MMA Fighting - Rankings Show: What The Hell Are We Supposed To Do With Khamzat Chimaev? + Is It Time To Stop Calling DJ A Flyweight, More

Episode Date: September 15, 2022

What in the hell are we supposed to do with Khamzat Chimaev after his massive weight miss? Is it egregious to call Leon Edwards a top-4 pound-for-pound fighter in the world? And is it really time to stop calling Demetrious Johnson a flyweight because ONE Championship’s unorthodox weight divisions? After a crazy few weeks, the gang is back to sort through the noise on the latest edition of the MMA Fighting Rankings Show. Co-hosts Shaun Al-Shatti and Alexander K. Lee are joined this month by Jed Meshew and Damon Martin to reckon with the fallout of UFC 279 and more. Follow Shaun Al-Shatti @ShaunAlShatti Follow Alexander K. Lee @AlexanderKLee Follow Jed Meshew @JedKMeshew Follow Damon Martin @DamonMartin 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

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Welcome to the MMA Fighting Ranking Show. We appreciate you guys so much for joining us as always. I hope you're having a wonderful little. September here. My name is Sean O'Shti, and I'm here with my guy. The Prince of Positivity himself. He's the king in the north. You already know who he is. He is Alexander K. Lee, AK, my man, it has been way too long at this point. I've missed you, dude. How are you doing? I'm great. The people have missed us. I've seen so many comments on social media on the MMAFighting.com comments. Where is, where are the rankings? Where is the pod? Where's the

pound for pound list? Where's the global list? The divisional list. So people please check out MMAfighting.com, the divisional rankings that came out, you'll have been able to read them by the time this recording comes out, came into this week. And we sort of explain our new, our sort of new rankings feature schedule, guys. We're going to try to aim to have it after every sort of major UFC event that we kind of better capture, you know, when the, when the big rankings happen. And keep an eye out, guys, for those rankings, shake up features that we've been doing to sort of, you know, when we're not doing a full rankings feature load out. So, but yeah, but, yeah, but thank you. you have everyone for your patience we are we are definitely back yeah so as i k mentioned are we have now moved the schedule we we're doing initially the first week of the month uh and now we're just going to do the week after the pay-per-view because most of the big stuff happens for the pay-per-view which just makes sense for us uh so just keep that in mind as we move forward uh and you guys already know i mean i k it's been a good six weeks and we've had a lot going on so we have a lot to dive into but first let's bring in the rest of this month's panel first the ogy himself the host of fighter versus rider

This man is prolific. You already know who he is. He's Damon Martin. What's going on, Damon? I'm happy to be back. I missed the last rankings podcast and I was sad about that. Well, we are happy to have you back, my friend, anytime. And also with us today, Mr. No Gray area himself, he is the host of No Betts Barred.

He's the host of Dame. They were good. He just does a lot of really cool stuff for us. He is Mr. Jed Michoud. How are you doing, Jed? I'm doing great because I knew what I was doing when I set my rankings. And I knew what was going to happen. I knew that I'd be in this position.

position and I'm ready to fight all of you. Bring it on. I'm ready to fight all of you. Okay. That's the energy. I like that energy to start. So let's just start on a big picture of you because as we said, guys, I mean, it's been about six weeks since we've been able to be in this space and talk about this kind of stuff. So I'll start with you, Jed. I mean, when it came time to do your rankings this month, there was a lot of different moves. We had a lot of big moves in the pound for pound list. Leon Edwards, Hamzaa Shamaia, DJ taking the top spot of a flyweight. What was the standout story or move for you this month? I mean, obviously, it's the whole Leon thing.

Like, that's, Walterweight is the standout story. I know we're going to talk a lot about the DJ and all of the ramifications there later in the pods. I won't step on that. But, I mean, Kamar Usman is dead. The king is dead. We have a new king. And also, there's another guy by the name of Hamza Achmaev. making things real weird in here.

The whole 170 thing, weird stuff's afoot. Let me just add that Kumar Usman's actually alive for all the viewers out there. He's very alive. He's doing well. He's fine. Don't listen to Jed. Damon, do you agree? I mean, is Walter Waite sort of the big story for you when you were filing your ballot this month?

Yeah, it really does come down to that. I mean, I would love to sit here and say it was Demetris Johnson kind of climbing back on top of his throne, so to speak. You know, after getting knocked out by Adriana Mariah. but yeah, it's Welterweight because it's a weird month with Leon Edwards winning and then Hamza Tcha Myev completely blowing a weight cut. Not that a winner, René Diaz would have really bolstered him in the Welterway rankings, but you know, now he's basically fighting a middleweight. So, yeah, it's kind of a crazy month for Walter Wade now.

Yeah, you guys aren't wrong. I mean, there were small moves sort of around the edges. Cyril Gan taking the number two spot from Steepen Miochich, who, Stipe Amiochich, by the way, about to hit that 18-month cut off. He's about to be a goner next month. I know Jed, you're very excited about this. You've been waiting for this. Been waiting.

Gone from the rankings again. Gone from the rankings, by the way. Again, not dead. I stopped yelling fighters on our podcast. He will be alive. He will be gone from our rankings. Fingers crossed. He will be alive.

Just gone. He will be Cyril gone. I cannot wait for that man to leave to stop squatting on a ranking without fighting anybody. The pomp and circumstance with which you will push the delete button when that time comes to file out the next balance. I want you to film it. I am so excited. There are a few times that I've been waiting for things like this to happen,

and that is certainly one of them. I'm enthused about the next ranking cycle. Also, a couple of small moves. I mean, we had Bantam weight. This one really broke my heart, I'm sure, a couple of you guys as well. Mara Dahliazvili jumping over Jose. Although he's now a top five bantam weight in the world as well. Just, you know, some general movement.

But, A.K., I mean, ultimately, I think I agree with these guys. Welterweight was the big story for me. about you. I don't agree. Oh, hit me. I don't agree. I, I will play the devil's advocate. Jamal Hill guys. Uh, oh, Jeff Neal, by the way, Jeff, Jeff, Jeff, Jeff. Jeff, technically making one of the biggest. That's another welterweight thing. This is true, another welterweight thing. Yeah, going from unranked. I mean, I think on most of our list, he would have been, like, if you extended it to 20, Neil would have been like 16, 17, 18, so it's not like an insane jump. It was my 16 for a really long time. Yeah, he is sort of bounced around the edges for a long time.

So he essentially, but he jumped at least, again, technically like, seven or eight or nine spots, depending where you might have had him in a theoretical, theoretical 16 to 20 spots. So great, great job by Jeff Neal, huge win, career best performance against Lucke,

I would say. But I'll make the argument for DJ just by saying, like, he's outside the UFC, so it's hard for him to, the degree of difficulty to claim the number one spot. He is the only one right now. I know there's a vote for Corey Anderson

and light heavy weight up there. He's the only one ever. He's the only one ever. That's right. This would be the first time in our rankings, a non-UFC fighter. And again, People will say, well, I mean, he's not UFC, but he was the UFC, the man in the UFC for so long.

But technically, again, no longer a UFC man. He is one championship, one champion, one fighter. And they can be proud to say they have a guy in the number one spot. And he did it in such an amazing way, such a poetic way, with the knee knockout of much larger. I did I know, Matt Ice. And we'll talk about the size stuff later. Believe me, people, don't worry about that. We have a lot of talk to do about this size conversation.

I think all of us are sort of, I don't really know what to do with this. Yeah. But for him to go over. you know, Davidson Figuero, Brandon Marano, two people very worthy of the first place spot. They have first place votes in our rankings is really amazing. And at the stage of his career, too, where I do wonder if some people were writing him off, like, oh, was he just going to do flood and fights now? He's just going to do, because he said, I want to do kickboxing.

I want to do, you know, special rules matches like he did with Rod Tang. So is he past the point where he cares about being the number one fly rate? Not that he ever really did. If you ask him, he's pretty laid back about all this stuff. So, yeah, huge achievement to make it back. So I'll say the Edwards thing is impressive and all the moves at Welter rate for sure as a whole. I mean, that's the most, that was the biggest changes of any of the divisions. But I'm going to give DJ's props and say this was the big move of the month.

I got to say that DJ knockout is still one of the most gorgeous knockouts I've ever seen in my entire life. Just the precision on that thing was just masterful. Between him and Leon in the last like six months of this cycle, we have just had two of the best knockouts of the year. And it's spectacular. You love to see it. So let's jump into it, fellas, because we'll hit DJ in a bit, but this past weekend we saw a lot, a lot, a lot of craziness out there in Las Vegas. But none was crazier than the man at the center of it all. And that's Hamzat Shemaya.

And we're talking about a guy who had a total layup in front of him. Like he was being given the literal golden ticket that most of these dudes in the UFC are dreaming of. And instead of cashing it in, missed weight by a whole damn division, ended up demolishing still our previous number. 15 welterweight, Kevin Holland. That was at a 180 pound catch weight, but he blanked him. It wasn't even close. Holland literally did zero in that fight. You look at the stats.

He has zero stats next to anything. And now the number next to Hamzat Shemayev's name didn't actually change this time around when we brought out our new rankings. He was already number three. He remains number three. But that number three means something different now than it did last month. Because last month, obviously, you had the Leon, Camaro's situation that hadn't happened yet. Camaro, Colby, Hamzat.

That's what we were at. Now it's Leon, Kamaro, Hamzat, which means Camzat is basically jumped Colby Covington to be the best non-trilege welterweight fighter in the world, however you want to phrase that. He also debuted in our pound-for-pound rankings at number 20. But fellas, this got a lot of people really angry. And I'm just wondering, how did you approach this whole situation? How should we have approached this situation? Basically, giving Shimae of credit, moving him up.

giving him, you know, props after missing weight by such a massive degree. A.K., let's start with you. Like, how did you handle this this month? This wasn't hard for me at all. There was no dilemma. I have a pretty firm rule. You miss weight. You just don't move up and you don't move up.

