MMA Fighting - Noche UFC Post-Fight Show | Reaction To Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2 Controversial Draw

Episode Date: September 17, 2023

Alexa Grasso is still the UFC women's flyweight champion after Saturday's Noche UFC event, but she didn't defeat Valentina Shevchenko in their intriguing rematch. In fact, one judge stunningly scoring the fifth round a 10-8 for Grasso may have cost Shevchenko the chance to reclaim the title. MMA Fighting's Mike Heck, Shaheen Al-Shatti, and Jed Meshew react to Grasso and Shevchenko's incredible battle, it being scored a split draw thanks to Mike Bell's head-scratching scorecard in Round 5, discuss whether or not the trilogy is the way to go, and who in the division may have lost the most due to the result. Additionally, topics include Jack Della Maddalena's split decision win over Kevin Holland in the co-main event, Raul Rosas Jr. getting back on track with a quick TKO win over Terrence Mitchell, Lupita Godinez and Tracy Cortez's big wins, and much more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Shaun Al-Shatti: @ShaunAlShatti Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

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

available now, only from Audible. Now, ladies and gentlemen, normally at this time, you would hear the victory horn. Unfortunately, we don't have any victory horns to play you because there is no winner in the main event of no church. J-U-F-C made a man between Alexa Grasso and Valentina Shvchenko to a matchup that delivered in a lot of ways.

One that, dare I say, delivered even more so than the first fight. But in the end, it all comes down to round five. Looks like Valentina Shvchenko is going to curse to victory. She's jabbing away. She's piecing Alexa Grasso up. And then she makes a mistake. And Alexa Grasso gets on top, almost gets her out of there, almost submits her. The final horn sounds.

We go to the judge's score cards. One for Grasso. One for Chefchenko. And then we get Mike Bell's card, 47, 47. It is a split draw. And we're thinking to ourselves, selves, this doesn't seem too terrible. Like maybe we can make a case for round two,

a 10-8 for Alexa Grasso. We'll wait until the cards come out. And then the great John Annick lets us all know. It was round five. round five that was scored a 10-8. And if that card was scored the way everybody else on planet Earth scored it, a 10-9 for Alexei-Grasso, Valentina Shifchenko is once again the flyway champion of the world.

But Alexa Grasso leaves as champion. She didn't get the official win, but much like in the world of professional wrestling, you got to beat the champ to win the belt and you get to do it the right way. And we got ourselves a draw. We're going to react to all of it right now. Thank you for joining us for this live post-fight show. Appreciate you guys being patient with us.

I am Mike Heck. Let us say hello to the rest of the panel. Mr. Shaheen Al-Shadi joining us. Shaheen, how are you, my friend? I'm sure you get all sorts of feelings going on after this draw and the scoring, especially this fifth round. Yeah, I'm doing well, Mike. I'm glad to be on here.

That was a hell of a fight, first of all. Like, I know we're going to get to the scoring and we're going to talk a lot about it, but man, that was a ton of. fun, right? Like, in my opinion, I had a 3-2 grass, so I could have seen 3-2 Shevchenko, but to end up a split draw initially, you know, I didn't, I liked the result, but I didn't like the method that we got there, if that made sense. Because once it ended up with a split draw, it makes sense. But Mike Bell, man, what are you doing? What are you doing? and a man who probably didn't love the card,

but in hindsight probably appreciates what this all means and just kind of going with the branding of what 2023 in the UFC and this sport has been another funny, crazy, absolute chaotic result, Mr. No Gray area, Jed Bishu. How are we feeling about 25, 30 minutes after this result was scored and even seeing the reaction of Sean Shelby to finding out this story? is going to be draw. I got a lot of feelings,

just so many feelings. We'll get into that through all of this. The two most important things that I want to say is, first, we didn't need victory horns. We got the drums of competitive equilibrium, and that's totally fine. Like, we're right here, and that's okay. And two, and most importantly,

I think I'm about to get on this program, and I'm about to defend Mike Bell. Not for what happened, because look, it's a bad scorecard. But people, have you ever beefed? You ever screwed up? You ever looked at something and been like, that was a mistake.

And not like looking back at your high school yearbook photo and thinking, man, a high top fade was probably not the move for me at the time. This is like, oh, I just immediately regret the decisions I made. And I'm staring down at this scorecard. And it's looking like, if I score this a 10-9 for Grasso because she won the round, she don't lose the belt.

And that feels a little bad inside. So I'm just going to give an eight. And then it's all okay. We've all been there. Mike Bell took the opportunity to change a thing against all logic and reason because the outcome was the one he wanted to make happen. And you know, again, probably bad process, but we've all been there.

I see you, Mike. I totally know what happened here. and I'm not going to crucify you for it, even though it's bad. Shaheen, are you going to crucify Mr. Bell for this? Because I feel like, I feel like Valentina Shepchenko might have some words for the man. And if you have seen Valentina Shavchenko's mindset, the fact that she still has not cracked a smile since she lost the belt, I think she might have some words for Mr. Bell.

How are you feeling, when you found it it was round five, Sheehan, round five. it almost like to me it almost like soiled how good the fight was yeah that's it was like yeah it's stunt it was like a stunning thing i was like man i guess you're giving round two a 108 like i don't love it but i guess but when i found it was round five i'm like it just like ruined the whole thing for me in a weird way yeah i think that's sort of where i'm at right because you watch this fight and all throughout it the twist and turns the ups and downs the rollercoaster nature of it it was a tremendous fight you know i had it won one one after two going into the final round i had at two two it felt like anything was up for grabs these near submissions

knockdowns it just the the wild swings it was it really felt like one of these moments of like man we were about to see who is who can dig deepest in this situation this could be an all-time gut check moment for either one of these women a true legacy fight sort of set sort of set up and so as we exit this fifth round it's just you know it was almost that that thing of like valentina shivchenko had this wrapped up right like she she very much it felt like she was about to win this fight and that she made the same mistake more or less that she made in the last one gives up our back again and it's just like oh my god this is happening again there's no way we can actually be seen this play out again goes to the scorecards i had it three two grasso as

i said and then it just you hear the split draw takes a second to process it like okay this fight felt like it could have been a draw right because i think 48 47 sheftchenko is a completely defensible scorecard if that would if she would have ended up winning the belt i would have had absolutely no problem with it whatsoever. And so, okay, if you want to call this fight a draw, like I can sort of get there with you. But then it's just, again, it's what you said. It's the method by which we got there that almost makes this, it ruins what to me was one of the best flyweight title fights that we've seen maybe ever, at least it's certainly in a long time for the women's division, right? Like, that was such a great fight. That was such a great fight.

I was on riding such a high afterwards. And then right now, I just don't know how to feel. And I'm reminded of, I think it was like 2013. I've been in this a bit, so I've seen some of these fights. 2013 when Mark Hunt and Bigfoot Silva just went to absolute war in Australia, just absolute chaos type of fight, pure scenes. And then at the end, a few of the judges gave the final round a 10-8 to Mark Hunt, just to sort of end up at a draw, even though it wasn't a 10-8. It was like, hey, this fight was so much fun.

It feels like it should be a draw. We were just going to figure out a way to make. it a draw. And it's like, that's cool. That was fine in that moment. It's a very low stakes heavyweight fight. It wasn't for a title or anything like that. I can accept it in that moment. This one, though, man, I don't know. I don't know. Normalize that. Normalize that. Shaheen, what I'm hearing from you right now is not, it's you just trying to work your way process. And what you need, you need to get to the end result, which is if we didn't know what rounds were scored, if they just gave us the scores at the end, we'd all be happy. Would have been fun of us. So let's just, let's just live in that world. I don't need to read, you know, like when I get a bill, I don't go and look through line by line the items. I don't got time for that.

They're going to charge me, whatever they're going to charge me. And whatever you should probably do that. It's all I'm concerned about doing that when you get a bill. Not necessary because I, that's not how I choose to live my life. I don't get caught up in the minutia things. Sheen, I'm here about the end result. And the end result's fine. We should all be happy with it.

I'm, let's. me tell you, I'm probably more happy with that than if Valentina Lake wins the belt and then this discourse for the next three weeks or however long is, well, did she really deserve to win? Because I didn't think she did. I scored it three to two. I gave dueling 10-8s in rounds two and three, but I thought Grasso should have retained. Either way, the answer is these two women will be fighting a third time. And now, you know, we just have this to talk about tonight.

It's a great outcome. We should all be very happy with a draw. We are just too reflexively against draws in this sport because it feels, you know, like Ted Lassow said. But I don't think that's the thing. I disagree because I'm not against draws. I kind of, again, I kind of, I tweeted it in the moment. Like, I felt pretty good about the draw. Like, that was a pretty good result, ultimately.

If you're going to throw it up in the air and it seems like everyone was kind of like, eh, this could go either way. Like, I can accept the draw on that moment, especially because it, like, if you just put it out in the ether of, hey, there was a 10-8 somewhere, you could bring back a lot of results. It's right. You scored two different 10-8s. I think there were multiple rounds there where if you felt like throwing a 10-8 out in, it's not the craziest thing in the world. It just wasn't round five where Valentino Shibchenko won half the round

and then Alexei Grasso won half the round. That's not a 10-year-old. She won more than half the round. She won 65% of the round. I'm not a math guy. Don't trust me on that. But, you know, three minutes and 30 seconds of the round, she won. I see some comments saying, well, where's the press conference?

