MMA Fighting - BTL | UFC London, Leon Edwards vs. Sean Brady Stakes, Dirty Boxing 1

Episode Date: March 20, 2025

The UFC is back in the U.K. with UFC London this Saturday at the O2 Arena. In the main event, former welterweight champion Leon Edwards takes on Sean Brady in a high-stakes matchup. Is Edwards fighting for his championship future on Saturday? On an all-new edition of Between the Links, the panel answers your questions about UFC London, the main event between Edwards and Brady, and the stakes involved. Additionally, they'll answer questions about the rest of the lineup, the UFC and ESPN relationship reports, Bryce Mitchell and Jean Silva's continuously building rivalry ahead of UFC 314, other major news going on in the combat sports world, and much more. Join MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Jed Meshew. Follow Mike Heck: @m_heckjr Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When I got a great deal on a great gift at Winners, I started wondering, could I get fabulous gifts for everyone on my list? Like this designer fragrance for my daughter. At just $39.99, how could I resist? This luxurious will throw for my sister. This gold watch for my partner? A wooden puzzle for my niece? Leather gloves for my boss?

Ooh, European chocolate for the crossing guard? At these prices, could I find something for everyone at Winners? Stop wondering. Start gifting. Winners, find fabulous for less. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Live from MMA Fighting Studios, this is Between the Links. And now, your host, my! The iconic voice of Esther Lynn welcomes you to a brand new edition of BTL.

Happy Thursday to us all. As Esther said, I am Mike Heck on location here in Orlando, Florida. This is not a planned thing. just sort of happened. Kids on spring break. So last night, the wife and I said, let's get in the car, let's do this damn thing. And we drove five hours to Orlando.

And now we are here live on YouTube with all of you to answer your questions. And joining me to do that is Mr. No Gray area, the hot take kid himself, the greatest climber in all of MMA, the one, the only. Jed Bishu from MMAfighting.com. There is.

Hi, Jed. Howdy y'all? Mike, happy to see you out on the road, you know, giving your kid a good experience. That's what every parent, you know, should be doing on these lovely weather we've got. So let's chop it up. Apparently some weird stuff's going on.

BKFC, hockey fights. I don't know. Let's see what the people want to talk about. Yeah, it's there is a plethora of options because we got, yes, ice wars, which is, I don't even know what to say about that, but I'm sure we'll get asked about it. Dirty boxing coming up this weekend. UFC's in London and sleeves are optional here.

E Casey Liding producer extraordinaire. We'll be joining us as well. Where is he? Where's Casey? Hi. Hi, Casey. Hi. I'm happy to be here.

Yeah, sleeves off. I'm excited. Yeah, UFC London, Ice Wars, Orlando, family time. This is great. Yes, all the things. Family time like Ice Wars. Should we just, should we just start? Let's just start there, Jed, because you are a man who likes things that are against the norm,

and you are the greatest advocateer of Fight Circus that there ever was, probably including even those who work for said promotion, you introduce Fight Circus to the masses. And now we have this thing. And I remember watching, you know, 3 a.m., some weird network flipping through the channels on a night and overnight where a hangover is probably coming, eating some shitty food, flip them to the channels, and I'm like, oh, what is this? And you're watching dudes hockey fight, but that's the entire sport. And I was like, this is one of the coolest things ever.

And then it just sort of stopped. And now all of a sudden we are back at it, BKFC is bringing ice wars to the masses. And apparently it's going to come as soon as June. So we are knocking on the door of their first event. do you like this? I think this is an incredible idea and I don't like what they're doing with it if that makes sense.

Oh. So like obviously this is silly fun and I'm super supportive of it. I think to like some point somebody needs to understand like how fight like what are viable things right? Like this is not a viable fight promotion. People aren't going to tune in every other Saturday

to watch hockey fighting or whatever. But if this is a sprinkle of something different in the midst of your normal rotation, totally fine, right? Like this needs, you know what this needs to be, Mike? It needs to be the McRib because when it comes back, people are excited that the McRib is back. But it's a limited time thing. You don't do it. So you don't come out and say, we're going to do six of these events a year and it's going

to be BKFC Ice Wars, the organization. No, just one event a year. maybe two where this is the BKFC card. It's BKFC Ice Wars the card. BKFC Ice Wars 3. I don't know. I was trying to think of something clever off the top of my head and I just started speaking and hoping it would come

and nothing got in there. So it's just like you shouldn't try. Yeah, like something's silly something very silly and fun, you know? Like you shouldn't try to make this a promotion. Like it's something that is sustainable because it's not. But as a change of pace

for your normal BKFC product. I think it's great. And so if I were then, I would just be like, why would we do this six times a year? Maybe we do it twice a year, you know, but like we have our tent pole events,

the knuckle manias. We can add the ice wars as a thing. But I think that like, like I'm 100% going to tune in for the first one. Probably not tuning in for the second one, especially if it's a month and a half later. So it's just like you got to, you always say it.

You got to give people room to miss you. And this feels like the exact. the exact opposite of understanding that this is a sort of thing that would do much better in small doses, then it will be like, ha, here's this great new idea. So when I saw this, this was like, to me, this was the UFC's power slap in a lot of respects. We're like, all right, we're going to do something different where like you flip through the channels or in today's society, you flip through social media and you see hockey fights, which you would stop and watch the occasional NHL hockey fight. But if this is like what this is,

people are probably going to give it more cadence. So they obviously don't have the UFC's power. They don't have Dana White backing it as a promoter. Is this kind of similar? Like this will not do the social media numbers that PowerSlapp will. But PowerSlapp will never get a television deal again. Like it's not one of those things. They will make their money through just sort of the attention span of today's world,

which is, okay, we're going to watch one dude slap another as hard as they can. That dude's going to fall over. and then maybe we'll see another one in a few seconds. Like that's where PowerSlapp's business model is right now. And they're getting a YouTube deal and such. Is this sort of what BKFC is trying to do as well, trying to get some extra social media boom? Because like you said,

this is not something that like Warner Brothers Discovery is going to pick up and be like, you know what? We need before AEW Dynamite. We need Ice Wars from Bareknuckle Fighting Championship. I think that that is the goal. is to be something like that. I got to tell you, Power Slap should just not be your target.

Like, nobody should be aspiring to Power Slap. That is a thing that exists only by the virtue of Dana White's stubbornness and an infinite amount of money that he can pour into this project. Not that it's like a huge money sieve because they don't pay anybody anything and the production costs are relatively low. But like, it's, you don't need to try to be that. Because realistically, like what BKFC has done,

is run their own race. That's why they're interesting. This is a continuation of that to some extent. I just think it's a miscalculation as far as like what a sustainable product is for them. I think that this should just be like a one-off thing where you do it every once in a while because this is frankly much more interesting than Power Slap. I have never had the same moral issues that people do with Power Slap. I think that it is just incredibly uninteresting.

But if you like it, sure, I guess. I think a lot of things are like low brow, but it's fine. It's not a crime to enjoy that. This is at least there is something that maybe it could be interesting, but is it going to be interesting enough to compel people to watch over and over again over the course of a year? No.

