plan but yeah as far as danes he would just like jed said just go like well i told you steppe i should have been in this fight you guys wanted me to take stevie out this fight look what happens you never know what's going to happen in this sport you know one of them that would be what a moment that would be holy cow oscar you missed the possibility of marab beating sean o'malley the same rob that dana has been like this dude what an idiot the last two weeks

and then Ankleyev goes out steamrolls rackage they have to book him and Pereira and they're just sitting there like what is happening? It's crumbling down around it. Sports on fire. It's on fire. You just never know. It's the greatest sport in the world. Let's move on to an organization that could

probably use a little bit of a boost perhaps a promoter talking about a fighter's greatness even more so. Point for round two goes to. Oscar Willis, nicely done. Jed, you were great. But Oscar created some different avenues that I didn't even think about.

The Jake Paul Mike Tyson thing. Yeah, I don't know where this is happening. Is this a UK thing? Is this a movement thing? No, my mom's just standing here on top of a ladder. She's just dropping on top of me. Yay. Yeah.

Amazing. Well, let's stick with heavyweights. Let's talk about the professional Fighters League because as BTL was happening last week, I think on the tail end of it, PFL had a press conference. And we had Francis and Gano up there. We had Henan Ferreira up there. We had for a couple of seconds, Jake Paul up there. And every single media member and maybe every single fan, I'm not sure, got a chance to ask questions.

I feel like this press conference is still going on as we speak right now. I feel like it's lasted a whole week. But the fight is set for October. It's going down in Saudi Arabia. And this was the entire press conference. We didn't get any additional announcements. We knew Pacheco versus Chris Cyborg is happening. But this was the presser.

So, Jed, I will start with you a week later. We didn't get a chance to talk about it last week. Are you any more excited for Francis and Ghana versus Hendon Ferreira after this press conference? I'm less excited for Francis deGano. in Ferreira. That press conference made me less happy about things because it was that this isn't sold in a press conference. For instance, Gano has never been a dude who is going to sell something in a press conference like realistically. It's not it's not the strength of his game. He is a damn good fighter and a captivating person with an like a fascinating story. But he's not going to

say too much. And that's just not particularly like given them. other shit going on his life. Probably not his best situation right now. And like the big talking point of that was Sananah Phaeda maybe being misquoted, though being actually misquote, like actually appropriately quoted, but it's just kind of maybe a lost in translation moment where he's like, I'm going to deliver the worst thing that's happened to you this year when Francine Gano lost a child. Like that was like the only thing that happened and that's a bad thing. Like these two dudes don't need to get into a microphone. Just stand them next to each other.

Frankly, they need to start standing them next to each other without shirts on. So you can be like, look, these are two gigantic dudes who are very clearly going to hit the shit out of each other. That's what sells this fight. I thought coming in that maybe Jake Paul, like, as the MC would be the dude to get this over. And then he just pieced almost immediately. And so then it was just like leaving the two fighters to do it. And they don't have that tool in the bag. this was a very mistake like a big mistake of a press conference ultimately it's not going to matter

i care about this fight i would like to see this fight happen but this did not do anything to me it would be like i have to see it was like god damn pfl we we should have done better like get chris cyborg and becheco there they kind of like have some some actual animosity like get something to give the people some reason to take note and not fall asleep i guess cyborg had uh a person issue or something so she couldn't be there. So there's a reason why she wasn't there. So that's why. I mean, I'm sure we'll get something with the two of them. But Oscar, are you blown away by this press conference? This make you think, boy, get me to October because this is the one. Well, actually, the sick joke is this fight is the week after my bare knuckle

fight. So I will have been sober for like seven weeks and then have to fly to Saudi Arabia, a country I can't legally drink in. So no, it's not really like not super hyped on that, to be honest. But yeah, as far as the press conference, I had a couple of questions. Like first of all, I don't really understand the involvement of Jake Paul. I guess that he's got like a stake in PFL and stuff. But if his whole gimmick is MMA and the MMA world hates me, why would you bring him to an MMA show to entice MMA fans to watch, right? Surely, that would be the opposite reaction you're going to get. So I didn't really understand the logic of bringing him there, especially if he was just going to fuck off after 30 seconds and interview

someone who isn't even fighting on that card. I thought that was a weird choice. See? In terms of the actual like the heavyweight, yeah, like Jed said, the biggest talking point was when, you know, Therrera was misquoted slash quoted accurately. And it was one of those questions you get sometimes at press conference. I remember when Cody Garbrand said, oh, TJ, you showed us all how to use steroids. And like collectively, everyone in the room was so secondhand embarrassed. They didn't want to ask any other questions about it. Oh, that was weird. It was the same as that. It was like, did he just say what I thought he said. Let's not address that. Let's try and move past that as fast as we can and hope he didn't say that. I do think there was like some audio issues in the room. It seemed like

