MMA Fighting - HOAM | Dustin Poirier Back In For UFC 299, Recapping Wild Day In MMA

Episode Date: February 2, 2024

Dustin Poirier said he was out of UFC 299, and a little less than five hours later, he was back in to face Benoit Saint-Denis in the co-main event of the UFCs return to Miami. The former interim champion kicked off one of the weirdest stretches in the MMA space, one that will be remembered for quite some time. On a special edition of Heck of a Morning, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck reacts to a wild day in MMA, Poirier vs. Saint-Denis being a go, and more. Additionally, he'll take your questions about all things MMA, including the response from Dana White on Thursday, some of the weird reactions on social media, Saturday's UFC Vegas 85 event, UFC 300, 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. All right, everybody. It is Friday, February 2nd, 2020. And it is indeed a heck of a morning. We are live on the M.M.A. Fighting You, YouTube channel, you can hear the show in its entirety, surely thereafter on the M-A-Fighting podcasting network.

What's going on, everybody? I am Mike Keck. I hope you're all having a wonderful Friday. We are coming off just an insane Thursday in the sport. It's just amazing how quickly things can change in this sport and how the news cycle gets a little weird, just out of nowhere, because we did the show on Twitter. on Tuesday and there was like very little to talk about. And then we did the show yesterday on Twitter and there was like a couple of other things

to talk about like Kevin Lee saying that he's no longer retired. And we found out the Sean Brady Vicente Lucke fight that was announced for the main event of UFC Atlantic City. That is no longer happening. That is not a thing. And maybe we talked a little bit about UFC Vegas 85, a lot of speculation about UFC 300. And then right before BTL started yesterday, Dustin Porre puts out the tweet, fights off, but still working. And then everyone

went friggin bananas. And everyone's reaching out, trying to figure out what the hell is going on. YouFC really didn't know what was going on. Coaches and managers didn't really know what was going on. And then we saw some tweets from Ariel Hawani. We saw a tweet from Brad Okamoto. So Dustin Porei essentially saying, hey, listen, fight was never signed. And from what we've gathered, Dustin Porey never even agreed to fight Benoit Santini at UFC 299

at the time that the fight was announced. And still, up until a little while later on yesterday, it still wasn't agreed upon. So it was a really crazy situation. And then we just kept trying to figure it out. What's going on? what's going on. And then we kind of go back to the topic of the UFC just announcing fights before,

not only are they signed, sealed, and delivered, but to some extent, before they're even agreed upon. So this is a very strange situation. My initial reaction to Dustin's tweet earlier in the day was, this is brilliant. This is absolutely brilliant, because Dustin did just enough to keep the excitement for the idea of the fight going without. actually confirming the fight. And then the first day of February, about a month away from it,

he puts out this tweet and everyone starts to go crazy. And then we get to the conversation of, well, the UFC is doing the thing where they announced the fights prematurely to some extent. Why that is, it could be a number of different ways. It could be for ticket sales. It could be, we're going to throw this out there. We're confident it gets done. It could be putting extra pressure on fighters.

Like, that has happened many times before. And then with this situation, with Dustin just basically coming out and making this public, and then basically saying, hey, I never agreed to this. We couldn't come to terms. It just set off this wildfire. We were wondering, how would this come through? Will this fight actually happen? And then, of all things, to spearhead this fight coming to fruition so quickly,

it was the scumbag media. It was Guillermo Cruz, simply posting a video of a conversation he had with Benoit Santinese coach, where Benoit Santinese coach said, I didn't know what was happening. Benoit was woken up by his wife and said, hey, the UFC just announced you're fighting Dustin Porier, and they just kind of laughed about it. And that's pretty much it. There was no editorializing or anything of that nature. And then we're just kind of bringing up past history of, hey, the UFC has done this before.

In fact, we found out, and I knew this was the case, when they announced the Brady v. Luque fight. And we'll get to that in a second because this is just a strange day. And then Dana White's response to all of this was, Jeremy Cruz is a piece of shit, he's a scumbag. Look at this text message exchange. That's fantastic with Ben Wausantan today. But here's the thing.

And this is a lesson that I think a lot of people learned yesterday. And I think even people who have been in this sport for a long time need to learn. I don't know what it's like in your world. But when there's a fight, usually there's two people who fight. and when we're in the business of fighting, it's great that one person signs a contract. It's wonderful that one person agrees to the fight, but if the second person doesn't,

then is there actually a fight? Because that's what we keep running into. And yesterday was just kind of funny. Actually, it was hilarious. It was a hilarious day just watching this all unfold. And we were doing a reaction podcast to this news because, I mean, this is a huge story. This is what everybody was talking about.

It's me, Shaheen, and Damon. We're doing this whole reaction. And then in real time, we saw Dana's Instagram stories. And we were just reacting to it. We're kind of getting a kick out of it all. And then we, as all in agreement, I thought the fight was still going to happen. I wasn't super confident, but I was like 60-something percent.

I was like, I still think they're going to get this done. Shaheen and Damon were like, nah, I think they're just going to move on and maybe Benoit fights in the card against somebody else. And then once I saw this, I was like, this fight is definitely happening now because they're going to take this as a slight to the media. They're going to take a shot at Guillermo. And all in all, Dustin Porrier just, he, I can tell you this, he came to terms of it. He came to terms. There's no doubt about it.

And I don't know how this is going to be expressed, but this is going to be a whole thing of, see, when we announce the fights, it's true. don't listen to the scumbag media. And I thought yesterday ruled. I thought it was just so funny. And then just seeing the reactions after the fact from some of the managers in the sport about the media being scumbags, what it's just so ridiculous.

And I go back, and this is a lesson we all need to learn, my friends. There's two people in a fight. Two of them. Not one. It's two people in a fight. Like Benoit Sonsetti fighting, a clone of himself would be super fun,

but it's not real. Vesente Luke fighting a clone of himself would be really interesting and kind of weird, but it's not a realistic thing. You need two people to agree and sign a contract for a fight. And this is the second day in a row that this has come up. And I know Ali took to Twitter yesterday and called up Scumbag Media and all that because he said the Vesente Lukee, Sean Brady fight was a done deal. Even screenshot at a contract that Vesente Luke signed to fight Sean Brady. But remember the lesson here. folks, there's two people, two guys, two gals who need to be on the same page to sign a piece

of paper in order to make a fight officially official. Vicente Lucay signed a contract. So that's one piece. Sean Brady did not sign that contract. And that was the report the entire time. And I'm here to tell you, I knew this from the beginning. I knew this as soon as the fight was announced because I knew they were working on putting this fight together between Luke A and Brady.

and I also knew that it was kind of far-fetched and it was kind of surprising that it was announced the way that it was because I was like, wow, I didn't think it was going to happen so soon because Sean Brady went on the biggest podcast of all time the Joe Rogan experience and essentially said like, yeah, it's probably going to be too soon for me. I'm dealing with an injury.

