MMA Fighting - BTL | Jiri Prochazka Vacates, Next For Kayla Harrison, Pereira vs. Chimaev, UFC Orlando

Episode Date: December 1, 2022

The final UFC pay-per-view of 2022 will be capped off by the crowning of a brand new light heavyweight champion now that Jiri Prochazka is out of the picture for the time being. On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel discusses Prochazka's decision to vacate the light heavyweight title after an injury forced him out of the UFC 282 main event, Jan Blachowicz vs. Magomed Ankalaev fighting for the vacant title, and whether or not it was the right choice. Additionally, topics include the PFL World Championship pay-per-view event this past Friday, grading the promotion on how it all went, what's next for Kayla Harrison following her loss to Larissa Pacheco, the new feud between UFC champ Alex Pereira and Khamzat Chimaev, UFC Orlando headlined by Stephen Thompson vs. Kevin Holland, and more. Host Mike Heck moderates the matchup between MMA Fighting's Jed Meshew and Eric "New York Ric" Jackman. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Follow New York Ric: @NewYorkRic Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Audible. The Vox Media Podcast Network. From M.MA Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. And now, your host, my... Yes, the iconic voice of Esther Lynn.

welcomes you to a brand new edition of Between the Links. Thank you for joining us on this Thursday. We're back to video form. We're back to live form. Thanks to all of you who listen to the Thanksgiving edition of the program on the podcast network last week. But we're back to normal right here in the MA Fighting YouTube channel. Lots to talk about.

We have less than an hour to talk about it because we have work. It is a great YouTube channel. We have work obligations at the top of the hour. So let's get to it. Let us introduce the panel. First, let us introduce the exhibition king, Mr. No Gray area himself, from No Bet's Bard, Mr. Jedmishu. Hello, my friend.

We have work obligations? What's going on at the top of the hour? Is there fights this weekend, something like that? Well, it's a company thing. Oh, okay. Cool, forgot all about that. All right, let's keep this tight. Oh, okay.

There you go. And back on the show, the incomparable social media director of MMA fighting, the man with the greatest theme song in the history of MMA, Mr. New York, Rick. Welcome back, sir. Factual. Thank you for having me, Mike. As always, honored, thrilled to be here, a privilege to do this, and truly blessed to be able to sit here with yourself and Jed today.

So thank you for having me, and let's get to it. Man, we're just friendlier than Kevin Holland and Stephen Wonderboy Thompson right now. Just everybody's happy. Well, that's good. Well, let's get into it. Let's start with what we didn't talk about on the show last week because we recorded it on Tuesday. And like the first sentence I said is that if something happens on Wednesday and we don't talk about it on the show, sorry. And something big happened on Wednesday.

We did sort of react to it live as it happened. but that was for like 15 minutes or so, but this is now BTL, so we're going to get into it here. Because UFC 282 looks a lot different. The light heavyweight title picture looks a lot different. Yuri Perashka injures his shoulder. He could be out of the UFC 282 main event with Glover Tashira. He also vacated the light heavyweight title.

Tishara also out of the main event. And he's off the card in general. And now we will crown a new champion next Saturday, December 10th. either be Janbovich winning the title for the second time or Magamette Ancolaev winning the title for the first time with this 10th consecutive victory. So New York, Rick, we will begin with you, your reaction to the injury, the change, Yuri vacating the title, all of it. Yeah. Don't know what to make of it. I think the UFC was in a really rough spot. I don't think there was a title fight to make here that was going to knock anybody's sock

off or that they were going to come out looking like roses. I think the best option perhaps would have been Jan versus Glover, that rematch and had the most notable names, but it seemed to me just based on how this all shook out that they wanted Magamad and Kalayev in that fight and they got Magamette on Kalayaev in that fight. So ultimately, I guess at the end of the day, they achieved their goal. Don't expect it will do too well on pay-per-view. Don't expect that this is one that people are rushing to their televisions to order. for me, the thing that I couldn't shake at the moment and still don't understand now,

even after he has gone to Instagram to explain it, is why Yuri Prohasa vacated the belt. It does not make sense to me. I understand, you know, there's a Bushido, a warrior code kind of element that he alluded to. But financially, you are now giving up the opportunity to be the champion, which has financial implications, just does not make sense to me. Francis and Ganu also suffered a major injury and has been sitting on the sidelines with that belt around his waist. So I don't quite get that from Uri's perspective. I see a lot of people who respect it.

I get it. Great. I'm happy that that worked out in his favor. But for me, that's the one that left me scratching my head. As far as how the shakeup went, you know, they made the best in their mind of a bad situation and got what they needed. But I don't expect it'll be a huge pay-per-view. Jed, what do you think? Because one thing, we did react to it pretty much in the immediate aftermath once we actually confirmed this news.

But Yuri vacating the title. And it depends on who you ask because Dana White said, oh, my God, this is the worst shoulder injury I've ever seen in my entire life. And the history of UFC is get me out for a long, long time. Yuri's being Yuri and saying, I'll be back at six months, bro. And I'm going to win the title back. So are you shocked eight days later after we react? to this that he just decided to vacate the belt at this point? And how do you react to this whole situation a little over a week after we first talked

about it? I'm not shocked because I don't have any inside information. This is just me reading between the lines and far be it for me to make accusations. I strongly, strongly feel that Yerry probably didn't vacate the belt. entirely of his own accord um rick's right there this is they didn't have a great backup option for a main event here frankly like they're straight up we talked about in the immediate aftermath uh that's on the uc like frankly they put together a fragile card or a fragile you know a main event between some guys who i mean yerry is young but also

trains like a maniac and injury is probably not like entirely uh unheard of to happen in glover's 50 so it like that there's a fragile main event and they didn't have anything to back it up and they were hoping to roll the dice and get lucky and they didn't. If this card had a second title fight, I strongly doubt that Yuri Perashka would be

without a belt at this moment. If the co-main event was not Ancolaia versus Jan then Yuri would stop the belt because they would just elevate whatever the other title fight is on this and there's still a belt at the top. They didn't have that option. they clearly didn't want to do an interim belt for whatever reason.

That's the part that is strange to me is that they didn't just want to do an interim belt because it is not like they are opposed to that in general. But, you know, here it is. I agree with Rick. They should have done. Should have just been young Glover. Like, this is, and you're talking to the driver of the Magerman Anclyev is the best light heavyweight in the world bandwagon.

