MMA Fighting - BTL | Francis Ngannou vs. Anthony Joshua, Dana White Fight Announcements, UFC Vegas 84

Episode Date: January 11, 2024

With the new year comes big fights — not just for the UFC, but also for Francis Ngannou as he's set to clash with Anthony Joshua in a boxing match in March. What is at stake for the current PFL star, and what does his future now hold in the world of MMA?  On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel reacts to the booking of Ngannou vs. Joshua, what Ngannou has to gain and lose in the bout, and what comes next regardless of result. Additionally, they'll discuss Dana White announcing Dustin Poirier vs. Benoit Saint-Denis for UFC 299, Charles Oliveira vs. Arman Tsarukyan for UFC 300, if the excitement levels are up thus for with the matchmaking in 2024, Saturday's UFC Vegas 84 event headlined by Magomed Ankalaev and Johnny Walker, Jon Jones and Tom Aspinall stating their cases, and more. Host Mike Heck moderates the matchup between MMA Fighting's Jed Meshew and Morning Kombat's Brian Campbell.  Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Follow Brian Campbell: @BCampbell 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

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

The Downloaded 2, Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. Support for this show comes from the Audible original, The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudullian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever.

Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the audible original blockbuster, the downloaded. It's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, what are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The downloaded two, Ghosts in the Machine, available now, only from Audible. We're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is Between the Links.

The iconic voice of Esther Linn welcomes you to a brand new edition of BTL. It is Thursday, and that means it is time to banter about about all the big stories going on in the world of mixed martial arts and combat sports. And that's what the show gives you each and every week. We have a lot to talk about as always. So let us get into this and introduce the combatants first. Mr. No Gray area, the hot take Titan himself,

the co-host of No Bet Spard, and the new CEO of the John Jones fan club. He has M.M.A. Fighting Zone, Jed Bishu. Jed, how we doing? I've been eating this week, Mikey. Oh my God, it's so lovely. What a great week. I wake up one day.

We've got all these incredible fights that I didn't think we're going to happen. I wake up another day. The internet's dunking on John Jones. And then, oh, by the way, Nick Saban's out at Alabama. Everything's coming up in a shoe right now, Mike. Yes. There's the air horns. Yes, Bill Bello check out as well.

But we're not going to go down that road. Too much to talk about there. But back of the show once again, ladies and gentlemen, and very few things make me happier than an MMA fighting and morning combat collaboration. He is one half of the multiple time tag team champions of podcasting alongside Luke Thomas, the man the myth of legend himself, Mr. Brian Campbell, B.C., happy to hear, my friend.

Look at the pipes. Look at the pipes. Look at these 12-inch pythons, all right? Get some of this, Jed. Let's go now. I'm ready for it. Jed, are you scared? You know, I think we're turning the franchise around.

The last time me and Brian faced off, I got my first W. It's time to go back to back. Let's, you know, anyone can win one. Two's a streak. So let's start streaking, Mike. Hopefully in terms of winning multiple times and in no other way. I mean, you did the cannonball last time. I don't want it to go any further than that.

So let's get into this gentleman. A lot of news to discuss, including about a day after we did last week, week show, which is the Q&A episode. Question that came up, I believe, was about Francis and Ghanu. What's he going to do in 2024? We weren't really sure. Day later, we find out he is fighting in March. No, he is not fighting in M.MA.

No, he's not fighting for the PFL. He is returning to the squared circle. And he is fighting Anthony Joshua. It looks like it's going to be March 8th in Saudi Arabia. BC. You're the MMA guy. You're the boxing guy, too. Francis Ngano versus Anthony Joshua?

Holy shit, man. Yeah, guys, I got to tell you, I'm a boxing purist. I never thought this Francis Ngano boxing crossover would be more than one forgettable evening and a big bag to open up, right? This just in, Francis Sigano was somehow a threat to the real heavyweight title, and I couldn't be happier that he's going in there in this sort of superfight-ish set up against Anthony Joshua, who even with the redemptive victory in December against Ato Vallein, which really brought back the idea of the A.

old, the guy who would walk you down with two-handed power punching and take you out of there. Even with that little renaissance for AJ, I still don't know mentally what to do with what we saw just a few months ago, wherein Ganu dropped the recognized heavyweight champion of the world in Tyson Fury and actually went all the way to the point of a disputed split decision loss. So suddenly this matchup makes everybody not named Don Davis super happy, even this boxing hardcore. Why? Because heavyweight boxing has always been that, well, you're never.

quite sure because one punch can change everything heavyweight mMA the same thing but this really is the ultimate i'm not really exactly sure what the hell this is going to look like even with that first chapter that we saw vangano in this crossover with fury what we do know about him much more technical and calculated than we ever could have imagined has life altering counterpunching power uh for that old chin of a j which has been questionable at times yeah rightfully so you're going to have him as the wide betting favorite because of the technical skill. But guys, I love this showdown. And I can't even believe I'm saying this.

If Francis Ngano goes out there and pulls the upset, he literally might have earned himself an undisputed championship title opportunity. Who's to say, right? I mean, this is one of the most remarkable stories. We've already covered that ad nauseum. But this is a pretty damn remarkable fight. Sorry, PFL. It's time to get inside the box.

Oh, man. So much to unpack there. Jed, we didn't really get your reaction to this. I think you wrote about it on the Monday mailbag, but we haven't seen you on camera talk about this. Francigano, Anthony Joshua, this is happening, Jed. This is happening. The man who fumbled the bag, and I've said this a million times,

and I'll say it again, maybe we all strive to fumble the bag like Francis Gano. I hope I fumble a bag down the line like Francis has been fumbling this bag because that bag is so freaking heavy right now. Your reaction to this. I mean, my first thought was Francis Inganu, you clumsy motherfucker. How are you going to fumble into this?

Like, what an unmitigated win that Francis Ngano is just on a lifetime heater? You know, Bill Burr has that joke about how Arnold Schwarzenegger is like the most incredible human being because he came to America and just like became royalty just by lifting weights? He's just been on a 35 year heater. Francis Ngano is our generations that. He is the main character right now. And I couldn't be happier for it.

and for what this means and where it goes. You've got Brian Campbell, an avowed boxing person, a dude who did not give Francis in credit, not like many of us gave Francis a lot of an opportunity against Fury if I'm being honest. But you've got BC over here being like, he could earn a title shot. I'm excited about this fight.

This fight makes sense and isn't a total cash grab. What an unbelievable world we live in, Mike, and it's awesome. I don't think this fight's going to go well for France. I mean, I wouldn't bet my life on it because I wouldn't bet against Francis with anything that's like exceedingly valuable because this man makes a habit of making people look like assholes. But I think that this fight is going to go how many of us expected the Fury fight to go. But that's beside the point. It doesn't matter. The fact that he's getting this fight means that he will be getting more of these fights.

Because, yes, if things have gone poorly against Fury, it may have been a one and done. Instead, he's fighting Anthony Joshua. He's a ranked heavyweight fighting Anthony Joshua for real stakes here. And even if he loses, there's still Deonté Wilder out there. There is still a Tyson Fury rematch. If he somehow loses competitively, there's another fight with Anthony Joshua. This man has done what no one else in history has been able to do from our sport. He has become a real boxer.

Connor got the one big payday and all credit to him. You can't take that away from him and what that money meant and afforded him. Francis is now a real boxer. Like he has at least three more fights in heavyweight boxing available to him. And that is, I don't have words, Mike. I don't know what to say about it. It's insane. I love this.

I love the reaction. I love the enthusiasm for both of you gentlemen. So I want to go back to you, BC, because you are in thrallel, as Jed said, in both worlds, the MMA world and the boxing world. and even some of the boxing media that I've spoken to that I saw in person for the Jake Paul Andre Agus card

putting Francis over like crazy and these are people that were certainly not doing that heading into this Tyson Fury fight they have a newfound respect for Francis and they were hoping to see him either fight Deonti Wilder or Anthony Joshua depending on what happened at that crazy ass card that Joshua

and Wilder just didn't fight each other but now it works out great for Francigano the build to this fight how different do you feel this is going to be because at least in the MMA world, it was like, good for you, Francis. Like, you got the bag. We know what's going to happen here. You're about to get your ears boxed off by Tyson Fury, but you're going to get a whole

big bag of money. And this is great for you. I don't feel like while we're celebrating this now, I think by the time we get to like two weeks before the fight, I don't know. Is it going to be the same? Is it going to be different? Like, how do you think the build's going to be compared to the Fury one? Oh, it's going to be much, much bigger because obviously you're taking away one aspect of

the Fury and Ganu fight, which was a major reason why I wasn't behind it. Not that I wasn't behind the Francis story. I couldn't have cheered more for Frank the tank to crawl through the Shawshank Tunnel of shit to come out on the other end. Expired UFC contracts still with the championship. I mean, what he did was legendary just to get to this point. But the way that

fight was thrown together, just a couple of stones throw before Fury has now has this scheduled February 17th four-belt unification fight with Alexander Usik, which historically, from a historical standpoint, is arguably the biggest heavyweight fight we've seen in a long, long, long time to have Francis slide in there

at that point with the backdrop of Saudi just throwing money at whoever wants it for the fights. It felt forced. It felt like maybe Fury is taking his eye off the ball. There were a lot of things that took away potentially from that great story. And even more, I think it took away, you know, from the potential pay-per-view buys in what that fight could have been because of all the negative talk. But here's the difference between that fight in other moments like that historical. Look at Chuck Weppner. He was a journeyman heavyweight, right? The Bayonne bleeder. But he had that one big moment that he not only lived all of his life off of when he was getting beaten up by Muhammad Ali, but late in the fight stepped on Ali's foot and dropped him. They actually made the damn rocky script for the Academy Award winning first movie about that fight. But here's the thing. It was a fluke. What Francis did against Fury, in some ways is the ultimate fluke because how is Francis ever going to live up to what he showed that night? But we don't actually know if it is. And that's, and that's,

That's what makes this one super compelling. That not only are the real stakes this time compared to that first one, where he went up against the recognized heavyweight champion, the lineal WBC champion Fury, but the belt wasn't on the line. We're saying, you know, the fight's worthless. What does this even mean? That performance for Mangano was so just otherworldly and special. And I don't think he won.