You miss weight and you win your fight. You don't move up. You just can't. I'm trying to think if there's been exceptions to this, maybe there has. And I'm sure, I'm sure if there hasn't in the future, there could be. You know, if you're like the number 10 guy and you miss weight by half a pound, one pound, and you beat the number two guy or something. There's a chance.

I would have to, you know, there's a lot of, how did the fight go and how convincing it was and things like that? There's stuff like that that could convince me to, to not automatically penalize the offending fighter with no movement. But in this case, for me, he's already high enough in my rankings. He's number three in my personal rankings behind Usman and Edwards. Oh, sorry, behind Usman and, where do I have him? You have a number three?

Well, now behind Edwold. Last month, Usman and I had, should be I have number two. I don't remember this. So technically he got bumped down one spot, but not through any fault of his own, just because Edwards claimed the number one spot, Oumann down number two. So, yeah, so I didn't penalize him for it. I don't think he deserves to move up any further. I couldn't put him past the, as you said, sort of the trilogy guys,

we're going to assume they're going to have a trilogy soon. So, yeah, pretty simple for me. You miss weight in one of these high profile situations and you almost derail an entire card. You're not moving up in my list. I mean, Damon, when you look at this this month, did you pause like did you struggle to almost even put hamsat as a well to wait at this point because it feels like we're sort of in this weird limbo where we don't know where this guy's going obviously historically he has made this division but what the hell was that 178.5 like

what are we supposed to do with with a guy like this right now? I mean I gave him I gave him a bit of a pass when it came to like dropping him. I didn't drop him. And to be clear, if he had gone out and made 170 and laid waste to Nade Diaz, I wouldn't have moved him up either. That to me is not, you know, listen, I think Hamzot's an incredibly talented guy and he may be a welterweight champion or a middleweight champion in the next, you know, year, year and a half, but Nate Diaz is not the fight that's going to get me to jump you over Colby Covington, Kabar Usma, or Leon Edwards. I'm sorry. That's just not it. Um, but this one,

this one is so egregious that you have to at least pause for a second because he didn't just miss weight by like a pound. He missed it by, you know, seven and a half pounds over the limit. So I didn't penalize it because it's his first time. It's his only time he's missed weight, so I'm not going to drop him, but I'm also not going to reward him. Did he beat Kevin Holland dominantly? Absolutely. Was Kevin Holland training for Hamza Tchamaya? No, he was training for a boxer in Daniel Rodriguez, and he got paid a bag to take a fight at a catch weight and fight Hamzaa.

I have a completely stylistic difference from another guy. And Hamzat clearly showed he had no interest in going out there and striking with Kevin Holland. He went out there, took him down within two seconds. and submitted him and good on him for doing it. Take no damage, get out of there. I get it. But yeah, I mean, I'm not going to penalize him yet. I think we need to see a bigger pattern.

If he tries to fight at Walterweight again and misses weight again, then, you know, that might be it for him. I mean, that might be, you know, no more putting him a Walterway. That's two fights in a row. He hasn't made the weight. Or if he fights a middleweight, then we start talking about does he just start getting ranked in middleweight? So I'm not going to penalize him, but I'm certainly not going to reward him for beating

Kevin Holland in a catchweight fight where he blew the main. event and blew the welterweight main event at that. So it's interesting, the different philosophies I think we all approach this with, because I agree with you on a couple different levels, Damon, in that this was his first time, right? So for me, I didn't penalize him because it's his first time. If this becomes a reoccurring thing, then we can revisit it. And I might just take him out of my Walterweight rankings entirely because he, this dude just

might be a middleweight at this point. We kind of feels like we're at a crossroads where maybe that's what's happening. But we'll see. but I will say I did move him up. I did move him up. I love Kobe Covington simply because at this point, his body of work has become so overwhelming that it is hard for me to deny it. Where if you're five fights or six fights in the UFC and five of them are basically shutouts, more or less, like literal shutouts. At a certain point, this is some unprecedented shit that I've just never seen before in my entire life.

And I know a lot of our rankings, our philosophies are different. some of us like to do some forecasting with the way we put stuff of, hey, I think this guy would beat this guy rather than just resume. I think a little bit of that was playing into this for me. Because I think if Shemaya, if Chamey and Colby Covington fought, like, MZemeyev is going to be a big favorite. And I feel fairly confident that Shemeyov would win that.

Obviously, that's just me predicting. But to me, that combined with Colby Covington is just complete inactivity and complete, if we're being frank, just unwillingness to fight relevant. Welter weights. Like that's really difficult for me to just... He was assaulted, allegedly. Well, hold on.

Hold on. You say in 18, you fought March. Against the guy we don't even have in the top 15, my man. He was at the time, though. He was a ring guy. He was number 15. He might have been number 15 or out. He has not been ranked for a long time.

But that was a grudge man. I'm not, trust me. I'm not going to defend Kobe Covington. I promise you. I'm just saying like... It's the steep thing. I get it. These are five.

fights that are relevant. Beat somebody in the current top 15. That's all I want. Sometimes you're wild level. Listen, I am. That's where I come back on Homside. He has that one win over Gilbert Burns. It's an absolutely legitimate,

incredible fight. And that one win. That one win is better than anything else. I'm going to say. That's fine. Like I said, I'm not, I'm not going to negate the,

the, I'm just saying I was more responding about the activity things. He did just fight six months ago, which is sooner than a lot of other guys have fought. Well, let me pass the baton over to Jed because I think there is an elephant in the room in this whole discussion because when you look at the welterweight rankings right now, you'll see that there are seven first place votes for the man who scored one of the most unbelievable upsets in the history of this sport. The greatest comeback of all time. Starched Kamara Usman. Starched to the guy who for so long we said was the number one pound for pound fighter in the world ended up being number two when it happened. But regardless, Kamara Usman, as this man framed it, is dead. Leon Edwards is the king. And yet the one man who didn't vote for Leon Edwards, number one in the Welterweight division, is Mr. No Gray area himself, Jedmishu.

I need you to explain to me, to explain to Damon, to explain to the people, to AK. Why in the hell is Hamzat Shemai of your number one welterweight this month after everything we just saw from this guy? And can I add something out of that question real quick? How dare you? How dare you? How dare you? How dare you?

dead. Okay, I'm sorry. Go ahead. The floor is yours. The floor is yours. One moment to get his flowers and you can't even let him get it. All right, go. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

That's my fault. I should just let him go. I wanted to. I so wanted to give this business his flowers. Don't start out by lying. He's still getting his flowers because I knew that you all would.

But a couple of factors went into this. The first was, well, Leon's resume, I mean, honestly, a little Colby-esque. Like, he didn't have many recently relevant wins, obviously, but for starching Kamar Uisman. Which feels pretty relevant. That's why I have him as the number two welterweight in the world.

But so I came into UFC 279 thinking I had the battle between do I reward Leon for accomplishing it versus made it pretty. clear. The primary thing I focus my divisional rankings on is who would win in a fist fight straight up. If they booked it tomorrow on neutral territory, who would win? That is the main guiding principle. And prior to this, I had

Usman over Chamehav and then Shemayev and then, however, it shook out on my three after. Those are my one and two. Watching that fight, even before the knockout comeback, I thought okay, Chimayev will beat Usman when they

fight. Like that was a thing that really struck me. Partly the first round, like Leon scored the first takedown ever on Usman. His control on Usman was absolutely dominant. I was like, well, if Chamaio gets that, this is a rap, baby. We're done here. So, and then I, I just felt that Usman gave a good performance, but he looked a little older, a little slower, just not, like he didn't have everything there. And so coming out of that, had Usman won, I would have elevated Chamaiof to number one anyway because that that was the feeling I had obviously the CAO comes back and so then I'm like I really want to reward Leon for that incredible CO and then Shamiyev misses the weight and I'm like well there's really no better time to reward Leon for the thing that he accomplished but I'm sorry I can't

get over the fact that Hamzaa Shamaev is beating the ever-loving hell out of people to a degree we've never seen and it's really that because it feels like everybody here sort of feels the same way none of you have penalized Chimae for missing weight. I am of the opinion that this is the first time it's ever happened. Certainly something rotten in Denmark was going on. I don't have any issues about him making weight moving forward. Now, if he misses the next time, okay, totally willing to have that conversation. I am of the opinion that this is a one-off, whatever.

We frequently rank people who have missed weight before in divisions and don't give it that much credence. I'm treating it that way. I think a whole, whole lot of Kevin Holland as a welterweight. And you don't blank that dude. And it really is the level of dominance from him. Because, I mean, you said it. You said, Sheen, we've never seen this. And the thing that I keep coming back to, Hamzot is treating fighters like you see elite elite prospects treat regional talent.

Like when they just, when some dude, you know, three national championships, chips in wrestling comes in and starts blowing people's doors off, you know, like against nobodies and smokers in the Midwest. Hamzov's doing that to top 10 people because I think Kevin Holland is a top 10ish welterweight and he blanked him. And I can't, I can't, my eyes can't deny that if he, if he and Leon Edwards fought, he'd be a minus 400 favorite. If he fights Kumar Usman, he's going to be a favorite.

I think he's going to beat the hell out of any well to wait alive. and that just had that over that outweighed everything else everything else i just couldn't get past it because he is treating legitimate a plus plus competition the same way bow nickel treats contender series people and that's just not something that has ever happened in the sport yeah and i'll extend that even further jed i and i hate to bring this up i know this is this is always going to be a fresh wound but uh you know when we did miss fist together before i unceremoniously exiled even that feature yeah i i i i I still feel bad about that. That's what his wins look like.

