MMA Fighting - BTL | Francis Ngannou vs. Tyson Fury, Volkanovski Dominates, UFC 290, Adesanya vs. DDP, More

Episode Date: July 13, 2023

While UFC 290 this past Saturday was one of the best fight cards the UFC has delivered in quite some time, the headlines were moved from that incredible event to one of the promotion's former heavyweight champions as Francis Ngannou got the fight he wanted. On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel will discuss Ngannou getting a boxing match with heavyweight champ Tyson Fury in October, the chances Ngannou has, and how the UFC will respond. Additionally, topics include UFC 290's top storylines, Volkanovski's dominant win against Yair Rodriguez, Alexandre Pantoja's victory over Brandon Moreno in a classic, Dricus Du Plessis shocking the world by stopping Robert Whittaker and his subsequent face-to-face with Israel Adesanya, #UFCVegas77 this Saturday headlined by Holly Holm vs. Mayra Bueno Silva, and more. Host Mike Heck moderates the immediate rematch 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: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from the Audible Original, the downloaded two. 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 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.

And now, your host, Mom. The iconic voice of Esther Lynn welcomes you to a brand new. edition of BTL. Thank you for being here. It's good to be back chatting with all of you. I've had some voice issues for the past week. Turns out I have a pretty gnarly case of strep throat. So if I sound like a Muppet at any point during the show, please forgive me and try to ignore it. But we are coming off of a memorable UFC 290 event. Some major storylines coming out of that card. Great moments, perhaps not so great moments. We've had some big fights announced and much more. this should be a fun week, my friends,

as we have ourselves a very rare immediate rematch here on BTL. Let's begin with the man who I think is officially the BTL champion for life. The man put it all out there, stuck to his guns, didn't let the haters talk him down. And this past Saturday night, he was proven right. Folks, the victory lap continues for the wise predictor himself. Jed Michoud from MMAFighting.com. How are we feeling, Jed?

Look at that. Look at it, Mike. Look at it. I'm the king. I got my rematch. I called this last week. I said if he wins, you have to come back. All of you have to vote for me this week,

I will finally defeat this man because I am the forever champion like Amanda Nunes. DDP! DDP forever. Who! Casey, might as well, let's go ahead and play the clip. I mean, that crown is Jerry Loller-esque. What are we talking about here? Why is Jet the goat?

What does nose job? DDP look like. This man can breathe now, Mike. Do you understand the limitations he's been competing with? He couldn't breathe. That's why his mouth is agape immediately and he's heaving. There's no oxygen intake. He has now gotten that fix. Robert Whitaker doesn't know what he's in for, baby. He has no idea what's about to happen. This is like in the fast and the furious when you put the gnaws into the engine and it just explodes. This man can get O2 straight into the the lungs, he is going to light the world on fire on Saturday. DDP is about to cement himself a title challenge and none of y'all see it coming,

but I believe in nose job DDP. I mean, incredible stuff, Jed. I mean, how does this? Some of my finest work. Yes. I mean, you had the Giuliana Pena one in 2021 that lit the world on fire. I feel like this one's a better pick, honestly. I feel like this one has, it means a little bit more.

Does it not? Which one? How do you rank between the two? I feel like this one's better because I'll level it with you guys. I'll be honest. I didn't really believe in the Pena one. I was just saying it. This one, this one was right here in the heart and I was trying to manifest it. And then it frankly went better than I could have imagined.

I did not. He easily won. This was not really a competitive fight. Like he didn't totally just barnstorm him, but very clear. dominated Robert Whitaker and finished him in the second round and like wasn't even breathing hard from it. So I didn't think it would go that well for him. It was awesome. And I'm riding high right now, boys. If Rhonda Rousey comes back, which I also said would happen as soon as noon as retired, I may never do this show again. I may just be like, I'm done. I can't, I can't top this.

Yeah, it's been a hell of a run for you, Jed Mishu. And let us introduce Jed's opponent. the man who is in shock with that clip you just saw with his prediction, to the point where he said, Drick's Duplice has no chance of winning this fight. Could he perhaps give us some flowers? He's one of my favorites of the space shaking his head from the multi-time award-winning, morning combat from CBS Sports Showtime

and deep within all of our hearts, Brian Campbell is here. B.C., how are you, buddy? Still in shock that the living legend, Robert Whitaker, would get knocked out. against that man. But, you know, I'm here to teach the kids around the globe a lesson because like Whitney, RIP, I also believe the children are our future. This is how you take the L right here on national television or the television of the future, the internet, because, you know,

every once in a while a special power arrives on the scene. You can call him Nostragetis. Remember the Alibro. I remember where I was when he picked DDP over Whitaker. So I've got to come back on the show one more time and pay receipts. respects to that dime store kid rock second raid jerry mcguire mhm a personality that we know as jad mishu because i am one humbled man right now thank you might be the nicest thing you know has ever said on this podcast well what a great start to the program we'll talk more about ddp and what happened in the fallout and where this could i'll lead to in a moment but we got to talk about france and gano guys we got to talk about france and gano we got to talk about france and gano

The man who most wise-ass fans believed fumbled the bag when he left the UFC before signing a multi-million dollar potentially game-changing deal with the PFL. Got pretty much everything, excuse me, he could ever want as an MMA fighter. He now got the boxing match he wanted as well. It was announced Tuesday that Inganu will fight Tyson Fury in a 10-round boxing match in October. Jed, I know you talked about this Tuesday, but this thing continues to get some buzz. It's the biggest story of the week in combat sports for sure. Your reaction to this, and I'll put it this way, what word would you use to describe

to describe how you feel about this fight being put together? Oh, I mean, I'm of two minds because most of me is very happy for Francis and we'll get into that in a second. There's a part of me that's like, man, Francis, you just had to steal my thunder, huh? This is supposed to be my celebratory week. And then he gets to dunk his haters into the core of the earth. Like, oh, you went to PFL. You're afraid of competition.

I got all the money in the world and I get to do whatever the hell I want in PFL. Oh, but you're still, you're never going to get the boxing match. Actually, I got Tyson Fury. Suck it nerds. And he just, their victory lap, the victory lap that Francis and that Eric Nixick get to take now, uh frankly i'm i'm more excited to watch that than i am to have my own because couldn't happen to a better guy like that's i think that's there are a whole host of things that can be said about this fight but i don't think it has been said enough that this could not have

happened to a better dude m m m m ms is filled with people that are terrible and that are bad i was literally having this conversation last night with some friends when they were like MMA can't be that bad. And off the top of my head, I listed like 12 people who have done horrific things. Like, yeah, actually this sport is filled with awful people.

Francis and Ghani ain't one of them. This man's story is inspiring. What he has, frankly, just managed to will into existence should never possibly have happened. And he keeps uping it. He keeps beating himself. He won when he became the UFC heavyweight champion. Shit, he won when he made it to the UFC.

And then he becomes a champion. And then he leaves on his own terms, beating a guy that many people, myself included, picked to to beat him with one knee. And now he has made this happen. He is creating dreams out of just sheer willpower. And I couldn't be happier for him. I dearly hope I don't think any of us are going to even really entertain the idea that he can win. but ideally hope that he can at least give a decent accounting of himself in one way or another. So people don't come out of this feeling vindicated that, well, he lost that was a waste of time

because it was never about the fight. It was about getting it and everything else and about the enormous amount of money he is going to make now free of the confines of the UFC. So honestly, this is just dope. What a great piece of news. B.C., you have a tremendous podcast that covers a lot of mixed martial arts, but you say it all the time. You're the boxing guy. And now we get to this new attempt at a crossover between MMA and boxing with Fury and Ghana. We've obviously seen the most infamous one with Floyd Medweather and Connor McGregor.

Are you into this? What was your reaction to all of this? It decides, it really depends on which side of the brain you're asking me to react to. On the human side, on the heart side, everything that Burger King knock all. prediction maker said, and hopefully he can predict, heck, whether you'll perish from this COVID battle by the end of this program is true. Francis got the bag. He didn't drop it. He'll be making more money in one night, according to his management than he's made in his entire UFC career. And on top of that, you want to talk about the boyhood dream, Sean Michaels. And Gano didn't

crawl through hell to get from Africa through a jail in Europe to the streets of Paris, where he's living out of his car to become UFC champion or the face of PFL Africa. He did it to become the boxing heavyweight champion of the world. So to see him actually in this moment, that personal side of you is like, oh my God, like Jed said, rarely, rarely do we get a wholesome moment in combat sports where it always ends badly and sometimes along the way it's grimy and gross. And by sometimes I mean almost every time. The other part of my brain is the MMA side, which says, you know what, there's a spectacle, and I'll tune into it. Francis is going to try to do the impossible against the greatest heavyweight of this era.

That's pretty awesome. I don't see how you're not going to find a way to see that, find a way to react to it. But you mentioned the other side of my brain, the one that was raised on gas station food. It's true. That's also a boxing guy on that side. This ain't good. This ain't good under these circumstances. I think they had a window here to make this really,

special fight, which really could have demanded extra next level crossover viewership. And there's two things they could have done in there. One, mix the two sports together, make this a forearm glove match. Heck, you can even put in the damn smart cage if you want and try to do, hey, who's really the baddest man on the planet? The other side of it is why is the WBC heavyweight title not at stake right here? And I get that you can argue it's sort of like, well, who's Francis? He doesn't even have a pro boxing match.