I think that's taking it too far if you're really no boxing in the way rounds are scored. But he won the story of the night. He proved to us in one night what Jake Paul's trying to prove. admirably in about a five, six years spread of trying to improve his boxing skill, get through the rap artists and influencers and NBA players and ex-MMA guys and now seemingly wanting to fight real boxers, but still it's guys that are eight and oh, nine and one. And in the case of Andre August that you mentioned, probably shouldn't have been in there to begin with.

And Ganu went in there whether Fury trained for it or not, whether he was focused or not, and damn near turned the whole thing upside down. So how big is this fight? How different will the narrative be? I really have a feeling here that in the first quarter of 2024 in combat sports, boxing, MMA, bare knuckle, whatever you got, I don't think there's going to be a bigger event than this one, Inganu versus Joshua. Maybe other fights will draw bigger gates.

Maybe other fights will be better promoted than draw bigger pay-per-view buys. But in terms of the standpoint of getting as many eyeballs to care and take notice on a Saturday afternoon and either buy the pay-per-view or illegally access it or just follow it on Twitter like a lot of people do, I don't think you're going to find one with as much anticipation of this because it's not just another cash out or celebrity dunk fest. It's got real freaking stakes. And guys, to be honest, I don't actually know if Inganu can live up to that performance against Fury. Maybe it was an extreme amazing night for an extreme amazing athlete in the most unlikely ways possible. But even with, like I said, him being a monster betting underdog against Joshua, which he should be, he's shown us inexplicably that he has.

has the skills to compete at this level. And like I mentioned before, if he upsets Joshua, I'm really not sure if he ever will fight in the PFL outside of being a good businessman and wanting to maybe give them the minimum of what they expect from him. But he's not only going to have calls left and right, money coming through the roof. Don't forget there's a secondary title holder, Zhang Jolet out of China. They could do a big event there. There's wilder, there's fury, there's unlimited.

Maybe you can even argue he doesn't need a win. He just needs to look credible. It's incredible that we're here. And I think the greatest victory, although he's not chasing it, would be one time for Dana to go, respect. Because Dana has tried at every single turn since Francis has left the UFC to disparage, to put him down, to even try to counter program against him, whether it's announcing big fights right after Francis does,

or that short-lived hashtag never forget when Dana tried to say that we don't do gimmick fights, but we'd love to do John Jones against Tyson Fury. Even that didn't work out. I think the grace that Francis has shown throughout this entire process is almost more impressive than the performance he showed against Fury. Either way, I can't really explain how we're here, but guys, get me the popcorn, put my boxing purist love away, because this actually somehow is a pure fight that's going to cash in box office

and it's going to matter. Damn, I'm fired up for this. I mean, really, Jed, put me in my place. Tell me a reason why I'm overblowing this right now because I'm ready to walk around, you know, and parade with signs and tell me, let's get on board. Let's do this, Jed. I mean, far be it for me to pour cold water on you.

But since you asked, I will oblige you. I think we all probably know that this fight won't be fun, right? Like, I am, one, just so we're clear, if Francis is kind of upsets Anthony Joshua, he is never fighting in him again. He super shouldn't. R. and E. Casey Liden, who's on the ones and twos right now, has sort of said to us privately at several points. I don't really know why Francis would ever fight again.

he clearly is more invested and interested in boxing and there's more money. And A plus B equals C, like if those are the things that are true, then why would you ever go back to MMA? And I think that that's true. But I think that at some point he will be forced back to MMA because at some point you have to win boxing matches to keep this up. I think he's got some run to him, but you got to get a dub at some point for you to keep being a boxer in this regard. If he beats Joshua, then he's a boxer and we're just done with this. I don't think he's going to beat Joshua. And like I said, BC, the only negative, the only downside to this, because I'm with you,

I think it probably is the biggest combat event of this quarter. You know, like I think that this is going to be big box office and big eyeballs. People are going to care because of everything you just said. But I also am pretty sure that when this fight happens, it is not going to be fun because I have watched Anthony Joshua will compete over the last few years. And yes, his last time out, he looked kind of like that Joshua Vold. He looked really good. Previous to that, he has mostly been very, very defensive, very tepid in there.

And Francis and Ghanu, for as impressive as he is, for what he has accomplished, he is still not a boxer. And he would tell you that himself. He is, in the interview he gave with Arrow Hawani this week, it was, you know, I'm a rookie in this. I am still learning and developing. And so I have a lot of room to improve. and all that's true. But at a baseline, what that means is I also lack a lot of the skills.

And that didn't hurt him against Tyson Fury, who I would suggest probably took him lightly. And also is a bit stylistically advantageous the way Fury wants to fight and hang on you and wear on you. Francis is just such a physical specimen that Fury couldn't get away with a lot of that. Anthony Joshua now knows what's coming, knows that there is a legitimate threat, not this ephemeral. oh, he punches real hard, but like, hey, he can actually put some dude down because we saw him do it to Tyson. I think he's going to be extremely defensive and he's just going to jab him a bunch. And this fight is probably going to get boring because Francis does not have the tools to really work around that all that effectively. And we saw on Tyson Fury fight.

He doesn't have the tools to really compete for 10 rounds. Like he does, he's never been a high volume boxer in MMA. And in boxing, it really waned down the stretch. He could have won that fight with simply more activity, but that's not something he has to him yet. I think that this is this fight is probably going to be really, really boring. But again, that's beside the fact. The rest of it is awesome. Just the actual in-ring product will not be thrilling.

All right. Here's where I want to counter that. Mike, I'm going to take over the show right now. Can I counter this really quick? Hey, listen, I'm just here. I'm eye candy at this point. If you've been following the journey of Anthony Joshua over the past few years, you know, it seemed to fall apart when, when Andy Ruiz upset him in Madison Square Garden, last minute opponent,

2019, 2018, right? It was a big deal. Yeah, he got him back in the rematch, but Ruiz was like 4,000 pounds in that fight. What we've seen since then is an Anthony Joshua who's been having identity crisis. He can't put Humpty Dumpty back together again within himself, right? He tried to outbox Alexander Usick twice when Usick's the best boxer, you know, on the planet,

arguably, and certainly, you know, the best pure technical heavyweight we've seen in a long time. Even though his personality switched against Adolfo Valene, and that's why it was so refreshing, and that's why he suddenly looks legit again at age 34. Let's remember a couple of things. Vali doesn't have the power or isn't known as an explosive counterpuncher to stop him. And it turned out that his A plan, he walked right through Valene and showed us who he was. But Anthony Joshua has had a flash chin his entire career.

In fact, along with the fact that he was largely learning how to box on the job while already champion, And because people forget when Sir Charles Martin or Prince Charles Martin, as he called himself, maybe the least decorated heavyweight title holder in modern boxing history because he beat Zar Glasgow when Glasgow's knee went out in the second round and Glasgow never fought again in their vacant title pile. Anthony Joshua knocked out Charles in a couple rounds to win that title. He was learning on the job. And along that way, floored by Klitsko, got up, hurt multiple times by lesser opponents. And then eventually getting stopped by Andy Ruiz. really seemed to take away a chunk of that manhood and that self-belief.

How AJ recovered that was to go for four days and pay an expensive fee to sit in an isolation chamber in a pitch black, dark room with only food shoved under the door like he was in jail, and that brought back out the violin performance. Great. But is he fixed? No, he can be hurt easily. And the one elite skill that Ngano seemed to show against Fury was technical counterpunching. And when you have otherworldly power, you've got good explosive speed because you're a freak athlete,

but you have awkward technical skill that Ngano does. The first time Inganu lands big on AJ, that's where we're going to find out where AJ's truly at. So not only will that go against Jed's claim that this will be a boring fight in which Ngano is trying to catch up to that jab and trying to find anything that's going to happen, if AJ commits to the plan of attack and the intentionality that he showed against Valin, and Ganu has the power to floor him, finish him, or at the very least, discipline him by lowering his output. Then what you have, a real fight.

So if you know AJ history. But that's exactly my, that's exactly my point, B.C. You just made my point for me, though. I didn't realize you were doing it. No, because you said it at the very beginning. F a darkness retreat, like those are fictional. Like, we're not Aaron Rogers. We don't have to pretend that that's what brought this performance.

What brought the performance against Ottawaan was, Ottawa isn't a big hitter. And Anthony Joshua knew that. He could go in there knowing that this is not a threat, and I am weapons free. I am free to fire. He knows that he can't do that against Francis, which is why we're going to get,

I think, the Anthony and Joshua, we've seen the past few years pre the Ottawaan performance. It's not going to be pretty, but I think it's going to be effective because I don't think Francis has the tools to beat him. Now, I stand here willing to say I would never bet my life against Francis and Ghanu because that is a fool's bet. He has done so much. And obviously, if Francis and Gano hits him, this fight's going to be fun as hell.

I just don't think that's going to happen. But I'm willing to be incorrect, you know, come March, whatever day. I don't remember what date this fight is. It's in March. You know, the day after Francis has hit him, like Francis hit him a couple times and at least made it saucy, that would be great. I hope that's what happens. You just asked me to pour cold water on you, and the cold water I have is probably the reality

that there is a very good chance this fight looks like the previous Anthony Joshua fights, which I don't think anybody has been excited to watch him fight for the last year and a half. The difference is none of those opponents had the power of Inganu. He seems to have an interesting delivery system, and even if Tyson Fury was under-trained and overweight, and I believe both to be true,

the fact that he never could get back on track, readjust fully. I thought Fury won the fight literally just by outworking him, right? Like he just barely did enough to win the fight. But he was never able to control the terms in a comfortable, satisfying way. In Fury is five times the boxer that AJ is. So if you're thinking AJ is going to shine his shoes and be able to touch him and not get hit like crazy, I'm here to tell you that eventually he will in the first time he does, that's when you're going to get a fight or flight AJ

and if he turns, chooses to fight, he could get knocked out. If he chooses to flight, he's going to open up the door for Ngano to be competitive. Watch your ass, Jed, okay? Watch it. We'll see. You know, we can do this again post-fight and we'll see.

