MMA Fighting - REACTION: Arman Tsarukyan OUT Of UFC 311, Islam Makhachev vs. Renato Moicano New Main Event

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

MMA Fighting's Mike Heck reacts to the #Breaking news that Arman Tsarukyan is out of UFC 311, and Islam Makhachev faces Renato Moicano in the new main event. Follow Mike Heck: @m_heckjr 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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But first, there, the last one. Enjoy a Coca-Cola for a pause that refreshes. You're listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. All right, everybody, happy Friday. I mean, I guess it really depends on who you're asking about whether or not this is a happy Friday or not. But didn't think I'd be talking to you this early. I thought I wouldn't see you guys until the preview show coming up. up a little bit later on, but

we have some breaking news. If you guys haven't seen, Armand Sarukian is out of the main event of UFC 311. According to UFC CEO, Dana White, he was dealing with the back injury. And Dana White received a phone call from Armand Sarukian around 1am local time,

informing him that the back injury was a little bit too much. And then he would no longer be competing at UFC 311, no longer fighting. fighting Islam Makachef for the UFC lightweight title. And I had heard some rumors. I had heard some things in regards to this. People talking about what's going on with Armand Sarukin. Is he going to fight as the wayans in Englewood were going on?

He was noticeably absent. Things had started to spread. We had heard Armand may be out. And then Dana White confirmed it. But the good news is we have a new main event, the number one pound-for-pound fighter in the sport, Islam Makachev, will still have his opportunity to make history tomorrow night at the Intuit Dome.

He will now defend the lightweight title against Hanato Moikano. How about that? The man who continues to ask for money. Give me that money. Now he's going to get it. He's going to get main event money on a pay-per-view. He's going to fight for his first UFC world title.

And this is huge news for Hinata Moikano. It is an absolute bummer for Armin Sarukian. And to be fair, it is an absolute bummer for Benil Darius, who was originally scheduled to face an Otto-Oycano on the main card tomorrow. So this is absolutely insane news that is happening just before the UFC's first pay-per-view of 2025. So I thought I would hop in, give my reaction. And you know what? It's just me here right now.

It's just your pal Mike. I want to talk to all of you about what is going on here. So let's start. Johnny Wise says the enemy gods are dead. Hey, listen, we could have gone on without an Islam-Makachev fight, right? We could have gone on without Makachchev competing for his chance to make history. Hanata Moikano stepped in. Dana White was actually on the UFC 311 Wayan show and basically gave Islam Makachov's reaction to it and said,

Islam was like, I'm the champion, I'll fight whoever. and Hanata Moikano was absolutely aware of the situation, which is why he made it a point to make championship wait. Not coming in at 156, coming it at 155 championship weight. Now he gets the fight, he wants money, and what a moment it would be if Hanata Moikano comes in out of nowhere and wins the UFC lightweight title tomorrow night. What a way to start the freaking year.

And what a promo he would absolutely come. hot. But I want to see, I haven't really gotten a chance to look yet from what I understand. The betting odds open minus 600 for Islam Makachev against Anato Moikana, which I can absolutely understand. So did Dana and Natsmaniel gets a show and win money? He didn't say those words per se, but he said they were going to take care of him. So I assume he is going to get paid in some way, shape, or form. On top of that, they will probably go and try to rebook him because this isn't obviously benile der eush's fault so this is kind of where we're at right now and it's it's just crazy man like this sport never it just it just hits you sometimes things just kind of come out of nowhere and the new cycle just never sleeps it's minus 900 now all right

this this does not surprise me but hanaulta moikano gets his big opportunity and again it's a bummer for Binaldaryush. I want to see if the UFC has actually updated their website yet in regards to this. Oh, they have. Look it. They have a Makachep Moikano poster and everything. All right, let's see. I want to see who got if there's a, are they even?

I'm trying to see if there's an update to the actual main card yet. There is more breaking news. The opening main card bout will take place in the, the heavyweight division. It'll be Jelton Almeida versus Sergei Spivak, kicking off the pay-per-view. Then we go into Kevin, Kevin Holland versus Renier-Durritter,

Yuri Prahachka versus Jamal Hill, Marad Walshwili versus Umar and Magamagamato for the Bannamwe title and the co-main event, and then Islamakachad versus Hanato Moikano for the lightweight title in the main event. So crazy stuff here on this Friday on UFC 311E. We will have a preview show. Jed will join me. We'll talk a little bit more about what is going on here.