I'm hoping for like April or May. And then they announced the fight, and of course we do our due diligence. We want to talk to these fighters. And it turns out, like there was no contract signed. Like this is the report from the beginning So I'm not breaking any news here But this happens guys

And there's a million other examples of this And it's happened to Dustin Porre Before do you remember Damon brought this up when he wrote up the article Do you remember a time? Wasn't that long ago Dustin Porier versus Tony Ferguson was announced This is before Tony went on like

The really bad losing streak And all the craziness was going on With Dustin and him Sort of rising up the way they did And then the same thing sort of happened Dustin was like, well, we didn't come to terms, so it's not happening. And then Dana White goes out and says, well, there's a million, there's a million ways to get out of a fight and negotiating yourself out of it is one of the ways. Basically saying like, Pori didn't want to fight them, which is absolutely ridiculous.

And the MMA community just kind of laughed at that. They're like, this is Dustin Pori we're talking about here. We're not, we're not talking. First of all, I think that whole notion is ridiculous anyways. But of all people to say that about you say it about Dustin Porier, a guy's been doing this forever. who's fought everybody, all of a sudden he's scared to fight Tony Ferguson? Get the fuck out of here with that.

And then this is kind of like the same thing again. But Porre, God bless that guy. A plus plus plus plus. You ever see the movie, A Christmas story, and there's this vision that Ralphie has that he turns in his paper and the teacher thinks it's so great

and she writes A plus plus and then goes across the room to like another board and the pluses just keep coming? Like that's how I felt. Justin Porre handled this yesterday. This is incredible stuff. Gets what he wanted. Real time. Comes back and says it's a misunderstanding. Couldn't catch my manager for three days. But now the fight's on. I love it. I love everything about this. This is incredible. What a day yesterday was. I'm still just loving life right now. It's incredible. This is just so funny. It was just the funniest day. I was telling people at the gym, like this is what my day was

like yesterday. And most people don't even know what MMA is that I go to the gym with, but I was just laughing and having the best time yesterday and it's carrying over into today. So I felt, you know what, I want you all to see the smile on my face. I want you all to see how much fun that I've had with all of this. So let's get into this. There's a lot to talk about obviously you've got UFC Vegas 85 going down tomorrow. There's a lot going on. And we could talk about the Dustin Porre stuff. We can talk about any of this stuff. It's the best. And I don't know if you guys saw this on BTL yesterday.

We have introduced the super chat. So if you guys want to take advantage of that, we'll hop you to the front of the line in terms of questions. But we'll pull them up on the screen and we will discuss. All that stuff. Shout out to Jay Fish. Didn't even have a question, but throwing out the super chat. Getting us a cup of coffee.

We appreciate that. Love that stuff. Let's see what we want to talk about. We could certainly talk about Poria. I kind of feel like we're going to get a lot of Poria questions, but we'll start here. Have you ever we watched the DeLidez-Vitoi fight? I thought Roman won going away. Imagine 185 if his momentum wasn't halted there.

I haven't gone back and re-watched it. I remember watching it live on the watch party. I thought Vittori won barely. But again, that's not one that I kind of rushed back and re-watched. And no offense to Martin Vittori. It's very rare that he has fights that you want to go back rewatch very good fighter tremendous personality um it was a fun fight but it's it wasn't like one of those fights that i'm like i have to go back and rewatch that one but it was close i thought

watching live vittori snuck it out but there you go what do we got here what do we got yeah let's super chat them up if you want uh emergency reaction pods are next level fun love them god that was so fun kind of frustrating yesterday because we finished the reaction and I produced it and edited all up in our system and then I put it all in our host site for all the audio shows. And we hit live and then five seconds later, Poria was like, oh, fights back on.

And we were like, oh, you got to be kidding me right now. But I was not letting this thing go to waste. So we just kind of turned it into a little bit of a journey. And it was the best. It was just a fun reaction. So if you haven't listened to it, go back and watch it. We kind of take you. through the entire journey of how this all played out.

And it was craziness. In a perfect world, it would be nice see Colby fight for Cicente Lucke. And it's a nice way for Lucke to try to get back into the top five. What are your thoughts? I mean, I'd watch it. I would certainly watch it. I kind of feel like they're going to try to rebook this Brady fight. Because Brady, I mean, Brady has said it.

And here's the other thing about the Brady situation, about how the media is, like, so terrible. And we don't know what we're talking about. Sean Brady, when he announced on Instagram that the fight wasn't happening, he literally screenshoted somebody's report saying contracts weren't signed, Brady's dealing with an injury, fights not happening. He screenshotsed it when he announced that the fight's not happening. It's incredible.

It's wild. But I kind of think they'll just rebook that. I don't know if you're going to find anybody in time to replace Brady in like a headline kind of a spot. I mean, if Colby did it, that would certainly check off the box, but I don't know if Colby would do that. I'm not really sure. I kind of feel like they're going to bump the Aaron Blanchfield Manifioro fight up. That's what I think.

Mike, how do you think the PFL will fuse their roster with Bellator? Will there be a massive layoff of the Bellator roster? Seems there's a couple of Bellator vets who aren't happy with the PFL. I thought when Don Davis said, we're bringing everybody over, everyone's going to get their opportunity. I thought that was incredibly far-fetched. We've already seen a couple of fighters come out already

and say that they're not coming over. Sabah Masi is one of them that I saw. Josh Hill was another one, and I know there's others that have been reported. So I just think they're going to do what anybody in their position would do. They're just going to bring over kind of the best guys and gals and some who have potential to get up there.

But yeah, I think there was, I don't remember the, like, maybe 260 people, I think Don Davis said, but I was like, there's no friggin way. They're bringing overall 260 fighters. Like, some of them were, like, regional fighters to help sell tickets for those shows that were on the road. So there's just no, there's just no way. So I'm not really surprised by that. As far as a number goes, I'm not really sure.

sure. I bet maybe like half of them. Maybe half of them. Why do you think M. May fans had so much trouble understanding the Dustin story? Because I think a lot of fans are new, like are newer. And I think especially with like what's happened with Sean Strickland and the boom he has had since winning the belt, he helped bring in a lot of newer fans. And we're just getting like newer people to the business. Like most of us, like when I got into the sport, I wasn't like, ooh, I'm going to cover this. This is great. It was just like, oh, I want to sit down with my buds, have a couple of drinks and watch people fight each other. And I think that's what we all hope for when we first get into the sport. We're just, we just are watching fights. And Dana White was

always right when he said, hey, listen, if you're driving or you're doing this or that, but you see two people fighting in the middle of the street, like you're going to pull over and stop and watch it. And that's what most people hope this sport can always be. It's just, hey, Saturday nights, it's time for some fights and we're going to have a good time doing it, right? So now people are starting to see the business side of things. And one of the things that I've learned, the more I've dove into covering the sport and with all the different jobs and positions in relationships I've built, this is a dark place. This business ain't pretty. It's not.

and we're starting to see more of that when it comes to, you know, the unsealed documents and the antitrust lawsuit. And I think the newer fans are starting to know, to understand, or at least they're learning the lesson that we learned a decade ago, 2015, 2016. I mean, these things were happening. Damon told the story when he was working for Fox about the UFC announcing a fight involving Mack Danzig, who if you're a newer fan,

you probably don't even know who he is, but he was on the ultimate fighter. he built up quite a reputation outside of the UFC before coming in and the UFC announced that he had a fight and then he called Damon up and was like what is this? Why are you writing up that I have a fight? He goes because the UFC freaking announced and he had no idea that it was happening. So this goes as far back as like the MacDanzig era.

