MMA Fighting - HOAM | Bellator MMA vs. RIZIN Takeaways, Grades, and a Splash Of Irony

Episode Date: January 2, 2023

The Bellator MMA vs. RIZIN co-promotional event is in the books, and there was a lot to unpack from the New Year's Eve extravaganza, including a hint of rich irony. On an all-new bonus edition of Heck of a Morning, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck hits record and gives his overall reaction to the card, which took place at the iconic Saitama Super Arena in Japan. Topics include the grade for the event — and why the marks were skewed a bit higher — the matchups, A.J. McKee stealing the show for his main event fight against Roberto de Souza and potentially becoming the face of the promotion, the tape delay misstep, and how it led to an interesting discovery in the overall fallout of the event, thoughts on doing the concept again, other ideas on how it could be shaped together, how the build to the event got out of hand at times by taking focus off of what was important, and 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: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

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

The Downloaded. It's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, what are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The downloaded two, Ghosts in the Machine, available now, only from Audible. The Vox Media Podcast Network. Well, hello there, everybody. Happy New Year, and welcome to a brand new bonus edition of Heck of a Morning here

exclusively on the M.A. Fighting Podcasting Network. Mike Hack. Hope everyone's having a fantastic 2023 so far. 2022 is officially a thing of the past. We have changed the calendar over to 2023. But before we officially move into the wonderful world of mixed martial arts for 23, I wanted to do a bonus show since there is no MMA hour today on this Monday, January 2nd, 2023. Ariel will be back on Wednesday for the highly prestigious.

the MMA Hour Award show for 2022. But I wanted to put it a bow on 2022 by doing a sort of review of the Bellator versus Risen card that took place in the very early morning hours of Saturday, December 31st, which is New Year's Eve. And I have to say, it was pretty compelling television.

It was pretty compelling television in my estimation. I'm going to give my takeaways from the event, and I don't really have anything prepared. I'm just hitting, record, and going as I do this. But I definitely wanted to talk about it. I had some thoughts. I had some takeaways.

I'm even going to give the event a great overall. But for those who didn't get a chance to watch it, or for those who didn't get to follow along on M.A.fighting.com, we were up bright and early, covering not only the Bellator versus Rise and Main Card, but we were covering the Rise in 40 prelimbs, which, holy cow, that was a ton of fun, the Rise and 40

prelims. And then we went right into the Bellator versus Rise and Main Card, and I have to say, and I'll talk more about this when I give my grade. But if you missed it, it kicked off with Gazi, Rabadanov against Koji Takeda, and that was a super fun fight. And it could have gone either way. Rabadanov, with a big knockdown in the first, first round. It looked like he was going to finish

Takeda, but Takeda is a freaking zombie man. And if this was one of those fights that was in Las Vegas or in most major cities in the United States under the normal scoring criteria that we're used to in the world of

MMA, I scored it a draw in that sense because 10A for Rabadanov, no question. And I actually thought Takeda won the second and third round. But It was a very close fight. Robidanov got it done.

The knockdown, the damage she did in the first round, basically overtook everything. And it was a good start to the card. Very competitive fight. And I thought that was one of the locks of the card. And it just showed how game the Rise and fighters were. As we move on to the second fight, Bannam waits, Juan Archoleta gets a split decision over Suchel Kim.

And again, this is another one of those fights that kind of calls the judging and the scoring into question a little bit because, I mean, look, it was super close. This is not a robbery or anything like that, but I went back and watched it again this morning. And I actually thought Suchel Kim won the fight. I actually thought he won. I thought he did the majority of the damage throughout. I thought Juan did pretty well.

Again, this wasn't a robbery's close fight. Watching it live, I actually gave it to Juan. But watching it again, I could see the argument for Sucral Kim. And I think a lot of people agree with what I just said there as well. But split decision for Atchaletta, that's 2 and 0 for Bellator. And then we move on to the second fight that I thought was a pretty convincing lock for team Bellator. And turned out that was the most dominant win on the card. It was Keoggi Horaguchi versus Hiramasa Agi Kubo part three.

And Horaguchi goes 3 in the series. And more importantly, he, with his unanimous decision, performance. It was pretty one-sided. Somewhat competitive, but there was no doubts that Horaguchi swept everything and had the most dominant victory of the entire card, in my opinion. And like I said, more importantly, that won the whole thing for Bellator. That was it. It was all house money from there, because they were up 3-0. They win, and then it went on to the final two fights. Petitio Pitbull versus Claibor Coiky. Not the greatest fight of all time.

But I understood kind of where Patricia was coming from. And I understood where a lot of the Bellator fighters are coming from because you're going in there, you're taking, you're in Japan, new rules, new setup, at least for some of these guys, not used to fighting in this kind of atmosphere, this rule set, fighting in a ring instead of a cage. And you could see it. Like, Patricia, he was very tactical. He was very smart, if you will.

Didn't want to play Claibor's game, especially on the, the ground. In the end, it was a close fight. The numbers suggest that. I thought Kukki did a lot better on the feet than I thought he would. But Patricia Pitbull wins a unanimous decision. And then how about A.J. McKee, going in there against a very dangerous Roberto D'Sosa, Satoshi. And he was just like, F it. There's no real game plan here. I'm just going to get in there and get after this thing. And I'm going to have as much fun as possible. And I'm going to talk a little bit more about A.J. McKee later because I thought he was the star of this entire card. gets a unanimous decision win.

