MMA Fighting - On To the Next One | What's Next For Justin Gaethje, Paddy Pimblett After UFC 324

Episode Date: January 25, 2026

Justin Gaethje capped off the first UFC on Paramount event with an incredible performance to upset Paddy Pimblett to capture the UFC interim lightweight title in the main event of UFC 324. Following the chaotic main event, what's next for Gaethje in Pimblett in the always-interesting UFC lightweight division? On an all-new edition of On To the Next One, MMA Fighting's Mike Heck and Alexander K. Lee discuss where the UFC 324 headliners go following their Fight of the Night clash at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. Additionally, future matchups are discussed for Sean O'Malley following his co-main event win over Song Yadong, Waldo Cortes-Acosta after stopping Derrick Lewis in the heavyweight featured bout, along with fellow main card winners Natalia Silva, Jean Silva, and more. Follow Mike Heck: ⁠⁠⁠@MikeHeck_JR⁠⁠⁠ Follow Alexander K. Lee: ⁠⁠⁠@AlexanderKLee⁠⁠⁠ Subscribe:⁠⁠⁠ http://goo.gl/dYpsgH⁠⁠⁠ Check out our full video catalog: ⁠⁠⁠http://goo.gl/u8VvLi⁠⁠⁠ Visit our playlists:⁠⁠⁠ http://goo.gl/eFhsvM⁠⁠⁠ Like MMAF on Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z⁠⁠⁠ Follow on Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠http://goo.gl/nOATUI⁠⁠⁠ Read More: ⁠⁠⁠http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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 for the first time in six weeks. The matchmaking crowns have returned following UFC 324, the first UFC event of 2026, the first UFC event of the UFC on Paramount era in the United States. I think some mixed reviews is kind of what I've seen on a lot of different ends. the event was interesting. There was some good. There was some kind of okay. And the main event was frigging awesome

between Justin Gaci and Patty Pimbled. And in the end, Justin Gachi upsets. Patty the batters him, knocks him down several times. For some reason, UFC stats only gave Justin Gagy credit for two knockdowns, which seems absolutely ridiculous to me.

But in the end, the right fighter wins Justin Gachie, the brand new interim UFC lightweight champion. And now likely has a, date with Ilya to Poria and a title unification bout? Maybe not. Maybe he has a unification date with somebody else. Maybe there's a vacant belt.

I don't know. The UFC is a weird and wacky world right now. But thank you for joining us. I am Mike Hack and joining me as always. And I'm very excited to reunite to matchmake with this man, the co-host, the co-matchmaker, the Prince of Positivity and my best friend, Canada's own pay-per-view buying Alexander K. Lee, AK, how we doing? We are back.

We are back, everyone, we're back. I think mixed reviews is probably the best description of this thing. Like, yeah, I mean, I think from us, I think from what we've seen on social media, I don't think anyone thought this card was bad. Like, I would be surprised if anyone was sort of so far on that end. They're just like, oh, what an awful premiere for, on a Paramount for the UFC. I don't know, I wouldn't say it was a home run, but it was certainly enjoyable. It's interesting that, you know, this was also the same week as Zufa Boxing,

you know, the debut for Dana White's little pet project there that was on Friday. And this actually kind of had the feel of a boxing card. It really felt like it was building up to, you know, just this one big fight, which absolutely delivered. Love for this fight so much. Now, that's like in a way that's a little unfair because I do think, you know, we had quite a bit of star power, right? You have former UFC champions. You have top contenders in play. I think just the way the action played out, it felt a little boxing-y.

You know, we had some decisions that were fine, not fights that people will be re-watching at the end of the year, I'm sure, or years from now. But it had that vibe. So it was interesting. It was boxing in a way, but I think in a good way. I think in a good way. And as for the Pim, the G KG knockdowns, I just say. That was kind of a weird one because Pimlet was slipping so much on that mat. And to me, it looked like he got knocked down like nine times, but you could also convince me.

And he was getting poked in the eye a lot. Man, Justin was just had those, some of those points were definitely just slaps, like right in his eye. So I had to like nine knockdowns. But you could also convince me there was like one knockdown. So I don't know. I thought it was five times. He was all like he kept slipping. He was slipping. He was slipping.

He would like land a body kick and he would slip. And I'm like, oh boy, that's a rough. And it wasn't him. It was Derek Lewis. I think some other fighters as well. Yeah, Derek slipped a bunch. It was crazy. Again, I don't know what is going.

Maybe it's just been too long since they've had a, it's a fresh mat, Mike. You know, it's a fresh mat. It's not worn in. No, or it's January, right? It's a par mat. It's a pair. Wow. We're going to have a lot of that guys.

Buckle up. Oh, yeah. Pun City. Slip in a sled. Before we get into the festivities. Scott McCraight. Shout out to him, gifting 10 memberships to the MMA fighting service.

And we salute you, Scott McCrae. Thank you so much. Mixed your views, AKA, how would you grade it? Jed and I both landed on a, we thought B was very fair, only because the main event slapped. We do have a post-fight, like,

report card sort of thing tomorrow. And I comp this to, like, just a weird cold-cut sub that you would get in like Somerville, Massachusetts where it's like the bread is so delicious, it's so good and yummy, but you're getting like $1.99 pastrami in the middle of it.

You'll still eat it because you're hungry, but you're there for the bread. And that's who we got this main car. John Silva Arnold Allen rocked. The main event, rocked. Rose Damai Utis versus Natalia Silva through shot on Mali Song Yudong. Digestable.

Not your first choice of things you'd want to eat. but you would sit there and eat it if you had to. That was by comp. I think B is a solid grade. What did you give it? And we're factoring in a lot of stuff, like production elements, all the ads, all of those different things.

I think B is super fair. Yeah, strong B, positive B. I don't know if on paper what people had the potential for the card on paper, like I said, we know we had the star power. I know we had the Greatman event. But I don't know if this could have been a 10 out of 10, barring some like uncharacteristically aggressive performances from some of the contenders. Like I think even though I know they were favored, because of people like Umar, Natalia Silva, Sean O'Malley,

I don't know if like people were really expecting them to just blow their opponents out of the water and have like highlight real knockouts. Like that's just not what some of these guys do. O'Malley, of course, the exception. O'Malley, I guess if he thought he was going to knock out Song-e-Dong, but Song-I-Dong-Dong is so tough. Even when he fought Corey Sannhagen, Cori-Sanagan, like, you finished him, but it was just like a war of attrition, and just bladed them out, battered them, didn't like straight up knock them out. So there had to be some expectation that we were going to get some, like,

competitive fights on here that were not high in highlights. And that's what we got. And so if that left people feeling a little cold, totally understandable. From a presentation standpoint, there were like some nice little quirks. I thought some of the packages were great. Getting Brent Musburger in there was crazy. The Travis Barker intro, probably a little too long. God, there's so much going on with that.

It's all, you got to, you know, fighting is about a beat. Mike, I don't hear about that? It's like a beat. And sometimes when you're in rhythm, you know, and you just hit them. I didn't think the UFC would bring in an official drummer. Like, I didn't think it was Blink 182 literally the whole time. I was a band. Mike, you and I were of that age.

I like Blink 1A2. Sure. 1A2 fan. But boy, the integration was so strange. They were playing it in the backgrows of interviews and stuff. Like, oh. And again, I don't know. Does Blink have new material from the last decade or anything?

Because they were playing, I guess, what are now considered oldies. Yeah, I think they're like just touring again. Okay. But I don't think they had, yeah, I don't think they had like anything new out. But yeah. There's also a record label thing too, right? Paramount. I assume there's some record label Paramount is associated with that.

I don't know. I don't know some corporate. I had to assume there's some corporate synergy going on. Nothing wrong with it. Like it was different. It was fun. Again, if you like Blackaway 2, you probably enjoyed it. If you don't, I think you could easily ignore it.

Like it was constant, but it wasn't like in your face except for the Travis Barker intro. But I thought that was fine. People mentioned Kate Scott. I thought Kate Scott was great. Didn't have like her usual energy. I'm not sure what it was. I don't know if there was a time zone difference. I don't think she lives in the United States, if I'm mistaken.

We were sort of joking around on Slack. There's like a different cultural energy to MMA fandom. Maybe she got her first real taste of that. But she's done boxing too. She's done combat sports. I think Kate Scott is so great. So I'm not criticizing her performance. I just thought, I don't know.

She felt a little subdued. But maybe she also didn't want to get in the way of some of the bigger personalities at the desk. So I don't know. Yeah, I mean, obviously we were doing the watch party, so I didn't hear a whole bunch. I watched like some of the pre-show in the background because there was like 20 minutes of filler before we got to the actual first fight of the card. She wasn't a great start.

She got better. She got better as the prelims progressed. It seemed like she got a little bit more comfortable as we went on. I thought Chris Widman kind of had a rough start as well, but it seemed like he picked things up as well. Work in progress for a lot of this stuff. So I think putting them all back together, the more comfort they have together as a desk crew, I think things will be a little bit better. Like Kate's used to working with like the same people really.

So she's working with like pretty high level like broadcaster at this point, like former fighters, but people who have been on camera and have been on desk duty for massive events for years and years and years. And then she gets Dominic Cruz and Michael Bisbin and Chris Wybin who could not be three. more different personalities. Who could be, there's really no gray area with the three of them. They're either spectacular or they're horrendous. And that's just kind of how it was. So you're trying to sort of feel that out. So I give her a lot of credit.

I thought the desk overall was pretty solid. And shout out to Dominic Cruz getting into the Hall of Fame. But yeah, interesting night. Hopefully the pacing improves along the way. Honestly. But Zach Candido, the great Zach Candido, even tweeted out, Hey, the first event, we had to do some special stuff. Like, everybody relaxed.

It's all good. Like, the main car is going to, like, the first fight of the main car will start. As usual, next week, we got the first one out of the way. Yeah, three opening packages was a little wild. Like, I love the intro with the, the curtain and the buffer with the intro. Like, that was sufficient right there. That was like four minutes with the Musburger thing. I thought that was spectacular.

Yep. And then we went, and then we went into the Ron Perlman narrated one, which is like three minutes. And then we went to commercial break. And then we came back with the Travis Scott drummer. Opening package, too. We had three opening packages. Back to back to back. That's too much.

Too much. And then we got that Fox Sports style, you know, oh, pre, like they were doing predictions for the co-main event. I was like, boy, what are we doing? I know the card lost. Well, no, I mean, that was a prelim issue, losing a couple of fights. So as Zach Kandito pointed out, probably something they wanted to just try because it was the first time on Paramount.

