MMA Fighting - BTL | Jake Paul vs. Nate Diaz, Justin Gaethje vs. Conor McGregor, Derrick Lewis Free Agency, UFC Nashville

Episode Date: August 3, 2023

Jake Paul and Nate Diaz will compete in the boxing ring in Dallas this Saturday, and the build has felt much different than most Paul bouts, but has that changed the interest levels for Diaz's first bout outside of the UFC? On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel discusses the Paul vs. Diaz matchup, the build being a bit strange with Diaz being a bit nonchalant about things, which fighter has more pressure on them, and stating a case that Paul losing to Diaz would not be a terrible thing for the YouTube star. Additionally, topics include the fallout of UFC 291, Justin Gaethje seemingly changing his tune for a fight with Conor McGregor and the chances that fight could happen, how Dustin Poirier has reacted to his loss to Gaethje, Derrick Lewis becoming a free agent and the odds he signs with the PFL over re-signing with the UFC, Saturday's UFC Nashville card, the stakes in the main event between Cory Sandhagen and Rob Font, and more. This week, the panel includes MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Jed Meshew discussing the big topics in the world of combat sports. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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. The Vox Media Podcast Network.

From M.A. Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. And now, your host, my... The iconic voice of Esther Lynn, who as a matter of fact, I saw in person earlier today as we record this. Wow. She welcomes you to a brand new edition of Between the Links here on the M.A. Fighting Podcasting Network. I've been talking a lot today.

I'm losing my mind. I'm losing my voice here in Dallas, Texas. No live show, no video format, but I didn't want to leave you without anything. So I just left the Jake Paul, Nate Diaz, open workouts. They were absolutely insane and came right back to the host. hotel to do this show. And I knew I could only call one man who, like myself, is very good at just flying from the seat of his pants, doesn't need topics, just wants to shoot the breeze. He's Mr. No Gray area, the co-host of No Bet's Bard, the man behind damn they were good, Mr. Jed

Michoud. Hi, Jed. Thank you for doing this. It is much appreciated. You know, I'm happy to be here. I'm now jealous. I got to be honest. I'm interested in this fight, and I'm sure we'll get all into it. I wasn't like, man, I really wish I was there. Don't honestly care about being there. But you're getting to see the goat? I haven't seen the goat in years. So now I'm jealous.

You get to hang out with the goat some. Yes, it was like, it's the iconic voice. And I gave her just the biggest hug. Yes, the icon. Just the actual best. She is the actual best. It was great to see her. It's great to see the M.A.R.

crew here. They just wrapped up as we record this. a live edition of the MMR. They did a tremendous job. They were all over the place. The people loved it. Good work, Ariel, because that one looked tough, man. It was, man.

Look, the MMA hour is way harder, I think, than people give it credit for in general. Sort of doing that for that long is a very difficult task. But today, with all the ancillary stuff, obviously, was watching, trying to keep people on track, which seemed impossible. So well done, everybody on that program. Yes. Well done. a clap of the hands. So we'll talk about that in a moment,

but first, let's start with sort of the fallout of UFC 291. You were on the post-fight show, so we're not going to break down, like, all the storylines that have gone into it. But one thing we talked about on the post-fight show, Jed, things have kind of turned the corner a little bit, and I'm curious to get your reaction to it other than just straight out hilarity

based on one person that could be possibly in this conversation. But all of a sudden, while it seems like Justin Gaichie, after winning the BMF title and knocking out Dustin Porre, wouldn't it be any surprise if the man just wanted to sit back and wait for his Elamachachev and Charles Oliver to go out and do the damn thing, he could fight the winner for the title. And while many ask him about Connor McGregor and things Connor may have said about him in the past, Justin kind of no-sells and says, I'm not going to fight a guy on steroids.

The fight's been offered six times. He never signed. So I'm just going to no-sell this again. And then out of nowhere, Jed, earlier this week, he goes on Twitter, quote tweets something Connor said and said, sign the contract, let's go. And then he's had more to say. He's had more to say about it. So from where you were Saturday after UFC 291, when Connor went on that Twitter rant,

to where you are now, four days later as we record this, do you feel like we could get Justin Gauche, Connor McGregor, next? Do you think that's possible? No, still not happening. You know, it's just keeping the name out there. It's talking because it's not that Gachie wouldn't do it if it were to happen. I think that he would be very amenable to putting his new shiny belt on the line. He said after 291 that he got pay-per-view points for that fight.

So I assume that he just sort of will be getting pay-per-view points for any main event he's moving in forward. So I'm sure he would be more than happy to accept pay-per-view points for a bout against Connor McGregor about that he is, let's just be honest, extremely likely to win at this stage of their respective careers. But I don't think he's going to accept that fight unless Connor does the right thing, quote unquote, insofar as returning to Usada in the appropriate manner and filling out the full time there. And by the time that would even transpire, there will already be a definitive lightweight champion. We will have a winner between Islam and Chuck Jackie Olives too and Gatje is pretty clearly just sort of next in line for that.

So I maybe 1% this happens next, but I, Connor likes to say things. I don't think Connor is any closer to actually coming back than at any point in time we've had these conversations. And I don't think that Gachie is going to be the guy that gets him back when it does happen, should it ever eventually happen. Maybe after a lightweight title fight, but I still would say, 99 out of the 100 times we do this. Gage's just fighting the winner of Olivera Mockachev.

Let's just say the UFC comes to him and says, hey, December, BMF title fight, you versus McGregor. That's going to be the main event. And after that, you are guaranteed a title shot next. No matter who's the champion. Because look, Islam is not the most active fighter in the world. And I think you expect Islam to beat Charles Olivera. Islam's not a dude that fights every three months.

So if Islam fights. going to fight twice a year, Max. Yeah. So if he fights in October and Gaichi fights Connor in December, the earliest, Makachia probably comes back is May or June, and then there's Ramadan and everything. So it could be like July by the time we see Islam again. So couldn't the timing actually line up here? The timing could in that respect.

I think the question is, how will Gaichi feel about McGregor getting a pass on USADA? because maybe he doesn't actually care, but he certainly seemed to make a big deal out of it in the post-fight of 291 about that guy taking steroids or essentially strongly alluding to Gannon McGregor being on the gas. And so if McGregor, you know, they're going to say, hey, Connor's going to get a free pass. He doesn't have to do the six months so we can get this December.

