MMA Fighting - Fighter vs. Writer: Matt Brown Reacts to Ronda Rousey’s Quick Win and Conor McGregor Returning Against Max Holloway

Episode Date: May 19, 2026

On the latest episode of The Fighter vs. The Writer, UFC legend Matt Brown and Damon Martin react to Ronda Rousey dispatching Gina Carano in just 17 seconds in the MVP MMA event. The result wasn’t a surprise but did Rousey prove anything with her comeback and now retiring off this win? Plus we’ll discuss where MVP goes from here after the first event on Netflix. Also Conor McGregor’s comeback is official as he faces Max Holloway in the UFC 329 main event but Brown is skeptical that the Irish superstar actually makes that walk. All this and much 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

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Every week on our show, we celebrate. the intersection of food and life. And this month, we're releasing a new series called Culinary Masters. It highlights some of the most iconic people in the food world, and we're revisiting conversations with people who have fundamentally changed how many of us cook and think

about food. People like Jacques Papin, Claudia Rodin, and Tony Bourdain, the name of few. You can listen to this special series now. Just search for the Splendid Table in your podcast app. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Welcome back to the fighter versus writer. I am Damon Martin.

He is UFC legend Matt Brown and Matt. We are back after the first ever MVP MMA event this past Saturday night. Rhonda Rousey, Gina Carrano, Francis Inganu, Nate Diaz, Mike Perry. And of course, we got to talk about the big news from the UFC over the weekend, which was Connor McGregor's quote-unquote comeback. We'll talk about how legit that comeback is in a little bit. But Matt, I know we're going to open things and talk about the fights on Saturday night. obviously we've talked a lot about

Jake Paul and Nekisa getting involved in MMA they did their first show on Netflix ratings haven't come out I'm sure that we're going to get some numbers probably on Monday at some point but overall impression what you think of the show what did you think of the fights man yeah it was a pretty cool weekend actually man

you know I think it was cool to see the fights go on I thought they had a hell of a great production right I mean I think everybody would agree with that I mean the LED walkouts the hexagon look cool the LEDs on the seats you know

albeit that they were empty for the most part but I mean I thought the production was beautiful man and then of course we had you know some good fights honestly I mean I think we all knew at least those hardcores that were watching

we knew what we were getting into except for my dumb ass who made the stupidest pick in the history of M.A. But beyond that, we knew what we were getting into. For the most part, we knew in Ghana was going to get a knockout. We knew that Perry Diaz was going to be the fight of the night. And we should have known that Rousey was going to do what she did. I was the dumbass who just went out on a limb and picked her on her. And I know. But yeah, we can talk about that. But ultimately, look, you know, like,

You got to be proud of them. You know, they put on a good show. Doing the one show isn't what's so amazing, right? I mean, it was a cool show. You know, I'm sure tons of people watched. I'm sure they learned a lot of lessons, made some mistakes, learned a lot of lessons. So what do they do now? The next step, that's the real question, right?

The longevity. And, I mean, that's what the UFC is differentiated from everybody. One of the things, I mean, they've differentiated everything, basically. but but one of the things is like they've been able to do it as such a high level for such a long time and it's like what do you do now what is next and i've seen some some things online about um a peri d as rematch you know ronda fighting uh you know maybe holly home i think or something or you know trying to get trying to kind of redo the whole same thing that they did I don't personally get excited about that idea.

We'll see how it plays out there. I mean, I think one of the things mean you may or may not disagree on here, but I think we've kind of talked about this before is like I think there's always something else that you can do. Right? We're always at this situation. You know, this happens a lot like with Jake Paul

or with some of these fights that happen where we sit back. at the end and we're like okay what do you do now like that's it that's that's all you got and that they figure out the next thing and i do think there's the next thing that they'll figure out um how good is it going to be and and i think it's going to start to give us more of a idea of what their direction moving forward is going to be versus like the kind of one-off show that they did over the weekend that was really just uh highlighting okay we're getting started here you go here we're coming in with the bang Yeah, I mean, I think long term, and I said this on Saturday night, I said, you know, I think it's good for the sport if MVP is successful because it gives fighters more options.

But the reality is, you know, if you're going to work with Netflix, which is what they're doing right now, Netflix is only interested in these big marquee events. They're not interested in putting on like a fight night card. They're not into that. When they were in talks to the EOC, they're like, we only want the pay for these, the number of events. We don't want the, you know, the fight night from the apex. we're not interested in that. So I think the key for, and here's the problem MVP is going to run into is there's only so many names out there.

Remember, like, everybody that was a name that was like, you know, drawing eyeballs to this card was a former UFC fighter with the exception of Gina Corona. Gina Corona had been gone for 17 years. It wasn't like she was a known commodity out there. She was just, you know, I mean, yes, she was like the one anomaly. And she's still a name from something else, right? It wasn't, you know, wasn't grown through them.

Yeah. And so, like, Rhonda was UOC, Francis was UFC, Nate and Mike Perry. Now, granted, Mike Perry got much bigger under BKFC, but would he have become a BKFC star? Would he even have been that big of a name had he not fought in the UFC? So, like, the problem is, and I think you've got to ultimately build competitive fights. Like, the knockouts are great. Those are fun. We all have a great knockout.

But at some point, you got to have something kind of competitive. You got to give us a reason to be like, ooh, there's it. Because, like, watching Francis fight on Saturday is like, he's going to nuke this guy. Like, it's just a matter of time. And it did. Four minutes and three minutes, and it's over. And even the one fight that we thought was going to be a dog fight wasn't really. I mean, Mike Perry just kind of put it on Nate Diaz.

Like, he just battered him for two rounds, cut him up. So when you're cutting up Nate Diaz so bad to Nate Diaz, he's like, yeah, I'm good. Like, he didn't complain. Like, when the Bastidol fight happened, he complained, he's like, this is bullshit. I should be able to keep going. Saturday's like, yeah, I'm good. Cool. Yeah, it sucks.

