MMA Fighting - On To the Next One | Matches To Make After UFC 282

Episode Date: December 11, 2022

After a finish-filled 10-fight start at UFC 282, the final two bouts were the only to go to the judges' scorecards where controversy reigned supreme — leading to a light heavyweight division still not having an official UFC champion. With Dana White putting a new championship bout on the books for UFC 283, where do Jan Blachowicz and Magomed Ankalaev go from here? On an all-new edition of On To the Next One, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Alexander K. Lee attempt to answer that question from a matchmaking perspective. Additionally, future matchups are discussed for Paddy Pimblett following his heavily debated decision win over Jared Gordon in the co-main event, Santiago Ponzinibbio, Dricus Du Plessis after his stoppage win over Darren Till, breakout star Ilia Topuria, and more. 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

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 Cudulian 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? The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. Support for this show comes from the Audible original The Downloaded 2, Ghosts in the Machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudulian 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? The downloaded two, Ghosts in the Machine, available now only from Audible. We're live. Welcome to a brand new edition of Onta, the next one. We are coming out of just the weirdest, wackiest ending to the calendar year for the UFC. With UFC 282.

I don't even know what to say, AK, because, and let me just introduce you real quick. I'm like, that is my best friend, Alexander Kay Lee. And I'd love to just continue with the pleasantries and just give you this rousing introduction. But there's just such a strange taste in my mouth coming out of UFC 282, AK, because this card started off frantically. 10 fights, 10 finishes. We had some great storylines. We're building towards something really cool. And then we handed it over to the judges for the two most important fights on the card.

And boy, did they fumble the bag, as the kids like to say, okay? How are we feeling on this Sunday from a match following just a weird, wacky, and strange ending in conclusion to UFC 282? Yeah, weird is the word we kept using going into the event without the way it kept getting altered. Like it had a lot of modifications outside of the main event, of course. We lost Yeri and the beautiful, a weird fight in itself already, considering how the first fight went. The beautiful Yeri Glover rematch. Mike, we were this close to possibly having the number one and number two spots

in the fight of the year awards both go to the same two fighters. But we lost that opportunity. How amazing what had been. We lost Robbie Lawler from the card. Bo Nicol was supposed to make his debut. What a nice way that would have been for the UFC to end this calendar year. What else do we lose? Oh, Oven Saint-Fruh had three different opponents

and then just ended up not getting a fight in the card at all. It was a weird one. It was a weird one going in by best friend, I'll tell you. And then the night itself was weird. Even though people were having a good time, there was finishes. You could see in the air that chaos was lingering. Maybe not like full out chaos, but it was there. Our very first fight in a legal knee,

which probably, sorry Cameron Simon, probably should have ended the fight and disqualification. I don't think that that that that, uh, the, that Stephen Coslow was the same after taking that knee. Um, we had some, we had some, the commentary was, I don't even want to make fun of the commentary because there was some so much like some swings in these fights that like normally we say, oh, the commentary was so off like Joe Rogan, Dan Cormey, what are they talking about? And this is probably, this is probably right up there with like classic Rogan where he's like, oh, this person's not going to submit and then they submit or this person's about to get

up a whole, uh, this person's in trouble and then they completely get out of a hold or this guys winning a fight and then they lose like two minutes after but that's just kind of the night it was that's commentating on live action i can't even blame rogan for that chris kris kirtis because chris kirtis didn't look like he was doing super great against walking buckley just crack cracks them and Mitch obazian got a win for the first time in a few years uh it was just a lot of weird stuff it was a lot of weird stuff it's a lot of weird and that's i haven't even gotten to the main card yet we'll talk about more about the main card soon but it was i think the the gymnastics score i came up with before the 8.5, 8.6 range was actually perfect because I think it was a good card and a memorable card,

but not like an all-time. I saw people saying like card of the year just because there's so many finishes. And I want to remind people like finishes while exciting do not necessarily mean it was a card of great fights because it was exciting. But it wasn't like, I don't think it was the best card of the year. But it was super fun. I am not crapping on this card. I'm not crapping on this car. I'm super fun, probably more fun than it had any business being.

And as you said, unfortunately did not nail it. the landing. I would agree. I think the Wi-Fi connection is a little bit better here. I am in the hotel lobby, so it's probably a little bit crazy. I just got no choice. This is where we have to do this show, and we appreciate you joining us. I'm a little tired, perhaps a little grumpy following last night and the way everything concluded, but we are here with all of you to do some matchmaking. So basically what we're going to do as far as you guys in the comments section and all of that is we'll just throw out sort of like your general thoughts on things. If you have matchmaking suggestions for specific fights that we're going to discuss,

chuck them out there, I'll throw them up on the screen, and then in the last five to ten minutes, we'll just do like a rapid fire, pull up your matchmaking suggestions, throw them on the screen, we'll react to them in real time, and that's how we'll do the show. So let's get into this thing, AKA, let's start with the main event, because people kept asking me in the build to this new main event between Jan Bolivich and Magam and Ankelaev,

why do you preface everything by saying, at the end of the night, we are expected to have a new light heavyweight champion? Well, this is why, because the chaos clause has been invoked for the UFC all year long, and in the end, Magam and Ankelaev, Jan Bolivich battled out for 25 minutes, and we still don't have a champion of the world

after Yuri Perashka vacate. So were you shocked with the draw? Do you think the draw is like a valid scorecard? And how do we matchmate for these guys after this? First off, I meant to shout out my Croatian brothers at the top of the show, Croatia, in the semifinals of the World Cup. I actually have no particular loyalties to any team, but I have various gear from around the world for whatever reason. So Croatia is one of them. Again, you may see me, I never get to wear this thing.

You may see me in a Morocco shirt sometime, depending how that semifinal turns out. So shout us to Croatia and soon to be former Celtic FC back. Joseph Duranvich. Go get paid, son. Go get paid. He's done his work for Celtic FC. The main event score, completely valid. Completely valid. I think round one, I think because by the end,

Enkolaev was so dominant, so clearly winning the fight, there was a lot of people kind of raising their eyebrows. Like, whoa, how could that be a draw? But round one was a close one. I know some people scored for Ankalyev in real time. All three judges gave it to Blakovic. They also all gave round two to Blakovits, and I think it wasn't until round three that one of the judges gave Ankolaev a card. So heading into the championship rounds, it was 3027, 3027, 29, 28 for Blakovits.

If this had been a three-round fight as originally scheduled, Blakovins would have won. And Goliath Pye would have fought differently. I mean, he did say after, like, his, and we saw his coach just kind of saying, like, what are you doing, just, you know, go to your strength. And they probably would have said that a lot sooner in a three-round fight. So when I say Blachovitz would have won a three-round fight, I would have played out differently. Maybe he would have won, you know, but I don't think Ekelya would have fought the same way.

It would have been a little more urgency in round two. So, yeah, but the score is completely valid. 10-8, I mean, I think you've got to give a 10-8 in the fifth. I don't know if that would have made a difference, Mike. What was the, what, 47-47? Jan would have won. If that judge, if that judge who scored a draw didn't score the fifth round of 10-8, Janbovich wins.

Okay. I'm just sorry, if Mike Bell scores a 10-8, it's still a draw, I think. I think it's then 40s, yes, then it's just 47-47-47. It'll be a majority draw. It would have gone from a split draw to majority draw. And Goliath would have had the only winning score card, but we still would have had 47-47 from Sal Diomato. and 47, 47 from Mike Bell. So even if all three judges give a 10-8,

which Mike Bell didn't. Mike Bell did 10-9 for Jan. Still a draw. Unfortunately, it really was about the earlier rounds. Ankleyev really needed to win one of those earlier rounds to seal the deal. So I'm not sure if he'll feel differently after he takes a look at the scorecards. I doubt it. He probably thinks he won like four of the five rounds.

Definitely, again, won the last two, dominated the last round. But, yeah, I mean, based on the way fights are scored, it's it's it it was a draw pride rules clear win for ankylaev i think ankle i think coming out of this a lot of us feel like ankylaev is the better fighter that's not how judging works unfortunately so i have no problem with that with the math that was done on saturday i didn't i mean i get it like if you want to give a 10-8 in the fit that's fine but i didn't even give ddp a 10-8 in the first round against errant till because till like had those moments at the end and like got some offense going and made it happen.

And even one of the judges didn't even give that a 10-8 round for Triggins 2-C. And that was much more of a compelling argument for a 10-8 round. There are people saying, that could have been a 10-7 round for DDP. And Ankelyev just took him down and held him there and landed like 13 strikes. That's basically what the round was. He just held him there and landed 12 or 13 strikes. So I didn't score to 10-8. I still thought the swing round was the third for me,

because I thought Young clearly won the first two. four and five were definitely Ankelaiath rounds. And then the third round was kind of the swing round because watching it live, I scored it for Ankolaev. I thought Jan had moments. I thought the leg kicks were great, but I think Anka Laif was starting to turn the tide a little bit. He was landing with some vigor.

He was pushing forward a little bit more, getting a little more aggressive. So I did score that round for Ankylaif. But I got to go back and watch it because, like I said, two of those judges, did two of the – Was it all three judges who gave Blahovitch the first three rounds? Or just two of them? Just two of them.