I remember, I don't know if it was 2016, I think it was like the beginning of 2016. They announced that Chris Cyborg was fighting Jermaine Durandmi. Just like, oh wow, this is happening. then you try to reach out and independently confirm it, you find out like there's no truth that fight at all. This stuff happens. Jorge Mazadol versus Nick Diaz. You guys remember that one?

Nick Diaz coming out of retirement. It's going to fight Jorge Mazadol. I think this is 2018. Dana White tells Brett Akamoto this. They write it up on ESPN. Of course, if you're doing it right, you want to try to independently confirm it. This fight was never a thing.

And this stuff just happens. So just get used to it. Just get used to it. And understand that this is part of the business. It's not going to change. Even if the antitrust lawsuit goes full bore for the fighters, this stuff is not going to change. They want to have control of all of this. They don't want us breaking any news.

They don't want us reporting any fights. They want to do everything themselves. So it ain't all pretty guys. It just isn't. And I can tell it. Like I don't have like a tremendous relationship with just Disiporia. It's not like we text each other. a lot, but we've done interviews together.

And like, if I cover an event and he's there, like it's a fist bump and a hello. But I can assure you, and this is without even speaking to Dustin Porier, I will guarantee you that outside of the conclusion of all this in finding out that he did come to terms and probably got everything he wanted,

maybe a little bit more, he probably hated yesterday. He probably hated putting that out on Twitter. As brilliant as it was. Because Dustin's not that kind of guy. It's not like he's out doing interviews. He doesn't do a ton of them. I bet it was like a kind of an uncomfortable day for him.

And then everything sort of worked out in his favor. But Dustin didn't want to do that. He definitely didn't. So it's just a weird day. All of this is strange. But all is well that ends well. And Dustin gets it done and gets what he wants. Defenders and cybersecurity are always there when we need them.

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Go to Betterment.com to learn more. That's B.E.T. T-E-R-M-E-N-T-com. Investing involves risk. Performance not guaranteed. The real winner in this is Jed, because Dustin finally ends his squatting on the rankings and fights the guy on the come-up. Last time he did that was Dan Hooker summer 2020, and it was a banger.

It was a banger. Underrated fight. You guys have never seen that. Go see it. It's a good one. Dan Hooker had a good stretch of fun bangers. What do we go? What do we got?

A lot of people feel like Dustin's going to have a tough night at $2.99. Do you believe they're trying to make Colby Schofcott? No. I mean, well, I'm not going to say, I don't believe that report that I saw on social media. Let's just say that. Do I think, like, the UFC would try to put that fight together? Sure, I could see that. But do I think it happens?

No. If I'm Shafcott, I ain't, like, I mean, maybe if it's money and it's a main event and like a crowd and you get like a good bump and pay like and you kind of figure out when Leon and Belaw are going to fight each other if they're not going to fight till like August or September then and you want to stay busy sure like you could do a lot worse than Colby Covington right now but if I'm Shafcott if let's just say Leon and Blah are going to fight in June if I'm here I ain't fighting anybody I'm just waiting for the winner

good morning Mr. Heck there seems to be two lightweight title fight eliminators at UFC 300. What does the winner of those fights need to do to stand out to be next for Islam? I mean, they need to go out and have a banger and they need to go and be impressive.

I would also add, you could probably throw the Dustin Porre Ben-Wa-Santini fight into this mix as well. And even to some extent, not like I would rank this at the bottom, I would say you could probably throw

Gamrot and RDA, like at least in the mix. Because how this is going to play out, I don't even know if it's like a standout thing. I think you have, the winner of these fights has to stand out at least in some way. But like I said, with Drick's Duplasee, after Sean Strickland won the middleweight title, availability, or even after the Hamzaa Chamaa fight against Kamar Usman, because it seemed like Hamzat was heard, he didn't talk to the media after, etc. Availability is your best friend. And I think in this situation, with all these fights,

I think availability is going to be one of these guys' best friends. I don't know if they're going to throw Islam on the Saudi Arabia card. It wouldn't shock me if they did. I don't know if they're going to put them on International Fight Week, June, July, who knows. But it's going to be one of those situations. Like, if Islam is ready for a specific time frame, the UFC is probably going to try to make it happen. And if they're going to do Saudi Arabia with Islam,

it's whoever's ready to go. It's whoever's ready to go. I don't think they're going to wait. They didn't wait last year. You had Adasani DDP ready to go as the next fight, but they're like, no, we're going to Australia.

Izzy's got a fight on the card. Let's bring up Sean Strickland, and then Sean Strickland goes out and thumps up Izzy and becomes the champion. So availability is going to be their best friend. But if you have like a boring fight, it's not good. Best friend and I going to our first UFC event ever at UFC 298.

Got good tickets for about $660 each. It hurt the wall, but we're excited as hell. Enjoy. Enjoy. UFC should paint the UFC canvas like a street for UFC 300. I love that idea. That's a great idea. They're going to have to do something.

You can't do the gold cage again or the mustard yellow or whatever it was. Mike, what's the deal with Tatiana Suarez? She's dinged up. and she's probably going to have to fight somebody when she's ready to come back. I have not watched the doc. I have not watched the doc yet. That's on Max.

I'm planning on watching it this weekend. So we'll see. What are your thoughts on the up-and-coming league karate combat? I mean, it seems fun. It seems like an event I'd want to go to. I think President Awesome hosted at his event, like at his mom's backyard or something, which I think is the best thing I've ever heard.

It's so funny. It's tremendous. It seems like a fun thing. It's an alternative. It's something different, and different is good. Different is good. I'd rather see companies like try to carve their own niche than try to be like what Bellator was

and try to be like UFC light. This is different. This is fun. This is striking. You get knockouts and big finishes and bloody fights. And sometimes they're in the president's mom's backyard, which is hilarious. Hi Mike, love the work you do

and is Brady versus Ficente worthy of headlining a fight night since both of them aren't really flashy personality? I think it's worthy of Atlantic City because Sean Brady's from Philly so tri-state area it's a guy that could sell tickets.

