MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour - Episode 167

Episode Date: August 14, 2014

Featuring Anthony Pettis, Phil Davis, Mike Chandler, Melvin Manhoef, Duke Roufus, and Mark Pavelich. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from the Audible Original, the downloaded two, ghosts in the machine. The Earth only has a few days left. Rosco Cudulian and the rest of the Phoenix colony have to re-upload their minds into the quantum computer, but a new threat has arisen that could destroy their stored consciousness forever. Listen to Oscar winner Brendan Fraser reprised his role as Rosco Cudulian in this follow-up to the Audible Original Blockbuster. The Downloaded, it's a thought-provoking sci-fi journey where identity, memory, and morality collide. Robert J. Sawyer does it again with this much-anticipated sequel that leaves you asking, What are you willing to lose to save the ones you love?

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Joined in the back as always by Isaac, New York, Rick, and the returning will the thrill. I'm so excited for this show. We've got a jam-packed show, my friends. We're coming off one of the craziest UFCs in recent memory. divisions were turned upside down, upsets were had on Saturday night in Las Vegas. We will talk about that in the third hour with Mr. Rick. Now, a lot of you are concerned about how we will deal with the Rick's Picks Challenge. You may have heard he did not have the best Saturday night.

And, well, all I can say is, excuse me, you'll have to wait and see. We'll hear from Mr. Rick and find out officially how he did on Saturday night with his Rick's Picks Challenge. We'll also talk about the card. And we will talk about the card throughout the show as well because we want to hear from you. Your questions, comments, hit us up on Twitter using the hashtag the MMA Hour. Also, you can leave questions on the website in the comment section below. If you're watching this live right now and the best one, in honor,

this is the only time I'll mention it. In honor of the Super Bowl yesterday, you may have heard that John Jones's brother, Arthur Jones, had a good game. He recovered a fumble. And in honor of that, we will be giving out this championship edition. John Jones Round 5 figurine. Best question asker of the day gets this.

Okay, let me run down the lineup here because we got a stack show in particular in the first hour. We're going to be joined later on in the show by the Bellator Lightweight Champion Mike Chandler, MFC president Mark Pavlitz, who will also be stopping by for the first time. And if you've been complaining that some interviews have been too much about me on my show, unbelievable that some of the content would be about me, I suggest you don't tune into the Mark Pavlich interview. That is all I will say. Phil Davis, the light heavyweight contender who faces Vinnie Magalesh on April 27th, UFC 159. He'll be stopping by. Duke Rufus will be stopping

by as well. Your questions, comments, and Melvin Manhoff, who I saw in Las Vegas on Saturday night after UFC 156. He is in Los Angeles now, training with the Black Zillions. Well, we'll find out why Melvin Manhoff was in Las Vegas and what he's doing. What the Blacksillians? What am I talking about? With Black House, Blacksilians, they did not have a good night. Why is he training with Black House? We will find out in a matter of moments. But first, let us go to the phone lines.

Do we have our guests there? New York, Rick? Yes? Okay, let's go to the phone lines and welcome in. The man who stole the headlines after Saturday nights, Joseo Aldo versus Frankie Edgar fight. Joseo Alto retained his UFC featherweight championship, and then all of a sudden a bombshell was dropped by Dana.

White at the Post-Five press conference when he announced that this man, the man joining us on the line right now, texted him and said he wanted Josealdo next. He's joining us right now. His name is Anthony Pettis. Anthony, how are you? Anthony? I'm going to call him back. Hold on one second. Well, that is a good start. Well, I just, oh, yeah, weird. I, excuse me, I just, I ruined the reveal. But we're getting him right now. I think we have him. Give me the thumbs up. we have him. Do we have him? Anthony, are you there? What the heck is going on? I'm getting bad flashbacks here. All right, we're going to get Anthony in a second here. It's like we've gone back to the early 2012 era as we move out of this studio. Well, anyway, if you didn't hear the news,

after the fight on Saturday, UFC 156, Jose Aldo retained his belt. He beat Frankie Edgar. Two judges had it 49, 46. One judge had it 48, 47. And then at the press conference, Dana White shows up and says that Anthony Pettus texted him and said that he wants to drop down to 145 and fight Jose Aldo next. And a lot of people didn't see this coming,

obviously because Anthony Pettis is the number one contender in the UFC lightweight division. And a lot of people think that he should be fighting Benson Henderson next. And, of course, he has to wait to see what happens between Benson Henderson and Gilbert Melendez on April 20th, but regardless of what happens, it has been said he will fight the winner. All of a sudden, he's saying that he wants to fight Joseo Alto at 145. He hasn't fought at 145 in WC or UFC, so this, you know, took a lot of people by surprise,

and we wanted to talk to him about that. And then in a matter of moments after Anthony Pettis, we'll talk to his longtime coach Duke Rufus of Rufus Sport, who had a very busy week, when was it, last week, in Chicago and also for the Beltoor event when Ben Ascran retained his title he had Eric Coke on that card also Anthony Pettis was on the card this weekend they had Chico Camus on the 156 card we'll talk to Duke about what he thinks of Anthony fighting Joseo Aldo for the UFC featherweight title not the lightweight title and it's interesting because a lot of people think these days that Joseoaldo should go up to 155 I saw him in in Las Vegas all week long and it looked like like he was struggling with that way cut. It seemed very tired, lacked some energy. But then come fight night, once again, it's almost like we forgot how great Josealdo can be.

He hasn't fought prior to Saturday in what he had fun almost 13 months since he knocked out Chad Mendez. And he just put on another great performance against Frankie Edgar. A close one, you have to feel bad for Frankie Edgar. Your heart goes out to him. Third straight fight that he lose. loses, and this has to be the first time that I can think of, that a guy is stuck in a three-fight losing streak, yet he is still as popular, if not more popular, than he was as champion.

His stock, in my opinion, hasn't gone down at all. He's still, you know, as respected by the fans and the media as he ever was, but you have to feel bad for him, particularly when you think about what happened in the second Benson Henderson fight. A lot of people thinking that he won that fight. And then, in this one, while it was close, not as controversial, in my opinion, as maybe his Benson-Henderson fights. We'll talk about what's next for Frank Yedger when we take your questions and comments. What is going on with Anthony? Do we have him, or is there an issue with the phones or what? Someone tell me. Okay, so what, are the phones dead? Okay. Does he have Skype? Okay, gotcha. Okay, I understand. All right. So we're

going to get Anthony here in a second. I see them connecting. And obviously the other big news coming out of UFC 156 was big... Hey Anthony, are you there? Yeah, I'm here. Okay, I'm sorry about all that. Good to have you on the show. Let's get right

into it as I was getting all excited when I was introducing you. You stole the headlines on Saturday when at the press conference, Dana White, and I'm not talking about the amazing red suit that you're wearing. We'll get to that later on. But Dana White says that you texted him and said you want to fight Anthony Pettis. Is this true? Not Anthony Pettus, Jose Aldo, is this true?

Yeah, man. I'm at the point of my career where I want to fight the best in the world. And, I mean, 145 was always an option for me. I just was doing good at 155. And, you know, Eric Cote was down there, you know, tearing things up. That's my teammate. So, I mean, I wouldn't say I'm done at 55 or, or, I mean, 145 is a for sure drop.

It's just, you know, if it makes sense, and they can keep me from having to wait for all these times. saddle shots and I said let's do it. Was this something that you were thinking about before you saw him fight in person on Saturday or when you were watching him, you all of a sudden thought, wow, I want to fight this guy? No, I think it's something I've been thinking for a while. I mean, he's on the top pound for pound list and that's where I want to be at. I want to be, you know, the best fighter in the world and in my weight classes or around

my leg classes. So, I mean, the only way you can do that is to beat the guys there already. Now, are you able to make $1.45? Like, do you think that's a good cut for you? I don't think it would be hard cut. I mean, I only cut like two pounds making 55. And I barely, I have a clean diet, but, I mean, I barely cut and you weight when it's time to take it down to 55.

So, I mean, if my teammate Eric Cole can do it, I'm pretty sure I could. So what was Dana's response when you said that you wanted to fight Aldo? He didn't say anything back. I still haven't received a text message back. What? I'm not sure if nothing, yeah, I'm not sure. I'm not sure if, you know, it's something he doesn't want to see or, I mean, I mean, from the press conference, it sounds like he's interested,

but I mean, you know how that goes. I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to say anything, and then it gets sicking away. I mean, I'm sure it has to make sense for everybody. So are you surprised he didn't at least write you back and say, okay, thanks, because he told the world about this. Are you surprised you didn't get a text back? No, I mean, I think, I mean, either he's waiting to choose his words wisely

and making sure he doesn't promise me something that doesn't happen again, or, I mean, he did announce it, so I mean, definitely he crossed his mind. So would you rather, let's say, they said to you, okay, you're going to, you know, we'll give you the lightweight title show. You just have to wait for the winner of Benson and Gill and then wait for them to get ready. Or we'll book this fight right now and maybe you get that fight in four months, which would obviously be before Benson and Gil since they're fighting in three months. Would you rather do that?

Man, honestly right now, I don't know. I don't want to wait. So I know all of his fought. I know I can make 45. I think the world wants to see that fight. I mean, it's, you know, fireworks written all over that one for sure. But, I mean, I still want the 155's trap, too. So I'm torn in between both

You know I think me and Benson Have some unfinished business And I think I'm the guy I can beat Ben Henderson But I'm just tired of waiting, man So I'm just stuck You know, I hate being in these positions

Where I can't do anything I can't fight I can't take fights And I just I want to keep going What happens if you fight Aldo And beat him And you're the champion They're not going to let you go back up to 155

And hold two belts, right? I don't know Who else man I mean I know I can beat I can beat Ben Henderson I mean, he's a very good guy. I respect him. I respect all these guys.

They all got great skills. But, I mean, I think they need to book the fight that the world's want to see. And I think the world wants to be both these fights. I'm excited to be part of either one. What was the response that you got from your fans, like on Twitter and whatnot, when this came out? Do you think they're more excited to see you fight Aldo or to see you wait and fight the winner of Gil versus Benson? Honestly, it was a little more mixed than I expected. I thought everybody wanted to see the Aldo fight.

He's the dominant champion. He looks good doing it, but it was mixed. I mean, a lot of people on Twitter saying, you know, I want to see Ben Henderson. He's spread it's two. You know, some people want to see the Alba fight, but I think that's why they both make great fights. I mean, people want to see both of them.

Can I give you my opinion? Yeah, I would hear it. I really want to see you fight Benson again. I think it's such a great fight. It's such an easy sell. You show the Showtime kick over and over again. You beat him, so there's a history. there, of course, if Gil wins, you know,

you're still a contender, and I don't want to lose that fight. So, I am torn as well, but when I first heard the news, I was very excited about, wow, Pettus versus Aldo, this sounds incredible, but now I kind of want to see you stick around and see what you could do at 155 because I think you could possibly be the best

at 155. Yeah, I mean, I agree, man. I feel like, I feel like, even after the lawsuit, I still said on my Twitter end, I'm the best lightweight in the world, and I still firmly believe that. But like I said earlier, man, I'm looking for the big fight. I mean, I think both each fight are big.

And it's kind of just up to the UFC to pick what one they want to be part of. What did you think of Aldo's performance? You were there. You watched it. What did you think of what he did on Saturday? I'm always impressed with Aldo. Frankie Yeager is tough as they come. And, I mean, he only gets better, you know, the ending rounds.

I think we've seen in the homoing fight that, you know, all the kind of guys out in the ending round, you know, four-fifth round, you know, his strong point. but I mean he's always dangerous so uh no I was definitely I'm always impressed with the guy he's got a lot of tons of skill I mean it wasn't wasn't a fact to be calling around because I seen some holes in his game or I thought uh I could you know expose him here he's one of the best power for pound fighters in the world and I want to be on that list between Aldo Benson Gill who do you think is the toughest opponent

tough to call I mean considering the weight cut you know to the 145 um I don't know how I feel down there I've never fought at 145 I'm a small 155 or so it's uh it's uh it's If it comes down to skill, I would say, I would say, I would say, I would say, although, man, all those one of them guys that do is, he's good everywhere, and he looks down there and doing it. I mean, he just beat the 155 champ that beat BJ Penn. And he didn't look, he didn't look, he didn't look bad doing it. You know, you know, it's interesting.

