MMA Fighting - BTL | Masvidal's Alleged Attack On Covington, UFC London Fallout, Pimblett's Pay, UFC Columbus

Episode Date: March 24, 2022

Jorge Masvidal and Colby Covington’s rivalry boiled over this week with an alleged attack in Miami Beach, Fla., which led to Masvidal being arrested and charged.  This week on Between the Links, the panel will discuss the allegations against Masvidal and the reactions from fighters and fans, the fallout of a memorable UFC London event — including Tom Aspinall and Arnold Allen’s coming out parties, and Paddy Pimblett’s pay for his first-round submission win over Rodrigo Vargas — Bellator announcing a plethora of news, such as Michael Page facing Logan Storley in May for an interim welterweight title due to champ Yaroslav Amosov withdrawing from his title defense against “MVP” to fight for is country of Ukraine, UFC Columbus going down this Saturday headlined by Curtis Blaydes and Chris Daukaus, and more.  Host Mike Heck will moderate the BTL championship matchup between MMA Fighting’s Jed Meshew and MMA Mania’s Drake Riggs. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Follow Drake Riggs: @DrakeRiggs_ 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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welcomes you to a brand new edition of BTL. The iconic voice was not live last week. She was in podcast form because our man E. Casey Liden was getting ready to put a 3024 on some dude, and he did exactly that, at least in my eyes anyways. but we're in the middle of a very busy week in this crazy sport of mixed martial arts, both in and out of the cage. There's so much to talk about.

It was actually really difficult to narrow these topics down, but we're going to have some fun, and we're going to forge on, my friends. No time to waste. Let's get this thing started. Let us introduce the combatants. Introducing first, back on the show. He had dropped a highly competitive trilogy

to the current champion last year. He's back, and he's back as part of the SSI. B Nation family this time around. One of the best people I know covering this crazy sport of ours. He got to experience the Jake Paul Tired Woodley Two events on site with me in Tampa. We experienced that whole circus together from MMA mania. Let us welcome back, Drake Riggs. What's up, my man?

What is up, Mike? Great to be back and I've got to say fantastic stuff with the piece you dropped today on Ms. Klesnik. And congratulations to EKC. Happy to be here, man. Yeah. Glad to have you here as well. Thank you for the kind words.

And now we introduce the reigning, defending, undisputed BTL champion. He's back to defend his title. I have the oven mitts handy for the fiery hot takes. He'll likely put out over the next hour or so. Let us welcome back Mr. No Gray area himself, the champ from M.MA fighting, Jedmishu. Hello, sir. Look, I'm not the champ. We've talked about this, and I'm not the champ for a different reason.

I'm not the champ because our own E. Casey Liden is the actual. champ. He put 30-24s down, and I won't hear a word against the MMA decisions, you're cowards if you don't put that score up. I say you the score, post it, or I'm going to keep calling you out on this program every single week. So is this actually an interim title fight? Is that what we're calling it? No, Casey's just the Forever champ. Now we're just, we just have fun here. Casey's the Forever champ until I get in the cage

and fist fight him, which I'm not going to do. because I don't want to get 3024. Like I saw Habib Layden smashing. I don't want to get, I don't want to get that work. Oh, man. Imagine if you could throw elbows in amateur MMMA. It would have been a, it would have been done. No doubt about it.

It would have been done. Well, we could talk about Casey's win for a whole hour in itself. That's the whole show today. We've got to get into this program. It should be. And let's start with, yes, between the Leiden. Let's start with the story that is taking, in the combat sports world by storm,

ladies and gentlemen. I'm sure you've all heard about it. The rivalry between E. Casey, no, Jorge Mazadol and Colby Covington. Yes, we're turning the page to this story because this feud has allegedly boiled over outside of the octagon and into the mean streets of Miami Beach, Florida.

So unless you have been asleep this week, the entire week, you probably are aware that Jorge Mazda allegedly attacked a victim outside of a restaurant who has been identified as Covington via multiple sources confirming to our own Damon on the street, punching him in the face twice with led to a fractured tooth, a wrist abrasion, and some more stuff that we found out today.

We'll get into that in a moment. But now when the story was reported on to discuss, we got the police report. Mazadol had been, had not been arrested, not charged with anything until yesterday. He was arrested on charge. of aggravated battery, great bodily harm, as well as criminal mischief before getting released

in a $15,000 bond. Still nothing from the Covington side in terms of a statement in regards to this alleges it. So Drake, let us begin with you, my friend. This type of thing doesn't happen all that often, but it happened here. And not a lot of people seem to be all that surprised by this. Are you surprised by it? What is your reaction to the story? It's all very funny to me, Mike. And not to say that crime is a funny thing or anything, but in this specific case, like, I just can't help but laugh about it all

because they had the opportunity to legally do as much bodily damage and harm to each other as they wanted just this month. So for it to happen again, and from the loser's side, I think it makes Jorge look awful, obviously, and I think that's kind of in the general consensus. But then everyone's saying, you know, well, Colby actually going through with pressing charges, like that makes him look a certain way.

I mean, whatever. The whole thing is just hilarious to be because of the fact that they just fought. We saw how it went. And then for Jorge to come out and sucker punch him and do all this ambush type activity, which he's bragged about in the past. So he's quite good at it if you listen to him. And he obviously allegedly was able to land these shots

and do damage to Covington as he had planned and hoped. I'm just very curious kind of to hear like how I guess meditated it was, how they ended up in the same place. And I'm not going to go as far to say, oh, it was a setup or anything like that. But I'm sure those conspiracy claims will definitely be out there. But I guess I'm not totally surprised by it,

but it was a little bit surprising just because of the fact that Jorge seemed, you know, to somewhat humble after the fight, like when speaking to the media right after, seemed like he understood that he wasn't delusional about it. Like, oh, no, I won that fight even though he clearly did not. So I was surprised from that aspect, but just knowing the bad blood and the things that have been exchanged verbally, I can't be surprised in that regard.

Yeah, we're not going to discuss whether or not the Nelk Boys turned heel on Colby Covington, although that is a very popular theory out in the social media world. But, Jed, we had our own fresh reaction once we got the police report on the M.A. Fighting podcast. network at that time like we said before no charges no arrests not the case any longer so your response to what has happened over the last 12 hours or so i've come full circle we talked through it in our media reaction and i was down on it i thought a lot of what drake said this is very dumb why are we doing this this obvious isn't great we started talking through it and slowly at the end of it we got to the point where well this actually may set up a lucrative rematch between the two

I'm full circle. This was a great decision by Jorge Mastvedol. Let me tell you why. The hot take, I know. Assuming you did it, also a great decision, allegedly, if he did it, make sure we put that qualifier in there. If he did do this, and if Colby Covington was the guy, wink, wink, this is a tremendous marketing opportunity for Jorge Mastved all and for the UFC and for Colby Covington.

So we talked about it the other day, yesterday I guess that was. it's not coming off that fight, nobody was like clamoring for a rematch was pretty clear what happened in the cage. Like Drake said, even Mossvedoll seemed pretty, you know, sanguine about,

yeah, I kind of lost. But I think there's now a marketable rematch and neither man has a clear line to a next opponent, right? Like Covington came out, talked all that trash, wanted Dustin Poirier. He's not getting Dustin Poirier.

He's been thrown out as a, possible opponent Fisra Adyssinia. And though his choices are to fight Hamzaa Tchamayev, which he's super don't want to do because he's not trying to get his ass beat and lose the one thing's got going for him or fight another welterweight contender,

which Colby doesn't want to do, even if he could ostensibly do very well against anybody else he got paired up with. So his opportunities are really narrow about the things, the cross-section of what he wants to, can do is very, very limited. And fighting Hori Mospadol for a lot more, like a lot of money is obviously right in that

crossline. Like it's great. I get to beat up a dude who I already have beaten up convincingly before, like get paid, easiest fight. Fighting 101. For Mastodal, he wants Nate Diaz or Connor McGregor or kind of these fights that don't, that don't seem like they're coming for him, what with Porier, apparently having the inside track on Diaz or.