Brady's a very popular guy in the tri-state area when he fought for CFFC dude sold out every building you fought in. He's a very popular guy. He's got a huge following in that area and that's the biggest reason why this fight's happening. Or was, that's what they were hoping to do. Is, you know, local guy who's going to get the big pop

and Vicente Lucke's fun. I actually think it's like a really good stylistic match. Brady looked friggin so good in his last fight. Like, I know they're not going to go bananas, but at the same token, as much as we say things about the UFC and things they don't do well, they do a lot of things very well. They're on fire right now. They could go without announcing a main event for,

Atlantic City and they will sell that building up more than likely. People want to see them right now. And they've sold up buildings without announcing main events at all or just having like one fight on the books. That's just how red hot they are right now. So they don't really need flashy personalities for a card like that. But I could say that that's a fine one especially for the area. My man Cole, Dana posting such inside baseball on the Instagram story that maybe

one eighth of his Instagram following actually keeps up with this hilarious. People seeing his effue and thinking. Dana 107 all of the media. No, he didn't. It was actually like a pretty good day for the media, honestly. Like, seriously. It was a pretty good day. It was a pretty good day. Like, just go listen to our reaction podcast. We fucking called it. We told you. As soon as that screenshot came out and all the Guillermo hate came from Dana and the minions that have Dana's back, we knew the fight was happening. We knew Duss was going to get exactly what we wanted.

And hashtag thank you, Guy. For some reason, even though Guillemé didn't really do anything besides just teach a lesson to newer fans essentially, like, Guillermo helped make this fight happen. He really did. And when Dana White does his next press conference, I guarantee you he is going to dump on the media. And he's going to say like, oh, nothing changed. Dustin has a contract, yada, yada, yada. Don't believe it.

Don't believe it. For some reason, that's what he grasped onto. Of all the things that was said, and he wasn't the only one that posted, like, history about this type of thing happening. A million people did. Everybody did. Everybody did. This happens all the time. Everyone ran down the history.

Most people brought up Brady Lucke, which happened the day before. And Guillermo is the guy who got the best. venom? Hashtag, thank you, Guy. Matt Brown versus Nate Diaz. Was that another one? I don't know. There's so many at this point. Armin versus Benoit who wins. God, man. 2025, I want to see this fight. Very, very badly. Yeah. I would pick Armin right now, though. but Benoit's common MVP recently said in an interview

that UFC knows what they got with him and that he'll do a special walkout but do you believe UFC will allow a debut fighter to make a special walkout maybe I don't know maybe they will with him the way they announced the signing of MVP was just so lackluster

that like if you're going to give that shine to anybody you should probably give it to him be like, yeah, man, kind of screwed that one up, just sitting down at a press conference being like, hey, Kevin Holland's fighting Michael Page at UFC 299, who's got the first question? Like, that deserved, like, its own announcement on social media. That deserved to be announced on the broadcast. Michael Venom Page did a tremendous job promoting it himself. The videos he's putting together on social media, he's figuring it all out.

MVP, like, sometimes says things to, like, promote fights, but I kind of feel like he's not just going to make that up. So I will say it happens, but we'll see on March 9th. I can't wait for that weekend. There's going to be a lot going on. There's going to be a lot going on. All right. Thank you, Jeremy. We got a super chat. Right to the front of the line. Do you think it's weird that the UFC still announces fights without the being signed as a pressure tactic, even with the lawsuit going on? I figured they would chill out a bit. Guys, this is never going to change. Ever. even if the lawsuit doesn't go their way,

which it doesn't look like it's going to, this is not going to change anything. They are a frigging powerhouse right now. And this is what's gotten to where it is. But here's the thing. And we've talked about this forever. And yes, I know some of you're going to roll your eyes

because this is a decade-long conversation at this point. This is why there's a reason this doesn't happen in other sports. There's a reason why this doesn't happen in other industries. I thought about this yesterday for some reason. I don't know why. Can you imagine if like, let's just say I had a, like I have a three year contractor that I may fighting.

This is not true. And I'm by the way, supremely happy with where I'm at. And I love MMA fighting. I love the crew and I love everybody that I work with and for. Can you imagine like if it was like a contract year for me and we were working on a deal?

And like they sent me this like offer. Like I had like other offers potential. and they just send me this offer. And I'm like, oh, let me talk to my family. Let me think about it. And then I jump on Twitter the next day. And my boss puts out a video saying, hey, we just locked up my kek for another three years. What?

Like, how would I react to that? I'd be like, what are you talking about? Like, I'm not saying that I'm not coming back, but like, I didn't even like give you an answer yet. I didn't even like verbally agree. I haven't signed a contract. Nothing. So I'm like, I'm, I know it's not the same.

I'm not fighting anybody. but you kind of get where I'm coming from. Like if you work in a certain line of business and you're like, hey, I had this other like big job opportunity coming up, but your contract with your current job runs out. And you're like, well, I appreciate the offer. Let me go and look elsewhere and see if someone will match or whatever. And then your company just goes on social media and just announces that you're there for another four years.

Like, what do you? Like, it doesn't work that way. It doesn't work that way in this industry or in any other industry. think about sports. Think about like the Otani deal. The Otani deal. The Dodgers come out and say like, oh, we just signed Otani to all this money.

And then Otani's like, but I didn't sign a contract yet. What are you talking about? Like you don't see this in other sports. And the biggest reason why is because they have associations. They have unions. They have someone to collectively bargain against the league for the best interest of the players involved. NBA, NHL, Major League Baseball, etc.

We don't have that in MMA. We don't have it. And the problem is we're never going to get it. It's never going to happen. This stuff would not happen anymore if collective bargaining was the thing. But now you just have to get 600 plus people to agree upon this.

And it's not going to happen. And this would be a tremendous time to do it because we're seeing this all play out in public. we're seeing big-name fighters in public negotiations on social media some get what they want, some don't, and

the TV deal's coming up and it's going to be a massive one. Look at what WWE is doing right now. Look at what they just did with Netflix. That's just for one show. That's just for one show. They're getting a guaranteed $2.5 billion from Netflix,

five-year deal. And they could, could be as high as a 10-year deal for $5 billion. That's for one show. What do you think the UFC is going to go for? They're not going to go for that, but they're going to probably double what they're getting now, whether it's from ESPN or multiple entities.

You know what I'm saying? It's crazy. But without the collective bargaining, it's just, it's just not going to work, man. It's just not going to work. This stuff's going to keep happening because no one's going to stop it. No one's going to stop it. And the only way that happens,

is you come together. You have somebody come and sit at the table for the welfare of the fighters, but it's just never going to happen. Market Zero, dude, thank you for the super chat. What do you make of MMA media like Nina, so obviously sucking up to Dana during the Dustin thing? First of all, let's be perfectly clear.