You know, we had a lot of, there's a lot of, if anyone go back to this, when Jed and I were writing, there's a lot of like, oh, this is like, this guy looks great, but this is what's great about low-level regional MMA or low-level international on-May. Like, you don't see this kind of, you know, you won't see this in the UFC. Like, that's why we love this level of MMA. This kind of like rag-dalling, just pure dominance, like highlight real ass-whipping. Like, that's only you're going to see in like some card in like, you know, in the middle of Serbia or something. Yeah.

And then that is what comes out is doing to high-level UFC fighters. And it's the exact, it's the exact inverse of like, well, so think of the same, to carry your analogy forward, AK, when we're doing end of the year awards, there are incredibly dope things that happen from chaos to submissions on the regional circuit, like wild, like buggy chokes, all that. And that is never in our end of the year discussion because, well, yeah, I mean, cool, he did it against an 0 and 2 fighter on the prelims of an ACA car or wherever. Like it's no, this is Kevin Holland. Kevin Holland went 25 minutes with Derek Brunson and Marvin Mottori and they couldn't do anything to him other than hold him. Hamza Chimaev folded him up like a towel and threw him away. It is the most disrespectful dominance I've ever seen in the sport. And I can't, I was a big, big Habib guy from moment when I was like this dude's a future champion.

And Habib didn't bring this level of dominance. Nobody has ever done this. And I can't, I can't get that out of my head. I can't move past it. First off, AK, what the hell, man? Mr. Rules Rule himself? Are you kidding me? You're coming out here and defending this?

I just want us all to get along, Sheen. The disrespect shown to Leon Edwards. I thought it was at an end. I thought it was over. I thought this man had finally done enough to earn people's respect and just for one second of his life, get what was credited to him, get what he earned. deserved and you're going along with this let me just say this man just laid out a case for why beating kevin holland after missing weight should move you into the number one spot in the world

when this man just went out there one boom shot headshot dead whatever he said to leon edwards and to kamar usman and that doesn't get you the number one spot damon am i crazy am i taking crazy pills here no and here's the thing let me just throw this out at you reese mckee leagin leang and gilbert those are the only three wins that homzot has a at Walter way. Now, Gilbert Burns is legit. Those are three really good wins, dude. Rees McKee is a good. Reese McKee is a good wins.

That's one fine win and a top five and a top 15. A top one. Yeah, I agree. I'd put Lee, I put Lee above a lot of the guys that Rees McKee is a lightway. Just out there. Lee Jingleang is a solid guy. He's never been a great guy. He's a fringe

top 15 guy. French top 15 guys. He's still taking a beat him. Man, he's still taking a beat him. Fringe top 15 is not great. I am so excited to know that I will never even be good at a job if being one of the 15-ish best in the world is like, eh. You weren't number one in my heart until this. This is just, I can't.

This is that you're unforgivinglysmobile. Now, Gilbert Burns is the one legitimate big win, and that was obviously as tough as fight, no doubt about it. Gilbert Burns, again, legit top 15. That's a great. That's a one. Again, I have commonsuch of mind. Well, he got bumped down one only because Oussman.

lost and I have him in number two now. So technically, Chimae got bumped down to number four. And I'm not even really arguing the Colby Covington point. If you want to put him about Colby, fine. Colby's been out for six months. You know, but again, again, I'm a big, you know, what have you done? What have you done to do it? And to be honest, like, you know, Colby had the win over Mazvedal.

And since then, you know, Hamza had a chance to fight a Welterweight. And he didn't fight a welterweight. He didn't fight a middle way. He found this 178.5 pounds. He made up his own weight class. Yeah, he just made up his own weight class. So that's why I can't mean. We can do it, but Hamza can't.

I see how it is. Yeah. So the point is, it's like, I don't have a problem with him being three or four. Like, again, I have no pretty, I can't, but I can't put him above Oussman or Edwards. I mean, you know, Leon Edwards just head kicked and knocked out a guy that I was calling the greatest welterweight of all time leading into that card. Yeah, you were you actually saying that? Oh, 100.

And I, I, I think, 100% in their price. 100% their parents, Carl Usmo would wash George St. Pierre. Sean, do you hear what just happened? It's all the people listening who are like, Jed is a moron.

Then you're like, crap. Well, I guess Jed's right because Damon thought GSP wasn't the goat. Oh, no,

Damon. So if you bump Usman down to number two. But Usman, let's just put Uspen in number two then. Okay. And you got Edwards in number one.

Again, I just don't see accomplishment wise. Back on, yes. I just can't, I can't put Chamaa

above either one of those guys. when you look at the body of work. Yes, I mean, I think Shamiya is a monster. 100% he's a monster. And if he can actually make the weight, I fully believe he can become champion. Now, will he? I don't know because he can't,

we don't know if he's going to make the weight. His coach just said the other day, we're going to probably go to middleweight. Like, he's like, I'm going to talk to him. I'm going to middle weight. This may be a moot point a month from now because he may just book a middleweight fight against Paulo Costa. And that's okay.

Then we can rediscuss, but riddle me this day. because I have no issues with you, any of you not putting Hamzot, number one. I understand what you guys are doing, and I'm cool with it. But if they book the fight tomorrow, if they book the fight tomorrow between Leon and Hamzot, who are you picking to win? That's not the question, though, because if they book the fight tomorrow, I think it's a better.

That is the question to me. No, no, because as I have stated, the primary ranking tool I use is who would win in a fight. I understand that. But if they booked that fight tomorrow, I think a lot of people, would also pick Kamara Usman to win that fight and we can't put him ahead of Leon because we have to respect results to a certain degree especially when someone gets starched. I agree. That's why I won I would pick Edwards to be Usman.

But the way my rankings work, which I feel like I've clearly said, don't want to do this every time. But it's who I think would win unless there is specific evidence that I'm wrong, i.e. Leon just beat Usman. We have to respect the result. But with Leon and Chmai, I have to respect. haven't fought. There's no result to respect. So I have Chimae of it won because I think if they booked that fight tomorrow, Chamiyav wins the fight. Now, if they book it, Chamaev loses, I have to put Leon in front of him because that's how it shakes out. But this is, it's, I, I get it and I respect

all of your choices here. And I'm not even saying I'm right because I think there's a, there are a lot of people who wouldn't agree with me. And part of me hates that I have done it. But I can't get past the idea. I hope so. I just can't get past the idea that they booked the 18 dudes tomorrow. One man is going to be a minus 450 favorite over anybody else in the division. And when the fight actually happens, we're going to be like, dude, he should have been like a minus 800. Holy hell. I haven't seen Leon Edwards get absolutely demolished like that ever.

That was some gymnastics. That's some serious gymnastics. He said, I mean, he lives with his shame. He admitted he lives with this shame. The chimed hypotheticals are great, but I mean, everyone thought, everyone thought he was going to go in there and wash guilt. Berns remember he was a massive favorite Gilbert here this is going to be this is going to be his coming out party and he was be one two punches away from losing that fight I mean he got he got beat up I had wheels I'd be a wagon Damon but I don't have wheels and I'm saying you're playing

hypotheticals that's what I'm saying that's the hypothetical you everyone thought he was going to run through Gilbert Burns you say he's going to run through Colby Covington he may win that fight I don't know Colby's a good wrestler Colby's got cardio we don't know what Chbiby's cardio would look like in round four and five put that fight in Salt Lake City whole different animal Again, there's these hypotheticals that we're playing into the you can't actually say will happen with 100% absolute certainty, and that's the problem. Are you suggesting, Damon, that a ranking of a subjective ranking of people might not be the most scientifically sound thing we've ever done on this website? But if you're subjective is one thing, but if we're just ranking based on who we think, who we like or who we think is better, what do accomplishments matter? I mean, what does it even matter at that point?

Accomplishments inform who I believe will do better moving forward. Jed, can I ask something? Sure. You could have put, I mean, you couldn't have waited. You couldn't have given Edwards this moment. You could have made Shemaya number one later. I don't know. You could have like a few months.

I don't know. You just a random rejiggering of your, the top of your, you know, Walter. You couldn't have given in this one moment where he was the unanimous welterweight in the world. Because let me tell you something. Somewhere out there. Oh, AK just sat up in his seat. This is like you're leading forward

playing a video game or something. He's champion. Beat the pound of pound number one guy, one of the greatest welterways of all time, Karo's one. He's living life. And then suddenly the MA fighting global rankings come out.

He's like, he's got a sip of tea. He's got a cup of tea. He's got a cup. He's got a couple with him. He was enjoying a fine English breakfast. Rolls out the newspaper. I'm sorry,

whatever is phone to look at the rankings and sees one, he's not the consensus number one welterweight according to our rankings and just ruins the disrespect you just probably just ruined his whole day you ruined edward leon edwards company you ruined his christmas probably it's very upsetting him because leon edwards is a man who he is never he is always the underdog i'm giving him fuel to defend his title you guys are out here just crowning him let's king the man who lost 23 minutes or whatever of the fight

before pulling off the most sensational K-O comeback. He'll need to stop saying this, because I keep seeing people be like, oh, he lost all of that fight. Like, dude had a very dominant first round. And that is one fifth of the fight. So, like, let's give him.

18 minutes of that fight and had the greatest KEO in the history of one of the greatest KOs ever. But a fight, he was, they were writing his obituary before he pulled that shit out of his ass. Fights are 25 minutes long. Fight to 25 minutes.

Guess what? They're not 20 minutes. long. I'm saying. That man needs motivation for the rematch. And I'm giving it to him, baby. Because until he beats Chamaev, or Chamaiov blows weight again or moves to 185, Chimaya is my top 170 year until such time is something else changes.

