MMA Fighting - Fighter vs. Writer: Alan Jouban Expects Sean O’Malley to Have a Tough Time with Aljamain Sterling; Cory Sandhagen Reacts to Henry Cejudo Calling Out Merab Dvalishvili

Episode Date: May 9, 2023

Following UFC 288 this past weekend, Alan Jouban and Cory Sandhagen join The Fighter vs. The Writer to break down everything that unfolded in New Jersey. Aljamain Sterling successful defended his bantamweight title with a split decision win over Henry Cejudo and Jouban will detail what he believes went right and went wrong for both fighters. Jouban will also give his thoughts on Sean O’Malley’s chances to dethrone Sterling as the next title contender at 135 pounds. We’ll also discuss Belal Muhammad’s win over Gilbert Burns and his place in the welterweight division after going undefeated in his past 10 consecutive fights. Plus Jouban reacts to Kron Gracie’s bizarre performance and what should come next for him. As for Sandhagen, he’ll give his report from sitting cageside at UFC 288 and what he thought about Sterling getting the job done against the former two-division champion. He’ll also react to Cejudo calling for a fight against Merab Dvalishvili — the exact opponent Sandhagen has also been targeting. All this and more on the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer! Subscribe: Apple Podcasts Subscribe: Spotify Read More: MMA Fighting Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from the Audible Original, the downloaded two. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudullian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever. Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprise his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the Audible Original Blockbuster. The Downloaded, it's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking,

What are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The Downloaded 2, Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. Support for this show comes from the Audible original, The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudullian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever.

Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the Audible original blockbuster, the downloaded. It's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, what are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The downloaded two, ghosts in the machine,

available now, only from Audible. Listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. To the fighter versus the writer, I'm your host, as always, Damon Martin, and we are now a matter of days away from UFC Charlotte, where my regular co-host Matt Brown will step back into that octagon

to do battle with Court McGee. of course we send our best wishes out to Matt I spoke to him a night or two ago he's feeling good feeling ready to slice up somebody with some elbows so look forward to Matt making his return to action on Saturday and his triumphant return to the podcast next week

hopefully everything goes well but obviously with this fight now five days away I feel like we had to give him a week off so pinch hitting and certainly taking a place in well-regarded guys as far as breaking down the sport we're going to talk a little

later in the show to one of the top bantam weights in the sport who had a vested interest in the UFC 288 main event between Al Jermaine Sterling and Henry Sehudo. And I'm going to talk to Corey Sanhagan, who is there Cajside on Saturday night to watch that fight between Al Jermaine and Henry and his thoughts. And of course, you know, where he goes from here, I know he talked about fighting Marab de Wailashvili. Now we see Henry Sehuda maybe calling him out. So let's talk. We'll talk to Corey Sanhagan a little later in the show.

But right now, one of the top analysts in the sport, he's been calling fights for LFA for a while, but he also works on the analyst desk for the UFC and ESPN quite often. His name is Alan Joban. He's always a great co-hosts to have on the show. He's coming in and pinch it and co-hosts of the show with me in the past. And with everything going down this past Saturday night, including Bilal Muhammad's big winner over Gilbert Burns. I couldn't think of anybody better to talk about UFC 288 here on the fighter versus the rider.

In the wake of UFC 288, a huge event over the weekend. Of course, Al Jermaine Sterling defended his title against Henry Sehudo, and Bilal Muhammad also picked up a huge winner for Gilbert Burns. I couldn't think of a better person to join me on the podcast today to help me break down everything as one of the top analysts in the sport. It is always my pleasure to welcome the great Alan Joe

Band. Alan, how are you, my friend? I'm good, brother. I'm glad you called me for this one. I mean, I was as eager to watch these fight over the weekend as anyone. I mean, I did the breakdown show in the main event, so I was really curious to see how my breakdown information

kind of played out in the real life fight. And then anytime the Walter Waitsacomain event, Belau, a former opponent of mine who now has become a friend that I'm very much, you know, rooting for taking that on short notice. I was, I was eager to see how that match up played out as well. Yeah, well, it was a great event over the weekend, a lot of great things. Of course, at the top of the card, we mentioned, of course, Al Jermaine Sterling defended his title against Henry Suhudo. And Alan, I got to be honest, if you asked me about this fight three months ago, I said, man, I just, Henry Suhudo is so good. And even though he's been gone so long, his wrestling, his striking, I remember what he looked at. like before he left. He's still, he's 36, but he's a young 36 because he had time off.

I think if he would have been putting wear and tear on his body over the last three years, we may have a different opinion. But I was like, you know what? I just think matchup wise, this is Suhudo. And then as we got closer and closer to the fight, I started listening to a couple other people. I talked to Marlon Marais, who fought both of them, and I talked to a couple other people, and I started watching fights. And I was like, you know what? I was like, Al Javane's length, his size, his wrestling, and his striking are always a little underrated and I was like you know what and by the end of the week last week I'd pretty much totally switched my opinion I was like I'm going with Al Jermaine I think he's going to get it done uh incredible

fight incredible fight uh you you mentioned you did the breakdown how did it play out in reality versus how you thought it was going to go very different and I said I don't want to say very different but they have different skill sets and and when you look at the breakdown sometimes the X's and those don't always tell the story but doing the breakdown And you watch Henry Suhudo, it's so obvious what he's doing. So it makes it fun for an analyst like me. You see him making reeds. You see him throwing faints watching somebody bite on it and then capitalizing on it immediately.

The Dominic Cruz knockout, until I broke that one down, I didn't realize how well he had studied Dominic Cruz and how much he forced that knockout with the need, that he kind of, you know, baited Dominic into doing his normal role pattern. And some of the other knockouts, his clenches, his right hand. So what I'm getting at is he's very good. And it's very obvious when you're breaking it down, what's going on. And so it builds him up in your mind. And then when you look at the other side, when you look at Algerman Sterling, his moves and everything aren't as obvious, right? You know, he's not an Olympic wrestler, but he's got tremendous wrestling.

He looks for takedowns and he gets takedowns, but he's not really looking for the takedown so much to get on top, as much he's looking for a scramble opportunity to take the back. And we saw some of that play out in the fight. I was, I don't want to say worried because I didn't really have a dog in the fight, but I had somewhat picked Sohudo because of what I'm saying. His skill and his IQ jumped off the paper, jumped off of the footage so much that I had to lean towards him.

But I said, the thing that I think Aljo will have success in will be these opportunities where he gets, He gets Suhudo into a scramble and then finds just a little smidgent of the back and is able to take the back. And we saw that. We saw that in the fight where in the open floor, Suhudo was the dominant wrestler. Against the fence, Aljo was much stronger of a cage wrestler, a fence, a wall wrestler than Suhudo was. And he would find those opportunities to shuck him off, take the back. And then as you said, use that reach, that seven inch reach advantage.

And then just the lighter on the feet. So I was wrong. I thought Suhudo would win because of what I was just saying. But Aljo, you said the great word just now. He's underrated. He's underrated in everything that he does. And he's proven it for these last four victories. Absolutely.

And it's kind of crazy. And again, for me personally, I don't think it was necessarily that I underrated Sterling going into it as much as I just, I had a lot of belief in Henry Suhudo. I think he is an incredible athlete. I thought his wrestling would negate a lot of what Aljima he does well. And when you watch the exchanges in the open, when they were in the open, Henry did shut down Al Jemaine. Al Jemann couldn't just shoot a double leg and get him down. All of his takedowns came off cage wrestling and, you know, almost like that Khabib Nirmagameh Madoff style where he pressed him against the cage, work him and then take him down.

You know, Khabib was never a double leg guy. He would kind of take him up there and then molly on the ground. I thought that was super impressive in that regard. But I was just impressed by how much Sterling did use that power to his advantage, especially against the Kempel. cage because I want like Henry had his moments there too he was able to reverse and throw a couple things but you kind of saw in my opinion you saw the size and a little bit of the strength difference in the cage there you saw where Al Jemaine kind of imposed his will a little bit more on Henry in those moments and credit to Henry for surviving some of those scrambles because

the last guy in the world you want on your back is Al Jermaine Sterling but that's pretty much what he did he survived the scrambles you know he survived the scrambles he didn't he didn't reverse him to the point where he was able to turn into an offensive maneuver but again I thought there was a lot of close exchanges. Just to get this out of the way, I scored it 4-1 for Al-Germain. I could easily see it 3-2 Al-Germain. There was one round. I can't remember which one where I was like,

I'll go Al-Germain, but I could easily see it going sooner. So I'm okay with three-two, but I definitely, I did score for Al-Jermain winning. Did you do the same? Did you see Al-Jermain winning when it was all over? I was very curious to hear your score. I had Al-Germain winning as well. I had him three to two, and I think that to me the close rounds were round two

in round three. I had given Suhudo round two and had given Sehudo round five. The rest to me was Aljo. When I looked at the scorecards from the judges, I think all three of the judges or two out of three of the judges possibly gave three, round three rather, to Sohudo. And so that round I didn't remember him doing as much. It was round two that I thought he kind of had the momentum shift,

which to me is always, you have to be careful. Because one man's dominant in one round, which I thought Alja was dominant in the first round. And in the second round, he's less dominant. A lot of people go, oh, this was a better round for the other guy. But it was just less dominance. But momentum shift, but it didn't necessarily win the round. But nonetheless, I think the judges got this one right.

Thank God. You know what I'm curious to see to follow up. I'm curious on your opinion. I had people that were there that were texting me after the fight, that were at the arena. And they were saying, Suhudo won this fight. I'm shocked. What was your thoughts? And I kept seeing that.

And I was a bit surprised that people live there were saying that. And then I started seeing that on social media. Majority of the people that thought Suhudo won were in the arena. It seemed that majority of the people that thought Aljo won watch it on TV. And what I take from that is that it was a very pro-Sahudo crowd. Oddly enough, being that they were on the East Coast, which is somewhat Aljo's territory. But it was a Sahudo-friendly crowd. You could see it.

They were anytime Sohudo would do something, they were cheering. And I think that's what swayed a lot of the people, the live visitors, that they would hear the roar of the crowd and feel like it was a bigger move or a bigger shot than it really was in perspective, watching it on TV. I 100% concede that. I've had personal experiences where I've sat Caged side and you know where media sits Caged side. We're in the same vantage point as the judges. You know, we are right there next to the cage. I've had fights where I thought, man, I thought a guy won, and then I look online, and I was wrong. Like, everyone's saying, no, no, this guy won.

It's, for one, its vantage point. I think that that's a problem when you're in there. You can't see everything. And also, I always remember going back several years, I think it was in Louisville, Kentucky, when Diego Sanchez fought Martin Campman. And Diego won a very controversial decision. It was a, I thought it was a horrible decision. But being in the arena, the crowd wasn't reacting as loud.

The crowd was reacting loudly, but you noticed that, A lot of what Diego was doing in that fight was moving forward and throwing, he just wasn't landing. But people were freaking out and screaming, losing their minds. But in my vantage point, I could see, like, 80% of his punches weren't landing. They were just missing. And then Martin was counterstriking him. And I was like, man, this is a terrible decision. I think being in the arena is a detriment sometimes to scoring because of that.

Because a punch gets thrown, the crowd goes, ooh and awe, and you think it lands. And when you're moving at that speed, you know, the best fighters in the world, especially Bantamweights, move quickly anyways, you're talking about a split second where you see did it land, did it not land? And they were both very active. Henry was very active on his feet and so was Al Jermaine. On TV, I think you got a better vantage point of seeing where Al Jamein was landing and what he was doing, especially in exchanges on the feet. Not so much. It's a little easier to tell in the wrestling, of course, who gets to take down, who doesn't, who's on top, who's doing damage, who's going for submissions.

But in striking, it's just quick exchanges and a lot of movement. And Henry, in my opinion, was throwing a lot more power strikes. He was throwing the big looping punches, the big overhands, and then kind of diving forward. And maybe someone caught the hand or maybe they caught the shoulder, things like that, or they just didn't land. But you hear that crowd, they go nuts, they rip roar, and you think he must have landed. He must have landed something. And I think, again, like, this is getting off topic here, but like, this is what I've said

for years. I know it's funny, they were in New Jersey. I remember talking to one of the guys from New Jersey, I think it was Nick Limbo, who's their chief counsel out there. I think at one point they had talked about doing an experiment in Jersey where they were going to put the judges cage side and take three more judges, put them in the back and basically sound isolation booths where they'd watch the fights, but they wouldn't hear the crowd, they wouldn't hear the commentary, they would just watch the fight. And I was like, man, that might be a better way to judge a fight because there's so much you can see from TV that you can't see when you're just watching in the cage. And that crowd reaction is a big part of that because, again, they just, they freak out. And I get it.

