MMA Fighting - HOAM | After Shocking the World, Francis Ngannou vs. Jon Jones Only MMA Fight That Makes Any Sense

Episode Date: October 31, 2023

Francis Ngannou's combat sports career took another incredible turn on Saturday when he arguably beat the lineal heavyweight boxing champion Tyson Fury in a 10-round boxing match in Saudi Arabia — even dropping Fury in the third round. Despite not getting the victory on the cards, Ngannou is the fight's big winner in other ways. On an all-new edition of Heck of a Morning, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck reacts to Ngannou's performance against Fury, how Ngannou the boxer is far more intriguing than Ngannou the MMA fighter, and how the only MMA opponent that makes any sense is the fight with current UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones. Additionally, listener topics include potential boxing options for Ngannou moving forward, the "fumbled the bag" critics being humbled, if the UFC lost in the long run with Saturday's result, and much more. You can listen live to Heck of a Morning Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays at 10 a.m. ET on the MMA Fighting Twitter Spaces. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

The Downloaded 2, Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. Support for this show comes from the Audible original, The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudullian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever. Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the Audible Original Blockbuster, The Downloaded.

It's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, what are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The downloaded two, Ghosts in the Machine, available now, only from Audible.

To the Vox Media Podcast Network. It is Tuesday, October 31st, 2023. It is Halloween, and it is indeed a heck of a morning. We are live on the NBA fighting Twitter spaces. You can hear the show in its entirety shortly thereafter on the MFA Fighting Podcasting Network. What's going on at everybody?

I am Mike Heck. Hope you're all having a wonderful start to your Halloween, a wonderful start to the week. No one's having a better week right now than the former UFC heavyweight champion of the world won Francis and Ghanu. Holy cow. It's still so surreal what happened on Saturday.

because here's the thing. I've had some people respond to tweets. I've had people respond to certain things I've said via DM. And it's almost like they're trying to get one over on me in a way because we talk about what Francis Ngano gained on Saturday. I don't need to go through the whole thing because by now you know exactly what happened. France and Gano knocked down Tyson Fury. I scored the fight,

9693 for Tyson Fury. I watched it a second time. The score remains the same. 9693 Tyson Fury. But you know what? Nobody cares. The scoring of this fight does not matter. It doesn't matter

because Tyson Fury isn't the talk of the combat sports world right now. Francis Ngano is the talk of the combat sports world. And I know Shaheen brought this up the post-fight show. Ariel talked about it with the guys yesterday. And I completely agree. If this is like pride rules, if we're doing the pride rules thing, Francis won. Francis freaking won.

It's incredible. And it's wild to see how like Francis is happy with how everything went. You can see a smile in his face, but you can also see a big part of him that's disappointed that he didn't get the nod. He thinks he got robbed. He thinks he got screwed. And a lot of other people thought thought he got screwed too. I'm not one of those people,

but he was so competitive. And even some of the rounds that I scored for Tyson that others scored for Francis, you can convince me otherwise. If you scored the fight for Francis, I'm not going to get mad at you. I ain't going to argue with you or anything like that. Some of those rounds are really, really close.

They were really close. But no one, except for maybe Francis and his management, team and his coaches thought he could do what he did on Saturday night. Nobody. Jed Mishu did, said he would win, but we all know it was a bit. He said as much, but it's just incredible.

Francis Inganu, even though he didn't get the judges not, he won. He won on Saturday. And the UFC lost a lot. They lost so much. A lot of talk about how much PFL gained from this. I know a lot of the PFL brass are dancing around right now. I don't know how much they won here. They have the chance to win.

They have the chance to do something with this. But much like the PFL's last three or four years, they've had opportunities to capitalize on big moments and big things, and they have squandered those opportunities left and right. And I heard Don Davis on the MMA hour, and I'll give Don credit because I have dumped on him quite a bit on this program and other programs. We spent 30 minutes on BTL talking about the awful graphic that he tweeted not that long ago about how good their promotion is doing in terms of numbers and viewership and social media and all that crap.

But he was asked about Francis and what's compelling from an MMA perspective. And I was surprised to hear his answer. on the MMA hour yesterday. He said, look, I think his next fight's either going to be in boxing or it's going to be a mixed rules fight with a boxer because there is nobody compelling for Francis to fight right now after what happened on Saturday. It's John Jones and Steepay, maybe.

So he said like there's maybe one and a half heavyweight mixed martial artists that are compelling fights for Francis and Ghana right now. And I don't agree with Don Davis all that often, but I agreed with everything he said there because he's absolutely right. He's absolutely right. John Jones is the fight. I know John's banged up right now. They got to figure out a way to put their egos aside.