I get that too. but, you know, Floyd Mayweather had a historic run going, and his 50th fight was not an exhibition. It was a real fight against day one, Connor McGregor, meaning we've done this before. Could you argue like Kevin? I only didn't print that it's like overblown to do these type of things, yes, except for Francis. Because he's got that next level power, the fact that the real championship isn't on the line here from a boxing side, it makes us feel very ho-hum, and it ties into the idea that Tyson Fury should not be in Saudi Arabia in a ring with Francis Ngano. he should be in a ring with unbeaten unified heavyweight champion

Alexander Usik to crown the first four belt and in this case unbeaten heavyweight champion of boxing one name, one division, one face, one sport, the things as a boxing fan we never thought could be possible. It could have been possible back in March, but you got Fury moving the goalposts on Usik. So now as a boxing fan, we're supposed to get excited about this, only it's meaningless and the title's not at stake.

So it takes off any kind of pressure in terms of the meaning. It would be like this guy. It would be like if our beloved UFC had a chance to make Jones versus Inganu, and instead of making that, they were trying to make John Jones versus Tyson Fury. Oh, yeah, I think that actually just happened a couple months ago. I have to be fair. Where was Ioli's column during that one, right? Francis, you got the bad congratulations.

But this isn't a, you know, happy news across the board depending on your combat foundation. Yeah, and I see where you're coming from because the NBA community, at least those who want to see MMA fighters get what they deserve, of they love this for Francis. Like Jed Stead, it's not about winning and losing. It's about shutting people up and getting the fight

that no one thought you could get. The gimmick fight. It's about dunking on the nerds, Mike. It's about dunking on the nerds. Gimmick, the gimmick promotions is tremendous from Francis and Gano, by the way. The GIMIK, just incredible stuff

just adds to the story. You know, they love this for Francis. They love him getting the money, sticking it to Dana, all that stuff. And I think most in this community, except You know, we accept this for the bag he's getting and not much else because not a lot of people are giving Francis a chance here.

Some of the MMA community are into it because they're just stubborn and they just want bad things to happen. But BC, you gave your side from like the boxing, from like the boxing part of you. How is the boxing community as a whole reacting to this? Like one would think they'd be kind of pissed about this, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Half of them are doing what you would expect to say, look, Mayweather McGregor was a, perfect storm of all perfect storms. Each rendition after that, each sequel is going to be bastardized to some degree.

And that is certainly in play. The other half of it is exactly what I'm saying, calling out maybe, right? Maybe the best heavyweight of this era, probably in 6'9 Tyson Fury, who still unbeaten. Maybe he hasn't fought everybody they wanted to, but you got the fight of your life right in front of you. What the frick are you doing? You want to fight Derek Chasora a third time like you did, you know, turn of the new year and nobody cared? we gave you that pass because it was a stay busy, stay active, and here we are.

The reaction here is not necessarily a slant against Francis. It's more of a slant against what are we doing? Why are we doing this? Who's to gain from this? Well, Francis is to gain from it. Fury is going to get a monster payday. Saudi Arabia in its real aggressive attempt to turn, really, to be fair, to turn Saudi Arabia into a combat sports destination where people know you're going to get paid more to be there

than elsewhere. I felt like Saudi Arabia has this chance, by the way, dual chance. at one to be a continued theme of sports washing, which is uncomfortable. The other side of it is they have more money than everybody else that are willing to spend it. And that actually bridges the gap in terms of fights that are hard to be made. And we know as boxing fans, most big fights are hard to make. You can bridge that gap with stupid amount of money. Saudi's got that.

Ushik just signed with Saudi Arabia's boxing promotion because a lot of people think that's the only way he could actually get Fury. And we're not doing that fight. So yeah, boxing is sort of like, you know, F off, get off my timeline. But that's not an indictment against Francis. Jed, at BC brought up a great point because I was going to bring this up too, because we've seen this before, but not in the same kind of way. If Francis was still the UFC champion, and instead of getting the John Jones fight that we know is right there and that John wants and both guys seem to want in some way, but we got Francis versus Tyson in the UFC,

what would your reaction be? Like, what do you think the reaction would be from the MMA computer? community. We got this fight happening in the UFC. Like if Francis, we could get Francis John Jones. If it's right there, we're like,

yes, we're so close to Francis John Jones. And then Dana does one of his screaming things where it's like, oh yeah, the fight you've all been asking for, the fight everybody's been won, Francis Gano was going to fight

Tyson Fury and Madison Square Guard in November 11th. How would you react to that? How do you think the MMA community would react to that? I mean, they would all just be pretty mad. because it's not Francis John Jones.

And like, I hate to say this because it just isn't the point. It does not matter. But M.MA fans seem to really love to make this point. I mean, George St. Pierre just did it on the M.MA hour yesterday talking about this. Tyson Fury has will last less time in the cage with Francis than Francis can last with Fury in the ring. I think that's just like an objectively true fact. But that doesn't mean anything. But MMA fans would be like, well, this is just going to be stupid.

And it kind of is. And I'm even sort of with them because Tyson Fury would make like $40 to do it. The point of this, the reason this is an exciting and interesting moment is not because of the fight itself. It's because of the spectacle and the spectacle not happening inside the UFC for me. Like I can totally understand if boxing fans aren't into this makes the most sense in the world, frankly. For me, everything, this is a feel-good story, and it will be a fun, at least morally fraught sort of conversations to be had around this as it comes. And it will happen outside of Face the Pain and Bob O'Reilly and the same promotional patina that I've had for like 30 years at this point or whatever. So totally get why boxing fans wouldn't be into this.

I saw, honestly, a lot of boxing fans just like be even more angry. at Fury that this is what's happening and kind of wishing or hoping that somehow he slips, you know, steps on the banana peel here. And that would objectively be the funniest thing to happen in sports, certainly since DDP beat Robert Whitaker, but probably in several years, frankly, if somehow Tyson Fury actually did, like the one in a billion punch landed and Tyson Fury, even if he just gets dropped, he didn't have to lose. If he just gets dropped by Francis and there's like a moment,

it would be incredibly funny. And I think everyone could at least acknowledge that. One to 100, Jed. What percentage chance does Francis have to win this fight or even to land that knockdown punch against Tyson Fury? Whatever the lowest number I can say is. If the number is one, the number is one. Like it's not going to happen.

You know, God knows we all love MMA angles. That was such a fun, idiotic name. heading into the Carmer Grecker of Floyd fight as if Floyd doesn't know about angles. Like, ah, going to show him those M.MA angles. He's never seen these before. What? Like, coming in straightforward, not even, like, behind a faint? No, France is going to get tuned up in there.

The hope is that Tyson Fury knows how to carry him in a way that will be compelling for future endeavors. If Tyson, I said this coming into Floyd and Connor, I don't think it's going to happen for a number of reasons. If Tyson Fury was really, really a savvy businessman, he would take a dive. He, not even betting on himself. He would just fall over once, just one time. And then he gets back up, he can still win the fight.

But now you have sold in Ganu as a viable opponent for a rematch. and you could just keep milking that Saudi money for all it's worth and never have to fight Ussick, who might beat you. So that's what I would do if I was in Tyson's core. I would tell him to do that. But of like a realistic chance, Francis has none. B.C., do you give Francis a little bit more of a chance than one or zero? Even as the boxing guy, I do.

And does it come down to the old school puncher's chance? It really does. And I'm not going to expect Francis to be a slick box. In fact, having Eric Nixick on Morning Combat in the past and asking about this possibility, we have sort of talked about some of the strategy that they've sort of thrown around. Is it better for Francis to just be as unorthodox

and dangerous as possible? It probably will be. Now, that doesn't mean he'll be able to carry that stamina since they're a little bit different in that regard. And Connor faded badly and late against Floyd. But look, 1% no, I'll give him a 10% chance because, again, the only reason I think in general, aside from the Francis Feelgood story,

I don't want to dismiss that. That's a big part of all of us accepting this curiosity fight to some level. It's the fact that if you're going to go back to the well of boxer versus MMA fighter and the boxer isn't like way too old, so that's the way you're going to bridge the gap of competition. And in this case, disappointingly, it's boxing rules, but again, not the title on the line. If anybody has more than a 1% chance, let's be fair, it is Francis Ngano. Now, I understand I had a Maymac that Dana spit into every microphone,

and a lot of us did too saying, okay, no one's actually picking Connor, but Connor does have real power, right? One punch power in MMA. What happens if he hits Floyd clean? Well, he actually did. He hit Floyd with an uppercut to the throat from close range in round one. Only that adjustment didn't work out well for Connor. And by that adjustment, I mean going from an MMA stance into a boxing one

with much heavier padded gloves and the shifting of weight. Connor was unable to produce power in that case. Inganu from everyone I've talked to, that won't be an issue. Does that mean he wins or you're giving a big chance? No. And Jed nailed it on the idea of, well, the craziest thing, weirdest thing that could happen is if Fury gets, you know, knocked out for taking this big money chance here.

