MMA Fighting - On To the Next One: What’s next for Alexandre Pantoja after spectacular UFC 310 title defense?

Episode Date: December 8, 2024

Alexandre Pantoja had little to gain and a lot to lose at UFC 310, but he made the most of a tricky situation and turned in another sterling performance. The reigning flyweight champion notched the third straight defense of his flyweight title, taking the best shots that octagon newcomer Kai Asakura had to offer before putting him to sleep with a rear-naked choke submission in the second round. Asakura was already an out-of-left field challenger, so what’s next for Pantoja, who has beaten many of his rivals, some of them twice over? On an all-new edition of On To the Next One, MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck and Alexander K. Lee discuss what’s next for Pantoja following the Pound-for-Pound great’s latest exploits. Additionally, future matchups are discussed for Shavkat Rakhmonov and Ian Machado Garry following a back-and-forth co-main event contest that may have raised both fighters’ stocks, Ciryl Gane after a controversial win in his rematch with Alexander Volkov, along with fellow main card winners Bryce Mitchell and Doo Ho Choi, and more. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Alexander K. Lee: @AlexanderKLee  Subscribe to MMA Fighting Check out our full video catalog Like MMA Fighting on Facebook Follow on Twitter Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Well, hello there, everybody, and welcome to a brand new edition of On to the next one, the matchmaking crowns return following UFC 310. And this will be the final live edition of the program following a pay-per-view because UFC 310 was the final pay-per-view of the year. But that doesn't mean that we're done for the year, doing some matchmaking and doing some other stuff, more on that in a moment. But I am Mike Keck and joining me as always to discuss the follow.

out from a pay-per-view from a matchmaking perspective is the co-host, the co-matchmaker, the Prince of positivity, and my best friend, a guy who I work with every day. We were on the same Slack channels last night multiple times, but I feel like I have not spoken to this man in like a week. Alexander K. Lee. What's up, A.K. I missed you. I missed you, my best friend.

And you're so close, and yet so far. I know. Yeah. You, us, and it was busy for all of us this week, USCDTD. 10. You're going to be busy next week. I won't get to that later, but you're going to, You got a busy week coming up, of course. We will have Mike Boots on the Ground, heck, of course, for UFC Tampa. A little mic on the road, so that's going to be fun in its own way.

But again, I feel like I'm barely going to be able to talk to you. So we cherish these moments, Mike. We cherish these moments when you and I can talk directly with each other, live on air. We can talk with the fans. We can talk with the listeners. We can talk with the haters. You know, it's great. It's a good time, especially after, I think, a pretty satisfying UFC 310 card.

I give it like a, I feel like the card overall, like a solid. How much is it seven out of ten, but that sounds bad. But I mean like seven out of ten in a good way. Like I think like this, this scratch the itch. The scratch the itch for, man, I really hope there's one more like decent, you know, USC pay-per-view before the end of the year. This card, you know, took some hits, but it came together, I think in a nice way. And I, again, overall, I think a pretty good card.

I don't think people would regret their, their purchase. This was one of the, I don't know what the people's pay-review budgets is. If you bought like, if you only buy half the pay-per-views every year and this is one of them, I think it would be all right. You got it for $10 less. the quote unquote holiday pricing which was no one's going to buy this thing so we have to try to get a few extra pay-per-view buys and I don't think a lot of people bought it just kind of based on the trends of this event and that's okay it's the holiday season there's things happening

but yeah I think this is a B minus you know it was Pantosia rocks that guy absolutely rules Rachmanoff and Gary was really really interesting I think we learned a lot about both guys the most thrilling fight, but we learned something about them and we have something to talk about for both. Sierra God Alexander Volkov, hand up watching it live on the watch party, that might be the worst judging, personally self-judging that I've ever done because I somehow, and maybe it's just because I had a bet on God. I was just like, yeah, I'll give it to God.

I don't know. Like it was just one of those fights that was just so weird. And then it just got worse. You know what I mean? like it was better than expectations because it got so heavy weighty and wrestle heavy and it was actually hilarious to watch and then when round three came around it was just so terrible of a fight that i just didn't really know what to do and i was just like eff it give it to god uh i actually aka rewatch that fight this morning please don't do that there's nothing you need to to go back

and learn about it uh so my advice to all of our wonderful viewers and listeners don't go back and we watched that fight, especially not the third round. But hand up, I think AK, the robbery review needs to come back for this one. I actually feel, I don't feel it about, I don't feel it about any other controversial decision. I kind of feel like Volkov got the big, fat, hose job here. And I don't say that very often, but I feel like he got hosed. Yeah, I had a 3027 Volkov.

I was doing the live blog, so people can see exactly how I kind of might breakdown of it. I wasn't as outrageous people. I do find it hard to give Gone three rounds. I think all the judges were right. They gave round three to Volkov. Thank goodness. I think there was some worry that because Gone was fighting for some futile Kamara for like three and a half minutes longer the entire round almost, like that they would give him the round. But I mean, again, Volkov was on top.

He wasn't doing much, but he's landing little insignificant strikes, I guess is the best way to put it. Volkov's landing a lot of those. And I think that's enough to take the round where neither guy did significant damage. So round three, I think was fine. You know, all the judges gave it to Volkov, which is great. And then Comijo and Adelae Byrd gave it to, the first two rounds for gone. Excuse me, that's how we got our split.

I don't, again, I don't think it's the worst. I don't think it's so worst. It is bad. We've had a lot of bad cards this year. I don't know any out and out robberies. This was probably, I'd have to watch again. I'd have to watch again. I just told us all not to.

I would have to watch again. It's, I wish Volkov had done. a little bit more, which isn't fair to him, because at the end of the day, when it comes to the 10-point must system, you only have to do enough to win to be the guy who was ahead to get the 10-9. And I think asking Volkov to, oh, why didn't he, why wasn't he more aggressive on the fee? Why didn't he do more damage in the ground? Why didn't he, you know, it wasn't, it's a little unfair. It's a little unfair, right? Because by the letter of the law, it does look he did more to win at least two of the three rounds, if not all three. But gosh, it's just in a fight where not the guy gets that close to

finishing. I do struggle to call it a robbery, but I don't blame people. This was, if you were going to do like the top five questionable decisions of the year in the UFC, probably up there, probably up there. And we've, again, we've had a few. We've had a ton of questionable scorecards, that's for sure, which thankfully, like, you know, I think the right person ended up winning anyway. This was one of, this was maybe the year of like, you can make a list of like 20, I think, head scratching scorecards that, again, thankfully a lot more, a lot of the time didn't affect the end outcome. But, yeah, it wasn't a great year. It wasn't a great year. It wasn't a great you're for judging in some of these

some of these fights. Overall, as I always say, like, I don't think as bad as people think, but it sucks that there are so many examples that people could bring up to, like, to criticize where the scoring is right now. Dude, there were three on this card just last night. Three that got people all pissed off. I think one was real bad.

I don't think the other ones are bad. I thought Randy Brown beat Brian Battle. I had a bet on them, too, so maybe there's some bias going on there. I just, I still thought Randy won. And I thought, I thought, I thought Mobsar of Loy have beat Al Jermaine Sterling. And there were a lot of people very upset about that take.

And I rewatch that fight as well. And I feel even better about Movisar winning that fight. And I actually felt in the rewatch that I think you can make a better case for Movesar winning 3027 than you can for Al Jermaine winning 2928. Sure, sure. It's close though. Like this was like if Leib didn't blow the doors off Sterley. just a fun-ass fight. And if you want to go back and re-watch something and have some fun,

that is one to go back and re-watch and enjoy because it's actually just as good the second time around. But I felt pretty confident of one watching it live and I felt even better about it watching it again. Yeah, listen, this is what's going to happen when you have competent, high-level matchmaking. Gone Volkov was a really good rematch to book and you ended up getting, again, probably not the fight people expected, but you ended up getting like, again, two guys, showing off some of their skills like con god actually really legitimately showed advances in his wrestling and submission game like not enough that i thought he was better than volkov but that was surprising to see uh as you mentioned in blois and sterling was just fantastic to watch like no i get not

i get it not a wall-to-wall thriller but as far as watching like a battle of wills and two guys with just truly truly magnificent wrestling and grappling um that that was fascinating to watch and again a pretty close fight i i don't think people should have been upset with the decision and Brian Battle and Randy Brown before the egregious weight missed by battle was one of like the sleeper fights on this card. So all of these fights were expected to be competitive. I understand if people don't agree with the judging in the end, but I think all did turn out to be competitive. And yes, maybe maybe the right guy didn't like definitively get their hand raised in the end, which is unfortunate. But you could have like ahead of time said, well, I bet Battle Brown could be a close decision.