I don't know how Gates you would swallow that. Maybe they just add an O to his paycheck and he says, okay, you know what we can do. it but is the UFC even incentivized to do it is the real question i don't i don't feel like they have the incentive to make this matchup happen i think it's a matcher people would love and people would watch i don't think it's going to do substantially better than any other conner fight the only reason they would be incentivized to make it happen is if this is the only fight connor will take to get back and i'm not sure that's the case either i don't think he cares about

fighting michael chandler i don't think he really cares about fighting anyone right now i think he cares about the perception that he is still Connor McGregor, but there isn't a fight that is really calling to him that is going to make him re-enlist in Usada, give up the many aspects of his life that he may enjoy without the purview of Usada coming in and checking on him. And, you know, they said all the time, it's very cliche, but it's cliche for a reason. Hard to get up and train when you're sleeping in silk sheets. Like, he doesn't need to fight. I think it's going to take a pretty specific.

set of circumstances it looked like we had it with chandler but that pretty clearly isn't the case and you know i can't blame him for it i just think we're not going to get connor for a while and so while this is a fun thing to talk about and has been one of my favorite fights my my most anticipated fight that could be booked ever for many many years i don't think it's coming next And how do you, like, what is Michael Chandler thinking right now? I know, I mean, you love to, if there's one fighter, you just want to get in that somebody's head. It's got to be Michael Chandler. I know you would think this is absolutely hilarious if Connor has like two more fights and none of them Michael, or Michael Chandler.

But do you feel any better about Chandler even getting this fight at this point? Like, I know you're, you were kind of not really sold on it to begin with because Conner's just been completely no selling him. Do you think Chandler's next fight? is Connor McGregor, or is he going to fight Armand Sarukian or maybe the Fiziv Gamrott winner? Like, what do you think happens here? If he's lucky he gets Fiziv Gamrott, he ain't fighting Connor next. I've been saying it almost since Jump Street. Well, I think that fight actually does sort of make some sense.

It just never register with me, and the longer this has gone on, the more it is very clear to me that Connor doesn't care about fighting Michael Chandler. maybe we were talking about it on the ranking show this week. We talked about it somewhere this week where I pointed out that we can all safely assume that Michael Chandler is not getting this fight because Michael Chandler himself is already operating under that assumption. And you know that because after UFC 291, Michael Chandler didn't respond to Conner's mini tweets saying F Chandler, you and me fight Gaichi. I'll rip his head off

Or all the mini Connor Didn't respond to any of them With a Connor you're running You scared baby hands what up No instead he just Went at Gachi It was like You need to defend that belt against somebody

And if you're pivoting off of The guaranteed red panty night That is Connor McGregor It's got to be a damn good reason The damn good reason is you just know it's not happening You are just fully aware At this point that you were sold the bill of goods, Connor gave you a big pile of wooden nickels, and now you're left holding

this bag of nonsense. And if you don't trade it to somebody else, if you don't give the bad bag of awful somewhere else and pass that hot potato down the line, you're going to be staring down the barrel of Armand Sarukin. And ain't nobody want to be staring down that barrel right now. It is the perfect cross-section of awful two-face and awful to lose to from a name value standpoint. So if he is lucky, he gets the Fazeve Gamrot winner because that at least puts him immediately in title contention and is probably a more winnable fight, even though I think he would

lose to both men. But it looks to me like he is number one in line for Armand. The question there just being, if he holds out long enough, maybe his plan just becomes, I will refuse to take any fights and see what shakes out and hopefully Connor will decide to come back. But he is, if I'm him, I would be trying to get Connor to fight me. And he has done nothing of that sort, basically this entire time, other than calling him out repeatedly, which is fine. But I think it was on the ranking show at this point. If you look back on the history of the dudes Connor McGregor's fought, who has he fought that he's respected? It's Dustin Poyer. That's it. It's the only dude he ever fist fought who he like he didn't have any real issues with with donald seroni but that was a set-up fight

and we all knew exactly what that fight was the setup he can come back and get a w whatever dust and boy is the only dude who called him out respectfully and he was like yeah and that also coincided with the time when he was beefing with the ufc he had like done the i'm retired fake thing so it sort of just kind of worked very well otherwise the people are going to get fights with him are bringing something meaningful to the table. The lightweight belt. The featherweight belt. The lightweight belt again.

Nate Diaz, who called him out negatively and everybody was galvanized about that fight. Michael Chandler's just none of those things. He is going to have to pick a fight as opposed to politely asking Connor to bequeath a big bag of money onto him. Dustin Porier was on the MMA hour And what, I mean, if you have not watched this interview, I highly recommend that you listen to the rest of this program and then go listen or watch that interview between Ariel and Dustin Porier.

Just incredible stuff, the honesty about it. I know there's one thing that that you didn't truly love, and we'll probably get to that in a moment. But just the way Dustin's handling it in the fallout and the aftermath of this fight, what did you take away from that conversation? or some of the standing points outside of him saying, look, Charles is the better fighter. Charles was better than me, but I don't feel like Justin's better than me. That was like a big takeaway,

but just the way he kind of looks at life and everything that has kind of come out of it, this is not a funeral, I thought was an incredible line from the post-fight press conference. What have you made about how Dustin has handled this? And after listening to the MA hour on Monday in his conversation, do you feel do you feel like this guy's in any rush

to come back and fight again? Oh, he's definitely not. I mean, it's a great conversation. I've always loved Dustin's, sort of his perspective on the game. The only thing I disagreed with was I'm a better fighter and I'm a better fighter than Gachi and I'm lost to him.

And I'm not saying that he's not a better fighter than Gachi. He might be. For him to feel so confident about it is just very interesting. I know that fighters all have that sort of of kind of outrageous self-belief in their abilities versus their competitors. But it was just a very, that was a very jarring thing to hear him be like, I'm definitely better than this dude.

I was definitely not as good as Charles Oliver and Habib. And that just seems, there's a disconnect somewhere in there where I think he can beat Justin Geichie. I don't think he is definitively better at fighting than Justin Geichie. I think if they each fought each other a hundred times, neither man is winning more than 60. Like you're gonna just have a really even split because they're different fighters. And so that was interesting.

The rest of it was tremendous. And I think he, I think he's just one of the few people who at least speaks their mind. Maybe other fighters feel this way and they don't share. Who have a really balanced good understanding of the sport. And to some degree, he is able to have that, this sort of perspective because he's made a lot of money because he is financially secure

from fist fighting in a way that basically other fighters simply aren't but him being able to be like he's going to catch some backlash probably from the I don't want to fight the young dudes I think that's fine I think that that is an appropriate way to view and approach this you know because it is that it's slightly unfortunate for the younger crop of guys like it certainly is they don't they will not have the opportunity. Sauru can will not have the opportunity to get Dustin Poyer on his resume, etc. But from his position, why would he want to fight those dudes? He has done the thing he has gotten himself into this position.

And if he is no longer going to be in hot pursuit of a title, then there is no reason that he needs to fight the younger crop of people. Prior to this bout, there was a legitimate argument that him saying, I'm not going to fight Binaldaryush, is pretty garbage. because if he's still pursuing the lightweight belt, you should probably just fight the best dudes in the division to get your shot at the title. Him now being like, yeah,

I'm probably not really going to fight for a belt again because it's not really lined up and I don't want to fight these dudes. Think that that's an elevated way to approach the game. Like, yeah, man, I don't, the juice isn't worth that squeeze for me. I don't have that much longer in the sport because I love my family and I have to do these other things

to do that, that falls, that, you know, brings those parts of my life down. So I want fights that are going to get me excited fights that are meaningful legacy fights. And I think that that's okay. So I'm not surprised at all to hear that from him. But it does put him in the very interesting position of what the hell comes next because there aren't a lot of options. And I think unless he wakes up one day and it's just like, man, I got to fight somebody. I got to get a win.