It's not really a chance. Again, there's no title on the line. And as of right now, they're not telling us that, you know, people who put it together whether it's actually going to be an actual fight. Yeah, there'll be boxing judges. It'll be 10 rounds. But I don't know if it'll be on everyone's record. If it's not, all Fury does if he loses as Jed, you know, throughout there,

gain another big money rematch and delay this Ussick fight. And maybe Fury is doing the old school boxing move of waiting out the quicker opponent until he gets a little bit older. And anyone that doesn't follow boxing, Usoc's actually into his late 30s now because he had such a big amateur career, that could be the case. And I don't expect Fury to come out and tell boxing fans, hey, don't worry, guys, still going to fight Usook on the other end.

Don't get mad at me. It's just disappointing all together. But one thing no one's talking about, top rank is the co-promoter in boxing of Tyson Fury along with. Frank Warren in the UK. Top Rank did put out a press release that this fight's happening, and they put that weird language in there that said, don't worry, guys, both fighters will go toe to toe in the center of the ring and settle this.

What pay-per-view outfit is putting this on? I say that because Top Rank has an exclusive contract in the States with ESPN. You're going to have an ESPN plus, you know, victory lap party of how you escape a UFC contract on ESPN? I don't think so. I'm going to be, I think it's not a coincidence if it didn't announce the distribution. distribution partner here. If Dana's going to pick up that phone and dial Disney for anything, it's going to be this one. Why? Why is Dana being so salty toward Francis? Because at the end of the day, is Dana the kind of guy that doesn't, you know, give up grudges easily? Yes. But even more than that,

Francis cannot succeed in this situation or it continues to show that there's a chance for life outside of the UFC, that there's a potential roadmap. Now, that roadmap is made harder by the fact that after Francis left UFC made those contracts even more draconian to keep people locked in. longer with the sunset clause and all that. But still, if Francis succeeds, Dana loses, you think this is going to end up on ESPN Plus pay-per-view? I don't. I mean, you say Francis can pick up the phone.

What about old Donnie Davis just making a call from Francis's side of the thing? Dana White, you want to pull the UFC off? Well, PFL will leave if you refuse to promote this. Who's ESPN Plus going to side with, my man? I think we all know the answer to that. Well, just threaten to put a graphic together, and they'll be on ESPN Plus pay for you in a heartbeat. I mean, no one makes more noise with a graphic than Don Davis does.

We've learned that on this program. But heck. Or Saudi Arabia will just pay them more money and be like, make it happen. You know what the only good thing about this guys, this whole Francis thing for UFC fans is it's making really big fights that have been lingering and not getting signed. It's suddenly aligning them. puts out to the world that this fight is intimate.

Guess what happens next? Oh, hey, guys, Jones is really going to fight Steepay at MSG. It's on. And I don't know if anyone saw Michael Chandler's Christmas tree emoji critic. Like 20 minutes after this news dropped. Look, Francis, keep going, brother. Because if you keep pushing the envelope, we'll finally get all the fights we were promised from the beginning,

like you versus John. Love it. Maybe. I mean, that would actually be the best thing. If Francis comes out of this and is like, and I'm now signing. a deal to box Deonté Wilder. Your move, Dana.

All right, is he DDP, Jan 1st in South Africa, fine. I mean, he's just played this masterfully from Jump Street. So that is Ingan of Fury. We'll see how this all plays out over the next several months. We'll move on to what happened this past Saturday

because a lot happened this past Saturday. Point for round one goes to, goes to the boxing guy, BC, one and nothing. And Jed, you're wearing a damn crown. You've got the victory lap. You can't get everything. True. You can't have the cake and eat it too.

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and this exceeded expectations for most people. This is one of those cards where if you bought it and you spent the $85 bucks, you were very happy you did and if you didn't, I think you regretted it. So just BC, how good was this card? How good was this card? Was this

about just expectations? It was this so good because the rest of the calendar year has been awful or it's just a tremendous fight card on a zone. Hey, heck, the answer is yes to everything you just said, right? If you were like me and you were you were extra critical of UFC matchmaking and the larger sort of corporate reputation and communication this calendar year, this was the oasis in the desert quite literally, right? This is what a major in the UFC can feel like. I know I was critical even though a lot of people love

this card. Jed gave an A on paper. I wasn't as willing to because there was a lot of the potential for one side of matchups with stars. Some of that bro. broke apart, but what do we get? We got the full power of what can happen on a UFC night where it feels big. You're in a packed arena. It's, you know, again, I mean, this is arguably the biggest card of the year in terms of the expectations. Well, it over delivered. If you just want to compare this to the greatest paper views and UFC history of this, you know, modern era, it stands up very well there too, whether you love 100, 116, 205, 217, me, 236 in Atlanta with that great main and co-main event at the end there that changed my life. so many ways. Whatever you want to compare it to, this fight had that magic, that injection, that anything was possible. You had early knockout, bow nickel quick finish, Robbie Lawler, perfect retirement, crazy upset by DDP one after another, after another, that even though I really enjoyed the main event, we all have that same sentiment. It was arguably one of the worst fights on this card. This shows you again, if you are on the crying critical end like

I was of, hey, UFC, you are kind of going in the wrong direction and no one's really raising their hand. This was a, hey, B.C. shut the hell up moment. We still got it. This is what we're capable of. This is a night you will not forget. You'll remember where you were and what it felt like. I hope this kicks down the door of momentum into the second half. Obviously, I'm sure we're going to talk about this Saturday's fight night card that might be the worst card of all time. But short of that, I'll give them a whole pass. Why? Because we're coming off the one of the best cards I've ever seen. And we have two pay-per-views this month. And the second one is pretty damn badass. July 29. So 10 out of a 10, if there's any, if there's any other evidence, and I know 290 is a

special, special, special card, but if there's any other evidence to get the frick out of the apex and get back into the live arena all the time, no matter if you have a deep card or not, it's 290. Why? Because how do you make that special magic that was in the air? It takes hungry, fighters willing to break out in big moments. It takes a crowd that is just going nuts. Now, this was a different crowd, right? This mouth of teeth had different shaped ones. We had like Mel Gibson and Guy Fieri and Donald Trump. I mean, it looked like an absolute mess there. But it felt big and they over-delivered.

Stop the apex madness. Zuck can rent it out off-season all he wants. Let's bang, Too-E. This is how you get down. 290, special time in this job. I loved it. I was wrong. Thank you.

Well said. Chad, we have been preaching since October, since UFC 280. we've been a three word mantra not just for fighters but for like anybody do the thing and to me this was the UFC doing the thing they did the thing the fights are great it seemed like they tried it seemed like they put more effort into things point case and point the robie laa retirement just doing the thing they did the thing it took them all friggin week to do it but once we got to saturday they put the foot on the gas and they did the damn thing Jed, how good was this card?

It was the best card in recent memory. I don't want to say it's the best card of all time because there are a number of good contenders, BC laid out a few, and it's so fresh that that just sort of like reeks of being prisoner of the moment. But I think looking back on this, this will get consideration in future years

as one of the best cards ever. I personally think it's the best international fight week event ever. We talked about that on a ranking show this week, week and this one for me i think will you know again very new but you got just look at all the things you got you got two title fights one of them the main event all time great fighter puts on a near perfect performance you get a fight of the year contender in the co-main event and a new champion crowned with that like really heart-wrenching and kind of affecting moment at the end talking about his dad are you proud of me now uh you get another fight of the year contender a little further down

the main card. You get one of the biggest upsets in recent history with DDP and then all of that that comes after that. You get the Robbie Lawler retirement, which is the best retirement in the history of this sport. And like, when B.C. says this can be a card you remember for the rest of your

life. Like, that's a thousand percent true. And the Robbie Lawler moment is why for me. Like I, there will come a time when I'll probably forget about the Volkiya year performance or even as great as the fight was, the Pantoja-Marino fight. Like, I won't remember the particulars.

I will remember forever Robbie Lawler's retirement and how everything worked and fit together to lead to one of the best moments this sport has ever seen. And on top of that, you got four one minute finishes. Like that's a modern UFC record. It's just, and it's an incredible card from top to bottom. I'm going to echo a lot of the things that the BC said, so I don't need to repeat them.

But honestly, with a couple of days of hindsight and looking back on it, My biggest takeaway, and they're two, and they're a little, they're interrelated. And it's that when we shit talk to UFC, this is why, because this is what they are capable of. And you can't have an event like this every week. It is simply not going to be that way. Not everything is going to break right. Not all the fights are going to be great.

But if you set out and create card after card that like they have, where the max is, forgettable, where if everything goes right and they get super lucky and the card over delivers, it is still going to be a forgettable event, then you're just going to get a litany of forgettable events. But when you put together cards like this, cards that I gave an A beforehand because of what it could be, yes, all of it could have turned to shit, could have been a stinker of a card that happens. But if you don't give it an opportunity to succeed, if you don't create opportunities for big moments, you'll never have them. And the UFC is fully capable of doing it, and they just don't. And that's why we talk shit about them. And we'll get to this weekend.

