MMA Fighting - Fighter vs. Writer: Alan Jouban Explains Why Dustin Poirier Should Retire, Reacts to UFC 303 Presser Cancellation

Episode Date: June 4, 2024

The Fighter vs. The Writer returns with UFC analyst Alan Jouban joining MMA Fighting senior reporter Damon Martin to discuss the fallout from UFC 302 as well as reacting to the sudden cancellation for the UFC 303 press conference in Ireland. Just hours before the press conference was scheduled to begin, UFC officials announced that the planned event in Ireland was no longer happening with McGregor later stating that “obstacles outside of our control” led to the cancellation. Should fans be more concerned that something else is happening behind the scenes threatening the UFC 303 main event? Plus, we’ll talk about Islam Makhachev’s fifth round submission win over Dustin Poirier and what should be next for him. Is Makhachev destined to become a two-division champion or should he stick around his own division for a little while longer? Plus Jouban explains why he believes now is the right time for Poirier to call it a career and walk away from the sport following his fight with Makhachev on Saturday. All this and more on the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer! Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter 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. Back to the Fighter versus the writer. I am Damon Martin, as always, and this week I am very excited to be welcoming back one of my favorite co-hosts for the show. He's one of the top analysts in the game,

one of the top play-by-play and color commentator. in a spare time. Always happy to speak to Alan, Joe Ban. Alan, how are you? I'm good, brother. Good to be talking with you. It was a lot on my mind following that card, obviously the main event with Poria and Islam.

So I'm glad we get a chance to kind of break some of this down, man, and get kind of our first thoughts, you know, initial thoughts out of our mind and break this down some, man. Absolutely. And I know, listen, you do a lot of analysts work, but of course, you know, we've talked about this on the show. You've had a, you know, a very close and a good, you know, personal relation with Dustin for many years.

Both of you guys hailing for Louisiana. So it was perfect timing to get you on for this episode. And obviously, we're going to talk a lot about Dustin and Islam the main event because let's be honest, that was probably the only fight we're really going to be talking about a lot from that card. But listen, we can't, it's

so weird, like how this sport works. Like, we have this great event on Saturday night, maybe Dust to Porre's final fight. Come Monday morning, what are we talking about? Connor McGregor canceling a press conference at the last minute. He just put out a statement on Twitter today, and I'm sure everyone has seen it, but I want to read it just so we all understand what he said, which wasn't honestly a lot. He said, in consultation with the UFC, today's press conference was canceled due to a series of obstacles outside of our control. I apologize to my Irish fans and fans around the world for the inconvenience and appreciate all your passion and support. I can't wait to put on the greatest all-time show in the Octagon. Michael Chandler, for my understanding, was about to board a flight. Ireland when this happened. He got a call saying don't board the flight to Ireland. Dana White, as of Saturday night, was talking about, hey, I'm leaving the press

covers. I'm flying straight to Ireland. So this didn't happen like days ago. We just didn't hear about it. This literally happened like a day ago. And Connor's statement doesn't really tell us anything. Alan, when you saw not only the press conference cancellation, but now Connor's statement, I know we're all speculating because we really don't know, but this is really bizarre. Very bizarre. And as you said, the timeline of Dana saying I'm about to charter a flight and fly over there. And we knew this was a big thing. They were talking about not only this conference, this press conference being one of the first big ones leading up to the fight.

But they were talking about opening up the arena, allowing more people because it was sold out. I mean, this was such a big deal when Connor fights. You talk about my reaction to the news today. It was, I'll go back to the word timeline, a timeline. The first initial news, it's not happening. Oh, my God. What happened? Did Connor fail a test?

Did he do this? to do that, right? A lot of speculation, but it was very my heart sunk for a minute. Seeing Conner's reaction, seeing Ariel Hwani kind of break down any insight that he might have. And it seemed like Ariel kind of did have some insight that he was kind of just not able to share with everyone. Seeing Chandler kind of have that encrypted post. I'm much more optimistic now, man. I'm serious. I am.

If it feels like if something had happened, we would have seen different type of words come out of these guys. mouth or different types of tweets rather come from them it seems like i don't know what happened i do not know what happened that that would stop this that would slam on the brakes for this press conference that so highly anticipated but i feel like if it was something that would be removing this fight from the card uh we'd hear different we we'd hear something else out of them so i'm so optimistic with it yeah it's just i think the natural reaction is to worry because we've had this huge long delay with connor coming back you know they do the ultimate fighter over a year ago.

And then it's the USADA thing. He's not in the testing pool. What's going on there? And then he finally gets back in. And that turns into a very ugly situation with UFC splitting with USADA. And then we're thinking, okay, well, then it's going to be UFC 300. Like, they're going to put it on the biggest card of all time. And then that doesn't happen.

And then Connor makes an announcement. Says, I'm fighting June 29th. And Dana comes out and says, well, maybe by the end of the year, it says, we're just kind of like in this holding pattern of, is Connor fighting? is he not fighting they finally make the big announcement June 29th international fight week okay we all get excited press conference Ireland's going to be huge 10,000 people tickets gone people are are hocking these things on the secondary market for free tickets selling for money and then out of nowhere it's canceled I think we all in some level have to like be like uh oh like this is bad news because this has been the the pattern with Connor for the last year and a half but I'm not even saying it's any of Connor's fault

but I'm just saying like, we thought they're going to be the ultimate fighter and they're going to fight in September. Like when I talked to Chandler, right before he left for Vegas to coach the ultimate fighter, he was thinking the show airs through August, we'll fight August for September. We're almost a year past that and they still haven't fought.

Damon, think about the ticket sales, right? That arena, highest gate in history, I think they said, or something like that, over $20 million in the gate sold out in minutes in a national fight week, the return of Connor McGregor. If this card, if this fight gets scratched from the card, what happens then? I mean, this would be a huge blow to the UFC. This is negotiating terms.

Their network deal that's coming up in January, the end of the year, the ESPN deal runs out. I think it was a seven-year deal. They're talking about tripling or quadrupling that enormous amount that ESPN paid him with this new deal. And a lot of that falls on the back of Connor producing because he's the man. He owns all the top pay-per-views. of the top ticket sales, et cetera, et cetera. Connor coming back and showing the networks what a star-driven sport this is,

what he could do being a superstar like Connor McGregor, it pushes the needle for everyone. It pushes the needle for the UFC at the negotiation table. This would be a huge blow. I mean, we all want to see him fight, right? We just want to see it. We want to see the antics, the fighting, the, just everything that comes with a Connor fight.

But the UFC is also obviously very, very engaged on this one in a business sense of things coming up in the next few years as well. But the fact that you're not hitting the panic button makes me feel a little bit better because I, when it first came out, I was like, this is so weird. The timing of it all because my panic change. My panic. I panicked at first. It died down a bit. Yeah, but at first I was just like, this seems so odd. The timing just seems so odd for this to get canceled right before. And again, because Dana was talking about it hours before that saying I'm flying out right out. after this, blah, blah, blah, and I know Chandler was getting on a flight, and then it's just over.