You have been frustrated because, you know, you were promised the title shot, essentially twice, and it didn't materialize. And then on Saturday, when this came out and everyone was very excited, Ricardo Lamas, who beat your friend Eric Koch two Saturdays ago, said, what am I, Mirage? essentially feeling like he was getting looked past and kind of ignored. Do you feel for a guy like that? Because now you may go down and take away his title shot.

Man, I feel for him, bro. But like you said, I was in the same position twice. I mean, I was there. I was the next guy in line. And it all depends on who the UFC wants to see fight. That's what it's all about. I think if you can tell the tickets, you can tell the pay-per-views and who do the fans want to see fight.

Well, no disrespect to Lama. He did very good. I mean, he beat my teammate Eric Koch, and I have, I think, super highly of Eric Koch. One of the best well-ar-hearted fighters on our team, so, I mean, Wormouth is right up there also, but, like I said, I think it's at the end of the day, it comes down to what the fans want to see and what the UFC think to make sense. Side note, how is Eric feeling? On the 70s, we haven't talked much.

He went back to Iowa for a little bit, so he's back home visiting his family. We had a couple text messages. He seems motivated. I mean, you got to ask, after a loss, you've got to come back, you know, 10 times stronger. I know this because I've been there twice. Right. And I think we're going to see the best Eric Koch his next fight.

By the way, were you maybe a little more motivated to fight Jose after you saw him jump off the cage? Was he trying to copy you and send the message or what? No, I mean, he's just kind of a fighter. He put two of them kind of fighters in the same cage. He's unpredictable. I mean, he can do it. I mean, he's a top-level soccer player,

a great athlete. So, I mean, and so much. So I think that's why some of the fans want to see that fight also. I mean, you never, you're not going to see in that fight. And he has flirted with going up to 155. Would you try to campaign for that, or do you want to fight for a belt? I want to fight for a belt, man. That's, that's, that's, that's, in sure you can put it part for me.

I mean, it's another belt, and I don't think the weight cut would be impossible. I think it's something I can pretty easily do. So, I mean, the belt's what's been sure you mean in that. And, I mean, who knows, who knows what happens. I mean, if this thing doesn't come through, he comes to 155, yeah, I mean, definitely want to fight them, but I'm looking at these straps right now. So let's just clear it up. Let's say Dana White or Sean Shelby or Joe Silva calls you right now.

Anthony, what do you want to do? We'll give you this title shot if you wanted, or you can wait to see what happens in April. What are you choosing? Man, right now, like, it's so fresh where I need that I'm trying to put two or path to get the boat to eat the belt. I mean, I say, yeah, you can fight healthy all in three months, and then you get this winner of Henderson Gilbert, and I'm signing the contract there. But what if you can't choose both?

I mean, you may not be able to have the cake and eat it, right? Well, see. I mean, that's up to the U.S.E., man. I'm not going to make any decisions or close any doors until, I mean, they decide what they want to see. So, I mean, I put my opinion out there. I'm out for either one, and I guess it's just what makes sense for you guys now. But I think, like I said, both fights are very entertaining. I mean, me and although that sounds good, and me and Henderson times did as well. So I was just at the point of tired of waiting, man. I'm just tired of getting passed up, and who knows what happens in the lightweight fight.

you know, who knows what injuries are going to occur and how long that's going to take. And then the other tricky thing is, you know, again, if you fight him next and you beat him, are you okay with, you know, a bunch of fights coming up at 145? Is that a life that you want to, you know, is that a life you want to live? Yeah, that's exactly, that's the exact thing.

I mean, I got to feedback and look at all the options. I mean, once they come forward and tell me something, because honestly, I don't know anything, I can look at my options and see what happens. I mean, I'm 155. I'm comfortable, man. I saw I'm the number one contender. I'm right there.

It's not a fact that I'm trying to drop weights. I'm trying to cut down because it's easy weight to a belt or anything like that. It's just I want to fight. I just want to fight a year off. This is all I do. So, I mean, a year off just, it's more of a week. And this year, I just want to make it to my year. By the way, who are you picking Benson or Gil?

Oh, Ben. I mean, I think Ben, Ben's a tough guy. I mean, like I said, I've got all of respect in the world with a guy. He trained hard. I've seen him out in Vegas. He's out there rolling around. He's a true champ, man. So I'm thinking, Ben.

And here's the most important question of the mall. Where did you get that amazing red suit that you were wearing on Saturday? Man, actually, I was going to the store of my daughter, and I was my little bro. He's like, man, I bet you want to rock their red suit right there. It was kind of a joke in person. I'm like, watch me do it. And I think I pulled it off pretty good. It looked incredible.

I mean, with all due respect, it looked incredible. And you had the red shoes as well, right? And I'm colorblind. I noticed these things. That was a total page of your book, man. I was like, well, what area of want to wear it with the suit? Well, it was very impressive, and I was impressed with your call-out as well. I'm very curious to see how this all unfolds.

You know, kudos to you for calling out the champ, and now I want to... But Dana White should text you. I mean, the least he could do is text you to acknowledge the... Yeah, I mean, I was expecting some back, but, I mean, like I said, I think he's... He has to make sure whatever he says is the fish for the time, so I'm pretty sure he's, you know, going to be upset what happened in the past. Right. posted. Let us know how it goes and good luck with whatever path you choose to take.

Thank you, man. I appreciate it. All right, there he is. Anthony Showtime, Pettis, saying that he wants to fight Joseo. Want to get your take on this? Let us know what you think. Hit us up using the hashtag the MMA hour. Let us know in the comments below. What would you rather see Anthony Pettus do next? Do you want to see him fight Jose Aldo for the featherweight title? Do you want to see him fight the winner of Benson Henderson versus Gil Melendez? I told him straight up. When I first heard this, I was Wow, Pettus Aldo, that sounds amazing.

That sounds like an unbelievable fight, but then I thought about it. And to me, you know, along with D.C. came, which I know you all get pissed off when I bring it up. Pettis versus Benson is one of the top two, top three fights that I want to see in 2013. And I'm not taking anything away from Gill. If he wins, fair and square, more power to him. But I'm just saying, on paper, you ask me, what fights do I want to see? Benson, Pettis, 2. that fight at WC 53, in my opinion,

was one of the greatest fights I've ever seen live. I had the privilege and honor to see that live, the last WEC fight in Arizona, and it was unbelievable, highlighted by the Showtime kick. If they could put that together, would be great. So I'm kind of torn. Aldo, to me, I've said it on this show. He's probably at the top of the list of guys

who I would pay top money to see. If I'm just a fan, you tell me, who do you want to see, who do you want to pay to watch? Aldo's there. By the way, showtime is there too. I mean, I think the world of Anthony Pettis, I think he is one of the most exciting fighters in the world. And he is what MMA is all about, in my opinion.

So what a predicament, but it's a good one. It's an interesting one. I just am afraid that we're seeing too many guys moving up and down, getting title shots in a division. I like seeing guys climb the ladder. I like seeing guys work towards a goal and then achieving it, and then you see what happens. So you kind of feel for a guy like Ricardo Lamas. You would feel for a guy like the Korean zombie who has been out. and then it leaves a big hole at 155.

Who does the winner of Benson Gilgett? So it creates some problems, but it also creates some excitement. Very interesting to see. Let us know what you think in the comments below. Apologies for the technical issues. Do we have it squared away? What do you think? Yeah?

All right. Isaac gave me the nod. In a minute, we should be joined by Phil, Mr. Wonderful Davis. Do we have him here? No. being connected right now. Okay. In a minute, we'll be joined by Phil, Mr. Wonderful Davis,

who, as I said, faces Vinnie Magalesh on April 27th, UFC 159. And if you're sort of following our, my man Alizzo sending me a tweet of Anthony Pettis rocking the red suit with the white belt, the white shirt, I mean, he just looked like, he looked like a featherweight contender. So if you're following our schedule, you might. have noticed that we skipped over Duke Rufus, who as Anthony's coach, will talk to him about this fight, but he has now been moved to 2 o'clock. So just to not push everyone back due to the technical issues and whatnot to start the show, he will be joining us at around 2 o'clock Eastern time. So stick around for Duke Rufus, the head, the brains behind Rufus sport.

If you are a fan of the social media tool Twitter, you might have realized that our next guest, and his future opponent have been going back and forth on Twitter for quite some time. And I guess you can say Vinnie got what he wanted because he is fighting, Phil, in April, in New Jersey, UFC 159, and we're being joined by Phil Davis right now. Phil, how are you? I'm good, oh, good, how are you, Ariel? I'm doing great. I heard you had a very exciting Super Bowl party last night.

Yeah, I had a good, pretty good Super Bowl party. Pretty good Super Bowl party, yeah. How about yours? Mine was, you know, it wasn't as exciting as yours, I would imagine. It was nice. I was with my family and friends, but you were with some really important people, right? Not the Super Bowl. I was actually watching Saturday night festivities with some friends up an alpine.

I was hanging out with a congressman, and it was pretty cool stuff, man. Pretty cool stuff. Why were you watching a UFC fight with a congressman? Which congressman? Congressmen in which state? In California? Congressman in California. The great state of California, might I add.

The Golden State. What was that? It's the Golden State, California. Yeah, exactly. The Golden State. I don't know. I don't know if I should name it. But, yeah, we had a great time.

We just, not even talking shop, just, you know, enjoying the fights and, you know, I think he was kind of sort of into fights, and now he's a big-time fan. So I had no real reason to be there other than just watching fights. And now, you know, we've got another M.MA fan who was, you know, just a casual fan. Now he's pretty hardcore. I'm pretty sure he's going to be joining me in New Jersey. Wow.

So maybe you'll find out then firsthand. In your corner? Will he be in your corner? I don't know. I'll see if I could happen. So not only would you have him in your corner, you'd probably get some secret service as well, so you can kind of, you know, beat the system and get more than three guys in your corner. You know what?

That's actually a really good idea. You know what? The guys who walk you out, they're just, you know, the event staff. But if I had some serious secret service walking me out, you could, to touch me on the walkout. You could get shot for that. I know. That's why I said it's smart. And by the way, I didn't mean to blow up your spot there.

I didn't know this was like an actual secret rendezvous, so apologies. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Congressman's secret rendezvous will do. Whoa, whoa, well, I don't know where you had it was that. All right. It wasn't like that, here. All right. I wasn't like that.

I was told that you were watching the Super Bowl with these important people, but at least I got part of the story, right? you were watching UFC 156 on Saturday. And by the way, before we get to your fight coming up, I got to ask, since you know, you have some history, what did you think of the Nogara Rashad fight? Were you as surprised at how that turned out as most of us here? Well, you know what?

Kind of sort of. I talked about it with some friends at the gym. And I already know Nogara has great wrestling defense. I know this. And whenever I had trouble taking him down, people just assume it was my wrestling that sucked and not his defense that was good. Which is fine. You know, apparently it's not the wrestling. It's him.

He's freaking tough. Yeah. But it seemed like Dana said to me after the fight, that was more about what Rashad didn't do than what Nogara did. Do you agree? Yes and no. No, Gera did keep it in it. in a boxing range the whole time, and he was delivering pretty good kicks to the body,

which became really annoying for Rashad as time went on. You know, I think he definitely missed some opportunities to score big points and really initiate his game plan. But I won't take anything away from Moghera. He kept the fight exactly where he was comfortable, and he won. So now you get this fight moving on to you. against Vinnie Magalish, and it was a weird one because,

you know, you guys were going back and forth on Twitter, and to me it seemed, as I tweeted last week when the fight was announced, you know, hey, if you want to learn something from Vinny here, you know, basically if you annoy someone long enough, you'll get what you want. Where did this come from? Why did he continue to almost Twitter bomb you

to the point that he actually got what he wanted? Hey, don't ask me. This guy, here's my thing. it's one thing if you want to call a guy out that's fine I don't really call people out start what I do but if that's what you do cool no problem you know

but after my buddy Forrest Griffin got hurt at 155 he called me out when I was still in Brazil I just got done fighting I'm still in the arena and he treats that he wants to fight me next that's cool that's that's really cool

all right I'm actually kind of Amazing. I always wouldn't be at a level where guys call me out. It's kind of weird that I've reached that point. People like, oh, I want to fight this guy. I thought it wasn't nobody. And here, he chose me wrong by calling me out.