It just feels like Masuel is not going to get the exact fights he wants. He's going to have more options just because more people are going to want to fight him because he is a star and viewed as beatable. But at the same time, like, he's not going to want to fight Vicente Lucke or whoever the hell it is, you know. So back to this thing. I think this sets up a fight now. We talked about it the other day. I think that the UFC marketing machine can get behind this the same way they have

with any of these other sorts of altercations, the way that, you know, Conner's throw in the dolly at the bus was the worst thing that ever happened in the sport. And then four months later, that's the marketing promo for Connor Habib. Like, they can turn this around to make a lucrative rematch that you can get buy-in, even with what happened in the first run. I still think you can sell this. And from a legal perspective, look, the reality is Mosswell is not a lot of awful things are likely to come here. his way. You know, he got hit with criminal mischief and aggravated battery. He is likely just

going to pay a fine. Theoretically, he could get a short stint in jail, but that seems incredibly unlikely, given how everything is broken out. And he's probably just going to have to pay a fine, maybe fix Colby's allegedly broken watch, and that's just kind of where we're going to move forward with it. But, you know, it's easy to pay that fine when you've got a bag from a lucrative pay-per-view main event that that's right there in your pocket. So I'm not condoning what he did because you you shouldn't go punch people in the face. Like don't do that in public. We live in a society and you should live in the society and not outside of it. But he insofar as what happened, there is at least a point in purpose that I think can serve as a valuable monetary endgame

for him. And unlike other people, aka Connor and allegedly recklessly driving to the point that he endangers the general well-being of those around him, the only person who was in danger of any, you know, problems was Colby Covington. And he allegedly hit him and that was it. So it's not like he, if you're going to break the law, this is probably one of the better ways to do it, I guess is where I'm coming down, because it sets up a lucrative fight for him. Don't break the law. Don't break the law. law don't do bad things but i'm kind of in on this as a promotional tactic frankly okay so we're we're going to build upon what you just said at a minute but they're because i felt the same way we were on that podcast together things were where they were at that time that was like the first

thought it's like all right now the ufc's got something here they could make a big fight that everyone's going to watch they could take this story and turn it into a promotional tool no doubt about it we've heard reactions from many folks in this community. We've heard from D.C. who kind of went with what Drake said, you had 25 minutes to do something and you didn't. Tired Woodley said that Covington would be a quote unquote ho if he pressed charges. But the reaction that has gotten the most attention today has come from former UFC lightweight champion, Habib Mammagamadav. Or to be fair, and there's plenty of precedent set to have to throw this disclaimer out there,

Habib's social media account handler. And it said, quote, if you are stronger than someone inside the octagon, it does not mean you can insult his children. No one has the right to insult someone's family. Once you have gone on this path, then be ready to back up your words. You were attacked by a professional fighter,

the same as you are, your own size, and you go press charges against him to the police. I think all welterweights should refuse to fight Colby, just don't accept fights with him, let him sit without a fight. It will probably significantly affect him and all the fighters who even think of, who even think of insulting families who is provoking the fighters to look for someone in restaurants to deal with him.

Now, just to put this out there, and I'm not a cop, but I've spoken to a couple about this, there was enough meat on this. There was a cop. I talked to a cop. There was, I'm not a cop. I'm not a cop. but there was enough meat on this bone for the cops to just arrest Mazadol and charge him

with or without Covington's blessing. They just could have just gone to the surveillance footage and just said, listen, we got enough to arrest Twitter. Right? Or Masadol's Twitter. Right. Because in most cases when there's assault, there's witnesses, there's more than likely video that has not been made public yet.

And like you said, there's videos of Mossadol confirming it. His management teams out. there saying that it happened. Other friends are confirming it on social media. There's enough here for law enforcement to say, yeah, dude, we're arresting this guy and we're going to charge him, whether Covington presses charges or not. That is not the case anyways, because we received the arrest affidavit earlier today. The victim, which is believed to be Covington, reported 15 grand worth of damages to what was told to be a $90,000 Rolex and that the victim did in fact press charges.

So Jed, we get an interesting turn here. We weren't sure if we would get to this point, but the victim did press charges. Habib doesn't think that's very cool. So your response to Mr. Namaga Madoff or whoever put this tweet out there suggesting to the rest of the Welterweight division keep this Covington guy shelved.

Don't fight him. Just leave him alone. Well, first, A plus effort from Colby Covington because he absolutely should press charges. If you treat this as the absurdist theater that it is, it's substantially funnier that he's pressing charges. And so tremendous work from Colby. Also, like, I hesitate to take anything allegedly Colby Covington says at face value.

I mean, if he actually did suffer $15,000 worth of damage to a watch, like, that's a credible reason to demand recompense. Like, hey, man, like, all of, I guess go back to here. Everything Khabib said is wrong and dumb. Like, throw it all out. I think all of that is stupid or whoever is managing Habib's social media.

One, honestly, the way to actually, like, probably hurt Covington the most would be just to fight and beat him because if he takes a bunch of losses, then he retires from the sport, etc. But B, we're drawing a really weird line. I felt this way previously. I do not have children, and so I'm not going to speak too heavily on the effect of speaking about someone's family like that. Because I am not, I do not have kids.

And so I can't say definitively like how I'd feel someone spoke out on them. Though in general, I like to abide by the sticks and stones principles of life. But I have always found it very odd that that's what we've determined is like that's the line we do not cross. Not like the tons of other abhorrent stuff, Colby Covington said. Like, I could be in on the Habib thing maybe. I still would kind of think it's dumb. But I could at least maybe support it just from the outset. And they were like, yeah, Colby said like virulently racist stuff about Brazil.

Nobody should talk or fight Colby. And then this was a continuation of that. But it is a de facto like, well, it's okay for you to be racist towards a whole group of people. But you specifically invoke the family. of a man you're actively about to get into a fist fight with, that's too far. It's a very weird place to draw the line for me. That being said, you know, if you feel that way okay, I still think the freezing Colby out isn't just kind of dumb and odd.

So all of that just feels weird. And Colby pressing charges is A plus. Like, it's absolutely what he should have done. It's going to build up the potential rematch here substantially more. He has legitimate claim to for all of the, they had a chance to fight each other. Well, Colby did. Colby did his fighting. He put a weapon on Mosswoodall, and then Mosswoodall came and sucker punched him afterwards.

Like, he has a legitimate beef, even if you don't want to respect it because of who Colby is and the things he's done. Like, again, we live in a society. You can't just run up people and smack him in the mouth. Or you can. You just have to be willing to accept the consequences of your actions. And that's okay, too. Like, it's okay for Mosserol to have done this if he's willing to take it on the chin when it comes back at him. him in whatever fashion it does.

I just found out Mazadol's next hearing will be April 21st. So I don't know if anything will concur before then, but that's when the next hearing is going to happen. But Drake, we saw lots of reactions to this. Even Ben Ascran chimed in and said what he had to say. And there's like a back and forth there. But what did you think about this particular reaction from Habib or whoever may have possibly potentially maybe posted on his behalf?

well first of all i mean jed keeps mentioning society but we're forgetting this took place in florida so i'm even surprised that we're kind of having issues in the first place so i mean i think we should throw that out the window why are we even talking about this not just florida in miami yeah exactly so oh thank you thank you anyway as for my reaction to habib It doesn't surprise me. I mean, obviously we know how family-oriented Habib is. And I mean, it's essentially the entire reason, thank you, Elvin, that he retired in the first place because his mother didn't want him to keep competing.

And then, of course, what happened with his father? And, you know, it doesn't surprise me for him to say that. But it is very funny, I think, for him to say, or whomever to say, not to fight Colby. Not that that's not a decent point, I guess, to throw out there or argue, but that's not going to happen. We know people are still going to want to fight Colby and take fights with Colby. It'd be stupid of them not to. So that is what it is. But ultimately, like I said, I mean, it happened in Florida.

What are we talking about it? I thought Connor's reaction to it was like, well, then he'll just go up to middleweight and fight those guys. Like, it's not a big deal that he'll just go fight other people. It's like a great response. It was a great response. So last thing on this. It just needs to be said very briefly. Again, I have on, I think this very program, defended and will till the day I died, that it's not bad if what you're doing is attacking Dylan Danis.

It's total like all rules are off if you're attacking Dylan Danis. It's also an interesting thing for like this question of morality coming from the dude who, who just like flying dove into a pile of people to fight one guy. Like maybe maybe there's a reason he's in on Moss for all sucker punching Colby because he has obviously been okay with doing things outside the norm. Oh, man. Last thing, last thing of this, Drake Riggs, true or false? By the time this year ends, we will have.