Like, it's a weird thing to say. Like, do you feel like, they had to do, and again, we always encouraged them to do like new stuff. Like, I think the USC production team is pretty damn good. Do you think they had to feel obligate to sort of take all the, going to slightly different directions given that is the audience that different? Do you think they got that much of a new audience with Paramount Plus? Like, do you think? Oh, my God, yeah. Or the way, who tuned into this, though, don't you think it was still the same audience? Like, there's people who have Paramount Plus, but they probably just, I don't think they randomly went like,

oh, this is on Paramount Plus now. I'm going to watch UFC for the first time. I don't know. I don't know by that. I don't know how much. I don't know. I don't know how much. much like new fans they gained, but I would say more of the casual fan base are going to graduate from this. I have like my brother, one of my older brothers, for example, he'll watch like all the massive events. He'll watch them all. And if there's like one that he's on the fence about, he'll like text me and be like,

hey, is this worth 85 bucks? And then I'll kind of let him know like yesterday or how I'm feeling. He was super fired up for this last night. He was, he took pictures. He was watching like hockey. on one TV, college basketball on another TV, and he had the UFC on in the middle TV, which means like he was super into it. And then I had like people I hadn't talked to in years reach out to me about this card and being super excited for it. So I definitely think it passed

the mom test in a different way. Yeah, I mean, I think the site traffic was pretty damn strong last night. I wasn't sure how watch party numbers would be. I know they're pretty damn good, considering like literally everybody, their mother, their brother, their cousin, their sister, and their uncles all have watch parties now after GC and I kind of like built this whole blueprint on like how to do it right.

And now everyone's doing them. So the numbers are pretty comparable to what Jake Paul Anthony Joshua was on Netflix, which is pretty good. We were happy with pretty much everything last night. So let's get into everything. Let's get into the fisticuffs, AK. We could take some questions about production.

and stuff at the end of the day, but I thought people were super into it. Let's start with the main event. Justin Gachie, performance of a lifetime. The dude is a friggin' legend. Jed and I were so loud, AK, when he knocked Patty down the first time, that we literally, our audio was so loud coming through the microphone. It actually knocked our camera out of place. We went, you could actually hear us, the screen froze, you could hear us still talking,

then the screen went dark and I had to like unplug things and plug them back in to get the camera back. That's how excited that's how excited like everybody was and how like shocking that moment was. This is awesome man. Gachie looked incredible.

And shout out to Patty Pimbley. I will say this. Patty Pimblein and his team, their gameplay was absolutely atrocious. I mean, it was brutally bad. And I'm not right about everything, but my whole thoughts about this fight was this simple.

We will know who's going to win this fight in the first five minutes. We will know in the first round who wins. And I was absolutely right. Because I was wondering where Patty's game playing was going to be was going to take him down and just burl through him and just wear him down with that size advantage. No, he decided to, and I give him credit for this, he stuck by his word.

I'm going to go in there. And I'm going to try to fight this dude on the feet. I'm going to try to outdog Justin Gachie. And boy, did that not work. And by the time he tried to shoot takedowns and try to get to the ground, It was way too late. He just took such an asswhip in at that point.

So I give Patty credit for surviving to the final horn and giving the fans a very fun fight. But in the end, Justin Gaci gets it done. He's fighting Ily Tuporia. I mean, I don't know. We don't need to waste a ton of time here. He's fighting Ili Tupori. It will happen to the White House.

Maybe. I mean, that sounds like a damn good main event for the White House car. I do Iliate Teporia, one of your biggest stars against Justin Gaci, one of the most beloved fighters, the most exciting fighter in the history of the sport. And it'll probably be Justin Gachie's final fight because as much as I love Justin Gachi and how as much as I love seeing upsets and crazy things happen in sports. And I think we got a little appetizer of that last night. Ily it's poor.

He's going to clap for Justin Gage. And that'll probably be the end of his career. But still, Justin's getting this fight. Not a lot of people think he would have got there. So, Ilya for me, I assume you're on the same boat. Maybe you're not. No, I am. And I'm going to warn people right now that I think a lot of the picks on this episode are going to

be pretty clear what should happen. Will these things happen? We can't say, right, because it's dependent on sort of some upcoming results and when some fighters would be available again and the looming mothership that is the UFC White House card that until we know who is fighting on there. Because, guys, that is like still five months away. Assuming it does land on the, you know, June 14th date as expected.

That's still five months away. Like theoretically, a lot of people who fought tonight should be eligible to compete again in that span. But in all likelihood, some of them will be saved. for that card. So it kind of screws up all of our like, well, this will definitely happen. This should happen, blah, blah, blah. We don't know. We don't know for sure. But again, if you, there's a, you guys probably have your own ideas in mind of what's next. I'll tell you they're probably not far off from where we're going. Mike, can I defend both Patty Pimbley and Justin Gitchie for like, I don't really need to defend Gagee, but I mean, defend Pimble's strategy.

I don't think he can take Justin Gathe G down. I know he should have. I don't know if that's true. He's not an incredible takedown guy, Pimblit. He's super strong. He's a great grappler once he gets his arms on you and gets a body lock on you. He's not a great like single leg. He's not like a, you know, Dagestani single leg, double leg, switch it up, kind of take down guy. And that was what a lot of people were saying going to the fight. So that's why I wasn't surprised because a lot of people were saying like, how is he going to get Gagy to the ground?

Obviously he's a great grappler. And if it goes down there, he'd have the advantage. I wasn't convinced. Gaiji has very rarely been just straight up dominion the ground. Again, we're talking about guys like Charles Olivaire. We're talking about Habib. I just don't put Patty on that level. And I think Patty is a great grappler.

Like if you want to give him an A in grappling, I would not disagree. But we're talking about guys like Habib is an A plus. I would have about guys like Charles like an A plus. And I'm not saying all these guys are straight up just took him down to the ground. Obviously, there was some striking in there too. So maybe Patty could have skewed a little bit more in that direction, trying to mix it up more. But I think we have to give Justin and his team a lot of credit. I think they made it extremely difficult for Patty to implement his grappling.

I think the constant front face locks, I thought, was so smart. Such a basic technique. But it really showed, again, we remember that Gagy is an elite wrestler. He's always used to defensively. So I don't want to just make a sound like, oh, well, he only, it only, there was only a stand-up battle because Patty didn't want to, like, didn't want to wrestle with Gagchi. I think you have to give, because I think that takes away from what Gage did. And I think his team really knew how to stifle,

that part of Patty's game. So yeah, Patty could have mixed up more, but for me, this was just like, he kind of did what he had to do as far as what the options were. And I give like even more credit to Gigi

for, you know, obviously doing what he does, winning stand-up wars and just doing his best to knock out a guy who was just eating clean, so many clean shots. That was crazy. This to me, it's not exactly the same

because of just how one-sided I thought this fight was, even though Patty was like somewhat competitive and kept battling. This was very reminiscent. to me, at least kind of how I came out of it, to blow Muhammad's strategy against Jackdell. Right. That would be the obvious comparison. I think that's the one.

Like he just waited, he just waited too long. Like if he came in there and just, you know, was landing kicks, there are moments where, like, Justin, Justin didn't retreat a ton in this fight because Justin, I think realized pretty quickly that he was going to get the fight that he, that he wanted to have to, like, increase his chances of winning the fight. But I think there are moments where, like, Justin was backing. up towards the fence where he could have just gone in there and just went in there and try to hauss him and there were moments like in the middle rounds like especially in the third round where

patty like had moments to get just into the ground and had he done that in the opening round and just wear it on him against the fence i think the fight would look a lot different but listen that's a total if if patty wins that if patty implements the game plan we all expected him to that fight's not as fun as it was last day it just wasn't um i don't think patty would have got like the flowers that he's receiving in a loss more than he would have gotten in a win. And I think he still, I think he still loses. I think he still loses. I just don't see a world where he can, where he can consistently take down Justin Gagey and hold him down. Like I just don't see it. It's just, again, it just has not happened that way. Like if you were to put the two in a

straight wrestling match, I know this is kind of abstract, I would favor Justin Gagee, frankly. Like we're talking like traditional amateur style wrestling match. I would favor Justin Gagee. So that's why it's not like, it doesn't blow me away that, you know, this just didn't get to the ground. But definitely for the sake of the viewers and for why he was put in this position, Mike, Patty did the right thing I did the right thing right thing right gaining something in defeat right getting something to be a lot of microphone time after

everyone talking about how tough he is one of those well even the haters have got to respect that got to respect this performance so yeah however it turned out I don't think he was winning anyway but this was the best path for him career wise did you pick HG and our staff picks I did I pick him in the stat to become

did you pick him to be Patty I did of course yeah I picked him by decision as I we were the only we were the only two I got hammered in bets last night, but I did bet on Justin Gaichi and at least I got to cash that one. And you won our picks overall, by the way. Eight out of 11. Eight out of 11. Eight out of 11.

Eight out of 11. Solid. Very solid. Pretty well. So yeah, great win for Justin Gaichi. He's a champ. He's going to go fight Ilya and it's not going to go well for him. I immediately that honestly, I think like my, I think my biggest takeaway now that I like speak this out was like,

I'll eat an ounce of a ounce of sleep here because he's going to ask. absolutely cream, uh, whoever he fights here. And it's no disrespect to these guys. It's more about how just how damn good Ilya is. Um, but man, if some, if Justin Gajee could beat Iliya to beat Iliotipatera, like, golly. What an incredible run that would be.

We start changing some very interesting conversations that that happens. Um, so shout out to Gage. Shout out to Patty as well, who we're going to talk about. This is super easy for me too, AK, uh, with Patty Pimblet. Dan Hooker's about to fight and probably lose to Benoit Suntini. this Saturday, UFC 325. And even if Dan just goes out and has the performance of a lifetime, he's getting Patty Pimlet.

And even if Ben Wausantini finishes him in 12 seconds, he's fighting Patty Pipplet. The band is, I'm telling the band to chill. This is just so obvious. The band is taking whiskey shots right now. They're not looking good right now. I hope they don't have to play because they're in no shape to play.

I think I'll stop you on social media saying, oh, it's on Dan Hooker's court now. He's got to win next to. No, he doesn't. Who cares? Who cares if he wins, that's one. That is the fight they're going to make. 100%.

It's an ugly-ass view. I wish it wasn't so deeply personal. I think the trash talk is horrible. But hey, fans invest in this sort of thing, man. I mean, I hate to say it, but this kind of bad blood, as nasty as it is. I mean, I don't think you want to get too much in the nitty-gritty of it. Like I think, like I said, if we assume there's this new Paramount crowd, a slightly more casual Paramount crowd, they're probably not going to love the kind of things that Hooker and Patty

have been saying about each other. But the general animosity is very good and strong. Fun style matchup. Again, that's where we should see full-on D1 Patty. But I don't know. But yeah, let's not overthink this. Win-loser draw, Dan Hooker, I have to match, especially if he wins. I'd imagine he's just going to call out Patty.

