MMA Fighting - Fighter vs. Writer: Matt Brown Breaks Down Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley, Offers to Face Jake Paul Next

Episode Date: August 31, 2021

In the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer, Matt Brown joins the podcast to break down all the action from Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley, why he believes Woodley has no one to blame but himself for the loss and his own personal interest in facing Jake Paul next. Follow Damon Martin @DamonMartin Follow Matt Brown @IAmTheImmortal Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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This is Spider vs. The Writer. I'm your host, Damon Martin. And this week I am joined by a good friend and a longtime podcast co-host from a couple different shows. The man with a whole lot of UFC knockouts, UFC Weltsway and my friend, Matt Brown. Matt, what's going on? What's up, man? So where'd you get the music, man? That's like some de jank kind of, you know.

Solid. That was good man. It was a good intro music. Where'd you get it? That's what they call that that free, uh, like the, the non-licensed music, you know? So I found, I had to find some metal though. I couldn't go in like it. I got to go in legit. I couldn't go with some wuss, you know, like, you know, beat music. I had to go some metal, dude. Come on. Nice, nice. Which, by the way, I forgot to tell you. I got a new record player. Oh, I spend some vinyl. Some vinyl, bro. I'm all about the vinyl. I'm going to show to you next time. We hang out, man. But, um, um,

Yeah, I'm glad you got a good intro, bro. That's solid. Yeah, yeah. I'm all about the vinyl, man. You have to come and see my vinyl collection sometime. I got a big bunch of vinyl, so. We might have to do some swaps. Yeah, absolutely.

All right, so let's get into it, of course, last night. 24 hours ago, I was in Cleveland, Ohio for the big boxing match between Jake Paul and Tyrone Woodley. Of course, Jake Paul ended up getting the nod by a split decision over eight rounds. Tyron was not too happy about that. He's calling for an immediate rematch. He doesn't think the judge has scored the right way. I'll be honest. And we'll just kind of get in this now and I kind of get my opinion.

I'll be honest. I didn't think it was that controversial, the decision. I scored it. Now, okay, so just to put it in context here, I'm sitting I'm sitting ringside, but not really ringside. We're kind of back away from the ring, like behind the first, like, section of seats on the floor. So I'm on the floor.

So I'm basically watching the big screen because you can't see anything in the ring at that distance. So I'm basically watching the big screen. But I'm not watching with any. commentary. So I have no idea I could see you on TV. That's a scary sight right there. Have you watched it yet? I haven't watched it back yet, no. I think that was you.

It was a dude with glasses. Just like here's at least. Yeah. Could be. Yeah. I'm right with you, man. Tyron doesn't really have much of an argument there for that fight, man. That was a unfortunate, man. It looked to me like he had the skill to win that fight.

He probably is a skill to ability to win. I mean, well, a lot of fights, UFC and boxing. I think he looked real good out there when he opened up. But I tell you, man, it just looks like, like Tyron for the past, I don't know, what, five, six fights in UFC and now in boxing or celebrity boxing, whatever you want to call it. It's like he's more concerned about getting out of the ring safely than he is winning the fight. Yeah, it was weird because I'll give him to her credit for this.

he was more aggressive. I was worried about that. I thought he was going to sit back against the ropes like he did in his last few UFC fights where he was just sitting back against the cage and kind of waiting for guys to come in on him. And that didn't happen. He was a little more aggressive.

The problem is, is while he was standing and he's saying that Jake was running from him, I don't like that because Jake, you can be a counterfighter. Anderson Silva wasn't running from people because he wasn't chasing after them. But he was pursuing him a lot of, of the fight, but he wasn't throwing.

I mean, if you look at the punch stats, they landed combined. I think it was around 120 total punches in eight rounds. That's, to me, ridiculous. Like, there was no output. Like, I think that is my biggest issue with Tyrant's argument about winning the fight is that his output wasn't there. If he would have actually thrown more punches, he probably would have won the fight. He probably would have knocked him out.

I mean, that's, but he didn't engage enough. I agree. And I think you got to give Jake some credit, too, and that when Tyron did back up against, or did back up a little bit, Jake read it, put a couple of jabs out there, then he was the one backing up. He controlled the range really well.

He controlled where the fight took place. When he was backing up, he would catch his breath, and then he would set his feet and decide when the engagements would take place, where they were taking place. And, you know, you got to give him a little bit of credit, man. He looked pretty good in there.

You know, again, for me it's kind of the big question is, you know, was it Jake Paul looking good or was it Tyron just kind of going through the motions? And that's just what it looks like. It looks to me like he's just going through the motions and just really just wants to get out of there safely, you know, like doesn't want to be in a fight. He looked very uninspired, very unmotivated, didn't look like he really was enjoying himself in there. And, you know, so again, I just don't know if you credit Jake for that or if you maybe, maybe it was,

or maybe if it was Tyrone's fault. Yeah, I think Jake, I think for the first time in Jake's career, and listen, when you knock out a YouTuber, an NBA player, and Ben Ascran, you haven't really been in a fight where you've been in any kind of serious danger. We've got to be honest about that. Like, he's just not, he's never had anyone in there that presented any kind of serious threat. I love Ben. I like Ben Ascran very much.