This weekend is the exact antithesis of this. It cannot succeed by almost any definition. And so the big takeaway is that, and the second one, and again, it's interrelated, is I hope, I don't think this isn't going to be a sea change moment. The UFC isn't going to look at this and all of the great press and stuff and say, we should try a little harder guys. It's pretty cool. That's just not what they're going to do. Money is the driving factor.

I do hope that they can at least look at Robbie Lawler and the retirement and the universal love that that has, not a single person has a bad thing to say about it. Everybody is so thrilled with how that went and what that meant for particularly old school fans that I hope that they can look at this and say, man, we got to do this more. We got to do this better.

We have to put our legends in positions to succeed. And they still have to do it. They got to go out and win the fight. But we got to at least make it an opportunity for them to go out on a high and for us to do this sort of big, big emotional moment for them. Because that one is a pretty low ask, I think. And I hope that if they take nothing from this event else, they take that and say, okay, when the next guy comes up, when Jim Miller retires at UFC 400,

let's give him a fight that he can win and let's make it special because it should be for some guys in this sport. I love everything you just said there. Jed, you talked about Alexander Volcanowski, near perfect game. Does it again, makes it look incredibly easy against IA Rodriguez. We all felt like if someone was going to, like Vol could win the fight, but he's probably not going to win the war when you fight Yaya. That's just what he does to people.

And this didn't happen here. This is pillar to post. Volga got takedowns early and often. And Yair just could not get anything going. And when he had any moment, Volk just punched him in the face really hard and the fight was over shortly thereafter. These last three title defenses, Jed,

zombie, the Holloway one, and this one. These are three of the all-time best title defense. Like a run like this? Can you think of anybody who has put together three consecutive title defenses this near perfect in a row like this? I mean, most of, like, I'm sure John Jones's run. Certainly during that early stretch was also pretty immaculate. Very small quibble.

I'm just going to say that the Yair and Holloway are not of the same quality as zombie just because of where zombie is in his career. But, yeah, I mean, dude was flawless, got effortlessly. got takedowns, controlled the range the entire time. Yeah, you got comfortable for about 35 seconds in that third round. And then as soon as he got comfortable, Volk was like, well, we're done with that. Boop, you're going to fall over and be done now. I mean, just no perfect performance.

Like, I don't personally have him ranked at this top pound fight in the world. If you do, I have no issue with it. Because I've said this. I've said this many times this past week and certainly the lead up. I think there is actually very credible argument. that Alexander Volcanovsky is the best fighter that we have ever seen set foot in a cage. And he continues to perform like that. And that's, there's nothing to say other than, holy shit, man.

Like, Yair could have been a problem and he super wasn't. That's damn impressive. BC, how do you grade Vulx performance? And what was your biggest takeaway from it? I mean, you know, A plus plus without question. And I don't even like Jed downplaying what that Korean zombie title defense was. in this run only from the standpoint that we didn't consider Volkanowski a finisher before that. In fact, part of the personally, part of me being slow to come around to the idea that

Volk isn't just a great active champion, but potentially the kind of stuff we're trying to say about him now, like maybe the goat featherweight, maybe knocking on the door of immortality, I would say, okay, well, you know, he's very good, he's smart, he can set these traps, but can he go in there and finish guys? What happens if, you know, he faces legitimate adversity? well, look, he faced legitimate adversity against Ortega and showed incredible character and poise. And then he went in there against Korean zombie and beat the freaking crap out of him. And if you look at history, the only people that do that outside of that miraculous Yaiir elbow in the final second is basically like Jose Aldo and guys of that ilk, right?

So I think that was actually important and part of this current evolving narrative around Volcanovsky is that he's getting, not only it was just getting better, he has pretty much raised every category of. his fighting game, even with the limitations of his height in some matchups, to like elite video game level across the board. He's not a sum of his parts type of guy. He's not a guy who, okay, man, you know, he's a wizard out there. He's tough to hit. But if the state, you know, if the chips get down, what's he going to do? He's going to thrive because as Jed mentioned, he's like a near-perfect fighter. And the only time, I've seen near-perfect runs, right, of great, great fighters. But who's the, who is a near-perfect fighter in MMA history? Demetrius Jonathan. I'm getting Demetrius Johnson vibes through my screen from Volk.

And at 34, and Luke Thomas loves this freaking stat. That 35 and over below Welterway, you're basically dead on site if you want to win a UFC title fight. At 34, Volknoffsky is getting better, guys. Like, holy shit. Yeah, he could hit a wall and fall off, meaning going from super, super elite down to just regular elite at any point. But I know he did a face-off with Ilya Tricade. I could not be banging the drum more to get him back in there. because we have a window here for him literally to max out greatness on a level that few have

seen across the board. Go back up to 55. That first fight was a classic. You could have argued it either way. If you win that, you really are going to start pushing those other big names down below you and stepping on them to get to the very top of the all-time rankings. Rare do we get to talk about that as a fighter. I felt like Izzy before the Bolhovic loss was starting to sniff and open that door a bit. Obviously, John Jones, we felt that a long way coming. But Volk, you got a window here to continue this magic and do things that not haven't been done before, but maybe haven't been done across this level with this level of class in every category. Oh, and you also have the intangibles. Look, I don't like post-s shaved head Volcanowski as much

as Jed. He looks like a weird cosplaying pirate. But that freaking pirate's unbelievable. And he's already past Josie Aldo in the featherweight rankings, despite what Jed tells you, Hey, Jed, your guy, Aldo's been stopped three times in featherweight title fights in the UFC. This guy Volkanowski's undefeated all time in this weight class, and they're not sniffing him. And the only people that have done are all-time freaking grades, and he beat Max three times. Good freaking Lord, this guy, right? I mean, you can take the Burger King crown off already, okay? We've given you the flowers here, guy.

Thank you very much. No, no, no. It stays as I am the king. I will not be engaging in the Go-Talk. I have come up with a new rule, which I think is pretty justified in that you just don't get to be involved in the go talk until you're done.

When you're retired, then absolutely. And then let's see, because it is a factual truth that Jose Aldo got stopped three times in Featherweight title fights. That is absolutely true. He's done fighting, and now we know. If he had retired when he hadn't lost, the conversation around him is just wildly different.

And you go back in history and you look at that, and it's fighters who were ubiquitous all-time greats, BJPen, Fado Emilianenko, get downplayed because they keep fighting past their best years and start to suffer losses. Vogue may never lose again. I certainly cannot say that he will. He's an unbelievable fighter. Or he does turn 35 in like three months, and maybe the wall is real. The magic wall that Luke Thomas talks about is real, and Iliot Tepuri and knocks him out. And then he tries to get it back. And then suddenly he's older and he's slower.

And he sticks around for four more years and he takes five losses. And then everybody who's like unquestioned blah can have all the arguments thrown back in him. So just not going to engage in any goat talks until somebody is retired, at which point, then they can be a viable thing. But until we can look at the totality because half of the arguments come from, that guy lost 13 seconds, dur. It's just a nonsense argument. I couldn't disagree more with BC about the, about the Machachev fight thing either. Like some people are pushing it and that's fine.

But I said this, I think last week, I've said it a ton. You're talking about him chasing all time greatness to put people behind him by going up and win a second belt. Fuck that, man. Like that is just not as important to me as winning multiple title defenses.

Like he has five. That is an awesome number. Like that's already elite status. But there are two people in his, who have double digit title defenses. There are like 12 multi-division champions. There are like four people that have even gotten up to seven plus title defenses. Volk can do that and he's set it himself in the post fight.

He's knocking on the door of some of these records. He wants to pursue them. Pursue those things. Like, Ilya is ready made. Like that is the most obvious next fight. You do that one. And then I'll even say that if you beat Tuporia, if nothing else happens, in the next six months,

you've done a pretty good job of cleaning out most of the contenders. There's not like a really clear next opponent for you unless something impressive happens. Maybe then you can go fight Makachev while you wait for Arnold Allen or Mosovov or somebody else to get wins that are relevant. But just go fight to Puriya, man.

Get that W because you seem to think it's going to happen very easily. So do it. Keep stacking those wins. build your legacy that way because I fucking guarantee you. If you go up and you beat Machicev, that will be unbelievable. Nobody will take that away from you. But in 20 years, you'll get some jackass who comes over from boxing and can just look at a wiki page and be like,

but he lost to Makachev and then he lost a couple times at the end of his career. Whereas instead, you could just be like, man, he definitive his title 12 times. That was incredible. Nobody else has ever done that. Like, do that thing because if you have it in you, I want to see it. and you might have it in you. You're damn good, dude. Like beat Dupuria, and then we can talk about Mokachev.