Like I said, I'm not willing to bet my life that I'm right. I just think I am. Last thing I'll say on this. Hey, Mike, can I ask you a question or am I breaking all the rules on the show? Go for it. Go for it. What are the rules? What does Frances actually?

have to accomplish, maybe short of a Nobel Peace Prize here, for the UFC to be willing to co-promote with PFL in a John Jones fight? Like, is a heavyweight championship in boxing enough? Nope. They will never do it. You've been around New England long enough, BC. You've been around New England and Boston people long enough. You know how stubborn we can be? If our flag is planted, we ain't going to help anybody else. You think the UFC would even entertain this only because of the whole PFL thing. They're just not going to give them anything right now. Like the whole, they don't have to co-promote at all. Like Dana was asked about the press coverage and I respect that dude for asking the question. I wish you went a little bit further with it. And I think he admits

that himself. But the UFC doesn't need to do this fight. They're still printing money. Whether they book John Jones versus Francineau, where they book John Jones versus Tice Fury, whether they not book John Jones versus Tom Aspinall. They are printing money. They are on fire right now. They do not need to do the PFL nor France-Singano any favors right now. now, and it doesn't change a thing. Now, could things change? Ring, ring, Rick, Mike. Sorry, I got a phone call.

It's, uh, it's, okay. Yeah, yeah, Dana here. Oh, Disney. Hi, I haven't talked to you since you shut me down over the, uh, Tai Chi Palace incident. Yeah, I know PFL's also on your network. Oh, we should cope. We should. That's what I'm saying, Mike.

What if they get the call from above? There's only one boss, Dana really has. Really has, right? I'm talking to Dana right now. What do you, what do you think about this? Oh, yeah. Uh, if you want my TV right? then shut the fuck up.

That's all I'm going to say. Yeah. Yeah. Didn't the UFC make Disney a whole lot of money? I don't think I don't think they're all that concerned. It would never happen. It's never going to happen.

No. It would be great. It would be terrific. Can you imagine the tweets? The Don Davis tweets if this happened, I could eat forever with what Don Davis should be tweeting out if this happened. What? It would never happen.

They'd be number one with a bullet if they pulled this off. It would be the greatest thing I've ever seen. Gandhi would be quoted till the end of time from Mr. Don Davis. And all they had to do is let this dude box. It's so hilarious to me that if the UFC had just been like, hey, it's totally okay for you to box Tyson Fury. That's fine, which made even sense because the overwhelming logic was, well, you'll lose to Tyson Fury, and then it will be out of your system.

Now, granted, they'd be in a different world, but they could just let them box. We've been in such a better world. It's crazy. It's crazy. It's like when Michael Scott quit Dunder Mifflin. If David Wallace just let him, you know, if he just took Michael Scott's phone call, he would have never quit and then start the Michael Scott paper company

and Dundermifflin, we wouldn't have to pay a whole bunch of money. It's just one of the big what ifs. It's going to be an interesting story, an interesting 30 for 30 down the line. But let us move on because we can talk about this fight for a while. We'll be talking more about it. Point for round number one goes to E. sneaks it out 10 to 9 and a half.

Nicely done. I almost gave... Fagrant disregard of the rules. I mean, look, there are, I mean, this show's never the same every week. What are we animals? We never go to knockout rounds.

What are we... Animals. Yes, we are absolute animals on this program. And lots to be excited about. Boarding for flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what? Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo.

idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements. What you win is yours to keep groovy. Hey, I won! Feel the fun. The morning will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concerned by your gambling or that if someone close to you, call 18665330 or visitcomex Ontario.ca. With Amex Platinum, $400 in annual credits for travel and dining means you not only satisfy your travel bug, but your taste buds too. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Conditions apply. Let's talk about the UFC and what they're trying to do to counteract

this big Francis Ngano versus Anthony Joshua. Adon said, he's trying to make some announcements himself. He's announced another big fight for UFC 299. UFC 300 is starting to come together. So BC, I'm going to start with you, Jed. We have already reacted to some of these fights, but there's others we have not yet.

Dana White announces, we'll start with UFC 299, BC. Dustin Porri. is back. He wanted to fight at UFC 300. He wanted a big fight. He was hoping maybe a Nate Diaz or somebody like that. He's not fighting at 300. He's fighting a month earlier in Miami, Florida, close to ATT where he trains, and he's fighting

Benoit, Santany, the god of freaking war, not Nate Diaz. Co-mate event. Your reaction to this matchmaking because I didn't see this one coming and we're getting it and I'm freaking excited for it. Yeah, in the immortal words of Tommy Chong, what balls

he has? Because Porrier probably could sat out and just, you know, waited for the next big BMF opportunity or what have you. I am interested in hearing what he was ultimately promised for taking on such a matchup, but it's probably not all that far removed from when Gachi came back against Raphael Fiziv looking to reestablish himself against one of the younger guns on the way up. That could be the case for Porre who looked so good against Michael Chandler and then obviously so bad in the BMF rematch against Gachi. I like this fight ultimately.

Even if I do have questions about the reasoning, it's Porriere, not wanting to sit out knowing that the phone could ring for big opportunity that really didn't come together. I mean, seriously, guys, why is he not fighting Nate at UFC 300? And why is UFC 299 like six times better as we stand right now than UFC 300? Because you can charge a ton. They're charging $500 for the nosebleed seats in Miami. I guess maybe I'm not going to complain too much. $299's great.

I love this fight. But I don't know if you have questions for me about $300. but I got questions for Dana, Mick, that new guy they hired, that no one knows his name, and even Joe Silva, okay? Because what are we doing here, guys? 300 is supposed to be life-changing. It's supposed to wake up the casuals, the old fans, the everybody, come to our 30th anniversary celebration. It's going to be the time of your life unless you're living China and you thought you were getting

Shaan-V versus Wei Lee there because you ain't. And you know what, Mike? I don't think we're getting much at 300. And Luke Thomas said that a month ago, and I thought his black heart, pessimistic ass was just being Luke Thomas. I think he's right, though. I think he's right. What are we doing, guys?

What are we doing? I don't want to complain here that it's so optimistic and bright. UFC in 2024 is going to be great. And even if you don't like UFC, we got a lawsuit coming to fruition in a couple of months, so everybody's pleased and satisfied. But 300 was supposed to be, hey, boss, you're sending me there no matter what, because this is a life-changing event. Guys, I covered 200, right?

Even though it didn't go out as planned because John dropped the bag, it was still awesome. Brock was there. It was intense. It was its cane came back. Pre-Locat Cain came back and looked like a million bucks. What are we getting on 300? We ain't getting what we're supposed to do as of now,

unless they got many tricks up their sleeves that maybe we'll see coming tonight at a random midnight posting from the war room. I'm waiting, Dana. Oh, man. All right. We're going to get back to this at a second. But, Joe, we've had a couple of days to digest this. poor Asa Sout did he fight?

Please, very, has anything changed here? Does the five, does it make, how much better does it make this car, which has already been stacked anyways? Could this have been a 300 fight? Where are we at a couple days later?

And then we're going to talk about UFC 300 and try to get BC to calm down a little bit. Yeah, BC, uh, stay tuned. When we talk about 300, I will reveal what's going to happen. I've,

I've stared into the magic eight ball of truth. And I know exactly what's going to happen. And I think, you're going to like it. So just hang around for a minute BC. Don't, don't, you know, chicken little too much, even though I understand it. Because we should really just be celebrating how kick-ass this is, right? Like, I said it at the top of this episode.

Mike, I woke up one day and I was like, holy shit, I didn't think either of these fights were going to happen. I did not believe that I, like, we talked about it after Amon-Sarukian's enormous win over Binidaryush. It made the most sense for him to fight Charles Oliver. and no doubt about number one continue matchup, but we just didn't think that's how that would go. We thought Charles had previously had a title shot. He might just sort of do that thing where he holds on.

And instead, he's taking a fight. That fight is incredible. That fight would be leader in the clubhouse as it sits today for fight of the year, except for they also announced Dustin Porier BSD. And that fight was the one that blew everyone's minds because nobody thought Porriere would take that fight. I think I said that several times on different programs. Well, wouldn't it be awesome if Bibbonne d'Aundee got to fight Dustin Porreier?

Like in a different sport, that's the matchup that would happen. You've got this, the aging old guard action fighter legend versus, by all accounts, it appears to be the next version of that dude, the next guy who is Justin Gagee reincarnate, you know? What if we just bang them together like action figures? it was sick and awesome, of Poyer would never do it. And then Poyer did, because as I said on our reaction pod,

he's got a big set hanging, like Sam Cassell in the dance, you know, after ripping of Monster 3, that's Dustin Poyer. And with some more time to think about it, I have realized why he's accepted this outside of the fact that he's the balliest man that ever there was.

He can win this fight. This is an extremely winnable fight for him. Because we're talking about a battle tested dude that like there are few men who have gone through what he has gone through in the cage and come out on the other side before gaichi put him on his ass for the bmf belt that first one that this was that matchup then just in gaiti is i am looking for my equal in the sport i am a man who creates car crashes and none can take what i can take and dustin porier was like actually i just have a little like i've got pretty solid defense and i too can can bring the thunder and that's what he did

And that, I think looking at BST, he can say to himself, like, I have to fight somebody. And Nate Diaz would have been my preferred option, but that's not realistic. I want to fight. Here's a dude that I can beat. And when I beat him, I'm going to get all of this shine. He is the hot commodity right now at lightweight. Ben Wassandini is rising. And I can catch him now as opposed to in a couple of years, and I can take advantage of them.

I am very defensively responsible. Ben Wassandini has only loosely. heard of the idea of defense and he's not sure that he wants to be involved in it like i think that this is a very winnable fight for porre it's going to be super sick and when he wins he's probably not promised anything like a title shot or whatever but when he wins and his stature in the sport he's going to be right back in the conversation because that's what this win will afford him it will put him right there to be like hey i beat this dude give me a title eliminator next and let's see what happens so these fights rule.

I am super pumped about $299. And I'm pretty pumped about 300, Mike, because I know what's going to come and it's going to be spectacular. Okay. We're going to get to that in a second because I want to go back to you, BC. You're shaking your head right now. Here's what we have for UFC 300 so far.

We were waiting. Dana White goes on Instagram live at like 9 p.m. Eastern says, in 20 minutes, you MFers, I'm going to announce a title fight for UFC 300. Then he goes on the UFC's fee and says, Within the hour, MFers, I'm going to announce a title fight. And then, like, 17 hours later, he finally announced to the title fight,

Zhang Wei v. Janjohn. Now, I did not see this on Twitter. I saw it on MAAfighting.com. It's great website. So I didn't get to see any reaction to it. But when I did a heck of a morning, this morning, a lot of people are saying, oh, everyone was shitting on to this. And I'm just like, okay.