It's like a morbid curiosity thing. There's a reason like you brought up. the greatest promotion in fight sport currently fight circus they don't do all their gimmicks every time out because it loses the panache it loses the appeal you just put it in sparingly and you let people keep coming to it and so i ultimately think that this will have less legs than power slap has strictly because there's not the same level of investment behind it and i think that that will overall be better for it because it should not be something that it shouldn't be a new thing we're like oh there's an ice wars tonight because

you should never say the phrase there's an ice wars it's like oh ice wars if it ever gets frequent enough to use a word before it you know a qualifier before it there's too much this should be ice wars the only ice wars we talk about for the year 2025 i dig it i agree with you i think this is one or two times a year i think make knuckle mania a little knucklemania fight week a little more special like slot one in there the night before that would be a cool one doing some freaking ice palace somewhere where B league 40 plus year old hockey players play their Wednesday night games like you just do something there four or five hundred people sell a few tickets make it part of it experience to enjoy the entire hockey fighters in

yeah yeah like old hockey enforcers in yeah like that's just fun stuff like that's what this should be this should not be hey let's look at our schedule of events and see six ice wars cards between now and Thanksgiving. It should just not be that way. So I'm intrigued by this. Hopefully it's done correctly. Hopefully it's not overkill. But every time BKFC does something, we're like,

ah, this is as good as it gets. They always find a way to keep on moving. And yeah, if you're going to do events, it should be part of fight weeks and just like the two biggest ones you have all year. So, um, yeah. I just, BKFC is obviously like a fairly creative organization.

I would like them to channel, like to just lean into that as opposed to being like, ooh, here's an idea. Let's, let's beat this horse until it's dead. Like, okay, you've done ice wars. What other kind of wars can you do? Like, what else can we do here to sort of exist in your same space, but maybe push the envelope a little bit?

I would love to see that from them instead of just going down. Oh, here's an idea that's fun. Let's really try and make it something because I just, and maybe I'm wrong. I guess it could always be wrong here. but like there's just not a real world I don't think where this becomes like a thing and so don't try don't try to make fetch happen

you got to let fetch happen organically and this feels like they're trying to make fetch happen a little bit by saying we're going to do six of these we wish you luck BKFC we like the out of the box thinking that's for sure all right let's bring in the suns out guns out in case you lied in to bring up your questions your thoughts

maybe you have super chats about ice wars to keep the conversation going. Ice wars. Ice wars. Yeah. You have C London. We get crazy. Dirty boxing.

Do you even have ice in California? Do they play hockey in California outside of the Los Angeles Kings? I was saying. Ice is a very bad word in California. So. Well, it depends on who you're for.

F them. F them all. Touche. Tijé, too J. apparently there's a hockey team here a Los Angeles L. Reyes, I guess, or something.

But yeah, that's all I know about hockey. Oh, yeah, there's a duck team down the down the street too. Yeah, quack, quack, quack. Let's go. All right. First super chat we got, this is a loaded, not loaded question.

It's a, you got to go back in the nostalgia part of the brain for this one. I like the nostalgia ones. If this is a Spencer question, okay, I'm looking at it. So far, so good. Usually it's like, name the top 10 falterweight fights you've seen between 2004 and 2009.

We love you, Spencer. 2024 is my favorite MMA year since the early 2010s when GSP Silva and John were all on top, but feels like 2025 has dropped off. Curious how you three describe your current MMA fan and what your favorite MMA period was.

Casey, I want to start with you because I think you've been here, you've been around this world a lot longer than we have when it comes to this stuff. Because you look at it from a different lens. You've been covering the sport for a long time

and you've been up close and personal some of the biggest moments that have ever happened. So what was your favorite MMA period just as a fan and then just even working within the sport?

They're kind of, of different periods. There's, there's definitely that, that, I think that period as a fan where every fight you see, it could be in the long run, like kind of an average fight, like, whatever, but in the moment, you felt like this was freaking amazing. And I felt like that was around, I don't know the date, but I don't know if you can look on topology, when Diego, Diego Sanchez fought Clay Guida. Was it Clay, no, no, no, I'm sorry, Clay Guida versus Roger Werta.

That was it. Clayguita versus Roger Werge. Around that, so I think that's about 12 years, maybe 14 years ago. How long ago was that? 2007. 2007. Oh, more than that.

That was 18 years ago. Oh, my God. You old kid. There was that, there was 18 years ago. That was the main event, that was the main event of the Ultimate Fighter 6 finale. Was that fight? Oh, my God.

Well, that same was like everything was it was when Dana used to say and this was very true in the time Every card has like this this oh or holy shit moment like there was something you saw on a card that you're like I can't believe human bodies did that word like that was this this incredible amount of violence that was kind of like your my kind of my first like level of MMA fandom but as far as like to me that my favorite part of the sport it had to be the rise of Connor McGregor. In particular, when Connor was fought on the Dublin card, I think, the Dublin card. That was, to me, the best UFC has ever been. The most energetic crowd has ever been, almost innocent in a way. And that would be kind of my, I think, peak kind of fandom as far as like, oh, my God, this sport is so freaking incredible.

And I'm seeing a type of energy in this crowd I've never experienced before. So that's why I kind of go to as far as that kind of fandom. How about you, Jed? It's really hard. Because like a lot of this will just be like your favorite fandom is more than likely going to be like your initial fandom. Right. Like that's why you stayed a fan for I guess I'm at 20 yearsish at this point, maybe a little longer than that. I think my answer has to.

to be around 09 to 2010. So that sort of stretch there. Because I think that, I think 2016 is when the product was the best. 100%. I think like that's like the 2015-16, like right before the sale basically. Like that's when the product really had started to mesh everything super well together. All the strike force dudes had come over. Like the UFC had fully monopolized the sport at that.

juncture. Carr as was that year. Yeah. Like that that was just when that was the year that was the year that was the year that monopolies are good. Monoplies are good like right when they happen because you get all the things you want. And then basically immediately after that the people that have the monopoly like cool,

we can start delivering a much worse product, which is almost exactly what happened. I think my the zenith of my fandom is probably 0910. And 09's like UFC 100 was that year. By that time, most of the pride dudes were in the promotion at that point. So even if they're not peak Shogun Who or whatever, we've got Shogun Fandallet going on. That was the year we got St. Pierre Pen 2, which is, that was just a monumental thing. They did the 24-7 style promo build for that. like 2009 to 2010 I think is probably like when I was in the apex of my fandom.

And for my current fandom, it's hard to qualify, it's hard to qualify how I feel about the sport right now because it is my job and that fundamentally changes your perspective on things. The best way I can answer this is I love my job. I do not wake up and think, ever think, man, I don't want to go to work today, which I'm very, very grateful for. If I was not working in this industry, I think that it is extremely low percentage that I would still be like plugged into the sport. Maybe. But like I would have fell off a lot sooner, I think. Because frankly, when I started working and I was already starting to feel some decline on it.

And that is just every year the product is worse. So it is harder to like I if I were if this were my job, there's not a chance in hell I'm watching 42 events a year when the events are this stage. Just would never happen. Yeah. I think I mean obviously like first easy ultimate fighter was like super interesting to me. And I was watching the sport before it. It was an important time for me is when I ordered UFC 40 that was like the first one like that I bought and like convinced my parents like can I can I buy this on on pay-per-view?

That was Tito Ortiz versus Ken Shamrock because I was obviously a big pro-wrestling fan. And then I realized on that day, through the fight week and then watching the fight itself, I'm like, Jesus Christ, the UFC is pro-wrestling. It's real, but it's pro-wrestling. They built this fight up like a pro-wrestling card. They made people believe who were not longtime fans of the sport

that watch everything, that Ken Shamrock had a chance of winning that fight. And he sure didn't because Tito ran his ass over outside of like one tiny moment where Ken landed a big shot. And then they ran that ship back two more times and it just never really got there. So that like was a big learning experience for me of like what the sport actually was. I love the ultimate fighter mostly for Diego Sanchez. But 2016 is just the year of years for this sport. When you look back on the defining moments of the UFC, obviously it was tough one in the finale in Forrest Griffin and Stefan Bonner.

And there were other big moments along the way. but 2016 was just nonstop chaos from start to finish from the beginning of the year. I mean, the first main event of 2016 was the fucking fight of the year. It was one of my favorite fights of all time, Jed's favorite fight of all time. Robbie Lawler versus Carlos Condit was the first main event of 2016. And it was the best fight of the year. I distinct those. That was on like January 3rd, too or something insanely.