That's awesome. Now, if you have the opportunity to fight me, you can't back down after you already have agreed. You know, you started calling me out. It's just silly. The guy doesn't really be silly. It's annoying. You know what I mean? So what are you saying?

that they offered him. I'm saying he backed out of, they offered him a fight at 155. Right. Call me an event against me, and he turned it down. Why? What was the reason you were told? You would have to ask Finney on that. Okay.

You know, I don't want to start quoting his excuses because, you know, this is only an hour-long, you know, show. And, you know, we just don't have time for that. But, you know, first he said he was overweight, then he said, I didn't want to give him. a full fight camp, and if he had a real fight camp, and he would beat me, and blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, you forfeit your rights to all these things once you start calling a guy out. Right. You know what I mean? Tell sonning. Take Chow sonn for example.

Whether you love the guy or hate the guy, if he calls you out, he will fight you or a week's notice. That's who he is. That's Chelle Sonnen. Right. Then he ain't that guy. I don't know who he is. So he turns down the fight Why did he end up getting the fight?

And four months later I had some other things I had to do I actually went on a mission trip In January to the Dominican Republic To help build a hospital Wow And just help out with a lot of things going on down there And I refused to

Turn down that trip after I had already paid, and people were counting on me to be there to fight Vinny for, I mean, it's obvious, he's, whatever, I'm not going to get into that. But, yeah, I had already some things from plans going on, and some other family things I had going on that stopped me from fighting. I think he wanted to fight in, like, February or something. So, yeah, no, that wasn't what happened. You know, the light heavyweight division, I just had to submit my,

rankings, the often talked about rankings, and it's a very stacked division, as it has been for a while. I have you in the top five. Vinny is not a top five fighter. He hasn't, you know, been in the UFC in his second go-around long enough, hasn't fought top competitors and et cetera, et cetera. Do you view him to be on your level? Do you think he is as good? Does he deserve to be fighting Phil Davis? You know, if I say simply, he's not on my level. He doesn't deserve to be fighting me. I feel like that sounds worse than it actually is,

and almost sounds like I'm talking about his character as a person rather than his fighting skills. So I want to word it a little differently and say what he's done in the UFC, which is one win, and I guess we can count as old two losses. Doesn't really warrant him a fight with me, but, you know, it's fine. You know, I don't, listen, I don't do matchmaking.

That's entirely up to Joe Silver. Joe Silver's a genius. I'm going to let him. I'm just going to go with what he says. I don't question him. Man knows what he's doing. Does this fight get you excited? I mean, it seems like there's some bad blood there,

but are you up for this fight? I'm up for every fight, and my only thing is that I hope the evening of April 27th when he gets back to his hotel, I hope he doesn't say to himself, what did I do this for? Why did I call this man out?

This doesn't make any sense. Why did I do this? I could have thought somebody that wasn't top 10. I could have thought somebody that wasn't top five. I could have fought somebody that doesn't, you know, somebody that, you know, I could have beaten, you know, came home a winner without two black eyes and a bruised ego. Why did I call this guy out?

Hope he doesn't say that, but, you know, it's looking like you will. Did you see his return fight to the UFC against Igor Procriich? His return fight against Igor Procriich? I actually didn't. I heard a little bit about it. Well, go ahead. Tell me about it. You give me your take on it. Well, you know, he obviously looked a lot better than he did when he first fought in the UFC. Made it to the finals of the Ultimate Fighter, as you may recall.

Didn't have a great run there. Went out, did some good things, M1 and whatnot, and he looked a lot better. I mean, there's no doubt about it. It looked a lot better. And won via submission. So it was impressive. I think Igor is, you know, I don't know, top 25 in the UFC light heavyweight division. You know, still, I think there are questions about striking, and we all know about his ground game and whatnot. I think this is an interesting matchup because of his submissions and you're wrestling, and I'm curious to see where the fight ends up.

But I wanted to get your take on if you thought he had improved since his first run in the UFC. See, you have to understand a couple things. I don't just for the run of and watch fights. I watch my – it's just so many fights. I watch my friends. I watch my teammates, my training partners. And sometimes the breather I get from watching fights is, you know, not watching everybody else. And he's definitely one of the guys I just wouldn't have watched.

Are you familiar? So, go ahead. I definitely definitely did not watch his fight. Are you familiar with the term? I suppose between now. between now and April 27th I'll check it out at some point yeah I think you should

I think it would be a valuable viewing for you but are you familiar with like internet trolls and whatnot and if so do you think that Vinny is one he definitely is one I mean I mean

I just I just hope he gets everything he hoped and dream this fight would be um they get to be on the big stage, but, you know, it's not going to be as fun as he thinks it's going to be.

So, you know that sometimes, like, he may just be trying to get a reaction out of you, that he may not truly, you know, feel what he says or writes and things like that, right? You can recognize that. Well, sure. Yeah. Well, I wasn't sure, because it seemed like on Twitter

it was getting a little personal. I don't know. You handled it very well, though, I must say. You know, I, when fans fans say fans are a lot doesn't have to say whatever they want because at the end of the day

it's understood to you think I am a fan I have an opinion and no matter good or bad or indifferent I'm a fan fighters you should probably keep

the opinions to yourself unless you want to fight and he's going to have to live up to some of the opinions that he shared and yeah that may not be as cool as

some of the internet bloggers get to make out. And by the way, where do you, I know you said you don't really pay attention to the rankings and whatnot, but where do you kind of view yourself right now? Because, you know, like I said, I still have you, the light heavyweight division is totally out of whack because, like, you look at the Rashad situation, right? You know, Rashad beat you, you beat you,

Noghara. I mean, you beat Alexander Gustafson. He beat Shoghung. I mean, it's like a weird Bermuda triangle. So how far away do you think you are back from fighting, you know, maybe a number one contender fight. Well, in the way it seems to be, I just need to call out the right person after a good performance.

Right. So, I mean, I can't be too far. And I don't really know. But that's an interesting question. I don't really think about that too much. But I like that top five. That'll work for me. Do you think you're above, Alex?

people's i always get criticized because i have you above alex because you beat alex but it was a long time ago was a different Alex do you think that that should still stand or do you think what he has done uh against like let's say you know shogun tagosylvis fighting musasi

you know how long does a win last in other words you know what i'm saying right sure i don't know um it's kind of one of those things like the bcS if you lose early and then you do good and you come back then it's almost like

that loss didn't happen, but if you win, win, win, and then lose at the end of the season, well, then you drop down to the end. I totally agree. So it's, I don't know. I don't know. To say, oh, well, that's not the same, Alex. I, 100% agree with you. I didn't beat Alex that beat Chogun and beat the last couple of guys.

But then again, that's assuming that I'm the same person. I've gotten a lot better since then too. And both of you are fighting in the same month in April. Is it 100% that you won't fight again? Is it 100%? I think maybe we will fight again. But if we do, it just makes no sense to fight unless we're going to fight for a belt. It doesn't, to me.

A lot of people say, well, what if it's for a number one contenders fight? Well, it doesn't make sense to. He's my teammate now. He's my training partner. And if I'm going to lose a training partner, we both agree. We don't lose it for a belt. Hey, we're not going to trade together because we're going to fight for the belt. That's perfectly okay to people with both of us.

Right. You know, but to throw away, you know, a good training partner and all that just for another fight, There's plenty of people out there to us to both sides. By the way, last thing before I let you go, just looking at your Twitter, how awesome was that go-dadi commercial with Bar-Refelli kissing that kid? Awesome, right? Oh, man. Wasn't it great?

It was. It warmed my heart. I was like, man, it's great. It makes you think that. Kids have everything. Dreams do come true. Oh, yeah. Much like.

I was pretty, you know. Much like Vinny's dream came true of fighting you. There it is. Phil, I appreciate you coming on, talking about it, and I'm looking forward to it. It's shaping up to be a great card in Newark. Coming up in April, April 27th, Chal's Sondon versus John Jones is the main event.

Your fight versus Vinnie, much anticipated also. Roy Nelson versus Czech Congo, a bunch of fights announced over the past week. I'm sure we'll talk to you closer to the fight as well, but I appreciate you coming on and giving us a bit of a preview here. of what's to come in April. Thank you, thank you. And you're welcome. I will hopefully be back on soon

and talk about another fight. All right, thanks for the time, Phil. Yeah, thank you. There he is. Phil, Mr. Wonderful Davis, talking about his fight against Vinnie Magalesh, the internet troll.

And I called him out on this. I said, hey, much props to you. Nothing wrong with it. You got what you wanted. There's no way this fight would have been booked had he not said what he said

and continue to bomb him. I give him props. I'm not saying this in a negative way. Don't get me wrong. I see a lot of you writing to Vinny and trying to, again, do what you internet people do. I'm just telling it like it is here.

Vinny was not in the running to fight a guy like Phil Davis. And, you know, this should be a lesson. You want to fight, go out, call out the guy, and there's a very good chance with everyone getting excited these days on social media,

All right, let's move along now and welcome in a guy who had an amazing fight just a couple of weeks ago. He is the Belator lightweight champion. He is on top of the world these days. He is Mike Chandler and he joins us right here right now. Mike, how are you? I'm good, Ariel. How are you? I'm doing great.

Thanks for joining us. By the way, how do you feel about all of this? You feel in this day and age, like Phil just said, if you want a fight, you need to go out and call someone out. I know as champion, it's a little different. But is that what MMA has turned into? you have to just kind of be your own matchmaker? You know, I think it is, unfortunately, going towards that direction. But, man, I just don't feel right or I wouldn't be able to, you know, live with, you know, going out there and calling people out.

I don't like to say a negative thing about anybody. My opponent's nobody. I don't care how bad, how badly I'm how much I don't like you or whatnot. But I'm definitely not a talker. You know, I don't know. We'll see what happens in the future. But, I mean, I don't agree with it that. much and I just hope Phil go, you know, Phil's my training partner.

So I hope Phil goes out there and smashes Vinny and on to the next one. So as champion, though, it's kind of assumed you don't really have to worry about that. So that's another perk, right, of being champion. You can kind of just sit back and let people take shots at you. Yeah, yeah, basically. I mean, I just let them bounce off. And, you know, I mean, I just try to keep the main thing, the main thing. My main thing is getting my butt in the gym and getting better.

And I let my, you know, luckily I have great management. and I let them handle that stuff with Bellator and matchmakers and all that kind of stuff. I just, like I said, sit back and wait for the next guy to step into the occasion and hopefully go out and put on a good performance. Speaking of good performances, obviously on the first Bellator on Spike TV show, I thought you looked amazing, defeating Rick Hahn, submission, all that stuff. Were you happy with your performance? Anything that you did in there, you walked away and that left you unhappy? you know what not really I mean when you when you get the opportunity to go on that that kind of platform

I mean I don't know what the official number was but I know it peaked it over a million I mean to be able to go out there and get that kind of exposure and be able to fight on that platform was just great and to get a dominant win and another finish you know under my belt it's uh yeah I think hon was he was a little bit harder to fight on the feet than I wanted I he was kind of I felt like I was chasing him around a little bit and when you're chasing somebody around you can't get that range and I've worked a ton on my boxing, kickboxing, and that kind of stuff at the alliance over the last almost a year now.

So I've really improved my striking, but I wasn't really able to show it that much because he wasn't coming forward as much as I would have liked him to. But at the end of the day, my favorite thing in MMA is picking people up, putting them down and beating them up on the ground. So I was able to do that, and, you know, we got the finish. So it was good.

Did you feel like, you know, the pressure of, you know, being the first main event, spike this has been talked about for a year all that stuff you know it seemed like there was a lot of buzz and of course the ratings ended up being very good the best ever for beltor did you feel like you had to do something emphatic spectacular

in that fight and if so were you feeling that pressure the day of the fight a couple days out uh you know i don't know if if it's if it's right that i didn't or if you know if i should have but i didn't feel any pressure man every single fight's the biggest fight of my life and um it doesn't matter if i'm fighting in a shoebox in alaska or if i'm fighting on Spike TV in front of millions. I train the same and I step into the cage of that same mentality that I'm prepared.