We'll get his reaction to all of the, this. But yes, if you're just joining us, Armand Sarukian out of UFC 311, Dana White announced it is a back injury that just continued to kind of get worse. Received a phone call from Armand Sarukin 1am local time in California, letting him know he's not going to be able to compete.

But Hanata Moikano, who made 155 on the nose, is in, and he will challenge Islam Makachev for the lightweight title in the main event and Benil Darius. for those wondering what happens to derrush nothing he's not going to be fighting dana said on the ufc 311 way in show that he will be taking care of what that means sure he'll get a little bit of money they're going to try to rebook him and now everyone is say everyone is just like all over me right now because i'm kind of on the arm in surruchian train

and was predicting the big upset will i predict another big upset i don't know But some other breaking news as well. Just saw this on the way and show. Chris Wydenman, the former UFC middleweight champion of the world. On the way and show officially announced his retirement from mixed martial arts competition. So, man, the news just keeps coming. It just doesn't stop. We got a new main event for UFC 311.

One of the middleweight division's all-time greats, no longer competing. I don't think this is a bad idea. I think this is actually a terrific idea from me. Chris Widman because he did not look very good in that Eric Anders fight, if we're being honest. So this is not a bad move whatsoever. But yeah. All right. What are your thoughts on all of this?

Darius is just being compensated for his purse for cutting weight per Dana White. Okay. Yeah, I know he was going to, they said he's going to get taken care of. I'm sure he's going to get paid. It's just kind of a weird situation with this whole thing. wait did dana just call mokachev the pound for round number one all it took to saving the card he had to do it he had to do it you can see it in his eyes every time he has to say the number one pound for pound fighter is lo mokachev you can just kind of see the pain

in his face there's a little pain in mind yes obviously i wanted to see this fight i wanted to cash it on the arman prediction for many many years of him becoming the lightweight champion But as a fight fan, I just wanted to see them run this back because their first fight was so good with Siru Kine kind of stepping in and fighting his Lomachev on less than a month's notice for his UFC debut. And he's worked his way back to this fight. I just wanted to see this play out. I wanted to see the improved versions of both guys going against each other in a championship fight. I wanted to see if Armand could cash that ticket and get on in there and make it happen. So it's just a crazy.

situation. But for a guy that Kenata Moikano, one of the more likable guys, a guy that just continues to get over with not just the microphone, but his performances too. He has looked sensational. He beat the hell out of Benoit Sonsigny.

Beat the hell out of that man. And there weren't not a lot of people who were predicting that. There are people who were saying that Moikana could win. Maybe he'd grind out a decision. The longer the fight went, but he just pillar to post beat the hell out of BSD. And That was an incredible performance.

That was an eye-opener for me. And I'm just curious to see how this fight plays out now. How does Zizalmachachev approach this on a day's notice? Adi-Daroush literally is nothing to lose. He could literally just go in there and go balls to the wall. And he's a hero. He comes out smelling like roses in all of this, no matter what. How does Zizal-Machachev approach this?

Because there aren't a lot of fighters in his position who would say yes to this. there just aren't. And no matter how you feel about a guy like Gizamakajav, the fact that he is doing this is unbelievable. Unbelievable. So he deserves terrific, tremendous praise for this.

Obviously, Moikano stepping in, taking this opportunity, big move for him, sucks for Daryush, and sucks for Armin Sarukian, who got himself in tremendous shape. I thought he did a fantastic job sort of building this fight up

with the whole, uh, the secret technique. but it's just kind of the sport right now. It's a little bit of a bummer, but the UFC, as they always do, they came through. They came through.

Wyden an all-time great. What a dopy comment. I understand you've watched fighting for like two years now, but trust me what I tell you, Chris Wyman is one of the all-time great middleweights. That's what I said. He's one of the five best middleweights of all time. And if you think I'm wrong,

then you need to watch fighting more. AK was thinking of you because you had Armin on your fantasy team, Mike, is your lightweight. I sure did. I sure did. Not good for the fantasy team. Now the question is, what do you do with Armand Sarukyan? That's one of the big questions I have.

This is a guy who had to scratch a day before due to, at least what Dana said, a lingering back injury, which became a little bit too much for him. At least that's kind of how it sounded to me. Do you give him a title flight when he comes back? What do you do here? does he have to fight somebody else that's what's going to be really interesting about this on a positive note it's nice to see a fresh matchup lightweight has been stale for years with olivera poria gaiji i agree that's kind of why i liked the sarukian fight because we see how deep this

division is there's a lot of great fighters coming up and there are a lot of guys who be earmarked to be future title challengers the raphael fazeves the matush gamrots the jalen turners etc etc and arman Sirukian is the one guy who has gotten that big moment and has come through, knocking up Anil Daryush, Betty Beach Charles Olivera, Fiziv, and all these, a lot of these guys have gotten these opportunities. Gamrock got B'Neil, lost. Fiziv got Gachi, lost. BSD got Dustin Porre, lost.