You're reacting in the crowd. That's what you're supposed to do being in a crowd. but just because you react doesn't mean it actually landed 100% and it's just human nature if you're exactly what you're talking about if two guys are throwing punches and there's an exchange you couldn't quite see who landed cleanly um but you hear 16,000 people go uproaring for one guy it's just human nature to think okay this guy must have saw something 16000 people majority of those guys probably didn't get it wrong and so it sways the judges sometimes then it sways the crowd as well with being there live um i thought i to to your point i thought i heard

something that um in this fight and honestly i'm not even sure if they always do this but that the judges were going to be wearing noise canceling headphones so maybe it was what you were speaking to or maybe they did that for the judge's cage side that they were i have i have see i have seen them talk about that i have i have seen them do that before i don't know how well it works i mean i have i have noise cancelling headphones are like, you have the Apple AirPods Maxes, the big ones, the super expensive ones. It's still not 100% noise canceling. You still hear things out.

Like, you know, it's never going to be 100% when you're sitting that close to the crowd. I mean, there's just no way to avoid that. I thought they might have done that this fight. And if they did, I think it worked. Because they think it cancancet out that crowd noise to the extent that they were able to see in clarity what they were judging.

And again, I thought they made the right call. I thought that it was a close four to one, three to two, Nonetheless, I thought Aljo took it. I thought he did enough. And then, you know, I saw the reaction of Dominic Cruz. Dominic Cruz went with Brennan shop to watch him on, I think the fight companion or something like that. And they were asking Dom his thoughts.

And he was kind of like us. You know, nobody was definitively saying this guy definitely won. But when you look at damage and you look at the two guys' faces and you saw the hands about to get raised and you see Al Jermin Sterling doing this, not a mark on him, not a mark on his face. And you see Suhudo with the big busted up eye and everything. It's like, look, it already seemed like momentum, like Alju had more, just more dominant moments. You know, he taking the back, he had a couple takedowns on Henry, landed cleaner shots. But you see the damage, the wear and tear on the other fighter.

It doesn't always tell the story because one punch can close an eye and then four of the rounds could be the different story. But I thought it spoke clearly for the story of this fight. Aljo did more damage and he just kind of controlled the fight for the long extended of time. Yeah, and I also think when you look at the grappling exchanges against the cage, those were more control time. Again, control is lower on the scoring criteria, but in terms like the takedowns of using it offensively, I thought Al Jermaine had far better moments. Obviously, he went for a couple of the, you know, tried to take the back a couple of times. Again, credit for Henry for escaping.

But I think a lot of people always remember you don't score defense in fights ever. That's not on the criteria. It's only offense. You do not get credit for defending a submission, defending a takedown. Surviving. Yeah, you do not get any of that. Just to be clear on the scoring criteria, I think that it kind of confused people. Like, oh, he's stuffed like nine takedowns.

Great. Doesn't mean anything into scoring. Like, it's great he stopped a takedown, but it's offensive-based scoring is all the scoring criteria is about. I just thought Al Jermaine did more. And again, again, I could easily see two rounds. Round five. And I think I was with you, round two.

I think was what I scored for Henry Sehudo. It was really close. But I ultimately went 4-1 for Al Jermaine. fifth round to me was the clearest for Henry. But yeah, I don't think there was any controversy there. I mean, listen, I think people, and I haven't really seen a whole lot of people being up in arms saying, oh, my God, this is a robbery. I think we've got to stop using that word when it's just a close fight.

Like, it was just a close fight. Like, it was a good close fight. I, again, I thought Al Jermaine won. I would probably lean closer to, quote, unquote, robbery if Al Jermaine had lost. But again, it was a close fight. It was three, two, and there were a couple close rounds in there. Again, I don't think there's a robbery. And again, I don't think a lot of people are screaming robbery.

but I personally thought it was a fairly, a fairly clear-cut decision for Algebra and Sterling. If I had to go back or if Suhudo had to go back, and I know he watches a lot of his fights, he breaks down stuff, he studies the opponents, he's got a super high fight IQ. If he goes back and watches this fight with coaches

and says, what could I have done differently? First of all, credit to Alger, I'll just fought a tremendous smart fight, a very good fight, very hard to beat a guy like that. But what I didn't see enough to me out of Henry Suhudo was his aggression in the boxing. When I broke down the fights again, he's got a piston right hand. And he's very, very good at covering distance, fainting in and out, setting shots up, double jab, finishing with that right hand. All those things mixed it in.

I felt like Suhudo's game plan for the first three rounds was kick heavy, kick heavy, kick heavy stuff, take downs, get on top. He even let him up a couple times. Remember Suhudo took down Aljo and he said, get back up? I don't know if I like that. I think, I know Aljo's dangerous on the bottom and it does somewhat create scrambleability moments, scrambleability moments for Aljo to take the back. But I feel like Suhudo's base is good enough to stay on top. And if Suhudo could have stayed on top, and I think it was round three instead of leg,

letting him up and done a little bit, it just looked busy. He could have edged out around there. But the reason that I think that we both are saying five round, the fifth round, was the most clear-cut round for Sohudo, is because he knew he had to go forward on that round. He knew he had to do something dramatic. He either stopped the fight or if it was close to at least win that round. And so what did he do? He went forward and threw punches, aggressive nature coming forward, putting two and three punches

together. Not all of them landed, but they look good. And that aggressiveness won him that round. If he would have been a little more aggressive and let his hands go a little bit more in those early rounds, I think that's what I would have liked to see out of him. And maybe he could have won that fight. But you know what it was? I really truly feel that a bit of his pride was there and he didn't want to commit to the punches and allow Aljo to slip under and get a takedown. He would have been, And he would have felt like, you know, a takedown in the open for Suhudo's death. He doesn't want that. He doesn't want to show that he can be taken down.

So he played it a little bit safe, played the long-range kicking game, but it allowed Aljo to play his game because you're playing long-range game with a long-range guy. And he was losing that battle. Yeah, and I also think that when it came to the wrestling, like Henry, when he stopped his takedowns, especially in the open, the kind of naked takedown where he wasn't really setting the map algebra, he was just shooting for a double leg. He stuffed him. and they kept standing on the broadcast about the neck.

I know we've talked about the neck injury. You had the exact same neck surgery that Al Jemaine went through. So you know what? That's like they kept bringing that up. But when Henry would have him in that front headlock, he was not throwing damage. He was just kind of holding him there and then getting out because he didn't want to allow Al Jermaine to somehow scrambling at the takedown.

And I agree with you. I think Henry is so underrated because he's an Olympic gold medalist. We all know that. We all say that. But he has never been a guy who has taken a ton of time using his wrestling in his fights. The Sergio Pettus fight's kind of an anomaly where he just went in there and really outrestled him for three rounds. But typically that's not his primary weapon in a fight.

He doesn't typically go out there and try to take guys down and grind them. I think that could have gone a long way in kind of flipping a couple of those close rounds. If he had actually used Al Jermaine's take-down attempts against him to scramble, maybe punish him a little bit, kind of circle around the back, throw a few punches. Even if they escape from there doing that, he was kind of front head locking him. and then backing out. He wasn't, he could have circled around, throw a few flurry punches.

It's just those little moments that make an impression in your mind of, like, damage. Because I think about Al Jermaine's second fight with Piotr-Yon when he got those couple of takedowns, even though he wasn't able to put him away, he was doing so much damage from the back, throwing big, heavy punches. That just looks, you know,

even if you're not doing a ton of damage, that looks bad. And we know those punches are coming close to landing. I know it kind of goes against what I was saying earlier about punches landing versus not landing, But when you're in a dominant position and you're wailing on a guy, it's hard not to see that as damage. And I think if I was going to point out one error in Henry's game, I would say that because he had Al Jermaine in a compromised position several times. And he didn't really do a lot with it.

He just kind of stuffed to take down, held him down, held the neck, and then circled out again. Maybe it's because he thought he could do a lot more damage on the feet. And again, as you said, he didn't want to, you know, get caught in a scramble and then Algeman gets his back and gets tapped out. I totally understand that. but Henry has good control. I thought he had good control in those moments, and he could, again, I'm not saying he had to stay there, but throw a few punches, get out.

You know, he didn't really do that. He just, like, stuffed it and got out of there again. Again, we're talking about a close fight. Those couple little things could have made a difference. So I'm in agreeance. I mean, we both just kind of echoed the same thoughts. What it tells me is that as good of a grappler is a control position guy that Henry is,

he felt something in there. was with Aljo and he felt like Aljo was slipping out and he kept having to readjust the grip, readjust the grip, burn out his arms, keep that front headlock, that head and arm, trying to shuck him down, shut him down. And he just felt like this is too dangerous. If I let go of one arm, if I let go of my grip and I try to inflict some damage, he felt Aljo's, Aljo's going to either a slip out, he's going to sweep him, he's going to reverse the position, he's going to find the way out. Henry didn't feel comfortable in those positions. And that's what goes, that's what goes I don't say underrated, but for Aljuman Sterling, when you see scrambles, it's not always a,

it's hard to highlight that. Like he's offensively so good. It was like Tony Ferguson. Tony Ferguson would find moments in scrambles and he would finish fights. He would slap on a choke. Aljo has the same type of scramble ability where he could make you feel uncomfortable, even if you're on top because he can get out at any point. Here's more his route to victory that was find a scramble than find the backpack out.

obviously, but to your point, Henry could have done more, and that probably would have swung the round in his favor, but he didn't feel good. He didn't feel safe against somebody as good on the ground at finding a way out as Algerman Sterling is. And it just speaks to how good Aljo is that it gets, it goes over a lot of fans head. Like, why, why isn't he doing more? Or Aljo doesn't really do that much. He doesn't throw knockout power shots. And he's not really a, uh, uh, the highest level wrestler, but his, his, his, his, his, his, his in-between game is so good. It's so good that it makes people not want to commit to things like that, the ground and pound that Suhudo probably could have shown a little bit more of. Yeah. So I think one of the biggest narratives going into this,

Alan, was, you know, coming out of it was, you know, Henry Sudo coming back and winning and reclaiming the title, he never technically lost. He gave it up when he retired. And then potentially talking about one of those all-time great runs. He kind of mapped it out. He wanted to fight Aljo. He wanted to fight Sean O'Malley, and then he wanted to go up to 145 to fight Alexander Volcanowski. Now, looks like Henry's going to stick around. And maybe he saw the tweet this morning. He's calling out Morad. We'll get back to that in the second. I feel like Al Jermaine Sterling has been arguably the most disrespected champion in mixed martial arts over these last couple of years. And it all stems from the first

fight with Pierre Yon. We all know. He got blasted with an illegal knee. He won the title in that way. No one wanted to win the title that way. Al Jermaine didn't want to win the title that way and it still drives me nuts that none of this was his fault. He got, and I've said a million times when guys take a groin shot and or a really bad illegal shot on the knee, you need to really, really, really think about do you want to continue? Because those are two things. When it's a really bad groin shot, you better take the full five minutes because you do not just shake that off and come back.

I'm no fighter, but I've taken shots of the groin and you are not getting up and walking around in five minutes feeling great. And then part two of that is the, you know, in terms of, in terms of like an illegal knee, he took the illegal knee. It wasn't his fault. So, again, he didn't win the title in an ideal way. And he's had to live with that ever since. And of course, he goes out there, beats Peter Yon the second time. I thought he won the fight.

I didn't think there was any controversy. The only controversy I had is I think he should have got a 10-8 round in the second when he was clearly dominant. And then he beats T.J. Dillishal, T.J., of course, afterwards, my shoulders are wrecked. I wasn't, you know, of course, then again, you don't get credit. At this point, how do you not give you out of the time? Al Jermaine Sterling credit. He just took out one of the, and I agree with Henry, one of the greatest combat sports athletes of all time. You know, one of only three people now to hold a win over him.