Covington, Mazadol, two officially or three unofficially? By the end of the year, these guys will fight inside the Octagon again. Oh, that's a tricky one. I actually lean towards false as much as the UFC could, you know, hype that up and market it with this terrible, horrible incident similar to the bus with Connor, right? even though that was on, not UFC property, but in the arena and all that. And this was outside of it. Don't have as clean a footage as they did for the bus incident.

The reason I feel that it would be false and not happen, though, is because Colby could maybe feel like, even though he didn't take the pay-per-view points, right, according to him, that it would be a rewarding Mazvedol. He doesn't deserve it. Already beat him up. I'm on to maybe get a bigger fight without Asana or he still wants that Porier won, something that he feels makes more sense than the Mazzvedol rematch. But yeah, I mean, it could, of course, happen just because of he already beat him and he'd be like, yeah, I've done this before.

We saw how it went the first time. It wasn't too much of a struggle for him. But I don't know. I feel like he would think of it as more of a reward for Mazzvedal, even though he does it as a review. He's lost three in a row. what do you think jett i mean i know you think this is going to happen but do you think it happens as soon as sometime this year before 2023 before we get there this fight will be booked it will happen it'll be over and whatever happens on the streets afterwards might happen as well

smashing the true button look i gave all my reasons before if colby had any scent like the only reason this doesn't happen is if colby out out thinks of himself and he has been known to do this so like that's fair he has been known to overplay bad cards and think that he's got the nuts so like he could screw this up but if he had any sense about him at all he would immediately start firing just shots at at moscadol ultimately maybe you just drop like you're you're into the charge you're like i don't really care about this mosterol pays him to fix his watch or he just says screw it doesn't matter that 15k

off the watch is fine because this time for the rematch I'm getting points on the package here and we roll this into UFC 280 or something like that and if he was smart he would then lose that fight because this has the chance for Colby to actually have

like a Connor Nate Diaz sort of weird rivalry that people just get into and so if he just rolls out and loses like a competitive decision to Mossball on the rematch the trilogy is going to do gangbusters. Like that's, if I'm him, if I'm his team,

Mike, you talk to the man occasionally. I have been begging you for years to get him to come on BTL so I could teach him some things. Because I can jot him out a roadmap to success that he hasn't had because he keeps screwing himself over. He should have at one point

been the undisputed U.S.C. Walterway champion, but he talked himself out of a title fight with Tyron Woodley. And we saw what happened when he finally did fight Woodley. He should have had the real belt and he shot himself in the foot. He keeps doing it. He has been handed. Gold platter, another opportunity to make a bag.

And he needs to pick it up and run, baby. Run. I just wonder what's going to happen. Like if the UFC does offer this fight to both got, like Covington would probably take it, I'm sure. But would Mazdaal take it, when Mazdaal take it, when Mazdao give Colby the rub, be very, I'm curious to see how, like, what Covington will actually say when he actually speaks about this. Because it would be really interesting if he just came out and said, hey, Jorge, I will drop all the charges if you agree to put pen to paper to fight me in the octagon.

Like that would be such a brilliant move. I mean, there's your promo right there. There's your promo. But allegedly, allegedly, if this is, if we are to believe everything that we've seen is true, if we, you know, use our imaginations with Marcy's law. But as you've seen from the beginning, we will update the story with more information as we get it. No response from the UFC. No response from Dana White on this yet. I doubt anything will come from it outside of some, some fiery quotes. Maybe Dana saying, hey, look, these guys, they're fighters. They're a little crazy. We've got 700 of these people. It could get that way. But anything else changes. More details emerge. We'll let you know about an MVPfighting.com. Let's move on to some more happy

things, such as maybe the card of the year, maybe the best event in the history of UK MMA. Point for round one goes to I got to give it to Drake for the Florida comment because that popped everybody in the truck so well done. Good good good first round. It's hard to transition from this story to UFC London but we're going to go ahead and try

because what a card it was, it's going to be very difficult to top that one for event of the year. Nine finishes. All of those finishing fighters got bonuses. The crowd was, incredible Tommy Aspinall going out there in the main event just running through Alexander Volkov.

I'll never call him Tom Aspinall again. It's Tommy Aspinall for the rest of his life. And he runs through Volkov like he was a debuting pro fighter. Super impressive performance, Jedmishu. You know what? I'll start at the U.S. You can go ahead and brag about your rankings. I knew this before anybody else.

I told you so, yada, yada, yada. But go ahead and do that and talk about this man's ceiling. all right because this this might be the guy right i look i thought he's going to win that fight we talked about a lot beforehand i did not think it was going to look like that you are correct i have had him the highest up my rankings uh of anyone on our voting panel by like a considerable margin and in fact had him above volkov in my rankings and boy do i look like i know what i'm doing uh because he should have been further above the rankings than i had him in front of him in front of front of Volkov, frankly, the biggest thing to me about that whole, we'll talk about everything

else, but the biggest thing about the Aspinall fight, I came into that bout thinking Tom Aspinall, sorry, Tommy Aspenal, Tommy, Espanel, Tommy, I came in thinking that Tommy Aspinall was a really good heavyweight prospect who, you know, took a couple losses early in his career, but had put together a pretty fun game, was athletics to relatively young, and would one day fight for a title. Like I thought that he was going to work his way into a title shot. I left thinking he may well win the UFC heavyweight championship at some point. I wouldn't pick him tomorrow over Inganu or gone. But it's not, he is much closer to that top tier than I thought coming into this fight.

It was easily the best performance of his career. And yeah, like full marks, A plus plus. UFC should never have him fight outside of England again. I know that that is a thing that he said after the fact, and they should go back there two, three times a year and bring Patty and bring Tommy Aspinall and bring the group. And until he's fighting for a title, he just fights in England forever.

And it'll always be dope and really fun to watch. I thought about this maybe like 30 seconds ago, Drake, because there's all this talk, and we've heard about it for like two years now, about Hamzaa Chamaev, right? And the way he's just running through his opponents. And it's been ridiculously impressive. Ridiculously impressive, right?

But Tommy Aspinall, 5 in the UFC, five finishes, which includes a former champion on his resume, and most recently, a guy that no one has run through the way that we saw on Saturday. And you can argue,

actually, there is no argument. It is clear as day. Aspinall's UFC resume in terms of strength of schedule to this point. And this isn't Shamiyev's fault at all. Aspinall's is far stronger than Shemayev's. So is Tommy Aspinall the Hamzat Shemayev of the heavyweight division, Drake? Should he be looked at in the same way?

Or if you want to get real hot takey, you might appreciate this, Jed. Is Hamzat Shemayev the Tommy Aspinall of the welterweight and middleweight divisions? More the welterweight division, obviously. I mean, I can understand the comparison. I really can, but it just, it still feels, it feels so off to me because if we're going to be totally honest, like, Hamzad, what he has done in these four fights that he's had is still unheard of. Despite who it's against, I don't care. The man's been hit twice against four people and in two different weight classes.

And he's become a much bigger star still than Tom Aspenol, excuse me, I don't even, I didn't hear where that came from even. So I'm confused by the whole singing. Oh, you've heard the song? No, I missed out on that. So go to Eminemfighting.com, best website in the world. There's a video of fans outside of the O2 reacting to Tom Aspinall. I'm sorry to Tommy Aspinall and chanting the Tommy Aspinall song, Tommy Aspenol, it's the best.

That in the Patty song, the UK fans are so much better at sports than we are. Yeah, they just get it. songs make sports more fun. Like half the fun of rugby is getting hammered and singing rugby songs. And I'm like, we just need more of that in every, every sport in the U.S. It's the best. Agreed. So, yes, I'll have to check that out.

But in terms of the comparison with Hamzot and Aspinol, I get it, like I said. But it's still, it was so music for Hamzot. And I don't think it's been the same. But in terms of who's been more impressive, it's different that way, too, right? because performance-wise, clearly kind of hard to go against Hamzad, I think, but level of competition, very clearly as, but it's still crazy to me that he was able to submit the greatest heavyweight of all time. I mean, Andrei Al-Labski, right?

