MMA Fighting - Emergency Reaction! Kayla Harrison Signs With UFC, Fights Holly Holm At UFC 300

Episode Date: January 24, 2024

UFC CEO Dana White made a big announcement on Tuesday night as it relates to UFC 300, but it likely was not what most fans were expecting as White revealed that the promotion has signed former PFL champion Kayla Harrison, and she will meet former UFC champion Holly Holm at the historic pay-per-view event — not at featherweight, but at bantamweight. MMA Fighting's Mike Heck, Shaun Al-Shatti, and Jed Meshew react to the big news of Harrison's signing, and the matchup with Holm. Additionally, they discuss the many questions surrounding this news, including major concerns about Harrison's ability to make the bantamweight limit, how much it improves the division now championed by Raquel Pennington, the PFL losing one of their biggest stars, along with one of the big fights on the table with Cris Cyborg, if Harrison's arrival could lead to an Amanda Nunes comeback, if Julianna Peña should be worried, and much more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Shaun Al-Shatti: @ShaunAlShatti Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The downloaded two, ghosts in the machine. Available now, only from Audible. All right, Mike Heck here for M-Afighting.com, reacting to some big news. Yes, it's UFC 300 related. But no, it's probably not the announcement you expected from UFC CEO, Dana White,

on Tuesday night. He goes on social media just before midnight Eastern time and says he has some breaking UFC 300 news. I think a lot of people are expecting the announcement of Drickus Duplice versus Israel Adasania, maybe headlining. But no, kind of a double announcement.

There is a new fight added to UFC 300. It will involve the former women's Bannamweight champion, Holly Holm. And she will take on the newly signed Kayla Harrison at Bannamweight, which kind of threw some people for a loop. And I just can't react to this by myself. So I'm joined by my two wonderful colleagues, fresh off of a ranking show where we talked about a Bannonweight Division

without Kayla Harrison and just how bad it is. We got Jed Bishu, we got Shaheed Al Shadi here. And Shaheed, I'll begin with you. There's a lot of takeaways from this announcement. There's a lot of initial reactions when you find out about this announcement. When you heard what Dana White had to say, What was the first thing that popped into your mind? First thing that popped into my mind was, well, in about two hours, we have a Reiki show coming out

where we've just completely destroyed the women's Vantamweight Division. And I don't know if this still applies. And then I hit up AK, as I said to you guys before, we started recording this. I said, did our whole show just get ruined? Does women Vantamweight now saved? And he scoffed at me and said, Kayla Harrison's fighting Holly Home, man. No. It did not get saved.

The show has not ruined. Everything stands. It was like, you know what? That's fine. You sold me. You absolutely sold me on that. It's weird. It's really weird, right? Like, the division I have questions about. The opponent is an odd choice. I like the idea of it in some, right? Like, you get Kayla Harrison's big debut. That feels 300-e. Like, right? Like, we're just looking for different elements for 300, right? Like, hey, here's a big title fight. Here's like a weird gimmick. Here's like a wrinkle that you wouldn't have thought of. So you get the BMF stuff. You get title fights. Kayla's the wrinkle, right? Like we have been

talking about this for years and years. We just haven't really been talking about it in this permutation. And as I said on the ranking show intro, like I just don't know if I buy this. Because we've had a lot of history with Kayla before. And nothing about that woman has ever screamed, you can easily make bantam weight. Like she has said over and over and over again that that's not really like feasible. She might have to cut off an arm and in a leg. And the way it seems like this came together is that the UFC essentially said like, that's all we got.

Like you got to do bantam weight or you're just not doing it. And she's just always wanted to come over here. So like she just kind of agreed to it. And now she's got a couple months to try to figure this out. I have real questions having lived through the Chris Cyborg era, whether where they were just like really insistent on getting her to come down to 135 slowly. And they started at like, hey, make 140.

and then try to do it incrementally. And then like she almost died making 140. I just have real questions whether a fighter, a human being as big and as broad and as muscular as Kayla couldn't safely do this at all, if not more than once. Like maybe she can pull it off once, but this is not something that she could do two times a year for the next couple of years. It feels like to me, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe she's going to prove me wrong. She's a two-time Olympic champ. So she obviously has the work, like the work ethic to try to do this.

