MMA Fighting - On To the Next One | 2024 Predictions Recap

Episode Date: December 29, 2024

With 2024 being such a crazy year in the world of mixed martial arts, we felt it was important to look back at the predictions that were made heading into a memorable year for the sport. In part one of our two-part predictions extravaganza, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Alexander K. Lee look back on some of the responses they had to listener questions in regards to what 2024 was going to bring. Topics include Jon Jones' activity and the future of the UFC heavyweight championship, the PFL's potential success after acquiring Bellator, if Paddy Pimblett would end the year as a ranked lightweight in the UFC, Francis Ngannou, Jake Paul's MMA debut, the UFC's antitrust lawsuit impact, UFC champions in each division, bold predictions for the year, and more. In addition, we will need you help for part two: Our 2025 predictions extravaganza episode. Submit your "buy or sell" questions the same way you send your matchmaking suggestions to Mike or AK on Twitter, Instagram, or email by Thursday, Jan. 2 — and, please, be as creative as you'd like. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Alexander K. Lee: @AlexanderKLee 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

Okay, only 10 more presents to wrap. You're almost at the finish line. But first... There, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes. Welcome aboard Air Canada. Rocky's vacation, here we come. Whoa, is this economy?

Free beer, wine, and snacks. Sweet! Fast-free Wi-Fi means I can make dinner reservations before we land. And with live TV, I'm not missing the game. It's kind of like I'm already on vacation. Nice. Air Canada. Nice travels.

Wi-Fi available to aeropline members on equipped flights sponsored by valve. Conditions apply. See air Canada.com. Podcast network. Well, hello there, everybody. And welcome to a brand new edition of On to the next one. Thank you for joining us as we wrap up 2024. and we begin our annual two-part predictions extravaganza here on the program.

Next week, it's my favorite show of the year. It's our first show of the year. We do our live 2025 prediction show. We answer all of your buy-sell questions. A few of them have come in already. I get a bunch of them throughout the year, and there's some good ones already. So we'll let you know how you can participate in next week's show. At the end of today's program, we'll,

also go into all of our champ predictions for next year, all of the bold predictions for 2025, but that will be next week's show. But this week, we have a little fun. We go back into our time machine. We recap. We review how we did in 2024 with our predictions. And I'm looking forward to going back in time and doing that. But I am Mike Heck. And joining me as always is the co-host, the co-matchmaker, the Prince of Positivity, and my best friend, Mr. Alexander Kay Lee, AK, welcome. And can you believe that 2024 is wrapping up

and it's coming to an end? It's crazy, my best friend. It's crazy how the time flies. And it feels like it was like a pretty good year. I mean, I say this now, I'm sure if people go back to any of our shows, there'll be plenty of winging on our side about like various results, fight bookings, promotional

decisions. That's the nature of the game, right? That's the nature of the game. We're going to praise and we're going to criticize. But I would like to think that there was common theme always of, you know, appreciation for the fighters, even some appreciation for the big, bad UFC, you know, for giving us some truly unbelievable moments this year, even when it feels like they didn't always have the best laid plans, it doesn't always feel like that their cards were everything that they could have been. Listen, they're the ones who facilitate

these fights, are the ones who get the best of the best in there, and there's been some great moments. PFL had some great moments, too, rise in. A lot of good stuff from a lot of promotions. One championship had a lot of good stuff. I know they're not in MMA anymore, really, but they consistently put out really exciting, you know, kickboxing, Muay Thai, all that stuff. And you know, there's a huge audience for that. So I know they're not really on me anymore, but still good.

BKFC, huge year for BKFC, really, I have to say, like, I just think they've become, maybe the buzz isn't what it was, but now it's become this consistently, like, entertaining and established product. And that's a huge deal. That's a huge deal. Buzz is one thing.

Buzz is great. It's great to have everyone started talking about you. But when you're actually, like, consistently putting out fights and putting out cards, It's like that's a great thing. So man, for combat sports, I didn't even get into boxing. We just saw Fury and Usick again. It was a great fight.

So combat sports just continues to roll in 2024. What a business, Mike. What a business indeed. And I got to go back as we record this and listen to last week's show, or the beginning of the year's prediction show. And there are a lot of like strange questions. And I never remember what these are until I actually go back and watch them and see what we had to say about certain things.

And some of these things are really surprising. Some of the questions were just outrageous, which is what we expect every year. So I think we'll go back into it. We'll run through all the buy sell questions, what we said, we'll discuss if we were right or if we were wrong in some of these. Because some of these are going to have to kind of go through

and see how we did. And then we'll go through our champ predictions. Then we'll go through what our bold predictions were. And those are always fun. So let's get right into it. K. The first buy sell question we got last year was buy or sell Alex or Magamed will be featured in more than half of UFC champion names at the end of 2024. And we both sold this. And I believe we were both correct. Because I think we just have Pereira, right? There's nobody else. Yeah. I think I think the more incredible bet would have been like how many, how many obs, how many people that are the OV at the

end of their name are champions if you run like pfl as well and stuff like that like then i think you could have gone way over uh but otherwise i think we were good yeah i think oh well a pentosa so we had two yes that's right alexander pantosia and yes so because magam and ankle i've never got a title shot no none of the normaga madeoff's got a title shot no macachap everyone's i'm sure everyone's like like mockachap guys he's not he's not technically a norma mettov i mean he's a he's a he's a ev a macho He's an Ev. Yeah. So we're on the,

we're both on the board here, okay, we're both on the board. It's great. Always being right. Don't you feel that way, my bet? Don't you love always being right?