Derek Cleary went 10-9, Enkoliath in their third round. All right. So Ankyovych, Jan Belhovic, a lot of people were like, well, they're just going to run this one back for the title and just do this again. And one of these guys will be champion. Dana, it was like, nope, hold my beer, bro. Yep. It's like he was watching the UFC 282 watch party because New York Rick and I are discussing what they should do. And he's like, well, Glover should just fight in Brazil, but just give him somebody because you obviously can't do Jan and you can't do Magabed because he's all banged up from the.

the light kicks. And I'm like, well, you can just pull Jamal Hill from the March 11th fight and do that. Like, that would make sense. And 30 minutes later, Dana White sits down at the press conference. And he does exactly that. Jamal Hill is fighting Glover-Teshire to crowd a new champion January 21st in Rio. Stunned by this. I didn't think they would actually do this. I'm, well, I guess stunned is probably not the word. But I'm surprised that they actually just went to that route right away, especially for a guy in a company who doesn't matchmake after the cards on Saturday. Dana White was quick to pull the trigger on the matchmaking here. So that's that fight. That's where we're going with the title. But what do we do with these two guys? Do we just run this one back as like a three-round fight or like a fight night main event? Or do we send these guys on

different roads here following an interesting main event, but all in all, not all that compelling in the end? And by the way, I mean, there's a reason that Dana White doesn't matchmake right after the card, right after cards is because one, we've kind of criticize him as a promoter. but for practical reasons it's not like they can really get people to sign contracts I mean I think I assume it's obviously a pretty strong verbal agreement I think Jamal Hill comments

on it after already he's he's all he's all in you know he wants it of course it's the title fight why would he say no I don't did we see um did we get a comment from Glover yet I think he I don't know I have to go back and like look at Aaron Bronsetter's Twitter yeah okay I mean and I don't see why why Glover wouldn't be into it either

but but it is funny two literally right to that just say that these two it's not it's not like a case where like you know two fighters on the same card won a fight and it's like you know two fighters the same division on the same card clearly headed to a title fight like then i'd understand if dan is like oh yeah this guy defended his belt this guy's a clear number one contender we're definitely going to book them next which is something even then he doesn't do that uh so for two guys who aren't even on the card i mean one of them was supposed to be but for two guys who weren't on the card to just suddenly be booked into a title fight is pretty wild so i don't know

when contract's going to be sent out probably this week, I would hope, given how quickly Dana came up with this. Because I can't imagine it's something that was in the works until, because Jamal Hill had a fight with Anthony Smith. And I can't imagine it was in the works until Dana, like, very openly just said, like, I hated that main event. And I need to fix this now. I need to put a band-aid on this light heavyweight division somehow.

I don't know if the Tashire Hill fight does it, but, like, I'm all for running back Ankleyev and Blakovich, but not for the title. Sorry, guys, that ship has sailed for now. As you said, as Dana White said, it's to share in Hale getting it. But run it back, five round fight night main events, hopefully not in the apex. If they're hitting the road, this is the kind of fight that I know didn't thrill people,

but they deserve to have a crowd. They're big-name fighters, going from a pay-per-view main event to throwing the same fight into the apex, would just be weird and cruel. Though again, there's that weird word again. Maybe that happening would kind of put a real bow on this whole pre-UFC 282 and everything that's happened after,

this whole timeline that we're in right now regarding this pay-per-view. So I'm fine with them running it back, but it's got to be five rounds again. I think you had to recreate the circumstance as much as you can, which to me means it wouldn't be on a pay-per-view because I don't want a title. I don't want a title on the line. It's got to be a fight night somewhere. Yeah, I mean, I guess. The only other option, I feel like Ankelyev lost the most here, honestly.

I feel like Jan Belhovic could slide into that Anthony Smith fight. Like if he's ready to come back in March, you can do that. And that would make sense. And I think the fans would react a little bit better than that. But what do you do with Magamette at Angolaev? I have no idea. But I think they will probably end up running this one back. But I think if the UFC had their druthers,

they're going to try to convince Jan to fight Anthony Smith, because it's a good main event. It's solid. Do they, and that's going to be, that's an on the road card, isn't it? Didn't they announce the March lineup? I think every single card is out of the apex, right? We've got two pay-per-views. We've got, March is going to be a two pay-per-view night because, and a cool one,

because, you know, you've got one that's domestic in Las Vegas, and then you've got one a couple weeks later in London. March 11th is in Vegas, but not at the apex? That's right. What is this? version of the theater version hotels what it's like a 4,000 seat arena okay that's kind of cool which I like like this idea I like the smaller crowd sort of events I dig that as long as it's not in the freaking apex man I'm good at March 25th San Antonio there you go Antonio Texas let's do it there's your head there's your fight night headliner both guys are healthy if both guys want to run it back ASAP again on a card that's not at the apex San Antonio I'll call I'll call my shot there March 25th Maybe I'm hearing that the UFC might be working on something a little bit different for that March 25th card.

So stay tuned for that. I don't know if that's actually going to happen at this point. I mean, it's hard to predict what's going to happen in a week. Never mind what's going to happen three plus months from now. But we'll see. But I'm hearing that the UFC is trying to do something a little bit different for that March 25th card. So I can't tell you what it is because it ain't done yet. By the way, I still see people in the comments complaining about the draw score and they're like,

oh, round five should have been a 10-8. And I just want to remind people, if it had been scored a 10-8, it still would have been a draw. It just would have been a majority draw instead of a split draw. Let me double-check that, but I'm pretty sure because the first three- But two of the judges did score round 5-10-8. That's two of them did. Yeah, I think if all three scored it, it wouldn't have made a difference, like I said. It would have just been no cards for Jan, but two cards would have been a draw.

And, and Mike, if they had all gone your way and said no 10-8s at all, if it was just 10-9s, then Jan would have won. Yon would have won on two of the three cards if the 10-8s had not been awarded. So, yeah, really just a screwy, screwy fight. Yeah, I mean, if you scored round five, a 10-8, like, I ain't mad at you. I just feel like there are better examples of a 10-8 than that. Like, you could just lay on top of a guy and hold them down there and land five shots against somebody who lands zero. And you could call the 10-8, like, I guess because you landed more and the other guy landed nothing. But I don't know.

I thought, I thought, I won the first round. I thought the late kicks are big. I thought Jan looked real good early. I thought Jan won the second round. Third round, I thought Ankleiv won that one and then won three, four, and five. So I didn't think we were giving a Taka 108. I didn't think that we're going to have any sort of a splity city thing. Although after the patty of the batty decision, nothing was going to shock me.

I even said, like, they're going to score 5045 for Jan Belhovic. How about that? But that's where we're at right now. So boarding for flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50. minutes. Ugh, what? Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo? Great idea.

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It's hockey season, and you can get anything you need to live. delivered with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get a nice rank on Uber Eats. But iced tea, ice cream, or just plain old ice? Yes, we deliver those. Gold tenders, no. But chicken tenders, yes, because those are groceries, and we deliver those too. Along with your favorite restaurant food, alcohol, and other everyday essentials. Order Uber Eats now. For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. Let's move on. I don't think anybody wants to talk about this fight anymore.

We want to discuss the matchmaking for somebody else, the aforementioned Patty the Batty Pimbledt, who gets a highly debated, strongly controversial, unanimous decision win over Jared Gordon in the co-main event. I mean, holy cow, dude. I can't believe this. I couldn't believe it. I went back and watched it again this morning.

My mind does not change. I scored one and two for Gordon. round three for Patty. If you want to score a third round for Jared Gordon, I'd be mad at you. I just felt like Jared is more positional. It was just him fighting sort of not to lose. I do 100% agree with Dana White and Patty too.

I was kind of stunned by Jared's game plan, especially now going back and seeing how compromised Patty's ankle was and it was pretty clear how compromise his ankle was, which I may not have really picked out in real time because we had the watch party going on and so much was happening. but Patty gets the win.

Patty and maybe one media member on the planet are like the only ones who thought Patty won that fight, which is crazy. But at the end, as Patty Pimbled said yesterday, you could feel how you want about it. But there's a green mark next to my name on this fight. It's going down in the history of books as a victory. And now where do we go from here, okay?

Because in my opinion, this was the best thing that could have happened to Patty Pimble because he didn't lose. He still kind of gets to play. play this off in an emotional way where people are going to react to him even more so than they did heading in. And what's even better is the way most people thought Patty was going to win this fight, what would have been next was a top 15 guy who's probably going to absolutely melt him. And now he doesn't have to do that. He doesn't have to fight a top 15 guy now. He can just fight anybody because we learned what we needed to know about Patty and he didn't lose. So all

and all, this isn't a horrible thing for Patty Pimble. It stinks for Jared Gordon, no doubt about it. But man, where do we go with the batty now? Because we're going to be talking about this one for a while. There's a few ways you could go. First of all, I put up a poll before the show even started. Who was the biggest winner of UFC 282, Mike? I got four options.