It got a little hairy down the stretch, more so on the second half in the fight, most notably in the third round, where Satoshi had his back, had the body triangle, looked like he might sneak in a rear naked choke, but to AJ's credit, survived, did the damn thing,

and I was very impressed with AJ McKee, and I'm sure I'm going to be talking a lot more about him. But let's get into everything. I'm going to start off with the grade that I'm going to give for this card overall. And the grade I'm going to give this card overall. And some might agree with this and some might disagree with this altogether. Just seeing what I saw on Twitter,

not just during the card, but throughout the day. I'm giving it an A-minus. I'm giving it an A-minus. And maybe that's a debatable score. But here's how I'm looking at it. I'm grading it for the card itself. I'm not grading it for some of the negatives, and there weren't a ton of negatives, but I'm going to start with the negatives in a little bit. And I'm going to lay out the sweet, delicious irony that I've learned and discovered throughout all of this.

But stay tuned for that. I'm giving it a minus. What I would say like my realistic grade is a B, which is really good, because it was compelling. after Risen 40, it kind of slowed the night down a little bit. But not in a horrible way because the Risen 40 card, there were like eight or nine finishes. It was just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And there's two reasons why I'm giving my overall grade a bump up. One is because I think Belator Risen deserve a lot of credit for at least trying something, right?

MMA is kind of vanilla and I'll talk more about this in a little bit it is just what it is like fights happen on Fridays fights happen on Saturdays this is how it's going to look this is how it's going to play out this guy's fighting this guy

it's I don't know it's it just gets vanilla at times especially when you're covering multiple promotions like the UFC just puts on so many events and sometimes it just kind of drags and then you get to Bellator and they do what they do and then you get to Risen

and they kind of mix up things up a little bit in different ways and PFL is who they are and one is who they are. They try to mix things up in different ways. But the fact that they took a risk here and they did something different, I'm giving them a half grade bump for this. So that puts it up to a B plus. And why I'm giving it an A minus is wasn't even for the fights themselves. It was the opening ceremony.

The opening ceremony was absolutely incredible. And if there's one thing that I implore you to go back and watch, if anything on this card, like if you're thinking to yourself, oh, I'm just so mad it wasn't live in the United States or whatever. It will touch on that too. If you got to go back and watch something, go to either, I don't know if Bellator has it up on their social media page. I know Verizon certainly does. I highly implore you to go back and watch that opening ceremony for the main card. The one for Rise and 40 is really good too.

But this one was freaking awesome. Had the pride theme, had everything. It was just so good. It was so good. And I almost shed a couple of tears watching it in my office. And the fact that I didn't was probably because it was so early in the morning where I was at and I was pretty tired. Didn't get a ton of sleep in preparation for waking up for this event. But the opening ceremony, holy smokes, was so good.

It was so good. Go back and watch it. It's like four minutes long. spectacular stuff. Just really well done. And if I was in Saitama Super Arena, I would have bawled my eyes out. That's how good it was.

And that ceremony alone made me think to myself, before my career is over, I have to go to a New Year's Eve card at Saitama Super Arena. I have to do it. I have to do it and I have to experience it. And it was more so for that. So for me, the card was a solid B,

the risk taking, the coolness, the uniqueness, one of the guiding rules we like to follow for goodness in the world of mixed martial arts. Two promotions coming together. They want to have some fun. M.MA is supposed to be fun. They try to do something fun. And I give them a half grade bump for that. And the opening ceremony gives it an extra half grade bump.

A minus overall. And some of you might agree with me and some of you might not agree with me. But this is me. This is how I looked at it. In the end, Bellator sweeps rising. A.J. McKee gets the big win. there's a lot of takeaways. There's a lot of good that has come out of it.

I do want to touch on the negative and I do want to touch on the sweet, sweet irony that I discovered throughout all of this. And the one negative is the obvious negative. It's the fact that we were all very excited for this event. Fans were all very excited for this event. There are multiple ways you could have watched it,

but the fact that it was not live on Showtime or wherever, in the United States was a huge miss. It just was. And I saw John McCarthy kind of get crushed for this because he responded saying, essentially, and I'm not going to pull it up right now, but they're saying like,

you're getting mad at these promotions for showing this card at a more suitable time for the U.S., as opposed to them showing it at 5 a.m. Eastern, 2 a.m. Pacific, tough crowd, I believe, was the final wording of that tweet. And I looked at some of the responses to it. And John got crushed. He got crushed.

And Josh Thompson retweeted it. And Josh took a little bit of a beating on social as well. And I've actually kind of supported Bellator in this. And I've told you guys about this many times on multiple shows. The fact that it wasn't live, they don't get all the blame for this. Like, I know everyone just wants to jump. down Bellator's throat. They wanted this to be live just as much as everybody else.

TV deals and broadcast rights and all that stuff out of my realm. Don't know anything about it, but from what I understand, the fine folks of Bellator wanted this to be live in the U.S. And for some reason, it wasn't. And I will say that if this ever happens again, that can't happen. That can't happen. Now, I understand where John is coming from. And I understand where Josh is coming from in some ways. First of all, they're not going to talk crap about Bellator. They're not going to. They're company guys.

They get paid by the promotion. They work for the promotion. They work for them. They're not going to sit there and just be like, oh, you're right. You're right. Of course. It was a stupid idea. And I'm not saying it stupid.

Again, broadcast television rights, I don't know anything about that stuff. And it could be a lot more to that. And I'd love to know why it wasn't live in the long run. but I'm sure it's a reason that I couldn't come together and fathom on my own because I don't know anything about television distribution. Don't know anything about it. But that can't happen again. Now, I bet you're thinking yourself, what's the sweet, sweet irony?