Of course, you have to hit the panic button a little bit, but the fact, you're calling me down right now, because I was like, I don't know, man, like, it kind of scares me because when they say circumstances or when they go obstacles out of our control, what does that mean? Like, what exactly does that mean? Like, I wish it wasn't, I think the cryptic nature of, like, nobody really saying anything is what worries me, because if it was, if it was a logistics thing, like I know Connor, from my understanding, Connor was going to do the. press conference and then he was planning to fly to the United States to do the last few weeks

of his camp in between California and Vegas, which is what he typically does. He likes to get acclimated to the weather and the time change and he does it over a few weeks. So he'll typically wrap up his camp in Ireland and come out here for about three weeks to a month before a fight. He did that before Aldo. He did it before a lot of his fights. So I thought maybe there was something weird going on there, but the fact that they're just not, it's the unknown that scares me. If they would have just said, hey, Connor had to get out and there was like no fly or something he had to get out on time and he had to get to the state so we're just going to have to redo it maybe do it in l.A. or do a Vegas one sorry Ireland we apologize we'll come back or maybe

there was some like I don't know maybe there's some like riot in ireland something weird happen like that they were just told us it's the unknown and the fact they're not telling us that's what always worries me you know whenever there's situations like this like I try to always use a level-headed approach and I almost take a doctor's approach where you kind of do process of elimination. And so the first process of elimination is just two sides of this, right? There's Connor McGregor and there's Michael Chandler. I think it's easy to say that we can eliminate Michael Chandler from this equation, right? It's something dealing with Connor McGregor. It's something dealing with that side. The other part of this to me is the way that what we have seen from it, the way that

Connor tweeted and the way that other people on the inside are kind of talking about it, there doesn't seem to be a panic button. And so what that tells me as well as, I don't think there was an incident. I know, I'm not trying to regurgitate what Ariel Hwani said, but it doesn't seem like there was an incident. He did something wrong. He fell at drug test, et cetera, et cetera. It almost feels to me like there's some hoops that they have to jump through.

That's why nobody's hitting the panic button because it's something that they're saying, okay, we can't proceed with this press conference, and we have to figure out a number of things to make this fight happen, but we feel like we could still make this fight happen. And so that's the sense that I get. It's something on Connors' side, and there's something that they have to figure out and they're going to have every man on deck

obviously trying to get this done and what do we have? 29 days. They have to get this figured out and get things rocking and rolling. I feel confident that what is at stake from what I just mentioned earlier

for not only having Connor back, but for the leverage in the broadcasting deal for the UFC, I mean, they're going to have everybody within their power trying to figure this out, this imaginary obstacle that we're speculating about, they have 29 days to get this thing done, man.

And I think ultimately, and I think timing matters here because, listen, we want Connor to come in there to 100% or as close to 100% as he could come into a fight. And I don't, listen, I'm being clear. I've not heard it's like an injury or some kind of problem with that.

I have no idea. Why would you stop the press conference for an injury? I know, because I'm trying to eliminate whatever it couldn't be. But the timing, the timing matters because they need to fight June 29 because we already know the next card

July is Manchester. That's already booked. We got two title fights on that card. August is in Perth. We all kind of assume it's going to be Israel out of Sonia and Dracus Duplice. And I've heard rumors, rumors, by the way, rumors that it looks like potentially Alex Pereira may be fighting on that card as well in August. And then obviously September at the sphere, we kind of imagine that's going to be Alexa Grosso, Valentina Shepchenko. They're going to probably put another title fight on that card. It's going to be a massive card of the sphere. It's going to be a big deal for the UFC. Isn't Ilya Teporio supposed to be on that one? Possibly Max Holloway headlining?

I mean, Max Hollow would make a lot of sense. I think that's the one we're all kind of hearing. And then we know November is going to be John Jones-Stepe. That's the plan for that. And October's Abu Dhabi. You know, and that's going to be the card where we have to assume Islam's going to come back. So you've kind of got a big part of the rest of the year mapped out for the UFC. Not to say they couldn't slot Connor in anywhere, but like they're not going to take Connor to Manchester.

That's just that kills. Connor's going to fight in either New York. or they could technically, I guess, do. I mean, you could imagine how big a Connor John Jones card would be in November, but then it's like, who's the main event? Like, John Jones is the heavyweight champion. He's the star in his own right. Heavyweight and champion.

Yeah, he's got two nod, though, with Connor. So it's almost like, it's almost like they have to do June 29th, unless they just, like, pull a pay-per-view out of their ass and, like, we're going to get to a second pay-per-view in July or something, because everything else is kind of mapped out almost basically through December. Like, at this point, like, unless you, October's Abu-Doubado, unless you take that out of Abu Dhabi, which I guess they could do, but I don't think there,

I think there's contractual obligations. I know they're doing the fight night card in August with Corey Sanhagen and Umar and Nick Diaz's return, but I'm pretty sure October's still going to be a pay-per-view in Abu Dhabi. Options are limited. Like if he doesn't fight June 29th, we're talking about December. Damon, this sounds crazy,

but if Connor couldn't fight on, on this fight court international fight week, and every other one, that we just mentioned the logistics where they're at. It wouldn't make sense to go to Manchester. It wouldn't make sense to fight on a car with John Jones, being that he's a heavyweight, he's a champion. Connor being a co-main, two big, huge paydays for the UFC to have to pay out on one card.

The money wouldn't make sense. I can see the UFC inserting another pay-per-view for the likes of Connor. That's the kind of things that they would do for somebody like Connor McRerger. If they inserted another pay-per-view somewhere along the lines, I don't know where it would be, but I feel like they would pull out all the stops to get Connor to fight in the banner year of 2024. Yeah, it's just weird because when you think about it, like, this is the perfect time. And if it doesn't happen, it really becomes a logistical nightmare because they've kind of mapped out the rest of the year.

So, again, let's not hit the panic button. Let's keep fingers crossed. Everything is good. I've not heard anything, to be clear. Everybody I've talked to, not a single person has said the fights in jeopardy, the fights in danger, none of that. It's just weird because, again, you put a lot into putting this press conference on. 10,000 tickets are giving away. I mean, it's going to be a packed arena.

It's going to be like a fight just for a press conference. And then to cancel it, you know, 12 hours before it's supposed to start. It's odd. There's just no way not to think it's odd. But again, I've heard nothing to leading to speculation that it's canceled. There's any danger to the fight being canceled. But again, it's Connor. So we have to start wondering like what happened.

And as you said, we've already kind of eliminated Chandler. Something happened on Conner's side. What was it? And so until we know for sure, we're all going to be left wondering what happened. the the the the small thing i just want to add to it that that is odd to me as well um that does worry me is if it was some type of logistics or double booking arena thing you know what i mean we why not come out and say that right they would come out and say look the arena got double booked or there's something going on with the arena they can't fit this type of capacity because there's

construction going on like that that's kind of not an easy fix but that's an easy statement to release but the fact that they're being so secretive about this and not having the press conference. That's what worries me. That's what worries me. I just, I haven't seen, again, I haven't seen the panic button coming from everyone else. And it leads me to believe it.

It's something that they feel is fixable. Yeah, so we'll keep our fingers crossed. As I said, we had a massive event on Saturday and somehow we start off talking about Connor McGregor at a press conference of all things. But that's what Connor does. When Connor's fighting, when Connor's doing anything,

we end up talking about it because that's how big of a star, Connor McGregor is. But that being said, Saturday night UFC 302, of course, Islam Ocatchev ends up getting the submission win in the fifth round against Dustin Poyer. Tremendous effort from Dustin. I know that you are, again, you're an unbiased commentator. You're an unbiased analyst. But I know, of course, you share a relationship with Dustin going back many, many years because you guys both, you know, hail from the same area. But just your initial thoughts.

I mean, I thought it was an incredible. It saved the card in a lot of ways because let's be honest, that was a rough go from start to, finish on that night. Dustin and Islam kind of saved the day. But I thought it was one of, weirdly, I've seen a lot of people saying like, oh man, Dustin somehow exposed Islam. I'm like, how did you expose? I thought that was one of Islam's best performances, because I think he fought the best Dust of Porriere, possibly that we've ever seen in a title fight. I don't know if I would go that far, but I would say this. Yes, that fight saved the event, 1,000 percent. Not a great event. That fight was all that we remember from the event.

