MMA Fighting - On To the Next One | What's Next For Alex Pereira, Magomed Ankalaev After UFC 313?

Episode Date: March 9, 2025

Magomed Ankalaev can finally call himself champion after defeating Alex Pereira in the main event of UFC 313 on Saturday in Las Vegas. After the long road to UFC gold, what's next for Ankalaev, and is it a rematch with "Poatan"?  On an all-new edition of On To the Next One, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Alexander K. Lee discuss where Ankalaev and Pereira go following their 25-minute battle for the light heavyweight title. Additionally, future matchups are discussed for Justin Gaethje after defeating Rafael Fiziev for the second time in the co-main event, Ignacio Bahamondes following his sensational submission of Jalin Turner in the featured bout, along with fellow main card winners Amanda Lemos, Mauricio Ruffy, and more. Follow Mike Heck: @m_heckjr 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

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Well, hello there, everybody, and welcome to a brand new edition of On to the next one. Yes, we are back. The matchmaking crowns have returned following UFC 313, which went down last night into the early hours of this morning at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. For the first time in 2025, we have a new UFC champion. It is Magamette Ancolaev. defeats Alex Pereira in the main event via unanimous decision,

which capped off a pretty good card, honestly. The main event, I think, left a lot to be desired for a lot of fans, but we did have something we have not seen this year at champion losing their belts, and Magamenecklea finally cashes in on the promise that people have had for him for many years as being the best light heavy weight in the world.

So congratulations to Magamaheuf. We'll discuss what is next for him, for Alex Pereira, and for other winners on this card on this day after. And hopefully you guys set your clocks an hour later. We lost an hour of sleep. And boy, can I feel it. But I am Mike Hack.

And joining me is the co-host, the co-matchmaker, The Prince of Positivity, my best friend, and a man who also lost an hour of sleep. Mr. Alexander K. Lee, aka, how we doing? Are you a zombie like I this morning? My best friend, I'm not because, you know what? Big,ank, time. Big Hank time.

Come on people. People in the chat, bigank time. This is the new Shama, apparently. It's very catchy. I think we all saw. This is that I believe he unveiled this catchphrase, the new light heavyweight champion that is at the post-flight press conference. Big Hank time.

Mike, are you feeling, are you not, you didn't join me in the chant. Neither clapping nor it's going to take some time to get a use to or? I mean, I don't know. Big hang time. Big hang time, right? Because I'm tired. I don't know. It wasn't a definitive.

I mean, I think, so I know you had been picking prayer forever. I did pick Ancolaev, but I did think if Padetta's reign was going to end, it was going to end in like a dramatic way because I thought that's like, you know, we saw them, you know, he lost the Middle A title in a dramatic way. All his title fights were exciting. And I actually did think we would see a late finish by Ancolaev. Like I thought a prayer was going to lose the belt that it would have been, if not in an exciting fight, at least an exciting moment.

Like we wouldn't have any questions by the end of the night. I don't think we have too many questions now, but I'm with you. You know, I know you and Jed talked about us in the post-fight show. A close fight. Certainly not the most exciting fight. I have no problem with Anka Live winning. Scoring live, I had 48-47 Padena. I think you were with me, right, 1-3-5 if you were going to give the fight to now former champion.

But, again, I actually had no problem with any of the scorecards. Sal DiMato's 49-46 was a little bit strange. but I didn't even think round four Anclyev was that bad. I have not rewatched it. So at the moment, I was like, oh, 49, 46 is funny. But I think anyone who rewatched this fight

isn't going to be like, oh, man, Panetta was robbed. Like, no, he probably did enough to keep it. But clearly, Ancolaev also did enough to take it. It was not Prairie's best performance. I thought Ankaaev was great. This is me being, I guess, Prince of positivity here, Mike. I know, I know we all know that he's not going

to be a Pereira as champion probably won't be as active probably is not going to give us those same incredible highlight real knockouts doesn't have the aura of alice put it up but that's fine uh i i i've actually just kind of glad to see some change at the top of a division we've had a bunch of title fights this year and we finally saw one change so that's cool and depending how our matchmaking is for this fight like um the situation could rectify itself quickly so i don't know i don't know how long I'm going to be at the top. But congratulations to him. A very, very good performance. So I did something that I don't think a lot of other people are going to do today or any other day. I rewatch the fight this morning. Despite losing an hour of sleep, I watched the main event a second time.

Because when you're doing the watch party, there's a lot happening. There's live chats. You're making sure that everything looks good. You're trying to be as entertaining as possible as all this is going on. And sometimes, you score things in a way and because there's so much going on maybe you don't give the fight the attention it deserves. Upon reflection on this rewatch, there's a couple of things that I took away from this.

One, I scored it live for Alex Pereira, one, three, five. I thought rounds one and five were incredibly clear for Alex Pereira. I thought two and four were incredibly clear for Magamad Ancolaev. Round three was up in the air. And I think there's

one moment, and even going back into our Slack channels and seeing what I saw in social media, there's one moment that kind of led people towards scoring it for Ankelaif. Ankelyev lands a good punch on Pereira and Pereira kind of like loses his footing for a second. And even on the broadcast, they said like, oh, I think that shot hurt him or yeah, that shot made Pereira stumble a little bit. And even in our Slack channel, I saw some people saying, yeah, he hurt Pereira with that shot in the third round. I don't think that was the case. I think he landed a good punch, certainly, but I don't think Pereira was like hurt like he was in the second round.

Like the second round, he was hurt, hurt. And I saw Tracy Cortez tweet that he was saved by the bell. I don't think that was true either. But he was definitely rocked in that second round. Upon the rewatch, I still scored the third round for Alex Pereira. But I'm not, this is not a robbery. By any stretch of the imagination, if you scored that third round Frank Alive,

I got no issue with it. It's a coin flip round. Having said that, here's my biggest reflection of all of this. And I see a lot of people. I haven't really looked at the comments here, but I saw on the post-fight show. I certainly saw it on the watch party. I've seen it all over social media. A lot of people blaming Magam and Ancolaev for this fight being what it was and going down the way that it was.

And there was a part of me last night, maybe just the adrenaline dump of all of it. I was like, okay. Like it's just a workman-like win by a guy who has lots of workmen-like wins. I place almost all of the blame on Alex Pereira here. This, and again, if you watch the UFC 276 post-fight show, Israel Adasani and Jared Kahnir had a terrible main event. It was awful in Adasania cruised to an easy decision win, and a lot of people blamed Adasani for that.

I blamed Kananir for that. When you hand a guy a win, especially if you're Magam and Goliath, who knew that at the end of the day, this is going to be his, last chance to fight for a belt ever. If he lost this fight, they were never, ever, ever, going to give him another title shot. They didn't want to give him this one. And you could see Dana's reaction at the end of the fight when he found out who won and you saw Data White's reaction

at the post-fight press conference even though he kept it pro the entire time. He wanted to shit on this fight. He wanted to shit on ankle-ey's performance. But he didn't. And I give him a lot of credit for that. Alex Breyer handed him Baca Bay to ankle life, the freaking light heavyweight title last night. Pereira did not have his fastball. He did not have his change up. He did not have his curveball. And I see Gabe Dean in here saying, okay, Pereira won because he stuffed all the takedowns. You don't score points for stuffing takedowns. You actually have to do stuff. And I thought Pereira did enough to win. But this is not a robbery by any stretch of the imagination. Alex Pereira gave that belt away last night and Magameneke alive took it with a Magameneke

Live type performance. And he won the fight. So I don't think you can blame Ankeliah for this. I think all the blame for this fight not being thrilling goes to Alex Pereira. I agree with literally everything you said. I think you and Jed broke it down perfectly. Yeah, it's harsh to say. You know, it just wasn't Pereira's night. We've said this.