I don't know. Like, is that, do we, are we finally getting, are we finally turning a corner on people giving Algebra and Craig? I mean, there's always going to be haters. We understand that's just part of the sport. There's never going to be, there's people who are going to hate on him just because they don't like him and that, whatever. That's, I guess that you're right. But in terms of respect he deserves, I mean, when you look at the resume, when you look at what he's doing, the guys he's beating.

How can you not give this guy's flowers? I think that this fight beating Sohudo in a five-round fight, I think this is going to start getting people more on board. I think they're going to say, okay, this guy's earned it because as you mentioned, the two fights with Pjorda Yan,

it's just, they were tough because of the way it started, the second fight. Some people had it on. And honestly, being live at the second fight against Pryor Yan, I had it very close, but I was leaning towards,

Peter Yan in that fight. So I think people, and then the TJ fight being injured, they never quite, as you said, gave him his flowers. But beating Sohudo, you have to give the man respect. And he was able to take Suhudo down. He was able to reverse some of these positions. He hit a switch on him, took his back at one point in the fight. The great thing is this next possible matchup, I think, is the perfect matchup for Hudo to get

all the respect because not only would that put him on whatever it's going to be a five or six fight winning streak now but i think he needs a finish and i think he needs a dominant finish i think he needs a dominant win and as good as o'malley is the stylistic matchup allows for that it allows for a finish a lot more tall lanky striker who if he gets him on the ground he's going to be able to put that body lock in very easily against a small skinny waist against o'malley and o'malley is not going to be able to escape that, especially if O'Malley gets taken down in the first one or two minutes of a round, he's going to be stuck in a backpack position for three or four minutes having to escape and evade and defend. And eventually, it's inevitable. You're going to get choked out. So if Aljo could get

the take down early on O'Malley, I know I switch gears to the Amali talk real quick, but if he can get a finish, a dominant finish, a chokeout over O'Malley and say the first or second round, I think that will fully bring the fan base on board and say, this guy's one of the greatest we've ever seen in this weight division. It allows that opportunity coming up. And so I think everything moving forward is going to start looking very, very well for Aljo. You know, and I agree. And I think stylistically, and again, I give you all the credit in the world to Hindu Suhudo is an incredible athlete and an incredible fighter. I think Sean O'Malley proved me wrong in a lot of ways because I picked Peter Yan to win that fight. And it was a close fight. I mean, it was a very close fight.

I think on the night of the fight, I scored her for O'Malley. I went back and rewatch and said, man, maybe I'm leaning towards Peter Yon. It was really close. But that was kind of the fight that kind of woke me up. But I remember having a conversation before that fight with Anthony Smith. He was on the podcast, and he had talked about that. And he's like, he actually liked Sean O'Malley to beat Piotr Yan because of his length, because of his distance, and because Peotry is kind of like that shorter, stockier. Bansway.

And one thing to Anthony said that rang in my head again right after that fight was over this past weekend was, he said the guys that the guys that O'Malley wants to avoid the long, tall guys who can just take away that reach advantage. he's like he does not want to see guys like Corey Sanhagan or Al Jermaine Sterling because they're going to match him in the length and the distance. And then Corey is arguably maybe a better overall striker and Al Jamein's got the wrestling and the submissions. I don't want to sound like I'm disrespecting Sean O'Malley. But I think Sean O'Malley, when I say easier, I mean this in like in terms of styles.

This is an easier fight for Al Jamein than Sehudo was because Sehudo did have the wrestling. He did have the screen. Like I think, like I don't know what the. odds are going to be and I know odds are, you know, the odds are what they are, but like, if you're asking me, like, from a betting perspective, like, hey, who are you going to put money down on or who would you bet on? I would bet on Al Jermaine Sterling. I had problems.

I would, I would be like, I can't bet on Suhudo Al Jermaine because that fight's just so close. I would just be losing money because I have no idea who's going to win that fight. I can honestly say I'm fairly confident in Algebra. Now, I don't want to seem like Sean O'Malley has no chance. Of course, he has a great chance. He's an incredible fighter, great striking, boxing and knockout power, which, which I'm just something that, you know, can really come into that, come into play. And super tough.

I know people don't like to give him credit for his toughness, but Sean O'Malley is super tough. But I just think stylistically, he's not going to struggle with the takedowns on Sean O'Malley the way he did with Hinoosvenor because it's not an Olympic level wrestler. And then you talk about the submission ability of Al Jermaine. If he gets on Sean O'Malley's back one time, I don't know that Sean O'Malley has the strength and the wherewithal to just resist Al Jermaine Sterling for first. second, third round when he's got time. I just, again, if you're asking me right now to pick that

fight, I think, I think it is an Al Jermaine sterling fight. Again, weird things happen. Crazy things happen in fights, but stylistically, I think this is an easier fight for Al Jameen. That's why I'm like, I understand why you want to stick around, get the big money fight with Sean O'Malley before maybe going up to 1.45 because why not? Because to me, there is, again, less of a threat with Sean O'Malley than Henry Sehudo, in my opinion. Much less of a threat and probably be. bigger sales than a lot of these fights, right? O'Malley's a draw.

And now you have a big draw coming in here. O'Malley's gotten very good at kind of selling the fight. The UFC was on board with selling it. Dana White regrets having O'Malley go into the cage. But they got that, right? They got that footage of them in each other's face. It's going to help promote the fight. They're both going to be drawing back and forth, back and forth.

And 100%. I think this is one of the few times. We're finally going to see Aljo as the champion as a heavy favorite. in a matchup and it's warranted in this matchup because as as fluid and smooth of a striker that O'Malley is, he likes somewhat of a stationary target. If you find you stationary, he will put you out. Aljo is not a stationary target. He's constantly moving lateral from a long distance away and he's just throwing all those long kicks, fanking the shots, everything. So it's going to be very tough for O'Malley to land that clean shot on Algebraman Sterling. And you look at the Peter Yan fight with O'Malley.

to me the difference maker in that fight was that knee it was that knee that came up the middle right that cut pewter yon on the eyebrow and that was the most damage of the fight had that knee had not had not have landed he maybe didn't squeak out of victory i'm unsure but that damage played a lot the blood leaking that was you know it was a good shot so what i'm getting it is pewter yon's a shorter guy algerman sterling's a much taller guy i don't think that knee up the middle is going to land in a clinch and if they get in the clinch i was just going to be looking for those takedowns much more. The clean shot from the outside, the sniper bullet that O'Malley has perfected, it's not going to be as such of a higher percentage shot because Aljo is going to be moving all

over the cage and the distance is going to be much greater in the fight. O'Malley's going to have to cover much greater of a distance. So the matchup, as you said, it very much favors Al Jermaine Sterling. And this is a guy. You mentioned he had the same neck surgery as me. And I remember speaking to him after his surgery. And he was saying, first of all, he was recovering so fast. I was shocked how fast he was recovering and wanting to go again. It just speaks to the type of athlete that he is and how well he still recover for his age and just genetics.

He's just built different. But moving forward with it, the neck thing, it didn't bother him. You mentioned with Suhudo, the next something in the past. It's not in his mindset anymore. This is a great matchup. I had some point I was trying to make. I lost where I was going with it. But all in all, this is a dream fight for Aljo.

Aljo has said very openly that he probably has Sean O'Malley. He told me this before the fight. He's kind of hinted at it afterwards. Sean O'Malley and then probably out of the division. Of course, we all know Marraib DeWilishvili, his teammate and his friend waiting in the wings, which, by the way, Sean O'Malley needs to just give him the jacket. Like that was one of the funniest things When I saw the replay, I didn't even notice

that Marab had put on the jacket I know it almost... I noticed it almost... Did you see it? Yeah, it almost caused the dust up, obviously. It almost caused like a riot to do a breakout. But that was one of the funniest moments that I could remember with Marab just putting on the coat.

I was like, Sean, you've lost the coat. You need to just send it to Marab. He pulled it off. You need to just gift him that coat. But Marab's there. And I, you know, legitimately, like no offense to Sean O'Malley, I think legitimately, Marab de Wallis really, to me, is the actual number one contender.

But we all know they're not going to fight. I'm completely okay with that. That's fine. I commend them for sticking to their guns. Matt Brown said something on this podcast, and I appreciate these. He's like, I fought teammates, I fought training partners. I would never fight a friend. And I appreciate that.

I appreciate their sticking their guns. And also, Al Jemines doing exactly what he said. Listen, we all know the Sean O'Malley fight is a big money fight. Going to draw a lot of crowd. Pay-per-view buys. You're a champion. You get those back in. and pay-per-view buys, of course you wanted that fight.

And then he goes away. And listen, if Alchamaine Sterling can close out his Bantamweight career with a win over, you know, Winsover, Reputer Jan, T.J. Dillishaw, Henry Sehudo, and Sean O'Malley, you know, we may be putting him in that goat conversation of Bansomay. And I think that Bansomate goat conversation is shorter because for one, the division hasn't been in the U.S. as long, but also there haven't been a lot of long-reaning champions.

I still put Dominic Cruz number one overall because of WC and U. combined. But I think if Al Jardin goes out there and beats Sean O'Malley and that's his last fight at Bantamweight, I don't know. I'm thinking maybe I think he might have submitted that spot number one all the time. But I appreciate that he's being honest about himself saying, listen, I got maybe one more, get to big money fight and then go up to 1.45 and let Marab do his thing. And I think that's the way it's going to play out. I think that it also tells me that that Algerman Sterling sees the end is near. And although he's in the prime of his life somewhat,

I think he's ready to get out of the fight game. I don't want to take this as like any type of negativity towards algebra. I just feel like what I was mentioning earlier is about the neck thing, and it just came back to me was he was thinking about when he was recovering. I was telling you he was healing very fast from the neck. He was telling me, man, maybe I'll come back, test out the neck. maybe I have a fight. I don't know, man.

I don't know how much longer I want to fight. That was a couple of years ago. Since then, he's been able to cement his legacy. And he's looked better than he ever has in his entire life. But he was thinking about retirement a couple of years ago. Now he's been able to make money provide for himself and family and put himself in that, you know, Hall of Fame champion, possible double champ status with if he moves up in

weight classes. if he beats Somali and then goes up, I don't think he really has any expectations against Volkov, Volkanowski. I think it's just that's a super fight. That's a money fight. Let me strike while the iron's hot. If I lose, it doesn't matter.

Just like Volkanaki going up when he fought 55. Islam, yeah. Islam, thank you. Mahathev. You know, Volkov, Wokkanowski went up, and obviously he wanted to win, but he knew it didn't really hurt his. status or his reputation. It's a super fight. Let me take this opportunity. There's no loser in this.

It doesn't matter. Aljo sees that opportunity. Let me go up and fight. It's a huge fight. It's a lot of money. And if he loses, so what? So what if he loses. Volcanowski is one of the best we've ever seen inside of the octagon. If he loses, that would be a way for him to then exit. Does he want to leave on a possible loss if he were to lose? I don't know. But he's giving up his title for a friend Marab to have an opportunity going up. And then after a loss, I think that would be a suitable exit for him to say, look, I've cashed in and I've cemented my legacy. Now is a suitable time that I could exit the company.

Yeah, and I think, why not? Like, why not, you know, listen, you know, you and I can have this conversation all about guys getting out at the right time versus the wrong time that still breaks my heart to this day, the amount of legends who get out of the wrong time. You know, they just don't know when to say goodbye. And you can count on two hands the amount of fighters who have retired on a win, much less, like, you know, at the peak of their prowess, being like a GSP or a Khabi, being a champion in leaving.

If that's Al Jameen's path, if he goes Sean O'Malley and Volcanovsky, and again, as you said, maybe he loses the Volcanovsky. He'll be a heavy underdog. Of course he will. Alexander Volcanowski's a freaking monster. He'll be an underdog in that fight. If he somehow pulls that off, oh, my God, what a huge moment. But if he loses, again, you know, obviously Matt losses matter, but who really cares?

I mean, he went up and took a shot and then walk away, make your, you know, make your, you figure payday or whatever for a big pay-per-view and then cash out and leave and I got no problem with that. It's weird to say like you'd lose and it would not really mean much but to me that's kind of like I don't hold like did Volcanozky lose to Islam of course. I thought he lost the fight I didn't think it was a

controversial decision I thought he lost but I don't think he definitely doesn't lose anything in his legacy or or anything like that like it's kind of like when Israel went up and fought Jan Blahovic. He lost but didn't ruin his legacy. He fought a much bigger opponent. Nobody cares about that fight. Yeah. Yeah. No one, so yeah, Alger, and like you said, why not?