So it's not like these up-and-comers haven't gotten their opportunities. Sarukian's just the one guy who's been able to come through. Mike, do you think Armil will get another shot? Yeah, I think he will. I think he will. Again, a lot of this is going to depend on the result of, obviously what happens with Makachev and Moikano, but a lot of this, as we've talked about a lot on these shows,

is going to depend on what happens at Welterweight. Because if Shafkat Rakmanov fights Bilal Muhammad and wins the belt, I think Islam's going to go up to 170. especially after this. He did the UFC a big favor, and I think if I'm him, part of this, if you want to be a two-division champion,

you stepping in multiple times as champion to take on a short notice opponent. He did it with Volcanovsky in their second fight, because obviously he was supposed to fight all of error again. And he didn't have a ton.

The poor fight came together kind of quickly, and then this came together in a day and a half, less than that, probably. So I think if you, wants to go up to 170, he can, but I don't think he's going to fight Bala Muhammad. That's kind of where we're at right now. But I think, but that means if he goes up, I hope he vacates the belt,

and then we could do Armin versus somebody else for the vacant belt. But it's a bummer, man. I really wanted to see this fight. I really did. Do you think your predictions could still come true, Mike? That Armin wins the lightweight belt before the end of the year? Yes. I do.

Diego looked rough on the scale. I wonder if Benny moves to Doss. I haven't heard anything. I would say probably not. Oh, there you go. Where's Dan Igay? That's, see, that's a great question right there. Where's Dan Igay?

Maybe he could step in. Can you talk about Bogdan's opponents? I can't lie to you, my friends, and I want to be transparent with all of you. I don't know a whole hell of a lot about his due opponent. Um, Billy Alacana. I know he trains in Vegas. That's pretty much all I know about him. He's fought for PFL.

Um, I don't really know a ton about him. I know he's a middleweight for the most part. I think he's obviously moving up here. I think he weighed. He was, what did he weigh in at? He was like 200 pounds.

I think he weighed in at. So he's, he's, typically he's typically a middle oh no he fights a late heavyweight but he came in super light someone told me he was a middleweight maybe i'm wrong but again i don't know a ton about him but what i can i'm not going to say confidently say but i will say pretty confidently say is uh this is not going to go well for him i think he's he's going to get got pretty quick in this fight because bogdan's one of those dudes what else we go do we got anything else we do

do have a preview show coming up so we'll talk a lot more about this is marab going to pull out to no john jones would never do this i mean revision is a little bit of history lesson for you john wouldn't yeah john wouldn't have taken the fight i mean maybe would have i don't know he certainly wouldn't i don't think john would have fought tom aspenov something happened with stepe the day before he didn't fight chel sudden on you know weeks notice before they had to cancel an entire pay-per-view events. But again, that's why I'm putting over Mokachev so much. And again, I don't blame John for that either. You're the champion. That's your, this is, you grind your way to the belt. Once you win the belt, that's when you can start making the real money. That's when you start

getting pay for you points. That's when you start getting pay for your main events. That's when you start getting those bonuses and those upper tier things that main event champions get. So, you don't want to lose that. But Islam's just like, I don't care. Let's go. And if you guys missed it, we've got obviously a new thumbnail for the preview show. If you missed it,

Jailton Almeida versus Sergei Spivak will be the new main card opener for UFC 311. Now that Hanata Boiqano and Benal Daryush is obviously not happening because Anato Moikano is fighting for the championship, which is absolutely insane. Why is Armin out? Why not B'Neal?

Well, I mean, it's kind of hard to give B'Neal a title shot right now. It's very, very difficult to justify this. You know, it's, was B'Neal's last fight? Yeah, it's been a tough go for Mr. Darius, because he's, what? Got wrecked by Olivera, got wrecked by Armin Saurukian. It's, you can't get a guy who got knocked out in the first round, back-to-back fights a title shot. Mechano's on a long wing streak.

He is. And we were sort of talking about it in all our programs, too. If Hanata Moikano went out there and d'Aryush, with sort of the layout and landscape at 155, Hanata Moikano, like, could have gotten himself a title shot anyways. You know what I mean? This just comes a little bit sooner. And I was going to pick Moikano to win.