Yeah. And it's a avoidable fight for Patty against a rank guy. I just think that makes all the sense of the world. Could they do like Padil Darius and just have Patty just roll Benny if it's possible? Could they do like an Atomoycano or something? They're going to try to book him into, I might say it's like a guaranteed win over Dan Hooker because Dan is a dog and Dan's got hammer and tongs

with some of the craziest SOBs in the history of the sport. I don't think Patty's grappling would be as underrated as Dan's grappling is. I think Patty gets on top of him. It's going to be a really bad night for him. And I just don't say, like they're not,

I see some people like I see solar, serpent saying, oh, Pimblo versus Arm and Sarukin, there is in no world. Oh no. That the UFC is like, you know, it's a great idea. Let's put our guy, Patty,

in there with Armand Sarukin, just going to absolutely smash him. Like they're not, like you that you thought last night was one-sided. If he gets in there with Arm and Sarukian, oh my lord. Like that is just, it's going to go so badly for him. So they're going to try to avoid that at all costs. And even if he won the belt, he's ain't fighting Armin Sarucan. And the UFC's going to avoid that at all costs.

So, but, but look, and I say, and I just want to say this and be super clear about it. If the UFC offered Armin Saracian to Patty Pimblet, he's taking it. He's not saying no to anything. I'm not there's no there's no ducking of of challengers for patty pimble. So I do see a lot of people saying like, oh, well, he chose his opponents. No, he didn't. If the UFC offered him these fights, he would have taken it. Patty's not going to say no, but the UFC wanted to build him and put him in this position.

So you do not blame Patty for being in the spot. You blame the UFC for being in the spot if you have an issue with it. So I just want to make that perfectly clear when it comes to Patty Pimblit. But yeah, Pimla versus Harker seems a way to go. Let's go to Sean O'Malley, AK. Sugar Sean O'Malley. Defeat Song Yudong. I see the word robbery being thrown out quite a bit when it comes to this fight and another one on this card.

Really? Let me just say, okay, during the NBA fighting watch party last night. And I had a point spread bet on Sean O'Malley. So even just the way that the fight went, there's no way I was winning the point spread bet. I thought it was pretty clear Sean O'Malley 129, 28, but perhaps just seeing how people were scoring it and seeing what the chat was. I was like, maybe I just, like, didn't watch it right? Like, am I missing something? I went back and rewatched this morning,

because obviously the first round was the swing round. Song Yadong definitely round, round two. Sean O'Malley, the best in the most clear round of the fight was Sean O'Malley in round three. And I thought Sean O'Malley did enough to win round one. Like, I didn't feel I was wrong or I thought I was misrepresenting how that first round went. If you score it for song, like, I'll listen to you. But to call this a robbery is absolutely ridiculous.

I think the right fighter won, 29, 28 for Sean O'Malley. what do we do here, AK? He wants the White House. He wants Piotr Yan. Now he's saying he's willing to wait if they do Jan Marab. Piotr Yan started the day with social media clips saying, I'm fighting Marab. The UFC promised me Marab.

They said he's guaranteed, this is the fight. And then 10 hours later he tweets out, I'll fight who the UFC tells me to fight. If they want me to fight, Shot O'Malley, I'll fight Shot O'Malley. That's what I'll do. Whatever the UFC, I don't choose my opponents. The UFC does. So the vibe certainly changed in that conversation.

But AK, if you had to guess, if you're going for an out-no point here, Sean O'Malley versus who is next? I'm not even really going on a point here because I'm kind of, you know, I know it's 2026. I know it's a clean slate, but I was looking at sort of my recent picks from the end of 2025. And I, you know, I kind of decided want to see Jan and Marab run it back. As the, you know, since then, it feels like it's a 50-50 chance where that happens

because it depends, you know, just Marab going to want to take more of a break. But as I keep saying, even if it doesn't happen at the White House, there are shows that they need to fill in between now and then. There's also the weird, I don't know, there's that weird rumor. Again, this is not proven necessarily like, you know, are certain fighters from certain nations, including Russia, going to be able to fight at the White House? I don't know how that stuff works.

Again, this is online scuttled, but could be a total non-issue. So that's my one worry about, like, trying to book O'Malley and Jan for that event. So I do think we can run it back with Jan and Marab, not at the White House, somewhere else. Maybe again, in between there. had made events to fail. So I'm going O'Malley and Umar.

I don't feel strongly about it. I just think it's a, it's a sellable fight. I know O'Malley will, I think like what we say with Pimbley. If it's sent his way, I don't think O'Malley says no. He might be a little bit more hesitant

than Pimbley is with some of his potential matchups. I don't think O'Malley would say no. I think they'd do him right. And I think that fight could. It feels like it should headline a car. but it certainly can't headline a number of event. But yes, I'm only doing this because I'm sticking with Mirabian rematch. Theoretically, O'Malley could just wait for the winner of that.

So I came into UFC 324 believing that if Sean doesn't blow the doors off of Songyidong, then he's going to fight Umar because Umar is going to go out there and kill Davis and Vigorato. He's going to go out there and make a statement. He's like one of the top seven biggest favorites in UFC history. He should go out there. and at worst 3026 Davis and Vigureto, which would be really impressive. Umar and Mugamada Madov,

I think his stock dropped more than anybody on this entire card last night. And this is not just me saying it. This is just what I'm seeing and sort of the vibes that everyone's coming off of this. I am getting real Muhammad Mahama Jaya vibes off of Umaramauga Madov right now. And I don't like it because the guy is so damn good

and so damn talented. But now he's going into this thing where after he lost to a compromise Marabdo Lash, really it's like, well, I just need to win. I don't need to make statements. He should have rolled Davis and Figurato last night. And he didn't. Like, he won, but no one is going to remember this.

What they're going to remember is Umar getting booed out of the building by 20,000 people. Umar getting clobbered on social media because he cruised through a guy he should have absolutely clobbered. And it's just such a bummer because he's so good. And he's capable of all of this stuff. he's just going in there like i'm going to do everything in my power to win and not hurt a single person and it's just so frustrating to watch as somebody who believes in his talent so much um but i'm getting

serious bahia vibes from mumar and he is about one more performance like that away from being in mozhar mahaef just just in a reckless place he will never be able to get out of uh and it's just such a bummer So there's no effing chance Umar and Maga Madov is fighting Sean O'Malley next. There's just no way. And it's such a bummer because I'd love to see that fight. Sean O'Malley is going to fight

Peyote Rion next. Whether it's for a title or not. No matter what happens, next, the next person Sean O'Malley fights is Peyote Rion. Whether it's at the White House, and that's the immediate next fight. Whether Jan fights Marab and Jan wins,

they will go Yon O'Malley 2 for the belt. If they go Yon O'Malley 2 for the belt, If they go Jan Marab and Marab wins, O'Malley will fight Jan in a rematch anyways. Like, he is going to fight Peter Yan, no matter what direction we go in his next fight. That's what I think is going to happen. Yeah, tough, tough going for Umar, man.

And I think, and I have to, I don't know, it's his management that must be telling him to now go down the, I will fight anyone next route. I guess that's the best that they can get, like is that he's in no position to call for like, oh, I'm not fighting again to like get this shot. this opponent the UFC will just be like okay cool like we're not keep waiting by that phone because it's not going to ring anytime soon and I'm with you you know people know I'm a big umar guy I thought

he was going to beat maraub last year I still think he can beat maraub someday I still think he can beat piotr yon I still think he can be a champion um but these kinds of performances are just so frustrating for the matchmakers and for everyone in the uh you know up in the UFC offices like trying to sell stars and sell champions and sell storylines uh it's tough man it's tough so he's in bannamway purgatory right now he was a minus he is minus 60 $1,600 favorite. And minus 60. You cannot.

Honestly, if Figgie went, because there are moments or Figgie was like, Figgy was having moments in the end. Near the end. Yeah. If he went out there and like tried to punch, he might have a chance. They're going to play one of those third round flurries as like part of like Figgie's highlight reel for as long as it continues fighting.

There's some flurry in there. I don't know if they'll play anything from this fight on Umar's next highlight reel. Like this fight made just going to like moving on. Like I don't know what they're going to show. like a take good pretty good take down he didn't be a good take down in there i guess that's it yeah it's just it's just a bummer like like i see solo serpent just don't see how sean versus yon can be justified right now that's fine if you don't think sean o'malley should get a title shot that's great sean o'malley's next fight will be against peter yon it might be a year from now

sean o'malley will not fight anybody else unless it's one of those two guys it's just the way that it is you ain't fighting new mar i would love to see the san hagen fight he ain't fighting cori san hagen right now He's just not. It's not worth the juice to fight Corey's Oh, not yet. No, no. Someday. He's literally, he's the on-deck hitter for the title shot.

He might just get it. Why would he fight any of these other guys? You know what I mean? If Marab beats you, if Maraub beats Peter Jan, Sean obviously isn't fighting. He obviously isn't fighting Marab for the belt, but he'll fight Jan in a rematch

in order to maybe get a title shot. So like, that's why I think this is going to happen. O'Malley is just not going to, he's not going to risk it to, to fight Corey or certainly not fighting Umar. Like that just does nothing for him right now. Umar needs to go out and just obliterate somebody. And then we can start talking about that fight.

So yeah, Bandaumait's in a weird place, AK, remember like three years ago? There was arguments that this is like the greatest division in the sport. It's better than lightweight. It's better than everything. And now it's just like, eh, it's just like fine. It's just, it's good. But it's not where it was three years ago, is it?

I blame Montel Jackson. He let us down, Mike. He let us down. He was the one. He was the one that was supposed to shake things up. And then we've had contenders rise, just not the ones we expected, like Mario Batista. I mean, good fighter, but we didn't expect him.

Amon's a hobby, I think, did not expect him to go on this, like, lengthy win streak. And also in the fashion that they have has not exactly juiced up the contender line. Yeah. Can Amunds a hobby stop calling out Sean O'Malley? Maybe he gets it, Mike. He's the, he has a less, honestly, like, he has a worst chance of, getting the O'Malley fight that Umar does right now. Like, he's not getting it.

If you're Aiman's a hobby, your sole focus, everything you say. Every tweet you make should be calling out Umar. That's who the guy, that's who you should be calling out. Not O'Malley. You have negative 7% chance of getting Sean O'Malley right now. You're probably got a 90% chance of fighting Umar. Go do it. They're going to go to Canada at some point.