I thought that Dustin Porier fought like a champion. And I thought that Islam Mahathev proved that he is the best 55 around planet Earth right now. I thought both of those things. When I watched his fight, it was, I have a lot of conflicting thoughts on it. It's like everything that I think, it kind of contradicts itself. So I don't, normally I like to kind of have a clear train of thought about something and I flow with it. But I'm really kind of torn on this one, man, because. which you said, that he somehow exposed them.

I did see some areas of that, not in the 55 division, but as him talking at the end of the fight about going up to 170, then I think, okay, you got exposed, man, because when you look at the takedowns, five of 16, I think it was. Five of 16 against Dustin Porier, right? You picked him, Dustin Porre, you handpicked them. And I know there wasn't a lot of guys available at the time. The timing was an issue.

but stylistically, they wanted to Dustin Porre fight because they felt like that was the biggest name with the best stylistic matchup. We all know why. Dustin's been choked out and taken down in all of his other title fights. That's why they picked Dustin. The biggest straw with the least at stake

in terms of danger in that area. And look what Dustin was able to do to him in terms of stuffing the takedown, making it a competitive fight. Now he finished every round with the takedown, right? He got to take downs. He was relentless with him. But for Dustin to stall out 11 attempts, he was able to stuff 11 attempts on Islam and bust them up like that.

And you see their faces going into the fifth round. When I hear Islam talk about it, I want to be a double champ. I think, dude, you got some trouble in your, you got some trouble coming your way. If you think you're going to go up and have that same success at Walterway. Because if you're barely taking down Dustin at 55, good luck against Usman. Good luck against Leon Edwards. Good luck against these bigger guys that have these wrestling backgrounds. And you're not going to be the taller guy with the longer reach and all those factors.

So I don't want to take away from the effort of Islam. But that was what I concluded the night with when he was talking about going up yet. And let me add to this, I want to see him defend the belt three times, right, against 55ers. Two fights against a 45er as good as Volcanowski is. Doesn't prove to me that you've cleaned out the division. It means you took two fights against the guy that steps up on every fight. I need to see two more fights. I need to see the Armand fight, first and foremost.

I need to see how you do against that guy and clean out the division, at least three guys when I say clean out the division. But Islam looked fantastic as far as a 55er. I feel like he's the most well-rounded 55er in the world. The way that he was able to stand on the feet with Dustin and show that he has the boxing, relentless with the takedowns, even though Dustin would stuff three or four. He was relentless.

He would end up getting that takedown. And I think it's going to be tough for anybody to dethrone him. I really do. I think that what's his name? Who I just mentioned? Who should get the next title fight? Armand, sorry. I think Armand has the best chance.

I really do. But I don't think Ormond meets him in every category, right? Armand could probably hang with him in the grappling. But is he going to be as good in the boxing? Is he going to be as big and strong? Like, there's a lot of areas that Islam just, brings everything to the table and he showed it on Saturday night.

Yeah, I think, I think what I learned about Islam in that fight because I think we all would say Dustin is the better striker is he stood with Dustin a lot and did really well. Like, I didn't think he lost many of those striking changes. And again, I understand Dustin is fighting with the perspective of he needed to

get ready to stuff a takedown. Correct. So that totally changes your striking style when you're basically waiting for the guy to shoot on you. But he still looked very good, yeah. I thought he looked great. I I thought he landed a lot of the best punches in that fight. And again, Dustin really focused on his takedown defense. He talked about working with him Batush Gamrod and really, and again, he was fully prepared.

I think that also speaks to how good Islam is, is that when Islam didn't get the takedown, he still won the fight. Like, he still beat Dustin, you know, he was up. I had him up. I mean, again, there was a couple close rounds, but I had him up 4-0 going into the fifth round. I know some people were 3-1. Two of the judges had a 3-1. One judge had it 2-2, which I didn't really understand, but the two judges had it 3-1. But that's considering that, you know, outside of the first round, when he spent so much

time on Dustin's back, that means two other rounds. He basically beat him standing for the most part. That says a lot about Islam. And listen, I think this was a fully prepared Dustin Porier who went into that fight thinking this is it for me. Like I've got one last shot at this title. I'm going to give it everything I have. And he gave it everything. And credit to Dustin Porre, but Islam still beat him. And I think that says a lot about who Islam-Machia. of is the champion and not to get too far off of a subject, but what you said right there, and I know we've talked about this before when you've been on the podcast, Alan, I am so over this whole two division thing.

Like, good Lord, man. Like, be George St. Pierre, man, defend your title nine times. Do you realize how hard it is to defend your title that many times in a division? You know how it's hard it is to get to four, five, six title defenses? It is damn near impossible. I understand that's the popular thing to do right now, but I really do blame Conner McGregor because he started it because we never saw this before. Now, everybody wants to do it.

And, like, I'm just over it. I want to see Islam and Armand. That is the fight I want to see. Armand has clearly earned the title shot. Islam beat him early in his career on short notice. When Armand took a short notice fight to get to UFC, it was still a really, actually really fun fight. Islam won.

I want to see the rematch five rounds with the title on the line. I have little interest in seeing him fight Leon Edwards, and I probably have even less interesting in fight Bilal Muhammad who's a guy he knows and trains with so it's like fight Armand dude fight Armand, beat guys in your division maybe Justin Gajy works his way back

hell I don't care what he says I'd still love to see him fight Max Holloway after what Max Holloway did to Justin Gayser you tell him you wouldn't watch him or fight him and fight Islam Akachev stick around your division man I'm over this two division thing and I really think that you brought up the name

Max Holloway Max is the guy that I think that I think it would have a lot of success against Islam. Because of his style, right? He's always moving. He's always got the footwork and the quantity of strikes. I think the reason that Islam had so much success on the feet with Porier, aside from the fact that Dustin was waiting for the shot at all time,

so it threw his balance off. He wasn't able to settle into his normal boxing range. But aside from that, Islam threw more shots than normal. Dustin would throw one or two. Islam would throw two, three, four, continue. And he would always land that third or fourth punch. And so he had success with the quantity. good luck out quantity and out-voluming Max Holloway.

And so that's where I think Max Holloway would find those efforts, and we'd have to see Islam really, really shooting. Damon, this gets me into the, I don't know why. I was thinking about all these different things after this fight. And we started talking about like goats of division, goats of all time. And I started kind of comparing these two guys, Habib, who was in his corner,

and I thought, did a fantastic job, obviously, as always. And then you look at Islam. And you kind of, I want to kind of do a little bit of comparison with them. When I look at these two guys, I feel that Habib is by far the more dominant fighter. And that's kind of the thing with that could be. He's at a dominant career. Never lost a fight when undefeated. And he would dominate his opponents.

Where you've seen Islam have struggle more, but you've seen him excessive. sell in these other areas in the striking. If Habib and Dustin fought, I know they did fight already, but like, I don't think Habib would have went five for 16 and takedowns, is what I'm getting at, or had his back and not finished it. I think Khabib is more of a get it done, take you down, ground and pound you, he stayed active and then finish you, where we're still seeing Islam complete these holes in his game. He's still kind of rounding out his game, if you will.

