MMA Fighting - BTL | Nate Diaz Brawls, Sergei Pavlovich Arrives, Gervonta Davis Dazzles, BKFC 41, And UFC Vegas 72

Episode Date: April 27, 2023

Nate Diaz made headlines yet again this weekend when the Stockton native found himself in a Bourbon Street Brawl that resulted in one would-be influencer getting choked out in the streets. Mike Heck is off this week so Jed Meshew steps in to host an all-new edition of Between the Links, where the panel discusses Nate Diaz’s street fighting and pending arrest, plus, does this put Nate’s fight with Jake Paul in jeopardy? Additionally, the crew debates Sergei Pavlovich’s big win at UFC Vegas 71, Patchy Mix’s place in the bantamweight hierarchy, Gervonta Davis' big win over Ryan Garcia, and the weekend ahead with BKFC 41 and UFC Vegas 72, and more. Guest host Jed Meshew moderates the matchup between MMAFighting’s José Youngs and Morning Kombat’s Brian Campbell. Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Follow José Youngs: @JoseYoungs Follow Brian Campbell: @BCampbell Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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This is Between the Links. And now, your host, my... The iconic voice of Esther Lynn welcomes you to a brand new edition of Between the Links. But she lied. I'm not Mike Hecker, as you can very well see. I am Jed Mishu. also of Vimeafining.com great website. And I am proud to announce that I'm taking over.

Guest hosting for Mike this week while he's on vacation, a well-earned vacation. And I'm happy I got the call up because today got a fun one, two of the best minds in combat sports. First, the handsome half of morning combat, the BBC with the BDE. Mr. Brian Campbell, how we doing? Oh, yeah, fired up to be back here.

I was going to say Mike Heck, but that ain't you. Is it true, Jed, that you have a law degree? Did you get that at a gas station? But great to be here just the same. I do have a law degree. It's on that wall. But I don't use it because it might, so it might as well have come from a gas station.

Speaking of people who came from a gas station, the most handsome man in MMA full stop, a lover of high-level mixed martial arts and the man behind anything but fighting. Mr. Jose Young's, Jose, how we doing? Is that like because Mexicans are good at working at gas stations? I'm confused by that reference. Anyway, that was pretty racist of you, Jedd.

Seriously. I'm very confused. But to be fair, to be fair, he does have a law degree from the South, so you just have to be able to write your name in crayons, and then they give you one down there. So happy to be here. We know what it is. I'm here to lose to BC. Let's get it. Let's get it on. Hey, hey, you said he's the best looking guy in MMA sports journalism. I thought you'll want to say. that was Okamoto. Didn't we already cover that?

Well, Brett kind of transcends beauty. I'm just, you know, I'm the most handsome MMA journalist. Brett is like, you know, like, you know, it's like there's movie stars and then there's movie stars and then there's people that are on television. I'm the television guy. Look, hot take, Brett Akamoto just presents himself well. He just dresses nicely and he tricks you into thinking. But look at this man.

Look at this man to my camera, right, I guess. just not even trying. Look at that. I'm uncomfortable now. I wanted to bring a different energy to the show with Mike out, so I'm glad we could get Jose off right from the start. Well, let's hop into it,

because we got a lot to talk about. I didn't think there would be kind of when last week when we were talking about it was talking with Mike saying, yeah, I'll take over while you're on. And all hell is broken loose. So let's jump into it. Normally, Mike starts the first round off by talking about the big fights last week,

So that's what we're going to do, but we're going to start with the biggest one. The only fight that is still producing headlines as we speak. That's Nate Diaz's battle with law and order over the weekend. Diaz's gotten a couple of altercations. The biggest one, a Bourbon Street brawl that resulted in him. Allegedly, I don't even know if I need allegedly here, choking out a Logan Paul lookalike Rodney Peterson. After that, New Orleans police issued a arrest warrant. and this morning, Nate Diaz turned himself in to the New Orleans police.

Within the last few minutes, it appears that he has posted bail is out and is allowed to return to Stockton as this will move forward. So let's jump right into it. And BC will start with you. What the hell do you make of all of this? Well, this is obviously the street version of gotcha hat when Jake stole the hat of Floyd Mayweather ahead of his brother, Logan's big. boxing match a couple years ago.

You know, this has to be brilliant marketing from Nate Diaz. You think he cares about a catch in a case? No, he cares about sending a message to Jake Paul ahead of their August boxing match that if anybody comes across my path that even looks like your family, I'm a choke him cold. The only thing I'm not convinced with is whether Nate ever found out that actually wasn't Logan. Do we have proof of that? You know, I can't say for sure that, I mean, they look.

identical. It could be the same thing. Jose, where do you stand on on this tomfoolery? Because a lot of people have come out. I mean, Michael Bisping, who himself not a stranger to incidents like this, said, you know, Nate's getting a little too old for this sort of thing. Do you agree? I mean, Nate's pushing 40. And here we are getting into street brawls with wannabe influencers. Yeah, he's almost 40 and he has kids. I'm not saying he's too old because it's Nate Diaz. And if you read a headline, that says someone ran up on Nate Diaz and then that person ended up unconscious, you'd probably be like, yeah, that probably makes sense. So I don't know, it's just a world where you take Nate Diaz and you drop him in this influencer world where all of these kids are trying to make a name

off themselves. Like if there's one thing to take Floyd Mayweather's hat, who is like five, six, whatever, and then run away and say got your hat, laugh and then tattoo it on your shin. There's another thing to walk up to Nate Diaz on a street. with a lot of drunk people around, play stupid games, win stupid prizes. If your whole gimmick in life

is to look like another individual and you run up on an actual street fighter who doesn't really seem to care about, as BC said, catching a case, he was more than happy to pull out of a fight when he was wrongfully alleged to have taken steroids. He's like, I don't got to fight. You need me more than I need you.

I'm out. And then they cleared that. Nate Diaz isn't worried about it. So, but I'm not surprised that. Some gibrony. ran up on him and slapped his head across the camp, across the cement. Yeah, not the, not the canvas on Bourbon Street. Imagine.

Imagine. He's been there a couple of times. Not a lot of canvas out there. No. Okay, so let's talk about where we go moving forward because there are a bunch of angles to this Ariel Helwani yesterday was talking about the idea that Nate should probably get private security because, as you said, Jose, you're dropping him into this influencer boxing world where everybody is, they're cloud chasing.

and that feels really a lot like what was going on here. So is this just going to be the new normal for as long as Nate Diaz stays in this influencer boxing world? Jose, let's go back to you on this. Can we expect more of this? Maybe not to this degree, especially if, you know, now he's out on Bond and he had to turn himself in. Those an arrest warrant. Maybe he dials it back a bit. And I'm saying like, Nate's not going out there looking for the confrontation.

confrontation seems to be coming to him. So maybe someone, as you said, and as Aeroni said, if someone in Nate's team is smart enough, they'll get him some sort of handler, some sort of real security, because there's a difference between having trained security guards who are there to keep people away and just having your boys who are all black belts around you who are saying, having Chris Avalo with you. Like, there's a difference between the guy that's like, yeah, come try me. And the guy that's like, hey, get out of the way. We got places to be.

get our actual, you know, trained security guard to keep the peace and then keep Nate Diaz out of jail so we can see this boxing match that everyone allegedly wants to watch. So I'm not, it's probably not going to happen too much more unless the confrontation comes to Nate, which very well could if he doesn't get security. Yeah, look, this influencer world is weird, right? Like Nate earlier in the night had been bum rushed

by this Chase DeMore guy who, you know, you know, got disqualified for Landon, like 46 illegal blows in that misfits fight when his opponent was down and then, you know, tried to get Nate's attention on his rate. I remember when that dude, Corey B got all up on Pauli Melanagie and then they had a fight. This is what influencers do. I think for Nate, this is the justifiable tax you pay publicly to send a message to everybody else that I may be in this space, this bubble of crossover celebrity boxing because I'm here for the money. But I don't play that shit. I'm Nate Diaz. And like, it's weird, you know, to hear Bisping or anybody else go, you know, oh, you're 40, maybe you should kind of be better than this now.