I hate that I just got knocked out like that. Just give me a reasonable person, maybe. But if that doesn't happen, I think we're in for a wait. Like, he's probably going to wait for a while. And my guess is he is either going to fight the loser of Gaci Olivera, or he's going to wait until Nate Diaz makes his return to the UFC and fight Nate Diaz. But those are both probably six months away at least. So I think he's just not going to be in our lives for a little bit.

And that's fine. And that's fine. I didn't really even have a big problem with the Darius thing because I honestly, I think that got blown out of proportion because I think it was more about just the timing of it because he had won in November and they're like, whoa, why don't you go fight Binaeo Daryush in February? And he's like, no, I'm not really interested in that because I just pulled my daughter out of school for six weeks to take this fight. And if I had to pull her out of school again, like that's not really going to work. So I'm not fighting until July. Like, I ain't fighting again until the summer. So I think that's more of what he meant by that, as opposed to, like, nah, Daryush sucks and he's not worth my time.

You know what I mean? Like, I think if Darius hadn't fought Olivera and they offered them that fight, let's say, on this card or even international fight week, I think PORI would have taken it. I think that whole thing got blown up a little bit. Maybe. Also, somebody, and look, you've got to live your life the way you want to live your life. somebody should maybe just set Dustin Porre down and be like, hey, I don't know if you know this. They in fact have houses in Coconut Creek, Florida. You can in fact just live in the place you train instead of living in Louisiana and then doing all your fight camps there.

You can just do that. And then you can have both parts of life. You just won't live in Louisiana for five years of your professional career. And he can move right back after it's all over. Seems like that's, that was honestly one of my biggest takeaways. Like, I guess he just loves Louisiana because why not just, I don't know. I would just go live by my job for the six years that I'm doing this job, particularly when I know there's a timeline on it.

And I am much better off by being there. But you got to do it. It makes you happy, I suppose. Marshall's buyers travel far and wide, hustling for great deals. on amazing gifts, so you don't have to. They've bagged this season's Italian leather handbags. Designer. Hand-picked the finest sweaters from the rest.

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It's the matcha where the three ensemble Cado Cephora of the FACC, that I just de-niche. who energize so much. Hmm, it's the ensemble. The format standard and mini regrouped,

what's the abend? And the embellage, too beau, who is practically to give to do you. And I know I'd like these Offreys,

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Ormagas or a magazine. Yeah, they're play show. We talked about him on the ranking show, and we talked about Jamal Hill being all upset about the rankings, and apparently he's upset with Ariel, too, which Ariel addressed on the M. Mayhauer. Derek Lewis is a free agent, greatest free agency announcement of all time, 33-second finish, the pants came off, the cup went into the crowd, he's doing the Bobby Shmurda, he's doing

the DX crotch shop. Everything about this is great. He keeps saying, I'm comfortable in the UFC. I'd love to be back in the UFC, but I keep coming back to Like, what is there for him in the UFC? Because he's fought everybody. He hasn't fought, like, Andrei Arlowski yet. He hasn't fought Jarzini-Rosen strike yet, but that's two fights. And then what are you going to do with? You're just going to throw him in there with, like, Ramanov?

Like, where do you go with Derek Lowe? So do you think that as he sort of wades this thing out and sees his value, which him rushing to sign a UFC contract right now would be absolutely ridiculous? I think it's just not a smart decision, considering what else could be out there for him. where his stock is now compared to it was heading into that card. What are the chances Derek Lewis returns to the UFC? What are the chances Derek Lewis returns to the UFC before he takes any offers from anybody else? And is the PFL in play?

Because as Kenny Florian told me earlier this week, he can go fight Francis for minimum $2 million and probably get other big fights there. He's going to make a lot more money fighting in the PFL than fighting in the UFC. he gets the chance to redo the Francis fight, plus make a whole bunch of other money fighting guys who are not as good as the guy's going to fight in the UFC. I just don't know what else he can do with the UFC.

Do you know what I mean? Like he's not going to come back and fight for a belt. Go make your money. And you're not going to make as much of it in the UFC, I don't think. It was a 5% chance he fights in the UFC. Look, because a lot of people ask me this afterwards for the hot tweets column. You got to think about it this.

When Derek Lewis says, I would love to return to the UFC. I'm very comfortable here. Like the G and lasagna, the parentheses, if they want to pay me the same amount of money as anywhere else to fight is there. Derek Lewis is no dummy. There's no dummy. That part is just silent because he is no dummy. Like Nate Diaz before him, hey, I am out of my contract.

I'm not going to burn this bridge because there's no need to burn this bridge. burning this bridge might cost me money in the future, whereas instead I can say, I'd love to be back in the UFC, wink, wink, assuming they're going to pay me a lot of money, and we'll go forward. Derek Lewis and his team, I don't know, he must have a manager.

I just am not sure who actually manages him. They are not idiots. Let me be extremely clear. If you and I and the entirety of MMA Twitter can put together, PFL is offering $2 million bare minimum for any heavyweight Derek and his team can also at least read those particular

tea leaves Here's exactly how this is going to play out Whenever Derek Lewis is officially free Because I don't know what the look of his contract is like The UFC tends to have matching periods associated with their contracts or something of that Whenever Derek Lewis is officially out of the UFC The UFC may give

him an offer. Hey, here is what we would offer you to extend and fight. Derrick Lewis will respectfully decline that offer because it's going to be for pennies. Derek Lewis will then come back, or his manager, whatever, will come back and say, hi, we're talking to other

people. They're going to talk to the PFL, and however they're going, whether they talk to them or not, they are going to come to the UFC and say the PFL is offering us $2 million minimum. It's actually going to be more because they Derek Lewis can go to the PFL and say,

you have frankly already played your hand. I know that your negotiations start at $2 million because of the contractual obligations you owe to Francis. I am worth more than $2 million. If you want to give Ben Rothwell or Ante Delajia or whoever, two million to fight him, I deserve three. That is the negotiations for Derek Lewis's next fight

start at $2 million. That is the absolute basement floor of that. And it's only up from there. And then the UFC is going to be put in a situation where they're not going to match because they're not going to pay Derek Lewis $2 million for one fight or the commensurate money over X periods of fights because Derek Lewis can go to the PFL. I get $2 million for this fight. Here's what I demand for my other fights.