I mean, there's a bunch of ways you could have gone with this. I had to leave off, like, who else? I had to leave off Edmund Chabazz, you know, I think would have been a nice guy to include. I had to leave off. I mean, well, Jarzino. Really, Edmund, Edmund is the other guy I would have liked to include. But I went with Patty Pimblit, Drix, Ilya, Elia Tuporio, Jr. And right now, Ilya leading was 66%.

Patty Pimble, at the bottom, 8%, probably, because a lot of people are wondering, why is he even in the poll? He did not win that fight. Mike, I've also reviewed the fight. We were doing the watch party. If anyone wants to see our live reaction, you can check out the replay of the watch party on M.M.A. fighting's YouTube.

I was, Mike, I might have been influenced a lot by your reactions. I'll be honest. I recall, because Jared Gordon did great in round one. I thought round two was close. And you yourself scored round three for Patty Pimlet. I did.

And I don't, and I won't argue with that. I think this is, so people, there will be a formal robbery review coming on, by Monday morning. I'm still in the process of kind of working things out. my head. I've watched the fight. Like I said, I've rewatched the fight. Might have to watch it again. It's really certain segments of it. But I will say, and my first reaction was I tweeted right

after, like, that was not a good decision. I just said it firmly. I'm a little bit shaker on it now, having seen the fight again. Again, I think round one, what bothers me, round one, I think is a clear Gordon round. That's the one thing that's sticking out to me. I don't know how you score round one for Pimbleau. He just didn't land anything like, like the striking numbers, whatever against stats, as we always say, are not a great way of judging a flight. And this is a perfect example. The striking numbers, I think Patty actually had one more significant strike. But I don't see how anyone can watch that first round and say the head shots that he was landing were more significant than Jared Gordon.

He had some good shots, but Jared Gordon was landing this left hand over and over again. He was really like landing clean. And Patty just has an amazing chin. Two of the judges gave round one to Pimblet. I really strongly disagree with that. All three gave round two to Pimbleau, which I, again, it's not like horrible because I thought round two was close. But I could see a lot of people scoring for Gordon too.

I'd see a lot of 3027 comments on YouTube. So a lot of that social media, of course. And again, I don't think that I don't think 3227 Gordon's a bad score either. So and I did like round three for Pimbleau as well. I think I really did not like Gordon's strategy there, just the wall install. It's in today's, the way judging is understood now, that doesn't work. It can if you really, really make sure the other guy does nothing. But if you wall install for like four minutes and the other minute of the flight actually has action,

actually has some back and forth things going on, which it did at the end. Let's not forget, Patty actually ended up in a superior position. That wall install does nothing. You don't get points for that wall install unless you absolutely, like that's the other person, absolutely did zero. And that wasn't the case in round three. I would tell people, watch it again. There was stuff to score in there.

There was very, very little striking. and there was some effective grappling to score, and you could call it even, or you could say Patty even had the advantage because he took the back at the end. So all of that is to say that robbery review pending not as definitive as I thought at first. But again, I don't want people to think that I'm leaning necessarily going to say it's not a robbery. I have to judge some other factors. People are definitely calling this one of the robberies of the year. I'm not ready to go that far. Could be a robbery.

matchmaking mic i'll just say dan hooker wow really yeah i i i'm okay like maybe because because dan hooker talked about about him a little bit this week maybe because dan hooker i know he's coming off a win but i still feel like he's

he's not like this he's a great fighter i think dan hooker's a great fighter but i don't think he's like this elite world beater that patty doesn't stand a chance against um i think i think dan hooker should be favored, though it wouldn't surprise me if like with the Jared Gordon fight one, Patty was favored and then actually got more favored as the fight came closer. I could see it like money comes. There's just so many people who like Patty. So the odds would like wouldn't end up being that bad by the end. Even if Hooker was favored, it would be like probably minus 150 at most by the time fight night rolled around. I like Patty's grappling. I think Patty's grappling. I think Patty's grappling. Give him some

problems. And like I said, he's tough. He can take a hit. And listen, it might be fun for some people to see Dan Hooker just whack him around for three rounds. So even if you're not a fan of Patty, there you go. There's your little treat. So I'm, I'm into it. He's not ranked in our rankings. He is top 15 in the UFC's rankings, I believe. And it's, I think, I think it's a winnable fight and a good name for Patty. And if you're Dan Hooker, I mean, look, if you think he's been saying, I can handle this guy easily, well, I'd love to see him prove it. I'm sure a lot of people watching this right now who are reacting the way that I see them reacting, would love to see that fight. They would love to see that fight because I think Dan Hooker,

I think Dan Hooker runs through Patty Pimblit with relative ease, if we're being honest. But like I said earlier, I actually think this is a pretty good thing for Patty, because one of the fights that we've been kind of building towards was almost off the table in a lot of ways. But I actually think it works out now, no matter what happens, January 21st, a UFC 283 in the fight with Ismail Bonfine, we do Paddy Pimble, Terrence McKinney. That's the one. Now, we can do it now. We can do it.

Time. It's time? It's time. Because if Patty went out there and like, if Patty went out there and just smush Jared Gordon and subbed him out of there, like a lot of people thought he would, he's fighting like Jalen Turner or Grant Dawson. He's fighting one of those guys and he's just going to get crushed. So this way, you could do Patty Pimblet versus Terrence McKinney as like a fight night main event and it would work and it would sell. And you can make a case for either guy winning that fight. you can make a case for either guy winning. I think McKinney would win.

I would pick him right now. But if this fight gets out of the first round and gets like deep into the second and Patty starts to get cookin, Patty could definitely beat. Patty could definitely win. But I like that matchup. So I mean, Tristan, after watching what Jared, after watching what Jared Gordon did to him on the feet last night, you don't think Dan Hooker would do like 10 times worse. I don't know.

But I don't think Jared dominated him, though. That's the thing is. He did in the first round. First round, clearly. Dan Hooker's a much better striker. That's fair. That's fair. But I don't think, I don't think Jared Gordon, like, dominated him, though. And I think Jared Gordon's a better grappler than Dan Hooker is.

A little bit. A little better. Jared Gordon's also, Jared Gordon's also kind of a featherweight, if we're being honest. He is. Oh, oh, Patty was definitely bigger. Yeah. Way bigger. Like two-way classes bigger.

Yes. Honestly. And Dan Hooker doesn't have to. really deal with that. So it's a horrible stylistic matchup. Dan Hooker ain't slowing down. He's tough. I don't know if it is. Because again, I think Patty can take him down. I think Patty can take can take. He's not like an amazing wrestler. That's one of his problems. He's like he's a good grappler. He's one of those guys. Good grappler when he gets to the ground can do put in work, but not an amazing wrestler. He's not like a, you know, a D1 take down guy.

That's why one of Patty's huge weaknesses. If he had that, then we'd be talking about him as, you know, a legitimate contender. He doesn't quite have that. He kind of just like punch me in the face a bunch of times. I'm going to get inside. I'm going to trip you, I'm going to take you down, I'm going to make it ugly. And against Stan Hooker. I think that could work in Stan Hooker, but that's why I'm intrigued. Excuse me. I'd want to see it. I'm intrigued. I think, um, sorry, just grab some water. I think, uh, it's, I agree it's, it's not an ideal stylistic matchup, but I don't think it's ideal stylistic matchup for either guys. So I'd be into it. I'd be into it.

I just don't think it makes any sense when we have, listen, AK, I love you. And if they make the fight, I'm going to watch it. And it's going to be cool and they'll build it up. And it'll, it'll, it'll feel important by the time it happens. But to me, there's other guys in the top 15 that deserve a Dan Hooker fight much more than Patty Pimbleau does. And it would do more for those guys than Patty Pimbley. Listen, if Patty wins, what's he going to do then? Listen, I've been predicting Patty Ws ever since he came to the UFC. I have not been wrong yet.

Let's be real here. I've been predicting Patty W. I have not. He's four or no. He's four and O. I don't know. I don't know what people want to see. Is he that good?

I don't know. By the way, I just pinned the comments. Patty versus Elkikui. There's still time. There's still time. It's doable. Oh, I see another Patty versus Tony. No.

No. Yes. Sorry. I see you. Cody Fletcher, I see you. Listen, people say, and people saying it's like Patty hate. This matchmaking is not Patty hate. This is Patty smart.

This is Patty, like, this is what you do with him. You book him wins now. He's not fighting. Patty's not fighting for a world title ever. It's not happening. because he's going to have to be like a top 10, like a legit top 10 guy in this division. And he ain't doing it.

But he could have a very successful career, fighting tough dudes, and just not fighting for belts. Kevin Holland never has to fight for a title again. Derek Lewis never has to fight for a title. There are plenty of fighters in the UFC who can make a fantastic living without going on title runs. And Patty Pimblit just happens to be another one.