I bet a Vloy of Sterling could be a close decision. Gone Volkov, I'm not sure people leaning on that way, but I wasn't surprised that it was close. So people don't cry robbery all they want. Again, I just, I'm always reluctant to do it. I think sometimes close fights are just close fights, but Volkov has probably the best case for a grievance. I completely agree. And a lot of people are giving me crap about the Yvoyev take. And I was like, look, man, you got a punch.

Like, you have to do some damage. And you can control a guy for three and a half minutes. Like, that's totally fine. But if the other guy has a minute of control time and he actually lands punches, he wins the round. Like, that is just the criteria. That is the rules. You can't, you can have a guy on his back all you want. But if you do nothing, it's essentially like standing up and not punching.

It's the same thing. It's just a positional change. There's no domination. There's nothing close to finishing the fight. None of it. And the damage was done by Mobsar of Lov. So that's why I don't have an issue with 3027. That's why I felt even better on the rewatch.

but let's just get right into this, AK. I got to tell you, of all the post-paper view onto the next ones, this might have been the toughest one for me, and we'll get into it in a second. I also had a little bit of fun, as we'll also get into. Let's talk about Alexander Pantosia. I am here

to tell you, AK, I know we're not doing a ranking shake-up or anything like that. I have already bumped up Alexander Pantosia three spots in my pound-for-pound rankings. One, because I think I've just had him way lower than I should have. And two, this guy is just, great. He's not very good. He's great. He is unbelievable. In my opinion, he is

cemented his place as the second best flyweight of all time in the UFC behind Demetrius Johnson, the man he called out. And I would love to live in a world where we are talking about a build to Alexander Pantosia versus Demetri's Johnson. We are not ever going to get that fight. Demetri's Johnson will not go back to the UFC. He retired making millions and millions and millions competing for one against lesser competition for the most part and i love the the call out and the gusto from pants because he's fought all these guys anyways so what do we do here okay who does alexander pantosia fight next after pretty much fighting everybody already uh this wasn't a hard episode for me i think i had done some previous like matchups with so-and-so faces winner

loser etc etc from this main card so but but i also don't love like everything i landed on like it didn't take as much time to follow up something match like that. But there's nothing, I don't think I came up with anything where I'm like, not even like crystal ball picks, we're like, oh, if this happens next, I mean, super hype. Like, I think I see a path, a logical path for a lot of these guys. And some of them, like, I hope I'm wrong. I hope the UFC pulls out something, like, kind of creative matchmaking that I hadn't even thought of and gives us something exciting.

So a while ago, I think after Roy Vowal's last win, really, I've been calling for him to fight Pantoja again for a while, probably too early, probably too early after their first fight. But now that Patoja's two defenses removed, Roy Val, I think is two fights removed from that loss as well. Their second fight, run it back, run it back. I've said so many times, I just don't think that was the best version of Roy Val. No excuses. That's on him.

He should have showed up on Fight Night. He lost Fren Square to Pantosia, but it should have been a much more exciting fight. It should have been a much better showing for Roy Ball. It should have been the year of the raw dog. And frankly, it could be again. So I do want to see them fight. Again, this is something I called for. And that's about it.

That's really I'll have to say about it for now. I would love a DJ fight, and that'd be so cool. I'd love it if they could find some other flyweight champion from another league that I can't even think of. I don't even know if there is a more intriguing guy than Asakura, who wasn't even a flyweight over in, in Ryzen. But I think the safe thing to do is Mantotia for Royval, which, again, we're talking a co-main event here. And they might give a $15 discount for that one, if that ends up being a headliner, Mike. Not going skiing. It's just freaking cold and command center 4.0.

Nick, please don't, don't even talk about this. No Henry Shihudo fighting for any belts. That would be just be absolutely insane. You want to hear Boston might come out in full force. That would be one of the things that will absolutely do it. Plus, their buds, they've trained together. I don't see them fighting each other. So I have a crystal ball pick and then I want KioG Horror.

I mean, I want DJ. That would be the first choice, obviously. obviously, Keoggi Horaguchi is choice number two. Kioji is fighting December 31st on that Ryzen decade card against Kazamulo-Zulu. And there seems to be a little relationship between the UFC and Ryzen these days. So maybe we have Pantosia to sort of run the V-Risen championship gauntlet. I would have no issue with that.

Plus Horiguchi friggin rules. And that's just a really fun fight. I actually think Pantosia would probably, win that fight and be kind of pretty favored to do so the more I look at it but that'd just be fun it's just a different kind of a story we could tell it'd be like a terrific co-main event for a pay-per-view if we're not going that route let's say horriduji loses December 31st then we're right on the right track a kay not quite a friend's forever it's brandon versus brandon three winner of that keeps the name and gets a title shot oh okay okay so

So we got a little buildup. You're not throwing either brand into another fight with Pantosia's just yet. Yeah, I mean, that made that's fine. That's fine. The other thing I thought of was the ship has so clearly sailed, and I don't think we see this guy back at 125. I would love to see Pantosia get a chance to get the Figgi lost back. Because that was a long time ago.

I think that was 2019. And I'm not sure it goes any differently. Like, I think Figgie is just that good. And like matchup-wise, like, you know, styles to make fights, right? He could fight Moreno five times. Maybe Moreno always be. beats him, but he could fight Fingi could fight Pantosia five times and maybe Figgi beats the majority of those contests.

I don't know. So it's not going to happen. I think Figgies having a good time at 135. I think that's where his career is going to ride out. But that's a win because I am a believer that Pantos can keep climbing in the flyweight, like all time great rankings. I don't think there's enough time to catch up to Demetius Johnson. That's just not going to happen.

Even if Demetius came back and beat him, it wouldn't necessarily make him better than Demetri's on the list, right? You still have to compare resumes. There are different points in their career and so on and so forth. But Ficky is one I would like to see him get back because I do think you look at the mark and you're like, oh, well, this is one of the losses that keeps him from being, you know, me putting him over, I don't know, whoever you want to put like Sehudo if you have him up there, which, no, no, no, Al Jemetreth, DeMetre-Johnson.

So it's not going to happen, but that would be a cool one. But no, I think we're leading towards, yes, a brand and rematch. I lean towards Royval, but that's pretty much, what's that's. in store for Pandojo. He's a great champion. He's a great champion. It's a shame people think so low of the Flyweight division. I always see comments like the division is bad. And I'm like, it's not bad. It's just not deep. It's just of the men's roster, they have the least amount of fighters. But if you go 1 to 20, I'll put the top 20 of flyweight against any other division in the UFC. Look at the names in the flyweight division in the top of them. Look at the UFC's top

15 rankings. Look at our top of the rankings. Look at Fight Matrix, whatever. Well, they use other promotions. But everyone from 1 to like 20 is someone who are like, oh, they have the potential to either be top 10 or compete for a title. And not just because of how thin the division is, but because of their skills, how exciting. They're like, you've probably seen very few bad flyweight fights this year. And again, there's less than other divisions, I understand. But it is such a good division.

This goes back, honestly, to when Demetrius was champion and people were running down his challenges. It's just never going to get their respect to deserves, just because they don't, it doesn't, it's not as many guys. But the quality has always been high. So, I don't know. We had so many people in the watch party chat calling Pantosha boring last. night what are you talking about this guy is like so fun that Moreno go go

rewatch the Moreno fight from last year like it is the best flyway title fight of all time so good it's not by far it's the best flyway title fight of all time it's so good and Pantosia is just fun but if you give him if you hand him he made vini like him and Vinnie Siggs had a fun scrap that fight was good that was a good good it was really good it was really good the right was like was wasn't yeah that was the one would be but i don't blame pants for that that was just royval being like and he even admitted like you played it safe he didn't do the the raw dog it wasn't the year of the raw dog at least not that card but i'd love to see those guys fight again and if brandon beats brandon then we get brandon

versus pants again but let's continue out let's talk about kai secura because there's an interesting question here aka does kia secura remain at flyweight does he move back up to bantam weight because there's a lot of fun fights for him there. And I'm a man of consistency. I'm a man who likes to take a gimmick to the next level. I'm a man who likes to extend the theme for as long as possible. And if we're going to do Brandon versus Brandon, we might as well do Kai versus Kai, aka a little Kai Asakura versus Kai Kar, France.

A little flyweight action. Maybe we do that at UFC 312, AK, little Kai versus Kai. What do you think about that? Yeah, it's, it's, okay, so I think I had previously matched up Kairkar, France with someone, which I guess is why I didn't want to lean in that direction. But it's such a cool idea. It's such a cool idea. It does feel like it has to happen in Australia because with that car come up.

But that's a bit of a turnaround for Asakura, especially since I don't know how easy the 125 cut was for him. I saw a lot of people. I got a DM or two about, if he was like, oh, do you think, like, Kai's going to make it? He's only competed at 135. And I said, well, yes, he is very tall for the division. But they don't really cut weight over that, in Japan, that much. It's just not a thing, like extreme weight cutting.