But, you know, I'm good. So even the one fight, really, oh, that's going to be a battle. It wasn't really a battle. It was pretty much Mike Perry just kind of like beating on him for two rounds and Nate having an incredible chin and not going away. But Francis, Newkin, you know, Newkin, Philippe wins out, we saw that coming. I mean, it was fun to watch a guy like Saladin Parnas, who a lot of people probably didn't know going into it. But remember, he wasn't the name. You know, I mean, if you, if you discovered him, great, but who, what are you going to do with him next? Like, if you do

sign him to a deal and keep him going, like, who did you, you know, and so, and watching Despain Knockout Jr. was, you know, kind of sad in a little way because like you know junior's like 43's now obviously not the same guy and ronda getting the arm bar in 17 seconds well i got to pat myself on the back i predicted that i said that's pretty much how i thought it was going to go tough saw right yeah so i think i think the key is like if you're going to keep going i'm being dead serious i want them to keep going but you got to give people a reason to tune in and and keep it going and i think the mistake they made on Saturday was like when Francis, they spent like a half hour talking about him fighting John Jones.

He's not fighting John Jones. John Jones has six fights left on his UFC deal. They've talked to him about fights. He's 39. He ain't getting out of that contract. It just is not going to happen. To add to that, you know, the fact that they're talking to John Jones, I mean, they're doing nothing but giving the UFC more clout, right? They're like, we're not, you know, we want to compete with you.

We want to be as big as a year. UFC and be the next MMA promotion. But you guys have the best fighter in the world that we can't get. Yeah. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Like it's just all, it's just pumping up the UFC. Not that the UFC needs any more pumping up. And, but it's like, you know, like you're literally just, you're explaining to the world,

you know, the soccer moms and everything. They're like, oh, the UFC has the best guys. Yeah. So, You know, when you look at, like, if Rhonda was going to stick around, which clearly she sounds like she's not, you know, you could do her at Holly. Like, that would be a big rematch because everyone remembers the first fight, you know, Holly knocking her out.

But even then, like, then, unlike Saturday where I don't think Rhonda faced a lot of threat from Gina Carano. She faced a legit threat from like Holly Holm. She might get the same treatment knocked out again. And that was kind of round this whole point. She wanted to come back and go out on a win, which how quality is a win when you're beating somebody who's been out for 17 years, a whole other discussion. but uh yeah so like but ronda's been clearly and if they do gina i know jean is like she could potentially fight again is jina holly home gonna draw flies like are people gonna be excited for that like i don't think so like holly was when she was in the uc at the end of her career like she was kind of like already

like the fourth or fifth fight like she wasn't the main event at the very end of her ufc run so and she's doing boxing now too which you know she got a boxing match in a couple weeks and i love holly but like holly ronda would draw holly corano i don't really think is to draw and then like you could do in and to Spain, that could be kind of fun. The big giant Cuban and, you know, France is one of them is probably getting knocked out pretty brutally. But once again, like, is Netflix going to pay you a bunch of money to promote that fight? Like, maybe, I guess. Like, there's a little bit of name value there.

And they knew when Mike Perry, like, like they want to run back a fight between Mike Perry and AD as it wasn't close. Like, it wasn't a, it wasn't like it was a dog fight and a cut accidentally ended the fight. Like, he was getting the brakes beat off him. Nate was. And then it just ended. And I've not seen anyone be like, man, I want to see that. again. Like, we didn't, so like, I guess you could overpay and get like a Darren Till to do an

MMA fight maybe or something like that, but there's only, I guess my point is there's only so many options. And I was mentioning to somebody else and I looked at the thing, like, remember when affliction came around in like 2008, 2009, whatever that was? And they put on two cards. They had Fador, they had Josh Barnett. They had Tim Sylvia, who at that point was, you know, former UFC head with Jim. They had Vitor Belfort.

There was a lot of free agents out there. They signed to those cards. Now, they massively overpaid, which is why I flibing. and sunk into events. But they had a lot of people. I was looking there. I was like, my God, these cards were stacked because there was just a lot of talent out there.

That's just not the case. That's just not the case right now. Like all that, like, they can hopefully, they can work with PFL and maybe get Dakota Ditchiva, who's a bit of a star and something like that. But like, I guess when I'm getting options are limited. Yeah, and I say it again. I mean, I think it could always surprise us with that.

I think if we went, if we talked about before this card was announced, we'd probably been saying the same thing. right, but they managed to put together a big card that everybody wanted to watch. You know, I don't think that, to me, I don't think that's the issue, right? It's being able to find talent to put in there that will draw. Because I think, like, Jake's very good at that. I think Nekis is good at that. And I think that there's always surprises out there and people are able to find ways to do that.

That, to me, is not the big issue. but, you know, I think, you know, again, where do they go from here? Who knows, right? But I think they may very well surprise us with that. So I've seen a lot of online discourse about the Rhonda Gina fight. I'm sure you've probably seen this too. People call it a fixed fight, say it was rigged. And I laughed at that because I'm like, have we moved so far beyond when Rhonda was like this force of nature when she was doing this to everybody?

Like, she has so many sub one-minute finishes. I put on Twitter last night, she has, of her 12 wins, or now 13, but 12 wins at the time, 11 were first round finishes. The only person who made out of the first round was Misha Tate in the rematch, and she was getting handled, and Rhonda just had to go to the third round to submit her. And I said this, I was like, Ronna Rousey has never been in a competitive MMA fight. Like, she hasn't. She either steamrolled people and won in the first round,

with the exception that one Mishita fight, which she was winning the whole time. And Holly Holm took her to the second round and brutally knocked her out. Amanda Dunas finished her inside of amended in the first round or whatever. Rhonda has never ever been, like she's never been in a dog fight. She's never had like a John Jones Gustafin fight where she had to dig deep in that fifth round to get the win. Anyone surprised by this outcome saying it's rigged because she got a 17 second submission is absolutely ridiculous. That is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard. Like, Gina was just overmatched.

Like Gina just, like she's been going on for 17. years what did we really expect like I know you put a little face in her by picking her but I said on the show it was like it was in day one I was like yeah he's probably gonna take her down and submit her like that was what we all expected that's what happened it's not rigged though she just she's beat an overmatched opponent she did that a lot during her career yeah I agree and I actually I didn't realize she only had eight fights too like I got I thought she had eight more fights than that I mean that when I seen a record come up I was like oh shit 17 years ago and only eight fights to begin with like this is how much and like

Like, look, in retrospect, I can see how foolish my pick was. To be fair, I also pick Mike Perry. So we're one and one there, Damon. Yes, we are. We are. But with that, said, look, like, Rousey is not a difficult person to beat. Like, there's a fucking jih Tjitsu gym on every corner. Corona clearly did not go to one of them.