But I just have a lot of questions. And that's not even really bringing up the opponent, which I'll leave that for Jed. I don't know. I have a lot of questions. And I ultimately, my main takeaway was like, I think everything we said yesterday still stands. This does not save that division because I just don't believe in it. Like if Kayla can go ahead and prove to me that she can do this over and over again, safely, consistently, then I think that does start to change the equation because we've been looking for the future, right?

right? That was the big thing. Where's the future of women's bands to wait? If it's Raquel Pennington and that's your future, like that's not inspiring. If it's Kayla Harrison, that's something. We have something to go off of. I just don't, I'm not there yet. I don't believe it. Jed, what say you? Was what Shaheen said pretty much the first thing you thought of or were you going in a little bit of a different direction? Because there were a lot of different reactions to this announcement. So my first reaction was the same as my kind of primary reaction is, even after I've had some time to kind of think about it. And it's just, this sucks, man. Like, I don't, look, maybe I did not sleep well last night, so maybe that's part of this.

Like, I'm not willing to say that this is objectively bad, but I don't see who this benefits at all. Like, where are the positives here? Because like Shaheen, I agree. She's not making 135. We did this with Chris Cyborg. We watched the videos of Chris Cyborg almost dying to get to a weight that she physically can't. I've stood in the room with Kayla Harrison many times at this point because of the frequency with which she has competed in Atlanta and I've been at shows. She ain't making it, guys. Like that's just not a thing that is going to happen safely and repeatedly. I don't know. I thought we all understood this and when Kayla said, oh, maybe that it was just sort of one of those lies you tell because people need to hear it for whatever reason. It's not going to happen.

If, and honestly, I didn't even recognize when this was announced that it was a bantam weight fight. I just was like, oh, Kayla Harrison signs fighting Holly Holm. That makes sense. Because I do think Holly Holm kind of makes sense as a big name. If you're going to do it, you're just trying to get her in there with the biggest names you can, whatever. But then it was like, it's 135. Well, okay, that's useless if they were going to do our open weight idea, which you can go listen to the rankings pod and you'll know what I'm talking about there. Still a great idea. A hundred percent co-signing.

It's the only idea because she's not making one freaking 30. She's never making 135. I doubt she's ever making 136, but she ain't coming in a championship weight unless we're allowing her to DC this shit. She's not going to work. And that's not the most important thing, right? like having her around and making fun fights with her because belts don't always need to be the thing that matter is real.

Who wants this fight? Who wants any of the fights that Kayla can have in the UFC right now? To the best of my knowledge, no one. I am not pumped to watch Kayla Harrison fight Hollyholm or watch Kayla Harrison fight Rockall Pennington or Giuliana Pena. Women's Bantamway is a trash division and the rose-colored glasses. Some might say the worst of all time. Some might say the worst of all time.

Some might say because that's true. The rose-colored glasses, which I've seen this reaction get from some people, ah, this is how you save it. No. No, one woman does not save a division. One woman might keep a division on life support a little bit longer, but you need a structural overhaul and new blood. And it's not like Kayla Harrison is probably like hanging around for seven, eight years.

She's already had a long athletic career. There's not much left. we were all on board with the thing we wanted. PFL and Don Davis have made some bold proclamations. Many of them have been ridiculous. One of the very few true things Don Davis has said that is also ridiculous, but is at least true, is they have the best women, they have all the talent at Women's 145 under the PFL banner now. The only fight anyone has given a shit about for the last three years when it comes,

comes to Kayla Harrison or this sort of weight range in general has been Kayla Harrison versus Chris Cyborg and now that is never going to happen. That sucks. There is the idea that oh well, Amanda's already teased coming back and maybe Kayla comes here and that's what they do. I don't need it anymore. Like Amanda Nunes has clocked her ticket out. I do not need her to come back because we desperately want this weight class to work and all we can do. We are just grasping its straws to get there. No, Amanda had an excellent pointed exit from the sport, and that's fine. If they bring it back, I'll watch it and that'll be okay.