That's like, that's like you're playing with house money at that point. If you go out and beat Sean O'Malley, who cares? Like at that point, go up and make a, you know, make an eight-figure payday to fight. Alexander Volcanowski, who really cares, like, if you lose? Like, if you win, man, you're now in like a short list of like all-time, all-time grace, regardless of a weight class. If you lose, you just lost to maybe the number one pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. Is it really that big of a, of a detriment to your legacy and your resume, especially know when you went up a division when a lot of guys have struggled doing that. I mean, again,

Al Jermaine, in my opinion, is like in the perfect position to just close out his, again, maybe he wants to fight for him five years. I haven't talked to him about it yet. Maybe he's changed his mind. But I know it seemed like that was the way it was directing even before this fight. And like I said, good for him, man. Like, why not? Again, as I said, he's playing with house money. If he beats O'Malley, he's got all the money. He's literally won at the blackjack table. He's got all the money in the world. And at that point, he's just playing for, for, you know, just playing for legacy. There's nothing left to lose at that point.

And how about Suhudo? He's got to be sitting back now thinking, God, dang, and I was one round the way from winning this fight. And now my boy, Aljo, Aljo's taking my path. He's going to go fight O'Malley for the big payday that he wanted. And now he's even going to take the blueprint. And if he went that fight,

he's going to go fight Volcanowski, which was the same, the blueprint that Suudo had laid out. I mean, it's got to be somewhat, what frustrating for Sohudo to see somebody else taking that victory, but he deserves it. He deserves it. And there's no more, there's no more looking past Aljo, which I've been a victim of as well, man.

You know, as I said, sometimes it doesn't jump off the paper how good Aljahman Sterling is until you see him inside the Attegan. You see guys trying to deal with that length and that reach and that ability and that speed and everything that he possesses. Yeah, absolutely. Real quick, Henry Suhudo, of course, and we weren't sure after Saturday night he kind of left it up in the air.

Is he going to fight again? Is he not? And I understand that. I actually said going into it, if he'd lost, I thought maybe he would walk away again because coming back was all about these legacy fights. And you said he mapped it out.

It was going to be Al Jermaine, O'Malley, and then Volcanowski. He lost it. We saw the Twitter earlier today. He called out Morab. Now, I'll be honest with you, Alan. I don't know that the UFC, the way they're thinking,

because I think Dana has said this, and listen, it's a business. I get it. he seems a little, maybe a little upset or a little bummed that, you know, we can't do Marab and Aljo. It would be a big fight in the storyline. But I respect the fact that they're not going to fight each other. So we move on. It seemed like Marab and Corey Sanhagen is a fight to make because then if Al Jemaine does, if he loses to Amali, then you got a number one contender of Marab or Sanhagan, two guys he's never fought.

If Al Jameen goes to 145 and he just gets rid of the title, then the winner of Marab and Corey Sanhagan could then maybe fight Suhudo for it. for a vacant title. I like the callout, and I'm glad Henry's sticking around. I said this on Saturday night on Twitter. I said, he's still one of the best in the world. I hope he does stay, because that was one round difference of him being back and being champion. I hope he stays, and it looks like he's going to. But me personally, I don't know that they're going to give him the Marab fight because if he beats Marab,

again, I think Marab Sandhagans is the fight to make just because they're both coming off big wins. They're both fresh, and we could book that fight sooner, maybe like July. but again, I'm glad Henry's sticking around. The thing about this division is that everybody's last fight in the division outside of the champ has given them momentum to be the next guy in line, right? When we saw Marab go out there and just say, this guy has a gas tank unlike anything we've ever seen, he became the next guy in line, right? And then Corey Sanhagen comes in against Cheeto, which a lot of people like myself thought

Cheeto had the advantage in there with the power. And then Cori San Hagan looks phenomenal in that fight. Then he kind of leapfrog the division and became that next guy in line. So we can't understand enough how on fire this division is and how important everybody's last fight is because you have a good showing. You get a victory over a tough guy and you look dominant. It puts you up there. I like Sehudo calling out that fight because it keeps him in the game. And if that's the only fight that he wants, otherwise he maybe retires.

If I'm the UFC, I give him that fight because I keep Suhudo in. He's a draw. It keeps another big name in the division. Without him, it's one less name. So I like that fight for him. I say give him that fight. But then where do we go with Corey, right? Does San Hagan sit on the sidelines and then wait to see what happens with the possible

winner of both of those fights? Let's say Suhudo and Marab fight. Now you've got to look at who's going to face the winner of that one. And now you look at the title fight with O'Malley and Aljo. And so he kind of becomes the odd man out, that's San Hagan. But either one of those, Marab versus Suhudo or Marab versus Sanhagan, I'm for either of those. Yeah, and I'm just glad Henry's staying in because I think he is still one of the best guys in the world. I don't think it would take much for him to get back to the title.

Again, we've said numerous times it seems like Al Jermaine has kind of mapped his path out of Bantamway, you know, one more fight and gone. So, yeah, Henry's sticking around again. And again, I have no problem with the Marab fight. I think it's a tremendous fight, good storyline after fighting Al Jermaine. He may not like what he gets to the fight with Marab because Marab's a monster man. That may be the fight where he's like, well, maybe I do want to hang him up again because Marab's a freaking monster.

But again, it does set up perfectly. whether it's Marab against Corey or Marab against Henry, it sets up perfectly for the winner to then fight for a title, assuming either whether it's O'Malley winning and then needing an opponent or Al Jermaine winning and leaving the belt behind. Either way, I'm fine. Again, I've said this on the record.

I think right now Bantwaite is the most fun division in our sport. And we've got a guy like Umar and Morgomettov who is out there, who could legitimately be the best Banswaite in the sport. He just hasn't had those fights yet. I mean, that's the guy who's ranked like number eight or nine. or whatever he is the division. And that's how deep this division is. Bantamway's ridiculous right now.

Yeah, yeah, I know. He's kind of the dark horse, right? Right now, Umar lurking in the darkness later, and further down in the division, he just hasn't had those staple wind yet over the big names to put him up there. But, yeah, I'm just trying to think into the future. And I'm thinking, we both kind of think

that it's a very good stylistic matchup, Al Jogun, So Mal. So let's say Aljo does win that fight. He reclaims the belt, but then he vacates it. So now it's a vacant title, right? So now O'Malley had just lost, so he's back down on the track. And so it pushes everybody back up. So many moving parts in this division, but it's a fun.

It's a good thing to have, right? I mean, you see some divisions like 205, you know, was for a while where it was just like, everybody's been beaten. Everybody's been beaten. So let's get the number eight guy who's on a two-fight win streak and let him fight John Jones or somebody or in this current state of the 205 where the belt is just switching hands every other fight or something. You don't really have a definite champion.

But there's so many fun moving parts. And I think that's the intrigue in this division. Not only is the talent level so high, but not everybody has been beaten. You know, there's still a bunch of very viable. matchups to make in this division. So it's going to have a lot of longevity and good matchups for a while. Boarding for Flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what? Sounds like Ojo time.

Play Ojo? Great idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements. What you win is yours to keep groovy. Hey, I won! Boating will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating. 19 Plus Ontario only. Please play your response. concerned by your gambling or that if someone close to you, call 18665331-2-60 or visit Comex Ontario.ca.

With Amex Platinum, $400 in annual credits for travel and dining means you not only satisfy your travel bug, but your taste buds too. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Conditions apply. I agree. I agree. Now, the co-main event, of course, was Bilal Muhammad pulling off a huge win over Gilbert Burns. Both these guys took the fight on two weeks

notice and saying they did this and did it for five rounds. I thought Bilau had a pretty brilliant performance. Listen, I know Bilal gets a lot of hate. He breaks something on himself with the hilarious. Now I see why the Nets left New Jersey which was one of the funniest lines of all last week. He kind of embraces it a little

bit, but I thought it was a tremendous performance. And listen, I said this, you know, afterwards and I stand by this. Listen, I have nothing against Colby Covington. I don't like a lot of what he says. And I think he says way too much stuff just to get attention, but he is a tremendous fighter. But the reality is, in my opinion, Alan, again, I'm saying this.

I know it's not going to play out this way. Colby's getting the title shot. They made that pretty clear. He's getting Leon Edwards. Why they're obsessed with that fight, I have absolutely no idea. It doesn't make any sense to me. But the real number one contender at Weltoeit, the real, this is like back when they made GSP and Nick Diaz and Johnny Hendricks is out there like, hey, I'm right here on like a huge

win streak. Bilal Muhammad is the real number one contender at Welterweight. If there was any question before Saturday night, he answered that. Of course, again, he's not getting the title shot. They're giving it to Colby. I've given up on that. They're giving it to Colby for some unknown reason. But the real number

one contender, the guy who deserves it, really deserves it, is Bilal Muhammad. Bilal Muhammad. What is he on now? Ten fight unbeaten streak. The one, no contest in that unbeaten streak was Leon Edwards. I mean, there is a storyline there. I don't understand the Kobe Coventon Bush either, but I credited it to, okay, Leon Edwards was a guy that what do we say about him

for years before he became the title holder? Man, super good, well-rounded, probably could be a champion, but he's not that marketable, right? He doesn't really speak a lot. Sometimes some of his fights aren't that entertaining, even if he does get a finish. You know, he's not, he's not a, he's not always a blood and guts type of fighter. He's more of a smart stay at a danger with finishing ability. And then he had his moment. And then he had his head kick shot to the head where he won the title. And that storyline sort of playing in the Rocky when we saw the corner saying like,

you know, you got to believe in yourself. You want to believe it. Like you got to go out there and get it, man. Headshot, headshot, headshot, headshot. He hits the headshot. And everybody became a Leon fan after that. I started following him after that fight. man, I was so intrigued by this storyline and the rocky, the rocky storyline, the call by John Annie.

So everything, that was Leon's moment right there. That's what he needed in the UFC. And that's what the UFC needed out of Leon. If he was going to become a champion and he would have squeaked out of victory and had some boring post-fight speech, they're trying to get him out of there. He had what we needed. He got to finish. He had this beautiful moment where he was crying with his mom on the phone. I mean, it was the best thing that could have.

happen for both parties. Leon Edwards and the UFC. Now, they go and they have a rematch, and he gets the victory again. But what I took from it was the storyline is done. The ace has been shown. Now, like, it wasn't as exciting. The post-fight speech wasn't as exciting. And Leon became that guy that was kind of like, okay, well, is he still going to sell pay-per-views? Is he still a huge draw. He was after that head kick knockout, but then we go back to kind of his normal fighting style and his normal personality. And this is not a diss, but it just is what it is. He's not bringing in the masses. Not everybody has to see him fight. And so what I think the UFC is pushing Kobe so hard because he goes, we need an A, B side. We need somebody who's going to sell this.

And Kobe, Kobe doesn't give a shit. He's going to say all the stupid stuff in the world is going to hire all the girls in bikinis. He's going to do whatever he has to do to market this fight. And I think that's why the UFC is leaning so heavy on Kobe. They don't trust that Balaw will have the A-B-Side to be able to help sell the fight if it was Balau versus Leon Edwards. But you know what I took from the fights last weekend, Damon? Did you catch, and you mentioned it, he referenced the whole New Jersey sucks thing. I felt like Balaw was testing the waters and becoming a heel. I felt like when he got, when he had the mic and he had the hot mic and he had an opportunity to sell something to do something and DC was pushing very hard you know you're the next guy in line

he could have just gone and been boring and to say you know I want Kobe blah blah blah deserve the shot but instead he took a shot at the crowd and he said I'm going to kind of become a heel maybe if people kind of start hating me even more I don't know why he gets to hate it'll be more of a draw and so I think bala was starting to dip his toes in the water and just test to what's possible because me and Balau fought in his UFC debut. Bilal was a confident guy, but he wasn't as outspoken. Over the last couple of years that he's been in the UFC, he's been in the UFC for a minute now, but the last few years, you've seen Balow is very, very relevant on social media.

Yeah, maybe some of it's his manager, but a lot of it is him as well. He's very quick to snap back. When he got into it with Connor McGregor at first, Balau kept speaking, man, I say one thing and I get thousands of hate mail replies and it bothered him. Now he doesn't bother him at all. He will hate on Connor. He will hate on Kobe. He will hate on Leon.