they couldn't really hear each other all the questions being asked. So maybe he just had that one locked. Why he did, I don't know, but maybe he had that one locked in his head ready to say that and didn't realize he was saying it on the back of Francis mentioning his son. But yeah, I just think show him sweaty and shirtless and looking angry at each other. And that's about you're going to get the same sort of value of it. I actually think for two guys who English is a second language, obviously Francis can talk it very well. You're better off just doing like an individual scrum.

I think you'll get more insightful quotes from that than a press conference where neither one of them are going to go back and forth. The whole point of a press conference is to see two men talk shit to each other. So if they can't do that, don't do it, I think. And don't have Jake Paul there. I mean, he's good. He's a star and stuff. But I didn't really understand the value of bringing him there to go in a face off.

Yeah. Here's what you needed to do. The actual way to sell this fight and PFL, you're welcome to steal this and do it again. They don't talk because that's not important. They both need to hit something. Something that preferably like moves. I mean, sure, hit Jake. That would be pretty tough.

Well, like, you know, like you could just do like the punching machine. You should be like, hey, Francis, come up here and pop this thing. Well, like, just hit something. This should be like an. NFL combine style. It's like, hey, look at this dude, hit a cow and it falls over or whatever. Like, that's what you need to do. Just be like, he's tipping cows with a right hook.

Like, that is fine. That is how you get it. It's like, holy shit. These two dudes like blew a door off the hinges with uppercuts. We got to watch them try and kill each other. That's how you sell this fight, not with them talking to each other. I mean, what would you do? Oscar. We're talking about cow tipping and breaking vehicles with fists. How could this have been better

outside of just having them face off and not having Jake there? Break dancing. It's pretty hot right now. I would have them break dance. Then that'd be pretty good. No, I think, listen, I just think. I bet Francis can break dance. I think if you, if you, if you do like look at the money they must have spent for that press conference, right? They obviously, they had to build the stage. They had to fly Jake in. and they'd fly all these guys and they had to fly a bunch of people in um so if you if you spend that money you'd be better off i think spending that on like a very elaborate video shoot like they did for conor and aldo in Vegas and showing them doing crazy feats of strength not too dissimilar for when saudi did one for francis and tyson right they had this like crazy elaborate thing i think

that's a better spend of your money than having two guys answer questions on a stage i think i would spend put the money that way and show them doing wacky wackier and wackier stuff like they're hitting the strong bell at a carnival then he's picking up a boulder and then he's got the world on their shoulders and like making it super elaborate make this the cartoonishly big man big man fight and i think that would probably draw more attention and more casual attention than um you know sorry what was that question i couldn't hear it repeat it yeah get a ballistics dummy let's make this real forged in fire where they got do the thing and they just uppercut a ballistics dummy. And then some dude comes in as like,

his skull is cracked and his brain is bleeding out of his ears. Yeah, he hits pretty hard guys. Like that's, let's be creative guys. Have fun. Yeah. Dodgeball would have been fun too. One dodge ball,

they sprint at it. See who gets it and just chucks that thing at the other guy. You know what else you could have done? And it wouldn't have cost you a damn thing. How about announcing other fights on the card? Because I, I got to tell you. What other fights will they have, Mike?

Come on. I mean, we know AJ McKee, Paul Hughes is probably happening. So I don't know. Maybe make that one official. How about some other fights that are going to be on the car? Like, we got nothing two months away from this pay-per-view event that you're probably going to charge 50 bucks for. By the way, sandwiched in between two UFC pay-per-views, who's going to buy this frigging thing? We don't even know what, like, what else is going to be on this card?

How are you not prepared? Plus a BKFC event, you know. And yes, that's priceless. I mean, there's no doubt I'm missing that one. There's no chance I'm missing that one. So it doesn't matter. But come on, man. Give us something.

At least with Oscar's announcement, that was like the cherry on top of the Sunday. They announced other fights. So at least we're like, oh, shit, we get Oscar versus Ben. This is awesome. Oh, but then these other fights are happening. Like, we know what we're getting. This, we have no idea. It's crazy.

You've got to be better. We're not. I don't want to come on the show and dump on PFL. I want to come on the show and be like, they did a good thing here. We want them to do well because it makes things interesting. But when you do this and it's an hour long press conference and we get nothing but something taking out of context accidentally, it's crazy.