The PFL, the UFC, ESPN needs a step in the middle here and be like, yo, we got to do this. We have to do this because we're never going to get the chance to do it again. We have to do it now. Let's just put all the bullshit aside and do the damn thing. but we all understand the UFC's probably not going to do that. I am very curious to see what the UFC's reaction is to all of this. I'm very curious to what Dana White's reaction is to all of this.

Deep down, I'm sure they don't care all that much, but there is a part of them from a competitive standpoint as a promotion that's probably like, ah, fuck. Like we could have promoted this whole thing. We could have gained so much from this. And they could have put on Francis versus John themselves after this fight. and that fight is so much bigger now that it ever was it's so insane it's so insane last thing i'll say before i'll go to you guys this is something that i said on saturday on the post fight show i said a couple

of dumb things on the post fight show in the moment and i admitted to such but one thing that i stand by and i think is absolutely the truth here well it would have been very cool to come on this program on tuesday and celebrate a francis and ghanu win it would have been incredibly cool to be like wow, Francis just took Tyson Fury to a decision in one. As much as I would have loved that from a combat sports perspective, this was the best result that could have happened. Tyson winning a close decision like this, questioning whether or not it was a robbery,

this was the best thing that could have happened for all parties. Francis comes out looking like a winner. his boxing career is way more fascinating than his M.A career, but PFL could still capitalize on this, that they're smart about it. They're talking about maybe doing a mixed rules match with Deonté Wilder. Sign me the hell up for that. That's fun and interesting.

Francis is a star. We're still going to get the Tyson Fury Ussick fight. And some people are saying, oh, that fight's not as interesting as it was before. Are you shitting me? That fight is way more interesting now. because I thought Tyson Fury is going to mollywap Alexander Usik. But now I think Usik has more of a chance to win after seeing what happened.

Or at least the promotion and the build towards the fight makes us feel like Usik has more of a chance after watching Francis and Ghana go in there. And for a lot of that fight outbox Tyson Fury. So we still get the undisputed heavyweight title fight. We still get big fights for Francis and Ganu. France Agana versus Deonte Wilder just the idea of that was kind of laughable before but now it's like

the fight everybody wants to see this was a win win win win win for everybody this was the best possible result in my eyes it really was we get it all everything we wanted out of this we're going to and even in the future we're going to get it all

we may not get Fury Usoc December 23rd but we're going to get that fight it's way more interesting now and Francis and Gano could find himself boxing the winner of that fight in some weird way. It's so crazy. This is the best.

It is absolutely the best. People were like, well, Francis lost, so why are we all celebrating this? Yeah, he may have lost on two of the cards, but he didn't lose on Saturday. That's for damn sure. All right, let's get into this thing. Let's hear from you guys.

We're going to go for about 30 to 35 minutes here. So let's get to as many of you as possible. Jackson, kick us off. Hi, Mike. How are you doing? Good, man. How are you? I came on here a few months ago,

and to be honest, I was a little bit depressed when I came on, just kind of thinking, man, I'm just worried there's not going to be anything like big for Francis. I'm just worried that, you know, as much as I support him leaving the UFC and, you know, taking a chance is to just not going to pan out as well.

Obviously, you know, that's a foolish take now. So now that I'm riding this high, I want to ask if Francis ends up winning the heavyweight championship of the world in boxing and becomes an undisputed champ, I think we need to start having the conversation that, A, he's the goat in combat sports, above John Jones, above Muhammad Ali and Floyd Mayweather and anybody else, think you have to have the conversation, he's the goat. And it pains me to say this as a guy named after Bo Jackson, I think he's the best athlete of all time. If he wins the heavyweight championship, I think we should be saying he is the greatest athlete this world has ever seen. So I wanted your take on that. Have a good morning. That's about it.

Thanks, and I'll tell you what. There's two things you said there that I want to get into. And I do remember you calling it a few months ago. But you weren't, you're not going to be the target of what I'm going to say in a minute. And I'll explain in a moment. But, dude, if Tyson, if Francis and God, who becomes the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world in boxing.

Yeah. Yeah. There's a conversation we're going to have to have, ladies and gentlemen. It sounds so weird to say out loud and probably very weird for you to hear it. And some of you are thinking about it. And some of you are probably rolling your eyes right now. But it is a conversation to be had. What we saw on Saturday was, like honestly, as a,

I'm not a diehard overall sports fan. these days anymore. But for a long time I was, especially in Boston. And I watched freaking everything. Like, I watched everything. What I saw on Saturday night, like I don't even know what I can compare it to.