Right? Like, you can learn how to not get armed. like Ron Rousey's arm bar is not so fucking spectacular that you can just not you know figure out how to not get armed barred in one minute right now she may eventually arm bar you right beat you up hold you down you know trick you but like she didn't trick her like Carano turned the wrong way left her arm out there had no defense for it like that is is simple things to learn like like it's not that easy to submit like like like blue belts you know like like black belts submitting blue belt is not as easy as it was carano uh rousey submitting carano last weekend like she clearly did not prepare properly for this fight i i don't think it has anything to do with her athleticism and you know and that tells me okay she was there for the payday yeah and that doesn't i think i i can't imagine when people see that that they're not like not like okay i don't want to watch that i mean i was sitting with

my girlfriend watching it and you know happened you know she stayed up till midnight to watch the fight and they were taken forever the pacing was horrendous and it took forever and then finally the fight happens and she's like she's like i just stayed up till fucking midnight to watch this 17 seconds yeah this is stupid you know and uh you know i mean i mean i love corona death i mean she's a good friend of mine's husband kevin ross and nothing against her but like Like if somehow this happens again, like, can you just like prepare a little bit? You know, like, don't just go hit pads and and spar a little bit and lose weight to get ready. Like just like learn a fucking armbar defense.

Yeah. It's just I like and like the outcome to me wasn't surprising at all to what I predicted since pretty much day one. And that was, you know, there's a lot of reasons. But I think the biggest being that Gina hadn't fought 17 years. Like I mean, yeah, that's like. Like, I was thinking about, again, she only had eight fights, too. Like, I really thought that she was like on 20, 25 fights. I don't know why I thought that.

But, like, eight fights is not even a lot of experience to begin with. Yeah, but you got to remember, like, if you look at that level of experience and you look at, like, I mean, go back to what, go back to any strike force card of 2009, which is her last fight, and find someone who was on that card who is now, like, 45 years old and hasn't fought since then retired. I don't know any names. I'm just like saying, none of it. them are going to be like, oh, here's a heavyweight, throw them in there with Tom Aspinall. It's not going to end well. Like, there's just too much, there's too much of a gap to make up for in 17 years. And Rhonda has, like, Rhonda's specialty is getting people to the ground and going for an arm bar.

And I said this, like, I'll say this now, like, if Rhonda came back to the UFC, she can probably still find a lot of success because the women's division hasn't exactly flourished in her absence. But you put her in there with a Chris Seibor, you put her in there against the Kayla Harrison, you put her in there against her Amanda Nunes. she's going to get absolutely destroyed because she never really evolved that much. Gina hasn't evolved because Gina hasn't fought in 17 years. It wasn't like Gina was out there doing, you know,

kickboxing and Muay and Jiu-Jitsu. She walked away from the sport and she was not training. I know that for a fact. Like she wasn't like hanging out in the gym four days a week. I just wanted to train while I'm doing Deadpool. That was not happening. So she was basically trying to pick. See, my job I thought that maybe she was.

No. But it bugs with, like everyone, It's so crazy to me, though, because everyone's like, oh, it's a fixed fight. First off, it's so dumb to try to do that. Like, look at the gambling thing. It was like, look what happened there. Like, that is, I mean, that's, you know, guys who are, you know, quote-unquote injured going into fights and betting on it. We went through that whole scandal, whatever was two years ago.

They caught that. Like, they caught that. Like, they caught that. Do you think they're not going to catch you throw in a fight? No. She didn't throw a fight. She just got taken down an arm bar by somebody who's done this like a million times. This is what Rhonda did.

This is how Rhonda became a star. You don't have to throw that fight. And it doesn't make sense to throw that fight, right? Like, it just doesn't, like, you don't need to do that. There's no, there's no, like, you're not getting anything out of that. And except you're just risking your fucking license and fines and your reputation and everything else. That's one thing to say, you just, like, you didn't try. Like, you're just like, I got armed him out of here.

Like, that's a different story than, like, I'm. throwing the fight. Which is more likely. Yeah, like she got caught in an arm bar and she tapped. Like that was just pretty much it. Because I watched the replay, I looked like she didn't try to roll. She didn't try to spin out of it, which is a pretty normal, you know, defense for the arm bar.

And by the way, you haven't fought in 17 years. You get caught in a submission. You might panic. Like, there's absolutely a panic tap. I know that thing is real. Like you get a boom. She's just like, I'm done. That has happened.

I've seen panic taps before. Like I don't blame her for that. But it's not a fixed fight. It's not a whole. She didn't rig the fight for that. Come on. Like, that's ridiculous. I think if Ronda, Gina had knocked out Ronda like 17 seconds and maybe I'd be like,

well, maybe something weird's going on here because that just like didn't. But no, like, there's nothing rigged about it. It was just one person who was completely overmatched against somebody who was better than them. That was literally the story of that fight. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Yeah, I mean, all I could say is like I was an idiot for Pickett Corona. And again, and it's just like looking at it objectively.

So like Rhonda's not a difficult person to game plan for. She's not a different. And so many of these skills that she has are easily taken care of or easily mitigated. And quite a lot, clearly, again, maybe it's just the fact that, you know, she hasn't fought in 17 years. And, you know, she wasn't training and all these different things. What it looked like to me was like, you know, she hadn't trained properly. and she just wasn't ready for that. And, you know, like, for example, like one year into my career, I fought Daniel Marius.

Like, I had been training for about one year. He's a multiple-time world champion jiu-jitsu. You know, he's one of Helson's guys. Like, you know, beat everybody, right? I got armbard. But, like, I had no clue what to do. but it took him a good like four minutes i think it was like it might even been the second round like it it took a good like three or four minutes like and he went for multiple things before i got

armed and he you know punched me up a little bit before i got armed barred like it's it's not like something that you should just that that just happens like that you know what i mean so like again not rigged by any means but i really i think um in in for me personally, like I'm a little disappointed in that Gina just it didn't look to me like she was prepared. Yeah. I'm curious, Matt,

we had this conversation a couple years ago when Rhonda was doing her book tour and, you know, she was talking about like she couldn't go to a UFC event without getting booed and, you know, and you made a very smart statement back then you said, you know, we want to love you, Rhonda. Like, we want to like you, but you just keep kind of putting your foot in your mouth and saying dumb shit. It kind of makes this not like you.