He was a monster in his heyday in fighting. He's not a boxer. He's not a boxer. He's not a striker. As Michael Bisping said on. this very podcast a week ago, his striking is garbage. So, you know, to say that was a threat is a joke. Tyron's a threat.

Bro, look at 90% of boxers that are 4 and 0. And honestly, Ben Ascran's probably as much of a threat as those first four to 10 guys that pro-boxers are fighting. Yeah. So, but I think Tyrant, we know Tyron's got legit knockout power. There's no doubt about that. But Tyrant was never known for his boxing. I mean, Tyron had knockout.

There's a difference between having knockout power and being good boxer. You know what I mean? He had huge knockout power. We know that. And in MMA, you know, you can have huge knockout power and still be a terrible striker. You know what I mean? It doesn't mean you're a great striker just because you have knockout power. He had great knockout power.

We knew that. So I think the threat of that had Jake like on his bike a little bit more than before, but he was also playing it smart. But then Jake wasn't really engaging either. Jake was flicking at his jab a little bit. He threw a couple combinations. He tied Woodley a couple of times pretty decent, but nothing like super, super hard.

Went to the body a couple times pretty good. But I think there was, part of it was Jake wasn't engaging as much because he was more timid about Tyron's power. And Tyron was doing a lot of pursuing, but then not doing a lot of throwing a lot of throwing. And when he threw punches, and I noted this in my recap,

a lot of times when Tyron was throwing punches, he wasn't throwing combinations. He was throwing single shots. You can't do that in boxing. Yep, and that's just the lack of experience in boxing, right? And, you know, Jake's going to run into a guy that's going to do that a little bit better. Maybe his next match, maybe I'll get lucky, and he'll want to get his ass kicked, and I'll get to show him that.

But, you know, someone's going to show that to him eventually, and we'll see how he handles it. And it didn't, he didn't show any signs in that fight of being able to handle it well, because when Tyrone did throw combinations very few, very far between, but when he did, you know, Jake didn't show anything spectacular. And again, that's why I don't, you know, I could credit Jake Paul for a few things, but I really am more leaning towards Tyrone was just trying to gather safely, man. You know, he was there for a payday, looked at unmotivated. I said it.

Before the fight, I said if Tyrone took this seriously, he should kill him. I kind of still stick by that. And I think he probably did take his serious, but he's not, doesn't have no fire in his heart left, man. And I think we've seen that in the UFC. Perfect call out by Jake. Perfect opponent for him. What do you say?

I'm not, I'm not as you are, just to be clear, because obviously we've talked about this a lot of our old podcast, you are a much, much bigger boxing fan than I am. So I'm not a massive boxing guy. I like boxing. I watched a big fight, so I'm not going to lie to you. I'm not sitting here lying and saying I'm watching every fight on it. But I know enough about the sport to know that Jake is not bad.

He's not terrible. It's not like he's out there and he looks like a crappy. I mean, for a four-and-o boxer, I mean, listen, just to put it in context, I saw Tommy Fury fight earlier in the night in a four-round fight against a completely overmatched mixed martial arts fighter and Anthony Taylor gave up like six inches and like at least 25 pounds in weight. And Tommy couldn't, Tommy barely laid hands on him. It was awful.

I mean, it was an awful performance. And Tommy Fury is now 7-0. And I think I saw somebody put down on Twitter last night. the combined record of his opponents is like 14 and 175 or something ridiculous like that Tommy Fury is supposed to be a legit I mean I want to say legit boxer I'm saying like he's like legitimately trying to be a boxer like he is 6 and 0 now 7 and O comes from Tyson's fee obviously Tyson Furious little brother like he is actually before he was a reality show star which I didn't really know that about him until recently before he was that he was

that he was trying to be a boxer he's 22 so he's young He looked terrible That was an awful performance for him last night And he's now 7-0 For Jake to be 4-0 where he's at I don't think Jake is terrible I don't think he's terrible He's got a lot of room to grow

He's not a great boxer He's not a great boxer man he's stretching imagination Him throwing out names like Canello It was laughable But you know But I didn't think he's a terrible boxer But I don't think he had a great showing last night And he still got the win

And I'll stand by that It wasn't a great fight It wasn't a great performance but I still thought he won. And again, I'm right there with you. I think I agree with just about everything, but I'm just a little bit torn on whether it was, you know, credit to Tyrone or credit, credit to lack of Tyrone pushing or trying versus lack of,

or credit to, I'm sorry, my words are getting all confused, or credit to Jake Paul for being good enough to stifle Tyrone a little bit. and I kind of lean towards Tyrone just not do anything. I mean, even in the corner, you just look in his eyes, man, and this guy's his corner's trying to fire him up, and he's just kind of standing there a little lack of day's goal, like, you know, hey, I'm going to get paid, bro, I'm cool, you know? Like, don't worry about it, you know.