So you want him to go win this title defense thing, which is really the only thing I feel Jose really has as a solid argument for staying the featherweight goat. Yet it was a different era, as you tried to insinuate last time we had this debate, which means as these eras continue to evolve, the sport's only 30 years old, the eras get better. Volkanowski's fighting in a better era than Joe. Jose was. History continues to prove to that. I mean, he's not out there defending against like Patrick Cote and Travis Luter, right? Like all the great champions, it depends on the division and the stacked era that you're in. Volcanowski's in a freaking killer era. And before

you start giving the take- Is Sugar Ray Leonard dog shit because he beat the best dudes he can beat at the time? No, you can only beat the dudes you can fight, man. Listen, King, you'll have your moment again in a second. Okay. What I'm saying is you can't do the argument about the losses at the end of the career when talking about Jose Alto. You want to talk about BJ Penn and the Lavashack parking lot? Yeah, that's freaking sad. I'm talking about him being stopped for the title against Connor McGregor when he's at the peak of his absolute prime and twice against Max Holloway when he's, you know, 30 years old. I'm not talking about at the end of the day. Jose Al doesn't have that career that has all these stacked losses at the end. Because he went down to

an even tougher weight class and got to the title level. He's a freaking great. He's just not better on paper right now, in my opinion, than Volkanovs. So save me with the, oh, if he would have retired right at the peak. First of all, nobody does that outside of like basically Habib, okay? You know, Joe Kalsagi didn't boxing, but at the end, nobody does that. Jose Aldo. You are by definition projecting the next five years of Volcanovsky's career. Volcanovsky could be at his peak right now and then lose his next four fights.

You are just saying he's not going to. And he might not. We can have that conversation when it's all said and done. window now. Maximize it. Maximize it now. Go for the history now. I have thousand percent. Defend your belt now. The history is not four more title defenses against. Let's hope the next killer comes sprotting out between those legs. We need another. No, that's not it. You go after the guys in the current pound for pound top 10. And the other guy right there with him, one and two,

is Mahachep. Some people thought he beat him already. Go back in there and prove us wrong again. Dude, that's the quickest way to all-time greatness, the fame and money that Volk wants the window is open. Luke Thomas is on the other side of it with all of his freaking stats. He's going to close it on you. Hey, I'll tell you what, though. If Vulcan find a way to get a saggy nipple,

he may be able to push through that 35 and older stat line, just so you know. Because Guy know, guy, guy know, guy knows at all, all right? Yeah, guy. Just going to let that one sit. All right. You let that one sit. That is a perfect time to move on.

to the rest of this card. The point for round two goes to the man who didn't say saggy nipple, Jed Mishu, it's one to one. BC just heaving it at the end. Don't want it. It's well played. Don't want the point.

All right, well, we mentioned it, and you talked about it, Jed, because when we look back on this card, like 10 years from now, Pantosia winning the flyway title is probably not anything we're really going to be talking, but it's not like a huge storyline. But the fight with Brandon Moreno was incredible. And you have the crown on. You made a compelling case heading into last week's show or in the beginning of last week's show that the best fight the UFC could put together on paper could actually have been this fight between Pantosia and Brandon Moreno.

And boy, oh boy, did this thing deliver Jedmish? your thoughts on your prediction, how this fight played out, and Allie Pants becoming the UFC Flyway champion of the world. I would like everyone to forget anything I may have said about the Dan Hooker Jalen Turner fight because it's not important. But man, I had some good bangers last week for sure. As that fight was unfolding, I was like, man, I said that I thought that this like probably wasn't the best fight that could be done on paper.

but has a case and is one of the ones I would be the most excited for the UFC to make but it had overdelivered. I mean, that fight was just incredible. We were watching it live on the watch party. I thought Pantoja was probably cooked after round two. Like his whole body language had changed and Moreno started to get his game going.

And then look, it's really simplistic to say that he wanted it more because it's not like fully true. But he also just kind of, I kind of wanted it more. He just sort of kept willing himself forward and willing himself into these positions to create the scrambles, get the back control, get the takedowns. When Moreno was tagging him on the feet, I think this probably, like you said, this probably isn't a fight that we're going to remember for all time or whatever, unless this is the start of a long, you know, Pantosia title reign. Maybe we'll look back on it.

But there's an unbelievable performance, an unbelievable fight. and I will remember hauntingly his post-fight speech. Are you proud of me, Dad? Like now, Dad is one of the saddest things that I've ever felt in mixed martial arts. And so, like, that's probably going to stick with me for a while. And then hearing him talk about it on the MMA hour this week and sort of where he's at and what that meant to him. And the fact that he was driving for Uber Eats like a couple of fights ago, like how can you not just be thrilled with what happened for Ali Pants as?

past weekend. Really excited for frankly, whoever he defends against. If it's Brandon Royval, that fight the first time was super fun, and I will absolutely sign up for it again. If they somehow slot Moreno back in there for her fourth one,

which I don't think they will, but you never know. Obviously, I'll watch that again. If Figy Smalls gets to call up, even if it's Amir Al-Bazi, because Alejandro Pentosha is one of the most exciting guys currently in mixed martial arts. And so I am thrilled that he is the champion

of this white class because that by like by definition he is just going to make every fight super fun and uh should be good for however long this rain last bc what did you think i i pantosia to me at certain points of this fight i was like this guy's not human looked like he was tired looked like he was gassing he was just getting hit over and over again we're like up he's about to go down and then he just got better and somehow got stronger and his will was unbelievable what a performance from this guy bc Yeah, I got to push back on what Jed said where, you know, even though, look, he again, he again had an ostrichetist moment saying this would be the fight of the night. And I sort of, you know, or this would be the fight we'd most remember, the one he's most excited for on paper. Well, it turns out he was right on there, but he's wrong to say that we somehow won't remember this specifically.

This is the best fight in flywood history. I really believe that. And I was thinking back in my head, and there's been so many, especially in this post-Sahuto era with Mick Maynard, matching all these guys. There's so much parity and violence. I loved the first Devonson-Figuero fight versus Moreno. That was my favorite. I really loved the second half of that. Joe Benavita Suhudo won from a few years back.

But this one had everything. And when you mentioned that Pantosia was willing to sort of just pour it out, like they're both going to be different from this fight. They both went in there with a next level will. Like what separates great action fights? How can you say this is the greatest flyaway title fight? Maybe greatest flyweight fight. We've seen the UFC here.

Because those guys had second, third, and fourth, level adjustments and and like, you know, second win, third win, fourth win, where they were really ready to pour out their entire career. Like we hate when people say, I'm willing to die in the cage because it reminds us how realistic the threat and danger level is in the sport. But they were both took off years off of their career in one night. And for Pantosia to win this basically on heart and will alone and then deliver the father of mind speech. I mean, we already said it on this show. It's so rare in this modern era, especially in MMA to get these like great feel-good stories that seep through. I don't even think UFC in their marketing promotion, you know, jump on

these like they could. And we're on a pretty good run here when you consider everything from Rose Yellen. I'm the best after that. Come back win to Pena's unbelievable upset, which was the triumph of the human spirit, to Nunes, winning back the title and then retiring on her own terms. Like we're getting a bunch of these lately, Robbie Lawler, including on that same night, and to see Pantosia just pour out his heart and soul for that moment to justify it to himself that he was ever worthy of trying this,

to justify it to the fact that financially, these guys aren't getting paid what they deserve. And as you talked about, this guy was doing like regular odd men, you know, everyday jobs driving Uber or whatever before this. Now, because he risked it all, we have a moment we'll never forget, a fight will never forget, and I think the only travesty right now would be to run back the Moreno fight again and do it quickly.

Not only do both of these guys need some legitimate time off, Pantosia needs a long victory lap around Brazil. Moreno has been in too many wars in succession, and to go from a four pack of fights against Figuero, instantly into a four pack of fights in a lot of ways against Pantosia, even though two happened a while ago, you do start to ask yourself, would we continue to force those, just for the larger narrative of this great Mexican fighter in Moreno,

part of this great Mexican era. Unfortunately, Saturday, the curse of Aldana continued to make its way across Mexico as the champions fell in front of us and the pressures on Grasso in September. But it is time to get off of Moreno for a second, let him heal up. He's been through so many crazy blood and guts wars. And how about this division post-Sahudo? It's all parody, all violence. You're never going to be right on your pick.

except for Jed saying this would be the fight. It was Jedd. I hope you remember it, Dirthole. I think BC might be the first person to ever call Giuliana Pena winning the belt a feel-good moment. That is not how I would qualify that for anybody. She sure didn't win it on skill that night, okay? She won it on Will.

That's why, okay? She definitely did do that, but I don't think a lot of people were like, what a triumph of the human spirit. We're so happy, Julie. Who Thomas was, okay? Thank you. That was a good moment. What happened after that, and since then has not been great.

But BC, a moment we will remember, and we started the show with this, Drigis duplice beat Robert Whitaker. He ran him over. This was not a flash fluky KO. He convincingly won this fight. And then he had the face off with Israel Adasania, and it was uncomfortable to most. Others, and it's so interesting when we bring up these things,

because if this happened in any other sport, this is on Sports Center for a week, two weeks, it's all we're talking about. It's on first take. It's everywhere. But because this is the UFC, because this is Dana White running the show, this is the age-old adage in combat sports.