So here's what you have right now. Zhang Wei v. Janjohnan, title fight, not going to be the main event. My guess, maybe the first of three title fights, which, come on. That's not that bad. Uri Perashka versus Alexander Rackich, pretty damn good. Charles Oliver versus Arm and Sarukin is incredible. This is the do-the-thing fight, if there ever was one. This fight needed to happen, and it does.

Calvin Kada versus out of Stirling is super interesting in a number of ways. And then we got bow-nickel, probably doing bow-nickel things. You're trying to get a star over. What's the problem here? There's five fights announced. We don't have the rest of the card yet. Are we, our expectations too high, is yours too high? Are we, are we reacting too quickly to what this card could be?

Are my expectations too high? Well, apparently they are because based on what we have there, which is obviously very good, but hey, we're not shooting for very good guys. It's UFC 300. It's like, you know, four months after your 30th anniversary concluded, It's supposed to be great like UFC 100 was and like the intention of UFC 200 was. Also, I have these expectations because Dana has said multiple times

you guys are going to see these early prelims and essentially shit your pants and think, man, those should have been main card fights. So when I hear these filler fights that don't look like filler fights, they look like they could be main events of any fight night, co-made events even of a pay-per-view, especially when we're talking about Sarukian versus Doe Bronx. Love that.

shit. But you told us it was going to knock it out of the park. Now we're about three months away. And I'm not the only one who spent the last two months while there haven't been much fights going on filling podcast time with what? Mock drafts of UFC 300. So I'm as, you know, inclined to understand who might be available and who absolutely isn't right now when we talk about things like Ramadan, which is coming up, injuries. Oh, that guy just is always fighting at 298. Can he turn around quickly. Look, I understand that things could happen, meaning Jets Boy DDP, who I gave no chance against Robert Whitaker last year and he has completely turned me around to his possibilities. What if he finishes Sean Strickland early? Could he come back against Izzy in the main event of 300?

Yeah, you could. That'd be just fine, right? But if Shawn v. Wei, which is obviously under normal circumstances of pretty good to pretty damn good fight, guys, the fight belongs in China. I mean, it's an absolute no-brainer. So when that fight, gets haphazardly announced in the way that you described, Mike, that was, stop the presses, get ready. It's not going to be one of these fake Nina drama power slap announcements. This is going to be a real announcement, and we all stay up late. And then it's that fight, which, okay, if that's the third fight down on the main card in the first or three title fights, certainly not going to hate it. But we're running out of time. And if that's the co-main

event, then I've got more questions for you, UFC. What is going to be the main event? You know, I thought maybe we'd get Gachee versus Max Holloway for a BMF fight. But you got Mahachev saying, I'm going to be back against Gachi in June. I mean, you also have Connor saying I'm coming back in June. My whole point is, guys, we're running out of time. You look around. The options are getting fewer and fewer. I do expect something.

I'm not saying it's the best thing for MMA that one of these punk, Lesnar, rousy types, comes out of the woodwork, GSP, you know, comes out of mouthballs and comes back. But that's what you kind of should expect for 300. They hyped us up on the expectations that from top to bottom, it's going to be killer. It's just sort of like, deliver. This is not just one of your four majors. This is one of your every five to ten years super majors. You've got all the money in the world, the deepest roster possible, when you announced

Shaon v. Wei Li, again, a very good fight that should be in China as your potential co-main event for 300. You're telling us, you're telling on yourselves that you don't have a lot. a plan for 300, okay? You don't. They do. They do.

We have a solution. It's going to be Aspinall and Poetan. Yeah, that'll work. I mean, while I pop for that, it'll be interesting. But my whole point is when they, when Connor announced himself for June, you know what? I said to myself, this is great. That means they don't need him for 300. I don't even know if they know what they need.

Jed, you seem to have all the freaking answers. You got this great law degree that's never even been used. Tell me. Tell me what I'm missing here because they got me fired up. Not me. They did. This is their fault. Look, I'm not saying that you're wrong.

One, this, like, obviously, it's a bit ridiculous to announce you're going to make an announcement. And then it's, it's Zhang Yan. Like, that's as tough C. Someone with you on that, particularly because you're right. That should be a Shanghai card. But let's be real honest. This is not your co-main event. This is the third fight.

And maybe they'll order it as, like, the second fight of the first of the main card. because we've seen them do that. But this is the third fight. Your co-main event is going to be Leon Edwards versus Belal Muhammad. That I am unclear why we're not announcing that unless it is for this grand plan that they will announce that early next week because you said it. And I don't know if you believe that you were saying it or not. What is happening is 300.

They are waiting. They are waiting to see what happens in next week's main event. if Drickus Duplessi beats Sean Strickland That evening, Dana White is going to go to him Before he even walks out, he's going to go before he even comes to his presser and be like, hey, are you good to make a quick turnaround? Can you do 300 against Israel Addisonia? And if he says, yes, I can. Boom, Bob's your uncle. That's your main event for 300. If Sean Strickland wins, they're probably just going to ask the same thing to Sean. Hey, are you good to run it back with Izzy at UFC 300? Sean is a crazy person and will of course say yes, even if he's not physically capable of doing it.

He's still going to take that fight. They are waiting to see that they can get a yes to that answer. They can't announce it for obvious reasons, but that's what's going to happen. And if for some reason that fight can't happen because Drickis breaks his arm and cannot turn around even though he wins, or Sean Strickland does something similar, if there's a reason they can't take the winner of this next weekend's card, then they will say, is he? it's your time. Israel or Dissania will be in the main event. It's just

whether it's against Sean Strickland, Drix, Duplexi, or Alex Pereira for the UFC Light Heavyweight title. One of those three outcomes is going to be your main event for 300. I would argue that that's not like as big as sort of they've shot in other years, but

still when that's the capper to Leon Edwards, Bala Muhammad, which I have dubbed the leafy greens of title fights. And Janjanan Wai-Jang, as another fight and you're going to get Alexander Rockachier-Prahashka and Aljo Cater and Bo-Nichol and they're probably going to put some other

high-profile fighters on the prelims. I think that's enough to sort of sate our lust for what 300 should be. So I agree they haven't done this well. Like that they, we all agree. I think everyone agrees Connor should be headlining this. But I think we are still,

they are going to have made a good enough chicken salad out of the chicken shit they've they served themselves. Sure, sir, I don't agree with you that Connor should be the main event. I thought it would be an easy. Conner against anyone would be an easy main event. But Conner's not in the title position right now. Conner against Gagee for the BMF, you want to make it the main event? You don't have to make them the main event, but yeah, he's main event.

You cannot justify 300 doing Connor against Chandler for the main event. They probably would do it anyway, notwithstanding. A couple of things you said that really made me upset. One thing that didn't. You're right about one thing. If it is, and this is the fight when we did our first mock draft, months ago, Izzy versus Poetton at 205 for the Bell, I think is easy. Main event guaranteed.

I have to see that. It's interesting. It's wild. If they end up doing that based on your setup and scenario, I will be very happy. But I will be very happy about the main event because you just came out, you know, strutting like a peacock on Leon versus Bilal. Hey, I'm here to tell you, that's a, that's a good title fight. That ain't a great title fight.

That ain't a 300. I called it leafy greens. Why do you think that? I'm strutting by calling it leafy greens. I had an image of these type of leafy greens. No, no, I mean those shitty vegetables on your plate that you eat because you have to. It's the broccoli of title fights. You said, look, if that's the co-main event, that's fine.

That's not fine as the co-made event. That's one of the worst title fights you can make right now. It's necessary. I've never forgotten the name. In fact, Belal, I've said for years, the guy's got the best rack of anything, but not the strawweight division. Like the guy is my guy. I love that guy. That fight ain't co-main event-worthy.

And if you're going to package it with the all-Chinese female title fight that should be in China, then that main event better be spectacular. Okay? That's all I'm saying. What do you think that fight is if it's not co-main event? It's a title fight between two of the 30 best fighters in the world. This is not outrageous take. Is that you bury that on the prelims at an apex? If it's not co-main event worthy of a pay-per-view, I don't know what it is.

No, it's not Brock Lesoth. versus somebody, but this is still a really quality fight to be as the sandwich to a title of fight trifecta. Like, this is an outrageous take by you. I just want to remind you of something here, okay? UFC 200 originally was DC versus John 2 in the most heated rivalry before Connor and Habib happened in UFC history. And then what else?

Then you had Misha Tate against this rising star Amanda Nunes who nobody gave her shit about Amanda Nunes. Do not wet conness. Do not wet conness. Then you had Aldo Edgar 2. You had a returning Kane Velasquez to finally get healthy and maybe make a run of the title. And then when things F up, they called Andy Silva on like two hours notice and he flew in and damn near ruined the night for Cormiere with that kick to the body in round 3. My point was that's spectacular.

Okay. 100 Mere Lesnar 2. GSP on them. I mean, that was spectacular. What is this? This is not spectacular. I was there for this and the same narrative was there. Again, I'm not saying they've played this perfectly.

I think they should have made this more of a grandiose thing that they are building to instead of just a slight elevation. But like, I was around for the 200 conversation up until like the week of or whatever it was all a little like, what's going on? At this exact moment in time at 200, we still didn't know that Brock was coming back. like it was still like we're not really sure like yes john dc2 is amazing like we all love that but it didn't have the vibes that we have recon to believing it did it was kind of in a similar position i'm not saying they'll get it over the top and i'm not saying it'll be as good as

200 but 200 wasn't as good as 100 these things are going to get worse as the uc cares less about tent pole events like this but i still think three title fights one of them being a an arch rivalry of some sort. The other one being, again, two of the top 30 fighters in the world today, even if it's probably going to be boring and not great. And the other one being the first all Chinese, you know, female fight, maybe it doesn't make sense here. Still three title fights on top of what is already shaping up to be a very solid undercard. Like, this is good. The UFC 300, I still believe is going to be quite good. I have every... Okay, hold on. Hold on one second. Hold on second. Get me in here with these guys. Before my Wi-Fi decided to take just an absolutely

dump a room. Nobody knew that. We played it perfectly. Nobody listening is aware that you've just been gone. Well, when I have Casey award the point for the, for the round I didn't hear a single thing of until like two seconds ago, they will find out. But here's what I was trying to ask you there, B.C.,

because, yes, we have five fights. And let's not forget when you run down this magnificent UFC 200 car, which was on paper. We're supposed to, rumor and innuendo, we're going to get Connor Nate to. Connor said, pay me more. They said no. They're like, Nate, why don't you do this instead?