I love always being right. And the trend will continue, at least for me, after question two, it will not continue for you. Because question two was buyer sell that a current, which was January of 2024, a current Bellator champion fights for the UFC,

this year. I sold this. You bought it. Not only AK, not only did you buy this. You had a specific name that you dropped. You wanted the extra point. You said into a live microphone that Ryan Bader would return to the UFC in 2020. I said this. And compete. Yes, I dropped his name specifically. Ryan Bader. Ryan Bader. And with so much vigor and confidence, I was. was shocked by this. Doesn't sound like something I would say, but I trust you. I trust you. You wouldn't just make something like that up.

I feel like I'm closer with my prediction, though, because we, it looks like, Mike, we are on the, well, not with the Ryan Bader thing. That was, I don't know what the hell was going on there. It looks like we're pretty close. If, if the people over there do the right thing, if they do the right thing and, you know, get some releases happening, I feel like we're going to get some Bell to our champs coming over. Yes. And it's funny because I think we both sort of nailed what the end of 2024 would look like for the PFLO Tour brand.

But we'll get to that in a moment. Question three, Parker Porter re-signs with the UFC or signs with another major MMA organization. Here's how this went down. I sold this. I sold it. And then I talked myself into it by just putting positive juju out into the universe. If I just went with the old, if I went with the old brain, I would have got this right and started off three for three. But then I went to the old ticker and the ticker said, let's just put out positive vibes into the universe.

Let's get Parker Porter signed to a major organization. That did not happen. We both ended up buying this. This was an easy buy for you, AK, that someone would nab up Park Reporter. And unfortunately, he was not nabbed up. But 2025 could be his year, AK. Has he fought anywhere since? No, right?

He is not. Okay. And when was this release? Sorry, it was earlier this year or earlier this year? It was the end of 2023. Oh, so he just got the Parker Porter. It's got a well-deserved year off. He did. And I don't know if you guys watched the UFC 309 preview show that we did with Parker Porter as the special guest leading into John Jones versus Stipe Mietchich. Parker Porter looks fantastic. He lost a bunch of weight. He's got a six-pack right now. Dude is. Dude's looking spelt to say the least. So he said he's been in talks with other organizations. So hopefully we will see Park Reporter compete in a major organization in 2025. Question four, AK.

Buy or sell Alex Pereira fights for the UFC heavyweight title in 2024. We both sold this. And we're both correct. No heavyweight title fight for Alex Pereira. No, way too many gears need to be in motion. I think I want to say we made this prediction. I was still holding out hope that Aspinall and Jones would happen in some form, or at least it would happen before a prayer if I happened,

like even though we knew the UFC was still dead set on the Miotich Jones about happening. But yeah, it felt like too many pieces. As we're getting through these questions, I do wonder how many of these we're going to get like the same thing, but for 2025, like I said, the Bellator champions thing, to Predator fighting for heavyweight title. So, yeah, I'm kind of intrigued. how we're going to do the other half of this, as it were, because, yeah, I don't, I don't know

if we need to go over those again, but we'll see. We'll see. The next question, buy or sell John Jones has more MMA fights in 2024 than Francis and Ghanu, aka, I am proud to tell you, not only did you sell this, but you also said that both guys would only fight once. That it would be a tie. And you are absolutely correct. I bought this because I didn't think there was, this is before Francis got absolutely obliterated by Anthony Joshua. I didn't think Francis would be fighting an MMA at all in 2024.

And I was almost at the point during this live program that Francis would never fight an MMA again after the Tyson Fury fight. And what he accomplished in that one. So I bought it only because I didn't think, I thought Jones would fight once, but I didn't think Francis would have an MMA fight. But you nailed it, okay. This was before the Joshua C.O. This is before the Joshua Cio, but two months before. And then obviously the horrible, horrible tragedy, the family tragedy he suffered with his son.

You probably, I really, actually, your prediction looked really good, that he maybe wouldn't step back into action in, in 2024. But, you know, as fans were really grateful he did again. No one would have blamed him. No one would have blamed Francis if he did not compete in 2024. But it sounds like he kind of needed to. I think that's maybe what helped him sort of get through this hard time. But yeah, it was, it was, I think I either thought, yeah, I said,

I said they would both fight once. I actually felt less confident about that because I wasn't sure John Jones were going to fight at all. But I did feel very confident that Francis would fight and that no, certainly John Jones would not log more appearances as him. There's just no way. And now we have to also think about where we were in January of 2024 because the next question was buy or sell that Leon Edwards fight someone not named Bilal Muhammad or

Shafkat Rockmanoff in 2020. Remember, he was the champion. He was just coming off the lackluster-ish win over Colby Covington, just a bad fight to end the year. And we're trying to figure out what was going to headline UFC 300. There was already talks, I believe at the time, maybe not, about Leon maybe fighting Hamzaa Chamaif at UFC 300. So we're trying to figure out where they would go with Leon Edwards. Could someone else emerge? Could it be Islamachchev, maybe moving up to 170?