And you'll probably fight Ubar on that card if you call for it. Come on, Aben, do the thing. You can get this fight. If you beat Umar, you might get a title fight. You just might do it. Do it. Do all those things. All right, let's go to the heavyweight division.

Speaking of tremendous divisions, uh, Waldo Cortez-Acost and Derek Lewis, certainly, uh, they had a fight. A fight officially happened at UFC 324 between Waldo Cortez-Acost and Derek Lewis. Uh, it was not aesthetically pleasing at all. Uh, it was tough.

Derek looked Derek looked bad Derek looked bad in this fight he looked every bit of 40 knocking on the door of 41 and as a guy who was older than Derek Lewis like this ain't shade this is just this is just anybody with eyes

could kind of see this and Waldo just Waldo did the rebellus thing I guess where he's just like it was just a well-coached fight where it's just like hey you know what Derek does he's just he's gonna make you come to him

and he's going to try to connor you with something big. So just like, don't go to him. Wait for him to, like, move forward with anything. And then I think maybe like 11 total strikes were landed in that fight. And I think probably six of them were on the finishing flurry. I don't know what the stats were, but it was just a tough scene, man. Waldo landed like a weird jab. I don't know what's going on with Derek.

I don't know if there's like a knee injury or what or if he was just hurt. I don't know what happened, but it's just like a weird stoppage. And Waldo gets to win. He's doing the thing. Gets it done. He had five fights last year. He's not won three in a row and five of his last six

probably beyond that. Called out Curtis Blades. It's kind of what he's getting right now. Like, I saw some people saying he should get a title shot off of this. No, he's not getting a title shot off of this. It was just such a weird ending to the fight. It wasn't like a great fight.

No one's going back to rewatch it. It was a smart strategy. And it was, I don't blame Waldo for this because he goes up. it gets colded by Derek Lewis, dude's never fighting for a belt. So, yeah,

I'm fine with Curtis Blades. I think this is a terrific night for Alex Pereira and Cyril gone. Because I think, like, that fight could possibly be made for an interim heavyweight title right now. Derek Lewis could have put a wrinkle in that plan pretty quickly,

but he didn't. So, yeah, I'm going with Curtis Blades fight. What do you think? Mike, I disagree. I think, although it is going to fight for a title. I think. I think I just don't know what's going on with Tom Asplow obviously none of us do.

Alex Pereira, of course, if he moves to heavyweight, the title fight is his. I mean, it's not even worth discussing. But I think there's an outside chance. And I love the Curtis Blades call. I just think I'm still pushing for like a Curtis Blades' Volkov rematch for some reason, just because it's heavyweight and so many unanswered questions. Like the fans want it. You know, you got to give the Paramount crowd who didn't get to see, you know, Volkov Blades won.

You've got to give them a taste of that, right? but older and slower, right? That's what the new crowd wants. So I'm going kind of off the board here. I think there's a chance he gets Cidilagan. I think there's a chance to get Cilagon for a heavyweight title, probably interim. Again, don't know what the plan is with Aspinall

and the undisputed title. If it gets vacated, stranger things have happened, but you've got to capitalize on that salsa boy heat. I mean, this guy's doing something. That win was, again, as you pointed out, was really more depressing on the Lewis end than inspiring on the Cortez-A-Costa end.

fair enough. He kind of finished up with like a boop. I still don't, I'm not entirely sure what happened there. It felt like a mixture of accumulated damage, an accurate boop, and Lewis looking just really exhausted, like really like a feather would have knocked him over at that point. Very strange thing. But strange sums up this division right now. It's just in such a bad place. And I would not be surprised one bit if Cortez-A-Casta was one-half of some interim or vacant title fight, whether it was him in Ceyla-Gan or Dare to Dream, like, him and poetine. Wow.

Imagine that. Imagine that headlining a show. It is, I actually love the brilliant. I love how he's sticking to the Blades gimmick. It's good. It's a good call up. Very good call.

People kept saying like, oh, you called out Derek. He never called out Derek Lewis. Never. Lewis called out his. Derek's the one who made that call. Even though he was doing the,

then later did the, I don't know who this guy is, gimmick, which was strange. Yeah, which I called him out on that when we talked. I'm like, I'm like, you know who he was. Come on. You called about the second you knocked out Talos to Cher.

You said you wanted to fight. that dude call him for months walla kept calling for for blades and i kept mentioning derrick to him like go fight derrick lewis go fight derrick lewis uh he's like sure if it want me to fight him i'll fight him but i want to fight curtis um and now he might just get it i don't know heavy boy it's kind of weird right now um yeah i think my dream of derrick lewis fighting for a belt is uh officially over though that that might have been it was it was a worth dream it was a worthy dream they should have just give it to him in october they really just so we all could have had it you know what i mean well while there was some momentum there now it's over now you're you're

never get it and I blame the UFC I've never seen him poke someone in the eyes I think his fingers are too big I don't even think it's possible for him to do what Cito Gaon did to Tom Aspinall but I've been there's Derek by this Derek might have slipped into his eye who knows those mats were last night stuff yeah hope Derek's okay we haven't heard from him we'll see but Waldo continues to cruise and more fantasy points for me Natalia Silva AK took on Rose Nammy Unis again I have seeing the R word so many times here that this is a flat out robbery. I don't think that's true.

I scored a frenady ice, but I wasn't. I also scored it for Nadi Ice. Yeah, but I wasn't. What was it round? Let me see that I have the score. Round one. Round one is, round one is again, the swing round.

There were so many people who was like, oh, Rose clearly run round one. I'm like, did I just, are we watching two different fights here? Like, how did you, how did she clearly win? I don't know. I didn't, for some reason, they credited Rose Nama Unis with 13 significant strikes in round one and Natty Ice at 15. There's no world. I went back and rewatch this fight that round this morning.

There's no world Rose W. Unis landed 13 significant strikes in the first round. There's just no world that happened. Yeah, I should correct myself. Sorry, I actually did. People can see the live blog. I actually did score it for Rose, but with no, again, with no like, oh, she definitely won round one. I think my exact words were just close round. not a lot to not a lot to score there

Michael Carroll on Twitter he put out a good stat I think even if the the striking numbers were that close which seems unlikely Natty had a big advantage in head strikes so that was probably the difference there as it should be as it should be I think Natty shots landed meant a lot more it seems so right it seems so

we always have to remind people you and I and the rest of the staff we're juggling a lot of other things we're watching so even when I'm live blocking I'm like focused on the fight but I'm also focused on recording the fight and what's happening and that doesn't always jive with like scoring what's happening it's weird you guys you guys all understand what I'm talking about though but um yeah no it can't be a robbery this is one of those fights people know I'm very robbery adverse in the first place to call like anything

a robbery I'd say one out of like 20 alleged robberies or actually robberies um because there's just so little activity like when there's that little activity how can you say oh my gosh that person won the round that was that was faint city and from a technical striking standpoint like I thought it was fine, but there was so much feints. There was so much footwork. There was so much. And I'm not saying you can't enjoy that sort of thing, but I think to say that one fighter stood out above the other in that, when there's that kind of action, is really difficult to say. There's no knockdown. There's no sustained flurry. There's no like combination that stands out from the round. You kind of just have to go, not with your gut, but do your best to make an educated opinion.

And I don't disagree. I disagreed with the judges. I had it 10, nine rows, but I bet you if I watched around again, I could easily say, oh, yeah, 10, 9, 90 ice. Like, there's not, there's no, there were no robberies on Saturday. I don't think. No, I, and I completely agree with you on that. It's, uh, kind of crazy, but she's got to get the title shot here. Right? Like, she just has to get it. Whether it's against Valentina or Valentina moves up and again, sort of what I just said with Waldo, right, one half, uh, vacant interim title fight. My takeaways are this. If that, if the UFC is like Valencia, we need you to fight in May before the White House card and we need you to fight Natalia Silva, Nataliais gets it. If they approach Valentin and says, do you want to fight in May?

And she's like, no, I don't want to fight until the summer. Or Natty Ice can't go in May. I think somebody had a really good night last night. I think her name is Macy Barber. The timing of this is it has to work out in her favor. But Macy Barber is fetched to the UFC. trying to make fetch happen. They've been trying to make fetch happen since she was on Contender Series. If Macy Barber goes out and obliterates Alexa Grasso and does it in a more fun way than Natty Ice just beat Rose Namibutis, they will push her to a title fight if the timing works out. They will jump over Natty Ice and give it to Macy. But I actually think timing will work out in Natty Ice's favor here. She's willing to turn. I think they're going to do Shifchenko

versus Natty Ice before the White House card. So I think Natty will get it. But again, if Schipchenko's like, I can't go to like the summer or fall, Macy Barber might leave frog her. So Natty Ice needs this fight to happen before the White House card. That's what needs to happen. And I think it's going to be a really bad night for Daddy Ice. I'm sorry. I fully agree with your Barber opinion there,

only because I think it's so, so unlikely that she like just blows Alexa Grosso away. There is a chance that Grasso is just like maybe we've seen her best fights behind her. Like, you know, she's young in real years, but she's obviously had a lot of experience in fight years. You know, she started so young. I think we saw her in Invicta when she was like 20 or so. She was so young. And that was a long time ago. So it's possible.

It's possible. Barbara comes out, puts on a career best performance. And like you said, just makes that undeniable statement that they should give her the title shot over Natalia Silva. But I just, I am not, I'm not leaning that way. So I'm confident Natia Silva gets the title fight. But Mike, you're right. If that happens, it's good barber all the way. In all likelihood, maybe we get that Valentina move up,

and then you get Barber and Silva in a vacant title fight, and everybody wins. Yeah. And that would, uh, that'd be fine. But yeah, I actually thought Natiaz had like a decent chance of beating Valentina Shepchenko. And then I saw Rosammy Unis kind of hoss her around with takedowns. And I was like, oh boy, she is in real trouble when she fights Valentina and Shipchanco. But we'll see. They got to get in there and do the fights.

Natty Ice did the most important thing. She's now 8 and O in the UFC, AK. I still, I would still, I would need to see the odds because I think Natty would be like at least a plus 300 underdog at this point. Yeah, plus 200 underdog. I'll tell you, I might still bite on that. Yeah. I might, honestly might.

Yeah, okay. Matchups, man. Matches make fights. I don't know. I feel like she's still tricky. It's kind of a weird one for her. She's very tough to fight. I'll give you that.