So that was something that I still can't get over. And then he goes in there and cuts through former Belator champion, Alexander Bullkoff. I think this guy can be gone today. I think he's that good. And I'm sure that he will be champion at some point, not ready to say that just yet with Ones. And Gano's still out there.

Obviously, we'll see what happens with him as the year plays out. But in terms of who's a better fighter right now, you want to make that comparison with Amzot? I mean, Aspin has shown he can do it all and finish in that same impressive way, no matter where the fight goes. So for me, I don't think you can compare them too much. There are some small similarities, as you mentioned there, Mike, and whichever way you want to put the person over the other you can. But I don't think that's for me to do it. So just, I mean, it's obviously not the same. Shemayev's is just ridiculous.

One strike landed against him in his fights. First fight against Jake Collier. Four of astronauts fights, he's had more strikes landed against him. Sergei's feedback. Al-O-Doseg, go to Gooseg. Gooseg. Volkovily landed 13. Arlowski landed 20, but again, Jed can appreciate this.

Andriolovsky, greatest heavyweight in UFC history, as he said. and Alan Bodeo landed a whopping three strikes as well. So I don't know. It's just a fun question that had. Drake, was asking all the MVP of this card, or does that distinction go to somebody else? Oh, that's a good question. I don't know.

I mean, in terms of the win, yeah, I think so. Obviously, he had the biggest and best win main event kind of by default. He gets that. But if you look at the aftermath, I mean, I think we're still talking more about Patty. the guy we were talking about the most going in. So for him to go in there and wasn't the flashiest win whatsoever, you know,

rear naked choke gets hit by a big punch that questionably hurt him in the beginning of the fights. Still ends up getting a finish. Big crowd reaction, big celebration. Molly's out there. They celebrate together. Who's also an MVP best finish, I think, of the night, hands down. I still think it's Patty.

I mean, we're still him the most. He's the guy with all the hype continues to prove it. Whether you love him or hate him, is he proven yet? We don't quite know, but still, he's the star in the making. So Aspinall, in terms of what he did, yeah, that was an MVP win, but everything else that goes around, I think it's still Patty for sure. We'll talk more about Patty and why he's the most talked about fighter after. I'm singing in my head.

I can't get out of head. Tommy. I haven't heard it. It's in my head. Do you agree that Patty's the MVP? or do you think it's maybe Molly McCann? Maybe it is Asphenol. Maybe it's Arnold Allen.

I mean, the list goes on and on. I can't in good conscience give it to Patty. Patty, the biggest star on the event, you know, coming in certainly. And he did what he was supposed to do. But I just can't give him MVP honors. He was like a minus 650 favorite or whatever. And he still found a way to like make it interesting for a half minute. So no.

It's for sure. sure it's Mala McCann for me. One, poor, poor Ilya, you're not going to find a fighter who has an incredible knockout win and an overall horrendous weekend. But Tupuria threaded that needle baby where he's not getting a patty fight and he had knockout of the year for about 15 minutes until Mollin McCann's incredible spinning back elbow took that from him.

ain't no contest that is leader in the clubhouse for Keo of the Air. Also, if you read MMAFighton.com, best website in the world, and read my gambling preview, you would have noticed that in there, there's a long shot of the week, Mal and the K&TCAO in the third round plus 3,500. Oh, wait, your boy hit it. So she's certainly my MVP. And then also, you've got to add on. You know, she's maybe a little bit less of a star than Patty.

But her coming out and jumping around the cage with Patty, that was the highlight. of the thing. I talked about it afterwards. The several photos of them like together in the cage celebrating up on the cage getting the crowd into it. Patty could have done a lot of that by himself, but Molly jumping in as well. Molly jumping up and down while they're singing the Patty song during Patty's walkout, like all of that. Molly McCann is good vibes only and my MVP, no questions asked.

So let's talk more about Patty Pimble because a lot has been made about his recent interview with Barstool and Dave Portnoy, and we know the relationship they all have. And he revealed that he made $12,000 to show, $12,000 to win at UFC London when he was the talk of the town at the event. And since this information has come out, Jedmishu, we've seen a lot of people on social media,

fans, media, other fighters outside of the UFC bubble, if you will, giving the UFC a lot of grief about this. And of course, we like to give the UFC grief about this discussion quite often. We are always advocating for fighters to make more money and in most cases, I feel like that reaction would be a very fair and fine reaction.

In this particular case, Jedmishu, do you feel like the fingers are being pointed in the right direction here? Should they be pointed at the UFC or should they be pointed elsewhere? I mean, where else do you want to point him at?

I mean, sure. Other people can shoulder some blame but yeah like this is nothing new like if you'd ask me to bet how much he was making i would have said more than 12 and 12 because that is literally barely a step up from the contender series contract and actually i guess because he already won a fight it may in fact just have been that his first fight was a 10 in 10 now he gets the requisite bump up for a win um i would have said it wasn't i would not have thought it was much higher in that you know maybe 20 and 20 would have been about the cap I'd have gone for.

So yeah, totally tracks of this happens. And this is this just is what the UFC is. Like if you're upset by it, great, you should be. Everyone should have been upset by this for 10 years. It's not going to change though. So don't spend too much mental energy on it. It's not going to get fixed. And so, you know, if Patty felt okay to sign that contract,

no idea why. But he did. And maybe it's just because he got all, you know, he got his sponsorship deal from Barstool as a result of being a UFC fighter. Like, who knows? Who knows why he did what he did? But yeah, the UFC's obviously to blame. Like pay fighters more.

You keep having your best year ever time after time. But, you know, they got a big carry. They bought the thing for Bill. You're not going to pay that off by paying fighters an equitable wage. I'll tell you that. Drake, the UFC definitely shoulders some blame here. But do they shoulder the majority of the blame here? Or does that go somewhere else?

So I think I know what you're hitting at, Mike, with the management side of things, right? And them agreeing to the deal in the first place, which when you have somebody like Patty who was a guy who grew up in Cage Warriors and we kind of knew about him for years before getting to the UFC, it was a little bit surprising and considering kind of the standard or precedent

that they have set for Patty, at least what, Graham Boylan, who is the Cage Warriors president, I believe, if I'm remembering correctly, and also manages him a little bit. I could just be throwing things out there, but I'm pretty sure that is accurate. You know, there was a couple of months ago when he got into the UFC, they were talking about, you know, fighters getting what they deserve, and they've always been about this, and it led to Patty wanting to be paid for his interviews. So we kind of stopped seeing him do interviews for a while because, well, people would have to pay him, and who knows how much they were asking for, never tried to find out myself.

So, yeah, a little bit surprising and maybe some of the blame could be put on them for not trying to get something better than this base limit of maybe the 10-10 in the first fight and then now 12-12, but then he also has the barstool deal. So it's always going to be a UFC problem. Like Jed said, it is unfortunately feeling like wasted energy just as time goes on and on

because it just does not change. and I understand everyone being so up in arms about it because this guy was one of the big stars, one of the MVPs of the weekend, right, even before the fight started. I mean, the promo packages for his fight were specifically about him. Poor, poor Vargas, you know, getting no shine, and I mean rightfully so in the end.

But even with Sepuria, the UFC's official account put out that footage, didn't they? So it was like, it feels kind of gross in terms of using the fighter that way and then them not reaping the rewards of it to the maximum effect in their wallet. But I think that there is definitely some blame you could put on the management in that case, but it really should not be, we shouldn't even have to talk about it. That's always what it comes down to is UFC, just be better with this. Like, we know you got the ability to be better with these pay, these pays, and especially for guys who are really helping you out.

I mean, take Patty off the lending card. It's still going to be great and all that. But he was a big part of it that really enhanced the entire event. Patty was a big part of his debut at the empty UFC apex. I mean, he came into the UFC with a lot of buzz, a lot of fan appeal. He didn't come in off the ultimate fighter or looking for a fight or the contender series. You know, love them or hate him, Patty should have never accepted a 12-and-12 contract. I'm sorry.

he shouldn't he should not be making and this is no disrespect he should not be making what contender series contract winners even some losers who got contracts are making like there's no way this is a thing and yes the UFC is of course to blame a bit here because more the base pay to come in should be more than 12 and 12 there's no doubt about it and yes he got a bonus and yes to get the barstools deal but there's nothing to do with this conversation because bonuses are never guaranteed he didn't get the barstool deal until he's no doubt about it and yes he got a bonus deal until after he won his UFC debut because they saw the hair and they saw the reaction and they went after him and they got him. But I will say, yeah,

I think you have to look at his management team a little bit. And I think you have to look at Patty a little bit as well. There's enough of the pie here to be spread on multiple plates. But honestly, like every, I think a lot of people are to blame here.