Rhonda clearly wanted to go out on a win. Now, how quality of a win is that? I don't know. It doesn't erase what happened with Amanda Nunes and Holly Holmink. I think we all knew where Gina was. And obviously this entire buildup, you know, she was taking shots at the UFC. She was blasting Hunter Campbell. She took aim at, you know, Kayla Harrison.

She took aim at Hamzaa Chamaier over the weekend. Like, she was, like, you know, being very vocal and building the fight and whatever. When it's all sudden done, I know you're not, I don't think I'm breaking any news here but you're not the biggest Ronda Rouseley fan in the world. But did anything, did anything about this fight, this fight week, this promotion, did anything change your opinion of Rhonda Rousey? Because I think that was what, it almost felt like that was part of why she was coming back

because she wanted to have a better ending than she had in the UFC, which was, I mean, you know, I mean, she got blitzed by, she got brutally knocked out by Holly Olme. She got blitz and knocked out by a man and in as it sucks, but that's the sport. Did any, did your opinion of Rhonda change her? Did she create any goodwill by this comeback? Because it seems like she's back and gone again.

I know for me personally, and I think I speak for a lot of people. Like there was no redeeming qualities for this card. And in terms of, you know, making us better fans, Rhonda, like, I don't like how she carried herself. I don't like how she spoke. I think she's a narcissist and I think she's got, you know, a lot of mental issues. And I think she needs to maybe go to therapy or something because, you know, I think she should have let that go a long time ago. If she said she's come back, you know, for money,

I get it. Okay, right? Your price fighting. Come back, get a bag. Like, there's no redeeming quality about winning this fight. Like, you fought someone that hasn't fought in 17 years. Like, what are you proud of? There's nothing to be proud of there. And so, like, I think there's a lot of reasons that would have made sense for this. And that's just not one of them. But again, I mean, I think she's just kind of a narcissistic person. And it just doesn't, you know, nothing about this really felt good in my opinion, you know, if my opinion matters at all. But the, you know, the whole thing with, with this fight card, like, it was just, I don't, I don't think anybody would disagree. Like, this whole fight card from beginning to him was kind of cringe as fuck, right? And Rhonda was just

the, the cringiest person ever, you know, with her, with her squinny eyes, like, like, doing this the whole time and, like, you know, looking so angry and, like, all the buildup, all the shit, she said leading up to it like talking so much shit to like hunter campbell and you know and and this kind of vengeful personality that she has and and and all this anger and frustration and it's like it's like you need like you really just need to go to therapy i mean you need you need you just need a friend and you need like some people to help you uh you know just calm down like learn some stoicism and shit because like this shit is not what's important in life you know and coming back and and and beating someone that has a fought in 17 years that was a good matchup for you even 17 years ago

like that's not like like you shouldn't feel so great about that again if you're coming back for the money cool like like a lot of people do things for money and i respect that come back because you know you would say you want to get a win like come on like like i don't know what what are we supposed to feel about that like like do we feel good for her You know, I mean, it just cringe, man, from top to bottom. I think, and part of the problem is like, you know, when you have a fight that you've talked up so much, like as far as like this is, you know, meeting years in the making and two pioneers. And by the way, they are both pioneers.

That's not good. They are absolutely that. And you bash the UFC left, right and centers and Hunter Campbell disrespected you and didn't honor what you wanted. there's got to be a part of, and, you know, this is obviously revisionist history, but when you're looking at what happened on Saturday night, are you like, do you think the real, do you think the U.S. probably made the right move, not offering them $5 million apiece to go out there and have a 17-second fight?

Like, is that really going to build any? Because you're not building anything with that. Like, Rhonda's gone again. Like, if you were, if Rhonda was like, I want to get a warm-up fight, and then I'm going to fight Holly Holm. I want my revenge. I want to revenge my worst loss. You know, the person who knocked me out, took my away from me.

But I want to fight once first. I'd be like, cool. Like, that's cool. Like, you're building towards it. And, you know, she's going to wipe. She wiped out Gina Carano. Great. Then you set up to Holly home.

But she's said very emphatically, this is one and done. And I'm gone again. I want to go have kids, which I respect. But she wants to have kids. I'm not going to fault her for her, wanting to grow her family, whatever, like that. But don't make it like this is some grand comeback that you just proved that you're a better fighter. Like you said, she was a bad matchup for Gina Corona. 17 years ago.

She's still a bad matchup for Gina Corona in 2026 as we saw. And I'm not, like, I'm not here. to defend the UFC by any stretch of imagination. I've never once talked to Hunter Campbell, to be honest, I never talked to the guy in my life. He wouldn't know me from a freaking, you know, in a lineup. But when you think about the, when she's like, he didn't want to pay us what I word,

I'm like, well, people are going to bitch in a moment about the 17 seconds, and that was on Netflix where all they're doing is like watching their own Netflix subscription. They didn't really pay for it. They didn't pay you, you know, $100 to watch you tap her out and whatever amount I was talking about. Maybe Hunter had a point, and he's like, I don't really want to pay, you know, $4 million or $10 million

or whatever for a fight that seems inevitable what exactly was going to happen. Like, you know, that'd be like booking, like, John Jones comes back, he's, he wants one last fight, and you're going to put him in there with, I don't know, Anderson. Anderson Silva. Like, I love Anderson. Anderson's a legend. Anderson's an all-timer.

Anderson's 50 years old. Like, he would still have a better chance against John Jones than Gina did against Ronda, but like, what are you selling us at that point? You know what I mean? Like, if John Jones came back in heavyweight, and there's Tom Aspinall, there's Francis Ngano, there's Cyril Ghan, there's Poetan.