The sweet, sweet irony of all this is that the biggest negative from this card is that the MMA media who got called out by Josh Thompson heading into this. And I told you my resolution is to, be a little more positive, not do beefs or respond to silliness or anything like that. I'm going to be better at that. And I'll talk more about resolutions throughout the week

because we'll do that on a heck of a morning. But the fact that the biggest negative of all this is that the MMA media actually covered this event too well. Like we actually covered it too well that it made people very upset and it was the biggest net negative of the whole thing. Because there are a lot of fans out there that thought that the showing on Showtime at 8 p.m. Eastern was going to be live.

And to their defense, it was presented that way. It was presented. Watch live on Showtime at 8 p.m. Eastern. Which was wrong. Which was wrong. And I don't know if they meant to do that, but that's what it came out to be. So people were nestled in their beds. They slept in on Saturday. Looking forward to watching this card live at 8 p.m. Eastern. By the time they woke up, we were done.

It was over. It was done. We already gave you your results. We already wrote up a couple of post-fight scrums from Scott Koker and A.J. McKee. Like, we were done covering it. Like, we were done with it. And people were like, what the hell?

I thought it said it was on at 8 p.m. Eastern. So they woke up and they found out the results. Why? Because we covered it too well. We covered it too well. And that's the sweet irony of it all. Is that we were called out for not giving this enough coverage. And we were called out to do our effing job.

and cover it. And we covered it. And it was the biggest negative of the entire event. And to that, I say sorry, but we got to watch it. And we covered it. I did a live heck of a morning during the card. So we could do, we could do a kind of a watch along. So like, we had like a couple hundred people on at one point. So if you wanted to jump on and find out what was going on, I just freaking told you. And some people were able to watch a live. Now, I know there are some people out there that are saying, well, do what I did and just watch it on a VPN. That's great. And you could have done that. But it shouldn't be that difficult to watch this live. It just shouldn't. And you should be able to give people the option. You can either watch it live or you can watch it later.

We'll turn off Twitter. We'll stay off social media and we'll just wait for APM. We'll just stay off the internet altogether. Now, you're asking a lot of people to do that, but at least you're giving the option. Here, here's your two options. Wake up super early and watch it live, which I think a lot of people would have done, or you can wait till later. And even then, you're at least being honest about it and letting people know, hey, this is not live, this 8 p.m. showing. But if you want to watch it live, you can do it this way.

So that's my biggest takeaway. I thought the irony of it all was really kind of funny, and I laughed about it for pretty much the last few hours of 2022 before I went to sleep, that we actually covered it too well, that it sort of led into the biggest negative of all of this. And it certainly wasn't meant to be that way, but it is 2022. And there's no way. We were just going to be like, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, don't look at this because it's 2022 and it should never be that way. So moving forward, hopefully this never happens again. This is always a big issue. with Bellator over the last few years

where the tape delay international cars and they've done a much better job with that but this can't happen again if we're going to do something like this especially when you're pushing it as hard as you are and the people who work for you are pushing it as hard as they are like you can't set it all up

and then you should be like oh yeah by the way you have to wait 12 hours to watch it 15 hours you have to wait 15 hours later to actually watch it in an easy and accessible way but I'm not going to sit here and dump on much else. I liked the card and there was a lot to like. So I'm going to, the negativeness. I mean, will there be like little tweaks and critiques, sure, but overall, I ain't going to sit there and

just crush anybody because there's no need. There's no need. So, boarding for flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Oh, what? Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo. Great idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements. What you win is yours to keep. Grooby. Hey! I won! Feel the fun. Boarding will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating.

19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concerned by your gambling or that if someone close, you call 1-86653310 or visit Comex Ontario.ca. Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you. From festive and cozy fashion to luxe beauty and fragrance sets. Our special selection has something for every style and price point. Visit our Holt's holiday shop and store or online at Holtrenfrew.com.

here are some my biggest takeaways and these are different things there's these are different things about the fights these are different things about the build different things about just things I would like to see in the future so the first and biggest takeaway and I mentioned a little bit earlier AJ McKee I completely agree with Scott Coker AJ McKee is the MVP of this entire card he's the MVP 1,000 percent and I know Bellator went 5 and oh and maybe some of the fighters she'll be like, okay, whatever. AJ McKee is the MVP. And here's why.

Because there was a tweet from my wonderful colleague, New York Rick, Eric Jackman, our social media guru, put it out on Twitter. It's in the middle of the main event. I think it's after the first round. And New York Rick said something to this effect. AJ McKee just wants to do fun shit and I appreciate that. Well, that makes two of us, man. And that should make a lot of us.

Because on paper, and we talked about it a lot on a heck of a morning and throughout the build of this, the narrative put together for 8. AJ McKee's fight with Satoshi was that if this fight stays standing, it's his fight to lose. AJ McKee, that is, Perron's spell. But if he dares to go to the ground with Roberta de Soza, it could be a long or, you know, a very short night for AJ McKee. And I know there's a lot of staff members in our private Slack channels that are like, Satoshi's just going to tap Agent McKee.

And he's like, well, forget all that noise. Danger's my middle name, bro. And he just jumped right into the fire. And he did fun shit for 15 minutes. It was awesome. And it was compelling as hell. It was fascinating to watch because this guy had zero Fs to give, and I respect the hell out of that.

And like we talked about earlier, Satoshi made things very interesting in that third round. Took McKee's back. And it just looked like his every second was passing. He was getting closer and closer to locking in that rear naked choke. And there were certain times he looked like he had it. But McKee, to his credit, able to fend it off, gets the win. It was unanimous nod. No if sands or butts about it.

he is the MVP. Agent McKee is the MVP, and in my eyes, his stock rose tremendously, and Bellator needs to push the crap out of this guy. And one thing I noticed with that fight, in particular compared to the others, is that to me, like going in,

like, it was a very cool concept, and there were stakes involved, no doubt about it. You want to sit there and you want to represent your promotion in a battle against another company's top talent, right? You want to sit there and you want to go in there, you want to win. But it was also kind of like a fun thing. Like we're going to go do this thing.