And Habib said that after the fight. He said, Islam learned so much in his fight. He got so much better. And there's always these fights in your career where he's never been cut like that. He probably had to have like eight, ten stitches. When you start bleeding and you start feeling your energy gets sapped or that kind of like hurt feeling sets in, and you push forward into the danger zone. And you go into the deep rounds after having Dustin's back numerous times,

after getting stuffed on 11 takedowns. but then in the fifth round locking up a dars choke that by the way it wasn't even cinched in all the way it was i think we call it some of the times a baby dars where you want your hand to be on the bicep for the dars he couldn't get it that deep so he finished it with the hand on the forearm and still was able to put dust and dust unconscious he's a guy that's evolving and i think the ceiling is still very high but as of now i just still feel like kabb would have got that fight done quicker i don't really have a point to make here i want to compare the two, though. I'm just trying to see where do you sit these two guys in a comparison right now in their careers? So I still have Khabib is the number one lightweight of all time. I think when you go out and you lose, I think, one round and it was only on a couple scorecards, which was the Connor fight in the third round, which was a close round. I didn't think it was like a blowout by any stretch of the imagination and he finished him two minutes later. But when you're a guy who's gone that long and the only thing we can talk about with Khabib is one fight with Gleason T-Bow. It was kind

back and forth. That's literally all you can talk about. He had kind of a tough fight with Gleason Teabout, like two fights in his Jersey career. When that's all you can grab onto with that guy, then yeah, he's pretty damn dominant. Now, the disappointing side with Khabib, I mean, good for him, but like he walked away early. Like he could have easily, I think I, and I'm saying this with all admiration and respect for Islam Khachio, because I know they would have never fought. But I think Kib would still be championed right now. I think he'd be like nine defenses in right now. I don't think anyone would have touched him. At lightweight, he just chose to retire,

and I respect the hell out of the decision for his mom, for his dad, everything that happened. I have no problem with that. And I think we also do have, you know, we're still in an era where Khabib beat guys that are still competing right now. He dispatched Dustin Porre in dominant fashion. Somehow, I think some people had him losing the first round to Justin Gaci. I didn't really see that.

I still, to this day, don't understand how people had him losing the first round. but then he takes out Justin Gaichi without ever getting into a Justin Gaich. He's the only guy to ever not get into a Justin Gaichy fight with Justin Gaich. He just took him down and absolutely mauled him. I love Charles Olivaura, but I don't think he would have done any better against Khabibn than he did against Islam. So it's like, you know, so I think the only knock that Khabib has is because he retired. He retired early.

You know, if he would have kept going, would we still be talking about him taking out arm and taking out Charles and taking out, you know, Fiziev and all these other guys. But, yeah, the only reason we can compare these two right now is because he could be retired early. Otherwise, he's definitely the number one. He's still clearly the number one. And, you know, I don't have a problem that Islam has shown a few other wrinkles in his game. And he's willing to stand and trade with guys.

Maybe he's not quite as dominant because I've said this for years. I think John Jones is the greatest mixed martial artists of all time. And I think we learned who John Jones was after Alexander. Gustafson pushed him to the limit and really showed us that that guy's got that dog at him that he could pull out and gut out a big win. We never really had to see that from Khabib. And so there is that question of like what happened if, you know, Kibb actually had a dog fight.

He had to win that fifth round. He had to get a finish. Could he have gutted it out and won it? But yeah, right now Khab is still there. He's still number one for me. And I think is, and I think that's where I go back to like Islam needs to stay in his division because I don't think Islam beating Leon Edwards. I don't know that that really proves anything to me more than like,

I think beating Armin and beating, you know, whoever the next guy is in light of lightweight proves more to me. Because I wouldn't, what do it could be retired with three title defenses? Get four. Get four. And then we'll start talking. A thousand percent. A thousand percent.

It could be when I think it could be, I think the most dominant fighter we have ever had inside the autagon. Dominant. He was dominant. Didn't lose rounds, much less fights. Didn't lose rounds. He would ground and, an act of ground and pound and pound.

You take you down. It wasn't booing. It was exciting. He's passing your guard. He's punching you in the face. He's passing your guard. He's talking to you. Then he submits you. It was exciting ground and pound. But he retired too early. That's why I have a tough time keeping them high up on a list when it comes to goats. A lot of fighters, you know, the call Kabid the goat say, man, you can't take three title defenses compared to 13 title defenses. It's not even a comparison to me. Islam has an opportunity here, an opportunity to reign supreme in the 55 pound division, which I believe he can. I think Ormond Sauru Kins really his biggest test when it comes to a well-rounded approach. He brings all the similar tools. I think he's maybe a little undersized for Islam and there's certain areas, probably a slight advantage on the ground that, and maybe even on their feet,

different being honest that Islam possesses but when it comes to exploiting a weakness he can't do that against Armand he's got to be tested right there he can't just box because he knows you're scared for the takedown and then take you down with these it's not going to happen with Arman but if he can get past Armand I think I think I mean the division's his for quite a while and he could take those records and surpass could be one day and don't forget I think you know another guy that's out there and again I know he had a setback against Benile Darayous but But Matush Gamrott's out there as well. Great wrestler, and he has a win over Armin.

Like, we all kind of forget, he beat Armine, a very close fight, very good fight. But that was when Armin couldn't, you know, because Matush is a wrestler. And so they kind of canceled each other out in that realm. And Matush ended up winning a very close decision. I know he kind of had that, yeah, he had the opportunity to submit himself with a Benildare Ush right and he lost. But, you know, Gamrot gets another big winner too. He's right there as well. So there's still challenges.

And I still, listen, I understand Max Holloway wanting to go for the federal. title and wanting to fight Ilya. That is a very big fight. But I was one of the people right away saying, E. B. Gage, give him the title shot. Why not? Like, you can't say he has, like, that was my biggest, it's not a knock, but my biggest criticism of, like, Volcanowski going up,

is we didn't know what he was going to look like at Lightway. Now, did he do really well in the first fight? Yeah, he did better than I think a lot of people expected. And then obviously taking a short notice, but getting knocked out. That's not ideal, no matter how you cut it. But we had no idea. We know what Max Hollis.

Holloway can do a lightweight. He went five hard rounds with Destoporriere, not really preparing to be a lightweight. Then he prepared to be a lightweight, and he beat the brakes on Justin Gachey and knocked him out one of the craziest moments of the history of the sport. So to me, like, I would be into a Max Holloway fight. I don't know if it'll ever happen because it seems like he's pretty resolved in going back to featherway. But, you know, you got Gamrod out there. Obviously got Armin out there. You got Holloway. Stick around a lightweight, man. There's still challenges there for you. And, dude, after what Bilal Muhammad had to do to finally get Leon Edwards, we got Shavkat out there, we got Ian Gary and Michael Venham Pages. There's plenty of challenges to Welts away. There's a lot going on, yeah.

We do not need to hold that up to do another champ versus champ fight. Really, is anyone begging to see Leon versus Islam or even Islam versus Bilal? If that's the case, like, is anyone screaming for that? I'm not. I don't think those guys would fight Islam and Bilal, but nobody wants to see that. Nobody, I got to see Leon Edwards versus Islam. Give me a break. Nobody wants to see that it doesn't sell.

It doesn't make any sense. We move on. I mean, it's kind of an issue that we're bringing up. I mean, he did say it in the press conference. I don't think any reporters really even followed up on it afterward because it's like nobody even cares about that. They saw through it. But I don't know.

You know, it was an odd event for me. The show was over. I sat there for 20 minutes. didn't get out of my seat. The people cleaning the chairs, Damon, had to tell me to leave because I was just trying to absorb what I just witnessed,

a pretty lacklustre card that ended in a really competitive, very fun main event. Obviously, I was rooting for Dustin, so I was left there a little bit heartbroken, but my thoughts on Islam was still somewhat unclear

because I thought, wow, he looked good, and wow, he's the best 55 are alive. But wow, Dustin did pretty good, being that this was a stylistic nightmare for him fighting back to back at his age being his last fight you know what i mean like it was kind of like dustin was the the old man striker that they pan picked and man to stuff 11 take downs and bust them up and bring him into five rounds and get out of three or four submissions before inevitably being submitted i'm like well was

dustin just having a tremendous night or did we see maybe islam isn't as dominant as we thought, but he is as good as we thought because he got to finish. And it's not about getting the first takedown. It's about the chain wrestling, finishing the takedowns inevitably in wrestling, right? And it's the same way in fighting. You don't always have to be the most dominant fighter to win every fight. It's not about that, right? I mean, I feel like I'm coming to these conclusions in real time as I talk to you. If you ask me, who's the most dominant fighter we've ever seen? Say, Khabib. But if Islam wins two more title shots, three more title defenses, and you ask me then, who's the best lightweight in the world?