The only thing I could compare it to was, and it's a movie, like literally this is Rocky One. Like, this is Rocky One. Rocky comes in. Paul Creed's like a minus bazillion favorite. No one thinks Rocky is. is a chance. Paul's boxing

them up. Rocky lands a knockdown. Rocky's competitive. Gets to the end. Everyone's celebrating Rocky. No one's celebrating Apollo. Who actually won the frigging fight. Paulo wins the fight.

This was, other than Rocky, I don't know what to compare this to. I really don't know what to compare this to. It's friggin insane. It's friggin insane. You mentioned the other thing. and you were you were very good about it a lot of other people were not very good about it and i don't need to do the aerial thing where i call everybody out and pull up receipts or anything

like that but boy francis humbled up a lot of mma fans and it was the best it was the best this whole notion that he fumbled the bag and all of that was so dumb even back then like it really was silly to even say that now if you look at you love looked at it, him signing with PFL from a viewership standpoint and you were like, yeah, do I really want to watch Francine Ghanu fight rando PFL heavyweight that he's just

going to run over? Yeah, maybe not. But to say that he threw away all financial opportunities because he made the choice to leave the UFC and not fight John Jones was the dumbest thing I've ever heard. He got a way better deal from

PFL. He's on the freaking board. He's on the freaking bored. He's got like management perks and he barely has to fight. Did you hear Don Davis on the MMA hour? He doesn't have to fight MMA like ever again if he doesn't want to and they will support him. With that,

you think the UFC's doing this for anybody? They're not even treating Connor this way. Yeah, they let him fight Floyd but you think Connor, you think they're going to let Connor just do whatever he wants and box anybody and get the support of the UFC? No. You think John Jones

can get what Francis is getting from the PFL? Hell no. Francis is a man of his word. He's going to say, hey, I'll fight for you. But they're telling him, no. Go box. Make that money. Maybe we'll do something fun over here.

But even the old promotion is saying, hey, after what you just did on Saturday, we don't even need you to fight for us right now. We don't need it. Go box and make a billion dollars. The whole fumble the best. thing is so funny to me. And it's so much funnier now.

And the other thing that I love to, because I got a couple of these, certainly not as much as Ariel and Luke Thomas got, but this whole notion that the MMA media destroyed Francis and Ghanu's career because we were happy for him because we told him he should leave the UFC because we told him we should do other things

that we supported his decision to lead the UFC. And it's all about Francis. And you know what? He shoved it up all your asses. anyone who was a naysayer when it came to that. And this is just incredible. This is just incredible. I was so happy to see what we saw on Saturday.

I don't need to do the whole victory tour like Ariel did, but some of those comments that I got and a lot of them that I saw on Ariel's show, and that was just a few of the many, many, many that he got. The MMA media destroyed Francis and Gano's career after he signed the BFL. Oh, golly. There's going to be a lot of deleted Twitter accounts this week.

And it's the best. It really is the best. I honestly don't need to see France to fight an M.A. again. But he will because he's a man of his word. But I don't need to see it. This is way more interesting. Heavyweight boxing France and Ghana is so much more interesting than MMA, France and Gano right now. Unless we can get the John Jones fight.

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Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Jay Mack, go ahead. Hey, Mike. Yeah, so my question is, first of all, I think UFC thumbled a bag because they could have co-promoted this

and made a shit ton of money. And if he loses, so what? You know what I mean? It's like it's a big, huge fight, and they would have made money off of it. Now he set up to fight Joshua. he set up to fight Deonto Wilder. You know what I'm saying?

He's got so many options now. It's not funny. As far as mixed martial arts go, the only fight that makes sense is John Jones. The only fight. Francis should not even take a fight unless is John Jones in MMA. That's just the fact. Let's see.

But my question was, if Francis was a fight Anthony Johnson or Anthony Joshua, Deonté Wilder, or Ussick, who do you think wins in all three of those fights? And who do you think has the best? chance to beat him out of those three. And I'll let you answer that. Thanks, Mike.