All right. So Jed's alone on this island. We need to move this train forward a little bit. But we're going to stay on this topic because basically the welter weights, as we said at the top, were the big story of this month. And this one was, I think, surprising for us. that this even became somewhat of a controversial issue, but it seemed to, and it regards Leon Edwards,

and I think it speaks to the continuing disrespect that this man is getting, because Leon Edwards this month, debuted on our pound-for-pound rankings. He was unranked before. Now he's number four. Kamar Usman was number two. He beat number two.

Leon debuts at number four. I think Kamar was at number six now. And guys, people really had a problem with this. Like, really, really had a problem with it. I believe the word clown shit was used. I believe there were accusations of, guys, you're better than this. Just a lot of people being upset that Leon Edwards is now the number four pound for pound fighter in the world. This to me felt very uncontroversial.

I was surprised by all this, A.K. Damon, what did you guys make of this? Because, Jed, I know you have some thoughts as well. Well, I'll say quickly. I'll let Damon have a little more platform here. But let me just say there is reason to kind of question and this kind of, you know, our methodology here. and this kind of goes with what I was just saying sort of admonishing Jed for. We've been pretty disrespectful to Neil and Edwards. Now, it is tough.

I will say it is tough to land in the pound for pound rankings unless you are a champion in a promotion. Or if you are on, you know, some incredible run in one of the stronger divisions. So, you know, I think a lot of us will see multiple lightweights, multiple welterweights, bantam weights. So. But Leon, for whatever reason, just wasn't in there. We did have questions about his competition. I think his best wins are what. RDA definitely is a really good one.

Nate Diaz is fine. Gunner Nelson, Lucke a long time ago. So there's some names in there, but most of us felt pretty comfortable not having Leon on our top 20. I don't recall it ever being discussed. I don't know if I ever saw anyone

even give him a point. So it is a bit jarring. I understand to see him now suddenly all the way into the top five. But I'm fine with it. I justified it with, again, when you have a win that is that amazing.

I know not dominant. It's not a dominant bell-de-bell performance. but that memorable and that definitive, at least the way it ended, over the pound for pound one guy, you have to jump into the rankings somewhere. And for in my case, there's just no half measures. And then so I'll give, so it reflects upon the rest of his resume better. Like again, RDA, Luke A, the guy, some of the guys I mentioned, fine wins that'll put you like, you know, somewhere in the top 30.

And then you knock off the number one guy. Guess what? You get to jump all the way in, at least in my rankings, up to number five. And I think that's where he landed in our, line of number four. Yeah, number four. In our consensus rankings. Wow. So for me, this is going back a little bit, but this kind of reminds me, and I know this is a little

different because Leon Edwards was already, you know, top five, top six welterweight when the fight happened. But this reminds me of when Matt Sarah knocked out George St. Pierre and there was this huge conundrum among everybody. Like, where do you rank Matt Sarah? Like, is anyone really going to believe he's the best welterweight in the sport? But how could you not rank him, number one? Because he just knocked out George St. Pierre, the number one, you know, George St.

is far and away the best guy in the world. And so everyone's confused. Like, what do you do? Like, and there's no right or wrong answer. Like, what do you do? You can't put him below GSP because he just knocked him out in the first round. In this particular instance, it's the same thing for me. Do I, do I legitimately, like, this is where I kind of fall in the Jedsword a little bit,

where I'm like, legitimately do I think Leon Edwards is the number four best fighter in the entire planet pound for pound? Not necessarily, but he did knock out the guy I had ranked number one. And so you can't so I'm not putting them number one. I can't put him above you know guys like Volcanovsky and then and olivar guys who have been on longer win streaks against you know overall better competition. But you go out there and rocket Kumar Usman's head to the fourth row. I don't care if it came in a comeback or not.

You just knocked out a guy who was on an incredible win streak undefeated the UFC number one pound for pound. You can't not get a big jump up. And so I was kind of stuck with that. So do I truly believe he's the, you know, one of the best pound for pound fight? in the world. Well, he is a welterweight champion, absolutely. But would I, would I say he's the talent wise there? No, probably not. But again, you knock out Kamar Usman, knock him dead, hard in the fifth round. I can't not put you somewhere up there. I can't just negate that

wind doesn't have, but it means something. It means something. And I feel like it speaks to, because like we, we, we used discretion in my mind, right? Because we didn't jumbling on Edwards to number two. That would have felt ridiculous if we did that. I think most of of us, I think in particular, all of us on this call, either had him at number five or number four. But to me, that feels incredibly justified because he, all he was missing this whole time, right? This whole entire time, what was he missing? He was missing that one big statement win because he had wins over Luka. Seroni was Saroni was before Seroni had totally, totally falling off a cliff.

RDA, Nate Z is, I mean, Nate D's one is, whatever. But like, he had a good body of work. He was unbeaten since like 2015. Yes. A very, very long winning streak or unbeaten streak at that. the very least. But he was just missing that statement win. So he gets that statement win. And that is enough in my mind to then put you among the very best fighters in the world. And again, we use discretion. He didn't go in at number two. He went in at number four. That feels like a very nice,

happy medium for me. I just was surprised, I guess, and I think it speaks to just people not still not believing that this happened, believing it would happen again, respecting Leon as this number one guy in the world. Jed, where do you follow this? Because I saw you engaging with some of the people on this. Were you as surprised as me that this was even a thing? A little. I understand the inclination. I think it's wrong.

But like I think a couple, honestly, the biggest part to me is we, not me, y'all, because let's be clear, I do my pound for pound rankings are entirely a mathematic system of I score based on your number of wins against currently ranked divisional opposition. Like I just have a scoring structure and I lay it out and count it up. Big algorithm guy you. Yeah. Well, for this one, because to me that felt better for pound for pound is because I don't

think of pound for pound as I saw some people saying, isn't it if everybody weighed the same, the skills and like, no, I just think of it as like, how good are you against your where you are at compared to your peers? That's how I've sort of always viewed it. The, the, if everybody weighed the same argument never made sense to me, because like, well, fly weights would then be the number one pound for pound always because if you put a flyweight in 265 and he has all that. And by the way, let me say, let me say one of our panelists has a strict no heavy weights, no light heavy weights. We're about to get to that because we don't have to do that yet. We don't have to.

No, no, we don't have to dive into it. But I will say, I, the most egregious thing I think in our pound for pound rankings is that, uh, because. of that one rogue panelist just disrespecting the at least two very clear heavyweights that should be in there. Francis Ngano is five instead of at least three, which is where he deserves to be, if you look at how we score it. So that, I think, is the most egregious. But for me, I think this speaks some to, I am very surprised, based on the way you guys do

your rankings, that Leon Edwards functionally just wasn't in existence prior to this. I think that is an oversight based on that. And so it would cushion the blow a little better. But for me, Leon Edwards knocking him out doesn't change the fact that Kamar Usoom is one of the five best best pound-fpound fires in the world. Like if you just look at who he has beaten, his wins over currently ranked opposition in the division, he has more of them than anyone that's not Israa to Sanya. And he's tied with Francis and Ghanu.

So that's, to me, it was very. obvious like here I still have to have Usman ranked highly but Leon beat him in in the division it is not he went up a division like we got with with Izzy versus Jan is he went he beat him beat him at the stakes he gets to to reap the benefits of it in this regard so I rec if you disagree and wanted to summarily drop both Usman and Edwards lower as a result I don't have any huge issues with that but I do think that to somewhat undercuts just how how good and how relevant Usman's wins still are. That's the thing. Like, Usman's wins are still good wins.

Like, Steepa doesn't have any good wins right now, like over currently good opposition, but for the Angano tradeoff. So it's like, but with Usman, he's beating a bunch of other dudes who are still very relevant in our ranking. So that's just sort of where I settled down. I mostly think, though, that we should be talking about the injustice. being done to Francis Inganu, the number three-pound-for-pound fighter

in the world by any reasonable metric, but that's neither here nor there. That's a different argument for a different show because we could go a full hour with that, and we need to have the rogue panelists on because I think it would drive us all insane. But he is consistent, but his list has a clear ruling, as I will say, this rogue panelist.

But I think, Jed, you speak to maybe a good point in this whole discussion, which is, we probably should have had Leon Edwards on to some degree, right we should have had him on at least at number 2019 range uh and we just didn't and maybe and we're not infallible like we're all just a bunch of you also you also you also you have to remember leon going into that fight i mean again his biggest win at that point that's very fair we're talking about accomplishment you know i mean like i you know ne deez is not a welterweight i don't care how many times he fights a welterweight he's not a welter's probably luke like years ago you know yeah i mean

he has a he had a no contest with below you know if he had beaten below and seeing what below's doing now that would mean more now but he didn't be belize he didn't be belize you out. He had an eye poking if I was over. Just so we're clear. Just so we're clear. And not to call out people who are on this podcast. Some of us have Colby Covington ranked, whose best

win is Hafeel de Sanjos. And Leon Edwards' best win is also Hafelde Sanjos. So like, he could have been in there, is all I'm saying. But and he was. Yeah. Covington was. He was tied for 17th

actually entering this month. I'm saying is some, some, people have Covington currently ranked and had him previously. And if the argument is, well, Leon didn't beat anybody, Covington's best wins are two losses to Usman, which losses aren't wins. So it's very fair. Very fair. But who are you going to take off? I mean, I'm just looking at, so this is last month's time for Connoisse. No, I mean, I mean, a Peodorian, I don't think has a better resident, Glover to Sherry. I don't think, I don't think, I don't think he has a better record than Glover de Scherer. Corey Anderson. I wouldn't say, I wouldn't say

Leon before that had a better record than Corey. The Usman win really ties the room together. I think most people would say that we should have had Leon over Cory Anderson. Yeah, but that's just, I don't think they would say that actually. Fair to me. I wouldn't put him over Jan Blahovitz. Either way, I was just surprised by it. I think ultimately we all sort of land in the same place that this, we're number four, feels very fair. And I agree with you, Jed, that it probably should be number five and Gano should maybe be ahead of them, but that's not, that's not our fault. That's not, none of us here on this podcast, well, with Amex Platinum, $400 in annual credits for travel and dining means you not

only satisfy your travel bug, but your taste buds too. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Conditions apply. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here. Introducing the Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus powered by Peloton IQ built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans real-time insights and endless ways to move lift with confidence while Peloton IQ counts reps corrects form and tracks your progress let yourself run lift flow and go explore the new Peloton cross-training tread plus at One Peloton.ca. One last topic that I want to get into and then I know A.K I'll pass it off to you you have something as well. It's the last thing

I have for you guys. Will we have time after this, Shane? Are we going to have time after this one? We'll see. We'll see. Because I don't know how long this is going to last, but this is something that has a subject that's recently come up. It's honestly probably very long overdue.