So however you feel about it, it's all good. Like this was a great night for Patty Pimbley. Because look at the reaction to all of this. The reaction to all of this is great for him. If you're Patty right now, you are loving life. You are loving life. If you watch the two fights independently, not knowing which fight was the main event,

you would have thought Patty Pimbled, like the reaction that it got compared to the main event, the way the fans were watching the main event. You would have thought Patty Pimbleau was the main event, not, not Jan Blachovich and Magamette, Ancolaev. Well, that was the co-main event. Let's move on to the featured bout. we saw a fun one at 180 pound catchweight Santiago Ponziubio taking on Alex Marono. Again, my picks last night, I was feeling really good about a lot of them and things are trending in the

right direction, including my Alex Marona by decision pick. But luckily, those who watched the watch party, the chat bet came through, Ponziabio by Keo. I felt bad for G.C. because he had the over two and a half and the fight ended at 229 of round number three. So he missed cashing that ticket by one second. So that was brutal to watch. And then the night just got worse and worse for G.C. as we continued on. But good bounce back, good comeback win for Santiago Ponsadibio. My pick, AK, is the winner of next weekend's matchup between Jake Matthews and Matthew Semmelsberg.

Whoever wins that fight, you go, I have to think Jake Matthews is going to win. And then we do Jake Matthews versus Santiago Ponsadibio. But guess what? If Matthew Semmelsberg goes in there and pulls off a nice upset, Chuck, him in there with Santiago. I'm cool with that. The winner of Matthew versus Matthews, okay, I'm into that. I went with, well, I was trying to find a French welterweight from some sort of like World Cup finals angle. I'm sorry, guys. I'm, just so people know, listen, I've been a hardcore

football fan for about, my, you know me, you've known me for a few years now. I've been Howard Kroft for six months, and I am all in on football now. Let me tell you on. I pick the right year to get into football. We got a weird late World Cup. We got, I don't know, I went to Scotland, so I'm in love with the Scottish team. I'm wearing Croatia gear. I don't know what's happening anymore. So now I'm looking at everything in football, football, you know, through a football lens. And Ponzi and Nibio is a huge football fan.

He told Bronstader, he told a boy Bronsteader that, Mike, you remember we were doing, oh, no, you weren't there, but we were doing the live way-ins, and we were like, wow, why is Ponziadio so late? And then we were all, then we started speculating. He's probably watching the World Cup right now. And sure enough, he said, yeah, I was watching the Brazil, the Brazil-Curasia game. So I was trying to find like an angle, okay, what if France makes it to the final, and then, you know, then they play Argentina. But I don't know if there's ever been a French welterweight in the UFC.

I had my database that kind of went through. Benoit Saint-Denie. But that was one time. That was the Elizabeth Ulysses-Les-Ey fight. He's really a lightweight. He's not going back to Waltzweight ever again, I don't think. And of course, the immortal Orlando Vite, who we all know, who fought at UFC, of course. but that was back in the medieval days.

I don't even know if he wasn't welterweight, and he's probably not fighting anymore. I don't know where Orlando is right now, but he's probably not fighting anymore. They also play Croatia in the semifinals. There are no Croatian welterweights in the UFC at the moment. So I had to abandon that whole angle. Thank you, everyone, for coming with me on that journey.

And I landed on Kevin Holland. I landed on Kevin Holland. I think it'd be a good name for both guys. I have Ponzi and Nibio ranked slightly ahead of him. So rankings-wise, it's good for Kevin Holland. name value wise i think kevin's pretty clearly the more popular fighter at the moment so both guys have a lot to gain cool stylistic matchup i really want to see where panzanibio is at this point in his career um he's coming off to two tough splits and was not looking great in the morano fight and marano

was really taking it to him he's 36 years old um i don't like you know i don't think it matters i'm not saying like oh do we need to know if santiago panzano is a world title contender that ship was probably sailed. But I want to know, is he still a ranked guy? Is he still a guy that should be getting top 15, top 10 opponents, you know, for the next few years of his career? If he beats Kevin Holland, I'm ready to put him back in, not in the rankings, but against ranked opposition.

Yeah, I have no issue with that. I see one person throwing out Nassadine Imovov, who, yes, would fit that mold, but he's a middleweight and he's already booked two headline the first card of 2023 against Kelpy Gas. Who did that? Let's name names. Who did that? Savas Coob.

Someone said I was being, someone said I was being negative, and I don't want, I don't want to just, I don't want to be that guy. Like I, look at it. You are a patty hater.

No, I'm the one who's saying that Patty, Patty was a winner. Patty was a big winner. I don't think he won the fight, but all in all, this went as good as it possible. This is the best case scenario

for Patty Pimbo would happen last night. 1,000% in my opinion. So we move on to the middleweight division, big win for Drickus duplice, against the returning Darren Till. Fight was crazy, man. It looked like DDP was on his way to like a 10-7 first round. Darren Till got a little momentum at the end.

Till had a great second round. And then the third round, DDP just found a third gear and got Darren Till out of there. If you want to get Darren Till's reaction to the loss, you can go to M.Afighting.com and check that out right now. I posted a video on his Instagram. Pretty interesting comments. He says he's not retired, but he probably needs to take a break.

But big win for DDP. matchmaking success here. There were a lot of matchmaking decisions that I didn't love on this card, but this one I really did. And I think DDP, I think they can push this guy and do something big with him. So what would you like to do and see for Mr. Dricus Duplice? Whenever this man is back from injury, I'm assuming it's nothing serious because I haven't heard any news on it being something

that could take him out for a while. Derek Brunson, I'm throwing, I'm throwing Drikas right into the fire, give him a top five guy. He's top five in my rankings, my UFC rank. rankings anyway. And again, I love Drickus. I think it's just such an exciting fighter. He goes from looking like, again, he's going to ten eight someone to looking like

he's exhausted, though, as he said, he's like, he's never actually exhausted. It's just kind of like his body language. So he's never worried about, you know, going out there and having a hot first round. He's going to leave it all out there and he's going to have something left in the third, usually, even if it looks like he's dead tired. And he certainly did against Darren Till. But Till certainly didn't look like a spring chick. either. So I don't know how this strategy is going to work against some of the actual elite

fighters of the 185 pound division, which Darren Till is not, despite the matchmaking that he's had over the years where he's fought nothing but killers. I hate to say, Darren Till is just not a middleweight killer himself. I think, I don't think this is a news flash to anyone. I think this is kind of a duh comment for anyone who's watched his fights. He's competitive. I mean, he looked good at times against DDP. He looked good at times against Robert Whitaker. I know he can hang with these guys, but the difference between hanging with people and beating them. And he said it himself in a statement today, like for whatever reason,

he's just not been able to put it together in the cage. So I'm actually a hint. We'll talk about Dary and Tell a little bit more later. But yeah, for Dupac C, I like Derek Brunson. Derek Brunson kind of has to go back to being that in that gatekeeper role. It sucks to say it. But it's a good role for him because he keeps catching checks and picking up-and-checks and picking up-and-comers.

So maybe he could do it against duplicacy. too and keep himself in that title talk. Look, AK, you know, normally I'm not really a nervous guy, but there's a lot of people in the lobby. So I would cue the music right now, but if you want to sing, I'll lip sync behind you. One, two, three, friends forever. Well done, AK. It is Derek Brunson. That's the one.

I don't know what's going on with him. I know we're supposed to fight Jack Kermanson and Orlando. Insert Roman Delizze, who got himself a big moment. I see a lot of people suggesting, let's do D. DDP versus Roman Delizzi, and I'm down with that too, but I want to see Deleizze versus Marvin Vittori. I like that idea. And then let's give some, let's give DDP and a big opportunity against a name as well. Let's move these divisions forward with these young, hungry whippersnappers and give them, give them the opportunity to shine.

Let's keep giving them names and let's move this division forward. Let's give Alex Pereira some interesting challengers if he's going to be a long-rearing middleweight champion. So we're on the same page there. But one of the names, and I think most people that I've spoken with who are giant fans of the sport and even just sort of casual fans who watch the watch party or actually tuned into the final card of the year, the one name that sticks out in everybody's minds besides Patty Pimbled is Ilya. Iliottiportia. I blew the doors off of the T-Mobile arena, blew the doors off of Bryce Mitchell. We just never seen anybody due to Bryce Mitchell. What Iliate Taboria did to Bryce Mitchell?

This is an impressive performance. And the first combination that Ilya landed, like 10 seconds into the fight, you saw the expression on Bryce Mitchell's face. He was like, whoa, this is different. And Tampore just looked great. Take down defense for the most part was on point. Bryce Mitchell did have a little bit of control, but was able to do nothing with it. But Iliot's Porea just gets Bryce Mitchell out of there.

What an incredible performance. And this guy's on everybody's map now. The question is, A.K., there are lots of fun options for Ilya. you're typically a pump the brakes kind of guy let's not go too crazy but are we hitting the gas here or where are we at here

I think we need to pump I'm usually pumped the brakes after if it's only been a couple of fights or if they haven't beaten a ranked guy this is that was just 5 and 0 in the UFC now four fights at featherway he just came off a lightweight win over

Jai Herbert 13 and 0 in his career clearly I I mean, just passes the eye test, looks like a champion, fights like a champion, mixed the martial arts beautifully. As you said, dominated a legit ranked guy, like Bryce Mitchell, unless you're counting that loss on the ultimate fighter, which apparently the O.C. does.