I've been on shows. I've hosted this show many times, and been asked of Nina, and I've always put her over as someone who has worked hard and got herself into a good opportunity and people seem to like what she's doing and she's doing some different things.

And I will respect that. I don't have a bad... This whole thing was super weird, though. Was it not? It's just kind of weird. And let's just be honest, this whole MMA media thing, it's just not true.

your UFC media, and that's it. And that's fine. Like, that's your thing. And if it makes you happy, good for you. If you're making a good living, tremendous. You're getting access that I'm not going to be able to get. I'm okay with that, by the way. Cool.

But we know what this is. We all know what it is. So the real ones know. There is obviously an audience for that. And like I said, she at least is trying to do things differently. She has gotten different bits of personalities out of the fighters. But with this whole Dana thing, it's so weird.

It's so weird. Just call it what it is. Your UFC media. You're not MMA media. You're not covering Bellator. You're not doing these interviews with PFL fighters. You're not giving Don Davis the same treatment you're giving Dana. Like, let's just call this what it is.

Let's just call it what it. it is. Come on now. What else we got? It's the thing with the super chats is now I got to go back up. Let's see. Jayfish. With all the drama, I'm glad I told my GSP story on heck of morning yesterday. That's funny. I want to go back and listen to that. Will all this contract, Tomfoolery, spice up the Porier versus BSD matchup even more? No, I think it's already awesome. And I don't know, I, Dustin is, I like Dustin a lot. I like Dustin a lot. but I think half the reason I think like a big chunk of the reason

why I liked Dustin so much is that like he's going to do interviews like he'll probably go on the MMA hour he'll go to media day and he'll be probably asked about this day in particular and he's probably he's probably

like not going to divulge any details at all and that's fine and I think that's part of the reason why I like him so much and I think he's going to put more emphasis on the fight than the actual negotiation and yeah, I think we're all looking at this,

I think we're all looking at this fight the same way and I think we'll feel a pretty similar way and we're just going to be all really excited by the time the fight gets there anyway. So thoughts on Dana Wayne unloading verbal It's against an MMA reporter which is reporting the news, it wasn't even news. That's the thing.

He didn't report anything. All he did was he put out a clip of a video of Benoit Santini's coach giving his reaction. The question was like, basically like what was your reaction to this? What was Benoit's reaction to getting the Porre fight? And he told the story that Benoit didn't know that it was announced because he hadn't essentially, it seemed like he didn't sign a contract. He did verbally agree as we saw in the text message exchange. But he was sleeping when Dana announced it.

His wife woke him up. It was like, hey, you're fighting Dustin Pori, and that's how he found out about it. Because he hadn't signed a contract yet. That's all he did is he put out a video of a clip of a conversation he had with Benoit Santini's coach. He didn't even report anything. He didn't report the fight was off. Dustin Porier did. Dustin Porre himself said the fight was off.

He said it. He gave the statement to Ariel. He gave the statement to Brett Alcabono. Gierme didn't do that. Nobody broke any news. The fighter himself went on social media and said, hey, this fight's not happening. But I'm still going to work very hard.

That's like the funniest thing about all of this. And again, the second I saw these reactions on stories, I was like, buy your tickets for $2.99 because Dustin Bore and Benoit Suntity is 1,000% happening now. They are going to do everything in their power to get Dusted Porre to say yes, they will give him extra money. They will do whatever it takes so that when Danis gets in front of a microphone, the next chance he gets, he's going to shit on Guy, he's going to shit on the media. Watch. Watch. We called it. Go on this, the reaction. We called it. As soon as we saw this,

we nailed it. And it, I didn't think it would happen an hour later, but I knew it was going to happen. I mean, I literally knew it was going to happen. you'll learn. If you're a new affair, you're going to learn how this all works out. He didn't even report anything. That's the thing.

He didn't editorialize anything. He just posted a video and put factual information out. It wasn't even a report. We already knew what it was because Dustin said it wasn't happening. Oh, my God. But still, Dustin is...

This is absolutely brilliant. This is absolutely brilliant. And it worked out. It couldn't have worked out any better. Mike, hear me out. The rumor and innuendo about the announcement of 165 could the Holloway and Aljo fights

seeing them both move up, could that be a primer for new fans on why 165 is needed? I don't see it happening. I don't. We talked about this on BTL yesterday. I don't see. Dana has been staunchly against

the new weight classes. And, like, I just don't think it's going to happen. I really don't. I don't know. Are we just like, what do we get to do? We could do 65, 75, 75, no welterweight. Like, I don't know.

It seems like if anybody should do this, it's like we talked about this on BTL yesterday as well. PFL should do it. PFL should do 165. They should do the extra divisions that the UFC doesn't have. That's what helps make you different is you do things the UFC doesn't want you to do. Eagle FC. Remember when Eagle FC was doing shows in America?

And they were getting big names and put it. on these big cards that were getting a lot of interest. Do you remember what weight class they introduced so they could do the Kevin Lee Diego Sanchez fight? 165. Want to know the last time anybody's ever talked about 165? I don't. I don't.

I don't think it's like that big of a deal anyways. Like if they say like, hey, we're going to do 165, like does that change anything? All it does is like it adds a new belt and then like 175. Like what do we do with Walterweight then? Do we do $195 as well? Do we do cruiser weight $2.25? Like, are we just adding all these divisions?

Don't love it. Don't care. I honestly don't care. If they introduce it, I'd be like, all right, cool. These fights are just going to happen to $165 now. The doc was great. It would speak to even a non-fight fan. Potentially was cool or more about Tatanasuars' story.

Yeah. Yes, Dominic Reyes just came out and said this fight with Oldberg was never signed. Yes, that is very true. That is very true. My man James Lynch did an interview with Dominic Reyes. Dominic shared why he will not be fighting March 30th. Found some blood clots, I believe. I haven't watched the interview in its entirety yet.

But I obviously saw the Cliff Notes on social media. But Dominic Reyes said that that fight was never signed either. So there you have it. I mean, again, and they announced it. They announced it. When we found out that I don't remember which card it was going to be. beyond. Maybe it was 297? I don't know. But when it was off 297, we were told that it's probably going to happen in Atlantic City. And then they went and announced it. So, but he wasn't signed. Yeah, it's Friday. What the hell? Mike, thoughts on the rumors reports of LeBron possibly requesting a trade from the Lakers? Do you think this goes through? Also, do you think any player got snubbed from an all-star selection? Probably the wrong person to ask about the snubbing of the all-star selection. There's always somebody because of the way they do with the fan voting and stuff. But I mean, if, LeBron leaves the Lakers, it will just be kind of funny?

I don't know. Lakers beat the Celtics last night. I was in such a good mood last night after everything that happened yesterday that I was like, you know what? I'm going to go watch the Celtics. And then I watched the Celtics, and they played like absolute caca. It was awful. Why is a billion-dollar organization making fights through text message?