Same with, right, we talk about one championship all the time, and that's not the same, you know, that's not the same place. But I'm just saying, outside of the U.S., there are definitely promotions and, like, fight cultures that don't do the extreme weight cutting thing. So that's just not what Kai was doing. I think he's actually closer to 125 than, than people think. But I don't think it's an easy cut.

So my concern is that he's not someone who, if he stays a flyweight, will want to be fighting like three times a year. I think that's actually hard for him to do. And I think his future probably is to just go to 135 and have exciting fights there. So that's my one worry about the turnaround for Australia, which we know is happening in a couple of months.

I just don't know if he should stick around at 125 and try to fight again that frequently. So I had to, but I mean on paper, that's a very probably a super logical matchup. I had to go back on a previous pick. I wanted Charles Johnson to fight this guy, but I think the other way to go is Manel Kopp, win-l-l-lose-draw-fers-Brunner-Silva,

trilogy-bilt with Kai-Sugar. They fought twice in Risen. Kai won a pretty close fight the first time around, and then Kopp just smashed him in the second fight. So Kai would definitely want to get that one back. It's to the point where I think people forget the first cop fight happens. So Kai would definitely want to get that one back. Kai would definitely want to get that one back.

Cop, I think, would love to fight Kai. Again, he's got the win on him. Kai has a bit of buzz. I know, I know, you know, the fight didn't go his way. And after he beats Bruno Silva, it's actually going to be kind of unclear where Cop is going to go. So that's a good way to aim up. Again, I don't know if, I don't know where Kai is going to end up in the rankings in ours

or UFCs when two zero is around. He'll probably, they'll probably put a number next to his name just to make it, you know, just to justify what they did. Yeah, of course. But yeah, I think cop, that's still a good fight for cop to take. And by the way, sorry, one more thing. I know I'm rambling a lot today. We love it.

Kai didn't do badly. Like, he landed his flying knee in the first five seconds that I'm telling you, that would have knocked out 80% of the fighters in the flyweight and the phantomweight division. That was clean. That was clean of Vantosia's shit. It's not Kai's fault that Pantoja is not human. Okay, Atoja cannot be finished. That landed clean.

He landed actually a lot of good shots of Pantoja. Pantosia is just that dude. So give all the phrase to Pantosia, guys. Pintoja is so fantastic, but don't make it sound like, oh, Kai wasn't deserving and Kai got, like, run over. He's not as, he's not as good as Pantosha. There's no shame in that. Pantosha friggin rules.

He's one of the top five pound for pound fighters in the world. So don't, like, take too many negatives out of this. Kai fought the way everyone expected him to fight. Very aggressive, uh, defense, secondary. And guess what? Yeah, that resulted in him getting finished. But he gave the people what they wanted. So I don't know.

I hate the idea of the building like, oh, this proves he didn't deserve it. I thought he fought fine. He fought the way he fought. And he lost the way he fought. No, he fought a dude. You can't hurt. I mean, that was the thing for me was as soon as he landed that. And I didn't know how clean that flying knee, that jumping knee was until I saw the replay.

I was like, oh, my God. Like he hit it with everything. And not only did it do nothing, Pantosha turned it into offense, which is so ridiculous. He's just such a freak man. He's so good at this. And to me, I think that was, he fought the best Alexander Pantoja we've ever seen. That was the best performance of Pantosia's career, which is saying something with all the great performances he's had. He just, Kai had moments.

He got run over, man, but just by like a dude who was just on one. And you knew it as soon as man hit and you saw him start that walk out to the arena. You were just like, something's happening here. This guy might be in some trouble. So, yeah, flyweight's real fun heading into 20, 24. let's see what Men Elkoop and Bruno Silva do. And yeah, we know where Shafkat Rachmanov's going, AK. He's going to fight Belaw Muhammad for the Welterweight title.

Beats Ian Machado, Gary in a very competitive fight. 48, 47 across the board. I think everybody sort of, one of the easiest fights to score, maybe of 2024. We just knew what this is, what this is going to be, one, two, four for Shafcott. Gary almost gets the win in round five out of nowhere. the Wiley Stryker almost submits the

the menacing grappler but Shafcott gets the win we know where he's going so we don't need a matchmate for Shafcott Rachmanoff. We shall matchmake for Ian Machado Gary, okay? What are we thinking here? Because yes it's a loss but it's a loss where he obviously

wins in a lot of people's eyes because one he stepped up and took on the boogeyman two as he said and he's not wrong made Shofcott look human in there And three, when you do the UFC a favor in a big spot, especially when you perform like that, you're usually rewarded with something good, where they treat it as not a loss, but a win in some respect. So I'm super curious where you went for Ian Machado, Gary.

Let me say, I got so excited about that rear naked choke until Rogan gave us a, oh, that's in deep. He could have that. And then. saying that watch me. And then immediately like my energy level job, I'm like, oh, he's not going to finish it. This was this was a bet. It's not even worth commenting on anymore. Like, it's not even a joke anymore.

Like literally, I don't think he's once called the entire year, probably the last five years, once called a submission, like a near submission correctly. Just has not, just can't do. I think like there's one point on the Volkov gone fight at the end where he's like, oh, Volkov's going to choke gone out from like side control. Like, I was like,

what the, are you, what is going on? There's no, there's no doubt that like Joe Rogan knows way more about grappling, submission grappling, jujitsu than I ever will. But something happens when he's in front of a live mic where all just rational thought just goes out the window. And again, it's his job to make things more exciting. This is broadcast. He's not doing like a written essay on, oh, the fight. So I'm sure if he like really looked at footage and broke it down, like he actually,

I think Joe Rogan could actually give you like a better, pretty good grasp of what he's watching. It's just when he's live and he's cage side. Holy crap, once he sees anything close to his submission, he just goes insane. And that one actually did look good until he said it. And I'm like, ah, damn it, Joe. So I'm not blaming Joe Rogan, but I was just like that that's funny. I can't stand this guy, him and DC both calling submissions locked in anymore because they're just not. Man, Ima Chado Gary, his stock rose.

And he nailed that post-fight press conference. Great, really good performance. Nailed the post-fight press conference, you know, said the right things. Well, like, he didn't think he lost the fight, but he did. But also while putting Rachmanov over, you know, not saying like, not saying like, oh, I destroyed him. this guy was nothing known. He's like, he's like, I know how good Shopcott is. And that's how I know how good I am now.

That was perfect. He nailed that, how to laugh about having to change his shorts. He complimented Jose Young's jacket. It was just a five out of five, like a star performance on the mic for Ian Machado, Gary after. If you like him, I think you'd like him even more.

If you don't like him, it's not going to change your mind anyway. But this, this was how to handle your first career loss, especially one where you pretty clearly won two of the rounds against, yeah, the boogeyman, the dangerous man of the welterweight division. So somehow both guys stock rose.

I mean, again, Rachmanov made a state neutral, but that's all where it need to be, because like we said, he was supposed to get the Talas shot anyway, still in line. And Ian Machado, Gary, I think sounds to a lot of people. I've always thought he was a really good fighter, and I saw a lot of people saying he was just getting trucked. I picked Rachmanov to win,

but I didn't think Gary was going to have his moments, though surpassed even my expectations. Mike, we might be, we might be queuing up the band. Oh? I don't know. We got a card coming up next week. We got a name in the main event that Mr. Ian Machado Garry is not a fond of. And I feel like...

I have a message for the band. Oh. I have a message for the band. Oh. Keep drinking coffee. Have some more breakfast. Oh, no. No playing for you.

Oh, no. Because Colby Compton, of course, is fighting walking Buckley and next Saturday's main event. And I never match me for Colby because I think I say every time someone brings it up in the fix. Like, I just don't care about seeing me. this guy fight again. But he is fighting again. He's blocked. He is fight. So let me see Colby if he wins. After he depresses us all by beating Joaquin Buckley in the last UFC fight of the year, he's going to call for Ian and we're going to see that fight. Do you think he calls for Ian? I don't think he calls for him. I think this is the right time.

He's going to call for a title fight. One guy, no, no, please no. Dude, he's if he goes in Because almost the same reasoning that Ian Gary gets praise here, he stepped up and did the UFC a solid. At least that's how the UFC brass will view it. He goes in there and saves a fight night card, which is probably going to break a gate record. Let's be honest. It'll probably be the highest selling fight night

in UFC history in North America, because they do that every time. If Colby goes in there and thumps up, Joachim Buckley, he ain't jumping. I mean, I don't like this either, as you can see. But at the end of the day, Colby is one of the three best prize fighters

in history of the UFC. The man just knows what he's doing. You can like him, you can not like him, totally understand both sides of things. He is one of the three best prize fighters in the history of the company. And the reason he took this fight

is because he probably knows what could come from it. So if he wants to fight Gary, then they'll just give him that. I don't think he's going to call for that. and as a matter of fact, if he goes out there and just dominates, I don't think he's going to fight at all

until he gets a title fight. And you know if Bilal Muhammad beats Shafkod, you know who Bilal's calling out. He's calling out Colby Covington. Guarantee it. It is a freaking guarantee. So, Ian Machado Gary's going to fight Kamarer Usman next.