I'm glad Nate isn't. Do you remember in the mid-80s when wrestling, pro wrestling was still real? Like, Bill Watts in the Mid-South territory, like he had a rule. If you got into a fish fight at a bar with a fan who claimed wrestling was fake and you lost, you were cut from the promotion. I'm not saying that should still be alive today in elite mixed martial arts circles outside the cage. but if anybody should be about that life, it's Mr. 209 Nate Diaz, so it's good to see he still is. And can we put a modicum of respect on bootleg Logan Paul or whatever we're calling this bullshito fellow over here? I mean, Habib got slapped by Nate and wanted nothing to do with that, right?

Dustin pulled out of the New York City fight against Nate and took an L. Fake Logan Paul was there, was willing to tussle. right he'll tumble for you i had respect to that i will give rodney peterson his props because through all the reporting we currently have it doesn't appear that he is pressing charges on this one he was he was chasing the cloud and he's not seems like he is not going about this in um let's say the colby covington way to handle a situation like this so i will give him a modicum of respect in that he played his dumb game he won his dumb prize Jose, the last thing on this, after this happened, Jake Paul, KSI came out, said, you know,

KSI offered to step in if Nate's legal troubles prevent him from fighting. Jake Paul said, have you be the backup fighter. Do you think Nate then says you guys can fight each other, I don't care, very Nate response? Do you think that this affects there, the Jake Paul, Nate Diaz fight in any way, or is that still going to happen come August? I am probably because as I said people allegedly want to watch it and money talks and this happened on Bourbon Street. And I'm confident when I say that worst things happened on Bourbon Street that night that police had to deal with than Nate Diaz sleeping a guy. I'm confident that more than one person got slept in that 30 minutes spanned on Bourbon Street. So Nate Diaz just happens to be a high profile individual.

So we're talking about it. if this wasn't Nate Diaz, nothing probably happens. If the guy, if Nate Diaz looks like Brian or Jed, this wouldn't be a story either. So that's just, it's no, yeah, this fight's happening 100%. Yeah, I agree with Jose on one thing he was inferring that at least seven people in that video had chlamydia. I mean, it's New Orleans, right?

It's the streets. It's like, you know, I mean, you ever been out in Bourbon Street area after 8 p.m.? I mean, it gets gross. So, yeah, I'm with, I think this is much to do about nothing. Like, yeah, Nate will pay the fine or show up in court or do whatever he has to do. But, you know, he sent a message out there. And no, this won't affect the Jake fight.

This will get us more interested. In fact, Jake should be playing this up. I want to see now Jake beat up a fake Nick Diaz, right? Or maybe Nick himself. He's a little boy these days, right? Maybe, you know. BC, don't give the world any ideas. We don't need any more tomfoolery out there.

Jake did immediately. come out with a video essentially mocking mate. So fast. Which like, look, Jake, you can have any number of thoughts about Jake Paul and I may share many of them with you, but the man understands the MMA and the internet content space. He is quickly producing responses for stuff like this. Good. Solid first round.

We're going to move on. We have a shocking amount to talk about. So, Casey, give me my drum roll. The first round is going to go to Brian Campbell. I mean, when you invoke the great Habib Nirmigamadov, being too scared. He was scared, homie. He basically called Habiba Coward on national television. 29 and 1, all right?

Yeah, or whatever we got here, all right? 30 and 1, where are we having, yeah. All right, next topic. A lot of other real fights, sanctioned fights, it's called them that has all the fights are real, sanctioned fights happened last weekend. So let's get into the bar. bulk of them. We had the UFC going down back at the apex. Everyone loves an apex card. We had a Bellator-Hawaii doubleheader, but we'll start with the UFC because Sergei Pavlovich might just be

that dude. We're going to talk all about the fight, but he ices Curtis Blades just over three minutes in the main event of USC Vegas 71. And Jose, we're going to start with you six straight first round K-O victories for Sergei Pavlovich. Can anyone stop this man? Probably John Jones, probably Cyril gone. And after that, I am not overly confident because I thought Curtis Blades, I'm not saying steamroll over him. On the preview show, I said, I would not be surprised if Curtis Blades is just 50, 45, Sergey, like he did to Alexander Volkov and just, you know, use that high level explosive wrestling he keeps talking about. And everyone keeps talking about why didn't Curtis Blade just shoot for.

take downs and this and that he was finding success on the feet against sir sergey pavlovich sergey pavish just decided to unveil an unbelievable chin out of nowhere because if you watch that replay curtis blades is landing flush on his chin this is the same punches that put down jd s the same punches that put down chris dachis and and all these other and i know the tom aspirin one was goofy but curtis blades was landing bombs on sergey and sergey just didn't laugh didn't smile didn't phase. He just phaed his way through that and then just uncorked a barrage of, as I said, death by a thousand lunchboxes on Curtis Blitz.

John Jones, I'm confident. Could beat him Cyril Gahn, maybe, because he's also, he can probably match his speed and precision and everything. But I'm not overly as overly confident with Cyril Gahn as I was after the John fight and after watching what Sergey did the Curtis Blades. Outside of John Jones, it's at, worst 50-50 against Sergey Pallage against anyone in the top 10 of heavyweight. I was really excited by the, yeah, sorry, am I supposed to talk now?

I keep walking all over you. You just jump wherever you want, B.C., and I'll work around you. I'll piss, you know, you guys provide the sink. All right, here we go. What I'm trying to say here is this is my best type of development. This is my best type of get excited about the prospect that's red hot who has worked himself into legitimate title contention. Yeah, we don't know shit about Sergey Pavlovich at the end of the day.

The only thing we know is he loves to play the slots, right? Which maybe comes in handy because the champion right now in this division used to love to play the sluts. I mean, we had Boo Boo Boo Wild thing calling him at the Albuquerque intersection. All right, we'll edit that out afterwards. That was my first material of the day. But what I'm really trying to say is this. I love when somebody gets to this point, looks this devastating. And we've yet to see him in situations to get completely experienced.

both like another rising heavyweight Alexander Romanov just did recently in back-to-back fights where it gassed out and then just came in overweight and looked like a slob. It's like, didn't that guy used to be that guy? Yeah, he did for a minute. Pavlovich is that guy, but he just keeps knocking good fighters out left and right. I would love for him to get into a title fight against John Jones if he gets through Stepe Miyochitz this fall with these same questions unanswered ultimately because he fills the role as the, as, you know, the Russian-looking vealts.

villain at the end of the, you know, the B action movie. But he's got the same reach as John Jones. He's got the lunchback's fist that you mentioned. He's scary as shit. Man, he looks like Shankar went on steroids. As much as that sounds like an oxymoron. But, I mean, he's just a monster. I want to find out at the highest level if he's got enough cardio for two or three rounds.

If he can wrestle at all, if his takedown defense is any better than it wasn't that one time when he stuffed blades cold after he finally started to hurt him. I think this is a really fun development for the division. We've got to wait a little bit more on Tom Aspernel coming back to finally have his moment. But I want reasons for John Jones to stay around and keep defending that title. And I actually think Pavlovich is one of those reasons because John's too smart. In his mind, he's seen the tape. Oh, that guy's limited.

I'll destroy him. Fine. Let's make that fight next after Stepe and find out. I think that's good matchmaking. Jose, that is a great segue because my next question was going to be about John Jones. At the end of it, Sergey says, hey, I'm waiting for my title shot. Conflicting kind of feelings among the MMA intelligentsia saying, John's going to fight Steepa and retire.

Do you think, you know, is Sergei Pavlovich somebody of interest to John Jones? Should he get past Stepe Meachich? Hmm. I don't know because I'm tired of trying to figure out what John Jones is thinking. I've been doing that for 10 years and it doesn't usually work out. usually the opposite happens and usually it's not great and usually it happens outside of the octagon.

So John Jones did tweet like something along the lines like imagine the scenes of beating the greatest heavy weight of all time in my home state and then retiring. If John Jones is tweeting about retiring and he retires no one should be surprised but then obviously a fan goes no, keep fighting, goes, oh, okay, yeah,

no problem. Something along those lines. I don't know if Sergey is enough to keep him around but John Jones does like money and if the UFC sees money in Sergei Pavlovich with this big Russian audience that they've been cultivating lately and they give John Jones a lot of money, maybe

he does write off into the sunset again Sergey Pavlovich. I don't think Sergey Pavlovich right now is a big enough name to keep John Jones around in the UFC because he came back to fight Cyril gone and he didn't seem overly excited to fight for the vacant heavyweight title because

it was Cyril gone and then a lot of the whole time buildup he's like kind of talking about Stepeh, kind of talking about Francis and this and that, not really talking about Cyril Gahn. Don't know if Sergey Palovich is a big enough name, but as BC says, if he goes, this guy's limited, I can make a lot of money to just kind of mop the floor with this guy.