She's very tough to fight. Yeah. Let's go to the main card opener, John Silva versus Arnold Allen Allen. terrific fight. Really, really fun. It was the front runner for Fight of the Night. Some bonuses were coming their way, it looked like, and then Justin Gaci had to do

Justin Gagy things. John Silva double leg springboarded off of Arnold Allen's back at the end of the fight, which is one of the awesomest things I've ever seen. And John Civil looked good, man. Like, he looked so good. He was like kind of reserved in the first round.

And I was like telling Jed, because usually John is just an absolute demon from from start to finish. John came out just kind of chilled about 90 seconds left in round one he started open things up and then he really started cooking in round two

I was like maybe this is the fighting nerds new style like we're just going to chill out gather some data for the first like three minutes of the fight before we start making our move because we start with Carlos Pratchez against Leon Edwards just kind of chill Leon like had a decent round and people like wow look at Leon and then Carl decided

I'm just going to start fighting this dude and then he killed him great before us from John Silva where do we go here can he fight yai yore abriguez is that in the card where is yai year right year i mean he fought it not that long ago what summer he fought like in the summer or something so it hasn't been like forever but year is it's so hard to pin down right it's like um there was a time when he was always like circling around you know in the center of rumors uh

but that's like now it's just like when he's gone he's gone there's just like you don't hear anything about yair or what he's doing and maybe it's better that way maybe it's better for his career um i think that'd be such a fun matchup uh there are other people of course in the contender line And I'm sure John Silva is keeping an eye in Volcanoz. And Diego Lopez, I mean, there's a chance that if, you know, Mozart, we don't know when Mozart is coming back, we don't know what they're doing with Lauren Murphy. There is a chance that John Silva could just leapfrog both those guys and fight Polkinovsky

or Diego Lopez. Diego Lopez is a bit weird because they run it back. But a fun fight for as long as it lasted the first time. But I think the year is the right and middle ground here to keep John Silva relevant, produce a fun fight and also maybe again maybe the timing works out for him to get if he gets a win there a title flight for the end of 2026 could happen I'm going with Al Jaljana and Sterling I thought about that as well yeah so that versus Aljo that makes a ton of sense I would be fascinated by that matchup I think it's I think it's a really good fight I think it makes

sense for both guys and it's probably a title eliminator Like after, I mean, who the hell knows what's going on with Mozart? Is he fighting Leroy Murphy at UFC London? I'm stunned. We still don't have a main event for that card. Like, I'm truly shocked. Nothing about the UFC's matchmaking and scheduling stuns me anymore. Like, uh, Zufa boxing, Mike, we didn't have a card until six days before the event.

The first ever Zufa boxing. That was like crazy. Like we have April apex fights being made. Shout out to Edmichibati and the Iron Turtle, which I reported on the watch party last night. Did you see Dana say in one of his like 8,000 interviews he did in the leaders of and credit to him and everyone else for doing the whole paramount. Like they were full on in promotional mode for this paramount event. You cannot accuse them of being lazy.

You can accuse the, you can, you can, you can say the interviews were not compelling. No, they weren't. But time was filled, Mike. Content was created for the Paramount Plus launch. We will give them that. One of the things he said an interview was, and I don't know if he's ever said this out loud, but we say it all the time. He said, listen, we're at the point where the machine is churning, you know,

know, so efficiently that we can do whatever we want. Literally just said it. And I'm like, yeah, it's very true. You can, you can sell tickets for an event in London. I don't know if tickets have gone still yet, but you can, whenever they do, or if they have already, you can sell tickets. And it's very likely going to sell out or come close to selling out because of the machine. So you're right, Mike, absurd that they don't have a main event for that show, but also

part for the course with how, how the business works these days. Yeah. Let's go to the wild card round, AK. We'll select one fighter. We have not match made for yet. And we'll matchmake for them right now, AKA I mean, so many choices here. You can go with Song Yudong, you can go with Derek Lewis, you go with Rose, you could go with Arnold Allen, you go with Josh Hockett, your fantasy MVP. Single-handedly, like, single-handedly getting me on the board.

200 points. They gave him a post-fight bonus. They gave him, like not the automatic bonus, not the 25K. They gave him a classic performance of the night bonus. Now 100K and Josh Hockets, goodness me, that's probably way more money he's ever. Maiden one night. That is wild. For a manhandling of a clearly overmatched Denzel Freeman, if Casey were here, he would say there's no way that that should have been awarded the fight of the night award. That's our performance award, just because the gap in skill was just so clear.

I mean, if you saw Josh Hokic's last fight or any of his fights before this and you shot Denzel Freeman's like USC debut, I'm shocked. I'm just looking at out. Josh Hookett was only like tops a minus 300 favorite. Like I should have jumped on that. because he should have been like minus 800. He's in a, he's much, much more talent than Denzel Freeman. Sorry,

Denzel. You seem like a nice guy. Just what we've seen in the UFC has not been compelling. I could not pick him, mainly because heavy weight's pretty thin. I think there's like, you know, 10 different names,

like just outside the top, like 20 that you could kind of throw him in. There's still you're going to build this guy up right way. Also, listen, his post-bite promo, I don't know, give or take. The Britney Griner shoutout was so weird.

I just don't understand who that appeals to, no matter what your opinion is on these sort of things. I don't understand who that appeals. It'd be like if I just randomly called out like, oh, Travis Kelsey, by the way, Taylor's latest album sucks, like at the end of a speech. Would people find that funny? Like, what is the random? I don't understand. What does the random shot do other than a very obvious, like, desperate appeal to, you know,

kind of pop his fan base, whatever that may be. So I'm dancing around my feelings about Josh Hock and. promo and his politics. But yeah, good for him. Nice win. You'll be seeing a lot of Josh Hokit this year. Health permitting, you'll see a lot of Josh Hokka in 2026, Mike. He might be, we might have to be talking about him for like,

fighter of the year consideration when it's all said and done. I think he's going to like 3 and 0 in 2026. Sorry, I'm going with Sonia Dong. He's got off the rails a little bit. Did see that comment. Mike, I'm going with Sonia Dong. How do you like this, man? I said, screw it.

Song, he's so close, Mike. He's so close to being a top five guy. I just see it. I'm like, he's in there with these guys. Corey Sanhagen. Umar? You're giving him, Muammar? No, no, no.

I think I'm going fun, fun for him, Mike. And a real, this is a follow-up to kind of what we've been saying a lot. One of our, I think, by sell questions on the show, which was like, will these Bellator guys win an X amount of fight? So Patchy Mix is in there. Oh my God. Let's start it up. Let's see how much Patchy Mix has left.

Let's put him in the, let's put the bell to a boy's in the mixer. I think he could be the first one. I don't know if Patricio or Pico have a fight book. But I know Pico doesn't. I know about Pitbull. But Patchy, you want to stay in the top 10? You want to stay irrelevant? I'm putting you in the wood chipper, man.

I'm looking at the wood chipper with this young gun who I kind of want to see have a showcase fight for once and prove that he's the timing's there. The timing's there. The timing's there for Songuong to still fight for a title someday, but he's just not there yet. Song absolutely clobbers, Patchy Vicks. I think so too. Like not, I don't even think that fights remotely. He's fallen so far.

Because two years ago, we would have been a very competitive fight and probably favored Patchy. But I wouldn't have. I wouldn't have. I've been pretty consistent on on on on on on patchy. That's true. He's solid. I never thought he was. I mean, the grand prix run like you had to reward him with like a top five spot.

Like you just had to the wins are so good at the time. It was just a good run. But there are so many people who were like, this guy's the best band I'm waiting in the world. He beat Marab. He beat everybody. And I remember like, she and Al Shadi and I would have conversation like, if Patsy Mixx fought Sean O'Malley right now, Sean O'Malley would dust him. Like he would smoke him. And this is like at the peak of Patsy Mix's powers.

But that's interesting. I don't, I don't dislike that. Because who knows, maybe Patsy has like a great night and like tackles him and beats him. I don't know. But I would favor song pretty heavily. I don't I thought you're going to go song versus Montel. That's what I thought we're going. I thought about I think I matched up Montel recently.

I can't remember who. So I took Montel off my board. But yeah, obviously that was my first thought. I'm giving you two wild cards this week. Okay. Do it. Because I think everyone knows. I think everyone knows what the gimmick is right now.

While the Derek Lewis title hopes have have ended, as long as he didn't like rip his knee to shreds, as long as it's not like a tort ACL or some sort of bad injury because that looks pretty bad. It looked like there was a neat tweak that happened earlier in the fight from one of the slips. If Derek Lewis is okay and can fight on the White House, throw him in there with, I don't know what Justin Topp is doing these days. I don't even know if he's on the roster.

Just get him to the White House to fight Derek Lewis. Let Derek do his thing and just obliterate this bad. Let him have a moment. He'd call it a career if he wants to. But the true one, AK, is my boy, who did not have a great night last night. Got me points. He got me points. Uh, Ataba Gautier, who is one of my MVP's last season.

I left it for you, Mike. I left it for you. I said, this is a, this is Mike's wildcard. Andre Pulaev ended up being very, very tough. Gotei knocked him clear across the octagon with one right hand and then was just like, okay, get up. And I was like, what are you doing? If you just like hit him three times, fights over. Like, they were ready to jump in and stop it.

So I didn't really understand that. I know Gotee was like, oh, I'm happy to go 15 to see what it feels like. And I'm like, I knew he's going to say that. He's not wrong. he's not wrong this makes him better this fight makes him better okay

you don't seem convinced first of all I want to go back to the Josh Hokka callout one of the worst callouts I've ever seen so bad and I might even like the promo was bad enough

but the callout stunk it was so shitty what if he gets it zero chance he gets it I don't believe in zero chance in anything in MMA Mike no he's not getting it okay I agree I'm just saying

there's no chance in every the only chance he had him getting that is if Derek Lewis killed him. Then it's just like, all right, let's give it to him. He should have stuck with the Walter Walker gimmick. Just keep calling for that fight. He might just get that one.

He should nowhere near getting WCA. Or he could have called out Derek. Like, Derek actually would have been a better callout for Josh. But he didn't do that. It was just so bad. The promo was at least like with the Apex one, there was 11 people in there. But at least like it was a highlight.

It was like cringy, but like it was the right callout. It was the right name. The dude was like the hot shit at the time and it was like a fight realistically he could get. This is bad all around. It just wasn't great. It was tame for Josh outside of the Brittany Ground or stuff. But like compared to like some of the other ones, this was like PG-13 compared to some of the other ones. So Gote's call out of Barbara Vittory.