Right. And I remember watching it. And I remember going. going that's the best fight I've ever seen I don't know if it's going to win fight of the year because people will forget that it even happened this year because it happened on like Jan 2 or whatever and like the year's really long time

it's like that should be the best fight of the year because it's the best fight I've ever seen and it was fight of the year I was really happy that everybody got it right yeah there's so many yeah go ahead oh I was like real quick on the fight of the year do you think if Carlos would have gotten the not the decision are outlook changes on that fight at all?

I think most people feel would feel better about it. I would certainly feel better about it. I just wonder. I thought Carlos won the fight. I think most people thought I'm also comfortable with the draw. So my only minute issue with that fight is that I don't think the right man won.

It should either be a draw or Carlos winning. So, but otherwise, I just couldn't give a crap last. The fight's amazing. Yeah. Still not the whole fame. How my, but this, I think this is very interesting for me, how my fandom has changed. I was at that fight. At that time, I knew Carlos a little better because I saw him more frequently.

And I was like, I was just, I was amazed. But now, how many years is it later now, 10 years later at least? How many years? Almost 10. So whatever, 10 years later. Now, now I look, if that fight happened now, I would be almost, I'd be excited for like, cool, that was a fun fight personally, but like I would be actually really sad because of how much brain damage took place in that fight.

So, like, I just see fights differently now in that sense. Like, now I recognize brain damage and how incredibly, you know, like both those fighters were not the same fighters after that night. And it's just weird. So, like, I was, I was still a little, even though I was, even though I was working in the sport for like almost 10 years at that point, I was still, I think I was still a little naive to the reality and dangers of the sport as compared to what I am now.

So, yeah, it's different. We're good in this one? I think we're good. Spencer Gate is $999 worth? I think you did. I think so. I mean, 2016 just rules. And then you guys should just go, like, if you're bored, like, if you're,

want to like a if you need a time period to catch up on if you're a newer fan if you're like a covid era fan and welcome if you are just go on the fight pass or ESPN plus and just go through the entire 2016 from start to finish and I'm telling you not all that was good by the way they lost pay-per-views they had to turn a pay-per-view into a fight night like two days before because they lost a main event and johnny hendricks and stephener wonder boy thompson became a main event and they had to change a pay-per-view to a fight night, like at the flick of the fingers, at the snap of the fingers. Like, this is when Steve-Bay won the heavyweight title in front of 45,000 people. This is when Steve-B fought in Cleveland.

It never fought in Cleveland to freaking again. After the biggest star-making moment of his career, one of the top five-star making performances of anybody's career, if we're being honest. They never went back to Cleveland. See him punk debut. Like, there's just so many weird things that happen along the way, so many great things that happen along the way. the sale of the company, UFC 199 for multiple reasons. Sorry, Casey. Also, 200. I mean, just Jesus. So much happened with 200 Fight Week as well. Just craziness. It's obviously a very big year. I will say it's different. 2023 was a great year. It is fundamentally different than these other years because there is also so much just nonsense in between it because there are 40 plus events. year right like 06 there were like maybe 18 events or something it was like a really small number

and so every fight card you watched was something meaningful good important things were happening and so like with the biggest stars in sport o3 we know the we know where the sport is out with as far as stars and declining etc o3 was fun because it was chaotic and so it was incredibly fun to watch like islamakache volkinovsky like defy was sick uh Sean strickland and became the middleweight champion out of nowhere. Alex de Grasso pulled off that incredible upset. Like, O3 is a really fun year that I think I would remember much more fondly if the sport were the way it used to be.

And where every other weekend I wasn't watching some Apex slop, like we just got to build better cards with a little bit more scarcity. But O3 was our 2023 was a really fun year as well. Yeah. Which made last year, obviously, the high. eyes last year were extremely high. There were like three of them. And so it wasn't, it felt like a letdown in a lot of ways.

Yeah. Sean O'Malley wins the Bandaway title. Alex Pereira is on the wrong end of the knockout of the year, leaves the division, wins a title in another division before the year is over. It's just nuts. John Jones finally. John Jones came back. Valentina Schochenko got stopped by Alexa Grasso.

I mean, Jesus. What is? 23 was a wild year. And so it was really fun. But like that is sort of the difference in my fandom for a year to jump out now to me as something like a whole bunch of insane stuff has to happen. Because there's also going to be half of the events are going to be whatever, like just stuff you don't really remember or care about. And so whereas that's not how things used to be. And so, you know, I'm an old man yelling at the clouds here.

All right. What else we got? I got some more Super Jets from Slito. Did you see the John interview where he picked Tom and O'Malley as the two fighters to watch out for? Now he's acting like he does know Tom is. When was this? I missed that. It must have been a while ago if he was picking Tom as a guy to look out for.

Oh, someone picked something like a keynote interview, I guess. It must have been if he was going to say that. Because like why? There's just no chance he'd say that now. And now he's acting like he doesn't know who Tom is. Yeah, that's John Jones. Guys, he's just not going to fight Tom Aspaw and that's okay. I've been saying it for three years or however the hell long it's been at this point.

And it's fine. We don't have to harp on it. We don't have to dig in. He's just not going to fight him. And that's he doesn't have to. He does not have to. He does not need to. He is more than will like able and I'm not going to use the word deserve because it doesn't really mean.

anything like he didn't have to if he doesn't want to he's not going to my primary issue at this point is we all know you're not going to so just quit pretending like let's stop wasting everybody's time for this which is what's happening right now so that's a little annoying but like he's just never going to fight tom so it's fine yeah and it yeah UFC should make time to champion and move on do you think like hold on since you brought this up like I've seen people say well because of how bad the UFC and ESPN's relationship is right now and the whole, you know, the way the year has started that because it's a contract year, anyone who wants to see that fight should, should have more hope than ever that it's going to happen. Well, respect to people within this

industry. Does that, does the way this year has started this first quarter, the ESPN blunders, UFC's awful cards for the most part outside of 311, should that give you hype? as somebody who wants to see John Jones versus Tom Aspinall? Are they setting us up for something big here? Or do you think one has nothing to do with the other? I don't think they're unrelated, but I don't think anyone should have hope. The ESPN stuff is unrelated. The UFC is just mad at ESPN because they have a dog shit product.

ESPN having a bad product will not incentivize the UFC to pay more money to make John accept this fight. It just means it's incredibly likely that they don't resign with the ESPN, which has probably always been the case because ESPN is bad. They are bad at their job of streaming. And that is true of all sports, not just in May. They are bad at it. And so they're going to lose the UFC. I will be pretty shocked if the UFC comes back to ESPN unless CSPN just opens the bank account, which I don't anticipate happening. And so like that's unrelated.

But like, sure, it's more likely than it would be at any other scenario because they are in a contract year and you want to put your best foot forward. That it's 1% instead of zero. Like it, the ultimate determination here is are the UFC going to pay an arm and a leg? Because that is what John is asking for. By his own words, I want FU money. The UFC is not in the business of giving FU money to anybody that's not in the business. named Dana White or I guess Ari Emanuel. Like, they're just not going to pay the price of he asks, and that's fine.

It is, that is not a condemnation of John Jones to ask for that money. That's what he feels is services are worth, and that's fine. But they're just never going to do that unless they have no other alternative. And they, they do. Because it doesn't, whether John fights or not is not going to make a major difference to the deal Netflix is going to offer them, or the deal Fox is going to offer them, or Amazon, whoever it is. Like, they have a product that suitors want.

And so they don't need John at all. And that is the core tension. The UFC does not need John Jones. And John is asking for money that they do not give out. So he's never going to fight him. Yep. The UFC will never let a fighter become bigger than the brand ever again. Yeah, they did it once with Connor and now look for that.

We're actively not trying to have him fight. And when they did do that, that was the, the most fun the sports ever been. Yep. But maybe not the most profitable though. And that's what matters because that's the world we live in. Boohoo. Dude.