What's after that, boys and girls? If they bring Amanda back for a big fight with Kayla after that, what's after that? Who does Kayla fight then? Tell me. Somebody tell me who she is going to fight after Holly Holm and Amanda, like, Misha Tate? Does anyone care? No, any fights that existed? The one time in history that this is a true statement existed in PFL.

The Chris Cyborg and I've running it back with Larissa Pacheco after they had that big fight where Kayla finally lost. Those are the two fights that mattered for her. And now we're doing this to pursue. I hope the answer is to pursue money. I hope the answer is Kayla is getting paid all the money in the world by the UFC. I know that it's not. I know that it's not, but I'm hopeful. because if why Kayla is doing this is to answer some sort of weird urge to fight for this promotion

because it's what you have to do and because the people on the internet will never take you seriously unless then what a freaking misstep here do it in a year but give us Chris Cyborg and run it back with Pacheco because those are the fights that matter not whatever the we're about to get here like I woke up and thought this sucked y'all I'm sorry to be the next. negative Nancy on this one. But I was like, this is just, this is not good news. This is a bummer. I can't believe you're going to make me do the devil's advocate on this.

This is, I am impressed with your level of passion when it comes to this issue. I mean, it feels obvious what this is for Caleb, right? Because BFL essentially had a blank check for her. Like, this isn't money. Is it a duck and cyborg? Because I don't think that that's true, but. No, no, no. It's not duck and cyborg either.

because the one, Chris Cyborg tweeted at some point this week that like, hey, I got one fight left. I wanted to be Kayla. Kayla signed to Bellator specifically to fight Chris Cyborg. She just ended up getting the contract match. Like, this is a thing that both of these women have wanted for quite a while. It's obvious what this is for Kayla, right? Like, this is a legacy play. This is to get the title of UFC champion on the Wikipedia, to get the mainstream recognition of like,

oh, yeah, you're a UFC champ. That is significantly different than saying you're a two-tenth. time PFL champion. Like, we all understand that. What's, the, the misstep is just, like, the stubbornness by the UFC, right? Like, I get you want to get rid of women's featherweight. If ever there was a chance to just, like, keep this fake division alive that you kept alive for one person, keep it alive now.

Keep it alive now. Like, make Kayla Harrison your new Amanda Nunes at Women's Featherweight and just bring people in to fight her or have Hollyholm move up to fight her. Like, there's ways where you could make this more palatable. I just feel, I feel kind of like... Do you think that's more palatable? I'm actually like, well, I think the whole 135 thing is trash, as I've said very clearly. I think making another fake belt for Kayla to have so she can feel special and loved is also trash.

Like, if you're going to bring her over, just have her fight 145 fights and that's fine. I don't know that it's to make her feel special and loved. It's to make so making sure she doesn't die, right? Like, I just don't want to see Kayla. No, but you can just have 145 fights, without a belt. You don't have to put a fake belt on it. But I think for a real belt, for an athlete like this who is fighting for championships, high dollar athlete, like that is the carrot, right?

You want to come over here to be UFC champion, not to say you are a UFC fighter. So it's a meat in the middle. It's making concessions of like, okay, like we're going to put this belt that has existed until last year, back up for grabs and you can sort of be that person. I just really, really don't want to watch her cut down to 135 because two things are going to happen. One, it's going to be Chris Seiborke all over again. And like we said, like I watched that man. And that was not fun in just making her, forcing her to cut down to 140 to eventually get to this 135 thing with Ronda Rousey was miserable for everyone or Mananudas or whoever it was. It was

miserable for everyone. And most of all, Chris Cyborg, it was one of the most unhealthy things I've watched in the modern day UFC. I don't want to watch that again. I really, really don't. Like, Kayla's a good person with children. Like, I just don't want to see her put through that. Two, the other outcome is that she does make it. And then what does that mean? What is the Kayla Harrison who shows up at 135 pounds? Because that feels to me like an extraordinary diminished version of Kayla,