It's crazy. It is. Come on, PFL. This is your chance. This is your chance. Well, wouldn't be funny is heading for air knocking out Francis because then they're screws. They're in deep trouble.

It'd be so funny. That's happening. That's how MAA works. That's going. That's the surest bet you can make is that like all the best laid plans are going to shit. Oh my God. Well, they get two months to pump this thing up. So hopefully we get a bang.

This should be their UFC 300. Every fight should be like a top 10 fighter. Everything should have significance. Everything should matter. What's Johnny Ebblin doing? Why didn't he fighting somebody on this card? Give him anybody. Give him somebody good.

I don't care who it is. Give him somebody ranked, somebody good. Oh, no, Evelyn's about to fight Fabian Edwards again. Is he not? Oh, God, I hope not. Oh, it's out. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the fight.

I like how 75% of this panel don't know. Mike, Mike's the only one to give us the information. The other two are just like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I heard that too. Yeah, I think I wrote that up. October, maybe, maybe September, November? I don't know. It's happening sometime. I'm looking.

September 14th. There's two back-to-back belly cards. That's right. So we get the Ousman fight September 7th. So two Bellator cards in back-to-back weeks. It's going to be fun. Right. Same day.

Oh, it's same day as No. J-U as UFC 306, which is even better. I mean, just terrific promotion. Just doing incredible things. But let's move on to something that a lot of promotion going on with a Hey, here's this promotion that's dead. We're going to put it heads up against the UFC 306. And Dave White is promoting as the greatest live sporting event of all time.

And a canello card. Maybe that's the trick. Maybe at the sphere, they just show you better to all the big screen as the UFC is to get the best of them. You show Johnny and Fabian Edwards just up in the sphere. Yeah. Well, that'll be over before that starts, which is, which is, I guess, sort of positive we can look at but let's move on to probably the most anticipated fight on the calendar right now for the rest of 2024 besides oscar rillis versus ben the van davis

round three goes to mom get confetti jad gets the confetti this time two to one nice mom what are you do great ideas there we go guys we talk about bad promotion and things that have been that they're promoting for october we don't even need promotion for this fight that we're about to discuss a UFC 308 for the featherweight title, Ilya versus Max Holloway because these two guys don't need Dana selling it for them. They don't need anybody selling it for them. They're just kind of doing it themselves. Ilya is just on a smack talking, trolling, just on a rampage right now.

And I got to tell you, I'm loving every second of it. He's posing with the BMF title. He's talking all sorts of crap. Say he's going to put Max in the hospital if he points down to the mat, all sorts of fun stuff. So Oscar, you're a fan of electric trash talk and trolling. Great to Poria's approach to building this fight with Max Holloway thus far. Well, right. It goes against.

It's like contrasting with what we were just talking about with how to promote a fight. You know, after Max knocked out Gaci, I really was like, oh, he's going to beat Toporia and I think he's going to do it quite stylishly. But if you just show me you dropping a sparring partner, I'll switch real quick. And now I decided to support he was like really dangerous. That's all I need to see. I need to see you hitting another dude and it hurting them and I'm all in. So I love that Taborio showed us that he looks so vicious.

And then Max's reply of like you think 300 was special, wait until you see this. This is one of those fights where there's no bad blood necessarily, but both guys are clearly, it's the old tale of I don't hate you, but I'm just so much better than you and I can't wait to show you that. And that's where a rivalry is born. I love those sort of buildups. and that's got this has got that written all over it um the bmf thing is funny because right edia really wanted that on the line um which is sort of an anti bmf thing to do i guess but then to actually

just get your own bmf belt and if he just started carrying that around with him and saying oh max was too scared to put his on the line so therefore right he forfeited it and now i am the bmf champion there's some there's some fun in that too um but yeah man i think the best fights don't need the best buildups necessarily. This one just happens to have two really, like a really good fight and is getting to be a really good buildup. Jay, we talked a lot about Ilius Duporia at the start of the year, right? Because he was getting ready to fight Volcanovsky. He was talking all sorts of noise. He's calling Vulcan easy fight. He was saying all these things that people were kind of chastising him for. He's changing the Instagram profile to, you know, extending the record. He's the UFC champion.