Patty, like his management team, Patty himself could have been like, nope. Like he might have been making more cage warriors, maybe. This is a very, there's a chance of that. But if his manager is like, do you want 12 and 12?

And he said no. Yeah, we'll call Bellator. We'll call somebody else. And I guarantee you they would have paid him more than 12 and 12. I mean, there's no doubt about it. I know Ariel said something similar yesterday. But I mean, I agree 100% with him. But the thing is, like, he made the right business choice.

Like, I'm never going to, look, you're not going to, I don't have a lot of love for management. And in May, I think it's at best use. and at worst, a lot of really bad instances of things going on there. But I think he unequivocally made the correct business choice. The UFC should absolutely pay him more. But you said it. He got the million dollar barstool deal after he signed with the UFC and did that thing. And so if that's the calculus, hey, we can get more money from Bellator or whatever.

But we're not going to get the springboard to other things. and we know that you are a self-made star and you just need the exposure and all these other doors are going to open up for you, that calculus paid out. The UFC is still bad in this scenario, but Patty's not because, okay, I'm making 12 and 12, but cool, I come in,

they're going to give me a clean bump anyway because the UFC's incentivized for me to be a better star, and I can go outside of this and get my scratch that way. And then he gets a mill from Barstool. Like, I'm not saying that he, could have got my maybe could have got more i haven't sat in a uc negotiation maybe they just say no you're going to take 12 and 12 because they turn people down all the time and they have an endless supply of contender series talent i just i don't blame him for signing the contract i think he's

underpaid but i think that contract got him paid because if he signs a bell toor he's not getting a mill from barstool nobody watches belittor maybe that many times it's on a fake network No one cares be on a real channel, Scott Coker. So I don't blame him for signing that contract. Maybe he could have gotten more. But I blame the UFC for really pinching pennies everywhere when it comes to fighters. And I holistically blame the fighters for not doing better to get their value. But that's a different conversation.

So I want to ask you guys kind of about the whole idea he's presenting because I think it's a good idea, but who knows if it'll work, right? How he's kind of saying that he will not take a top 15 fight until his pay improves. Like, will it pay off, though? Will Dana? I mean, he continues to win, I'm sure. But right now, I don't think we'll see him top 15 next because he won't take it. Oh, God, no.

Are you kidding me? No way. You can't do that anyways. You can't do that. It's been thrown out there. It's really interesting. Patty is going to be a really interesting scenario from a business aspect because, like, I have made it extremely clear.

I don't think he's that good. Like, he's not a bad fighter. I just don't think he's a good fighter. But he does have this intrinsic star quality. So in one hand, the UFC is really incentivized to give him a soft touch. And we've seen that so far, and I think we're going to continue to see it. But as soon as he becomes more difficult to negotiate, with or they present him a contract and he's like, no, I want 50 and 50 or whatever it is.

I can see that deteriorating really rapidly and they still have the power of the book. Like they still get to put him up against people and it's not like we talked about a lot. If they just decide to match him with DePuria at some point down the line, DePorea is going to wear Patty's knuckle bones as a necklace. Like he's going to dust that man up something vicious. So like it's just going to be really interesting. to watch how that plays out because the UFC will at least currently is going to be incentivized to help build his star but as he becomes a bigger star I don't know if that

if that will still hold the same way that like to some extent they have felt Connor Connor's gotten a little out of pocket on them but they have ultimately agreed with with him by and large but like Patty's not going to be as big a star not as good a fighter as Connor how much rope are they going to be willing to give him before they get a little hard with him. Yeah. Even on on to the next one, there's not one fight I liked for him.

Not one. Literally nothing. Like the only thing you could do. That's fine. I like the Hernandez fight. Like, if you're going to give him a little bit of a step up, I like the Alexander Hernandez fight.

And even that might be like a little too risky, but I mean, that's probably the fight to make because. Jim Miller or the loser of the throwing. I don't like, I hate the Jim Miller fight. It's fine. He can probably beat Jim Miller. He might.

not. Maybe. But like, that's a step up in competition. I'm still killing dudes out there. But if he probably can just by being young and like it's a step up in competition. And if he loses, he loses to Jim Miller, the winningest fighter in UFC history. Like, you can soften the loss that. The same with the lows on or a Soroni fight.

Like those would be the fights I'd be booking him. Or, or honestly, the actual answer is you just softball the hell out of him. Like you just keep going England. Yes, that's the answer. And keep giving him a minus 500 dude. because who cares? Who cares? He's not on a title track.

He doesn't want to be on one. He's never going to get to one. Just run it. Make money with him selling out the O2 every five months. Yes. You match him up with feather weights who fought on the contender series

and didn't win or get a contract. What's Brian Keller doing? Brian Keller is always down to fight somebody regardless of weight classes. Patty can probably beat Brian. He's like 40 pounds heavier than him. you can probably win that fight. All right, we got to move on.

We can talk about this, but for a while. But we got to get to Bellator, right? We'll talk about this UFC Columbus event. The bar is set very high for USC Columbus, but that's round four. We got to talk Bellator. They've been super busy this week. Point for round two goes to Jedbushu, one to one to play the music.

There you go. All right. There has been a lot of Bellator news. this week. We'll get to the Bannonway Grand Prix in a moment because that looks way different now that it did at the beginning of the week. But Bellator announced a lot of things this week that we confirmed a bunch more. They're returning to Dublin in September. Benson Henderson just resigned. He's going to fight Peter Quilly on that card. Juliana Velasquez versus Liz Karmouche for the women's flyway title will headline Bellator 27 April 22nd in Honolulu.

Gagard Musassi targeted to defend his title against Johnny Eblen in June at an event to be announced later, amongst other news. But I want to start with the welterweight division, Drake Riggs, because Yaroslav Amosov was scheduled to defend his title against Michael Venom page at Belator 281, May 13th in London. Now Amosov is in the Ukraine on the front lines, fighting for his country to slow down Russia's invasion. He's out of the fight. So Bellator announces that Logan Storley will step in to face MVP in the main event of that card, but it will be for an interim Walterway title. And this has been met with mixed reviews, Drake. Not the fight itself, but the fact that there is an interim title on the line.

So what side are you on? Are you okay with this? Or do you feel it's a little, I don't know if disrespectful is the word, but maybe it is the word, depending on how you feel about it? You know what I mean? Yeah, it's, uh, It's definitely an interesting just overall situation, you know, that we don't get faced with in every interim title situation where the champion is, you know, going to fight in a war. So a hero and true champion is Amosov.

But, yeah, I already know how Jed feels about it. He put it out there with the other day that thinks it as a terrible kind of look for Bellator. True Bellator. Which I totally understand, again, because of this weird situation. but then there's that argument of, well, this is exactly the time when you make interim so you don't know when the champion's going to come back, yada, yada. But then you kind of look at this fight in particular,

and of course, they don't need to have the interim title, but you know they want MVP to be champion. And we've been building up to this for years and years and years, felt like it would never get there because of the competition he was facing. Now he's kind of starting to fight some better and better guys obviously was, you know, up there to fight Amosov in the first place, who is very, very talented, a champion for a reason, now facing Storley, who is also very good and can definitely give him problems and beat him.

But you got to give MVP that chance to still become a champion, potentially at home, right? That is in London, I believe you said. It is. So it doesn't surprise me whatsoever that Bellator would do the interim just from that that side of business, the MVP side of business. Take away why we're actually there in the first place, which the morals are, you know, you decide on them yourself. I'm not quite sure how I feel about it,

but I understand why that is happening because the show must go on, as they say, the show must go on. And MVP is one of their guys who they're going to want to help out any way that they can. and this is kind of that, I think. Real quick, for those who may not have seen on M.A.fighting.com. Jorge Mazzal is not guilty plea after being charged with aggravated battery and criminal mischief. Online court records obtained by M.A. fighting show that Mazzal entered a written plea of not guilty, along with a demand for a trial by jury after he was arrested late Wednesday night by Miami Beach Police.