Like, it doesn't matter in this. He's young. He'll get a title fight. he'll fight the winner of this fight. But the two most markable names, it's a championship rematch. You can sell it. They're the one and two ranked guys in the UFC's rankings.

Like it's them being so insistent that Anka Live gets it is it's all just very weird. Because it is not like, well, I believe he's the best light heavy way in the world. Nobody cares. Like there is not a soul alive who's like, I got to tune in Magamette's fighting. So what is the rush to get him the belt at this juncture?

So it's very weird. Like all of the little pieces of it are very odd. But if you had just told me, Yuri got hurt, this is not at all surprising that this is the outcome because they got to try and sell pay-per-views. You know, got to hit that into your quota. Yeah, and that's the thing for me.

And I'll go back to you, New York, Rick. We're talking about how this is probably not going to do spectacular numbers on pay-per-view. And there's been a lot of conversation about some of the different reports. I know gear mates, spoke with Glover and he gave his side. Ariel reported it as well that they offered Glover the Ankleyev fight. He said no, I'll fight Jan though.

We'll just do the rematch and make sense. You got a story there. And I feel like that was probably the best of the situations you can make. Is it like a 200,000 by swing doing Glover Jan 2 over Jan versus Ankelaif? No. But it's probably a more compelling fight because most fans know who both of these guys are. Ancolaev is just getting on the radar. And I think Ankiaheuf probably beats both of those guys at this point.

But all in all, is this the right main event? Or should they have gone with what Glover wanted? Let's just do the rematch. I'll fight him. You get to keep me on the card. Keep him on the card. Ankelyev, you just fight the winner. Yeah, I mean, like Jed, I'm kind of reading the tea leaves here.

And it seems like for whatever reason they wanted Magamette Ankaliev in this fight. So ultimately, yeah, it was the right call because they got that outcome, right? They were able to convince Jan to take the fight. Just one thing for clarity. So everybody is on the same page. Glover did say no to Ankhaliev in December, but he said yes to Ankelaev in January if they were able to shift that fight to Brazil. They weren't willing to. They needed a fight for this card.

Understandably so. They need something because otherwise this card is probably cancelable without even this fight. to be honest, maybe this is cancelable even with this fight. But regardless, yeah, I mean, ultimately, if I'm looking at it from the UFC's perspective, for some reason or another, they wanted Magamette and Kalayaev in this fight, they got it, and they have at least half of the Jan Glover equation and have a name that some people know, a former champion in Yan, fighting on Kalayaev.

So they got what they wanted ultimately. Obviously, it's not ideal scenario. They would have wanted Yuri and Glover to run it back. but Magamad Unkalive is now fighting for the title for whatever reason or another. They wanted that desperately. And now they've got it. So, yeah, they've got what they wanted. To your point, I don't know how much of a swing in pay-per-view sales the fight between Glover and Jan does anyway.

So let's just keep the train moving, get who we want in this title fight, and then move on from there. So, yeah, mission accomplished. Jed, do you feel like with the way Glover has handled all this and the way. way the UFC handled all of this. Do you feel confident that Glover's to share will fight for the light heavyweight title in 2023? Yeah, no.

It's not even a little bit. Not confident. Like, it's 50-50, frankly. Because if Uri's right, like if you're going to come back in six months, which isn't impossible,

like we genuinely don't really know what's wrong with him. You know he messed up his shoulder. And like, while that may have long-term lingering side effects, it also maybe was still something you can come back from. and, you know, middle of next year. So Glover is, I would assume, first in line if Yeri is out for an extended period of time. But they fight in December.

If Yeri's like, hey, I'm ready to go international fight week. Then Glover's waiting. And then Glover's going to be like 45 by the time he gets a title fight or they're just going to make him fight somebody else. So no, I have no confidence that'll happen. It's probably slightly more likely than not. but it wouldn't shock me in the least if it didn't. Let me throw this one out to you guys, because I was thinking about this earlier,

and since we were just talking about the pay-per-views, this is not something the UFC would have done, right? Like, I'm willing to engage with that idea immediately, but what if they just put Patty Pimbleau in the main event? Like, that's probably better than this fight in the main event from a buy standpoint, isn't it? I mean, it's probably, I give him two weeks to just get out, or at the time, two weeks just get out in front of, like the press and just yell about blowing the roof off

the gaff, et cetera. Like it feels like that does, because this ain't going to do shit. I think the margins versus magamette is doing nothing for me. Agreed. The margins here are really small, but you've already got Patty on the card. He can already do the pre-fight hype and the buildup. The USC has a thing where they want title. fights in their main events unless it's Connor.

Well, unless it's, unless it's Connor, unless it's Nate Diaz, maybe even Jorge, you know, there's certain fighters that they'll let it away with that. They won a title fight in their main event. This made sense to me. I don't understand why not interim. They've done this many times. That would have made a lot more sense to me. And I just want to circle back.

I'm even less confident than Jed is that Glover Tischer is going to get a title shot. if Anthony Smith or Jamal Hill make a statement in their fight, I could see him getting skipped by them. I could see Yuri coming back and getting right back in there. I'm really not confident at all that Glover is going to be fighting for the title again. Otherwise, they would have put him in this fight. If their, if their motive was to get Glover an opportunity and put him in a title fight, they had one lined up for December 10th that they could have done,

or they could have even done it in January in Rio if they gave him Ankleye of then. So I don't think they're motivated at all to put Glover back in the title scenario. I think even this fight with Yuri was a last hope resort for this pay-per-view. They were dying to put John Jones or Francis Angano or somebody else in the headline slot. So yeah, I don't like Glover's chances, to be honest. And that's quite unfortunate. Last thing on this. Let's just get Patty Pimbley in the Intercontinental Lightweight Belt.

Just make one. Make another belt. There's no reason to have one belt in every weight class. Have an infinite number. then you solve this problem. Yeah, the North American title. Just be like AW and just have 800 titles. It'd be really funny for Patty Pimlet to win the North American and lightweight title.

By beating Jared Frieding Gordon. That would honestly be incredible. Just do that. It would be way better. I think that would just do so much better because casual people wouldn't know. They're like, oh, I know Patty Pimble. He's fighting for a belt. It doesn't matter what the belt is.