It just, because it looked to me like he had his opportunities. He had his time. He dropped him there in the fourth, at least heard him bad. You know, they didn't call to knock down, bounce off the ropes but they hurt him bad and even then he didn't push forward he didn't go for it you know and that tells me that's there's just a lack of um a lack of desire you know yeah i got to agree with you there because i think last night was more about tyrant not

pulling the trigger than it was about jake you know then jake putting on a great because i don't think jake i think jake i mean again i mean there's not a lot to judge from obviously. Again, you know, you knock out Nate Robinson and Ben Ashken. I don't know that we've really had a lot of footage to judge him by. But I don't think Jake looked great last night, but I do think, I think when, if Tyre is being honest with himself, and I know, listen, I don't think he looked terrible. I think for a guy in his boxing debut, he actually had some good moments.

But I think if Tyra is being honest with himself, if he goes back and watches this like a month from now when he's kind of cooled down and, like, you know, kind of put everything behind him, he's going to look at this fight and have a lot of regrets because he had moments. He had moments where he had Jake pushed back. He had Jake, like when he landed that right hand and heard him in the fourth round, which is obviously the best punch of the fight, he didn't follow up. He threw one punch and hit him and he didn't follow up. And, and again, there were very, I don't remember if he ever threw more than like two punches simultaneously,

like maybe once or twice. It was all one punches. Twice. And I tell you what, almost every time. he threw his jab, he had a really good jab, sharp jab, landed well a few times, but there was like two per round. Yeah. So like I think if when it's all said and done, like I said, a month from now when he goes

back and watches the fight, he's going to say, damn, that's on me. Like, that's on me. He did not, because I don't think he did enough to win the fight. It's not that it wasn't a close fight at moments because it was a bad fight. It wasn't a great fight. But I think Tyron could have won that fight. Tyron had the ability to win that fight, and if I'm being honest about it,

he probably should have won that fight based on the way he was fighting if he would have actually thrown punches. This is my point. And unfortunately, for Tyron, I like him, man. You know, we're not friends, you know, we're acquaintances, but, you know,

he's a good guy, man. He's a really good guy. And, you know, so I don't want to say any bad about him. But unfortunately, man, he's going to look, he's probably looking at his last, what, five UFC fights and, saying that same thing. You know, we know that he's got the skill to at least compete with those guys.

You know, I don't remember all the names, but, you know, I think maybe Gilbert Burns is probably the only one that just legitimately is good enough to beat him. But most of those guys, like, I think Tyrone should be beating them probably, you know, three or four or maybe four or five years ago. He probably beats those guys. And he's not pulling the trigger. Just, again, lack of motivation. though not fighting inspired at all.

So I think he's probably going to look back at a lot of his fights and feel sort of that same way. Yeah. Yeah, it's unfortunate. And I agree. I think Tyron, you know, in his prime, he was one of the greatest Walter weights, you know, in history. And then, you know, he has that loss to Usman really lopsided fight. He basically got, you know, just completely moiled on the...

Yeah, that's another guy. You know, even a motivated Tyron might lose to Usman. Yeah, yeah. But like that, okay, so that's... You take that one out of there because that's... that's Usman kind of ascending to becoming who he is now. I think Usman's the top pound for pound fighter in sport right now. But Gilbert Burns, you're right.

I think Gilbert Burns is another one. But like, he could have beaten Colby. He absolutely could have beaten Colby. He stood there against the cage for five rounds and didn't do anything. You know what he could have been way more competitive, right? Yeah. You know, it's again, it's another one of those where you're looking at it, like, did Colby win or did Tyron lose?

Yeah, exactly. So where we're at now, last night was, it was, it was everywhere. You could not avoid Jake Paul, Tyron Woodley. It was the biggest event of the weekend. It's going to end up being one of the biggest boxing events of the year. And I think when they said, and again, I know total numbers haven't been brought in, but they're saying it's going to end up being right there with Logan Paul and

Floyd Mayweather's exhibition bout as the biggest boxing paper views the year. And there's a lot of purists, and you're a purist, Matt. So I'm going to, I'm going to argue with you on this one. There's a lot of purists out there that we're going to say, this is so garbage that a YouTuber with now a 4-0 record is breaking

you know pay-per-view records making pay-per-view records against Tyrone Woodley a former UFC champion no boxing experience whatsoever and it's like a it's like a sacrilege that we're talking about this whereas I let me just go ahead and make my argument listen whatever people want to watch it's up to them