One of the things I was saying a lot going to this fight is it's hard to defend your title a lot, guys. I know that seems obvious. I know we've seen some great champions runoff four, five, six straight tail defenses. But I don't think like people appreciate sometimes how amazing it is. I don't know if they took for granted, like how good Pinet is and was able to pull off that three and, you know, uh, 20, 24 in championship fights, it's brilliant run. But sometimes it's just not your day. And that's why like those old runs of like GSP and Mighty Mouse and Andrew Silva of like

seven, eight, nine, John Jones, 10 straight title fights is so, it's so incredible because you have to always be on. You have to always be bringing it or at least be able to do enough to get you over the top. But all these champions had days where they weren't at their best. The John, Jersey here had the Johnny Hendricks fight where you could argue he lost it. how did enough to retain, according to the judges. And Silvas had some stinkers, absolute stinkers, like fights that he won, but we're just, we will never watch again.

Terrible, terrible, terrible fights. Even DJ, Dominizias, I think there's some fights that people just like, just don't talk about, just don't care for. Not because he didn't win. They're just forgettable. It happens. It happens. And sometimes you're so off your game that you actually lose, and that's what happened

to ask for that. And I want to give so much credit to Ankelaia, it wasn't exciting. I want people to look at, if you guys ever decide to rewatch this fight, which if you don't, don't blame you. watch his footwork in this fight. Ankelyas' footwork in this fight was unbelievable. The way he controlled the range is, it wasn't as simple as like,

oh, he's just going to come forward and that's going to throw Alex off. That was certainly the overarching game plan, and it worked. But to do that is obviously easier send than done. You want to advance on Alex Padetta. You might get your head taken off. But I think his movement was so, I'll go as far as they're beautiful. I know the fight is not going to describe that way.

I think his movement is beautiful. Watch his footwork. Mike, have you ever, have you ever listened to a song or an album and just said, you know what, I'm just going to listen to the bass. I'm just going to listen to the bass of this song. Or I'm just focusing on the percussion. I'm just going to focus on the keyboard.

Have you ever done that before? It gives you new appreciation for songs sometimes, right? There's like, there's like songs like, wow, I didn't realize the drums in what's that, Vanessa Carlton song, A Thousand Miles is so good. So I'm like, whatever. Do that with this, as I'm with guys, we haven't had a lot of sleep. Do this with the ankle I off by guys. If you watch just parts of it again, watch how he moves,

watch how he controls the distance. It was, it was masterful. It wasn't exciting. It wasn't exciting. If anything, the focus was probably on making the fight as unexciting as possible in the stand-up and to capitalize it through any big openings, which Alex didn't give, but he also didn't create any openings for himself. So that's really how the fight was won. It was, it was tactically, I thought, a really, really well-fought battle. And I thought both guys fought hard. They just, it was this kind of style matchup where neither guy could afford to make a mistake. Neither guy made any big mistakes. And that's kind of what you get in this 25-minute fight.

We have a new champion. And I know some people love us. Dana White, probably not that enthused about it. No, he's certainly not. And look, here's the other takeaways that we'll get into the matchmaking. One, I'm still picking Alex Pereira in the rematch. And just to spoil it, I'm going with it. I hate, and I'll explain why in a second.

Yeah, me too. I hate it so much. I don't want to do it. And secondly, the biggest question I have is just how good is Paul Craig? How good is Paul Craig? Because the man defeated and finished Magamette Ancolaev, and maybe he should get the first title shot. Who the hell knows? But let's just get right into the matchmaking, AK.

I'm going with the rematch here. Again, I don't, I don't love it. I kind of want. Just to see what this rain will look like from Hockman-Ankelaive at this point. Like, he's finally gotten there. I will probably still pick Pereira in the rematch, because I think if Pereira brings his fastball, he wins this fight more up like seven out of ten times.

And I still think even without his fastball, change up, maybe even his curb ball being left at home, I still thought he won this fight. But again, I totally understand people scoring it for Ankeliath. And if I watch it again, maybe I'll have a different perspective on it. it's fine. I've watched it twice. Third round is just so damn close. I kind of just want to see Ancolaia fight Yuri Perashka. If I had a choice, that's the fight I would make just because it's fresh and it's super weird and interesting. And I would like to see Perr go up to heavyweight and

try to tackle something different. But I think we're going to get the rematch. That's the official pick. And sure, there you go. Yeah, Ankelaive has a lot of fun. I'm with you. Michael, go in the rematch. Ankelaive has a lot of options at 205. A guy, who have previously fought for the title, but also guys who I think fans would be happy to to see fight for the title again, Yeri, Jamal Hill, uh, Kilo Roundtree who's fighting Jamal Hill, of course. We got Carlos Ulberg coming up. Beyond Blockb is still out there. I mean, he could beat our Ulberg. He gets a teleshot. So there's, uh, so he has options. So that's good. But I'm going with the rematch. Not because I don't think either of us are waving a magic wand here.

I think we're kind of going crystal bally, right? I think we just think, uh, Peretta, I don't think it's going to be off for a long time. Um, he did say after like, oh, I'm not really hurt. And it's true. Neither, neither guy did, like, crazy amount of damage to the guy. And the Ankelaiive will be happy to book his next title fight like as soon as possible. So I don't know if we see them necessarily like June or July, like, you know, first like international fight week or something. I doubt that. But August, yeah, I could totally see them booking this as a main, whatever the August

pay review is, this being the main event for that. You run it back. Oh, what's going? Why? No, why? You're shaking your head. We're going. This fight ain't happened until the fall.

Oh. Oh, well. Okay. I go back to. It'll be, yeah, it'll be October, Abu Dhabi. That's, that's what this fight's going to be. this is what Anka Lives said is where he would like to defend his title. So, but if Panera is ready to go, I don't know if they have a choice.

I don't know if they want to wait that long. So I still think it can happen earlier. But yes, this is what we feel like is going to happen. It just feels like the obvious thing to do. Alex Perez still has so much star power. His run was a, they give rematches for guys with no title defenses. So I think three memorable title defenses is enough to earn him another shot. So it's not like my number one pick.

I'm still curiousy to Peta move up someday just for just for poops and giggles. Even if it's not like Aspinall or John Jones, I would love to see him just go up there and fight one of the top five, top six headways to see how that goes. Just for fun. And that can still happen eventually no matter what happens in the Ankleyev rematch. So, yeah, UFC, I think, just starts working on this one now and figures out what to do with that possibly changing divisions. Or someone else changes divisions to fight him later. So we have a roundup of the event where we answer different questions.

And one of the questions we're going to get is, you know, who is the biggest loser? of UFC 313. I'm going, I went outside the box with my pick and I'll leave that for you guys all to see tomorrow because it's not any of the fighters on the card.

It is a completely different thing. But I will say if we're looking at it from a fighter in a divisional perspective, the biggest loser at UFC 313 was Janboehovic. If he beats Carlos Olberg, if he nukes Carlos Olberg, the UFC's never booking Maghamed Ankelai versus Janbovlovich, too.

No friggin chance after UFC. 2.82. It's just never, ever going to happen. So, Beholvich, watching Maghame and Goliath put the light, heavyweight title around his waist, there's just no chance he's getting a title shot

no matter what happens in London. So I think he's the biggest loser. But that first fight wasn't even bad, but Dana White hated it. He hated that fight so much. And that was a good fight. I actually thought it was a good fight. I thought that Boehovic and Ecclev was a fine fight. But Dana White was so mad after.

So mad. Good. Good. fight. Good fight is probably a touch of a stretch, but a fine fight. Fine fight. Yeah, dramatic. Good? It wasn't a good fight, but it wasn't as bad as data laid it out that day. That's for sure. When I got

a great deal on a great gift at winners, I started wondering, could I get fabulous gifts for everyone on my list? Like this designer fragrance for my daughter. It's just $39.99. How could I resist? This luxurious will throw for my sister, This gold watch for my partner? A wooden puzzle for my niece?