Would it be a very John Joe's move to stick around for one fight and just destroy Sergey and then retire. But I don't know. Again, like I said, I'm tired of trying to get in the mind of John Jones. Hasn't worked out for the last 10 years. It's a tough mind to read. I will say I am of the opinion that he's going to fight Sergey

because exactly like BC said, I think he looks at this as a very winnable fight. I mean, you can draw a lot of parallels to Pavlovich and Inganu, a bunch of first round early finishes before Steepa just tackled him. And the kicker for me, BC, I want to get your thoughts on this, if he sticks down,

if he beats Stepe and then he beats Sergei, he's got two title defenses at heavyweight one more ties the ufc record he is a good year away from becoming the undisputed greatest ufc heavyweight of all time and if you can walk away your career as the goat light heavyweight the goat heavyweight most people's estimation the goat fighter that's that's an unimpeachable career even with all the other stuff so you got to be with me right BC you think he's coming back for PATHwich. I think I felt like I was the only one making this argument. Everyone's going, well, I saw John's interview.

It looks like maybe Stipe and he's done. Are you kidding me? I mean, under the scenario you just laid out, imagine if that third title defense was Tom Asmodal in front of 80,000 people in a UK soccer stadium? Like, like what if? What if they get the Anthony Joshua rock star treatment and really do that? Here's the thing about John Jones.

He's one of the best competitors we have ever seen. And, you know, really. It's serious. Combat sports across all sports. I've always talked up his unflappability, the ability where no matter what chaos is going on in his life, he can focus, he can barmentalize. Floyd Mayweather can do that. Durvante Davis can do that. It's a rare skill. But he loves being the best.

And I think he looks at this landscape and how easily he literally sat on gone and won back to the championship here. Francis not coming through that door. If Dana has anything to say about it, I look across this landscape and I think John says, look, I can beat all of these guys. guys, why don't I just cement the idea of being the goat of goats, that there's not even an argument or conversation. And oh, by the way, let me, as you said, Jed, take a ton of money along in the process because UFC one day is going to debut at, you know, Allegiance Stadium in Las Vegas and they're going to one day do the UK soccer stadium thing. If you're John Jones, you know, why don't you say to yourself, I want to be a part of that? I want to be making close

to the type of money that I originally sat out of this game and made that. argument that I demand and deserve Deonté Wilder money. I don't think John Jones is afraid of anybody. And I know there's still some lingering wall, you know, he did conveniently choose to come back after Ngano finally left after three years. Yeah, there's some wonkiness in there, too, that I don't really understand what was really happening. But John Jones, I think, looks at every situation and wants to find the most competitive option and then wants to beat them. I think his life works out a little bit better when he's winning and inactive and busy. If there's a chance he's learned from the missteps in his life,

now would be the time to sit down and put together the, you know, potentially the most, not the best run he's ever had, because I don't think anyone's had a run like he had in that five, six fight stretch at light, heavyweight beginning with the, with the Bader, or even the who will fight to win the title, in terms of quality of names and just destruction.

But it's been a long time, it seems, since John Jones has had it all together, personally. I think winning really helps fuel that, that comfortability and that process. I think we're going to see the best of John Jones over the next few years. You're not going to hear about retirement. You're going to hear about, you know, how much further can he go?

If they can get that loss off of his record, whether anyone accepts that loss or not against Matt Hamill. But look at what Habib did. I know Habib retiring undefeated didn't get the fanfare of Floyd Mayweather doing it at 50 and O. But like in MMA, it's way more ridiculous what Habib did. How about John Jones has the idea of like, how many more title defenses would it take for me to put my record, what I accomplish, way out there so nobody can touch it? That's the bones we actually know underneath it all. Yeah, he likes to fool around a party a little bit and gets text messages late at night and shoots guns in the Albuquerque street corners and hangs out with drug dealers.

But, you know, I've made a few missteps in my life, too. They still ask me back on this show. I don't know why, but, you know, here I am, right? We will have John Jones on this show whenever he would like to come. So stick with that. We're going to move on from the U.C. Vegas 72 talk, though, because let's be, or 71, though that frankly holds the same for 72. Not a lot else happened on this card,

but a lot of other stuff happened this past weekend. The Bellator double header is where we're going next. Jose Youngs, you're a lover of high-level mixed martial arts. Patchy Mix. Do I need to say anything?

Patchy Mix knocks out Ralphian Stats in the first round, wins the Bellator Bannamweight Grand Prix. I'm giving you the floor to talk about Patchy Mix because afterwards he said he's the best Bannumweight in the world. And he might be. I don't is that is that crazy for him to believe that he's the best band away in the world no patching mix is incredibly good at professionally fistfighting human beings and I said leading into this fight that I was picking patchy mix but I thought it was going to be I thought he was going to submit rofion Stats because he's a guy like rofion Stats is an incredible wrestling is an incredibly athletic dude but like when danny sabs and him fought there was kind of the blueprint out there where Danny sabs controlled a lot of the fight yes rofion Stats won

but there was a lot of openings for a guy like Patchy Mix, who he's not going in there to hold you down, he'll kind of grind you against the fence. He's going in there to decapitate you, to separate the oxygen from your lungs, to snap your arms, to do something violent to you, something's with bad intention.

Patchy Mix is every definition of the word of a hunter in there. And I thought he was going to submit Rofionstots in the later rounds and the facts that there is no, no colder image in MMA than Neen, someone in the chin standing up and then just walking away into a million dollar giant goofy check. That is the coldest image out there. And Patrick Mix walked in there, didn't smile at all, need Rofion Stotz in the chin. If you watch the replay, it sounded like a baseball player hitting a home run.

That is what it sounded like. He went yard with his knee on Rofion Stott's jaw, standing up, standing. This wasn't in the clinch. This was step in knee to the jaw. Yodemachita did obviously did that a lot to the body. Dude did it to a professional fist fighter to the jaw and sent him tumbling and Mark Hunt walked away. Is Patchy makes the best banning way in the world?

I don't know. I think he's very easily the best banning way on the Bellator roster. I would favor him over Patriso Pitbull at 135. Now, obviously, if Petruso looks unbelievable against Sergio Pettus, that's another conversation could have. But I would favor him against Sergio Pettus, easily. The fact that we're talking about patchy mix and knocking people out has like over 15 something submissions to. Dangerous cat, I would favor him over a lot of people in the

UFC. I'm not ready to put him above Marab, Corey Sanhagan, Aljo or Sehudo, and I know Umar and Margamadev is out there. He's a little lower ranks because of the competition he's fought, but though patchy mix in there with anyone in the top five of the UFC and it will be extremely competitive. So the dude is unbelievable. Rofihan Stats is unbelievable, but the fact that we watched what Patschie Mix did to him, look out Bannemakes because that dude's going to be a problem for a long time. Marshal's buyers travel far and wide, hustling for great deals on amazing gifts, so you don't have to. They've bagged this season's Italian leather handbags. Designer. Handpicked the finest sweaters from the rest.

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Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you. From festive and cozy fashion to luxe beauty and fragrance sets. Our special selection has something for every style and price point. Visit our Holt's holiday shop and store. or online at Holtrenfrew.com. BC, I mean, that dude obviously is going to be a problem for a long time,

but Jose already said it. We know where, we know what's next. He is going to face the winner of Sergio Pettis versus Patricio Pippel. How big is that fight? Who do you favor in that fight? And just tell me your thoughts on Patchy Mix. Well, let's start with Patchy here. Is he the best band of weight in the world now?

Oh, that's just the problem. live, live. I heard it loud and clear. Yeah, I'm on right now. I'm live. The people know it, Jed. Maybe you should get that law degree out of the dumpster behind 7-Eleven and, you know, represent my audio here, all right?

You sound great, B.C. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry. Yeah. That was me, my senior decided that it wanted to jump in. And I was like, I can't hear anybody right now. Sick.