Who's the best lightweight goat? I'm going to say Islam, because he's got the numbers. He's put him in the book. Kavib stopped early. And I know I'm kind of backtracking here with it, but it was an impressive performance by both men, man. I thought Dustin fought like a champion, and I thought Islam had what it took to go into the deep waters,

and they learned that about himself on Saturday. Boarding for Flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. What? 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! Sporting will begin when passenger fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concerned by your gambling or that if someone close, you call 18665330 or visit Comexontera.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. Absolutely. I know this is almost an impossible question to answer because we can't answer it for him. But Dustin Porre said very openly on Saturday night that might be his last fight and he's got to figure out what he's fighting for if he continues because he wanted to be an undisputed champion. He's now had three shots at that. came up short every time.

And while I do understand, I made the argument talking to Islam's manager, Ali Abdel-Aziz, last week, I said if not for Khabibin Islam, you know, Dustin may have very well been a champion. I guess that's not true because he did have a shot against Charles Olivaire and also came up short in that one. So he can't just say it's only Khabi and Islam because he did have that other shot against Charles didn't happen for him. You will not find anybody in the sport that respects Dustin Porier more than me. I think he's one of the sports really good people.

I think everyone would agree with that. Like he's just one of the really good guys in the sport, and he's a ferocious competitor. I can't tell Dustin Porey what to do, nor would I even presume to do so. But there's part of me after watching that fight on Saturday night, I think, and after watching that and after watching what he did with Benoit Saint-Denie, that I'm kind of like, I just, I don't know this is the end for Dustin.

I understand where he's coming from. I certainly do, and I understand you can't fight forever, and we all would love to see our guys go out on top. versus going out, you know, getting carried out of the cage, because that's the last thing we want. But watching him push the pace on Islam and having a pretty damn good fight against Islam-Makacha, basically, you know, really bringing the fight having the best dust of poor we've seen in a title fight, in my opinion. I just, to me, I'm like, this guy's not done. Now, I understand, like, his goal of being champion.

That may have gone away, and it may not come back again. I don't know if the U.S. he's going to rush, even if he wins a couple of fights to throw him back in their Islam if Islam is still champion. but there's just something about that performance where I'm like, man, I just, I don't know. Like, I don't feel like it's the end of me. I don't know. Maybe, like, maybe if he had gone out there and actually Islam got that Kimor in the first round and ended it, I'd be like, all right, you know, I think that's a wrap. Like, dude, walk out, you know, you're good. You got all the money in the world.

You got a happy family. Like, be done. You know, you gave it like your best shot, but it didn't work out. Weirdly, that fight made me think, I want to see more from Dustin. But that's selfish because I love Dustin's why. You know Dustin better than I do. you've been around him. I know it's hard,

probably hard for you to even contextualize this situation because you do know Dustin so well and obviously been around him for so long. What are you thinking, like, do you think, do you think we should see Dustin again or is he in a place right now where we could say, yeah, like walk away now,

walk away while you just came out of a title fight that everyone's praising you for? I haven't spoken to him since the fight. I would say walk away. I would tell him to walk away. I think it's been on his mind for a while. I mean, since I've been talking to him for the last three years since I've been back home, he's been bringing it up.

I don't know how many more have left. I don't know how many more have left. And then he gets a fight and, man, he knocks somebody out. One more. One more. Who knows? Gets a loss. Oh, I can't live with that loss.

Gets a win. Oh, we'll see what happens. Title fight comes. You can't turn it down. But he's already got the money fight. People are chasing the belt or they're chasing Connor McGregor, and he's done both. he said it a million times what left what is there left for me but i like the way you put it as well he lost a fight that people probably gained even more if it's even possible respect for him

it was such a competitive fight against the number one pound per pound fighter in the world who he handpicked dutton because he thought it was a stylistic easier matchup and dustin put him in deeper water than he's ever been in in his life against islam I think it's a loss that you could hold your head high on. It's one that's easy to walk away from. He got submitted, so what? We get submitted every day in a gym. I go out like that all the time.

It's not a big deal. You're not hurt. Maybe he has some injuries. I heard that his knee could be messed up. I really hope that is not the case. That's going to make a possible retirement tougher. His nose is fractured, things like that. But if we're talking about just a fight,

Not the injuries, not this and that. That's the type of loss I would love to go out on, where every single person, it seemed like, in the arena, was rooting for you. The celebrity, everybody loved Dustin. I mean, they were making video after video. It just ended up to video where the underdogs would rise tonight. Everybody was backing the underdog.

It was so climactic in the approach to build up to this fight. How can you relive that? How can you go through all that again and say, Like my next fight against who? A number 5, 6, 7, 8 ranked the guy. Is that going to give me that same feeling that it did? Just fighting with the world watching and the world saluting me? I don't think he's going to get that feeling again.

And I've told him before, like, if you can go out on a victory, it's going to feel so much better. When he went out, when he lost the BMF, the Gachi, it ate him alive. he cleans his soul with bin while something neat and i think his soul is still cleansed even in defeat against Islam because the way he performed i thought he fought like a champion Islam was just a better guy that night i'd say hang up that hat man continue everything else you're doing in your career that way this sport doesn't retire him he retires it yeah you're saying that does put that thought in my head you're absolutely right because we all love dusta pourier like

who like unless you're colby covington who's an idiot uh you love duffer you love duffer Dastaporee. You love Dastepora. You can't not love the guy. The guy is one of the truly good people in this sport, and he's been a ferocious competitor and put on show after show after show. And I had commented before the fight, I was getting like Facebook memories. And one popped up from when he fought Korean zombie down in Virginia. I was at that fight. And I put up a little picture of the post-fight presser that popped up on my feed from whatever was 2011 or whatever it was. And I said, this is the definition of Dustin Poree is. Because even in that night, that was supposed to be a number one contender fight. wins against a featherweight title shot. He lost. And I remember him coming to the press conference and asking him questions. And he was, you know, choking back the tears. Like, it broke his heart that he thought was going to get a title shot. And watching him in that moment is like, this is why we love Dustin because he's so raw. He's so real. He's so invested in this sport, invested in this game. This is not just business for him. This is personal in the way that, like, he just takes everything

in. Like, his emotions are right on the surface. And we love him for that. But you're saying that makes me think about it and you're you're you know what you're probably right like i'm being selfish now because i love watching dust and porre fight you put him back in there of the trilogy against just a gaiti i'm damn sure going to watch you put him in there in a third fight with max holloway with the bmf i'm damn sure going to watch that you put them in there with anybody i'm damn sure going to watch it but that's selfishly because i love watching dustin porier compete realistically though what you just said you're probably absolutely correct all and like now that you say that i'm like yeah, you know what, you would love to go out on a win.

And he said it. He said if he would have won, he would have been satisfied. That was it. Like, he basically said that to post-fight press conference. If he would have won and become champion, he probably would have relinquished the title right there and we're tired because he would have achieved the only goal left in the sport. That was it.

He would have been satisfied with his career. But I don't think he really loses anything by losing that fight. He went out there and put on a freaking war with the best lightweight in the world, maybe eventually the best lightweight of all time. he made a much better showing for himself than he did against kabib. I think we all would agree on that. That fight went pretty south for him in a hurry. And he wasn't supposed to be here.