We might be able to do stumps and soccer kicks. But the stakes just seem to be a little bit higher for everybody involved than even I thought. Just maybe in their mindsets. Who knows? And I know Scott Coker talked about it on his post-fight interview saying, I let these guys know, like, don't take these guys lightly. Take them seriously. I want a 5-0 sweep.

And good on them for delivering for their guy. Nobody wanted to lose. Nobody wanted to lose. And that was clear, even from the rising side, because they were all really competitive. Like I said, Cojy Takeda, stock roached tremendously in that fight with Rob Badoanov. Sue Cholkim, stock rose tremendously in my eyes.

Even Claibor Coike, just being able to strike as efficient as he was. It was pretty, absolutely not. But he landed a lot of volume. He landed shots. He uses length very well. Patricia's just a better striker than him. And he has moments on the ground. Patricio is very solid down there, too.

But kind of going back to Agent McKee, here's something that I've said many times. They have something with this guy. They have something with him. We all knew that during the Grand Prix, when he won the Featherway title, we knew unequivocally they had something very, very big with him after he finished Patricio to win the belt at Bellator 263 and won the million dollars. And they just didn't do enough to capitalize on that in the aftermath. But now they could do it again.

Like you get a second chance here because this version of H.M. McKee had a new and a healthier weight class. I would really like to see Belichord just put a spotlight on this guy. Get him on shows. Get them on Good Morning America. Get them on the Today show. Get them on CBS this morning. Like get him on these things.

Like get him on there. Push this guy to the moon. Make him the face of your organization. And make it known that this is our guy. this is our dude and let people know about him and after this performance and what he did and just how cool it was

I'll talk to this guy every week if Bellator wants me to 100%. Big A.J. McKee fan right now after that performance and I always thought he was super talented and he had something but the way he just went in there and just like I'm going to give the fans what they want. I'm going to dive right into the fire and just make this fun.

Hell yeah. Great stuff. My other takeaway is, and this kind of goes to the grade overall, this was an A-for-ever. I mean, it's an A-for-ever. No matter how you felt about this card, if you felt that going to all decisions was slowed down everything. If you watch Risen 40 first and then waited for this main card,

did it slow things down? Sure. I think the co-main event kind of slowed things down a little bit more, but luckily the main event was great. Was the main card compelling? in a lot of ways? Absolutely. Were the fights mostly competitive?

Yes. Was this card one that most people are going to go back, rush home and watch again? Probably not. But guess what? That's okay. That's okay.

Because like I mentioned earlier, what Bellator and Risen did was they dared to try something different. And for that, a tip of the old cap. Like when I was in elementary school, just outside of Boston, Massachusetts, We had grades for certain subjects, but we also had like effort grades

and like E was excellent and S was satisfactory. So while I say it's an A for effort, in the old Linden Elementary School world, this is an E for effort, an excellent effort. Because with the sport getting more mainstream with so many cards throughout the year, it just like I said, things can feel watered down, right?

Like the UFC is who they are. Not much is going to change in that regard. the risk Velotor and Risen took incredibly commendable. And when this event was announced, everybody was excited for it. There was not a single negative thing to be said about it outside of once people found out that you couldn't watch a live in the U.S. And the biggest reason for it is because of the out-of-the-box thinking. Despite what some people who work for Bellator might say, the enthusiasm for this event, the anticipation for this event was pretty damn high.

And I thought doing it on New Year's Eve, doing it in that time frame. And I'll talk about the week and everything in a moment. But the anticipation of the enthusiasm was high. We were talking about it on every show. People wanted to talk about it. I wanted to talk about it. But again, the tape delay thing in the U.S. just, it kind of, it was tough, man. It was a tough hang.

And you just, I don't know, like I said, I don't know anything about television, but whoever is to blame for this, it just can't happen moving forward. Slapp on the wrist, let's move on. But the relationship that Bellator and Risen has had over the years, it's been a lot of fun. And it was nice to see them team up again in some fashion. But I guess like the biggest question I have coming out of this event was, do they go back and do this again?

Do we go back to the Bellator Risen well? Or do we go back to something that I try? truly enjoyed. Do we go back to two separate events featuring some pairings of each promotions fighters in different rule sets? Do we do the two events?

Do we do the Bellator card two or three days earlier? And then do the rising card on New Year's Eve. Now, in my eyes, either way's fine, but if I had to choose, I'm choosing the latter. And that leads me to another sort of

takeaway from all this. And that is near impossible expectations. The expectations were almost impossible to reach. And the enthusiasm, the expectations for the card, they were high, almost to a point where it's impossible to reach. Like when you compare it to the PFL championship, that event was great, but I think what made that event so great

is that we had very low expectations for it. Like very low expectations. And I talked about this on the, watch along on Saturday. The PFL championship event was like 8-year-old Mike Heck going to see Cabin Boy at the movie theater. Because I watched the previews of Cabin Boy and Chris Elliott,

who I think is hilarious. And I was just like, Dad, I don't want to see this. And he's like, ah, come on, let's just go see it. And I went and saw it. I kind of laughed my ass off. And I was like, all right, this is the greatest movie of all time. But I had no expectations heading into it. The other thing that was made it a little bit unfair,

and I took this away because I woke up early I watched a lot of Risen 40, putting that main card following the Risen big event and how it showcased. A lot of people were looking at as, oh, this is the preliminary card for the Bellator Risen main card. And there's some truth to that the way it was laid out,

but the Risen 40 event was like its own event, and then Belator versus Risen was kind of its own separate event. And for those who have watched these end-of-the-year Risen cards, they're always chock full of mayhem and it always has hardcore fans, has media members who cover a lot of the Asian scene questioning, M.A.

fighting and all the other websites are year-end awards because it either gets left out of the equation or they come out, like the awards come out before the event actually happens. And people are like, well, why don't you just wait for the Risen event because it's always awesome?