He will call you out in a second. He's gotten very good at finding his kind of demographic. How can I sell? What gets me the most feedback? And I think it's a very smart approach from Bilal to do that to say, okay, I've got the fighting attributes, but for some reason the crowd doesn't get on my side. What can I do? And he's doing that.

And I don't mind him kind of just going, you know, full heel and just kind of being the bad guy, if that's going to warrant him more opportunity to fight for the title. I remember years ago talking to Michael Bisping, who is one of my favorite people in this sport. Nice guy. I've been around Michael many, many years. And even when he was in the thick of his career, when he was probably the most hated guy on the entire UFC roster, I was like, I wish you could see the real Michael Bisping. He is actually one of the incredibly the nicest.

most accommodating people I've ever talked to. I remember when he fought Rashad Evans back in the day, I was at a hotel in New Jersey, hanging out with his dad. The entire day of the fight, we were just watching fights. His dad, Jan is like the nicest guy in the world.

And, uh, and, like, I was like, you don't understand, but Michael embraced the hate. He just embraced it. He's like,

bring it on. You're going to hate on me? I'm just going to keep feeding it to you. And now he's kind of turning the corner after his career. Now everyone kind of loves Bisping. We kind of realized, like, what we had in him. I think you're right.

Bilal's just embracing. He's like, okay, you're not going to cheer for me. You're not going to root for me. I'm going to go to the pro wrestling route. I'm going to make fun of your town. He did a little bit with Brady too. He's talking about how Philly sucked. And obviously they were in Abu Dhabi so it didn't play as well.

But when he said that line at the press conference, and he said, now I see what the Nets left for Brooklyn. I was like, oh, that's like the classic pro wrestling move. Like he's trying to get people to hate on him. And good for him. Like I said, you know, you got to find a way to get people interested. And Balal Muhammad is, again, clearly to me, the number one guy in the world besides Leon Edwards, but you still got to draw people in.

And I've said this a million times, Alan, if you are a mixed martial arts fan or supporter, strike the word deserves from your vocabulary because it will drive you insane. This sport is not about deserves. It is about who's going to sell. That's why Colby Covington's in this position. You're absolutely right. You're 110% right. Even though, again, I'll keep saying I don't get it.

I do get it in that way. That's why. That is why. He's going to sell the fight. and if Leon beats Colby, which I think he has a great chance of doing, that just puts him over, even bigger. And then you maybe could legitimately sell Leon versus Below as a big card, maybe do it in England, something like that.

But I love the Below's embracing, and I hope he does. Keep embracing and have fun because Below is actually, he's one of the few people who actually went toe to toe with Connor McGregor on social media, in my opinion, won. He had a couple of even on Saturday night, Connor tweeted out, piss poor about that fight. And he tweeted back out, when's the last time you want a fight? And I was just like, that's like the perfect answer.

Belau's a funny guy. He's actually really intelligent with the way he does his kind of like trash talk. And again, brilliant performance. And then you cap it off with like you said, he didn't say Colby, he didn't say Leon. He made fun of the town and the state and got everyone riled up and freaking out. And did it in a much less Colby Covington way, by the way. He didn't go full on insult. He did like the pro wrestling thing.

Like your town sucks, like that kind of thing. again yeah embrace it like I said there's certain people you got to embrace it and it seems like he's been cast into a role and for whatever reason and he's accepting and good for him like I said and I hope that I hope that Colby and Leon does get scheduled relatively soon I know they're not doing July I talked to Leon about this he said you know September October would be perfect great and if I'm Bilal Muhammad I know nothing I know we all know nothing's guaranteed in life but at this point you just won again I talk about house money you just won with house money you shouldn't have been in this fight. You took it all. You were in Ramadan. You were in Canada eating Putin. You were not getting ready for a fight, dude. You were not getting ready. And you went out there and beat freaking Gilbert Burns, who's one of the best of the world, who was coming off a fight of his own. You go out and win this fight, dude, sit. Sit and wait. I'm, generally, it's a bad move, but in this regard, if they booked that fight in August, September, somewhere around there with Colby and Leon, just sit and wait, dude. Just sit and wait.

You might be on the shelf for nine months, but you're going to get the title shot. And that's really what matters. and he could let everything heal up, work on tweaks for if he possibly has to face either one of those guys and be the backup guy. Be the backup guy, go away in at that fight in case something happens because that's a long time, right? And either one of them can get injured or there's a weight problem or something. So I agree. Sit on the shelf. You've done all that you can.

The worst tragedy that you could see in this, well, I'd say the worst tragedy you can see in this sport. But a tragedy is when you see a guy works so hard and you mention a word, serving. But, you know, what comes to mind is Tony Ferguson, who's in the news right now for other things. But Tony Ferguson, when he was on that like nine fight, one street, and he kept having to chip away, chip away, chip away, go one step up the ladder rather than making that big jump. And anytime the possible super fight would come, it never happened. Him and Khabib never happened. And he, he works so long and never really got rewarded for it. You would hate for that same travesty to happen to Bilal Muhammad, where he's, he's done everything.

he has to do and doesn't get the title shot. Maybe he has to go. And like you said, if he didn't sit on the shelf, if he went, if they tried to match him up against Rock Monoff or somebody like that or put him in there with Shemayev or just something and maybe it doesn't go his way and then he loses all that momentum, hell no. Fambolao, I've done everything plus more. Not only did he take this fight against Gilbert Burns, as you mentioned on two weeks notice, he said, let's go five rounds.

He didn't have to take five rounds. He could have said, look, I'm doing you guys a favor. Pay me the extra hundred. for taking this fight on a short notice. I'm going three rounds, though, because I'm just coming off of Ramadan on two weeks notice. I went, he went five rounds, and he didn't get tired the entire time. Gilbert, I mean, Gilbert Burns, you looked at this warrior that went against Chimae of in that fight. That was not the same guy that we saw against Bilau. And I'm not saying that Gilbert was different. I'm just saying Balow just did a very good job of, of, you saw he took

one of Gilbert Burns' best shots. He just kept pressing forward. He wasn't getting hit that much, but when he did get hit. He took the shots very well. He stayed out of danger. He always has a tremendous gas tank. I mean, in the kicking game, Balau's kicking game has grown leaps and bounds. He used to be kind of a boxer with a few kicks. He would mix in the wrestling. Then he became very wrestling heavy. Excuse me. Now you're seeing the kicking game. He was kicking the crap out of Gilbert, the entire fight and having success using that game. Absolutely. And I think realistically, there's no one for Bilada fight right now. I mean, if Chimayev was going to stay at Weltsweight,

that would seemingly be the one to make, but he's not. He's going to middleweight. We all know that. They've all talked about the Palo Khaas to fight. And I think it's better for Chamaev. He's killing himself. He did not, you know, it was not going to look good when he missed weight by nine pounds or whatever it was for an A. Diaz fight.

Go be a middleweight. He seems like a natural middle weight. Let's just leave Chimayev out of there. If that's out of there, there's no one else. I mean, Rachmanov's a monster, but he's not there yet. I think Usmann, obviously, if Ustman, if he hadn't fought Gilbert Usman was the fight he wanted, and that would have made a lot of sense, but now no, because, you know, if Usman beats him, then we're back to square one again.

You know, are we going to see Usman Covington or Usman Edwards? So, you know, Usen maybe do Usman. I don't want to see it. Yeah, maybe you do Usman Rachmanov or maybe do Usman Gilbert, too, when Gilbert's healthy again. But yeah, Belalja is sit and wait, man, at this point, like, you're not going to really gain anything, and there's really, the reality is, in my opinion, there's no one for him to fight. I mean, beating Gilbert Burns was the only other guy on a streak you could have fought. So who else are you going to fight?

You're just risking it at that point. Why? Like, why would you bother? And Gilbert was the bad matchup for him too, right? Gilbert was the guy that great wrestling, tremendous jujitsu, more powerful striker, good gas tank as well, solid chin. I mean, I don't think many people thought that Bala was going to win. Do you know who won person that thought Bala was going to win? Anthony Pettis.

Anthony Pettis, I saw somewhere that he put down a lot of money. I don't remember what it was. It was like 30 or 40, 30 or 40 grand, maybe more, maybe 80 grand or something. But for Bilal to win. And let me tell you, he killed it. Anthony's always making money. But a lot of people didn't think they thought that was the wrong matchup for Bilal. Balau has to wrestle you.

He has to wrestle you. How's he going to wrestle? somebody as good as Burns. No, he went out there and just used his full arsenal and got it done again. Switching stances. That was a brilliant game plan. Kept Gilbert guessing. It was just a great performance.

Like I said, he's the number one guy. Again, in reality, he is the number one contender. He's not going to get the next title shot. It's going to be Colby. I've given up on that.

It's going to be Colby. But he is a legit number one contender. And now, like, Balal said something to me before the fight. And I did an article about it. And it said, if I beat Gilbert Burns,

and you're still, you still, you know, don't give him my respect, you're just a hater. And that's the reality. At this point, if you're just, if you're just giving Bilal Muhammad an issue because he fought a five-round fight or he didn't put on the most exciting fight, you know, taking a fight on two weeks, freaking short notice, you're just a hater at this point. And again, like you said, maybe he's finally embracing it. It seems like he is. He's having fun with it.

You know, it would be interesting, like I said, depending on if he fight, I mean, imagine imagine Bilal putting on that kind of show in terms of the performance part of it in terms of the pre-fight build-up and he does that in England with Leon Edwards. I mean, that crowd would lose their minds if he just starts ripping on England or whatever. Have a great opportunity for him, yeah. There's marketability there. And again, like I said, I agree with him. If you don't have to like the guy, I said it on Saturday night, love him or hate him, he is the real number one contender. And people are still going to hate on, but you got to respect the guy, man.

who goes out there and does that on two weeks notice. I guess the guy as good as Gilbert Burns. Again, give Bilal Muhammad's credit, man. You don't have to like the guy, but you've got at least begrudgingly say the guy, the guy has proven himself as a legit number one contender in this division. Can't do anything more, especially in a division like that, the guy that he's beating.

I mean, these are really tough guys. So he's earned it. Last thing before we get out of here, Alan, I got to ask, of course, Jan Nan got a big win over the weekend. There were some other great fights. Real quick, I want to ask you this. I know I'm sending you up for a bit of a time bomb here on terms of your reaction because we saw it on Saturday night with Dana White.

Crone Gracie went out and had one of the more bizarre performances in recent history. And Dana said something after the fight that absolutely cracked me up, but he's right. He's like I felt like I opened a time capsule from 1995. Yeah. And he came out. And I said this, and I said, as listen, I know it's harsh. I don't ever like to call for people to get released or retired. That's just not my move.

but I said, I said, Cron Gracie just should not be on the UFC roster. He's not that fighter. Like, you cannot be, in 2023, you cannot be that one-dimensional. It just does not work. Can I just ask what you thought? Like, it's such a bizarre performance.

And I don't think the UFC's going to bring him back. And again, I'll never advocate for anyone to lose their job. That's not what I'm trying to do. But I feel like if you really, imagine him going into a fight against a guy. Obviously, Charles Dordane is a good fighter. It's no offense to Charles Dordane But imagine you throw him in there

Against a guy who stuffs to take down And then really just turns on the offense to punishment You're gonna get a guy hurt I mean honestly I think like he just You know go do something go go do your jihitsu thing Maybe learn me he was off for almost four years And he came back looking like that Like I just I can't see it I can't see it

He would have to evolve tremendously To um To keep a long career in the UFC because, you know, he can go back from this and he could really sit down with a boxing coach and say, I want to really polish my game. But there's technical attributes that you could add to your game and then there's just natural physical attributes. And you can see physically he's not a natural striker or an evasive, elusive type guy. He's very flat-footed. He's a jiu-suituit. I mean, he's one of the best jiu-suits guys in the world. And he's warranted

a lot of respect from that. And that's what's kind of inserted him into the UFC and these opportunities that he's had. But when you come out like that and you look like you're watching Hoyce Gracie, UFC 2 right here, with the stance and the flat-footedness and the pulling guard and it's not a good look. And that's exactly what was going through my mind. I was watching the fights and I'm going, I can only imagine what Dana's thinking right now. Dana's got to be pissed. Dana's got to be on that phone, that red phone right now saying,

what the hell he's got to be upset so um you you know what they need to do with them they need to give him a jiu jitsu guy and just make it a fun fight and see what happens there what's god i'm i can't think of everyone everyone everyone said everyone was saying ryan hall ryan hall's the fight you make because he's like he's the other jigsuitz guy give him ryan hall and let's see some crazy ass technical jiu jitsu let's just make it one of these feature fights where it's like I can't wait to see what's going to happen in this position and that position and make it fun. And then from there, we could see what happens. But yeah, you can't give him another very well-rounded MMA UFC guy that's going to stuff his takedowns.