Was undefeated. And Jai Herbert made him look like he was not in his class. Like, it was, said, Jay Herbert, Elliot DePray, excuse me, made Bryce Mitchell look like he wasn't his class. It was just a spectacular performance. He looks like a future world title challenger, and I might be underselling him. some people would probably say he looks like a friggin future champion. So no, we don't need to slow roll.

Love to call out. We always, sometimes Mike, we say we don't like people doing their jobs for us, but he said, give me T-C city in Madrid city, bring a UFC card to Spain. I love it. Please, Dana White, make this happen. Ilya, where's Brian Ortega headlining UFC Madrid, which should be so sick. I love that idea. We're not queuing the music, though.

It's AAA, baby. It's AAA. It's Iliate's Boyer versus Arnold Allen, number one contender fight. I'm ready to, I mean, I'm going full throttle here. I'm going fast, driving 150 miles an hour. Let's go. Him and Arnold Allen, you put him on that March 18th card, number one contender fight. There you go.

Like, obviously, there's going to be an interim champion. And again, if Volcanowski wins the title in February, I don't think he's fighting a featherweight anymore, because why would he win all the biggest possible fights he could have the rest of his career at 155? but you do that's the fight to make i want to see it i know a lot of people are suggested let's do arnold allen versus max holloway i do not like that idea right now because we're trying to position arnold allen as a number one contender and throwing him in there with the guy that the current champion has beaten three times including the most recent time where it was a whitewashing for the most part it was a perfect game from volkanowski why knock off the top dude in waiting

with Max Holloway. Like, it's way too risky. Now, if you want to do Toporia versus Max Holloway, I'm okay with that. As long as Arnold Allen is either next in line or gets another guy in a fight that's perceived

a number one contender fight. But if Arnold Allen is not fighting for the belt or fighting in a number one contender fight, I don't want to see him in there. Like, Arnold has earned his opportunity to get to a title. That's why I don't like the Max Holloway fight. Now, if Arl Allen fights Toporia or anybody else

and loses and you want to do Max Holloway, totally cool with that. that. But right now, keep Max Holloway away from the dudes at the tippy top. Because if Max wins, then it's just like, okay, that we're having the same issue we've been having since Volcanovsky won the belt. No one has been able to emerge because Max Holloway is beating them. So I don't love that idea. But Toporia versus Arnold Allen, I'm cool with. Alan's, I'm going to pull this up. Double standards, Mike. Why not Alan? But Tapori's okay. Because Alan's the guy right now. Because Alan is the guy in wave.

We have an interim title fight, but if something happens, Arnold is the guy. He's the first phone call. So throwing him in there with Max Holloway right now makes no sense. Toporia is not like if you want, I'm ready to throw him in number one contender fight. If you obviously he's not ready to do that, you can throw him in there with Max if you want. But Deporey's not the number one guy. He's like the number two, maybe the number three, depending on who you talk to. Arnold is the guy right now.

That's how I feel. You can match make however you want. this is this is the people show you can match break how you want that's just how i see it i'm keeping holloway away from arnold allen just because max like if max wins that fight it's brutal man it's brutal it's just horrible because then volkovsky just has nobody to fight it's it's wild but i love to poury versus arnold out and that fight frigid rules yeah as i was when you first mentioned i was like man that's tough for arnold allen but at the same time he's not getting a title fight just by sitting around i sincerely doubt it i know i know i know

So, Yaya Rivera, you guys kind of did. But I think people, in retrospect, kind of gave him a little more credit for the, the Ortega injury win. There's a lot of people who said, listen, he kind of created the injury with the, with the, you know, going to the ground and grappling with them. Whether you're good with that or not, Yaya has also had a little bit more of a push behind him from the UFC. It's been a consistent push for a long time, probably since he won the ultimate fighter.

And they've loved, yeah, yeah, I'd say they don't like Arnold Allen, but they, he hasn't, I don't think they quite view him that same way as marketability. If he beat someone like Tuporia, it might change their mind, and vice versa. Tuporia beats him clearly a guy they have to get behind. So it sucks. It sucks that, again, Arnold Allen might have to win 10 straight fights to get a title shot. That, by the way, would still not be guaranteed. But, I mean, that's where he is.

That's just where he is in such a tough and such a deep division. And same with Tupura. You could argue he's ready for like a number one contenders fight now. And I guess that fight would be it. But yeah, both guys have to win one more, one more tough fight to get to, a shot at UFC cold. And again, when you're fighting 145, that's just life, unfortunately.

Yeah, featherways is just a crazy division. It's super loaded. It's not quite bantamweight. It's not quite lightweight, but it's probably like a tier below bantamway right now, and that ain't a bad place to be. So that's the main card. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here. Introducing the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus,

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And hustled all those wish list topping toys. So plush. Our buyers have got you covered. Marshals. We get the deals. You gift the good stuff. Let's go to the wild card, AK. We'll select one fighter we have not match rate for yet.

And we'll match for them right now. So we can go with Darren Till or Jared Gordon or we go from somebody from the prelims, whoever you want, AK. I'm curious where you're going with us. I bet I was going to talk more about Daryntill, Mike. It's my wild card pick. Oh, okay. Now in a statement that came out today on social media, he said, not retiring, he needs some time off, which is, first of all, get your jokes in now that Jarentel has taken enough time off from the octagon.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, very funny. Like him or not, it is unfortunate that he's had a lot of injuries. And we've kind of talked about on other shows, like maybe the matchments. making, I'm sorry, he's not complaining about it. If you're Darren Till, you love getting big fights. Darren Till is probably the last person in the world asking, you know, oh, please give me easier competition. He doesn't want that.

He thinks himself as, of himself as a top five guy at 170. He thinks of himself as a top five guy at 185. He's like, keep bringing on the top 10 guys ranked opponents. It's really like his management or someone else that just step in and say, hey, can we get, can we get Till some easier opponents? But again, if you're Till, you like the prestige that comes with fighting big names. You're not going to complain about it. But I hope with his idea of taking a rest, there's also a reappraisal of who he should be fighting.

Because one, I don't think he's going to rest that long. Again, this is a pre-holiday fight talk, I think, where it's like, you know, I want to spend time with my family. It's the holidays. And I think he will. And I think it'll rejuvenate him. Because I think he has to at least consider being on that March 18th card, the first UFC pay-per-view in London in four years. It's been a while. It's been a while since they've done a peer review in London, maybe longer.

He has to at least be considered being a part of that. He's such a big name, win streak or not, whatever his record is. People just love him. People just love him there. That's why you have these regional cards. Record is secondary. Streaks are secondary to just does the person resonate with that fan base. And he resonates in a huge way in London.

So you've got to give him a fight. And Mike, I went way down the rankings. Like, I want to find someone who not only can he beat, he may beat in a spectacular way. can we break the glass in case of urgency and pull out Jordan Wright, the Beverly Hills Ninja, throw them in there with Daryntail. Because if Daryntill cannot knock out Jordan Wright, who again is a fighter I really like and a guy like Jed and I always mentioned you need guys like this who are going to go in there and just you know the fight's not going to go to decision.

Something spectacular is going to happen. They're probably going to end up getting knocked out. But listen, we need guys like that in M.A. We love guys like that in M.A. I think that's what Jordan Wright is. Give the Beverly Hills Ninja a free flight to... Give him a flight to London, let him see the sites, and then let him get knocked out by Darren Till.

And you can sort of keep... Darren Till's not even... He's going to be 30 years old soon, but he's not even 30. He's got a lot of mileage on him, but he's not even 30. There's still a lot of flights you can get out of them. There's still money too made off of Darren Till. I sound like I'm freaking Dana White right now,

treating a fighter like property, but I hope people understand what I'm saying. Like, Darren Till, I think, is not getting cut yet. and if we want that to remain the case, he needs to pick up a win against someone, anyone, Jordan Wright, UFC 286 in London. Interesting. I mean, it is the wild card round,

and boy, you went heavy on the wild there, okay? I like your idea. I wish we lived in a world where we could do that. Like, if Darren Till is in Bellator and this is going on, like that's the exact fight they'd make, but it's not Bellator, it's the UFC. That fight would be insane. I just don't see it happening.

I'm actually going a different route. I'm going with Raul Roses Jr. Because I want to make sure we're all on the same page here. I want to make sure we're all doing this correctly. And I hope the UFC matchmakers hear me as well because this kid is 18 years old. He looked real good against a tough guy and Jay Perrin. A lot of people are actually questioning the matchmaking there, feeling like Jay might be a little bit too tough, a little more battle tested.

Someone that maybe Raul wasn't ready for him. Maybe the moment would be too much for him. but Rall didn't care, loved every second of it, was very comfortable in the walk, very comfortable in the octagon. And I saw some, like, different suggestions for Roses Jr. Some guys that are, like, in the top 30 right now. And we're pumping the brakes here. Like, we're pumping the brakes. This should be a slow, slow build.

Very slow. Like, we're smoking this thing for, like, years. Smoking this thing for years, okay? There's no need to rush this kid. He's got to be fighting in the top 10, probably in three or four years. Let's not go crazy. Let's let this kid enjoy his senior year of high school, bring him back International Fight Week to fight in the UFC on a big stage.