Nate's like, no, pay me more too. And then they didn't do it. We didn't even know John... Like, Mike, he was in Iceland. He didn't want to train. You didn't want to go to the press conference. I mean, what are we doing here? There's a lot going on.

There's a lot going on. John Jones, D.C., we didn't even know about till like two months before the event, right? Like, I think they announced that in April and the, like late April. It was like a little over two months. Yeah, a little over two months. We didn't know Brock Lesnar was going to be on UFC 200 until the day of UFC 100 until the day of UFC 199. The day of

199. Okay? Ariel new. So, yes. Are we... He announced it at 199. I remember because that day was a shit. Which was a month before the card.

No one knew he was coming back until a month before. What I'm saying is, are we being a little too harsh? Considering what rabbits, the UFC has been able to pull out for these mega cards in the past on somewhat short notice, we only know five of the fights. We only know a third of the card right now. We haven't, we don't even know what the rest of it's going to look like. We can guess. We can try to figure out and try to put the pieces in place.

But I don't even think, I don't know even think we're going to get a main event announced for this card for like another three to four weeks at this point. Even if Jet, what Jed says is true. If DDP and Sean Strickle beat the shit out of each other and DDP wins a decision, I don't know if he's going to turn around in time. What I'm saying is I understand our expectations are lofty and they should be. And this is a conversation we have as a website and you have on your show all. the time. We have seen them do great things and we almost demand that and expect that from them.

And it's not wrong for us to ask that from them. But five fights in, we have a title fight and a whole bunch of storylines that we can add for all of these fights that are announced. Are we being a little too harsh right now? Who knows? Maybe when the next 10 fights are announced, we could be like, maybe this wasn't as good as we thought it was going to be. But right now, are we being a little too hectic? Is basically what I'm trying to ask you. Heck, hectic. Nice play on words. I get that, you know, maybe you're not so mad at me. You're just disappointed. That's why the fatherly tone comes out.

I mean, you know, it's like, wow, do I really screw up that bad dad? I mean, great. Wow.

I'll just tell you this. When you look at the cupboard, when you look at the cupboard, though, Mikey, it's kind of bear right now. All right? Kind of bear.

Kind of bear. Maybe. Kind of bear. Maybe not. A bear. Okay. Wardrobe malfunction. Kind of bear.

It's kind of bear. Like, right? We don't know. Israel. This is just going to be. main event 300 and then we'll all be cool with it. Jen,

we laid out, we laid out so much wackiness that would work here that is available. You could do Tom Aspinall versus Derek Lewis on this card for the interim heavyweight title. Look at your face, but you're telling me right now of my dream. You would watch the hell out of that BC and you know you would. Derek Lewis deserve an interim title shot. Like what do you talk about?

For two big reasons BC, one, who gives a shit about an interim belt? it's fraudulent and two because it would be sick we talked about this when we did an episode of damn they were good at my podcast and we did the one on Mirro Crocop and it's like yeah Crocop fought like nine times

in 04 or whatever and not all of them are winners but you know what all of them were dope as shit and if you just had Tom Aspinall go in there and run over Derek Lewis it'd be cool as hell like we'd all enjoy it wins how funny would life be also that would be deeply funny yeah that would that would

happen, but that would be awesome. Yeah, then take this heavyweight title picture, which is already, you know, a disjointed mess and it would just completely, I mean, come on, come on, you guys are better. Curtis and jails it? Listen, you got to allow fun in your heart, BC. You got to let fun in your heart. MMA is serious, guys, okay? Would you be okay?

Would you be okay if Dana, Dana says getting announced a couple more fights today? Say the shuffle can also happen, Mike. The shuffle that I've been trying to push for a while, even though it probably won't happen because I do believe Islam Makachev is hurt. What I wanted was Islam and Gaichi at 299. We do O'Malley Cheeto at 300 just so we can beat Ramadan. And that's a nice little shuffle up. And then we do the three title fights.

That's the main event. We put the rivalry in the head spot. You could still do that right now if you could find something to fill 299. But 299 is so stacked that like if you wanted to just do something rando in that spot, like it's still good. We're still going to watch it. But the point is we have to. I don't know what to do, but let's just have fun with this.

If Dana-O-I comes out in an hour and says, hey, this is what we're going to do. Islam is actually more injured than we thought. It's not going to fight till November. Let's do Justin Gagey versus Max Holloway for the BMF title. Would you be good with that? Would that be a 300-ish kind of a fight for you? I'm good with that. Zero chance.

I've got many creative ideas, okay? Brock versus Tuivasa, Deli-Rexam. Blach versus Ashton. JP Bays. Like, there's a lot of, you know what I mean? Like, there's, you know? Brock versus Jim Miller, you know. Shout out to Anthony Smith.

I thought I had the hottest takes in the game, and he just lost his goddamn mind. It's great. You do Jim Miller versus Paul Felder on that car. That's a nice little 300-e kind of a fight, little appetizer there. That's a terrific prelimb car. That's a terrific prelimb.

Great early pre-lim feature fight. I'd be into that. Yeah. What I'm saying is, you could be right, B.C. You could be right. But I think it's too early to, to shit on this. We're only,

we still have 10 more fights to be announced. You know, that's all I'm trying to say. Either Izzy or Pereira are fighting in the main event and maybe both. That's just what's going to happen here. We need it.

And it'll be sick. In my perfect world, we just go ahead and do Cleo Real Entree versus Alex Pereira because that would just be, oh God, that would be great. Well,

we'll see. There's a lot more time. And who knows, I'm hoping Dana jumps on and makes this announcement like right now so we can react to it. but we'll see what happens.

300 still coming together. Next weekend. But BC, I mean, real quick before we move on. We talked a lot. It's become an intervention, Mike. And it's very important. No, no, no. No, I'm curious to get your thoughts because you and I,

and Jed, like I said, we are the ones who probably give the most shit to the UFC for card quality. Like a lot of people would be like, yeah, we'll find diamonds in the road. We're the ones that'll tell you. Like, if a card's really good, it's really good. And if it sucks, we're going to be the first ones to tell you that it sucks. We're not going to mince words about. We try to tell you the truth and give you what you need.

Compared to last year, where we're just like, okay, there's some cool things that happened and the results were the story more than the actual fights on paper. Do you feel like 2024 shaping up to be a more exciting year in terms of card quality, the UFC really putting forth more of an effort? I think it will be because they get the TV deal coming up and I think they really want to take the best strides possible. But do you feel like when we have these conversations in like August, September, about the effort the UFC has put forth and putting quality cards together.

Do you feel like this will be better than 2023? Absolutely. There was that unexplainable stretch where the main events and co-main events were still strong in 2020, but the filler up and down was becoming more and more unacceptable, missable. I do think that'll change this year.

I think you're also going to get some in between super cards that will matter. There's going to be a London fight night that Dana said would be like a pay-per-view, a Saudi fight night that he said would be like a pay-per-view. I think that you take all that into account and maybe what you mentioned too about the upcoming TV rights negotiation

I think they're going to come back big $299 suggest that I don't hate $298 either up and down I mean yeah yeah we're going to be fine here but you did ask me a question and I had a passionate answer and I stand by it and I love you for that BC

that's why you're here if you didn't bring this passion and thunder you wouldn't be here as much as you've been you're outside of MMA fighting staff members you've been on the show more than anybody else Jed do you feel like 2024 will be a year where we'll be going on preview shows being like, you know what, this is pretty good.

More so than, and this is trash. Undeniable, yes. So we're still going to have the, hey, this is trash for Apex cards because the Apex is where dreams go to die. But the rest of them, I mean, this is a contract year. It's in any sport. A contract year is the year you can expect the best play out of the player. The TV rights deal is coming up.

The UFC is going to be doing what they can to be like to max. maximize their negotiating leverage and they already have a ton of it like they don't need to but they're going to do they're going to pull out all the stops particularly because it's also could theoretically be the last year that their business is allowed to operate in the same way that it currently has so you know make all the money you can while the game is still rigged in your favor uh but like they're i think they're going to to fire out why i was so shocked by the connor international fight week announcement because that means you're waiting until june to get Connor on the schedule, whereas I was almost dead certain you run him at 300. And then hopefully you can get him at least once more in the year, maybe even twice more if he's feeling froggy. So even accepting that, I still think every pay-per-view I think is they're going to really be shooting for it.

Like BC mentioned the Saudi card, London, like they're going to have some pretty big no-cha, late night cards, no-cha. I think they're going to be taking big swings this year to maximize. the negotiating leverage they have for the upcoming TV rights thing. Casey, who wins this round? Because, I mean, my disappointment speech, it'd be wrong.

It'd be wrong for me to give the point here. So who gets it? Mr. Leafy Greens, Jedmishu. You didn't have to tell him. Nobody knew. We did it seamlessly. Casey, like, hit me up. It was like, Mike's out,

just jump right in, take over. we're going to be great. And then you told the viewers because you're an honest man. I'm a man of truth. What could I say? I say how I feel and I didn't want to let this slide. It would weigh on me the rest of the day

if I didn't tell the world that my wife I shit the bed in the middle of the best show we've ever done. Let's move on. Let's talk about some more drama. And Jed will start with you. You have the message on the whiteboard behind you. John Jones, don't be scared. We had a little melting pot reaction to this,

kind of winged something together. and you supported Tom Aspinall in this social media beef with John Jones, as everybody knows at this point, John Jones was scheduled to fight Steepa Mietchich at UFC 299 in November. Tom Aspinall steps into fight Sergey Pavovich on short notice,

becomes the interim heavyweight champion with a quick knockout. And now the MMA community is like, we need to see John Jones versus Tom Aspinall. Forget me, Stepe, I want to see Jones versus Aspinall. The UFC is like, no, we have to do Jones versus Stomismanol. do Jones versus Stepe. John Jones saying, yes, I have to fight Steepay.

And Stepe is like, yeah, dude, I'll fight John. And then I'll fight you, Tommy. Where are we at here? Like, this is all kind of very dumb. But at the same token, it is a very important conversation with this heavyweight division right now because we essentially have two champions. Tom wants to fight John Jones. And he should demand that.