Well, it's the fight game. Damn it, there's 700 maniacs, and they say a bunch of crazy shit, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What did you think of... Yeah. What did you think of this face-off and how it played out, B.C.? All right, well, we got two separate questions within here. The DDP win.

if I'm going to give the flowers to Jed for making the bold-as-shit-shit prediction. And I know Aaron Brons stard, by the way, who I love is trying to claim the same thing. Aaron, you picked up knockout with plus money in your betting segment. That's different than Jed putting his reputation on the line if he had one to begin with. But here's the point, DDP, you get our flowers. And the same question I have to go back and ask people like Abron and Jed, what did you see that we didn't see? And I think because we didn't see this before, unless it was your prediction that he would

come in and do exactly what he did. Overwhelmed Whitaker, use the size, use the power, then I guess you were right. But to get to that point, as he said himself after the fight, he had to change who he was as a fighter, which means to be patient, poised, technical, switching stances, using incredible IQ and game plan and adjustments. This was not the guy the last few fights, who even though he had convincing clean-up wins over Brunson and Till, good names, I didn't think he had done enough to get to this point. Because I didn't think he had that in him against the living legend Robert Whitaker,

who, as DDP said himself, that footworks off the charts, the hand speed, the technique, the setup, all of that was real. But it wasn't just that DDP is the biggest middleweight we've ever seen, which actually might be true here. It was the way that he combined all of that together with the kind of craft and poise that, like, he went from canned beer to, like, you know, craft ale, like right there in front of our eyes. So, yeah, let's send a giant bouquet to South Africa. Consequently, on the other side of it is that face-to-face.

The good is that that hatred was real between them, and you can keep showing that. By the way, you have seen Twitter, not even bleeping out the N-words. They're like, yeah, we don't police that stuff. These are fires. It's a fight game. But it's going to work. It's going to get people massively behind this fight that I didn't want. And the reason why I didn't want it is because I didn't think DDP was good enough,

but I also didn't want a fight thing that's sort of built upon race. But I do think we should examine what actually happened in that cage. It's not lost on me what the deeper level potentially of the DDTP comments might come across and mean to people about this whole idea of, you know, who's the real African champ, which is not really what he said, right? But I know you can go back and watch what GDP said and watch the corrections he made to it after. And even though he wasn't outright racist, you could try to connect dots deeper. you can go deep in the history of Africa and colonial, if you can go all down there you want. I thought Izzy's actual reaction in the cage was not good,

not good for peace, you know, just not good across the board. It will help the fight because it's injection of real fervor and spirit there, but it only keeps perpetuating the idea that this is like a white versus black in 2020 fight with like real race on the line. When the reality might actually be, go back to Izzy's interviews ahead of the first Whitaker fight, when that's all he talked about, that Whitaker's not the real New Zealand fighter

because he moved away. Go back to Leon Edwards saying that about Bisping, that you're not the real UK champ because you moved to California and the U.S. and became a champ there. I'm not here to say DDP's comments are all on the up and up. I don't know. I don't know the heart of the man.

I'm here to say, though, I didn't like Adasania's escalative reaction, and I do think we need to investigate a little bit more, like what he said in the past and what DDP's saying. Is it that different? Well, if DDP is a huge racist, behind the scenes and I don't know about it. It might be. But maybe we can pull back

on the race stuff a bit and just focus on this instead, that this is now a very viable fight and DDP is proving that he's a bigger live dog than I ever would have thought. I didn't think I wanted this fight. I didn't think I needed it. I want Izzy at 205. I can shut up. I was wrong again. This is going to be something

and we're all going to tune in. Jed, what did you make of this face-to-face? It wasn't for everybody. We had to react to it on live. YouTube during the freaking watch party. I'm like, oh, there's Izzy. Why, I wonder what he's going to say.

I'll tell you everything he's about to say. No, I'm not. I'm not telling you. Can't do that. Can't do that. Nope, couldn't do that. So, look, you know the UFC is going to take that and they're going to put in every promotional video

when this fight actually gets made. That is going to be monstrous on how they push this fight. But what did you make of the whole face-to-face there? First, I just want to say props to DDP. because I echo some of what BC said there and that this is now the biggest fight that UFC can put together,

like the one I'd be the most interested in because I really didn't think he had much chance against Izzy and now coming off that performance against Whitaker where it's not just he beat Whitaker, which is obviously unbelievable, it's how he did it and the way he looked and the improvements he showed. He's like super live to beat Izzy.

I don't know if I'll pick him, but he is very much in play to do that. So that fight is incredibly compelling now. And you just got to take your hat off to the man. And you got to take your hat off to him as well for the post fight. Like BC, I am not standing by anything that the DDP has said. I think that it is incredibly naive to think that he doesn't know what he is saying when he says, you know, I'm going to be the first African champion.

bring a belt back to Africa. One, other other champions have brought belts back to Africa. And two, I think he just knows what's going on. You would have to be the most oblivious person in the world to not understand that. And as a white man in South Africa, I suspect that he is not the most oblivious person in the world. That being said, he handled Saturday so much better than Izzy did. Like, we talked about it on the post fight. I loved his little slide jab when Rogan was like,

and here, the best middle weight in the world. He's like, I don't know about that. And then, is he like, look, I'm not in Israel, this in his head. I cannot say this with absolute certainty, but it feels pretty easy to just say, Izzy was trying to bat him into saying the N-word. He was just repeatedly screaming at him

and trying to bait him into saying something bad so he could have the moral high ground because, like BC pointed out, is he basically did something very similar. It's not as fraught, you know, with the racial complications as DDP essentially calling three black African champions, not African. But he did straight up tell Robert Whitaker

that you're not New Zealand, like, you're not Kiwi, you're Australian, fuck off. So very, very similar. And I think he's just trying to bait DDP into saying something, trying to get some sort of a moral high ground because this rubs him the wrong way. And again, I think it's justified for Izzy to be upset by the comments from DDP. But he didn't handle it super well. And DuPSE just essentially no selling him, just being like, whatever, stop.

Like, you're insane and just walking away. Like, that's how you handle that. If that's their first true interaction together, DDP 108's Izzy right there. And we'll see. I think we're going to get a lot more of this sort of interplay between these two. doesn't seem like either man is backing down from the statements that they are making. DDP continues to repeat that he never said that he was the only African champion despite saying that functionally.

And Izzy is probably just going to hammer home on the 23 and me line, which is awful, just super, super bad. But Izzy likes to repeat super bad lines. Q the Elsa clip. So where it's going to be ugly in a lot of ways. but the end result is going to be a fight that kicks ass. And so I kind of don't care. Like, it's probably good in some regards that this is going to force

MMA fans to at least reckon on some level with extremely complex, you know, racial and sociopolitical issues. But, yeah, don't really care. It's fine. I've seen a lot of worse things happen in this sport. That was a bit cringy, but this fight's going to rule. And that's the most important thing. All right.

real quick before we move on to, I mean, the topic everybody's here for, which is UFC Vegas 77. Will this be the next fight for Israel, Adasania, B.C.? Because as much as, look, doing this in Sydney would be brilliant, but I kind of wish the Sydney card was in November, then we could give it some time, let it happen. But this Sydney card has to have Adasanya on it. It just has to. Otherwise, what the hell are we doing here? And it's almost like unfair to the fans to have DDP, like, rush back.

into camp just to get another fight. So could the UFC just be like, dude, Izzy, we need you to fight? Like, go fight John Strickland and then go fight DDP after? Or do we just do everything in our power to get DDP ready eight weeks from now? We'll just rush this thing out there. Let me inform you if you don't follow boxing on the regular. There's a term we have. Bob Aram once voiced it.

It's called Marinate. We marinate way too much in boxing and then the whole falls through. Bob Aram still tried to marinate Yoriochres Campbell against Juan Ma Lopez in a fight that never ended up happening because they both got knocked out, right? Like right after, it's like, no, you have a chance to make that fight. You have a window. Again, the best thing that happened is DDP didn't really take any damage outside of some quick step jabs from Whitaker and, you know, some early action there. He would turn it around.

Of course you would expect him to. This is the moment of his life. You have a red hot fight and feud here. You have to come right back at it and cash it in. If DDP had, you know, one on a cut or he had. one on a boring decision that you argue the other way, it would have so much less juice. He went in there and knocked out Robert Whitaker.