who is this physical force, right? She is all physicality. She is the drickest duplicacy of the women's division in that regard of just like her whole game is built around physicality and just big brothering all these women. I don't really want to see like a really. really physically diminished Kayla come in there just to again prove some kind of point. I think that won't matter. If she can somehow make 135 and not like physically die, the weight class is so bad that I don't think it will matter. I think she will just win regardless

because everyone she's fighting is not very good. So okay, if 80, if she's 50% of who she is at you're max, it's still good enough to win, but I just don't know, man. All we have ever wanted is Chris Seiborg. It's the only fight we've ever wanted for this woman. We're now never going to get it. It's never going to happen. And that sucks. Like, if you want to be UFC champion because you need to to satisfy whatever,

I think that that's a bit dumb or a bit silly, but it's your career and your life and you get to make those choices. is you also know that the actual legacy defining fight for you is Chris Cyborg. You have said that your entire career, basically, there has never been a better time to do it. There has never been a time where it was more available than at this moment when you are both under the same banner. And this is the moment when you opt to exit the promotion to satisfy some other need.

You could have come to the UFC next year. It's not like they wouldn't still welcome you with open arms because they need you. You could have done the Chris Cyborg fight this year. And I don't believe it's because she's afraid of Chris Cyborg. But she has chosen not to fight her in exchange for something else. And I think that sucks as a fan. And I think that is a wild misstep for her legacy-wise. Defenders in cybersecurity are always there when we need them.

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You don't need a Nobel Prize to be a great investor. All you need is Betterment. Go to Betterment.com to learn more. That's B-E-T-T-E-R-M-E-N-T-com. investing involves risk performance not guaranteed yeah i think my first reaction outside of like whoa didn't see this coming was exactly what you guys were thinking and then on top of that same kind of questions and then the thing that really has kind of stood out of my mind ever since was man tough start to the year for the co-leader because i mean don davis went on the m m m m hour and

literally said like this summer we promise it's going to happen mark it down Kayla Harrison versus Chris Cyborg, big smirk on his face. And now that's gone. They don't have any stars outside of Franciano who is not fighting an MMA anytime soon. You can make a strong argument that their second biggest star is Kayla Harrison and she's gone. And honestly, I don't think that's an argument. I think that's a fact. And then on top of that, as interesting as the hardcore fans were interested as they were in Harrison versus Cyborg,

as far as like pay-per-view revenue, I don't think that was going to do that great anyways. So now Chris Seiborg has like nothing interesting at all. So now you've just kind of put her out in the past year as well. I still want to see. Yeah, that's kind of interesting. Yeah, you're right about that. I'll give you that. But man, this is a tough.

This is tough for a PFL right now losing her. Legitimately if I'm Chris Seabor, I just retire. I'm not going to fight. I'm not going to fight the risk of Pacheco. It doesn't really do anything for me. I can just do the boxing thing. Like, why would I? What does that mean?

It just means nothing that the Harrison fight at least meant something. I, if I'm Chris, cyborg. I'm just retiring at this point from some boxing. I agree with you in principle because Larissa Pacheco is not some big mainstream name. Like it doesn't do anything for her in the general sense, but like from an actual historian sense, hardcore sense, like Larissa Pacheco is probably like a top five name on her resume. Let me be clear. It doesn't do anything for her because you probably will get her ass kicked. Like I just possible. I think I would pick Lishapcheco to win that fight comfortably, but that's neither here or there.

The risk reward there is simply not worth it in my mind for Cyborg and where her career is when she can just do the boxing thing, which she likes and wants to pursue the only MMA fight for the last like four years that has made sense. I know she's been fighting in Bellator to do it, but the only fight that has made sense is Harrison. And if Cyborg is not going to go back to the UFC, and I would be very, very surprised

if Cyborg was ever interested in doing that, though now there might be a reason. reason, yeah, I just would quit and focus on boxing. Let me also throw one other... Should I get into $1.35 either? Go ahead, Gene. Well, let me just throw one other road that this could take, because this is now a road that is opened to us, and this is something that very, very viably could happen by the end of the year.