I don't understand everything listen just for example I talked about Tommy Fury as a reality show story he was on a UK show called Love Island my girlfriend watches Love Island I don't get it I don't understand it I'd go as far as to say I hate it

because I hate reality shows but I don't understand it but do I understand there's a lot of people who like that stuff there's a lot of people who like reality absolutely I get it I can't begrudge somebody for liking what they like because I'm sure there's shows

or movies or a sport I love MMA there's probably people out there who despise MMA don't get it think it's too violent whatever the case may be so I'm never going to begrudge anyone

for liking what they love like. And I was in that arena last night, Matt, and the crowd was insane. And the one thing I will say having watched enough boxing matches over the years, this was by far the youngest audience I have ever seen interested in boxing. I mean, there were like

nine-year-old kids in the audience shouting Jake Paul, get him Jake, knock him out, Jake. I've never seen anything like that at a boxing match. So for people to discount this and say it's a joke, or you shouldn't be doing it, or what are we doing with the sport that this is happening? I'm like, shush. Because

you can't tell people what to like and obviously people like Jake Paul. Yeah. I guess maybe you were looking for a debate or argument but I'm right there with you. I couldn't agree more, man. I think it's actually pretty cool what they're doing, man. It's a different lane.

You know, like you said, I'm a purist. I love the rawness of, you know, pure in May. I love it at the highest level. Same with boxing. I follow it closely. But this isn't that. they're two different things. It's different lanes. They're just doing two different things. And you can't even really compare the two. You know, it's a YouTuber doing a boxing match. It's not a

boxing match of an up-and-coming guy. You know what I mean? It's not like ESPN Friday night fights, right? It's a different thing. You know, this is a, and that's why you see nine-year-olds in the crowd cheering for the guy you don't see that at a any boxing match ever right so it's two different things and look i congratulate them for uh you know i say hats off to jake paul man he's i think it's pretty cool what he's doing um good for him man you know he's he built his brand and um he's not tied to any promotion um you know he's his own boss man you know he's doing it his way and uh good for him man, I don't think you can take anything away from. I think anybody saying the opposite is a hater.

And the fact is, you know, if he does keep moving up the ranks or keep moving up in competition, you know, he's going to get knocked out. You know, he is playing a violent game here. You know, he's playing with the wrong toys here, man. So I think that's a bad idea for him. But he's making a lot of money doing it. And if he gets knocked out doing it, he wakes up tomorrow with the wrong. millions in his pocket and I'm sure he'll be perfectly fine with himself. You know, and if he ever goes in there with me, I'll be the one to do it.

Yeah. But who knows, right? Yeah. Well, let me, let me start by saying that if anyone is to blame for Jake Paul being a big star, if there's anyone to blame, it's boxing. And what I mean by that is, is boxing has done an awful job. Boxing has done an awful job building up at stars. I bring this up all the time.

I said this a couple times last week when I was doing a couple of appearances, you know, talking about the fight beforehand. Vasolomachinko, who I know you are a big fan of, I'm a big fan of, okay? Going into that fight with Tiafima Lopez, which was a great match, and Tiafima Lopez deserved all the credit for beating him, but going into that match, Vasolomacinco was, by and large, every fighter's favorite fighter. Every fighter I know who likes boxing

Lo Machinko loved him The casual audience couldn't pick him out of a lineup If he put a gun to their head They had no clue who Vassal Lomachinko was He was fighting on Saturday night 1130 p.m. on ESPN That's that's egregious That's awful that one of the greatest boxers in the world

Has zero audience Or has a small audience I guess they said no audience But a small audience Like, again, the average combat sports fan, if you put up 10 pictures of people, just random people, put a gun to their head and said, pick out Vassal and Machinko, I guarantee you 99 or 98 of 100 would have no idea who he is. That's a problem. You're not building your stars right. I mean, yes, there are absolutely stars in boxing.

There's still, I mean, Canelo is a massive star. We know Canello is a massive star. But look at what's going on right at Oscar Day, La Hoya, at 50 or whatever he is, about to come. out of retirement fight Vitor Belfort, Anderson Silva and Tito Ortiz are fighting next weekend. That's going to be, that's going to do huge business. Now, I know Oscar is obviously, you know, great in his own right, but that's the problem. I mean, you have Tyson Fury, who I think is probably, you know, legit star. I think obviously him and Anthony Joshua would do a lot of business.

Obviously him and Deonté Wild did the rematch did a lot of business. You got a couple of people out there. But when you got, like, when you can't see Errol Spence against Terrence Cross, offer, or you can't see some of the fights you want. You got Manny Pachialmatchel Match and Errol Spence was a joke. When you're not building up your stars and giving people the fights they want to see, they're going to gravitate to something else.