Man, it's so, like, it's so tough because I don't know. Like, apparently I don't know anything anymore after what we just saw. And yes, can you make the case that Tyson had a bad night and maybe didn't take it seriously, sure? But the man's side the dotted line, and he went in there in box and he knew he couldn't lose this fight. He knew how bad it would be if he lost his fight. Everything goes away. And you could see the look of shock on Tyson's face multiple times.

the fight. So while I understand what, after watching Tyson Fury fights, like maybe he did not, maybe he didn't take Francis as seriously as he should have, it doesn't take anything away from this at all. It really doesn't. It's far of those other matchups go, like a lot of people feel like he's just going to run

Anthony Joshua now because of how Joshua has looked in his last couple fights. And I do think Francis is competitive with Anthony Joshua. Eddie Hearn is saying what Eddie Hearn should be saying. We only need three rounds. We only need three rounds to beat this guy and yada, yada, yada.

And maybe he's right. I don't know. Wilder is the most interesting of all of them. And Ussick is a great boxer, but Francis is just going to be so much bigger than him. I don't know. I wish I could even answer that. I would be interested in all of those fights. If Ussick be Tyson Fury, I want to see Francis versus Ucic, I really do.

Wilder is like the top choice for me. That's the fight I think everybody wants to see. And Joshua is interesting because he hasn't been great. He hasn't been great. But if you compare the resume of Anthony Joshua to the resumes of any other of these top-named heavyweights, you can make a strong case that Joshua has a better resume than all of them. You can make that case. But you could also make a case that what we've seen from Joshua over the last couple of years,

maybe Francis can beat him. I don't know. There's a lot of options, and that's so great about all this. Francis didn't fumble the bag. He took that UFC bag, and he dropped it on the ground, and he just sprinted to a bigger bag.

And then on Saturday night, he just took that bag, and he found it even bigger bag, and he took the bag and just put it inside the bigger bag and zip that shit up and ran. And there's going to be bigger bags coming his way, too. It's crazy what Francis had gone to accomplish on Saturday. dude is set he is set he might even be my fighter of the year like i'm serious i might make frances

frances gano might be my fighter of the year boat after what we just saw on saturday we're having internal dialogue whether or not we should rank francis and gano back at heavyweight right now but because he didn't have an m m m fide fight the time lapse has come he hasn't fought an MA fight in over 18 months, we're having a little bit of a debate whether or not we should rank Francis. I think we're ultimately deciding we're not going to because that would set a weird precedent that he still isn't having it's an MMA rankings. But boy, Francis and Ghana is going to get a vote for me for a fighter of the year after what he did on Saturday. There's no MMA fighter who did anything more impressive this year than what Francis did on Saturday. Nobody. It includes

Sean Strickland, that includes his Lamarachev, it includes Alexa Grasso. All did incredible things this year, but none of them even came close to what Francis did on Saturday. Nobody. So you can make a strong case that Francis Gano is the fighter in the year.

Ebswalia, go ahead. You're doing? Yes, I just want to talk about Francis. A few things. Firstly, he did really good for his standard of being a debut boxer. He had a really good experience. I think he handled the distance very well, switched it up a few times, you know, landed a lot of good shots.

I wish he did work on the head movement a bit and, you know, went for multiple range of shots to the body, you know, a little bit to the head, to the chest, but it's all right. This is a, you know, it's a learning experience. He's done well with himself. I also just want to mention two other things. I'll make this one quick, first one. the UFC I really heard they learned their

lesson in learning how to market a fight that is not named Connemagreger or even John Holmes and learn how to market some of the most valuable stars because Francis and Garland if this fight doesn't prove and show to anyone

in the combat sports world how marketable he truly was and how popular he really should be just just look at the type of famous people that have showed up to this man. We had Ronaldo. We had Connemar Gregor, all the biggest boxes in history. Bivel, George Foreman, you know, all these guys. Very famous Bollywood actor named Salman Khan, you know, Eminem, Kanye West. These are very big names. You don't see these people.

LeBron James. Where do you ever see LeBron James ever watch at combat sport even? Maybe outside of, you know, Steve Miocha, John Jones or Anderson Silver. I've never seen people like him ever really watch even like, you know, Islamakshu versus Volk or even a column of Gregi event. You know, and to even think for a second, Francis was never capable of selling paper views from all the fucking haters who loved to talk so much of shit about his fight against cereal last year. Please, go and watch some of his fights. He was the biggest prospect back in 2017-18. For anyone this, you know, chat who's listening to me who was not watching MMA back then,