They're just going to make it happen. I like it. I will say this. The biggest loser of UFC 310 was Kamar Usman. Him what, him, first of all, him not fighting Shafcott

was unreal. Like I'm still absolutely shocked that he did not take this fight because this is it, man. Like, it's a new division. And this new generation of welterweights are coming. They are coming and they're coming fast. And they're jumping over Kamar right now.

Every single one. one of them. Ian Gary is now above Kamaro in the UFC's eyes. Shafcott is above Kamara in the UFC's eyes. Wachim Buckley right the second is above Kamaru in the UFC's eyes. And even the man I just talked about, because he's stepping up, is above Kamar Uspin in the UFC's eyes. Not to mention Leon Edwards because they do go to the UK twice a year. Kamaro, as each day goes by, is getting more and more forgotten in this conversation. And I thought it was absolutely malpractice that he did not take this fight because even if he lost like who cares

you could be in the same sort of position as Ian Gary right now it's like dude you stepped up on short notice and fought Hamzot and Shafcott and back to back fights like you're a menace he will have favor forever doing that and I guarantee you him watching that fight and watching

what Ian Gary was able to do with some of the grappling he was probably like son of a bitch I could have beat this guy I really and I honestly think like in the division, if Kamaru is on, he is a really tough fight for Shafkat. Like,

he's a really difficult matchup for Shafcott. I think the more that this division plays out, the further back he falls. So I think he lost a ton here. So I think the one way the UFC is going to pitch this to him and his team is they're going to say, look, man, you've got to fight this guy.

Like, you can't pick and choose who you're fighting here. You're not fighting Leon. you're not fighting Colby, you're not fighting any of the big names, you're not welcoming back Jorge Mazat all. You're fighting this guy. Like, this is what we're doing. Either take it or you're just not ever going to fight for the belt again. Take it.

And I think that's kind of the situation that they're going to have to put him in right now. So, yeah, I think they're going to go Gary versus Usman. If Colby goes out and loses to Joaquin Buckley, could I see them trying to do Gary versus Colby? Sure. But if Colby wins, Colby ain't fighting. Gary? There's no chance that fight happens. I'm not as hard on Kamaru, but in the court of public perception, this was a big hit.

This was a big hit for sure. He never should have even thrown his hat in the ring in the first place. That was the big misstep. If he had just said nothing, sure, there would have been some speculation. Oh, can Kamar's step in for UFC 310? But, again, this is what happens when you enter that podcast world, right? It's like, you've got to say stuff, you've got to put out content. And sure enough, of course, he's asked about UFC 310.

He's going to say, yeah, I'll take it out. I'm ready to fight shop car. I'm not scared to him. I'll take him. Yeah, we trained together, but whatever, that doesn't mean anything, blah, blah. And that was his mistake.

And now, you know, people, everything on the internet lists forever, people will keep those receipts forever. It's just one of the things people are always going to bring up. Why didn't you fight a 310? Oh, you ducked shot. You could have had shot shot caught. You could have what Gary did.

Look what Gary is now. Gary left over you now, maybe in the contender ranking, just because you didn't fight and all this stuff. And again, and I'm not saying it's fair, but the door is open to that. So again, I'm not. as hard because I think I want to believe Usma knows what he's doing. I'm not entirely sure what

his strategy is right now, but if he ends up getting like a favorable fight somewhere in the first half of 2025, then good for him. It all worked out. But this was like, you know, would have been a nice situation for him to step in and see, see where he is with Shotcott. See where he has in the current division. And like you said, if he loses, it's what would have been expected, right? And that's what happened to Gary and he's rolling with it. I still believe Colby, Gary can happen only because, now you know him better than I do, Mike. You've spoken to Colby many times. I have to think there's a part of him that is, clearly he's willing to wait.

I was going to say that doesn't want to wait. Clearly he's willing to fight once a year, so it doesn't matter. But, you know, she doesn't know when Shabkat and Bilal's going to have books. I guess we're all assuming 313, 314, 315, fingers crossed somewhere and there, depending when Bala is ready. And the Walter Huit Division is kind of moving. I don't know if he thinks if he's that confident they'll throw him in the there as much as they like him, as much the political climate around the UFC maybe favors him

right now. I don't know if he can bank on that anymore. And I think there's enough juice in the Gary name, plus Colby actually thinking he can maybe win that matchup that he would at least consider it. I don't think it's his number one choice. I do think he's going to do the callout, though, Mike. I do think he's going to do the call out. He doesn't have to stick to it. He doesn't have to stick to it, right? Like he said, things change. Boom, pivot. Whenever Usman Rokmanov's announced pivot to that I'll beat up all these bonds blah blah record a little video on his Instagram or his Twitter whatever he does when those things happen

pivot no one wrote whatever we'll have the Gary call out but this is the fight game you can call someone out you can change your mind the next day it doesn't matter there's so many podcasts so many outlets for you to speak your opinion just keep yourself in the mix and I think that's what company's going to do it I think he's going to keep his options open so maybe it's a bit wishful

a bit of wishful thinking but I'd like to see him and Gary share the cage yeah I mean I'm shocked this that was a perfect main event for Tampa but now Gary's like but again like legacy and name value and what you've done in the past

don't mean shit anymore what it comes down to is availability is your best friend and when that phone rings if you say yes you're in a much better spot than the guy who didn't that's just today's UFC

that's the modern era of the promotion that's what it comes down to and what Shafkod and Gary both did by taking this fight this is very old school shit this is the stuff that we made us fall in love with this sport a decade ago was seeing the two best guys fight seeing guys take risk and just putting it all on the line like shop cut putting a title

shot on the line he could have waited three months and fought for the belt he said epit i'm going to fight this undefeated dude i'm just going to fight because i haven't fought a year no one no one would fight me so i'm just going to fight him like it's it's sick it was awesome everything about it was awesome. Wasn't the most thrilling fight, but both those guys, shout out to both of them. Mike, I'm glad you talked about those fights a lot because I am in no rush to get to our next

matchmaking job here. I struggled, man. I struggled to the next one. I'll just say that. Well, here's what I will say. I always take a road for a reason. My brain works in just really mysterious ways. Interesting.

We talked about the loser of UFC 310 and the Walterweight Division was Kamar Usman. I wonder who the winner of UFC 3-10 from a guy who did not fight at all last night on the entire card?

Tom Aspinall. Tom Aspinall, the price to pay for Tom Aspinall just went up significantly after last night. The UFC is now in a position. And you know who else won?

John Jones won last night too. Because the UFC is now in a position where Tom Aspinall is no to fucking fight. Like, he has no one to fight. Because God ain't getting a title shot after that performance. I'm sorry. He's just not getting it.

And you can't give it to Volkov. Court of public opinion aside, you can't just give a guy who lost a fight a title shot, even though the masses feels like he won it. Now the UFC's like, okay, Cyril's going to beat Volkov. And then we could do Cyril versus Tom. That could be the real belt.

And then John can go fight Alex Pereira and, like, do it. whatever. Now Tom is nobody to fight. And now the UFC might just be forced to pay John and Tom, whatever it takes to book this fight. And here's a message to Tom Aspinall and his management team. The price today is not what it was yesterday. Your price just went up to fight John Jones after what just happened yesterday. The UFC wanting and needing you right now, their desire to have you compete against somebody at high level, just shot through the roof after what we just saw in the Cyril Gahn fight.

So, I'm going to say Cyril Gahn has to fight Sergey Pavlovich next day, okay? Like, I don't know what to do. He's not getting Aspinall. He's not fighting for the belt. I wouldn't even hate if they did a Volkov trilogy fight next because he gained nothing from this. It was tough, man.

It was tough. And I respect the honesty and him being so pissed off about all of this. got hurt early and I and I take that into account of all of this. But it was just so bad the way that fight ended, man. I say he fights somebody else and Tom just kind of chills and hopes the UFC picks up that phone and says, hey, John's in. It's nasty. It's nasty. Yeah. I know. I hate myself for it. No, I know. I honestly, I didn't even lock in here because for me, you know, me, I'm still living in a dream world where John Jones versus Tom Aspinall is going to have.