And you're like, no, he's going to fight Anderson at 50. Like, what would you expect to happen? John would have beaten Anderson in their primes because John's freaking gigantic and huge and a great wrestler. Anderson is a natural middleweight. But what are we gaining from that? That's my point. Like, what do we gain from this?

And Rhonda acting like it was just this monumental occasion and she wanted to go out to win, you got a win over and overmatched opponent. I don't really know how much you want to celebrate that. I'm not saying she shouldn't be happy, but I agree with you. I'm coming back for a payday. I'm coming back. I want to make the most money possible. I want to set myself up,

you know, my family up for the future, whatever. Don't come back and tell me you're trying to sell me like this is just the greatest fight ever because we saw what happened. It was 17 seconds. Very anti-clock acting. No matter how you cut it, that's what it was. Absolutely.

And my ultimate takeaway from all this that, you know, still sucks at this day, is that MMA is not that popular. The UFC is popular. Right? Like you said, with Hunter looking at it and saying, okay, you know, how are we going to sell this? And, you know, does it fit into our business plan and all these kinds of things?

Like, they didn't sell out the arena by a large margin it appeared. I don't know what the final numbers were or anything. But, I mean, it looked on TV like there was a lot of empty seats. And I've seen some video on Instagram or something where someone, where it looked like it was kind of full. So I could be wrong on that. But, I mean, it looked to me like it was very empty. And, you know, the UFC, like, the one thing they do is they put on, they have the best fighters in the world.

And that's what they sell you is the best fighters. And the other thing about this is like the UFC's already done this. They went through that phase. They brought in Brock Lesnar. They brought in C and punk, right? They built Connor up to be what he was. They built Rhonda up to be what she was. Like they've already done this whole game.

and now they're on a different trajectory now where they have the best fighters in the world they locked him down in their contract to be with the UFC and we've talked about this ad nauseum about how like there's not really any stars these days but they're still selling out you know at least you know the way that there was right

with the Brocks and the Rondas and the Connors but they still sell arena anywhere they go because the UFC is so popular not because MMA is some fucking ginormous sport. Like people love UFC. It's not MMA that people love. It is UFC that people love.

Yeah, I just, I'm glad she, I'm glad they did it. I thought it was, you know, good, good but all the, I don't know. I don't really think Rhonda changed much about our opinion of her with this one fight coming back. Like everyone was celebrating her bashing the UFC and that's fine, but everyone bashed the UFC at some

point and brightly saw in a lot of occasions. But looking at this now, it's not like, you know, like, Rhonda, like, we talk about cringy, like, she had some cringy trash talk. Like, she tried to make that thing about Hamzot, which was so weird. She had that, you could tell she had that written down their pocket somewhere. And she's like, I'm going to bust out Cliff Lipp Lincoln or whatever. I'm like, oh, my God.

You know what, like, that's what sucks, man. It's like, this was kind of an opportunity for her to redeem herself for the fans and for, you know, for the community in general, right? And she certainly did not do that at all. You know, at least I felt that way. Maybe other people feel differently. Maybe they've seen some redeeming qualities there. But for me, I mean, I felt like it was kind of the same old Rhonda,

the same old story that we've heard a million times. And to me, it's not interesting. It's not interesting and it's not fun. And some of the comments, like you said, talking about Hamza, again, that's not interesting to me. and it's like a again like she had a written down in her pocket and it's and it's it's not uh it's not it's not it doesn't feel authentic it yeah it does not feel authentic and it it's just again i really think like she's a narcissist and she needs some damn therapy well and i think the other problem is like

i said this when she was doing her book tour and i'll say it again now like during that whole media bliss she did a lot of media now did she do media where people are really going to ask her hard-hitting questions. I talked about that at the beginning. Never really happened. But she did a lot of media. I never once heard her mention Holly Holmes' name. I never once heard her mention Amanda Nunes's name. Like saying like here's what went wrong. Here's where I messed up. Here's what I should have done. I know I still have not heard that. I have not heard her say Holly Holme got me. Like I heard her make excuses like oh, I had a concussion. I fell down to fly the stairs. I was in the right headspace. And by the way, those could all be real. But the end of day, it's an excuse.

you're making an excuse. And I don't think she's ever said, man, Holly got me. She was just a better fighter that night. I don't think I've ever heard those words come out of her mouth. And not with Amanda either. And I'm just like, do we learn nothing here? Like, I'm not saying you have to sit around and be mired in depression about losing, but at least admit your shortcomings.

Like, she's all, basically the only thing she said about that was, I want to go out in a better way. Okay, I understand that. I understand that feeling. I've known a lot of fighters. Nobody wants to go on a loss. Like, that's true. That's absolutely true. But you never really addressed that.

You never really addressed those shortcomings. All you ever said was all I had concussion problems and I fell down stairs and blah. Never once you say, no, she shut down my judo. She wouldn't let me take her down. And then I found out that I wasn't a very competent striker because she was beating the hell out of me. And I got head kicked and flopped on the ground. And then Amanda Nunez just ran through her like a hot nut through butter. But I never heard her address that during this whole time.

Maybe I'm wrong. And so we can find a clip of her saying, you know, Holly Holmes is very. greatest, I lost her, she's much better, whatever. I never heard that. I never heard her say anything about the past just, I want to go out in a better way. You went out in a better way against somebody who was completely overmatched. Matt, if you came back right now and they gave you a 1-0 amateur, would you feel good about that?

If you went out there just absolutely just laid waist to a guy and elbowed him and knocked him out, and you're like, oh, Matt Brown, I'm champion. You're like, did you really celebrate? Like, you went out on a win, obviously, but I'm just saying, like, would you feel good about that? Would you feel good to you beat up, like somebody who should not have been in the cage with you? No, that's exactly it. I mean, that's where, you know, I can speak as a fighter or former fighter.

Now I'm kind of an old grumpy man. It's all beat up and shit, you know, but as a former fighter, I mean, you want competitive fights. Like you want matchups that are going to push you. You want to push yourself. You want to test yourself. And you want to test your skills. And that's certainly not what happened with Rhonda.