But here we are. If the UFC was negotiating with only ESPN and then they are negotiating for a deal, hey, we need to show how much value we bring. This is what we can do. Here's how you can get returns on your investment with us. Then maybe. They are not. They have every streaming partner is in a fight to get them.

It is not the ultimate thing that will decide the deal would not be how much value the frigging UFC brings on like pay-per-views, which recent reporting actually suggests pay-per-views are just in the tank. Because that makes sense, honestly, anecdotally. But like, yeah, no, it doesn't matter. Like, this is a bidding war between Netflix and Amazon and Fuby and whoever the hells wants to get involved. and they're going to have to pay out the nose anyway. So it does not matter whether John fights. So no, they will pay John $3 million more dollars than his regular contract because, you know, they feel generous or whatever.

But that's it. Like he's not getting F you money. And so, yeah, just give up on it. And then you can be pleasantly surprised if some miracle it happens. But give up on the idea that this is happening. It's not. Yeah. So do you guys believe that John knows who Thomas?

I believe that I single-handedly made John aware of Tom by trolling his ass. I led the trolls that specifically got John to start tweeting responses. This kind of got me bummed about talking about MMA, actually, a little bit. I'm like, oh, okay, we're down. I'm rolling on the credits now. No, I get it. Really? I just,

whatever, man. No, because we were talking about fandom and like, oh, yeah, this is, I was, so in my head, I'm going like, oh, those memories and those fills. And then I'm now, I'm out of the here. I'm like, oh, well, UFC's got to make their money. You know, that's, that's, that's, because U.C. didn't make John Francis. Why did they make John versus Tom?

Of course, of course. They're not going to do it. They're not going to do it. It's fine. But we all made it in the middle of COVID year. They all wanted it. All they had to do is pay for it, and they would have gotten it. And I bet.

And I didn't do it. Honest to God, bet the price of that fight is cheaper than the price John wants now. Oh, one million percent. One million percent. Because that's just how things work. So it's just not going to happen. And that's okay. We miss out on fights we want all the time.

And the sport keeps moving on. And then people, you know, will remember, oh, that's a shame we never got that one and then never think about it again. There are dozens of fights like, ah, would have been cool to have that. But we didn't. All right. It was just a slight change in our timeline. We could have had Francis Naganu versus John Jones at the UFC Apex in front of 10 people. Oh, no.

That would have been they would have brought that shit in Yazzo Island for sure. Oh, yeah. That was going to fight Allen. When they did Steepa, Francis, right? That was an apex, right? That was Apex, yeah. Yeah, you're just saying, yeah, who knows. All right.

Thank you much. I've got a few more super chats. Oh man. Some people in the chats are just stone wrong. Oh, I can't wait. I can't wait. And I'm hoping there's a subject that I got blasted about in my DMs that I hope comes up here because I got shit to say about that. LazyBed, thank you.

UFC on TNT. Are we four or against? Very intrigued. So our own Damon Martin writes up a report, the CEO from TNT Sports, WBD to be Warner Brothers Discovery. They are in the, they're hopeful to be in the UFC business. They're in the pro wrestling business right now with AEW that is giving them just awful ratings across the board, if we're being honest, especially compared to where they were five years ago. so you would think since the drop-up the UFC would look pretty damn tasty to them right now however they did power slap if we're because they were power slap was on tbs and that those

ratings were absolutely atrocious so maybe they just see the UFC I don't know but let's just say jed we find out right now NBA's gone UFC is going to be on TNT instead how would you feel about this I would feel I would sell my stock in Warner Bros. Discovery. Holy shit. Can you imagine the mismanagement of your brand if you lose the NBA to buy bad UFC? Because if you're on Warner Discovery,

you're not even getting the pay-per-view cards. Like, the pay-per-view would be done some other way because that's not the thing. And so, like, unless you are paying out the nose for them to move off the pay-per-view model and so you get some good cards, You're getting 18 APEC shows a year as opposed to the MB freaking A. Like that is a catastrophic failing if you are the Warner Bros. Discovery people.

I wouldn't shock me. Hold on. Hold on. They do. Warner Bros. Discovery owns Max as well. So if they can figure out, they haven't done it yet. But eventually they're going to run AEW pay-per-views on Max. You can get that, I guess. So technically there is a chance they could get paid.

When you frame it as, hey, they're out of the NBA business and into the UFC business, that's a loss. Like, that is just an outright failure of your work there. The UFC is not remotely close to the NBA as far as like being a, oh, we lost them, but we got here. It's like, that's not an even tradeoff. I have maintained a firm belief this entire time that the UFC is going to be. buy for Kate its product in some ways. And so it won't just go to Netflix or thing or Warner Bros or whatever that it will be some. And so it wouldn't shock me if, you know, we did go to a couple of, you know, we got 20 events

on T&T and we got 20 events on Netflix and et cetera, et cetera. So we'll see how that ends up. It'd be fine. Like it's all just the product will stay the same as the issue, right? Like I guess not an issue depending on who you are. Like the UFC does their promotion. Like they do all their production stuff. So it will just be what channel do I have to get to watch it.

And at least it's off ESPN with their dog shit streaming service that does not work. That's my big issue of all this conversation about the next broadcast partner. Because in the end, I really don't care because as fans, like Chad said, the product will be the same because that's one thing Dana has always kind of reiterated. like we control the production. The only way I would be excited about the new broadcast deal is kind of like if on TNT versus whatever Netflix or whatever, there's different production, just like, you know, NFL games and CBS versus Fox or whatever. It's the same thing, but slightly different production.

I just want that. I want something different. I've been seeing the same freaking logos, same freaking music, the same freaking everything for the last 20 years. I just want something different in terms of the production. And I would love that. It's just like if the just, it just had a different look, a different vibe. Yeah, you're still in an eight-sided cage, but it just looks a little different.

That's all I'm kind of hoping for as a fan personally. But yeah, they're going to make money yet. They're going to make a billion dollars here or a billion point one over here. I don't know. So I'm going to disagree with Casey on there's one because I obviously just don't even care. Like at this point, it does not matter to me what their production is. Like, it's fine, whatever. I think we do care, but okay, go on.

And then my, go on. Just like that means so little to me. Like, sure, it would be better if it was better. But like, I ultimately, it is not going to make a major influence on me. The one thing that I will stand up and be like, oh, this is interesting. One of the biggest issues with the ESPN deal, again, other than Ratchet streaming service, is that there is no incentive in the pay-per-views anymore. because the ESPN pays them a flat fee per pay-per-view. And so, like, they just don't, they try a little harder on the pay-per-views

because they still have to, like, get to a threshold per year or whatever to, like, because that's how their pay-per-view payout works. But, like, they're not really incentivized to max out their pay-per-views because they don't ultimately give a shit about the pay-per-view by number, which, per some recent reporting, is probably why the pay-per-view by number has dropped off catastrophically. If in their next deal, they are no longer operating in that, if they do a Warner Bros thing or whatever, and the pay-per-view goes back to being a, the UFC directly makes profit off each specific pay-per-view,

that will at least incentivize them to try hard on the things you pay the most money for. So I'd be interested. I don't think that's going to happen. But if that does happen, I would be very interested in that. But I think you care about production. Because imagine if they had different commentary teams. Because we complain about commentary a lot. I don't.

I care. I just don't. It does not matter. I hate all the commentary teams. Like, it would be better. Does it matter? No, it's still 50 events a year. It's just like, fine.

All right. All right. Man. I feel like we're in a weird tone. I want to kind of change it up with. Hey, listen, let's go. Let's freaking go. All right.