And when he does, we're not going to go crazy here. We're just going to do a nice little step up. Like on the huge ladder all the way up to the ceiling here, and it's a very high ceiling. We're just taking one step up. Kevin Natividad. That's where we're going. Ronald Roosier v.

Kevin Nativide. Because Kevin can create some chaos. Kevin's fun. And Kevin will be game. but stylistically Rao Rosa Jr. matches up really well against him, but I don't want to see this kid fight again until like the summer. Like let's let him enjoy being 18. Let's let him enjoy his senior high school.

Let him walk across that stage with his friends. And then international fight week, get him on there, feature prelim, Kevin Attivie Dodd, let him shine. That's how I would do it. Let's not go crazy. I love it. I love it. Kevin of Tibidad, 0 and 3 in the UFC, 9 and 4, 3 fight losing is. streak. An exciting guy, exciting guy when he's with the LFA. So at least has that reputation.

We know he's fought decent competition, even though he hasn't picked up a win in the UFC. But yes, those are the guys you want to put in Rosa's way right now. So I do like it. I've got someone saying Rale Roses Jr. versus Brandon Davis. Brand Davis is not with, I don't think he's with the UFC anymore. But he did he get a cut? I believe he got released. Excuse me. Oh, I thought you're going to sing the patty the baddies. No, I was clearing my throat. No, I believe he is no longer with the UFC. And even, but whether he is or isn't, I mean, listen, just bring him back.

Bring him back. Yeah, you bring him back for a fight like this. So, yeah, I don't know. No, maybe I just made that up. I'm not seeing any formal. Other way, Brandon Davis are out there. Yeah, for sure. I like that.

Yeah, there's a lot of ways to go. You're definitely looking at the bottom of, it's bantam weight is super, super, super deep. UFC has a lot of bantam weight signed. You have a lot of options in the lowest tier of the rankings right now. So, yeah, Brandon Davis, Kevin and Tivida. dad. These are good choices. I can't remember what my choice would have been. I put Ray, I keep saying Ray, I keep putting Raul pretty high. I actually put him, I debuted him like 51 in my personal UFC rankings, which sounds low, but that's 51 out of 70-something phantom weights,

a lot of fighters more experienced than him. So that's how impressed I was by that performance. But you're right, Mike. Let the simmer. Let the simmer. Let the simmer. Let's see. Let's see if we really have a world title come in here because it's a tough division he just turned 18 he's a fresh 18 you remember he was signed as a 17 year old just turned 18 and he looked great and i think he'll continue to look great if they keep giving him guys like nativity dad like j parin like bren like brenn davis uh shoutouts to uh at dragon slayer too on twitter benito lopez that that was another really good choice that's a good pick too yeah experienced guy kind of recently came back probably not still not at 100 but but who is a who is a really talented fighter um but yeah there's a

Again, a lot of names near the bottom of the band-whoim rankings that are good for Rada Rulrosis Jr. But what a flight. I was not winning UFC fights at 18, like, and I doubt you were either. No, I was winning baseball games, though. Oh, okay. Yeah. I was doing baseball games in front of like, you know, at most like 1,500 people, wasn't fighting or playing baseball for like 19,000 people. That's crazy.

Didn't happen. And soaking it in. Like, he does not look, he came out with a great, you know, great entrance with his, honoring his Mexican heritage. I don't know what's going on with my voice right now. He was soaking it in, man. He was Media Day, completely comfortable. He's done a bunch of interviews. You've spoken to him.

It's incredible. And again, I don't know if it is just the confidence of being a young man who doesn't know better or the opposite he's mature behind his ears or somewhere in between some mixture of that. But you can really kind of see why the UFC doesn't, you know, they don't sign teenagers very often, you know, even off the contender series. They're going to wait. They're going to wait one or two years. two, three years. We saw Cameron Simon, I guess. He's at least 21, still pretty young,

but a 17-year-old getting signed and then showing out like that, it's good stuff. I'll be doing some pump the brakes talk. I'm sure at some point in 2020, after he wins a couple more fights, and everyone's saying, throw him in the top of 15. I'm sure I'll just help you able to chill. But for now, I mean, that's just good a debut as you can get, given the circumstances. 100%. All right. So I think for like the next 10 minutes or so, unless we have some extracurriculars you want to give away real quick. Let's just let's just give a full on no point. to our boy regular viewer marcus mcgayhi he predicted demone blackshare versus ferreed basharat ufcci 25 march yeah for regular listeners of otno uh he's always sending a contender series picks uh for guys as soon as

they win the contender series he's sending in a guys for this fight and i'm always telling him like why are you sending these we don't need them but guess what he just got himself an otno point so he's already set for 2023 marcus mcgahey he's redoing his whole budget for 2023 there's all kinds of things he can plan for now got himself an otno point so he's got himself an otno point so he's already set for point, which again, as always, they only go up. They only go up. They're the most valuable, it's not even a cryptocurrency. It's beyond cryptocurrency. The most valuable currency you can have right now. So, Marcus, take your points. And that's how you get your points these days, because we have so many people sitting in suggestions now. Like, you just got to, you got to go off

the radar. You got to go off the radar. All right, this is what we're going to do for the next, like, 10 minutes or so. We're just going to pull up suggestions. Let's go. We could just be, it could be one word answers. We could have long, in-depth discussions. We can do whatever. And we'll start Barry O'Reilly, who's, I think, at OG, Avatna, he's been here since, like, day one. Patty Pimble versus Claudio play, SAK. You like this idea? Yeah, I like it a lot. Like I said, I think Claudio needs to do some imagery habilitation as well after a really rough performance against Dan Hooker.

I'd rather have Dan Hooker fight Patty, but sure, again, we're just talking about getting Patty on that London card against somebody. And Claudio is not well-liked in the NBA community right now either because of the way he fought. I thought it was hilarious, but people were not so amused, especially people who paid tickets to see a fight, did not like how he fought against Dan Hooker. So you put in there with Patty, huge, I mean, it would just be massive booze for Claudio, huge cheers for Patty. Yeah, very good choice. I'm actually fine with that. And it's realistic. Any interest in Darantill Wonderboy 2A.

No. I'm not either. Moving on. Terrible fight. Terrible. How about Darren Till versus Joaquin Buckley? I think Buckley Buckley was doing okay against Chris Curtis

So I think Buckley This is not far enough back for me I'm like I said I went way back in the rankings I don't think Buckley's back far enough But I can see them making it I just I don't it's not a terrible like Choice from a match like the matchmaker's perspective But from like waving a magic wand

I do not want it I'm actually okay with this one I'm okay with this one I don't love it It could happen I just wouldn't I wouldn't If I had the book I wouldn't do it Is Till versus Kevin Holland And, oh, what do you think about that, A.K.?

Maybe Holland bumps back up to 85, wants to be that active dude again? He would too, but I really would like to see Holland make an earnest go at 170. But listen, he's just there to make money. He's there to run through fights in his contract and keep getting the next contract bumped up. So if you're him, he'll take it. But he probably wants to fight sooner rather than later. So he'll probably fight twice by the time we see Daryntel again, unless I'm right that Daryntill changes his mind and fights in March.

Darren Till versus whoever did his tattoo. Yeah, the cover up. It's bad. It's bad. I don't know what the hell it is. By the other, I see people mentioning Till's ACL. We don't know that he tore his ACL. That's what he said right after. He's like, I think I tore my ACL. And it's certainly possible given his injury history.

I mean, worst case scenarios seem to happen to this guy pretty often. But I would just put like a grain of salt in anyone diagnosing their own injuries after a fight. You can't, there's really not a way to know. I've never torn my ACL, so maybe I'm wrong. anyone who's torn your ACL, please let me know if you immediately knew that you suffered ligament damage. But I'm pretty sure you need to get examined. Hopefully, fingers crossed for Daryntil, it is not that because if it is, I mean,

that's at least what, like nine months in the shelf probably. So that might suit his timeline. Like I said, he wants to take time off. But it is possible. And I think if he's healthy, like I said, should fight at USC 286. But I do see a lot of people bring it up. And it is a factor that NECN mentioned. I just wouldn't necessarily like say for sure that he's, that he has an ACL tear.

A lot of people bringing up Darren Till over. versus Edmund Shabazzian, AK. That's what I wanted if both guys lost. And I don't hate it. I don't hate it even now. But again, like I said, if Till is going to fight in March, I say go for it, I guess. I do prefer it if they had both lost.

And if Till's going to take a break and you definitely don't do it. I think Edmund, yes, I like that he's kind of, you know, still developing, probably wants to focus on training and not getting there as quickly as possible. but you don't want to wait that long for Till if it's a series. So a lot of these matches have do with whether we think that Till is actually going to be out for, like I said,

possibly nine months, maybe longer. Roses versus Brady Highstone, AK. Yeah, I like it. I like, I like Brady, but I think Roses is right there skill-wise. I'm seeing Buckley versus Boenix. I'm just going to just pin some messages here. Yeah, I don't mind it. You can throw a lot of names out there for Roses

that are better near the bottom. that's fine. Roel versus Randy Costa. If Randy was still fighting, he's not fighting in the UFC right now. He got released. I think I was getting Brandon Davis mixed up with Randy Costa somehow. Randy Costa got released.