Leather gloves for my boss? Ooh, European chocolate for the crossing guard? At these prices, could I find something for everyone at winners? Stop wondering. Start gifting. Winners find fabulous for less. So let's move on to the co-made event. Justin Gaichi gets it done.

Rematch with Raphael Fiziv. Fight of the night. Not a shocker. I actually, I have to go back and rewatch the first fight. I actually think this fight was better than the first one. one just top of mind, but maybe it's just recency bias. I'm not really sure. But it was a lot of fun.

Justin Gachi hurts Fizzee in round two, almost gets him out of there. Fiziv is tough as hell. Took this fight on a little under two weeks notice. Absolutely incredible shit. And Justin Gachie goes out and does the damn thing. And he's asked what he wants next. And he's like, yo, I need to get back in shape because I want to fight Islam Machachev.

And in this division, AK, there is a very real world where that could happen. But is that what is going to happen in your mind, A.K., what is next for just a Gaechi after getting back in the win column? Yeah, I think, you know, I'm not proud. I think I just went boring with the Dan Hooker rebooking. This was the fear. This was the criticism that Jed was really in on, just like almost no matter what happens.

Like even if Gaiji had scored, like, I think, like a huge first round, not going to busy. It's just, it just doesn't move the needle for him as far as being contend. as far as the rankings. I loved the fight. Like, I loved the fight being booked. I loved the fight as it played out. But I totally understand what Jed was saying.

It just, it was much more fun to imagine, you know, Gichi and a fresh matchup with Dan Hooker. So we can still do that. We can still do that. If you're Gai Chi, it probably has a bit of a sour taste now. The fight probably had a best before date. And whenever they're able to, like, start talking about booking that fight again, if they decide to, they'll probably pass that date in Gatji's mind. So I don't know.

Again, this is almost more of a crystal ball thing. I think that's what they'll do. Mike, I have two questions. Obviously, which way did you go? And also, Jed said that you can't book Gaitchee in a boring fight. And I think he's probably right. Like, I actually went through the list of whatever, the 70 lightweights that are on the UFC roster. I couldn't find a match with probably.

I was like, oh, this would definitely suck. Because it's either it's a competitive fight with like someone in the top 30 or you go outside the top 30 and it's someone that like he's going to go blast or is just going to go wild and throw caution of the wind against him and have fun time. So I do have an answer, but I had to cheat a little bit. I'm not, I'm curious. Yeah, where did you go? And is there a boring fight at 155 for Gachee?

Probably not, right? It's impossible. No. I would say like Matush Gammrod is probably like the worst option. Hmm. But there's just zero chance Matush Gammarok gets this fight because if the UFC wanted to see that, Matush Gamrott would have gotten this fight and not Raphael Pazeev. So there's just no.

And even then, like Gamrath, Dan Hooker was incredibly fun. So it's not like Gamrot can't be fun in there. This was tough, man, because lightweight is just so bizarre right now. And I, especially with this Iliate Taporia move and the tweet of you'll never believe what just happened kind of thing.

Is it Toporia doing the John Jones thing where he's like, I'm going to help Spain fight medical insurance fraud or something like that? Or is this, because if they announced, If Dana White goes on Instagram right now and says, hey, Islamak just fighting Iliate Tuporia, like we'll believe that. We see that coming. But if he announces, hey, Iliate Tupori is going to fight Connor McGregor, international

fight week, like out of nowhere, yeah, that might throw people off a little bit. And then you kind of look at it like, well, then what happens? So I'm going to play the fun game and just see what happens. Because I would like to see, and I've been very vocal about this, I would like to see Iliot Tuporia win a fight at lightweight before fighting for the belt. And Jai Herbert is not the one. I'm sorry. I know he's got a lightweight win,

but Jai Herbert is like, no disrespect, the 70th best lightweight in the world. Connor McGregor is probably like the 50th best lightweight in the world currently, but Connor is still a big enough name. And if you beat Connor McGregor in a main event in a big stage like that,

sure, you made weight, you win, you finish Connor, you get a title shot, it's a huge moment, catapults him, massive. So let's just say, let's do this the correct way. let's give Charles Olivera his shot at Islamachachev

because he's fought in 17 number one contender fights won almost all of them just had one in November against Michael Chandler beat the shit at a Michael Chandler for 25 minutes give this man his opportunity to fight for the belt again and then Islomachchev could kind of decide what he wants to do from there does he want to go up to 170 he could wait to see if Jack Delam Adelaida beats Bilal Muhammad

if he does we know that's what's going to happen So then where do we go? It's just a Gaichi versus Arvin Saru K. Just give me that. I am incredibly fascinated by what that fight looks like. Gaichi's style against Sarukian style. That's just compelling shit, man. So that's the fight I'm going with.

Oliver finally gets his title shot. I don't think it goes well for Dubroggs, but let's give this man one last crack at it. He's earned it. He did what was asked of him. And who knows? If we have some weird shit going on, they booked this fight and Oliver can't go. Gachy could step in, fight for the belt, and go from there.

So, yeah, Gachie versus Sarugan is what I want to see. Do I feel confident this is the fight that will happen? No, not at all. Yeah, I made, I waived the Magic Juan last time wanting to see them just keep the Islam Armand fight intact after Armand withdrew. But we have heard at that night up, Dana White was like, no, I'm not, Armand has lost his spot. And we have heard no rumblings, no rumors, no indication that you have to

is changing their mind on that. Again, you never know the timing could work out. Again, they just, you know, they need a main event for whatever, whatever day, month. And then it's just like, well, this guy's injured, this thing didn't work out. Armand is still there. No, we don't want him to, uh, I'm sorry, yes, we want him to earn his teleshot again, but Makachev wants to bend. You know what? Screw it. Just book Armin. So I'm still holding on to hope that that happens somehow. It is definitely not planned number one, two or three, for the UFC, unfortunately. And to answer my other, the other hypothetical question, I think, like, if you want to create a boring Justin Gathechee fight, can he go up to

185 or something? Can he go up and fight like Jacob Malkoon? I think that's maybe the only way. And even then, he'd probably give Jacob Malkun like the most exciting fight of his life. So I don't even know if it's possible. The man is just such a, such a joy to watch, a pleasure to watch Justin Gavej. And I apologize to Jacob Alcun. I'm always picking on him when I talk about it.

I just cannot remember any of his fights for whatever reason. He's a good fighter. So, Jacob, if you're out there, I'm not, I don't mean to diss you. It's just, it's an issue with me probably that I can't remember your fights for some reason. But I guess I'm just bringing up a random example of someone who would be a really weird fight for Gachi and probably stylistically not produce the most exciting bout. But, no, Gagchi could fight anyone at 155 and I'll be tuning. Everyone will be tuning in and everyone will have a good time.

And he's probably going to win another bonus or two. Oh, I should mention, fight in the night again for him and Fizziv. This only happened like a handful of times. I want to shout out to people on, I immediately tweeted after, how many times has the same fight won, uh, fight of the night? Uh, and apparently a handful of times.

I thought it was way more rare. People of course remind me, I, off the top met, I totally forgot, uh, Conne McGregor and Nate Diaz, both fights one one fight the night, obviously, uh, two of the figgy Moreno fights, Tito and Forrest, uh, two of their fights, the, the first one and the last one. Uh, what was the other ones? Who was some? Oh, I mentioned, uh, uh, Sam's down, Spencer Fisher, also fought three times two of those

one fight of the night. So there was a handful. Oh, and of course, shout out to HQ, HQTR-E-D on Twitter. How could I forget Mike? Charles O Laveren, Nick Lentz, the immortal, the Immortal trilogy, two of those fights won, but I think one was overturned to a no contest, but doesn't matter. It did win fight of the night. So, yes, I apologize, I forgot some of these. And shout out to on Twitter who helped me out with those answers because, yeah, it happens. But it's rare. It's rare. And a testament, really, to gate you and B-C-C-C- Congrats to those guys. there is only one fight that I think could be very boring for Justin G. I won't 55.