And Risen 40 is its own separate entity. like all of the New Year's Eve cards was absolutely wild. There were seven brutal finishes, eight maybe, I think it was seven. The featured bout was one of the most compelling fights on the entire slate, and this includes Bellator versus Verizon.

The Sika Izawa, Siwu Park, Adamweight tournament finale fight, and the fight delivered. It was a chess match. It was great. I actually thought Sebu Park won that fight, but in the end, Izawa remains undefeated, caps off a 4-0-20.

22 year. Definitely get some nods in the female fighter of the year. Category, no doubt about that. She's got a check in the old box. She's the front runner right now for the 2023 female fighter of the year. I can tell you that because that's how we're going to base this awards, base this event and these two events in my eyes in the awards section. It's going to be part of the 2023. But as I was somebody to watch, I thought Siwu Park won the fight and it was good scrap. But I remember December 2019, right? It was December 2019. This is pre-pandemic.

So a lot of you listened to this probably didn't even know this happened because I know a lot of newer fans have jumped on. But fans were treated that fight week to both promotions putting on cards in the same arena. And I think it was like over a two-day span. I think one event was the 28th or the 29th of December and then one was New Year's Eve. And it was Bellator 237, I think.

in Risen 20. And the Bellator event had the cage. It was under Bellator rules. It was in the same building. Both were in the Sitama Soup Arena. And the Bellator event gave more of their fighters the opportunity to compete in that arena. And I know how much that means to them.

In fact, I remember interviewing Lorenz Larkin after he beat Andre Koreshkov. And most fans of Bellator thought he was the number one contender for the welterweight title at the time after the Koreshkov win. And he told me that he would rather fight on that card, that Bellator card in Saitama

over getting a title shot. If he had a choice, he's fighting in Saitama and not fighting for the belt. That's how much it meant to him. And that's how much it means to a lot of these guys. And I remember that Bellator card because I covered it for a different website. This is a few months far as star with M.A.

fighting. Michael Chandler was on that card. MVP was on that card. Lorenz got to fight on that card. He looked fantastic. You could tell how much that meant to him because he looked sensational. That was the main event

with Fador and Rampage, and of course that fight was what it was. The rest of the card, it was incredibly fun to watch. And you know what? There were fights after. There were like post limbs, and there was like five or six fights after the Bellator card. And it was very, very cool.

And then a couple of days later, we got Risen 20, which in a lot of people's eyes is one of the best events in MMA over the last five years. It was crazy. It was a crazy event. So I guess, like my other takeaway is,

is like am I against the final week of the year, Bellator versus Rise and sequel? No, I'm not. If they want to do this every New Year's Eve, I'm cool. Sign me up, I'll watch it. But if I had my druthers, and if it's feasible,

I would rather see that concept be its own thing and then the New Year's Eve, Risen card, be its own thing, if that makes sense. Like if you want to do Bellator versus Risen, Bellator rules in the cage, switch things up for the next year, but still do it in Saitama. If you can pull it off where you could do it a day or two earlier, cool, like sign me up and then do Risen whatever it's going to be, Risen 47 or 40, whatever it's going to be.

Do that on New Year's Eve and do this card on its own so that way they don't collide with each other. Not a knock, but that's just, if I had my druthers, that's what I would like to see. if I had the option. And I don't, and it's cool. Other takeaways. And you saw me tweet this out. The UFC's never going to take part

in a co-promotional event like this. Will they be a part of like a big-time boxing card that would make them a ton of money? Yeah, we've seen it before with Connor McGregor v. Floyd Mayweather. It wouldn't stun me if we did it again. And as much as I would love to see the UFC take part in a co-promotional event like this, there's zero upside for the UFC.

at this point. Zero. There's none. And quite frankly, they just, they don't need to do it. They don't need to. We would love to see it, but, I mean,

it does nothing for them right now. It does nothing for them. Other than settled debates. But overall for the promotion, does literally nothing for them. They're just, they're just at the top of the mountain. They're at the top of the mountain,

everyone's trying to climb up and get to them. And it's a hefty climb right now. but if you're and again, that's okay. The UFC is who they are. They are the NFL. I know it's not exactly the same, but they are the NFL.

Everybody else, still fun, still can do cool stuff, but you're not going to reach them. Like you're not competing with the UFC right now. You're just not. And that's okay. But you are competing if you're Bellator,

the PFL, one championship, maybe KSW, you're competing with each other. You're competing with each other. You're right around the same, especially Belator, PFL, and one. I think Belator's number two. PFL's climbing,

but I think Belator is probably the number two promotion. I think PFL made things real interesting in 2022. One has a foundation to compete. I know they have the viewership. If I'm Chatri, and I've said this before, you need to get on board with this whole co-promotion thing. You need to get Scott Coker on the phone

and just be like, how can we be a part of this? If you're the PFL, and I know they tweeted about the saying that Bellator don't want none, Belator versus PFL will be fun as hell too. And I know it's going to take a lot of creativity to make something happen.

But if you're any one of these promotions outside of the UFC, you guys got to figure out a way. You guys got to be an empire and somehow find a way to be a part of something like this. Like, how could you be working for the PFL or one, watch that card and not want to get involved in some way with something like this?