We negotiate from this point on. and the UFC is simply not going to match that for a dude who is maybe a top 15 heavyweight, extremely popular, but has lost many fights in a row recently, isn't really going to compete for a belt that's just not in their business margins anymore. So it's almost as close to zero as is not actually zero is how the likelihood that he returns to the UFC, because he's not an idiot. There is value in staying at a place you are comfortable where you know the rhythms, and stuff of the UFC,

but it's not a million dollars worth the value. And the UFC isn't going to pay him $1 million per fight. They're damn sure not going to pay him $2 million. The kind of money that sets him up for the rest of his life, not having to do literally anything else if he just fights Francis. God knows he beats Francis in the rematch. We're off to the race about what could happen there. So he's going to the PFL.

I would bet I'd bet a pinky on it. Straight up, I would bet a pinky on him going, to the PFL. Wow. Because he's not like... It's a... The pinky bet is just... The bet is not, does he go to the PFL?

It's, is Derek Lewis an idiot? Is Derek Lewis dumb? This is an IQ test. He's not going to fail this IQ test. I feel like there's a very good chance goes over there. Even if he wanted to fail the IQ test, which again, I don't think he does

because I think Derek Lewis absolutely understands surprise fighting. He's manager. is not going to be like, what you should do is accept this UFC offer that I get 10% of and maybe make 50 grand over three fights off you, as opposed to getting 200,000 plus dollars for your fight with Francis in the PFL. The people around him won't let him fail this IQ test. It is impossible that he ends up anywhere that isn't the PFL.

Assuming the one major caveat, we are all operating under the assumption that the PFL, that the PFL $2 million price tag for Francis' opponents is true. I've actually seen no paperwork to confirm that that is actually bulletproof guaranteed. We are taking it on fairly reliable faith, but assuming that that is true and that that isn't a bold-faced lie to up their promotional standing, basically, he's going to PFL. How quickly does PFL have to get this done? And I know there's matching, but if PFL comes down and says,

like we're going to give you $2 million to fight Francis and Derek goes to the UFC and says they're going to pay me $2 million to fight Francis. They're probably just going to be like, thanks for your time and best of luck on your future endeavors. Or they could just be a jerk because of Francis. They could certainly do that. Or maybe they just give Derek Lewis two million dollars. That'd be dope for, that'd be dope for Derek Lewis. Like, all right, cool. I'll take this $2 million.

But if I'm Derek Lewis, I wouldn't take $2 million from the UFC. I'd be like, you're going to have to give me, you can give me $2 million for my next fight. but I can just in perpetuity leverage going to PFL fight fight is not signing more than a one-fight contract with you because I know there's $2 million in BFL. I think that it would behoove them to move more quickly on this just because I don't think that it has to be done super speedily but strike him while the iron's hot always better.

Primarily I think you want to get him in. You want to have this locked up or at least close enough to locked up to feel confident about it. and you want to fly him to Saudi Arabia and sit him ringside for Anganu Fury because why not? There's no reason not to at least make some promotional effort out of this. So I would say that it behooves them to move somewhat quickly with it, but, you know, they don't have to, they don't have to rush. I don't think Derek Lewis is going anywhere. Well, I met like, PFL is supposedly going to make a big announcement very soon, and a lot of people feel it's going to be the merger with Bellator, even though,

no one's really fully confirmed that yet, but I feel like if Derek doesn't make that decision before then, it's got a little less leverage because that's like one extra spot that is no longer there. You know what I mean? And I feel like that's going to be the big issue with that merger,

which I kind of feel like it's going to happen. Not that I've insider knowledge, but it just kind of feels like it's going to happen at this point. And I don't know how the how the hell it's going to look, but I don't know. I kind of hope they get this deal done before that news comes out. I think Derek's value.

I would certainly say that Derek is the one who should be moving the fastest for anything, because if you have the opportunity to lock up a $2 million paycheck, you should do that. In this sport,

you should do that as quickly as humanly possible for you. PFL maybe doesn't have to because if they do acquire Bellator, you know, Francis can fight Ryan Bader in a fight that no one cares about but that's sort of the thing. I think if the PFL gets Derek Lewis

and they have Ryan Bader, I still think they would just be like, Derek Lewis is a much better fight. It's a fight that more people will care about than France is fighting Ryan Bader or whatever. Is Bader still the heavyweight champ of Bellator, right? Sure is, John. Knocked out Fador, and that keeps you with the belt or whatever.

So, yeah, if Belator still had Fador and they could maybe do Fador versus Francis, sure, but I think that, I think, I think this will get done in the next couple of months anyway, because it's just such a no-brainer. Like every party knows what's going to go on here. So I think that that'll just happen. And it'll be better for PFL to get it done sooner

so they can, you know, do the same thing they did with Francis and Deonti Wild and all this stuff. They can bring him to their playoff events. They can bring Derek Lewis to sit him cage side at a PFL event and be like, hey, here's the heavyweight tournament finals. Derek Lewis, one of these days you're going to get to fight the winner of this one. How interested are you in that or whatever? And so I think that this will happen before October.

And yeah, it's the most obvious outcome. It should happen before October. That is UFC 291. We will discuss where the UFC is going next in a moment. But let's talk about the big fight of the weekends. This is why I'm here and the entire our crew is here in sweaty-ass Dallas, Texas, where it's like 108 degrees and it feels like 120. It's just brutal outside.

but he's going to be on in the American Airlines Center on Saturday. Jake Paul versus Nate Diaz finally happening. The bill to this has been a slow burn at best. Jake seems to be trying to carry the promotional burden here, and Nate's just like, eh, don't really care too much about selling this fight. And it seems to be getting under Jake's skin a little bit, which makes Nate want to do it a little bit more. So I kind of think it's been fun in that aspect.

but compared to most of these Jake Paul fights, Jedmishu, the Woodley fights, the Ben Ascgren fight, the Anderson-Siloh fight, even the Tommy Fury fight. How different is the build to this one compared to those others in your eyes? Feels real weird. Honestly, if I was capable of having sympathy or kind feelings towards Jake Paul, I would honestly feel a little bad for him for this fight. because the book on Jake Paul has largely been,

both through the way he has tried to sort of spin a narrative, and actually the truth, he has not had a promotional partner. He has been the A side of all of his fights, and that's reasonable. He's a very, very large star. But Tyrone Woodley doesn't have that juice. Ben Askeran doesn't have that juice.

They can do their best and they can try. Anderson Silva has never been like a hugely galvanizing promotion. star in that regard. So he's just largely been paired up against other people, you know. Tommy Fury did his best, but he's not an actual superstar to really draw interest. Nate Diaz is that. Nate Diaz should be a more than competent B side to the A that is Jake and drawing interest, creating dynamic pre-fight build in the same way that he was with Connor.

You know, the Connor Nate build up. It was nine days because Nate flew in off a boat on Cabo or wherever he was. and then did it. But they still made a build work there. And then for the rematch, they made a build work. It has been incredibly weird to watch Nate's perspective on this unfold. This is not a condemnation of him because I can't really be like, you should care more or whatever.