Like he wasn't, he beats Binwasse to me. He didn't go through like a nine-fight win street to get back here. He got a fight because timing and opportunity and good for him doing it. But yeah, I'm kind of with you now. Now that you said that, I'm kind of like, you know what? Yeah, like, who's going to really complain if this is it for him? So yeah, now that you say that, I'm like, yeah, I kind of with you now. I'm kind of like, I don't know that he needs to come back.

And also, you know, you know, as well as I do, when some guys, you know, some guys who just don't know when to walk away, as you said, don't let the sport retire you. If he comes back and even if he gets that third matchup with Gachi, is he going to be as excited for the Gachie fight? Like, is he going to get us up for that? I don't know. So, yeah, you're probably right, man. Like, it's, it is kind of poetic in a way that this would be the end for him. You know what I would like to see as well? First ballot, Hall of Fame, get into the Hall of Fame.

I think he deserves it. I think he's got the best resume that we've probably ever seen, the toughest resume, in the toughest division. I mean, some people have tremendous resumes, but 55, I think, since the beginning of time, you could really look at it as the most competitive vision, the most amount of fighters, just the stable of fighters, one of the highest numbers, and then the list of top 15 and so on, one of the toughest, and he fought the best of the best of the best in there. get him into the Hall of Fame.

And there's a bit of a, like a, I can't think of the words for this, but champions club in the UFC. If you've had the belt, you're allowed the table type of thing. I think these guys need to in some way welcome us into this table because there's a lot of guys that, you know, well, you never won the belt. Well, I'm not thinking of anyone in particular, but I'm saying we've obviously had a lot of champions. And there's a majority of those, there's a percentage rather of those champions that beat lesser competition than Dustin has faced many a times without even getting a title shot, right? And so the belt doesn't always put you in a prestigious category.

It should be honored and respected. But the guys that Dustin have been fighting, have been straight killers his entire career. I think he has a seat at that table. I think he's earned it. And I'm saying this, people are going to say, man, you're taking a sideways shot at somebody. I'm not. I really am not. But you got to look at the pantheon. Like when you look at the history of champions, I mean, and I'm saying this is somebody who actually really likes her.

I really, really liked her as a person. She's a really good person. But like, Nico Montanio is a former UFC champion. Legitimately, she was the first ever flyweight champion. But would you put Nico's record up against Dustin Porreys and say they're the same? No. No one would. No one in their right mind would.

And that's not a knock on Nico. That's just saying, like, at the time she became a champion, she is a UFC champion. But would you even put her resume in the same sentence as Dustin Porier? No, you wouldn't. I mean, to really up to Annie, you could even put in more current times, 205 division. You look at like heavyweight champions in the last five years. I mean, Dustin's got better resumes than all those.

Dustin's fought tough for people. I mean, you know what I mean? The title's been flipping. And those are all killers. But the title has been flipping hands fight after fight. I mean, I'm not even bringing up the women's ban. I don't wait. I mean, that's, that's, that's more like Nico Montana or whatever.

But, yeah, I mean, just you look at guys like that, that, that, I mean, it's just an incredible, incredible resume. They've done a lot. They've done a lot for the sport. Yeah, I'm with you, though. Yeah, I mean, put him, dude, if he, if Dustin came out tomorrow and said, you know what I'm calling a career, call an audible, put him in the Hall of Fame in June with everybody else. Like, that's how quickly you honor this guy. And, and keep him around the sport. I know he's worked. I know guys have worked with him in Louisiana.

I talked to, you know, Brendan Allen who worked with him when he was a teenager. Like he's got a gym down there. I hope he stays around the sport. You know, he's been, by the way, one of my favorite things, I bring this up every great now and again. One of my favorite things about Dustin Poirio when he fights is when Bruce Buffer announces him and he says his style is stuck jitsu. He still has that Eve Edwards background. He still has stuck jitsu as his style. I love that, man.

I love that. He started with Eve Edwards, and Eve Edwards is still. mention even though you Edwards isn't even coaching you anymore that's still his guy he still has the stylist like jits it always makes me smile your favorite fighter's favorite fighter doesn't pour you man that he's the one that when all the best guys in the world love to watch you it tells you something man he's got that style about him absolutely uh real quick before we get out of here of course you know c we mentioned ufc 302 was a bit of a rough watch it wasn't it wasn't the most compelling card in the world you know it had some fights on paper didn't really pan out in the end

But, of course, the co-main event, Sean Strickland, got a pretty dominant win over Paulo Costa, minus that one judge who, what in the world was he seeing, scored that fight. Oh, no, get me started. I forgot all about it. Oh, my God. That's the same guy who scored Mitch Riposo beating the kid at the beginning of the car, that Andre Lima had him winning that fight, too. And I'm like, what are you watching? I put out a whole link on him the other day. I'm blanking on his name at the moment, but it's like Dave.

Dave Morelli is the name. Dave Morelli. I'm going to, I've got to remember this guy's name because I'm going to keep watch, man. If this guy is on a card, I'm watching. I'm watching what he's doing because we have to, we have to clean the sport up. We have to get guys like this out of here. I don't know if this is under the table money. I don't know if there's just incompetence.

We got to get on the same page here. There's too much at stake to make these type of stupid decisions or time after time. Laura Sanko sent me this article on this guy on like Reddit or some people that have been doing some research. This guy has a history of terrible calls, terrible decisions, where he's seen flip-flops, 3027 one way, and he comes in with a 30-27 the other way. Numerous times, we've got to get these people out of here. Yeah, it's not personal, but fighters' lives, fighters' money, fighters' family, all this is at stake.

A lot is at stake. And you're making stupid-ass decisions like this. Get these guys to fuck out of here. I went off. I was livid after when I heard that. When I, when I, when I heard that announcement and then I started digging deeper into it, it's crazy that this still happens, this day and age. And I'm keeping watch. Would you say, Dave, Terrelli, huh?

Dave, Dave, Dave. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. And, you know, listen, I'm not going to sit here and say that, you know, I don't want to point fingers and say, it's this guy's fault, is that guy's fault. I know New Jersey's been around forever. They were the ones who basically created the unified rules of MMA. so I don't want to dig on them because they're the originals, and they have a lot of CFC,

ring of combat shows are all the time happening in New Jersey, so they have a pretty active commission. But I will say this, and I remember I had him on the show about two years ago. I had Frank Trigg on the podcast. We were talking about him transitioning into being a referee, and we were talking about, you know, everyone says, man, we want to see more fighters, more fighters get involved

because we saw Vitor Hibero refereeing over the weekend. He's become a really good referee out there. And I asked Trigg the question. I said, why, you know, everyone says, why not more fighters? And Trigg told me something that's very telling. He said, if you want to be a referee or a judge in California, Andy Foster forces you to go through thousands of hours of training and calling fights. He will put you on amateur fights.