RS 40, guys, can you consider doing a watch party for this weekend's card? Also, do you think Leon's excuses of the Bala loss are going to haunt him versus Sean? I don't think we're going to do a watch party for this weekend's card. There's just so much shit happening on Saturday that it's like impossible to do it. So we're not going to do it. I would say that there is a world where there will be a watch party of some kind the following Saturday. not for Mexico City, but for the KSI Dylan Danis, Darren Till, Darren Stewart card,

because that's just silly, ridiculous fun. So we'll probably do one for that of some kind, probably like a digital one. I reject being on that. We're doing Mexico City. I'm in on that. I'm not, I'm having to write a thing on KSI and Dylan Dennis right now.

And I want to go lay down in traffic. Like, I do not. understand why Dylan Danis is still a thing. He just, he's the most uninteresting human being alive. And so I'm out on that. Find somebody else to digital. I'll do Mexico City because hell yeah, Brandon Moreno, Vinny Sigs, rock on, baby. The main card's fired.

That prelim is tough, but main card's great. Yeah. But I ain't doing that. I'm not willingly subjecting myself talking about Dylan Dennis. Fair. But the bigger question here, Jed, do you think Leon's excuse of the Balala loss are going to haunt him versus Sean? And I think the thing that people keep going back to is, well, the fight happened so early in the morning that it threw me off, even though Bilal fought at the exact same time. Do you think that those excuses are going to haunt him versus Sean Brady on Saturday?

So we're clear. I think that's a valid excuse. I mean, it's not a valid excuse in the fact that Balal is like, it is. It's not an excuse of like, oh, he got an unfair advantage. It's, I did not handle this well. I think it's totally reasonable, which is a condemnation of your own preparation, Leon. Like, it was not a surprise when you would be fighting. You needed to prepare better and you did not do that.

But I do think that, like, it's not an unreasonable thing to be like, I was not, I did not do well because this time was different. And Ballal did better at that and thus he won. I don't think that his excuse will affect the Sean Brady fight what will affect it is his ability to fight I don't think we got the best Leon in that fight against Ballah Muhammad I'm not sure that it would have made that much of a difference Bilal Muhammad has been getting better every time out and just seems to be really really really good at fistfighting guys

I am fascinated by this main event because I don't know what to expect from Leon If he loses, I do not think it will have anything to do with him making excuses in Bala. It would just be that Sean Brady is a better fighter than him. But I've seen Leon be really good at defending takedowns, and I also saw Bala Muhammad score like 10 of 11 on him. That is the core story at play this weekend is can Sean Brady just spam takedowns and get Leon to the floors? If he does, he'll win.

If he doesn't, he's going to lose. And so I am like that main tension is really fascinating because Leon is, honestly Leon has always been a bit of a Mercurial fighter he went on that long win streak but even during that win streak like there were just boneheaded errors Nate Diaz almost beat his ass like that's Nate Diaz who's super washed when they fought almost pulled off the upset win because sometimes Leon just forgets that he's in the middle of a fist fight and so that is always a thing that can occur and so it's why like he is a fascinating fighter to watch even if he's not the most exciting fighter to watch Sean Brady I talked to Sean earlier this week You'll see that interview coming out shortly on MMA fightings all over the place. And Sean, like, obviously, yes, you have to ask Sean about this because it keeps coming up. And Sean's just like, no, man, like, Bilal is just better than him. And the reason that Bilal is better than him, because there is a blueprint on how to beat Leon Edwards. It has happened since his first UFC loss.

It happened in the Kamara Usman loss. And it happened in all of his subsequent losses since then. Anytime he's lost, it's for the same purpose. It is a guy who can grapple who could push forward and put Leon in his back foot. Those are the fights he loses. And then on top of that, if they can just pester him, keep Leon moving backwards, put him against the fence and put him on his back. Those are the fights Leon loses. And it's not because he can't do that.

But it appears and it doesn't appear like Sean is alone in this conversation. Leon just gets so discouraged in fights. Like you could see it in his eyes and you saw it in the Balafi, where he was just like, okay, I'm not going to win. And then his coach will like fire him up and he'll have a big moment. Like go watch the first Kabar Usman fight. He was just getting outside of the first round and the kick at the end of the fight. Usman just chased him down, made him uncomfortable, tackled him.

And even when he couldn't, he would just keep chasing Leon around. Leon will go backwards and Kamar just made him very uncomfortable all night to the point where like Leon just looks like he was bored and didn't want to be there. And that's sort of the thing that I'm very interested in because I don't know if you guys are aware of this. Sean is going to do the exact same thing that those guys did on Saturday. I'm just super curious to see how Leon reacts to it because all these guys are great grapplers. All these guys do it in different ways. Sean Brady is a friggin' hoss, man. That guy is probably the strongest dude in this division, like just pound for pound strength.

And he's also a super good technical grappler on top of that. So this is a super interesting matchup. I actually think this is a more compelling matchup than the JDM fight was. I understand for the Leon fans, like JDM is different. It's not a grappler versus a striker. But I actually would have picked Leon to beat JDM pretty comfortably. This one, I don't know. I have a hard time picking this one, which makes this a little more interesting.

Plus, the stakes are way higher here where I feel that the loser this fight will never fight for a UFC title, either again or just ever. I like the term strikler Nice Strycler baby The strikler He's a strikler baby He's a strikler I disagree that this is more interesting

I do agree with most everything else you said I'm just more interested in the JDM Leon because I have less sure how that goes This fight is there are two outcomes Sean Brady tackles him or Sean Brady does not And we'll know very early on Like if Sean Brady gets the first take down the fight's over because, and I debated whether I was going to say this because it's mean.

And I try really hard not to be outright mean about fighters. Because mostly I'm saying like stuff. Like there are a couple of fighters I don't mind. But like Leon has never done anything that really warrants being mean other than being boring as hell. Which I stand by everything I said. All those times I trashed him for being boring and letting his career be dictated by others because he's boring. I stand by all that. I and I don't throw this accusation lightly because I almost never make this accusation about fighters

I don't think Leon Edwards has that dog in him like I just I don't think it's there and that is a testament to his ability to climb as high as he has without having like that deep-seated f-you somewhere in there when the like when the going gets tough he'll just turn it on And maybe I'm wrong, but like, I've just never seen it in a fight. Because even the head kick against like Usman, it's not really him like digging it out. He just threw a head kick that landed. That's more of a technical accomplishment than a he willed himself to victory there. And when you were saying, it's like, yeah, when he starts to lose, he does, like he just loses because he does not have that that edge to him.

He doesn't have the dog in him. And Sean Brady's a dude who, he's got some dog in him. Like, that's really tough. So, like, that's why I'm not. Like, I am interested in the core question of this fight. Once that's answered, I know how this fight goes. And so I was much more interested in the JDM fight. Because a lot of things could have happened there that I don't really know what would have gone on.

Let's keep going. All right. Oh, quick question. When you were talking about Leon and kind of how he loses, are there similarities between how Leon loses and how Alex Pereira lost a couple weeks ago? What are you saying? They just kind of not look bored, but kind of like, they kind of like, they just don't do anything.

Because like, because to me, to beat Leon, all you have to meet, not all you have to do, you have to do it, but you mix to martial arts, make him go backwards, make him think. And then once you're thinking, making, going backwards, have to have to do everything. then you can kind of beat him. You don't, you don't, no, no one's demolished Leon, but no, but they beat him. I mean, the ball fight was not competitive. I disagree. He didn't, he didn't TKO him, but 49-46 to his ass.

Yeah, but, yeah, but there was no, like, he lost rounds. I still don't think he got beat up and, like, lost that fight. He said, yeah, he lost rounds. He lost the fight, but, like, much like Pereira and Encliffe, like, yeah, he didn't get beat up, but he lost the fight. And that's why I kind of, like, he just kind of, like, we know, we can. Like, prayer just didn't do his best. And I feel like when we talk, when you're talking about Leon, Leon just didn't do his best when he loses.