I made the right decisions to get here and I know that I'm going to go out there and perform because I deserve to win. You know, I make the right decisions. I surround myself with the best people possible. And, you know, I try to be the best person I can. So when you have that kind of confidence going into a fight like that, you know, you don't take anything any different. You know, I know if I focus on the task, and if I focus on myself, my game plan,

and going out there and win in that, you know, I'm going to do a, I'm going to do great things in that cage that night, and in turn, it's going to do great things for Bellator, for Spike TV, for, you know, for the fans and for my friends and family and training partners. So, you know, I didn't feel any added pressure, which is a good thing, you know, pressure, pressure, you know, kills people these days. So I just try to keep it light, keep it, keep knowing that, you know, I've done everything I possibly can to go into that cage and perform well. So I kind of keep that mentality, keep things light. And, you know, I'm just glad I, you know, went out there, got it done. dominant win and, you know, on to the next one. How closely are you following this Eddie Alvarez saga?

Zero. You know, I, you know, I'm always going to have to talk about Eddie because of what we did, you know, that fight last year. But, I mean, I have not followed it. Man, I've just been enjoying the win and kind of sitting back and waiting to hear what's next. So you don't hear about the numbers being thrown around for him and that doesn't get you fired up. You don't hear about any of that? Oh, no, yeah, I saw that. I mean, I think I read an article with the numbers, and, that's great.

You know, people deserve to get paid these days, I guess. I'm not close to my numbers, but whatever. So you don't sit there and compare your numbers to his, and if your numbers are lower, that doesn't bother you? Oh, no. I mean, not really, man. I've only been in a sport for three years. Like I said, you know, keeping the main thing, the main thing, and that's getting better.

He's been in the sport for almost a decade. He's beat a lot of better names than I have. He's paid his dues. And, you know, I beat him on a Thursday night last year, or 2011. And it was a great fight. But it doesn't change the fact that I'm still a newcomer. But, you know, like I said, I got all the confidence in the world that whoever I step in the cage with around the whole world that I'm going to go out there and win. But, you know, I've no sense in staying up at night and worrying about my –

my wallet compared to other people's because at the end of the day, when you do things right, it's going to continue to keep growing and you will be successful and you will, you know, make that money eventually. So I just kind of worried about training and getting better right now. And by the way, just because I'm weird like that, it was actually on a Saturday night, not a Thursday night. No? Yeah, it was. Oh, it was a Saturday.

Dang it. Hey, hey, good day, good job. You knew you better than I did. I thought it was a Thursday, but we switched to Thursday this year. Yeah, same night as the infamous. or the famous Hendo Shogun fight? The greatest night in MMA history? The greatest night,

the self-proclaimed greatest night in the MMA history. Two fights of the decade on the same night. It was unbelievable. You get people now that Spike is airing it, you get some people coming up to you and almost like living the fight for the first time? I guess a little bit, yeah. I mean, I think that Bellator 360,

that one, well, I kind of broke it down a little bit. Man, people love that because, and I even, you know, to be able to, see the fight on TV on a big screen in HD is obviously a lot better than the MTV too, but it was definitely got a ton of response from the fans and that kind of stuff. So it was great, you know, it's almost like it almost happened again

and, you know, people, you know, are just now seeing me for the first time, unfortunately, sometimes. But, you know, it's cool. Are you hoping he comes back to Beltor so you can maybe, you know, emphatically beat him and, you know, there could be some questions whether, you know, the second time around he beats you. Is that something you're hoping for? You know, I mean, it's hard.

I mean, I'm probably one of the worst interviews you're ever going to have, man. Whenever you ask you about that kind of stuff, I'm just focused on whatever happens, man. I'm just getting better. I mean, I can tell you one thing right now. If I stepped in the cage with Albert again, I would definitely beat him and be him in a lot dominant fashion. That's how hard I've trained over the last year since that fight

and how much I've matured as a mixed martial artist. But, you know, whatever happens, happens, man, he deserves every good thing that comes to him. He fights hard, and whatever happens, whether he stays or he goes or he does whatever, it's not going to affect me much. I guess it will because I might end up fighting him, but, you know, at the end of the day, I just want to step in the cage with whoever and fight and put on a great show for the fans. And by the way, one of the big things to come out of the first court appearance from a couple of weeks ago,

I know you say you don't follow it, but I'm just wondering, the Bellator lawyers said that there have been talks of you versus Eddie to headline a pay-per-view in March. Was that ever brought up to you? Because that seems to be a point of contention here. Yeah, I mean, I haven't heard anything from anybody, whether my management or Bellator or whatnot. Like I said, I stay out of it and let my managers fight that battle and they do it very, very well. But I haven't talked to anybody about that kind of stuff. So, you know, like I said, who knows?

Who knows what's going to happen, what's being said, what's going on. But I haven't heard anything of the sort. So if they're not talking about that, and I know there's a lightweight tournament final coming up, Marlene Held and Dave Jansen, when do you think you'll be able to, because there are no more super fights, right? So you have to wait for the winner of that fight and then fight them probably later this year. When do you think you'll fight again? I'm hoping, I mean, I'm healthy, man.

I'm healthy and hungry, and I'm ready to get back out there and fight on Spike TV in front of the fans again. So I'm hoping, you know, they're fighting, what, March, March something. Yep. So I'd like to go to fight April, May, and get back out there. And I'd like to see, you know, I don't really care who it is, but I'd like to see Jansen win that just because I'd like to have a win over someone else rather than, you know, the same guy doesn't really do you much good to fight the same guy twice. Sure.

But, you know, we'll see. But that's who I'm focused on. I mean, obviously, Bellator's format is the tournament champion. It's a shot at the title. And, you know, that's pretty standard issue with Bellator now. So that's who I'm focused on. That's who I'm planning on fighting next, and that's all I've heard so far, is that's who I will be fighting because they're one of those guys are going to win the tournament.

Held has looked really good since you beat him. He hasn't lost and had some nice finishes. Do you feel like he's a different fighter, or do you think that he would present nothing new if you fought him again? You know, I don't, yeah, I mean, I don't say anything to be disrespectful about him. me. I mean, he looks pretty much the same standard issue. Roll around, try and grab a leg and rip it off, you know, type of guy. So, you know, still hasn't really thrown much with the hand. He just loves to roll around and, you know, almost broke my leg last time we fought.

But, you know, I didn't tap. I was willing to let it break, but luckily it didn't. Just got out of it with a couple little tweaks and a little bit of, you know, swelling in the knee and that kind of stuff. And then fought Lloyd Woodard a couple weeks later. But, you know, this time, you know, if we fought again, I'd obviously continue working with my grappling coach Neil Malenchen and work a lot with leg locks and, you know, stop those and hopefully finish them again. What's the biggest difference for you now that you fight on Spike TV a lot more people? I mean, you had that one fight just a couple of weeks ago. Is there a difference in, you know, the life of Mike Chandler fighter on Spike TV as opposed to MTV 2?

You know, I mean, not a ton. I mean, you know, the standard issue, more friends on Facebook, more Twitter followers, and, you know, a couple more interviews. But other than that, you know, it's still, you know, still a lot of the same. But, I mean, when you look at the numbers, you know, over a million views and that kind of stuff, I mean, a lot of people watched, a ton of people watched, a ton of people saw me. And, you know, luckily I was able to go out and put on a dominant performance and hopefully, you know, say some things and spark some people's interest and just kind of gain some momentum. And it's kind of like a little bit of a, you know, I got a little bit of a taste of, you know, that big, big platform. And, man, I just, you know, if I could fight tomorrow, whoever on Spike TV, man, I would love to jump in the cage again and do it again, man. I'm ready to do it.

So, like I said, hopefully, Marcy and Hale, Dave Jansen happens March 7th. And I get to fight one of those guys, April, May, June at the latest, and then another fight in the fall. And I will successfully get three fights in this year and three wins, hopefully, and in 2013-0. You know what I really like about MMA these days? And I was talking to someone about this when I saw, after I saw Anthony Pettus at UFC 156, he had that really awesome red suit, the red shoes, just good style. And I feel like the younger guys coming in now, like yourself, like the Roy McDonald's of the world, the T-shirts and the way you present yourself in public, the way you dress,

how you, you know, you act professionally like in this interview and when you see you in person. It's very different from a couple of years ago. Is that important to you? I mean, I always see you're wearing nice suits and things of that. You're always very clean cut and all that stuff. Is that a big deal for you? Is this something that you thought about as you were climbing the ladder? If you get to the top, this is what you're going to portray?

Yeah. Well, when I get to the top, no. But, you know, yeah, I mean, it's one of those things, man, where, you know, it is great because I want to be, I mean, it's important to me to win belts. It's important to me to win fights. It's important to me to make money and be able to provide them for my family that I'm going to have someday. You know, at the end of the day, it's more important to become the best man I possibly can be,

especially being able to be put on a platform like this. And it's just a blessing and opportunity to wake up every day and do what I love, which is, you know, train and fight. And I've been given just an awesome opportunity. And, you know, this sport started with, you know, no rules and in a cage with 400-pound guys, fighting 150-pound guys and guys, you know, bouncing at bars and then stepping in the cage and all that kind of stuff. And now I think it's, you know, slowly making that transitions toward, man, these guys aren't just, you know, brawlers.

They're not mean guys. They're not, you know, punk cuss and spit and fighting, man, they're good athletes. They come from, you know, a lot of them have college degrees. If you look up the amount of guys who have college degrees who come from sports in college and all that kind of stuff, man, we're, you know, a pretty good kind of almost clean-cut, you know, version of athletes. And you see more and more of that these days. And you can see it, you know, on the out-out-over-the-perance with the nice air and the suits

and that kind of stuff. But, I mean, even when you can listen to these guys' interviews, it's not a lot of them, you know, aren't talking about going out and just, you know, killing people. They're talking about going out there and doing good things and fighting and, you know, and really, you know, serving a greater purpose. And that's really what I'm trying to do. And, you know, I'm just hoping that I can continue to keep that kind of platform

and keep that, you know, to keep that mentality, you know, no matter how big I get. I plan on becoming the best life in the world. And I have no doubt that I'm going to be able to do that if I continue on this road that I'm on and hope I can be a great ambassador for the sport. You can't drop a nugget like you just did on this show and expect me not to follow up. You said, you correct me, you said when I get to the top. What did you mean by that, Mike? Well, you said if.

You said if. I was putting you in your shoes a couple of years ago, but it made me think that you don't feel like you're at the top right now. Am I wrong? Well, I mean, I'm not considered the number one lightweight of the world. and I just have so much more. I want to exceed people's expectations so much and wow them because when you're given an opportunity to do things, I mean, we're all given an opportunity to fight right now

and I can do with it what I choose. I can make the right decisions. I can show myself with the best people possible, and I can become the best man I could possibly be and make it to the top and do something great. And in turn, you know, inspire people to go out and do things that they want to do and do great things. So that's my goal.

But, you know, I'm not considered number one when I win the world yet. I'm not considered, you know, I'm not on that pound for pound list. I'm not, you know, where I need to be yet and, you know, where I'm going. So I'm just excited to just keep fighting, keep wowing people.

I mean, obviously, the Spike TV thing has been huge for me. So I can't wait to get out there and do it again. Can you reach that in Bellator? Hey, you know, I, who knows what the future holds, man? Bellator is doing some great things. When you look at the reach that they have on Spike, when you look at the partnership with Viacom,

you look at the higher-ups of Bellator doing, and they're doing some great things. And like I said, it's not my job to worry about all that. I've got all my trust and my faith in Dave Martin, and Randallel Allman and Martin Advisory Group, greatest manager in the world. And I just sit back and train my butt off, do the right things, and let it come.

They are building an impressive stable, and they are great guys. so I echo those sentiments as well. I'm just wondering, you know, we used to have this with Strike Force, with WC, where guys would say, I just want to say to people, they say, what do you do for a living, MMA fighter, what, oh, you know, UFC, things like that? Do you have those conversations a lot where you have to sort of explain yourself instead of just being able to say I'm a UFC fighter?

You know, I think it still happens, obviously. You know, people still call the sport UFC, but I mean, when you look at, when you look at what we're finally making that transition, the spike things have been going on for a year now, and now we're finally on spike. And people are, it's really easy to turn it to the Spike channel and NCMMA all the time now with Belator. So it's going to continue to grow.

And, you know, and like I said, it's up to the fighters as well, too. I mean, it's up to guys being ambassadors of a sport and saying, hey, you know, I'm proud of this sport. I want to educate people. I don't want people to think that, that I, you know, going out there and I don't take this sport seriously.

I want people to know that I train and bust my butt hours and hours a day and I make the right decisions and I don't, you know, and I don't go out and do things and I do make certain decisions and I do take care of myself and I take this sport just as serious as a, you know, a neurosurgeon takes his occupation. So it's up to us and it's up to us to kind of spread awareness and continue to grow the sport because at the end of the day when the sport grows, you know, we grow and that's Great for us. Well, Mike, I think you are an amazing ambassador for our sport.