It could be. Grant Dawson. I don't know. I think he'd bring him out. I think he'd bring something out of Grant. I agree. That is, I saw that name.

Either he either he just wrecks Grant, like early with a knockout or Grant tackles him a whole bunch and wins in Grant Dawson-esque style like he did against Diego Faheda. But still. It's very difficult. It's probably, it's not boring, but if there's one that would be like a minus 170 to be the most boring,

it's probably that. Yeah. Hypothetical. Let's just go there. Strictly hypothetical. That fight's not going to happen. No, nobody, no, don't worry about it.

It's going to be okay. But let's move on to still at layweight. Ignacio Baja Monday's AK. What a performance. A lot of people thought, listen, man, these are two huge guys. Both guys could strike, but Jalen Turner is more ways to win.

What happens if this goes to the floor? It's all Jalen Turner for goes to the floor. His grappling is better. Gnacio Baja Baja Mondea said, all right, man, we'll welcome this to the floor. You can put me on my back. And then I'm just going to submit you. And on top of that, end Jalen Turner's career.

Jailen Turner retires at the age of 29. We'll see if that sticks. A huge win for Ignacio Baja Baja Mondays. He will now be a ranked fighter come Tuesday, aka what's next for Ignacio Baja Mondees? Yeah, happy trails to Jalen if he decides to retire. Never, honestly, never too early to do it. Hopefully he's got, he's financially secure.

He's got other plans, got other eggs in the basket. Always been a really nice guy and an exciting fighter. And it's a shame, you know, some fights just didn't go his way and took some damage to some of those fights. So I still like to see him try 170, but that's not necessarily a move that's going to fix whatever is ailing him in his fighting career. So it's definitely not something like, oh, he has to try 170. Yeah, it could be fun to see. It might not work. Mike, did you put any thought towards just throwing.

I didn't do this. Did you have any thought to just like Ignacio Bahamundas versus Rufi? Thought about it. Didn't go in that direction. Okay. I'll go with, I'll go with Fresium. It's just taking two streaking lightweights.

It's not like... I like that. Yeah, I didn't want to go top 15 yet. Ignacio is great. There's still some holes in this game. Just a gigantic lightweight. So physically it's always going to be fascinating to watch. Always going to give him some sort of edge.

almost any of those matchups. I know Jed was really wanted to see him in Fizzy, which would be just visually hilarious based on the size discrepancy. But no, I'll go. I'll go Ziam. Just two guys who are on really good streaks right now. And it's the shark tank of 15, you know, someone's got to show out and someone's going to move up just that much closer to

hopefully shaking out one of those veterans in the top of team. I went with Benile Darius for Ignacio Bahra one day. I know Binaldairi called out Illi Taboria. And Rufi called out him, right? Didn't Rufi call out vinyl? Yes, but I don't... I think, and look, beating King Green is still a great win. And Rufi's knocko is incredible.

I was more impressed with Bahamandis's win. I just was. That's a great win. And submitting Jalen Turner the way that he did was incredibly impressive. So for me, let's give him the Darius fight. Derrish has, I mean, less than zero chance of getting Iliot support. like he just literally has absolutely no chance so this is i mean this is kind of where benny is right now the best thing benny deryush could have hoped for was getting patty pimblit that was the best thing

he could have hoped for after losing the moikano fight patty's fighting michael chandler so he's going to have to fight one of these two guys so i'm going to give bahamundas this opportunity and ruffey's going to get a good fight too uh maybe a slightly a tougher batch up although you could argue that deri could give Baja Monday some fits and maybe he can. So I went with that direction and I'll reveal what I did for Ruffie and you can make your revelation as well in a moment. Yep. Let's go to Amanda Lemos, A.K.

Oh, the one everyone's waiting for. We should have let off with this. Look, this fight happened and I'm kind of happy it did because I hit a underdog ticket on Amanda Lemos. The fight went exactly the way I thought it was going to go. She wins. I'm not going to spend a lot of time. time here. It's tough to book Amanda Lemos. She has legitimately fought everybody in this division

except for one person. And I'm going with the Anjanjan, win or lose against Verda Genderova because who the fuck else are we going to put her in there with? Because she literally fought everybody else. That was the obvious choice. The problem is I have, I think I've made that matchup at least three times on this show. And it hasn't happened yet. Win, lose or draw, of course, against the beer and a mix a ton of sense. I just want a different direction. You know what? I just like do a dark kind of here. Like, why not her and Tisha, Tisha Pennington? I don't know.

Someone else she hasn't fought in the division yet. Sure. I don't know, Mike. I don't know. I think it's possible. This is a crystal ball-ish type, a very murky crystal ball prediction. So, yeah, whenever Tisha's just, you know,

gonna fight again, throw her in there with Amanda and see what happens. Yes. Speaking of Mauricio, Rofi. We're moving on already. That's it. We're done. Oh.

K.O. The clubhouse leader for not going to of the year. That was sick, man. Like, it was so quick and out of nowhere that I think people just all, everyone had sort of delayed reactions to it because we're like, what the, what just happened? Did green slip and fall? Did the wind blow him over?

And then you saw the replay and you were like, oh my God, that was pretty nasty. Spinning heel kick right to the face. Down goes King Green. Marisha Ruffie gets the big win. And now he wants a big fight. He wants Benny Dyerush. I don't think he's going to get it. But we're going to live in a world, AK, if my dream comes true,

Marussia Ruffy versus Benoit Santini, good Lord, just viciousness, violence, blood. Wait a second. Are we plugging in? Are we plugging in the speakers? Is this about to happen? We got to tell. What? Zach attack.

Get in there, Zach, attack. I mean, A.C. Slater was at the event last night, so it's only fitting that we count it down. Three, two, one. Friends forever. Yes. Wow. I was actually surprised. I struggled with this one a little bit. I think I was just looking at the, oh, one guy's on a losing streak, one guy's on a win streak. Oh, we should. No, but like, why does it matter? Benoit is still, will still be higher ranked after Rufi after this fight.

I don't think this earned Rufi the number 15 spot, which is where BSD currently sits in the official UFC rankings. And I also don't think this should, like, I don't think I would assume either of us are looking at this as like, oh, we're just building up Ruffy with a guy that he can, like, gang in the first round because, you know, BSD fights are always super exciting. Because I don't think he gave up on Belmont-Sanini as a prospect either. I know he looks like an older guy, but I think a lot of people forget, I think Sondini's only been fighting pro since 2018. Now, it's a bit of a weird situation because he's been fighting in France

where it just, like, wasn't even legal until around 2018-ish, something like that. So I'm sure he's had some other fighting experience, just that's, you know, sort of undocumented or off the record. But, yeah, he's still really new to this game. So, Rufie would definitely be at least a two to one, maybe three to one favorite going to that. But don't count out BSD, man. I still think there's something with this guy. And if he beats Rufi, I think he gets some of that steam back.

Again, holds on to his ranking. We can start talking about moving him up the rankings again. And more importantly, forget rankings, forget all that stuff. Like, just what an awesome fight on paper. Like, that's take the under. Someone's getting real badly hurt. So I love it, Mike. Yeah, I think solid friends forever pick.

And I shouldn't have been surprised. I should have known that you would pick something so good. for all the newcomers here who are watching this for the first time we're just joining our channel for the first time i think this is an important lesson uh for everybody bsd is booked what happened to the bsd versus alvarez fight my question i will answer your question with a question of my own did you see bsd versus joel alvarez on ma fighting dot com i sure didn't which means it ain't real and i'll leave it at that it was reported was like explicitly told, I got LOLs from people I asked about that fight because it was so untrue. So that is not a thing that is real.