I don't, I don't think that this is similar. I think, I think Perra had an off night. I think if Pereira continues to lose in that fashion, sure. Perra had one off night. The other time, he got knocked out cold. Leon mentally quits. And I don't think those are the same. And I could be wrong.

How many off nights is Leon had? It's not a lot of off nights having to win some of those fights as well. But that's what I mean, to me that is a dog in him. You're saying, you know, dog, to win on your bad nights,

that's having that dog in him. I know it might not be the same sense. I think, sure, he's got a poodle in him. He doesn't have a pit bull. Like, that's a different kind of dog.

And if, like, I don't, that's just going to take us down like a really long, breaking down what that dog in him means. like, I am not disrespecting Leon Edwards' ability to cage fight. He's very good at cage fighting. But when has Leon Edwards overcome adversity other than the Kamara Usman fight?

In the cage, not saying in life, in the cage, like when has he been like, oh, this guy's losing a fight. He is mostly a frontrunner, which is mean to say about a fighter because they hate that, but I think it's true. He's the most famous win. I mean, that's, that's it, but. Yeah. And that part of it was so spectacular as it was so unexpected.

It was so out of nowhere. And it's awesome. It's a great moment. Talk your shit forever, Leon Edwards. But like, he gave up against Ballal Muhammad, just straight up. He was just not doing anything in that fight when Belaw got going. And Balloa does that to a lot of people. But like, I don't know.

I think comparing him and Alex. And that's, and that's why. That's why I kind of compared to the prayer for example. I was getting the same sense. I think that prayer was just like, I can't deal with this. And I'm just, I think you and I are just never going to agree that that fight is remotely like

Leon's losses. And the other thing about Pereira too. Yeah. And the other thing about Pereira too in comparison to Leon is Pereira was fighting all the time, man. Leon fights like once every eight, nine, 10 months. maybe once a year, prayer is fighting every freaking three months.

At some point, it's just got to catch up to you and you're going to have a performance like that. And in some respects, he had that against Khalil Roundtree too, but just found a way to get it. Casey, here's where I fundamentally see the difference.

Alex might have won that fight. Like, that was a fight that Alex could have been winning. He was not performing his best, but many people thought he won. Like, there's not necessarily a, hey, you got to do something different because you are definitively losing this fight. Leon did nothing different and lost.

Like, I think that that's it. Like, there's no question who was winning the fight and did not have the ability to change the game. Alex was very much up. I scored the fight for Alex. Like, I don't necessarily think he needed to change anything. He just got the wrong side of the cards because Magamad, you know, fought well.

I if you want to squint your eyes and call it the same okay I to me they feel very different I guess just how we saw that maybe the prayer fight because you scored for Alex and going and like I said going into the fifth round I already thought the fight was over I already had it 3-1 for Enka-live so I was like oh well inculive to me in my mind watching that fifth round going to make the prayer fight it's like well prayer is God to do something different he's got to be crazy you know prayer and he just didn't happen I

Like, from my viewing, I kind of get the same sense when, not the same exactly, but when Izzy came for the fifth round versus Strickland, where he was just like. Yes. So that one, I'm much more. I am much more in that parallels to Leon. Like, the Alex fight was close to a toss-up to me. I don't like, it would have been cooler for him to try order, but I did not think he was down 3-1. And that probably is the fundamental difference there for us. But like the, the, the.

Is he Strickland? 100%. 100%. Okay. But, okay, I'm gonna get off the dog, the dog in him because,

you know, I'm like, but. That's what I was honest to God, I did not want to say it because I know that people will flexibly hate that and push back on the idea.

I'm not calling him a coward or a pussy or anything like that. I'm just saying he doesn't have the, he's not just in Gae where, oh, shit's going bad. F it. I'll stand here and chuck them.

Like that ain't in him. And, Sometimes you need that and that that is not in him. Got a lot of other things going for him, but he ain't got that. I think Sean Brady's got some of that in him. Now that got him killed by law, mind you. Sometimes doing that is bad. Yeah, then you look horrible.

Yeah, rather than just losing your decision. Correct. All right. Thank you, Jeff. Now, this is great conversation. I like it. digging it. Thank you much.

The BTL's all about, baby. Yeah. That's your votes. Uh, Jedder Casey. All right. Oh, oh, man. God dang.

Okay. Because this gentleman paid $999. We got to, we got to answer this. God, dang it. Wade, thank you. Appreciate all the week of content. If possible, do more shows with all four of you guys like last week. Jen mentioning Casey having Hank at 20 was hilarious.

Look, we don't have to dive back into this. I'm just saying. Watch our winking's video on a YouTube channel. The man who was apparently dominating the number two pound for pound fighter in the world is only 20. Yeah, at 205 pounds. Because, yeah, because those guys. Yeah, you know, you know what I feel about the big guys. Everything Jed said about, hey, don't mention it on the show by a, 100% true.

We literally had a meeting. We're in a Zoom. We're in a Google meet legitimately discussing that exactly. exact thing. Hey, let him have his day. It's okay. Like, choose your battles. And we're like, okay, of course, you're our best friend, AK. We support you. And then Casey brought it up and I'm just like, you see the moment where our faces change. And we still were very kind. I think there's a legal doctrine about opening the door and Casey opened the door. And we still didn't walk through that door. Yeah, we might have threw a wiffle ball in the door. That was about it.

He just poked our head in. We let you know. We let you know where we're in. We just honked the horn outside the house. Come out and talk to us. And then you just didn't. And it's okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Wade. A few more super chat. Ontario. The wait is over. The gold standard of online casinos has arrived. Golden Nugget online casino is live. Bringing Vegas style excitement and a world-class gaming experience right to your fingertips. Whether you're a seasoned player or just starting, signing up is fast and simple.

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It was the night before the gathering and all through the house. The host rapid cozy cashmere throw from homesense for their spouse. Kids toys for $699 under the tree. and crystal glasses for just $14.99 for their brother Lee. A baking dish made in Portugal for Tom and Sue. And a nice $5.99 candle. Perfectly priced just for you. Happy holidays to all.

And to all a good price. Home sense. Endless presents perfectly priced. Another one from our great, great friends, Spencer. Spencer, one more nostalgic fun one, boys. Assuming in primes, y'all rather see aldo versus ilia bj versus habib spider versus izzie we already saw that by the way or fader versus ingano yeah that's true spider izzie for me

100% it's spider izzie yeah uh if you're getting me prime anderson versus prime isy 100% that's that's the one that i'm more interested in uh i love fador i have a great great love and respect for fador against prime and gano that fight is not removed totally close. Things get better. Fador's 20 years preceded Francis Inganu. If you gave me Fador against like not prime, like early Francis before he learned things,

I'm a little more interested. But like, Fadour's not going to hit a Russian trip on Francis and then ground and pound him. He's just going to get uppercutted into the freaking third row. Francis has a great chin. So like even Fadour's like big like casting punches aren't going to work there. Like I love Fador.

I think Fador is the greatest heavy. of all time, bar none. Eras are eras, and Francis is of a different era and a newer one, so would win that fight. Aldo Ilya would probably be number two. Yeah, I love that player. Aldo is probably a little undersized for that, like ultimately, but that fight would be sensational, so that's probably my number two there. BJ Habib, I just don't need it.

I watch BJ fight. I watch BJ fight George St. Pia the second time, and I think that the fight looks something remarkably similar. First round would be interesting, like the first round or two, but, and I, as big a BJ Pin fan as has ever existed, and I do not think he is competitive over 25 minutes with the beat. I'll go auto I love that fight. That's fun.