I just, I deserve that. Anyway, please go on with whatever you were saying, B.C. Look, is Patchy the best band of weight in the world? We don't know yet because, you know, you can do the mythical matchmaking all you want. But let's give him this credit. I'm saying, you could do the mythical matchmaking all you want, but he's not going to walk in the octagon tomorrow. We're not going to find out against those two or three guys that are in the conversation for that.

You know, obviously Sterling the champion in the UFC. But the deepest, most red-hot division across the sport, the best thing going for Apache Mix right now beyond the $1 million and the, you know, emergence of this power couple with Tatiana Suarez. is that he may have the chance to really have a strong case for that in this conversation. And it's rare, obviously, when someone outside of the UFC can mount not just to, hey, look across the divisions. You know, you know, like it might be as good as the UFC, but like actually make the case, no, I'm the best in the world. He's got an opportunity to face the winner of that Pettist Patricio Pitbull fight,

which is going to put a really credible name on top of everyone else he just fought on this current run. And it's weird that Patsy Mix or Bellator is kind of like accidentally become who we thought Aaron Pico would be at one time and still might be, right? More to come on that. And who A.J. McKee was at one time, but then, you know, had the setback in that rematch with Patricio and is now trying to get his footing back in this tournament and trying to make that run. The idea of this homegrown guy who's come in full bloom under the Bellator banner to the elite world class top of the line level. I mean, Patchy Mix was 10 and 0 when he made. made his Bell Tour debut in 2019. But he's gone nine and one

cents. The one loss against Juan Archeletta and a vacant title bout in which he gassed out and learned those crucial lessons that so many fighters have to learn like Stepe in the first JDS fight. But what did he do overall outside of that? Of those nine wins, he stopped

eight of them. The only one he didn't was Horiguchi, who he pulled the upset on and completely controlled. It's the violent, sudden nature of the stoppage wins, and it's the idea here that this guy is, he's found out how to maximize. And it's not just rounding out the game to make the striking now, potentially as dangerous as the calling card of being able to finish you on the ground in so many ways.

But he's raised his game. He's rounded it out. And they are setting him up with a can't miss fight in the winner here of Patricio and Sergio Pettis, who, you know, who's going to win? Peter Pettis has a lot of questions to answer two years away from this after a big injury. And the division kind of, you know, not passing. him by, but evolving at such a quick point. I'm not sure Patricio or Sergio Pettis I would favor betting-wise over patchy mix right now

because sometimes these guys get on these runs and when you're able to be a dual-threat finisher and you're carrying that nasty level of confidence like he is, I don't know, think we know his ceiling. I don't think he does, man. He is on freaking fire right now. And it's good to see Bellator get a chance to celebrate this moment. They got the interim belt on the right guy. they got the right bank account with $1 million after what he just accomplished.

He demolished this bracket. And he's going to have a chance to show us whether he might actually be the best in the world. We don't know it yet. We don't know it. You don't freaking know it, Jose. I don't know nothing, though. Jose is always very open about not knowing things in this regard. So that's good.

Belator, like you said BC, on fire right now. They have somewhat legitimate claims to having the best fight. in the world that like heavyweight, middleweight, welterweight, anthem weight. Like you can make credible arguments there, which has got to be an all-time peak for them. And on that note, we had other things that happened.

You mentioned it as well. B.C. You had Aaron Pico picked up a big win. You had Liz Carmouche defending her title with a fourth round submission of Deanna Bennett. So to wrap up this category, it's been a long one we had a lot to talk about. To close it all down, Jose, let's go start with you.

between the other the bellator double header if you have something from ufc vegas 71 what what else do you want to give shine to from this past weekend that we didn't talk about hmm i mean danny sabs actually getting a stoppage win has always been impressive because he is incredibly good at wrestling but as a lot of people said he's more like this generation's ben askeran talks a big game just kind of goes in there and dominates you which is fine because if you can't get a human being off of you you don't deserve to win a professional mixed martial arts fight So Danny Sabs getting right back in the wind column Talking all that stuff Backing it up Good on him.

Liz Carmoos getting another stoppage win Because like Liz, I think Liz got a bad rap In the UFC obviously she came in In that historic moment against Ronda Rousey And came very close to submitting Ronda Rousey In that first round. Obviously she had the teeth marks in there And then she just kind of stumbled at Bannonweight

Kind of was an undersized Bannway for a long time Dropped on a flight when they added that Had one of and I love like Valentin, I like Liz, one of the worst title fights I've ever seen down in Uruguay, where the two of them just kind of shadowboxed the invisible person in front of them for five rounds en route to Valentina winning a decision. And then she was doing charity work for the UFC and then got the news she got cut while she was doing charity work for that promotion.

So the fact that she's kind of carved out life in Bellator, not just carved out life, but winning the title, yes, she had that weird win over Giuliana. came back one again, silence the doubters. Good on Liz Karmouche. Good people deserve good things, and she's one of the good people. She's been a great ambassador for the sport in the LGBT community. So the fact that she's getting the shine, and now she gets to fight her friend, Alimalae in Alimala's retirement fight, hopefully in Hawaii, like I said, good people deserve good things,

and Liz is a good person. I'm happy it's all working out for. B.C., what about you? Who do you want to give some love to? A lot of the things. that man said about Hawaii, but I want to double back down on Pico because he had answers and ideas in a key moment because like they, they don't, they don't effed around with his shoulder last fight against Jeremy Kennedy. And you get why there was the urgency to kind of just,

hey, we'll fix it later, man, go out there and get the win. He was on the verge of fight in Patricio Pitbull for the title and finally coming to the forefront and having his moment in trying to, you know, almost right off his record that he was the biggest prospect of all time who crashed and burned multiple times in front of us. I give Pico so much credit for who he's become on this win streak to get to this point. But he had to go out there against you a tough fish opponent. And first and foremost, show us that health-wise he's fine and that, you know, it wasn't like a Dillishaw situation on the risk they took there.

I love, though, even more important about it than the grinding style that led to that victory showing, again, not the young Pico who would leave his chin out there, but a guy who's leaning on his strengths and getting after it and going to the the body on the feet in such vicious ways, is he had a great idea. Let me rematch Jeremy Kennedy, put an interim strap on it. Patricio is going to be busy down at Bannonweight fighting Sergio Pettis. Let's find out now. Jeremy Kennedy has done nothing lately but win, and he got that win against Pinko,

fair and square despite the injury. So I really like that idea because this has been a odd little reality show following the career of Aaron Pico. I think moving to New Mexico has been great for his spirits. There was some mismanaging of his career early on, including his debut, a division up against the veteran. But now we're seeing a guy, and it's good to see, finally get that chance to put all the BS away and live up to,

you know, and live up to his calling by getting to the title level and then showing us exactly who he is. It could not have been easy being Aaron Pico the last few years, but, you know, I give him credit for how he's pulled it together. That will bring an end to this round. Great round. We covered a lot of topics. we got to move because we are taking up time and there's still so much to talk about.

Casey, hit me with the drum roll. Round two is going to go to Jose Young's. We could have stopped early. When Jose said death by a thousand lunchboxes, the round is over. We just played it out because that's what we do on this show, all in pursuit of content. Next round. With these two gentlemen on, there was one topic kind of called an audible because originally weren't going to talk about it, but you get two big boxing heads like this, and the biggest

fight of last weekend happened. How do you not? I'm talking about, of course, Javante Tank Davis versus Ryan Garcia. Tank gets the stoppage in the seventh round with a chef's kiss punch right to the liver. Afterwards, declares himself, I am the face of boxing, and that felt a bit weird at the time until the numbers dropped. 1.2 million pay-per-view sold for this one. Biggest pay-per-view in some time.

So, B.C., let's start with you, the resident boxing ed here. Is Tank Davis the face of boxing and just how good was that performance? This is a question that I addressed directly after the fight on the morning combat post show Saturday night in Vegas. And my answer then was, well, not yet, but he's on his way there at a distance that is for, than anyone else in this discussion. What I mean is who's still the biggest star in this sport? It's Canelo Alvarez, who's right there also near the top of the pound for pound list as well. And obviously, whenever the heavywees do big business like Fury and Joshua, they can sell out stadiums in their native land, that's a big deal.