I'm not saying that it could not happen. Benoit Sontini is not fighting Joel Alvarez's UFC 314, Joseph Boza. That fight is not on the books. And they actually revealed the main card and featured prelims for UFC 314. And that fight wasn't on there. It would be on there. It wasn't. That fight is not real.

Golden Rule. Sleado, I wasn't trying to call you out. All we did was we were serving lessons to the people, okay? If we, if it's not on our website, it ain't a thing. It's not real, okay? We're not calling you guys out. We're calling out some of the people who aggravated this. Yeah, social media horseshit.

I told us about this happen. I'm just looking at a couple of the accounts that clearly boosted this. And I'm like, oh, that's definitely not real. Now I know why you're saying it wasn't real. I actually don't need, I must have missed this rumor when it first started circulating. So I just quickly went to social media now And I was like, oh, Alvres Santinni, who was who was talking about this? Who was tweeting this out?

And I saw a couple of names. I don't even want to give them attention, but a couple of familiar names. I'm like, ah, if you see it from those guys and you guys know who I'm talking about, definitely either wait to hear from us. You can DM us, guys. We'll look into it for you. But yeah, this was not real. I don't see any credible source that picked up Alvarez-Santanis.

It's not real, guys. It's not real. I see some people saying it's for UFC 314. Looking at the UFC or 315 lineup. Not there either. It is not there either. And it could listen, we're not saying this fight can't happen. We're just saying it is not.

It could happen. It is not. It could happen. It is not. Yeah. It's not real. When that report came out, of course we asked about it. And we were told absolutely zero chance that fight's happening at that moment in time.

So not real. Cool fight. If it does happen. I'd love to see Joel Avers gets up, get an opportunity like that. but yeah let's uh let's move on let's go to the wild card round a k let's matchmake for somebody we have not match made for yet i assume you're going to matchmake for yasmid lucinda right now it's only fair after giving amanda lemo so much time on this program uh but all joking aside who's your wildcard pick uh i did go with a young Brazilian with plenty of potential and it was not yes

miscindo uh i got to go with ultimate fighter 32 winner and now two and o in the ufcc myron Santos. I also, of course, we'll just talk about the verdict that fight a little bit. Watching live, yeah, I thought it was a little suss. I saw, I myself, I think had it 29, 28, Francis Marshall. I will say I was not watching the fight super closely. Just working some other things. I have the fight on, of course. And there was the Marshall takedowns, which he didn't do a ton of offense with, but there was some control there. And I also did see exchanges on the feet that Santos was winning. Very close exchanges, don't you're wrong. They're like, the clashes where both guys were landing.

And I think when they showed the replays later, they're actually somewhat favorable for Myron. I think, like, you could kind of see where he was getting his shots in. But, boy, I was a little surprised. I was a little surprised by the results. I don't want to call it a robbery, probably closer than it looked live.

But I also thought Francis did enough to win. I don't think anyone would have been shocked by 29, 28, Francis Marshall score. I know commentary didn't agree. I saw some people, some media members have it 3027 Francis Marshall. So if I get a chance watch. I am curious, see how that goes. But not the most impressive win for Myron, but good for him. Did enough. Get that win, get that extra check, stand defeated in the UFC. He's a young guy,

I think he's 24, 25, who also has a lot, but still has a lot of experience. So he's someone I want to build. I think there's potential there. And I think he's someone who's going to be a bit of a roller coaster. Like some nights he's going to look like a friggin world beater, just first-round K.O. smoking dudes. Some nights can look like this fight. He's going to go the distance. And you're going to be like, what is this guy doing? Why can he put it all together? but he has a lot of time to put it together so we build him up just a simple fight someone lower rank than him

Weston Wilson wherever he is let's get him back in there I think that's a good next opponent for for Marvin Santos and if he loses to Weston Wilson it'll give us a real idea of where he is yeah that's not too shabby yeah I just saw one

I'm kind of here I'm very close to the R word I don't like to throw that word out too often, but I mean, I'm on the doorstep. I'm like this, but do I actually want to knock on the door? Do I want to ring the doorbell? I'm not really sure, but I'm damn close. I'm definitely close to it. There's just, there's just no world where Myron Santos won two rounds. There's just no way you can give him rounds one or three. It's just not possible. There is more of a case for 3027 Francis Marshall than there is for 29, 28.

Santos, in my opinion. I know if you look at UFC stats, like Santos landed more strikes overall in the fight, but yeah, I just don't see it, man. I just don't see it. So, I'm not going to throw the hard word out, but I'm real close to it.

13 media members on M-May decisions registered. 13 picked Francis Marshall. 10 had it 30-27 Marshall. So, again, I'm not giving my full of- Did anyone score for Santos? Not one. 13 for 13, all- 10 out of those 13 said that Santos did not win around.

So again, I did not win and watch closely enough guys. So I apologize to comment on it. You guys can try your own conclusions. You saw the fight or you saw what people are saying about the fight. But this was, this is going to be a rough run for the Marshall and his team to take for sure. 100%. Because I think it's three losses in a row for him now. I think it is now.

No, no, no. He won a splitie against, didn't he win a, I think of someone else. Yeah, he won a splitie against Bazookja in a lightweight fight. Oh, that's right. That's right. Yeah, that's right. Okay. I'm going with Raphael Fazeve because I just, I want to throw this man a bone. Guy steps in, 12 days notice, gives Justin Gage a hell of a fight, fight of the night,

rolling off the couch essentially. Like, he was training, obviously, but he wasn't preparing for anybody, especially the third best lightweight in the world according to the UFC rankings and gave Justin all he could handle and then some. So we're going to give him the fight he wants. We're going to give him a two scammrot. Let's give him the rematch. Let's get the fight. We all deserve his fans.

because that first round between Fiziv and Gamrott ruled. It was incredible. We're on our way to a thrilling main event. And then Fiziv suffered that injury and it sucks. And this is the fight Fiziv wants. If the UFC called Viziv right now and said, realistically, we'll give you any fight you want, you pick. He would pick Matush Gamrott.

And I know they tried to make this fight. People were reporting that it was a done deal. Again, did not end up on MbVviting.com, which is a terrific website. And there's a reason for that. Fazeve said yes. Garmat very publicly said, no, what are we doing here? Fake news?

Not a real thing. And now I don't think Gameraut's going to have much of a choice. They're just going to be like, all, all, man, you either fight Fiziv or you don't fight at all, and I think we're going to get it. Yeah, I like it. Because I'm glad you picked Garmat, because honestly, he kind of was in play for, like, Bahamundas or Rufi, probably too soon for them, but certainly was in play. So I thought one of us would bring it up earlier.

But that's the right way to go. Yeah, I think Fiziv coming off a loss is the right way to go. And hopefully Garmrott is already thinking about it. Because, yeah, we got to close that loop. We didn't really get to see that fight. Yes. All right. Let's go to the peeps.

You guys, we're in a wildcard 15 or so minutes. The super chats get to the front of the line. So let's get into this. Shout out to Scott, you to man. Slido, Lamosch, Lucindo, or Rose Carla, too? Like, which was worse? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, too-shay.

Okay, I thought we were gonna, I thought we were gonna. I thought matchmaking. Leymish Lucindo was Yuri versus Glover compared to Rose Collar, too, if we're being honest. Van versus Bruno Silva. Sure. Josh Van is fun as hell, man.

That was originally, that was the original booking, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, because Ray Surrey. It was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're running this one back. So I just want to read a poll result real quick. Mike, I asked who was the biggest winner of UFC 313? Unsurprisingly, Magumann Ancalaia, 45%.