I'd pick I'll play, but it's a fun. It's a fun for example. can fight. That's going to the cards. It's going to be incredibly close. Dude, I still might pick Prime Aldo because so here's the other part of that one. Yeah. We don't know what Prime Ilya. We don't know what Prime I is. Ilya is not in that prime yet. So like Prime Alia, probably pick Prime Ilya. Ilya right now versus Prime Aldo as incredibly fun fight. Prime Aldo actually kicked people, which was sick and made him way better fighting than when he only is going to jab and throw a left hook at people, which. she's still unbelievably good at winning fights with that.

But Prime Aldo against current Ilya would be a sick fight. I would guess that Prime Iliot beats him because we just don't know what Prime Alia looks like yet. What would you think of Prime BJ? Because I'm not the biggest BJ guy, but I get people, he was dude for so many fans. I get no issue of that. But Prime BJ versus Prime Connor. I think BJ absolutely dog walks him.

Dog walks him. I yeah there's I don't how does Connor win that fight is my question BJ has a prime BJ I mean shit he can't be knocked out shitty even old shitty BJ had a legendary chin

yeah the little machita couldn't knock his ass out at heavyweight like Connor's left hand as good as it is and Connor will just you know they have fundamentally similar issues they both get tired but when they get tired BJ can tackle him and the fight is over so I I think that is a nightmare matchup for Connor honestly.

Cool. It's kind of curious. Now, Prime BJ versus Prime Aldo? That's pretty fun. I'm interested in that. So Otto would we're going auto up and wait then? Yeah, I think Aldo has to come up and wait. I know BJ went down to 45, but that was a bad.

BJ wins that fight, but although is, Aldo's not getting the doors. Yeah, although doesn't get the doors blown off him in that fight. No, no. He's competitive. It's just. BJ's boxing was so like one-two focused and Aldo's defense is so good. I kind of want to see it, yeah.

I would have really loved a prime, Prime versus Prime there. Yeah, these are fun to think. These are fun of the thing about. Thank you, Spencer. Honestly, as you say this, other than Habib, I don't know a worse matchup. Like, I'm struggling to think of a worse matchup for Connor than Prime BJ. It's like, hey, here's a dude you cannot hurt and is arguably a better boxer than you and definitely a better grappler than you.

Good luck. I guess I was more. I knew the boxing about. I was wondering what you thought of BJ. Could BJ take Connor down and how the boxing would go, you know? So I just kind of curious how you thought. And the first round, Connor is going to beat most people. And then after that, BJ is probably going to jab his ass off.

And as soon as he shoots a take down and gets it, it is over. So as a real, I've never thought of that. fight before, that is a uniquely bad fight for Connor. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Like, Connor would have to do the Nate Diaz rematch where he's like, I can't

kill Nate, so I'm going to have to learn how to fight for 25 minutes. This is like his only chance. I don't think that that would go very well for him. All right. Thank you much. Let's take a couple more. Slido. John Slito. Can we speculate on how

the end of John's title ring goes if he chooses not to fight slash pulls out against Tom. How does Dana slash the UFC handle it? With relative grace. I don't think they're going to throw. I agree. I don't think they're going to throw John on the bus just because they've spent so much time propping him up. And so my guess is it will be a behind closed doors. John, here's our final offer.

Here's the date. If you say, no, we're going to take the title from you. and John will say, no, that's not the money I want. And then they will say, cool, if you would like to announce privately that you're retiring, you're done. We can go with that as opposed to we are stripping the belt from you. And John will say, okay, guys, announcement, I am going to retire. And a week later, they will be like, John Jones is going to be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame. Yeah, pretty much.

That's how it's going to look. I'm looking forward to it. A couple more super chats before we. get out of here? Honestly, John should just retire after the statement would have made all this sense in the world. Yeah.

Thank you, Jake. How do we get Dana to remove that Islam quote from the PI? Islam is so scared of Teporia and a laughing emoji. Jed, your response to this. Put Jed up in the solo screen. What's the quote?

What's the quote? I don't know what the quote is. It's something like I'm the champion. It's something like I am the champion. I'm willing to fight anybody because I am the champion. Yeah, that's fine. Jake, love you.

Thank you for the super chat. We really appreciate it. This is a really bad take. And that's okay. We all have bad takes. I have bad takes all the time. You take is really bad, though. He's the top pound-to-bump fighter in the world.

He's certainly not afraid of Ilya to puturia. Because as I've mentioned about everybody, almost all the time. No fighters are afraid of other fighters, particularly not when you're the best fighter in the whole goddamn world. You just operate under the assumption you'll beat everybody. However, I think it's more than reasonable for Islam to say, that dude actually hasn't accomplished that much of featherweight because that's the reality. We all love Ilya Tupori.

He's my number two pound-for-pound fighter in the world. He's a very, very good fighter who's not even at his peak. He's going to probably go down as like a talent to remember forever. literally a year and two months ago from this day that we are speaking, the conversation around Ilya was, I don't even know if he's done enough to fight Alexander Volcanovsky. Right. Like he's only got the Josh Emmett win.

That's the only win he's got. He has an incredible 2024 where he knocks out Vulcan Max. Those are great wins. I'm not here to disparage those wins. That is three meaningful wins at featherweight. and two of them arguably against dudes who aren't at their best anymore. It's like we just because we want it, because we are desperate for there to be stars and greatness and get to see it,

we want Ilya Tuporia to be the greatest fighter in the world without having to prove it, right? Like he has come out and said, I'm fine with Lopez and Vokanowski fighting because that's really my belt or whatever. Well, if Vogue wins, that argument holds a little more water, If Lopez wins, no, because you bailed on the division before you fought him or Mavsar Evluev. Like, he didn't, he is, there is a legitimate question on whether he's the best featherweight in the world right now. Like, and you have to acknowledge that there are two men who have credible claims to being better than him.

I would still put him above them and did when we last rank it. But he is arguably not the best featherweight. And to just go, hey, here's a free lightweight title shot. It's not the worst thing that's ever happened. but it's definitely not like all that great, especially if you were Ilya, all of your title defenses have come against former featherweights. That's just how it's broken out for him.

But Dustin Porre, Hanato Morcano, twice on Volcanovsky, he's fought the featherweight. He fought the featherweight champ twice when everybody was like, this guy is undeniably the best guy. Now you want him to do it again as opposed to, hey man, just earn it with one. win one fight show me that you deserve this that is a reasonable ask and very clearly not afraid of anything in the goddamn world much less illy tuporia love it patar why not ilia versus armin why not

patar because that fight friggin rules i want it it's just not going to happen because armin might beat him and you super don't want to do that i think that would be a promote like that would be a sick fight that I would support, I think that that's bad promoting. Like, that's bad promoting. Like, give, give Ilya, like, there are a lot of more winnable fights than Armin. Not saying Ilya wouldn't win, he could win that. And if he does, it would be sick. But like, it's a lot more winnable for Ilya to fight Justin Gaichi or something, you know?

Then that's just, no one's going to complain about that. And they're all in, you will ever be mad about that. Oliver is interesting. Oliver basically said like, look, man, I should fight for the belt, but if the UFC wants me to fight this dude, like I'll fight him. Like, I'll fight him.

My jiu-jitsu's great, but I think I can knock his ass out. This isn't featherweight. This is lightweight. Lightweight's a different place. And if anybody knows that, it's Charles friggin Olivera, because he's done the dance of moving up to lightweight.

That's where he found the most success. And he's felt some of the toughest losses of his career as well. So that's the fight. That is actually the fight to do. And that's sick. And like, again, man, I just. Give arm in the title shot. It seems incredibly reasonable to be like, hey, like, of all the people who deserve

a title shot, it is like super low on the list of people who deserve a lightweight title shot. You just want it. You want it because you want to mash your action figures together and you think it will be good. And it may well be amazing. And I'll be able to win. I'm not here to tell you, I'm not here to tell you, I am here to tell you that he, he has

done nothing in this weight class. He has won one fight in this weight class on short notice, and he almost lost to Jai Friggin Herbert. And that was years ago. He's much better. I'm not saying that this is the same thing. He has not earned this by any definition of earning a lightweight title shot. It is purely we want to see it because we want to eat our dessert before we eat our vegetables. Like, he doesn't have a long featherweight title reign.