But again, that, I mean, I'm not a fucking psychologist, right? but like I think like it's pretty clear like she has like some narcissistic qualities and and that's you know you know like she okay she wants to go have a family now okay like I hope that maybe that helps you grow up and and be an adult and and and act like an adult and and I hope it I hope it like you know helps you find peace in your life and you can start you know accepting you know the way that that the world is and the way the things have happened in your life and you know there's like fighting is a hard fucking sport man you know i get it like i'm not going to like dog her for feeling the way she feels but it it seems like almost everybody at least in my experience i've never met someone

that just could not get over a loss like that and and and and and and i can't imagine anybody that i know personally, that would be redeemed by beating up some, you know, amateur level fighter. Yeah. Like, I can't relate to this at all. And I can't, and I can't understand how this would be redeeming for her in any way other than, like, just straight narcissism. Yeah, it's a weird one because, like, when it was all said and done, Rhonda made her comeback, and you're like, did your opinion of Ronda Rousey change? She had come out and been very humble and humility to show a lot of humility and said, you know, what, Holly Holm just beat me.

She got the better of me, blah, blah, blah. And even if she was fighting Gina Corona, okay, it's a big fight, it's a big name, I get all that. But like, this just felt like Ronda just forgot and just became Ronda again. Yeah. It just became like just talking trash. That's it, man. Like, I'll say exactly what I said years ago.

Like, we want to love Ronda. And this was her opportunity to another of her thousand opportunities. But this was a huge opportunity for her to create a lot of love for her. She could have got even more views, I think, had she come out humble. and and, you know, just speaking properly, you know, and not making it about Hunter Campbell or the UFC or not making it about, you know, trying to go out on a win. And, you know, I'm like, I don't know,

who the fuck is doing her PR, man? Like, she's got the fame and the money. She's got to have a fuck a PR person in her ear saying, say, look, just speak like this. Like, just even if you fake it, like, don't even be, like, we don't even care if we can see through all the fucking fake bullshit like you say it. Just fucking

say the half right things and I don't know. She just can't do it. Yeah. Well, and it's funny because we talked about you know, Rhonda had taken on a completely overmatched opponent in Gina Carano and like does this really erase anything in the past? No. It doesn't like, yeah, she didn't get a win to the point where I'm like,

oh wow, Rondo. It doesn't really change a thing as far as I could tell. But you talk about the UFC and again, you got to give them, I mean, if you're going to give them a compliment, you know, we're going to talk about this, which is announced Connor McGregor's comeback, July 11th, U.S.C. 329. Will he make it? We'll get to that as a second. But they didn't give him some up-and-comer.

They didn't give him some, you know, guy with a decent name who could give, who's going to guarantee to give Connor a win. They gave him Max Holloway. And Max Holloway opened is a massive favorite. And I think we talked about this couple weeks on the show, Matt. We did not like, you definitely did not like this matchup for Connor if he does come back. But, like, that's the difference. And so, like, if Rhonda came back and they're like, okay, Rhonda, you're not getting a title shot, we're going to match you up with, I don't know, who, Giuliana Pena, who was a former champion, you know what I mean? We're going to match you up with her.

Now, I'm not saying she could or could not win that fight, but they're not going to give her Gina Carana. Like that, you know what I mean? I think there's a reason why they weren't, like, amp it up to spend $10 million on a fight that played out pretty much how we all expected to play out with 17 seconds. Connor supposedly is back, but they're not giving him an easy fight. They're not giving a fight he should win. As a matter of fact, according to Ozmakers, he definitely shouldn't win this fight. But Matt, I know your opinion on Connor as far as, like, him actually fighting again. And there was so much skepticism when I put out the tweet on Saturday Internet.

Like, is he actually going to be there? Is it actually going to happen? Where, like, here we are basically a little less than two months out from his comeback. Anything changed? Do you think Connor makes it to the fight with Max Holloway? I'm sticking to my guns. And until Bruce Buffer announces his name, like I'm not believing. in it you know so uh and especially against max holloway i mean you can't i'm not sure if i can think of a

worst matchup then max all the way uh maybe ilia seporia right like like there's just like this is about as bad of a matchup as you can get i mean max has been extremely active max is what 34 years old i want to say and 33 something like that yeah yeah 33 34 i mean he's kind of in his prime you know i mean he's got a lot of miles on him so i think connor might be banking that he's kind of at the end of his prime i think he's you know he's lost a couple of fights um i think he beat porre lost to uh uh ilia and who else he lost to olivera he got taken down by olivera bunch yeah you got connery conner ain't doing what olivera did i promise you that no but but you know i'm just looking at it from connor's point of view

if he's actually serious about coming back and if if he is you know looking from connor's point of view. He's looking at the losses on his record and maybe Max is a little past his prime. And wouldn't it be so interesting if Connor did come back and win, though, like against Max Holloway, where he beat Max Holloway when it was really too early for Max Holloway and then again, when it's like kind of too late for Max Holloway, I think that would be kind of interesting. But I don't think that's going to happen. I think Max is really probably in his prime. and, you know, like the Oliver loss was just, you know, he had to, Oliver is a fucking killer, right?

And matchup wise, game plan wise, like Oliverer implemented a great game plan. That again, Connor is not going to do what Olivera did. This is not his world. So I just, I can't think of really a worse matchup set maybe Ilya to Poria. So, yeah, I don't, I don't see him taking the walk still. I'm still not a believer and still at. actually happens. But how about Dana announcing it during the Ganga walkout?

Like, what a fucking Dana move, man. You gotta love it. I don't, here, like, I saw it coming. I knew, I just knew it was going to happen. Although, I don't know, like, Dana's, like, you guys there to say Dana is not savvy about the way he does things on, like, media and things like that, but doing it on IG, like, you're in the middle of

the UFC show. Like, why aren't you just going on Paramount and being like, hey, like, if you really wanted to steal the attention away, you go, like, you have a pre-recorded Connor Max interview, something together. like what they do like the side-by-side thing or something. Here's the announcement. It's happening.

Here's our interview. You want to draw people away from the MVP card or just kind of like you fuck with them? That's what you do. Like put it on. You got a card. Like I'm being honest. I watch bits and pieces of the Arnold Allen Melchie Constify, but it was on my side. It was on my side computer.