See, the beauty of tonight is and the beauty of this show and you see the little duck in the corner as we can do both at the same time. We figure out a way to do it. So if you want, I don't like to tell people. Yeah, get you a website that can do both. I don't like to tell you to leave what I'm doing to go do something else, but at least we're going from one thing on our website to the other. So if you want to watch Post-Five Press conference, you can go ahead to do that. You can do that right now. Or you could stay here and join us.

And guess what? You could watch it later. It's all there for you. All the options are a plenty. And Jed, it's amazing to me that you have found, are you the new Prince of Positivity? You found a silver lining in all this. You found a silver lining and all this. And I think it's a good one.

I think it's a good one. It's a great outcome for me. This almost, I can't lose. This pretty much guarantees we're going to get a third fight. Because I think you have to do it now. And this fight was awesome. Like their first fight wasn't that fun. Like it was very high stakes and tense.

This fight was really tense down the stretch. Like heading into that fifth. when, you know, it score cards were sort of all over the place and even more so than we knew, apparently. And, you know, it felt to me and I think largely what, you know, and turned out actually to be true that kind of win the fifth, you're going to end up winning this fight. And so like it was just, it had just built and there were big epic moments, you know, in the first fight, really, there was the moment, the finishing moment, which was this, you know, crescendoing experience. And I was on the wrong end of that. And I was very sad about it.

it. This one, there were swings and there was back and forth. And I'm live blogging and after round two and when Grasso drops her and then kind of puts it on her for a lot of the rest of the round. And Chichenko dives in a double and just holds on for dear life from top position. Like I'm writing and man, I don't, she didn't look great in the corner. That's a really bad round. Is this the moment when time has just caught her by? She just got dropped, blah, blah, blah. She needs my exact words or Chichenko needs a really big something to happen in the third to change this. And then she immediately gets that in the third. She comes out and has her best round of the fight, gets that guillotine that gets extremely close, in my opinion, not for the whole part of it, but there was certainly a time when she's immediately rolling to mount where it's like, that's bad.

And then she has back control for, you know, two and a half, three minutes or whatever. And that's, I know that we had this argument at the beginning of the year. I'm sorry, if you, if someone's on your back for three minutes, you lose the round. And in my opinion, you lose it around by a 10-8 measure. because that's all defense all the time, baby. And so there were ebbs and flows, and the fourth round was super competitive. And then the fifth,

Shevchenko has pulled away. It's just like out of sort of nowhere. Her best round for a lot of it was that third round. She was moving the best. The jab just couldn't miss. Grasso didn't really have answers. And then Shevchenko does the dumbest thing possible and goes to a move that has cost her fights before.

And it all, like, I thought it cost her. I wrote at the end. It was like she heaved a belt. She was winning this fight. She was going to win the fifth round. And she just threw it out the window. And Alexa Grasso is wearing the Alexa Grasso era. And then this happened.

And I feel like it's pretty close to the right outcome. I don't think either woman like truly asserted themselves much more than the other over the totality of the fight. If I'm picking one, I do think Grasso should have won. So I'm very, I'm happy in that regard. She didn't lose the belt. And we get to do this all again. And it's a great matchup. It's a great fight.

And I'm, I'm fine with it because also we'll talk about this more later. But Aaron Blanchfield versus Menon Fior. That's going to be fun. And then we'll have like a no doubt about it. Here's our path to a title. There's no ifs, or buts. It's very clean. So I'm okay with this.

This is a good night, man. Men and Faro, like low key, the biggest, not even, high key, the biggest, nice low key of the night. Because sure, she doesn't get her title shot, neither is Aaron Blanchfield. But you said this when we were in pre-show, Jed. She got to fight. Now she gets to fight. Aaron Blanchfield, which is not a great consolation prize from maybe where you thought you were

headed. Plus, she didn't screw up. Like, Shevchenko's a big loser, but she went for that dumbass head and arm throw. So she's at fault for that. Manal's just minding her own business, beating the women that they keep putting in front of her. And now it's like, hey, sorry about that wanny. I will have to say, too, if we're just trying to print a positivity of this, there is one other positive outcome to this that I'm now deeply intrigued in because, Mike, you sort of alluded to it when we were setting this up of Valentino was a very different Valentina this week and maybe the lead up than she has been in a long time. She was very intense, very focused. A lot of the interviews looked like interrogation scenes to use a phrase from our own Slackroom. I was deeply

intrigued by sort of the Valentina we were getting in this. And now she's only going to be more pissed off because now there's two fights in a row where she feels probably like in both instances, She was the better fighter, and yet she didn't win either of them. So the lead up to the third fight, she's going to just be carrying around a pistol and going to shoot somebody more or less. Like, I can't, I can't fathom the level of a frustration she's going to be throughout the lead up to the next one. Because there is going to be a next one. Like, let's not kid ourselves right at this point, right? Like she is the greatest champion this division has ever seen.

I think there's a real case. She could have won this fight, even if I didn't score it for her. The whole way that this fifth round was the decider, this is going to be a third fight. just going to be the most salty person in the lead up to it. And I'm super here for it. She's going to have a freaking Mohawk. It's going to be incredible. She's going to do something wacky with the hair.

She's going to be a whole different person. And for a UFC schedule, especially on the back end of 2023, that is kind of unknown, we kind of, we might have another option here. If we need to throw in a title fight, maybe not as a main event, but as a co-main for December, like if we can't get O'Malley on there, you can chuck this. one in there as the co-made event to Sean Strickland versus DDP or whatever ends up

being the made event of December because we don't know. So this is just another additional fight that we can add to the equation unless you want to wait until January and do it in Toronto, but it doesn't really seem to make sense to do it in Toronto. It is just it is almost like a fast turnaround, but it is quick. Three months. Yeah.

Yeah, but I mean like if they want to take any time at all, that's three months to get right back in. That's, I always just a lot. I mean, you could do March. They took a decent amount of damage in this fight. It might take them a bit. Yeah, January is to be in Toronto.

Yeah, February will probably be in like Australia again. So maybe March and Vegas we do it again. Do it in Australia. It's fine. Who cares? It does kind of feel like we have the makings here of essentially what happened on the men's side of flyweight, right? Where we have this weird trilogy with Moreno and Figurato that ends up being in this

Tetralogy. Yeah. Yeah, like if this ends up being one-one, one, one, we kind of have to figure it out at that point, right? Aaron Blanchfield is going to be fuming, just beating poor women senseless and just looking, be like, I would murder them. Just let me at them. Please, coach, let me in. Oh, man. Yeah, of this whole division, right?

Man, let me tell you, there are very few things I want to see more than, and again, we're talking to the number one. Valentina Shavchenko stand for like a decade at this point. I just desperately want to see her try ahead and arm toss Erin Blanchfield and see how back that goes for her. Because Valentina has a lot of abilities, but the moment someone gets like on top of her, she is cooked. Every second Grasso has been on top,

she has been just obliterating this poor woman. So, uh, Aaron, I'm sorry, you're the champion in my heart. Give it some time. Look, we're going to go back to all of this because we're going to be joined by someone in a little while who actually stands. He's okay with the 10-8 in round five.

Stands by it. Says it's okay. And we're going to bring that man in for him to share his wisdom with all of you in a matter of months. With Amex Platinum, $400 in annual credits for travel and dining means you not only satisfy your travel bug, but your taste buds too. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Apples Biers Travel far and wide, hustling for great deals on amazing gifts, so you don't have to. They've bagged this season's Italian leather handbags. Designer.

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We get the deals. You gift for good stuff. Before we do that, call me an event. Another very, very close fight, Shaheen. Jack Del and Madalena versus Kevin Holland. Super close fight. Could have gone either way.

I saw somebody score at 3027 for Holland. That is an awful scorecard. So maybe not put that out there in the public eye anymore. But 2928 either way is okay. But JDM gets the win, Shaheen. Did the judges get this right? did you score for JDM and what did you think of his performance, especially considering how people kind of viewed him after his most recent fight

where he went to another split decision with the newcomer and some people thought he lost that fight. Yeah, I mean, I did score for him. I scored a 2-1 form 29, 28. It was a good win for him. I think it is one of those fights where you look at the statistics and maybe the statistics don't tell the whole tale, but they certainly tell a little bit of the tail, right? And I think one thing, I mean, we were talking about it amongst ourselves,

the optics of the game plan with which Kevin Holland approached this fight with, he was going to have to fight more or less a perfect fight to get that decision, just because when that is sort of the approach you're taking, fighting that defensively and also just sort of turning your back and running and doing a lot of the shoulder rolling things that he was doing, it's just not easy for the judges to pick that up in real time. And just optically, they will always tend to go. Aver man who is marching forward,

the man who they view as sort of being the aggressive. And also, I mean, it was just, you know, kick and all of the stuff that Callum was working and landing, I just don't know that that goes a long way with a lot of the judges. So it's a tough fight, man. That's another one. Could have gone either way. But I did have that 29, 28.

And it's a good bounce back for JDM. Though I do wonder if the last two have maybe slowed this role a little bit. Because it felt like we were getting hot and heavy with the JDM is going to be a future champion talk pretty hard after his first few UFC fights. And I think now maybe it is a moment to settle down on. that. Like, he's certainly someone who's going to matter in this division, certainly, and he has a long way to go. He has a long future ahead of him. But I think this was a good indication that, you know, hey, like, let's take some time here. This isn't something we need to rush. Jed, you, you were very

hard on JDM. You questioned his fight IQ. Were you, are you back on track here? Did, did he show you enough to be a little bit easier on him here after this performance or you still have questions? I mean, I still have questions, but this is exactly the performance you want to see from him. This was a super disciplined fight from him, which, you know, I think a lot of people guessed and you could have guessed that he, you know, he got an earful from his coaches at the end because they were telling him during the fight, stop doing this dumb shit man. And so, you know, he went back to the well. And again, very, very disciplined performance. He clearly had stuff that he had worked on and was trained, trying to do and then trying to figure out this fight in a way that best benefited his skills. with Shaheen, I think Kevin Holland's approach to this fight was both good and bad.

It was good in that it was a really competitive fight. And I think there is an argument that he won the fight. But I was really confident we were talking about the slack that the judges would not score this fight. I scored it for JDM. And I think the way that Kevin Holland was fighting was not conducive to success for most people because the optics are pretty poor. Luke Thomas this week on one of his shows was talking. about Sean Strickland and the Philly Shell.

And it's really great to listen to him talking about it. But one of the things that really stood out to me, particularly in the context of this fight, is Strickland's Philly Shell, like, caused a ton of problems defensively for Israel Dissue. And I think we saw the same for Holland, but the primary difference between those two and the way they employed them is Strickland's Philly Shell was used almost entirely moving forward.

And one, that's, like pretty rare and two that still gave him the initiative in most of the exchanges to parry slide slip and and get off a one to get back at him whereas hollins was almost exclusively moving backwards and so instead it just created more opportunities for jdm to continue throwing in combination that is something jdm has always been really good at we'll keep doing if you are close enough to hit he will keep punching you until you are no longer close enough to hit or you're unconscious And so even though Holland was blocking like a lot of that like those combos that happened, that's just, it just looks like a dude is teeing off on you and you're trying to cover up and run away. And that's not the same as Strickland doing that against Izzy basically. So I thought it was a really disciplined performance from JDM. Really good performance. Still have tons of questions. And I will say that, you know, the Basel fight tempered me on my expectations for him. But. But this is still a dude who's going to hang around at the top 10 of this weight class for years to come.

And honestly, outside of the tactical choices that I disagree with from Kevin Holland, very solid fight from him still looks good. He's a guy who can still make noise in the welterweight division. Just might want to rethink some of how he's approaching some fights sometimes because it does appear that every couple of times he gets caught up in something that's probably not the best way to go about. fighting like you probably shouldn't try and do a kickboxing match with stephen thompson for four rounds and just get battered around the head probably could have gone to more takedowns or had more aggressive game plan against jdm here but you know fun fight yeah in discipline it seems like is the imperative word the keyword that you kept using right because i think that was a very legitimate very legitimate questions that were being asked regarding jdm after that last one right

where it was a very puzzling fight IQ that we saw from him and that have his fight, very puzzling decisions throughout the fight. That was one of those takeaways coming from that of like, is this who this guy is? Or was this just a weird circumstance with a short notice opponent for a guy who cut weight twice in two weeks? I'm willing, I was willing to give him a mulligan after that last one of this potentially being a weird circumstance. And in what we saw tonight, I think is a good return to form for like, okay, yeah. Like that was, that seemed to be an aberration comparatively with what we saw tonight of what was a very intelligent fight from Jackie Three Names. As far as bonuses go, all the finishers got bonuses, all of them.

So good on that. Hey, finish bonuses. Finish bonuses. We're all Roches Jr. who we're going to talk about in a moment, Daniel Zellhuber, Lupi Godinez, Roman Coppiloff, and Charlie Campbell, who channeled the rock and kind of made D.C. look a little silly, but D.C. with a great comeback. I thought he did a great job in that moment as well.

Real quick, before we bring in our special guest and take some questions, uh, Raul Roses Jr. Jen Mishu in the featured spot. This is perfect matchmaking, Jed. Was it not? I mean, this is, this is tremendous because Raul Rosh Jr.

needed to come back. He needed to come back in a big way. Got to show his hands. He got a knockout win. It's only the second of his career. Usually he's just going out in subbing dudes. And boy, did he have a great dance partner in Terrence Mitchell,

who just the perfect guy to get him over. I think Terrence Mitchell should have a job with the UFC for the rest of his life. As long as he wants to continue fighting, I think Terrence Mitchell has a permanent place in this company because of what he did tonight. And what do you can do for guys like Raul Roche Jr. Or anybody else who gets into the octagon with him, Jed? What did you think of that fight? I think about six years ago, maybe, I wrote in, you know, I formally did missed fist with AK Lee before I was unceremoniously thrown out of that endeavor. But at the time, we were talking about something.

And I think it was like a Bellator prelim. and I don't remember who, but whoever it was just got their doors blown off in spectacular fashion. And I wrote a thing that I've come to believe is one of my great offerings to the MMA world.

And that's, look, being a good fighter is all well and good. And you want to have many of those if you're a promotion. But what you really want to have, you want to have stars, Connor McGregor stars. And then right after that, you want to have people who lose,

in good fashion. You don't want to have tough outs who are going to have boring fights. You want to have guys who you can call in and get smashed. And you know, and look, I don't care how disrespectful this is to Terrence Mitchell.

I am sure he is a lovely young man and I hope the best for him and his family. But anyone with two working eyeballs and the ability to actually read could have looked at his topology and said, I know where this is going And it has nothing

I mean yes the betting line Could have clued you in But you look at his career Is Alaska fighting championship Honestly a really enjoyable promotion I don't know if they still do They used to have events on Fight Pass It was very funny to watch them all the time

Enjoyable not good All of it's in Alaska fighting championship He gets called into tough For the tournament of champions Loses to Kai Kaikawa France in 30 seconds The first like Here's a prospect 30 seconds blows his doors off.

Goes back to Alaska. Fights in Alaska again, gets pulled in against 8-0 Cameron Simon, super prospect, gets his doors blown off in 30 seconds. The point is to have this man fight somebody you're trying to get over a young, talented prospect.

And I'm not sure how talented Rall Roses Jr. is. We can get into that in a little bit, but he was obviously going to do this the whole time. And that is a skill set. you should pay for if you're the UFC. Just have this dude come in every six months to fight the next young dude who you want to get a big

win on Mexican Independence Day Noce UFC event or whatever the next one of those they're doing. He should have a job forever. Someone is saying we're overselling a win for Rao Roos Jr. We're not. We're overselling

we're overselling Terrence as being a valuable commodity here. exactly because I have in my notes of this people are way too high on raw rosas junior coming off of this like I saw a lot of comments after this being like wow it was like you guys remember he was a minus 800 favorite and we all knew

this was going to happen and like sure credit to doing the thing that you're supposed to do but like maybe pump the brakes on that a bit but yeah this is nothing to do with all roses this is everything to do with tance mitchell and his unique set of skills which are extremely valuable what did you think of ral roosier jahin go ahead Yeah, I will give the 18-year-old who did something pretty well on a big stage some credit,

because I certainly couldn't have done anything remotely like that at age 18, right? I continue to be, like I understand Terrence Mitchell. Terrence Mitchell is Terrence Mitchell. Like, we're not going to oversell what this was. But the poise showed by that man, that teenager, is continually impressive to me. Because he is doing all of this on a stage where most 18-year-olds, like, I couldn't even tell you. you never mind i'm not gonna i was gonna say some i was doing some weird shit at age 18 as we all were right like come on man what were you doing at age 18 i couldn't have been answering i couldn't have been

answering all these questions from the media and being the sole focus of the week and like all this stuff because like we've we all sort of see the metrics we see the views like people are very interested in ral rosa junior any content revolving around this kid does well his scrum usually does the best of the group like like whatever this is people are invested in this kid's journey and he is still just a kid. And so for him to continually be able to not only handle that with a level of a plum that is pretty damn impressive, if we're just being honest with ourselves, but show out on moments like this where, yeah, it was a fight where he was designed to show out. But either way, he still did it. And that,

to me, like, that was a violent 18 year old I saw tonight, man. That kid was putting some aggression out in that fight. Like, that was, that was some frustration of, of having, and all these adults just asking him questions about why did you lose for a good six months or however long it's been. I was impressed by it, man. Like, we're not going to oversell it. We're not going to over-hype it. We're not going to say what it was, say it was something that it wasn't.

This is still someone who is very, very, very, very far from becoming the finished product that he will be and very far from becoming a person who matters in this division in terms of contention. But I don't know, man. If you can get an 18-year-old out there who can put on a performance like that in front of the world, I'm impressed by it. it's just how the world's going these days she need it's all going to be children it's all children in every sport now you know it's just it they're better prepared for this so look it's great i'm

not here to downplay his thing just like we can find a happier medium than this you match this dude up well he's guaranteed to be big star and a champion like i don't know people were pumped about sage northcut and here we are with sage north yeah but what was sage north cut like yeah but what was stage north cut like 22 23 I feel like there's a big difference I those I feel like if there's a big difference if that is

less in the favor of the 18 old top of sleep like he might wake up tomorrow and just not want to do I've said it's all the time like he probably won't probably won't keep fighting but he's 18 like might wake up and be like I'm going to be a race car driver or just try and do that he can do anything that's what being

18 is so I I just want to see him keep fighting and keep winning And, you know, if every once in a while you throw him a can to crush and he gets to do this and it's great, then that's fine. But, you know, just don't need to say this guy's a future star. No, no. Just keep performing. Because I also have no idea how much of this. He's the thing, he's definitely an intrigue.

I don't know how much of that intrigue is sustainable once he is no longer 18-year-old, Earl Roses Jr. or 19-year-old or Roses Jr., because it feels weird to be like 20-year-old or Roses Jr., you know. I don't. Is there just a two year? Is there just, I want to be clear. If he's really good for a long time, I'm keeping up the bit. 35-year-old Ronald Roses Jr. Like that's, we're just going to do that. But, you know, I think a lot of it, at least at this point, feels to me a bit, you know,

galsh and he's 18 years old. I want to look at this. And I don't know if that keeps up as that no longer becomes true. But it's a good performance, a great bounce back. And great hat. I would say with Habib out of the game. game. That sombrero is top two hats in MMA right now. This is good hat.

Ultimately, this night was not even with this fight. This whole night was built around either the fights are really competitive or there are squash patches. That's it. Like that's what this card is built to be. There's only like, what do we say, Jed? Outside of the main event, the co-main event and the Cortez,

Jazz DeVecius fight with Chase's Cortez, great, that fight was awesome. And they probably should have a fight at the night. But every, what every single favorite was like minus 250 or above. Something in that neighborhood. Yeah. And the one fight I thought was mislined was the one that the dog cashed. And it was Kyle Nelson. I thought him being a plus 250 or whatever he was or plus 200 was,

I thought that line should have been was a little too wide. But this is what the night was. It kept me from a perfect night, Kyle Nelson. Dude. Yeah, it was good. It was a fun night. It was a fun night. This, this, I loved that the UFC did this.

And in execution, it played out in a really cool and fun way where this felt big. This was more or less just a fight night, right? It was a fight night type of card with a really, really, really good main event, right? Like, this is a championship fight underneath just what is essentially an apex card. But the way they designed it, the production around it, just all of the little features with it and everything that sort of went into it to make it special. All we ask for every single week is for the UFC to make things feel special. We see your financial reports.

We understand that you guys are made. making billions of dollars. Like it's ridiculous, the amount of money that this corporation is making to reinvest it into the sport in a way that a night like this, free for everybody more or less, like free with a subscription, obviously, but free, title fight, really cool setup, squatch matches galore, but it was a great crowd. They were super fired up. This felt like a big fight night.

This felt more or less it had a pay-per-view type of vibe. To be able to give us something like that on, you know, ESPN Plus. I love that, man. And I hope that they do more of this. I hope that they see how much all of us enjoyed this and lean farther into it. And we can get regional variants like this, just cards that are sort of specialized in this way and feel different than UFC Apex 4,000 where we're seeing, you know, the same people fight over and over again in front of nobody. Like this is this is cool. This was different.

And all I ever asked for the UFC is cool and different. Yeah, this is fun. I loved the ceremonials being outside, the mari, you band like everything about it was just cool like more fun more fun give us more fun we'll all be very happy if we're not if we're not doing a bastille day card next july with all the pomp circumstance what the hell are we even doing here you know like it's a great point just go go to nice you don't even have to do it in paris if that's you know too hard as you know they are celebrating just come on make it happen guys this was great it's a wonderful it's really fun time it all

worked out. You know, I had a great time tonight. Yeah, I don't care about the. I had a great time. It was really, really enjoyable set of a I had a great time.

Mike, even though some of those fights don't matter. I had a great time. Mike Bell, yes. Apparently Valencia Shafchenko is at the press conference, just ripping Mike Bell and judges in general. So how did we feel about the heel turn? How did we feel about the heel turn?

Because, I mean, look, she's a salty. She's planting seeds. Dude, just playing seats for the next fight. Look, I get it. I don't think that's the pure explanation of in a fair and just world, I am the winner. Like, that was just, she just straight up was like, I think the judges felt pressured because of Mexican Independence Day. And that's why this happened. I was robbed by just by the fucking cowards sitting in the judge's chairs tonight.

It's basic what she said. Did you hear the reaction from the crowd? Yeah. So I missed it. It was an incredible heel promo. I missed it. And I was watching. I had the captions on.

So you go, so yeah, all I saw was like, oh, it's Mexican Independence Day. And I was like, oh, she showed out the day in the fighters.

And then I went, then I went back and rebound it. And I was like, oh, now I understand why the crowd was like, what the hell was that? Like, that was completely out of nowhere.

She is not here for anyone's bullshit. She is not here for your bullshit, my bullshit, and their bullshit. And I am, I kind of appreciate it, frankly. Like, that takes incredible balls to just go up there and say that. So the thing is, I appreciate it. I can't think of one that was more like, do you want to infuriate a good amount of people watching this? Like, I cannot think of another fight that was more designed to get. Maybe Colby in Brazil.

Yeah, but that's even so performative, it's stupid. This felt from her soul. Yeah, this was just her. She genuinely believed everything she said. That's fair. Yeah. Speaking her truth of I was robbed by the cowards in the judges' chairs who didn't want to cause a riot in. I just wish she would have specifically pointed, just found them and pointed to them and been like, you guys, you need to explain to me.

would have been the best she just goes and finds Spike Bell and just stands over him he's like tell me now puts a microphone in his face and forces him to give an explanation at least that would be a change that would be nice yeah that wouldn't be a better job than anyone else has ever done

with these judges what an incredible job these people have really to where you can you can be doing something so deeply important to so many people something that meaningfully impacts so many different people's lives and you could just be so flippant with it where it's like, hey, you know,

this doesn't really make sense, but it feels fun, and it's going to lead to some cool talk, talking points for people. I'm going to do it, and then I'm just going to walk out, and no one will ever get to ask me any questions about it ever, and there will be zero accountability,

and then it's just, we all move on. What a cool job. I wish I had that level of non-accountability for my job. It would be great. Shaheen, think about what you just said. That's why I'm okay with what Mike Bell did, because you know that I would do exactly the same thing the whole time. If I was in that position, I would just do whatever I wanted because it felt right.

So I get it, Mike Bell. I understand where you're coming from, buddy. I see you. No one else does. I get you. It's the matcha or the three ensemble Cadocephora of the fact that I just just need to denishy who my energize all time? It's the ensemble.

The form of standard and mini-regrouped. Hello, Ben. And the embellage, too beau, who is practically pre to donate. And I know that I'd everly these offriar. But I guard the Summer Fridays. and Rare Beauty by Selena Gomez. I'm just a good The best-a-a-caddle

of the Feshoe de facto, the first of course, and other part of the video, and other part of the video. Procurrevee you these formats, and mini, regrouped for a better quality of price,

on link on C4.A. or in a magazine. Unwrapped holiday magic at Holtrenfrew with gifts that say I know you. From festive and cozy fashion to luxe beauty and fragrance sets,

our special selection has something for every style and price point. Visit our Holtz Holiday Shop and store or online at Holtrenfrew.com. I think we have set up a perfect transition here because we're talking about speaking truths and saying what you feel and being your true self. So at this point, it's time for me and the man who's been patiently waiting since we began.

He's been sitting in the green room, the virtual green room. This is a man who's actually defending Mike Bell. He's defending Mike Bell. There he is right there. He's defending the 10-8 fifth round. he said, and I quote, I got no issue with it. I have no issue with it. I can see a 10-8 fifth round.

So Casey Leiden, producer extraordinaire, gets to sit in the co-host seat today. Please explain yourself to the people. Have you been talked out of this take at all? Because you, we almost, we have done like real fish stuff during these days. Actually, I think the only person that scored this fight correctly was Jed Mishu. Nailed it Nailed it That's right

This is another This is how you said earlier It's not what I said But Jed did make a good point I'm right Round three was around the deep Round three was around the deep gilly Right

That was round three Yes Deep gilly and the extended back control It's in the back control Okay I just really I want to remind people We at home

Have a better view of the fight than the actual judges do. That's very true. We don't know where the judges are sitting. It is so deeply hard to judge a fight at a fight. It really is. It's very dumb. It's kind of silly how we at home we have a better view.

The fact that that sentence is true, is it dumb. Yeah. It's just a dumb thing. And if you've ever had a chance to, if you get an opportunity to sit cage side for a major fight, you'll realize this. Go, oh, I think this guy's winning. And I guess I have to watch out at home to be confident. Because you just don't know when you're there.

And I'm going to assume Mike Bell from his angle thought that choke was just, the time of round five, was just in super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, deeper, deep. And that's why he gave it a 10-8. First and the guillotine attempt in the back mount or whatever in round three. He just didn't feel quite made the 10-8 to jump from 10-9 to 10-8. And this goes back to a bigger issue why I hate the 10 point scoring system because how can round one be scored the same way as round 5 or round 3?

But that's a larger, stupider issue that would never get resolved. But all I'm saying is I think it's justifiable. I didn't score. I didn't score round 5 and 10 8. I did score the fight for Grasso overall. But I think the right person, quote, unquote, still won. So that's kind of Nobody.

Nobody didn't lose. The right person didn't lose. The right person didn't lose rather. Yeah. Okay. I met admittedly as soon as it started when we were off air, I was, I went a little harder in the paint. You really did.

Yeah. Well, I was kind of shocked. You guys came after me hard too. You're great. You're digging. Well, at least. Okay. So the point we're making.

And by the way, I was, I was emotional. That's why. We all were. We all were. Jed. Jed, real quick, for those who don't know, how did you score the fight? Just so we can go back to this. I scored the fight 4746 for Grasso.

It is another of many instances where I am the only person with the correct scorecard and MMA decisions. If you could, I don't know if they let you search like my name there, but you're going to find a whole litany of those because I'm doing it right and everyone else isn't. I gave rounds two and rounds three, 10-8s, dueling 10-8s. I gave round 2 a 10-8 for Lexa-Grasso because under the rules, I am absolutely within my rights to give her that round based on how scoring criteria works. And I think that that round had substantially more impact and dominance that led to an effect that was tangible. And so scored that a 10-8.

Similarly, I think the third round where Schochenko got the very tight guillotine and then spent three minutes in back control, which is an asymmetrical position that Lexa Grasso had no answer for and no offense. I felt that that was enough dominance and duration to warrant a 10-8 round. I am actually at least somewhat on board. I think that it is not entirely unreasonable to score round 5, 8, 10-8. I think it is unreasonable to score that a 10-8 and not score 2 or 3, as those were more clearly dominant rounds. I could be talked into it. Why I didn't give that a 10-8 is because up until the first three minutes and 30 seconds of that round were pretty clearly Shivchenko dummying Grasso for large portions of that with the jab.

And so I just went 10-9, but I thought Grasso probably won three rounds. And that's why I'm like fine with what happened. I don't think she should have lost her belt. It wouldn't have been the worst scorecard ever if she did. But I think she did enough, had enough big moments in that fight to deserve to retain. That's why this is also dumb. All of this is so dumb. Because there are so many defensible, easily explainable ways we could have reached sort of the result we reached.

Round 2108 is super defensible. I think there's a very clear case for that. Round 3108 is also very defensible. The whole thing is just... That's the thing, Shaheen. I've come around on the 108 scoring system in MMA. It's very fraught and super complicated thing. I think it's not the best.

but I think it can be ported over fine. The problem is creating a system that is, for a large portion of its history, is too restrictive on 10-8 rounds. And that's dumb because boxing is three-minute rounds, which is substantially different than five minutes. And boxing has a very clear structure of how rounds get weighted more. A fighter gets dropped, that round goes down. And that actually works in the whole combination of the system of boxing,

because, hey, that guy got dropped. If you got dropped, it was clearly real, and thus it deserves more weight. It's much more fluid. And now this like, well, let's bring some ambiguity into when it should be. It should just be pretty clear. Like, hey, if this fighter did substantially more of something than the other, then that's a 10-8 round. And just add more of them in. And this gets so much cleaner, holistically.

And it's really frustrating. Well, so I have a question for all y'all. And then I have two statements that are separate. question pride rules which are the ultimate rules the king's rules the rules of the greats who won Alexa Grasso for sure I hate probably Grasso I hate pride rules I think probably well I hate you

here's the big problem with pride rules is that pride rules say that it's like who won the fight as a whole but that just functionally is who won the last three minutes and look like they would be winning at the fight That is super not how stuff played out. It largely translates out. But I think under either term, Grosso won. But yes, Grasso won the fight. I think Grosso won the fight.

Yeah, by private rules. School yard rules. Grosso won the fight. School yard rules for sure. Who do you want to be? Who would you have rather been at the end of the fight? That's sort of where I always see it. Two quick aside.

I would still rather be Shevchenko because Grasso has a cut and stitches suck. And I don't think Chivchenko is cut. but you know she got pretty lumped up she was pretty lumped up chifingo took like 20 knees of the head trying to play the game and that was that was one of my first thing i the two asides i have one who was the ref against i absolutely her love her that herb dean a great night great night perfect refereeing by herb dean and i love that that's the rule now because those knees were sick in round four that was monstrous i i hope we see more of that because you saw valentine

and trying to play the game. And her just being like, nah, you got a deal. Like, you put yourself in this position. That was killer, man. I loved that. The aggression, like the instinct to do that. It's tremendous. What's up, Jeff?

Oh, I just want to be like, so I'm with you. One, I thought that was brilliant from Grasso. I hate the world we live in because, like, what is? Chivchenko, because Shivchenko is sitting there and like trying to play the game. and feeling like she is getting hard done by because it's not working for her and it shouldn't but also

the rules aren't unified and so in some places where they fight you can play the game and it's so dumb to have this like one very dumb rule be not the same and we're like all of this is dumb tonight was a perfect encapsulation of why all of this is dumb there are no there's no basis of there's no like baseline

for any of this is all of this is people just doing stuff and then being like It's all Calvin ball. Is that going to work? My big takeaway, though, from that moment was first, damn, Schochenko's getting beaten the head right now. That probably sucks. She should stop letting that happen.

And then immediately it was not great. I was like, you know, it was just, man, why is there any ambiguity about this? Why can't we all just decide what is fine to, when it's fine to need people in the head and when it's not? So she would have done something better instead of playing that. the game. So that was just a frustrating moment, but good on Alexa Grasso, because that was some of her best offense. Yeah. And that, that ties you maybe the second aside that I just wanted to say here, which is I am truly, truly impressed at this point with who Alexa Grasso has become. Because I, I'll be honest, I did not see this coming, right? Like the evolution of what she has

sort of achieved with this final form. She showed tonight that the first fight was clearly no fluke. And she also showed that, like, results or not, whether she got the win or not, flyweight Alexa Grasso is very much for real. And that is a staggering fact considering that like four years ago, basically to the day, more or less four years ago, she was two and three over her last five. And she lost the fight to Carla to make it to put herself on that slump. Like she looked like someone who, I mean, obviously entering from Invictor, there was a lot of hype around her and Aldana. It was just this idea of like, hey, these two Mexican fighters, these two Mexican women are going to come into here.

They look killer and Invicta and they're going to come take the UFC by storm. And it super did not happen for a large chunk of Alexa Grasso's career. And this move to 125 is why I is, you know, we don't we don't talk about often. But like I'm so glad the UFC ultimately instituted this division because the 115 to 135 gap, there was just too much there and so much talent now has found their way at 125. Alexa Grasso looks incredible, man. She looked like a world beater tonight. She looked like a champion tonight.

and for her to become this all around just demon where she's throwing out these knees the jab was working all the groundwork where like you said jett earlier when she was getting on top of valentina she was just tearing her apart and the heart that she continually shows in all of these fights you saw in the first fight coming from behind to get the to get the choke when nobody thought or to get this mission when nobody thought she could get this mission tonight fighting out of the guillotine pulling it out in these final few rounds even pulling the 10-8 in the round five whether you like the heart the heart that she shows out there man combined with the skill set and the talent of what she has truly become frankly incredible because i super did not see this coming and i was still a little bit doubt i still doubted it a little bit after that first one because it was somewhat of a i wouldn't say fluky

but it was one of those things of just like is this for real and no questions this is obviously is this a safe space is this are we in we in the circle of trust oh boy i still have some doubts Not about her heart or toughness or anything like this, but like, I mean, there were, look, again, I scored this fight for her. I thought she won and there were parts of what happened tonight. That was just tremendous. There were also parts of it that were really bad. She's fighting Valentina Shvchenko, man. She is.

And that's why this was like a really fun but interesting fight. Like, I'm, yes, Valentina Shibchenko won the greatest of all time, like a terrific fighter. Grasso simply couldn't work around a jab. Like she could not figure out how to work around this jab. And other people who are smarter than this than I am are going to go into deeper about this this week because I don't know all the answers. But it is so evident that like just fighting Val in Southpaw like totally jacked her up. Like that first round for like the two minutes when Grasso was in Orthodox and Chepchenko's whipping the body kick in her off. offenses in rhythm and she's looking really strong to start.

As soon as it switched back, it was just like, oh, all I can do is jab. Like, that's the only thing she could do to a fellow Southpaw. And that, and then Grasso couldn't even figure out a way around. Like, there were some, I would say problems. The whole thing is great. Like the outcome, the heart, what she showed, her grappling. But like, I don't know. You choked her out the first fight.

Every second you were in dominant position in this fight, you were smothering the life out of her, maybe go to a takedown before the last minute of the final round of the fight and see if that works for you. She also knocked her down, though. She was finding success in various aspects of the striking. She did, and that's the thing. I feel like you are deeply underrating what we've seen her do twice now

to one of the greatest female fighters in the history of sports. I don't think I'm underrating. I think it's just a weird thing where she has had really great moments in these fights. She's also had pretty bad moments in these fights. It's hard to pin it down, but the ebbs and flows of this fight felt more to me like the opposite woman's failure than the successful woman's successes, if that makes sense. It's not that simple, though. It's not like she's fighting you or I in there. She's fighting someone who's so complex and so tricky and so dangerous.

I don't think it's nearly as simple as you're making it out to be. A lot of people have lost fights because they can't figure out how to get around a jab. That feels like a very gross sort of minimalization of what we're watching. I mean, but you know she's going to have a jab and you spent ostensibly this whole camp preparing and you still struggled so hard with it that but for a good jab. It is, but if Val doesn't go for the most boneheaded throw in recent memory, probably the most heaved of a move since Chris Wyden

did a spinning attack on Luke Rockhold. The entire narrative is... We're talking about the first fight or this fight? This fight. This fight. This fight. This is the first fight was not a...

Because she did the same. Okay, yeah, because she does... That makes crazy mistakes in fights. I don't... I don't think in the first fight, that's a mistake. Valentina Shepchenko went for a spinning back kick. It's a weapon for her. That was Grasso being drilled and timed on a trigger and motioning on it.

That's nothing but upside for her. She didn't throw that at all at this fight real quick. No, she didn't. She didn't spin it all. Except for that one time when she wasn't spinning, she was trying a head and arm throw, which is idiotic. But if that doesn't happen,

then this whole fight is, well, down the stretch, Grasso ran out of answers. And, you know, we are talking a lot of it, but it's like,

when the answer was just the jab? Like, your only answer was to go to South Paul, and that took a lot of her things away, but how, why weren't you mixing things up a little more effectively? Like I said, I'm not saying she's a bad fighter.

I think she's, the best flyweight in the world that's not named Aaron Blanchfield. But I still just have questions about like the whole piece of her game at this point because there are there are weaknesses. Like she is not a champion who is bulletproof. There are flaws and that makes her really compelling. But I still have questions. Well, we shall see.

We shall see where she will go from here. We'll take some questions here about some different things. First one, we kind of touched on this. but Shaheen, I'll start with you, was the straw the best outcome for everyone. And I don't think it's the best outcome for everyone, but Valentina could do anything, but knowing her, she'll demand a third fight, or we'll fight in an eliminator. Best outcome for everyone here. Before you answer that, Shane, real quick.

I did a poll. Oh. Basically, I just asked who do you think won the fight on our listeners right now, 46% for Grasso, 45% for Shepchenko. and the rest being draw. So that's why I keep, so essentially a draw. And if you look on MMA decisions,

it's incredible. The fan, basically is split 50-50 between Grasso and Jeffchenko with the media. And the fans themselves, 47.8% had Grasso, 47.8% had Chefchenko,

the rest being a draw. This fight is as close as I've ever seen between media and fans. It's actually very incredible. Yeah. I just always don't get that out there before we go on. And that's what I go back to just, I like the result a lot, actually, ultimately.

I just don't like the process. The process of how we got here is infuriating. This is round two. It's a different failing. Yeah. If this is just a 10-8 round two, super different conversation. Who scored the fifth round? I'm curious, who scored the fifth round for Al Jermaine Sterling against Henry Sehudo?

Was that Mike Bell, too? Oh, I can look real quick. I'm curious. I don't know if it was, but I'm throwing that out. Because that was the other, like, super weird one where, like, in a world where the fifth round was scored appropriately, like, Henry Sehudo's the Bannon Way champion and not Sean O'Malley. What event was that?

No, Michael. Michael Bell scored. It was Derek Cleary. That scored. Derek Cleary. Okay. Derek Cleary. But Michael Bell was also judging that card, and he scored the third.

the fifth round for Sehudo. Yes, which is the right call. Yeah. Michael Bell. Think about a fifth round. Mike Bell is a good right. It's a good judge. Mike Bell is usually a good judge.

Yeah. Yeah, he's good. This is why I just, I really wish. Weird one. I could, there was some level of. I've already explained it. I would have just loved to hear from him. I'm so certain that this was a, I made an oopsie.

And so she's going to get an eight because that will correct my oopsie. It's like, I'm so certain that's what happened here, honestly. It is what it is. All things considered, I just can't get over the fact that four years ago, this woman was two and three in the last five and really looked at somebody who was just not going to become this. And then now she's, we're having legitimate conversations about her kind of beaten Valentina Shepchenko twice in a row. That's what I think that's a great point, Sheen,

because I don't think a lot of people saw this coming. The improvement she has made, I still do have questions, but she's come astonishingly far in the last few years. Absolutely. We say that about Grosso, but it sounds like we could be saying the same thing about, I mean, I don't want to talk about Strickland.

It is out of sign it too much, but I mean, what Strickland did, is it almost the same like, I could not see him being champed? Like, just like we're saying about Grosso, I cannot see Grosso being champion. Even though we're kind of saying a couple years ago, with Strickland, we were saying it last week.

Yeah, but we did this after Strickland where like you looked through his resume. It's not that bad. there's never a stretch where he's two and three over five and you're kind of wondering whether he belongs in this sort of conversation like he was losing to the guys you'd think he'd lose to an oosman you know those type of figures but like yeah i don't know i don't know that it's comparable but it's certainly like it's another example which of which we see many you can't judge these people these fighters before when they're midway through their career right

you give up on them way too soon or we push them way too fast you know so that that's It's the beauty of everything. Colorado wins it in double overtime, by the way, guys. Golly, man. Dion. Deon can't lose. Coach Prime squeaking one out over Colorado State and

Watt. I don't know anyone who goes in Colorado, so I'm good. Did Colorado State go for a hand and arm? Did Colorado State go for a head and arm throw? No, they got put on like fourth and ten, and that just couldn't get there. So their defense was awful in overtime, but, you know, All right.

So the head and off throw. What an impossible. We'll keep on rolling here. This is a very interesting night because we had a judge in the main event that wasn't great. Herb Dean, hokey pokey her. It was actually did a really good job in the main event. I thought he was fantastic. He's been pretty good.

We had some hair pulling. We had some hair pulling in the Jasmine Jazz DeVizzias Tracy Cortez fight. And that only made that much better. It wasn't called props Jason Herzog for letting that thing go. but not all the refereeing was great tonight. Edgar Chiraez versus Daniel Lacerda. Can we break it down? Will Edgar Chiraz be successful in his appeal?

So for those who don't know. Oh, he's appealed? Oh, yeah. For a great website. I'm sorry. I missed it. I missed it. It's a pretty good website.

So if you guys, if you guys didn't watch this fight, Daniel Lacerda, who is 0 and 4 in the UFC with four stoppage loss, went in there with Edgar Chires and they had a fight. Edgar puts in a gilly looks kind of tight. And then he readjusted and then looks real tight. And Chris Tione, I mean, the dude pulled out a monocle and was this close to looking at things.

That's how close he was. He had his monocle on and everything. But unfortunately, the monocle was just on the arm of one Daniel Lacerda, but nothing else. And at first, as I'm watching this, I'm like, oh, this is the right call because Lacerda's arm just goes completely limp. And as soon as it does, Chris Tiodi jumps right in and stops the fight. And Daniel Lerda is pissed. He immediately protests it. They go to replay.

Chris Tione, when they come back from break, says, I was wrong. I screwed that up. Apologized to Daniel Lacerda, who for a moment was 0 in the UFC with five stoppage losses, was in the history. books and then it gets overturned to a no decision. And as we reported on M.A.fling.com, Edgar Chires is appealing this and wants to get his win. So that is kind of the breakdown of this. So Shaheen, what, four, five hours later? What do you make of this? And does Edgar Chiris have any chance of being successful with this appeal?

B, no, he has zero chance. This is absolutely not going to work. I hate to spoil it for him. but there's zero chance that he's going to do. Like, what are you expecting to get out of this? A win? Because you're not going to get a win. It's already a no contest. They can't just run it back. They should have been able to just run it back in the cage. It's very dumb that you can't just resume the fight from the offending position.

But to answer your first question, I almost just want to go to Casey because Casey felt very, very strongly about this at the moment. Oh, yeah, go ahead. He might have mellowed since Casey tonight. He was very much facing out while I was talking. I could tell right there. Yeah, Chris Deone, he screwed up and they just, okay, the big thing, we say the arm went limp.

First of all, I didn't go limp. Because if you look at the replay, he never actually checks his arm if it's limp. He literally, was the guy lost. It appeared to go limp. It appears to go. But he was stuck in the gate thing. He just puts his arm down. And if you notice, Grasso did pretty much the same thing, but she was on her back.

She was stuck in that gate thing, and she goes, oh, wait, never mind. I'm just going to relax. Being on her back doesn't bring gravity into play, which is a problem. And when I kept saying about Tione, if he's going limp, what happened to his legs? His legs did not go limp. Think of the John Jones Machita thing. Like when Machita went out, his legs went out and he fell down. So somehow this guy is only his arm goes limp and his legs were still holding him underneath.

This, and that, Kristiani, he's a professional arrest. He just made a mistake. He just made a mistake and they fixed it, thankfully. And it sucks. It sucks for Edgar Chuck. Chiris, it sucks. It just sucks. Because he was most likely on his way to winning that fight,

maybe not that submission, but he was going to win the fight eventually. I think he was going to win with that for him. Yeah. I think he was going to win with that submission. He might have to readjust for the, he might have to readjust this submission and thing. But the position he was in right then, he was not getting this submission right then.

But he could have readjusted for it. But now on the other side, Daniel Lassardo may or may not have already broken the UFC record for most UFC appearances without a win. So that's a fun. I think this is. History. History. History. History. History in making.

No, there are other... He's at least top three. I don't... I'm sure there's some weird stuff that I can think of them. No, no. He's... There are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 fighters. The wonderful A.K. Lee actually pulled this together this week who are 0 and 5 in the UFC with including

no contest. So he joins that illustrious group, which includes people like Pat Healy. Sheen, I know you stand opposed to that one. I thoroughly disagree with that. I watched Pat Hillie beat Sean Soriano. I do not care how high he was during it. Jesse Ronson. I'm sorry, if we don't follow the rules, we live with the animal, Shaheen, and he broke

them. John Alessio also owned five. So he does join a very elite group of people. And since he probably gets another shot, maybe he's the first one to go on six. So there's that. that is on the table now I think I said so we did something like this not that long ago

and I said the same thing like it's an unfortunate circumstance I don't blame Tione that much I don't think he was like perfect operations but he grabbed his freaking arm and lift it he didn't grab his arm

yeah like he could have done that it's not like he's getting punched in the face while he's knocked out like there's not a crazy sense of immediate urgency there so that's part of that like that's my only real thing It's like it's a blood choke or you're fine if he goes out. Like he can hold it for another second or two. But like ultimately,

I totally get why he did it. Because it looks like he went to sleep. Like he probably should have checked the arm, but it was like a little awkward against the cage and that may have been tougher. And it looked like his arm does just drop. And it's something similar happened with Robbie Lawler, Ben Ascran. It's not a great circumstance, but he owned up to it. And that's really all you can ask.

You know, roughing's hard mistakes are going to get made it's hard yes it's like it's really tough sometimes things are going to happen it's unfortunate um but you know they did the best they could with the thing and then the rest of the conversation is like you guys mentioned ways to make this better hey we can just restart this fight like that would be okay um figure out how to do solve things like this in ways that don't adversely affect the fighter when they happen because you put on a thousand fights a year a couple of them are going to get wonky it's just the law of numbers How about Edgar Chiraz?

What a year that man has had. He was in a submission. He was part of a winning submission hole that went on way too long for Fury FC. That almost killed a freaking dude and like ripped the dude's arm apart. Yeah, that was. It's pinned to my Twitter if you guys haven't seen that or anything about it. Did a whole breakdown of that. Edgar was a part of that fight.

Get signed to the UFC next. Steps in on short notice on a pay-per-view. Has a fun fight. And now he's on the end of like a submission that was top two short. And now he's appealing. It's been a year for that dude. Holy shit. So something else to have.

He's really, you know, the guy that he, that Gianni Vasquez, the guy that he actually almost killed, I actually saw his last fight. Yeah. He's a champ. And it was, and it was a legit one of the best regional fights I've ever seen, too.

So, yeah, so that guy's back on his horse. So, yeah. And since you brought up, since you brought up one young Gianni Vasquez, I spoke with the man last week about that win and about everything going on with his fight against Texas. So stay tuned for that. I'm just trying to squeeze out a time frame to get that out

and figure out a way to put that out to you, a little follow-up to the big story from earlier. I forgot Mike Bell also gave a 3024 scorecard earlier today for the first fight of the night. Josephine Knudson. I didn't hate that one at all. I thought those are all. I didn't watch a second of that fight.

I remember, yeah, and that was a 3024, and then one ref gave it, one judge that I gave it a 3027. So we should have anticipated we're going to have some 10-8 tomfoolery by the main event. Yeah, but these were like, these were like, okay, anytime you turn a TV on to watch fistfighting. Mark, that's the thing. In 15 minutes. I thought we were going to have 10-8 tomfoolery. I just didn't think Grasso won the, or I thought I thought Grasso won the fourth. And so I thought it was going to be a 48, 47 scorecard for her.

And then when it didn't, I was like, okay, I guess some people in our Slack had said that Shipshanko won it. And that was like, okay, I guess Grasso got round two and they gave Chevy the fourth. And then it was like, round five. Interesting. Okay. Yes. I'm actually in round four. Was it round four?

Who what? How did you score round four? Was that a close round, round four? I get four to Grasasas, but it was the most competitive round. I thought it was extremely competitive, but I thought the needs. judge gave it to Sheffchenko. The knees sold it to me. Yeah.

The knees were the difference for me in that round. I scored it for Sheffchenko. The knees made it closer, a closer conversation, but I still gave it to Shepchenko. Two of the judges also gave it to Shepchenko. I believe Mike Bell was one of those judges, if memory serves it correctly. No, he was.

Yes. Because he had it correct. Because then he had to make up for his error at the end. It was a makeup call. It was. You watch a football game, and they don't call the face mask penalty that results in a touchdown. Next time they get down the field,

they let the O-line get away with like an egregious hold. Happens all the time. He just did it in a very public setting on ESPN Plus. It's okay. I see you, Mike Mel. It's fine. Mixing my shards is a sport. That's all I just say.

Hey. There we are. It's very exciting tonight. Guys, can we briefly? Yes, please. Can we briefly before we go? I don't know if we're answering more questions. I want to bring up two more.

We've got to get out of here. Oh, we've got two things. I will do one more. Maybe these questions, maybe these questions will be what I was going to say. So let's find out. Well, I wanted to bring this up because I thought Tracy Cortez was one of the stars of the show tonight.

The only girl to beat Aaron Blanchefield, I don't know if you actually watched that fight, but she didn't win that fight. She did. But it looks good on the Wikipedia. It sure does. And she looked good tonight. Yes.

she's the only girl to beat Aaron Blanchfield and look good tonight versus a surging Jasmine Jastovicius while coming off of a long layoff. Is she a top contender if she can fight with regularity? That's something you and I talked about Casey on the People's Pre-Fight show. And this is something Shaheen

that I thought was very interesting coming from Tracy Cortez saying, hey, I know you guys haven't seen me for a while. I got heart for days. And guess what? I'm going to come for that belt. Not in three years, not in four years. not in four years, next year, I'm going to be the champion. She plans on being active and getting to the belt.

So thoughts on Tracy's performance after the long layoff. And her saying, hey, I'm chasing the belt next year. So be ready for me. I thought it was a very impressive performance. I hope she's telling the truth about the activity level. Because this is somebody who been in the UFC five years now, and it's literally one fight a year. Like we've not seen her twice in a single year throughout her time.

And I've been impressed, man. I feel like her evolution, you can just see it. Like she has grown, leaps and bound since who she debuted as coming off of Invicta. But I don't know, man. I hope that she can find the level of activity that she needs to sort of become someone who matters in this division. Because she reminds me of similarly of sort of how Arnold Allen took a really long time to become a contender in the Featherweight division because he was just kind of fighting once a year against the rando. And then you wouldn't remember it because he'd be gone so long. and then all of a sudden there he is again fighting against a rando and he'd win and all the and you look at it and it's arnold allen is like five and oh in the ufc but he's not mentioned at all when we talk about people who matter in that division and then he was able to find consistency and fight a little bit more often and now he's who you know he's that guy i hope that tracy quirtes can make that make that push because i'm really intrigued to see who she can become especially because man i know that it may feel like something just to be said to the or that something that people would just throw out of what she was dealing

dealing with, dealing with Henry Sehudo's sister tragically passing away yesterday. But that is very meaningful. Like the Suhudo family has been very important to Tracy Cortez. If you sort of look in her backstory and her history, like they have, that is, when she calls her her big sister, I believe her. Like they've been very important to sort of getting her where she is and bringing her through some really tough times. And for for Henry Suhudo's sister to pass away yesterday and to be able to push through

that and have a performance like this today on a really big stage like this not fighting for more than a year that's impressive man just emotionally like as a human to be able to push through those emotions and perform i was super impressed great fight great performance uh jad i'm going to bring up a different name for you loopie godinez uh you went on no bets barred you predicted she would get a win inside the distance i think there was a moment in that fight where you were like um maybe she won't get it inside the distance, but man, she peppered that face and then like immediately, like after the last punch landed, she was already, she already had a poor Elise Reed up in the sky. Somehow she punched her in the face and still lifted her up in the air and slammed her to the

ground on one motion. It was incredible. Lupi Godinez. What did you think of her performance tonight? How high are you on her after this showing at 115 pounds? One, let's just start with Lupi Godinez is dope. Two. I need to put you guys in the correct mind frame of the day I've been having because it hadn't been, it's been around. Wake up this morning. Very excited. Atlanta United game, Inter-Myami's in town. This guy named Leo Messi plays for Inter-Miami.

It's going to be great. We're going to have a fun time. The family came in. We're going to go see it. Oh, what's that? Oh, Juano Messi is not. Even in Atlanta. Didn't even fly up to wave at people while he sits on the sidelines.

Tough beat, particularly when you look at the retail value of those. tickets go have a good time anyway except for that game's going on the same time my beloved georgia bulldogs south carolina in town supposed to wamp them or like 20 point favorites 14 to three for south carolina half not not not the vibes all day were off and then i get home i'm watching this fight i've got a loopy inside the distance she breaks the woman's arm i don't understand um that was ridiculous man it's i just don't understand stand the arm angles. Is that what MMA angles are?

Because I heard it was 90 degrees to her elbow. Like I don't like I remember when I used to train like they were like you know, not everybody can you can't break everybody's arm. You know, some people just really bendable. And I never like came across a person that was super that way. And I guess at least read is I don't get it. And then she almost like finished her anyway. And I was like, this is just going to be a day.

of awful beats. And then even, even up until the finish, I was terrified because she is lamping her against the cage, killing her. And then she goes to the takedown and won, credit to Lupi.

She's got some high amplitude tosses when she gets in on you. She can, she can chuck a woman in the air, uh, like few others in this weight class. But I was concerned. Totally fine in the end.

She just rolls over. Uh, I don't know what her ceiling is because, you know, she's suffered some losses. But when she's on, She's game to give anybody a damn good fight. And she's just one of the most fun fighters to watch, you know, in the Strawweight Division right now.

She's just gas. So terrific performance against, you know, Elise Reid, who's competent, but I wouldn't say like a great fighter. Yeah, it was awesome. Really, really, really fun. And then Casey, real quick, who impressed you the most tonight? Daniel Zell-Huber, Roman Coppuloff, or Charlie Campbell? there's a right answer Casey there's a right answer

you pick the right answer Casey I wasn't going to say loopy but of those choices I'm gonna go can I go Zellkeeper no one's the right answer Coppola Coppola is the right answer

It's definitely copy of one Zelluber had the cool The anaconda was awesome though Like that was super slick It's dope but also Zell Cooper looks like a middleweight fighting a lightweight So like you got to docking points for that

And I like Zell Huber and rib roasters baby, Coppola off with the with the burners. Like, oh, the answer will always be body shot, KO for me. I have,

I have long arms. So I'm very, when I saw the anaconda, off, after stuffing the takedown, getting the headlock and then going for the anaconda, it just made my heart skip a bee. It made my heart skip a bee.

I was just like, oh, she used the long arms to punch that dude in the body. Work the body. Yeah, that liver shot, that liver roasting was very beautiful also. It was a lot of great violence tonight. It was so good. Can I just ask all you?

We can close on this. Robin Kabayloff, four in a row now. Loses his first two in the UFC. Kind of didn't look super great in them. And now all of a sudden, four in a row knockouts. How for real do we think this is? Do it look pretty good, man? I feel a little bit vindicated, Gene.

I feel a little vindicated with this one. We'll talk more about this on onto the next one tomorrow because I think we're going to automatically bump Roman up to an official pick for the main car because I think he frankly deserves it. But after that second loss, everybody had given up on the man. Oh, he's one fight away from getting cut. You know who didn't? You know who used him as a wild card even coming off of a loss?

Because I believed in him so much. This guy right here. This dude right here. And he's paid it off for me. He's paid it off for me. Four straight finishes. Dude's good. dude's real, real good.

I can't look at him and just think it's just Chase Hooper on the juice. That's the thing. He just, he looks to Eli like what actually he brings to the cage. So who actually won this fight? Is this a win for Chris Curtis or Anthony Hernandez

since these guys both replaced those two guys? I don't remember how we track this down in the pre-show because this was an easier one. I think Cynthia Calvia lost tonight. if I'm remembering the main car, the first fight of the night, open or by it could be wrong. I don't know.

You know what? I'll get with the mathologists and we'll figure out who were the Anslayer winners and losers in the thesis ship of this fight event. Because copy-off is supposed to play Hernandez, so technically it's Chris Curtis then. I guess so. But she had to your point,

to your point, one, it's five-time world combat zambos champion. And if you look at the history of World Combat Samba champions in MMMA and the UFC, it's pretty well. Particularly multiple time world champions. They, it's very strong base for mixed martial arts. Odd to lose to the dudes that he lost to the same time.

Look great. But also, like, tough to know how good because Josh Frim, Coquille Soriano. That's the thing. We just haven't seen the competition. Alessio de Chico. So, like, these are guys who are not bad fighters by any stretch, but, like, that's a pretty clear tier of guy at middleweight and not a top tier of guy.

So, I don't know, but, I mean, it's on a great run. I think he's going to get a shot at top 15 guy next. So that'll be the one where we can really determine. But five time, five time, five time, five time, world combat ensemble champion. Do we just check him in there with? Do we just give him either Chris Curtis or Anthony Hernandez, whoever's ready first? Yes, I think that I think that's totally fine. I agree.

I like that. It seems good. Let's see if you get past it. A boost. Look, if he just passed a boost. You know what happens to be a boost. Fighting for the title, baby. Before we close a dog, I do want to ask one thing.

I just want us to take and appreciate how lucky we are because I've been following this sport for 20 years, I think. I think this is my 20th year of fandom. Maybe it's one less or one more, give or take. I think here, September 17th at 240, I'm willing to call it, stop the fight, matches over. This is the funniest year in the history. I don't, I do not think a collection of funnier outcomes have happened, and we still have like the whole backstretch of the year. I mean, Sean O'Malley winning, Sean Strickland winning, this fight ending in a draw. Like, that is a series of heaters right now. Not to mention at the beginning of the year, we got the whole light heavyweight, whatever that was in a ranch.

Here's our new title fight. And then by the summer, the guy they crowned champion blows his Achilles, Aaron Rogers is himself out of the company for the next nine months. He says he's vacating the belt. He's sitting in a sombrero cage side for this. and they're still calling him the champion, despite the fact that I believe they are working on a title fight between Alex Frera and Yuri Prasca. This is the funniest year of all time.

They didn't even put the press release out before they took Yuri out of the title, before they officially stripped Yuri of the belt. Yeah, you actually forgot the funniest part of the whole year. Is that the fact that Chandler Connor is not actually happening. Yeah, not. That's true. You know what that's fair. That's the funniest part of the whole year.

Michael Channos threw a year of his career away. The whole Bellator PFL stuff is hilarious. Francis is going to knock out Tyson Fury at this rate. This is the funniest year. I've had so much fun. There have been so many post shows where I've just been like, this is incredible and hilarious. And it's,

I mean, even Grasso beating Shibchenko the way she did. And me taking that hell is funny as hell. Like, this has just been a, Chef's Kiss Year for Humor. I love this sport so much. I love what you're saying.

You're good. It would be the funniest year. No, no, it's in the background. Just very slightly. Yes. This is the track. You can win the title. Stata 5,000 happened in 2016.

No, that's the funniest fight. That's the funny. That makes the year the funniest. That's the goat fight. That's all it is. No. No, that is the goad. don't fight, but this year has too many other funny moments.

It's best. I've had so much fun this year. And I have so much done sharing these moments in the aftermath with all of you, not just the men who are on the screen here, but all of you watching this program right now, but we're done. The other funniest outcomes that can happen for the rest of this year. I mean, Steve is a good article.

Steve and winning is obviously the funniest. We'll make this the funniest. This would be the fun. I came up with the funniest one on heck of a morning, by the way. The funniest one would be they book Yuri versus Alex in December. Something happens with Alex and Sean Strickland

steps in on short notice because nobody else is available and he doesn't immediately. That would be the funniest thing. Oh my God. He would say yes. He would absolutely say yes. I haven't thought of that. Now I kind of want that. I kind of want to. What a year.

It's the best. All right, but we're done, everybody. Thank you so much for Shaheen for Jed for Casey. I am Mike Heck. Next week, they're back at the hallowed apex. That's just how you want to follow up an event like this. Three events in a row, baby. Yes, we get a, uh, we have a hell of a main event next week. We have Matush Gamrod versus Raphael Fiziv, which is just going to kick ass.

We get Danny Gay versus Bryce Mitchell. Not a bad one, not a bad one, but we are back at the apex. So thank you very much. On to the next one tomorrow. I'm May hour on Monday. It's going to be fun. Thank you all very much. good night everybody love y'all

Sean Strickland two division chair two divisions champion I think it's funnier if he fights Alex Pereira for the light heavyweight title oh no he would be going down again yeah you're listening to the Vox Media

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