I actually thought Rufi, who came in second, 20% would be higher, just because that knockout was so good. But, I mean, clearly, Anclyev won the main event, won a title, BDXPeleda. So, yeah, no surprise there. Just Gae 22%, Ignacio Bahamundas, 4%. Amanda Lamoche, I did not put on the poll. So you guys can, you know, leave in the comments if you thought Amanda Limoch was the big winner.

So you adds, if the UFC hates there, yous, Ruffie will get his shot. I mean, Darius could win that fight, man. Maybe. Or he's going to a legend killer tour here and just getting some of the older guys. Because we were saying in the chat, like, all love to Bobby Green, but he's clearly, you know, in the twilight of his career, maybe a little past twilight. Like four years ago, that spin kick does not catch Bobby Green as cleanly as it did. But no, he's 50 pro fights into his career now.

And 38, 39 years old, like, it sucks to say, because I'm not saying he should retire. Like, if he still losing a P, he still likes fighting, he still making good money, he should go for it. But these finishes will start racking up. We saw it with Tony Ferguson. And, you know, these things just happened. So, but congrats to Rufi. That was amazing. But I don't know if I want to see, need to see him fight another sort of up there in age, lightweight.

Yeah, we're, as we were watching on the watch party, we were noticing Bobby Green was looking pretty slow out there. It was kind of tough to watch, honestly. We were like, man, he's just got no pop to anything he's really doing. Like, he's still fun and he's talking shit and doing Bobby Green things. And we appreciate that. We love Bobby Green. He's a character. And, yeah, he's fun.

And great fighters, got some great wins, giving us some cool moments. But you just kind of saw that coming. Obviously, we didn't see a spinning heel kick coming as the tail end of a combination from Marisha Ruffie, which is insane. but yeah shout out to Ruffy Nick Davis thank you

we had the UFC 314 press conference can Bryce Mitchell say or do anything to get back in the fans good graces which AK I got to tell you

Casey and I had a great time reliving the UFC 314 press conference Giann Silva just stealing the show Bryce Mitchell with the what are you a scientist now line

which gave us all some chuckles but Bryce got booed out of that building. And I was, it's the correct reaction, honestly, but I was a little surprised that he was just mercifully booed like that,

mercilessly, whatever the fucking word is, just booed like that in Las Vegas at a UFC press conference, truly was a little surprised by that. But can Bryce Mitchell do anything to turn those booze into chairs at any point? Yeah,

just educate yourself, man. Like, I mean, I, it's, I don't think, Bryce deserves anyone's sympathy or understanding at this point given the comments he's made.

Again, there are certain groups of people who are furious with him, hurt by the things he said, and they are under no obligation to forgive him just because he issued that apology on social media, which genuine, perhaps, I don't know, you guys can be the judge

of how sincere that was he heard a lot of people. He heard a lot of people and offend a lot of people and insult a lot of people's intelligence. And he just needs to educate himself. He's to educate himself and he needs to learn things, learn history. just to be a little more open-minded about listening to people. It just feels like he's so made up his mind on these dumb opinions and these stupid conspiracy theories.

And again, at heart, maybe he's not a bad person. I don't know. You've interviewed Bryce. I interviewed Bryce. Bryce was really good at the media when he was coming up. And he made a lot of, I don't want to say friends, but I think a lot of positive relationships to the media. And I definitely enjoyed talking to Bryce early on.

I didn't get the sense that he was a malicious person. But just uneducated. And I hope he can learn things. spread a positive message using the platform he has because he's he's he's a well-known ufc fighter now guys he's not like a a level mainstream guy he's well known he has a platform the things he says matters and um it it will require a big change in his perspective so is there is there anything and say yeah of course there is no one is beyond redemption um does he want it does he care does he think he's just like jesus and that he's being you know uh these these things are being cast upon him and he's just

enduring as a good christian boy uh if that's the case then I mean that's again we're heading in the wrong direction but I I want to believe there's hope for Bryce to really again I'll say it again educate himself and turn things around and spread a more positive message this is sports this is MMA this is the UFC I don't think people will forget what he said I think people will continue to give him shit for it and rightfully so but in this sport people really truly only care about your last fight Bryce Mitchell goes out there and has a fight of the year contender with Gian Silva, win or lose,

that'll help. If he obliterates Gian Silva, whether people like him or not, that is going to help him. And that's just the nature of the beast. And it's not just MMA. It's like that in any sport. You could say some heinous shit.

You could do some heinous shit. But you go out there on Sunday at the Masters and fucking win, man. Like, people forget all of it. And that's just sports at the end of the day. That's true. That's a big. Winning will be big. not getting the doors blown off will be big.

If he just goes out there and has a fun-ass fight and then look, if he goes out there, if Bryce Mitchell goes out there and has a banger with Gian Silva and then gets on the mic and apologizes and says like, look, man, I'm sorry if I hurt people. Like, that is going to go over huge. Without, it's just going to be gigantic.

So, yeah, anybody can, if Joaquin, if Joaquin Buckley can come back, and I know he didn't say the things that Bryce Mitchell said, but he got back quick. Jamal Hill's gotten back a little quicker than I thought he would in a lot of people's minds.

It could, it probably should take longer for Bryce, but yeah, he goes out there, has a great performance, says the right thing on the mic. I think he'll be okay. All right, let's go to the peeps. Gerard, Ankleiv versus the Jan Ulberg winner. There's just no chance they're doing Yon fight. There's no chance. I don't know. Pereira versus the Jan Ulberg loser.

I don't hate that, but. I think there's even less chance of that. Really? Yeah. Again, well, Perry is not going to fight a 205 unless he's fighting for the belt.

He has options. He just has so many options to not have to, you know, battle his way back the traditional way. Yeah. Gagee versus the Pimblech,

Chandler winner, 0% chance that fight happens. Nah. Not interested. 0%. Fizzi versus Joel Alvarez. We love to see it. Hold on,

actually. Nope. Pimblech Gechee. Listen, Mike, no. I hit on Fimblet, Ferguson. I hit on Pimplet chance.

They're not going to do it. They're not going to do it. Let me see how that fight plays out first. I'm not ruling it out. I don't want to contradict myself in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, one chance. Zero chance. Zero chance. Uh, Fizier's Joel Alvarez.

It'd be cool, but I don't think Fizzie's going to get that fight, especially I have to do the UFC a favor. Bob Mondays, Gamrod, I could see Lemos versus Suarez. Interesting. I thought about that. That's not bad. I thought about that, but I don't know. Soros could be out for it.

a minute. We'll see what happens there. Ruffy versus Dawson could definitely happen. Van versus Esteban, Bruno versus Shara. Ooh. That's interesting. Lial versus Salikoff. Santos versus Naimov. Pretty good all around.

There you go. I thought that's a veteran. Yeah, I think George's a veteran. I think he knows what he's doing. Do you know when Blades versus Cooney F. will be rebooked? I don't know. I don't know. I really don't know.

Yeah, we, we're, we, we, we don't think it'll be too long. I mean, no. Yeah, I don't think it'll be too long. Like, if they didn't get 315 or something, like it wouldn't surprise me. There's no room for it on 314. So you can't do it there. There's 15 fights on that card. 15 of them right now, including, uh, some women's band-a-weight action on that card.

Oh, man. Of course. Don't ask me to name who it is. I'm just going to nod my head and go like, yeah. Uh, Nora canoli. versus Haley Cowan. I was going to be my fourth guest. Sorry, what had gotten into a version.

Blades, Cunia, this was delayed. This is supposed to be in Seattle first, right? This is supposed to be on Seattle, right? And then got shifted to the pay-review. And now it was going to, wow. This could be really funny. Is this the heavyweight hubby versus Tony Grayson? I don't know.