And it's going to be neatly resolved by the third week of January. We're going to hear, oh, John changed his mind. Him and Tom came to an agreement, shook hands, and we'll have John Jones versus Tom Aspinall sometime during your C-fight week or something like that. I can't let it go. I really want to see this fight happen. I know it's not. So my pick, my, I guess, my magic wand pick, I guess, was gone as the backup for Jones

Aspinall. Again, such a weak choice. I know I have, I really. didn't know where it maybe gone ends up fighting Curtis Blaze or some shit put his wrestling his newfound wrestling skills to good use like it really was like one of the worst possible results the US he could have had as far as sorting out what to do with this whole Tom astronaut John Jones and then everyone else situation so I guess my official pick is yeah he's gonna fight Curtis Blades sometime in 2025 but I can't imagine still wanting that to

having any interest in that fight I think it would be a good fight intriguing at least like good in the way this fight was on Saturday But yeah, I don't know. That was, that was messy business, man. That was messy. So messy. Absolutely just, just a disaster for the heavy weight division. It's already historically bad right now anyways.

Like, this is just the worst thing that could happen. People are wondering why, like, Dana was so pissed off last night at the post-fight presser. That fight did not help. There's no way that fight helped at all. So, uh, Cyril Gone versus TBD, we shall see what happens. Now we have to talk about featherweight again. Bryce Mitchell has won the flat earth bowl. Congratulations to him.

He slam KOs, Crone Gracie, and then lands two probably unnecessary elbows on top of it, because Crone was out the second he hit the mat. And then the first elbow woke him up a little bit, but he was still pretty much out, and then the second elbow almost decapitated him. And Bryce Mitchell back on track after suffering

one of the worst knockout losses in the history of the UFC. I don't know what to do. I mean, I think I know where I'm going, AK, but I'm very curious to see where you went here because Du Ho Choi did call out Bryce Mitchell before this fight even happened. It's almost like he saw something coming and just knew it and set the table. Did you go with that Korean Superboy versus Bryce Mitchell? No, I probably should have.

I probably shouldn't have racked my brain over this one as much as I had to, as what I decided to or say. Is it weird? I kind of want to see how Bryce goes with Aljo. Maybe I'm just still high on the wrestling that we saw. And I guess I get this would be a step back for Osamae Sterling, considering he just had a pretty competitive fight with a guy who is like the clear cut number two featherweight in the world.

You're going to get mad about that. With respect to Volk and Holloway, I'm picking Evloia to meet everybody except maybe Ilya right now. I think Ilyev is that good. But Osmey and Sterling also still very good. This is a former UFC champion, and I probably, I picked a Vloyev, but I think I picked a Bloyev to win a little bit easier than it turned out. So I didn't give the man enough credit.

He really gave, he really gave Vloy run for his money. So I don't know what Aljo's plan is at 1.45. I know he's at the stage where he just wants to angle for big fights. That's totally understandable. But I just don't know if he has the cachet or, again, now the record, now just one in one the division to do that sort of thing. So I think we have to see him tested again. And maybe Bryce Mitchell's the way to go.

Again, we get some more fun grappling and move on from there. And frankly, we can still see what we have with Bryce. I know that Emmett knockout pretty much wiped away any support for people thinking he's going to be a contender one day. But we don't know. The crazier things have happened in this business. Kobe Compton has fought for a UFC title three times. So if you don't think Bryce Mitchell can somehow sneak into a title shot with a good run of matchups, I mean, again, you haven't watching combat.

sports long enough, I guess. And a win over Aljo would move him very nicely in the right direction. I also went with Al Jermaine Sterling. Okay. For do Ho Choi. Come on, Mike. Sorry. I'm going with Bryce.

I don't think Bryce gains anything from this. Cron Gracie is like, I don't want to be an absolute asshole about this, but Cron Gracie is like the 900th ranked featherweight in the world. I'm sorry. Like you just gained nothing from this. Uh, cool finish. It's good to see him back on track. I actually thought the post-fight stuff, uh, was pretty good.

The apology to Joe Rogan, I thought was kind of cool. Uh, all in all, not a bad night at the office for Bryce Mitchell, but he beat a guy who's probably not even in the top 60 in this division. So I can't really give him too much from this. I'm going Bryce Mitchell versus Yusuf Salal. Yusuf Salal gets his opportunity to fight a top 15 guy who's on a role. right now, like on a much better run than Bryce Mitchell is currently on. And I would like to see what he can do, man.

Like, if Bryce beats Yusuf, then to me, I'm like, all right. Like, now we can go. Now we can move him up a little bit more. But we, I just, I cannot, I can't give him too much of a jump after beating Cron Gracie and like almost getting stopped in the second round in that fight. It was real weird to watch. but like Bryce is in big trouble. Almost got tapped by Chrome Gracie.

So, yeah, I'm going Dooh Cho versus Al Jemaine Sterling because he looked friggin' incredible against pretty decent. Like I don't think Nate Landware is a world beater, but Nate Landware would thump Crone Gracie up proper. That fight would not be all that competitive. Like, it just wouldn't. So, yeah, Doho Choi versus Sterling, Bryce versus Yusuf. That's what I went with.

I like both. got no problem with Choi. I went in a different direction. I'm going back to the UFC Tampa well. One more time, my dipping, digging back into those sweet, sweet Florida waters. And I think win-lose or draw,

Cubs wants and Billy Quarantillo. Let's run that one. Let's run Cove and Duo Choi again. Oh, man. They, they, uh, John Anick, when he was doing the, you know, the way-ins, he was like, he was like calling up, like, oh, here comes UFC Hall of Fame.

or doho choi and i was like that's right i'm like do ho choy is a hall of famer in the fight wing of course where his incredible battle with cubs watson which happened in toronto which i was here it's a horrible story i was like i wasn't cage side for that fight i don't remember why i think i was like backstage trying to be studious like poor jose is all the time just backstage barely gets to watch any the fights i think i had the option of being out and for that one i just wasn't and then like i saw like secondhand all this excitement anyway terrible story missed a hall of fame fight live uh good for me um But yeah, where I don't think Choi is necessarily in that situation where like, oh, we just need to book him in fun fights. Like, he's in his prime right now.

I know he's, you know, a little bit older now for a featherweight. It's hard to be, you know, once you creep towards 35 in this division, I know people start to count you out. But there's some element also of like he doesn't have as much wear and tear because he missed so much time. I feel like he's like a fresher 33 than 33 or 34, how old he is than people think. And I actually think he's another guy who could make a charge to a tablet shot in the division. Like, especially with the substantial improvements that he's made. So I'm not like moving him to a top 15 guy yet. I just think like the Cubs fight would be so, so, so fun to revisit.

I think it would probably be the first time that they've rebooked a Hall of Fame fight. I mean, just because they didn't, I'm in the Hall of Fame, trying to think how long the fight wing has even existed. And more often, of course, it's, you know, they induct fights with people who are long retired. But Cove and Choi are still around. So if they ever want to have this opportunity to actually say, hey, here's a Hall of Fame fight part two. This is it. This is it. So I would love to see that no matter what happens with Cove and Quintillo on next hour.

Yeah. I mean, that's obviously fun. But yeah, it's nice to see duo Choi back in there a little more consistently. Yeah. And in his athletic prime because he looked incredible. Like Nate Landware had nothing for him. And Nate usually has at least something for everybody. and most people have everybody read this fight was

duo choy's gonna absolutely clobber him and then nate just got to survive and knock him out and that didn't happen here doho joy just blasted him everywhere this fight went just complete domination he looked fantastic so doho choy is gonna be very exciting let's go to the wild card round ak let's get to it let's match make for a fighter we've not match made for yet we'll match make for them right now who did you go with ak

There was a lot of good options here. I leaned towards Chase Hooper. And I tried to not just go with his callout. I seriously since I had, I think, previously, last time Jim Miller fight, I think I used him as my wildcard pick. And I was like, ah, I'm just trying to find fun matchups, fun vaguely age-appropriate matchups for him. And I drew Jim Miller and with Hapa Garcia. But him and Hooper makes so much more sense. I've seen, like, this was obviously Chase talked about it.

And then I saw the replies on my social media saying, like, ah, he's not on that level. yet and you guys might be right like people might be right um it it is i'm not saying hooper needs to go on a legend's killer tour but that'd be a fine gimmick to go with right now and i think jimiller has a little bit more left in the tank than clay with respect to clay who's still in great shape i just don't think he fighting wise he can pull that trigger anymore i think the skill gap between him and some of the younger guys is just a little too big right now but i wouldn't say the same for jim i mean jim miller is still winning fights jimler still very competitive uh it put again it keeps jim trum trudging along towards, you know, that magic number of 50 UFC fights.

Because again, win or lose, I don't think Jim Miller just retires if he loses to Jay Super. And if he wins, I mean, good for him. And again, not the end of Chase Super's career. Mike, you and I have been very critical of, you know, some of Chase's booking and whether he should have been pushed so quickly into competitive fights in the UFC. Like, should he even been sent back to the regionals? Like on a sort of, you know, modified developmental deal.