So well-spoken. Such a true professional. Perform amazing in the cage as well. Your undefeated, great performance back in January. Cannot wait for your next fight. Always great to talk to you. Good luck in your next fight. I'm sure we'll talk to you before then.

But I want to wish you the best and appreciate you stopping by. Absolutely, man. I appreciate the opportunity and definitely look forward to coming on again. Let me know whenever you want to make it happen. Our pleasure. Thanks so much, Mike. Yeah, thanks, Ariel. See you.

There he is. Bel-Tor lightweight champion, Mike Chandler, stopping by. I see a lot of you writing on Twitter how you've become fans of Mike Chandler all of a sudden. A really great guy and a guy who may not get the attention that he deserves in the rankings, pound for pound, etc. I certainly have my top 10. I think he's a guy who deserves all that attention and then some. It's the issue that you're always going to have when there's competition out there, especially, you know, Beltaur is so young. And it's the issue that guys like Benson Henderson.

I will never forget Josh Thompson sitting at a Strike Force press conference and essentially calling out Benson Henderson out of the blue, out of the blue, because he didn't think that he deserved the attention that he was getting because he was fighting in WC and he was the champion over there. And I think that guys like Mike Chandler can continue. I mean, Mike Chandler, if you look at what's going on in Beltaire now, they just had their lightweight, the first round of their lightweight tournament, Will Brooks looking good.

There was some, you know, fun fights. but he can be undefeated for a very long time, especially if Eddie doesn't come back. Where does he go from there? And can he get the attention that he deserves? We'll find out. Great stuff from Mike Chandler. Okay, let's move along now.

Welcome in our next guest. We spoke to Anthony Pettis. Earlier on the show, let's talk to the man behind Anthony Pettus, the brains behind Showtime. Duke Rufus joins us right now in the MMA hour. Duke, how are you? Oh, I'm great, but I'm not the brains behind him.

He's a very intelligent man. He's I just help out here and there The kids got it So I'm just a humble Staff member with Anthony He's a great leader himself Well, that's why we like you so much

Because you are a humble leader And we appreciate you stopping by He was on the show He stole the headlines I'm sure you heard about it You were in Las Vegas texting Dana White And saying that he wants to fight

Jose Aldo next He wants to go from 155 To 145 Are you in favor of this idea? I am in some aspects. It's just all timing. I mean, I think anyone wants to fight,

although anyone wants to fight the winner of Bendo and Melendez. I mean, right now the mindset that we've had he fought last week, and he was in the gym already Wednesday. He's training just in case one of those guys get injured. He's very hungry right now. That shoulder injury kind of with a serious, fire under him to get some things accomplished. And he just comes to age, he just turned 26.

I see him going from a young man to a grown man. His very focused, and his goal was to be the greatest of all time. You know, his performance against Soroni showed that. His performance against Joe Lozahn showed that he's a very smart kid who's going in there and not taking a lot of damage, and he just wants to fight as often as possible and make a legacy for himself. Beyond just trying to earn an income for a family, he really is committed to being the best he can be. But is this the smart move?

Because it seems to me like he worked his way back up to the number one contendership, right? And Benson is about to fight Gill. I think Benson versus Pettis, as I said earlier in the show, is one of the most intriguing fights that the UFC can put together this year because how great that first fight was, because he beat Benson Henderson. Is this a smart move right now to switch things up, cut the weight, go down to 1.45? when, you know, you don't know how you're going to perform at a new weight class. Definitely. I mean, I think he's really spooked for sure about having a repeat of a few years ago.

I remember watching the fight on New Year's Eve going, wow, we got us a big title fight coming up with Frankie Edgar and the tables are turned. And in this business, nothing is for sure. here's the thing who knows when and Aldo fight could be booked who knows when he's ready to fight

but at the same time you know Ben Henderson hasn't been in a hurry to fight Anthony Pettis if he wins the fight when is the fight going to happen then that's the other thing too a lot of the guys

who are fighting title fights aren't exactly fighting as often as he used to so it comes down to him wanting to fight while he's in the zone in his groove he just wants to

get out there and do his thing. You know, I mean, definitely, I think it would be changing it up. Obviously, the eye on the lightweight prize, but I think this is something that the lightweight prize doesn't come right away. He'll go after Aldo. So do you think Benson is ducking, Anthony? No, I don't say that. It's just timing and things like that.

I mean, you know, he did make some comments in Japan. Well, Pettus needs to do this, Pettus needs to do that. well, you know, if I got embarrassed on TV with a highlight real move, the first fight I'd won is that one. I mean, this type of guy, and I lost a guy in 1999, I came under retirement, and I had a promoter ear in Milwaukee for I was after here to Milwaukee so I could beat him. You know, I'm just a very competitive natured guy like that. I can't speak for him, but I just know, I don't know that's how Anthony is.

I know a lot of guys, I mean, if that were the case. I mean, you know, I think it would be one thing you lose to certain guys, but title fights and the draft and things like that. I mean, I think Benson's awesome. It's going to be an epic fight. And, again, it makes sense to have Gilbert fight them at this time because we're unifying the Strike Force title with the UFC title, which is for the greater good of our sport, actually.

You know, anytime they have these unification votes, it really connects the dots in our industry. Would you see? I mean, again, there's the injuries, is their close decision? Do does someone want to rematch rate away? I mean, you know,

it's just hard these days. I mean, anything and everything did happen. So then again, he's just looking to fight and, you know, be phenomenal. You know, he just wants to get out there and do his thing.

I think he matches up quite well with all, though. Anthony's got a weird body. He's, not a huge 155er, but he's kind of a tweener. His last three fights he hasn't really even gone to the sauna.

The cut, his nutrition, is on point, its strength and conditioning. We just do a light workout in the morning to make weight the last three fights that we've fought. He's very disciplined on that side of his career. You know, he's very

on top of his nutrition when he's training and leading up the fights. Did you know that I think. Sorry, interrupted. Did you know that he was

going to ask Dana for this fight? No, but I support him 1001%. If anything he thinks he can do it,

he'll do it. I mean, that's just the type of man he is. So, if that's his dream and passion, I'll follow him there.

If it means we're going to fight for the lightweight title, that's his dream and passion and it's meant to be, you know,

I'm 101% supporter of them. I mean, to me, I like coaching. I've kind of taken myself out of the big manager role. I'd rather focus on what I do best. I'm the brick and mortar guy in the gym and the trenches.

We got a great management team with Mike Roberts and Jeff Meyer at MMA. They'll at the end make the dubious distinction of what's right, what's wrong. Me, my job is to prepare Anthony with our staff of coaches to get him ready and support him. I mean, I'm for it, but, you know, at the end of the day, until the contract is signed, I'm not going to over-focus my energies on it until we have a about agreement of who he's fighting more than anything. And, you know, like I said, he was back in the gym already Wednesday. He's very focused on becoming the best Anthony Perez.

You know, obviously, as his coach, you may have a different perspective, so I'm wondering which fight you'd like best for Anthony next? Jose Aldo, Gilbert Melendez, or Benz? Johnson Henderson. Henderson. Why? He beat him already. I mean, you know, as a coach coming into the fight,

I know some things, especially in the striking side of it. I knew, this is not very arrogant. I knew that Donald Ferone was an easy fight for stylistically stand-up-wise. I can take apart guys just because no disrespect to other people. blessed. I've trained with some of the best masters on the planet in Muay Thai and kickboxing and boxing. The way my mind works,

we can dissect people. And, you know, I knew that Anthony was going to do just what he did this for Roaring. And the game plan that Anthony did the first time, it was an easy game plan that worked. Obviously,

Benson's improved on some things. But I've been watching closely, and I know the capabilities, you know, the other side that Anthony is doing. Obviously, we're in wrestling more. Ben Ascrens bringing in some high-level guys for him to some good 55ers. We're going to get some guys to help them out more. Obviously, Jiu-Turatsu, but then Daniel and Diego Marias.

I don't see Benz. I'm trying to kickbox with them by any means. But, you know, I like that fight a lot. I knew in the fight, watch the fight again. on five. Anthony did an Ali shuffle and Benton tripped over his own feet. And he's like, Anthony has number, and Ben knows that. And some people have certain people's numbers in the fight game,

and Anthony has Ben's number. I do agree with that. I do believe that that happens. Mike Brown, your eye, favor comes to mind. It just, you know, Frankie Edgar, BJ Penn, those things happen in the fight game. You just got me really excited to. I didn't think I could be more. excited to watch Benson Pettus, too. You just got me even more excited. Now, on the same card

as Benson defeating Don Taroni, Eric Koch, another one of your fighters, had a tough night. How was he feeling? I asked Anthony about him. He didn't know. I'm sure you do know. How is Eric Koch feeling less than two weeks later? Well, I mean, physically, he's better. I mean, emotionally, it's just picking up pieces. You know, it was probably the toughest night of coaching for me. I'm not thinking winning and losing, I'm taking love and concerns for people you really care about. I had to leave Eric in the cage bleeding hurt, so I had to run back and get Anthony last second and walk back out with Anthony.

You know, it was really hard. I mean, it's one of more emotionally trying experiences of coaching. We just had a bunch of fights in January, and I'm kind of taking this. the day that just kind of exorbed the whole emotional roller coaster I've been on. And it was very, I'm very close with Eric, Anthony, a lot of the guys are coach. And, you know, I had to be, you know, it was hard to talk about. So please excuse me, stammering. I had to leave Eric there.

He's in the cage, bleeding, you know. I even, you know, I had to go, Ben asked for him. Come on, buddy. He was watching him. I could tell he was kind of tripped out, you know. we had to run back, get Anthony ready. But then at the same time, I had to be like the father figure go back and, you know, Anthony asking, hey, is they're correct?

Yeah, yeah, hey, it's fine. You know, that's a whole case why I had to say in a situation to keep him focused on his task. I didn't want him slipping out of focus for the care and love of his teammate. It was hard after Anthony came back and did the interview with you. I do go They needed me to sign the consent form To have Eric go get checked out of the hospital I remember walking out with a marm and arm

And I haven't cried after a bite in years And we both You know it's just one of those things You know it just wasn't this night And no excuses You know Lammas was the best guy in that night They're just going to regroup

Some of those things just sometimes losing. It's like medicine. I know I'm like taking it, but it's what makes you better. And don't be bitter, be better. You know, I don't coach from results. I coach from potential.

I know the potential that Eric has. It's just we didn't reach his goal this time. I'm in it for the long run with Eric. I see his potential. It's just he's got to reach his goal next time, perform. when he performs up to his capability is phenomenal. It's just regroup, helping get to his goal.

That's the thing about coaching. You just got to go back, figure out, pick up the pieces, and help them accomplish their goal. To me, if you really care about your fighters, it's one of the most emotionally taxed in things in life. Losing as a coach is way harder than, losing as a fighter for me, honestly. Because I take

responsibility when a fighter loses. I feel like I'm the one who made the mistakes. So it's, you know, it can be tough at times. And that was, I mean, actually, you ever see the movie, Platoon, when they leave Elias on the battlefield,

they're flying a well in the high helicopter? Yeah. That's all I felt, but in Chicago. Like, and it was still a night of mixed emotions. Pascal Krauss came out there. reinvented himself and did such a great job. And we go to the ultimate low of Eric and then the ultimate high of

Anthony destroying Seroni. It definitely was tough. When you were in his corner, when you were in Pettus' corner and it was a short fight, was it hard for you to focus? Were you still thinking about Eric? Once we got out there, no. And I'm going to tell you,

you know, Donald said everything was just a talk up for both Anthony and I and we, you know, he really attacked Anthony's character. So once we got out there, it was I told someone else,

I said it was kind of like the movie The Patriot. You know, I remember when the dude's son died, he just wanted blood. That's how I felt. I just wanted Anthony to slay that kid so bad. It doesn't help me death that we get the W back, but I just you know, it's that

raw emotion inside that you want to see the next guy go down and go down hard because I just lost my kid, you know? I mean, it's just maybe I'm overthinking it, but I'm very emotionally attached to the fighters. I train. How can't

you be, though? We go through the highs and lows day and day out. We travel on the road. We, you know, we a lot of times I see these guys two to three times a day, five to six days a week. I mean, you can't help but to be close to them.