It is just really odd to see him pretty clearly be moving towards this for the last two. years. Like pretty clearly UFC, I just want to get a fight. Give me a fight. I don't really want to fight Hamza, because why would I want to do that? Just let me fight for it. Let me fight somebody to get out of my contract

because I want to go box Jake Paul and make a lot of money. That has been, that went on for two years functionally. Finally gets out, it gets out in the cleanest way possible. It's going to happen. We know it's going to happen. There's like a weird moment where maybe it almost didn't and then it rolls out.

He gets the thing that we all know and seems super disinterested in it. And it's, if the answer is just, I just wanted to get out of the USC contract so I could make a whole lot of money and I know I'm going to make this money so I don't really care about doing the rest of it. Okay. I can't really blame you for that, I guess. But this will do better business if you're invested in care more. And it's very, very weird to see the lack of days ago effort from Nate Diaz and promotional here. like I kind of agree with Jake Paul and that he's having to carry the stuff in that way. And it's probably not going to make a, I'm sure this is still going to do well on pay-per-view.

People are still going to be very interested. But this feels like the fight Nate should care about in the same way that fighting Connor didn't really do anything for him like from a fighting standpoint. It's not like Nate certainly didn't look at Connor McGregor like winning this is meaningful in the terms of an MMA victory that matters historically and that guy's a BMF and I'm happy to beat him. He looked at him as a big pinata. If I beat that dude's ass, a bunch of money pops out of him. That's the exact same scenario, but he seems so less interested in doing it. It is genuinely jarring and I honestly don't understand it.

Do you think this is like mental warfare from Nate? Just trying to, because you can tell Jake's getting kind of pissed about all of this. he's trying to talk, he's trying to say things that he's really trying to get Nate riled up. And Nate's just like, eh, don't really care. I'm just going to go in there and fight. I'm going to beat him and go home and then do something else. Do you feel like this is mental warfare by Nate?

He's just trying to get under Jake's skin. Because Nate comes off like he's not the smartest person in the world, but in reality he's actually very smart when it comes to this stuff. That's the thing is I don't really. Like maybe it is, and I guess maybe that'll work and we'll see. I don't feel, it just doesn't feel like that. I can't put like a, here's why. It just sort of the vibes don't come across as this is a grand tactical maneuver from Nate to offset his opponent.

It just feels like he actually doesn't care. And honestly, the best answer I have is that Nate thinks he's going to lose. And so he doesn't care because, in the same way that he sort of has that approach to a lot of things where he's failing or not doing well at wrestling is fake and for cowards because I can't do it so if you wrestle you are not a BMF and thus it doesn't matter that I lose to you it's the only real thought I can have you is that like maybe they just know he's going to get his ass beat and so he's walking into a in exchange of brain cells for money that is worth it from a financial standpoint but is, you know, he's not that pumped about it.

He was like, he very clearly thought he'd beat Conner's ass the entire time and did. He was absolutely right about this one. I think if he really was super confident that he was going to beat Jake Paul, he'd be more invested in it. And just be like, you can say all this stuff, I'm going to beat the hell out of you. Or at least he'd even be going to the like old lame standby of maybe you can win a boxing match, but in a real fight, I would literally murder you, so whatever. I don't know. I don't think it doesn't feel like mental warfare.

It just feels like he doesn't give a shit, which is so odd. Who do you think has more pressure on them on Saturday? Because I was talking to Ariel, I got to jump in the Amer for a couple minutes, and he feels like there's so much pressure on Nate. And I don't really agree with that. I feel like all the pressure is on Jake here, because I feel like Nate can just, as long as he, like, lands one big punch in 10 rounds that gets Jake's attention, he will spin it as,

hey, if we were on the streets of Dallas, I whipped your ass, bitch. And people were like, yeah, you did. Yeah. Just like he always does. So it's not like it hurts him that bad. As long as he's like somewhat competitive, it doesn't get the doors blown off him. Like if he has moments late in the fight, like if he wins like the last two rounds, but has a moment somewhere else, even if he loses the first eight. Like, I feel like Nate can still move on with his stock pretty high. But if Jake loses to friggin' Nate Diaz, who's never had a professional boxing fight, who is incredibly undersized standing next to both of those gentlemen today, if Jake loses to Nate Diaz, like, it's it. Like, it's probably it, right? Like, he's even talked about retired.

Like, his manager said if he loses, he might retire. and just be done with boxing. So who do you feel has more pressure? Do you feel it's Nate or do you feel it's Jake Paul? I feel it's Jake by a mile. Yeah, I think it's certainly Jake. It's not Nate. Like, it's, I don't really understand the arguments for why Nate Diaz would be the one with the pressure.

One, at a very baseline level, he's a very sizable betting underdog. That just comes with less pressure. If the expectation is you are going to lose, pressure by definition is lessened. And conversely, if the expectation is you are going to win and probably finish the person like it is with Jake, then that is an increase of pressure over a baseline level. Like, that's just how that works. Adding in, like, I don't, there's the argument that like if Nate wins, I mean, it's an opportunity cost. If Nate wins, it's huge.

If he beats Jake Paul, this gives him infinite amounts of bar. bargaining power to return to the UFC as the dude who did it. The dude who beat Jake Paul defended MMA's honor, and now he's going to come back and fight Conner. He's going to fight and fight and he's going to pay him a million dollars base salary per fight plus pay per U.N. incentives. So like that's a lot to lose. But if he doesn't, one, he's still making an incredible amount of money, which really is his primary purpose here. There's no other reason he is doing this. He is not doing this for the fame or the glory or the legacy because none of that really comes from.

He's just doing it to get a big back of money. So he's not, he doesn't really have a lot to risk. He is guaranteed to get that back of money. So yeah, whereas Jake Paul, I don't think this is crippling to him. I don't think he retires. It would be a blow. Like losing to Tommy wasn't great, but you can write that off. Losing to Nate much more difficult.

But he can still fight KSI, which would be. one of the biggest events of the year. He can still just fight other influencers because the influencer boxing thing seems to still have some steam. I mean, it's still going. So he can still kind of do that and reevaluate. It would just be a, again, I don't think that it's like pressure in that it will hurt him long term. It is pressure in that it will make him come to Jesus and realize whatever lies he is telling himself about his viability as a legitimate combat sports athlete are just that. they are self-fabrications.

He is not going to be a professional boxer of high quality. There's nothing wrong with that. He came to the game extremely late. He has acquitted himself pretty admirably thus far. And if he sticks with it, you know, maybe he can do something. But if you lose into a 38-year-old Nate Diaz, you're never going to fight Canello. And you know what? You are never going to fight Canello anyway.

So, yeah, I don't... I think Jake Paul has more, particularly because I also forgot what you mentioned. Nate's just Nate. when Nate loses, everyone writes it off and doesn't care. So, like, even if he loses Jake, there's nothing going to happen. It's fine. So, yeah, if there's pressure, I think it's on Paul. I think there is some, but I don't think it's a tremendous amount for this fight in particular.