But good for him and the UFC for sticking with it. We still don't know what his ceiling is, but he's still pretty. pretty young. And I thought he looked, I thought he looked great against Clay Gweed, as he should have, took care of business. And I think we can still see him fight more veteran guys. So if they want to give him like another like streaking contender, I'm fine with that too. But for now, again, I want to kind of keep gauging where he is. And really more importantly, finding fun fights for Jim Miller. So yeah, I think that was a great, I think it was suggested to Chase, but I think that was a great suggestion from from whoever threw that out there. Yeah, that's that that's fun,

man. I like Chase versus any of those. I like, Joe Lozahn. I know Joe wanted that fight. Maybe when they went to Boston last year, that's like what he wanted. I'm actually kind of surprised you didn't go with Tony Ferguson for Chase Hooper because that actually is like not horrific. I wouldn't feel great about it, but I would understand it a little bit. I think most would be like, hey, you're going to pick Mobsar. I'm not going to pick Mobsar because this is the most obvious matchmaking of all time. He should get a title shot. He won't. So he's going to have to fight Diego Lopez again, and that's going to rock.

And I'm very excited for that. I went with Josh Van. This guy is so fun to watch at 125. We talked about how good 125 is. Josh Van wasn't even ranked at Flyweight. And clearly, he is a top five talent. There's no doubt about it. Little green, little raw, but he beat the soul out of Cody Darden, who was tough as hell last night.

So now we're going to do it. We're going to give this man a little step up, okay? We're going to give them a step up. And we're going to see a world, possibly. If Josh Van is ready to come back in a couple of months, we head to Australia, the land down under, and we do Josh Van versus one, Vicenzo Erseg.

Little Josh Van Vinnie Siggs action, because guess what? The boxing in that fight, the striking in that fight, is going to be unfrigan believable. So Josh Van Vinnie Sig's, come on down. It's a great fight. This division rules. We said, we were talking about earlier, this division rules. There's so, pick two names in the top 25, throw them in there together. Look at next week,

Bruno Silva, Minnell Cop. That's an awesome fight. That's an awesome fight. I know there's not a lot of hype around it. I know Bruno Silva doesn't, for some reason, doesn't get the hype that like Minnell Cop does. Bruno Silva is sick. Like the dude's so good. His fights are so exciting. Yeah, and I love the idea of Josh Vanne Fanniex. So, flyweight just keeps chugging along. Not the deep division. That's fine. But man, just one great fight after another. So good. So, so, so, so. good. All right. We're going to open it up to the peeps. Yes, Mike, I did want to, I did pin a question

YouTube because I wanted to remember to ask you, this is a while ago. This is from Masters of the Universe Classic. What did you guys think of the announcements of Tatiana and Drickis last night, their title fights? Hamzat, I think it's a timing issue. He'll get the shot still, I think. I have no problem with the fights that were booked. I was fully on the Hamzot train for sure for wanting to see him get it, but they've been talking about duplicy and Strickland, too, forever.

So Dana White said like months ago, like, yes, this is the fight. He was pretty transparent, like, that even before the Hamzat win, of course. But so it's fine. I'd rather see Hamzat, but it's a, the time is right, I think, in the degree match. Competitive first fight. Both guys have won since and run it back. It was more the, um, the way it was announces would be curious. They just put Tatiana on screen. And then there's a sudden, there was a lower third. There was a lower third. Like, oh, by the way, she's fighting, uh, Sean Way Lee at USC, Thetown. And I was like, I was like, lean in. I'm like, like, what i'm like googling i'm like i'm like did we miss what did we report this did we miss this and it's

like no it's just happening and i think one reason they did it is because they have no confidence in tautiana make it to fight night frankly and like if it if it plans change it's like what do you mean we never announced it at uc 311 uh 310 i don't remember that so but yeah both great fights uh it's it's gonna the first uh two pay-per views of use of the ufc calendar year fingers crossed no injuries no one like getting forced off the card pretty pretty well set it looks really good my re my initial reaction was just like wow this is out of nowhere i didn't see it because for the same reasons this is just on the lower third and we had to react to it live during in real time during the watch party but the more i think about how i actually felt about it was relief with strickland ddp and not because

like i feel like this is the fight to make it's that it's happening so quickly in 2025 like we're not waiting until August for Dreyst Duplice to fight again and to get the Sean Strickland fight out of the way because that's kind of how everyone's viewing this is like let's just have these two dudes fight whoever wins will go fight Hamzaa Chamaif like Hamzad is next for whoever wins this fight so and I want to see Hamza fight both fight both of these guys like Sean Strickland versus Hamzot Shamaif is really really interesting and then Drick's Duplice versus Hansat Shemayef is just full-off. on transformer shit that I'm really excited about.

So, yeah, the winner's Homsats just going to be chilling cage side potentially, and he'll do a little face off with the winner, and it's happened it earlier in the year. The Tatiana Suarez getting a title shot one was real weird. Not because I don't think she deserves it. It's just like she was supposed to fight Verna last night and then was pulled for quote-unquote health reasons, and then books a title fight two months later. What the hell is that? like verna not get like i feel like verna got the big like she got this the short end of the stick

here like but maybe they already have her like kind of tabbed is like look we're going to announce tautiana but you should probably be ready just in case but she's weighing in she's weighing in that's super weird that one that one threw me off a little bit um i see people asking the comments yeah what was swarza's health issue and and if you remember she actually like when the news broke She reacted right away. I think I don't know if it was to us or made junkie or something. She was saying, oh, this is report's not fake. Like, I'm going to, I'm fine.

So she didn't really acknowledge that there was an injury. Yeah, because it wasn't, it wasn't listed as an injury. It was listed as like when we confirmed it, we were told it was a, it was a health issue. Health issue. Okay. So when she was replying to people is when people saying that Tatianosaurus is injured. Ah, okay. And she's like, nah, dude, I'm not injured.

Like. Okay. You know what I mean? So it was just, it was just a. A technicality. Yeah, yeah. I feel like, I feel like, yeah, technicality. I feel like there's also, like I said,

some communication issues maybe with, I don't know, with her management and the organization or with Vyerna. It is weird. It is weird that, again, we kind of ended up getting the fight we've wanted all along,

but the road to it was extraordinarily bumpy and confusing. But yeah, Vierna will be the backup. She will weigh in. You guys will see her in January. You'll see her at the scale. And hopefully not in the cage the following day, because I do want to see Tatiana and Zhang

just finally get that settled. But if that's what happens, good for Vierna, because she certainly earned a title shot. Yeah. All right. So that's our reactions. 312's looking pretty good. 311 looks incredible.

Wonder where 313 is. Maybe that's Belal versus Shafcott. Let's just book too tight. And maybe we'll throw Valentina and maybe Manifioro is the co-main event on that card. Like, let's just load them up. C-4th, C-14, Jones Aspinall. Yeah, it's great. man, UFC just keeps rolling.

It's crazy. Just keeps rolling along. Tom might have to drop to light heavyweight at this point. He's got nobody to fight. Patty Pimbled, Michael Chandler, co-main event. Man, that's 314 is fire. It is fine.

It's bad. People don't report this, please. Don't report these fights. All right, here we go. Kennedy versus Marcus Rejury to Lima. Good old getting nunchucks. Yeah, we have talked about Nzing. I just laughed when Rogan was like,

we got a new contender at heavyweight. And yeah, heavyweight is maybe the only division. like depth-wise shallower than flyweight. But for God's sakes, he beat a one-legged Chris Barnett. We all love Beast Boy. He beat a one-like Chris Burnett. And he beat Lucas Breske, who is of the Barry Horowitz division of the United States. He's not even Barry Horowitz.

Barry Horowitz got wins. Berwick's got wins. Lucas Brecky beat Walter Walker, I think. I think he's one in five. And again, that's not a big feather in his cap. I don't know where Walter Walker is as far as the people's estimation. but yeah let's chill kennedy's having employed forever though he needs to be employed for i guess he's got real good oh yeah he gets got real good yeah i guess he is one of the i guess he is

one of those guys but uh yeah kennedy having a great time not cutting weight obviously having fun um so i i i will don't know if he's a player in heavy way let's stop guys i know you only need like two or three wins to get to the top 10 but just rogan everyone else just calm down good for him keep getting those checks candy rogo was super positive last night and i and i i do dig it but it's just It's just kind of funny sometimes to hear him say some of the things that he says. Yeah, I don't hate that. Kennedy versus, oh, do we did that one? Yeah, maybe.