And he is due back in court. his next hearing, 9 a.m. on Thursday, April 21st. So there's your Mazadol, Covington update. Back to you, Jed. I genuinely thought you were doing here. What are we doing here? It would have been the funniest thing.

I mean, we still could get there. We still could get there. But a storyly MVP interim title. Thoughts. Everything about this sucks. Every single aspect about this is garbage and bad and indicative of bad. Bellator being very bad, which they have been for arguably the last two years, certainly the last six months.

Let me break it down for you. One, shouldn't be an interim title. When we talk about, you know, the show must go on, it doesn't need to. It's Bellator. No one cares. Nobody, nobody is going to be mad if the Bellator well-to-weight title sits on the shelf for a little bit. no one will be like oh dang it we had to have it

especially in the context of the champion was going to fight and then his home country got invaded in this thing that like the world is paying attention to he is standing up and going home to fight for his country

there's nothing more understandable than that in the history of this sport you don't need to have an interim title and it's absolutely disrespectful to Yaroslav Amosov, because for as much it's going to argue or whatever, it's exactly what Drake said, like, this is a business decision. They want to theoretically give MVP a belt, do it in England, yada, yada. That is disrespectful to a man who is literally putting his life on the line

to defend his country and his ideals and principles. If Bellator had any sense at all, they would have come out and said specifically, hey look, we've done interim titles before. We understand that they have a point and purpose. But we stand with Yarslav Amasov. We stand against what is going on in the Ukraine right now. And so we are pointedly not going to put an interim belt up for grabs here because we support our welterweight champion.

And they let there be no question who our welterweight champion is. So no interim title. That is what they should have done. That would have been substantially better. and I would have had a great, great deal of respect for it. They went the other way. But if you're going to go the other way, if you're going to do the bad thing,

do the bad thing right. Don't put Logan Storley against MVP. The whole point of this is to get MVP of Belton, England. He's going to get wrestled for 25 minutes. How stupid are you? Like, I don't understand what is happening. All right, the only reason we're going to do this is we really want to get MVP the belt and England.

in England, that feels like a really good promotional value. I can grasp that. It's morally bad, but I can understand it. Okay, well, let's put MVP against a four-time All-American wrestler who, like, looks really good in his last fight, honestly. That's probably going to pan out for us. What are they doing, man? I got to understand what Eagle FC's doing with their book.

I have no idea what poker's doing. It's not that hard. It's not that hard. I'm very excited for this next part, because we got to bring up the Bellator Bannamweight Grand Prix. Because Jen doesn't even know about this. He does not know about this. So we will fill him in on what has happened

with the Bannamweight Grand Prix because I confirmed earlier this week, champion Sergio Pettis out of not only this fight with Raffian Stats that was scheduled for next month, but he's out of the Grand Prix altogether with an injury. Juan Archeretta now fights Raffian Stats for an interim Bannamweight title on April 23rd, and that title will be defended throughout the tournament.

And the winner will get the million dollars, the interim title, and then we'll fight Sergio Pettus next year. Then we find out James Galaher is out of the Grand Prix as well, with the hand injury, surgery, he's out. So when I woke up today, I was told that we were going to get some news. We're going to find out who is going to fill these two empty slots. And I thought to myself, Jedd M. I cannot take it.

This is not going to be good. So when I woke up this morning, I was prepared to write an article saying that Josh Hill will be in the Bannamway Grand Prix, one, because when he knocked out Jared Skagans, Scott, Josh Hill was, quote, officially the alternate for our upcoming World Grand Prix. So to me, Josh Hill was going to be in. So I'm wondering who would the other guy be. Would it be Jornel Lugo? Would it be Enrique Barzola? Would it be Danny Sabatelo? But I entered today thinking two people

were about to be really pissed off. Well, it turns out I was completely wrong about all of that because there's one person who should be really pissed off and that is Josh Hill because at Bellator 278, April 22nd, we will have two qualifying bouch, Jedmishu, one between Lugo and Sabatelo, one between Hill and Barzola.

So Josh Hill, who is a guaranteed alternate, now has to fight Enrique Barzola to get into the Grand Prix that he was already the scheduled alternate to already be in. And the winner of the former gets Leandro Ego. And the winner of the latter gets Magamed Magamadoff. So, Jed, my first thought was, damn, kind of sucks a lot more to be Hill and Barzola because Magamadav is a super tough draw,

much tougher with all due respect than Leandro ego. But what is your reaction to this new field? have play-in fights. We're losing champions. James Gallowher's out. All of it. They're so bad. They're so bad. I don't, they weren't, they were not always dumb. Like, I don't know what is going on. But like, PFL by virtue of just having a baseline level of competence is somehow going to be the second biggest organization of MAA. I have no idea how this happening. How do you lose arguably the two most interesting aspects of your

freaking Grand Prix and replace it with four bad fights. How is that it's like back asswards money ball? Well, we can't get Pettis, so let's put in a couple play in fights. What? What are we doing?

And we're doing another interim title, so that interim belt will theoretically be defended more than Pettis' actual belt by the end of this freaking Grand Prix. And also, I didn't mention this when I was doing the Yaroslav bit because I had enough fire. I don't want to go down it.

Again, we don't need it. Do you know how long the heavyweight title sat on the shelf with Ryan Bader before they finally made an interim belt? Two friggin years. It was two and a half years that nobody fought for a heavyweight title with Bellator. Then they can't do a year or six months. What the? This is so dumb.

This is so dumb. I cannot fathom what is happening. I didn't think your voice could get that high. But listen, I mean, listen, I'm going to try to play devil's advocate. I'm trying to be the print more, when AK's down, I'm trying to be the Prince of positivity, lift the spirits up. But, you know, listen, Stotson, Stotson, Archelaide are going to make a little bit more coin that it's an interim title fight, right?

I mean, that's good, right? Are they? Those fights now are significantly more important in terms of the piggy banks. Are they based on what? Yeah, it's their title fights. Because they're title fights. Sure. I guess what if we just paid them more money and didn't do really dumb things that, like, by definition,

deteriorate the quality of our product and our believability as a promotion? This is some great-Aid Bjorn Redney stuff. Like, I don't know if Coker went home and Bjorn came back from Mexico, but that's really got a Bjorn feel right now. Jed, your reaction, your reaction to this to this Grand Prix news before we move on. Oh, my reaction, you mean you call me Jed, Mike, come on.

I just did go to Jedd. It's, yeah, I mean, it's kind of hard to wrap your mind around when you break it all down like that, Mike. But, yeah, I don't know. It's a shame because I was really looking forward to the tournament. we'll still be interested in watching it, checking it out. But the interim title thing is the dumbest part of it to me. I mean, the whole entire point of a tournament typically is to find out who's the best

by having all the best fight each other. Or sometimes, in some cases, we'll see them fight to determine the next challenger, which essentially is what this becomes when Sergio gets taken out of it. But to put the interim title in the first round rather than have the finals be for the interim title is that I don't like that. That's that's uh, that's just very odd to me. But like you said, hey, if they're getting paid more for it, then sure, okay. But I was going to say then we get more rounds of action too, but they already do the five

rounds anyway because the title is involved at some point. So it's a mess, man. It's very exhausting to think about. Danny Sabatel is about to run through this whole ground pre and win the freaking interim title. That guy's a nightmare matchup for like everybody in this division. It has always been kind of dumb, but understandable at least that like in these tournaments, the champion competes in the Grand Prix. And so the belt is by definition up for grabs when like realistically the Grand Prix

should just be a Grand Prix and the champion should fight some other people or whatever the hell you're going to do with it and then can fight the winner. And it's a promotional tool, but whatever. It's incredibly dumb when the champion is no longer there, but to still be like, we need a belt on one of the brackets. One side of the bracket needs a belt because winning the Grand Prix means nothing. By definition, putting a belt here in interim title means you are devaluing the Grand Prix win. Because actually, the Grand Prix doesn't mean crap. Winning it is useless.

What matters is you are competing for a chance to win the belt. Great job, Bellator. Take the one thing people like and you just be like, actually, this is stupid. Our own product is dumb. Moron. I cannot fathom this. This might be the most interesting year for Bellator. Like, I mean, just I'm so curious to see what things are going to look like at the end of the year.