Yeah. I think the only bad thing for Nate is if he just gets up alliterated. If he gets deaded in the first three rounds or if Jake just masterclasses him for 10 rounds and knocks him down a couple times and Nate does nothing, that's bad. But if Nate is just somewhat competitive, I think he's okay here. If Jake knocks him out really early, that's tough. But here's the other side. If Jake loses, the other thing that I don't think anybody has mentioned, so I'll go on record as the first person to say it,

there is an argument that it is better for him to lose to Nate Diaz than it is to win this fight. One, because they can probably set up a rematch, which, you know, just more money. Two, Jake Paul is very close to, and arguably even coming into this fight, is in a position where he can no longer fight MMA fighters because he's too good for him and the public is on to the fact. Losing to Tommy Fury, if he had beaten Tommy Fury, no one, this fight still might have interest because they are big names, big personalities. But I distinctly remember saying after that fight, oh good, he lost to Tommy Fury. it makes the idea of a Nate Diaz fight more palatable. Because after the Anderson Silva fight, there was no reason to have an ATS fight. Jake Paul very clearly win.

Still think that's true, by the way. But him losing makes it more palatable. Him beating Nate Diaz means that the next dude, pick Dustin Porier or whatever, random undersized older MMA fighter. Why? If he can beat Nate Diaz, he can also beat you other small MMA fighter. who's not a boxer, it makes it less sellable. If you lose this to an ATS,

then we have the chance, Mike. The chance that I think people are getting away from. The original conceit of all of this from day one for Jake Paul was to box Connor McGregor. That was it. That was always the goal from the first instance of this. And it has gotten further away recently

because Conner's too small and Conner's doing Connor stuff and all this. If he loses to Nate, that really makes a Connor fight a lot more achievable down the line, I think. Because then he lost to Nate. It's not like he just dummied up Nate who beat Connor, and then everyone's just going to MMA Math is. I'm like, okay, he lost to Nate.

Maybe him being bigger than Connor won't matter. Nate doesn't hit that hard. Connor does hit that hard. You can start to sell that story if he loses to Nate. So I think there's actually a legitimate argument that losing to Nate. that losing to Nate Diaz would be long-term better for Jake Paul. I don't think it's going to happen. I don't think that it's probably not all the way true,

but it is not catastrophic to lose to Nate Diaz. There is a silver lining to that particular cloud. Yeah. And let's also be clear, Jake has a floppy trillion dollars with or without boxing. So it's not catastrophic for him. He'll be fine. It's not like, oh, you know, my dreams are dead and I'm not going to make any money. He'll be fine.

He'll be fine. He'll make $50 million to box. KSI at the end of the year. Yeah. Last thing on this, this is a very simple question. Are you interested in this fight? Are like, is this something that you are like, you know what?

I wasn't really interested, but by the time we get to Saturday, I think it might be interested. Like, one to ten, where are your interest levels for this fight right now? I'm like a three. Yeah, it's kind of has that feeling. It's trying to not knock it for anybody,

but once Jake Paul fought Anderson-Silva, the idea of fighting AT has lost any appeal, Anderson's over is much better, bigger than Nate Diaz, and just like that's a more difficult fight and Jake Paul won that fight. It was competitive, but he won the fight. I don't, I have some mild curiosity about what Nate Diaz looks like boxing, like actually boxing, because maybe he comes out there and he can just, you know, put a pace on Jake Paul and we haven't really seen Jake Paul have to fight anybody who's going to throw in combination. I'm not even sure Nate will throw-in combination. I think this fight is going to just be pretty boring for a lot of it.

The only real question I have as far as could Nate make something happen is if Jake gets mad and really tries to gun him out of there early and gasses himself. But I think he's not an idiot and he knows that that's what happened to Connor. And so he's just not going to do that. And this fight's going to probably not be that interesting. But I have a mild curiosity. during one of the face-offs, will there be physical contact made between the two of them? Yes. There will be a shove, a pull-apart of some kind?

Almost certainly a shove tomorrow. At the presser? Either the presser or the way-in face-off. Or both. Maybe both. I would probably, if I've been putting money on it, I would say the shove is more likely to come at the way-ins just as that little extra juice

to try and get more people to buy the paper. review because it's always good marketing. If you can throw a last minute promo together with a big shove, be like, ah, bad bud. But I would say it's pretty likely that they are going to, in one of the face-offs, touch in a negative manner. And then maybe we would get Nate throwing water bottles or Celsius cans or whatever it is. And it'll be fun, fun times.

Celsius is there giving away free samples. I had the watermelon one today. It was delightful. Absolutely delicious. Shout out to Celsius. keep those away from Nate. Who delivers the shove? Jake or Nate?

I would say Jake Paul delivers the shove. I agree. The man's trying to promote. Yeah. He's trying to get something out of him. Nate should just like walk away altogether and not do anything. He's not really pissed Jake off. And that might be a smart thing.

The other thing is every time Nate does a face off with somebody, he gets really close to him. Because he does the Stockton fists up and gets like really into their space. It's Nate, like Jake is just going to shove him off. It's just going to immediately shove them back, and that's how we're going to have it. Yep. Well, that's in the boxing ring on Saturday. Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you. From festive and cozy fashion to Lux Beauty and Fragrance Suts.

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Shop now at IKEA.ca.ca. Black Friday. IKEA. Bring home to life. The UFC is in Nashville, Jed. Nashville, Vegas, this Saturday. We're supposed to get Corey Sanhagan versus Umar Namaga made off. instead we're getting Corey Sanhagan versus Rob Fon which is a great fight this is a fantastic fight

if you're going to do a short notice replacement for Umar Rob Font was the best available guy no doubt about it it's not Umar so I feel like no offense to Rob Fon I feel like the interest levels aren't quite where they were but still a very fascinating fight how do you like this car Jed

like if we go up and down the lineup like it's a good co-main event featured about it's pretty interesting We got some interesting storylines of some fights that aren't great on paper, but is this like a seven and a half, eight effort here

by the UFC? AK and I were talking about this on No Betts Park because he sat in for the wonderful Connor Birx, who was obviously with you on Dallas. I don't know. It's hard. I think that this is a mid-level area card. So it's not an apex card, so it's a little bit

above an apex card, and certainly with the matchups, You can see that. It is pretty heavily lacking on broader name value. Jessica and George is a former champion. People might know, you know, Corey Sanhagen and Rob Font and maybe Tatiana Suarez, but your average fan is not going to know a single other person outside of the top two fights. If they know all the people in the top two fights, that is. That being, and there are a couple of fights that are whatever,

but all the fights for the most part are really well made. aid. We have a trio of very likely to be bangers on the prelim card leading us into the main card. Billy Q versus Damon Jackson going to be a hitter. Kyler Phillips, Haunney Barcellus going to be a hitter. Jeremiah Wells,

Carlston Harris, going to be a hitter. The other fights on the prelims are pretty relevant, meaningful for the most part. Sean Woodson taking on late replacement outside of that, though. Then there's a couple of fights that don't mean much, and then the top three are very relevant, useful fights.