in like all of these things that other fighters have tried to piggyback on and have not been successful doing it but ilion support is just having here and now he's doing essentially the same thing with this max holloway fight is he is he doing the thing i know kai bollio didn't quite do the thing but is is ilia doing the thing to ramp this thing up not that it really needed it 100% because like what was left out there is yeah he was doing all that ahead of old you know one of the 12 best fighters of all time and then what did he do backed it all up it was easy it was actually the pretty late work for leit to pura in that fight against volkenovsky and now he's doing the same thing i mean this is not to make it too broad here this is the connor mcgregor playbook i am outspoken and popular and i have

a lot of charisma and if i can just do the things i say i'm going to do and bowl seven when i need to i'm going to be an enormous star and if he goes out here and waxes max i mean just puts him on a stretcher in the first couple of rounds buddy like he's the best fighter in the world uh like the best fighter i've ever seen if he can just knock out volk and max and back-to-back fights and the sky's the limit like he is already trending towards being a massive star and now he is fighting the biggest test for him in this weight class and like a fight that is going to determine who the fighter of the year is Whoever wins this is the 2024 fighter of the year in my book, and there's nothing anyone can do to stop it.

And particularly if they win it in dramatic, epic fashion, then it's extra. So he has done everything right to kind of keep promoting this, keep making this be the fight that we all know what it is in our hearts to be. Max on the other end, I haven't loved some of the stuff Max has said, but that's just my personal issues with the most annoying way that fighters motivate themselves. but this is still like Max is also doing his part here of continuing to play the game with Ilya to prior to this fight being booked staying active about it and being like I don't know apparently the Spanish dude don't want none like these this is the biggest fight for the remainder of the year at least probably not monetarily John Jones assuming he does fight steep it's probably going to be the biggest business unless Connor does fight this year

but this is the biggest fight for people who know for people who are watching this show if you don't think it's max ilia you are in an astounding minority of it because the rest of us like this is this is the fight of all the fights that can be made in the sport there might not be one i would like more than this so everyone's doing their part uh to your to your previous question about pfl that didn't that press conference didn't make me say man i need october to get here everything these two dudes are doing says, man, I really need this fight. Let's get to Salt Lake City tomorrow, please. Well, let's, I don't want to go to Salt Lake City when that fight happens. It's not happening in Salt Lake City. Oh, wait. That's, that's the, uh, yeah. Hand up. I get the point

for that, right? If he fucks up that bad, I should just get the point by it. What about it? I mean, look, Jed, we got to get the Salt Lake City so we can get to Abu Dhabi. Yeah. Yeah, there you go. Uh, well, I'm going to give Jet, I'm going to give Jedd his chance here, because as he was talking, I pulled this up. So I'm going to give him an opportunity because you talked about, yes, I'm not really a huge fan of how Max is approaching him, but maybe if I actually read the quotes for you,

we'll get your true reaction to this. Max Holloway in a recent interview with himself, essentially on his YouTube channel, about this fight. I can't wait. I've been going hard over the last few years trying to regain my throne. A lot of people laughed,

but we'll see who gets the last laugh come October 26th. Also adds, a lot of people said I wouldn't be in this position. I wouldn't be able to be fighting for the featherweight title again. And I'm here. And I can't wait to get going. Camp is just starting. We're buckling down.

And I'm excited. And Jed, if there's one thing that I know about you, you love when fighters like Max Holloway play the underdog, you never believed in me card, right? It's just, it's so silly. It's just nobody said that.

Not a human being alive was like Max Holloway can never fight for the belt again. I know this because we have. long conversations about we don't want Max to fight Ilya because if he wins then he'll fight for the belt again. It was not that he couldn't. It was that the overwhelming likelihood if he fought other dudes is he will get to fight and we've already seen him fight Volk three times we don't particularly need a fourth. Nobody said he couldn't be in this position again. Sure, some people on the internet said stuff. People on the internet say literally everything. There are human beings out there who pretend that the world is flat.

You don't need to give those people credence. Like it is the biggest pet peeve I have in the sport, and I know that many people are not here with me, but you can just be like, you don't have to be negatively motivated. And Max has never really struck us like me as a person like that. You don't have to be like, I'm doing this to shut up the haters who said, I could never do this. She'd be like, I'm doing this for my family.

I'm doing this because I always not knew that I could do this and then I could get back there and had a couple of, you know, unfortunate losses, but I stayed hard. And he says a lot of that. But it's all just kind of thrown out for me and it's like, and nobody believed in me. Nobody thought that I could get back. No, we all did. Everyone agreed that you were one of the best fighters ever. And it is so hard for somebody universally beloved to be like, you all counted me out. No, everyone loves you.

everybody loves you for good reason it's okay to just embrace those people and not be like i'm here to stick it to the doubters like it's ridiculous man i can't just please no fighter do that ever again it is like the anti that which is hilarious he's like the complete opposite of vulcan and holloway in that regard but uh oscar what did you think of jed's reaction there did do you agree with some of that stuff or do you not care about this thing? If he hates guys pretending that the underdog, when they do Volk Holloway 4, he's going to be really upset because both of them will be trying to be like the guy who's being doubted, right?