I sold this thinking that he would fight both Balal and Shafkat. You bought this AK. You bought that he would fight someone not named Bilal Muhammad or Shafka Rahmanov. Did I say who? I don't remember. I just, but I know you bought. What was I thinking?

Maybe I thought, you know what? I probably thought Ian Machado Gary or something was going to seek in. Yeah. You did mention Ian's name. You mentioned JDM's name. Yeah. And some others.

Yeah. in that same kind of discussion. I think I was probably, I'm sure I was on some like, well, Balal just doesn't campaign hard enough for these things. So I just don't see it happening. And I guess I thought Shopcott wasn't, I don't say wasn't ready, but just hadn't positioned himself yet. And I guess we were sort of right.

It took all the way until the end of the year for Shopcott to finally get that booking. And then, unfortunately, it fell through for him. So wait, so wait, this, the wording of this, this one confused me. So if Shavcott had fought full, oh, no, certainly had Edwards question. Never mind. So shotgun fighting the wild has no effect on it. But okay. So yeah, all right, all right.

Next question. One of these former champions will fight for a UFC belt in 2024. Dominic Cruz, Cody Garbrandt, Connor McGregor, Hafealdos, Kamar Uspen, Jan Belhovic, Cyril Ghan, Jess Gondraj, Rose Dammi Yunis. All of those names. We both bought this. We did. We both bought this. Was it just so many names?

We were like, oh, surely someone, one of them will just fall. asked backwards into a tell-a-shot? I went with Rosamai Yunus. Right. Because I was just like, look, anytime she wants to fight for her belt, all she has to do is pick up the phone and call and say, I want to fight John Wiley.

I already beat her twice. You went with Cyril Gunn because you thought that Tom Aspinall would have multiple defenses of the interim belt and that Cyril Gan would be one of his challengers. So that's why you bought this. Aspenal did defend. It was just against,

it was against Curtis Blades, not Celagon. And that's mine. And Curtis Blaze made a lot of sense. But yeah, I don't think you and I were wrong to buy on that one. That's just such a wide net. I just feel like. But whoever came up with that question, great job.

Because I think they pick. Great job. Yeah, that's like that's like one of those. If you were like an odds maker, you're trying to get as much money to people to bet as possible, like on a certain outcome. That would have worked really well. I think you set the line like this person set the line, figuratively speaking, like perfectly. Next question, AK, this is right up your alley. Buy or sell that Patty Pimblit.

ends 2024 as a ranked lightweight. You bought this and you were correct. I sold it. I sold it only because I just didn't think, my reasoning was he's just not going to get the matchups. He's just going to fight like known guys, but not ranked guys. Maybe he gets Bobby Green,

but I didn't think he would get Bobby Green and then he got Bobby Green and he just ran his ass over. But you bought this AK. Are you? Well done. Patty Pimble, rank number 13 in the UFC's lightweight. rankings you did not think he would get Tony Ferguson he did you did not think he would get Bobby Green he did are you ready for Patty Pimbleit and Michael Chandler like are you

ready are you ready actually I will say this I am preparing myself for a world where this could happen mm-hmm and I'll leave it at that as you should as you should I will leave it at that but yes you're right as you said Patty Pimlet number 13 ahead of Jalen Turner and Joelle Alvarez, two guys who I feel like would be favored if they're matched with Patty, but he's ahead of them. And just one spot behind Benoit Santini, who probably would also be favored. But they know what? That's how it is.

That's the Patty Pillow experience. If you just keep counting this guy out, the guy just keeps winning fights. Next question. By herself that a UFC fighter has a Sean Strickland type out of nowhere 2024, where they become, they go from either basically an obscurity to becoming champion. we both sold this and it did not happen. No one just kind of came out of nowhere and won a title, right? That I can think of.

No, no one. Steve Versaig would have been the one. Like if he had some beat Pentosia, probably would have fit that criteria. We definitely had people like, quote unquote, come out of nowhere in a way. Like Buckley, I think Buckley becoming a contender,

like not a champion, but kind of fits that. I know a lot of people we're not believing, even like, I think he was what? So he's 5 and 0 now at 170, I think. Or 6 and 0, 5 and 6. 6 and 0. So he was only.

only two and oh in 2020, so since making that move. And I don't think anyone was like, oh, Buckley's going to be a contender. So the fact that he's like, probably one good win away from a title shot would kind of fit that, not the exact warning of the question. And Carlos Prochis, I suppose, as well, but that's really more just like a standard breakthrough, not like a, I understand. I think the spirit of the question is a fighter we know that most people are familiar with, but don't expect to ever, like, actually make it all the title.

That's really the Sean Strickland story. Just so unique. There's just nothing like it. But Buckley would maybe be the closest this year, but no, we did. It would have been Steve Versaig if he had beaten Ben Doge. Yeah, and Sean Strickland came into 2023 off back-to-back losses. Right. Crazy.

And then went on to win the belt. I still don't believe it. It's absolutely ridiculous. It's absolutely. Dominated. That fight is, I have not rewatched that fight in a long time. I think I will at some point because that was crazy when it was happening. And the more I think about it, I'm just like that.