Like, holy shit, you got to do it and you got to do it next and you got to do it now. And yeah, go down to Sydney and do it. Let's make this a monster, monster event. Jed, do you think that's what happens? Or do you think he fights Strickland and then DDP gets the winner? I agree with 80% of what Brian Campbell said, but his end result is still. a fail. You just don't do this

in Sydney, man. I agree. This is the next fight. Don't do Sean Strickland. You know, banana peels happen. I think he would win that fight, but it would distract from the moment. Like, yeah, you're putting on a card in Sydney. I know you wanted to be a pay-per-view. The weekend after you're having a rematch

of the fly-way title, you can just move that to a pay-per-view and say, F it, and the Sydney can be a fight-night card that'll be fun, like a London card or whatever. If I'm DDP, I wouldn't take this fight. It's like, no, it's too quick. I need to heal up a little bit. He has the leverage right now. UFC might give, you know, is he somebody else to fight? But he can, his,

DDP's next fight, it's for the belt. Like no one. Oh, 100%. So he can just say, guys, I'm not ready. And frankly, I don't think the UFC should try and shock on this thing. I don't, you know, B.C. says marinate like it's, like it's a bad thing. But if you don't marinade your chicken, it tastes like dry bland bullshit. But you look at B.C., he probably eats dry blame bullshit. Man probably puts raisins in his particular. potato salad. So like that's we need to let this one marinate. We need to let the flavors seep in. I think they need to be taking this one and and give it a full court press. Give this. Israel Disigno, by almost any metric is one of your five biggest stars in the sport, a guy who has the

potential to really break through into a tier of stardom the UFC doesn't frequently have. It's going to be bad. Like they're going to be parts of this that are cringe worthy and tough. But I think you give this the full court. All right. The rest of this year is basically. basically booked up. We will set this for January. And we want to make this happen in in Australia or New Zealand because that's where we want to do it. Let's start getting a venue ready. Let's get this fight set for January, start of the new year, and let's give a press tour on this. Let's get this built in a proper way to let everything really develop. And I think that that's what's going to happen. I think they will maybe initially try and do it, but cooler heads will prevail and realize

that eight weeks, just not enough time for a fight of this magnitude and this quality. And we need give this one a little extra TLC. Can I just say something? Sure. This is a byproduct of the way I was raised. I'm not against putting baked beans on top of the ketchup, on top of a hot dog. You know, and when I walk around on the streets, people are always like, BC, you gas station, piece of shit. How could you hurl insults at Jed?

Isn't that just like the Spider-Man meme? It is. And that's why I know that Jed's an absolute dirt hole. I see you right here, okay? So don't be trying to talk about. We know our own. My spine is in over yours. Thank you.

Yes. I'm just saying, let that chicken marinade, buddy, just overnight. It's all you need. Hey, I've eaten plenty of chicken out of a gas station,

all right? I'll do it again. Hot dogs and beans are a New England delicacy. Kidding me? With some brown bread on the side? A little bit of brown bread. A little bit of brown bread.

Oh, yeah. Hot dogs and beans. What are we having for dinner, ma? Hot dogs and beans, Michael. Ah, yes, it must be Tuesday.

So let's move on the point of, I learned something new. Yeah, man. It's like $1.99 a person. Point for round three goes to. It's B.C. It's two to one. Good battle here.

Good battle. Most of this is just see Jed's face, but he doesn't get that. I thought raises in the potato salad was done. I thought I cooked in there. That was a great line. It was a tremendous line. It's hockey season, and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything.

So no, you can't get a nice rank on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Goaltenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those too. Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now.

For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. 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 IQ, 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. Explore the new Peloton Cross-Trainting Tread Plus at OnePeloton.ca. I don't know how much time we're going to spend on this, but B.C. Vegas 77 is coming up on Saturday. Holly Holm is back in our lives. She is in the main event against Myra Bueno Silva. We just found out that Jack Della Madelena is part of the co-main event.

And then there's 11 other fights that are going to happen on this card. So give this a great, B.C. What do we give to see Vegas 77? I was really excited that Walt Harris was said to bring his three-fight losing streak against Josh Parisi and who's lost like three out of his last five. But even that fight just fell apart. So, yeah, we get Jack, Mr. Bob Dobelina on the Co-Mane event, fired up following his story literally against any level of opponent is worth your time.

But let's be really honest here. This is arguably the worst, seriously, seriously, it's arguably the worst UFC fight night card we've ever seen. That's not, though, the big, you know, grandstanding argument I'm going to make. Look, it's not lost on me. We just had $2.90. Like, that's everything you would want. And yes, if, you know, if the.

They're going to fill out cards most weekends. We can't expect everyone to be a binger. All of that is true, by the way. If this one had even a little bit more of intention, I might have changed my tune. But the main reason why I think I'm allowed to stay in the negative lane so shortly removed from the best this sport can be is because there's just an abject lack of care to what's really going on here. Amanda Nunes retired a month ago. There has seemingly, I'm not in the UFC office.

They don't let me in the war room, right? There's seemingly been nothing done about what's the future of both of those titles. Is there even a future for women's featherweight, which the night that Amanda retired, Dana sort of kind of admitted, yeah, probably not going to go forward with that division anymore. So what do we have here? Arguably like the number one person you would probably want to put into a vacant phantomweight title fight, Holly Holie home, who at 41, really, to her credit, has not really changed how good of a fighter that she was now to five years ago. She's only, you know, she's evolving. She's leaning more on her wrestling these days. I know people think she's more boring these days.

But against this level of competition, she's still very viable and a good-ass fighter. And we don't know what we're doing with both divisions. We have actually a decent featherweight fight on this card, Norma Dumont against Chelsea Chandler of the 209. And like, what are they fighting for, guys? We've never had featherweight rankings on the UFC page ever. Now the division's clearly dead.

Is everybody just fighting out their contract before we can fold it completely? and then you guys can go to the PFL and get in the Larissa Pacheco sweepstakes. I don't know. But here's what I do know. To just not have a seemingly a plan and again to spend all your time pushing power slap down our throat. Could he use less of the Wolverine to hand out CTE like a bitch? And I could have used more of, hey, guys, maybe we actually should pull Holly off of this

card if we want her to fight Juliana for the vacant bell, or maybe we should actually do something. I don't know what this is because it's nothing. And that's not here to crap on Myra Buena Silver or anybody. But this card sucks, and we got two prominent women's fights atop the marquee that kind of don't really mean anything because of the circumstances of right now. The lack of communication on some of these sort of foundational elements of the UFC, the structural elements, is maddening to me. And the fact that, like, you're sort of just a reactionary. Well, as long as Amanda's still going to fight, we'll just keep both divisions open.

Okay, cool. She's been retired for a month. What the hell are we doing? These are the moments when as a fan You do have to question like do I really have this in my schedule and time every week if some of these dots aren't connected This is like default Pre-requisite get the shit handled, okay? I'll deal with the power slap emails if I know there's a future here at 35 and 45 or are we just rolling out fights

Because we're just rolling out fights what are we doing you just had the best weekend ever last weekend Let's build on it people thank you This is my TED talk thank you Yeah, you're giving us a 10 p.m. Eastern main card with six fights. Then you're going to London next week. This is just a very bad card. It's not a very great card.

There are two title fights this week. We got two title fights. We got the women's band away and the women's featherway. And it may very well be the final women's featherweight fight that ever happens inside the UFC. It's historic. You guys are, oh, it's so terrible. Look, is it going to be fun?

No. Hollyholm hasn't been fun to watch in literal years. The last time Holly Home was fun was when she was kicking Betchke Hay in the head, which was like six years ago. So no, it's going to be awful. I'm not here to say you're going to have fun. But this is, the Holly Home versus My Boy and Silva is like the uncrowned Bannamway champion fight. So that's sort of important, I guess. And then Norma Dumas Chalder's last featherweight fight that's ever going to happen in the UFC.

So that's historic, if nothing else. and then the rest of this card is awful. You look at this and say, wow, and we lost Walt Harris versus Josh Parisian. I look at this and say that's kind of a tragedy because, you know, I love the heavyweight fights, but also thank God we lost Walt Harris versus Josh Parisian. It's going to be a terrible fight. We could lose a couple more fights on this card. We might be cooking with gas.

If we can lose the main event and it's just Jack Delamadalina executing some dude at the top of the car, then we're really starting to make some things happen. So it's not good. But we've got like three lightweight fights on this card. That's really fun because lightweights are always really fun. And I did my best guys. I tried to sell it. Good job.

I can only do so much. The king of positivity? When did this happen? Look, I'm in Isatar versus Francisco Prado is going to be super damn fun. And when has Terrence McKinney ever been in a boring fight? The answer is never him versus. is Nazim Sadekhov is going to be a banger for however long that lasts. Those two, not saying they're worth their price of admission,

because that would be hypocritical of me to claim that. But if you're not doing anything else on Saturday night, at the very least, the opener, three of the five main card fights here are going to be pretty fun because Jack Della killing some dude is always a good watch. Yeah, but what is the stat that you have to, don't you have to get through like eight fights on this undercard before you find a ranked fighter?

Oh, I don't. Or did that change? I think that changed. I don't. I think the only ranked fighter is Holly home. I think there's like four. I think Jemondi and they both are. In a division that doesn't exist just so you know.

That's insane. They have them ranked as Bannamwait. Yeah, that's insane. I don't have any of them ever actually fought at Bannamweight in the UFC. That's nuts. So I'm not going to count those because that's ridiculous. But yeah, look, the key thing that you just said, though, BC, is that you have to get through like eight fights.

And you actually don't. You can just not watch the prelims. You can tune into MMAFighting.com. Great website. Any fun things that happen, we'll do a breakout highlight post for you. You can watch that. And then you can just turn this on. You can watch like a movie, hang out with your kids, do something else Saturday night.