Dude doesn't even say a date just a month. So immature. I don't know. Who would you book on an all-female UFC? pay-per-view. Golly. I'd have to think about that one. I mean, Kayla Harrison probably have to be on it, especially if she beats Holly Holm.

Julianna Payne has probably got to be on it because she's going to draw up interest. And then you just, you stack it with just prospects. Because I think, like, it's not going to do tremendous on paper review, but I think it still does fine because the UFC is attached to it. And they're going to bring some good fights. Like, Natty Ice would be somebody I would put on that card. I know, like a Macy Barber. After watching what Jass and Jass DeVizius just did at UFC 297,

probably throw her on the card. Like, lots you could do there. Is UFC 300 is the stands already better than 200. Look, I know 200, but it's almost like unfair to compare them because like what we ended up getting at 200 was like not what we got. It was not what we were supposed to get. We were supposed to get D.C. John Jones on that card.

Like, would we have, like, how different, would that card have looked and been in execution if we got that fight instead of all the craziness that happened. I'll tell you, it's got to be, even if UFC 300 like delivers on paper in every way, there's just no way that it's ever going to take the memory of UFC 200 fight week. Just, there's no way. There's no way. I mean, 200 to 200 was ridiculous. Jim Miller Takanori Gomi was the first fight of UFC 200. Gagard Musasi, Tiago Santos. And this isn't like 2024 Musassi and Santos.

This is 2016 Musassi and Santos, where they were both like really exciting and like on the top of their games. That's the second fight of UFC 200. Joe Lozhan Diego Sanchez, which at the time, it's slapped. Sage Northcut, you put a prospect you're trying to build on the card. T.J. Dilleshaw, Hafiela Sunsau was on. the early prelimbs

Calvin Gassum Johnny Hendrix Juliana Pena Katsin Gano which at the time was a very high stakes fight that was the featured prelim the first fight of the main car was Kane Velasquez his return fight

against Travis Brown then we got a title fight and then we got two non-title fights we got D.C. and Anderson Silva which came together last minute Brock Lesnar on the card I don't think he'll be a 300 and then we ended up getting

newness to take I don't know we'll see we'll see wow I got a Michael I have a hard question I think a worst possible reality is Henry Suhudo beats Marab challenges for and wins the 135 pound belt then all he does is try to get the

145 pound belt is there any worse scenario I don't know if Henry's really in that position right now I really don't now if he had beat Al Jemaine Sterling there's no doubt in my mind he was going to go to 145 and fight Volk and he wouldn't have done anything else that's why I like I didn't love the matchmaking.

And that's why I was always in favor of Suhudo coming back, but I was more in favor of Suhudo fighting somebody else before he fought for the belt. Like if you did Suhudo Marab off the bat, where he did Sehudo Piotr-Jon off the bat, or the one I threw out was Suhudo versus Cheeto Vera, like immediately before the title fight. Do that fight first. Then you, like, it's a win-win.

If Cheeto wins, he gets title fight. Everyone loves Cheeto. Suhudo wins. He's proven that he's serious. he wants to come back, then he goes and fights for the title. You got to remember when Sehudo left, like he kind of screwed the UFC, beats Dominic Cruz, and then just says, I'm outy because I want more money. And the UFC forgot about him moments later,

because Danaway went to the press conference and said, yeah, we'll talk to him, but we're going to do Pieterian in a title fight. Peter Jan's going to fight for the belt next. Like, they had already moved on. And then Pieterian ended up fighting Jose Aldo. and the rest is history. So I don't know. I don't think it's as bad as,

I don't think it's as bad as you are laying out. Boarding for flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what? Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo, great idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements. What you win is yours to keep groovy.

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Like, I've already put the man over. He's the star of the company. The UFC's killing it. Without him, this wouldn't be a thing. Like, I get it. But, like, he hasn't been good. It hasn't been good. And I believe you're the guy, David, if memory serves me correctly.

And I'm not going to dig through it now. You had the gall to go on Twitter and tell me that I need to apologize to Dana. Are you high? For what? For telling the truth? For calling it exactly how it all played out? What the hell are you talking about? What do you mean I never praise data?

When they do good things, we praise them. When they do terrible things, we say it's terrible. We tell it like it is. Like every other sport. Like every other sport. You think, what am I doing here? You think I'm sitting there? You know, percentage-wise,

Don Davis gets way more shit for me than Dana White does. Go listen to all of our programming. Go ahead. Percentage-wise, Don Davis gets way more shit than Dana White does for me. Chatri, he's like 100% negative stuff for me. Dana gets praise when it's warranted. We praise the announcements when he first announced us at Poria v. Ben-Wasantadi. We praise Charles Olivera versus Arm and Sarukian.

We praise the UFC for doing the thing. That's how we started this year. Go back and listen to the programming. UFC is doing the thing. They're doing it right. And then this shit happens. And we're supposed to just let it slide? Why?

You attack my friend, my coworker, for putting out a video of Benoit Santini's coach? That's your response to your starfighter saying, I'm not fighting anymore? That's your response? And guess what? If that didn't happen, you know what Dana would have said?

Justin's Porre is scared to fight Benoit Santany. Yep. He would have said exactly that because he essentially said the same thing about the Tony Ferguson fight a couple of years earlier. And he does this all the time. So miss me with that bullshit.

What do you make a David Feldman meeting with Dana White? I just think it's a thing. I don't think like anything is going to... I don't think really anything is going to come from it. BKFC's trying to get sanctioned in Vegas. they did a presentation for the commission. And I think they just met. I don't think that's the first time they've met.

So, yeah. I don't know if, like, they're going to be like, hey, we'll trade you Mike Perry for Connor McGregor or anything like that. But look, they're trying to give us, like, BKFC's trying to do something and trying to get TV deals and stuff like that. And guess what? I'm going to praise Dana White here. I know.

I've never done it in the history of my covering the sport. Never, ever. Dana knows how to book TV deals. He knows how to negotiate. He knows how to put these deals in place. He's a very astute to business man when it comes to that stuff. It's why the UFC has been able to get the sponsorships they've had.

Dana is a very powerful man. He knows how to get in that room. He knows how to charm people. So there you go. Doesn't hurt to have advice. Eddie Hearn was there as well. Look, if you're trying to build a huge product that makes a shit ton of money,

whether you like Dana or not, whether you like the business practices or not, proofs in the pudding. They're freaking killing it right now. Do you believe Michael Chandler is derailing his career in accumulating ring rust by waiting for Conner's possible red panty night blessing? It's an interesting question.

No? I don't know. Probably not. Chandler doesn't seem a guy like a guy who gets a lot of ring rust. I just think he is who he is doing this for so long. And I, like, UFC Chandler is so different than Bellator Chandler. So, I mean, it's not like he's sitting on his ass. I mean, just follow him on social media. Mike, are you married?