Who knows if we'll succeed right now and what we're trying to do, but we're just going to try to figure this out right now. Right here, right now, with you the people. We're going to try to figure out this all out because we don't know what the hell we're supposed to do with this. One championship. guys. One championship is weird. One championship is just a very weird, weird thing that exists in the MMA space. And usually you don't have to take it into much consideration when you have rankings

discussions because they don't have many of the best fighters in the world. But there are a few exceptions. And one of those exceptions is now our number one flyweight. This was not a debate that we really fell heavily into over the last year of doing these rankings. When we initially did the rankings last year, we said, how do we want to handle one championship fighters? Mainly how do The honest debate we had when we were setting up the rankings. It almost derailed the actual rankings from being a thing. But it was all more or less, like focused around one guy, Demetri's Johnson, because Demetrius Johnson is just one of the greatest fighters of all time,

best flyweight of all time, but it doesn't fight at 125 anymore. How do we deal with it? Because obviously one championship divisions are 10 pounds or just not even 10, but just like whatever the next one up from a normal division because of the way they do hydration tests and such. That didn't matter as much. when Demetrius Johnson was not the number one flyweight in the world in our eyes. But now he is because he exacted violent vengeance upon Adrono Marias.

And now all of a sudden we were left in this weird conundrum of what do we do with this? Because DJ, in my eyes, is very clearly a flyweight. Like if you just use common sense, dudes of flyweight, he was never a bantam weight ever in his life. He competed at bantam weight because there wasn't a flyweight division. And then the moment they made one, he went down and he dominated and became one of the best fighters of all time. And even right now, you look at him against actual bantam weights and he is so much smaller than. So it felt common to me or for common sense to me. But then DJ, literally the day after or the same day, I think that we proclaimed him as the number one lightweight or flyweight in the world.

Same day. Goals on the M.A. hour on M.MA fighting and says, well, you know, I don't really consider myself a flyweight anymore. I consider myself more along with the bantam weights in the world, like the Al Jows and all the Peter Yons and such. And now we're sitting here with egg on her face. with the number one flyweight in the world saying I'm not an actual flyweight. So gentlemen, I bring this to you. I don't have an answer. When we posted this initially, a lot of people were very upset of, hey, DJ fights at 135.

Do you guys even know the sport? What the hell do we do with one championship fighters and in particular DJ? But just in general, we need to figure this out because we have been sort of floating along, just putting them in with their listed division. You say you're a flyweight. We'll call you a flyweight. You say you're a lightweight. We'll call you a lightweight.

wait, I don't know what to do anymore. I open the floor. If anybody has ideas, what do you think? Let me start off here. I felt so attacked when DJ went on the MMA hour and was like, yep, nope, no flyweight for me. Don't even want to hear about this flyweight discussion. Nope, nope, no, no, bantamaint, bantamate, never going back down.

That was personal. And I love to meet Johnson. We all love to meet Johnson. That shit was personal. Oh, man, you're even getting AK to swear. That's how deeply he feels about this. That's PG. You can say that on Nickelodeon now.

Is that true? There's no chance that's true. I don't think so. It's, it's really, what really makes this conversation messed up is not just the DJ part of it. It's the, the Adriano-Modais part of it because Adriano. Because he's super not a flyer. He's clearly not a fly-way, right? And I get it, people, I get it.

This was the case ahead of their first matchup two, I understand. It was very convenient for us to just kind of sweep that, like, sweep it under the rug at the time. We're like, it's one thing, you know, we don't have to, it's fine. It's, there's no other, there's no other issues we need to bring up. Let's keep him it flyweight. needer this way and then neither of them fought again until they fight each other in their in their rematch i mean again uh dj did the special rules match but so it was easy didn't have to worry about it we just we we should have dealt with this ahead of time we were arrogant we were like we were

we were arrogant but it is it is really tricky because j yeah don't put that on me yeah don't put okay well i'm trying to guys don't put it on me by myself we're a team we're a team um some of us Some of us said from the jump that this was stupid and the flyweight is flyweight and it's a hundred and twenty five pounds Would you just put him and Adrianemodized in different weight classes? Like that makes no sense you can't do that they fight they clearly fight each other or you would put or you would put DJF at 135 There's a one thirty five or I said we were doing this a year ago. I agree because he could be a dope flyweight He is a dope flyweight. I don't care what DJ says I'd be a wagging He doesn't find it to decision.

Stop, sir. He fights at 135. I don't care. No, listen, this is, I don't care. Listen, DeVice Johnson, if you're out there, I don't care what you say about your weight class. I know you better than you. I'm saying you're a flyweight, sir. You are a flyweight.

I know, I know you're living life out in Singapore or when you're losing your fight out there. And not having to cut that extra weight, fantastic. I get. It's just that your life is easier. And I'm sure if he came back, if he ever came back to the UFC or any North American promotion with normal weight classes, he would probably take some fights at 135, sure, against the right opponent. If he came back to the UFC, he would fight at 125.

But he's a flyweight. He would make, they would make the money right and he would fight drop down to 125 again. He wouldn't love it, but he would do it. He's a flyweight. Figurato is bigger than him. Brandon Marino is probably bigger than him. Most of the flyers in the UFC are bigger than him. So while I don't approve of one's weight class chicanery in general, this is one situation where I'm okay.

This kind of makes sense for them to do it this way. And I wish he could come back again to America just to stop this madness. But we are now left with this problem. And we kind of, I think we all have to agree with this guys as a family. What are we going to do? At some point, do we just move all the one guys, including your boy? Jen, I don't know what we were going to do with your boy, Ryan. De Ritter.

He's going to take a big hit if we move them up. Well, he would go up to light heavyweight and then, and technically heavyweight, I guess, because there's other titles like 2. It's like 225 or something like that. He's not a heavyweight. He's not a heavyweight. He's not a heavyweight. So, so Jed, I throw it to you in that way.

Are you willing to do that to the Dutch night? Yeah. Because it's, it's reasonable and okay. Here, I, when we first did this, I got overruled, and I was vehemently against this because it's not incredibly. stupid to me for us to be like, fine. Well, in our feels, he's a flyweight because

that's what it was. I just want us to be honest. I just want us to be honest about what this has been the entire time, which is everybody loves Demetrius Johnson, and if we make him a 135er, he doesn't get to be ranked anymore, and that makes people feel unhappy because

he's dope and awesome, and we love him, and we want to fete and celebrate this great, great man. And I'm on board with it. But But if he, when he says he ain't a 125er and he's not fighting at 125, if it looks like a duck and it weighs like a duck, it's a friggin' duck. And he's just how- He does not look like a duck. He doesn't look like a duck.

He doesn't accept that. This is the issue yet. And that analogy, he does not look like a- What I meant to say is if he weighs like a duck and says, I'm a duck, he's a duck. Fine. And so he's not a 125er. And as long as our rules stipulated that he was, I ranked him in number one because that was the rules we all agreed to and I was overruled in this. I think I, from the jump, I said we shouldn't do this.

I would be content for us to do it. I am also willing to offer you an olive branch, AK, and say, who cares? We've already gone down this road. Let's just keep paddling down the creek if we're happy about it because. I mean, one, you're talking to a guy who frequently just makes wild speculations about who would win and who wouldn't. So why not speculate about who can make weights and who can't? And then also, like, historically, we've played pretty, not us, but in general, MMAs played pretty fast and loose with weight classes. Like, technically the UFC's 205-pound light heavyweight division started as middleweight, which was less than 200 pounds.

but they keep that all in a linear progression of historical value. And we all, the pride versus UFC weight connections weren't like totally analogous. But so sure. If we all just decide to do that. So here's the thing, though. Here's the thing, though, because I still don't know where I actually fall in this debate. I'm very conflicted because there is one element to this that feels like it could very possibly happen.

And then we're left looking like dicks, which is Demetra's Johnson, Adrona Marias might fight for a third time. They're probably going to fight for a third time. And if Adriano Marais wins that fight, it's fine. We might be compelled to have to put him as the number one flyweight in the world when the dude is clearly not at flyweight. Like he is, if anybody's moving this conversation,

doesn't look like a duck. He doesn't look like a duck. And I know, Damon, you had him at number one flyweight before all. Where do you stay on us? Because I... Okay, so let me, I'm just going to settle the debate. I'm just going to put it to an end right here. Please do it. I'm going to bring you guys around to my way of thinking. So when we had this debate

initially. I was the one banging the drum saying they're saying their fly weights, ranked them in fly weights is going to get too confusing to try to do otherwise. And a lot of the guys and girls and one championship were fighting into bigger weight classes were legitimately in their weight class. They just didn't cut weight. Eddie Alvarez fights a lightweight in one championship. He's a lightweight. Yes, he did fight a well to wait early in his career, but he's a lightweight. We all know he's a lightweight. Christian Lee, who is the current one lightweight champion. He is legitimately a light weight. Yes, he fights at 170, but he is 100% of lightweight. And we just talked at nauseam about Demetrius Johnson. We know he is truly a flyweight. That being said, I've come

around on the other way of thinking because when Demetrius Johnson, the guy who just became a flyweight champion comes on and says, I'm not a flyweight. I'll never be a flyweight again. It's real hard to argue against the logic and saying, well, no, no, you are the best flyweight in the world. Because the reality is, the reality is, the reality is, listen to me, please. The reality is at 135, which is where he's fighting now, which means he's weighing more than 135 and still cutting a little bit of weight to get to 135. I remember when Demetrius Johnson fought Dominant Cruz. I was at that fight, and he got ragdolled for the most part of that fight.