It's just that was such a bizarre, impressive win. That is still the best M. fighting post-fight show in the website's history was when John Shirkle won the title. Never had more fun in my life talking about a card. Myself, Jedmishu and the great Chehene Al-Shadi, who was no longer with us. But just, I mean, he's with us, just we're not here. We've done this before. Jehaw-Hat-I is at.

He is alive and well. He's just not with M-A-F-F-A-F-F-D. He did this in a show before with someone else. Guys, I'm so sorry. Jahen is alive. Oh, God. Next question. By or sell, the UFC loses the antitrust lawsuit and business changes forever. We both sold this, okay.

Yeah. We both said that they would lose to quote unquote lose the lawsuit, which if we're being honest, they didn't lose anything. They lost some money, but they didn't lose the lawsuit. And we both were like, there's no way business changes forever because they'll probably settle. And the only way that it can change is if this goes to a full on trial and neither of us were convinced that it would go down that road. and we were both correct. So we both sold and we were both right. I hate that we were so right about this because I'm not like a business savvy person.

I would say like the business side of MMA is probably not one of my strengths. But I know enough about business in general and about, of course, this, you know, this crazy world that we cover that I was like, gosh, it just seems so obvious that they're going to settle. They just have so much, so much ability to do so much leverage in that regard compared to their opposition in this particularly legal battles. So yeah, we knew it. We knew it. And like you said, didn't even really lose. I don't consider a settlement a straight-up loss. It's called a settlement for a reason, guys.

I mean, there's certainly some cases where I'm sure you can look throughout history where someone got an exorbitant amount of money from someone. And you're like, okay, that's a clear win for the party, the agree party. But in this case, yeah, less than hundreds of million dollars. I'm sure you've seen the shareholders not happy about it. But in the long run, boy, a drop in the bucket. Just a drop in the bucket. bucket. And yeah, the second part of that sentence was an easy sell, right? We just knew nothing's

going to change, Mike. We knew it. We were not, uh, we were just certainly not wrong about that. And it is what it is. The next question, buy yourself, PFL has their most successful year ever and becomes a legit threat to be the quote unquote co-leader, aka, we both sold this. We both knew what this was. And this is at the point where we said, that we would hear from fighters such as Johnny Eblen and Patchy Mix complaining about not having enough fights and asking them to send them to the UFC. We didn't mention Patricia Pitbull or some others, but we saw this coming from a mile away, okay? We saw this coming in January and we were absolutely correct about this. So not their most successful year, certainly further away from being a co-leader than they were in January.

That's for sure. Okay, I was going to ask about the first half. So we can't even maybe argue it was their most successful year. No. No? How can you argue that? But what was, though? Do we do what would we?

I mean, that's the thing. The year were 2022, I think was their most successful. Let me see. I'm looking back. That was the, that was the championship season where Kayla lost to Larissa Pacheco. That was their most, that was the year where they ended with like the most. And you can even argue that 2023 was a more successful year because while the world championship card stunk, they got a lot of buzz because they got they signed Jake Paul, they signed Francis, they signed Amanda Serrano. They did a whole bunch of things.

And then they got the Bellator merger, which people were excited about. So like they ended the year with a lot of momentum. they do not have any momentum hitting it in 2025. But this year, this year, Francis fought, at least, you know, they didn't sign him. He fought in 2024. That was nice by all the Giants was kind of a cool event. They got Cyborg and Pacheco. That was a five people wanted to see.

That was cool. Jake Paul recorded a cool video of explaining the scoring. What is? He was explaining the season scoring or something, right? I can't remember what the video or the new rules. He sure did. Just everything. It's like a PFL primer, the smart cage.

So there we go. Paul actually did something for them this year. Dakota Digiba, breakout star, breakout star. I don't know. They lost their biggest star to Kayla Harrison. And in their face of the organization, shit on her on the way out. Yeah, yeah. But I mean, come on, how much was Kayla really, really bringing there?

Right. I don't know. I don't know. Dana White spent an entire press conference after Power Slap, ripping Don Davis to Shrek. He acknowledged them, Mike. I think for the first time he acknowledged them. Do you see?

Do you see? He acknowledged them. I'm not saying this one's the most successful year, but I will, I think you could make a case just based on the, you know, the first part of that question. I think you make a case, but certainly nowhere near being a challenger or actual co-leader, however you guys want to phrase it to the UFC, not remotely close. Oh, yeah, they're so, they're way further back right now. Next question. UFC makes any meaningful change to the ultimate fighter format. I'm assuming I sold.

We both sold this. Yeah, but my argument was probably because the show was already perfect. Why would you change anything? I'm pretty sure that's what I said. Yeah. Mine was not. Mine was not that. It was just like, look, it's the same show.

They don't care. But they still love it for some reason. Next question. We pondered this for a minute, AK. We truly pondered this one. And then we both ultimately landed. in on the same answer. We both ended up being absolutely correct. At least one of these names will announce their retirement. Dustin Porre, Justin Geichie, Michael Chandler. We thought Porier was

a very interesting name here. I thought Justin Gaichie was a very interesting name. I certainly didn't see Michael Chandler. In the end, we both sold this and we were both correct. Dustin Poirier has has teased it, but he it was like, yeah, I think I might be done. And now it's one last dance. So he hasn't officially retired yet. Gaichi is saying he wants to fight Dan Hooker. Chandler is just going to be Chandler forever.