And I'm not saying, like, do a New Year's Eve. But you've got to be creative about it. Like, I know there's this, PFL is tough with the layout and the season and all that. But you've got names there. And we saw what happened with the PFL playoffs. They try to move it to England. And, like, a lot of the bigger names, a lot of the favorites who probably would have won the million dollars, couldn't get the visas to go over there.

Like some of those guys, some of those gals, maybe like an injury happens and there's an alternate that slides in. We could be creative with this and somehow make it happen. And Jedmishu has said this on many programs, including our BTL Festivus, that a Super Bowl of MMA would be an incredible idea.

And he's a thousand percent correct. And the UFC's not going to get involved in it. They're not going to. But for these other four promotions, like these other promotions, Bellator, PFL1, Risen, KSA, whatever, four or five promotions. They should find a way to make something

incredibly cool happen if they can. Now, I know it's a long rule to get there, but it would be cool as hell. And the attempt would be something that fans would gravitate towards. I mean, can you imagine the type of matchups we could get between champions and stars from all of these promotions?

Not just Bellator versus Risen, but like all four of them, and just do like a freaking Super Bowl, like that'd be sick. But it's going to take some realism, some like-minded thinking, some uncharacteristic camaraderie to make it happen in a sport

and in a place where you don't get that very often. But if somehow we could, it would just be cool. And if you're a promotion, and Chatri said this publicly. Instead of saying we would only co-promote with the UFC, their 1A, where 1B, or vice versa, which is never ever going to happen, which you've already talked about.

Why not try and prove your roster is better than some of the other major promotions in the world that people talk about? It doesn't all have to be focused around the UFC. Like other major players can do this incredibly cool idea. And you, like, if there's ever a way you can make the UFC feel like they're uninvited to the coolest party in town,

if there's ever a way you could do that right now, now with where the UFC is, this is how you do it. And after seeing Bellator versus Risen, there's a lot of fun things we could do in the space with a concept like this. And at the end of the day, as we talk about, MMA is supposed to be fun, right? It's hockey season, and you can get anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything.

So no, you can't get a nice rank on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Goaltenders, no, but chicken tenders, yes, because those are groceries, and we deliver those too, along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here. Introducing the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus, powered by Peloton IQ, built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans, real-time and insights and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence while Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress.

Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton cross-training tread plus at OnePeloton.ca. And this leads me to my final takeaway. And this is the last time I'm going to talk about any of this crap. I'm not going to talk about, but this made me upset more in the aftermath. once the event ended. And I was upset about it at the time. I probably got a little too crazy with it.

I let my ego, my stubbornness, all that kind of get the best of me when I called out a certain individual. But it's not really a secret anymore, my friends, because at many points during the build to this card on Saturday, and I told you this is going to happen. And it did.

and it made me really upset for like 15 minutes yesterday. The build wasn't about Bellator versus Risen. It became more about Bellator versus the MMA media. And vice versa at times. Like I said, I stand on that. I stand on that crate, hand in the air saying that I screwed up. I made it about me. I made it about the MAA media beef versus Josh Thompson

and the things he said that were incredibly wrong. And at times, and more times, and even building, because people send me tweets and stuff all the time, and I don't really care anymore. But it became more about Bellator versus the media than Bellator versus Verizon. And to me, that's not fair to the concept. That's not fair to the promotions involved.

And most importantly, that's not fair to the fighters. And like I said, I lost sight of that a couple of times. I'm a stubborn prick at times from Boston. And maybe that's true. just because I care about what I do so much that my ego just gets the best of me. And I'm not trying to make any excuse for that. But I try to wonder where it all comes from. And I think about the road that I've traveled to get to where I am.

All the work, all the sacrifice, all the things I missed out on in order to try to accomplish this dream and to have somebody come out and say, do your effing job. This is how you're supposed to do things. It set me off. And it could have been Josh. could have been anybody else. I've had social media interactions with fans and people I respect for saying we're not covering things well enough or anything like that.

That's just my ego that I got to get in check sometimes. And I've, yeah, I screwed the pooch. I know I'm probably going to be the only one to say that. I don't think we're going to hear Josh Thompson say that he screwed the pooch. In fact, he's probably going to double down on it. And that's okay. That's fine. Because we did a lot for this event.

We talked about it a lot. And we covered the hell out of it. And we woke up early and we did play-by-play for you. Like I said, the sweet irony in all of this is one of the bigger negatives coming from fans, especially in the United States, was that the MMA media covered this tremendously. So that by the time they woke up, everything was done. Like, we covered it too well. And it shouldn't have been that way.

It should have been something we're all watching and falling along with that didn't happen. but we all just want the same things, right? And I don't know how many times I have to publicly say this, but for the sake of this show, and I just hit my microphone a little bit, but I'm just going to say this one more time. I want Bellator to succeed. I want them to do really well.

I want the fighters in the organization, and out of it too. I want all the fighters, but I'm talking about Bellator specifically right now. I want them to get opportunities to live the best lives they can for themselves and their families because of what they put on the line for us.

I fell in love with covering MMA because of the athletes, because of their stories. They're wise for actually getting into a cage or in Saturday sense a ring to get punched and kicked or soccer kicked or stomped in the face for a living. Like, you're a special individual.

And that includes you, Josh Thompson. I have immense respect for Josh Thompson and what he did as a fighter. 100%. And where my beef and such comes from is not, I'm not dogging Josh Thompson the fighter. And I never did. Josh was a fun-ass fighter. He was great. He's a world champion.