I'm going to see when you see butt scooting in the UFC, it's not a good look. It's just it doesn't look. It looks like he hasn't evolved. You've got to be able to at least roll and grab a single leg. You got to be able to do something or throw some, you know, better hands. I say give him Ryan Hall, man. Give him Ryan Hall. Give him one more opportunity to entertain the crowd with some type of slick

jiu-jitsu fight and then go from there. Yeah, I remember the fight years ago when they did Jake Schills and Damien Maya. That was one of my favorite fights, the scrambles, the wrestling, the exchanges on the ground. It was everything I hoped it would be. I really didn't want it to end up being a five-round sloppy striking matchup between two guys who aren't great strikers, but they ended up doing the ground fighting. And it was just tremendous. Jake Shields is a great example of a guy who,

who evolved his game in terms of he became a really good wrestler to then apply his Jiu-Jitsu because when you just used Jiu-J, he was, Jake Shills was never a good striker. No one's ever going to lie and say he was, but he developed his wrestling to where he could take guys down without having to just pull guard. It just looked like, Chrome Gracie just looked like to fish out of water. Like you say, it was that. It was like, it was literally like watching flashback of Hoyst Gracie. And listen, Hoyst Gracie's legend, love him, of course, all-time great.

He would not do well in mixed martial arts in 2023. That style just does not work anymore. It's just that we've evolved beyond that so far beyond that. You cannot be a one-dimensional fighter in this sport. Not saying you have to be bow-nickel in wrestling and and Israel out of sign and striking. You're never going to be all that. But you have to be at least good enough in rudimentary skills to survive. As you said, butt-skoothing, that should not be your method of victory.

And even when he pulled guard, like it was almost like almost, it was like desperation pulling guard. It wasn't even like an offensive. Like he was just going like he was throwing flying triangles to try to pull something off. He was basically like, I can't do anything else. I'm just going to pull you down on top of me and hope for the best. It's just, it's again, it's 2023. You cannot be a one-dimensional fighter in 2023. And we saw hints of this recently.

What's his name, Saul, Raoul Saul Jr., the young kid. Oh, Rojas. Rojas, yeah. Thank you. And I don't think he's one-dimensional, but he's, got a definite strength and his strength has been in his grappling right that's his thing he's just so good and just like he's still got like he he he's strong but he's got like almost that like i'm going to say little kid like i'm trying to get he's able to move still and and and bend and his flexibility like

he's not stiff like some you know when you start putting on the muscle and stuff he's just able to find scramble opportunities and and and he was doing tremendous in the ufc then they put him up against a very well-rounded guy who was able to stuff these takedowns, counter some of these submissions, lay down some ground and pound. And you saw him kind of get exposed slightly, where he's still young enough, where he's still able to be molded. He still has a very, very bright future. They just put him against too much of a well-rounded guy. But for Gracie, he's at the age where he's in the point of his career, you're not going to mold him into another fighter. He's not going to, he's going to get a little bit better at boxing and maybe change and working a little bit

read more on his wrestling entries to try to obtain these takdowns, but he's not going to change his identity. That's who he is. We just seen it. Yeah, the sport has evolved. He didn't evolve with it, give him that jiu-jitsu match up.

And just have some fun with it. Yeah, I'm with you. I'm with you. Well, Alan, it is always a pleasure to have you on the podcast. One of the best analysts, one of the best minds of the sport, which is why I wanted to have you break down everything with me on UFC 288. Obviously, you're a very, very busy guy. What do you have coming up next that people can see?

I know you've been doing the analysts thing a lot. One day we're going to see a call fights. I think I'd like to see you to call some UFC fights. I feel, I never thought I would say this. I feel like Laura Sanko right now. I feel like Laura Sanko. That's an odd thing to say. I don't feel that pretty.

But yeah, what I'm getting at is that Laura Sanko has become a, like a, like a, like a, like a, like a, like a, like a, she's so useful for the UFC. She does everything. feel like the UFC is starting to push me in that position where they have, don't get mad at me guys, but they have me going to do something with slap fighting next week. And then I'm doing the fight night on May 20th. And then I'm going to China and doing the inside the octagon interviews and cage side reporting as well. So the reporting. So this is stuff I've never done, the reporting, the inside the octagon interviews, the slap fighting. So they're starting to kind

of see how much they can get out of me. So I like it. You know, I like to be challenged. I like to have new areas. But the end goal obviously would be on the color commentary. I've been doing color commentary for three years now with the LFA. I love it. And yeah, I can't wait to have my opportunity. I'm hoping that is coming because you saw this saying.

That's why I bring up Loris Sanko because I felt like they used her as utility knife for a long time. She did everything. She was an analyst at the desk with me. Obviously, she would do reporting. And then when she had her opportunity on Dana White, not looking for a fine, I'm sorry, on the Contendium Series. She was doing everything. I mean, she was a Swiss Army knife.

She would do the interviews, the cage. She would be an analyst. And so I feel somewhat like they're pushing me in that direction. So I look forward to bigger and more things to come. Well, I look forward to it as well. And that's a great example. Laura does an incredible job. I thought she did great in her first couple commentary roles.

And you said LFA, of course, they just got licensed to do events in Nevada, too. So we're going to see some LFA events in Las Vegas, I'm sure, in the near future. Ed Sors and the crew over there doing a great job with LFA. so look forward to that. Alan, it's always a pleasure. I appreciate you cutting out some time for me today. I appreciate it. Obviously, look forward to whatever you have coming up next and the fights you're going to and, of course, in China as well. And come back anytime, man. It's always a blast to have you on the podcast. Thank you, brother. My pleasure. We'll talk soon. It's hockey season and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats.

Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get a nice rank on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver the Those. Gold tenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes. Because those are groceries, and we deliver those too. Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here. Introducing the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus, powered by Peloton IQ. Built for breakthroughs, with personalized workout plans, real. time insights and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence. While Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress. Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton Cross-Training Treadplus at OnePeloton.ca. Hey, Cameron. It is always a pleasure to be joined by the great Alan Jobein, one of the great

minds in our sport, one of the busiest guys in our sport for him to donate his time to us. We really do appreciate it. Great thoughts, of course, on both the Maine and Co-Main. And, you know, we had to talk a little bit about Crowe and Gracie, one of the most talked about figures of the weekend, probably for all the wrong reasons. But, you know, it did make quite a few headlines on Saturday and Sunday, for that matter, after what was, could only be described as a throwback performance. I guess that's the kind way to say it's a throwback performance, not in the good way. All right. As I said earlier in the show, nobody, very few people had as much vested interest in that main event on Saturday night more than this guy.

And he is coming off a winner of Marlon Chito Vera, also beat Song Yadong fairly recently. And his name's Corey Sandhagan, of course, he's hoping to get that fight with Marab de Wailashvili and put himself into a position to fight the winner of Al Jameen Sterling and Sean O'Malley. Or, you know, again, let's be honest. If Algeman Sterling wins, he's probably going to leave the division. It very easily could be Corey Sanhagan against Marabda Wailishvili with a vacant title in the line as well.

So I wanted to bring Corey on to talk about his thoughts. He was there, Cajside, in Jersey to watch the fight between Al Jermaine and Suhudo, and also, of course, where he goes from here in the Bantamweight Division. Coming off of UFC 288, the Bantamway title was defended, of course. Al Jermaine Sterling defeated Henry Sehudo in the main event. I couldn't think of a better person to talk about that main event than the guy who could be battling for that title one day very, very soon. Coming off a huge win of his own over Marlon Chito Veri. It is always my pleasure to speak to Corey Sanhagen.

Corey, how are you? I'm good, Damon. How are you doing, man? I'm fantastic, man. Appreciate you taking the time, as always. You were in Jersey. You were right there to see it all unfold. This is your division. You're right there knocking on the door of title contention.

Let me just ask the obvious question. What do you think of Sehudo and Sterling? I thought it was a great fight, man. It was, yeah, it was a great fight. I kind of, it's really hard for me to score those ones, especially because I was just watching from a different lens. And I think, you know, maybe most people were where I was trying to like learn some stuff by watching them and learn, you know, where they're weak, where they're good, all of that stuff. So I kind of had Henry win in the fight a little bit.

But I also, like I said, I really wasn't scoring it round by round. I was kind of just looking for a bunch of mistakes on their end and looking for what they do good as like a competitor's point of view. so but yeah it was a close fight it was a good fight the grappling exchanges were awesome aljaman did really awesome in the grappling exchanges um Henry probably could have took advantage of some of them and he didn't and uh yeah it was a good fight I thought I know uh you hate picking fights but I always try to get you to pick fights every time we do an interview and when you did before the cheeto fight you said you lean so hoodo you kind of lean to hoodo again you were not you know dog in aljamae by any stretch you imagineaceous lean to hootoh I don't you know I

was super impressed sudo came back and looked as good as he did i think i did have concerns about the whole three years off and everything but i thought he looked good uh but i was super impressed with aljermaine you know i mean four takedowns that's something a lot of people didn't think he could do against an olympic gold medalist uh you know he did take the back briefly a couple times uh you know look good on the feet as well like i think again close fight not a robbery i've had some people say the same thing they thought sudo won i scored her for al germain been a close fight but i was just super impressed with like how aljamaid did in that fight because i think a lot of the ways that people thought henry would beat him he did pretty good especially the wrestling like i don't

think a lot of people thought he could take pseudo down he did it four times yeah yeah the takedowns were really surprising he did really awesome in that regard uh his footwork has improved a lot too like uh i thought henry his path to victory was going to be just like march him down and put him in exchanges because Al Jermaine, he, you know, he some, I just thought that that's where he would maybe lose. You know, if I was going to see Al Jemaine losing, it would be in just Henry throwing him in a bunch of exchanges because Sterling just being a longer guy, like the exchanges don't really favor him as much. So I thought that that's how Henry was going to do it. But Al Jermaine moved his feet. He got pressed against the cage a couple times, but he moved his feet real good.

He defended a lot of the shots, and then he got his own. So, you know, he did exactly what he had to do, and he did a really awesome job, man. I think he, it was surprising, you know, like always when you watch Al Jameen fight. Al Jermaine, you know, I've said this to other people, Corey. Al Jermaine has had kind of like one of the roughest runs of champion because, you know, he won the title with the illegal knee, not his fault, by the way, not his fault at all. He goes out and he beats Peter Rion in the second in the second fight, but it was a close fight again. some people thought Peotryon won. Again, I thought Al Jard won, but it is what it is.

And then he fights T.J. and T.J. comes out after, I had two bummed shoulders and all this kind of thing. And again, I hate when, you know, after the fact we're taking away a guy's victory. I hate that, but that's, again, kind of like the run that Al Jermaine's been on. Listen, this was a close fight. I hope no one's calling this a robbery. Even if you lean towards the Hutto, it was a close fight. Does it feel like maybe Al Jermaine's starting to get the respect you deserves?

I mean, I know, you know, you're a former opponent. Ideally, you would love to rematch it with him one day, but just kind of taking yourself out of it. And I know you're a good analyst this way, Corey. Like, is it finally time for people to start giving Al Jume a little bit more respect? Because good Lord, like this guy's had like one of the weirdest runs as champion, but you cannot take away the Henry Suna thing.

Henry looked good. Henry didn't look rusty. He didn't look like, man, it's been three years. He didn't look like, oh, man, time has passed him by. He had a good performance. He just lost a close decision. Yeah, no, I agree with you completely. I think Henry got out fought, you know, like Al Jermain did exactly what he kind of had to do.