Those like both they're less like they're. I don't mind it. I get whatever motivates you. I don't really care, but I do enjoy Jed's frustration on it. Yeah, for Holloway, it's an interesting one, right? Because I kind of disagreed with Jed until he actually made the point that after he fought Volk the third time, I do think there was an overwhelming sense of like, well, Max, Max's era is done now, much like Whitaker was when Adasania beat him.

It's like, okay, we're done with you now. We're all Volk's best friend. And then to your point, when Toporia showed up, everyone was like, well, don't let Max find him. He'll beat Poria. And then we'll be back where we are. So it's like, it is a funny one. I think, yeah, I will give Max credit for this. When he lost the Volk that third time and said he was staying at Featherweight and would

make himself inevitable and would fight Volk again for the title. I think most people thought that with the UFC the way they promote things, they're unlikely to do that fight for a fourth time. It didn't seem like they're interested in doing it. So it seemed like that was maybe a bad career choice for him rather than say move to lightweight. The fact that he stuck through his guns has forced himself a title fight. And if he wins the championship, will fight Volk again for a fourth time for the belt. I think that's pretty impressive manifestation that he managed to make that thing that I certainly doubted and I thought the UFC would never sign off on actually happened. So I'll give him credit for that. Look at that. Differing takes. Love that stuff.

Do you agree, Oscar, that, because look, many people believe Alex Pereira's going to go in there and do what he does to Cleo Roundtree, even though Cleo is a pretty dangerous cat. Do you feel like if Alex goes in there and takes care of business and knocks out Roundtree, that's three title defenses, that's three quick knockouts, you saved two cards for the UFC, essentially two of the biggest ones of the year is that enough to overtake the winner of this teporia max holloway fight in the fighter of the year discussion i mean you'd think so on paper but then actually like gaichi and uh teporia would be bigger wins than i think all of alexes and then fuck volk and holloway two generational goat level talents of a division can't really ignore that then

he'd overtake john and dane would have to have him shot you know it'd just be like what so i think I think, yeah, no, I think the winner of this fight will probably be, oh, sorry, like, dude, he slept him in the last second after pointing at the ground. Like, Holloway should just get it for that. I had like, you know, sometimes, hey, people don't really appreciate this, but sometimes when you go to the apex to watch certain main events, you would literally rather die than be there. So when you get something like that happened in MMA, like he points to the ground,

knocks him out, and it makes you feel alive. You're like, oh, my God, this sport does rock. Like, I kind of want to pay tribute to those moments. So I would have Max as my fighter at the year just for that. If he goes out and beats Taboria, even better. Love that. Jed, any final thoughts on this discussion? Winner of this fight is it?

Like, it's Pereira will be number two if he beats Cleo. And great year, like not downplaying the unbelievable year. But beating Yeri again in the exact same way, beating Jewel, although that may be my favorite moment. of the year is it's just not if evelian knocks out volk and max just crown him we just just give that man an actual crown to wear around and if max does kind of author this career come back and get the belt again for the second time is that right um for him like that will just be like on top of what he did at 300 against gaichi this this is the best fighter of the year like this is the fighter of that 2028

will be remembered for the most. And then Pereira will be a very respectable number two. Interesting year. I can't wait for that freaking fight, man. Cannot wait for this Featherweight title fight. It's going to be incredible. Next few months are going to be a lot of fun. Let's award this point, shall we?

Point for round four goes to. I mean, it's Oscar Willis. I mean, come on. He said salt right. He was big. Oh, yeah, he was done. He was done right there. I can't keep track of all this stuff.

I know. It's a lot. And I don't even remember where I am. It would be way worse if this was in Salt Lake City at elevation. We don't need that fight to have anything like that going on. Yeah, I suspect there was a reason it didn't get put there. Pereira and Khalil will kill each other before elevation matters. So it'll be fine.

Yeah. Well, Islamakachev, not fighting in Abu Dhabi certainly changed some ideas as well. But that means, guys, it's knockout round time. Two to two. One question decides at all. 60 seconds each. I honestly have no idea where I'm going to go with this because it's an off week. But I think I have an idea. So Jed, we'll let you decide. Price is right style. Do you want to go first? Or do you want to pass on over to the future BKFC lightweight champion?