He was Dominic Cruz dominated Demetrius Johnson because he was that much bigger, that much stronger. Demetius Johnson, I've got, listen, I'm admitting, I was wrong. I went by that logic when we made the rankings and said it's just going to get too confusing. most of the guys who are fighting at their weight class. And to be clear, by the way, to my Adriana Mara's side, he actually did fight at Flyweight in one championship. He did. And so good. His life.

But that man absolutely could not make Flyweight right now. We don't know that. We don't know that. He did it a few years ago. Before they did the hydration testing, he was fighting it at 125. He was, I believe he was a champion at 125 before they made the changes. Regardless, that's not the case now. That's not their weight classes now.

And if Demetrius Johnson is coming down saying, I'm not a flyweight, I'm never going to be a flyweight, stop calling me a flyweight. It's real hard to say, no, no, you're a flyweight, number one flyweight in the world. The reality is if they're going to make their weight classes bigger and if they want to do the whole hydration testing and all this kind of stuff that,

I don't know how suspect it is and what's real, what's not. Yeah, there's a lot of air quotes going on right now on the Zoom. I'm just letting you know that. A lot of air quotes here. So if that's the case, then we can't rank them in those weight classes anymore. We got to wake them.

by weight and the weight is Demetrius Johnson weighs 135 pounds. I won't put him in the top 15 of bantam weight. He's not. We have a little bit of evidence. You wouldn't even put him in the top 15. So that was, this is what I have to ask. Hypothetically, let's say we make this move when nothing decided yet. Where do you put Demetrius Johnson in our current phantom weight rankings?

Uh, not in the top 15. That seems so. Here's what. You don't think DJ beats John Linnaker. Well, John Linnaker would move up. John Linnick would move up to 145. The Bantzway division, the Bantzway division, the Bantz The Bantuanet division is so, like, this is, this always goes back to, like, what I think about, like, the weight classes, what they once were.

There was a time when Dominic Cruz looked like the most, the biggest, most massive Bantzway in the world. You see him against, like, Diorai of Faber, and you're like, man, they're in different weight causes. Your eye looks so much smaller than him. Now, Dominic is barely the same size of some of these guys. He's smaller. But, Damon. So my point being, so we had the little bit of Banty Evans, we have elite level Demetrius Johnson at Banty, he was okay. He lost to Dominic Cruz

and there's no shame and that Dominic was at his best. He was more than he was better than okay. He was still relatively elite. He fought for the world title. But David, so I'm just looking at your phantom weight list right now. You don't think,

you don't think if I matched him right now that DJ would beat Ricky Simone, patchy mix, or Pedro Munoz. Oh, see, you want the different one I would have gone with Sean. I think Sergio Pettis is the best counter example here.

Any of them. Sergio Pettis. Petis is like number, a top 10 guy for us he is also a former flyweight and DJ would probably dust him up something fierce i wouldn't pick him to be rickie rickie simone because i'm fully on board with damon on the size difference there but i think pedis makes a bit more this is now this is the situation we get hold on let me get back here the one other thing i'm going to say about this is again i'm not the who would who would win and fight you know while i'm saying i don't think he would do well against most of the

bantam weights I'm ranking. The other problem is, if we're going to go by accomplishments, who's he beating bantam weights? That's the thing that. We're putting him in a division. He can't be ranked then. We're essentially, he can't possibly be ranked in.

If we make the change, we're essentially saying that one championship fighters can't be ranked because they won't have the resume against the respective division. We're putting them in. Pretty much. Oh, chat tree's going to come breathing, breathing fire down on us. I definitely don't want to do this. Listen, I understand.

Listen, I understand. Make a better. make better divisions. I understand. I understand. I'm tempting the wrath of billions upon billions of potential fans. But the reality is

that if you're not in that weight class, and listen, I'm admitting, I'm coming around on this. I'm Jed's way of thinking now. I was not that way when we started because I was like, it's just too confusing.

Let's just go with their rankings. They say fly weights, let's go flyways. I've come around and saying, you know what, they're not. They're not at that weight class anymore. While I still legitimately believe

Christian Lee is a lightweight. He fights at 170. And you're right. He won't have the resume at 170 to ever get ranked. That's one championship's choice. That's their choice. One championship has chosen to go with this. But it punishes the fighters, right?

Because Christian Lee could go on a 10-year unbeaten streak, but if he will have never fought a single ranked Welterweight, we're essentially damning him to never be ranked in our rankings. No, we can still rank him. Because, like, I mean, so I agree it caps you, but let's just be honest, not fighting the UFC pretty much caps. just about every fighter in the rankings.

But if you look up and down my rankings, I have a bunch of people who are in different circumstances because they're competing at, quote, unquote, the true heavyweight or whatever. But like, I've got Phil DeFries ranked in my heavyweights. You know, KSW champion. Like, they're not beating guys who would traditionally consider great or whatever,

but they put together these runs and they will can and deserve to get in there. But Phil de Freeze is on the very, very, very periphery of your rankings. That's where you end up because you're not fighting in the UFC and that that sucks, but that's where that's also just the truth for every one of these. None of us have, we said to start. Everybody has a UFC fighter as their top fighter, but for flyway. How many non-UFC fighters really popular rankings? Well, Damon has Cory Anderson, too, I believe.

I don't have number one. I have not. Somebody has Corey number one. How many non-UFC fighters populate the top fives. of our rankings. It's incredibly few. And also, and it just sort of is, but that doesn't mean, but also, but that doesn't mean that none shit. Let's, let's, let's remember, Demetrius Johnson is number one, or he's, again, the reason I put Adrianne Marias number one based on our ranking system is because he beat Demetrius Johnson, who is the greatest flyweight of all time. Let's not forget.

The whole reason Demetrius Johnson is even hovering around that top spot is because what he did in the UFC. It's not because he beat, you know, Yu Yu-Wakamatsu. It's not because he beat Yu-Iwaka-Matsu in one championship. It's because he was the number one flyaway in the world. He lost a very controversial decision to say, or very close, I won't say controversial, close decision to Henry Sehudo. And he was still, that's where he was when he went to one championship. But Andrew H.

He didn't say controversial. It is a very good win. Like, in particular the method in which he accomplished it. But I'm saying that the whole argument about Demetrius is that he was all. rating ranked number at worst number two or three when he went to one championship. If he is, if that UFC career didn't exist, he would be in the same boat that guys in Bellator fighting an uphill battle with, guys in KSW are fighting an uphill battle with every other PFL.

They're all fighting an uphill battle because they can't, they just legitimately cannot typically put together the resume to jump over the UFC guys. They're fighting up the battle, but then we're adding an extra hill on that hill that already exists. We're not adding the hill. And because... We're not one championship. They...

What championship out of the hill? Listen, because all those UFC fights exist, we know Demetrius is a 125er. Exactly. So I agree. I agree. He reminds me to my face. We cannot ignore all those 125, but he's clearly a 125er. But we can't ignore what the main himself says.

Yes, I can. And I will. And I have. Oh my God. I can. And I will. And I have. It's also, you talk about, to Jets's point about sitting on rankings, like,

if you wanted to have a sitting on rankings, well, Demetrius hasn't had a flyway, a legitimate flyway. He hasn't had a flyweight fight in like three years. Like legitimately has not fought 125 pounds in like three years. At what point, again, I agree. You know what? Neither is Davidson figurato or any of these, any of these other friggin flyways. They're all coming in there at 135, 140.

Like, what are you talking about here? Like, they're hitting, they're hitting 125. Can we all just blame AJana Marais because he is, this is his fault? This is his fault. This is his fault. Let's be real. We could live with the illusion. We could live with this fantasy world that you guys created that I tried to be like,

this is stupid and we shouldn't do it. But then he clearly comes in and the hydration. I hope you just call this whole time too. He can still make it. Yeah, well, I know that he missed weight and he failed hydration, but now he's passed both because that's how science works. People lose weight while getting more hydrated. It's obviously just a cartoon show up there and he ruined the illusion.

Now we have to live in reality. And reality is. cold and painful. Can I apologize to you first before you make what I hope is a closing statement? I was going to make a closing statement. Okay. Thank God. I want to apologize because I'm the Prince of Positivity.

And this has come up in a couple of meetings and we didn't want to derail like, you know, some of the meetings are, you know, our business, normal editorial business meetings. So we were kind of like, let's push it back. Let's keep pushing it back. We'll have a rankings meeting eventually. We didn't. And then we realized it's a good, this is a good time.

Let's just do it on the show. Let's do it live. I'm sure. We'll do it live. on the show with Damon and Jed and Shaheen and myself, we can figure, and then we'll bring it to the rest of the panel. The panel will unanimously agree, just like we did on the show, and there will be peace in the land, and we'll know once for all. I should have known that this would happen, and I apologize. I was too, I was too optimistic. So I want to be clear, I don't care.

We can do whatever. I've been living in this weird world you guys have created. If we'll stay there, that's fine. My closing thing on this is just, I want, I need to avoid a world in which we are in a situation where we might have to put Adrian and Marias is the number of flyweight in the world because the dude is clearly not a flyweight. So like I don't know where we landed. I feel like we didn't accomplish anything in the last 20 minutes. We're flying fancy free still.