Stop booking, stop suggesting anybody fight Waldo Cortez-A-Cost. Come on. No, more salsa boy picks. People give us your best salsa boy picks in the chat, right? I'm so sorry, Mike. I'm so. So much Kennedy here. Kennedy-en-s-Chuku versus Tai-Tinvasa.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe we got a new player at heavyweight. Joe Rogen himself said it, you know? So yeah, yeah, Kennedy ends the two. People are interested. He's like the old yellow fighter where it's just like, let's just take these dudes behind the shed and Kennedy can just take them out for us, make our lives a little bit easier.

Hooper versus Jared Gordon. Not about that. Do the Oliver title run, sure. We need Ty versus Parker Porter. Bring him back. Alliteration battle. Bring it back. I mean, I mean, I thought you liked Ty to Evasa.

I thought you liked him. You want him to just get run over. by New England's finest. Trista, Chase Hooper versus Alexander Hernandez, that's actually pretty interesting. Yep, I like that. Vicente Luque versus Chaos Williams, that fight ain't happening.

That ain't happening. Why would Vicente Luque fight Chaos Williams? No, I mean, it's not that I wouldn't enjoy the fight. Lucke is a ranked fighter. He was supposed to fight Nick Diaz, ends up fighting Temba Garimbo instead. Like, he already took his big step back. So let's throw somebody else in Lukey's direction, perhaps.

I actually thought about matching Gary up with Luke A just as like, Hey, we booked this one not that long ago. Let's just throw you in there. And Gary just gets a win potentially. But I don't know, Brian Battle versus Muslim Salikoff, which I'm actually okay.

Let's talk about Brian Battle. Can we? We can. There are people asking on the post fight show, oh, he should get a top, maybe we should give him a top 15 guy because he's like 4.0 and 1 in his last five. And I'm just like, nah, this guy's going backwards.

Like, he's going back. He gained absolutely nothing from this win against Randy Brown. One, because I don't think he won. Two, a lot of people don't think he won. Three, it was not a good fight, especially down the stretch when Brian Battle started changing momentum. He missed weight, did not care that he missed weight. Not a good night for him. This is Mario Batista-esque in my eyes.

So, what do you do with Brian? battle yeah we're filling in a little uh you fc 310 like post you know post event actual report you guys been following m a flame dot com you know we've been we've been the staff has been tackling those and uh we always ask like best moments worst moments i didn't pick that but i wonder uh if one of you mike you or damon or jed might point out mr battles very very awful 48 hour stretch where he missed weight by four pounds uh second time he's missed weight too that's not like and we know he's like a taller guy. We know he won the ultimate fighter as a middle weight. So it's not like surprising that 170 is less than ideal for him. And again, he said after, oh, you know, whatever, I kind of took

this fight on shorter notice than usual. But that's your decision, man. That's your decision. If you can negotiate it, if you could have negotiated a catch weight, that would have been great, like ahead of time. But you didn't or your team didn't. And now you end up in the situation where it's just such an unsatisfying weekend. For a guy who had lost who were getting high on, because Yeah, he's making a nice run at 170. Clearly has a talent. Clearly has the physical gifts. But you miss weight by four pounds.

You mishandle your microphone time after. Again, saying like, oh, I paid a fine. So it's like, I don't like it's okay. We don't have to talk about anymore. I'm like, that's not how it works, man. Like, yeah, no, I didn't move him down my rankings, but I didn't have him that high anyway. So he just, he remains neutral.

He doesn't take Randy Brown spot. Randy Brown's a top 20 welterweight. He still is in my eyes after that fight. I like Brian. and I hope he gets things sorted out. I wish the UFC had more weight classes because I don't think he's a 185 or either. I think 175 would be perfect with him.

But this is where we are. So I just don't expect Brian Battle to get like a high profile flight next time, guys. I would not expect it. I would give Brian Battle like Carlos Lial, like just a menace to society in that cage. If we're going to do Chaos Williams against somebody, Brian Battle versus Chaos Williams is not a bad idea.

Like that one, I would rather do, that for Brian as opposed to Vicente Lucke. Like he ain't getting this like Salikoff is about as high as I would go with, with battle. Yeah, yeah. You got to be better, man. The Salikov suggestion isn't bad. And you know what?

Listen, this setback again, which, you know, if he had beaten Randy bound, made weight, beaten Randy Brown cleanly, probably vaults him to the top 20, top 25. This might actually be good for Brian battle. I don't think people realize like how he has not been in MMA for a long time. he hasn't really been a dedicated fighter for a long time there was of course infamous photos himself that he has shared of him as a heavyweight like in his very first fight just an enormous man enormous heavyweight so he's still like in in fight years relatively new to this game

um his amateur in 2017 pro in 2019 that's not a long time guys and then onto the onto the fighter onto the UFC um you never want to see guys miss weight you never want to see him win like kind of cruddy decisions like this but this could be good for his development if it does mean he's dialed back and his next two fights are against, again, fighters outside the top 30 because I don't think he's a top 20 guy yet. So battle, I wish you the best. All right, a couple more.

Pantosia versus Kikar, France, fight Amabai, then winner takes on Pantosia. Wait, what? Pantosia versus Kek, I think winner. Oh, okay, okay. Oh, they fight Pantosia. Oh. That's the, okay. Kaya's Kerr versus Brand Royval.

Shafka v. Ball, Ian Garry, versus the winner of Covington v. Buckley. So, Kai Ka, wait a minute. So. Yeah, explain that to me again. I didn't actually didn't get it. So what he's saying is that the number one contender fight, the title eliminator fight should be Kaikara

France versus Asu al-Mabayev. I, no, sorry. Oh, oh, Alexander Prantosia versus Kai Kar-F fights Al-Mabaya then winner things went. Yeah, so it would be what, KKF versus Alma-Av, and then the winner gets the title shot? Is that what I'm

reading here i think that's what they're saying that's i mean i don't hate like yeah because i think i'm a by oh where the hell's moreno in this conversation is it because he beat him three times which i get but the fights are all so good i know it's a hard one's a classic and you could argue you could argue moreno won the uh third fight frankly yeah uh choi versus ege sure yeah speedback uh yeah speed back versus chelton almeida this app that's a fight that's a fight that's happening okay that's a fight yeah and i was almost gonna say the win like just almeda beat him and gets gone but i i didn't want to do that uh pants versus dj that fight's never going to happen i'm sorry i hate to burst your bubbles guys uh dj ain't fighting and if he is he ain't doing in the ufc

because he could have just stayed in one made way more money uh and fought lesser competition i would love to see that fight but it's just never going to happen he he should accept words DJ shouldn't accept less than like five million to return to the ufc and fight i don't even know if that i don't even know if that doesn't and they wouldn't and they would never they They didn't pay him that when he was there. Trust me, they're not paying him that to come back. Yeah. Gary versus Edwards in London,

Belovar Shavka, Volka v. Blades, too. Bryce versus Choi. I don't hate that. Dom versus Rackage seems to be very popular. Lucke versus MVP, Battleslese, Hooper Miller, Anders versus Trayshon Gore. Kennedy versus Ty.

Another Kennedy versus Ty. Maybe he is. Perhaps Kennedy is in Zuchuku is the dude. I hope he fights like I hope Kennedy fights like Motusman in his next fighter I just out of this Oh no no no no no no no

No no no no Battle versus Magny works fine No it doesn't No it doesn't Sorry he doesn't deserve that fight Neil Magny is like Neil Magny is the Elevator to the top 15

He doesn't know You can't give that. He has not earned that. He needs to go get a clean win, make weight against a guy like near where Randy Brown's, right? That's why I don't mind the K.S. Williams, like a top 30 guy. Go in there. Just get a clean cut win, make the weight. Then sure, we could talk about the Neil Magnus of the world.

But not after that. That's a huge. That's too much. Did people not see the weight miss? I'm wondering. Did people just are not aware of the weight miss? It was, and it was a dude who, like, didn't try. Like he did not try to make the weight

And Randy Brown Busted his ass and made it And it played a factor in this fight 1,000% I played a factor So yeah To get the second half of your paycheck That's fine You know and forfeit your 30% or so

To Randy but Yeah man I just can't do it we can't do it Magnet is still Elevated to the top 15 Yeah I'm not for it. I'm not for it.

I'm not for, Phil Roe fought Magny. But Phil Roe, like had clean wins, was finishing people, like that were decent level. Um, but, and Phil like, I don't know.

I don't know. That was a weird fight. That was one of the weirdest fights of all time. So, yeah. Does anybody want to see Neil Magney fight? Who's clamoring besides left lane to see Neil Magny versus Brian battle? Anybody?

I'm looking at the comments right now. I'm just trying to see it. I see nothing. I see nothing. Brian Battle versus Chaos Williams is a thousand times better. Yeah. Last one. Pants versus Asu Amabaya for a fresh fight.

No, no, no, no. Not yet. Not yet. I think they will. I think Asu is on his way. But I just don't think it's next. I don't think you do it next. Should we get Pants versus Raw Dog 2?