And he was literally the biggest prospect and the fighter that was being pushed most by Dana White, you know, all his knockouts, all his fucking performances. Even after he lost his steep back, he literally built his high back. You know, he should have been where Kabib actually ended up, you know, putting him, he should have been where Kabib Atchis today in terms of popularity followers and stuff. This guy is one of the most entertaining fighters, one of the greatest humans I've ever seen, one of the most respectful and honestly presentable fighters that, can represent this sport perfectly. And I just want to touch on one last thing. This is more from my personal viewpoint standpoint about how I'm seeing this really weird and flux

about MMA fighters go into boxing and fighter pay. I think as much as I'm happy for France and doing what he did, and he has definitely for sure changed the future of how many fighters are going to do some of their contract deals or even possibly open up the doors for union ship. I hope so because I think a lot of reasons

MMA fighters, in my opinion, don't really care about the fighter payers because some of them come from foreign countries. So for them, some of that money they make is, you know, life-changing. I'm not here to necessarily on Zoom stuff. I'm sure people do have big dreams, but some fighters, they're just here to fight.

They don't really care about the business, logistics stuff. But for others, we've seen, you know, plenty of them like Luke, Rockhole, Sean O'Malley, they care about this stuff. So I really hope. I think it's put definitely Dana and some of the other MMA, organization in or run and it's probably going to kind of force them to either play their

cards very dirtily or the fighters are going to have to take a stand because if you saw dean Thomas's comments that are in fighter pay he brought up the same points that francis was talking about to araohanee early this year and why he he chose on some of ufc you know and um boxing if anything i'm this really proves why boxing is a fucking dead sport you know if if an m mama fighter who has barely done boxing in his life can put out that good of a fight what what does that tell you about the state of the sport in general. I mean, it's definitely a lot to consider. You know, I really hope we start to see MMA firing to be able to make the money they deserve, especially if you're the most popular and top of your competition level as a champion.

You should be making the kind of money that the top boxing guys make, even some of the top guys in soccer, F1 and NBA making. That's all I have. Have a great day, man. This changes nothing. I mean, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but this change is absolutely nothing. The fighter conversation is never going to change. It's never going to happen because you're never, ever going to get all these fighters together. It's never going to work. It's never going to work.

And Dana's Dana and the UFC and anybody else who runs a promotion is not going to be like, you know what? Yeah, Francis, Francis deserved that money. We're wrong. Let's give everybody more money. No, it doesn't work that way. way like I've always compared it to. This is 1980s WWF.

We're not going to pay you much, but we're going to give you the chance to make money. You get yourself over, you get popular, you make money. If you don't, you don't. That's where they're at right now. This is a baby. This sport is a baby. And the UFC is making so much money right now.

Why would they change anything? No one's telling them not to. I mean, it's craziness. The other thing I'll touch on real quick is the whole marketable thing. France, I've said this for years. There is no easier fighter, maybe in the history of the UFC.

And this probably includes Connor McGregor. There was no easier fighter to market than Francis and Gano. You don't even need him to speak a word. You just have to look at this frigging guy and just show the knockouts that he had. That's it. It was so easy to promote this dude.

You didn't even have to, like his story is incredible, like all those other things. yeah you could have sold those and just put them over the top even more but all you have to do is just show what this guy looks like the only time they ever marketed this guy appropriately they marketed him appropriately for him but they kind of effed stepe because they made the whole promotion about hey make sure you order ufc 220 and watch francis and ghan who killed his firefighter from cleveland and stepe was like all right i guess this is the francis show not me and he in france's and Steepie went out there and annihilated him to the point where he wouldn't even let Dana wrap the belt around his waist. He was like, no, no, no, no.

And he gave it to his coach and made his coach wrap that belt around his waist. Steepen was pissed about the promotion of that fight. But that was like the one time they really made Francis look like an absolute killer. And then he had the Derek Lewis fight and like he never got that again.

Even after he just wiped the floor with everybody he fought, including Kane Velasquez. I don't know. It's just so bizarre. It's so bizarre. I bet they're kicking themselves now. Good.

Yep. What's up for us? Hey, heck, good morning. First off, I just want to say, well said by Absualia. He touched on the Francis and Gano's situation perfectly. We saw what happened Saturday night. We know who won, but boxing's going to do boxing things and, you know, give their guy the win. I just wanted to ask you real quick on.

the Bobby Green, Dan Hooker fight. I saw last night, I saw, like, reports of it. I didn't think it was, like, official. But I guess today they, you know, made it official as a co-main event, five-rounder. Is that true? It is true. It is very true. Sorry, I didn't know.

I didn't mean to do that. Armand Sarukian versus Benil Daryush is the official main event for that Austin card December 2nd. Dan Hooker, Bobby Green, is the co-main event. But it will also be five rounds. That was from Dana White. He announced it. It was like super early in the morning. Like 3 or 4 a.m.