Just make him do it. That's hilarious. last thing on this, and I'll start through New York, Rick, because this is not going to do great on pay-per-view normally. But what the UFC pay-per-view model has become is it's become WrestleMania, where it's the UFC, they're on pay-per-view. We're going to, most people are going to buy it anyways. Like, they have built their brand enough.

It's not like the PFL charging 50 bucks and we're like, hmm, we're thinking about it. Most people are just going to buy it anyways because it's the freaking UFC on pay-per-view. So we're never going to know the answer to this, Rick, but. 300,000 over under. Oh man, way under, way under. To pull back the curtain a little bit, talk about how the sausage is made. The UFC is not incentivized to stack paperviews or at least every single

pay-per-view, right? They're not incentivized to stack every single pay-per-view. They're incentivized to stack certain pay-pviews. But they're not incentivized to stack every single pay-per-view because ESPN provides them a floor, right? ESPN has purchased the right to be the sole provider of UFC pay-per-views. They provide the UFC with a floor baseline number of pay-per-view sales. When the UFC exceeds that, when they have a great event, that's when the UFC is able to

participate and reap the rewards of that. But ultimately, their motivation is to put on 12 to 13 paper views a year, some of them to be gangbusters. You get your Connor, you get your Francis, you get John Jones, whoever those stars may be. But the rest of them, you really just have to get there. And it's the same thing with the fight nights where you just have to get 50 plus per year. So I don't think this does even close to 300,000 buys, but I don't think the UFC is particularly hard up to make it happen.

I think they're willing to sacrifice this one, move on to the next one, and hope that maybe they can put something on Rio to bump it up because that one's not looking amazing as a pay-per-view product either. And then by the time February, March, April rolls around, they've got some really good fights coming up. So I think that's probably the thought process. But yeah, they're not incentivized to make this a banger at all. What do you think, Jed? Because

sometimes we look at these pay-per-views or like, oh, this is really top-heavy. It's a two-fight card. And the rest of the main card isn't great. The main event here is somewhat compelling. It's not a draw. But the rest of the main card has a lot of name value.

And there's some really good fights on this main card. Bryce Mitchell, Ili, it's a poorer, is ridiculous. Patty Pimbled's obviously a star, Darren Till, Drickus Duplice, interesting fight. Ponsonibio, Robbie Lawler could be fun or it could be kind of sad at the end of it. So what do you think? Like over under 300,000. You think this does worse?

Or do you think 300 may be a baseline? 300 pretty close to the number. If you stood over under 250, I'd take over. A lot of what Rick said is mostly right. So the one thing I will quibble with is the baseline number that ESPN pays them. is to my understanding rolled over year versus year based on an average of the previous years pay-per-view sales. So you average it out.

They did 12 pay-per-views. Here's what you average. So in broad strokes, certainly you just want to have some peak moments because then they get the extra. Everything else pays out at the baseline. But if the UFC is just baseline selling more than that baseline from ESPN also correspondingly moves up and they get more money. theoretically that should incentivize the UFC to be better about their pay-per-views.

That hasn't historically been like the most accurate part of this. They've mostly just been like, yeah, cool, I'll take what I've got and we'll move on. But there is certainly some incentive to do so, particularly with this one, where you have your 11 previous months of pay-per-views. You know where your average revenue is set at now. And you can see a market line to determine here's how many buys we need to up to this plateau to X plateau to Z plateau. So there is some incentive to actually make this one a little bit better.

I don't know. I don't think that they are attempting to do that if we're being honest. Like they just did that here, here's where we're at. As far as this though, like I still think I think 200 to 250 is the baseline for them at this point. I mean, Demetrius Johnson, when the UFC was less popular than it is now and not an ESPN property, DJ was pulling 150, you know. as like the least marketed and beloved by fans, but not by like the broader pay-per-view buying public, he was still doing, you know, 50, you know, 150.

So I think we're probably looking at two to 250 as the baseline. And you put Patty Pimblein on this. You put Robbie Lawler, you put Darren Till, and you have something at the top. I think that that's enough to get us to about the 300 range. I think that's a pretty good number. So that's my guess. But like we're never going to know and it's not going to really matter for any for all intents of purposes because this is the world we live in now.

The one thing I'll add to that is yes, that number was was true for Demetrius Johnson back then and the UFC is more popular now. But pay-per-view is down now. Paperview is a harder sell now. Those numbers are smaller. They've shrunk since the peak when Connor was fighting and UFC was at its peak as a pay-per-view product. Those numbers are smaller now. And that's across the board, whether it be boxing, whether it be MMA, paper view is a more difficult space than it was back then. I have no idea.

So if Rick says, I believe him. Yes. Well, the good news is whether you spend the $75 on this card or if you don't want to spend $75 on the card. We will have you covered. We will have you covered. UFC 282 watch party going down next Saturday. So we will keep you posted. We will try to entertain you for the entirety of that main card.

But speaking of pay-per-view, we will stick around there. The point, there's no way I buy this for $75. I mean, you have to. I will be work, but if I'm just a fan, like, a couple of weeks before Christmas, I got to buy gifts for the famine stuff. I'm going to drop $75 on this. Come on. Well, if I got the whole card for $75, sure, five fights.

One of them is terrible. No. I'm not paying $75 for this thing. Well, maybe you can pay for it with BTL points. The point for out one goes to listen to that. Edmishu, it's Wadna-N-a-nothing. All right. Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you.

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On Friday. Quality sound effects. Hey, listen, I can't do the iconic voice, but I can make up sound effects. Friday, this past Friday, six days ago, we had the PFL World Championship. They went to pay-per-view. I'm still scratching my head with this decision to not only go to pay-per-view but charge $50 for this pay-per-view. But for those who actually bought it and watched it legally, and even if you watched it illegally,

I don't recommend you do that. But if you did, it exceeded your expectations more than likely. Most of the fights delivered in some way. We had some finishes. Obviously, the card ended in a pretty surprising way. So I'm going to start with you, Jed, because we were covering it on Friday. we've had some time to sort of digest all of this. You're going to be Professor Michoud right now,

and you're grading the PFL's first pay-per-view event. What grade are you giving it? A minus. You could convince me for an A if you came to my after hours and made an argument, you could talk yourself up to an A, but a minus for sure. Look, nine out of ten things that happened here were great. Like they, we were very critical going in.

I stand by literally everything I said. It was all correct. I'd have no notes on my own performance pre this pay-per-view. But most everything broke right for them, right? You know, a number of finishes kept the fight time from ballooning for the main card. A lot of good storylines, a couple of duds, but you're just going to get that with any fight promotion you put things. my only real i say that almost everything was good my only negatives the reason it's an a minus not an a plus or an a is one uh you just didn't need the aspen lad julia bud on the main like

that just that especially that that's just not it that you just that didn't need to be there uh it it didn't fit just because everything else was like a serious championship fight and that was not a million dollar fight so I stand by that critique prior. The main event, which I'm sure we're going to get into, so I won't talk too deep on this. The outcome there, not ideal for them promotionally,

but set aside. And then I'm going to dock you points for having commercials on a pay-per-view. And I was told by several people that the UFC does this. That's cool. Two wrongs don't make a right. If I'm paying $50 or $75 or any set amount of money to watch your televised product, don't give me fucking commercials.

Like that's just bullshit. And I'm using the hard language because it is because you're you are milking me for all of the money you possibly can. And that disdain for a fan base really rubs me wrong. You do product placement or this is PFL presented by corn nuts, corn to the core. Cool. But to literally run an ad during this thing bothered the hell out of me. And it docks them a full half a point down.

to the minus instead of just a clean A. New York, Rick, you were there, man. You were probably hob-dobbing with the fans out there. They're probably all lining up to ask for your autograph, take selfies, if you will. How do you grade the card, having been there in person? Oh, yeah, there was a lot of autograph signing. Maybe we start there.

In-person experience, it's an A-plus. The Hulu Theater is a great venue. PFL puts on a good show a lot. PFL puts on a good show. It was a great night of fights. So I'm A plus live experience. If I'm grading the overall package of what PFL presented, it's a B, maybe. And I'll say that with it's probably an A or even an A plus.

They're one folly. And I don't have a problem with Ladd and Bud on pay-per-view. I don't even have a problem with pay-per-view commercials. My sole problem is the fact that it was on pay-per-view altogether. Because this could have been a business card for the PFL. This could have been their event that everybody watched on ESPN or ESPN Plus and said, wow, I didn't know there was this competitor product to the UFC. And what I think their advantage is over Bellator and even won to a certain degree is that

they're not just doing MMA fights, right? There's a structure to it. There's a different. There will be some people who are critical of the tournament format, certainly, and I understand it. But it's different. And I think that's important. And I think that that creates a level of separation between them and the UFC. that is important right now because quite frankly,

like Bellator is just UFC light at this moment and it's not really cutting it. So PFL having a different product that they could have exposed to their fans and shown their champions getting million dollar checks and being able to tell this storyline about Larissa and Kayla is something that would have had long lasting effects for them as a promotion and put them in front of a lot of people that would have been repeat viewers. And they blew it because I don't expect that this pay-per-view did really, well. So it was it was a high mark for me as an event as what the fighters were able to deliver from a live experience. And it goes all the way down to a B for the sole fact that they put this

on pay-per-view when they had an opportunity to do something really significant for their promotion. And they screwed it up by not taking my idea of just throwing a curb ball on Friday and be like, look, you're the best fans in the world. We're they going to knock this down to like just buy if you have a subscription to ESPN plus you get it for free or we talk to the to the head honchos we're going to put this baby on ESPN you would have got so many more fans by making that decision and so many more people would have applauded you and would have tuned into the card but all in all for the action which transpired it exceeded expectations no doubt about that but the big story it will go back to you Rick Larissa Pacheco beats Kayla Harrison we've talked about

we've reacted to it. You have talked about it. You've reacted to it. We've hit this from all angles. But the last thing I want to say about this, we're just running this one back, right? Like this Chris Cyborg idea, all this, this isn't even a thing right now, is it? It's a, the one caveat to this is it really is in Larissa's court, right? Larissa is the champion. And she has the opportunity to do a super fight with Kayla if she wants it. She has the opportunity to go back through the season, defend her title in a season format. So the ball is in her court a little bit on how this plays out and what Kayla's next move is. Because we know based on what we heard from Kayla Harrison and the PFL, this was her last time through the tournament.

And they're not doing 155 pounds anymore. So there will be super fight cards or super fights on other cards that are happening. And that's where Kayla Harrison will have her final two fights. So it's a little bit in Larissa's court to say, okay, I'm willing to do it at this point. against Kayla and rematch her. Or maybe she says, you know what? I want to go back through the tournament and give somebody else an opportunity and defend my title and do it that way as opposed to in a super fight.

So that's the one caveat I'll say. Best for business for both Larissa, for Kayla, for everybody involved is to run it back. And it seems like based on both of their comments after the fight, they postbooked to Ariel as well, that they want to do it. And it'll be in PFL's best interest to do that. So yeah, I would put any cyborg talk on hold for now. quite frankly, if I'm cyborg, I'm not that interested in this fight anymore. I think Kayla's undefeated record was the thing that would have had the most intrigued for me.

If I was cyborg, I would just run back Larissa and Kayla for a fourth time. And I've long said, I've said this a million times across many different platforms. If you have the two best in your organization, I don't care about new opportunities for other fighters. Put the two best in there every single time. I will watch Figurato and Moreno every single time. I'll watch Alex and Izzy every single time. and I will watch Kayla and Larissa every single time. So run it back, give it to the fans.

That's what we need to do. Agree with this, Jed? I don't know. It's a little more complicated, I think. I think that that is what's going to happen. Let's start there, right? For a lot of the stuff, Rick said. PFL certainly is going to believe that this is probably their best path forward.

It's probably best for Pacheco and Harrison certainly wants it. I think there's a good argument to make. Maybe not. And I know that that's going to be a little controversial. But here's my line of thought, right? One, you're going to have to pay Pacheco. Like, I don't know the terms of her contract. They just changed because if I'm her and the PFL's like, hey, we're going to run this back.

I'm like, cool. I would like a million dollars to fight this fight again. And they're going to be like, no. And I'm going to be like, all right, I'm going to not fight this fight. And I will enter the next year's tournament. Because at the end of that, there is a million dollars that I, I will win because Aspen Ladd sucks ass. So Pacheco has some bargaining power here.

She'll be like, I just won't do it. I would, I'd rather do this thing. There's a million dollar prize at the end of it. You are going to have to give me a million dollars to forego this tournament to fight this woman because you're 1.45 division. Let's just say I feel pretty good about my chances to run the table there and do this again. At which point, the PFL can either say, here's your bag of money. fighter, go fight Kayla, or they'll be like, Kayla, can you hang around and fight in the thing and we'll do this at the end of this tournament again? Kayla's got two fights in her contract. She's not

going to do that shit because she wants the freedom that comes with being a free agent and being able to move and leverage yourself. So they're just going to have to pay Pacheco to do this. And I don't know the PfL's appetite to pay her a bunch of money. But again, if I'm, if I'm Pacheco's manager, I am settling for nothing less than a million dollar check to fight this woman. That's it. There is no ifs, hands or butts about it for me. So I don't know.

I don't know how they're going to feel about that, which frankly may be part of the reason you saw the PFL dude still post to Cyborg and interest in that fight. Totally agree with Rick. Cyborg's lost interest. I didn't think Cyborg ever was interested. And now she has a great excuse to never fight Kayla Harrison. That's not to say Kayla Harrison beats her,

though I think she would have. It's there's, Cyborg has an interest. sense of herself and her her value as it's stardom in this sport and she wants to do other things and she just doesn't want to fight Kayla Harrison because it feels like an affront to her personally or whatever her reasons are. She never really wanted that fight in the first place. She's going to pretend that she won the fight that never happened as we saw from her tweets post-fight and now she never asked to fight her. That fight is never ever happening. I feel pretty

good about saying that at this stage. So there's not a ton less. Like there's not much else for them to do Because what are you going to run Julia Bud Versus versus Kayla Harrison now Like that fight maybe would have mattered Before Bud just lost a lad So I think the PFO ultimately is just gonna have to pay Pacheco I'm not sure that it's a good fight for Harrison to take

At this moment in time Harrison said that she just didn't perform And that may be true And it was a close fight, it was a good fight That was not the way any of us thought That if Pacheco was going to win She was going to win I think the universal opinion was Pacheco caught her on the feet if she was going to get the dub.

She didn't. She's how worked her ass. And that's it. Like it just, they fought real hard for 20 minutes. And when push came to shove, Pacheco dropped him on the table and was like, mine are bigger. I'm going to win this five, this last five. And I'm going to win this million dollars. And Harrison had nothing in the tank for.

And you heard her talk after saying she was a lot more physical. I haven't fought her in three years. She improved a ton. I am not saying that Kayla Harrison is a bad fighter. and maybe she just had an off night happens to everybody and that was a long season, tough fights, etc. I don't know that I feel confident that she wins an immediate rematch.

And this is not a catastrophic loss for her. She can rebound and rebuild. If she loses two, that gets real bad in a real big hurry for her and everything she wants to be in an accomplish in this sport. I would personally say it's probably better for her to take some time. I know she gets time anyway because of the PFL tourney structure or how their seasons work. It might be better for her to say, you know what, I'm not going to fight her next spring.

I'm going to take some time with my kids. I'm going to train. I'm going to improve because as much as she has improved in general as an MMA fighter, there has always been a question in my head, which I feel like maybe got answered a little bit in that fight of how much can you really improve when you're the best person in the room and you know you're just better than everybody. Like you can But I feel like this will push her to be like Shit, I got to work harder Because I'm no longer just dump trucking these women

I just got beat I got beat in a bad way And it's not one that she can shake off as I got caught It's I got consummately beat So I think she should take some time And if they want to run this fight back next summer Next fall That's probably a lot better for Harrison

But I don't know how that's going to work For anybody's timelines frankly Best of five would be interesting here especially if Marissa wins the next one, everything on the line for game five, fight five. I guess. That'd be fun.

Yeah, be fine. I was just going to say, it's a logistical problem. It's not really a fight problem. It really truly is a logistical problem. When their season starts, they're going to have to make a decision,

and Larissa is going to have to make a decision. Is she in the tournament? Is she waiting for a Kayla Harrison super fight sometime in the middle of the year? Maybe Kayla fights somebody else, and now she's waiting for a fight at the end of the year. It's truly a logistical problem based. on the fact that the PFL has a season and is trying to supplement it

with these super fights. So I don't know what's your bad girl. Do not fight her for less than $700,000. As I started with, the ball is in her court. She's in control of this scenario. Not Kayla Harrison, not the PFL. She has all the leverage.

She's the one who did what nobody thought she would be able to do. And now she can reap the rewards of that. And she should be paid accordingly. Let's be, I want to, because you threw this out, Mike. if Pacheco wins the re like the tetrology like I get like they probably would do a fifth fight would you have any interest in that fight because I frankly if Pacheco wins the fifth

I don't think I care like at that point I'd watch I'd watch the hell out of it I mean it's literally do or like it's literally do or die for Kayla like if she I guess I'd watch I would just feel confident that Pacheco is better than her now because it's not like what did you have there was a three year gap between this fight you could at least pretend like well she was 25 when they fought she's 28 but she's 20cco can now have been improved significantly like that that's a selling point if they fight she beats her in november and she beats her in may and then they do a fifth fight in december or whatever like i would just feel confident pacheco wins so like it just there's not the time that i feel like that needs i agree with you i agree with you to an extent but i'd

throw back something you mentioned, which is Kayla Harrison is very, very young in her MMA career and hasn't really fought the alphas, really hasn't fought the best fighters in the room, and now she's facing them. And if she fights Pacheco again, she's getting more experience against somebody who can beat her and can push her. I would like to see it personally. Like, I'm not predicting. If I'm thinking right now, I would, I would assume Kayla Harrison wins a fourth fight. That's my personal feeling on that fight. I think she will and would win a fourth fight. But if she lost it, I'd be willing to see it a fifth time. Obviously, this depends. Look, if she comes out there and starches her and it's really bad, maybe we can put that on hold.

But Kayla Harrison does not have the reps. She does not have the fights. And now she's finally getting them at a level that is beyond the filler content that she's been getting to this point. And I'd be okay seeing how that evolution looks in a fifth fight, personally. I need to see the fourth to see how it looked, I guess, really. To look like this. one, then sure, but if it's just like, actually, Pichenko is still getting better and Kayla's just bought. I'm with it. They also don't have anything else to do.

They don't have any other fights to make with her. Well, for the interest of time, we'll move on. The point for round two goes to, I got to say, it was going to Jed, but New York Rick countering back, Jed asking that last question, New York Rick sneaks it

out. Man, na, na, nan, man. It's one to one. Nicely done. So, I want of the talk about something that we mentioned last week on the podcast. We got a little cooking, cooked a little more well done on the MAA hour on Monday. Alex Pereira versus Hamzaa Shemayev. Things got a little more interesting on Monday. Shamiyev has been challenging Alex Pereira since UFC 281 ended.

Pereira goes on the MMA hour. He and his coach reveal that they have let the UFC know that they are in to fight Hamzaat Shemaiah at UFC at UF at UF at UF at 205. But they claim that Shemayev didn't want it. Now, I'm told from somebody from Shamiya's side, the exact quote was absolute bullshit. But also, Pereira puts out a bet to Brendan Chab, who basically said that Shamiya will dump truck Pereira. 50K for the fight. Another 50K Shamiah won't take him down in the first 30 seconds. Shab is in.

Shemayev also wants to throw some money at this. So New York Creek, with all this happening on Monday, are you interested in this? happening like i doubt it does although like we talked about earlier 283 could use a little bit of a boost if we're being honest are you interested in this fight at 205 i'm interested in this fight whatever weight those two want to walk into the cage together let's do it um there's not a lot of interesting challenges for hamzaa in my opinion um i think the dude's going to walk through nearly everybody at 85 and nearly everybody at 70 so why the hell not he's the 85 pound champ Hamzaa Shemaya fights at 179 or whatever weight class he's actually in.

Let's do it in Rio. Brendan Shob in the corner with the stack of cash ready to throw it in the ring. If we're ready to throw it in the cage if he loses. I'm all in. UFC 283 needs a boost desperately. It really needs a headline attraction that it doesn't have right now. And Hamzaat Shemaya's name and Alex's name right now means a lot. So yeah, why not?

Let's just have some fun. This is old school MMA. This is pride. This is the weird stuff that got me into this sport. So let's just do it. I don't care. Meritocracy has been dead for years. So I really don't care about people skipping lines and opportunities and this, that.

There's no titles on the line. So who cares? Because it's at 205. Let's just have some fun in Rio. Let's do it. Two big names headlining that card. And if I'm a betting man, I'm probably with Shob and Hamzot on this side of the fence.

in terms of those takedowns. Jen, we talked about this if you're in Pereira shoes defending that title against Shemai, if you probably just don't even want to think about that right now. But now he's re-raising and just bumping it up away class, 205. I might be injured, but I'll do this at 205. Are you more interested in this idea now that there's no titles, no nothing? We're just having two dudes who seemingly have an issue and they're just going to fight for the sake of fighting up away class on a pay-per-view.

No, I'm not more interested in it, certainly. I'm probably a little bit less. Don't get me wrong. Still watch the hell out of it. Although I do hate the fact that somehow Alex Paheta and Hamzot will have made me agree with Brendan Chab on like anything because Hamzot will take that man down with alacrity. Honestly, at 2 of 5, I just have very, my appetite is less.

and still going to tune in, still going to watch it. I'm down for the freak show weirdness of it all. And I don't give a shit about meritocracy because meritocracy also involves you being interesting. And Leon Edwards needed to be interesting. And he never was. And then he got here and good for him to capitalize. But could have been faster if you were just better at being interesting. And for whatever reason, Hamzaa Tcha Myev is interesting.

And so if he gets it, cool. My issue is doing this at 205 means. that if and when Hamzot wins, we just have to redo it at 185, which is a waste of everyone's time and energy. It is not about, like, I don't have any issues that they just said,

my belt is on the line, but we're going to weigh 200 or whatever. Cool, like, that'd be fine for me. It's just, there is no, it, Hamzot will win this fight. Like, if they fight, I feel pretty good about Hamzot beating Alex Pereira. And when he does,

the next fight is just a rematch at one. 85 and it's not like cutting weight will help friggin Pereira it's not like that's going to make him better he's the enormous one hamzad is big but he is not as big as perera so it will just be like less good for him to go to have to suck himself out to get to 1.85 so that's my only quibble with it otherwise hell yeah roll it if he wants to do it uh 283 need something uh because god love davis figurato and brandon merino

that that ain't carrying a marquee show. Watch your mouth. Watch your mouth. I'm just ain't, man. I'm sorry. It's just, I love them. I love them.

Their fights have been awesome. They are one of the few people. I am not like Rick. I don't need to see the same dudes fight over and over and over again. I didn't need Max Holloway versus Volk a third time. Felt pretty good about where that thing we got a third. If somehow we got a fourth, I would hate it because I've seen this story before.

This one, it's new. It's different every time. I'll watch them. 100 times because they're all bringing new things to the table every time out. That still just ain't going to do it. And then what else is backing that up? The ghost of Shogun Huah getting carried out in the casket. Like, you need something and maybe this is it.

And so I'm cool with it. It's just going to be really lame when Hamzat wins and is the best middleweight in the world, but doesn't have the belt. And then it's just like, also, Izzy, what are you doing now? You got to hang out. because we're going to have to do this fight again at middleweight. Go fight Bob again. It gets lame.

I'd watch it again that one too. I'll tell you that. I don't get a shit. Watch him up again. It is. Is he beat that man's ass for what's that 35 minutes? It's fine. I know who wins.

It is so much cooler for Hamzot to be an uncrown champion and the specter of Hamzat to loom over the 170 and 180 five pound divisions where everybody just assumes he'd be champion and isn't champion. I think that's so much cooler. I think going up to 205 and not having a belt and not mattering is so much cooler because Hamzat becomes the de facto champion at 170 and 185 because everybody just assumes he smokes everybody. I mean, it's not different from now because that's that's kind of the position I'm in where I think he smokes everybody. But I think it'd be cool if he did that like if he fought izzie at 205 it's just going to log jam the shit out of everything if he goes up and this is the homzat show where we're we're just this is the homzat show that's all i care about is

what's up with hamzat the one thing i'll lob out there is is this brandon shop's greatest contribution to mma somehow getting Alex pissed off enough that now he's countering humzot and making bets and it's seeming actually feasible what is the other option I can't think I can't think of one good thing he's contributed. So by default by default. This is the this is at least this is a genuinely interesting thing, which is not something I've ever said about Brendan Schaugh before. So I dig it. Thanks, Brendan.