And yeah, neither of them retired. The day of this recording, I just want to say, Chandler has once again tweeted that he wants to fight Conner McGregor. So I, the guy is never retiring and he's never giving up on that fight. Even after he retires, he's still going to be. tweeting at Connor McGregor, I think, and saying like, hey, you know, there's that one more fight. I think we got to get back in there one more time. Yeah, I'm glad we sold on that. But that was tough. That was tough. It did feel like there was a chance any of those guys could have,

could have maybe hung it up. And again, deservedly so. They've just done so much in their careers. If they ever want to stop getting punched in the face, I don't see why anyone can blame. Michael Chandler will be at the Golden Years Retirement Home. Yes. Doing pool jazzer size videos for social media calling out Connor McGregor and it's going to be electric and you should just keep the skimick forever next question by herself that the UFC and wwe will come together for a major event in the same city in the same week and we both bought this and i don't think they did what did they do didn't they do like an nxte the same weekend as something well they did do it and they did an nxte card at the apex yep and you would have to assume

that there was a UFC of Apex event maybe that same weekend and maybe they just changed it out. I don't know. This is the one I didn't, I wasn't sure of the answer. One of the caveats I threw out was if WWE appears at the UFCX during international fight week, like if they have their own booth and like a couple of wrestlers show up, is that, does that count? And also, if you want to put this into perspective, because I was there, they both were at, fanatics fest together, like right next to each other. But I don't know if that counts.

I think the initial phrasing, the question means we're going to do Smackdown on Friday, UFC on Saturday, and then raw on Monday or something like that. Yeah. And that didn't happen. I, yeah, I think we're definitely on the run on this one. They did this. So I'm just looking at that. We bought that this would happen.

I don't think we did. Oh, damn. No. I think we were wrong. I think we were wrong. because I think, so there's NXT Battleground on June 8th, sorry, June 9th, excuse me. And then a day before that, there was a UFC event, but it was at KFC YUM Center in Louisville, UFC Louisville, so there was like, I remember there was a weekend.

We were talking about them having events and then, yes, the NXT event at the apex. But it wasn't billed or hyped as this like, oh, the first, the first like UFC WTO TKO weekend. So I think that's still to come. So we were, I think, yeah, we, we, we, we sold. Oh, sorry, we bought poorly there. Yeah. And I know that there are certain venues in cities that have, like, done payout deals to guarantee that both companies would host events in their city. Like, I know Anaheim has something in place where the UFC will have a card and WWW will have a card once a year for the next few years.

But still, it's not like the same week or anything like that. So I think the answer, I think we're both wrong about that one. Next question, we will see three or more UFC champ champ fights in 2024. And we both sold this. I did we didn't see one, right? No, we did not. A lot of talk of it. I mean, more talk than ever probably of championship,

which is saying something because every year, I think, since McGregor did it, has had at least two or three guys calling for it. But I felt like we had a lot of that talk. Just so much stray talk. I'm going to champ. I'll go up two divisions and fight for another belt. So I think we thought the chance of happening was very slim. And I think that's a good thing for fans, guys.

These champ champ fights shouldn't happen regularly. And she's like once every like three years. And if like the timing is right, it should be a rare thing. But gosh, every fight it wants to know. Next question. Buy or sell the UFC will have more than two interim title fights in 2024. You were correct, AK, you sold this. I bought it.

I thought Tom Aspinall was going to defend his belt twice. And he didn't. He only defended it once. What was that, Mike? This is an interim title defense question? UFC will have more than two interim title fights in 2024. Because we didn't have another one, right? I was going to say, I think he's our only interim. Again, another good thing. You know, no good.

No unnecessary super fights in 2024. No unnecessary interim champions. Though really they, they're really the one situation where they could have with like, Shafcott. And Ian Machado Gary, like we would kind of would have accepted it. Even though, again, it's still like bad because we think, I'll all be back in the first half of 2025, but that we would have been fine with it.

I'm glad they at least got five rounds. I just hope they got paid the same amount as they would have if it was for interim title fight, though I somehow doubt they did. But yeah, I think that one in the super fights won pretty, pretty easy to predict. Yeah, because 2024, we definitely got two. We got Aspinall and Pavlovich, and we got Yair and Josh Hammett in 2023. Yes. Gosh, I totally forgot that was an interim title fight. Right.

Where's Yaya year? I don't know. We haven't seen him since what, the Ortega fight? Those last time we saw him, right? Maybe something cooking for him. Arnold Allen teasing that he might be fighting Yair, so we'll see if that is the case. Next question. By herself, that either Muhammad Mikhailton Almeida, Mavsar of Loyaf or Marab de Walshvili

will get a title shot in 2024. And boy, do we think hard about this one, AK. We did. We both ended up buying it. Okay. But we were not confident. You were actually, and it's more of a gimmick thing for you. You were the most confident that J-Lat-Albedo would get a title shot.

