MMA Fighting - HOAM | Should UFC Pivot To Beneil Dariush vs. Dustin Poirier After Charles Oliveira Scratch From UFC 288?

Episode Date: April 18, 2023

With Charles Oliveira being scratched from his matchup with Beneil Dariush at UFC 288, is it too risky for the UFC to push that matchup back to UFC 289 on June 10 with Oliveira's injury, or should they pivot to a new fight between Dariush and Dustin Poirier instead? On an all-new edition of Heck of a Morning, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck makes the case as to why the UFC should do whatever they can do have Poirier step in to face Dariush in June, and how this division is looking right now with plans to have Islam Makahchev defend his title in October. Additionally, listener topics include Max Holloway's win over Arnold Allen in the main event of UFC Kansas City, the stakes in Saturday's UFC Vegas 71 main event between Curtis Blaydes and Sergei Pavlovich, Song Yadong vs. Ricky Simon being moved to the UFC Vegas 72 headliner, the UFC 290 fight card as it stands, 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

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It is Tuesday, April 18th, 2023, and it is indeed a heck of a morning. We are live on the MMA fighting Twitter spaces. You hear the show at its entirety shortly thereafter on the MMA Fighting Podcasting Network. Hi, everybody. I am Mike Heck. Hope everyone's having a great start to their week. Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend. There was combat sports action galore.

We had the PFL with prelims and post limbs and main cards. all shuffled up in random places. Livia Aubin-Mersier defeat Shane Burgos 3027. In the big fight on that card, we had the UFC back on Saturday in Kansas City. Pretty fun card. And in the end,

Max Holloway defeats Arnold Allen in the main events. And now my concerns of having that fight to begin with, they kind of come full circle right now because Max Holloway wins and now we don't have like a clear cut next guy for Alexander Volkadovsky. Now that could certainly change if Iliate Tuporia just goes out there and washes Josh Emmett in June. You can make a case there, but perhaps the UFC will be like,

ah, let's throw Iliot to Poria in there with Max Holloway. And I truly hope that doesn't happen. And I would like to publicly thank Max Holloway for not going that route, for going the Korean zombie route, and Korean zombie seems interested in that matchup, which means I am interested in that matchup. Let's have this division move forward a little bit, but it's a good fight.

Really good fight. Arnold Allen proved that he belongs in the upper echelon. He hung tough with Max, but in the end, Max Holloway got it done. The official MFA fighting scoring for that fight was 4946 for Max Holloway. I was live blogging as I was watching it. So I didn't really get to fully grasp all of it.

But I saw a lot of people. I saw a few people on Twitter. I know Ariel Hawani talked about it yesterday. My buddy Brian Campbell also initially scored it for Arnold Allen. And at first I'm like, all right, maybe I can see that. So I had to go ahead and rewatch the fight Sunday morning. And in the end, I feel like 48, 47, Arnold Allen is. Not a terrible scorecard, but it's not a great one.

I don't think there's a... I think you have to dig really deep to make that case. Now, I initially scored the fifth round for Max. Having rewatched it, I changed my tune. I think Arnold Allen won the fifth round. Wasn't scored a knockdown. It was kind of close. The thing that really leaned to me towards scoring that fifth round for Max

after that flash knockdown was Arnold Allen's body language was not good. He got up and he was pissed that he got dropped. And that's sometimes is such a difference because Max Holloway

got hit a bunch and he got hit really hard, but you would never know it. You would never know it. But when Arnold got hit in that fifth round in that final floor, he got up and he was livid

that he touched the mat. And that is just not good body language. And judges see that. And I saw that. And that's why at the initial watch, I scored the fifth round for Max, having rewatched it, I scored it for Arnold. In the end, I go 48, 47 Max. I gave Allen two and five. But two of the judges gave the second round to Max.

And I got to tell you, on the rewatch, I don't hate that card. I think there is a case to be made for Max Holloway winning that second round. So could still be 49-46 Max. 48-47 seems like the correct score. And in the end, the right guy won. And that's all that matters. So Max Holloway gets the big win. Edson Barbosa, did Edson Barbosa things to Billy Quarantillo.

I know Billy is a favorite amongst the MMA Twitter community. I am a big Billy Q fan myself. Great guy. sharp mind, good fighter. But again, and we saw this in a couple of fights on this card, it's something that reared its head at UFC 287. Experience truly matters. And I'm not just saying like the number of fights,

it's who you fights. It's the strength of schedule. And nobody has had a tougher strength of schedule over the last decade than Edson Barbosa. He is far and away, number one. Just go back and just look. at the names that this man has fought. It's absolutely ridiculous. And sometimes that experience is such a, just has such an impact on some of these fights. We saw it in the Pedro

Munoz Chris Gutierrez fight. Again, Pager's been in there with everybody, everybody, the who's who, the day, most, some of the most dangerous guys in this division. And Chris fought well, but just wasn't enough. And I think Chris, yeah, he takes a step back, but I saw a lot from Chris Gutierrez that impressed me. And I feel like Chris Gutierrez will be a bottom end of the top 15 kind of guy for years to come. I think he's going to take a lot away from this fight. And Pedro gets the job done. And we'll see what happens with that.