Yeah. Let me shout out a couple of people on the social media is real quick, just because they gave their first timers. Chase Kola, Chase Kola. Thank you. Welcome to the party, pal. Mike, what do you think of Ilya versus Giga?

I think I think Ily just jumped him big time. I'm not like buddies or anything, are they? Not as far as I know. No, I think they are. They might be. I think they are.

Let me do a quick, quick search here. And even their buddies. I'm not sure they, are they so buddy-buddy, they wouldn't fight? They support each other. They support them.

They probably fight for, they probably like fight for the belt. I'm sure that would be. He's, to pour he is far ahead. Gig is coming off of loss. They're actually, in my rankings,

they're pretty close together. But people do, as people know, I'm pretty slow to jump people up. So I don't know. I know some people might have thrown nearly into the top five of their rankings after beating Bryce so definitively. I didn't do that. I'm pumping the brakes, Mike.

It's a classic AK leap break pump. Let's see what we got here. I'm trying to, we're throwing out just Wonderboy versus RDA. Neither guy fought last night, but it's okay. Let's see. This is your chance. You got like five more minutes. Tristan Gordad.

Simon versus Olivera. Simon versus Simon, AK? Simon on Simon. Tristan, I mean, listen to the US music, of course. Sign it up. Sign up. Another one for Brady Heaston. And hey, maybe Brady, if you're out there, get on social media.

Maybe this is a fight that you can take and steal that thunder. And quarantine of Philly, I love it. One of those fights that I feel like has it not been booked? Has it not at least been booked and fallen through? But yeah, it feels like they're in that right range. And you're going to get an exciting fight there. How good is Billy Q, by the way? He's just such a dog, man.

So fun. So fun to watch. He's so tough. He's so pretty good. I also want to shout out Crave, another first timer. Welcome to the party pal. What do we got here? Looking forward to a robbery review.

It will be coming Monday. Rematch John, Uncleayev. Patty versus Tony. Thank you. Jekis versus Strickland can, near loser, Ilya is an animal. Not book.

Let's have a what? Oh, is it versus a Korean zombie? Zombies? So here's what I've kind of curve. He's supposed to meet a post some zombie. Yeah, he's supposed to fight it on that. They're planning on doing a card in South Korea. So zombie could headline, but it looks like zombie has an injury,

won't be fighting. And now there's reports. I haven't checked into this nearly enough because there's just been so much going on. But there's talks like maybe they'll move the entire event away because zombie was a star. And they would sell that place out if Korean zombie was, was main eventing that. card but now that he's not fighting they're not sure whether or not they're going to do it or not so zombie could be out for a while i have no idea so that's kind of tough it's kind of tough to book him right now but he maybe has like one or two fights left in his ufc i don't know if he finds a second life

in another promotion but as far as ufc career goes probably one or two more fights he's got to be picky i think to paris just would destroy him at these days of careers and i love korean zombie but it's just this is not pique korean zombie anymore we're far from it um cravel says keep up the good work, Mike, by the way. Thank you. Rose Strike, Rose Drake, Derek Lewis is the biggest O'Brien on this entire guard. Oh, you got to do that.

Another one of those. How have they not fought yet? How crazy is Rosen Strix? Seven and four in the UFC, all seven wins by knockout. 29 second K.O., 22 second K.O., he's got a nine-second knockout of Alan Crowder. Rosenstrike. Jay Zion is fun, man.

Patty versus the Drew Dober, Bobby Green, winner. Either of those guys beats Patty right now. I agree. I think the odds The funny thing is I think the odds would be like I actually think Patty would end as a favorite would open as a favorite and end as a favorite just because his name, he has so much name value

but like and I again never bet on MMA I would be fading Patty so badly in that fight I would be either Dover or Green I'd be putting all my money on them I don't think either of this guy's beat him he can beat either of those guys right now I'm glad you mentioned this one Wes Chris Curtis, Edmund Shabazzian, teammates now

so just throwing this out there just throwing this up this up this is a learning thing, because guys change camps all the time. We call this the Brennan Allen Gerald Mearshot rule. Those two aren't fighting each other. Those two are thickest thieves. They're not fighting each other. And as of right now, Chris Curtis, I mentioned Shabazzum, are not fighting each other.

I am going to pull this one up, okay, because this one, this one I liked. Let me see. This one I really liked. Young man, I don't know, by the name of Alex McAdam, a featherweight fight. Bryce Mitchell versus JSP. I like this idea a lot. I think it's likely to happen. If I had a magic wand, I would make it happen.

We got to see this in 2023. Alex McAdam, excellent choice. That's a great. I hope you get, I don't know if anyone else recommended it. Alex McAdam, I will make a mental note that if that happens, you will, it will get yourself a point. Patty versus Hinata, Boycano. I don't like that fight for Patty. I don't like it.

Beats his ass. But again, listen, we've been saying this in a few Patty fights. Patty, listen, keep proving us wrong. Though I don't know if he necessarily proved us wrong on Saturday, though I did pick him to win. But you know what I'm saying. Us, the collective us. Denny Kappas Hernandez versus Sungwu Choi, Billy Kew versus Tukov. Landware would be a hell of a scrap too.

I know Billy Q mentioned landware as a potential option. I like that. M. Chbizabazi versus Andre Petroski, or do you want to kind of keep this? I mean, I don't know. Aren't we keeping Edmund away from grapplers? Yeah, it's tough on. Just eat him for dinner. And again, maybe I'm overstating.

How much Shabazzian versus Jordan Wright? Yes, yes. This is what Jordan Wright is for. If there is a middleweight that you want to see an exciting fight and probably finish someone, call Jordan Wright. And again, it sounds like I'm slagging Jordan Wright so badly. But like I said, these are guys like this exist for a reason. And Jordan Wright is also a fight finisher.

He is not like a walkover. These are keys. He's a chance he turns the tables and gets a highlight reel himself. Either way, you're having a good time. Denny, kind of a do-do pick because we already saw Curtis versus Brendan Allen. Oh, Denny. Chris Curtis for a moment was the middle-weighty, middle-weighted champion, which is now held by Brendan Allen, the coveted number 16 spot.

Let me shout out quickly, my Casey Carpenter, a regular listener on email. Great job by all this week. Looking forward to the Robert Review. Thank you, Casey. They throw this out there. Hear me out. Some people want Patty to fight a rank guy. Patty has his issue with Ariel.

This guy is Team Ariel. Patty's the company guy, and so is this guy. And the biggest reason, Jed hates both of these fighters. And I think you're going to hate this pick, Mike. Patty versus Michael Chandler. Oh, he's rubbing his chin. He's thinking. I am thinking.

It's not going to happen. No. But do you like it? Honestly, I didn't even really consider that one? I just like, it was like a communal, anybody in the top 15, Merck's Patty. Ah, man. That's actually kind of interesting.

I would favor Michael Chandler to win. Yeah. But Chandler just, like, Belator Chandler, destroys Patty Penblet. Belotor Chandler destroys Patty. It's like a 30-24, that version of Michael Chair. So just take him down and just beat the hell out of them. but UFC Michael Chandler is a whole different dude

and it will get chaotic and there's a very real world that if Dustin Porier is down there in the chaos submitting, and I love Dustin Porier. I think Dustin Porier has earned a special place in my heart after this year after that performance. It made me believe that as highly as I value Dustin Porier, I probably didn't value him enough and I valued him very high in the MMA Spear.

But Patty Michael Chandler is actually kind of interesting. I would actually watch that fight. I think Chandler would win, but I would actually, I would watch it. That might be the only, I would pick that one over Tony Ferguson, Ake. Oh, well, a lot of people would apparently. People seem to like the pick, but mostly because they're all saying Chandler would kill him, and they want to see that.

So, hey, whatever gets you to turn on the channel, right, or buy a ticket. How well, Patty versus Michael Johnson, Ake. Yeah, great, great big. I think we've mentioned that on a previous show. It's the right kind of matchup for him, though. I kind of would favor Michael Johnson. Let's see. Adrian Yonaz, Pedro Munoz.

I see that, but neither of them fought last night. Ilya versus Josh Emmett. Josh Emmett's fighting for the interim titles. You can't do that. Tristan just said, Gordon versus Christos Gagos versus Jared Gordon. Sure. Tristan just throw a Patty versus Gillespie.

Listen, we don't match. I don't know. I think we banned Gillespie from matchmaking, right? Just because we just don't know if he's ever played again. And by the way, when you guys see the UFC rankings, sorry, the UFC. Mike, I misspoke. When you guys see the MA fighting global rankings this week, yeah, Greg Gillespie's out.

It has been over 18 months since he's spot. He's out of the ranking. He's holding on to a top 12 spot. He out of there. What about these two matchups, A.K., Ryan Hall for his comeback fight against Bryce Mitchell, Walt Harris versus Chris Stachis. Walt Harris for Chris Dachis, great matchups.