Is it a gimmick? Is it a gimmick or do I mean it? You meant it. You meant it. He's fighting early. He's fighting early in 2025. I'm just saying he's got a fight in the first couple of months. And after that, who knows?

Who knows? But we were both correct there. A few more of these. Next question, by yourself that the interim UFC heavyweight tight. will be defended before the UFC heavyweight championship. AK, you sold this. I did. Why did that?

But you sold this. Because I thought that we were going to get the real thing. You thought Tom Aspinall was going to be promoted to the actual champ and that he would defend his actual heavyweight title. I bought this, couldn't buy it fast enough, and I was absolutely correct. next question a ufc champ i think this is the last one a ufc champ defends their title three times in twenty twenty four we both sold this no wrong damn you alice pareda damn you we said and we said we said alexander kaley that the only there's only one man who could have done it and it was Sean Strickland. So we didn't have a lot of, apparently we didn't have a ton of faith that

Sean Strickle was going to beat Drick's Duplacy. Or kept, cap the title at all. Well, no, wait. So we said he would have defended his title three times. We said that the only guy who could have done it is Sean Strickland. And Sean was the middleweight champion at the time. He was about to fight DDP, but we just weren't confident that he would hold on to the balance. Okay. Okay. If he had, in order to do that. If he had, he very likely would have tried to book two more title fight. in in 2024. Oh yeah, because he fought in June, so that would have given him six extra months

to book another one. And then he didn't fight again, which is super not Sean Strickland-like, business savvy guy. Paulo Costa. Yeah, that was the June fight. That was in June. Oh, that's your time.

Okay, he didn't fight again. And now he's just not fighting anybody until he fights CDP, which is smart. He's got a tough. Very, very smart. Damn, damn, that Alex Panetta. We were so, we should have been right. If he wasn't, if he wasn't the ultimate company man,

we would have been right. If he was not the MVP of the UFC, if these cards didn't fall apart, left and right, it wouldn't have happened. But Alex Breyer just kept coming in, saving the day, and just doing the damn thing.

Three title fights in eight months. Who could have predicted that? Who's predicted that? Come on. He had four title, four title fights at 11 months. Dude is a savage. That's crazy.

Dude is an absolute savage. I wonder if he can, who knows, maybe if that's a buy-sell question for 2025, can Alex Pereer keep up the same? pace. We don't know. All right. Let us move on, AK, to our champions predictions for 2024. Who would end the year as champions of the world for the ultimate fighting championship? We start with the women's strawweight division, AK, we were both correct. We both said it would be

Zhang Wei Li, and it is, in fact, Zhang Wei Lee, who's getting ready to defend her title against Tatyana Suarez at UFC 312 in February. I have a feeling this is going to be a very interesting weight class to try to predict. Heading into 2025, women's flyweight division and the women's band and weight division, AK, we were best friends. We were a lockstep and both incredibly wrong.

Women's flyweight, we both said Aaron Blanchfield. It was certainly not Aaron Blanchfield. And then Women's 135 with just the utmost confidence, we sent Myra Buena Silva. And boy, was that maybe one of the worst, predictions we've ever had on this show.

She is tough scenes. I think people barely remember that that fight happened at 2.97. I honestly, I think anybody remembers anyone like it's so, I know and it's, it's almost a year ago now, but like people are definitely like they remember the main event, stricken DDP, you know, uh, turned into a pretty decent fight, big grudge match. Um, nobody remembers as might have won us off a fight. And she fought, did she fight again since? Yeah, she got finished by, maybe.

Jesus on, I believe. Oh, my goodness. Oh, gosh. Was this one of those nasty cut ones? Yes, I believe it was. Damn. Wow, that was a, that prediction was real bad. Super bad prediction.

Yeah, and, okay, she's not even, she's not even in the division anymore. She went back to 125. She's fighting Jasmine Jazz DeVesius February 1st at flyweight. So she can be our 125 prediction, you're saying. She could be. She could be. Something to keep in mind.

Something to keep in mind. We go to the men's flyweight division, AK. Both of us said that the champion at the end of the year would be Alexander Pantosia, and we're both correct. Allie Pants gets it done. 135. Our success ratings drop tremendously. You predicted that the men's band-in-weight champion would be Umar, Naram-Aidoff.

I said that the men's band-o-weight champion would be Sugar Sean O'Malley, and we were both incorrect. But it just depends on who you ask. If you ask Sean O'Malley, he's still the band of mine champion. I was a month early. Let's put it that way. I was a month early. Okay. He's going to get it.

All right. Well, speaking of a month early, we're getting there. The men's featherweight division, AK, the 145 pound division. You said that the featherweight champion would be Ilya to Poria and nailed that one. I said it would be Movesar, if Loya, I'm a little early on that one. It's coming though. That time is coming.

155, lightweight division. Everybody who was on our staff at the time said it would be Islamakachev, except for one man. That man is me. And speaking of being one month early, I said Arm and Sarukian, and I am in fact one month early

because Arm and Sirukian is about to be the UFC lightweight champion and it's going to be incredible when it happened. If you knew Armin personally, I would feel very threatened because I feel like he would be your best friend. If him and I were full-time equal ground with you, socially speaking,

I feel like he would become your best friend because you have been on the Armin train for a long, long, long time. You are very convinced that this man is all but officially the best lightweight in the world. Seven years. Seven years. The chips are in the middle.