If Kayla Harrison comes in here, again, diminished, not particularly Kayla Harrison because she's having to make this insane weight. And then Holly Holmes, just Holly Holmes all over her for 15 minutes and beats Kayla Harrison. you know what's going to happen next with Holly Home, right? We already established the Holly Home, who has a win of Roccoe Pendington, is extremely likely to be fighting for a title. If Holly Home gets this one win, she is going to get a title shot, and she's going to beat Raquel Pennington,

and then we're watching another Holly Home reign at 42 years old, that I am not here for that. It won't be a belt will change hands. I wouldn't be concerned. I think Kayla, one, she's not going to make. like, wait, so she's not going to be that diminished. She's going to beat Holly Holme, which, you know, Holly Holm's old and at this point isn't even a kickboxer.

She, like, is a clinch staller. And clinching with Kayla Harrison is a pretty bad idea. So I think, I think Kayla will win this fight. It just, I wanted one fight. We all wanted one fight. Now we're getting, you have swapped out. Kayla Harrison versus Chris Cyborg, a fight. We all loved, all wanted, all have been salivating over.

for a Holly Holie home fight. What the, that's the shittiest trade I've ever heard. Like the league, league official should step in and David Stern this and be like, this is unequitable. We are not allowing this trade to go. No, this is awful. And this is, again, I'm sorry to be the negative,

but I woke up and hated this. Kayla Harrison Open is a minus 375 favorite. And within an hour, she's already up to a minus 500 favorite. Dunshot. Against Holly Holm. there's a chance. I mean, look, there's a lot of avenues that we can go, and we'll get to some of those in the second.

But, Chaheen, if you are, if you're Giuliana Pena right now, who is waiting to fight Raquel Pennington, feels like this is the fight that's going to be made. And then, what, three days after Raquel Pennington wins the title, and we feel like we're going down this road to Julianna Pena, the UFC announces that they've signed Kayla Harrison to fight at Bannamweight and fight at UFC 300. If you're Giuliana Pena, are you as confident today that you're getting the next title shot?

as you were on Monday. Oh, absolutely. Like, realistically, Juliaette Pena is like the UFC's only opportunity for this division to still be something that people are even moderately interested in. Because I just, again, until Kayla proves to me that she can make this consistently and healthily,

like Julianna Pena is that person, she's going to get the next title shot regardless just because of the timeline, right? Like, she's looking at the summer. This is UFC 300, so it's in April. So, like, just the timelines are going to work out for her where she's going to get that shot. And then, if anything, it's a good thing for her

because she might have a actual compelling challenger that people will want to pay attention to if Kayla Harrison is able to win. I just, I don't know. I'm still so dubious about all this. It's hard for me to even forecast it. Here's what I just want to know. What happens when she misses weight for Hollyholm?

If she comes in and she can't make one three six, the fight will go on. Hollyholm will take a fight at whatever. But if she actively sits down and tries to do this and fails, what are your options at the? that point in time. Just reignite the trash ass 145 belt for no reason. I think that's probably what ends up happening. Because they need title fights, man. We've seen it. How many spots do have they needed to fill? Right. How many dumb fights have we seen? How many, well, yeah, I'm not,

I am asking you from the bottom of my heart, just do an open weight belt. It's freaking much cooler. It is so much cooler now. If you do open weight, I will reverse my position. on this immediately and instantaneously. Be like, hey, there's a world where I can watch Wiley Zhang fight Kayla Harrison for a title. Sick. I'm super in. The fight's silly and ridiculous, but so was pride.