But we got to move ahead. This has been quite the show. They're done. And we won't have to deal with them anymore. That'll be nice. The point for round three goes to... So mad. I'm so mad.

I mean, I don't want Jed to yell at me with that high tone if I don't give him the point. So he gets it. It's two to one. By the way. We talked about it beforehand and I'm so much more mad that I didn't figure this out before I got on air. I know you wanted the live reaction. I wish I had just... I wish I could have been mad before we did this because this is real dumb.

Oh, man. By the way, like, we give these points away, but this is a new thing we've done over the last month. The peeps decide this, but sure there's a poll in there, deciding on which way you're going, whether it be Jed or Drake, if we get to that final round, if I allowed that to happen, but maybe I'll Derek Cleary this thing and just give it away. But let's talk. Let's talk.

He's got to be mad at me. All right. So we got UFC Columbia. this coming up on Saturday. We have more fans in the building. We're out of the apex. We got Curtis Blades versus Chris Dachis. We got some stakes in the heavyweight division.

We got Alexa Grasso versus Joanne Wood. Some stakes in the co-main event. We got Matt Freaking Brown versus Brian Barbarina. That's just, there's just no way that that's not going to be fun. Maybe the most underrated fight of the year so far is on this card between Ascar-Ascaroff and Kai Kar-Franch. We've got Manon Fioro, getting her big step up against Jennifer, on the prelims and there's a lot of really good competitively matched fights on this card,

but Jed, no one seems to be talking about this card. In fact, many would argue that this is the second best card of the day because one X goes down on Saturday as well. It is in the early morning hours of Saturday, but it is happening on Saturday. So let me ask you, am I overselling this card or is it just kind of a tough spot for it in terms of timing, news of the week, coming off of UFC London. Why are so few people talking about this card? I don't think you're ever selling it.

I think it is actually really competitively matched card. We've talked about that a lot this year, and the UFC have done a pretty good job of making their cards interesting. And also, I mean, first, it's doing great on the Wikipedia test. Four people, I guess five people don't have Wiki pages, because one fight, like Wiki hasn't actually put as a confirmed bout. The currency of two to Leon. I can't say his name.

I apologize. That fight's like not official, whatever. But other than that, everybody's got a wiki. It's great. It's competitive. The fights make sense. Most of them are very close. The squash matches make sense for the reasons that they exist.

It's a really good card. You're never going to have a card people talk about. And this is not one of the guys I disrespect because I don't have anything bad to say about Curtis Blades. But if you put him atop your card, you're not going, no one's going to talk about it.

No one's going to be interested in it. They're going to look at that and say, all right, this is a weekend I can skip and go spend with my family. I'm good here. That's unfortunate because he's one of the four best heavyweights in the world,

but sometimes that's how the cookie crumbles. Also, yeah, one X probably has more star power. I mean, not probably, I would say, certainly has more star power. also a really well-made car really fun fights going on there

so I get why this is flying under the radar it's coming off the hangover from London which was such a thing and it's coming into a gap week as we build towards 273 and let me tell you 273 is not going to fly under any radars that is true

Drake your thoughts why is this flying under the radar yeah I mean it's it's kind of hard to disagree with Jed there about the main event and being the reason. And it's, I don't know, just something about Curtis Blades,

I think, has turned off a lot of people, the wrestling style. I mean, he's not a boring wrestler. I mean, we've seen him smash people into oblivion. The Alistair over a fight always stands out in my mind. So it's not like he's a boring person to fight necessarily, maybe for some just because if you're a stand and bang kind of fan. And then Chris Doc is on the other side,

who is still relatively new into the scene, at least at this level, I mean, his last main event was his first main event against Derek Lewis, and that didn't turn out so well for him. And now for him to go right into one again here, which wasn't the original plan, right? This was a replacement. I think it really just boils down to the main event being that thing that generally, of course, is going to pull in the more casual fan and get them talking about excited, which is very sad, though, because I do really like this card.

There's a lot of great matchups on it, a lot of great names. if you follow more as religiously as we typically do. So, yeah, I think it's just specifically the main event. I mean, you look at they're going back to, they're not in the apex. They're going to another crowd in Columbus. It's great to see shows in actual different cities again moving around. So that's an exciting part of it for the fans who are actually there. And then I think it enhances from home as well.

I mean, look at the London card. We all felt that energy from our couch. But for the main event, also I think the idea when you look at it, it feels fairly clear how it will end up going, his blades. If he does what he generally can do is he'll take down Doc and have his way with him, which might not be the most exciting thing for some or just too predictable for them to care. So really, again, I just think it hones in on the headliner, which is a bummer because this whole card is pretty solid. Yeah. Yeah, and real quick, just because we're going to have a preview show tomorrow, so we'll dive more into this card, but just more on Blades.

He might be the biggest victim of timing in the history of the UFC heavyweight division because every time he is in the spot where you can make an argument that he could or should fight for the belt or an interim title, there's other maybe like not as good fighters, but clearly much more popular fighters that people would rather watch ahead of him in the court of public perception, the court of momentum. So right now heading into this fight, we would assume the UFC is going to try to do John Jones versus Stepe Bichich for an interim title with Francis and Ghanu on the shelf, having surgery. That might be a tough one to book. But then, you know, even you got Taitu Vasa.

Now you get Tom Aspinall, Tommy Aspinall. You get Cyril Gahn that are in the same conversation. So, Drake, if Curtis Blades wins on Saturday, does it change anything at all for them? No, I really don't think it does. And because of the names that you mentioned right there, I mean, we don't even need to really, we don't even need to mention Tommy Espinal and Tai Tui Vasa, Mike. I mean, you just look at, Depe is still around, I guess,

until they figure things out. You know, he's very adamant on being in the title picture, but that's a name who will be in the way. And then same with John Jones. I just feel like for Curtis Blades to end up getting a title shot at this point, he's going to have to just be doing some very dramatic things in the cage in terms of the results, or just go on a crazy Joseph Benavita's like winning streak where he cannot be denied anymore because he's beaten everybody else.

But at heavyweight, we know how difficult that is. So I don't even think you need to look at everybody that's around him. You can just look at kind of the ones at the very top, and I don't see it happening. and then even look at the guy who's the champion, still depending on what happens with Francis coming back and all that. He's already lost to him twice. I mean, Blades is just in just a terrible no man's land kind of position where he's just fighting to make a living, it feels like, right now.

Really, Jay, because Blades can't, like, he cannot lose this fight. Like, he can't lose. But if he wins, it's almost like he wins an exhibition fight, right? It does nothing for him or does it? Like, does he have to go, even if he goes, out there, it wins impressively. Does it do anything for him? Not at all. And look, that's fine. Curse Blades

won. Again, I don't disrespect the man because I like him a lot. And he knows all of these things and is super okay with it. Like, I mean, sure, he would prefer things to be different. But every time I've ever spoken to the man, he has been, yeah, look,

I know that I am not everybody's cup of tea. I'm still going to do me and I just keep winning. And I mean, he was frankly kind of in this position the second time he lost to Inganu, and it was clear Inganu was at the top of the heap, and it was going to be hard for Blades to ever get back. And he rattled off four wins in a row, right? Like, he's, he knows the position he's in. He just has to keep winning, and he is still, I think he's like 32, 30-ish. So I'm like, he's still young in the division.

He's still almost singular in what he does. Like, there's nobody else at heavyweight that's really shooting, like actually shooting takedowns and playing top game. And so he's like he just has to keep doing it. Eventually he will fight for a title. Heavyweight you can stay around that division until you're in your 50s, apparently. He doesn't get one with a win here. He doesn't get one with two more wins down the road. But he is good enough, unique enough.

He is young enough. He just keeps doing it. And eventually the timing will work out for him. Right now it's log jammed. I mean, he's out of it, but he'll get there. In the end, he will get his day in court. Agreed. All right, we got to move on.

Let's go to the split shot. The point for round four goes to Drake Riggs. I was trying to sing like a Tommy Aspinall kind of song for Drake. They're syllables. Not the same. Yeah, not the same. Drakey, Draky, Drakey Riggs. Drakey, Draky, Drakey Rigs.