The chips are in the middle in 2024. But the time ran out and the World Series of poker returns and resumes on January 18th. And then I can cash in that ticket. It's going to be incredible. We go to welterweight and middleweight, AK. We both had the same answer. We were both incredibly wrong. But we're very close at 170.

Both said Shafcott-Rak-Mannoff would be the welterweight champion. And as we do on all of these shows, regardless of Divor-Eval. that he happens to fight in, we both said Hamzat Shamaif would be the middleweight champion. Because we always say Hamzaa Shemayev will be a champion of some division. Perhaps if we're, if we're believing the rumor and innuendo, perhaps Hamzat Shemayev will be a choice for the light heavyweight division in 2025. No. I don't think so, but people are talking.

So we're both wrong about those. This, I'm going to go to heavyweight and then I'm going to go back to 205 because I have to I have to maybe give myself a slap on the wrist and for shame myself live on the air here. Heavyweight, who would be the heavyweight champion, AK, to nobody's surprise. You went with the legendary Jailton Alveda. Did not happen. I was correct. Went with John Jones, nailed it, AK 205.

Let's go to the late heavyweight division. You nailed it. Got to correct. Alex Poetan Pereira would end the year as the late heavyweight champion. in. I cannot believe that I chose this. I went back. I read it and then I listened to it and I still can't believe it. I said Jamal Hill. Of course you did. I said Jamal Hill. Yep. I cannot believe I did that. I truly cannot believe that I did that. It certainly is not Jamal because at least he fought for the title though. I mean, it's not crazier than some of the other

predictions. At least he fought for the title, right? He did fight for the belt. And no, and even knowing that he would get run over by Pereira. And then like the only time I didn't feel that way was like a couple days before the fight. I'm like, oh, maybe Jamal Hill, like he's got an ace up his sleeve when we don't know about it. But no, he didn't. He just got booped real bad. And boy, it's been a tough year for Jamal Hill. But now he's getting ready to fight Yuri Perashka, January 18th.

I cannot friggin wait for that fight. Oh my God. And by the time you hear this, my interview with Yuri Perashko probably be live on the YouTube channel. golly man Yuri is that's a scary man that dude is ready to go he is locked in like I've never seen him that is going to be some fight on January 18th in Los Angeles

so of some of those misses I feel like Blanchfield is probably like a lot of the names you mentioned obviously are like in title contention and you know could be a good 2025 pick we mentioned Hamza I mentioned of course Armand who's fighting I mean Armand and Umar

umar are could be champions for the next three months but some of them are far off i do feel like aaron blanchfield fell back i don't i can't imagine a lot of us will be picking her to be the champion at 125 in next year um jelton as much as i love him i love the gimmick he's also probably pretty far back though it is heavyweight let us let us keep mind it is heavy weight and depending how the situation shakes out with aspinall and john jones like if john jones jones retires by sometime mid-year and aspinal needs challengers you could see jelton to sneak in there. He's got to beat Sergey Spivak first. But yeah, that's early. And Charlton could sneak in that fight and then another fight and then if Aspinola or whomever

needs a challenger. So Almeida's also pretty far back, but definitely close to the Blanchefield. I think that's about it, right? Like, otherwise, all the name, most of the names you mentioned, like Tatiana, again, she's finally getting her title shot. Myr-Buena-Silva is pretty pretty. Oh, that's right. Sorry, that's how I forgot. Yeah, yeah. And I, unlike Aaron Blanchfield, I don't know if we ever talk about it. about Mada Bruno Silva in the Bantamweight title future again. Or almost definitely not if she stays at 125. Yeah.

Yikes. We'll see if she makes the weight and all that. Yeah, yeah. Ovsar of Leav will be interesting for me because he should get a title shot this year. I just don't know if he's going to. Yeah. So I don't know. And I'll just so damn impressive this year.

It's going to be tough to choose against him. So. But stay tuned. M.A.Fighting.com. We will have all of our staff champ predictions. We will predict them live on the program next week. But now, AK, let's close. let's close the festivities by telling the folks what our bold predictions for

2024 and a theme throughout the show that I noticed and it has become more and first of all it has become almost impossible to do these because the buy sell questions that have come in have been so good and so bold that it almost makes our jobs impossible to try to come up with a prediction that's just so spicy where it is almost impossible for it to happen. And the 2023 predictions were yours was like incredibly bold, but it wasn't,

it wasn't ridiculous. It seemed ridiculous in hindsight because your 2020-23 prediction was that Volcanowski was going to beat Islam and that Habib would come back and fight Volk and then they would do it at Texas Stadium. So you were like all over the map here. I was really, I have a guarantee for fans this year.

I will not pretty predicting Habib's come back. I keep doing that. I did it because I said he would fight Charles. I said that I shifted to Volk. He's not coming back. I'm good. Yeah. You did not do that in 2024.

Okay. And because of all the toughness of trying to make a bold prediction, this is your prediction. At least one major fighter in the UFC will receive a, quote, public slap on the wrist for something that they said or did. I could not be farther off because, right? You couldn't have been morog because we had the biggest star in the UFC found liable for a sexual assault case and a civil suit. Excuse me, a sexual assault civil suit.