Right. But, you know, Anthony was very focused. You know, that's one thing, too, right now, Anthony is a little bit more dangerous. I think the last couple years, Anthony is, you know, he's been a popular fighter. He's been around the scene a lot more. I think Anthony's trying to withdraw a little bit more from the scene and focus on being the Anthony that got him to the dance. You know, a lot of people don't realize Anthony grew up in a really bad neighborhood.

in some harsh situation. The guy like Theroni trying to craft talking is not scary, Anthony. You know, I mean, he grew up with guys in the hood every day trying to intimidate him. So he's not going to be intimidated. And all Donald did was get Anthony even up more to whip his ass, which you saw he did. I mean, you know, and taking no way Disrespect of Donald, I think he's a hell of a fighter, hell of a kickboxer.

It's just, that's just how good Anthony Pettis is. You know, the stuff that he does, like jumping off the cage and whatnot, and we've seen some of your other fighters do that. How do you guys sit around and come up with that stuff? And in particular, when to use it at the right time? Because it's never wasted. It always seems effective. And why isn't anyone else doing this?

Well, we saw, Algo did it the other night Yes, that is true And I asked Anthony if he felt like he was stealing his moves But yeah, you're right, Aldo did do it You're going to see more people doing it I mean, I saw on some YouTube link Of the case

I've seen those two in the kick We actually have about 10 other moves that we work You know, the one, we just work A lot of fundamentals Once a week I try and do one practice It's a fun practice where we just go outside of the box. Now, these guys, at the end of the day,

are still the kids that start a train when they're young. So I like that one day a week where we play, and it makes it fun. I mean, but why did Michael Jordan dunk the ball the way? Because it entertains people. At the end of the day, I'm trying to help all the fighters are trained, you know, be a marquee value. There's 300 fighters in the UFC,

and maybe another 50, 70-5 fighters in Bellator and all the other great shows. Me, we've got to do something to stand out, and I'm trying to help these kids brand themselves as the guy that you want to watch, the guy you want to tune into. Even, you know, Ben Aspen, he's called a lot of criticism. Last week, he definitely didn't have a critical performance.

That was the evolving Ben Aspern. Was it hard for you? I actually had a chance to watch that fight with you right next to you, and I could see the way you're watching him and I'm wondering while sitting there next to you, is it hard as his coach to not be there with him and you have to watch it on TV?

Yeah, very hard. I mean, that's two of his last three fights. I still have been at another fight when he was there. The way we kind of do it on the team, the guy who gets the fight contract at first gets kind of first selection of coaches. Okay.

You know, like, I mean, I look at all the elite level guys are all equal. It's just timing. But the most resilient guy on our team who doesn't need me has been asking. I mean, he is a mindset like no other. I mean, if I could somehow end-produce and mold his winning attitude, he's something special. A lot of people have been critical about his, you know,

know, M&A performances, but he's just starting to get comfortable in the sport the way he thought last week. You're going to see more of that. You're going to see him get even better on his feet. He's getting confident in MMA, but the guy is a hard worker, the most consistent guy on our team. He has a very special winning attitude. Again, a lot of people look at them and they sleep on him. They don't think he's a tough guy. Funny story, he was here in town training, helping Allen Bell.

He's helping a guy train. He doesn't have a fight himself. He goes to me, hey, coach, you guys? I go, yeah, sure, what do you need it for? While I was in Russia, wrestling, I kind of compound fractured my finger. The bones coming to the skin. I got to tape it in so it doesn't come out.

Wow. Yeah, exactly. Jesus. You know, he wrestled on one of his state championships in high school with a broken ankle. I mean, through the whole tournament. He just went to one leg. I mean, you know, these are the things that a lot of other people don't advertise,

but, you know, that's the traits I look for in an athlete in fight sports, in competitive gladiatorial sports like wrestling, jihitsu, kickboxing, and MMA, you need to have that special mental factor. There's a cool YouTube video actually on Anthony. He gets slammed on a fight in Milwaukee. his shoulder pops out while he got flamed and he finds the way to get up

stand up and he only has one kick in him knocks a guy out with one head kick and wins the fight. I mean these are the type of people like oh you're so high on this guy, you're so high on that guy. Yeah, because they've shown that they have that extra

special edge that makes them a champion. I think you know, the toughest thing about coaching is not skill. I mean, we had it, I don't know, it sounds like I'm criticizing the fight right head Saturday, but he was winning his fight, Chico Camus. Yeah.

And he chose the wrestle when we chose him to keep boxing. You're winning the fight. And that's just that maturity level and getting that mental game down in your fight. And that's what a guy like Ashton and Petis had. They really are on top of their mental game right now. I know because, like, I won some championships, but I would lose fights too because I struggled mentally,

and that's something that I'm very cognizant of with the athletes. I'm working with helping them develop their mindset to be a winner. The skill part's easy, honestly. I think the mindset of what makes a champion or a championship level athlete, that's what I'm trying to tap and do with the fighters that I coach right now. Well, Coach, I really, really enjoyed this discussion. You're such a brilliant mind, such a great leader and mentor. I see some people stealing some of the quotes you've used in this interview.

Don't be bitter, be better. And really enjoyed just getting your perspective, especially the way you feel about your fighters. We don't see the stuff with Air Coke and whatnot. So appreciate the insight. Appreciate the time. I'm sure we'll talk to you very soon. And good luck.

I know you have a busy schedule coming up. you just had a busy schedule. Good luck with all your fights coming up. Thank you so much. It's my pleasure. There he is. Duke Rufus, the head of Rufus Sport in Milwaukee, joining us a very busy last couple of weeks, as I mentioned with Ben Ascran, Pascarne, Pascal Krause, Eric Koch, Showtime Pettis, Chico Kamis this past weekend. Great insight from him. Follow him on Twitter. Twitter.com slash Duke Rufus.

Always tweeting out inspirational things and nice messages and whatnot. All right, let's move along. another big story to come out of UFC 156. Sort of a under the radar one, but I noticed at the end of the press conference, everyone's kind of, you know, whistling down, filing their reports, doing what they do in the media center after the fights.

I notice a familiar face, taking a picture with Dana White, a familiar face, a face that looked a lot like Melvin Manhoff, the striking legend, one of the most feared fighters in MMA and kickboxing, and lo and behold, it wasn't. Melvin Madhuff got to talking with him, invited him on the show.

Very happy that he's able to join us right here right now in the MMA hour. Melvin, how are you? Yeah, fine, man. How are you guys? I'm doing great. So what were you doing in Las Vegas in the media center talking to Dana White on Saturday night? Nothing, just talking. We're doing nothing.

No, I was like I went to watch the show in Vegas. That's why. And afterwards, I was there with George, and the guy from Black House, I was there, watching the interviews of the guys. Yeah. And I saw you took a picture with Dana. You had a brief conversation. What did you guys say to each other? Yeah, nothing much.

It was nice to be here and, you know, when I'm going to fight the UFC. No, just normal, no. Just normal. I and how are you and everything. So it was nice. want to fight in the UFC? Yeah, who wouldn't? I think everybody would want to be fighting in the UFC

because, yeah, it's like, I think one of the biggest organizations at the moment. So, and I'm a fighter that I want to entertain people. So, so if, I want to entertain people. So for me, it's like pretty nice to fight in the UFC. if the chance is there, I'm going to do it for 100%. And I think that every fighter, it's an achievement on his work, I think.

You've been around this sport for a very long time. You've been around combat sports a very long time. How come you've never fought in the UFC? Did you ever get close? Did you ever get an offer? Why have you never fought inside the Octagon? I was on the contract at the K-1 at the moment, you know. Yeah.

So I couldn't, you know. And that's the only reason. And also because of, I started as a K-1 fight as a kickboxing guy, you know. So at that time, it was better to stay at the K-1 because then I could do my K-1 fight and do M-M-A fights, both. So right now, are you a free agent? Are you not tied to any organization? No, I'm not really tied to any organization. I fight now at 1S3.

often and I have like I'm going to fight at KSW so I have like some fights lined up so when's your next fight? It's going to be April 5th I think April 5th

is going to be my next fight Edwin-S-C so I'm preparing on that you know and now I'm here at Black House I'm going to train with the guys with Leotto because I heard he has a fight against and Henderson also so I'm going to help him prepare

and this is what I'm going to do now. Before we get to that, who are you fighting in April? In April, it's not confirmed yet. Okay. They are busy. Oh, okay. So it wasn't going to be a Japanese guy, but I don't know if it's going to be him.

So I don't know yet. I don't know yet. I have to call and ask them, but it wasn't confirmed yet. But maybe in a week it's going to be confirmed. So you're at Black House in L.A. helping Liotto train for Dan Henderson. Are you a member of Team Blackhousa?

I never knew that you were affiliated with them. Yeah. Like a year ago, me and Ed and George started to talk, and you know, and he came to my house and we were talking, and it was a nice thing,

and he let me feel comfortable. And he said, yeah, you have to come and train with us, and he was going to happen, and he is helping me now. So this is the thing. and we have like a self-commitment with each other, so it was nice. And of course you're talking about Ed Soros, George Guemeyers,

who are the managers to the likes of Anderson-Silva, the Noguerre brothers, etc. So you just got there. Have you trained with Leota yet? Not yet. I am, now I'm going to start because, you know, yesterday we were in Vegas, and I just arrived today, and I just arrived at gym. So when I'm not finished with you, I'm going to start. training with Learrow

we're going to spar a little bit and do some techniques, I think. You know, so it's going to be nice. It's going to be awesome. Was that the first time that you attended a UFC show in the U.S.? Uh, no.

No. No. I went like two times early, I think. Yeah. Two times early when Tiago office fought, uh, I don't know, was it John Fitch or somebody.

Oh, okay. At that time, I don't know anymore. I was just wondering how you compare you. I mean, you fought all over the world, so many big stages. You know, when you sit there now and you see the UFC today as the leader in MMA, do you feel like this is a big show? Like, does it get you excited being there? Does it remind you of, you know, what it was like in Japan and things like that?

Yeah, it reminds me very, yeah, yeah. Because it was like, you know, the show was pretty big and the atmosphere was also good, you know. It was very nice. And it reminded you. also at night times, you know, in Japan, in the big venues, and it was nice, you know, and it's also nice to not fighting and see how

everybody else is fighting, you know. It was a great show. It was really to be there. What did you think of your... Sorry, go ahead. And the feeling that when you are there, you know, and in the venue and you feel all the vibe and the things, you know,

it's like, oh, at that moment that I was, that I really wanted to fight, you know. It was really nice to be there. What did you think of your fellow Dutchman Alstair over him getting knocked out? Did that surprise you? Yeah, a little bit. Not so, you know, it surprised me like I didn't know he would get knocked out.

But I thought if he should win the fight, I think he should win the fight in the first round, I think, because then his stand-up is better than Antonio. but I know Antonio also, and he's like a hard fight, you know, and I know that Antonio is like, for every weight he has, like, good cardio, and he is light, and he moves good. So I know it was going to be like, if it was the first round, I think Alessu would win the fight if he had put some pressure.

And if it's gone, every round, it's going to less longer. Antonio has, like, more in the finals, I think. So this was my prediction, but, yeah, and at the end, it was like this. And it was like, Peter for Ellister, good for Antonio, so, yeah,

congrats to him. Do you think it was a mistake for Alster to leave Golden Glory? No, I don't know, because I don't know if it's a mistake,

you know, because I think every fight has to do what they want to do, and I don't know the inside story about Elsa and Golden Glory, but if he would be at

Golden Glory, and he would be there, he would still lose this fight, so it doesn't melt if it's a good choice or a bad choice, you know, I don't think so. You know,

the last time we saw you in action was, obviously New Year's Eve in Japan, Dream 18. You've had some vicious fights, some vicious knockouts, but the Dennis Kang knockout, the knee to the body in 50 seconds, that has to be up there as one of your more vicious finishes, right? I mean, it just, that look, when I watched that,

I felt the pain. Am I accurate here? Was that one of your more brutal finishes? Yeah, it was like one of them, I think. You know, but, you know, I finish everybody with my hands, with my knee, and now it also with the knee. So, you know, if I fight, it's always like this, you, you're not the time to get a snack or something, you know.

It's like, you know, I come to fight and I want to do everything. And I think the knee to the body was, like, very devastating and was very hard, but I don't think it was one of the most brutal knockouts, I think. I always wanted to... Go ahead, sorry. I think the one of my brutal knockout was against Sakurama, you know. I find that, that one I find very hard, you know.