Now, a lot of people I think have gravitated towards MMA, which obviously I enjoy. As again, I'm a purist for MMA. But, like, boxing has done an awful job of building up their stars. So they have no one to blame for themselves that people are interested in Jake Paul. Yeah, that's a good point. And, you know, I think a lot of guys could probably take some tips from Jake Paul, right? You know, he built his brand, you know, so good for him.

And that's the one thing the UFC does for MMA, right, is they give us a platform to magnify our brand. Whereas in boxing, that platform really isn't there, you know. And I guess there's pros and cons to each, right? because with boxing, that's also why they get bigger paydays too, right, because they get the purse bids. And, you know, they're not necessarily contracted to a single promotion. And even when they are, there's, you know, different clauses. You know, there's so many politics and details to that.

But so I think there's a lot of pros and cons to that. And that probably gets into a much deeper conversation. But, you know, again, I think we could take a lot of tips. from Jake Paul about building a brand. And that's something boxers particularly, but even in May fighters, you know, we're not necessarily good at. Yeah. Well, again,

I just, you can dislike Jake Paul. I have no problem if you don't like Jake Paul. You think he's an idiot, whatever the case may be. You can dislike the guy. But you can't fault him for what he's building. I mean, again, he's doing an amazing job. Yeah, I mean, if a million people are buying a pay-per-view and I was in, like I said, I was in the arena

last night. 16,000 people were there. It was nuts. I mean, the crowd was on all night. They were there. Most of the crowd was there at 7 p.m. for the first fight, which never happens. Every big punch that was thrown, every big moment the crowd was rising and falling. I mean, 16,000 people. Again, you can dislike the guy personally. You can say he's a clown. You can dislike his YouTube channel, whatever. But you can't say the guy hasn't done a good job building himself into a legitimate star. Is he a legitimate boxer? Is he a real threat in boxing? No. But no, no, no foreno boxer is. I mean, realistically, he's 24 years old. I mean, he can develop a lot in boxing still.

Do I ever think he's going to be a champion? I mean, I don't know. He's in the cruiserweight division, too. Name the, you know, a great cruiserweight champion. Roy Jones. That's what I got. Yeah, I mean, it's been forever. You know, like that's not one of the more powerful divisions generally in boxing.

Usik, you know, he's a great one, but he's moving up to heavyweight. But, you know, if you're going to choose a division and boxing, And look, there's a lot of belts he could get, too. I mean, there's, you know, a lot of smaller belts. I mean, you know, at 24 years old, and you've got to think, too, I mean, some of these guys that he could, he could fight up there on the bigger, the higher levels of boxing. You know, think of like what Mayweather did to Canelo early on. He put him on such a big stage early on, you know, I mean, I think that's what was Canello's issue in that fight mainly. I mean, it was just such a big stage.

You know, Jake Paul is going to put these guys on gigantic stages. All the pressure is going to be on them. That's a tough thing to handle. A lot of these, you know, if he gets up there into, you know, actual ranks of boxing, which I think is an actual possibility. I mean, I don't think that he'll ever be a legitimate, you know, I don't think anybody's going to be like, wow, he's a great boxer or anything ever. But, I mean, just imagine, you know, you're a boxer.

it's been grinding your whole life and now this this guy comes along and all of a sudden you're fighting you know in front of 50 60,000 people and you know for a belt and that you've dreamed of your whole life and this guy you're not supposed to lose to you know what I mean there's like there's a lot of little little things to that but you know again at 24 years old I think the sky's the limit for him and I'll say it again I'd love to test them on that limit. Well, let's talk about that because obviously we've seen a lot of, a lot of people coming out of the woodwork to want to fight Jake. Um, I get it. I mean, I get it. A, you believe, obviously, A, believe you could believe you could beat him. B, why wouldn't you want a multimillion dollar payday to

fight a boxing match with, you know, I mean, for that kind of money. I mean, I, listen, if he wants to pay me $10 million, I'll get, I'll get knocked out, but I'll do it. I don't $10 million. I'm not a price. I mean, it's like the million dollar man you say in pro wrestling. Everyone's got a price.

Trust me, I do too. Would you do it? Would you box Jake Paul? Of course. I don't know if the UFC would let me do it, but it makes a lot of sense to me in the, where he's at right now.

Like he's fought obviously a washed up Tyrone Woodley or an older Tyrone Woodley that hasn't done anything in a long time. He's fought. Ben Ascran, who can't box his way, have a paper bag. There's, you know, so it's time for him to take the next step up. And everyone knows I'm a real fighter.