And Dana White's, what was Dana White's response at the press? I was like barely even acknowledged it because he was asked about it after. Yeah, he basically had no, he basically gave a no comment. that is insane that is i know he's not i know conno's not an active fighter but he is still again very much so maybe probably the biggest name on your roster if you'd have no comment wow like they did not admonish nobody in 2024 that is for damn i said they would i said that that's that was my bold prediction that's that was your bold prediction that some i made i said it's in december you're kidding i said in january before 297 before 2907 it was like two weeks before

Before what happened with me at 297, I made this prediction. Correct. Which makes this very, very interesting. Oh, yeah. Data's response to that was the complete opposite of a public slap on the wrist. Okay. So pretty bold prediction. So I feel good about it.

I made a prediction that was very, very good. And apparently in this universe cannot possibly come true. There's just no way it's ever going to come true. I'll make that my bold prediction again for 2025. Yeah. maybe we thought maybe with like the TKO merger that perhaps something might come but it just it sure didn't it sure didn't and it sure won't uh even after the the Dana white video from new years the prior year and there's no statement no nothing there it just won't happen so there you have it

i totally forgot that's so good i totally forgot that prediction that's that's a great one my bold prediction was that the UFC would would acknowledge pfl to some extent But they would do so by creating something that would create them to respond to it. And my bold prediction was that the UFC would hire Scott Coker to some major position within the company. He would be Dana's right-hand man. He would be Dana's mouthpiece if Dana didn't want to travel to an international card. be you know if david shaw wasn't going to do the press conferences for the nondana events you just shoot

scott scott koker up there to give just the perfect PR answer that you're looking for that did not happen in fact almost the complete opposite happened because scott's koker ended up starting another combat sports promotion with uh gilbert melendez yeah out in california san jose more specifically so that could still be a bold prediction for 2025 who knows Maybe Scotty Cokes ends up with the with the UFC lanyard that he gets to put on his car. Man, I'm glad because on paper, you know what's sad is that these are bold predictions, but like they don't sound that unreasonable that one, a company would have some sort of conduct standards, two, that Dana White would like, you know, want to just bring in someone who has so much combat sports experience

to kind of help lighten the load and just like, you know, maybe help someday ease his own transition out of the company so he can just retire and enjoy the rest of his life. So these are both, like, they're bold, but they felt still grounded in reality. And yet, as we both said, like, somehow we were not close, which just tells you how silly this business is. It certainly is. So now you guys, like, if you're newer to the predictions extravaganza,

if you've kind of hopped on board of them, Mayfiting sometime in 2024 and you missed all this, this is what we're doing next week. We will be live on the YouTube channel. And we're going to answer a whole bunch of bi-finding. sell questions. I think we only answered maybe a third of them on the show because they were so good. We had a whole bunch more that we didn't even get to. And then we'll do the champ predictions. And then we'll knock out our bold predictions. So we want you to be involved in the program. So how you

would be involved is the same way you would submit your matchmaking suggestions post UFC event. This is how you will submit your buy sell questions. So for me, I used to do this show before MMA fighting. So there is a crew of people who send me buy-sell questions throughout the year to like my old email address, which is still active. So I still get those and we still accumulate those. A.K., how can people get in touch with you to submit their buy-sell questions? Guys, my DMs are open. My email is open. Please, DM me on Twitter at Alexander Klee. That's just a 1K. On Instagram at Alexander KK Lee, that's 2Ks. And then on email, Alex. Dot Lee. at sbnation.com.

Guys, hit me up. Let's, let's get, people have already sent me some. You guys are incredible. So people already sent me a couple in anticipation, Mike, of the show. But let's try and get some more in there. You love it. Best way to do it with me is, uh, just do it on Instagram, M underscore, heck, J.R. Just send them there, shoot them in the DMs.

I will find them. Sometimes they get put in different folders and I get to dig deep for them. But I will, I will make sure I find them. We'll put these all together. We'll send them on over to good old E. Casey Liden. And then he randomly selects them. We don't even know which we take a quick peek at them, just to have an idea of what we're up against.

But then once the show goes live, we have no idea what the questions are going to be until we actually see them. So that makes the show a little bit more fun. And of course, maybe a buy-sell question will come in in the super chats and we can do that live and just off the cuff, which we love to do as well.

And we'll do that. And then we'll lead right into the UFC's return to action, January 11th. And no better place to return for the new year than the world's most famous apex. That's what they will be on January 11 for McKenzie Dern versus Amanda Hebas 2. And then we will roll right in to UFC 311 on January 18th. And what an event that's going to be? And that means once that event ends, we will be live on the YouTube channel for a special matchmaking edition of on to the next one following UFC 311.

So with that said, thank you to everyone. everybody who has been listening, watching, being a part of the program, whether it's submitting matchmaking suggestions or leaving comments or just being a part of the program and part of the website in any way, shape, or form we appreciate you. And the next time you hear from us, it'll be a new year, a new us in 2025. So thank you all very much. Have a great rest of your holiday season. Have a happy new year. And we will see you next week for a live predictions extravaganza edition of on to the next one the podcast you're listening to the vox media podcast network