I was watching the MVP card. You really want to steal attention away. Put Connor on the broadcast. Even as a pre-record interview, people will jump at that because Connor doesn't do a ton of media now. He didn't go on, he didn't do a ton of interviews. five minutes, everyone's going to clamor to watch it, and then as soon as the events over, as the MVP's over,

they're going to watch that interview again. So it was a weird that going on IG live to announce him, but whatever. It was funny, though, because it's, you know, classic Dana. But, yeah, like, I'm not quite as adamant about Connor never fighting again as you are, but it does scare me because when he had the Chandler fight and he broke his toe and dropped out, okay,

like, I'm not questioning was he legitimately injured, whatever, it's fine. But my problem is, is, like, he just went away. away again. Like he didn't he didn't recover from the broken toe and just rebook the fight. Like he could have done that. It was just weird because he got it was it was June 2024 he broke his toe he dropped out. Okay I've had I've had broken toes. I'm certainly not a fighter but I've had like you heal up when it was six eight weeks. I don't know what the timeline is and then you fight in December. Let's just

say that. That never happened. He just went away again like he just left the planet earth again for a year and a half. So like that's my problem. It's not like he got injured. It's not like he He rebroke his leg, which that would be awful. And, you know, that would understand him. He broke a toe. Why did it take another two and a half years for him to get a fight? Like, that's what I don't understand. So, and I don't love, I mean, I think the worst matchup for Connor would be putting in there against something like Islam, or Armin, who's going to take him down, just absolutely mull him on the ground.

But, like, Matt Holloway is like a lethal striker. And when he fought Dustin Poyer, when Dustin was at the end of his career, yeah, Dustin had his moments and comeback moments, because, Dustin is just a super, super tough guy and did it, but Max dropped him like four times in that fight, you know, beat him pretty handling. It was a unanimous decision. It wasn't even really that close. I mean, yeah, I give credit of your credit to do that Dustin made it tough at points. But we kind of saw like one guy was in his prime and one guy was on his way out. You talked about that, like one door out, one foot out the door.

I don't know if this is the guy you want to come back against Connor. Like this is like Max is a volume striker. He's very, very good. He's very creative. I mean, look what he did to Justin Gachie. Look what he's done to a lot of guys. I don't love it, but does it even happen, I think is a better question. And you can't not ask that question when this has happened with Connor before.

Exactly. Yeah. Again, I don't see it happening, but I mean, who knows? He could always surprise this and, you know, maybe they're giving him a huge bag or something. I mean, they could really use Connor right now. I mean, I think Connor coming back and, you know, I think could be a huge thing for the sport, for UFC at least. You know, it could be a huge thing for the UFC. and I think it could be, obviously, it'd be massive, you know,

an international fight week out in Vegas, and, you know, I think it would be a gigantic thing. But, I mean, I just, I don't see where, you know, like what Connor's point would be to come back. And, you know, people want to tell, oh, money, whatever. Like, he's got money, boy, you know what I mean? Like, he ain't sweating, like, you know, the $20 million that the UFC is going to pay him, if they even that, right?

Like, he ain't sweating that shit. He don't need that. So, like, like, what's his objective? for coming back and and if you're going to come back like why do you pick a guy like max holloway it doesn't add up to me like why would you pick a max holloway right at least get a tune up fight first you know even if it's you know there's not really tune up fights in the ufc right for a for a connor but you know a better matchup like a just engagey which i know he's got a fight with ilia but like you know you get a guy like him maybe you know just uh or michael chandler perfect right

Like come back and fight Michael Chandler. You know, it's already been hyped up. Like that all makes sense. Coming back to fight Max Holloway does not fucking make sense. But to his credit, if it does happen and even if he loses, you can't say he didn't come back against a quality opponent. No one can say that Connor came back just to what we're saying about Rhonda. Rhonda came back to get a win.

She fought somebody who pretty much had no chance in there with her. We saw that how that played out. At least Connor's not doing that. You can't say Connor was holding out for more money to fight. know, somebody else a contender series, I don't know. I don't want to insult anybody by name value because UFC doesn't have any genie Caronnas hanging around.

But at least Max Holloway is still a top five lightweight in the world right now. On this day, he is still a top five lightweight in the world. If Connor does come back and fight some of him if he loses, you can't say he didn't come back and fight a quality opponent. You can't say he didn't come back and take a risk because Max Holloway is as legit as they come, and it is a big fight.

So listen, give him credit where credit is doing that regard. He didn't come back and say, give me Dennis Siever or whatever, whatever. You know, give me, give me the new guy. Like, he took a legit challenge and arguably a bad matchup now with Max Holloway. So regardless, if the fight happens, and that's a big if, if the fight happens, you can't fault Connor for at least giving, at least taking on the toughest possible opponent outside of them. Be like, here, fight Islam. See how that goes for you.

Outside of that, this is a pre-Or Oliver. Or Oliver would be a bad matchup too. But, you know, this is not. As much as Oliver is a bad matchup, like, Oliver is hitable, you know? Yeah. I mean, Holloway is somewhat hitable too, but he hits you way more. But, you know, I could, like, I would like the Olivera matchup better than a Holloway matchup. But what a disparity between the two here, right?

Like, Connor is actually probably one of the easiest guys to hate. And there's certainly a large group of people that don't like Connor. And, you know, it's part of his cell, right? It's part of his attraction. But, like, you know, when you look at, like, Connor, versus Rhonda, like he's coming back and he's assuming he comes back. And he wants to fight a fucking badass, right? And Max Holloway, he's like, again, even if he doesn't come back, like at least the thought

of him coming back, like he, okay, I want to come back and I want to fight, you know, one of the fucking studs, one of the long time grates of this, of the UFC, you know, I guess, you know, kind of lower divisions. You know, he's not really in a division anymore, I guess, because this is going to be a 170, which, again, favors Connor. you know so I think there is like some things in Connor's favor if this happens but you know versus someone like Rhonda coming back and this is a good where I go back to like all it's to me it's a clear sign of narcissism where you know she makes it all about her and her revenge and her uh vengeful

things that she has against the you know the UFC and Hunter and all these things and and Connor again whether he comes back or not I don't know I don't think he will i'm i'm very clear about that i don't believe it but if he does at least he's coming back against a real motherfucker and i think he should get a tune-up fight i think he i think a tune-up fight would suit him well like someone that's a better match-up for him would suit him well but like i even if he comes back and loses to max holloway badly like i would have a ton of respect for that and i think even the fans and the the people will at least respect it they'd be like look he came back and he fucking tried and he was