One of us is going to get knocked out. I'm not going to sit back and wait like Tyron. You know, I've got a lot of experience, and I'm a damn good boxer. So I think it would be a perfect match. You know, the only thing I know he's probably going to look for like a McGregor, something that's probably going to be you know he wants as big of a payday as possible most likely but if he wants a legitimate challenge um really see where he's at and have a true risk of being knocked out i mean i got the record for knockouts you know why wouldn't you

fight someone like me well you're also let's be honest you're also you know size wise on par with jake paul you know connor i listen i you know we can talk about connor all day connor's a hundred and 55 pounder on a good day. I mean, he should really, if you look at him even, you know, against this last couple of fights against Porre. He looked a little undersized next to Porriere. I thought so. Jake was 190 and, I mean, he's a big boy. You know what I mean?

Like, dude, he would, I mean, that would be, I mean, I'm not saying Connor just based on Connor being a better boxer potentially, you know, whatever, but like that would be such a size. He would literally have like 40 pounds on Connor. You actually have size. We all know how big you are as a well. I mean, you've obviously fought a mid-year-old. weight and you've talked about fighting middle weight again,

that would be a much, like much different size difference for you and him versus Connor or any other, you know, well, that's my whole point. I mean, if he wants a legitimate challenge,

you know, not, you know, I may not be the guy that's going to, you know, make the fucking, uh, countdown show or whatever or pre-fight conferences be a big shit show or

circus or everything, um, like, like Connor would, um, you know, I might not be the, that guy, I might not be some of the

things he's looking for, but if he wants a real fight and he wants a guy with experience that knows how to box, I mean, I've done a lot of amateur boxing. You know, I just chose to MMA for the professional career, but, you know, if he wants a real guy that's going to give him a real challenge and, I mean, I believe I'll knock him out, but you know, he's got to know that there's a real

potential of fighting me, he's going to get knocked out. So, you know, if he's actually got those kind of balls. We would see if he would actually fight me. But, you know, again, I kind of think that he would probably lean towards a path of the most famous guy that he can get rather than the best challenge that he could get. Yeah. Yeah. Also, you fight Jake Paul, you tear Ohio apart. Why would you do that, Matt? You're both from Ohio. And I give him credit, man. Like I said, he rapped Ohio hard last night, man. Credit to him, obviously, we're both Ohio guys. Always like the guys who rep Ohio. He did. He brought it out for Ohio, man. He's obviously the Cleveland.

kid and good for him. Like I said, it was cool. He had that really, the outfit with all, like, the Ohio State and the Browns and like the Cavaliers, that was kind of cool. So, yeah, he was rep in Cleveland. Good for him, you know, but you're going to tear Ohio apart. I feel like we bring Ohio together. Bring it together?

Yeah. You have guys from all over Ohio rooting for one of the other, right? Yeah. Let me circle back. We talked about the fight. You know, we all, I think we both agree that, you know, if anyone has anyone to blame for the way the fight played out, it's Tyron. Woodley. Obviously, Tyrant's calling for a rematch. He's demanding a rematch. Let me just let me,

let me say this first, Matt. I don't think they should do a rematch. I don't see a reason for a rematch. It wasn't a great fight. If it had been a dog fight, if it had been a war, you know, if it had been that kind of like, you know, that just knocked down, drag out battle for eight rounds and Jake Eaked him out on the scorecards. Okay, maybe. Jake's four fights in his career. I don't really think he needs to be doing rematches right now unless he legitimately got beat and he wants a rematch to get it back but uh and it's nothing against tyrant it's not that i have anything against tyrant at all but tyrant's 39 he's at the tail end of his combat sports career there's no doubt

about that especially based on you know his run you know obviously even the uc and everything um i don't want to see a rematch so if the first might have been good maybe but yeah i'm right there with you it does you know tyrant's age doesn't really matter because You just look at his performances, right? I mean, Anderson's still out there. He put a good performance on against Chavez. What is he, 44 now? Yeah, 40, no, 46.

46. Jesus Christ, you know, I mean, what a savage, man. You got to love that guy. You know, he's out there putting on great performance. But, you know, time runs just look terrible. And he looked terrible again. So I don't see where a rematch would be constituted at all. where, you know, like you said, there was nothing exciting about it.

I think the rematch would probably do far less numbers than the first because who's going to say, okay, I want to see this again, right? Yeah. Like I said, if it had been like a knockdown, dragout fight and then a controversial split decision, sure. It wasn't that kind of fight. The fact that one judge even gave Tyron the fight was mind-blowing. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, like I said, it wasn't, what Jake Paul did to win wasn't that exciting, but he still won. I mean, you know, but again, there's a lot of MMA fights. I can say the same thing. There's a lot of many fights. I'm like, yeah, a guy won 3027. Wasn't a great fight. Wasn't a great performance, but he won 3027, you know, like, that's just the reality of it. And you got to look at, also look, Tyron made a decision some, or didn't make a decision

at some point in that fight where he could have made it a dog fight. He knew he was down rounds. His corner was telling him. and he did not bite down on his mouthpiece and walk forward. Had he done that, maybe he would be at the position to constitute a rematch at this point. But at no point did he just bite down his mouthpiece, walk forward and say, fuck it, I'm going for broke. Yeah, yeah.