I kick them, breaks arms, and, you know, it was nice. It was one of the brutal, I think. Now, that was a relatively short fight, like your fight against Dennis Kang. But to me, when I think of Melvin Manhoff, like the, if I want to show someone who Melvin Manhoff is, I show them the, the cyborg fight, Cage Rage. Yeah. That, to me, is like, that's like a legacy fight.

That, that paints a beautiful picture of who you are. Do you agree? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is, I do completely. When's the last time you watched that fight? I don't know, but it was maybe before the fight of King, you know. This is one like a fight. It gets me always.

is fired, you know. So when I was this fight, I get, yeah, get really pumped up, psyched up, you know, and, you know, and every fight I want to make the same fight as the cyborg fight. Because I think, you know, when you're fighting, you are, you are entertaining, you know, and I think I need to entertain the fans.

And that thing, you know, because you need to entertain the fans, and then you go, fight, put all of it in, it and you know try to knock some people out you know because I think at the end the fans like that the most you know when people come and give them a good fight you know because everybody's paying for their ticket and they want to see some action so I'm only I am the guy who wants to live with it so that's why that's why I look at fight of cyborg it's like for me it's like yeah you like a good yeah go ahead no sorry yeah it's like a good um how you say this um um um

I don't know how to explain it, but it's like the good five to get in and do the same again. Yeah, absolutely, to recreate that kind of magic. Now, you're turning 37 later this year. You've given out some big shots. You've taken some big shots. How many more years do you want to do this for? You know, it's funny, but I'm getting stronger every day. And every day I'm learning more.

Yeah, it's really funny, you know, when I'm training with the young guys and everything, I overpowered them My speed is like It's like not normal My ground is getting better and better every day So because you know I'm doing it now A little bit more

And yeah So every time I'm increasing with everything So I don't know how long I'm gonna do it for more But there are like a lot of years In me I think So does this mean that you're going to be spending more time in the U.S. Now that you're doing stuff with Black House

Yeah, a little bit I'm going to prepare myself for fight here And the guy's going to help me And I'm going to help the guys You know because you know they have like a good team and everything So this is the this is adventure The plan what we wanted So

Will you be moving to the US My wife would want that Why my wife would run it But you know Yeah maybe everything Everything is possible You know it would be also something to think about in the near future.

You know, it would be nice. You know what they say here in America, happy wife, happy life. Yeah, I know. And it was also like everything, every dream can come through, so maybe my dream is going to come through that. The American dream, and I know,

would you say at this point, like, you know, you fought everywhere and all that, the last dream, the last goal is to fight in the UFC, is that the last thing that you can really truly try to accomplish in your career? Yeah, I think so. I think so. Because just what I said, I have fight everywhere. I'm doing strike force.

And the only thing what is missing is also the UFC. So, you know, I'm going to do every fight what I have to do. I'm going to put all in it, you know. And if it happened, it happened, you know. And I want it to happen. So I think I'm going to fight. Like, like, this year I'm going to fight like four or five fights, so this year has to watch me, I think. And what I'm going to do with people.

You want to fight at 170 or 185? You know, 185 is okay, you know, but I also like a challenge to challenge myself to go to the 170, you know. The last time that I was cutting, I was like, I tipped the scale at 82 kilos, you know, and I had like, a lot of a lot of, still I had, like, a lot of body fed. So I think it would be, I think I could, you know, but I never tried it. So I wouldn't try it before, but it's an opportunity to also do that because I think there are also great fighters that are 170, you know, pounds, I think, to have a nice fight with, I think. Have you thought about some guys that you would like to fight in the UFC?

Like, you allow yourself to think, oh, I'd love, you know, I see some people here saying, you versus Tiago Alves would be fun. Is there anyone in particular that excites you over there? In what way? In either way, whatever you want, 171.85? Yeah. Yeah, I would like to fight five who would like to stand and bro with me. So this is the fight I want to choose for myself, you know,

to give the like the fans a nice fight. And this thing is one of those guys, Fandalize, one of those guys. Oh, God. And Lillie is one of those guys. You know, there are a lot of guys who like to banning. So those guys, yeah, I would really like to fight them. You versus Vanderle would be bananas. Yeah, it would be great, I think also.

Now, are you done? Yeah, he's like, he is like one of my idols, you know, but now it's like, you know, before. He was like, before he was like in the prize and I was fighting nowhere. You understand? And then I was watching Fandela. Right. And now the guys, just like Sakuraba, It's an honor for me to fight them, so I really like to fight them.

And are you done kickboxing? Yeah, I think I'm going to try to focus me more on the M.A. Okay. Because I think when you bet on two horses, you know, it's like always, when I'm training, when I'm training, kickboxing, the other guys that Ebermae are training, you know, training M&A. So it's not good to me. I heard from the maximum fighting championship.

How are you today? I hear, sorry about that. I hear what's going on in the back, guys. Sorry about that, Melvin. No, no problem. You were saying, so you're going to focus on one so that you can put all your attention and everything on. Yeah, this is what I want.

You know, I think, yeah, yeah, this is what I want. I think it's going to pay off, eventually it's going to pay off much better. And nowadays, when I'm training, I see that my ground game is getting better because I'm basically every day with this, you know? So I think I have to continue with doing this. Well, I would like to see you there. It was great to see you on Saturday.

It was a nice surprise. I think it's very interesting that you're training with the Odo for the Dan Henderson fight and enjoy your time over Black House, L.A., all that stuff. And keep us posted. Let us know if something happens, if you need us to give a call to you to vouch for you, let us know. Yeah, of course. Thank you for your. Appreciate your time.

and it looks fair to not to be in your show, man. You have good guys in your corner with George and Ed, so I'm sure you'll be fine. Thank you so much, Melvin. Best of luck to you. We'll talk to you soon. Yes. Thank you, man.

Bye-bye. There he is. Melvin Mannhoff joining us, saying he wants to sign with the UFC. Wouldn't that be interesting? Van der Leis Silva versus Melvin Manoff, I think I would lose a few brain cells if I watch that. So I appreciate him stopping by,

and very interesting that he will be training with Leotamachita helping him for the next few days, as he prepares for Dan Henderson. That's the next big UFC pay-per-view coming up. That's UFC 157, February 23rd. But don't forget, a week before that, is UFC on Fuel TV 7, Michael May Day McDonald versus Henne Burrow, for the interim bantamweight title.

That's February 16th in London, England, Wembley Arena. So don't forget about that. I know they've been promoting the 157 card. You saw the Ronda Rousey promo. Very interesting. promo with Ronda Rousey with them saying they'll break more than your heart. No, what were these? Yeah, these girls will break

more than your heart, but if you notice, they turn all the Moro sound bites from the old Strike Force events, and they replaced them with John Anick. You notice that? Anyway, we'll talk more about UFC on Fuel TV 7 next week,

and I'm sure Rick will have his picks for that. He may even have his picks for that right now, but let us go to the Skype and welcome Welcome in our last guest of the day. He is the president of the Maximum Fighting Championship. He is Mark Pavlach. Mark, how are you? I'm fantastic, Garyl. How are you today? I'm doing great. And, you know, let's get right into it.

A lot of people in the past have asked me, why don't you talk about MFC? You know, you're a proud Canadian boy. I have a Canadian flag right here in my studio. You support everything Canadian. Do you have any idea why I never talked about MFC or never had you on the show? Do you have any idea? I think in the past that I made comments that you probably were, you know, I probably shouldn't have made

because I've always looked at you as very high standard in the journalism field. And at that time, there wasn't very many people that I looked at in that high regard. So I felt that at times that you favored certain things, right? But at the same time, it doesn't take away from the fact that I always thought you were at the highest level in the game. I always had a great esteem for what you've done and what you've accomplished not just in the sport but in the field of mixed martial arts, right? So for myself, I would truly apologize.

Do you speak Hebrew? I do. Okay. Any Mista. Do you know what that means? Maybe not with that accent. Explain to the people because I'm sure a lot of them don't. I studied world religion when I was in school

and I studied with a great rabbi named Rabbi Plout. And he explained to me that the word, Enimist Thar means my deepest apologies, right? In Hebrew, so for the non-Hibur listeners, and my accent's horrible because I'm Canadian, right? So I don't have the, I can't make that noise. Yes. But he said that's that serious form of apology to somebody when you've wronged them. And it's very rare that I do apologize to anybody because most of the time I prefer now not to make comment at all.

Well, you know, I appreciate that very much. And I've been calling 2013 the year of peace. You know, we had Tito Ortiz on the show, Hector Lombard, all in a month and a bit. And I must give a lot of credit to Scott Zer, who works with you, who I met in Las Vegas, and, you know, he said he wanted to sort of bridge the gap. And I must admit, and not to make this, you know, about our little thing, we'll get to MFC in your career. And I've always watched from afar. But I must admit, I was very hurt because I remember when this started.

I was on Moranalo's show. And it started when I said that the most famous three letters in our sport right now are UFC. And I still, by the way, believe that the most famous. three letters in our sport are UFC. It's MMA, but still, people know UFC. They think the sport is ultimate fighting. And you posted a nasty video on my Facebook. We were Facebook friends saying that I'm up Dana White's ass, that I'm biased. And you threw some major threats my way. And you continued and you continued and you continued. And I was like, where is this guy coming from? I know you're kind of a colorful character, but you were completely off base and disrespectful.

And it bothered me. Well, see, the problem is when you wake up every day like me for 13 years, the longest running show in the country, one of the longest in the world, and you have to compete for second place all the time, it's very frustrating. So that would not be your problem. That would definitely be my problem, because I wake up every morning, I go to bed very late, and I wake up extremely early as well. And for me to know that every day that I wake up, listen, I'm not crazy. I realize that the number one brand in the world is the UFC. I mean, and they do things the right way. There's no question. The problem is a person like me that has to wake up every morning and fight for second place is just it's hard for me right so that's just

the reality of it and like i said you're you're 100% correct it is still the no three letters that are most popular out of anything but at the same time is i figured that i would get a little bit of home court advantage from a fellow cana so and it's not your fault it really is not it's my fault because i i will fight for every inch in this business to be that other brand of mMA and i i've tried i listen the ufc is the best brand of mama and i'm i've tried i listen the ufc is the best brand of MMA in the world. I've never bowed down to them, but at the same time is it doesn't change the fact that I know that they're very good at what they do. They're at the highest level. But for someone like me that wakes up every morning, to just be the biggest brand of MMA in Canada is not enough for me,

right? There has to be more. And if there's not, I'll stop and open a hot dog stand on the corner, right? That's just kind of how it works. Well, for those, you know, and again, we don't talk a lot about MFC here. And it's not because I put my personal bias in it. There's only so much you can talk about once a week. And there's all these UFCs, Belator, Strike Force, etc. But for those that don't know, you started MFC in 2001, right? I mean, you've been around this sport for a very, very long time, and

it is a credit to you and your staff that you are still around. We've seen so many organizations come and go since 2001. What's been the secret? How have you been able to outlast everyone essentially but the UFC? It's basically just relentlessness, right? I mean, it's

a family business. And when you have my wife involved, my son involved, you know, We have a very close-knit group of people that all have the same crazy mentality as me. It's just some of them are much more politically correct than I am in my office. But at the same time, I just want to win so bad, Ariel. It's just something, I don't know, it's in my DNA for my father who is a referee in the NHL. My uncle played for Detroit Red Wings, the one four Stanley Cops. It's just, I think they're still alive and they're basically my board of directors that are always telling me, Mark, you know, you can be bigger.

You can be bigger. And, you know, when you have these people around you constantly, knowing that the knowledge that I have in the mixed martial art business is far greater than 95% of the people out there. You know, like I said, just being the biggest show in Canada is not enough anymore. It's really not. So how do you take that next step? Well, right now we're on Access Television, right, with Mark Cuban.

Right. And we're on TSN, the largest sport network in Canada. And so, you know, the next steps were, you know, just bigger sponsorship and just keep going forward at what we're doing. Don't make any crazy radical mistakes right now. just stay on course. It's unfortunate that you see someone like Strike Force go out of business because I thought that brand of MMA was phenomenal.