Hey. Yeah. Broken clock. Right twice a day. There you go. Well, we'll move on. This could we'll see if this becomes a thing. Who the hell knows?

Um, and we'll see how things react to it. it's probably not going to happen. Believing that Hamzaa Tshmaev is going to fight somebody when he just calls out every person alive, every chance he gets. Eh, don't need to buy that. If you throw enough darts,

they're going to land somewhere. But the point for round three goes to York, Rick. It's two to one. Nicely done. Manna, na, na,

na, nah, all right. UFC, I'm waiting for the music to come, but Casey's not here. So there is no music. So I have to create it myself.

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We got some big names. We got some interesting names spread throughout the card. UFC Orlando, Jedmishu. You tell it like it is. How do you like this fight night offering for the UFC as a whole? I'm so torn, Mike. Because this is one of their better fight night cards of the whole year. year like like London it was like the first London show was probably top to bottom still better

and certainly what happened afterwards is better but I mean this is these are what we hope fight night cards will be right like this is the this is it this it hits we somehow have tied to evas on this fighting Sergei Pavlovich I don't understand how that fight is here when that fight is better than like almost all of the the pay-per-view fights next weekend But like this is a great fight night card. It is also 15 fist fights. And this is not like a nooner start time. Like this is so many fights.

And it doesn't seem necessary to watch 15 fist fights on a Saturday. You could just have fewer. And I don't even know, like it's hard to even cut because there's so many good fights. But like, I don't know. could we have taken some of the dope fights on this card and replaced some of the trash ass fights on like the last four fight nights and just spaced out quality instead of throwing 15 of them on this one like I don't so it's hard because I from a nuts and bold standpoint I love this fight card it's a great fight card everything almost every fight is relevant or has a relevant

name or there's a story there's there's purpose there's intention to this fight card I am guaranteeing that I will be tired of it by hour four. Like there's just no way that when I'm on, and absolutely no disrespect to Michael Johnson, Mark DiKeezy. Michael Johnson's been in the UFC 100 years. Mark T. Keesey finally looks like he might be, might have started to put something together

to fulfill the promise that we thought he had. It's a very quality fight. But I've already seen six other fights beforehand. I've got another eight to go after you. It is just an overwhelming amount of, content that's gonna lull. Like you can't build infinitely with this many fights.

So it's a B because of the length. If it wasn't, this is an A A plus fight night card. Like it's, there's also a lot of old folks on this one too. Like low key,

a lot of old guys maybe getting put out to pasture in this particular fight night card. So that gives me a little bit of pause. But in general, it's good. It's just long. Rick, your thoughts.

I'm going to answer your question. No, we cannot spread the good fights from this card across the last four cards because those are at the apex and they don't have to sell tickets. And this one is not. And they have to sell tickets. Do Nico Price ain't selling tickets to this thing? Doesn't matter. Maybe isn't he local, but either way.

Put his ass on a fight night in the apex and that is fine. We're going to continue to get trash apex cards and the ticketed events in a city like Orlando. We're going to be the ones that are stacked like this. this is trite this is cliche but i'm going to say it anyway uh this fight night's fine but we're so starved for good fights that we're overrating this card it's fine it's good a few years ago it would be just a normal everyday fight night i know we're living in a different reality now that's why it's trite that's why it's cliche but i just can't like i've been watching mima for long enough that i just can't get excited about a card just because everything else is anemic it just

it's fine i'm not that excited it's great i love kevin holland he's he's like one of my guys i love kevin holland but like this card's fine i'm not i'm not that pumped c plus b minus that that's it that's all i got to say respect it hey listen c plus b minus it is what it is because ufc2 is the uc has flunked a lot of fight night cards this this year is all i'm saying which that's totally a reasonable position to have. That might be my position, yeah. That's reasonable. I'm just saying they have failed a lot of fight night cards this week.

This is a seat. Last thing, real quick, 60 seconds or less. New York, Rick, we'll go to you. Steven Thompson versus Kevin Holland. I dig the booking. Wonderboy is a pretty big name still. Holland is obviously a very popular name. He's looking to make some moves at 170.

Your thoughts of the matchup, but more importantly, the stakes involved here. What are these guys fighting for? Yeah, I mean, for Holland, I don't think unless Holland could go on a run, there's really not stakes in any of his fights because he's so willing to fight anybody at any time. The Hamza at Shamae of booking the most recent example of that, just he will take any fight anytime, any circumstances, which makes it very hard to build momentum and also to have stakes, right? Because you're going to lose a lot of those when you're just willing to fill in at any opportunity. So his fights don't really have stakes. He's just a very reliable headliner who's going to talk really well and put on a good show.

But there's not really implications because he's going to win some. He's going to lose some. He's really not going to go on a streak unless he's a little more careful with his career. As far as Wonderboy, man, this could be it. At a certain point, you have to look at the performances and feel like maybe this is not the level I should be fighting at. And when I say it, I don't necessarily mean done career over. Maybe he doesn't want to fight outside the UFC. but I think somebody like Wonderboy could do well with a change of scenery if he can't get this one done against Kevin Holland.

Maybe UFC level competition is not for him. And somewhere like the PFL or Bellator or anywhere else might be something more interesting. I know he has like some kind of ambassador relationship with karate combat. Maybe it's there. I'm just thinking outside the box here. But I don't think that if he drops this one, we need to see Wonderboy against elite UFC welterweights anymore. I'm kind of over that if he if he can't get this one done. Jed, where are you out with this?

What's at stake for these guys? I mean, I guess something is at stake here. Certainly for Kevin Holland, this would be a big win for him, get him into the rankings at Walter Waite if he's not already. And he can start trying to make a run, you know, up that division as best he can. For Thompson, if you lose, as he's done. Like, he's just, his time is it, I mean, I believe his time is. a title challenger is done anyway, but this really steals it up.