Volkinovsky had like four title defenses before they let him fight one. like he he beat one he won the belt and defended it once and that's it there are other dudes and he just said man i'm out i would also frankly think it sets kind of a poor precedent to then do that but that's a whole separate issue that doesn't really matter like i think it's more than reasonable like hey man just win one fight i don't even really care who win one lightweight fight and then we can talk i think that's more than fair uh breaking news guys ooh get some breaking news Oh, hell yeah. Rose Tommy Eunice is back.

Let's go. Rose Dame Eudis is back. She'll be fighting Miranda Maverick, June 14th. Miranda put it out there. We confirmed with Rose's side as well. June 14th, which as of right now, although there is not an official announcement on this,

if it's out there from a fighter who probably saw a contract, it must be true. June 14th, mark it down, baby, the UFC heading back to Atlanta. Back to Atlanta, Georgia. Boy, wouldn't that be a great time to announce TNT sports in the UFC, right in the home face of where like TBS was, baby?

What about that? How about that? This is interesting. Oh, now I've got to look this up because this is not going to be a pay-per-view because they already have pay-per-views in June. How do we know? We don't know yet?

Because I think there's a, I think they're going to New Jersey and then 317 is fighting. They haven't announced that yet, though. Oh, well, Wikipedia is lying. So that's good. Well, there's rumor and innuendo that's what's happening. But the UFC has not announced Newark just yet. That would still, I mean, that'd be bold for them to go pay-per-view week off international fight week. So I'm going to guess that if on this date that this just means we are.

In fact, doing a fight night. And the last time that they did a fight night in Atlanta was never, never is the answer. Wow, history. They've done four pay-reviews in Atlanta and they have never done a fight night. So that's kind of fun. That'll be different. Mike, you can come on up. We could do a live everything that week.

It'll be sick. Get a swing rounds in. Let's go, baby. Well, there you go. Breaking news. Now I have some things I got to do before. I was wondering, I got some DMs. I got some DMs earlier today about if I could confirm that the Atlanta thing was happening.

I was like, I have no idea what you're talking about. Now, here it is. Nami Yunis versus Miranda Maverick. Nami Yunis, I don't think she shouldn't fall in Atlanta. Not that I can remember. Sick. We talked about this earlier this year at some point. It's like, it's been a while since they've been to Atlanta.

It's a major market. They should come here a little more frequently. The last time, I believe, was 236, which had the time. two best fights of the year on it. So, awesome. Like six years later, we finally get another card. Good stuff. All right.

What else we got? My day just got a little busier with all this news. And Casey's muted. Fahim, is it possible we see Islam and Hamzat sharing international fight week? Unlakely. I'm going to go unlikely, but possible, but unlikely. I don't think that they would do Islam versus. whoever, especially if it does end up being Tupouria, and DDP versus Hamzat for that card.

That would be cool if they did. That feels like they're putting a lot of star power into one basket, and they would split that up a little more. So, look, there's, there have been reports out about this. This is where this question stems from. I don't know if, I think it's a member of Hamzad's team. I don't know if it's a trainer or a coach did like an Instagram live and basically said and it was translated to the effect of, yes, Hamzat is going to fight DDP on the same card. Islam is fighting Iliate to Poria on. And obviously when you see things like this, you reach out.

The plan has been, is and has been for a little while now from what I understand to do DDP versus Hamzat on international fight week. It is not done. Anyone who says it's done is wrong. It's just sort of like what everybody wants. It's just a matter of like getting everybody together to say, okay, this is what we're going to do. We dot the eyes, cross the teas, all that stuff. So could it happen? I'm not going to say it's impossible because again, this is a TV year.

And you would think if you want to, what's the word I'm looking for? if you want to entice future investors in your company from a broadcast perspective, sending them out to International Fight Week on a card like that would be a damn good one to do it with the UFC fan experience, the Hall of Fame. I'll throw Power Slap in there because I'm sure that's going to be part of the goddamn experience. And then leading into like just a mega international Fight Week card, which I'm trying to think. think back. Like one was the last, like UFC 290 friggin slapped. Like that car was great, but it was not like overwhelmingly star driven. You know what I mean? Like had just good hardcore fan fights that we knew would be good hardcore fan fights. Like we got Volcanowski versus Yair. We got Moreno versus Pantosia. Like great fights. Not fights that will sell payper views,

but just cool ass fights. That's what. those cards a bed. UFC 276, that's where we got Izzy versus Jared Kandaneer. Last year, they had Connor and then lost Connor, and we got Alex Pereira versus Yuri Perashka too, because those are the only two guys who were available. We kind of coddled them together. They haven't put together and executed a star power,

this is the U.S. open type of international fight week card, in quite some time. been a long time, been several years. So maybe this is the one they bring back to make, to remind fans, especially some of the newer ones,

introduce them to the process like, yo, we got, you know an international fight week comes. We're bringing our absolute best. And maybe because of the year is the year, that maybe they stack this one up. That's more of my line of thinking with this whole UFC ESPN thing. And if you're a fan,

what should you be clamoring for? It's not John Jones versus Tom Aspinall. It's that the cards that are supposed to be great end up being fucking great. And this would be one of them. So I'll say this does happen without any actual real insight to this. I feel like the UFC is going to push for this to happen. Whether it happens or not, not really sure. But I think in the UFC's mind on that war room, when they're trying to put this card together,

I think all those fights are on there. Now, is Islam fighting Yelia Tuporia? Not sure. But maybe Islam fights Armand Sarukian. Maybe he fights Justin Gaichi. Maybe he fights somebody else. Who the hell knows? But it would not surprise if his Lomax Shepp is on that card.

All right. And last one. Scotty B. Saturday Night's All Right for Fighting. New UFC song. It's all right. I mean, if we're going with the sort of colloquial definition of all right, 100%.

It's all right. It's not great for fighting. It's not amazing. It's all right. It's all right. Yeah. It's all right. It's all right.

Some good stuff happening, some interesting things. Hey, and they do get the fight on a Saturday night. They get the fight on a Saturday night in London finally. Leon Edwards, you got a wish. I just realized that this thing kicks off at one, which is nice. That's fun. Ruins my Saturday plans, actually, but it's fine. What, really?

Yeah, I get a... I was trying to go golf Saturday morning. I can't now. Night golf is a Saturday morning. The best we're talking about. Get that 6.30 a. Anything other than like Abu Dhabi. You got to get,

you got to get that first T time. Just get that first time. Well, I already had a T time. So I now have to cancel that T time, which I'll be doing momentarily and seeing if I can convince. Yeah, get that 703.

Get that 703. You're out by 11. I want to be out early. I want to be out early as I wake up early. But my friends do not want to wake up early. And so I have to convince them like, hey, well, you play 7 a.m.

golf with me or else I have to skip this weekend. people when they got that early that's just so early I prefer to go out as soon as I can because I wake up early it doesn't matter okay hit the music we're done a million things going on right now

hey go dogs you're in the turn of the way go dogs congratulations to the dogs uh yeah more interviews coming Mike Perry is up live on the YouTube channel you'll hear from Sean Brady

you'll hear from Al Jermaine Sterling coming up this week on our YouTube channel. But not just Al Jermaine Sterling, you will hear from his brother, Kelvin Sterling, at the same time, who fights for LFA this Saturday. More on that coming up throughout the week.

It's a busy one here at MAPFinding.com. So stick with us. ESPN is buying the NFL network for $2 billion because they ain't getting the UFC. Good night, everybody. Love y'all. This has been Between the Links, an MMA Fighting production,

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