Well, we already got it. So, yeah. Oh, yes, yes. Oh, come on, Joseph blows up. Come on, Joseph, Pozo. You're right. Of course, we already got. Should we get it?

Yeah, we should because we got it. I know what he meant. I know what he meant. Yes, I want to see him. I do want to see him. I got you, Joseph. I know what you made. You're all way more mad at battle than everyone else.

Yeah, so apparently you didn't have the volume on during the pay-per-view last night. 19,000 people boo him out of the building. So I don't think that's true because I didn't boo him out of a building. But everybody else in Las Vegas, booed him out of that building. Yeah, it must have been something wrong with our speakers, Mike. I don't know. Yeah, it must have been my, just my television.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I like Brian. He's, like, he's good, man. Yeah, Brian's cool. He's good. He's fun fighter. He's good on the mic, gift of gab, all that fun stuff.

But man, don't side the dotted line if you ain't going to make it. And if you know, you're not going to make it, like, I just wanted to hear the reason. And he said, well, this is the quickest turnaround I've ever had at the division. And it's not like, and he's a big dude. six like if this was like three weeks i would understand it right this was like three months sept it was the paris car right yeah this is a three month turnaround i mean it's not ideal but just say like hey man i can't make it let's push it to january let's do it another time you know but it is what it is that's what what's brian's thing that he says oh you know what i'm

saying you know what i'm saying you know what i'm saying i love that so much no i like i'm not trying to like dump on brian but it's more so i see so much potential in the man oh you know it's just i'm not mad i'm disappointed i was gonna say you're so you're not madding i'm just disappointing in in uh ryan baller right now uh i don't know there's any more of combs but i did let's let's can i say something positive uh happy birthday by kesa hi birthday i know i know i'm sure you guys fed him on the uh the show on the watch party. I read the Cleggwita.

I read the Clegguida today. Yes, how did we record this. 43 years young. Good for you, Clay. Fighting since fighting pro, as far as we know, I bet he's fought, I bet he actually fought in professional fights before that. But fighting pro, first recorded pro about 2003, 21 years ago.

Clay Guida had his first, like, sanctions pro fight that we know of. Chase Hooper was four years old when ClayGuita first fought. Crazy stuff. If Clay Gway decides to retire tomorrow, very happy for him. If he doesn't, it continues to fight. Very happy for him as well. Just crazy stuff. And big, man, my case is that birthday power, man.

That was a vintage case of performance just wore Max Griffin down. And I got that submission in third. So I just want to say something. I just want to say something nice. If McIyev wins his brave fight this month, I could see Dana wanting him back and making it like a timeout. Has to be impressive. Oh, yeah, he's got to be. He has to be impressive.

He's got to absolutely, I mean, it's got to be on missed, not even misfits. it's got to go viral. Yeah. Like a viral finish. A win is not enough. No. If it's a two-round decision. Why would the UFC rush to bring him back?

Like what is what is the rush to bring him back? It's not like he's a giant star. It's a guy who's been a pain in their ass for almost his entire run there. I mean, Dana's been pretty honest about how difficult it has been to deal with Muhammad Mikhail. The UFC does not need any singular fighter at all. They don't need Connor McGregor. They don't need John McGregor.

don't need John Jones. They sure as hell don't need Muhammad Mikhail. Like, I understand why they got rid of him. And it wasn't he like he was cut. He fought on his contractor. They're just like, all right, bye. Grow up a little bit. And I don't think one win against a guy no one has ever heard of is enough for the

UFC to be like, yeah, man, you've learned your lesson. Because it doesn't seem like he has. So go fight outside of the UFC for a year. go win two or three fights then you come back build a name for yourself get people wanting you to come back and not just hey Pantoja needs fresh blood

so let's bring him back after he beats the 4,000th ranked flyweight in the world you know I win a couple of fights like if he was fighting Shorty Torres if he goes out there thumbs up Shorty Torres who's like maybe a top 30 flyweight

yeah okay I'm all right with that that now we can have a conversation. But I don't know. He did say he's willing to fight for free, Mike. And I feel like the UFC likes that. He did say before he was released that he's like, I will fight for free.

Please let me stay in the organization. So that's a pretty good selling point for the UFC, I feel. He is fighting Lutando Pico at a show on December 13. So guys, very soon, just around the corner, it'll be a little midweek MMA. Not midweek. This will be next. Yeah, next little midweek Thursday.

I guess, so this is, yeah, Brave CF-91. I'm trying to think where people can watch this. Brave events, I think, are on their own website, but also sometimes broadcasts. No, I think you need Brave. I think you need Brave TV or something. I could be wrong, though. Follow guys, you know, Krabaka Hitman. Come on, he'll have the hook up for you.

Got you. But he goes a champion from the extreme fighting championship promotions in South Africa. So, you know, it's kind of cool. They go like, I do like that they brought in a champion from another promotion to kind of do a champion champion thing. So that's neat. It's neat. It's not a huge name.

So like you said, Mike, I think for this to go, like it has to be a fish. Viral preferably, but if it's just a grinding through-round wind from Akiav, boy, that is not going to do it. That is not going to get Dana way out of bed. He's not getting a text from that. He will have no idea that that might even happen if that is how that goes. Yeah, Dana is not Vince McMahon and for a number of reasons, but Dana is also like Vince would always do what's best for business if he found it like no door it was always never say never

with with viz like you could do the most what he deemed as the most dastardly thing on earth and if he felt like it's good it makes good business sense he would bring you back uh dana's not like that if you if you mess with that man if you get on his bad side like it's going to take almost a miracle for him to green light something positive happening to you um So I don't know. I don't know what they do with him because it's tough. Because we, I mean, listen to all the program we've done over the past few years. Not only did I think Baham Makhoyev could be the flyway champion,

I saw two division champion written on that guy after his first couple of UFC fights. And then for some reason, just the maturity levels just continue to dwindle, some of the stuff that we saw him getting in fights with mental cop and his team, like just super weird shit. And the UFC just doesn't need that headache. making so much money right now that they don't need it. And I don't care who pants fights. I just want to see him fight. If it's Moreno again, who doesn't want to see him fight Moreno again? The greatest fight in the history of the division. You don't want to see that again?

I'm okay with that. But we'll see how it all goes. What we're done here, we know where the UFC is heading next. They go from Las Vegas, Nevada to the beautiful Amelie Arena and Tampa, Florida. will be there as well. I will be heading out there tomorrow, uh, hanging out the, with the parents all week and kind of going back and forth from their place to Tampa. Uh, we got Colby Covington versus Joaquin Buckley in the main event.

Cubs Swanson versus Billy Corantillo is the co-main event. Minelcott, Bruno Silva featured about Dustin Jacoby, Vitor Petrino. We got Daniel Marcos versus Adrian Yannias. Holy smokes, that fight is so ridiculous. That is a ridiculous fight. Navajo Sterling versus Tukotokos. We know how that fight is probably going to go. Michael Johnson versus Otman Azitar.

This card actually like low-key slaps, AK Drakar Close versus Joel Alvarez. Holy shit. Sean Woodson versus Fernando Padilla, Miles Johns versus Felipe Lima. Damn. That's good. That's a really good fight.

Random Maverick versus Jamie Lynn Horde. Davey Grant is back against Ramon Tavares. someone's someone's getting bloody there and then uh pierre rodriguez versus josephine canudson who is just uh they're both kind of savages so i actually i think this is a pretty damn this will be a fun watch i know we lost hebus and durn i know we lost saiyan urbaga made off uh i know he lost e and gary but all in all this is this is this is pretty this is a pretty darn good card i'm looking forward to it okay this is a great post pay-per-view like cooler like if if you have c310 again that's the the big, the big bang, you know, their last peer view of the year.

You still got, you got the after party. You got out the after party. And that's a youths to have, it's chill. It's chill. Like, there's a lot of Colby coming to fans out there. Like I was saying, like, oh, man, he'll suck if Kobe just like, just drags walking Buckley down for five rounds and beats him. But, hey, I might hate it.

I guarantee there's a lot of people out there who like it. So, and of course, Kobe will be making headlines. I mean, listen, Buckley might too. Like you said, you've touted a lot. The man has done a great job rehabilitating his image after some very, very, very bad. post-fight interviews and interview moments outside with other outlets. But he's back on track. He wins a ton of momentum going in 2025,

and upcoming he wins, as you said earlier. My God, might set up a title of fight. I don't know. Joaquin Buckley could get himself Fighter of the Year votes if he wins this fight. Oh, yeah. 4-0 with a main event win in the final fight of the year against a former interim champion. That's a pretty good year. but we'll be back on the podcast network

talking all things UFC Tampa from a matchmaking perspective right here on onto the next one the podcast. Thank you all very much. Enjoy the rest of your day. We are out of here. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.