We had some retirements. Zach Cummings, Ed Herman, had a fight. And there's not much more I can say about it. Zach had his big moment. Both guys retired. And then we had back-to-back fake retirements with, Bill Algeo cutting a promo, and then Clay Guida does the fake retirement. Dana White was pissed about that.

We had a little bit of controversy on this card. My man, AK, my best friend, wrote his first robbery review of 2023 on the opening bout of this card. Jocelyn Edwards versus Lucy Pudolova. Jocelyn Edwards wins a split decision that had everybody scratching their heads. And in the end, not only do we get our first robbery review of 2023, according to my best friend who I trust more than anybody in these cases, that's the first robbery of 2023. Lucy Pudolova should have got that one done,

and the judges didn't score for her. And then we had Gillian Robertson, Pierre Rodriguez, the arm bar, was it a tap, was it not a tap, all that. In the end, I think the right call was made, and Jillian Robertson gets a big win in her UFC strawweight debut, Brandon Royval, just steamrolls, Mateus Nicolao. He shared our sentiments that he should have been on the main card. Even Dana White agreed that they screwed that one up.

And now Brandon Royval has put himself in a great position where he might be the backup for the Brandon Moreno, Alexander Pantosia title fights. And I'm with that. And he should absolutely get the winner of that fight. There's a storyline for both guys. And Royval has gotten over in a big way. and that was the kind of performance

that just gets you a title fight. I don't know Cop's fighting Davis and Figurado, but I think Roy Val's got to be next, and Cop can be the man after that if he goes out there and beats Figgie Smalls. So there you go. That's what's going on from this past weekend. We got some news yesterday,

and I would like to, I'm not going to take credit for this, but I think the heck of the morning community deserves credit for this because I'm not sure who actually brought up this idea. Somebody, we were talking about what was going to headline the April 29th card. And we were thinking maybe they just push Anthony Smith and Johnny Walker up a couple of weeks.

And then I forget who it was. Somebody called it and said, let's just move Song Yidong versus Ricky Simone to that spot. They're fighting the 22nd. Let's just push that to the main event. And I love that idea so much that that idea has carried over in multiple programs. And who would have thunk it? last night UFC tweets out that's the fight we're getting

in the main event of the April 29th card love that great move great job heck of a morning listeners one in particular and we made this happen it's a collective win for all of us

and I think it's because of this space I will thank that individual if I find out who it is but yeah it's much better than no offense to Kyle Barallio but wasn't ready

for a Cairo Barallo main event. I haven't been ready for any Cairo Barallio co-main events, and we've gotten a bunch of those, and it looks like we're going to get another one, but I certainly was not ready for a Caio Baralio made event at the hallowed UFC Apex.

And then who knows what's going on with UFC 288 right now? That seems to be a big question. Are they going to add another fight? Seems maybe Gilbert Burns, Bilal Muhammad, was on the table. At least that's what's being shared on social media.

Now Gilbert's calling out Dustin Porre. Very respectfully. And I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what's going to happen. I do love the Mobbzar of Loy of Bryce Mitchell upgrade. I think it's an upgrade. No offense to JSP, but I think that's an upgrade fight.

We got Maffervola jumping on the main card against Drew Dober. So that's cool. But it's not a tremendous. this main card. It's not one that I feel like a lot of the non-hardcores are going to drop $80 on this card. So let's see if the UFC could pull a rabbit out of the hat before UFC 288 on May the 6th.

We'll get to the calls in a moment. I'll reiterate this throughout the week. But quick announcements. So after the card on Saturday, I'm going to do on to the next one with AK on Sunday. but then I am on vacation for 10 days. So I will not be hosting this program. I will not be hosting any of the pre- or post-fight shows the following week.

No BTL, at least that I'm going to be hosting. We might have a heck of a morning next week and the Tuesday of the following week. We're trying to work on that. It will not be me doing it, but perhaps a special guest will be tagging in to perform those duties and give you guys a voice. and more on that over the next several days.

Hopefully we can iron that out. If not, I see the hand raising. So surprise gone. Alexander K. Lee will be the guy who will step in if we can make it work. And then I'll be back midway through UFC 288 fight week. And we'll get ready for the watch party and all sorts of fun stuff. So let's get the party started.

Abzwalia, kick us off, my man. Hi, Mikekega from morning. How are you doing? Yeah, how are you? Hi, I'm good. So I've got three questions I want to ask. So my first question is we saw Pedro Muno, he got his win on Saturday. What do you reckon should be next? In my opinion, I would like to see him fight Peter Yan.

I think it would be a perfect two-knife if Peter Ian wants to get back in the win column. My second question is, is there a good chance? we will be getting used very soon for the future PPV events that are headlining in July and August because they're not really far away. All we know is that Alexander Volk and Brandon Maria are fighting by us. There are going to be more fights announced?

Are they still going to announce possibly what they'll do with Marvin Vittori, what they'll do with, you know, Korean zombie and all that? And my third question is, is there any news where you see might want to headline the Australian card? Is there like a possibility that can be in Melbourne, in Sydney, Brisbane? Them there. Thanks, man. That's what I have to say.

Thanks, man. So from what I understand, there are talks about doing another Australia card. Max Holloway had brought it up. That's where he called for the zombie fight to do it in Australia. early fall. It's kind of the early preliminary discussions. But that'd be a fun one. I don't know where it's going to happen,

but all we know is just kind of Australia at this point. That's what's being discussed. No guarantees it happens. But I would be stunned if it doesn't at this point, but we'll see how it all plays out. As far as the July pay-per-views go, I don't know what's going to happen at this point because Dana said he wanted to make the London car.

a pay-per-view, but I'm not really sure how you do it now because you would think that they would do Leon versus Colby headlining that one if they were going to do it. But Leon did a bunch of interviews last week, including with our own Damon Martin, since July is not going to happen. So he's thinking September. If he had his druthers, it would be October on the Abu Dhabi card.

But I just don't know if they're going to wait that long to get Colby back in there. I don't know if they do an interim title fight. I don't know what they're going to do. So the initial plans were the 29th, I think. Yeah, because the 22nd is slated to be the London card. 29th was the plan all along for the second pay-per-view. And I have no idea what's going to headline that one.

No clue. And international fight week kind of seems like it's locked and loaded unless they, again, pull another rabbit out of their hat. but Volk's over in a big way. He's, I think it's fine. You get those two title fights. You just load it up with other good fights. And I think you'll be good to go.

You got bow nickel. And we'll see what sort of the rest of the slate looks like. Love to see him get Hamzaat on that card. That'd be a great little addition. But it seems like Hamzaa wants to fight in Abu Dhabi in October next. So it's kind of all up in the air right now. And as far as Pedro, I said on on to the next one.

First, let's bump the Song-I-Dong-I-Dong-Riki-Simon fight to the main event of April 29th, and then the winner can fight Pedro Munoz. We can do another fight-night-made event. Hopefully not at the apex, but probably would be. And that seems like a fine fight. Let's go to CV. Hello, C-V.

Hey, Mike. Hec of a morning. Yeah, I will take the credit for the Song-I-Dong and Ricky Simone. That was you? Yes, that was me. But no, it's everybody's idea. It's all the heck of a morning community's idea. I don't know.

Maybe they got people working for the UFC listening to these faces, like with burner accounts. I mean, who knows? But, yeah, just two quick questions for me. First off, looking ahead for this Saturday's fight night event, the main event. What are the stakes? Like, does the winner get, do they wait for the winner of me,

which and Jones, if that happens? or did they win the gone sweepstakes? And last question is, what's your early prediction for the Tank Davis and Ryan Garcia fight? Thanks. Man, I need to, I'm not ready to make a prediction for Tank Garcia yet.

That fight is incredible. That is an incredible fight. We have boots on the ground there. Casey's going to be there. So we will have you covered. on that card in multiple ways. And we'll be covering that on Saturday as well. The stakes in the main event, I don't know.

As it stands right now, I would say they're just kind of fighting for placement, really. Let's just be very clear. John Jones is Depe Mietchitz, you're going to fight. It seems like they're going to do it at MSG. That's what John Jones was saying. Dana White sort of reiterated. that. And I don't think either guy

is going to fight again unless it's against the other. At least any time soon. I think Steepay, if he beats John and John wants to run it back, I could see a whirl where they run it back. If John wins, Stepe is probably done.

John will probably walk away for a little while until something interesting comes up, because I don't Curtis Blades is interesting to him. I certainly don't think Sergey Pavlovich is interesting to him. So I guess their best hope is that whoever wins, they just hope John wins and walks away, and then they vacate the title.

And then the winner of that maybe fights, I don't know. Looks like Tommy Aspenall will be ready to come back for that London card. I'd love to see him versus Cyril Gaon headlined that one. I think that makes a ton of sense. And if Tommy wins, there you go. You do Tommy versus the winner of that fight for the vacant belt. I'm cool with that. But without knowing when this fight's actually happening with John and Steve A,

without knowing the results, it's kind of tough to say. But I don't think the stakes are incredibly high as it stands right now. But whoever wins this fight is probably going to be hoping John Jones wins and says, all right, I'm piecing out for a little while. until something interesting comes along. Let's go to Tristan. Mike, can you hear me? What's up, ma'am?

Yep. So it's confirmed that Charles Alavara versus B'Neill Darius, that's going to be on the June 10th Vancouver card, right, as a co-main event, I believe? It is not confirmed. Oh, it is not confirmed yet. Okay.

Benil is saying that's what's on the table. He's saying that, but we haven't fully confirmed that. Okay. information totally just yet but yeah that you have to kind of put it on that card and if not they probably have to move on okay yeah because when I read the article on m fainting.com but I don't know with with Charles Olivera if he's going to be 100% for that fight because he said he has a minor injury he hasn't even stopped training yet he's going to try to train next week and then I mean this is

kind of similar to when Jeff Neal for Shafka-Rakmano. You remember, it was part in January. The fight was supposed to be in January, and then Neil got hurt, and then they rebooked it for March. But heading into that fight, Jeff Neal wasn't 100% healthy. Now, you know, with him being so tough, he was able to put still a great performance, but not at his best. I don't think Charles O'Vare is going to be close to 100%.

I mean, and then then you got to, then you got to worry if he's going to miss weight. So, and he talked about that going into the Islam fight. He wasn't 100% healthy and he doesn't want to do that again. So, I mean, just your thoughts on that. I mean, I like, I think you said it yesterday or any last week. I think somebody said it. This could just give Meneo Darius the title shot at Abu Dhabi against Islam and call it a day, you know, because it's just you're running the risks of Charles Olvera not being.

really, really healthy for that fight and maybe not going to put a good performance, or I might be wrong about it, but I just, I don't know about that. What do you think? So what's it? What was interesting about, and this is one of the things that kind of drives you crazy about social media and everything when it comes to news is that Benil did that interview with the Schmo and it came out that, oh, the fight's pushed back to June. No, it isn't. That's just what Benile said was offered to him. Yeah, we're hoping to do it in June. And I said yes. That doesn't mean it's done for the exact reasons you just said. It's, we don't know if Charles Oliver is going to be ready. He's going to train next week. And what if he trains and the injury

isn't any better? Then what are you going to do now? So as interesting as that was, the most interesting thing that Benile Daryush has said. And he said it. with the submission radio guys as well, is that when he told the UFC, just give me the title shot, you know what they told him? Something I've been saying for a while. They said,

Dustin Porrier is the number one contender right now. Dustin Porriere is the number one contender. I've been shouting this from the rooftops ever since he beat Michael Chandler and ever since Islam B. Volcanowski, it would not shock me at all if Dustin Porriere gets, the next title shot.

And look at the position we're in right now. If Benny beats Oliverer, sure. But if Oliver wins, they're going to give Dustin the title shot. And some people thought I was crazy. I'm not crazy because that's what Benile there you're just told. That Dustin's the number one contender and that you're probably not getting a title shot. So what I would suggest is I would just scratch this fight altogether. Let Olivera heal up and maybe you chuck them on a

different card and you try to get Dusted Porriere, because Dustin's saying he wants to fight, Ariel is saying that Dustin would take the Daryush fight right now. And this is another thing that I think kind of got taken the wrong way, is that after Dusted beat Michael Chandler, there's this notion that Duster was like, nah, I'm not interested in fighting B'arayevish. That's not really what he said.

The question he was asked at that post-fight press conference was, would you be willing to turn around and fight veneal Daryouche on that February UFC 284 card maybe it's like a backup fight, number one contender fight? And Dustin said, no, I'm not really interested in that. And the biggest reason why is because he had to make a lot of changes. He had to pull his daughter out of school to get ready for the Chandler fight at MSG. So he said, I don't want to do that to my daughter.

again and have to uproot my family in the middle of the school year again. So I'm probably not going to fight till June or July. So that's, that was the biggest reason why. Seems like he's more interested now because the timing is a little bit better. I don't know if he's going to fight May 6th, but to me, if you can get Dustin to fight June 10th, do that. That's what I would do. do Darius versus Porreier

winner gets Islam works for me and then Olivera can heal up and when he's ready to go he could fight somebody else he could fight Is anyone going to complain if we see Oliver Gagchi too? I don't think so

I don't think anybody's going to complain about that or Oliver could fight if Darius loses they could still do Oliver versus Darius you still have options but there's no need to rush Olivera if Porre wants to fight. And Porre seems like he wants to freaking fight.

So that's not a bad idea. And that frigging card could use that fight badly. You could throw it on the International Fight Week card too. But again, but my concern with that is those two are probably going to beat the shit out of each other. And I just don't know if we can turn either of those whoever wins that fight around quick enough to be able to fight Islam in Abu Dhabi. So you got to make some waves But if Darius is just going to fight And it seems like he needs to

To get a title shot He has to fight in May or June I don't think I think July Unless he's willing to To risk it for the biscuit as the kids say And hope that he doesn't sustain Any major injuries or anything that's going to keep him out So that he's able to turn around

Three months later And fight for the title I don't know. But if Poria wants to fight, just pay the man his money and let's do that. I like that idea. But we'll see.

Maybe Oliver is fine. Maybe he'll train next week and be good to go. 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. Gold tenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes.

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Hey, Mike. I agree. I definitely do feel that, what's the call, you got to put something off of that June 10th card. You can't have two thinkers of people. reviews back to back, which feels May 6th card isn't it. I don't think so many people are going to be buying it.

I have a conception that maybe this is just what's the call Dana's way of, you know, finally putting two people that he doesn't really care for as the main event for May 6 and saying, see, you guys don't bring good numbers to the table

and making sure this card isn't, you know, that's just my opinion. I wanted to talk about Max. I definitely felt that Max won. I don't think it was Arnold didn't win. I agree. I don't think Arnold should have ever, what's the quote,

showed any type of expression that he felt like he got defeated at the end of the fifth because, you know, judges do see that. I love the fact that Max said he wanted to fight Korean zombie. But one thing that did bother me was I saw on on the mmafighting.com IG page that Volcanowski was complaining saying that, you know,

he's beating up his contenders. My problem with Volcanowski is this. You have the ability to call these people out. Instead, you're just complaining, wanting another crack at Islam for the lightweight title. Call these people out, you know. Call out your Bryce Mitchells, your Maas, your Aloyves,

your Ilya supporters and stuff like that. I know he's fighting Eir and stuff like that, But at one point, he was even debating on trying to go up to lightweight again and avoiding that year-year-a-fight. And then we're going to have the same situation where featherweight is in shambles when it comes to, you know, a whole backload. Now, my whole thing is this. I'm looking at the featherweight division. And I see that Brian Orsiga, he's still ranked inside the top six. The man hasn't had like a really good decent win.

I mean, yeah, he beat Korean zombie, what was it, 2020. he has had like a really good win in such a long time i mean i was at the long island card and i mean ii rhodriguez was putting work on him and in the last three fights that he has had what's it called what it didn't look that great in my opinion i mean i just i don't know i just feel like ortega i don't know where you guys have ranked in your global rankings but i just think that brian rtega needs to be off um he hasn't had a good win in quite some time and And, yeah, I mean, what's next for him? I mean, I would like to see him fight Giga Chaconci,

but he hasn't been anywhere in the news as for wanting to have a fight. And like I said before, in the previous show, I'm glad what's it called? Royville ended up expressing his feelings as for not being on the prelims. It's a crime. It's a travesty that Royville versus, what's the call? I forgot his name. I have like a brain for it right now.

that they were on the prelims and not even the feature prelums but hopefully Royvo has never featured on the prelums ever again. We have, yeah, I don't think Royvel will be a prelim fighter anymore. I don't know what's X-Fortega.

I don't know. Maybe the Bryce Mitchell Movsar of Voiv winner. I think of Voiv beats Bryce, that's the fight to make. That's the fight to make. I'm not, I'm not,

I'm not sold on Giga Chikaze. I'm not. I'm not. He, I mean, he got the wood put to him by Calvin Cater. I'm just not convinced yet. I need to see more from him.

I need to see more from him before I'm willing to throw him in there with the Brian Ortega. So, I mean, you could do the Teporia Emmett loser. But I actually like the Obloia fight if he wins. I think that makes perfect sense.

I think that's the way to go. But we have him, it's going to change a little bit, because we haven't updated him. But right now, he is tied for fifth in our rankings with Arnold Allen. So, yeah, we might not be a ton of movement from there. He might remain that way. Or he might drop a spot, and Ortega will be number five by himself. But look, he's been out for a while.

He's had injuries. I suffered a pretty bad injury against Yair. He's had some bad luck. That was a great performance against TKZ. That was a really good performance. And he beat TKZ up on the feet, the whole fight. So, yeah, we'll see. And I agree with Volk about the hallway thing.

They should have never made the Allen fight to begin with. But it was a great fight, and now Allen, Hallow, let's fight Korean zombie. and that's what they should do. Clay, hello. Hello, Mike. How's he going? Good, man.

How are you? Good. I got two questions for you. What do you think is on the line for Curse Plades and Pavlovich this weekend? You know, being John Jones in the Shadows, I don't know what's on the line. And my second question is, do you have predictions for that main event? So we addressed the stakes earlier. I don't think there's much, man.

Like, I don't think there's much. I think they're just fighting to keep their spot. John Jones or Stepe Meitchits, neither of those guys are fighting either of these guys. They're just not going to. They're going to fight each other. If Stepe wins, John will probably get a rematch, even though we hate immediate rematches for the most part, but you know the UFC's going to try to strike while the iron's hot.

And if John wins, I see a world where he's just like, all right, I'm out of here. Not like retire, retire, but he's just going to vacate the belt, sit back. something really interesting comes along. A new star is developed, so to speak. Maybe he comes back. But here's the thing, man. Like, we got some big...

And when I talked about this earlier, Curtis Blades has deserved a title shot for like three years now. And never got one. And I don't think he's going to get one. Sergei, he's going out there and just finishing people. So I don't know. I think what they're fighting for is the hope that John beats Stepe and then John walks away. And then we can do the winner that fights somebody else for the vacant title.

I also feel, and I didn't even mention this the first time, they moved, they shuffled up the UFC Charlotte card. It's an ABC card and they put Jailton Al-Meda in the main event against Jarzina Rosenstrike. Now there is a very real world where Jailton Almeida just runs over Jarazini Rosenstrike. There's a very real world that happens. And to me, the UFC is making that move because they want to get Jailton Almeida over. This is not to get Jarlizio over. This is to get Jailton on the radar because getting on ABC, getting on network television is a very big deal. And you put this big monstrous dude who looks great getting off the boss and just,

Steamrolls everybody. And now he's in a main-in-man spot. So maybe they're fighting for the winner. Basically if Jailton wins, maybe they're fighting to fight Jailton. Maybe it's a vacant title fight. I don't know. Plus we get Tommy Aspenall coming back.

We'll see who he's going to fight. Probably on that London card. Cyril Gahn makes sense to me. And we'll kind of see how this all plays out. but I don't think they're fighting for really much at this point. Because John isn't going to fight either of these guys, and Stipe's certainly isn't going to fight either of these guys. So it's kind of a weird position we're in right now at heavyweight,

but my guess as of right now, especially with the timing, winner's probably going to fight Jeltsin Almeida if he beats Jarzanio Rosenstrike. That's what I think. And I'm picking Curtis Blitz to beat Sergey Papalovich. Matt, hello. Matt, are you there? I've got something for you. I know that this is going to be controversial for you, Mike.

But how would we feel if, let's say that triple C goes in and starches algebra, instead of just giving him the belt at 145, why don't we let him fight Max Holloway? I know that that's just taking another contender away from Alex. but I feel like, you know, everybody complains about Henry just going straight up to 145. So why don't we just give him a real contender and a real fight at 145 instead of giving him straight the belt? Well, what's going to happen is, look, Henry's not an idiot. He's the worst retireer in the history of combat sports. There's no doubt about that.

But he's also smart enough to realize that the big bag of money for him right now, that's realistic. is not the Volcanovsky fight. It is the Shano Malley fight. So I think if Suhudo beat Sterling, he'll fight Shano Malley and kind of go from there. I don't think Suhudo's going to go up to 45 and fight Max. I just don't know if that's going to happen. An interesting idea, though, is,

because I don't know, U.S. Cic's Suhudo is something bigger than he is. Because I just don't think he's like a big star. I still think Stirling screwed the pooch by not going all in on O'Malley after he beat T.J. Dillashaw, but that's the past and we're going to get this fight. Whoever wins is probably going to fight Sean O'Malley. But maybe Aljo is just like, dude, this weight cuts too much.

My dude, Marob deserves it. I just don't know if the UFC would just chuck Sterling in there with Volk right away. Sterling versus Holloway would be interesting. I think it would be more likely that that happens if Aljo wins and wants to move up to 45. Because I don't think they're going to just chuck him in there and fight Volk. I just don't think that. I don't know if that happens.

So who don't fight O'Malley if he wins that? He's definitely going to be like, I ain't fighting again until I fight Volk. And who knows where Volk's going to be at that point? Maybe Volk's just like, you know what? If I have to vacate the belt to fight Mokachev again, then cool. I'll do that. I don't know. I don't know what's going to happen, but be an interesting fight.

Be an interesting fight. I just don't think that happens. We'll go to Devil's Advocate. Then we'll go to J.D., and then we'll go to the hardcore casual. Devil's Advocate. Hey, Mike, how you doing, buddy? Good. Good.

I saw the golf swing the other day. I assume that was you. You posted on Twitter looking good, dude. Looks great. Oh, that was a minute. Oh, okay. That was John Rahm, man. That was John Ron.

I was going to say. I was like, wow, Mike's got, wow, Mike's going to be in the next PGA game. No, I wish I had a golf swing like John Rom. Jesus, Louise. Yeah, tell me about it, bro. I had a question. I was wondering what you and other fans would think of Justin versus Dustin for title contention. When I hear their name is being tossed around with other people, I kind of get like nervous

because I really want to see that fight. And I would think other fans would want to see it too. The caveat, though, I feel, and I would like to know what you think, I don't see either one of them beating Islam, unfortunately. I see those fights going the same way they did with Habib. You know, I was also, I'm not ashamed to admit that I was kind of on the fence with all the Dagestani wrestlers. Oh, this is all they do, blah, blah, blah.

And then I actually went down a rabbit hole for a couple of days of watching all of the stuff that Javier Mendez has posted to YouTube of like behind the scenes with all the guys at AKA. And you just grow to love all the Russians because they're all such cool guys. So I was just curious what you thought about that whole thing. And do you actually think either one of them, could beat Islam, even though we're all assuming now that he's slightly possibly better than Habib. So I don't think he's better than Habib.

I think Volk kind of prove that. And I'm not taking anything away from Volkovsky, but I just don't, like, I think if Volkanovsky fought Habib, he's not having the same success. I just don't think he is. But there is only one Habib. And if Islam is a shade below Habib, that's still pretty pretty. damn good. It's still pretty damn good place to be. Habib is kind of an anomaly. And look, Gaichi had a little bit of success against Habib. He ended up getting tackled and submitted,

but Gaichi won that first round in a lot of people's eyes. So I don't know. Look, I love, look, I love Dustin, Justin, too. I think it's a great fight, but I've been hesitant on it because we had this Daryush Olivera fight on the table, and I've been saying since February, I really think Dustin Porre is the guy the UFC is going to want to put in that title fight. And B'Neil Darius basically confirmed that

after he lost the Olivera fight. He's done the media rounds, told submission radio yesterday, I said, all right, just give me the title shot. And he was told by the UFC, Dustin Pori is the number one contender. So you kind of have to fight. So, weird spot. And if you're Dustin Porre, yeah, the Justin fight's cool.

But if you get a chance to fight for the belt, like, go fight for the belt. I don't know. I don't know what they're going to do. I don't know what's going to happen. Derrish needs to fight somebody. He knows it. And I think the timing actually works out. Maybe he could just fight Dustin Porier.

I think that fight makes perfect sense at this point. Why rush Oliver back? If you're Darius, do you want to fight a somewhat injured Charles Olivera and hear the excuses, well, he was hurt? If he wasn't heard, he would have lost that fight. Just chuck him in there with Dustin. Dude wants to fight.

Number one contender fight. There you go. But it's got to happen probably on that June card for multiple reasons. One, because that 289 card is god-awful right now. And two, you've got to be able to turn one of these guys around. But if they rebook Olivera and Darius wins, that we can do Dustin and Justin too. But if Oliver wins, Dustin's probably fighting for the belt.

Let's go to JD. What's up, J.D.? I can. Oh, awesome. How are you doing good, buddy? I'm doing good. What's on your mind? All right.

So I've got two questions for you. I'm not sure if you covered this, but is the Iliot Tuporia versus Josh Emmett fight for Jacksonville. Is that location confirmed? And then follow up, is there anything on the new, anything of swirling around about the UFC coming back to Atlanta? That's all I got for you, man. Thanks.

I've heard nothing about Atlanta. I saw the report about Toporia Emmett being pushed back to the Jacksonville card, which is supposed to looks like June 24th. is going to be that one. I know that originally was set for June 17th. They wanted to do it in front of fans. We reached out. We were basically told that was news to both sides,

but that doesn't mean it's not going to happen. I don't know, man. Like, I don't know if Ilya and Josh are, look, we love both of them. We love both those guys. We see Ilya as a potential star. We see this. but if you're from Jacksonville and Dana-Wa is like we weren't going to give them a card because we owe them.

We owe them a thank you for letting us host events during the pandemic. And it seems like this would be the last one to kind of get that deal finalized, if you will. Is Josh Emmett Ilyat-Illia Teporia the type of fight that is going to sell 15,000 tickets? I don't know. I don't know. I like the fight, but am I going to drop $100 to sit in the nosebleeds to watch that fight? I don't know. That's tough.

I don't think it's going to sell out that building. Unless you just load it up with other fights. I don't know. But from what we were told when we saw this report on Sunday, it was kind of news to everybody. But it could still happen. I don't know. But again, I just don't know if that one fills an arena.

It's a tough one. Let's go to Hardcore Casual. Hello, Hardcore Casual. Hey, what's going on there, Mike? Do you hear me? Yes, sir. Hey, so I know I was listening to the Believe You Me podcast with BizBing. And they were talking to Clay Guita last week.

He was talking about his UFC debut at UFC 64. I started doing some research on some fighters. I know John Jones made his appearance in, like, I think the high 80s, 85, 86, something like that. I was thinking about this coming up, I mean, not soon soon, but we have UFC 300 coming up. I was thinking about what other fighters have been around for the pre-100s, fought in the hundreds, in the 200s, I was thinking about maybe like UFC 300, potentially being like a legacy card, where it's fighters who've been around for those years of the UFC.

I just didn't know what other fighters have been around that long. And if you think that might be, you know, a neat idea, like a legacy UFC 300 card. I don't know. Just an offhand topic. thinking about it last night doing a little bit of research and I couldn't seem to find any other fighters that have been around that long. I don't know. No real crazy question. I was just thinking about it. Maybe you got some more for me as my name says. I'm a casual, hardcore casual,

so I don't really know how many of the other fighters have been around that long. Thanks, Mike. Have a good one. Yeah, it's kind of tough. Top of my head, and I don't even know if this is for sure, but Joe Lozon, I think he's like the the most tenured ultimate fighter contestant that's still in the UFC right now. And I think he debuted before UFC 100,

I believe. So he's one of them. Matt Brown's probably pretty close. Yeah, there's not a ton. John was there, but had John not gotten popped before the D.C. fight of UFC 200, John would be kind of a no-brainer

because he fought at 100 as well on the prelims, which goes to show you. But yeah, I'll have to look a little deeper in that. There ain't many left. We had one of them and he retired on Saturday. Clay's obviously been around for a minute as well. Yeah, like Jolo's on Jim Miller,

guys like that. But a lot of these guys have moved on to other things at this point. So let's go to, to Zeeke. What's up, Zeke? My man, Mike, how are we? Good. How are you? I'm going to keep it short and treat for you on this Tuesday.

I talked to you about Sang Yadong and Ricky Simone. I'm not going to tell you a lie. I thought Sang Yadong was putting it together his last time out and then Corey Sanhagen just absolutely overwhelmed him. What are you thinking? I mean, look, I love the main events. It was, again, I give CV

the credit now that I know, but it's a fight that came together. here on this platform, and we made it happen. So it's a good fight. It's a good fight. It should be the headliner with what's available. I thought Song looked pretty good in the Sanhagen fight. The doctor stoppage kind of stunk,

but it was one of those sort of performances where you're just like, all right, this dude's real good. And he's super young. Like Song Yidong is a young man. And he's nowhere near how good he's. he's going to be. And that's the scary about him. And Ricky Simone just is a freak athlete,

starting to put it all together. It's a really interesting fight. It's a really interesting. Song Yidong is 25. He's a young man. Ricky's only 30. He'll be 31 this summer. So he's still, he's like smack dab in the middle of his athletic prime.

And we saw, and we saw what he did to Jack Shore. Like those, there's just one of those fights. Like Jedd and I talk about this all the time. It's just one of those fights where you just realize that Ricky's just playing on a different field right now with his athleticism. Like Jack just could not keep up with him athletically. You can talk about the weight cutting stuff all you want. But if they fought at 45, if that fight was at featherweight instead of bannamite, the same thing would have happened.

The same thing would have happened. Ricky is just a freak athlete. So that's an interesting fight. Song is the better striker than Ricky, but Ricky's athleticism, any sort of space that there is between Song Yadong and Ricky Simone on the feet, Ricky's athleticism, his intelligence, his fight IQ, it kind of closes that gap a little bit. And I think on the ground, Ricky's is better.

So great fight. Should be the main event. I'm pumped for it. I am pumped for it. So last call for people. if you want to hop in here. Sorry, I'm doing multiple things at the same time. So Saturday,

I'm actually going to be before the UFC card. I'm going to be competing in a CrossFit competition. Doing something, one of my goals for this year is to do a bunch of things that I necessarily wouldn't really do. things that make me nervous and take me out of my comfort zone. And so Saturday, me and another gentleman that goes to the gym,

we're going to compete in a competition against like 36 other teams. And we're going to see how this damn thing goes. So very excited about that and very nervous. This is going to be a bunch of people there watching me lift things and do weird exercises. So I don't know how I feel about that,

but we're going to do something a little crazy and then that'll be over and I'll come home and I'll take a shower and then we'll do the People's Pre-Fight show for Pavlovich versus Blades. I think this is UFC Vegas 71. So yeah, that's what my Saturday is going to consist of. All right, I think we're good here, everybody.

Thank you very much. Back on Thursday, 10 a.m. Eastern, we will do it. Oh, wait a minute. Yeah, yeah, wants to hop in and who am I to deny that? Yeah, yeah. I glad I got it before you went off What's going on?

How are you? Good, good. I just looked at the problems for this Saturday. I see that Muhammad Usman is going to be fighting. What do you think about his debut? How do you think he's going to do? I don't know. I don't know. What's the betting line on that fight?

I would say Usman's pro. Oh, no. Top is the favorite. Minus 1.15. It's basically a pick-em. is minus 115, Ushman's minus 105. I lean Uspin slightly just because of the wrestling, but top is good, man.

That dude can frigging crack. And it's not like, like he's fought in some, like, lower level promotions early on. Like you fought for beat down promotions, hex fight series, but his last two fights isn't brave. Fought for,

fought at Risen 40 against a 6-1 dude and starched him in 90 seconds. Top is good, man. He's good. I'll be intrigued to see how he does on the mat. I don't think Muhammad Usen wants to have like a straight kickboxing battle with Junior Tafa

because that's probably not going to go well for him. But I could see a world where Usman just kind of tackles him and wins the fight this way. Wins the fight that way. But the difference is Tafa is, Like, Taf is a young guy, 26 years old. Usman much more seasoned, if you will.

He's 34. And yeah, he won his last fight against Zach Pauga to win the ultimate fighter, but I don't really put a lot of stock in that win. I mean, it's a good performance. He had a sick knockout. But Zach's a 205er. Tava is like a legit heavyweight. so and you can probably make a case that this is the toughest matchup he's had he fought don't

d'ontail maize but he lost that fight fought brandon sails he lost that fight he got tapped in that one i don't know i think i'm talking myself more into justin taffa here but oushman does have that wrestling if he needs to if he fights smart and just tries to get this to the ground he's got a good chance, but if he wants to have a striking battle with Justin Taffa, it's not going to go well for him. I don't think so. Closely line fight for a reason. That'll probably be like a dogg or pass type situation for the betters, but yeah, it's

good fight, and I don't think the UFC loses a lot either way. Justin's an exciting guy. He's good on the mic. Oussman is his car is brother, you know? It's the younger brother. I mean, they've been trying to build this guy forever. Titan FC. Try to really do something with him.

And the problem was he just never really had like a great showing. They fought for Tachi Palace, lost to Dantel Maze. And then he went to Titan and Tyson wanted to put him over. Got a decision. A couple finishes against guys that weren't really good. And then he went to PFL and got tapped in his first BFL fight. So we'll see. We'll see.

But the youth, the athleticism, I think it's more with Taffa, but Oussman's got that wrestling if he needs it. And maybe that'll be enough to get it done. But all right, everybody. Thank you. Let's do this again. Back on Thursday, 10 a.m. Eastern. And enjoy the rest of your Tuesday, everybody.

Have a great rest of your day. And as always, have a heck of a morning. You're almost at the finish line. But first, there, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes. Hi, I'm Sophia Prokero, host of the Before the Chorus podcast. We dive into the life experiences behind the music we love. Artists of all genres are welcome.

And I've been joined by some pretty amazing folks, like glass animals. I guess that was the idea was to try something personal and see what happened. and Japanese breakfast. I thought that the most surprising thing I could offer was an album about joy. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. Oh, and remember, so much happens before the chorus.