Eastern time that he went out and did the Dana Yellen and screaming thing. So yeah, that Austin cards look a pretty damn good. But yeah, I'm sorry. Like, no offense to Bobby Green and Dan Hooker, but Darius Shurukian is the correct main event here. It's the correct main event for sure. And as I told you guys, you know, over the last couple weeks, everyone kept asking about that fight.

It's, they were never really done. Like, at first I told you guys, like, Surukia and Darius was, like, in the worst, because Darius had done something with Luke Thomas. And he said, oh, yeah, I'm going to, I think we're going to fight Syruki in December 16th. And I was like, eh, it's not really what I'm hearing. And I was told that December 2nd, like,

there was talks about it headlines. And then I saw reports about Bobby Green and Dan Hooker being the main event. I was told that those conversations were happening, but it was like way too soon to actually report that that was a thing. Because, and I think we know why now, because this is the one they wanted is the main event. But man, it's a pretty damn good car. We got Darius Sarukian, five around main event.

And we're showcasing, by the way, the best division in the sport, which is lightweight. Then we get Dan Hooker, Bobby Green. Great fight. Rob Font, Davis and Figurato, great fight. Sean Brady, Calvin Gasselm, great fight. Misha Tate, Julia Obila, liked that fight too. Khalil, Roundtree, Azamat, Mirzacconoff, Joe Selecki, Drakke, Jekar, Close, willing to determine, Jared Gooden, Steve Garcia,

Moccasio Costa, Cody Brunge, Zach Reese. We were first reported that yesterday. Clay Gwledee of Joachim Silva, Jamie Lund Horth, Veronica Hardy. Like those top five, six fights on this car? card are bangers. We were supposed to get Canaaner DeLie on that card too. But torn MCL not happen anymore. But cards looking nice.

It's a good looking card right there. Toke, go ahead. My last call really aged. I believe I basically ridiculed everybody that said that this would be contentious in any sort of way between Engadu. and I know we were all, almost all of us were wrong, but I feel like I was basically shitting on everybody in that call.

So firstly, I want to say, apologize to all of those folks. And then, because I'm a professional, I will just move on to the next week. I'll just roll with the punches, and I will say this. I have this co-made event in Sao Paulo between, I believe this, the co-main event, Nicholas Dolby and Gabriel Bonfee, the more I look at it, the more I think that the Brazilian slayer Nicholas Dolby could get it done. Why? Because he has only been finished once. And that got overturned because, you know, the guy popped for performance enhancing drugs right after that. And we've seen Nicholas Dolby in...

straights. Like his fight against Ross Houston for people who haven't seen that, his last fighting cage warriors, go watch it. It got stopped because there was too much blood on the canvas and they were skirt like going around. But Nicholas Dolby was ready to fight on. This guy is a beast. And Gabriel Bonfie has only won by finish. He is a fast starter and he always gets people out of there. But Nicholas Dolby is not one you just get rid of. So this is what I will say. I think Nicolas Dolby can get this done. I think he will continue his Brazilian streak. And oh, God, man. Then he's almost the top 15 guy. It's a bit too late because of his age. But he's going to be up there. So good luck whoever gets him next.

Thanks, man. You make a really good point. I get to say, I haven't looked. to the betting odds for this card just yet. I'm looking at him now. I can't tell you if the $20 gambling genie came down and said, hey, here's $20 to bet on this co-main event, I'm betting on Nicholas Dalby. I'll tell you that right now. Plus 440, that line should be closer than that.

Like, I'm very high in Gabriel Bondfam. I think he's a really good fighter, but plus 440 is just too juicy. Derek Lewis is plus 380. That's kind of juicy. too. Like, give me straight odds. I'm picking Bonfim in Almeada. And obviously you all know how high I am and on Chilton Almeida, but Derek Lewis is tough, man.

Plus 380? There's value there. Nicholas Dahlby plus 440. There's value there. Vince Pichelot plus 380 against Ishmael Bonfima. I think there's value there too. Yeah. There's value all over the place here. So it'll be an interesting, no-bets bar to listen to this week. Yeah, I can see it. I don't know if I'm confident to pick him to win, but I would bet him at plus 440. Wouldn't go crazy on it, but I would take a shot at it.

All right, so we got Eric, Black Belt, Henderson, and Panda all lined up. Those will be the final four calls today. Eric, go ahead. What's that, man? Branson McGonnell should have won that fight because Bracian McDonough did everything to knockout. Because in that round, Brace and Nagano knocked down Tyson's theory. So, yeah, the judges, I don't know what the judge did I think, but for instance, McDonnell won their fight completely.