I don't know how I feel about that. I think it's like a C. It's like a C-grade call-out. Only because it's like too soon for this. And I agreed. it'll be another decision because you just can't no you can't knock Marvin out okay if you go to a decision with Marvin vittory that is not only respectable it's accepted it's accepted too like no one a table goche could bring an AK 47 to the fight and he's still not going to finish margatory he's still

not going to finish him so we need to build to this barbent vatory fight we need to build to it uh so we give him a guy who is just going to go right after him get shot out of a cannon has gone hammering tongs with some of the best guys in the division. Always fun for as long as this fights last. And Octavent Gaudier is going to highlight real this man into another planet. A top 30 dude, his name, AKA Michael Oaxeichek. This is what we do.

This is what we do. You get him in there. That's a tough test, though. You sacrifice this man to the altar of a table go to him. I don't know. I mean, Alexeachic's good, though. He's, I don't know. He's fun.

He's the. perfect guy he's the perfect guy like he is not going to ewan kuchelab we're not going to get d1 oligzechak no you won't we're going to get dude just got to go right in there and try to smash him and he's going to get he's just going to get smoked he's going to hit very very hard and fall that's what you want here that's what you and if he loses like so what it's a learning lesson but it's not bad it's not like a un it's it's a fight you at least go back and watch again someday what if mike what if i told you michael Olo Saechuk has not been knocked out in a very, very long time. I would say it's because he hasn't fought,

I'd say if a goatee here. Fair, fair. I mean, his last two opponents were Jared up here, and said you could do Masu, neither a knockout threat by any means. But still, just listen, I... Like Kevin Allen submitted him, but he like hurt him bad beforehand.

This is true. He's been hurt, for sure. He's been hurt on the feet. I'm just saying he hasn't been knocked out. He's obviously been hurt on the feet. He hasn't been finished by strikes since November 2014. I I actually look again I don't think he's that bad I actually I like I like bad I think you're you're you've definitely got the right matchup I think your head's

the right place but this is and I said this is a pull I up too I thought Pallaya would actually be a tougher matchup for a Tiber than people were saying this one definitely wouldn't go to a decision but I don't know I just worry about well I don't know I tell you but you're right yeah he has to move up in the rankings eventually so you're right we got to give him someone in the top like 35 right we can't we can't just keep having hovering at the lower half yeah so yeah I think It makes sense. It makes sense.

Because look, my boy, my boy at Taba, he's going to fight like five times this year. He's going to fight like every couple of months. So we go Mikhail Oaxecheck. Then we go with what Dirty Reg is suggesting, Michelle Pereira. Or you can go Michelle, then Mikhail. Like, you can go one or the other. We can just do like one or the other. Because the Tava is probably winning both those fights.

And then we go to, and then we could do Marvittori. I must not be as high on a Tava as everyone else's. I don't know. And like I said, I like the knockouts, fantastic. I like that he went. I am not holding this decision against him. I think the fact that he, I know, your board is a point in the decision I am. I actually like I'm taking it as the classic.

Like, oh, he needs to get ring time, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm viewing it that way. I'm viewing it brightly. I don't know. These are like very experienced middle ways you're talking about, though, right? Like Michelle Pettetta, it looks at HAC's kind of newer to the division, but Michelle Padetta is a very, very experienced middle. Yeah, but very, very, he's washed. Like, he's flaky.

He's wash, washed. But he's also kind of tough to KO. So, dude, he just got, he just got nuked by Kyle Dacus, who's like a fine fighter, but not a knockout artist. That has more to do with like Michelle Pineda of randomness than on any given night, Michelle Preda can lose in some stupid way. I totally agree. But man, I would be, I like these matches only not, I think for the same reason. you do i don't see them as like automatic buildup highlight reels for a table i see them as actually interesting tests actually kind of so i'm with you before different reasons yeah i mean i think we're

kind of at this point with like because i'm with you like i think pull i've was like definitely the toughest fight of his career in terms of like matchmaking like pulayev's fought some good dudes i definitely didn't expect him to go a full 15 and it's a huge cry from the jose medina robert valentine trustin vines of the world like literally those are those are the three worst guys of the division. And then we took a step, we jumped up like a bunch of steps, past the Pulaev test. Let's just see what he does.

Like he's super young. Like a loss doesn't hurt him. And that's the end. That's why I like it too. Like if he lost him, like Alex Echik, if he lost to Michelle Padetta, I wouldn't be like, oh, hype train derail. That's it for a table. I'd be like, okay, cool.

We have a better idea of where he is now. Dial it back. Let's keep working on this table of Goetheye project because he's got it. He's got that. Speaking of it, uh, Goateeatier versus Torres Fitty. If he wins next. weekend okay what do you think of this lady we're talking about not derailing the go to a hype train we're trying to not derail the go to a high train you do not want him losing a 29 28 spitty to the

man with currently i would say maybe the ugliest fighting style in them in the uc right now and i say this with love because i do think torres finney is going to go undefeated and win the middle eight title the way he does this that malcun fight is going to be unbelievable and that's all i'm going to say you can you can you can take that and you can interpret that any way you want it's going to be unbelievable people. Let's go to the peeps. You guys got mass brings,

just to fire them out. Early odds via bet online, I'll get to pouria minus 600, the comeback on Justin Gacy plus 400. Sounds right. Actually, yeah, I think, like by the time they actually fight,

that's where I actually thought the odds would end up. I didn't think it would open that wide, honestly. I thought it'd be like minus 450 and then just kind of let it build. Because you want to try to get action both ways. That's why I thought the line

be a little closer but yeah i think tippori's going to get bad up to like a minus 800 honestly so we shall see that's that's quite a spread sounds about right uh derrick lewis versus riko verhoeven next i don't like that uh it is fun though it is fun i don't know if if derr lewis is truly truly washed it could be sad and it's hard to say because i think we've had the derrick lewis his wash talk in the past i haven't known that he dropped some a few losses and he's washed he's washed he's washed he is like a few weeks away from his I think two weeks away from like his 41st birthday so this really really does feel like it's it um just based off that performance um so yeah it might be just

be sad to throw him in there with rico but uh it's fun though it's outside the box i kind of it's fun and i can see the UFC doing it yeah and i know heavyweight is like a little more i'm going to say ageless but you can you can go a little bit longer and like even even though like the it's not like you Derek was like the most active dude i mean he was supposed to fight in edmonton and then got pulled like the day before. We still don't know what happened with that situation. I'd make no idea. You know, he looked like a young man against Rodrigo Nassimento, but it's

Rodrigo Nassimento. Fought Talas to share. A lot of people thought Talas was going to go in there and clobberum. And then Derek went out there and like looked explosive. It looked athletic. Well, it was a super short fight. But again, shout out to Waldo for like, that's how you fight Derek Lewis. Like if you want to just beat him and not have like a slughey.

Lugfest, great par and burner of a fight. You fight Derek Lewis exactly the way Waldochor Tess Acosta did. You land a jab, you stay away, you just stand there for 30 seconds and try to let Derek make some sort of first move. You do the D3 Mighty Ducks thing where you make him make the first move Conway. And that's how you do it. It's never going to be aesthetically pleasing. But at this point, like Derek looked old.

Like he looked, he looked every bit of 41 in that fight. And that was the first time I was like, yeah, man. because this isn't like a shape, this isn't like a being in shape thing because Derek is in shape. The dude has made a lot of lifestyle changes. He has lost a ton of weight. He's lost a ton of body fat.

And it's a consistent thing. It's not just like I'm cutting weight for fights. He is, I played golf with the man a few months back. Wasn't training. This is, I think they just signed the Talasin to share a fight. And the dude was already like,

real lean before even getting into like a full-on fight camp. So he's definitely taking his like his health seriously, the quote unquote peptides or whatever they actually are. They're working for the man. But yeah, he looked, he looked tough. He looked tough. It was a little tough to watch. I think he's on the tail end of things. Even though he's making good money, we'll just get him a win on the White House card. We'll just do that. And then let that be the send-off because you know what helps your health, Mike? I'm glad he's taking care of something. You know what helps your health? Not fighting anymore and not getting not putting yourself to grueling training camps and not getting hit in the

head by other dudes who are you know north of 250 pounds so i hope uh derrick lewis made enough money that he can retire whenever he wants i don't know if that's the case but um yeah black police black beast excuse me you have done enough uh you can lay your lay your sword down whenever you want um you owe you owe us nothing and i hope you're fighting for money and for fun and not because you have to hokey is fighting stephen aspland if stephen wins i don't hate that who is stephen fighting that's a good question is he he is i believe yeah i'm looking up right now i think that is accurate oh oh no no no he's not maybe there's a rumored fight maybe there's a rumored fight we're not aware of uh let us know let us know in the comments i did i mean maybe there's something we just

didn't see i don't know go they're making me go to twitter now to look up stephen aspline fight rumors mike that's the that's the part of the show we're on right now okay um e-rocket honestly john really didn't look that good lopez would definitely fit him again, he's called to fight Diego next. I thought he looked great last night. I don't know what you're talking about. It's not easy to look good against Arnold. No, I think he meant, I think he meant didn't look good against Diego.

Is that what he meant? Let me see the comment again. Yeah. Oh, you know, hard to say, oh, okay, it didn't look that good in general. Yeah, I don't know if that's, I disagree with that. I thought it was one of his, like, that was like a performance. That was like the exact performance I wanted to see. It was great.

Arnold's tough. He hurt Arnold multiple times. You know how hard it is to hurt that guy and, like, wobble him and, and make him bleed his own blood is not easy to do. Max Holloway, he spent 25 minutes to docked out with him

and hit him 16,000 times and barely made a wealth on that man. John Silver just needed like a couple of punches to wealth him up. So I thought it was a great performance from John Silva. I learned a lot there.

100%. Duke Madduck clarified that Aspland has said he has fight news coming up. So no, no, okay. And he's predicting a fight between Aspline and Guillemay Pat.

Wow. I'll give you a point if that happens, Duke Mad, Duck. I have no idea. I have no idea what they have. plan for both guys that's not dude who no no no they like they like Asplen he says a bunch of weird shit um they're gonna try to build this hockett thing up who's the dude that hoakett beat like one of

the worst heavy rates in the history of you of ufc uh do you remember the guy hoakit beat like his debut his debut max Jimenez is that his name yeah yeah that's who asked one's gonna fight okay he's gonna whoop on him at Jimenez will be out of the UFC asselin will cut up promo and things will happen. Joseph, Joseph versus Ilya, Sean versus a hobby. Joseph, you're insane. Joseph, why are you doing this to Mike? Can I give you do-do?

Do you not hear him earlier? Can I give you do-do without anything being in? There is- You can, Mike, but what are you going to- Zero chance? You can give him to Mike, but what are you going to do if it happens? Is Amund's a hobby, like, going to win the Bannamway title in the next few months? Because that's the only way that fight happens. That would be so funny if that fight was made.