I do love that intro of I honestly don't know where I'm going with it. But I think I have an idea. I'll go first. Screw it. All right. I'm super unprepared. So let's get it done. Yeah. And so am I. So it just if it fits the narrative. of the show perfectly. So Dana White did not just make news for the Contender Series post-fight press conference. He actually had an Instagram live, I believe, last night, and said fight news was coming for a majority of names, Volcanovsky, Charles Olivaara. He said Max Holloway, which I don't know why, because we already know the Max Holloway news. He mentioned Connor McGregory, he mentioned Michael Chandler. So we assume they're going to match Connor and Chandler up.

there were reports coming out that olivera's fighting volkenovsky which i'm told her app is absolute bullshit but regardless charles olivera seems to be a name people who are excited about so jed one minute or less i want you to tap into your inner dana white and book charles olivera's next fight who's charles oliver fighting jed go this is a serious question is dan hooker i thought we all agreed. That's what's happening. Like, this feels rude that I got to go first because, you know, Oscar, Oscar's boys with Hooker. But when Oscar talked to Hooker at their pub talks afterwards, it seemed like Hooker suggested that Oliver was the name mentioned to him. That fight makes all the sense in the world. Sure, you could do the Gaetchi fight, but like, I think that this is just it, right? Like, this is, Dan Hooker got the big win to get himself into legitimate title contention. Charles Oliver has to fight back. Charles Oliver has to fight back. Charles Oliver already fought a lot of the dudes around him there's no wrong way to eat the charles oliver rheses like you match that dude up against anybody and i'm going to be there with bells on but dan hooker makes so much sense like two of the more exciting guys of the last seven years it's guaranteed

fireworks and frankly the winner of it can just get a title fight like oliver's a former champion he barely lost to arman sarukian actually some people may even scored it for him so yeah that's it A fight, boom. There you go. Well, I'm glad you went first because you laid this out so easily, but we'll go back to Oscar because oddly enough, Armand Sarukian just did an interview and said, hey, if I got a fight for an interim belt, I'm fighting that. I want to fight that dude.

That'd be a lot of fun. So Dan Hooker is now coming out of Armin Serucan's mouth as well when it comes to what could be next for him. So are you with Charles Olivera versus Dan Hooker, Oscar, or do you want to go a different direction with Chuck Yovs? and maybe Dan Hooker fights for the inter-rebelle if Islam can't go sooner or rather than later. Go. Well, obviously, as a completely unbiased media member, if Dan got off of the interim title fight,

I think he should take it. But come on, look, they both dye their hair, bleach blocked. It's the battle of the blondes. It makes all the sense of the world. Dan's even got his tattoos now. It's like they're mirror images of each other. And I think it's one of those fights that Dan Hooker Charles Oliverer is fireworks from the get-go. Charles Oliver doesn't have to worry about the takedown like he had to worry about it

with Islam and Armand. So he can come back out in that crazy firefighting knee to body style against the calf kicking knee machine that is Dan Hooker. That's two fighters beating in the middle and throwing down what's not to love. And you know that fight will be so exciting, but we won't have to worry about like, hey, when it gets around five like Hooker Gachie potentially would, it's going to get uncomfortable to guys taking that much damage. I think Charles Dan is a fun, fast fight that should cement the next title contender for

the Islam Armin winner. That's how I have it. Dan Hooker, Charles Oliverr, December, book it on the corner, Charlie Card. Love it. By the way, is that a new clock? Am I, or am I just dumb? It was a new clock? That looks incredible. Wow. We got Casey, Casey, Lqueror production. What is happening? This is incredible. Yeah, this is a, this is an Osher Wilson room right there. We've got the star BKSC coming home. We got to up our game a little bit, you know. Yeah, we've had an influx of new budget. So we got a new clock.

Yeah. Where'd you get that from? How dare you? Yeah, next week's show. I don't know if the production values will match, but we'll see. Yeah, get your votes in. It will be real. You'll have that much money.

Yeah, maybe. Well, we'll definitely be here next week. Don't worry about that. We'll have UFC fights to talk about as well. But cast your votes. Is it Oscar Willis? Is it Jed Mishu? Who gets it done?

We shall see. Yeah, there's nothing happened. Is there any fights? happening this weekend. What's supposed to talk about? There's got to be something to watch. They'll give us something. Um, I'll go down the strip and have a punch up

if you want, get in practice. Yeah, a little practice. Yeah. Old Vegas. Break my tiny little hands. I mean, there is just nothing. There's an LFA on Friday. I like how we're all complaining.