But what Tank has done across the board has been very impressive, the selling out of multiple arenas in major U.S. cities, you know, without having any connection there. and really in some cases, irrespective of who his opponent is he started to get that tag for not only a younger audience in general that he's cultivated largely through social media like Ryan Garcia has, but he tank really brings in that celebrity crossover, cool, hip hop generation type of audience, and they come out for him. And it doesn't matter who he's fighting. And he's been a consistent pay-per-view brand, but to come to the level where he is now, where the live gate is the fifth biggest in Vegas history.

bigger than any UFC card and only trailing the two Golovkin Canelo fights and, you know, Floyd versus Mani and Floyd versus Connor, that's a rarefied era to begin with. But in the proliferation era here streaming-wise where it's so easy to pirate, there's so many competing streaming options, you know, of entertainment that's trying to get you, all of that. And the fact that, you know, no one really ever wants to talk that in 2015, Mayweather Pacio kind of broke the pay-per-view business and boxing in general. To go over a million, 1.2, and be the first fight to do that since Canelo Golovkin 2 in 2018, that's a big deal.

Tanks' pay-per-view numbers were not on this level beforehand. Obviously, you have to tip your cap to Ryan Garcia. This fight does not get made unless 24-year-old Ryan Garcia goes against the advice of those close to him and says, no, I want it right now. So it was the merging of two perfect storms of fan bases that are separate from each other, but both targeting young. When do you say that? Outside of like a Jake Paul fight, when do you ever put Young in the same sentence of boxing? Maybe that time Jose Young got in a street fight.

I heard about that, all right? But, you know, it didn't go well for him or fake Logan Paul. But I'll say this. The fight, we ran in your ear, us in the boxing media spent the whole buildup to that fight bragging about finally this is different, right? This is young versus young. And this is like, you know, opposite sides of the street. We're doing non-boxing things here.

And then those numbers came in and it fell. like it justified that, you know, if I can change, you can change. And you change, we all can change. I mean, look, is boxing going to fix itself because of this one good night? No, but it felt really good. Leading up, fight night, now the aftermath, if you build it, the fancels still freaking come out. They really will, right?

So let's keep building that shit, all right? Come on now. Jose, you did our pre-fight breakdown of this and you, you're a man who loves pugilism, and this was just good, honest-to-god boxing. How did you feel about Saturday? It was much more competitive than I thought. I said in our preview show that there were two, I know it was a catchweight of 136, but there were two 130, 135, 136-pound fights happening that weekend.

And patchy makes Rofion Stats and Giovante Davis and Ryan Garcia. and I thought the patchy mix Rufiott Stod's fight would be much more competitive than Tegovus Ryan Garcia and boy was I wrong patchy mix ended up being that dude and Ryan Garcia ended up being the guy that can

yeah he did get kind of dismantled at the end but he had his moments. I had never really been sold on Ryan Garcia but I did say if he shows me anything in the first few rounds then moving forward I will be very intrigued by his career I was one round off I thought it would be an eighth round TKO

Giovante, TKO, Giovante Davis obviously called his shot. And we say this a lot on the preview shows on how the UFC can build stars. Young fighters need that moment where the crowd is just erupting around them after a huge main event win like Connor had in Dublin,

like Darren Till had in Liverpool, like the fact that the UFC never went back to Cleveland with Stepe, the only city that really seems to erupt for Stepe-Meogit's title fight was just mind-boggling to me. So, Giovante Davis having this, as, as BC said, like it was a, it felt like a massive fight. From the outside looking in, I wasn't on site. BC was.

So obviously, in Casey was. They said it felt like this big deal fight. All the way in Phoenix, it still felt like a massive fight. I hadn't really had that feeling since the second Triple G. Canelo fight. And the Fury Wilder fight was great, but that's heavyweight. So anytime like two massive heavyweights do business, like BC said, it kind of becomes a spectacle. This just was two incredible talents, young talents fighting,

and I agree with BC using the word young when talking about boxing is just refreshing. It was the buildup was everything I needed it to be. The fight played out exactly how it should have played out in terms of building this audience. I think it was a home run across the board. Yeah, just a perfect storm of two young fighters building this fight up and then the way it played out,

chef's kiss, like you said, loved everything about. it. All right. Let's talk about the, um, the sad part that seems to be destined to come with any major boxing event. The ending, because anyone who's boxed before can recognize that that, uh, was a very serious shot right to the liver. And yet you have people like Carl Frampton coming out and saying that Ryan Garcia quit like he, he gave up. BC is what do we say to these people? This was not a controversial. This was not Ryan Garcia doesn't have that dog in him. This was just Tank Davis's night, correct?

Tank Davis was the better fighter. It played out how we expected. I don't think Ryan embarrassed himself on the whole or necessarily set back is correct. I think this is only a plus plus. He's got a lot to grow. Technically, of course, but there was a lot to like there. But the idea of how we should respond to this does kind of, in some ways, react to

like you're where you're coming from. Should us keyboard warriors who maybe put on the head gear once or twice and went in there and spart a little bit, should we be like, oh man, man, he quit. You know, he definitely could have got up. No. I mean, in a normal human sense, no, that those type of shots can turn, as they say, can turn your legs off for a minute or two and you can be down. Ryan Garcia's own promoter, Oscar Del Hoya, was stopped by Bernard Hopkins that way and in your head endure the same thing. But this does feel escalated by not just Frampton's comments. I've heard other pro fighters. And now Julio Cesar Chavez Sr.

basically came out and said, like, I don't ever need to watch Ryan Garcia again. Which when you know about that machismo Mexican boxing culture, that's still the foundation in a lot of ways of, you know, American boxing fandom in terms of like the fighters that become popular and this whole, you know, attitude that may be certainly outdated. But if a fighter is watching that, a pro fighter and saying, you know, they're not saying it didn't hurt.

They're not saying Ryan Garcia isn't a warrior. You could strategically say him staying down and, you know, fighting another day long term could be the best move business-wise and all that. But if they want to say he quit, I think they understand exactly what they're saying. They're saying could he have gotten up and continued? It's very rare that somebody can take a clean, hard body shot that does drop them and that they can recover in that time. It's why when it happens, we celebrate it.

Arturo Gotti and the first Mickey Ward. if I had no business getting up from that. Darren Barker in 2013 when he won that middleweight title in shocking fashion after his brother died. He got knocked down to a body shot against Giel and basically said, I saw my dead brother rise in the ring in front of me and say, get up. I mean, it's rare. Sometimes you need that to happen.

But I'm not here to doggle and Carl Frampton, though, because they know. Could Ryan Garcia continue? He probably could have. It would have been painful. It may have set him up for a knockout. His decision, I'm not judging because I'm not in a position to. but if you are subscribing to that old, often outdated machismo way of looking at this sport, which is natural, why to some degree we all still do to some degree.

I mean, yeah, he did say no mas. He did rise at the 10 count for a reason. He didn't want anymore. I don't damn him for it, though. But if you do and you got the hutchpott of back up your stance, I think there's a case of that argument, just not for me or you, Jed, at all. How dare you? Jose.

Jose, what about you? Is this, to me, this all read like a continuation of the pre-fight narratives around Ryan Garcia as not being a quote-unquote real boxer. But are you with BC on this? Are we defaulting to, you know, Carl Frampton and Cesar Chavez? Like, how are you feeling here? Well, any time Julio Cesar Chavez, Sr. says anything, I'll defer to that man, you know, especially growing up in a brown household, there was.

Jesus Christ and then there was Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. It was like and they were I'm not saying they were on the same level. That's what I'm trying to say. I obviously don't know what it's like to get punched in the liver by Tank Davis. I imagine it hurts almost as much as anything in the world would hurt. But I agree 100% with what BC said. I have no I don't know what that's like. So who cares what I have to say? But could Ryan have gotten up? Probably. I guess it would just

depend on what his long-term goals are moving forward because you got fighters like Roberto Duran have said no moss and that kind of lived with him his entire, like they made a movie about it. They made a whole, they made documentaries about that fight and him saying no mass. So just I guess if his end goal is just, you know, make a bunch of money, live to see another day,

take these big money fights, win or lose, I'm just a prize fighter, then so be it. But if he wants to be the next Canela, if he wants to be the next wheelier, Caesar Chavez, senior. And he should have kept fighting. But again, that's not for me to say. Because there are a few Mickey Ward Arturo Gottis in the world. And yeah, we love those fights, but look what happened to them after.