And now he's calling out Deonté Water for an MMA fight. I think that's good. I think that might be, I think that's going to be good. I think that might be a BFL or some other organization, but good fights. Thanks, guys. So Don Davis said on the MMA hour yesterday that the plan would be like a mixed rules fight. But he said like the rules would be determined, but I would assume it would be everything's good, but takedowns. But that would be super fun.

That'd be super fun. And there's talks going on. He said there's two guys in line for a mixed rules fight. And that Deontze Wilder is one of them. I love that idea. I mean, look, as I said earlier, if you scored it for Francis, great. I don't have a problem with the card. I did not score for Francis.

I didn't score for him live and I didn't score for him in the rewatch. I was on the 9693 Fury bandwagon. But it's not like those weren't runaway rounds for Fury though. That's why I said. This was the best possible outcome for everybody. It's like it just was. Francis loses a competitive fight

that a lot of people are going to defend that he won. We're still going to get the undisputed heavyweight title fight, and Francis' stock is through the roof. This could not have gone any better. And we can play, as MMA people, we can play the Pride Rules card all we want. And it works here. Pride rules, Francis won the fight.

Francis landed the bigger shots throughout the fight. Francis got the only knockdown in the fight. But boxing isn't scored in Pride Rules. They're scored round by round by round. I thought, Fury won most of the rounds. I heard Dan Hardy's scorecard. I'm like, don't really know how you got there.

He gave Francis the first four rounds. I'm like, yeah, dude, don't. Maybe a little home cooking there, Dan. Because that just, I didn't see that. But it was a great fight. This is a great result. This is a tremendous result. There are no losers here.

I mean, Tyson Fury won, but he lost, and Francis lost, but he won. This is tremendous. Anderson, go ahead. Hey, Mike, heck of a morning to you and happy Halloween. My favorite day of the year. I'm so happy for Francis, just that he was able to succeed in boxing and also show the world that he's a very talented striker when he doesn't have to worry about takedowns or any of the other martial arts, you know, and not even kicks.

So I think he has a future in boxing and just as a future to make money in boxing because he's such a sight and like around the world people love him so i think he's going to do really well and it's just nice to see him as a ufc champion now making so much money and one thing i just saw that came out was with this ufc lawsuit a lot of contracts are already starting to leak so i think or not even get leak just get exposed through the lawsuit so i think we're going to see some really really crazy stuff um and i was i just got on like late so i don't know if anyone already mentioned the Khabib contract that leaked or was exposed in the lawsuit. And it's absolutely insane.

Like, it's the contract that he signed right before fighting RDA, I'm pretty sure. And it was a 20 and 20 contract. And with like the escalator clause in it, until he fought for the title, he was only making 30 and 30. So that's ridiculous. Like Khabib in his prime making under 75,000. with the win bonus. Oh, that's brutal.

So I'm sure he made some other money here and there. And I'm sure his government actually is probably helping him out with a little bit of funding and stuff. But it's just so sad how these UFC champions are so taking advantage of that they have to go to boxing to make money. But in this case, at least Francis was able to achieve that dream. And I think it also is a good sign for the Diaz brothers that they can escape this world and make some money. So I wanted to hear your thoughts on that. And happy Halloween. Thanks, man.

Yeah, it's going to be, the lawsuit's going to be real interesting. We're going to see back and forth between the UFC and managers, which is going to be really interesting. There are certain managers who are probably holding their breath right now in regards to what is released as exhibits in that lawsuit. But yeah, I saw the, I saw the Habib contract. And I wasn't, like, really shocked by it. I mean, it took a long time for Habib to become the Habib.

that retired as champion in 29-0. A lot of people, and we did a whole damn on it. A lot of people thought Habib was just like a boring fighter who got hurt all the time. And then he, and then it became, well, Habib's the boring fighter who wins,

but gets hurt, but now can't make weight. And then all those narratives went away when he just started running fools and getting finishes and winning the belt and getting a personality. Like to me, the Michael Johnson fight is what changed everything.