And that's what you've got to do if you want to either win the fight or at minimum, get a rematch. And that's when you can come back and say, man, I should get a rematch. I start picking it up too late in the fight or something like it. but he never picked it up. He never got started. And that's just been his, at this tail end of his career, that's just kind of been the story of Tyron Woodley.

And it's sad to see with the amount of skill he has, the amount of talent that he has, the amount of athleticism, his knockout power. He has so many great qualities. But you've got to let him fly, man. You can't worry about getting out of there safely. You got to worry about getting out there with the W. Absolutely, absolutely.

Real quick, before we talking about the fight coming up, week in the UFC, let me just ask you. Jake Paul fights again. I don't know who it's going to be. Don't know when it's going to be. Will you watch? If he's fighting me, I watch. No, I mean, just like this one, you know, I watched it the day after. I'm not really, I am a purist, you know, so it doesn't really interest me like that. But again, I'll say, I can't say enough times. Hats off to him. Good for him. Made a lot of money. Made Tyron a lot of money. made Showtime a lot of money. Good for all those guys.

Not my thing. Yeah, understandable. Understandable. This week in UFC, let's get in here real quick before we get out of here. Of course, big middleweight fight, Darren Till taking on Derek Brunson. Winner, obviously, it seems like,

would be maybe a fight away from a title shot or kind of getting that title contention. This is a really interesting matchup. Derek's been on a great run lately. Four or five in a row. Obviously, a big dominant win over Kevin Holland. His last fight, Darren Till, been out for quite a while.

His last fight was a loss to Robert Whitaker. Yeah, what has it been out? What's been going on with him? He had some injury. He was supposed to fight. I think it was Marvin Vitori, and he broke his collarbone. And that was what kept him out.

Yeah, that's what kept him out longer. So now he's coming back fighting Darren Till main event this weekend. Matt, your thoughts on that fight? I think if Derek wins this fight, I think he's got to be in title contention. If not, you know, you know, man, he's got to be right there. How could you not be looking at him? I mean, how many other, what other guys are even left up there at 185?

Yeah, I mean, it's basically, yeah, Whitaker for the rematch. And then that's, I mean, Cannoneer is the only other guy who has a very fond on this on you. I forgot about him. Yeah, so, you know, you got to, he's got to be right there, right close. And I think he's good enough to do it, man. He's showed a lot of improvement, too, from early on in his career. He's looked really good, especially that Kevin Holland fight. I was really impressed with him, kept his composure real well, kept discipline.

and Darren Till is a perfect, perfect test to see if he's ready to fight for a title. You know, the guys he'd be fighting for a title, whether it's Whitaker or Arasagna, that's going to be a major, major challenge for him. Now, I think it's a tough matchup for Darren Till personally, but, you know, he's the type of guy that could pull it out, you know, for sure. And if Brunson gets a little bit too cocky, I think also I think we've seen him do it before on the feet

get a little comfortable on the feet and that's when I think Till could catch them for sure. Yeah, if Derek wrestles, I think Derek wins. It's hard to, yeah. You know what I mean? Derek is a phenomenal wrestler. When he got away from that

is when he started losing fights. He started knocking people out and he got a little too overconfident his hands and he got knocked out a couple times. They had a couple, you know, obviously went in there, had a firefighter with Robert Whitaker. great round. It was a freaking wild round, but, you know, you're playing with dynamite against the guy

like Robert Whitaker doing that. And, and yes, Derek Brunson has knockout power. We know that. But now that he's back to his wrestle, look what he did Edmund Shabazzian. I'm not, I know everyone's jumping off the Edmund Shabazzian train saying, you know, whatever, he was overhyped. I don't think that, I don't think so at all. I think Edmund has a lot of work to do. And obviously, he's not a great groundfighter. But guess what? Derek exposed that. Derek went out there and took him to the ground and just pummeled him. And you could be a great groundfighter. and still get beat up by Derek Brunson on the ground, too. Yeah, Derek Brunson out-wrestled Uel Romero once upon a time.

Like, they fought Derek out-rescled Yuel Romero, and then he got kind of gassed out in the third round, and Yel kind of came back and caught him in the third round and finished him. But Derek Brunson's a monster in wrestling. If he goes out there and wrestles Darantil, I think he wins. I mean, I think the only way Darren Till wins this is if Derek doesn't approach this fight the right way, decides I'm going to try to test my hands against Darantil, and he just stands on the outside and lets Darren.

because I don't have anything against Darren Till, but I'm still not quite sure who Darren Till is. Like, we obviously had a big, he had a big win over Cowboy at one point, but then like he had kind of, I mean, he didn't look terrible against Wonderboy, but I actually thought Wonderboy won that fight.