And Ryan Garcia, if he wants to continue making a lot of money and saving his brain cells and saving his liver and saving everything else, I'm not going to dog him for it. So it sounds like Ryan Garcia will not have his picture up there next to to Jesus and Jesus Christi. Not going to make the wall. One time I shared an elevator with Hula, Caesar Chavez, Sr.

And I have never been more starstruck in my entire life of anyone I've ever met. He's a commanding presence in person. Yes. Yes. And his bodyguards are about four feet taller than him. It was unbelievable. I don't know how we can end this round better.

So we'll cut round three right there. Casey, hit me my drum roll. Your winner, round three, the point is going to go to Jose Young, sneaking in at the wire with his own personal anecdote about Julio Cesar Chavez. That's very bizarre. All right. Hey, you won that round in my heart. Hey, he stole it at the end.

Hey, we had Elvis right up there with Jesus, all right, in my house, okay, please. If B.C. had said that about Elvis, he might have gotten the point, but unfortunately, I learned things is to show about growth. I learned what it's like to grow up in a brown household and what it's like to share elevated with Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. So you get the point, Jose, and we move to the final round of regulation. Round four. It's finally time to talk about this weekend, guys.

Let's be honest, it's not a great one. The UFC event, U.S. Vegas 72 is headlined by a Bannonway fight between Song Yadong and Ricky Simone. It's a great fight. The rest of that card, poop. The biggest event this weekend is BKFC 41. So we're going to talk about all of it. Might as well start with there.

Because of BKFC 41, Luke Rockhold, taking on Mike Perry in the main event. Co-main event is Eddie Alvarez taking on Chad Mendez. We also have a flyway title fight between Christine Faheda and Beck Rollins and a bunch of other stuff because it's BKFC. So, Jose, we're going to start with you. If we're looking at the BKFC card and we're looking at the UFC card, what one single fight this weekend is the most interesting to you? I mean, unfortunately, it's Chad Mendes, Eddie Alvarez, because Mike Perry doesn't particularly like me.

Luke Rockhold, I don't know where I stand with Luke Rockold. Both of them have said very mean things to me, to my face for whatever reason during interviews. Chad and Eddie have always been nice, and I have a lot of questions surrounding that fight. Chad Mendez has looked very good taking the gloves off and fistfighting human being. Eddie Alvarez, I don't know how he'll look. He's been knocked out a ton in his career. He's been stopped a lot and rocked a lot in his career against guys that hit a lot harder than Chad Mendez.

The best fight, like if we're talking about the best fight, the most competitive fight of the entire weekend, it's probably Song Yadong and Ricky Simone. But if we're talking about fights, I'm intrigued and have the most questions about. It's unfortunately the circus that is BKFC. Chad Mendes versus Eddie Alvarez is the one I'm most interested in. Because Mike Perry, Luke Rockold, for as fun as those interviews are, that fight does absolutely nothing for me against the Luke Rockold, a guy who kicks a lot and is very good at grappling, taking both of those out of the equation, don't particularly care.

I don't want to see Steph Curry in a dunk competition. I don't want to see Luke Rockold in just a BKFC competition. So I guess the answer for me, by default, is Chad Mendes versus Eddie Alvers. BC, what about you? Where are you, if you're watching one fight this weekend, what's it going to be? Well, I'm not surprised by Jose's answer. It's the way he was raised. And, you know, in that household with Chavez, I was raised a little bit differently.

And, you know, for better or worse, and you would say worse, given the fact that I've been diagnosed with a black liver, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, which basically means. you have eaten entirely too much hot dogs out of 7-Eleven and fasting gas station food your entire life, which is true. Luke Rockhold versus Mike Perry is like steak dinner and the gas station food lineage. You can't freaking avoid it. Like, look, am I here to tell you the idea on the mass pike I-90 in Massachusetts on the way to Boston when you pull over into the little rest stop?

and the idea of pre-inserted hot dogs with cheese sauce right in the middle, that that's somehow good for you, that you should be excited about it. You can feel however you want to feel about it, but if I pull over there regardless of my metal cook condition, I find out they pre-inserted the cheese. Remember, they should do that to the pretzels in high school. I am getting on that, okay? I'm doing that.

There's a reason why I spend all of the 90s watching Cinemax, HBO, and Showtime after 10 p.m., okay? There's a fly, and the fly keeps running into that glowing thing that you put out on the tree by your pool. Mike Perry versus Luke Rockhold is one of the most ridiculously intriguing combat sports fights I could ever remember. They have no business being in the ring against each other. They have no connection before this outside of the fact that they were UFC fighters. But it's perfect because Mike Perry, it turns out, is really, really good at this sport. And he told me when I interviewed him this week that like he had this epiphany, like stop trying to be this thing to everybody else and be this complete MMA fighter and just be you.

Just go out there and be a savage. He's like really good that the idea of him fighting the former UFC middleweight champion of the world who's, you know, heightwise looks like he's two divisions bigger. It's actually good matchmaking somehow. Like Mike had no business taking MVP in England to a bonus sixth round and then just outworking him. Like Mike Perry has figured out in his weird life and one of my favorite lives to watch. And yes, he's hung up on me and threatened to kill me when I asked him a question about his ex-wife that time. But now we're good. Now we're bros because we respect each other at the end of the day.

He's become somehow like this loving family man who's entered into the most financially viable portion of his career doing the dirty work openly and willingly. And he might be the face of like this promotion. And like Luke Rockhold who's like, you know, male model, the most. most non-savage but technically great and, you know, powerfully violent fighter, but who was coming off a fight against Paul O'Costa that was like fight club. It was just freaking weird, right?

It's like, man. One of my favorite fights of 2022. And we get big Ben Rothwell. And we get Mike Alvarado, the old boxers on this car. Like, there's a lot of weird items on here. Dude, BKFC doesn't always get it right. I do enlarge think it's the last stop at the end of the

combat sports highway and it's a little bit sad at times. But their matchmaking of late has kind of gotten us up out of the chair because there is life post-UFC for a bunch of these guys. It could come selling your name and get knocked out by Jake Paul when your two divisions lower or it could come in this bare-knuckle circle where they do tend to respect the fighters. They pay them a lot. And this is like a weird ass rock and jock all-star game. Only it's a bare-knuckle fight and it's Mike Perry and it's Luke Rockold.

Yeah, that's the only thing that matters this weekend. Like, UOC picked a great couple weeks stretch to completely mail it in. We don't care. Give me the slap bullshit. No, no, not that bullshit. Give me the bare-knuckle bullshit. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah, both of these men in that main event, Mike Perry and Luke Rockhold have called me gay in the middle of interviews and walked out of the interview.

So they deserve this main event. That sounds incredibly on brand. Yes. Casey was there for one of them. It was very funny. I laughed. Okay, I have one more question about BKFC 41, and then we're going to pivot to at least mention the UFC. But it's simply this.

This is a big event for BKFC 41. On pay-per-view, they shelled out a lot of dollars for Luke Rockhold, a lot of dollars for Eddie Alvarez, both making their promotional debuts. I mean, they are putting a lot of eggs in this basket. So, Jose, let's go to you first here. is this a make or break event for them i mean if this one goes over gangbusters is this is this going to elevate them to a new tier what are the stakes for bkFC this weekend oh the stakes or bkfc is i i mean nothing's really on the line in the top two fights and the fact that we're talking about it right now is this is not a break it's not make or break because the only way like have you you've

watched mike perry fight bkFC like it's never not interesting because both of the men looked like they went through a blender at the end of the fights. And Mike Perry said something to Luke Rockhold on the MMA hour yesterday where he goes, people like to watch you because they want to see you get your ass kicked. I'm like, well, that's not wrong. Like there's a lot of people that hate Luke Rockold that probably want to tune in to watch Mike Perry just put his fist in his orbital. It's hockey season and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats.