He'll put you on a lot of amateur fights. Then you have to go up and start doing pros. Then you do like the first car, first fight of the night at a regional show. And not the big regional shows, not LFA, which is like the main feeder league to UFC. I'm talking like the shit kicker bucket shows Yeah, like there's maybe 200 people in the audience And then he's like, you're doing hundreds of fights Before you get a chance to referee a UFC

Even like the prelim of a UFC You're refereeing 100 He said Andy Foster puts you through the ringer To even qualify to do this. Now, do I think other commissions are putting their people Do that same kind of strenuous work to get there? probably not and I think that's a sad state of affairs but I've said for years Andy Foster is the gold standard

I think Andy Foster they need to reach out to Andy Foster and get him to set a program that this is how many hours fights rounds you have to score and we have to agree with your scoring before we allow you to go on and referee UFC fight and listen I don't want to screw over the guys in LFA or other organizations say they don't matter they absolutely do matter they're getting half their paycheck just the same as anybody else but when you get to title fights and you get to number one contender fights and things like that in the

UFC you can't have these mistakes you can't have somebody watching that fight and legitimately thinking paulo costa 149 46 you didn't watch the fight you didn't there's no way you watch that fight and you scored four rounds for paolo costa we need to weed that out and i think andy foster is the guy to do it don't let these guys anywhere near a fight if they haven't gone through that kind of training and i know dave dave i looked he's been calling for he's been scoring fights since like 2011. He's been around, but clearly he's not learned anything. So, yeah, we got to be better about this. It's got that you cannot have that. I mean, I understand close fights and I refuse to call close fights robberies because they're not. They're close fights.

But 4946 for Paulo Costa, you weren't watching the fight. You just weren't. It's a joke. Let me bring up, I don't say an example, but you said it earlier. You had Islam winning all four rounds. The other ways to look at it is that Dustin won the second round. Some people thought Dustin won the fourth round. And then even one judge thought Dustin won two rounds, that it was two to two. It makes sense because one judge had one round for Dustin. Another judge had one judge had the second round for Dustin. The other judge had the fourth round for Dustin.

And the third judge had rounds two and four. So you're seeing some similarities there. There were some close rounds where based upon what you're seeing. you thought there was a momentum change. And that's a lot of times how a round gets stolen because one fighter could be dominant, but the momentum change really thinks you say, whoa, much better round,

even if it wasn't as competitive. So those rounds are what I like to call close fights because you could see it either way. And they make sense. That pattern that I just gave you makes sense. 49-46 for Costa makes no sense. And they need to be accountability where they sit down after the fight

and they go, show me what you were looking at, round for round. And then when it's all said and done, if they go, if the guy really has a case that he thought calls to won that, and he go, no, you're way off, buddy. You're not even in the ballpark. Whatever you're talking, whatever you're seeing, that's not how we score fights. Back to the amateur fights. Get better at this and then come back. Or it just needs to be like corrected, right?

Like, I don't understand why we don't correct it. Or if he doesn't even have an answer, man, I really, I botched it. Okay, you botched it, you made a mistake. here's a suspension for a month or something. Like, let's just correct it and move forward. I don't understand how it doesn't get corrected on a pay-per-view card co-main event, 49-46, the opposite direction of what really happened. It's crazy.

Well, and I know we've told, I know I brought this up, and other reporters have brought this up. There needs to be an accountability on the commission level, because after the events, and I know Andy, I'm not, listen, everyone's like, good Lord, dude. Why don't you just, you know, good and just bow down to Andy Fawson? But it's true. We need more commission accountability as well.

Like I know Larry Hazard is the guy who is like the in charge of the New Jersey state of the commission. Have him meet with us after the event and answer these questions. You know, have him, even if it's just one pool reporter asking him like, okay, there was some pretty weird scoring. Like, what do you say about that? And he's like, well, we're going to review it and we're going to sit down with Dave and we're going to talk. At least we know. There's just so much secrecy about, you know what I mean? Yeah.

This is, we're on to this. We're going to, we're going to correct this. A thousand percent. Give me something. We can't just know that this guy got into his car and went home and then next week and he's going to do the exact same thing at another fight. No, he needs to be corrected. And the fact that there's just so much, you know, there's, it seems on the surface,

because we never hear about this, there's no accountability. And there's so much secrecy because judges and referees typically don't talk. Now, we do occasionally get a Mark Goddard interview or a Herb Dean tweet or John McCarthy. the addressing rules. I know he had talked to you. He addressed a rules thing with you over the weekend, which I appreciate it, because John, of course, one of the best of the game.

I think Mark Goddard's one of the best of the game. But judges never talk. Judges are never allowed to talk. They never address their scorecards. That's weird to me. Like, I'm not saying I was excused it. And I certainly don't want that guy, I certainly don't want that guy judging fights again anytime soon until we figure out why.

But at least if he could come out and say, here's why I scored it that way. Now we may all vehemently disagree with him and say you were absolutely wrong. Yes. But the fact that he can't even explain himself is a problem. But show me why you thought that it went that way. And then we say, no, that's wrong. And then they need to like correct it.

But yes, at least show me what it was because it makes us think that you didn't even watch your fire. You don't even care. You don't even care. You just kind of picking at the end of the day. It's so much, so much at stake. And to hear these laughable cards, it's like, what do we? doing? What is all these 20,000 people and all this buildup and all this hype when there was nine decisions that night? What if nine of them went the wrong way? Because some guy doesn't take

his job seriously. And I said this. I was talking to somebody about the card coming up this weekend in Louisville. I was at the first Louisville card years ago when the main event was Diego Sanchez and Martin Camman. And Diego won a pretty bad decision. It should have gone Martin Camman. But I know what happened. To this day, I know what happened because I was cage side and you know where media sits. I'm five feet away from the octagon. Diego was more active, but he was swinging and missing constantly. His land percentage had to be like 9% in that fight. But because Diego was so popular, every time Diego swung with a punch, the crowd went nuts because everyone loved Diego. I guarantee you, because when the judges are sitting cage side, it's sometimes tough with angles to see what lands,

what doesn't. If you got your back to a fighter and they swing, and you see the guy react, he must have connected, or he didn't block it or whatever. The crowd's going nuts. 110% I guarantee that's what the judge has scored that night. It's because they saw Diego swing it a thousand times. He didn't land, but like 10% of him, but because he was swinging so much, the crowd's going nuts.

They're scoring it that way. Martin Kammond should have won. Martin Kammond clearly landed the better strikes, the more effective strikes. He absolutely got robbed that night. But I understand in that moment why it went that way. I don't agree. I don't agree with it, but that's why it happened.

You can't tell me, reason why paula costa got four rounds none you cannot tell you cannot you cannot you cannot tell me any reason why you gave paul o costa winning four rounds and that's why like i joked on i said removing from the building after the remissioned riposo fight and then he did it again i mean good lord man like that that that first score card on the opening fight the car should have gotten removed from the building that was him too that was him on the first one yeah that was him too same guy god See, I'm about to go tweet some crazy shit out because you told me that. I didn't even realize that.

That was him. And I just talked about his history of it. There was all these other fights that they listed that he's done it before. And I remember that crazy scorecard early in the night as well. God, damn. We got to fix this problem. And the thing is, is like, it takes, I mean, it's sad, but it takes, like, you know, Dana flipping out on, like, Steve Mazzagotti so many times to where we don't see Steve Mazzagati

referee fights anymore for that reason because it just got so bad and so egregious like dana just had to flip out and something to matt brown said on our podcast you know months ago we have to start naming these guys when they make bad cards we can't just say that one judge if it's if it's a judge and i know like douglas crosby's taking some bullets over the years for some of his bad scorecards we got to be able to name these guys dave jurelli you got to be named buddy i'm sorry i'm not trying to make your life a living hell but you know what you were potentially robbing sean strickland of a win on Saturday night. You potentially robbed Andre Lima who went on Saturday night. Now both these

guys have split decisions on the record, which ultimately doesn't matter. They both got wins. The right guy won the fight, but it doesn't matter. You messed up and you messed up badly and we need to name you and say that you messed up, you messed up badly. It's true. I'm a thousand

percent on board. I've, uh, what's it, Bird? Natalie Bird. Natalie Bird. Oh, Adelaidele Berg. I've, I've called her out numerous times on a post show at fight nights where the score card was atrocious. Cosby, again, there's been a couple of them. I forget their name sometimes. But when I see the name and I see a horrible card, I'm going to call you out.