And at 10 p.m. is the start time for the main card. Just toggle on over to ESPN. plus at 10 p.m. You're going to get Terrence McKinney right out of the gate. That's going to be sick. You're going to get Isatar Prado. That's going to be really fun. And then you can watch the rest of it if you like, or you can just be like, that's

enough for me. I'll come back in an hour and a half and watch Jack Della beat the hell out of somebody. And that's a good way to do it. If I'm plotting out a path for the casual MMA fan, that's what I'd say. Don't pay attention until 10. Tune in for those two fights. You know, maybe have a smoke break, hang out. whatever, come back for Jack Della, and then call it a night and you're good.

Don't tell me how to live my life. Yeah, maybe watch a Tyson-Nam fight because you know someone's going to sleep when he fights, whether it's him or his opponent. It's always fun watching Tyson. And look, Ozot-Maxon, 16-0, like a little older for a debuting prospect. I think he's 29, something like that. But good signs at least being the 16 wins, the 16 wins, really hard to do in the sport, even if you're fighting total can.

And so that fight's at least like kind of fun. Some of the fights can be fun, but they're all meaningless, which is pretty tough. Yeah. Well, let us move on. The point for round four, there'll be more UFC Vegas 77 talk throughout the weekend. So get ready. Point goes to the king of positivity, Jen Mishu. It's two to two.

Look, with AK on vacation, somebody had to step up and be positive. Yeah, someone has to. Someone to step up and watch out to my fighter. Doug Crosby and a Turkish bath? What's going on here? I don't know. That's an awful. Yeah, cheese, Louise.

All right, well, it's time for the knockout round, everybody. Excuse me. One question will decide at all. Each will have 60 seconds to answer. And this will be a fun question. So, Jed, you're the king. You get priority. I know BC one last week, but, yeah, you have all the chair.

Let's live our dreams. Let's go first. Okay. Well, I'm feeling the vibes right now. So, Friday was an interesting day because Ariel Hawani, our wonderful colleague at MAAFighting.com, host of the MAA, our tweets out that Francis Nganu, Tyson, Tyson, Tyson, Fury is going to be announced very soon. And immediately, well, not immediately, but a few hours later, we get the John Jones

Dipe fight announced just randomly right before the ceremonial way-ins for UFC 290. Then we find out, Francis and Tysoner, Tyson, Fury. Such a coincidence. such a coincidence. Then we find out on Tuesday that Ingano Fury is official, and we have been waiting. We have been waiting with bated breath. What is this next big fight the UFC is going to announce? So, Jed, you are now Dana White, and for the next 60 seconds, you have to get our minds

off of Ingano v. Fury by announcing the fight that we're going to get next. The big announcement, what's this big announcement that's going to get us to forget about Angano Fury at least for a few minutes? It's one in on the clock. You're up, Dana. Go. Look, I think this. I'm glad I went first because there's only one answer here, guys.

Look, we put on the biggest fights, the fights you all want to see. I know the fight that everyone has been wanting to see. It's been building for years at this point in time. You all said it couldn't be done. And the bullshit media came at me with some totally valid quotes that they are, that I'm just going to say aren't true. But it's fine because we're doing it. Connemer-Regger versus Michael Chandler.

That's going to be headlining our December pay-per-view. It'll be happening in Las Vegas at the T-Mobile Arena. You're coming at me. You're saying, oh, but what about you Sada? I got you Sada. Don't worry about that. I got this. Let me worry about you Sada and all of that.

You guys just worry about buying your plane tickets, getting out to Vegas, because these two dudes, you saw the shove? The big shove in the face? They're going to do that, but with their fists, it's going to be great. Michael Chandler's going to be screaming about to see you at the top. Kahnna McGregor is going to act like a week. lunatic can probably get arrested in the buildup at some point in time, December 13th,

whatever the date is, buy tickets now. Okay. Conn McGregor, Michael Chandler. PC? Yeah. Now you're Dana White. Just what you wanted on a Thursday afternoon. What's the big announcement?

You know it's coming. It's probably coming either after this show or tomorrow, but you know it's coming. What's the big fight that is going to be announced to get our minds off this? Go. Well, if you're Dana White and Francis and Gondon. who cannot succeed because of the potential of what that shows to other UFC fighters who are currently getting underpaid so that the parent company can pay off this WWE acquisition, you need not just a regular super fight, not just the gimmick, you know, you can't,

you can't beat a gimmick by going gimmick. You need the type of fight that brings back the crossover audience, the soccer moms, the regular guys at work, anyone walking by the water cooler at the right time. The kind of fight where the names need no introduction, doesn't even need a current storyline. They'll get you up. They'll have you a buying cage fight in once again, like it's 2012 all over again.

Who's that person? Oh, guess what, guys? She's also in the company, and she's on the verge of exiting her WWE deal. It's Rhonda friggin' rousey. Why is Holly Holm not being considered for the vacant Bannamweight title fight? Because Rhonda versus Misha 3 is the only fight last. that can break the casual jar in case of emergency and flush all the goodwill of Francis

right down the drain again. You want crossover. You want big appeal. Call up all the Eskimo bros because she's back, baby. Ronda Misha for all the marbles. You were so close. You were so close. Why is he so?

It's Rhonda Holly. It's not Misha 3. That's not interesting. Well, I got that one. Holly's fighting this weekend, bro. Holly's rematches the better sell, but she's fighting this weekend against Buono. It's no Buono. Exactly.

She's fighting this weekend. She's going to be Bueno. And then it's like, all right. I mean, can you imagine the scenes if Rhonda gets smuggled into the apex to do a post-fight face off with Holly? Oh, my God. No one will see it coming. And then it's like, hey, guys, so headlining our December pay-per-view, Ronda Rousey, Holly Home, Banned him white belt. Seriously, in the illegal streaming era, that's still a 1.5 million pay-per-view by.

Rhonda Holly, two, for the belt. Yes, yes, it is. Yes, it is. If that happens, I will then ceremonies hand this crown off if we get Rott to Tate 3. Oh, man. You put it out there. You put it out there. That's the cash-your-vote music.

So cast your votes. I don't even know how close this is or whatnot, but this is a fun show. I cannot believe my voice went through almost 90 whole minutes of this. Well done. Well done. I know. It's so weird. I've been sucking on some,

this is not a plug, but some vapor cools. These things have really helped me out. So I'm just talking out of the right side of my face right now. So vote now three times, as Casey said. There may be a preview show tomorrow. There may not be a preview show tomorrow. I don't know.

We're going to try to do. heck of morning tomorrow. I'll let you know on Twitter whether or not that's going to happen. People's pre-fight show going down. I believe it's 6.30 p.m. on Saturday to get you ready for UFC Vegas 77. And we'll have a post-fight show. We'll have it on to the next one. We'll have it on to the next one. Jed, you might have to check your DMs. I mean, you just step in if you want to do some matchmaking on Sunday. And what a card to jump on for. I'm sure it'll be a nice tight. We're going to tell you now, Holly Holme versus Rhonda Rousey. will be my match that needs to be made.

Oh, man. Casey, are you there? Where is he? There he is. Sons out, guns out. What's up, buddy? Good afternoon, gentlemen. Great, great, great, great, great competition today. We have a winner.

It was. We have a winner. Who won? Your winner today with 59% of the the vote is and still undefeated Brian Campbell. Wow. We talked about this, guys. We talked about this last week.

You were supposed to vote for me. This is appeal. Appeal. Nonsense, viewers. We haven't had an emergency meeting of the BTL championship committee in a little while, so we might have to call something to order. BC gets the people's vote. again, Beastie, congrats.

What do you have to say? I would say I haven't seen a boxing guy thrive on this network since Ariel tried to reinvent himself this year. The streak is still intact. Look at me right now. I want to brag more, but look at the guy I beat. He dresses like the Burger King. He's got a creepery smile like Ronald McDonald.

He's as corny as Papa John, and I've seen his search history. It's just like Jared from Subway, but I still beat him. Chad? There you go. You know, I'm just disappointed in you. Not you, Mike, you the viewers. We talked about this last week. We said that I call my shot.

I get it. I deserve to be rewarded. And all of you are just bitter. It's just a bunch of Robert Whitaker fans. Might be a bunch of Bobby Knuckle Burners just in there voting. He's mad that I manifested this reality where he lost. So suck it to all of you. I'm disappointed in you.

Well, the good news is a lot of people did listen, Jed, because this is a much closer battle than it was last week or maybe the previous iterations of the BC versus Jedmishu matchup. So some people listen, but we can't get everybody to listen. We can't get everybody on the same page. Casey, you can hit the music. We are done. What a show. What an event UFC 290 was. And who knows?

Maybe we'll come back next week and be like, wow, that UFC Vegas 77, second best event of the year. I doubt it. I doubt it. We will not. Find out if that's what happens. Right here next week on BTL for BC for Jed. Casey on the ones in Tuesday. I'm The Ones of Afterlund.

We'll take you home. I am like that back next week. Good night, everybody. Love y'all. Between the links, and then we're fighting production on the Vox Media. ...to the Vox Media Podcast Network.