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powered by Peloton. on IQ built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans, real time insights, and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence while Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress. Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton cross-draining tread plus at one peloton.ca. This fight is going to be interesting. It's not my cup of tea, but people are going to tune in. They'll watch Chad and Eddie.

they'll watch a high level, you know, martial art if we're using BKFC for that, with that term. And then they're going to get Mike Perry versus Luke Rockald, which is apparently the above-ground swimming pool of fights this weekend. So I don't know. It's not break because it's guaranteed to be entertaining in at least the post-fight interviews. And it's going to be, it is without question going to be the most viral fight. And like a week ago, we're talking about Giovante Davis and Ryan Garcia

and how that fight got made on social media. this is going to be the most social media friendly fight of the weekend without question. B.C., is this event going to elevate BKFC out of the, you know, that they don't always get it right there? The last stop on the combat sports road. Is this event going to take them to a new level? It could be. And I think sometimes that comes down to timing. And it's not that BKFC wasn't doing stuff like this, you know, a year ago or two ago bringing in ex-UFC names that we know.

Look, the PVC signing, which didn't really turn out great, at least launched this like competitive female division and there's trash talk. I mean, like, it still was interesting to watch. Here's where I think it works in the timing wise. Look, that recent boxing card that we saw was a game bread. Was that, no, that was Pettis. Was that Pettis's Showtime promotions, whatever the hell they call that in Wisconsin? That was Game Bread.

I was Game Bread. Oh, that was game bread there. All right. So here's my point on this. You know, I don't love Roy Jones in that fight. whatever on that. I thought there was something interesting with the idea of taking pre-established rivalries going, oh, Josie Aldo and in the hardest hitting 145 or, man, they had a fun

MMA fight that time. Let's have them box against each other. These fights were like, even Belfort mopping around Jokorei and then suddenly Jacqueray gets up and he's coming back. They were oddly and interestingly competitive, like better than like Jake Paul versus Tyrone Woodley. Like it just kind of was like interesting that I've said for a while. and I think we might see it because when Zufa boxing will never die,

but I think the UFC, you know, obviously was in error putting all that money in Karen to slap and that bullshit. What they really need to do is just create Zufa boxing the promotion. I think they will now that WWE is involved and there's this larger company because, you know, wouldn't you love if you're WWE to make the brawl for all an actual thing and make it real? But my whole point is there's there's money to be made if it's done right and the fighters are treated right in these post-UFC fighters still having a little bit of life left and, wanting to use their name value to make a fun attraction. I think the UFC has watched all the money they're losing

as all these ex guys can't wait to get out of their contract, become an ex-guy and then try to get in the Jake Paul sweepstakes. Somebody had to make a non-bS, non-triangle ring compromise here of trying to present it as kind of legitimately competitive as we can, but also pay you a lot of money to do that. BKFC, I think, has slid in here with the right card at the right time, some cool ideas like the Mendez versus Eddie Alvarez where if it works, if no one gets hurt, if everybody gets paid and there's sort of fun, competitive viral moments, yeah, I think

there's a potential window there because, you know, these ex-UFC athletes want money and respect. And they're not against taking off the gloves and doing the gnarly bare knuckle thing. We are as journalists. We're like, why the hell would you want to do that? Every MMA and boxer I talked to, like, oh, that should be easy. Okay. I mean, that's the only thing. As much as I'm against in general, guys staying on well past their combat prime and just constantly doing the Bigfoot Silver thing, right?

And selling your name to anybody. I'm obviously against that. There are guys who have a certain left in the thing left in the tank. I'm happy when I hear Rockhold and Perry legitimately say this is the most money I've ever made to fight. Like legitimately say that. I'm starting to come around on the idea like, you know, if this works for BKFC until Zufa, if they ever do put that model together, there's money to be made. There's a lot of people that want to do it. Let's do it as safely and competitively as we can.

Like, I wouldn't even be mad if they made Zufa championship belts in boxing for ex-UFC guys to come in there and box for. I'm sure you're going to throw up in your mouth when you hear that, Jose. But that's, to me, a better way of doing it than Tim, you know, Tim Sylvia's showing up on a slap dock with Mark Coleman there. You know, I'm making what are we doing here, guys? Yeah, I actually don't hate the idea of Zufa titles for ex-UFC fighters. Wow, look at that.

Out of nowhere that comes in. I, like BC, thought you were, you would hate that, Jose. So, all right, let's round out. It's boxing. The more belts, the better. I feel that way about the UFC. They should have many more belts. But that's neither here nor there.

Let's wrap this round up by talking about the UFC, because we haven't, realistically. Song yandong, Rikis Simone, it's a good fight. Everything else in this card, your mileage is going to vary. So, Jose, let's start with you. Is there anything to care? about on this card outside of the main event i mean there are interesting names that i'm interested and see how they perform give me five michael oligey cheque is a very exciting individual to watch he's one of those guys that either gets got or gets the other guy uh he's hyperactive in there julian erosa

has looked very good yeah he got head kicked by alice casares but he's another guy that Like beating Hakeem Duwado was was hyper impressive. Beating Charles Ordain was hyper impressive. Dude has a TKO win over everyone's current favorite fighter, Nate Landware. And I actually obviously scored the fight against Patty over in the Cage Warriors days. I thought Julian Orozah won that. Even Patty said, like, if it's in this current rule set, Julian Oroza wins that fight. Those two are interesting.

Hadovo Vieira is very good at submission fighting. He's not very good at MMA. I'm sure he's going to get exhausted in there. and I know how much you love sloppy, tired MMA. That's about it. Those three names I'm very interested in. Stephanie Egger is a very, very nice woman. When I was stuck on Flight Island,

I was the only thing we were allowed to do for a long time was rent a bike and drive around in a circle. And one of the part of the circle was on like a 45 degree incline, and it was about 100 degrees with a humidity level of 75, and I was absolutely exhausted. And then all of a sudden I look up in Stephanie Eggers, on the top of the hill cheering me on and I was like oh god a UFC fighter's watching me I can't bitch out now didn't bitch out now so props to you Stephanie Eager for getting me up that hill

so three of the names I'm excited to watch and then I'll always watch stephaniager after she cheered me on up that hill in fight island bc what do you got that was great that was great uh no this fight card absolutely blows and that's not me bc being the white belt fan that many people, you know, peg me to be like, normally on a regular fight night, I could go up and down that prelim card and tell you a few Instagram fights worth watching in the Strawaway Division, right? Like, like, there's none of that. There's very, very little redeeming quality.

This is the bottom end of some people that are getting smart to the business and seeing the factory that the day and away contender series has become and see how little they can pay the fighters coming in. And now, like, this is bad. But what I want to find out is what's going on in the larger hole, because it's not as if Any promotion can't have an in-between card that just isn't great or doesn't specifically satisfy what you're looking for. It happens all the time.

We can always recall, hey, what's the worst UFC main event you can remember? Was it really Calveo versus I? Right? Like, we can do that game. But you give them that mulligan because they deliver. Now, though, we're starting to get a couple in a row that are just sort of like, oh, damn, like, I don't even think we needed this one. What am I really being offered here?

Love Simone versus your dog. I mean, it's great, right? but like it slides off quick. And then I look at the next pay-per-view and you know it kind of sucks. It kind of sucks a little bit. And I look at the one after that in Vancouver. You know, that one kind of sucks too.

And that ABC card coming up has got some decent fights. But like, you put Rosen Struke in an ABC main event. My point, name a single person that wanted Nunes versus Pena 3. My whole point is what is going on overall, Pena. We know, we know what's really going. on with the ESPN contract and it doesn't put as much onus on the UFC to build pay-per-view stars or over-market paperviews. But I think across the board, along with the idea of being unhappy about slap, along with

the idea of seeing too many fight cards at the apex when it doesn't make sense, along with this merger with buying WWE and will that actually affect anything UFC-wise on the day-to-day? I didn't think it would. Like, what are we doing right now? We're not doing our best anymore. And, you know, doing close to the best is like the calling card of why that UFC brand is so strong and why you know every weekend you can turn in and see that. And maybe this weekend, we just get badass fights and, you know, somebody could tell me to shut the hell up. But I'm a little bit worried on the hole right now.

Is this like the off season? There is no off season, but this is the off season? Or is this the type of product we're going to get moving forward? Because, you know, it doesn't suck, but it ain't great. and I remember a time when the UFC was great. In fact, if I had a red cap right now, I would probably send a message to the UFC about figuring out how to make it all great again.

All right, because right now this sucks. I mean, it kind of sucks, guys, right? It does, you know? It doesn't suck. You can take my hardcore card. It kind of sucks, all right? That's going to be the title of this show. Doesn't suck, but it ain't great.