I'm going to let you guys know. I've been in that position before where I felt like I got robbed. I've seen judges who were just eating candy during fights, not even paying attention. Judges that don't know what they're looking at. I've watched back fights and rounds where I go, there's no possible way that anybody with any type of credentials, knowledge of the sport could score this this way. But this judge did this. So this tells me that either they don't know what the hell they're doing or they don't care or they don't watch it. We need to out these guys. And so I'm all for it. I hate ruining lives, but we want

a good sport. And also I want to be, I also want to throw this out there. I mentioned on Saturday night, Gasper Oliver, the referee who didn't call the eyepokes. There were eyepokes in that one fight. And he just told the guy to keep fighting. And they mentioned it during, I can't remember which fight it was. They mentioned it during the fight. And then between rounds, they said that Mark Ratner went up to him and told him what he needed to do. And then the next round, there was another eye poke and he paused the action and said, okay, now we're going to pause the action. I said on Saturday night, I mean, you should not have to tell a referee how to do their job in the middle of a fight. If that's the case, they shouldn't be in there. If he doesn't know to give the guy five

minutes for an eye poke, he shouldn't be in there refereeing. That blew my mind as well. they're like, oh yeah, Mark Ratner went over and talked to him and told him what is, I was like, how is this even happening? How is this guy not know that an eye poke deserves a break and a potential five-minute break for this guy to recover? He's just telling me, oh, yeah, keep going, you're good. I mean, it's absolutely mind-boggling to me. Like, that guy should be nowhere near that octagon that night. If you don't know that if I poke is a foul that deserves a five-minute break, you should be in the cage.

It's the highest level of the sport. the highest level of the sport and we're getting these jokes as refs and judges yeah it needs to get cleaned up it happened and we came in here and Connor McGregor hijacked the beginning of it and the referees are hijacking the inning of it I mean how imagine if you were watching I understand like NFL NFL referees do make mistakes trust me as a Cincinnati Bengals fan I understand that all too well from some of the bad calls we've made against us but that being said imagine

Imagine watching the Super Bowl and the game-winning field goal goes wide right. It clearly misses the field goal and the referee calls the good. Like, that's how bad that is. This isn't missing past interference or a holding call. This is like calling a field goal wide right when it clearly goes down the middle or calling it down the middle when it goes wide right. That's how bad does this. The decision of the game, the decision of the fight, right.

It's not like, oh, did he hold a fence or not hold the fence? It's like, this is who won the fight or not? And some of them are close, as we said, like the Dustin fight. It's arguably one or two rounds. But some of these are not even close at all and they're still botching it. It's, uh, and you know what? This is a never-ending conversation. We could do a four-hour podcast and talk about every bad.

And it's, it sucks. And listen, I understand it's a thankless job. I do. I understand that these guys have tough jobs. And also none of them are doing it full time. Like I understand some guys do it, but most guys aren't doing a full time. They're getting paid a couple grand to come sit. at EFC card and score fights.

I understand that. We got to do better. You got to do better. You can't have Paul O'Costa winning 49-46 in a fight. He clearly did. Paulo Costa would tell you he lost that fight. When a fighter will come out and say,

no, I didn't win that fight. That's a problem. That's a real problem. I think he said that. I think he even kind of, in some way or another, like said, like, I didn't fight. I didn't win.

I didn't do good at all. It was bad judging. But look, this is the job they signed up for. I know we hear that a lot in different things. You know, celebrities, you know, they wanted to be a celebrity. You know,

they have people tracking it, but no, no, this is their career or their job on the weekend, like you said. They wanted to be a judge. Just judge it the right way. I know there's some close rounds,

but the close rounds that are not close, do the right thing, make the right decision. Yeah, like I said, I can see Dustin Islam. I cannot see Paul O and is Sean Strickland. That was not the case.

So, oh, man, I tell you what. So we, the train never stops rolling. of course, because we got UFSI Louisville coming up this weekend. We got another Apex card. I think that's the one with Alex Perez and Tutsuia Tire. Then we move into Saudi Arabia, which is Hamzat and Robert Whitaker.

That's great. And, of course, we cap off the month with, hopefully, Connor McGregor and Michael Chandler. Alan, I know obviously you are always busy. You're going to be back with us next week. You're going to be co-hosting the show again next week, which we love having you on every time you can come on. but you got some stuff going on this weekend what are you what are you doing this weekend

yeah i'll be at lFA we're going to be in ham in indiana knocking one out and then uh i'll be back with you the following week and also doing that ufc apex cord the uh who'd you say it was it was uh alice peteras and tatuia tire i think is that i think that's a guy that uh i didn't even realize he was a main event yet i didn't see who was on that cord but he's a guy that since he's gotten into the ufc i've had my eye on my eye on i think he's a guy that could be a future champion. Good everywhere. This is going to be a good matchup for him.

But yeah, man, next weekend, next week, we get on the show. I'm not going to be in this kind of hangover from the Porier fight, from the nine decisions and from the horrible cards, calls rather, from their judges. I promise we're going to have a much better show. And going to Indiana,

which Indiana doesn't get nearly enough credit for being one of the birthplaces of MMA because I spent a lot of time in Indiana watching hook and shoot cards back in the day. I was at the card when Caitlin Young head kick knocked out Misha Tate back in the day when they had a women's tournament with Jeff Osborne's hook and shoot. Indiana, man, they used to be a hotbed for M.A. back in the day. That was a promotion? Hook and shoot.

Hook and shoot. Jeff Osborne. They did mostly women's fights. And it was the night that Caitlin Young head kick knocked out Misha Tate. Long before strike force, way back in the day. I was there that night. Hook and shoot was the placement. If you wanted to be a women's fighter back in the day, you went to hook and shoot.

I didn't even know about that one. Yeah, so that's also Indiana. A lot of people remember that from Indiana. So Indiana was once a hotbed for MMA. So have fun in Hammond. I'm going to use that in my opening. The former hotbed and for MMA. Yeah.

Hook and shoot. Baby. Jeff Osborne. That was the place back in the day. When you couldn't fight before, a lot of more strike force in the U.S. are promoting women's fights. Jeff Osborne was doing God's work,

promoting women's fights in Indiana and hook and shoot. So, yeah, good time. So LFA always a quality. Yeah, that's what he said. Feed your promotions. I know that's technically a regional promotion. Let's please hopefully weed out the bad judges for it to get there because a lot of guys from LFA get to UFC.

So let's have a graduation before you even get to LFA. The fighters, the broadcasters, judges and referees as well. It feeds them to the UFC. Yeah, let's get the weed out the bad ones there. And we should have only top notch, the best of the best when we get to the UFC. especially the pay-per-views. Yeah, please, please, let's do that. All right, folks, that is our episode for this week.

We'll be back next week. Alan's going to join us again next week. We'll talk about everything that unfolded at U.S.C. Louisville, and hopefully maybe we'll have a little bit more word or what's going on with this Connor Chandler fight. Hopefully good news that it was just a logistical thing or a flight or something weird that was going on. So hopefully we get more good news about that.

And we appreciate everyone tune to this show. Make sure 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 see you guys next week for another edition of the Fighter versus the Rider.

Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you then. With Instacart, you get groceries that over-deliver so you can over-share your preferences. Want russet potatoes with no brown spots? You got it. Want turnips that look light but feel heavy?

Easy. Want honey-crisp apples that are firm green and definitely not Macintosh like last year when you lost the fall bake-off to perfect Penelope Johnson? Okay, a bit TMI, but we're here for it. So download the app today and get zero delivery fees on your first three orders. Instacart, groceries that over deliver.

Service fees exclusions and terms apply.