And I love the shit out of pride. So open weight women, and I'm cool with this. If we're still pretending bantamweight's real weight class, this sucks shit. I'm very curious to hear from Hollyholm about this. I'm curious to see if when they were negotiating this, because Ariel already said on Twitter that this was the rabbit out of the hat fight that the U.S. you were trying to put together,

which he said it was like a six and a half, seven. I think it's probably slightly a little higher just based on the reaction, but I wonder what Holly's thinking. Like, is there something in the contract that says like, is she going to wonder boy this, Chaheen? Like if Kayla goes in, if Hollyholm goes in and makes weight

and then Kayla Harrison steps on the scale, 139 and a half, is she just going to be like, no, I ain't fighting her. I'm not giving her the shine. because I wouldn't friggin blame her for doing that at all. But maybe the UFC can position this already where they're already planning like by the time we get to Friday, we walk in, we welcome you to, AK welcomes us the way in show and we find out from Jose that, oh no,

this is going to be a fight at 140. But what if it isn't? Like, what does Holly do if Kayla doesn't make the wait? Does she take this fight, you think? I think she still takes it just because of the accoutrements around it, right? It's UFC 300. I think someone like Holly, like wants to fight on a card like that, especially at her age, she's not going to get very many big opportunities.

It feels big to be able to say, like, hey, I fought on UFC 300. And also, I think there is an element of like, I want to beat Kayla, right? Like, we've been hearing forever of Kayla Harrison's this monster. Kayla Harrison's the best women, not in the UFC. Like, I think for Holly, that's a point of pride of like, oh, I'm the, I'm the UFC person who beat this person on her first, on her debut. So I bet the fight will still go on because also Holly's fought plenty of times at 140, 1.45.

She's kind of jumped around in these weight classes. So I bet it still goes on, but I bet she gets a big healthy percentage of that big old purse that Kayla's going to get. So that might be a little carrot too for Holly. Jed, what do you think? Do you agree with that? Or do you think she's like, nah, this is a risky-ass fight? I think that there's absolutely no world in which the UFC would offer her or allow her this fight without an understanding that she will accept it on Fight Week, no matter what the scale shows. you're dealing with a woman who has never made this weight before,

and who has repeatedly said that doing so will be extremely difficult. It's not like they had to do Holly home. Sure, Holly is a big splashy name, but they get it to Misha Tate. They could have run this to other options and been like, hey, let's see this. I think you just take the fight. Like this is, I mean, one, Holly fought like a ton at 145 too. So even that was fake 145. Still, it's the same thing.

She's just going to take the fight. They're just going to scrap it out at whatever weight it ends up being at. There's 135. Like if Kayla could make 135, this conversation gets at least a little, this move gets a little more interesting. So I hope that that is what ends up happening. But yeah, this, she's, Holly is just going to take this fight regardless. Well, we'll see how this all plays out. It is Wednesday.

I have one question for you all before we exit. Please, please. Do you believe that this makes it almost certain that Amanda Nunes returns? If Kayla wins, I think there's a very good chance. I've talked to John Anick about this a lot. And John, for a while, ever since Amanda retired, said he actually thinks that Nina Nunes would come back before Amanda, unless something really big comes along. And this might be the thing. Now, she has to go on and perform and beat Holly home, but I could absolutely see this being big enough for Amanda.

to come back and at least give it one more college try. What do you think, Sheen? I think if Kayla is able to become champion, that then becomes an interesting conversation because we've seen it. Like Amanda's already getting itchy knuckles over here. She just needs like an opportunity. And that opportunity is not Juliana. I don't think she ever, ever wants to give Giuliana an opportunity to fight her again. So if it is something like Kayla, I could actually see that. But again, that's so many steps down the line. Yeah. Well, a lot to unpack here with this announcement. I think maybe this will age like a fine wine. Maybe it won't. Maybe it'll just be Garbo the entire time. It's just going to get smellier and smellier as we get closer to

UFC 300. But I have a distinct feeling. This will not be the last time you hear from us in terms of doing emergency reaction podcast this week. Dana promised a big announcement of the UFC 300 main event this week. But who the hell knows at this point? So stick with us at mafighting.com for all things News and UFC 300 for Jed for Shaheen. I am Ikech. Thank you for listening. We may even see you later on today. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Okay, only 10 more presents to wrap. You're almost at the finish line. But first, there, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes.