MMA Fighting - HOAM | Win or Lose, What's Next For Khamzat Chimaev After UFC 294 Fight With Paulo Costa?

Episode Date: September 14, 2023

Khamzat Chimaev is scheduled to face Paulo Costa at UFC 294 in October, which will serve as Chimaev's first octagon appearance in over a year. While some are predicting Chimaev's reign of terror will continue on, he will have his hands full with the one-time title challenger. Where does Chimaev go with a win, and even more wild, what happens in Chimaev is defeated in Abu Dhabi? On an all-new edition of Heck of a Morning, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck attempts to answer that question, along with whether or not Chimaev's welterweight days are officially over regardless of the result against Costa. Additionally, listener questions include the incredible episode of Dana White's Contender Series on Tuesday, Kevin Holland's Noche UFC media day where he went in on a reporter asking about his title hopes, Holland's fight with Jack Della Maddalena, Raul Rosas Jr. returning to the octagon on Saturday, the stakes in the Curtis Blaydes vs. Jailton Almeida fight Nov. 4 in Sao Paulo, 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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Shortly thereafter on the M.A. Fighting Podcasting Network. What's up everybody? I am Mike Heck. Hope everyone's having a great week. Hope you're all enjoying this new world we live in where Sean Strickland is the UFC Middleweight Champion of the world. It's been a very busy week as far as reactions to that goes. And we're not done yet.

The UFC 293 hangover is real. We'll have a BTL later on today at 1230 Eastern. It'll be Jed and New York Rick. coming on to react to all this news five days later. We got Noce UFC coming up on Saturday. It's a free card. I mean, somewhat. You get a heavy ESPN plus, but still,

you're not having to pay $85 for a title fight, which is pretty sweet. We got Alexa Grasso versus Valentina Schochenko 2. For the flyway title, Valentina Schochenko will look to exact some revenge. We have Kevin Holland versus Jack Delamadelina. Really interesting fight at 170 in the co-main event. We have the return of Raoul Roses Jr., his first fight since suffering his first pro loss. The 18-year-old takes on Terrence Mitchell.

We get Daniel Zellhuber, a very exciting prospect at 155, taking on Christos Gigos, who has just fought a murderer's row since coming to the UFC. Fernando Padilla versus Kyle Nelson. We got Lupi Godinez, Elise. Reed, Roman Copulov, Josh Fremt, Edgar Chiresz versus Daniel Lacerda. Kind of buried on the prelands, if you ask me, Tracy Cortez versus Jasmine, Jazz DeVicius. I think that one should be a little bit higher up on the card. We have the debuting Charlie Campbell taking on the returning Alex Reyes, who returns

to the Octagon for the first time in six years, six years to the day. Alex Reyes is back and then kicking things off we have Josephine Knudsen versus fellow UFC newcomer Marnik man so a lot going on Bellator 301

we had a bunch of big fights announced for that so there's a lot going on right now so let's hear from you guys and gals and we'll get right into it Thomas you are up first go right ahead I just wanted to bring up

I don't know if you seen it on Tuesday would have been Tuesday morning here or Tuesday evening for yourselves. The Dana White's Contender series, I know you're quite critical of it, but I thought it was probably, I've watched all of the season so far and I probably thought it was the best

episode yet. It was just, every fight was just a banger. How was it? Yes. Look, let me just clarify something. I'm not critical of the show. I like the show. I've always liked the show. I have

been into the program since it began. The problem I have with the show and that I've been having the last few seasons is that all you have to do to get a contract essentially is win. Like it can be a boring performance. Like Dana White awarded a contract to the guy that he said put on the most boring fight he's ever,

one of the most boring fights he's ever seen, maybe the most boring fight that has ever happened on the contender series. And he still gave the guy a contract. that's my issue with it. That's my issue with it. The stakes are lower than ever on the contender series. And I get it.

Like I totally understand it because it's a business thing. And we have a million cards we have to fill up. There's fight nights. There's apex cards. There's the traveling road show fight nights. There's the pay-per-views. And there's, you know, 13, 14, 15 fights that are supposed to be slated for all these cards. So we need to have bodies and bringing on contender series.

fighters at 10 and 10 or 12 and 12 wherever they're at, it's an easy way to make a ton of money, especially on those Apex shows where it's in your building. People are paying astronomical prices to go and have the Apex experience. So I get it from a business perspective. I'm not dogging the UFC for that. I understand why people are upset about it. But look, this is the world we live in and the UFC is printing money. This episode of the show was incredible.

And to me, after watching, I've watched like every single contender series over the last couple of years, but I watched this one. And golly, this was, I don't know if it was, I mean, it's, I don't want to be a prisoner of the moment. But you can make a very strong case that this is the best contender series episode there ever was. It was so good. From the first fight, Matsumoto and Casey Tanner, that fight was incredible. That fight was amazing. And I have a feeling Casey Tanner's going to get an opportunity in the UFC sooner rather than later. The performance of Julia Palastry was nasty.

Great rear naked choke. Stephen Wynne has been on the show. It seems like 500 times. Finally exercises the demons. That fight with A.J. Cunningham was insane for as long as it lasted. Jonana, Denise, Eduardo Nevis, crazy knockout there. And then the main event was super fun too. Like, it was a great episode.

It was a great episode. And I like the fact that Dana awarded contracts to all the fighters because they deserved it. But instead of offering contracts to the fighters who lost, he gave them their win money. And like, I like that. I like that. The one thing that's been missing from the last couple of seasons is, while we've had some great performances and a lot of these prospects are very good, some of them just aren't UFC ready. They're just not.

I miss the days where if Dane is excited about a guy, but they're not ready, he doesn't just usher them into the UFC. We had the deal where you could fight around, I forget what the actual terminology is, but it's a deal where you're signed to the UFC, but you're not fighting in the UFC. Chase Hooper got one, William Knight got one.

I liked those deals. I liked those, and I wish there were more of those. So we could see some of these prospects with high floors and unknown ceilings get a chance to spread their wings and gain some experience on some big shows before just getting thrust into a UFC card and not being ready for it. So I'm not critical of the show. I'm critical of the stakes involved more than anything. But this episode was fucking incredible. It was incredible. And if you haven't watched it, I highly recommend you go back and watch it because it was awesome.

it was awesome. It was a great episode. Those fighters all showed up. Yes, Foran, Sniper. How are you? Hey, I'm good. How are you? Good. Hey, heck of a morning. Just real quick, I wanted to talk about a matchup between Raoul Roses and Terrence Mitchell this weekend. I think the UFC did a great job matching up Raul Roses with Terrence Mitchell. This is probably the most favorable matchup you could have gave Raoul. He's a minus, I think, 800 right now. I honestly think he should be minus. 1200 because I think he's going to run through Terrence. I just wanted your opinion on the matchup between those two and what do you think is going to happen?

Yeah, this is a good bounce back fight. And Terrence, look, I know Terrence is kind of being brought in here to, I don't know, to be kind of a showcase for Al Roses Jr., to be a bounceback, if you will. But Terrence has been up and down the block a few times. This guy's not bad. Like, he's not bad. he's an exciting fighter. He's an exciting guy.

And if you even go back to his debut in the UFC where he fought Cameron Simon, like that was, he ended up getting knocked out in that fight, but that was like a fun fight while it lasted. So Terrence has been in there with some decent competition. He's got a really good ground game, probably a little underrated here.

But yeah, dude, we know what this is going to be. Like Terrence is going to bring a fight to Raul and allow him to do what he does best. Now, do I think Raul will go in there and just choke him unconscious? It's possible. But we could see Raul Rosh's Jr. get himself a little bit of a knocko right now. Like, I think there's, I was listening to No Betz Bard,

and I kind of agree with Jed and G.C., because there is opportunity for Raul Rosh's Jr. to get a knockout. I don't know if it's a standing one, but probably more of a TKO where he gets him down. Maybe Terrence defend some submissions, and Raul Rosh's Jr. just throws a bunch of elbows and punches

and gets him out of there. So, yeah, this should be a good bounce back for Roses Jr. I think he needed to be humbled a little bit, and he certainly was by Christian Rodriguez, and he's still got some swag and some confidence to him, but we'll see how he does here.

He needs to go out and just run Terrence Mitchell over. He goes out and wins a 29-28 decision. Not very good. A win is a win, that's important, but for what they're trying to accomplish here, Rose is winning a competitive decision is not the road to travel here if you're the UFC or Raoul Roes Jr. So yeah, I expect Raul Roche Jr. to get Terrence, Mitchell, out of there. I think there's some value to a KOT, K.O. Prop won't be a standing knockout, I don't think,

but Terrence is pretty good on the ground. He's got pretty good defensive grappling. But he does get, he does have trouble with some ground and pound. And I think this is a, spot for Raul Roches Jr. to possibly get a TKO. That will be my official staff pick for M.A. fighting, either first or second round, TKO for Raul Rosh's Jr. But if he submits him, wouldn't surprise me at all. Would it not surprise me at all. But I think we all know what this fight is at least put on paper to be. But we also live in a world where Sean Strickland's the middleweight champion. So anything can happen in the sport. It is official and that's how it works. moment a laa go ahead

yes sir how are you doing today good how are you I'm good man I was just wondering what do you think would be next for the loser between Chamaev and Costa

if it was for Chamaev do you think you would go back to Walterway and challenge there again or do you think you would come back bounce again and challenge again and try our 185 that's a really

interesting question And honestly, when you're dealing When you're talking about a guy like Hamzat Shamaa, if it's not a question that you really ask yourself that off because you just expect Hamzat to go in there and do Hamzat things and just run over his competition. But Paul Koss is a tough fight, man. He is a tough fight.

The dude is a dog. And, but if he lose, if he lose Apollo, it's not good. It's not good. And I don't know if going back to 170 is going to really work. here because I don't know if you guys have seen photos of Hamzat on social media. Dude looks like he thicked up a little bit and put on some muscle. And being able to make that cut back to 170 is going to be super difficult.

It's going to be super difficult. So I kind of feel like his path is still at 185 even if he loses this fight. But you just go back to the drawing board, get a little more active. And if Hamzat loses, like, it's going to be a bad week for him. He's got to get shit on by a lot of the dopes in the MMA community saying he was never that good to begin with. I mean, look what Israel-Asania is dealing with right now. Oh, Izzy was never that good. Eugene Barriman was never that good of a coach.

Like, this is what the reactions are like sometimes. So Hamzaa will have a bad week. But if he goes out and just fights like a high-level middleweight wins, like he's right back in there. But the key to Shabaev's success at this point is just getting out there. and being active. Like, this guy was, like, on his way to becoming a massive star. Now, again, for the second time in, like, three or four years, we have to wait over a year for him to fight.

That's a huge thing. He goes out there and wipes the floor with, mops the floor with Paul Costa, and then is ready to fight like five months later. It's a good spot to be. But if he loses, I don't think 170 is the answer. I've said this a million times. I was in Jacksonville for Fight Week when he fought Gilbert Burns.

I stood next to that man. I have no friggin idea how that man made 170. No idea. Hamza could fight it. Like, standing next to him, like my first thought was, dude, this guy could fight at 205 if he wanted to.

Like, if he put out a little more size, he could fight at 205. He's that big. He's humongous. A giant. So, no, I don't think 170 will be the answer if he loses that fight. Shout out.

to the comments, developmental deal. That's the word I was looking for for contenders series. Tocke, go ahead, my man. It's kind of crazy that last week was the pay-per-view, and this is the free card. This card looks insane. So I'm just amazed that this is not a pay-per-view. But other than that, you know,

I'm the Danish correspondent on this show, of course. So there's just been announced a fight between Nicholas Dolby and Gabriel Bonfee. I don't know what it is with the UFC and booking Danes against Brazilians. They've had it all throughout, if you look through the fighters that they've had, Mass Bernal, his first fight in the UFC was Michel Paceres at Lightweight. And lightweight, Paceres is not lightweight, Praceres. But they've had it with all the other Danish fighters as well,

Damia Hatsuvic getting sent off to die in Brazil against Canato Moikano. And yeah, they've done it with almost all of them. And they're doing it here again. I don't know how have you seen that matchup. If you see Dolby having any chance against Bonfim, or if you just see this as a slaughter in Sao Paulo. I don't know, man. I don't know.

Let me take a gander here. When is this fight happening? When is this fight happening? November 4th, it'll be, yeah, South Paulo card. I mean, look, man, he's. He does very well against the Brazilian fighters. He does very well. And he usually wins when he fights in Brazil.

So I ain't count him that man out at all. Like look at his resume in the UFC. Win against Alex Olivera. Win against Claudio Silva. Win against Warli Alves. Dude does very well in these types of situations. So I think it's a good fight. It's a good test for Gabriel Bonfine.

Like, Dobby's looked really good. That one of a Muslim Salakoff was super impressive back in June. So I think it's good matchmaking. I don't think it's going to be a slaughter. And if it is, then they know they're cooking with gas with Gabriel Bonfee. So I think it's a good next step for Gabriel. I think a lot of people are very excited for him. I think it's a good fight.

I think it's a really good fight. I think this was a pretty popular onto the next one pick as well after UFC Jacksonville. And after Bonfem's last fight. So I think it's good matchmaking. I think it's good matchmaking. We also got a bunch of fights announced for UFC 294 that were made official. So we got the four we saw on the broadcast, the Machchev-Oliv-Oleverer rematch, Costa Shemayev, Imov, Alaskarov, Ancaliath, Johnny Walker.

But UFC announced Tim Elliott Muhammad Bahaif is official. S.D. Dumas is fighting Abu Azitar. Victoria Dutakova versus Genufri-Ju-Fri-Gin-U-Fri-Cis-Brna-Syra-Burna-Magh-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-Mah-A-W-Ga-F, Maha-A-A-W-A-W-S-A-W-C-Raw. And you know if Trevor Pek's fighting, it's going to be insane. Anch-Gi-Gubli-Ev-Refs. And Saeed-C-Fer-Fov.

So that's the current UFC-294 lineup. It's pretty good. It's a pretty good car. Those top-5 fights are really, really good. So right now there's 11 on the books. I'm sure they're going to add some more. But, yeah, their card's starting to come together. And Dalby Bondfings, good fight.

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Winners find fabulous for less. Go ahead, Absolalia. What's up? Yeah, I just got a few things I want to ask. I'll start off with the Flyway Division. Just a few interesting fights I would like to discuss and get your thoughts on it. So as you can see, we're going to have Brandon Roble fighting Pantosia for the belt. But in the meantime, I think I would definitely like to see Matthew Nicolao fight Amir al-Bazi, who recently won against Kai Karafi.

France in June because truthfully speaking if we watched that fight it was kind of a robbery or at the very least it was just a unanimous split decision win that didn't really effort amount too much to earn him a title shot and I think that would be a good fight for both fighters to have as a maybe title eliminate finds since we don't know what's going to happen Brandon Marino he'll probably be in the mix of things as long as Pantoja's not the champion and I just The other questions I would like to ask is, first thing is with Hamza Chimayev, like I heard you talking earlier about his Wade and all that.

Like, obviously, I don't ever see him fighting at 1-7 again unless it's for a title, and that's if he does become a champion 185 and accumulates at least two, three, title defenses to fight for double champs. But is he, like, you've stood next to him before, as you mentioned earlier, but is he definitely a fighter that seems more fitting to be even fighting at 205 in the future as he gets older? Because I find he has a very unique and weird body complex. Like he definitely looks like a huge fighter, but not to the point where I think he would hang with the Yere Pahaskas, the Alisana Rackich,

the Nikita Krilovs and, you know, all those kind of guys. I mean, if we look at how big Jan Blahowich is for fuck's sake like that, alone. tells me like he's not going to stand tall with that. He might be able to put some damage, but I don't see him doing much. And I think it is kind of a waste because the hype, part of his initial hype

and potential was him becoming a double champ status at 170 and 185 or even triple champ with 205 because, you know, just like Colin McGregor, there was a lot of interesting fights that were very marketable for him like Kamar Usman, Leon Edwards, maybe Belal, you know, Kobe Cumberton. and I was seeing a 185, same thing Costa, maybe Artisania or Sean Strickland.

I would definitely want to know your thoughts on that about, you know, the 205 situation. And I just have one more thing I want to kind of ask and state, because you're a reporter yourself, and I generally respect you as a reporter and how you've run your profession, your day-to-day job. But I have noticed similarly to, like, soccer and NFL reporters, there's a lot of, lot of MMO reporters are just really tend to be ridiculous at their job and they just don't seem to have this charisma or, you know, interesting questions to ask fighters because I was watching the Kevin Hollum press today and I'm very glad he actually pointed this out to one of the reporters about how stupid some of their questions are. Like, you know, I see John Morgan, Brett Orichamoro

and just some of these other people or they ask Dana or these fighters the same bland questions. other than having an interest to ask the difficult question like Ariel does or I've seen Alex Bohumian does. I just want to know your thoughts. Is there a reason why these reporters just tend to not have that charisma or interest in asking finance, you know, an interesting question that could lead to a spark of conversation? And that's all I have. Thanks for have a good day. Man, a lot to unpack there.