You know, he obviously, then he got, you know, just dismantled by Woodley. He got knocked out by Mazinol. And again, no shame there. Masidol hits like a truck. Okay. good for him.

He had the weird win over Calvin Gaslam. I mean, that was okay. It was not a great fight, but he won. And then he got beat by Robert Whitaker in another kind of not exciting fight. So I'm not really sure who Darren Till is, but I'm confident if Derek Brunson wrestles, Derek Brunson wins. I'm right there with you. That's the smart, clear path to victory for Derek Brunson, right?

Take it and run, man. No reason not to. And that's where I talk about, you know, Darren Till is also the type of guy that could lull you into the wrong kind of fight, kind of make you think that you're going to do okay on the feet. And maybe you even have a little bit of a success on the feet and then Till just pops you with something you ain't ready for.

So I could also see that happening too. You know, Brunson's definitely a proud guy. You know, all of us, man. Once we get that taste of a knockout, we want more of them. So hopefully that doesn't play too much. into his head and he sticks to who he is. But I know what you mean there with Darren Till, yeah. Yeah, he seems, hasn't seemed to evolve a ton, right?

It's sort of the same, Darren Till every time, even though I'm kind of saying the same thing, even though you're saying, like, you don't really know who he is. It's still kind of the same thing every time, right? Yeah. I don't know if that makes any sense. Well, no, he's, I mean, since going to middleweight, he said two fights and, like, he's got a middleweight body. We know that he used to kill him.

himself to make welts away. But does he have middleweight power? Does he have middleweight strength? I mean, we really haven't seen that. I mean, yeah, he beat Gaslam, but, you know, Gaslim's a pretty undersized middleweight. And obviously, Gasolm is also probably the most inconsistent fighter on the roster, maybe in history. Like you see the most amazing performance come out of him, like when he fought Israel.

And then you see just a complete lackluster performance next time. Like he doesn't even, like it reminds me of Paul. a feeling fighting chelsohn and like talking to people seeing ghosts and shit what I always expect to see Gasolm do sometimes because sometimes he'll do that he'll do kind of the Woodley like just stand there and like

like yeah we're here you know what we're going to do now and I get that man like I've been in there enough times I know exactly what that's like and sometimes you just don't fucking feel like being there man there's a lot of pressure you know maybe sometimes you get a little over pumped up and then finally when you actually get there

it's not everything you kind of thought it would be you know there's a lot of different things you wait cut obviously gasolm struggle with that a billion times so so many different factors but that's certainly one of the things I think he needs to get together all of us you know but when you see the guys like the greats like Izzy Anderson

you know these guys are GSP is probably the best ever you know, where they're just consistent every time. You know exactly what you're going to get, and they do it well every time. Yeah. So if you're picking, Darren Till or Derek Brunson, who are you picking? I'll go with Brunson for sure.

Yeah, I think because I think he will, he's come a long ways. He's experienced now. He knows who he is. He knows what he wants to do. He's getting close to the title shot. He's going to use his wrestling, probably set up with some striking. I don't think Till will have quite the power. if he does clip him to stop the fight,

and Brunson's going to take him down and probably finish him on the ground. Yep, I agree. I think Derri Brunson wins either finishes him on the ground or wins a pretty lopsided decision. Derr has gone five rounds now. He won that main event. We know he can do it now.

Yeah, I think he wins. I think he wins either wins a pretty dominant decision or a late stoppage, like fourth round, you know, just continues to take him down and batter him on the ground, gets him out of their fourth, fifth round. I could see that happening as well. there we go. Matt, it is always a pleasure to catch up.

And now they got this new podcast, you are going to be one of my regular co-hosts on here. I've already co-opted you into joining this show on a regular basis. Unlike our old podcast where, you know, obviously we're doing it week to week, and that's a lot of time commitment. I'm like, okay, you got to show up like every four weeks here. Okay, you can do that. I know you can do that. Yeah, man.

I mean, shit, maybe I just made the commitment, man. We'll just start doing it regularly. I don't know. we'll see. You know, my life is crazy, man. Should be getting back into camp soon. And, of course, that's always a huge commitment. So, but I love doing it with you, man. I love being on any time and we'll figure something out, bro.

Absolutely, absolutely. Matt, it is always a pleasure. Stick around for a second. I'm just going to get out of here, play an intro, and then we'll come back in a second. Everyone, make sure you're checking out the podcast every week. Fighter versus the Riding. You can find it on MMAFighting.com. You can also find it on all of your favorite podcast, platform, Spotify, Apple Podcasts,

all of those. Make sure you subscribe, rate, all that kind of good stuff. And we'll be back next week with another edition of Fighter versus the writer. I'm Damon Martin. We'll see you then. Thanks for tuning in.

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