Yes. And David, you're just, you're digging yourself like the biggest hole I've ever seen. If Costa beats Rob, where does he go from there? He could very well find himself in a title fight. If they do DDP Izzy and Izzy wins, Costa probably fights Homestead or somebody like that. But if DDP beats Izzy, if he goes out there and runs over Robert Whitaker, Yeah, he's got a real good shot. He's a popular guy.

Who said Jared fight next? I assume you mean, I mean, I like what he's doing. I like what he's doing. I like the Homsok callout because he's not going to title fight, so I think, yeah, I don't know.

Would it be a cool idea if they brought up Mike Goldberg just for the early prelims of UFC 300? Nah, I don't think that relationship's getting put back together. Mike seems happy. He's doing stuff for, like Dada's promotion doing some play-by-play for them.

It seems pretty happy, so good for him. Oh, Jared Kennedy, I think he's, I think he's probably going to have to fight like Brennan Allen. Like if Brennan beats Marvin Vittori, he's probably, that's probably the fight. I think he needs the Homzaa fight to happen. I'll put this one up because this might be the funniest comment

in the history of my career. Because Danao took away our media credentials. You do know we cover every event, right? like all the pay-per-views were there. Like, you know we're there, right? In fact, I was, I was just covered a UFC event. I covered two UFC events last year. I talked to UFC PR all the time.

What are we, like, what are we doing here? We're fine. I don't need, I've said this a million times, and I stand by it wholeheartedly. And thank God for the pandemic for showing me this. I don't need to cover a UFC event again for the rest of my life. I don't need to be boots on the ground at any event. I can do it from home

or I can do the watch party I enjoy the watch party so much more than covering fight night on fight night it's so much more fun MVP versus Leon UFC 311 I've seen the future baby what do you think of the enhanced games this

oh my god this might have been of all the outside of Dustin Porre's tweet yesterday this was my second favorite tweet of the day I got to pull. Let me pull this up. This is friggin brilliant.

Where is this tweet? Okay, there it is. From Joe Pompiliano on Twitter. Peter Thiel and a group of venture capitalists are funding the enhanced games an Olympic-style competition that allows performance enhancing drugs. Events include track and field, swimming, gymnastics, weightlifting, and combat sports. Oh, my God. First event will be in 2025.

I don't think anybody on planet Earth was happier that combat sports was on that list more than my friend Jen Mishu. Incredible. I love the idea. I think it's so, I think it's super funny. It's great. I apologize to Don Davis. No. What else do we get here?

We already answered the Chandler question. Do you think if Charles loses to Armin, he's still in the title mix? Or will he also be in a weird spot like Dustin? where he could fight someone like Max Holloway or Dustin, and rematches win or lose. Yeah, it's a big one for Charles. It's a big one. It's must win for him,

especially as long as Islam is the champion. And then if Sarukia ends up winning the belt, it's going to have a hard time getting that fight too. So, yeah, he's, he's in a tough spot. He's got to win. But this is, this is the fight. Again, I'm going to praise the UFC here. This was a plus matchmaking.

This is the fight that absolutely needed to happen. We'll go probably for like 15 more minutes. Hey, Mike, do we know the nature of Kizriev's injuries or any of the details of why he's been out for two years? We just first fight back fighting against Murdof the Saturday. Not really sure. I feel like we've, like, reported or confirmed, like, a bunch of his fights, and none of them have happened.

So I'm sure they'll talk about it on the broadcast. Does all this drama change the way Dana announced fights going forward? No. No. It's going to happen again. guarantee you. This is going to happen again in the next month that he's going to come out and he's going to go on social media

and he's going to yell and scream and he's going to announce a fight that's not signed. And I'm here to tell you guys, there's more of them. There's more fights that have been announced by Dana White that aren't signed yet. I'll leave it at that. Costa versus Strickland if Costa wins. Yeah, it's a good one.

Dustin. Thank you for the Zuber chat. Using it to boo David. If Sean Beach Cheetah, when do you think his next fight will be in 2024 or 2025. It depends. If Sean just lights Cheeto up and gets a highlight real finish, I think he's going to try to box. And that's where things are going to get interesting.

Will the UFC let that happen? I've, like, we did our year-end prediction, like our predictions on who's going to be champion at the end of the year. I picked Sean O'Malley. Wouldn't be shocked if Cheeto Vera beats Sean O'Malley. There's probably like a big part of me who thinks Cheeto's going to win that fight. I thought Cheeto was going to win the first fight. But I just feel like it's very vibey right now.

This is just a vibes pick. And Sean is obviously a much better fighter than he was the first time. They fought. But so is Cheeto. If Sean wins and finishes him, I say Sean doesn't fight an M.A. again the rest of the year. That's the biggest reason why I picked Sean. Because if he does win, I think he's going to go try to box.

And maybe they let him. I don't know. Justin versus Max, what happens to them after win or lose? I mean, when they're probably getting a title shot. Lose, I think Gagey probably would try to... I mean, he should probably go after the Connor fight, right? If he loses? There you go.

Yeah, I realize that too. I don't mean it. You know what I mean. Did I say that? Or I learned this to... Maybe I didn't say that. I didn't mean to. Sorry.

Win Cartel versus Aljo. Who's your winning pick, Mike? Kater or Aljo? Man, that's a tough one. That's a tough one. I have to look into it a little bit more. I got to see what kind of Sterling looks like. This is the right fight, though.

If he wasn't going to fight Holloway, this is the right introduction to the division. Like, part of me is going to... I know you're all thinking... Like, my first thought when I saw was I was picking Calvin Cater. But Alger's very good. He's a very good fighter.

This is a great question. How come there isn't a segment or programming catered to the MMA audience that you would want? There's always talk of audience turnover, but why not aim at the older fans who have been around for a bit? Because, again, block your ears, David. I'm about to say something about the UFC's business practices. It's actually very smart. They know that they have us. We're going to watch it all.

We watched in the heyday. We watch when the sport was growing and was it a much, different place now where like we were the under like ms may was the underdog all these different states and governments and even even from a federal perspective we're like no can't do this can't do it can't allow this to happen it's human cockfighting all that all the stuff that we got and then 2016 happened and we saw the emergence of stars we saw them get to new york we saw them at madison square garden and we saw like all these big moments like this little engine that I could, the sport that

like we went through the dying day, like we went through the awful times. We went through some slow times. And then we got to 2016 where like everything changed. And there's just a, it was just a whole crazy thing.