So it's not a bad card. It's just pretty low on name value, and so it's hard to get excited about it because it's hard to imagine that this is a fight card that's going to stand the test of time or going to be one of the ones we talk about at the end of the year. But a lot of the fights can be fun. So not good enough for me to take the trip up to Nashville, which actually isn't that far from me. And if Umar I was still on it, I probably was actually going to go and attend this one in person. but even though I think the main event might be a more fun fight without Umar in it, frankly, the rest of the car is just not strong enough to warrant a trip. So like the Michelin Star Guide, you know, the three stars means you should take a trip

specifically to see this fight card. You should plan a trip to see this, to see this restaurant is three. Two stars is like very good. And if you are in the general vicinity of it, you should go out of your way to see. see it and one star is like really really good if you're in the city make sure to stop there this is a one star card this is a if i was in nashville i would absolutely go see this fight card if i were outside of nashville and by an hour i might go see it by four hours away three hours away it's not quite a two-star card not going to quite get me to take a trip trip up to nashville to see it

fair enough let's talk about the stakes in the main event actually i i want to be clear i came up with the Michelin Guide rating right now, I'm going to use this for a future reference. I am in love with that off-the-cuff thing. That was great. That was really well done. Who knew the Michelin Star Guide knows how to rate things in an effective and efficient manner?

It's somewhat, I mean, it's all positive answers. Either it's like incredibly good, pretty good, or just good. It's one star is high quality, worth a stop. Two star is excellent, worth a detour. three exceptional worth a special journey. That feels like the best freaking system to do fight cards these days. This is not worth a journey, and it's not even worth a detour, but it is worth a stop.

If I was in Nashville, it's a one-star card, baby. How would you rate Holly Holm v. Meyer Buono Silver as a card on the Michelin scale? That does not get a star. There are no Michelin stars given for Holly Home versus Myr Buena Silva. I'm just going to go out on a limb and say that I'm pretty sure almost every apex card is not going to merit a star. Okay. So we can't use the Michelin rating unless there's a crowd of more than 200 people. Oh, no, we can use it. It's just a non-starred rating. My McDonald's does not have a

Michelin Star attached to it either. And that is what the apex is. It's a non-Michelan starred fight card. Every apex card is basically a non-Michelan Star fight card. Yeah. So, I mean, the apex cards are like, oh, I shouldn't eat this, but it's the only thing open kind of a feeling? Maybe the occasional good apex card can get a Bibb Gormand, which is the like, it's the good cheap food. So it's like, this is really good, but it's also like dirt cheap. So you won't have a one-star, the what you sort of presume a one-star experience is at it, but the food's good. Maybe the occasional really good apex card can get a bib gourmand out of me. Let's talk about the main event, Jed. Let's talk about the main event. The main event is

really good. Many star ratings in different ways. Rob Fon stepping in on Shornose, he was getting ready to fight Song Yidong at UFC 299 in Boston. Song was out. Umar's out. This just lines up perfectly. And for Rob Fon, who is 36 years old, if this man ever wants to fight for a title, he has to win this fight. He will jump the line, not all the way to the top, but he will jump a lot of people should he beat Corey Sanhagen. And for Corey Sanhagen, seemed like the stock was very high after his last fight.

The Umar fight would have been super interesting. And it feels like the UFC is really pushing Umar. Umar wins. He probably is right into the title picture. Sanhagen kind of feels that way too. But now you insert Rob Fon, who's a really good fighter, but not a massive star.

And Bannamway is just a mess right now, at least until we see what happens with Al Jard Mains. So I ask you, sir. What is at stake for these gentlemen? What's on the line for Corey Sanhagan? What happens if he wins? What happens to Rob Fon if he wins? So, funnily enough, from the U.S.C.'s rankings, this is a better opponent for Sanhagan than U.Mahar. Yes, Umar has the Nirmagr-Gamadov name, which is a lot of juice, but he's only 11 in the U.S.

rankings was Rob Font is seven. So better for him in that regard. And I think the answer for Corey's, you're right. Bannon Way is a super mess right now at the top. We're about to have a title fight in a couple of weeks with Aljo and Sean O'Malley, which will help a little bit. You've got Marab just hanging there. Henry Sehudo graciously got himself injured so we can remove him from the title conversation, which is very helpful. And then I think basically what's up for grabs here is a title shot, though, right?

Like, seems like that's going to be the outcome because either whatever the outcome at 2.92. I am anticipating Al Jermaine Sterling is done at the Bannamweight class. Believe that he will just be moving on up to 1.45. It seems like he, I mean, he's said it many times. It seems like as clear a break as possible for him to just go up. And maybe he can, he can fight Alexander Volkanowski because Volcanowski is going to fight Ilya. If he beats Tupuria, he'll won a lightweight title shot. Oh, wait, Justin Gage, he's going to be taking that up. So Volk can fight Al Jameen Stirling. Look at how all these timelines are starting to roll out very effectively for all of us.

And that'll leave Marab to fight the winner of this Corey Sandhagan-Robfffant fight. Because certainly if Umar won, I think they were just going to strap the boots on him, let it get him, get him going, get him after it, and then fight for the title. So I think that that's probably what's at stake here. And I will say, I alluded to this earlier, kind of more interested in this fight. I frankly thought Umar was going to work Sandhagen. then that's not a indictment of who San Hagan is a fighter.

I just think Umar is the dude waiting in this weight class. But I think Rob Fonk, that's going to be a really, really fun, good scrap. And I'm very interested in how it rolls out, frankly, because I'm not entirely sure who wins. Where does Henry Sehudo and Barron Vera fit in this conversation? Because you have to feel if Sean beats Eljo

and Maraub beats Pedro Munoz, they're just going to go right to that, right? Yeah, I mean, if Sean wins, then things get real wonky real fast. But if Sean doesn't win, God love Malinvera, big star, huge fan of him. He just lost Corey San Hagan and beating number 10 Pedro Munoz. Just isn't going to get him the juice to fight Marab for the vacant belt, assuming Sterling wins. So if O'Malley wins, things can get a little wonky. but assuming Sterling wins,

please, he is a betting favor. I'm trying to talk myself into O'Malley. I'm having a hard time getting there. But assuming Sterling wins and he does vacate, this is for a vacant belt. If neither or only one of those things happens, then who knows what is going on then. Yeah, Tatiana Sores, Jessica Androge is a great fight.