I think the Michael Johnson, like obviously the Connor fight is the most, is the biggest fight of his career. It's the most watch UFC pay-per-view of all time. Probably will end probably 10 years from now. It'll still be the most watch UFC pay-per-view of all time. But to me, the most important fight of his career, to even get him to that point was the Michael Johnson fight. Because he was,

Habib was screwed then too, remember? remember there was talks about eddie and connor they couldn't get it together so they were going to do eddie versus habib for the lightweight title and habib was like yeah i'll fight him we're going to have this fight and then the ufc only did that as a negotiating ploy to make sure connor signed the contract to fight eddie and then they bumped habib to the prelims to fight michael johnson and he beat the shit out of michael johnson and then cut the promo about the chicken he's talking to dana white in the corner like his corner's trying to tell like Josh thompson's trying to give him advice about how to he's telling michael johnson like i have to fight for the belt boom i have to fight for this title boom in the corner before round three josh thompson's like hey man you got to do this this this hubby been listening to him he's yelling at dana white he's yelling at dana and then he cut the promo at the end that was everything that tur that was the turning point for habib was never the same again he became he was a made guy that night at madison score crazy.

But yeah, this lawsuit's going to be wild. It's going to be wild. I guess this is like maybe the one drawback of all this. Is that like every Tom Dick and Harry is going to win one UFC fight? And they're like, all right, I'm going to box and they're just going to call out a name and no one's going to care. I just don't like, like, I want to see these guys get opportunities. But I just don't want to see like, hey, I made my UFC debut on three days notice. I want to split decision.

I want to fight you, Floyd Mayweather. That I don't want to see. That I don't want to see. Panda, take us home. Because I get to go. Four corner sports, I see you there, but I don't know. I'm not going to have time today. But you'll be first tomorrow.

My man, Mike. Panda, go ahead. My man, Mike. How are you? Good. How are you? I'm doing good. Yeah.

So I'm here to just kind of weekly as I do take my shit with my bad takes because I thought that Tyson Fury, Francis, Nagan who was going to be a blowout. And Mike, it was a blowout. For Francis Nienk on him, Tyson Fury just sat there and he stared at him. Francis was actually going forward. Francis was actually landing strikes.

One day I'm going to need to sit down and take a boxing judging class because, Lord, not only did I not judge that fight right, I can never judge a boxing fight. Secondly, I agree with you with the Nicholas Dobby take with the plus money. I do not agree with you with the Derek Lewis take. I think Francis, not Francis Nengon. Meantanaganu, Jelton Almeda, who is also a tank, is going to absolutely annihilate poor Derek. I think Derek got his rise to fame back a little bit.

He got his stock going back up with the flying knee, which obviously Derek Lewis is stock. I mean, come on. This guy is a freak. But long story short, if you're going to put him up there to kind of boost somebody stock, Jolton is the guy. I think Jolten gets done in one or two. All right, Mike, have yourself a heck of a week. I mean, you're probably right, but I just don't think.

I think this line's too wide. Derek isn't a jujitsu guy. He's a, I'm going to power my ass off the ground guy. And then he's just going to throw hands at Jelton Alameda. Like, we know what Jelton's going to do. He's going to throw a kick. He's going to shoot a double. He's going to try to take Derek Lewis down.

And then he's going to try to take his back and strangle him. Jelton's very good at that. Jelton has not been punched in the face by Derek Lewis before. He just hasn't. He just hasn't. And if Derek hits him, I'm very, curious to see what that looks like. Very curious.

Do I think is my official pick going to be Jailton Al-Meda submitting Derek Lewis? Yes. Probably will be. But from a betting perspective, Derek Lewis really, I mean, he just has to land one good shot

and change the tide of this entire fight. So I think there's value plus 380. I'm not confident in it. But I think this could be lined a little closer. minus 420 for Jelten almeda. I would say like plus 350 or higher it's worth the shot on Derek Lewis. It really is.

There's just value there. That's all. That's why I'm looking at it. And again, as the theme of this entire show, good for Francis. He did the damn thing. And it's going to be real interesting to see what he does next. He deserves his flowers. And he hopefully will continue getting them.

And again, I'm going to be real interested to see what the UFC side on all of this is going to be. I'm actually going to be talking to John Anick and Stephen Thompson later today. I will be interested to get their takes on it. I'm supposed to be talking to a pretty big name on Friday. I will obviously get his take on it as well. It's crazy times, my friends. But I got to go because I got to get ready for those interviews. So thank you all very much.

We'll be back on Thursday, Four Corner Sports. Like I said, I see you. will be first on Thursday or whenever you hop in you will jump to the front of the line everybody else back 10 a.mish eastern on Thursday we'll also beat you out Thursday we'll get you ready for your FC sub-hallow so much more m-m-a-hour on Wednesday as well you know that's going to be a good lineup it's going to be a hell of a week everybody so thank you all very much enjoy the rest of your Halloween have a heck of a morning listening to the vox media podcast network