We didn't land anywhere. We're circled the airport and we're running out of fuel. Sean, here's what we do. To assuage your guilt, we keep everything the same. And when they three match, if Marias loses, he does not get to become one flyweight

and then we make the adjustment. and if he win or if he loses, we make zero adjustments and continue on. If Marius wins. Then we make the adjustment because of him. Yeah, because then we're just directly punishing Adriana Marias. I don't hate that idea.

I don't hate that idea. We just have to admit we're showing bias for Demetrius Johnson because no one else is in this situation. Yeah. Honestly. Turned on us. Yeah. But hold on.

Hold on. Let me just say one last thing. We're showing, we're showing bias to a guy. who said on our network, on our MMA hour. You can't prove that. I'm not a flyweight. I'm never going to be a flyweight and I'm not a fly.

I'm a band weight. So we're going to show a guy who said this. You have no receipts. Yeah, fighters never make, never make unwieldly claims about their status and careers. Oh, that never happens. Let's just take everything they say at their word, even one of the arguably the greatest fighter of all time.

Let's just take a minute of work. Okay. I'm just saying. I'm going to put a pin in this because we're only four. There is a panel of eight. who does this ranking, so we need to have a broader rankings meeting. My hope was that we would maybe come to a resolution. We're not doing this again, Jane.

Can we just record the whole panel and just put that up to the pie? Can we never do this again? A.K., you brought this upon us. I did. I did. This is my fault. So now we will follow this to its inevitable conclusion. We're going to have to have the bigger discussion with the team about this.

Maybe we'll revisit it on a future ranking show. For the moment, we got to put a pin in it. When I got a great deal on a great gift at winners, I started wondering, Could I get fabulous gifts for everyone on my list? Like this designer fragrance for my daughter. It's just $39.99. How could I resist?

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or Mager or magazine. Last thing, before we get out of here. Yeah, let's have some fun. AKA, yeah, I don't really know what this is. I've been having a great time. Okay.

I don't really know what this next thing is. A.K. has a little game for us that he wants to do, so I'm going to pass the Florida of you, my man. Yeah, let's get, you know what, guys, let's get back on the same feature. Let's get back together. Let's have some fun. That was a good discussion.

I think mostly harmless. All right. So we've had a couple of people who fought this last month, who I think most of us would agree are barreling towards a teleshot or will almost definitely become champions. And I'm not including comments out, by the way, that's its own discussion. We've talked about Hamzat to death on this.

And there's a young man also that's fighting at UFSI-280 at the end of our upcoming ranking cycle, or sorry, this current ranking cycle, who I think we've also said mobile times, we think will be a champion. So I've taken these three names. Let me just throw in real quick. UFC 280 is money.

Like, if you look at the rankings, the rankings up there we just came up with, UFC 280 is up and down that MF or like there are so many matches that have so much like big potential for big moves in the rankings and stuff on 280. I love it. I need Islam to win or I'm going to be a sad man on this ranking show. You need who to win?

I have Islam. Islam. Islam is Islam number one? Oh, you also have him number one over Charles because you just don't respect the rule of anything. Yes. I'm just willing to say right here, I was happy to take my scoreboard victory lap on the whole flyweight conundrum and I will come on this program and let you guys lay waste to me. Should Charles beat Islam?

All right. Listen, so I want to talk about three. We're, I'm looking forward to that so much now. I want to take three names here. And you guys are going to tell me, I'm going to give one name to each you guys. We'll go one by one. And you guys are going to tell me, let's say you're their manager or something. I don't know.

I'm not sure. Are you either your manager or you're the matchmakers? I don't know. Whatever it is. And you have, how does this person get to a title and how soon can they do? I think with all three these guys, we're pretty sure they're going to make it. One, one maybe less so. But, okay.

Jed, let me go to you first. Let me go to you first, Jed. I'm going to give you a young man that you have been a fan of and have been touting as a future two division champion for a long time now. He fights Malcolm Gordon at U.S. T-80, a good old Canadian boy who I'm a little scared is kind of getting thrown to the lions here. Jed, tell me, how does Muhammad Mikhailiath get to a UFC title? How soon do you think this happens?

What is the path for him? So you're basically asking us to pick out the opponents that would leap-progan. And if you want to go broader than that, like, Like, do other things have to happen? Do other guys have to lose? Do other, like, you know, do other things have to happen for this guy to get a faster, a faster path? So kind of, like, project a little bit here. Do a little fantasy booking, you know, for the UFC and for this fighter's, uh, this fighter's chances.

What do you think, Jed? Okay. Well, I'm going to assume we're going to talk flyweight title, because you are correct. I think he probably has a good shot to get to. Or if you think his faster path for some reason is somehow to bantam weight, if you can, if you can outline that as well, yeah. I don't think that's the case. So just for context, Mahama Mahama, I have currently as we speak, is tied for

number 12 at our flyweight rankings. Yes. Where do I have him put in flyweight? That's a great question. You have him the highest. I'm pretty sure. I'm sure I have him the highest. Jed,

you have him at, yeah, number eight. That's honestly pretty reasonable for me. It'll be number one after his next win by Judge ranking. Maybe that'll solve the DJ conundrum. By then I'll get to see Asker Asgrove and see if he still has anything left in the tank. So he may definitely move up a bit. I could see putting him a hive above above Ascarov.

It might be tough to put him above Kikov, France. I mean, so his path to the title is going to be pretty short, I think. He's 2 and O in the UFC now. It's not going to be like incredible. We're not talking two fights, but it's not that many. He's got the Malcolm Gordon fight. He's going to win that fight, I would assume. And I think that is going to be the determiner, right?

They're going to let him, they know what they've got with this guy. They know that this kid is special. They know this. I mean, you hear everybody talk about him. They say this guy is the future. We're hearing the same stuff we heard about. Kane Velasca's coming in. It's that kind of hype around him.

So they know they've got something. I think they also will not want to build him up. They won't want to rush him, rush him. But we can speed things up a little bit after he's got his third fight under him, has little wheels. So after Gordon, now we're talking somebody in the top 15. Lower into the top 15, somebody there. What's Tim Elliott do?

in these days, AK, you're our matchmaking specialist? I think he has a... I thought he had a fight coming up, I think, later this year, not this month, I think, later in November, December. Also, I will note, he is ranked below Muhammad right now. For us at least. Again, we have him tied for 12th. I'm more

looking at the UFC's rankings for this, because their rankings while... They're fake and nonsensical, of course. Of course. Are going to honestly play more of an effect in the carving a path out. Which is a real shame. Which is a real shame. he fights Tim Elliott early next year or something he beats Tim Elliott then what's happening yeah so he fights

to Meliot he beats Tim Elliott then he is uh going to be at that point ranked in the top 15 in the UFC's rankings he probably actually will get a top 15 ranking after the malcolm gordon somewhere at the maybe number 15 spot based on how they usually shake out fights Tim Elliott now we're talking top 10 for the UFC then we're going to be talking somebody like hoi vol uh Hoyval and Ascroft are fighting. So maybe that's a little, maybe he fights the loser of Ascroft of Hoyval. Something like that. Just that sort of will depend on how time frame shakeout.

Matt Chanel has a fight booked. Who's he fighting, AK? Oh, God. Matthias Nicolao. Nikolao. Yeah. So let's assume that Nicolao and Chanel, the winner of that fights the winner of Hoyval Asgrove. We can throw in Makayev against the loser of one of those two fights would be fine.

then he's in the middle of the top 10. So we're talking Gordon, two more fights in the top. We're talking Gordon to get into the top 15, Tim Elliott-ish to get up another fight there to get closer to the top five, somewhere just outside of it. Then it's a title eliminator over, however, it's going to shake out because obviously at this point a lot of balls are in the air. We're going to have a fourth bite, I think, between Figy and Moreno.

Alexander Pintosia is widely overlooked. Like, man deserves a title fight at some damn point in his life. He got some pound for pound love this month. I'm not sure. It's a kind of popped out of nowhere. He got some pound out of him. A lot of that was on me because I think I had been disrespecting his career accomplishments until I went back and checked it all out again.

So I think we're talking four fights, right? Four fights to get a shot. Yeah. Including this week. His fifth fight will be. Including Gordon. Gordon, a top 10-ish, a top five-ish, a title eliminator. his fifth fight, he will be fighting for the belt within five fights.

And you think he wins it in his first try against whether it's Figurato, Moreno, whoever it is? I don't know if he wins it. I don't want to see a little more development from him. I think he has a really good chance because if they were to book it tomorrow, I would not pick him to beat Figurato or Moreno. But in a year and a half to two years, which is kind of the timeline. And also this assumes no injuries anywhere. Yeah, I was a say. Totally derails it. but based on where he's at and his projected level of development,

I could totally see him by 23, 24 beating, especially depending who has the belt, because I would say that I think in two and a half years, he beats Figurato, a figurato still holding the title somehow because I anticipate figurator to start dropping off. Moreno, sort of a different story. Moreno still seems to be getting better, still relatively young.

I could see that being a bridge too far, but I think he is competing for a title in five fights. He is actively challenging for the belt in five fights. You're saying by the end of, and you said possibly end of 2023, early 2024? No, no. By the end of 2023, it would be too fast, I think. Okay.

I think we're talking early. That's not that quick. I think we're talking 2024, just because five fights is a lot of fights. Like, because he takes Gordon next month. He's not getting another one this year. Let's say he does three in 2023. He's fighting for the belt somewhere in 20, 24 I think wow I'm around people he's he's 22 years old this 22 years old he's

no rush no rush 2,000 baby I don't like that we're saying I think he has a world where he can become the UFC youngest champion I'm not saying I would what is the right one is John Jones and what was how old is John Jones's bull is is is garbage one Jose Aldo is a spiritual youngest champion sure WC sure they were both 23 and change I think okay let me just say that there is a day there is a day there's a coming and it's probably not very far off where all of the UFC champions are going to be born in the 2000s of course and i will be so ridiculously sad not hit not i'll be so i'll celebrate not everywhere eventually it will happen and i'm going to be so sad when that happens that's all let's uh you know

then let's thank you uh jad amazing breakdown let's go i'm sorry jess something else you want to add to your your markaya no no i was saying let's let's talk to Sean about about young champions and He seems to be having an existential crisis. Okay. Well, I'm on nose sleep. This is a new board baby in this house. I'm like a walking dead right now. Let's talk about this.