All right. The original main event, unfortunately, that original main event between the Nautomai Kano and Sarukian was everything I needed and then that's fine on you don't Ricky Simone was a great co-man sometimes no that wasn't ever the co-main

that was last week's fight they moved in here that's right that's trashed so it's always this all right we're closing it down because we got to get to OT oh or maybe we don't we'll see who gets the point for round four who could it be Brian Campbell gets the um four he correctly

identified that Luke Rockhold Mike Perry is the only fight that needs to happen this. I like how in this matchup, I like how in this matchup between me and BC, I get the boxing questions, the points for the boxing questions and BC gets the point for the FMA questions. Yeah. Well, BKFCs. Anyway, we're going to overtime. We're going to round five, the maker break round. Before we get to it, I should just mention that there's a poll up. It's been up for a while, vote for who you think wins, you know, be honest about it. Pick the, pick the right winner here. And let's get into our final topic of discussion.

I flipped a coin beforehand in case we got to this position. Brian Campbell, you are going to have the option. Would you like to go first or would you like to defer to Jose Youngs? Oh, I want to go first. Let me bang, right? Let me bang, bro. Fantastic. Okay.

All right, Casey, throw 60 seconds on the clock that BC is almost assuredly not going to respect. And let's get into it because this week, it was announced that Conner McGregor has a four-part documentary series coming out on Netflix. McGregor Forever. It's going to detail his return from the leg injury. And also, B.C. Showtime. The label that pays you released a documentary series this month catching lightning covering former UFC fighter Lee Murray, who orchestrated one of the largest robberies in history and is currently still incarcerated. So the question for you is if somebody if Showtime Netflix, Amazon,

whoever it is comes to you with a big bag of money and says, I want you to create a documentary, a four-part docu-series on an MMA fighter or an event. Who or what would it be about? Three words. Just bleed guy.

That's it. And it'd be freaking awesome. He went to jail, right? Like, did you see the guy smoking the joint next to him too? Like, real on the slide? No. That's a great question. Etchohia, maybe.

Chale's on him. Let's just do that one already, all right? I mean, he's got, he had the most interesting life. Will he be honest about things? Why were you staying at the luxur that night, jail? Did you really kill seven people? I mean, what's going on here? You know what I mean?

I don't have it today. You know, I drop the ball. It's not a bad answer. Just bleed guy. Just bleed guy. I mean, it's not a bad answer. It's not a bad answer at all. Sorry, I got to love that for it.

You could have added some flourish to it. But there we go. BC just caught off going. Jose, just fell apart. Honestly, credit to you, BC, because I think that's the first time you've ever come in under the 60 second mark. Yes. And Chavez Sr. just tweeted that he'll never watch the show again. So there you go.

Yeah. I'm sorry for your loss. Jose Young's the same question. If somebody, Showtime, Amazon, Netflix, whoever gives you a big bag of money to make an anime docu-series, who or what? Are you doing it on? Casey, get the air horns ready because the only answer is I want to see the circus surrounding Affliction MMA because that seems, that still seems like such a fever dream to me.

The fact that we got, what was it? Mega death playing for an ungodly amount of time while Fadour and a bunch of other fighters just stood on the stage. I want an entire episode on just that decision. The contrast in that is I watch that video every few months and I just have a great time. I want to see the lineup like Jesse Taylor, who's still fighting, was supposed to be, Ben Rothwell, who we just talked about on BKC, he was supposed to be on the canceled third car. Donald Trump was there. We can get all of Esther and Casey's footage.

Fador knocking out Tim Sylvia, Fador knocking out And Jarolowski. It all happened in the famed Honda Center where Ronda Rousey kicked in the door for women's MMA. Matt Leland fall on that card. Josh Barnett fall on this card. I want to see all the whole circus. And it means we get all the bad affliction shirts

for five episodes because that's what I want. Tough, tough final round to judge, really. Thank God I don't have that power. We have just bleed guy versus affliction to MMA. I love it. Just the guy is it bad? Might be tough to make four apps on it, though. Might be a tough stretch.

Okay. You know what I should have went with? It doesn't count. I should have went with the night Elite XC fell apart when they, when Shamrock got cut. That is the correct answer. That's why I was about to jump in right now. I was about to say that. I'm not a contestant, but I was going to say I want to see a dog.

Because I was working for Elitexie at the time. Like I, like the night. The whole Ken Shamrock, Petruselli, Kimbo Slice. It was like, let me just say, so I was working for Elitex-D. I'm sitting in row two. I got my dad tickets. I'm there with my two brothers. You know, all the stuff went down earlier.

You know, it was crazy? You know, did Shamrock really do it on purpose? Was it a whatever? Was he just trying to get more money out of their promotion? Nobody knows the truth. Kimbo gets knocked down in 10 seconds. I look over to my dad. I go, ooh, I need a find a new job.

And sure enough, I was laid off. about a week later. Like, it was, oh, it was wild. And I don't know the truth. No one knows the real truth what happened that day. I've heard so many stories. And then, you know, Seth Petrazzellie said afterwards that they offered him money in the locker room

to not take, to not take Kimbo down. And you could tell the whole story of Kimbo through this film as well. So, yeah, and the more Jared Scala Shaw, we get in there, you know, like, you know, the, I mean, he was Dana White while Dana White was still Dana White, you know what I mean? Yeah. And I've heard rumors of like allegedly the late Kimbo Slice was they didn't think they were going to fight and they were just having a blast, you know, and then all of a sudden like, oh, you're fighting.

Like, oh, okay. So a lot of crazy stories. Yeah. That's the right answer. It was one of the stills one of the funniest thing that's ever happened in this sport. Get your votes in, Casey, while you are doing the tabulation. I will run us down programming notes. My keg is still off.

So tomorrow morning, A.K. Lee, we'll be back with Lee of a morning. So make sure to tune in for that. We'll have a preview show for this weekend. Tomorrow, I think it's me, A.K. Shahin al-Shaddy. And, you know, just the normal weekend coverage stuff. If you're not trying to watch or if you can't afford the pay-per-view, tune in to mavit.com.com. website.

We'll have you covered for all of that. Some may say the best. Some may say the best, but, you know, there are also people who really like Morning Combat who, B.C., I'm sure you guys are covering all of the critical, the award-winning morning combat. You're covering all of the critical events this weekend, I'm certain. That's true, correct? Yeah, especially that bare-knuckle one. Yeah. I mean, that's the one you want. Casey, do we have a winner?

Yes, sir. We do have a winner. We have a winner, well, for an illustrious prize. All right. I changed the poll up a bit. This wasn't a straight, you know, pick red corner, blue corner. So with 13% of today's votes. What in Dodd's name did you make this poll? With 13% of today's votes is Jose Young's.

So. He doesn't get. the sounds what was the poll I need to know what the pole with so 13 for Mr. Jose Young's with 16% of the votes

Mr. E. Casey Leiden so Casey wins and with 21% of the votes Jedmishu with 50% of the votes. Your winner today is,

of course. Mr. Brian Campbell. What was the poll? Who would win in a hot dog eating contest? We never could have seen this coming. Yeah, I felt like

this monikins. Leon. Yeah, that was, that was something. Even with my disastrous fall at the end, thank you.

Thank you for having me. Thank you to the people for voting for me. And, you know, Jose Young's is a very admirable opposition. I respect him greatly. Thank you.

Anytime, man. That was fun. What a humble man in victory. Jose, before we get out of here, do you have anything to say? You saw it coming. Does it hurt any less because you knew? I mean, I don't get mad when the sun rises.

It's just kind of a matter of fact. It's just science. Anytime you go against anyone that's part of morning combat, you're going to lose. So saw this coming, not over. really upset about it. But everyone, go donate comic bookforkids.com. Oh, what a, what a message. And we'll end on that message. So Casey, hit the music because that's it, folks. Uh, Mike Heck returns next week to take over this. So I won't be

in this chair. I might be where Beast C is. It might be where Jose is. We'll see until then. I'm Jed Mishu. That's Jose. That's Brian Campbell of Morning Combat. That's be Casey Lydin on the ones and twos. Thanks for spending the time with us. We love y'all and let the iconic voice of Estalin take you home. This has been Between the Links and an everybody fighting production on the Vox Media Network. We're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.