It might be, man. This could be real funny. Simam-Khali. I hope I got that right. Thank you for this. Fizzi versus Dossib Baham-Mundits versus Guram. Kutatsaladeh after the Fernandez fight,

Mauritio Rufi versus Jared Gordon. I think Ruffie's probably gotten, no disrespect Jared Gordon. He's gotten a little better than that. Honestly, like he's going to be ranked. I don't think he's going to fight Jared Gordon after this. Ferreira versus the loser of Munez versus Alaskaroff.

Don't hate that. And rebook the Josh Van Bruno Silva fight. People really want that one. Yeah. That was a really good matchup on paper. Shout out to. We haven't even spoken about Josh Van at all, have we? Shout out to Josh.

Dude is so good. Very good performance against Ray Suria. Again, you know, Ray is another young guy, but this was, you guys probably heard ad nauseum by now, the first UFC matchup between fighters born in the 2000s. Ray is extremely green in the sport. I mean, to why he's so tend to know. I know he's tended to no heading into it, but the experience jump up to a Josh fan who's had a lot of good experience.

Probably a similar amount of fights, but I think his level of competition has been a notch better. And it looked like, it looked like. And Ray's not bad. It's not like Ray. I don't think Ray looks terrible. It's just Josh is a future. title content challenge like I think he's a cent I think Josh is on the max holloway

title arc where like he might take a loss or two or three early on and at some point Josh Van's going to hit his stride and just be rattling off just wins and we're going to see him contend and possibly win the title he is really good very impressed by Josh he's he's going to fight for the lightweight title or flyway I think so he's going to fight for the white title RS 40 Leal versus we're not two wants it I think I think he wants it I think or Vanderford R's 40 you got a land on one of the other. We don't do that point.

We don't do ores here. Roofie versus CDF, Van versus Amir al-Bazi. Wow. Whoa. I love it. I like it. It could happen.

It could happen. Bahamandis versus BSD, Ozzy Diaz versus Gerald Mearshardt. Oh, man. That's a bit of a step up. Is that doo-doo? Are they buddies? No.

No. I think Mearshart's booked. I believe he's booked. He is. He is. April 5th. Brad Tavares. Oh, yes.

Oh, wow. What a middle lady matchup. What a middle lady match. If he submits Brad Tavares, that would be amazing. Boy. That would be amazing. A little chance for Extreme Couture to get one back after the Edmund Shabazian. Brad Tavares is going to end up with like 40, like 40 career in May fights.

UFC fights, I should say. Yeah. He's been with come back. John Ray, Alex versus Cyril Gone. He's saying move up to heavyweight, which by the way, if we're up. to me, I would do the same thing. Just go up. Just go up.

Go fight Derek Lewis. Who gives a shit? All he needs is one win and he's fighting for the belt. Yeah. Like, go just do that. Cyril's a good choice. It is a good choice. That's a good choice.

Him and Parer and Pavlovich would be fun. Like, there's tons of options in heavyweight that are somewhat compelling. He's 37 too, like the window's closing. He likes Justin versus Charles too. I feel like if Justin Gaichi is going to retire, he will retire fighting Charles Olivera. Like, that'll be his, like, last fight. Okay.

If he has, like, the Porier, like, I'm doing one more last dance. He will probably fight Charles Olivera. Because, I mean, just listen to any time Gichi talks about Oliver in that fight and what he took away from him. I'd watch it again. Baumondays versus Ruffie, Lemos versus Jan-on win or the...

Good picks. Good picks, John, Ray. Good picks. Tristan Likes, Ba'A, Mondays versus Joel, Alvarez. Yeah. What's going on? I'll throw Alvers.

No, he's not booked. Um, I don't. No, we just, yeah, he's not booked against anybody. Yeah. Even though he, yeah. I'm into it. I'm into it, Tristan. Uh, thank you.

Daya, or Tia, sorry. I, I, I, apologies, if I got that wrong. Ruffy versus Boycano. I thought about this. I did think about this. I was very close to pulling the trigger on this fight. Uh, it's a distinct. I think possibility.

I would even like Moikano's chances enough like. I don't even think that's a, like actually, I'm actually quick. Who do you rank higher after Saturday? Rufi or Bahamondez. Bahamundas. You rank Bahamundas.

You because you had Jill and you would have had Jailen Turner theoretically higher than Bobby, than sorry guys. Because I didn't have like in my personal rankings, I did not have green ranked. I don't have I don't think I have Turner. Turner I did. You did.

Okay. Okay. So just by the numbers Bahamundas would jump up over. Yeah. Rufi and green. Okay, interesting. Yeah, I don't know. In that case, yeah, I think Rufi was more kind of makes sense.

What's the second? Oh, Lael, Brian Battle. Can I just say this is one of my favorite picks so far today? It's very good. Dude, that is, that's wild. That's a wild ass fight. I think I have them. Damn, have you been looking at my rankings?

I think I have them like right next to each other after yesterday. I have, what we're looking at here? My brain just went like. I have Leyal. Man, that was a good finish, too, by the way. I mean, I know he was heavily favorite, but I have Laal 42. I have Brian Battle 37. And if anyone's asking, how can Brian be so low given the run he's been on?

I think I dinged him a bit for the weight miss. He probably should be in the top 30. I do think Brian is probably in the top 30, actually. But yeah, this would be, if he beats Laal, I would sort of jump him back up. I would jump him back up to, like, 30 and give him a top 20 matchup probably in the next way. So very good matchup. I like that. He needs a redemption fight

Because I don't even I thought he lost the Rennie Brown fight as well Yes, not too Despite the weight miss And then just for my work after Like just poor my workout Yeah, It was really not

It should have been again The fight that like Moved him jump him up the rankings And like ah Just a lot went wrong Ruffie versus Rebekchi Damn I love it

Hey Mauritio Great win Great knockout Let's give you this Absolute unranked maniac That's a great fight It's a great fight. Rufi's going to be one of those guys, man.

I feel like there's no bad matchup. Like, I know we want to reward him and push him up the rankings, but there's just so many good lightweights and so many that he can have an exciting fight with. So, yeah, I'm into that too. I want to Rubezky for a hackpras after that recent fight. But, yeah, if that doesn't happen, then they go with him and Rufi, great. This is a troll, Joe.

Come on. Why? Crazy. For the podcast. For the podcast. First round? Crazy podcast. Gamrod would have to say it would have engaged you in the first round.

Come on. let's let's let's not be yeah i i don't yeah uh another ruffy versus bahamundas let's see which prospect rises rather than booking them in separate fights where they book could where they could both maybe lose yeah and i don't think either guy again those matchups either guy isn't like ruined by a loss like okay back to the drawing board they're they're just both in the thick of that that mid tier uh upper mid tier i sorry lightweight is so deep you got to do a lot upper upper upper mid tier of lightweight but they haven't like clearly separated themselves from it yet so you might have to fight uh put them up against each other to figure that out baha mondays versus boycano sure rematch

with main event sure lemmos versus the loser or verna versus jean no joseph we just saw bernic cannot be involved in this we just saw verna tap lamoche out why would they killed her why would she have to do that fight again if she lost no that win-lose draw yon just makes so much more sense but thank you she smoked her absolutely smoked her you have no reason to run that one back you yeah what else we go what else we go what else we got Ruffy versus Dawson sure yeah

I could see that one I see there you go the people's made events oh my gosh egg versus Craig too oh not hold on what kind of run of form

is Paul Craig in these days let's see let me let's look at middle weight he just got he just lost a bow nickel fight he has lost three straight fights five of his last six including his last two at lightweight uh lighthead weight excuse me

Johnny Walker and Bolk on. That's a tough self. That's tough. I do love. I mean, look. Y'all Mara is getting title shots after like three straight losses. So if he, if Paul Craig came back up to, to 05, if he beat the winner and then just beat the winner of like the Blachovic

Ulberg fight. I mean, they still. It's just be so funny to see them fight again. How crazy is, though, that like that one second, that submission. did through Ankleyev's career in such a weird arc, right? Because if he just beats Paul Craig, I don't know if the matchmaking is that different. Like, I'm trying to think.