And John Jones wants to fight Stepe with what he's accomplished his career. He should demand that as well. So where are we at here a couple days later after we reacted to this? So I'd encourage everyone to go listen to our reaction, and I've had a lot of time to think about it. And I think that what John is trying to say is... Just a big old chicken, Mike. He's scared.

He's scared of Tom Asper. He wants to fight the geriatric firefighter instead. The dude who can't even walk in and out of a UFC event anymore. The dude who hasn't want to fight in four years, but this is a legacy about the guy. that means so much. No, the only truthful thing that John said in any of

his belabored ranting with twittering was, I want this fight, the UFC wants this fight, Stepe wants this fight. That's true. All three of them won it for very different reasons and none of them are good. The only person was a good reason to want this fight

is Stepe because the title shot. So of course he should want it. John and the UFC won it. That's it. And that's the three people in the world who won it is Dana, John, and Steepa, and I guess they're relatives. Beyond that, not a soul is interested in this fight. And I would be much more accepting of what John is saying, because at some level, I do recognize the goal here. You know, take the easiest fight for the most money. That's the old chale son and adage. That's how business works. I don't piss on my head

and tell me it's raining. Don't say you're doing this for legacy or that Tom Aspinall hasn't earned it or any of the other nonsense that he spewed out there. Just own it. Just be for real about it. Be the John Jones who says,

I would kill you, Daniel Cormier, and not the one who is putting on airs on TV because he wants to project an image. That's not going to... We all see it. And you know, I know we all see it? Because the internet spent friggin' twos. dunking him to the center of the earth.

It was delightful. I had the best day of everyone being like, hey, John Jones, he's scurred. And that's it. That's really what it is. Don't be scared, John. If your legacy depends on this fight, as I told Eric on Tuesday when we did the reaction thing, man. If you don't accept fighting Tom Aspinall, a lot of people will defend you to the end of the earth because they are the John Jones defenders are here and they are a band united. But many people, and I will be at the head of this particular charge,

will be like, well, could never be my goat. Because I've done the research, Mike. In the time since we did our last podcast of this one, I went out, I investigated. I reached out to a couple of agricultural scientists, and they have confirmed to me that scientifically, goats cannot be chickens. Goats and chickens are two different things. And if you're two chicken to take on time, you could never be my goat, John could never be.

So take that and make the right decision. Fight Tom Aspinall, baby. Let's go. B.C., you heard what Jedges said. And one of the times I introed him on the show, and I don't think he loved this, but I think it's making more sense. I introduce him as the David Koresh of MMA Media

because he started this gaslight John Jones campaign. And I got to tell you, I got to tell you, between the DMs I've been getting this week. We've gathered members. The Gaslight John Jones campaign that Jed Mishu has started has grown exponentially this week. But after hearing what Jed has to say, we love drama in the sport.

And by the time these guys, if they actually fight each other, the UFC is going to use these tweets to build this fight, do you have a side here? Like, what has been your reaction to this Jones Aspin all back and forth? Well, the similar reaction is Jed initially, which was, John, you should have just kept your mouth shut, right? Like, you are the corporate champion at the moment.

The company has decided that this steep fight to them for the history, for the potential money. in box office at stake still matters, still has shelf life a year after it almost didn't. And what I mean by that is we already had the debate last November at MSG ahead of that, whether this fight should have been happening or not. And, you know, a lot of people were saying, no, they're too old, steep hasn't fought in three years, blah, blah, blah. I stood the course and defended the fight then because it was MSG, it was history.

It was a tent poll event for the year. It was one of those moments that, you know what I said a couple, as a promoter, this is the entertainment business sometimes, you got to do that. That all changed when John got hurt, especially now that we're looking at best case scenario mid-summer return, probably maybe even more likely to the fall now that he's added the second surgery on top of that. So what I'm trying to say is John should have just shut up because he decided to play the corporate route.

The company wanted to go in this direction. He said, let's go. They're going in that route. And what they've done, unfortunately, is make everything John tried to say to defend himself look bad. meaning specifically his claim that you have the interim title, Tom, and that's worthless. No, John, because of this decision, now the full title's worthless. The full under spear, you know, the full official UFC Heavyweight Championship is now the senior division title

because combined they have one fight together in the past four years. And there are elements that if this had happened under any other situation, John would have enough respect that you'd go, you know what, I might not agree fully with what he's saying, but, dude, he's the freaking goats, John Jones. The problem is, John, you will be sitting out a full year against a guy who will be sitting out a full four years by the time you fight. And John, you've only fought once in the last four years. And it was for a vacant title against a guy who had just lost to the champion on one leg who then left the promotion. So the problem here, John, is we're already not getting John Jones versus Francis and Gano, the biggest heavyweight fight really for UFC of all time, right?

not bigger maybe than Fador versus Crow Cop. But it's wild in the same calendar year that boxing can't get it right, yet we're getting Fury versus Usik probably two times in a row for all four titles. And good Lord, maybe the winner of AJ versus Ngano of all people are going to fight the winner. So we're not only not getting Johns versus Ngano, Jones versus Ngano, but now we're in this announcement, this verbiage by John is telling me that he's going to retire after this, that all the pessimists that predicted he was going to retire in November at MSG, we're probably right and that's what's going to happen.

So that has actually made the full title completely meaningless. It's not about what Aspinall has achieved to get to this point. It's the fact that he has. He's prime. He's 30 years old. He looks like a heavyweight of the future in terms of his style. We haven't seen a lot like this. We thought gone was heavyweight 2.0.

Turns out it might actually be Aspinall. And you're outright telling on yourself and telling us that you're going to duck him and you're going to retire. Only you don't have a leg to stand on here because. of all the time frames that we talked about. You didn't beat a defending champion for the title. In fact, not your fault, John, but Cyril Gond, shoot his pants in the middle of the octagon, and you submitted them in about a minute and a half. So it's even worse when you then sit out a year, you're avoiding the top guy.

Now, your title kind of means nothing. And the reality of all this guys is although we all started mad at John, we're really mad at the promotion. It's misdirected hostilities toward that that probably should go at the promotion in Dana. And this is really ridiculous that they're going to go in an official one more calendar year and still try to pull this off when it's very possible that Asperol could defend the interim title twice before Jones-Stepe actually happens, which is mind-boggling. Here we are, guys.

You know when I come on this show every once in a while and I complain that things are headed toward boxing? Like, I actually know boxing, right? I know the pitfalls. I know the stains that you can't get off your skin. But because you've been injected so deep, you can't get enough of. this BS. This is exactly a boxing move. Let's have a second title that's meaningless and we'll defend them both so we can have more main events that the people are happy about because they're title fights and I'll buy a ticket to that for $500 to $900 and nosebleeds. That's where we're at.

It's a corporate decision. So, John, you should have just kept quiet and let the people talk. And then when you beat Steppe, you should have just retired. That would have helped your go argument. Now the asterix are going to be so large into his goat argument that it pains me to have to say that. Why? Because I I predicted John Jones to move up to heavyweight win the championship, like 13 years ago, like everybody else, we've been waiting for it to happen. It finally happened. And now you're telling me we can't fight Francis.

We can't even fight Tom. And we got to fight that other. I mean, yeah, there we go, guys. Okay. So, no, I'm not happy. Thank you. Man, the energy levels were just there. Jed, what do you think?

You might have another person on your side here. Oh, I mean, the movement's growing day by day, and I feel great about it. The last thing I'll say on the, on the, this particular instance because I haven't seen a lot of people posit this and I'm probably not going to be popular. John's belt is fake. It's fraudulent belt. It's among

the most paper titles that exist in the history of the UFC heavyweight or just heavyweight titles writ large or just UFC titles writ large. He beat Cyril Gahn and at the time that's a good win and maybe that win ages well, maybe it ages poorly. We really cannot say at this point.

time it will depend on what cyrogan goes on to do if cyro gon puts together five wins reclaims the belt and ushers in a new era that that win will age beautifully for john jones cyro gong loses six of his next seven fights and it's like actually we were you know we we we overhyped him at the moment that that's just what context will get with time but he did not beat the champion to get that and now, fairly or unfairly, the reality is that broadly people believe that Tom Aspinall is the best dude in this division. Or if he's not, he's like he is the guy. And so while fighting Cyril Garne made sense, I guess at the time, with an extra year of context, John Jones is we don't have them ranked as number one heavyweight in the world.

And I think more people are coming around to this idea that actually what Tom Aspinall has done is what a heavyweight champion has. does. He beats the best dudes in the division. Got four wins over top 10 ranked guys per the UFC's ranking. John has one over zero gone. Tom's best wins are as good, if not better, than John's at heavyweight. And so, John can say that he was the UFC heavyweight champion. But it's not real. Like, it's, people are aware that he didn't beat the champion to become the champion.

He won the next title. But if he never defends it against a credible heavyweight, Is that real? Like I was pretty firmly of the belief that Charles Olivero, when he won the lightweight title by beating Michael Chandler, the paper belt, was not a real title because he didn't beat Habib for it. And Chandler was not the dude. He needed to beat Dustin Porre.

You know what he did? He beat Dustin Porre. And there were no doubt about it. No questions asked. He is a deserving champion. And he beat the other guy, Justin Gehche. No doubt about it. You cannot deny that this man is the real champion.

I can and will till my dying breath deny that John Jones is the true heavyweight champion of the UFC until such time as he beats Tom Aspinall. And if he does, then he's done it. And then you can take nothing away from him. But if he chooses two fights deep a business reasons or whatever, that is a legitimate blemish on his resume to me that a lot of people will be comfortable hand waving away. And I absolutely will not. It will be among the first things I bring up when speaking about his career arc, his argument as the goat will be, well, we can't, let's not pretend he was a two-division champion. You guys want to take credit as that's, that's not part of the conversation because he wasn't.

It was a fake championship, and I'm not going to give any credence to it. Last thing, BC. I never expected him to call Nico Mangonto over here. I mean, you just dropped a doogie all over the Bones Jones. damn. I mean, look, I think if you want to make the argument, John's the goat, you absolutely can. I think it's entirely about his light heavy rate run.

Sure. If his heavy rate run is beating Cyril gone. And again, if Cyril goes on and becomes amazing, then I'm happy to reflect on this. But we just don't know how that wins going to age. That's why I made the argument on our immediate reaction thing, that the idea that Steepa has a legacy fight is insane. No one with like a functioning cerebral cortex will be like,

yes, that improves his legacy. It just truly will not in the same way that if he beat Tony Ferguson, it won't do him any good at this juncture. That's just how time works. But fighting Tom is legitimately potential. Now, there's also the potential that Tom Aspinall loses his next eight fights and sucks. Like, that's always at play. I argue with that, Jed. A lot of people are saying, well, why would John have to fight this guy?