Nicolal-Aabazi, sure Is it a number of contender fight? Probably not. I mean, if Al-Bazi wins, he's got a much better case than Nicolao does since Nicolao just lost not that long ago. So, yeah, it's not a bad one.

It appears that the UFC's, I mean, if you're following Twitter at all, UFC's trying to do Min al-Cop, Kikar, France, probably the main events. So I don't think, I think anyone's really surprised by that whole thing. So we'll see if that comes to fruition.

So, yeah, flywood's pretty interesting. Brandon Moreno is a big wild card in this conversation because when he's ready to come back, he's probably going to get a title shot when he does. But who knows? They could just chuck them in there with like Henry Suhudo and just do a fun rivalry fight. Like, no one's going to complain about that either. So I think Moreno just kind of needs a, if it were up to me, let's throw Moreno into another fight with somebody else and just get them away.

from the bell for a while. Dude, he's been attached to that belt for so long. Almost three years now, he's been attached to that belt. The whole thing with Figgi and now Pantoja and Kikar, France, like everything has been about the belt. Maybe give him a fight outside of the belt. And then if he wins, he gets right back to it. You mentioned Hamzot.

I think his days of 170 or over. If he's going to be a two-division champ, it's going to be 85-205. at this point with Hamzad and how inactive he is, I think we get a walk before we run. So I'm going to hold my future prospects for Hamzat Shamaif until I see him walk to the octagon and fight Paul Costa and see how that fight goes.

And then we can start talking about that. As far as the reporters go, look, it's different when you're on site and when you're like doing a straight 25 minute interview with somebody because like a UFC press conference as much as we would love to see it as much as these press conferences can be super tough you want things to move along a little bit and you also don't want to take the attention off of the fighters

and off of the promotion of the fight and put it on you And if you sit there and you ask Dana White about fighter pay at a press conference, like, that's not good. That's not good. The other thing I will say when you mentioned John Morgan is that when we're on site covering these events. And I noticed this when we covered Jacksonville. I noticed this when we covered when I covered International Fight Week in Vegas. I'd have been Boston too. John wasn't in Boston for 2992 and all the fight week stuff.

But John is the reason John asked the first questions is because, Because John, like, lays out the path. John asks sort of the obvious questions. We get the response from the fighters. And then those of us batting behind John, we can ask follow-ups based on their answers. So John just kind of sets the table and then we kind of do our thing after that. It's just nice. Like, even for me, like, 2.92 during media day, I asked all the first questions.

Most of them were just kind of setting the table for everybody else. and then the press conference we have kind of a game plan like Jose went first and then Oscar went and then I think I was supposed to go next but I think Danny Sigura ended up going next

but like we had a plan like Jose's going to ask these fighters questions and Oscar's going to ask these fighters questions and then my plan was all right well there's other fighters up there so I'll ask them questions because like if I didn't ask Mario Batista

and Daman Blackshare a question at the press conference It's like nobody was going to ask them questions. Nobody. They were just sat there the whole time and nobody who asked them anything. So I don't know. It's different. And then like a post-fight press conference,

you can get a little more in-depth with Dana. But to me, those questions and those opportunities are more so for one-on-one conversations, at least to me, at least to me. And you know me, I'm not afraid to ask the hard questions. I'm not going to do it at a press conference. It just takes the spotlight off of what we're trying to do here. Want this thing to move along. and want to be in and out.

And there's no need to like piss date off at a press conference. Now the post fight stuff, again, you get him for a little bit longer. It's just him sitting there. You can ask questions. After a contender series event, you get him, he sits there and answers questions for 20 minutes. In those opportunities, you can't ask the hard questions. Like, you really can't. It's just, it's tough, man.

It's tough. It's definitely tough. And then sometimes there's just tough questions to ask that are like, right there for you. Plus, Dana does this thing. This has nothing to do with it, but I'm just going to say it anyways. Dana at the Contender Series was asked about the Israel Adasanya rematch. And Dana did this whole thing that he always does where he says something that nobody agrees

with, and then everyone just kind of gets after Dana, and then he flips it on the websites that write up exactly what he says. So when he's asked about Israel, he's like, someone asks me a question. I said, yeah, I would be into the rematch. And then all these websites write this shit. That's not what you said. You said absolutely we should get the rematch. You said it.

You literally said, I'll pull up the exact quote right now. I'll pull up the exact quote right now. Because I was wondering what he was so fucking mad about when it came to that. This is what he said. I think you do the rematch absolutely. The rematch is interesting. That could be the thing too. When you think about Autosate, going into the prayer fight, such a big fight,

you've been in there with this guy so many times, and then you overlook Strickland. You come in, and I don't know, I don't know the answer to these questions, but Israel does, and I'm looking forward to hearing it. I think you do the rematch. Absolutely is what he said. Tuesday, that after the Contender Series, here's what he said. I think if you remember that night, people said, what do you think? You think rematch?

I said, yeah, the rematch sounds great. That's not what you said. You said, let me pull it back up. You said, I think you do the rematch absolutely. That's what you said. And now it says, oh, the websites misquoted what I said. You said absolutely. Ah, shit drives me crazy, man.

I saw the stupid fucking shit that was written by all these stupid fucking websites. Never once did I say, yes, we're going to fucking do this rematch. Yeah, no one said you said we're going to do the rematch. But you said, absolutely, I think we should do the rematch. And that's the tough thing about talking to data because he flips it. When he says something that people don't agree with, he just, oh, well, it's not my fault. It's the website's misquoting me. It's fucking bullshit.

Let's go to Noah. Go ahead, Noah. Noah. You're muted. Yep, there you go. Do you have you? It's not going through. Try again.

We'll get you in. Go ahead, Four Corner Sports. Hey, Mike. So, forgive me if this question was asked earlier, but I see GEDM versus Kevin Holland. Kevin Holland is actually the underdog. I'm picking Kevin Holland to win the fight just because he has fought, you know, better competition. But is there an avenue that you see this fight going the distance just because Kevin Holland can possibly, you know, institute, you know, a ground game? I wasn't really pleased with JDM's last performance against Basil.

and I feel like, you know, there's a lot of, you know, doubt creeping in the other people's mind on how JDM perform. I know a lot of people are predicting this might be a striking matchup, but do you feel that there is a possibility that Kevin says, F it, you know, I'm taking this down to the floor? And then lastly, when do you believe that Dana's actually going to announce this second title fight for Abu Dhabi? I feel like he is just letting time slip away.

I know he had to do stuff on Wall Street. street for the whole TKO um unveiling but i just feel like there's a possibility it could be the fly weights that's just my opinion because i haven't heard any rumblings whatsoever that it's has to do with the women's band-o-way division and there's no way that it's going to be leon versus colby at al-dabia because that just doesn't make any sense whatsoever all right mike that's all i got to say thanks i don't know man i don't know we're at a time here it's September 14th, that card is October 21st. We are a little over five weeks away from UFC 294,

and we don't have that second flight. So this is what I said after the Moreno Pantosia fight. And I think this holds true, which, by the way, if they offer a fight to Pantosia and he says no, like, are you really going to rip on this guy after just fighting Brandon Moreno, like in an absolute war? I mean, those two beat the shit out of each other. And to ask him to turn around like three months later,

I feel like you're asking a lot of Pantosia. But if he is ready to go and they offer him like a little bit of a bonus or something, I don't know if Royval gets the shot in Abu Dhabi. I think they go with Albaughi if they go over there. I think that it honestly makes more sense. Like if Moreno won, I think it would have been Morayevil 100%. I do think Royval is in most circumstances gets the fight over Albaughzi. But if they do it in Abu Dhabi, considering Al-Bazi's background, I could see a world where he

sneaks in there and fights Bantosia and then Royval gets the winner or something. But I don't know. I don't know what they're going to do. But again, we're getting close. We are just about five weeks away from that card. And I don't even know if we get another title fight at this point. Maybe you just bump Shamiya and Costa to a five-rounder. Create another belt.

Who gives a shit? I don't know. It could be the band-in-white fight, the women's band-in-way fight. I don't know, man. I'm trying to think, like, what else could be available? I don't think Zhang's going to fight in five weeks. Volk's not going to fight in five weeks if he's not fighting Islam, and Oliver is already fighting Islam.

Yuri Alex isn't going to happen in five weeks. John Jones is fighting in November. It's not going to be Leon Colby. I don't know, man. I don't know. Uh, Noah, go ahead. Hey, Mike. Stop him.

So a couple of mornings ago, you said that Jelton Almeida, and you were kind of breaking down the Jelton versus Curtis fight, and you said that Curtis wants to keep that fight standing, that he just doesn't want to go to the ground with Jelton. And if he does, he's in trouble. I really disagree with that. And I'm kind of curious on why you think that. I don't think that, I mean, Curtis is like a true heavyweight. He's got insane top pressure. and we really haven't seen him struggle when he gets the fight to the ground. We haven't seen Jailton have much success from the bottom or anything.

Like, you know, when he goes to the ground, it's just take the double leg, you know, pass guard, rear naked choke, right? So I kind of think that Curtis, if he gets the fight to the ground, which honestly, I don't think he'll have a super hard time. It's kind of hard to know, but just for that on that one. And then another one I have is, it's kind of hard to say because the heavyweight division is, you know, we have no idea what happens in November. But, I mean, what do you think happens, let's say, or winner, let's, regardless of who wins that fight, what is the winner go from that fight in the kind of Tom Aspinall, Gahn Pavlovich picture. What do you think they fit in? Thanks. I mean, honestly, it all depends.

I think if Jelton wins, you have to give you. Tim Pavlovich. Like, I think he's done enough at this point. And the timing of that fight couldn't be any better for Jelton Almeida if he wins that fight. It's a week away from the title fight. And as you know in this sport, what have you done for me lately? And a lot of time will have passed between Cyril Gahn's win.

A lot more time has passed from Tommy Aspinall's win. I kind of feel like Jailton gets it if he does win. to go back to the other point. Yeah, I'm with you that it's kind of a mystery if he gets put on his back, but I think what I mostly said was, if I'm Curtis, like, take the path of least resistance, like just stand there and strike with him.

Why even risk it? One sweep from Janselmaida, and the fight could be over. Like, if Jensen gets on top of him at all, like the fight could be done. Like, he's that good. Again, we don't know what's happening off his back, but why take that risk?

why take that risk now could this be something where Curtis has a plan where keeps it standing maybe they battle against the fence a little bit Jelton's very good in that position too able to get trips and takedowns like 25 minutes is a long time and if he gets top position at any point in that fight it could be could be the night man like that's just who he is now could we see a world where Curtis Blades just takes it out over and over again just sits on top of him and like land some ground upon sure that could happen he tires them out but why even put jailton off like why even take this fight to the ground when you don't have to so there are a lot of unknowns but to me i just i feel like you're flirting with fire unless there's a plan unless you kind of treat this

like yambahovitch is your lot of sanya where you keep the fight standing you have success and then as the fight goes on we get into rounds four and five then you start taking them down get him a little tired, a little sweaty before that happens. But a lot of people are telling me like, oh, Blage's just going to have like a Maraub performance where he's just going to take him down a million times. Like, you really want to take that risk so early in the fight? Jelton's a house, man.

Like Curtis is a big, strong athletic guy, but Jelton is a house, man. It is, that dude gets on top of me. That's like having a, like a 350 pounder on top of you. So it's such an, interesting fight. It's such an interesting fight. I understand why people are very high on Curtis. Jelton's like not even a heavyweight, which is even

crazier to think about. But he is a house, man. He's a house. That's an interesting fight. It really is. But if I'm Curtis, like, why even risk it? Just stand there and punch them and you probably have a better chance to win this fight. The more of this fight stays standing, clearly it favors Curtis Blades.

And if it goes to the ground, I don't know. All bets are off. That was Mostly my point. More than anything, but I say a lot of things on this show that are probably wrong. So you may be completely right, and I just shit on Curtis Plains for no reason. Riley, go ahead. Hey, Mike. Good morning.

Two quick things. One, I just wanted to ask. The guy before talking before me, did the UFC say they plan to add a second title fight to 994, or was that just sort of speculation because they, pretty much always stack the Abu Dhabi cards. And secondly, I just wanted to ask you, what do you think of the Makaya and Tenaliate fight? I feel like that could be, I don't know,

like a B-grade version of Saruki and Gamrod. I feel like that is definitely going to be a bangor. Yeah, I like that fight a lot. I think it's perfect matchmaking. It's a true test for Muhammad Mokaiath because the thing with my mom, Mohammed is like after that first fight with Cody Durdin, we were like, oh shit. Like I even said this guy could be a two division champion.

Like I was pretty confident in it. And then you realize just like how old he is. He's just, he's a super young cat getting better. And I don't know. Like some people, some people say, well, maybe it's just the level of competition. Like if he's fighting a guy that he's like a minus 900 favor over, maybe he's not as, as motivated and enthused. And only a couple of people in the world can actually answer that.

that question. But when you book a fight like this with a guy like Tim Elliott, who is a frigging dog, we're going to learn a lot about Muhammad al-Mukai in this fight. We are going to learn a lot about him. Because Tim ain't going to, it's going to be really tough to get him out of there. Tim is just, he's a wily grizzled vet who can be competitive with anybody in this division. It's a really good fight. Really good fight. The second title fight thing, that's typically what they do is they do two title fights in Abu Dhabi. It's kind of like part of the process, part of the plan. I think it's part of the deal as well.

But I don't know, man, Hamza, Paul Koss is a pretty damn good co-main event. That's a pretty damn good co-main event. That's probably better than any other title fight that's available that you could put on this card right now. Outside of Leon and Colby, which I just don't see that fight happening. in Abu Dhabi. It doesn't make a lot of sense. But dude, Hamzaa, Hamzaa Koss is like a tremendous co-made event. It's a really good one. By the time we get to that fight week, by the time we get to

like Wednesday, like we're not even talking about Islam versus Charles. Like everyone's going to be talking about Hamza and Kosta because those two are going to get together. They're going to talk trash about each other. The press conference is going to be wild between those two guys. And it's going to be like every Shamaa fight and every Kasta fight where they just steal the headlines. So, yeah, I don't know.

I don't know if they're going to get out of a second title fight. And if they do, maybe it's Pantosia. Albaozy or Pantosia Roy Val. I don't think it's going to be Pintoja Royval, but I kind of feel like Albaazi will have a good chance of getting it because it's in Abu Dhabi. Anywhere else, Roy Val probably gets it. But we got 11 fights and some spots for it. So I think it's a pretty damn good, like those top five fights is a pretty, solid card right there.

A lot of a lot of like local fighters on the card as well who fans are going to come out and cheer for underneath. They'll probably add a few more. I don't know. We still are wondering what's going to happen

at 2.95. Are we going to do a second title fight on that card? Are we going to do three title fights in that card? Is Colby Leon going to be on that one? Are they going to do the women's band and weight is a fight on that card as well? there's a lot of spots open and there's a lot of unanswered questions Leon Colby

and we got Chottomalley Cheeto Vera is that going to happen in December? Is that going to happen in November? When is that going to happen? When's Yuri Alex going to happen? I mean, there's lots of options, but we're running out of time. The clock is ticking in regards to booking those fights. So, yeah, it's just kind of a thing

that's part of the deal, two title fights. I'll bring up the Kevin, Kevin Holland fight as well, because I know Four Corner Sports asked about it, and we had another caller asking about reporters, because Kevin kind of went in on a reporter, and I believe the context of the conversation was, you know, about whether or not Kevin Holland's looking for the belt. and Kevin says what he always says.

I'm not looking for the belt. I'm just looking to fight as often as possible and get as much money as possible. And I believe he said that, those exact words in about 45 seconds, and then the follow-up was, well, why don't you care about the belt? And he's like, I just, he basically said,

like, well, I just told you why I don't care about the belt. Why do you care about the belt? And then it went kind of back and forth. So it is important to kind of understand where the fighter is coming from and you have to understand where these questions come from and how many times they have been asked about this question. There was a time where I interviewed Kevin Holland a lot.

I don't get to interview all that often anymore, mostly because he goes on Ariel a bunch. I don't know. If I'm asked to interview, sure. But there was a time, like, I was interviewing Kevin Holland like two days before fights when he was on that run. I mean, I was hired Kevin Holland before most people were. before he went 5 and 0.

I was telling people like, how this guy could be a star for the company. He's got the gift of gab. The dude could fight his ass off. He's never in a boring fight. Keep your eye on this guy. And there were times where I would interview him all the time. Now I don't, but there are hot buttons with Kevin.

There are hot buttons with him. And it's something you learn with him over time. Because I was interviewing Kevin before he got in the UFC, before the contender series, when he was just getting into the UFC. He's got hot buttons. And you have to like, you got to read his body language. It's very rare that Kevin will sit there and like react the way that he did yesterday.

It's very, very rare. I don't know if I've ever really seen him do that. But it's just a matter of like when he makes his point, move on. You just got to move on. And Kevin just wants to fight and make money. Like that's been his thing. Even when the pandemic happened, you can go back. I don't know if there's on what the heck or just like a standalone interview.

but like Kevin was supposed to fight who the hell was he supposed to fight let me pull this up let me pull this up real quick um who is he supposed to fight I believe it was on that canceled London card that was the one that was supposed to be headlined by Leon Edwards

Tyron Woodley he's supposed to fight oh he was supposed to fight Jack Marshman March 21st I believe that was the the London card that was supposed to be headlined by It was Willey. Yes, it was Roaldi versus Edwards. Man, there were a ton of freaking fights on that card.

Shafkar-Rakvatov's supposed to fight on that card. Tommy Asperal was supposed to fight Jake Collier on that card. It's kind of a wild one to go back and look at. Paul Craig Ryan Span was supposed to be on that card. But I remember talking to Kevin Hall, I'm like right when everything was canceled, and Kevin was just like, and I was asking him about, like, how he's looking at fighting and, like, his money and stuff.

and he was just like, no, dude. Like, I'm just going to, I don't care that I'm not getting paid. Like, I'm just going to spend all my money. And then, like, things are going to turn around. I'm going to get another fight. And then I'm just going to get another one. And I'm just going to get another one. Like, I'll fight every three weeks.

His whole goal was never the belt. Like, he's never, ever once said that I can remember, at least to me, of all the years, all the conversations I've had with Kevin Holland. Never once has he ever said to me outside of, like, putting himself in position, like being 5 and 0 and stepping in on a, in a main event on short notice after the jockey win.

The potential of fighting for the belt was like right there. He's probably a win away. And even after the joccuray win, like you could make an argument because Kevin's sock was so high that you could put him into a title fight. But he was never like, yeah, give me the title. He's never ever said that to me. Never once was like, what's your goal in the sport?

There's never to be a UFC champion. It was to get fucking rich. That's what he wants. He wants to be a prize fighter. Just fight often and make money because that's how you become a star in the UFC. That's how you get over. Kevin Holland fought five times in 2020 during the pandemic and got over like Rover because he fought all the time. That's how Hamzok got over initially.

He fought twice in Fight Island like a 10-day stretch, went out and just melted Gerald Mearshardt. And we're just like, this is the dude. This is the guy. We saw him all the time. And Kevin's just always been that guy. That's just how he's always been. So, yeah, it was kind of weird seeing him just kind of go off like that. But Kevin just wants to make money and fight.

That's all he's ever cared about. So, and he's mentioned like the belt. He doesn't care about that. He doesn't care about any of that stuff. He just wants to fight and boost the bank account and collect shoes and cars. That's it. Cole, go ahead. Hi, Mike.

You know, you're talking about no bet's barred? What did you make of Jed switching sides after going bankrupt from this fight earlier this year? I don't, like, would you have done the same thing? I can't believe he did it. I think you should have stayed with Valentina. But, yeah, what do you think about that? Don't blame him. I don't blame him.

And the reasoning behind it makes perfect sense. To Jed, this is at best for Valentina. a 50-50 fight. It's a 50-50 fight. That's how Jed views this. Worst case scenario, this fight could go either way. That's how Jed views this in his head. So if you view a fight as 50-50 and you're getting plus money on one of the sides, you've got to take it. And that's the way he's, it's a value bet. And Jed even said, like when he makes his official pick, he's probably going to, like, if it's, if they're like minus one 10 each, he's probably picking Valentina.

But if you're giving her, you're giving Alexa Grasso still plus money after watching the first fight, you truly feel it's a 50-50 fight. You've got to go with the value. So I'm not surprised by it. Having said that, like if he jumps on a preview show or something

and I say who's going to win, he's probably going to pick Valentina. But he getting the extra 42 points of juice when you think it's a 50-50 fight from a betting perspective. If you feel that way, that's where your money needs to go. That's where your money needs to go. Like if you feel like Kevin, if you feel like Kevin Holland, Jack Delamadena is a 50-50 fight,

like this could go either way. If you get a bet on it, like, why would you bet on Jack Delamadena? Why not bet take the extra juice with Kevin Holland if you think it's a 50-50 fight? Because the odds are, I mean, what you're saying is Jack, JDM's like a 50, I don't know, with those odds, 54% chance to win, take the juice. Take the juice. It's a value bet. So, no, I don't blame them at all.

It is kind of shocking to hear it, but when you hear Jed sort of break it down from a value perspective, it makes sense. It's wild to think about, though, after going all in on back-to-back Valentina fights. Daniels, Jesus Christ. Go ahead, man, Daniel. Sorry about that.

Yeah, no worries, Michaelina. I appreciate it bringing me on to me. No. You know, me, I always got just, like, a quick one. Just curious how the betting went last week. I mentioned a couple of fights, but just curious how the betting went for you last week and if you're taking any shots this week. Thanks, Mike.

We'll not be taking any shots this week. I will take shots on 294. I'm only going to bet on the pay-per-views. Like what I'm doing the watch party, like that's it. Those are the only ones. And it's just because Traff King's involvement and, like, I don't want G. G.C. to be by himself. Let's just go.

I did all right. I did all right. I was heading into the main card. I was feeling pretty good about things. I had cashed. I had added some bets while I was waiting at the airport to fly out. I had bet Kevin Jocet as an underdog. The more I looked at it, I'm like, how the hell is this guy an underdog?

I bet Gabriel Miranda by submission over Shane Young, so I got a nice win there. And then I did bet Jack Jenkins by decision. So obviously the Chappi Marasco and the injury that didn't work out. I had Nazareth Haccairass in two parleyes, which is probably something I'll never say again. But I did pretty good with that. I had Hackparast, Minel Kopp, Carlos Oldberg as a parlay. So that was plus money. And then I did Hackperass Cop, Izzy, as another one.

Obviously, that didn't work out. Tyson Pedro I cashed. I'd caught Felipe de Santos under two and a half. That didn't work out. I had caught by KOTKO. That didn't work out. I tied to evas by knockout. That didn't work out.

And then I had a bunch of exposure on Izzy and some unders. And yeah, I did not win. I was off to a great star. It was feeling pretty good. I was up like six or seven units, like heading into the middle cop fight. And then I cash one parlay. then I lost other bets on Minow in the fight going under. And then Ty was just like another dagger.

And I was still up like a unit and a half maybe. And then the Izzy fight happened and I just got sunk. And then freaking Giraff Kings with that boost to plus 100. Like having any exposure on Izzy and not taking that was absolutely silly. And that turned out to be the biggest bet I placed in total. because like my GCs units and Jeds units and anybody who bets units are much higher than mine. Like I'm just doing it more for entertainment purposes. My units are like $3.

But I did put the full 25 on Izzy at plus 100. And that was the biggest loss of all. So I ended up down. And I was down with $292 as well because I had a lot of exposure on, I had some exposure on Al Jambay and Sterling. I had a lot of exposure on Zhang Wei Li. getting a finish against Amanda Lemos, and that didn't happen. So that one stung a lot.

But I'm not getting melted at all. But, yeah, two losing weeks. But I lost a couple of, all at all, I've lost like maybe a week's full of Dunkin' Donuts, ice coffees, which I would get anyways. So no big deal. Joe, go ahead. What's up, Mike? What's up?

Hey, bro. Do you remember last week there was a guy who's, said he thinks Sean Strickland has a 65% chance of winning, and you told him bet the house. Did that guy ever come back and say anything? And if so, I'd like to know who he is, so he can tell me who to bet on next week. Thanks, bro.

I don't remember. I think it was maybe Octagon blog who said that. Because you don't forget when someone says, Sean Strickland has a 65% chance of beating Israel out of Sanya. But I think that's who it was. But yeah, I hope he bet the farm on. Sean Strickland, if he really felt that way. There's the value right there.

If you feel like Sean Strickle was 65, 35, at like plus 440 wherever he was, like go bananas, man. Like go five units on that. Max bet the shit out of that. And I hope he did. I hope he did. That dude's going to live forever on this show

after say it's 65%. It's funny because I've had some like interesting conversations with some different folks about this fight. Like, yesterday I talked to Todd Duffy. I think you, like, maybe newer fans aren't familiar with Todd Duffy, but longtime fans know who Todd is. He was in the UFC for quite some time, had some main events.

Dude looked like Ivan Dago coming through and just was like a big, jacked up, fun-ass fighter who's like never in a boring fight. And then he just kind of vanished for three years. came back, had a fight, it ended in a no contest, and then four years went by almost, and like, we didn't see him at all. And then he booked a fight with Phil DeFries and KSW, loses that fight, and now he's fighting for fighting at a next weekend's rising card. And I talked to Todd about the fight and how he viewed it. And the way he sort of broke Sean Strickland down to me

from a technical aspect. I was like, make a lot of sense, man. Like, I really wish I talked to you before this fight because a lot of the stuff he said made so much sense. And I know you can look at him and be like,

you know, it's in hindsight. The fight already happened so you could say anything at this point. But Todd's train with Sean. He knows Sean. Sean has punched him in the face many, many times. So to hear him say, like,

he wasn't surprised, like the way he thought of people just saying like Sean had no chance in all, he just thought it was the funniest thing in the world. So yeah, that whole conversation is probably not going to get aired because we, I mean,

we just went down many, many rabbit holes about many different things. It was pretty interesting conversation. There'll be write-ups, obviously, because it's getting ready to fight, but just hearing the fighter perspective on what went down. And I'm actually going to be talking to John Anick

a little bit later on today to get his reaction to everything. sitting cage side watching this all unfold just wild times it's freaking wild John Strickland the middleweight champion of the world this story is just going to continue on and it's going to be amazing

it's great seeing Eric Nixick get some extra shine the guy's done a million interviews he's on Ariel's show yesterday and it was just amazing stuff if you haven't watched Eric's interview with Ariel or vice of our Ariel interviewing Eric from the MA hour yesterday, jump off here and go watch it because I can listen to Eric Nixick,

break things down for hours and hours and hours. Just incredible stuff. All right, we are going to get out of here. Start a little bit later, so we need to end a little bit earlier. BTL coming up in just over an hour, if you're listening live right now, 1230 Eastern. Jed, New York, Rick, reacting to all this. We'll talk about your UFC, talk some Bellator announcements,

all the fun stuff. Tomorrow we'll be back here. We'll do it again, 10 a.m. Eastern. I believe 10 a.m. Eastern. There will be, Jose is in Vegas, or I believe he's getting there later today. So there's going to be a live way-in show. So I'm not really sure when that's.

I think it's at noon Eastern, so we should be fine here. Way and show at noon, Eastern tomorrow. Preview show at 3 p.m. Eastern tomorrow. and then we'll have the usual. People's free fight show, post-fight show, all the post-fight stuff, live post-fight press conference, everything you needed one from NoJ UFC.

We got you covered onto next on Sunday. This is when things start to ramp up here at M-Afighting.com. So thank you all very much. See you back here tomorrow morning. 10 a.m. Easter. We'll do it again. But until then, everybody, have a great rest of your Thursday, and have a heck of a morning. Thank you.