But Benny's a tough out. he is a very tough out like he only loses to the to the best of the best at least recently Tyson honestly would have been islam's biggest competitor yet very disappointed i agree i thought this is the toughest fight of at least timing wise i thought this was the toughest fight of his career and i obviously it's it's become a gimmick with the armin surukian thing but i i really wanted to see if armin sarukian could go five rounds with Islam. Could he go the distance?

How would this fight look? Could he win a five-round fight against Islam if we went the whole way? I wanted to see what it would be like seeing Armin in four and five against a guy like Islam-Machachev. So it's a bummer. The matchup's so good stylistically. It's a bum. It's just a bummer. It really is.

Who is Benny fighting? Nobody. He will not be fighting anybody. He's getting money, which is good. And then hopefully they rebook him soon. What's your prediction for the fight? What round and how will it be finished? I don't know.

I mean, I'm picking Islam, obviously. But you just never know. This just has weird vibes written all over it. You know what I mean? It's just, it's very strange. The pick is Islam. I just think he's bigger, stronger, more physical. Hennato is.

a sneaky as hell grappler, but it's just, it's tough. Tough scenes. But I'll go Makachchev. I think he finishes, I'll say round four. There's no way Money Moikano is a replacement. There is, Money Moikano is the replacement. I know a lot of people, a lot of people jumping on. I'm sorry.

sorry to be the bearer of bad news are they going to make Armand take another fight I don't know again this kind of all depends on what happens in this fight tomorrow and what happens at 170 because I do feel that

if Shafkat Rahman off beats Bala Muhammad and wins the welterweight title I think Islam is done at 155 I think he's gone what else does he need to do he's not going to just wait for these guys to come He's already beaten all of them. Some of them twice.

Justin Gaitchie just got badly knocked out. If he beats Dan Hooker, they're going to give him a title shot? Is that going to excite him? I mean, that would be a really interesting fight. Dan Hooker, he already ran through. If Dan Hooker beat Justin Gage, you can make a strong case. But we've seen this fight, and it wasn't that long ago. So it's just a weird time for lightweight.

And get his Lom out of there, get him go to 170. I think you'd do well again, Shafcott. A lot of people just. just figuring this out right now. Tupori versus him? No. Come on. Can't do that?

Tuporia's got shit to do. He's got a lot of fights. If there's one champion who doesn't need to move at all, it's Iliott Tuporia. He has a million dudes to fight right now. Go fight Volk. Totally okay with Volk getting an immediate rematch, even though I think the fight isn't going to look terribly different. But from what I understand from people I've talked to,

Volk is locked in for this one. So we'll see. But again, then you get Diego Lopez. Then you got Mavsarv, Lov, and these guys are just going to keep coming at 145. So all right, if you're just joining us, we're about to get out of here. We're going to talk more about this very soon on the preview show. Armand Sarukian out of the main event of UFC 311. He is no longer competing a back injury per UFC CEO, Dana White.

He announced it on Instagram, talked about it a little bit more on the UFC. F. 311 official way-in show on the UFC's YouTube channel. But 1 a.m. local time. He got a phone call from Marvin Serukian, back injury, no longer competing. Hanata Moikano steps in on a little over a day's notice. He will fight Islam Makachev for the lightweight title. He was supposed to fight Benil Darius. Benil Darius no longer competing.

But Hanata Moikano did make weight at championship weight 155, which was very pivotal. we didn't know when he stepped on the scale how important it would be that he makes 155 and the man did it money moikano trying to make the most money he possibly can if he goes out there and he beats his on machochev tomorrow night boy the bank account is just got to get bigger the stock of a guy like can otto moikano is just going to get bigger because you know that the promo he is going to cut after he wins the belt will be absolutely unbelievable

so guys thank you so much more on this coming up Stick with us at MAAfighting.com for more information on this. We will have a preview show. Jed Mishu will join me. He's actually up in New York right now, if you can believe that. So, yes, preview show coming up. I know it says it's supposed to start right about now, but I think it's going to be delayed a little bit, but it is what it is. It's the new cycle.

It's MMA, and this is MMA fighting, and you guys are the best. So thank you so much. We'll see you very shortly on the UFC 311 preview show because things look vastly different right now. You guys are the best. Thank you. listening to the Vox Media Podcast Network. Hi, I'm Sophia Loper Caro, host of the Before the Chorus podcast. We dive into the life experiences behind the music we love.

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