I would just be cackling if that fight were made. We need to do a live reaction when, for me, Mike, when Camaro and I guess Telshan against Islam, I think when Sugar Sean gets the contender fight was the hobby, I think we'd do a reaction there. So I want to be, I want to be, I want to make this very clear too, because there's this whole thing as like, oh, you hate Kamaru, spin, but like everything else is fair and just. Let me, let me be 100% crystal with all of you. If Dana White drops an IG live tomorrow and says Sean O'Malley's fighting Peter Yan at the UFC

White House card for the belt, you're going to get a scathing reaction for me on that too. There is no world where this man deserves a title shot right now. And we understand what this is 100%. And it's redonculus. It might be, I haven't decided if it's more egregious that Camaro has been getting a title shot, but it's like neck and neck with it. It's neck and neck with it. Maybe Sean has a slight advantage for a couple of reasons.

One, Sean has an actual win over the current champion and has a win over like, what was song ranked heading into that fight? Was he? He was a top five, was he? He wasn't top five. I don't think he's ever been in the top five. I know our rankings he was like seven or something. He is five.

Oh, no, I was wrong. He is number five in the UFC rank. A top five, he got a top five win, which Kamar did not get in his fight with Joaquin Buckley. And here's the one other thing that Sean slightly has in his favor. There will be a cluster. of fans who say I want to see Sean O'Malley fight

Peeryon. You will not find a cluster of fans that say I want Kamar Usman to fight Islamachachad. It's just not there. It's just not. They're trying to make things happen. They did the fake face off in the back. That's an Ali special without question. It's so we like we know what it is.

We know what that was. And like the reaction to it if you like look at comments on social media is like no. Please know. Please no, no, no, no, no, no. So it's both of those are I will be just as upset if Shot-O-Malley gets the title shot as Kamar Uso and if he gets the title shot.

So I want to be clear, it's fair on all sides of things. All right? Let's just throw that out there. Plainly stated. Plainly stated. What else we got? I saw some earlier. Did I scroll past that? I did scroll past it.

Shout out Todd, who watched the watch party last night and had a great time. I had a great time as well. Gerard. Gerard. What's up, Gerard? Gagy Tuporia, Armin, the BMF winner. Zero Chats, that happens. He's got to fight somebody, Mike.

Who's Armin going to fight? They got to give him a fight someone. He probably fights. I would see him fighting the loser that fight. Yeah, okay. Okay. But Armin has the benefit of, like, having money and stuff. So he could, like, literally just sit around and wait if you want to.

He's such a weird case right now. Like, because I believe him, like, he's one of the guys when he says, I really don't care. Like, I'm doing side quests. I just don't care until they call me. Like, I really believe. leave it that he's like if they never give him a title fight he probably disappointed but he's like i'm good like yeah he is truly the exception of the rule where like he's actually gotten more

popular not fighting yeah or fighting very minimally like he is getting he is he is one of the five biggest stars the ufc has right now and he fought dan hooker and that was like his only fight in the last year to have almost two approaching two years um it's pretty good he's had a pretty good run uh patty versus a boycano no ortega two winner uh sorry oh okay that's interesting that is booked um patty yeah there's some he with boycott yeah definitely he'll be very random but also kind of an interesting play and both are wittable i think for patty um but moikano could have a great night you never know uh sean san hagan it could happen uh i would love to see that fight at some point uh waldo versus drago natty valentina john versus yair umar versus a hobby there you go gerard now we're talking

we're talking amin sahabee please i'm begging you get either a pro wrestling manager some sort of social media director to control what you do no more sean o'malley callouts it's silly umar umar umar umar that's the fight he needs to start like shading him on social media like really making it look like he's chasing umar you know like umar doesn't want to smoke he don't want that sahbi smoke you know he needs to start i have a message for you you look bad against davis of figurato oh no amin out like that's that's his meaning as he's that's his canadian is we're gonna he's gonna get so you know i mean uh but yeah that that he needs to go on the offensive here with this yeah 100% goatea versus dumas love it i mean

look if someone who's holding goatee at his fantasy team i'd love to see that uh because he's getting all bonuses if that happens uh kraal off versus racket sure that's new is that a new fight it is it is yeah but even if even they fought it was probably a long time ago so uh Alex Perez versus tim elliott hoekid versus janada denise sure again Pull a name from the bottom 10 of the heavyweight division. That's probably probably Josh Hooker's next to phone. Shout out to Tristan Gordad who's just, I mean, this is the strategy if you want to get so a lot, no points.

You batch make for Ty Miller. He always does this. Trey Waters, Pulaev versus Edrigue Duma. I didn't think we'd get two Dumas suggestions on the program, but here we are. Didn't expect one, Mike. Nikita Krylov versus Alonzo Menafield. Yeah. Do we need to talk about Krilov at all?

Did you, did you saw my comment in the Slack the other day? Is Modestis Bukascus, the Montel Jackson of light heavyweight? like I think we keep expecting because this should have been this was they were trying to give him a number um I think he is in the UFC's rankings modestis already no he would have been he would have been with a win they were trying to give him a number this was the davison figure radio matchup for Montel and I honestly I'm not sure what happened credit to Krillov and then Cox very good fighter very experienced he fought his fight he made more importantly he made Modestis fight his fight but man that was just gosh it just I feel like modestis is so skilled and good enough to be a top 10 light heavyweight. I was in this division. Top 10 light heavyweight is not a high bar right now. But that was disappointing. And I don't I don't know what happened. Yeah, there'll be there will be no championship fights for Modestis Baccoscosquez. Good dude. I think the UFC's like learning he's like a good dude and like has a great personality. And I think they finally realized it like we'll just give him a guy you can beat and he didn't beat him. Takeda look great. Nikita look great. I was so

proud of him. Um, plus like Jed and I are doing like the the team versus team stuff on the watch parties and Nikita Krilyov was on my team and he was so mad. You picked Nikita? I didn't pick him. Oh, oh. He picked Modestis. Oh, yes. I got Nikita. You guys are doing that. Yes, yes. His new, his new watch party gimmick. Yeah. You know who did have a madame? Actually, oh, you know, no one had Krilov. Poor Damon Martin had Modestis and there you go. Did not work out. Yeah, I bet some Bidestis too did not go well. Gachie versus Armin for an interim title defense is Zach. I mean, you could do that. You could certainly do that.

And I would love this. I would love for this to happen. If Ilya cannot go, they should absolutely do this fight. Boy, is they going to go bad for Justin Gagee. But they should absolutely do that fight. And Armin put Justin over. He wasn't like, he wasn't, like, impressed with Justin's skills. He is impressed with Justin that he's like such a damn dog.

And he knows that, like, the UFC offered a fight with Armin to Justin Gage. Just would be like, hell yeah, I'll fight. and so I would be down for that for sure. Another O'Malley versus Sanhagen, Waldo versus Volkov, Nati Ice title shot, John Silva versus Aljo, Goteer versus Jordan Santos. A lot of people still treating Goethe with the kid gloves.

They're still not quite ready to give him that hard shove yet. Or a nudge, hard nudge. Erman, pretty spot on with most. Sillow Yair, Natty Ice Val, WCA Blades, Sugar waits for Morabion three winner, Gae v. Ilya in the summer.

Yeah, we say at the beginning of the matchmaking, Mike, like, it's very clear what should happen next for a lot of these people who won on the main card. It's pretty clear. Again, will the timing work out? Will the, will the management, you know, the negotiations work out? We'll see. But the storylines are very obvious for the most part coming out of 324. What happened to Justin's kicks the staff?

Justin kicked a lot in the second half of the fight. Yeah, the second half. I kind of answering this in the chat. I think it was part of the plan as well, like I said, to not get taken down, just kind of not sacrifice whatever balance it takes to, you know, commit to those leg kicks. And I think they're saying on the commentary, he doesn't like,

like, there's just been fights in the latter stages of Justin Gates' career where he doesn't like kick as much. I will say, I think if he had landed a lot more like kicks, boy, it would have been even tougher night for Patty. But it worked out.

Hey, he got the win, got the win. Whatever his plan was, it certainly worked out. Armand matches for the losers of the main card. Arnold versus Steve Garcia. That's interesting.

I would watch that fight. Rose versus Grasso. Grasso's books that's do-Doo, Derek versus Tai Tui Vasta. There's no two. That's also due to. Song versus Byra Batista. Patty versus the winner of Hooker BSD.

I can assure you, I can assure you, Raman. I love you, man. BSD beats Dan Hooker. They are not. The UFC is in no way going to put Benoit Santini in the same cage as Patty Pimbled. Yeah, I don't know. I just don't think there's a lot of heat to that. That fight probably goes really bad for Patty.

There's a reason why on Patty's rise, they didn't book him with Benoit Santini. even after Benoit got finished in two straight fights. They still didn't put Patty in that type of matchup. We have a super chat. We do. We do. Just came in. Maybe acquiring staff is the new meta from winning.

No, it's called maybe acquiring an ingrown hair. Exactly. He said it wasn't people. He said it wasn't staff. He never said it was staff. How dare you accuse him of what was very possibly a serious medical issue? I'll answer Joseph real quick. He says, can we get A.K. Stoss?

the fact that Dana confirmed the injury rumors to Alex Hernandez isn't why the fight was canceled. This is the third betting scandal. That's not exactly true because the injury, if the injury rumors, whatever they may be, we're clearly tied to the betting line moving guys. So I understand what you're saying. It was, you know, and Dana answered it plainly. There was betting irregularities. That's why they decided to call off.

But that, guys, that's because, we don't know for sure. The rumor is that Alex Hernandez may have been going in compromise. somehow that got out of his camp, out of his team, and that's why the line moves so dramatically. So it's not one or the other. But yeah, my overall thoughts in the situation are good for the USC for doing this. I hope they're more proactive when it comes to this sort of thing, because it is a tricky, it is a bit of a slippery slope,

but also as of right now, pretty easy to keep track up. Like I said, because of social media. When there's a betting irregularity, it gets out there real quick. And I'll credit the USC and staff for like saying, okay, let's look into this and make sure we're not compromising, again, a very important card for us. That's the last thing they would have wanted to happen

was if Hernandez was injured and just goes out in the first round and then everyone's just talking about, oh my gosh, did they know? And is this why the line moved? That's not a topic of conversation you need on this card. Been really bad. Yeah.

And I don't even think they really looked in anything. I think they just got the alert from integrity and they were just like, pull it. We're not doing it. We're done. There's no even reason to look. look into it. If it's flag, just pull it. It's better to pull it before than deal with it after. So they did the right thing. I still don't think we've heard from anybody about this.