All right, so it's time for the knockout round. One question we'll decide at all. we had a plethora of topics we could have discussed. So we're going to play a fun game, a fun game of Choose the Door. There's all different questions, all different topics. And each of you are going to get the chance to discuss your own topic. How about that? You have one minute to discuss said topic that we will turn it over to the people,

as well as the man, the myth of legend, the undefeated, number 15 ranked pound for pound fighter, soon to be in MMA fighting's global rankings, the one, the only E. Casey Liden, will announce the winner when it's all sudden done. So Jed, you are the champion. What do you want to do? Do you want to have Drake go first, or do you want to go first and choose a door?

Well, it doesn't really matter since we're picking doors, but I'll still go second because I know how I want to end today. I want the last word. All right, Drake, we have six doors to choose from, one through six. Let's go with five. We're going with five. All right.

We're going back to UFC London, Drake. Of these fighters, who would you put your money on becoming a world champion first and why? Your choices are Arnold Allen, Paul Craig, Mohamed Wahiav,

Jack Shore, Ilya, one minute on the clock who would you put your money on becoming a champion not fighting for the title first but becoming a champion first Alan Tuporia, Mahayev, Craig or Shore one minute on the clock your time starts now oh man that's a very tough question mike but uh I don't know if it's the obvious answer but I think I'm going to have to go with Arnold Allen and I mean this is a guy who I I really didn't even realize how long that he's actually been in the UFC now. What I think it was 2015 when he made his debut. And he's just been beating everybody since then.

Maybe not been the most active guy, but he can really do it all. And this last weekend against Dan Hooker, a guy who's notoriously very, very durable. Yeah, maybe not as much as we are known to seeing recently. But went out there, finished him, kind of like a madman, a new fire that we've never really seen out of Arnold Allen. I think if he can channel that, hone it in, he can be a lot. more dangerous on the feet. And he's already a very crisp and technical striker, which is why that was surprising to see him unload in such a manner.

If he can hone that in against some of the more refined strikers also atop the division while incorporating his great wrestling game. I think he can do it, man. He's still relatively young and has plenty of experience. So I'm going to take Arnold Allen. Arnold Allen, AAA. I mean, you can't really go wrong. I think everyone you can make an argument for there.

So, all right, we have one door gone. Jed Michoud. you could choose door number one, two, three, four, or six. Man, I kind of want five because I had a way better answer, but we'll go with three. We're going. I rolled the die. Three is what came up. So three.

All right. Three. So number one was going to be, by the way, when McGregor have a better chance to beat Kamar, Usman or Islam Makachev and why. Number two was Greg Hardy will return to the UFC by the end of 2020. Number four was Pearl Gonzalez suggested Jake Paul fight Alex Paheda

instead of Connor Connor McGregor and number six is going to be going back to the old days of naming pay-per-view events what would you name UFC 273 what would be the sub-player so to speak You chose door number three, Jed Mishu is a Bellator question

kind of so you get to have fun with this Jed You get to basically run Bellator and matchmake and do something crazy. You get to have some fun. You could fight Circus this up if you want. So Nate Diaz tweeted recently that he wants to fight on the Bellator Hawaii card alongside his friend, Yancey Maderas. Now, we know this will never happen because he's under UFC contract.

But let's just say you have veto power. You somehow use your lawyerly instincts and somehow make this happen. and the UFC lets him have a one-off over there. How do you book Nate Diaz and Bellator? Who would you want to see him fight if you could match him up? One minute on the clock. Go. So there's an obvious answer, and there are two answers.

The first one, the best one, is Jake Paul. Scott Coker, all the bad things he said. He has recently, or at least earlier this year, said they were interested in being in the Jake Paul business. If the Paul brothers wanted to get into MMA, they would extend an olive branch because of course they would who doesn't like making money

that's it if you can make somehow Jake's over there great just do an MMA fight that seems tremendous Jake Paul will probably do it on 8 Diaz would probably do it you you could actually

do something with that which is great because Belator doesn't have any other fights they can do something the true answer though the only answer that makes sense I think is the one the only undefeated undisputed

3024 E Casey Leiden Coming off for the Emmy win Makes his pro debut Nate Diaz don't want that smash Baby ground and pound for days Bucket Scott Coker Wow If this was like two months ago

Jed would clearly be getting the victory But Casey's only reading the answer But he's not actually going to pick the winner So there you go You heard the two arguments We had a little game show fun. While we're killing time, Drake, I'm really disappointed in you. Your answer is true. It's Paul Craig, right? That's what you were going to go with.

Because that's all I would have done. I don't even think that's true. Like, I think Mokai is going to be a champ in two years, but I would have just been Tommy Espano. Tommy Yaspeno. They need to go to London like every two months. They have to go to London every two months. Because I mean, how much fun? We have never had more fun recapping a UFC. card than we on this show than we're having this week 100% and there he is in the bottom right hand corner of your screen number one in your hearts the undefeated e. Casey lied and how you do it man it's been what five days removed since the big victory how are you feeling are you uh are you getting the itch we're already getting the age too yeah you know I have so I like I have been

getting the itch again um I caught myself walking around my home and I started doing some light shadow boxing, I was like, oh no, it's coming back. Because that Sunday and Monday, I was like, I do not want to get anywhere near a gym. I was just like, I was over it for a couple of days, but I'm filling it. And I'm recovering. Everything's good. Everything, the only soreness I still have is my ears. My ears blew up again.

And now they're even extra cauliflowered from all that rasseling. You know what else? You know what else, go up, Casey? Your star power. your star power and your spot in the annual global rankings. So get ready. All right, Casey, now you're back to work now. And now you have to let one of these gentlemen down based on how the peeps voted.

So who's the champion? Is it Ann Still, Jedmishu or Anne New, Drake Riggs? Or is it Tommy Espino? Tommy Espinno. He's a true winner. Tommy Aspenov's a true winner. But the fans have voted. ending the poll

your winner oops I thought that music was going to stop your win 60% 60% 60% a blowout

but Jed doesn't care A blowout you see the Tommy Yassanel song All the way home to his immediate rematch though Drake Congratulations by a man

You took the fight on short notice. You come in and you win the damn title. You were the Michael Bisbing of Between the Links. And with that, you get 30 seconds to talk about whatever it is you want to talk about, good, bad, and different in the sport of MMA. Oh, boy. There's so much going on these days, Mike. I just want to say everybody, remember to stay positive in life in general.

It is always important to try and find what you are most happy in. And, of course, focus on the good over the bad. like Mike Hacks, great story that he released today. And yeah, just things alike. I don't have a lot to say. I'm just overjoyed from this victory. I feel like Casey, not undefeated, but in the winner's circle. Jed, what would you like to say about the peeps?

I know you're dancing around. You're still singing Tommy Aspen all in your head, so maybe not all is lost today. But your thoughts on the judging here. I mean, look, don't have any issues. I did not think I was going to beat Drake. Drake's a very popular and well-liked man. And you know, I'm okay with that.

I'm okay with taking this one because we've still got Tommy Aspinall. We've got MMA fighting the greatest website in the world. Go check that out. And we've got Mr. 3024 himself. MMA decisions. Put it up. I believe in you. Put it up.

That's all I got. This has been a long, ass show. So I'm trying to, I'm just going to put it out there because I think if I say it, into the into the microphone maybe it will happen i think it is officially time to have a non-title grudge match on btel next week between new york rick and connor oh yeah i think i think we got to do it i think it's time that's what i'm going to work on tag those two gentlemen because there's no better place to settle it than right here in the btel virtual we have europe on one side gc on the other and we battle it out that way okay and then we have

something to talk about in the MMA hour. You can build it up. They can cut promos on each other. It'll just be a lot of fun. So that's what I'm shooting for next week because there's no UFC card next week. So we're going to try to have some fun,

fill some time. And then Drake will come back for UFC 272 fight week or 273 fight week and defend his title. But until that, everybody, we're done for Jed. You're not a cop for Jed for Jed. But Drake, I'm Mike Heck. Big shout out to the undefeated Casey Liden.

We'll see you next week on Between the Links. Good night. everybody. This is E. K.C. Leiden. The undefeated E.K.C. Leiden. You have been watching Between the Leaks. Thank you for watching. Good night, everybody.

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