Let's do a quick walk down memory lane here. So March 2018, again, for anyone who's not familiar, I don't know if people remember this. Angoliath, UFC debut, cruising, we're going to win a clear decision against Paul Craig. So Mr. Triangle Choke, literally 459 mark of the third round. So after that, Ankylaiap fights Prach now, Kuclinson Abrayu,

Langeembula. Yeah, losing to Craig really kind of bumped him into a lower tier. Like I think if he beats Paul Craig, he gets slightly better opposition than that. And as you guys know, had to go undefeated in 13 straight fights for getting this shot at UFC 313. So, man, how weird. That one second changed so much. Angolive could have been championed way earlier, I think. That's weird.

Yep. That's so weird. What about this? Yvon Kuchelava versus Aiklive 3. We talked about the weird. With a win over Modestin Bukas, maybe he gets there. Maybe he gets there. The first fight, the accidental ropa dope,

or that led to a loss for Kutja Lava. And that, I don't know, guys. I think I can't have answered that question in the second place. Yeah, last one. Then we're going to get out of here. How about Josh Van versus Kaya Sakura, AK? I love it. I've said I want to see Kai go up to 135,

but we haven't heard any indication that's the plan. I have him, I have, I have, I've kept Kai ranked at 125. So, yeah, if he wants to stick around, exciting fighter, depending how things go with Pantosia, you know, if Pantosia loses his belt anytime soon, Kai could be like two highlight real knockouts away from maybe fighting for the title again. It's not the deepest division. And Josh Van, huge test. Big, big, big, big test for Josh Van.

That's pretty creative. I like that. And then one more super chest, Slito, A.K., I think Bryce educating himself is the problem. This is true. We know Bryce reads stuff. Maybe the horses are questionable. So that's a good comments. You're right.

Quite the conversation going on about the better win, whether it's beating Bobby Green or beating, or King Green, excuse me, or beating Jalen Turner. So interesting stuff there. Ladies and gentlemen, I think we are done here. But guys, just what do you think, like, it can't get any better? Wait till you see what the UFC is giving the fans

of this fine sport next week. UFC Vegas 104 No longer happening At the world's most famous Apex by the way Breaking news It is now happening at the world's most mightiest apex Never forget Mark Shapiro The Mighty Apex

Which feels the same as a 20,000 seat arena Yeah, of course does Listen to this freaking fight card The main event A rematch of all rematches This is for the middle-way middleweighty middleweightiest middleweight title like all the middleweights Marvin Vittori versus Roman Deleuiz a a fight so thrilling so eventful so impactful

that Marvin Vittori thought he was fighting Roman copulov and not Roman Deleiz a after he signed the contract and after the fight was announced there you have it co-main event should be fun Eliza Zoleski versus Chee and Jokawati I like it D.R. Nergozai versus Brenson-Rabreau. DeMond Blackshare versus Cody Gibson. This is a main card fight, by the way. Alexander Hernandez versus Kurt Holabobeau.

That's going to be good. It should be fun. Kurt's not. That's not have boring fights. Also on the main card. Kevin Vallejos versus Sungwu Choi. That would be good. Andre Lima versus Daniel Barras.

And folks, if you are going to the world's mightiest apex, not only do you bring a heavyweight fight, but you bring the middle-weightiest heavyweight on Earth, Waldo Cortez-A-Costa. What is the over on this? Ryan Span, who moves up to heavy-weight for this contest? What is the over on this fight? What can I get, what odds can I get today?

I don't think it's dropped yet. I don't think it's dropped yet. Van Duel. I'm going to Fand-Duel right now, Lurorrs. There's no way it's dropped yet. Go on, go on. I'm looking. Go on, Michael. Keep running down. In women's flyweight action. Unisi Dubin versus Carly Judice.

I like Carly Judice a lot. She is real fun. Sam Hughes versus Stephanie Luciano in women's straw weight action. Okay. In men's band and weight action, Josias Musasa versus Carlos Vera. In featherweight action, Sue Young-U. versus AJ Cunningham and kicking things off at least as of right now,

they might bump this up to the main event, maybe the Coal Main event, aka the future UFC Women's Bannamway Champion, Josian Nunes, versus Priscilla Kachua. That is happening. World's mightiest apex.

13 can't miss fights. 4 p.m. Eastern start time. How are we feeling? I guarantee you. I guarantee you by Thursday. I'll have talked myself into this card not being that bad. I think I said, what did I give the cop,

I'll buy a card. I was like, I was like 6.4 right of 6.4. So like that was like degree of difficulty the best it could be. And it did turn out to be like a decent card. So if you will, did I miss a fight?

Is that even possible? You've mentioned Evan Elder and Markle Maderos? Oh, did that fight get called canceled? Maybe. I'm looking at Wikipedia, not a topology so topology it did get cat topology said it was canceled okay okay so maybe that one's

maybe maybe markel maderos might get a replacement opponent maybe we get a short notice fight who's all knows the fans don't tease the fans with this excitement mike your responsibility as a journalist not to do this but i probably will talk myself into this card um i don't think it'll reach a 6.4 in the degree of difficulty scale uh which is what i did again i did with you the last Apex card, which hit it, by the way. I think it just about hit it. I think it just about reached its potential. Like that card was not bad.

So this one has a smaller hill to climb. So I'll set the bar low, probably around like six, flat six. And maybe it reaches it. And that's like not bad to say that. This fight card is so memorable, ladies and gentlemen, an AK who makes my schedule for the week decided to give me the night off. I didn't ask for it. He just gave it to me.

It was, because that is the impact of this card. Too much excitement. I said, I said, you need to calm down. I said, you need to calm down. Well, let's get. All we got to do is get through this, okay? We just got to get through next week. Salca Boy and Ryan Spam.

This is a real fight. Get through next week. That's a real fight. This is a real fight. And so is Hamdi, Abdel Wahab and Moeusband, not in this card, but upcoming. That's a real fight too. That's the guitar card.

Heavyweight is on. Way, go. God, heavyweight is on fire. God, that's on fire. God, my goodness. 18 heavyweights. Yeah. That's why Ryan Span moved up, because all you need is one win,

he'll be like, if he wins, it'll be like the seventh ranked heavyweight. If he beats Waldo, course, has the cost of it. We get through this card. And then, sorry, I should say lazy bet. 4.37 is his degree of difficulty of this card real low. So he's saying the bar real low. So that's good, lazy bet. Maybe you'll have a good time.

I don't know. That's a very low bar. We get through this. Then we go to London for Leanna, Richard Shosham Brady. Hey. Then we got Mexico City, Brandon Marino versus Viti Sig, Steve or Segg. Love.

And we're back to the Mighty Apex for, I mean, just a terrific made event. Josh Emmett versus Lerone Murphy. Like, all honesty, that's a terrific main event. And then it's UFC 314. So I think just like kind of looking at the current slate, we just got to get through next week. And then I think we're going to be off and running a little bit. And we don't have a free Saturday until the 19th I'm seeing. It looks like April 19th.

There's no card. After 314. After 314, we get a break. And then we, uh, we, the road. road show continues for the next three cards hey so we we're at the mighty apex April 5th and then it's on the road for the next four events Miami Kansas City Des Moines Iowa oh baby and Montreal Quebec Canada for UFC 315 so there you have it well thank you all very much you guys rule you're the best and get some sleep everybody

catch up on that hour we lost. Enjoy your Sunday. I don't know what else to say. I'm just so hype for UFC Vegas 104 for A.K. I am Mike Eck, always remember the golden rule. Bigank time. Big Hank time.

Mike, just try it. It's like Shama, but it's better. Goodbye, everybody. Congratulations to Boggwai, Iqalap, though, in all seriousness. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.