He hasn't fully proven himself yet. Who knows? Maybe he could lose five for a row. It doesn't matter. It doesn't even matter about the gone win, what he does. it matters who they were that night coming in when you beat them. So I do, I agree with you. I disagree with you, but you can't necessarily change history for that moment who they were.

It's just that, look, I agree with you on this album. It's context. It's context because they only fight so many times. We have a belief of what people are at the time, but then with more time, we get to, we get a more deep and understanding picture. I don't think that would be the case. I think Tom Asperol is going to be the chant for a hot minute here. But if Tom goes, fights John, loses, and then never, and then has a Dominic Reyes-like run of getting his ass kicked, then that win won't age well.

But there is no world where the steep a win ages well or does anything for his legacy. Tom Aspernel, there is legitimately the possibility that he fights Tom. Hey, not only does he have all the accolades everyone knows about, not only did he beat generation after generation of fighter at light heavyweight, he did that shit at heavyweight, too. He beat the next breed of guys at a weight class up, and that adds even more to the storied career. There's nothing to be gained by fighting Steepa other than a pure vanity play to say, I have a win over the guy that people broadly consider the greatest UFC heavyweight of all time. Like, it is a meaningless fight, and Tom Aspinall is meaningful and could be super meaningful, depending on how the next seven years play out after it.

Yeah, it's an easy fix. All John has to do is come out and say, hey, guys, I didn't mean that I was going to retire and avoid him. I just mean he's not in my level. Don't worry, I want to have a legitimate title reign too. I want to make a full title defense, all that. Or, you know, the UFC could fix this very easily by just making Tom fight Steepa and the co-man event of UFC 300,

or just by stripping. Or just by stripping John. Or just by stripping John, because didn't they just do that? Jamal Hill and Yuri Prohatska. So it would be very easy, very simple. But to close, I agree with you. I already know John's the greatest of all time.

The problem is I don't like when we debate that. The people go, no, hold on. I'm actually more of an Anderson Silva guy or GSP or Fador or Demetris or whoever you like in the moment. No, guys. John Joe's the greatest player of all time. But he's also come this close to screwing it up like 57 times due to unforced errors. John, the finish line is ahead of you. We would favor you to be just about anybody, okay?

finish the job so there is no debate because you've almost ruined it and blown it multiple times somehow Teflon John has been able to stay up this long with no real defeat. Finish the job. We're gonna, we would love till we don't hate you. We would love to laud you as the best. But, but Jed, this is exactly what GSP did

after defeating Bisping and no one's talking about that, okay? No one's talking about that. He even promised Dana he would defend that title. No one's talking about that. That's all I'm closing with. I mean, I also make the same arguments about GSP, like that his middleweight title does not mean anything. It's, it's fraudulent because it is. I mean, it's less fraudulent than Johns, frankly, but it's still pretty fraudulent.

Yeah, he didn't, Bisming didn't fight Yoll Romero. He didn't fight Robert Whitaker. Neither did GSP. But at least GSP did get the lineal belt. Like he got the appropriate lineal belt, even if every other part of it was paper as hell. Yeah. Here's the one thing I'll say about this. If I'm Tom Aspinall's manager,

I'm his mouthpiece. Tom, just act like your belt is the real belt. Like no sell John to the nines of this point and just be like, I'm the heavyweight champion. I guarantee you, you say that enough into a live microphone after defending that belt

once or twice, however amount it takes this year. John's going to be peeved by that if you call your belt the actual real belt. He will be tweeting up a fucking storm. I guarantee it. So it's all you're going to do right now. just do it again.

Just keep doing that. Like don't say, John, you're the greatest fighter of all time. Oh, John, I think I can beat you. But your resume is great. No, just no sell John and say, I'm the fucking UFC heavyweight champion. And you're not. This is the real belt.

Yours is the fake belt. You do that. I guarantee you John's going to come knocking on the door. At least he's going to be closer to knocking on the door. He might take a flight. He may not take an Uber to your house, but he's at least going to get on the plane and maybe test those waters a little bit more.

That would be my one piece of advice for Tommy. ass at all. I think he's done this perfectly, where I think that you want to start this conversation out being very respectful in the way he has. And I think now after John just had his Twitter Tuesday, now is when you just turn and get super childish. Like, I'm not even kidding. I would just post TikToks bocking like a chicken at him. Because it will get him. He's already like, he's so mad. Like you can see the energy in his fingers when he is tweeting about this stuff. He is so mad. And so being like, yeah, you have a fake belt.

And then when he responds, when he's like, oh, I have the real belt. I've been champion south of 23. Your response can just bachet him like a chicken and it will drive him insane. He will not be able to cope with it because he's very easy to needle. And you should start that now. Oh, man. What a story this will be. We'll see.

maybe these guys will fight maybe they won't if they fight I'm taking all the credit guys I don't care the point for round three goes to be my greatest achievement in life I can't support cult like behavior so BC gets it two to one nonsense it's outrageous my opening arguments maybe the best thing I've ever done on the show this episode is brought to you by Peloton a new era of fitness is here introducing the new Peloton cross training tread plus powered by Peloton Built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans, real-time insights, and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence while Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress. Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go.

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and you don't even have to try hard. Nate Diaz tweeted out, I was supposed to headline UFC 200, headlining UFC 300 would be better. I mean, the guy's just so good. And now everyone's going to go bananas talking about this, even though I would literally, and I'll say this again,

because I don't know if I've said it on this show. There are very few announces that Dana White could make that would shock me for UFC 300. Nate Diaz fighting at UFC 300 would literally shock me. That would shock me. And I'll leave it at that. By the way, guys, There is a UFC event on Saturday.

I don't know if you're aware of this. UFC 297 is next Saturday. We have, I believe this is UFC Vegas 84. And this is pretty good, but you see, this is a pretty good card. We got Maga Manankalive versus Johnny Walker. Very important fight at 205. You look at this main card, pretty good.

There's a couple prelims that are pretty good. What are we grading this one? UFC Vegas 84. Look, we're at the world's most famous apex, so they aren't all going to be winners. But what are we grade in UFC? Vegas 84 here. Where are your excitement of levels? You know, I would say on paper quality, it's a B minus, but I'll give it a B because it's been so long since we've seen these people,

and we do need them back. I don't agree on the card step outside of some bantamweight bangers, but I really like the main event, right? And we got to find out exactly where we're at in this wild card of a light heavyweight division and this absolute wild card of a future champion in wading in Ancolaev who can't stop doing things that get him in the way of that. So he's got a second chance here after this DQ loss to Johnny Walker. I know there's been some trash talk back and forth in the ankle lives. A huge betting favorite coming in. There's been a lot of Zuprooder film decoders trying to figure out in the three minutes we did see between these two, whether Johnny Walker had shown a little bit of an edge or an advantage with those calf kicks. Ultimately, I think it was too

close to tell. But outside of the interesting storyline of is this Johnny Walker finally putting it all together and becoming a true title contender, which he would be with a win. In fact, guys, if you went out there and after round and knocked Ankleyev out, he might be getting a call for Poetan at UFC 300 for all we know. I will say obviously the much more important, much deeper story, is if Ankalyev doesn't do it here, which means come out and be solid, mistake-free across the board, show us the threat of that wrestling, but don't lay and pray and be an absolute hammer and the badass that you're supposed to be. If he doesn't do that, is there any more time? Yeah, he's only 31, but it's like how many more chances can you give a guy?

who keeps fumble in the bag to use an overused term. That's been Enkolaev up to this point. I legitimately thought he would be, you know, it wouldn't be long before he would gain that title after Jones gave it up. And, you know, Jan Baloic had a nice little chapter there. As to Glover, I just thought eventually as everyone else, it would be around the waste of Enkolaev. My doubts have grown since then.

DeVegis is telling you he's going to squash. If he don't squash, I'm just not sure it ever happens for him because, damn, man, it's there for you. show us exactly who you are. He gets one more chance Saturday night. Yeah, he needs to go out there and just club around Johnny Walker and get him out of there if he wants to get a title shot because for some reason, and I've actually gone back and watched this fight since,

Dana hated that Ankelai up Yon Bolojavich fight. I didn't think it was as bad as he made it out to be. It actually thought it was kind of compelling, considering how Jan had him hurt with leg kicks early, and then he was able to battle back and at least get to a dry. I thought he won that fight, but hasn't even sniffed the title discussion since so he needs to go out there and do something spectacular but jed we've had a little bit of a breather here and we're not getting right back into the pay-per-view which i think is kind of cool and i think

this is a good little uh we're wetting the whistle here with this card i don't think i think it's pretty good i love the culminate event there's some storyline there are some bannam-wight fights and there are some prospects on this card that i'm really looking forward to to watching bc gave this car to be where are you at yeah i mean this is this is a rock solid b this is exactly what you want you know um I think this is the upper tier of what apex cards are ever going to be here. And it's perfect because you don't want to come back to a pay-per-view because we've been off for a month. You want to get the ball rolling.

Just like you said, just dip the toe in a little bit. And that's what we're getting here. We've got a main event with stakes. We've got a co-main event with a lot of stakes. If Minel Kopp beats Maitis Nicolao, he could legitimately be next in line to fight for the title, depending on what happens with the Amir al-Bosie Brandon Moreno situation. So there's a lot of stakes here on the main card, a lot of good stuff.

And then like you said, a bunch of prospects should be a fun fight card. This is, you use this phrase all of the time talking about fighters. But I thought of it a lot this week. And it's let give people time to miss you. And that's what the UFC does this time of year. They take a month off. And it gives us time to look at an apex card like this where there are five events between UFC 300 and UFC. 3.01 or maybe it's two between ufc 299 and ufc 300 there are five fight cards that are happening

if this was one of those i might shit on it like it would still be okay but it's like if this is just part of noise it's not but because it's the first one back because the ufc has given us time to miss them it feels better it feels i'm more excited about this weekend's card and the fact that it's now going to lead us into ucc 297 so it's a really good card pretty pumped about it um Like it's a really good apex card, I should say. I'm pretty pumped about it. And yeah, it should be a good Saturday. Yeah.