I have so much respect for that guy. But he's also one of us. And he can deny it all he wants. He is one of us. He is a member of the media. He's not a journalist. He's not a journalist. He's not out there breaking scoops and talking to sources and doing all these things.

But he is a part of the media. He's part of the broadcast. Troy Aikman, this is the point I made a lot. Troy Aikman is not a journalist. Troy Aikman's not a journalist. But Troy Aikman's part of the NFL media. Why? Because he's on television and he talks about the sport.

He covers. He's part of the media. John Anick is part of the media Joe Rogan is part of the MMA media He is So are you So is John They are

You're just not journalists You're just not a journalist And that's okay But we all need to come together And just realize that we all want the same things Yes, the UFC Is by a wide wide margin The biggest promotion in the world

They are number one with a bullet And And the biggest stars and the biggest stories in the sport of mixed martial arts come from the UFC. It's just the facts. It's not anybody being a prick. It's not anybody being an asshole. It's just the way that it is. It's the truth.

They are the biggest organization. They have the biggest stories. They have the biggest stars in the sport. But that doesn't mean that the media does not want to cover Bellator or any other organization. That's just so inaccurate. Along with some of the other narratives that were paying upon a media, and I'm not going to go through this again, but I'll just drop this one more time.

This notion and this narrative that we don't want to cover Bellator because the UFC is going to get mad at us and not credential us is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. It's just not true. Have there been instances where media members have been banned? Yes. But I can assure you it's not because they covered Bellator. or covered PFL or covered another organization.

That's not how it works. That's not how it works. I don't have to cover another UFC event on site ever again if I don't want to. I don't. I don't have to. I could do it from here, paper views you do the watch parties in New York.

It doesn't matter. November, I was in New York. I was five miles from Madison Square Garden. I could have covered that event live, but I didn't. I went into the studio with GC and we did the watch party and I loved it. It was fun. It mixed up the monotony for me. I could sit home and watch pay-per-view and do the post-fight shows and do the interviews and do all the stuff.

I could do it from here. I don't have to go there. And I've said this a million times and I'll say it again. If MMA fighting was like, hey, Mike, go out for UFC Fight Week, but come home Friday night. Come home after ceremonial weigh-ins. Or come home Saturday morning, you can't go to the fights. I'd be like, yep, sign me up.

I'd just like being out there. And I would do the same for any promotion if the opportunity arose. But again, the UFC is the top promotion. That's where the biggest stories come from. It's just the way that it is. Now that can be fixed. That can all be fixed. And I know we had our promotional festivists,

and I know we're kind of hard on all four promotions, and I think some people felt we were a little bit harder on Bellator, and I don't necessarily agree with that. I think everybody got their share. I mean, we spent 35 minutes talking about a lot of the UFC's issues. That's far more time than anybody else. But Bellator has issues. They've had a bunch over the years.

And I've also said on multiple occasions, I think they've, 20, 22, it wasn't a spectacular year for them. It was a good year for them. Some of the issues that they've had coming out of 2021 and 2022, they fixed them. They did more fun things.

Some of the production got cleaned up a little bit. Some of the issues I had with watching the broadcast got improved. They got improved. I thought John McCarthy had an excellent year on commentary. But that's not when I'm here to talk. talk about. What I'm here to talk about is all of the issues that we've seen and we've talked about with Bellator. All of it can be fixed. None of this is impossible stuff to fix. They just got to do it.

They just got to do it. The big thing is, and I think it was kind of, and again, I don't know how about the television distribution and all of that. I don't know. I don't know how that all works. However, Bellator's got to get off showtime. They got to get off showtime. Enough. enough. Get off of Showtime. Stay in the networks. Use Showtime as a place to watch replays or do whatever. You can get on Paramount Plus,

streaming on Paramount Plus. Go live on Paramount Plus. Figure out a way to do it. It's just way more accessible to your product. And I've talked about the Paramount Plus deal, how they kind of merged with Showtime. They did a cool thing like, hey, if you sign up for $7.99, for Paramount Plus, you get Showtime, like, in the same app.

And even still, like, when I want to watch Bellator Live on that new app that I have, I have to work really hard to find it. Like, I have to do a lot of scrolling. I have to search. I have to go all over the place to try to find it. It's not as easy as, like, click the app, click OK, boom. Like ESPN Plus, phone watch UFC. You go right on ESPN Plus.

It's the first thing you see. Even one, as much as I like to dogg on. one. And there's plenty of reasons for it. When they do those events on Amazon Prime, as soon as you go on Prime, the night of the event, it's right there. It is plastered for you to see. It's right there. Thursday night football. I know Jed talked about this. Thursday night football. Thursday night football crew, they're reading promos for the one event. CBS. You're doing a broadcast on CBS. How powerful would that be if Jim Nance was like that? like, hey, this Saturday night, Danny Sabatelo, Raffaun Stats, the rivalry comes to a head.

Watch it live on Paramount Plus. Just make it more accessible, man. Just make it more accessible. But what leads me to my point, and I just went off on a rant. But these are like, all these things can be fixed. And Bellator can do well. And what they did the last three months of the year, I thought it was great. I loved, for the most part, the Stott's Sabatello build.

I thought that was the biggest, that was the biggest event, the biggest fight they had this year, not including the Bellator versus Rising card. I loved how they did the little thing with Liver King and Pitbull and Powell Costa. That was friggin awesome. You put a lot of eyeballs on your product doing it that way. I love the Dust Commander thing. I like that they're thinking outside the box. Like they're doing these things that we've been saying and critiquing for a long time.

And they're doing it. I think they have good momentum right. now. And I think they could be great. Like, I think they can. They have a really good roster. They have the second best roster in the sport. Their roster's better than ones. Their roster's better than PFLs.