And then you're left in the, okay, if I, Robbie Lawler, kind of do the veteran guy who's been around circuit of fights if you're staying in the UFC. Or I don't know, man, but that fight with Sadabousai and Delano Taylor was horrifically bad. And I got to feel like Stephen Thompson can look at that and say, I may not have my fastball, but I could probably win a PFL welterweight championship with my changeup. Like, I could probably pull that one off still. So maybe that's just looks at the big bag of money because it's getting old.

It's like 40 or almost. And it says, I need to make one last run to really fill my pockets, fill the coffers, get ready for what comes next. And maybe that could be it for him. But if he loses this, he's, he is either going to be a scalp that they feed too young, up-and-coming talent. Or if he refuses to play that role, then he's just going to fight like Robbie Lawler next. Like that will be the next fight for him, which is fine.

So it's not the worst fight I've ever heard of. All right. Well, the point for round four goes to Jedbushu. It is two to two. That means to go to the knocker round. One question decides that all. The poll is already up. Vote for who you think wins this battle between Jedmishu and New York, Rick.

voted the poll right now. Jed, do you want to go first? Or do you want to pass it over to your Greg? I've been going first. Let's keep that train alive. All right. So the first thing I'm going to have you do, Jed, is pick a number between one and five. Four. Number four. All right.

So we're going to play a fun game because Nate Diaz is a free agent officially. He is no longer on the UFC roster. He is free to talk to anybody he wants. and what we're going to do for the next couple of minutes is you're each going to play the role of a promoter to try to entice Nathan Diaz to come to your organization.

And Jed Mishu, you have chosen the man who puts on fights that billions and billions and billions and billions and billions of people watch all the time. You are representing one championship. You are Chatri Citro Tong. I knew that.

One minute on the clock. Go. Oh, man. I knew that I would, I knew when you said this was like somehow I'm going to end up being Chotry, which is the one I was the least like to be. Nate, let me level with you.

Sure, the UFC are awful and, the PFL can offer you a million dollars. And Bellator will just give you the keys to the kingdom, because what do they care? And there's, what we can offer you is, weight classes,

that pretty loose on enforcement. So you just kind of do whatever you want. Singapore is a great place, lovely, lovely area. We've got a new deal with Amazon that you can join us with. And more importantly, 15 seconds. Nobody in our company is a star. God, we've tried, and none of them have succeeded.

You can be the only guy that people will matter. And when we put you up on Amazon Prime during Thursday night football, People will say, hell yeah, and tune in. So we will give you all the money. That's all I got for you, bud. There you go. All right, New York, Rick, one, picking number two, one and five, four is off the table. Three.

Number three. Oh, okay. By the way, number one was Scott Coker. Number two is Dana White. Number five was Dave Feldman from BKFC. Oh, that's the good one. So New York, Rick, you are Don Davis or Ray Cepho or somebody from the professional. Fighters League trying to entice Nathan Diaz to join your organization.

One minute on the clock. Go. Let me start by saying how happy I am to be here. This is me, New York, Rick. It's been an honor, Jed. Thank you so much for this opportunity. Mike, you're the best. Thank you for having me.

Switching now, my Don Davis cap, going to don that, pun intended. Thanks for taking a meeting with us, Nate. As you can see from our very successful first foray into pay-per-view, we're trying to get into that business and put on the biggest fights that people want to watch. So we're not interested in the tournament. We're interested in partnering with you and Real Fight Inc. We're interested in doing PFL X Real Fight Inc. Yourself, Chris Avila, anybody else you want on this card is going to be on a pay-per-view card presented by PFL and Real Fight Inc.

and whatever opponent you're looking for, we're going to break the bank to get that opponent. So let's do something, whether it be boxing, MMA, grappling. I'm not particularly picky about what it's going to be. You make the terms. You tell me what you want to do

and I'll open the coffers and we'll get it done. Thank you so much, Nate. Thank you. Truly an honor. I mean, beautiful job. All right, get your votes in. You got 10 seconds to get your votes in, all right? I'm closing the poll.

You got 10 seconds. 10. Nine, eight, eight, seven, seven, six, five, four, three, two, or Bellator. Belator is the easiest pitch. All right, the poll has ended. Wow. Incredible. Incredible.

All right. So the winner, come from behind win. Drummond. With 50% of the votes, just over 50%. Was there a third option? No. So how are you the winner with 50%? Because there is an uneven amount of, there was an odd amount of voters.

Oh, okay. So the winner is, like 50.1. New York, Rick gets it done. By the slimmest of margins. When I hit end poll, Jedmishu had 53% of the vote. And when the poll wrapped up, New York Rick ended up slightly ahead. New York, Rick, congratulations. What would you like to say?

again i'd like to thank you mike for having me it's always a pleasure truly um i relish this opportunity jed i mean you're just a legend of this game it was an honor to go against you i have to disagree with the with the voting public here just don't know what they were thinking quite frankly like a really a really poor showing by them but that's natural like they they tend to get these wrong um so i'm not gonna be too hard on them but you know do better next time people because you know jed jed really brought it um And yeah, just stay positive out there, people. Life's beautiful. What a, what a, what a wonderful day.

What a great day to be alive. Great day. We got UFC Orlando coming up. We've got Tyson Fury boxing. What's better than this? Like, how lucky are we? We get pain to do this. I mean, it's just tremendous.

I've got, I've got only love and appreciation for everybody. So thank you so much. It's always a pleasure. It makes great points. Great points. We'd love to hear, we'd love to hear more from you, Jed. But, uh, we can't. We got places to go.

And I lost. And I deserve to lose. Well, listen, you are a winner in our books, a winner in our hearts. Tomorrow, back at it. We'll have the UFC Orlando Wayans. We'll be streaming it live. We'll have heck of the morning. We'll have a UFC Orlando preview show.

It's going to be a very busy day, everybody. So until then. And one champ, one on prime. One on prime video five. Nobody knows. The Dutch night. Hini ain't a hitter. You're Jed.

I am Mike Heck. Thanks for watching. We'll see you back. We'll see you back. We'll make. See you back. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Okay, only 10 more presents to wrap. You're almost at the finish line.

But first, there, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes.