MMA Fighting - Oleksandr Usyk vs. Tyson Fury 2 Post-Fight Show: Reacting to Usyk’s Big Win And Where He Ranks All-Time

Episode Date: December 22, 2024

Oleksandr Usyk remains the heavyweight champion of the world. On Saturday, Usyk took home a unanimous decision win in his rematch with Tyson Fury in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Now 2-0 against “The Gypsy King,” Usyk is firmly entrenched as the best heavyweight boxer in the world, and possibly the best of his generation. Following Saturday’s epic boxing event, MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck and Jed Meshew react to Usyk’s big win and where we go from here. Topics discussed include whether the judges got things right, how A.I. judging got things wrong, what’s next for Fury, where Usyk rates among the greatest heavyweights of all time, a few holiday questions, and much more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Jed Meshew: @JedKMeshew Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. For the final time in 2024 here on M.A.fighting.com, we hear the victory horns, and they sound once again for the second time this year for Alexander Usik. He defeats Tyson Fury in the main event of Usik, Yuri 2 reignited in Saudi Arabia, 116, 112, across the board. and he remains undefeated, remains, not the undisputed champion, should be the undisputed champion, but boxing has terrible rules and weird guidelines when it comes to that stuff, but Alexander Usa gets it done again. Tyson Fury now has lost two consecutive fights,

and we are here to react to all of it with all of you. Thank you for joining us for the Usufuri 2 post-fight show. I am Mike Heck, and joining you once again, Jedbyshu, Mr. No Gray area, the hot take kid himself. How we do it, my friend? haven't seen you in so long. I know, man, it is. And you won't see me for longer still, Mike.

I mean, this is it. Three weeks of no fights. This is, now we're there. Because that's how I'm doing, Mike. I'm doing great. We just watched our last live fights of 2024. And you know what that means? It's on to Christmas.

Haleigh! Yes, Tyson Fury got us in the spirit with his walkout to the ring. Came out to Mariah Carey's all I want for Christmas. This is you. Maybe he should have asked for a victory in the fight. I thought he fought pretty well. I scored it a draw. You mean he should have said all I want for Christmas is double you.

Yes. Yes. Absolutely. That's exactly what should happen. And that's our show. Thank you very much, everybody. We'll enjoy the stand in the moment for you. But, like you're right.

This is the shortest post show with the history of the program. I told you. I said 35 minutes. We didn't make it to 35 seconds. This is spectacular. But now that we've watched the fight, and I think it's one I'm going to go back and rewatch without the benefit of doing a live watch party,

because especially these boxing matches and how the scoring is, you kind of need the benefit of that hindsight and just the rewatch without the pomp and circumstance. But the first fight was unbelievable. It was a classic. This was very good, but just in a different way. Do you, did you like this fight better than the first one? No, no, no.

Certainly the first fight's better. The first fight has a really dramatic moment where Fury is actively hurt. And it looks like Usik may even get a finish, which was wild to sort of envision. I felt that there was just more action. It was certainly more tense. I know that we all believe it's for the undisputed belt. But the vibe on this one, it on it felt very much like the middle child. in the trilogy series.

Like, you'd think back, so the Ali Frazier, one and three are iconic, and the middle one is just sort of an afterthought, you know. To some extent, Gotti Ward is similar. Like, this just felt like it didn't mean as much. The crowd was less significant. There were less people there, less famous people there. This didn't capture the imagination in the same way, the promotion of the first undisputed title fight,

25 years or whatever or whatever it was for that one also we got this fight earlier in the year you know running a reback rematch back within the same calendar year just it's a little bit of we've already tasted this now we're going to do it again so this it felt less big and the fight itself delivered less less to the lofty ideals of the first one but it was still a really fun fight back and forth affair um i had i had it 7-5 overall but I think six, seven of those rounds where toss-ups could have gone either way. So good fight.

I don't think it will go down as an all-timer, but certainly an enjoyable way to spend a Saturday, early afternoon, late afternoon, depending on where you are. I think if we're talking hindsight, I think if you're Turkey-A-L-Sheikh and that governing body, you should have done this fight a week prior.

But you should have done it the week before. This is a terrible week to have a big fight like that. It's just four days before Christmas, like you're smack dab in the middle of the season. People are traveling. People are doing a million other things. They're going shopping, everything. Like we talked about earlier, there's big college football games, bowl season, all of that. It's just, it's tough.

I don't think this does great on pay-per-view. Yeah, NFL's on. I don't think this does spectacular on his own pay-per-view. I don't think we'll ever know the actual numbers, but I don't think this does great. So all at all. You get great celebrities because no celebrities are going to fly to Saudi on Christmas. They have other things to do. So, like, I love Jason Statham.

I love Jason Statham. Jason Statham is really, like, the best you got. You know, maybe we made a mistake here. Yes. But all in all, like you said, 116, 112 for Alexander Usik. I thought he looked great. I thought Fury looked great early on. And it looked like you started to slow down a little.

little bit. Usik had, I think it was round five, was it round five? Maybe it was round six. Usick just kind of beat the shit out of him. Round five was the best Fury round. So round six was the round. Usick battled back and really put it wood down. Yeah. And yeah, then Fury came back with one of his best rounds of the night.

And it was just a back and forth affair. And it was just one of those things where Usik just kind of waited Fury out, waited for him to get a little tired. And then he started to get way more aggressive. And it was just a great performance. And I guess most of this post-fight show is just going to be getting your comments and your questions about this fight and even whatever else is going on in the combat sports world since it's the last live show we're doing this year. So I really wanted to spend a lot of time with you guys doing that.

But we had Daniel Dubois crash Alexander Ussick's post-fight interview. Usook's just like, Your Excellency, make the fight because what's he going to say? He doesn't give a shit. Even though Dubois is already fighting somebody, he's fighting Joseph Parker. That is the thing that is going to take place, which is, makes this a little weird. Tyson Fury, is this just obvious right now

that we do the Anthony Joshua fight? Like, if we get any other Tyson Fury fight right now, I think it's promotional malpractice without question. I am looking up to make sure I haven't missed somewhere that Joshua got booked somewhere, but I don't think so. No, there is no other answer. That fight should be announced within a week

of just like we don't have the date we don't have the I mean the location is in England I know that you know Saudi is paying all this money I get that doesn't matter that fight specifically must take place on English soil and you blow it all out it is a fight that is nearly a decade in the making frankly and is long overdue it will be a monster pay-per-view it will sell out Wembley or wherever they do it in England the biggest arena they can find, the biggest stadium, it does not matter. It will sell it out and that will be the biggest boxing match. Won't be the most meaningful.

It'll be the biggest. You do that 100% no questions asked. Yeah, you do it at Wembley Stadium, 80,000 people and just blow the thing out. And whether it's Tyson Fury's final fight or not, like, it doesn't really matter. It's just, it's a huge deal. One last big payday to put on the table. And it's not like Tyson Fury hasn't made much. money because he's made a whole bunch of it probably made a whole bunch more tonight but yeah it's

kind of tough to leave that one on the table it's been sitting there forever it's been on the tea but you just haven't been able to to make that swing of the bat yet so you got to do it now you have to it is a perfect dessert fight right like you've had the entree the main course you've had your fish dish and your soup and your salad you you've worked through the 18 course meal but you want an after-dinner coffee, you want a brandy, just wash things down. This is a perfect fight for that and that it is meaningful. It is delicious, but it doesn't make or break your career. It's just, it is excellent for everybody involved.

I cannot imagine that fight is not next or that there's any issue with booking it, frankly. Yeah, it's an Irish shamrock baby. You just put on ice, the little mint bailey's on. It's just so good. It just washes it down perfectly. You sip it slow and just enjoy it for what it is. And then you go home and then you call it a night. And that's and that's that.

So Alexander Usick gets it done look great. That Tyson fear looked pretty damn good too. I thought the fight was closed in the 16112s. Yeah. And the AI had at 118, 112 with 1010s mixed in there. So they're saying that Usik won like pretty much every round of the fight, which is wild. But hey, this is why we were. testing this out and this is why it was not something that was going to factor into the overall

results of the fight because AIA clearly needs some work because this is not a 1118, 112 fight. It just was not. So it was not a 10 to a 10 round win for Alexander Usik. I just don't see that happening. So. There are not a lot of score cards I would say are bad on this. Like you could score that fight a lot of ways for Fury, 7,5, 84 Fury for Usik, 84. 10 is a lot.

That's a lot. That's absolutely insane. So, with that being said, let's bring in the great Casey Liden. Ooh. So per the Twitter machine, Jedi Goodman released a clip. I don't know where he pulled it from. Tyson Fury saying, I thought I won by at least three rounds. So something to know.

Something to think about. Well, that's, that's, again, Like you said, if they had scored this fight, 1-16, 112 for Tyson Fury, I might have to, like, shrug my shoulders to touch at it, but it wouldn't have been, like, completely outrageous to me. Would have been fine. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Legitimately, half of the rounds in the fight were total toss-ups. Yeah. I'm more surprised that all three judges were in agreement with the numbers. And I don't know how they scored each individual round, but I was very surprised to hear Michael Buffer. or say all three judges scored this contest. That was a surprising. That's not bad, obviously, right?

Like, their independent judges, they all come to the same thing. I was absolutely flabbergasted that they all saw it the same way. I haven't seen the individual scorecards. I'm sure those will get floated at some point. So I don't know if they all scored every round the same way, because I would be baffled if that's how they got to it. But I thought for sure we were just headed to Splitty City. So did I.

So, yeah. What did you think about the AI giving two rounds 10-10? I believe it was rounds 1 and 12. Broadly speaking, I like it because I think 10-10 rounds should be an active part of combat sports. They aren't, and so it's kind of ridiculous that it did that. Are 10-10s, are they less frowned upon in boxing than an MMA? I know MMA is just like, no, but boxing is it kind of? Yes. I mean, they are still not frowned.

Like, MMA, they are active, you are actively told not to do it in the judging criteria. It is a not even actively told not to do it. You are like, the wording is basically there should never be this. Like, it, it, tin tin should exist only in the rarest of circumstances. I can go find the wording. But it is very clear, make a choice. I don't flip a coin if you have to. That is better than you get putting a tint.

10 down, which I think is crazy. To my understanding of boxing, and again, I'm primarily an MMA guy, I have not looked at the boxing criteria nearly to the extent I have an M.A. They are a little more accepting of them, but it is still not something that is broadly applied or used. So the AI gate, so you said six rounds can have gone to either guy. So it sounds like, I mean, I'm just ballparking. Oh, bar parking.

Yeah, that's not, that's not me thinking out. It was just like, I don't know. Felt like half of the fight was pretty up in the air. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like... Yeah, there were a lot of rounds where we were like, eh, I don't know. Yeah, I guess, yeah. I feel like, I mean, I know it was a little poo-pooing the AI, but I don't know.

I feel like it was one of those fights where the score looked farther apart than the actual fight was. One of those type things. At least they tried it, though. Yeah. But I'm just saying. At least they tried it. It became a fun little talking point, but... Yeah.

It did become a fun little talking point. It did. It reminded me of, this is like in 2015 or 2016. CFFC, Cage Fury did a thing where they had the three judges cage side scoring fights. And then they tried something where they had three judges like in a room with a commission person over them watching monitors without the commentary or being able to hear what the crowd was. And they wanted to compare the scores between that to the cage side judging. And I never really got the result and they never tried it again. So I found that very, very strange. But I like that they're trying different things.

I certainly don't think AI will be the way to go. But I like that they're trying different things to just see how we can develop and evolve judging and scoring fights in the future. I think MMA needs to dive into a lot more of that stuff more so than boxing. It seems like whatever their AI system, whatever, whatever, or whatever. go, that's a whole other thing. That's the other thing is, I don't, what is the transparency of the AI system? Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah. How, because realistically, AI is just like this broad term used to be like, oh, it's smart,

whereas like, no, it is a computer program and it's not like. It's programmed by humans. It's programmed by humans. So what are the inputs? Because you could just focus those inputs for judges and apply them if you think that is better. It's very, very silly. Yeah. Even the company they said was like,

the one that built the, like the formula or whatever, they like came out on Twitter and was like, yeah, people are saying we did it, but we had nothing to do with this. This is before the fight. So something to also keep in mind. We don't know where this is coming from. I would bet my almost my life that the AI is just CompuBox stats

and whoever is winning the compu box wins the round. Whoever landed more copy box stats. That has to be exactly what they did. It's just especially like, I thought that prior, but then in retrospect, it's like actually CompuBach stats basically had Usik outlanding Fury in almost every round. So it just matches up where it's like, oh, the two Tintin rounds, those are the rounds they landed the same CompuBox strikes. And it is just CompuBox with the, oh, A, so it's smart.

This is the dumbest shit in the world. We just don't want to pay. Wicked Spocker. Yeah, but you can't say copybox because people have known copybox for 40 years. years. So you just say it's AI, but it's just copy box punch, punch numbers. That's it. It was just a smart ring. They didn't want to pay PFL. So it's a smart ring. Innovators in the space, baby. Oh, it's tremendous. All right, let's take, let's take some questions from the peeps. This is the people show. They've been with us through the trenches all year long.

This is the people's post fight show. Oops, sorry. Let me get that wrong screen. Do do, do, do. Here we go. Hope for a third fight. I wouldn't mind it. I wouldn't mind it. This is a smart, smart man right here. This is a smart, smart man. There it is. That's how I had it too.

Plus I had a bet. I was a little biased. I had a plus 1,400 bet on the draw, but. I was rooting for you. I had it. Yeah, I legit scored it a draw. I really thought we could have been on our way to like a split draw. One a piece and then third judge with the draw, but alas, it was.

not to be. I wouldn't mind seeing them run this back, but I don't think you need to do it now. I thought Usik won both fights, despite them being competitive. Let's do the fight that needs to happen. And then, hey, Fury beats AJ, maybe we, then we can go back to a third. We've done that before. They did it with the Triple G in Canelo. We did the third fight a couple years later. We could do that if need be. Yeah. I don't know if there's going to be a huge hankering for it. Yeah. Like, today, maybe. But down the line, I don't think people are going to be claiming.

The issue is there's not that many awesome heavyweights now. Like, the generation of heavyweights is kind of aged out as Usik has now just sort of risen up where it's like, AJ just lost while there's retiring. He's just beaten Fury twice. Like, are people that in on Bicoli or he's already beaten Dubois, which is Parker? Like, Wiley, or not Wiley, um, Jang. is different Zhang. Zhang is 50. So process of elimination

may just leave Fury as an option a year from now. Yep. What do you... I don't keep up heavy boxing that much, but what's... I know you mentioned it, but what would be ideally next for Fury

if they don't do a trilogy? Joshua. And Joshua's coming out. Joshua 100%. Correct. He just got knocked out four months ago, whatever it was. Yeah, four months ago.

But that fight will be in England, I assume not Saudi Arabia. I would hope so. I mean, it's hard to say no. Saudi's just going to pay all the money, so it'll be if Saudi wants to pay it. But they could easily do the Riyadh season presented by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in England like they did with 306. And it would be insane not to do that fight in Wembley or just somewhere in England. It's a massive stadium show. Okay. Thank you much.

Actually, one more, one more comment from Dennis. Enough of these Saudi fights. They ain't going anywhere. I would broadly agree, but it ain't happening. It's like the apex. Somebody put that too. Reality season seems like boxing's version of the apex. It's just, it's here.

It's like it is the warrior version of it. where the apex is hugely profitable because they pay no money to make it happen and they get to reap all the financial benefits of it. Saudi pays a lot of money to make the Saudi fights happen. So it's hugely profitable. But you're still in a half full gymnasium and it's lifeless and doesn't have the same vibe. I know, that was a sick drumming concert. I mean, nailed it. Dude was ripping it.

Yeah. We didn't expect that. We didn't expect that. Oh, yeah. Sad at all. All right. Thank you, Dennis. What else?

What else we have here? Yeah, just, we mentioned this earlier. Tyson saying you won by three rounds. Don't hate him saying that. He could have. That is a justifiable scorecard in my mind. I'm sure if you're in there and no, you don't get dropped, you're not getting beat up, you know, so. So yeah, I'm sure it feels like you won three rounds.

Watching, I'm not watching as close as you guys were because I was running all this stuff, but just now kind of watching the pipe peripherally, every round seemed close except maybe for two rounds. And even those two or three rounds weren't like, oh, that was almost a 10A. It was just okay. That guy clearly won. But so, honestly, every scorecard I'm kind of okay with, even the AI scorecard. I'm like, all right, you know. And it's, no, this boxing is very subjective. It seems more, it seems more subjective than MMA, but, yeah.

Yeah, I don't think it's wrong for him to think he won. It wasn't, it was a very competitive fight. Yes, yeah, yeah. And basically every fighter will tell you forever that they really don't have an idea what the hell's happening in there. Like, unless it's so obvious that they're beating the shit out of somebody or whatever, it's just like, I thought I was. doing well and then I lost or I thought I was getting my ass kicked in but then I was winning tar when the bullets are flying it's hard to have a real grasp of the true nature of the situation

true all right um let me see what we got here um just that most people definitely kind of picked at usik winning by seems in the comments by at least one or two rounds um that is the other thing. What I have seen online broadly favors Usick to have won. I have not seen a lot of, yeah, just by any number of rounds three, two, nothing nearly by what the AI has said. But like four. Nothing on Fury side though. As in one. I have seen like two score cards for Fury maybe. Like it is there's not been a lot of support that I've seen for Fury online. All right. I hope Usik retires. He's done everything. I mean, he can. Could.

Undisputed heavyweight champion, undisputed cruiserate champion, beat Tyson Ferry twice, only got to ever do it. I don't remember whether the ring has what rated now, but may well be the pound for pound number one right now in the sport. Wouldn't be a bad time for him to call it quits. The only issue is he gets to keep making a lot of money if he fights and he's obviously still at the peak of his powers and things are going to get easier for him now. Like, he's fought the hard ones now.

Now it's the easier stuff that awaits him. So I'd be a bit surprised to be hung it up. Now he's prize fighting. Yeah, it's like, oh, I'm going to get a lot of money. He's going to pay me a lot of money to beat the shit out of a dude I already beat the shit out of. Yes, please. Do you think that is, that is literally Maraud Voschili's dream. Usik is living his dream right now.

Why would you retire? Where does Usec? I just don't know. What does Usec rank in terms of great heavyweights now in boxing? Not very high. Top 15, top 10? No. No?

Okay. Boxing's been around for 120 years. What was Tyson Fury before this? I mean, I'm not, I'm kind of... Fury, I don't think Fury was top 10. Like, some people were trying to make the argument. I don't think you would have been top 10. But the thing, like, Fury is still higher.

Usik in the terms of great heavyweights because he Usig's heavyweight career has been like four fights or whatever he's just not he spent so much of his career as a cruiserweight that that's different it's not okay Ali and uh Joe Frazier and Foreman and freaking uh I mean in Linux Lewis Joe Lewis like you're getting that it is so hard because boxing is a 120 actually what is it like eight it's like 140 years old There's just so much history to overcome that he's higher in the all-time grades outside of weight class than he is in the heavyweight thing. Yeah.

Yeah. Gotcha. Thank you. And he is like one or two. He's certainly top five cruiser weights and arguably the best cruise weight ever or whatever. Yeah. I mean, it's, he's, he's like, it is. Yeah, he's, it's not exactly the same, but he's, he's John Jones.

where he dominated a division and then moved up and it's only he's got wins and significant ones at least in the UFC's eyes but the sample size is just so small overall that you can rank Jones as the greatest fighter of all time in MMA but he's not the greatest heavyweight in the UFC if that makes sense so copy that all right I mean he did

who is the greatest heavyweight ever so he he did just saying man sure did And it's like the other problem is it is also heavyweight where heavyweight boxing has been boxing for 140 years. Like cruiserweight came along later and the other, but it has always been heavyweight. And so basically like every great heavyweight for 140 years there's just been like dudes who have rained for seven years or whatever. It's like, okay, Jaloo's definitive about like 40 times or something ludicrous like that. Because also boxing, they used to fight eight times a month. But just more on Ousex legacy, what about, I don't know, four more wins, kind of would people start talking?

Like, oh. Four more wins and like, he's probably already in the, where is he of the generation, right? Like he's in the generational mix because of the significant. of his wins and then it becomes okay he's one of the better of this generation if he stick that's the thing if he doesn't retire if he sticks around for like five years like top 15

I think it's just nearly impossible for him to get like top 10 unless he fights for another seven years or something ludicrous because it's just like Joe Lewis and Muhammad Ali or like he's never catching them like Rocky Marciano and a little controversial

there in some ways he didn't beat that many good people but undefeated champion Lennox Lewis on E Liston like just names of Foreman Foreman Larry Holmes who is just

perennially underrated in boxing terms Tyson who is probably more beloved than he was actually great but still was great Holyfield Lennox Lewis like just so many Jack Johnson Jack Ditchgo Jim Jeffries

So fucking miss it these people No I mean I love you guys saying these names because if we go to MMA, we can name the great MMA heavyweights pretty much in like 10 seconds. We're like, yeah, all right, we're done. Yeah, exactly. Because it's so different. Yeah.

So different. It's really interesting, no, kind of, you know, just lay out names and the time frame. Like, oh, dang. But I think he is already in the generation conversation. He is a little bit Roger Federer, or not Roger Federer E. Yokevich E. And that his heavyweight career came just like a, there's clearly a lot of overlap with that other heavyweight,

with the big heavyweight generation of Fury Joshua Wilder. But he's just like a little bit after. And so he's going to get more wins and kind of be Novak Djokovic to the current era of heavyweight champions. And so he's going to, I think, and as the guy of this generation. And then it does become a question of, how do you rate this generation versus past generations

versus the golden era of heavyweight boxing? You know, his ceiling is probably cracking the top 10 of heavyweight, but I don't think he's, I just don't really think he's close there, just by virtue of how his career has worked out. All right. Thank you much. Lazy bed. BKFC starting soon, the real festivities of the day. Yes, if you got that DeZone suburb.

subscription, the little free trial today to watch to order and buy the pay-per-view. You can watch BKFC Hollywood tonight. Well, Hollywood, Florida, not Hollywood, California. That's a pretty decent card. The real fist-to-be. That's actually a pretty decent card. I have not looked at all at that card. Jared Ward and Mike Richmond.

Christine Ferrier is fighting defending her belt. BKFC cards are always like just super fun watches because they're just, violence short break violence short break they know the assignment they know the assignment yeah they get through like 16 fights in like an hour and 45 minutes it's it's a terrific watch it really is why they're doing the post fight interview they're bringing next fight out you know the same time yeah it's just like it's so good all their promos are just like we're just cleaning up the mat let's do a backstage quick hit with the main event and then we're already on to the next fight it's spectacular What we got here?

We'll take a couple more. Like we said, this is not going to be a... Dan, no, I do not believe Fury is a top five heavyweight boxer ever. I don't think he is a top 10 heavyweight boxer ever. No, I'm with you. No. 15, there is an argument. I still probably would say no, but I have to really dig into it.

I don't think he is top 10. No. Is he a top five prize fighting heavyweight? If that's a different. Oh, so I mean, he has definitely made more money than any heavyweight boxer ever. I mean, I know not accounting for him. I mean, accounting for inflation. Even really accounting for inflation like he's just making more.

I would guess like he's. And look at some of the guys. There wasn't paper view previously for like all. Yeah. stuff. Ali got like, some of the guys he's fought. Ali got what like five million dollars

for the rumble in the jungle because it was a 10 million dollar purse that they chopped half and half and I was in what like whatever is 68, 70s? I don't know, whatever year that was. That's not, Tyson's Fury made 50 million dollars

today I would guess. Like he's made more money than any of them. So in price fighting, absolutely. Man killed it. Okay. That's kidding. All right.

Thank you. We got some off-the-cuff questions. Here we go. Fun question for the panel. Name your favorite animations from back in the day. Some ideas. Rocko's Barden Life. Doug.

Beavis and Butthead, South Park, Johnny Bravo, Cat Dog, Ah, Real Monsters, etc., etc. I watched a shit ton of Doug as a kid. South Park, obviously. The winner. I watch it.

I mean, the Simpsons is the champion, I think, of all animated shows because it's been around for 80 million years. But like I actually never was a big Simpsons dude. South Park was much more my speed. But the goat, the true goat, is Batman the animated series now and forever. That's a great one. Also the X-Men animation, the first like three seasons were really good, do. The Ninja Turtles,

from like the 80s and 90s animation was great. G.I. Joe friggin slapped back in the 80s. Rugrats was obviously a just absolute monster as a child for me. Trying to think of other things. As a child, as a child, I loved Muppet Babies. That was a big Muppet Babies. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Muppet babies. Yeah, that's a good one. Doug. Doug, I watched a bunch of. I watched a ton of Rugrats, a ton of Doug, Batman, X-Men, probably like,

that's like my top four right there. South Park, I was a little older, but watched a shit ton of South Park. South Park, first all ready to move you went to. My dad took me to see South Park one day.

Held me out of school. We went to see South Park Big or Longer Uncut. Yeah, I would watch that. I got like half the jokes in it. I didn't understand most of it. I was also more of,

like I would watch animated stuff, but I was more of like the not animated stuff. Like those days, first of all, I wanted to be a game show host on those kids. So I always watch game shows just to like take notes and study these people. Uh, double dare absolutely ruled that was like all my all time favorites. Mark Summers. One of my greatest. If any of the people listening later or watching now, if any of you own a piece of the

agro crag, I need to know about it. I need to see me. Michael Mallee, another Massachusetts guy. All I've ever wanted in my life. was to get a piece of the agro-crag. Like, can you- It's got to be on eBay somewhere. Oh, you absolutely can, but I want to earn it.

And so I'll never earn it. I'll never get that. But like, Legends of the Hidden Temple, I was always mad about not kids sucking at the monkey because I would have crushed it. But I wanted to climb the agro-crag so badly. And if I ever had, to this day, every profile picture I would have

would be me holding the glowing piece of the crag. Like how, that would be my whole personality is I kicked guts his ass when I was 12. That would have been awesome. Two real quick underrated Nickelodeon shows. One was Salute Your Shorts.

Excellent show. Very, very good with ugly as the counselor. We hold you in our heart. And when we think about you, this thing came apart. Yes, hey dude. Hey, dude.

Wild and crazy kids on Nickelodeon was one. my jams. It was a great show. We were watching the same thing growing up. We were watching the same after school. I think it's on Amazon, though. Maybe I'm misremembering.

Maybe it's on Hulu. A few years ago, during COVID, there was a documentary about, like, primetime Nickelodeon and how, like, the people who made Nick Nickelodeon become like a real thing. It was fascinating. I highly recommend. I watch those. Mark Summers is so important. Dane was on Wild and Crazy Kids.

That's freaking crazy. Yeah, someone's saying, yeah. Cuba Goading Jr.'s younger brother was like one of the hosts, Omar Gooding. Yeah, yeah. And he actually had a budding career. He was on hanging with Mr. Cooper. And that was like the only thing I ever saw him in after Wild and Crazy Kids. Adventures of Pete and Pete was the goaded, just goaded show.

Pete and Pete's a good one. Yeah. Oh, my body. The strongest man in the world. You had the Saturday night programming. Are You Afraid of the Dark? And what was that other one? I don't know.

It was a skit show. It wasn't the round. All the signs goosebumps. That was a little before. I was a little after me. After? Yeah. Yeah.

But I watched all the Beavis and Budhead when he used to come on MTV, had the music videos. Speed racer would always come on after. Yeah. Liquid television. Oh. This was obviously just very later Like very different time But cowboy bebop is an unbelievable animated show

That's good one too I am not I've never really been a big anime person But cowboy bebop is It's just good She's on real good Yeah This is modern stuff

Real quick Bojack Horseman I think my one of my favorite shows ever And Scavengers Rain It's on Netflix Check it out Thank you much Oh, here we go.

He's having some of fun questions before we get out. Mike and Jedd and Mustache, if he's here before you go, give us your top five, top five Christmas moviesies? Can we just do like three? Yeah, top five is asking for a lot. I ain't, I can't, all right, die hard, a Christmas story, Christmas vacation, bad Santa. Oh, bad Santa, thank you.

Home alone, thank you. Home alone one. Die hard. If we're counting it as a Christmas movie, which... It is. Yes. Absolutely number one, because it's one of like the 12 best movies ever made. Elf is probably number two in that list.

They're not Christmas movies, but I watch them every Christmas. I know a bunch of other people do. Lord of the Rings. I love to just rewatch the Lord of the Rings trilogy this time of year. They're not at all Christmas movies, but I don't care. They bang. There are trees in it. There are there are there are there are there.

Die hard elf. Uh, home alone one and two. I rewatch them this week and then they were unbelievable. Uh, I gained a whole new perspective on Kevin's plight and how his family were actually abusive people. Um, and the comedy,

it still holds up. It's like watching Looney Tunes. They're absolutely amazing. And, uh, I'll round it out with Santa Claus. that movie meant a lot to me as a child. With Tim Allen?

Yeah. The first Santa Claus, like that movie meant a lot to me as a kid. Yeah. That movie, this, having an 11-year-old is the best this time of year because he just watches all those movies over again.

And it's just the best. Shout out to Jingle all the way. Arnold just, Christmas with the crad. Killing it. If we're counting a nightmare before Christmas is a Christmas movie, because it's kind of like tweenery,

that's probably in the top five. That movie is extremely good. Yeah. Worst Christmas movie of all the time is Fred Claus. What a piece of shit. It's not a good film. It's terrible. Why did you watch that?

You have a kid thing? No, it just was on and you're like, oh, Vince Vaughn and is in it? Let's watch. And I'm just like, golly, this is fucking terrible. I know this is controversial. I really like Love Actually. I enjoy that movie a great deal. Why is that controversial?

A lot of people think that that movie is bad. And I understand that it's not great, but I really enjoy it a lot. It hits the spot, yeah. The old man being musician is like the best freaking thing in the whole in film. It's just the best. Three best Christmas movies for me, Elf, Bad Santa, Eyes Wide Shut. Okay, Fold. I like it. Eyes by Sheds of Christmas movies.

movie. All right. All right. And for this Christmas, go watch. Oh, Scrooge, of course. Scrooge the gray one. Scrooge. For this Christmas.

I pulled up a list of them. This Christmas, go watch first day. Go to the movie theater and watch Nospheratu. Watch the remake by Robert Eggers. I'm not doing that. But what? What? What?

Oh, my God. Oh, Robert Eggers. Ooh, that movie's so good. That movie's so good. Turn the bar and the toilet I will see it I see everything but No

Oh my God All right Thank you Let's not fly by once For Christmas Facing Oh I love that vibe I love that vibe All right

Thank you much Anything else One more One more That's for Jed It's for Jed before we get out here Did you catch your boy Did you catch your boy

The Big Booper In karate combat Is he your big booper? Is he? He's not not the big booper. The big booper is Alex Pereira, but he is a big booper.

And I did deeply enjoy him because he's a very funny man. And yes, of course I saw him obliterate that poor, poor schmuck in seven seconds or whatever insane thing it was. Young Jacek. Absolutely perfect.

Like, I don't, the Spanish shouldn't ever come to M.A. That's just, he's getting out-wrestled by Waldo Cortezza-Costa. Like, what are we doing here? karate combat is I mean outside of his clear background obviously like where he will be as much of a star as he could be would be in karate combat like perfect this is like when Mike Perry was like I'm going to do bare knuckle and it was like yes that fits and is correct why didn't we do this immediately perfect art form with the artist pairing and I'm excited to see he and the karate pit and what they do with captain super awesome president sauce or whatever is Just do that.

Just do that. Feed him to seven foot bad fighters. Just do that. They need to have an like Eddie Hall type of fight where he just like knocks out three random. That is. Now we're talking. Now we're talking.

That's what they need. Oh my God. All I need this year is for Eddie Hall to freaking fight pods. It's my, it's probably my like number two most wanted fight in the sport. Aspinot Jones, Puds, all. Got it. I will fly to friggin' Poland to sit, freaking cage side for that one.

Well, that is Jed's holiday wish. Hopefully all of your holiday wishes come true as well. But thank you all for a fun year. We're not done yet. We're done with like the live shows, but we got award season. We get the award show coming up. We got onto the next one,

predictions extravaganza, part one. coming up. We got the promotional airing of grievances edition of BTL coming up on Thursday on the podcast network. Lots of stuff coming your way. Jed, did you want to say something else? Masters of the Universe, the Jim Carrey Grinch is unbelievable too. Put it right in there.

He's so good in that role. Yes, it's good. It's good in every role. Underrated classic. But guys, thank you all. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. And if you, we don't see you. Have a wonderful holiday season. Have a great rest of the year. Love you all.

Love you all. New Year. We in 25. Allo, no. We don't know go. Go away, Notre Dame. We don't care. Let's go Irish, baby. Let's go Irish. Go dog, sick him.

Happy birthday. We start signing off every show by barking. Your Listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.