You fire this up, watch some NFL playoffs. It's going to be great. Can't miss if you don't leave. And that's why this is a nice time of year. I got to tell you, after the rumor innuendo going on on Twitter about maybe Kioji Horaguchi wanted to come back to the UFC, if Manel Kopp beats Mateus Nikolao and we get Minel Kopp versus Kiochururaguchi next in a number one contender fight, Oh my God

That would just be incredible Maybe put it on 300 We'll spice things up a little bit Who do you guys think is Speaking of 300 Who do you think is going to fight for the vacant women's featherweight title at 300 Ronda Rousie and Hollyhole

You know that have gone away And we haven't grown There It wouldn't I'm hearing that it's not the case But for a long time I thought Rondo was coming back And it would be quite funny

if the OC did that. Yeah. Yeah. I guess the adage of people. They can't because as Don Davis has informed us, PFL owns 100% of the top women's featherweights in the world. Don Dave's catching strays. This is one of the funniest tweets who have read my life, Mike.

It's very good. Don Davis is the most unintentionally funny man in the sport. It's awesome. Let's move. on, shall we? The point for round four goes to the Don Davis, Fireer of Stray is Jedmishu. It is

2 to 2. That's the best tweet ever. Just bragging about nothing and not even true is great. If you go through Don Davis's last like four months of tweets, it's really epic. Because he doesn't tweet a whole lot, but everyone is just

better than the previous. 80% success rate of just bangers. And then understand, man doesn't understand Twitter, but God, he's an epic poster. Yes, absolutely. Time for the knockout round, guys. We're going to have some fun with this. Plus, I missed the second round, which seemed to be the most contentious round of the show. So we're going to kind of go full circle here. We're going to have some fun here. So Jed, we will go to you first. You did win the last battle between yourself and Brian Campbell.

We got the cannonball here. You want to go first? You want to go second? I'll go second. I'll let BC, I'll let BC take the, take the reins here. All right. BC, this is we're going to do. Okay, Dana White just called you on the phone. They said, look, he's like, I'm catching too many strays from the fans for my flight announcements here. So I want you to do it for me, BC. I want you to make the announcement of the main event of UFC 300, all right? You could do it as Dana White. You could do it as Brian Campbell. I don't give a shit whatever you want to do. But for the next 60 seconds, you're going to sell this card as the epic. U.S. 300 that you dream of, that you feel everybody else will be dreaming of. 60 seconds on the clock, my friend. Go. All right. Everyone, I know you haven't loved our fight announcements, but get ready.

You know, and slap Jesus and the Wolfman take on each other. It's big in India. So, you know, we got that going for us. Here's the deal, folks, all right? Where are we out here? F it Thursday. I'll tell you this. It's going to be a banger, though, because Israel, Odessian,

is back, guys. I know he said he was retiring or going away for a long time. We don't know the current status of his sagging left nipple, but he's going to be back against the winner of somebody who's got a fight coming up, and man, we hope to know. Here's a serious deal. One of the greatest rivalries in combat sports history is actually Pereira versus Adasania. Let's do Chapter 3, MMA, Chapter 5 overall for the 205 pound title. If Pereira wins, it's one step closer to immortality in less than 10 fights. And if Adasania wins, it's the long-awaited two-division championship that is legend endures.

And also, Brian Campbell, we hear you and we're coming for you. Excellent job. Excellent job. Jed. He kept it to a minute. He did it. That's the upset of the year. He might just win on principle right there.

So, by the way, you can catch your votes after Jed gives his answer. So, Jed, you're announcing the main event. You could do it as Dana White. your impersonations have been incredible. I can't forget the Michael Chandler impersonation you did back in the day on the show. So maybe this will be the new one, the new generation of incredible Jed impersonations.

Announce the UFC 300 main event, Jed. You're on the UFC's Instagram. You're going live right now for the next 60 seconds. Wow us. Go. All right, dummies. I see you all out there. These are idiots out there saying that we don't have our hand on the wheel,

that we've just let things run. a muck and we don't have a plan. I promised you the best, the biggest fight card of all time. And when have I ever not delivered except all those times I haven't, but let's forget about those. Because what's happening? You see 300. You've got the co-main event, Leon Edwards, Bola Muhammad. That's a terrific fight between two guys who are good. But the main event, Israel Adisanya. He's back, and you know who he's back to fight. He's back to fight the man himself, the UFC middleweight champion, Drickus Duplessie who just ran over Sean Strickland. These two got a lot of animosity.

They hate it. They can't stand each other. And they are going to get in there and they are finally going to settle. Who is the true African champion in the UFC? UFC 300 April, whatever that date is, buy your tickets now. This is exciting. I'm already more pumped for UFC 300 just after the last two minutes. none of these fights are official, but Israel Adasanya attached to both of these.

So let me ask you this gentleman while we tabulate the votes, a waste of time. Just seriously. Like I understand the rivalry there and all of that, but let's take all that aside right now and just talk about like just weirdness and potential. Would you rather see BC Adasania Pereira 3 for the 205 pound title? Or would you rather see Alex Pereira fight for the heavyweight title or fight Tom Askenal for the interim heavyweight title. Is it easy?

Is it an easy out of Sanya? That's an interesting. Easy Otisanya. You want it. Look, I mean, I got the Marquez Pachial poster over here, the fourth one. It's the greatest rivalry of my combat sports life. I want something like that in MMA. As great as Jones and Corriere was, it was two fights.

One doesn't count. John won both of them. I would love to see this go to a fifth chapter because of the dramatic come from behind knockouts that we've seen so many times for the way that Pereira has owned him mentally. Yet Izzy has the greatest moment of the rivalry and the most recent giant strike. against him by coming back and knocking him out in Miami there. It's way bigger. And as much as I love and respect Poetan and want him to be considered a true legend and he is,

we would be leaping to throw him into a third division right now until at the very least he defends this title at 205. And this ain't even the full title, right? It's the interim strap, which is kind of the full title now because of Jones-Stype, but it would feel like a little bit of a forced job to make 300 magical when, as we established here, as long as Izzy's willing to fight, I think. we're going to be fine and I did see a headline just while you guys were talking that is he officially confirmed he will be at the fight card in toronto to watch strickland from cage side

so it does lend me to believe we're going to see him let's go 205 because the added history of him trying to become a two division champion only adds to this thing what do you think jed we have you know prayer out of sign he's a back pocket fight you do this anytime but for 300 what would you rather say? I legitimately would rather see Pereira Asmel. I recognize that it would make far more sense to do what Brian wants to do. Pereira Asmoral is way more fun. It's cartoonish in a way that is kind of befitting 300,

particularly when you look back at 200 and us bringing Brock back and all the circus like surrounding of that. And it opens up Izzy. Look, I know people love the Izzy Pereira rivalry and it's great. the fights were compelling and it's very interesting. I have watched them fight each other four times and I will continue to watch them fight. But I desperately want to see Izzy fight trick as two plus C. I've wanted that fight for a long time.

I do think DDP is going to win. That's what the Toronto, I legitimately am just so confident that the Toronto setup is, did DDP win? Is he going to say yes to turning this around? Dana will announce that fight at the post presser if those things happen. And if not, then maybe it is Strickland Izzy. But I really want to see Izzy fight at middleweight. And that's part of the thing with Pereira.

That fight is awesome. That fight at light heavyweight is still great. But because Pereira has the belt, I don't care about it. It's weird because Izzy's not a light heavyweight. He's not the light heavyweight champion. He tried and failed like already. And so he would get this title in a very odd situation. And then is he going to fight Magumann and Glyas of the world?

I'm not sure how that would go. That creates a lot of weirdness. Whereas instead, Alex Pereira can fight Ta-Assad, I'll probably lose. But if he has somehow become a three-division champion in three years inside of the UFC, that's hilarious and incredible.

And I guarantee you, I will bet my left foot. I will hack it off with a chainsaw. But if Pereira fights Aspera and beats him, buddy, I can't tell you how fast John Jones will no longer, be like, I got to fight Stapay. I'll be like, hey, I'm interested in fighting Alex Pereira as well.

So then we get that end of it too. So I just think there's more opportunity if we go Pereira Aspinall. It's just so fun. All right. Would it not be the funniest thing in the world for Pereira to beat Aspinall? John immediately tweets so much for the new generation or whatever. And then a week later, it's like, because I, a thousand percent, he would just have like a smug-ass tweet. and then a week later you'd be like,

F it, I'll show you guys I'm not afraid. I'll fight Alex Pereiro, which is the most insane thing. He would spin it so incredibly. It'd be the best. See, that's why I asked the question. All right, Casey, come on in. We will have a preview show tomorrow for UFC Vegas 84.

I believe 1 p.m. Eastern, so stay too for that. Casey, do we have a winner? Oh, yeah, we got a winner. Okay. Excellent. Who is it? Your winner today,

with 60% of the fan votes is Mr. Brian Campbell. Oh, he's back. He's back. There's no pools to cannonball into. B.C. gets it done. No streaking. There will be no streaking. Thank God.

B.C., congratulations. Welcome back to the wind column. How are we feeling? Very good. Very good, guys. I didn't want to feel like BJ after the second Frankie fight. No, my career was over. I'm back in it, baby.

Jed lit my shoe. You can lick my shoes. All right. Jed, how are you feeling? You know, I'm okay because I got to deliver the best promo of my life on John Jones. Tom, if you're out there, if you see this, just DMs are open, buddy.

Hit me up. I'm happy to talk strategy about cast lighting this man who is terrified of you. What a show. This is a memorable one. What a way to kick off the battle portion of BTL. We did the Q&A last week. This is this is what the show is all about.

So thank you, Jed. Thank you, B.C. Casey hit the music. Let's get the hell out of here. I got to pick my kid up at school. So thank you all very much. I appreciate you back next week. We'll react to UFC Vegas 84.

And we will get you ready for the first paper view of 2024. UFC 297. Sean Strickland versus Drickish Dup but C. Myra Buena Silva versus Raquel Pennington for the vacant women's Bannamway title. White belts. We're all excited. So thank you all. We'll see you back next week for Jed, for BC, for Casey on the Ons 2's.

I am Mike Heck, the iconic voice of Estherlyn takes you home. Back next week, goodnight, everyone. Love y'all. This has been Between the Links, an M.M.A Fighting Production on the Vox Media Network.