It still was a super close fight, you know, don't get me wrong. But if you look at like kind of what was happening in the fight is Al Jermaine was doing really well into grappling, which was a little bit unexpected. I thought that Suhuda, you know, even though Al Jemaine's a great grappler, I thought, you know, Suhudo's an Olympic champ. I thought that he'd have a little bit more success. but Al Jermaine like took him down a couple times had a crack at his back you know like did really good and like the like tie-up exchanges they both did actually really good in the tie-up exchanges but I mean what kind of won it for Al Jermaine is him just having a lot better footwork than he's had in the past you know like you've never really seen Al Jermaine move backwards that much just because he's always

been the dominant grappler and he's never really had to move backwards so I was really curious to see if he was going to be able to fight backwards. And he did fight backwards really good. He moved his feet really well. And that was like a problem for Sehudo. And I think it's something that Sehudo probably wasn't really banking on. But, you know, overall, like I said, I think it was like a super good fight. It's, it's, I'm trying to remember everything just because I was watching it like an intensity that is hard to remember. But yeah, it was a good fight. I thought that, yeah, Al Jermaine, oh, that was the question. Al Jemaine, yeah, I think that he definitely deserves his respect.

I think that he should, based off of who he's fought in the past. And then definitely after this one, just showing that he can grapple with literally maybe the best grappler in the UFC, with the exception of maybe a couple of other names, he showed that he could do that. He showed that he can fight on all fronts, move his feet, moving backwards, which was something that I didn't know that he had a skill in. So, yeah, I definitely think that he should get the respect that he deserves because, like you said, Suhudo did. He did look good, man. He didn't look bad in the first round.

I was like, ooh, man, like if Al Jermaine keeps that pressure, Sehudo's not going to, you know, that's going to be a problem. But then Sehudo started putting pressure on Al Jemaine and he had an answer for it. So it was good. It was a good back and forth. Yeah. So now afterwards, you know, good win for Al Jermaine. And then afterwards we get the Sean O'Malley thing. We knew that was coming.

You know, these in-caged confrontations. generally don't go well. This one, it didn't go like, I mean, it didn't go crazy. We didn't get full on like pushing and shoving. Marab stealing the jacket was hilarious. Or I didn't say stealing the jacket. Putting the jacket on and jumping on the cage was hilarious.

And that, you know, caused it dust up. We know it's going to be Al Jemly and Sean O'Malley next. I always go back to something that Anthony Smith said to me before Sean O'Malley fought Peter Yon. He said, in this division, and Piotr Yan is probably the best possible matchup for Sean O'Malley because Sean is so long. He's so good with distance and Piotrion is not a wrestler. He's like, that is a fight I can see him winning.

What Sean O'Malley doesn't want is to fight guys like Al Jermaine Sterling and he specifically mentioned you, Corey Sannig. And he's like guys who are also tall, long, can match him in distance and have, you know, he said you're a better striker than O'Malley and Al Jameen's a better grappler than O'Malley. I like Sean O'Malley. I don't think he's a good fighter. So when I say this, it sounds like I'm basically looking past it. But stylistically, I think this is you and Al Jamban were two guys. In my opinion, he did not want to see standing across the octagon from him. And I think, I think this is a much better matchup for Al Jamein than, let's say, Henry Sudo was, in my opinion.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I think O'Malley has his handfuls against Sterling. I think that, like you said, it's a really not good matchup for O'Malley. He's going to obviously be wrestling a lot all the way up until their next fight. But, I mean, you can only get so good in a short stint. You know, like I really, it takes a long time to really develop skills that are reliable in a fight. And, you know, like one year isn't enough. That's, you know, when I look back on what I had to change in some things, like after I had fought Sterling,

It took me, you know, that's when I really was like, I'm learning how to wrestle and I'm learning how to wrestle really good, you know. And I still think, obviously, I'm still on that progression, but I would say it took me like two, three years at least to like get to the point where I was like, okay, I'm like comfortable doing this against the highest level of guy. You know, that's not something that you really get to do in just one year's time. So, you know, and of course, Amali's been grappling and doing all of that for years and years and years. but I mean, we saw the level of grappling that Sterling has by being able to take down Henry Sehudo, which is not easy to do, especially when you're the taller guy. Like getting takedowns on shorter guys is not an easy thing to do. So, I mean, yeah, O'Malley has his handful, man, like that.

That's definitely not a good matchup by any means. And Sterling's no slouch in the striking. It's awkward, but it's not like he doesn't do super dangerous stuff and put himself in sketchy situation. So that's going to, yeah, that's like really a not favorable fight for O'Malley, but maybe he'll pull it off somehow, you know, but I can't really see how he would win that fight in my head. Yeah, Sterling is so awkward, too. Like his takedowns don't come in traditional ways. Like when he actually did the traditional takedons against Henry with the double leg, he got stuffed. But when he went against the cage, body locked him, you know, then dropped down, you know, kind of scramble into those takedowns.

And he's really good in the scrambles. Like that's what Al Jamein does. That's just to me is a nightmare for O'Malley because I don't think O'Malley can, you know, a shorter stockier wrestle like Henry, it's harder for him to like, you know, stretch out and get those submissions. I don't think you'll have that kind of struggle against an O'Malley. If he gets O'Malley down and gets a body lock on him from the back or gets his back, to me it's like game over. Like I just can't see, you know, he may survive, but I just don't see it going well for O'Malley.

But it's a big fight. We know it's going to be a big fight. We know it's coming. And it looks like that's going to be Al Jermaine, Swan. song to Bantamate. He wants to move on from that. I know I know you're not thinking about this way, Corey, but like it's kind of a bummer. Like it seems like that's not going to be a rematch you'll get just because all signs

are pointing to Al Jamein leaving the division after that. But are you okay with the like the trajectory that we're on right now where it's going to be Al Jermaine O'Malley and then it looks like Al Jamein's probably going to be gone. I would imagine win-loser draw. It seems like he's pretty set on this being his last fight at Bantaweight. Yeah, maybe. But everyone. kind of changes their mind depending on what the state of the environment is. You know, like if I go out and I, whoever I fight next, I go out and I do really,

really awesome. And then, you know, there's a lot of hype behind me and maybe there's more money in it for Algeman to fight me than it is to fight in another weight class or whatever. Or there's more hype behind it or whatever it is, you know. I mean, Algeman will take that opportunity too. So that's kind of what I'm counting on, to be honest. I don't really, I don't want Algeman to win. then take off and then I never get to get my hands on them again. You know, like I, I really, I really want the opportunity to fight him again, just, you know, to challenge myself and to

challenge just, just to see how far I've come, you know, that that would be like a really cool experience for me to have. And who knows, you know, like if, if I get enough hype behind me, which I kind of have right now, and if I, you know, if the UFC wants to fight, and they're, they're willing to give Al Jermaine kind of what he's looking for as far as compensation for that goes. And I don't see why he wouldn't take it. So that's kind of what I'm banking on. I don't really want Al Jermaine to take off and then me become champ. And then he always kind of gets that tally over me.

You know, I'd rather beat the champ that's been the champ for a couple of years now and do it that way. But like I said, we'll see that that's kind of on Al Jermaine. You know, that ball's in his court. So, you know, hopefully I can convince them into it somehow when I have a real good performance in the next one. And then, like I said, hopefully the UFC asked for that one. So we'll see. Yeah. So now before the fight with Cheeto, we talked, and I know you said, you know, you like the O'Malley fight.

O'Malley was, you know, not sitting out. Stylist LeCore, I think you're a horrible matchup for Sean O'Malley. So, like, I don't know that Sean O'Malley would have signed up for that. But you kind of shifted gears. We know it's going to be the title fight. I'm moving on, give me Marab. And that, to me, seems like the natural fight to make. Now, I don't know if you saw on Twitter this morning, Henry Suhudo suddenly come out.

And now he's calling out Marab for Boston. He's like, I'm going to stick around. I want to fight Marab. And the first thing it popped to my mind because I knew I was talking to you today. I remember that Nate Diaz woman, I was like, Corey Sandhagin needs to come out and be like, Henry Sehudo, you're taking everything I work for. I want to fight you, but like Marab seems like the fight. But can I imagine whether it's Marab or Sahudo?

I mean, again, I don't want to put words in your mouths, but like it seems like it's got to be U and Marab. Absolutely nothing against Andrew Sehudo. He just fought five rounds. I know he's saying August, but that seems like a quick turnaround. But you and Marab, I mean, that seems like the fight, unless I'm crazy. I don't think you're crazy. I think that that's the fight that makes most sense on paper.

But I've talked to the UFC a little bit, you know, and they said that they're going to give me some options. They had to kind of see what was happening on Saturday night and how all of that played out first. So, yeah, I'm just waiting for the UFC to get back to me. I don't know what Marab's timeline is with stuff, you know, someone, you know, he potentially has an injury or whatever's going on. So, yeah, I don't really know fully what's going on,

but I'm supposed to get some options here pretty soon and they don't know. And then, but yeah, on paper, I mean, me and what makes more sense than me and Marab for a number one contender, you know? Yeah, well, in a lot of ways, again, and again, I'm just playing devil's advocate here. You know, Sterling does go out and fight O'Malley and win and then goes up to 145 or just vacates the title to go to 145, what the case may be.

I mean, you know, you and Marab could easily be a fight for a vacant title, but, you know, I think that, like, it's just the one that makes the most of this. Now, can I ask, like, again, like, now that we know he's probably going to stick around, would you be open to a Henry Suhudo fight? I mean, I imagine you would because obviously he's a former champion. If he's going to stick around, it would be a big fight. Would you be open to that? Yeah, definitely.

That's depending on whether or not Henry sticks around, but I would love to put a cap of my feather of someone of that caliber, you know, like that's where I'm here, you know, is to fight those best guys. And yeah, so, you know, Henry's never been on my radar too much just because I always thought he was in and out and all of this. But if he's saying that he's going to stick around, then I could throw him on the radar too.

And we can see what happens with that. But yeah, we'll see, man. I don't, I still don't love the idea of Henry coming. coming back, losing, and then being able to call whatever fight he wants to call out for. So I think, you know, I think it should be me and Marab, but I'm definitely, you know, you've seen my career past, you know, I'm definitely not the guy to say no or shy away from a challenge. So I'm cool with it, man, you know, I would definitely entertain that fight if the UFC came

at me with that one. Yeah, but I think you and Morab, like you said, I mean, you guys are on win streaks. It makes sense. And again, you know, because again, if Al Jemaine's. leaving, then, you know, Marab becomes an option again because obviously he won't fight Al Jemaine. And I respect that. They don't want to fight each other.

I totally understand that. And that's cool. That's why I think you and Marab makes the most sense. And you're right. Listen, I like Andrew Sudo. I think he's an incredible athlete. But, you know, coming back from three years away, he already kind of rattled the cage by getting the title shot just because he came back.

You can't go and give him a rab now, too. Like, I think him and Cheeto would be a fun fight. I think that would make a lot more sense. Cheeto fought you, lost. He's coming off a loss. And if he beats Chito, he's. right back in the mix again. Like, that would make sense because Cheetah's obviously a very, very good fighter in his own right.

I think that would make a lot more sense. But, yeah, I get it. He's trying to get the guy on the streak and, you know, Marab's winning and all these kind of things. And obviously, it's closer to Al Jameen because it's his teammate. But I think you and Marab makes a lot more sense. Can I ask? I know you said they're going to give you some options. Do you have an ideal timeline, like, when you'd like to fight again?

I mean, I know you like staying active, but it is also about the right opportunities. Like, they're going to give you just some random fighter in August versus wait until, like, November to fight Marab, you wait until November to fight Marab, I'd imagine. Yeah, it's more about, you know, I don't, of course I want to fight again this year, you know, so I'm open to what, I just want to hear the UFC's options, to be honest, you know, like I could, as long as I have like my 10, 12 weeks to get ready for a fight, I'm pretty cool with that, you know, so as long as I have that amount of time to get ready for something.

and from the point that they tell me that I'm fighting till that point, that's really all that I care about. So I don't have necessarily a huge timeline as far as when I want to fight, when I don't want to. You know, I'm going to make a smart decision for my career, even though I have a wedding plan in September. But I'm going to,

my fiance won't listen to this anyway, so it's okay. I'm going to probably do what's best for my career. So if it means I need 10 to 12 weeks to get ready for a guy, then I'm going to, then I'm going to do that. So wherever the cars land on that is cool with me, but I can't imagine that it would be past September or October that you guys will see me back in there. Yeah, well, also, you know, listen, I understand like you are a fighter's fighter. You fight, you know, you fight.