Fuck, I'd rather a week off than like watching, I don't want to say any names, but some pieces of shit in the apex. Fuck. He's way better. These aren't go out. I agree. I want to go out now. I was not complaining at all.

That's just so real clear. It's just for topical purposes. Labor Day. Let's support it. It is Labor Day weekend. Support Labor. So get them to get those votes. We can talk about the oncoming street fight between Gordon, Ryan, and Craig Jones that they agreed to.

Yes. I love how it. They agree to a street fight. I love how Gigi see. They're so weird. they have to predetermine a grudge match street fight. Like, so just to confirm, you sign off on if we see each other, we will fight. It's like elementary school.

Pine Tree, 330. Yeah. They're like just so you know. I have verbal consent. What? Casey's here. Sleeves off. Well, there's a one on Friday.

Oh, okay. I mean, it's almost exclusively more. Oh, it actually is exclusively Muay Thai. God, we're so informed. We sure are. Shout out to Govacetan.com. Great promotion, everybody. We, uh, thank you.

We let you know what's happening. Uh, Casey, does this mean there's a winner? Uh, yeah, we got a winner. We got a winner. Hunter Azure Vince Morales is happening at a UFO. Oh, UFO. In Arizona. Team Sehudo versus Team Mier.

Is that what they're with the... Shaman's rise still out there fighting? Wow. I'm just looking at Caposa's schedule events now. Shout out to Caposa. I mean, good God. The actual... You need to know what's up.

The next, Oscar, the next time, Dana says John's the goat, can you be like, actually it's Caposa? Because Caposa is the real goat. Yeah, and Dana would literally just look at me like I've had a stroke. What are you talking about? Caposu? Boxing that way in it tomorrow. What do you say?

What do you say? There's no unboxing of it tomorrow in Atlanta. Oh, misfits too. Oh, yeah, Dave Fogarty's fired at misfits. I should have promoted him. Connor, another Connor guy. Oh, Foggerty's fighting. What?

Really? Dave's like, okay. Yeah, like, boxing. Lightweight title. Go get it. All right, we do have a winner, though. Today's winner with 56% of the votes. The BKFC

lightweight Oscar Willis. Bigger percentage than Brexit. That's a very British joke there for you. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Also very topical. Yeah. I'll just take this, then journalists of the year, then outlet of the year. It's going to be my year, guys. It's going to be fantastic. Trust me.

Oh, then I'll wait a might as well. I should mention that. Yes. Oscar, you don't get a paycheck or a trophy or anything, but you do get to talk for 30 seconds of whatever the hell you want. So you can plug your fight, plug something else, talk about Dan Hooker being in your corner, potentially, whatever you're saying. Listen, guys, sometimes this sport, the schedule of it can wear you down. You know, you can feel like, man, we're going through a lot of sludge

to get to that shiny, shiny, good stuff at the paper views. Well, things could be looking up here. You know, if we end the year on a John Jones, Connor McGregor back to back, this sport's flying again, baby. and if Dan Hooker for Charles Oliver on one of those cards as potentially the backup in case someone to get injured, as a personal fan, I'd enjoy that too.

Then also on October 12, I'm going to punch Ben in the face, he's going to punch me in the face, something will happen. One of us will probably go, how that hurts and give up. I don't know. They actually said it's three rounds, but there's a fourth sudden death round. If that happens, he can have it. I don't want to do four rounds. I'm very, very lazy.

But it will be entertaining and worth shooting in. Do it. What is? Ah, okay. Jed, how do you, uh, how do you feel about the decision of the fans here? I'm, I'm fine with it.

You know, as long as I don't have to fist fight Oscar, I'm pretty comfortable taking this L, uh, because bare knuckle just doesn't seem remotely appealing to me. Honestly, that it just seems, my mom's no hype on it.

My mom's not really, on the whole thing. Yeah, I, mothers, you know, they, after their kids and you're flying directly in the face of that instructive.

So good luck. I hope that goes well. I will be watching. It's now my second most anticipated fight of the year behind Ilya and Max. And also just so we're 100% clear, that was Oscar, the voice of the Mac life, close personal friend to Connor McGregor, basically breaking the news. Connor McGregor is fighting after John Jones at the end of this year. So you heard it here first.

I said if. I made sure I said if. I made sure. If we end the year with John Jones and Connor McGregor, breaking news, Casey, throw up the breaking news. I made sure. Trust me, I've learned my mistakes. It's always if.

As reported by the Maclife. Yeah. Oscar Willis of the Maclife. Let me get that name in there. Anything else here? Anything else happening? I need to go to train because I'm doing two a days now. You gotta go to train?