I reached out to a lot of people following the cancellation of that fight and it is deafening silence from all sides. And that's, I don't blame them. But you know, you always want to make sure like, because once the news came to that fight was canceled, that was that was immediately where everyone's head went. Maybe, you know, and I just wanted to make sure that maybe it was something else. We just don't know. Maybe there was a injury after weigh-ins. Didn't seem like it, but you just want to check and make sure.

So, uh, the injury rumor leak is kind of what's spun all of this. So I think both can be right. Uh, grace and Natty Ice, the only confirmed winner getting a title shot. Uh, what are we saying that? Do we, that we think for sure she's getting a title shot and she's the only one. I don't think anyone is against. I said, Justin Gaci, who's fighting Iliate Sporia.

And even then, let's be honest, guys, there's no, we always say there's no deserves. There's no deserves the UFC and there's definitely no guaranteed. Justi Gage, interim title does not guarantee you Jack Squat. Okay, so, I mean, we know his next fight. Ask Tom Aspin all what that means. That's not. Don't, don't do it. But yes, obviously, Justin Gage will be fighting the title fight next.

either defending his interim title fight, maybe not get elevated, we don't know. Hopefully, fingers crossed all signs point it to pour you. No, nothing is guaranteed with, man, with Natia. It is nothing. We explain why. It could be Macy Barber jumps the line, could be Valentina moves up,

and two other fighters who picked to fight for a vacant bell. It could just take Natalia out of the equation. They shouldn't. Yeah, even if they do a vacant bell, you have to do, you'll do Natty versus Minon. Menon, right? Menon, I think, is still ahead of Natty in the contender line. So yeah, it's there's no there's no confirmed.

I would hope so. I want to see that fight last year. I want to see Valentina and Natty Iceway. I do think she actually do think she's a tricky matchup for Val. I don't think the kind of, you know, uneventful fight we saw against Rose is any indication that daddy wouldn't be a good challenge. But it'll certainly affect the betting lines, guys, to look up for that if that happens. Yeah. I, after watching Rose, like, slam her to the mat and kind of effortlessly take her down when her title defense is.

held up quite a bit. Valentina is just going to chuck her around and it'll be it'll be a bad night for her. Unless she knocked her out. You're going to faint her to hell, Mike. Maybe. Maybe that. Maybe she just doesn't. Maybe she's not fainting at all.

What do I do? Maybe she just stops fainting. Maybe she just stops fainting. Thoughts on Dana throwing Tom under the bus. What do you say exactly? What's the new one? What is the new thing? I miss him.

He was asked about Tom and he was like I have no update. I heard he's getting another. surgery. He goes, but I don't really want to say these. God forbid I say anything. Oh, yeah, yeah, which is that. I thought it was just kind of funny. Like, I didn't take anything. Yeah. A lot of people thought it was like him throwing him under the bus. Like I really, I'd really look at it. Yeah. I saw that comment too. And okay, he was being a bit, you know, sarcastic obviously. But I, I do think he was essentially saying like, what am I going to say? I don't have, he doesn't have an update. He does not have an update Tom South that tells him it tells he was going to

do. Yeah. Connor versus Gates you one book. Scott McRate. Dude, I wouldn't hate watching that fight, honestly. That's one that like, it, this is one reason why it sucks that if you're a fan of Conner-Regger's

fighting, that he's been off for like three years. Because this fight definitely should have happened at some point in their career. Like, we've, I don't know, I can't remember the last time this was pitched, but,

sorry, the first time this was pitched, but this has been talked about for at least like six or seven years of positive of them fighting. It'd be such, the atmosphere round. It would be great. I think the matchup is so fun.

I would love to see that before the end of, of their careers, but I just, I have no idea how that happens now. Armand, my guy. Thank you so much. Thank you for being here, man. But first of 2026. And Mike, I don't want to skip to the end, but I'm saying, we're going to be live again next weekend.

We should tell people, make sure to tune in because we have back-to-back pay-per-views. We do. Yeah. Is this the first time? We're going to wrap up here. It's the first time this has happened that you and I are going to do back-to-back live shows? I have to imagine, right?

I don't think. I'll have to dig into the archives. With no weekends in between, obviously, with no, like, literally back-to-back weekends, back-to-back live shows. I mean, I think we probably did one. I don't know if we, like, Fight Island, maybe, during the COVID. Right. There might have been some special cards where we were like,

let's go live for this. But, guys, we will be back next week. We'll do it again. But this is a card. This is a card. UFC 325 going down in Australia. the main event, Alexander Volcanovsky,

Diego Lopez 2 for the featherweight belt. Thank you, Michael, you're the man. Co-main event, Dan Hooker versus Benoit Santini. Good fight. Why? Because you got lightweights. And speaking of lightweights, you have Raphael Fiziv versus Brescia Rufi,

which is going to be fun. Great. Actually, there's a terrific matchup for Raphael Fiziv, but who knows, Riffie is a pretty tricky, dangerous guy. Then we decide, you know what? We have two lightweight, fights you know what we need to do before we have like sandwiched another lightweight fight we get

have heavy weights fight the return of tie to evasa versus talison to shira that is the second fight of the main card main card kicks up with kill and sow killed versus jamy malarkey this is this is a this is a strong main card from a pure excitement standpoint compared to 324 324 the stakes way higher obviously way higher but like we knew there could be some sort of there could be some very competitive and not necessarily memorable decisions on there i don't know if that's going to happen on 325 i think they've matched made this right oh sorry even the fights are competitive like i think this even and uh rufe very competitive fight i think that's going to be awesome like you said lightweights hey you put three lightweights on the main card good times

good two lightweight fights i have to check this real quick okay uh to see if this is true because if this is actually the featured pre-lib this is i don't even know what to say here i think we should say is the featured prelain. No, I think we should say bout order still to be finalized. As right now, this is legitimately the featured prelim. Junior Tafa versus Billy Alicana. Boy, are you playing a risky game doing that? I mean, Billy, Billy was fun last fight.

Uh-huh. But he was also part of like one of the worst fights at UFC history, a fight before that. So I don't know. Maybe they see something I don't. Light heavyweight is worse than heavy weight, right? Can we agree on that? Or is it just just Alec Pudetta being at the top, like, save it. The balance better, yeary and like, I think heavy weights worse.

Okay, okay, no. Because, you know, I just, as I'm saying, like, Kaleel Brown Tree, Yuri. Like, at least your top, like, you have six or seven guys that are like, okay, we're going to have some fun here. For sure. It's not as bad. Fine.

Cam Roaston versus Cody Brundage. The real mate of N.A.K., uh, Jacob Alcun versus Torres Fiddy. Going down, we're six days away from Torres Fiddy's return, AK. How are we feeling? I'm a little nervous because I have a lot. of stock in Torres vini my name my name is tied with Torres viny right now and if he loses I am going to get it on social media I am going to be getting it I'm right now uh we also have

Khan offly versus ysha and then we have not one not two not three but four road to ufc tournament final bouts wait mike did you skip jonathan mccullough and oban elli oh ben elli okay we are getting two car for the price of one. Now, that may not matter to you fancy United States people who are getting everything on Paramount Plus. But up in Canada and several other countries, we are still paying for pay-per-view. So this will be a $799 purchase for me. So I am glad. I am not just getting USC through 25, Mike. We are getting, as you were about to introduce, we are getting the Road to UFC Season 4 tournament finals. Go ahead, Mike. So like, from my work perspective, yes. Can we just

like wait to start working until like Khan Offley versus usual? These are, though, technically not, for whatever reason, apparently not UFC fights. They just take place on UFC cards. Yeah, it's our UFC promoting events. Unlike ultimate fighter finalies, which have traditionally been treated as this is your, the UFC debut for, well, I mean, not obviously the debut this time because they recycle fighters. But this is a UFC fight at the final. Again, I don't even know who keeps track of these things officially. I know Sherdog and Topology and even the UFC themselves, they do their best, but I just don't,

know who's like mark it down as this is officially officially officially official UFC fight because as we say so it's very strange but as far as we know we're just getting an extra card like we're gonna add a little bonus card tacked on before okay sounds lovely but that's UFC 3 you didn't even name the fighter I'm not that's how this is you don't have to I'm just saying this is how Donmar fan versus sang ukem Sebastian Sizzle versus Kejaro Nakamura sullen grongbo versus Lawrence, Louis, and them Shry,

that's Byar, versus Aaron Tao. There you go. Aaron Tau, I think, is the only one I've heard of here. I mean, I think if I do a little deeper, I would learn more, but yeah. Oh, Lazy Bad raises a good point. He says Road to UFC fighters won't be eligible for bonuses. LazyBed.

Or should they be? Did you say, well, I, yeah, I guess not. They're fighting for AK. Yes, they're not UFC fights. They're not UFC fights. They're fighting for the sweet, sweet opportunity to make 10 and 10 as UFC fighters. That's messed up, though. That is messed up because they are on a UFC card.

They are providing their bodies as content for the UFC but are not eligible for UFC bonuses on this given night. I don't know. But what great PR would it be is if these guys delivered something big and then Dana gave them a bonus anyways? Oh, wow. So magnanimous. You think fighter pay sucks? Well, we just gave these road to UFC guys who already. even in the UFC extra money.

You are... Nailed it. You are so cynical and so correct. And that makes me... That's so depressing. I'm also exhausted, so I get a little grumpy on this Sunday shows. You're doing just fine. All right, we're out of here.

We're done. Gotta get ready to watch the New England Patriots earn a Super Bowl birth in two and a half hours from right now as they take on your Denver Broncos, my New England Patriots heading to the Super Bowl. Very excited. I'm going to eat some food. I'm just going to do nothing.

this afternoon. I'm spectacularly excited for all that. But yes, UFC 325 fight week is upon us. Just to give you guys a heads up, we will not be there. No boots on the ground for UFC 325. So, which is probably good for Jose, honestly, because he could probably use a week off from hitting the road after this week. And shout out to Jose and everybody else that are still stuck in Vegas at extra day. Jose was supposed to fly home today. But obviously the weather in the Northeast he's in New York. Everyone's just getting absolutely smoked with snow and wintery glop and goop and all that. So shut out. Positive vibes to all of you. I got, we are extremely lucky here in the Hilton Head Savannah region. Not a drop of rain.

It is a little cold right now and it's going to be like 60 degrees later on. So I don't know how we avoided all this shit. But I know a lot of you didn't get the opportunity to avoid it. So wish you well. May those shovels. shovel freely. May the plows be there timely in a timely manner. And stay warm. Hope your power stays on. Wishing you all the terrific vibes you can give you.

For A.K.I. I. I. Mikeak. Thank you so much. Back next week for another edition of On to the next one, the podcast. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network.