a man about it and you know he's showing the heart of a real warrior whether he wins or loses and it's just such a big disparity between like him and a ronda yeah also real quick where we get out of here I gotta say this and I'd like you know my opinion on Nate Dias I love Nate I talked to

any before the five and Nate you talked about he didn't want to be part of Conner's comeback story he had obviously a pretty bad night against Mike Perry I was like man you should have taken the Connor fight You should have taken it because, like, because, you know, Mike Perry is like, I mean, you know, I know Mike Perry was never like the top guy in the Walterweight, but he is a legit big, nasty punching Walterweight, and we saw what happened in that one. I'm like, man, Nate, you should have taken the Conner fight because then you would have got a big payday,

and I still think that's a winnable five for Nate Diaz. Like, you know, I still think that's a winnable five for Nate. But he didn't, and, you know, obviously, and that's the risk you take, I guess, when you're like, I want the tougher fight, I want the better fight, I want Mike Perry. Well, you got Mike Perry. It didn't work out too well. So it's like, man, you know, you could have had Connor. You could have been, you know, getting a big payday and getting Connor, which, I mean, like it or not, it would have been a bigger fight.

I don't care how you cut it. Like, no offense to Mike Perry. Fighting Connor's a bigger fight. But, you know, Nate stood on principle. And I appreciate that he's honest about it. He didn't want to be part of it. He didn't want to take a guy who was coming back on one leg or whatever. I get it.

He was not Rhonda. He was definitely not Rhonda. Again, that's what Nate Diaz says. Like, I truly believe, like, there's more to it than what he's like on. I think there's other factors involved. I don't know what they are. I can't even speculate on exactly what they are. It might be the long-term contract.

It might be the amount of money. But you get money talks. And if you're going to tell me that Nate Diaz won't take the higher payday, like, I just don't believe you. You know what I mean? Like that's so I do think there's like other parts to that. But Nate Diaz, you know, unfortunately for him. And I mean, he looked terrible, honestly.

And not just because of Mike Perry. I mean, I give all credit to Mike Perry. He didn't win in there and did his thing. But Nate didn't look even as good as he normally looks. I mean, I don't, it looked like he was not well trained for this fight. He was not well prepared, well trained. And that actually is what makes me wonder, maybe he didn't want to come back to the UFC. He wants to just go grab the big paydays because he knows like in the UFC,

which like you're going to get fucking studs. Like it's a pressure cooker. It's a fucking, you know, it's a battle of all gladiators. Like, you're not getting the easier fights. You're not getting, you're not getting no love there, right? Like, it's a fucking, it's a bowl of fucking war mongrels, right? Like, everybody wants to go to war there. And it's bloodthirsty lions on every corner.

And whereas he can fight, you know, on these outside organizations. And not that Mike Perry isn't that guy, right? like, you know, I thought it was a bad matchup from the beginning. But, you know, like there's other options for Nate now where he doesn't necessarily have to go in there and fight absolute murderers that are that are just bloodthirsty. Yeah, but I think it would have been a good move to say Connor right now because I think that's still a winnable fight. Although, although to be fairly, Nate didn't look good on Saturday. Maybe Connor would have blasted him. Who knows?

Maybe that's like, maybe he knew something. He's like, you know what? I'm not in the girl. I'm not in my best condition. I'm not in my best shape. I don't want to lose to Connor in this regard because then it's over. I never get a fourth fight, so maybe that was just, I have no idea, but listen, like I said, credit to Connor. If he does come back, and we've said big if, but he ain't taking it easy, man.

No one can say Connor came back and hand-picked an opponent, picked guys, I mean, even in Chandler, like, you'd be like, well, that's definitely a winnable fight for Connor. If Conner's even, like, 80% of what he once was, that's a winnable fight for him, he didn't do that. He's getting Max, and that's not a winnable fight. I know he beat him, you know, whatever it was 13 years ago, but, you know, Max is a much. A much different fighter now. Much different. Credit to him. Listen, if it happens, credit to him for taking a tougher fight.

You can't hold, you can't not say he didn't do that. He did. Yeah, I said, I'll respect Connor for that. And again, to me, it shows a huge disparity between someone like him and Rhonda where Rhonda came back against the give me fight. And, you know, I'm probably the only dumb ass in the world who actually picked Carano. And, you know, give me all the hate you want for that. It was funny.

Like on the, the MMA fighting Instagram, like, literally after the fight happened there were people like talking shit to me i was i was like you're still on this like like move on with your life bro um but yeah like you know connor you say what you want about him like you know some of his antics and some of the crazy shit that he said and everything but like connor's a fucking warrior man and and he's a real prize fighter and and he's a legit motherfucker and um you know again i i don't necessarily think that he'll take the walk but uh you got to love the guy man you get you at least as a fighter you got to respect what he's done and what he at least wants to do like i have the feeling like he does want to come back and i just have a

feeling also that when once he gets into real camp and he's going through that grinder he's like bro i ain't fucking doing this shit you know like i got a fucking yacht bro i got a fucking Lamborghini yacht like what the fuck am i doing and i've i'm going to have the feeling that's what happened last time but I do think that he probably does want to fight. And hopefully he does, man. Hopefully I'm wrong, but I don't think he will. Well, we'll have to wait and see. Matt, we're going to get out here.

Obviously, no big events this week. I mean, obviously we have Olegendezer Uc and Rico Verhoven as a boxing match, which should be interesting. But we have a week off from the UFC, so we'll talk more about that next week and obviously more follow-out from this. We hear some more news coming up. Matt, where can people check out?

They want to find out what you got going on outside the show? at I'm Immortal, Instagram, and Twitter, the Immortal, My Brown, on Facebook. And as always, I want to say a big thank you to everyone that tunes in the show. Make sure to check us out on all your favorite podcast platforms, Apple Podcast, Spotify, and of course over in the best website in the world, MAAfighting.com. For Matt Brown, I am Damon Martin. We'll see you guys next week for another edition of The Fighter versus the Writer. Thanks for tuning in.

We'll see you then.