You know, you fight when they put a guy in front of you, you'll fight. But it feels like this is, you know, to me, you're one fight away from a title fight. And arguably, you could say, depending on how quickly they both. book of Malley and Sterling, you know, if Sean, or excuse me, if Sterling wins, which again, I believe he will, and he just vacates the title. You and Marab could easily be a fight for a vacant title. You know what I mean? Like, there's a reality where that plays out as well.

So can I imagine at this point it is about, you know, not, when I say picking and shit, like, it's about the right opportunity because you're either, you're either one fight away from a title fight or you're in a title fight, in my opinion. Like, you're not in a position where you're like, oh, yeah, I'm just going to fight the number seven guy. I don't know who the number seven guy is. Like, you're not in a position now where you just fight the next guy. Like, it's Marab.

Maybe Suhudo, if they want to say, like, put him back in a title fight, which I don't think they'll do. Or, you know, again, a title fight. Like, I just, again, like, to me, it's like, it's worth waiting a couple extra months to get Marab or to get a title fight than just fighting the next best guy. Am I wrong in thinking that? No, yeah, you're definitely right.

I'm definitely, I see myself in a position where I'm, regardless of what happens if I'm not fighting for a title or a vacant belt or whatever. I'm fighting for a number one contender spot. I can't really imagine a scenario where that isn't the case. So whatever name they put in front of me for the next one, as long as it's a number one contender fight, which Marab is the guy that makes the most sense. But like I said, I'm open to hearing and entertaining whatever options it is.

As long as it's a number one contender fight, I'll say yes to it. Yeah, and it makes a lot of sense to it. Again, I know it sounds like I'm just discounting O'Malley. I try. I promise I'm not. Obviously, it's a fight. anything can happen. I just think on paper, like, where I was up in the air with Suhudo and Sterling,

like I was kind of like, man, like going into it, it was like I picked Suhudo and then like a week before I'm like I switched to Sterling. And it kind of played out that way. It was a very close fight, very back and forth fight. I don't feel that way about Sterling O'Malley. Now, again, I've been wrong and I'm happy to admit when I'm wrong. But I don't feel that same way with O'Malley where I'm like, oh, it's 50-50. I'm like 70-30, Sterling.

So I'm playing out the scenarios of Sterling winning, which again could be him, you know, winning and then trying himself at 145, which again, in that scenario, I think you and Marab for a vacant title would make a lot of sense. Like maybe if they do that fight in August, maybe you and Marab fight in November and we could, you know, the UFC does not like waiting around. Maybe that's for a vacant title. I think that would make a lot of sense too. Yeah, absolutely, you know, and that's why I'm kind of just waiting here about the options from the UFC, you know, like, uh, uh, yeah, it's, uh, I guess we'll just see. All, all of those are definitely options that I can see playing out. And I'm really excited for it, man. Like I'm really enjoying training. I'm really enjoying,

you know, where I am in life. And I'm enjoying being a really big name in one of the hottest divisions in the UFC right now. So I'm enjoying all of it, man. And I'm open to a lot of options. But like I said, like, it's hard for me to imagine a scenario where my next one isn't for either a a belt or a number one contender. So that's, I think, what we're looking. Tell Henry to sit down. Henry, you're a great, you're a legend, but you know, don't take it. It's, it's, it's, it's U and Marab. Come on now. It's got to be U.M.Rab. I mean, no offense, Henry. You can fight Cheeto. Maybe he fights Song, Yadong. Song had a great win over Ricky Simone after you beat him. Maybe he fights him, but, you know, come on now.

Let me get back in line a little bit. You know, you don't get two in a row. You got to, you got to fight somebody else to get back in that spot. And then we'll get in there. Now, I'm going to make you step on a bit of a landmine here, Corey, because you said something there about Bantan. You said Bantan's one of the best divisions, one of the most exciting division of sport. I've argued, and a couple other people have argued this as well, I think Bantuwait is now the best division in our sport. Now, that's not offense to, I love lightweight. Lightweight has always been kind of like the deepest division. Everyone says it's the best division.

I've always argued Welterweight doesn't get enough credit for how good. That division's been, I think Bantanweight across the sport is the best division in our sport. And I'm talking like sport-wide because when you look at, you know, yourself, Al Jameen, O'Malley, Suhudo, Cheeto, Marab, guys like Umar and Margamette off who aren't even enlist quite yet. And then you look at patchy mixover in Bellator, Sergio Pettis, now you get Patricio Pibble. Bantamweight to me is the most exciting and the best division of sport, deepest division in sport. Am I right or am I wrong? I would argue that you're right.

I don't like I said like it's really hard for me to view all of this stuff from like a like a lens that isn't just my own so I guess I don't think about it a ton but I mean it the bantam weight division I think I said this even a while ago like it's not gone anywhere either you know like that I think that that's also one of those things too where maybe in the other weight classes you see like they're either not as competitive or not that. that they're not competitive, but they're not as competitive as this one. Or, you know, you can kind of like see that it's going to maybe not be the same in one or two years. Once kind of the older generation kind of, you know, takes a backseat to the people that are coming in or whatever.

But Bantamweight, man, I think is in a place where it's going to be exciting for the next like two, three, four, five years. And it's, yeah, it's super awesome for me as just like a as like a fan of the sport, but also just like, uh, just being grateful for being a part of it and being at the top. And hopefully I can solidify that I'm better than all of these guys by winning a belt and, uh, keeping the belt for a long time. And, uh, I'm really excited for, for that opportunity in the future. Um, and I, and it's just cool, man, it's just cool. But yeah, uh, you know, I'm of course biased as as hell, but yeah, I do agree. It's the best in, in the UFC right now. Did you, did you do a second take because I did on Saturday when they said this because you and I have spoken many times.

You've been kind of running main events lately. And did you, did you hear that this is the first time Al Jemate it ever headlined a card ever? I was like, really? And it was. He had never headlined a fight night card. I was like, that seems crazy to me because I was like, wow, that was wild. Like I didn't know that. When they said that on Saturday, I was like, really?

And I looked it up. I was like, yeah, he never headlined a card before. Wow. Yeah, I know. Yeah, that was a little crazy. I think that this will, you know, I imagine my next one on be a main event, and I think that that'll maybe be my fifth one. So that's kind of interesting. Yeah.

And if it is you and Marab, it's got to be five rounds, right? Like, everyone talks about Marab's gas tank. I mean, there's just certain fights. Like, I'm glad they did Gilbert and Bilau five rounds. Like, I think certain fights, when there's that much on the line, you got to do five rounds. And I think you and Marab has got, yeah, because everyone talks. most cardio right everyone talks about his conditioning and he is he's like an energizer bunny he had a great fight against peter yon uh but i think it's got to be five rounds whether it's whether it's uh

even if it does end up like co-main event on a pay-per-view still got to do five rounds of my opinion yeah i i i weigh big time prefer five-round fights uh they're like more tiring or whatever but when you're used to them you're used to them like uh i've been getting ready for five round fights for like you know almost three years now so i'm pretty used to the the process of doing all of that being peaked and ready to perform for that long of the time. So yeah, so definitely I think that it's got to be a five-rounder. Yeah, I big time way more like five-round fights. I like figuring out my opponent.

I like three rounds is just way too quick, man. Even when I do just three rounds in the gym, I'm like, that doesn't feel like a fight anymore. But like I said, this would be, I think, probably my fifth main advance. so I'm pretty used to it by now. Yeah, absolutely. Well, Corey, like I said, whatever, you know, again, I keep saying whatever it is next. I know you said the UFC is going to give you some options. I'll give you the option.

It's Marab de Walshvili. That's the fight. No offense to Henry Sehudo. No offense to anyone else in the division. This is a one to make. I mean, come on now. It is. It just is.

Unless it again, I certainly in any way, shape, or form ever wish bad luck. Unless Sterling and or O'Malley gets injured and you fight one of those two, it's got to be Marab. Like, that's the fight to make. And I think everyone knows this fight to make, right? Like, it just makes natural sense, and I hope it does happen. And again, wedding in September. Talk about one-two combo.

Wedding in September, maybe you fight for a vacant title in November? I mean, I just say, that could be a hell of a 20-23 for you. Yeah, it would be unexpected 20-23. But, yeah, that would be definitely really cool. It's kind of cool that the cards could be playing out where I have a lot of things written down. Like, I do a lot of writing or whatever. One thing that I write down a lot is that I was, that I've been writing down for a couple of years now as I'll be the champ by the end of

2023. So it's kind of interesting that it might be playing out that way. So we'll see, man. Hopefully I can't imagine the UFC is going to take too long to give me those options. So you're probably here an announcement. My guess would be kind of soon. Awesome. Well, I look forward to it.

Always appreciate your insight on everything, Corey, especially sitting Caged side for the fight. I appreciate you doing this today. Obviously, best of luck. I'm sure we'll talk. Once the fight gets booked, I'm sure we'll chat again after that, as we always do. but I appreciate taking time today, breaking down everything with me, and look forward to the announcement. Because like I said, I think you're right.

Hopefully we'll hear it sooner rather than later, and we'll know exactly what's next for you. Yep, cool. Sounds good. Damon, good talking to you, man. Absolutely, Corey. We'll talk soon, okay? Okay, sounds good. Later. Bye-bye.

It is always a pleasure to catch up with Corey Sanhagan, one of my favorite interviews in the sport, of course. Very interested to see where he goes from here. I think him and Marab is the fight to make. I hope that is the one. I love Henry Suhudo. I'm glad Henry's back. I thought he looked great on Saturday night.

I did score him losing. Obviously, you've heard that several times on the show. But that being said, I'm glad he's back. But again, you know, you already got jumped into a title fight. Yes, you were the former champion, but it has been three years. There's no, you know, it's not written in blood that you give up a title and you come back three years later and you just immediately jump into a title shot. That's not necessarily how it's always going to work.

He did, and he went out there and had a great performance. Nothing against. But, again, to me, you got to work your way back in there now. you don't just get to jump the line and fight the other number one guy in the division right now, Marab de Walshvili. Fight Piotr-Yon, fight Chita Vera, fight one of those guys. And then if you get to tell you, if you beat them, then, you know, you can get Marab or Corey Sanhagen in that point. But to me, I like, I'm glad Henry's back. I'm glad he's going to continue fighting.

He's not retiring again. He looks like he's ready to work his way back up again. To me, that starts with, you know, Cheetah Vera or maybe Piotr-Jon. Marab and Corey Sanhagen, to me, is. a better fight to make. We'll see what the UFC decides to do, and hopefully we'll know more in the matter of weeks. Of course, as again, I want to say, best wishes to my normal co-host, Matt Brown. He fights on Saturday night at UFC Charlotte. Should be actually a pretty solid car. They did lose one fight. We announced today on MMAFighting.com, McKenzie Dern versus Angela

Hill is now moving into the main event slot on May 20th at the UFC Apex, so that card falls off of the UFC Charlotte card. But overall, UFC Charlotte, very solid card. Two guys who have been frequent co-hosts on this show. Of course, Matt Brown is the regular co-host, and also Anthony Smith fights Johnny Walker on Saturday night. And Anthony has come in and co-hosts this show numerous times over the past couple years.

So best of wishes, of course, also to Anthony Smith. And I've talked to Johnny Walker, too. Johnny Walker, incredibly nice guy. That should be a banger of a fight. Jalton Almeda, Jarsina, Rosenstrike. Pretty solid card. You know, there have been some lackluster UFC cards recently. This is not one.

This is pretty good. I like this card. It's not super top heavy. But when you got Matt Brown and Cort McGee on there, you got guys like Jarzino and Jolton Almeda and guys like Anthony Smith and Johnny Walker. You're pretty much guaranteed for some fireworks somewhere along the way. So looking forward to all this fights on Saturday. Of course, all works out well.

You know, you never know the fight, but obviously everything goes well. Matt should be back on Monday to talk to us about his fight with Court McGee and break down everything else what's going on with him the last couple weeks since he got ready for the fight with with Court McGee at UFC Charlotte.

A big thank you once again to both Alan Joban and Corey Sandhaker for stepping in here today to talk about UFC 288. We will be back next week. Make sure you check us out on all your favorite

podcast platforms, Apple Podcast, Spotify, and of course over on the best website in the world, MMAFighting.com. We'll be back next week with another edition of the Fighter versus the Rider. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you then.

Thank you.