It's not better than the UFC's. But they have some interesting names. There's conversations to be had. Scott Coker was, like, I listened to Scott Coker's media scrum, and some people had some issues with Scott saying,

we could send three or four guys from each division into fight UFC guys and we think we could do pretty well. I don't think he's like three or four might be a stretch, but they got guys who could go in there and give fights to the Belator guys, or to the UFC guys, excuse me.

Like Vadim Nemcoff is, I don't think he's the best 205 in the world. I don't. I don't think he's the best in the world. I think he's well on his way. I think a couple more wins against some established names. I think he can get there. I don't think he's there yet.

I think Johnny Eblen is a really interesting case because I think if you chucked him in there with Alex Pereira right now, champion versus champion, I think it's a pretty competitive fight. I would lean Pereira for the power. But if Johnny Eblen beat Alex Pereira would not shock me, it just wouldn't. I think Uzman Ramaga Madoff is on his way to being just tremendous.

In two years, we could absolutely be having a conversation that Usen Ramag Madoff is the best lightweight in the world. Would not, absolutely. They have stars, they got Aegee McKee. They got something. Now we just got to put it all together. And I understand, like, sometimes you put on these events, you have stars, but you don't have a ton of them.

It's hard to, like, get great main events every single card. I get it. I get it. But this is, 20203 is a big year for Bellator. And I actually, I feel good about it. I feel like they're going to do some good things. I was very pleased with the last quarter of the year. I was very pleased that they're thinking outside of the box with the surprising card.

And I was very pleased watching it. Like I know it was five decisions. And I know not all the fights were thoroughly entertaining. I get it. But they're doing good things. And they're trying to have fun. And you can come from this from all different angles. But moving forward, no matter what kind of card, Bellator does.

and this is a message to Josh, to John, and actually, not really to John, because John's kind of stayed out of it for most part, and I respect the hell out of them for that. But just know we all want the same things, man. We all want the same things. And as I've said before, I would love to get Josh Thompson on the phone.

And not even for this. Like, not even to do an interview or anything like that. I just want to talk to the man. I just want to talk to the man. I would love to know where he's coming from. I'd love to understand where these passions come from. I want to know who's telling him some of the things that he's been told that he's saying into a microphone. And I'd love to answer his questions too.

I don't want 2023 at any point for a conversation to be about a promotion versus the MMA media. We've done it enough with Dana in the UFC. It's dumb when he does it. It's silly when everybody else does it. It's just silly. It's just silly. We all want the same things. We all want Bellator to do well.

Because if Belator does well, we do well. If PFL does well, we do well. If people are engaged and they're into the product, that's great for us. It gives us more to talk about. I want this to happen. And the fact that this had to be a promotion versus the media thing, and it was actually the biggest story of the entire build of this, is just, it makes me.

sad. It makes me sad. And I'm pissed at myself for actually falling into the trap. I'm even, like, I've even talked about it a lot here. That, like, much more than I want. So hopefully this, like, puts us all to bed. I got a feeling that it ain't.

It's just, I'm feeling when the next podcast that Josh is on happens, he's probably going to call the media out again. He's going to call the fans out again for complaining about the tape delay and all that stuff. And I don't want that, man.

Let's just move forward. 22-8-3 is a new year. We all want the same things. Let's all do our best to get there, okay? That's all I'm going to say about it. But overall, cool event, very compelling stuff. Overall grade A-minus,

A.J. McKee, MVP, Star, should be the face of Bellator, 100%. Props to the rising guys for making these fights, in some cases, much more competitive than I thought they were going to be. I'm not shocked at the sweep.

I'm really not. I felt for the most part, the fights went mostly the way I thought they would outside of the Decade of the Decade of fight. That was much closer. I thought the Pitbull-Coike fight was closer than I thought it was going to be. They were, they were,

they showed up, man. They showed up and they made these fights tougher on them. And it was a cool event. Edge of your seat stuff. We didn't get five crazy flying knee finishes, but overall, Like if you're just a fan of the sport and you want to watch high level stuff,

we got it. We got it in spades. We got some cool, funny irony. Last little joke to you, Josh. But coming out of this, I just, I want the focus when it comes to Bellator events to be on the fights and the fighters.

Let's just do that. Let's all strive for the same things. As Ariel says all the time, rising tides raise all ships or all boats. It does. So let's rise this tide together, shall we? That's what we need to do in 2023.

And I wish Belleter are the best, and I hope they keep doing what they've been doing to close out 2022, because if they do, it's got to be a good year for them. The promotional festivists for 2023 is going to sound a lot different, I think. And I talked to somebody from Belleter yesterday, and I hope they shut a lot of people up.

That's good for all of us. So there you go. There's my review. Back on Tuesday, we'll do normal stuff. Heck of a morning. We'll take your calls. We'll get your reactions to this Bellator versus Rising card. We'll get your reaction to some of the big news and notes that have come over the last week of 2022.

I'm sure there'll be other things to talk about. Ariel's back on Wednesday for the M. Our Award show. Thursday. Heck of a morning. BTL. We'll be back live on video talking about the biggest news in the sport. Friday, heck of a morning again.

AK and I are going to have your 2023 predictions extravaganza. That'll probably be video as well on Sunday. A lot to be excited about this week. So again, to anybody listening right now, to anybody who might be listening, I don't know. I've talked enough here. Thank you very much for all of your support. I hope you guys enjoyed all of our coverage from 2020.

2023 is going to be a big year for everybody. And I wish you a very happy, healthy, and a heck of a 2023. We'll see you on Tuesday, everybody.