Just if you're keeping Chris Dachas around. I don't think he gets cut off of this. I think they like him. I do kind of want to see Chris. a shot at 205 he mentioned it i don't know he's thinking he's making a commitment to it but i and and that's not going to solve all his problems it's not like he drops to 205 and now oh he becomes a friggin title contender i don't know but i do feel like he's just lacking a little something power a little size to compete uh we saw that with jarzino jar zier and just ran through him like that

guy's a heavyweight i don't know if christoccus is is a true heavyweight even though he had some nice wins there and the other one was uh bryce mitchell r i p brice mitchell and there's jay Docchus versus Max Christian at 205. Yeah. He's got to take, like, a whole year off. Yeah. Gord versus Jim Miller. Miller's booked, but maybe down the line.

You have to think of your drag gore and like, you're going to have to let this one simmer a little bit. I think you're going to be, this one's going to be on his brain for a little while. Let's see. Do, do, do. A lot of Chandler Pimbleet talk. Patty versus Hackpressed. Hackperass is booked, I believe.

He just got booked. for one of the international cards. I was playing Jamie Malarkey, right? Did I see that? I think I saw that. What was that name, sir? Jamie Malarkey versus Nazarad Hackbarast. I think that's what they booked.

Okay, sure. Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. Yeah. What did they want Malarkey for Patty? What did they want Malarkey for Patty? No, they wanted Hackparas for Patty. Yeah, somewhere down the line, maybe. But that's not going to get Patty out of bed.

What about... your car close close beats patty and not in a fun way yeah i don't think that one gets well i don't know patty's kind of uh yeah i'll fight whoever and that's kind of the the way he should probably go right now especially with with the card being we will say with the card being in london if he does get on that marsh paper view it really could be almost anybody because the draw is patty does not matter who he's fighting they just want him on the card you want him in a co-main spot again and just get that reaction a fight night i think like if a When he fights in Vegas, I think you need to be a little more careful with the matchmaking.

Like I said, I thought Jared Gordon was the perfect choice, even though it did almost end in him losing or judging by people's opinions that he did lose. But I still think on paper, Jared was a really, really smart matchup. But when you're, if he's fighting back in London, maybe in Liverpool someday, match him up with whoever. It doesn't matter. He's Patty. I see someone say Bradd Bell retired. He didn't retire. Right?

He said he's taking a break. He's taking a break. Yeah. You can perceive that how you want, yeah. Yeah. There's one other Patty pick that I wanted to pull up. This one. Patty versus Joe Lozahn.

I'd love it. I think J-Lo should definitely pursue that fight. Again, especially if he was in London, take a little family trip. You know, again, that's the kind of stuff that Joe DeZan should be doing with the last few fights of his career. You don't like it, my way. Joe ain't going to London. No, I'd like, because Joe ain't going to London. It's a free trip.

Joe ain't going to London. Show the kids. Joe Lozahn has been very clear about what he wants. The name has to make sense. The date has to make sense. And the location has to make sense. Guess where the UFC's probably going to want to go sometime in 20, 23. Oh, boy, your old stomping grounds.

Bean Town. Yeah. Which, we're in the house. Yes. You know where people are going to travel? Bean Town. Will Patty fans travel to Bean Town? Yep.

They sure will. Of course. So I'm okay with that. I just saw that too. Kutat Lh-Ram. Damn. Kut-a-Lat-Nat-Nazes Patti. No, Joe doesn't hate London.

He just isn't going to leave his family to go fight Patty Pimblood. Bring the family with you. That's what I'm saying. It's a family vacation. He might have, like, because Luzon might have one fight left. Like this is it. So he wants everything to be kind of perfect. Like cowboy, that card made sense.

Pay-per-view, doing it in Austin, all made sense. Then Lozon kind of hurts himself. putting his socks on, which is really weird. I've been going with the, I've been on the Joe Loz on Tony Ferguson train for a while. I love to see those two guys fight at this point in their careers, but okay, I think we're good. If Joe Lozahn has ever fought outside of North America,

I don't think he has. I think we got a couple of Canada appearances on there. Wow, yeah, maybe, see, Mike, oh, no, excuse me, UFC 144, Anthony Pettis, Saitama in Japan. So, and obviously, that's it. I think he would, he would make the trip to love. London. Joe Luzon, become Joe London for one fight. Give us Joe London for one fight. Come on.

I actually love this idea. Bring back Reginald for Patty. Yeah, that's been a popular pick again for a while. That's a great pick. And again, if you are ally Quinta, that's something that might get your interest and make you step back into the cage. But yeah, I like it. All right. Well, I think we're all, I think we're good, gentlemen. Great picks. Great comments. Thank you. You guys are so amazing. I love doing the show. I love doing the pod, Mike, but I love doing the live show, too, because you get, you get this live interaction. And the viewers are so smart and just such, such great matchmakers. I love you guys.

Yes. So we're done here. We'll be back next week for the final matchmaking show of 2022 following UFC Vegas 66. We got Jared Kennedy, Sean Strickland, in the main event. This one should just be bummed to the main event automatically. Armand Sarukian versus Amir's Magulov. we get ameer albazi alex casseris julia rosa scrapp drew dober bobby green scrap cody brundage uh michel michel chate schak shanian velizmus back against cori mckenna jake mathy's back gets

matthews summersberger oh my god it's a lot of fight to this card julian marquez duran win uh the battle of the saeed nirbaghamaana versus said yukhovamaanof mahashata versus uh raffa garcia bryan battle we're not fact ret did it off i got That name so wrong. I can't get that. I have to work on that. David Devorak, Melle Cap, and Sergey Morozoff, Journey Newson. That is the final UFC event of 2022. I hope Crop.

I end up being on the main card. It's going to get buried in the prelims. That is silly. It'll get buried in the prelims. But here's how the rest of it's going to go. By the way, okay, I'm going to break some news to you and to the people here. I will not be on next week's show. So you're going to have to man the ship.

Is that all the information you're giving us? You break our hearts and you just leave it at that? No, it's the holidays. I mean, I'm traveling a ton. I got to go see family. All right. I'm going to be in Massachusetts, freezing my ass off. Oh, yes.

Boston Mike's coming back. Well, it's like Berkshire's bike. You know, we're just going to bus like fly in and out of there. But then we should have drive all the way across the state. But then after that, we'll probably take a week off for. the rest of the holiday. And then we are going to come back, AK, and we're going to do my favorite shows of anything we do on MMA fighting. The predictions extravaganza. The two-part series, one, we'll recap our 2022 predictions, which I actually listened to on the plane ride over and took all the

notes. We did okay. We did okay. So that'll be fun to just recap and remember some of these crazy questions that you crazy's asked, which reminds me the 2023 predictions, extravagance. We'll probably go down the following week, maybe like the first week of January. So this is where we ask you, the ones that are submitting picks, we want you to submit questions to us. They're buy-sell questions. So, but I want you to think outside of the box. Like, have some fun with it. Like, for example, one of the questions we had last year was the combination of Steppe Mietich and Robbie Laller will have more UFC fights in 2022 than the Diaz brothers. Like, let's have some fun with these things. And then the answers are by yourself.

Yeah. We'll take like the best 25 to 30. Yes. And then AK and I will try to pick UFC champions for the rest of the year. And then we'll have our wee, bold, Caliente prediction. We were both on the same page and we were both wrong. Just to tell you that up there. I don't know what it is. I don't remember.

But yeah, guys, hit us up anywhere. Hit us up. My DMs are open everywhere at Alexander K. Lee on Twitter. at Alexander KKK Lee on Instagram, my email Alex dot Lee at SBNation.com. So please hit me up.

Mike, your DMs on Instagram. You're just Mike, Mike, Heck? M underscore, HECJR. Hit us through the reply. If not DMs, guys, hit us just on social media. Just hit us in their replies on Twitter. You can find me and Mike easily, again, through my fighting.

So, yes, we want your... Whatever you got, guys, this is this time. Unload the clip, and please give us Give us your suggestions. I've been doing this show even before I'm fighting. We're doing something like this exact sort of layout. So we have there's like a group of like 10 to 12 sort of hardcore peeps who have been following, doing this for six years and submitting questions.

And they've already been submitting them. They submit them throughout the year. So we've got to play some catch up. So we're going to play like the top. We're going to take like the top maybe 40. We're going to throw them into a little generator. We're just going to hit shuffle and then we're just going to answer the like the 25 or 30 questions. does I come up that just like randomly generate.

So can't wait for that show. It's my favorite of the year. But I will not be here next week. A.K. will man the fort. And then I'll be back in a couple weeks. Just take it a little time off. That's all. And it's all good.

We're all good. And then we'll come back refreshed and ready to take on a very chaotic and crazy, yet very fun and positive, 2023 for not just the UFC, hopefully, but the entire world of M.A. So for A.K. I am Mike Heck. Always remember. Don't take the stuff too seriously. M.A.

supposed to be fun. A.K. will have fun. Next week. I'll have fun listening next week. On onto the next one, the podcast. Thanks for watching. Have a great rest of the day.