Let's talk about this young man who, I don't think he's, I don't think he's that. How old is he? I'll throw this one to you, Sheen. And then we'll close out with Damon. This man made quite an impression at the pair on the bus this Paris. What was the past by? 279. Excuse me.

One Mr. Jalton Almeida. This dude is an absolute beast. And it's a bit of a tricky question because he made his day. He's been finding a light heavyweight for a long time. But by all accounts, he's very happy being fat and happy. Outbat heavyweight does not plan to go back down to 205 a time soon. We don't, we don't know.

He lost fight he weighed in 220. He might be able to make 205 if he wants if the right fight came along. It appears the plan of heavyweight. But, Jeanne, I throw this to you. Give me a little plan for Jelmaida too. because I think, I personally think he's going to be UFC champions someday. I just see he has that Shemaya of grappling dominance. That is just crazy.

You'll be happy. He's born in 1991. So you can, he's at fine normal, normal UFC. Man, this is a tough one. Because I don't,

I don't think he can ever make it as a heavyweight. How do you get him there and take him? And he's not a big weight. What was he like 220 for this last one? It was a 220 catch weight, I think. He's just not, like you,

we're in an age where you can. make it to the top of the mountain in the heavyweight division being that super super small heavyweight like even the smaller heavyweights who have sort of made it in the past couple years of whether it's stepe or a guy like cyrogan even like they're they're not 220 they're like 240 240 250 range like you just the heavyway right now is full of very big boys uh and it's like that that number will just be in my mind so hard to overcome so for me like i just can't even get there with with at heavyweight, even though like he is obviously a very, very talented just fighter overall. Like I'm very excited to see his future.

It feels like inevitably whenever he does come against a top heavyweight, even someone like a Ramanoff or, you know, Tibera or something like that. Like I just feel like that is going to just be so hard to overcome. So ultimately I think it happens at light heavyweight. If it happens, luckily light heavyweight is a pretty old division, right? Like outside of Yiri, most of the top light heavyweights are sort of. of aging out in the UFC. So in that regard, I think it'll probably take a couple of years.

I think he'll probably have to lose one fight at heavyweight and then come over to finally make that drop back down and sort of start to work his way up there. So I don't even know at this point, if I'm being honest with you, like if I was to paint a path for him, I would be painting a path for like 2000, late 2003, early 2004 range and just starting up the ladder then at light heavyweight. So it would be hard. Like I don't think of some of the light heavyweights that are there now. would be there then. So I can't even get there with Almeida yet if I'm being real.

That's that guy that guy is a big time lock for me. Damon, let me go to you real quick. This one is a little less complicated. You're a big time lock. This one's a little less complicated than the previous two and somehow also more complicated. Marab de Valsh Vali. Now the longest winning streak, I believe, a bantam weight, including this is a 140 pound cash rate bout in there. Clearly should be fighting for a title tomorrow.

Of course he can't. The champion, the undisputed champion is his best friend and teammate. Al Jermaine Sterling. So how do we get Marab to a belt? Can it be at 135? Is he going to have to jump up? Can he go? I don't think he can go down.

I don't know. I don't know. Daman, what's your thoughts on? How do we get Maraub to a UFC title? Well, I think there's a couple of factors to play in here. I mean, legitimately, he should be, you know, after T.J. Dillishal, he probably should be the next guy in line, but we know he's not going to fight Al Jameen Sterling.

So I think it all comes down, you know, the fastest pass for Marob to Walshville. T. T.J. Dilishal beats Al Jalielsen, and he gets the next title shot. He goes in there and tries to avenge his best friend and teammates. And there's actually a storyline there. I think that's the fastest path. That's it. That's it.

T.J. Dillishaw beats Algeman Sterling. You do to Wiles really next. He's earned it. He's on a long winning streak. He just beat Jose Aldo, who legitimately should be in the title fight. He has a better resume than T.J. Dillishaw. And he also didn't get suspended two years from juice in his ass. So Jose Aldo deserved it.

He didn't get it. So that's the easiest path. That's the fastest pass. if Al J. Stirling wins, which I predict he will win, I think he's going to beat T.J. Dillashaw and remain champion. then it becomes a lot harder because Marab is not a fly it's not a featherweight he's just not he's way undersized for featherweight

could you imagine like put him next to Max Holloway and see the size difference like it's like he might stand like somewhat shorter than Volcanowski he's not the biggest guy in the world but in terms of like size and power I mean come on I love Marab I'm a huge Marab guy but he's not a feather weight

I think certainly let me just jump in that like Aljo's not a featherweight either They're like Aljo's the one talking about he would go back. I don't think if it came down to it, it's like, hey, dude, you're going to drop your UFC title on this money? I don't think he's going to actually do that. Yeah. And I think Sterling. I think Sterling.

I think there's a real world where he's just like, F it. I want Volcanovsky now. And then he came to end up. Dropping your title is a different thing entirely. No, I don't think so. It's all leverage within the UFC. Sterling. He was a title of Marobkin fight for the interim.

belt or whatever but then they would have to fight Sterling beats Sterling beats TJ then I think it becomes Marab money fight while really what I mean by that is is he's gonna seek out what money fights is Mara Sonna Malley after he loses to Peter Yon and he loses to Peter Yon if you live like that that's a potential you know he could have he could have a you know he could he at that point he becomes the gatekeeper a bit at that point because we No, he's not going to fight Al Jermaine. Also, let me be clear about this. I, I support their friendship.

I support their teammates. I support all of that. I do. And I totally respect that. But how many times in the history of our sport have we heard two best friends? Two teammates will never fight each other. Never happen. Not going to happen.

Well, here's a boatload of money. You sure you don't want to do that? You sure you don't want pay-per-view points? You sure about that? And then we get Rashad and John Jones Then we get Tyrone Woodley and Robbie Lawler Then we get there's a million examples The guys who said they'd never fight each other

I'm not pushing for them to fight each other I'm just saying If Sterling goes out and beats T.J. Dillishaw The way I expect him to do it Then it's probably going to be the winner of Yon O'Malley Next because either the Yon rematch or the And we know the O'Malley 5 would be huge And if he beats Peter Yon he's earned it

That's probably going to be next Who's after that? I mean, Cheetah Vera would probably be the next guy in line if he's not going to fight Marab, but again, Big Bagash, two fights away. And I think they, I think they put enough on the table,

they get them to fight each other. I'm not advocating for it. I'm just saying, I'm just saying we've seen this a thousand times before where two guys say, we'll never fight each other. We're, I'll leave the UFC. Sure you won't.

No, that feels more realistic. That feels more realistic to me. This is Sarah Longo. They aren't going to do that, though. Damon Martin hates friendship money over friendship every time in the Martin household you've heard it here people

but I do like the idea that Marab is really not far from fighting for a title regardless what happens he so deserves it he's a very he's a really good fighter is very exciting and I don't want him to just become a glorified bodyguard you just threw away the last crusade of Josealdo for no reason

at all right that matchmaking was stupid to begin with especially in Salt Lake City I'm not going to get on a ring but if that fight is anywhere else but then Salt Lake City. Josaldo's winning that F-in fight. 10 times out of 10. Thank you guys. Thank you guys for those questions.

We're all winners. There's this not a competitive game. You're all winners. I loved all the arguments you made for these guys. Except for Cheene, I disagree. I think Charlton, I'm telling you, this guy will winning his title somewhere, possibly even a heavy way. You give me how he's going to take out in Ghanu.

I don't know, man. This guy's a beast. He's super not. He's so not. He's a beast. He's a beast. He is all right. I'm on record now.

This dude's my love. Listen, this. This dude's my Shamiyaev right now. All right, Jed, you know, said you did a great job. I love the energy. You had Shamiyev number two way ahead of the rest of us. You had a number two and we questioned it then. Almeida, I need him to see him beat at least someone in the top 20, a live body.

He will jump up my heavyweight rankings real fast. I'll tell you that right now. This guy will be UFC champion somewhere. Connor and I were talking about Almeida on No Bet Spard this week. And it's, I'm willing to believe at light heavyweight because he clearly is a light heavyweight. He just doesn't want to do it. He's not, he can't. Franzingano, you can't tackle Francongan.

Yes, he can. And you can get your head cleaved from your shoulders, bro. That's just how it goes. You know why? Jiu Jitsu. Jets, that's why. It's a soft art. Look it up.

Weight classes don't matter when you were master of Jiu-Jitsu. Okay. I love the energy. Love it. That's it. That's it. Thank you for playing, guys. I loved all your,

I loved all your arguments. All right. Well, with that, that wraps up another very spirited episode of the MMA Fighting Ranking Show. It's always a fun time. I feel like we accomplished very little here, but I enjoyed the ride with you, fellas. As always, tune in next month. We will be back the week after UFC 280. Again, changed up ranking schedules to all of our rankings content will come out the week after UFC 280. In the meantime, thank you everyone for listening in. We love you guys so much. That man is Damon Martin. That man. And it's Jed Mishu for A.K. Lee. I am Sean O'Shati. Keep it locked to M.M.A. fighting and we'll see you later.

That one championship is just going to end up going two hours. I knew it would, too. I knew it would. I'm like, this is not going to be short-clary. We'll figure it out. We'll have... It's entirely my eyes as well. It'd be very cheated.