One last thing before we wrap up here, Another piece of news came out yesterday as I was traveling. Shafka Rakhmanov needs a new opponent for September 16th, and it kind of doesn't really make sense for him to fight on that card now because Calvin Gasolam is no longer competing. It's the Noche UFC. It's the Mexican celebration card in Shafkaa Rokmanoff. Well, I don't know, unless we can find somebody else that fits the bill.

Yeah, he doesn't really fit the mold of Nose UFC. see. Maybe they can rebook that fight. It's possible. Maybe they rebook it. That cut on Calvin's face is pretty nasty. His manager, the great Daniel Rubenstein, said they have asked for Wonderboy, which I don't think there's, I kind of feel like the UFC's going to try to shove Wonderboy in there, but Wonder Boy is not going to do it. Talks about Usman, I'd be really interested in that fight. I kind of feel like Usman's not going to take that one either. And Usman of Wonder Boy are going to try to like set up their own path towards each other. So what happens here?

Are they rebooking this fight? And if not, who's he going to fight? Let me just say shouts to Danny Rubinstein for, I mean, way to stay on your hustle baby. Just grift them in any way you can. You got to fight the boogeyman of this way class Shavkaa Rachmanov in a fight you will probably go to lose. And in your first return to a welterweight in like seven years. and that's even a generous.

It is generous that you get to fight a top five dude this quickly back. Oh, no, we got injured and we're out of that fight. What if instead we fight a different top five guy who is much easier to win or we fight the number one dude in the weight class, it's not the champion and was the long-reigning champion in Kamar Oussman? Stay on your hustle, baby. Fail upwards. Kelvin Gaslum has been the freaking captain of the. fail upwards All-Star for six years.

This man does nothing. Absolutely freaking nothing, but fail in a successful fashion. Look at his resume, Mike. Just look at it. He has lost five of his seven most recent bouts. One of those wins being Chris Curtis, which was steeped in controversy.

He, look, since moving up, people think like, oh, Kelvin Gasselm is a good middleweight. And you know why I say that? Because I thought it. I thought it when I was writing about Kelvin Gasselm this week. It was like, yeah, there was a time when he was like a good well-to-weight. No, it's a lie, Mike.

It is a dirty, dirty lie. He moves up to Welterweight in 2016. He fights and beats Tim Kennedy. That's not a bad win at the time. Right? It's certainly not a bad win at the time. Then he beats Vitor Belfort, gets overturned. That win is less good because Vitor's old.

but it's still okay. Gets a good performance against Chris Wybman before getting finished. So that's tough. Beats Michael Bisbing, who, yes, was just the champion in the fight before, but we can all be honest about where Mike was at that time, with one eyeball and old. Beats Jacaree by split decision in a pretty quality fight. Then it has the fight of the year against Israel Dissina, but loses.

You notice how I keep saying but loses a bunch? Because that's what happens. He keeps losing and failing. Like he beats Izzy, he goes and fights Darren Till and loses. He goes, fights Jack Hermanson and loses. Beats Ian Heinish. And then after beating Ian Heinish somehow gets to fight Robert Whitaker. He loses three in a row beats Ian Heinish and gets to fight Bobby Knuckles.

Loses and then gets to fight Jared Cannonier. Who's a top five dude? He just continues to fail upwards. He falls out of this fight. And I'm not blaming the injury on him. because injuries happen during training. But he falls out of this impossible fight against the dude, the dude, which he shouldn't have gotten in the first place.

They should make him fight lower down to earn a spot. But he gets it, falls out, and now they have the audacity to go after higher-ranked people. It is incredible, the effort Danny Rubinstein is on. I see you. I don't think anybody else in this game sees what you're doing, buddy, but I see you and game respect game love the hustle well said

and at that I don't know if we get ended any better he's I don't know we get into any better he's gonna he's gonna end up fighting Hamzat or umms chavcote geez uh like in November I think because there's no reason for

Shafcott to fight at the at the noj card um there's not Abu Dhabi right yeah you could throw him in Abu Dhabi against who like Wonderboy's not going to take that fight God who O'SFitt isn't either. Yeah.

So then who's going to take it? Unless you're just going to force Ballal to do it in Abu Dhabi. Oh my God. That'd be just kind of funny. But you would have to force it because I don't think Balaw is going to willingly choose it unless it's, this is a number one contender fight. So I could see Belaw getting that fight in Abu Dhabi.

I would have to roll very quickly. I don't think Shafkot fight. I don't think Shafkot will want to fight Kevin Holland. But he probably would just want to fight somebody. right? Kevin's at least got some juice even though we's... If there's like an unranked guy not named Calvin Gasolam, I kind of feel like Colin's a good one.

These Walter White rankings, by the way. Oh, that's right. Maybe. I don't know. I guess we'll see. The one that seems the most obvious is in Calvin's video this week, he said they wanted to rebook the fight for MSG, and that seems fine. That's fine. I'm down for that.

Be okay, but I don't know. Shavcott's sort of in the... the place where I would just give them a title shot. They're not going to do that. So, throw, spin the wheel, any top 10 fighter who's going to say yes, just have him fight that dude and that's for a title fight. If that's, I think the best answer is Ballol. And that is unfair to Ballol and I'm not here to tell you that it is fair.

But you just go to Ballal and say, hey, ma'am, Colby's getting the title shot for reasons. We're going to, you're going to have to fight somebody before you get a belt. number one contend match with a bullet No questions asked Shafkat Rachmanov We will promote it as a number one contender match You guys settle it up And I think

I think that would make Bilal take it And if they can do it in Abu Dhabi That probably is even a little bit of a boon to Bilal as well So Maybe I'm changed my mind I think that's what's going to happen You got to have Bilal do something I mean

They haven't even booked Leahon versus Colby yet. I hope they never booked that fight. I hope Leon just refuses forever to accept that fight. It's like, no, not going to do it. Maybe that's what happens. We're done. I think we're good here.

There's obviously going to be a lot more to talk about on next week's show. Things will be less chaotic. We'll find out. We'll recap Jake Paul versus Nate Diaz. We'll see what happens there. We'll recap UFC Nashville. What's next week? Back to the Apex, right?

Luke A RDA is next week. Luke A RDA in a absolutely zero star fight card. This is not a Bib Gremont. This is not anything. The main event might be fun. And then that's it. That's the extent of the fight card. Yep, we'll be looking forward to UFC 292 the following week.

Okay, Cubs Swanson, Hakeem Dawadu could be okay. Okay. Yeah, that's, someone's getting finished now. It's not a one-star card. This is not a one-star card. next weekend. If I was in Las Vegas, I would not attend this event. Is it Jack in the box? Maybe Arby's? This might be Nihilist Arby's. Have you seen the Nialist Arby's Twitter? It's the best.

Nileist Arby's Twitter is one of the best things that the internet has offered in its entire lifespan. That is freaking incredible. Just like all of you who listen to the program, back to normal next week. Thank you so much. Everybody will be returning for jed i am mike heck back next week on between the legs good night everybody love y'all the vox media podcast network