Two a day is? Professional athlete. Sorry, I'm jumping in real quick. We have- Oh, hold on, wait a minute. We have a guest. Why? Why two a days?

Who are you preparing for? Baines only training. Oh, you motherfucker. Oh, look at this. You really thought, you really thought, Mr. Oscar Willis that I'd let you do an interview without coming on in. You let MMA fighting get this scoop. You let them have us doing this,

MMA fighting? Come on, bro. We should have saved this. Anyway. I'm quite charitable. No, we can do it multiple times, baby. I'm planning on doing it every night with you. You know what I'm saying?

You won't go to bed without thinking about me. How's Dublin? How's Dublin? My home city, even though you don't really know. Your home city is fantastic. The Emerald Island is truly. a very fun place to be i uh i actually really do enjoy it a lot no bullshit it's a solid place and i'm hopping into a taxi now apologies gents thank you yet for ben beauty but i'm you know

i'm staying ready i'm staying ready any uh any final messages here before i mean this is the first the first chat here i'm sure there'll be many face-to-face is coming from this uh ben what do you want to say man you're in you're in oscar's territory here you're you're planting a flag and in Dublin right now getting ready for October 12th which is going to be here before you know it what do you want to say to the man listen I'm heading to the black forage in later tonight and I'm going to take it apart brick by brick I'm going to plant a photo of you and I'm just going to piss all over it baby I could have you killed I you know actually the food's great the food is incredible and I can't wait to have a little pint maybe you'll put that back

Oh, what a moment. What a moment. We're a little over a month away, guys. Ben, how are you feeling? No gloves? Someone, shout out to Blaine Henry. I don't know if you saw this tweet, but he said,

Ben has had a grappling match, a boxing match, and now he's got a BKFC fight booked in the amount of time since John Jones last fought, which is pretty wild. We could also tack on Indian leg wrestling with fight circus in Thailand within that same time frame, too. So it is,

it is crazy. activity and yeah we can't forget the casey my big win in kc but you know a statistical fact both ben and i have more recent wins than stepe am i it is true it's true listen what i keep here you guys talk about this rumored if maybe stepe and john i think the winner between oscar and i deserve the jones fight i think john jones versus ben the bain or oscar willis makes a lot more sense. Certainly, John and I have similar lifestyle choices, so I'd be happy to meet him there too. But either way, in the cage, out the cage, I'll take him on either side.

That's what I like to hear. Either side, Oscar Willis, either side. But no, we like being active. I think Oscar's a great dude, man. This is going to be a ton of fun. And this build-up's going to be incredible. You know, we're giving you a sneak peek. I'm trying to fucking get the light right here.

We're giving you a sneak peek. And the full entree is coming soon. You're getting appetizers. Heck, you're getting free bread at the table. I can't wait to give me the full steak dinner. I will take your meat with good grace, Ben. Ben. So misfits, tell everybody where they can watch misfits this weekend, Ben, before you get out of here.

Live, thank you. Live on the Zonic Series 17, Danny Aaron's YouTube superstar takes on Premier League title winner, Danny Simpson. It's going to be a truly, truly incredible matchup. I don't know what's going to happen in the main event because it's kind of like the old days of crossover boxing. Guys that haven't trained, guys that haven't fought before, but are willing to just lace up and get it going, which is what I can truly support and always be a fan of. So make sure you tune in. I'll be on comms all night long, and I can't wait for it.

Ben, you're the man. Enjoy your time in Dublin. Appreciate you hopping on for a couple of minutes. We're going to get you on the actual show for the entirety. One of these days, our schedules will line up and we'll make this happen. But appreciate you hopping in. Any final words, Oscar, for our guy, Ben? I thought Ariel had left MMA fighting.

I didn't realize you were still springing surprise guests on each other. I didn't know that was the whole band. The site moves forward, baby. We move forward. We go onwards and upwards. But I figured it would be a nice little fun treat. A little surprise for the winner of BTL this week. So, Ben, thank you.

Oscar, you're the band. Congratulations on the victory. Hit the music, Casey. Let's get out of here. Shout out to Jed as well. Performed admirably, as always. and shout out to Casey for just showing the pipes as much as possible. Appreciate you back next week.

We'll get you ready for UFC Vegas 97, and we'll see what other debates can be had at a press conference following the contender series. For everybody else, I am Mike Hack. Back next week, the Iconic Voice Special and takes you home. Good night, everybody. This has been Between the Links and MMA Fighting Production on the Vox Media Network. Let's go! Woo!

I'm not. listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.