And now since that time, like those who were around back then, if you stuck with them through all of this, like you didn't go anywhere. You didn't go anywhere. And had the pandemic not happened, and I know we're kind of going back to that, I'm very curious what this space would look like

if there was no pandemic. How many less fans of the sport would there be? Because I don't think there's anywhere near the amount of fans that the UFC has right now without that period of time. I mean, it's just, it's inarguable right now. They were the only game in town. everybody shut down

Dana said we're not shutting down we're going to keep going we're going to make this viable we're going to make this work and they did it and it was very very smart and they reap the benefits

and they got a whole bunch of new fans who learned about the sport learned about even us to some extent because I started them fighting like my first day to MA fighting was the day Massachusetts shut down and like everything started to shut down the whole world started to change

So we had to like kind of figure out how we're going to navigate. And honestly like the UFC kept it going. And without that time, like I don't think they're in this position right now. I don't think the TKO merger happens with WWE. I don't think, I don't know if any of this happens. So it's just a very weird time. And now it's just like you have to cater to the newer fans because you want them to stick around. And then once they leave, because most of there's a good chunk of people, I would say a third of them who, what?

Pandemic was three years ago. Two years from now, they will never watch. MMA again, unless it's like in casual passing, because that's just how the cycle works. Now, in terms of like the old school fan, that's why we're a tremendous website. We have Dan, they were good. We have shows like that where we get to talk about the Mirko Crocops, the Fadors, the Kimbo Slices, the George St. Pierre's, the, you know, I'm sure there'll be a Rich Franklin one. The Ronda Rouseys, like the trailblazers, the one that helped build this sport to where it is. And there's not enough of that. Like, there really isn't. And there needs to be more.

And I would like to see the UFC, I would like to see the UFC do more of that at these events. Like 300 would be like a perfect time to bring back some of the fighters that put them on the map and like make a big deal out of it. Kind of like, kind of like what Bellator did for Fador's last fight. Like you bring all the legends in, have them like line the aisle way as like the fighters walk in for like one big fight like that's cool shit that's cool stuff but it's kind of been forgotten man oh david you're just bad at this sorry man you're just not good at this oh yeah yeah i got you i got you yeah we're trying we're trying we have some other ideas in mind as well j kim in terms of like programming for like shouting them out but i think

everybody as a whole needs to do this Greg gillespie still on the roster i don't know I think so. I don't know what he's doing. He's one of the big mysteries. MMA is such, yeah, it does have a high turnover rate. Speaking of a trail player, show out to Markon, getting his bag of Tyson fight.

I don't think, I don't know if there's any truth to that. I'm going to bring David in here. This is a question. Could they do Blancheril Fioro in the main event of Atlantic City? Yeah, I mean, I just don't know what else they could do.

Like, Brady, Luke A, is the main event of that card makes sense because of Brady. not saying like luke can't headline a fight night because he certainly can but that one made sense because the tri-state region where that fight's happening easy drive from philly to get there so that's that's why i don't think they're going to do a replacement for luke you just probably just rebook that one at this point and just bump up blanchefield blanchefield's from new york not that far away let's just do that take a few more then we got to go we do a preview show coming up at 1 p.m. Eastern. Why is Moreno the main event over

Yair, Brian, too? Because the Moreno fight was booked and like ready to go. The Yairir, if you listen to a heck of a morning, because I think there were reports out there that they were going to do Yairier versus Brian Ortega on that card and it was going to be the main event. But what we got Moreno and Albaozi ready to go and now it's Moreno versus Roybal. The Rodriguez-Ortega fight was kind of always the plan.

But once they figured out what the pay-per-view... That kind of all changed when Dana came out and made the announcements of the first few main events of the pay-per-views. When he announced that Volcanowski-Tiporia were headlining the February card and that the event was taking place in Anaheim, there was talk about maybe doing that fight

on the Anaheim card. One, because Ortega has a big following there. Two, it's kind of like a best... back up in place in case something happens with Deporia or something happens weird with the title challengers. You always, more oftentimes than not, if there's a main event in a certain division, a lot of times they want to try to get like a marquee fight with a lot of stakes in that same division. So there were talks about maybe doing that fight in Anaheim.

In the end up doing Mexico City. And at that point, they'd already announced the Moreno fight. It got enough buzz. That's pretty much it. And they just kind of kept things where it was that. But they're both five round fights. the way you look at that, just kind of like a double main event.

And that event's going to be incredible. That is going to be incredibly fun. I know they're doing the PFL Bellator event. And they're charging people money. We don't even know how much is going to be, but I would have to guess it's going to be like 50 bucks. I kind of have a feeling people are going to be skipping that one. You have the 301 to remind fans why you don't complain about 300 to take it for granted.

Well, you might get two title fights on 301. You may get two title fights on that one. What do we got here? I think we're good. Man, real quick. Why is Gagee Fighting Holloway, not Islam? Mula. Availability.

He had kicked out of Poria so insane to me. He's getting a bag. Like, he has to be. He's got to be getting a bag. RDA versus Belcher and Gamebred? Who you got? Oh, you mean JDS? Wait, what?

Probably Belcher. Who knows? Oh, you know what? I'll talk about this real quick. When is the golf interview with Wyden dropping? Great question. The short answer is it's not. The problem with that was, like, we had a blast,

and I think the content is going to be good once we figure out how to do it. The problem was, I can only do so much by myself. I had to film it. I had to play. I had to host it. I had to do the interview. I had to do all of it. And it just wasn't a one-man job.

It was impossible to do. So we are going to do it again. And we're going to do it right. I will have like a second person with me who will help film it. And we'll do it again. And this is going to be a thing. And Chris Wyman is not the only person we have reached out about doing this as well. There are other fighters who are some very big name fighters who are extremely interested in this.

And we're going to, we're going to make it happen. Like, we're going to do it. We're going to try again. Just the way that we shot it. We tried to edit it. We tried a million things like make it look really good. And it just didn't work. And I don't want to, I don't want to introduce this segment unless it's like superbly good.

So that's why it's not going. That's why it's not coming out. Chris was hilarious. Gave me a bunch of shit. I might like release some clips of Chris just talking about how terrible. I played that day because it was awful. I played so bad that day. It forced me, watching myself swing on camera

forced me to like practice a lot more and my game has gotten a lot better. By the way, shout out to my dad. Shout out to my father. Got his first hole in one yesterday. About to be 70. First career hole in one. Big golfer.

He was so mad that I got one 10 years before he did. But he got one yesterday. So shout out to Mike. heck seen you. Papa. Getting the ace down in Florida. Good stuff. Okay.

Now we got to go. 1 p.m. Eastern. Preview show. UFC Vegas 85. Probably go for about 45 minutes or so. We will have the people's pre-fight show tomorrow 3.30 p.m. Eastern, myself and Casey. And post-fight show, on to the next one, et cetera, et cetera.

And then we'll do it again next week. So you get another apex. the apex card and then it's on to uh 298 which should be a lot of fun so thank you all enjoy the rest of your day we'll see you at 1 p.m eastern but until then have a wonderful friday and have a heck of a morning everybody you are the best hopefully we can do this a little bit more on the youtube channel and we'll probably do it right around ufc 298 time thank you very much the vox media podcast network