And, you know, you see those kind of men in Canada. The score fighting series just went out of business last week. So, I mean, we just have to stay careful. I mean, we've been careful for 12 years or so, but we just have to keep going forward and not running, but just crawling. Just keep going forward. Does that make you happy, though? I mean, when your competition dies, essentially, you're, you know,

there's a little more room for you. There's room for me, but I don't want to win by default, right? I mean, the score is a small brand of MMA, so I didn't expect great things from them. But Strike Force, for me, I thought it scared me a little bit when they went out of business. I thought even there was a way to keep it alive to keep, but it was strange.

It's like people thought, I'd be jumping up and down. That's not true. I think it scares sponsors in the future. I think it scares other people to get involved with mixed martial arts because of that. You know, when they see a big brand like Strike Force, going out of business, it'll scare away the bigger sponsor kind of guys. You know what? And that's what I've been working on now for the last few years is like really getting bigger sponsors.

You know, a few years ago, I mean, guys like Bobby Lashley have fought for MFC. I mean, there were some names. And I recall maybe a couple of years ago, you were trying to get some names like that, you know, like the Bobby Lashy's world. Maybe not, you know, like a GSP level talent, but a name that would attract someone. Now it seems like looking at your cards and you have one coming up in, in less than two weeks, and we'll talk about it, it seems like you're trying to sort of build, you know, stars,

your homegrown guys, you know, not just go out and get a quick name to get a few extra viewers. Has your philosophy about how to build MFC change over the last couple of years? It changed the last two or three years. I mean, before it would happen, a guy would get cut from the UFC, and I would sign them. And I'm like, that doesn't make any logical sense because I'm rewarding someone from the largest organization in the world

to come to the maximum fighting championship and I'm rewarding them for losing two fights in a row in the EFC. So I was like, that doesn't make sense anymore, right? It just, I don't think you should be rewarded that way. You've been cut from that organization, go fight somewhere or else for a few more shows, and then come and sign with the maximum fighting championship

and that's what I've done. And like I said, I've built stars like Elvis Mutopcich, Mukai Moromo, just really exciting fighters, and at the same time as you still have guys like, you know, over the years, Tala's ladies has fought in the maximum fighting championship. Luigi For Vont I mean, Patrick Cote, Jason McDonald, just so many guys.

And then I started noticing that their records in the maximum fighting championship weren't very good. I mean, they were 50-50 when they came here. And what I noticed was a lot of those guys thought it was going to be kind of a free ride when they came to the MFC. And then they realized there's lots of guys here that are very hungry and, you know, they didn't do very well against those guys. So then I started realizing that these hungry lions that I got, it's time for I build them into stars instead of recycling people. But then what happens like, you know, a couple of years. ago, I recall Ryan Ford, right?

I mean, a lot of us were looking at Ryan Ford. He was an MFC guy. Then he goes on and does other things. And this will happen, you know, I would imagine with some of the guys you're building now. How do you stop yourself from being the guy who, you know, I was a big Montreal Expos fan? How do you stop yourself from being the Montreal Expos, building the talent and then seeing them go away? Well, you know, we play Moneyball MMA. So there's no question that that's what we do.

And there's only one place that people will go now besides the MFC. and that's the UFC. I've lost one fighter in 13 years or for how long Bellator's been in business because the difference is this. People in the maximum fighting championship will fight four or five times a year and be on Access TV and TSN.

They'll only sign a one year deal, not a two or three year deal like in Bellator. So guys are going, wait a second, I'm going to come to the Harvard of MMA, I'm going to go to the maximum fighting championship, and then my next step will be the UFC. And my trick has been now to stop them from going to the UFC

for that extra two or three fights that they defend their title one or two or three or four times, and then eventually like a Ryan Jimmo, he kind of expires from the maximum fighting championship, and there's only one other place to go, and that's the UFC. People aren't leaving the maximum fighting championship going to Bellator. If guys get cut,

guys like Ryan Ford that got cut, then eventually they're going to go to those other brands of MMA because that's all they can go to. But the next step, most people come here, they come here for one reason, one reason only. They know they're going to get great. sponsorship, they're going to get a ton of publicity, they're going to be on live television,

and then the only other step they go to is the UFC. But are you okay with that? Are you okay with the Jimo, you know, going on? No, I'm not okay, but it's, it's the makeup of, like you said earlier, like the Montreal Expos, right? It's like they develop this great talent and you're watching the Expo's play and you go, this guy is playing shortstop. He's so awesome, right? But no one's really

paying attention to him. All of a sudden, he just signs with the New York Yankees and all of a sudden he's a superstar, you know, playing on the All-Stars. And that's a trick that I'm slowly trying to figure out and how to evolve it. But the only way to do it is with bigger sponsors, right? Then I can afford to pay people more money, you know, things like that. So you're in Edmonton right now, right? Yeah, I reside in Edmonton, but I'm originally from the Windsor area.

And I used to live in Montreal because my beautiful wife of 26 years is from Montreal. Oh, well, that's great. So how healthy is MMA in not only Western Canada, but all of Canada? How healthy are things right now? I don't think it's like, people are disillusioned by thinking it's healthy. I mean, I think we're the only brand of MMA in the country

that makes money and is self-sufficient, right? And people think I'm happy about that. And once again, I'm not happy about that. I would want people, I would want other brands of MMA to be successful and to run things properly because I don't think this sport's going to grow at that mentality. You know, I just think that we need guys

that are going to run it properly, not try to put on shows in 20,000 seat venues and get a thousand people to show up. Be realistic on where your brand is. And I tell everybody, you know, you've got to find some way to get it on live television or stream it live. I don't care what you do, but you've got to get it live for people. Even if you're the smallest show in the world, just figure a way to do that and really start to improve your product as time goes on. Use a ring. Why do you like the ring over the cage?

I know you used the cage recently, but I think you had to because you were in Ontario, right? but why do you use the ring? I mean, I have always loved the ring. I think viewership, and especially when dealing with corporate sponsors, I've always dealt with corporate sponsors. And, you know, contrary to everybody's belief, we always think that everybody knows everything about MMA, and that's not true.

And when dealing with corporate sponsors, it was funny over time when I started preaching them about the ring, they just liked the idea that it sounded more like sport to them, instead of being in a cage. And when I watched my show at Cesar's Windsor, when I did my show there, we had to have a cage made. And I had it made and it looked really fancy and everything like that. And then you got to the show and I was watching the show and I looked over at one of my,

Scott Zer and I said, I just can't stand watching it like this, you know? And he said, me neither. And it's interesting because I said, look at 6,000 people in Caesars right now. Where are they all watching? And they're staring up at the four video screens watching it, right? And my 80-year-old father, who's in the Hockey Hall of Fame, came with me one time when I used to train Jason McDonald's in UFC. And he said, Mark, why am I watching this sport on a video screen when I'm live?

in the venue, right? And I said, I said, Dad, don't ask me, but everybody thinks that's normal. You come to the maximum fighting championship and everybody's watching the ring and then watching the replay on the video screens, just like when you watch an NFL football game, just like when you go to watch, you know, NBA basketball, you're watching the court

and then you're watching the replay on the screen, and Mix Martial Arts, the complete opposite. Everybody's watching the show on video screens while they're in a live venue. How does someone, and if anyone is a hockey fan, they obviously know about the Pavlach's. How does someone who has that kind of history get into MMA promotion? I never liked hockey, Ariel.

I liked it to watch it, and I have friends that playing in the NHL. But once I got involved with mixed martial arts, I just, I can't sit and watch like hockey. You know, I just, I don't know why. I watch mixed martial arts, and I watch NFL football, and that's basically the two sports.

And then I have a dream one day to come to Flushing Meadows, New York, to watch the tennis that you have there, the U.S. Open? Yes. I don't know why I have an obsession with you with that. I watch it religiously every year, and I'm going to, one day, maybe the next year or two,

I'm going to go there, and I'm going to sit with my hat on, and I'm going to watch the tennis at Flushing Meadow. Wow, that's your dream. But where did the MFC come from? How did you start it? I had an entertainment business, and I had a martial arts school at the same time, and someone brought a Japanese pancreas tape in in 1999

and showed it to me, and I just, I was obsessed with it. And then I would be in Vancouver and I'd go to the Chinatown and try to find these VHS tapes to watch. And then I would go to Montreal and the Chinatown there and try to find VHS tapes of Japanese pancreas. And MFC started in 2000, not 2001, but in 1999 was the first time I saw the tape and I fell in love with it. And then I watched the first UFC. And then after that, I just started it. And I never had any intention on being big or popular.

I just was so loved the sport, you know. and then I started training fighters because I was good at G. Condo, which is Bruce Lee's martial art. Then fighters used to come in like want to box with me, you know, and try to fight with me. I wasn't a professional fighter. I'm not even athletic. And it's like they were trying to like do these things. They couldn't hit me. So I trained Jason McDonald. I trained Ryan Ford, all these fighters. And it was just, it all was an evolution to come to the maximum fighting championship. Let's say there's someone watching or listening to this show and they're learning about you and MFC for the first time. can you tell them which fight, in your opinion, best symbolizes what MFC is all about?

Maybe they can try to find it online or whatnot. In your opinion, when you think of MFC, the history, what stands out? That's easy. That's like Mukai Moromo and Adam Lin, you know, the second fight. That's all over the place. I mean, it was like watching a video game. Early days, Patrick Cote against Jason McDonald. I mean, those are fights that were just like, I was like jumping up like a little kid in the audience.

I've always had that problem. I'm very non-emotio to anything else in the world, but when I watch MMA, my own brand of MMA, I jump up and down. It doesn't matter who wins or losers. I tell all the fighters that I have no favoritism towards anybody. I just love watching great fights, and I jump up and down like a little kid still,

even to this day after 12, 13 years. You've got a show coming up February 15th. Mukai Moromo is on the card. I know you're very high on Mike Hackert. Why should people tune into this card on the 15th on Access or TSN2. Well, I just think once again, you know, I hate to sound like that proverbial promoter,

but I tell you, man, you want to see an exciting brand of MMA, man. There's no secret. It's the secret's out, and it's been out for a long time. And I look for styles of fighters that match up properly, and you're going to see that on February 15th, and I couldn't be any more excited. This fight card, I say to every live one, the last one was going to be the most exciting one,

and it was exciting. And then I tell everybody this one here, it's just the makeup and the guys, they have a different mentality here, everybody's bought into the system and the maximum fighting championship. So when I go to a fighter meeting, it doesn't take an hour. The speech is five minutes, not even. And they all understand when they look into my eyes.

They realize how hard our family works. And I can only sell something to a certain degree until it starts when they fight. Then they have to be the one that sells it to the people and to make me credible by backing up what I'm telling people. Any plans to leave Canada? Of course, right? I mean, we've had lots of people approach us to come to the United States. The difference is I'm blessed to be in Alberta, Canada, where you can charge $600 for someone to sit in the front road

of the maximum fighting championship. So that's the difference. And I mean, my broadcasting partners ask me all the time, and I'm like, you know, I check the ticket masters and the places like that with other shows and, you know, they're charging $20 for tickets and things like that. And I just, I can't afford to do that in those markets. I really can't.

And we've had lots of casino people call us. We've had live nation call us that want to make a deal. And when the right deal comes, we'll take it and we'll you know we'll expand on it but we're not going anywhere we're not going to go broke in the process just to say hey we were in the united states of america you know the same rabbi that that taught me how to say to you i my deepest apologies he also taught me to crawl and not run right and he said mark just outlast everybody and and that will be you know almost everybody and and that is my game plan well you really know how to get to my heart uh bringing

up rabbis, Canada, all this stuff. I mean, now you're really trying to soften me up. No, most people know that not my nature, right? I'm kidding, I'm kidding. It's a truth in the matter. I did study rural religion in high school, and to this day

I wear French-collar cuff shirts because the rabbi that came to preach to us and I was there learning from Catholic baz baz, pulled in, wearing a French cuff shirt and a Mercedes, and I fell in love immediately. So that was kind of how I grew up, up and I grew up, you know, when a kid playing golf, and I was a caddy as a child. And, you know,

I had, you know, rich judges and lawyers that I was a caddy for as a child. And they used to preach to me for 18 holes and how I should do things. So my education came very different than other people and came from very wise people. I must admit, Mark, you're surprising me right now, because you're very charming, you're very likable. You know, I like what you're bringing to the table. And for a while, it seems, I'm wondering where this came from, because for a while, you were, you know, not as charming. You were a little insufferable, right? I mean, you were trying to, like, go after Dana White, it seemed.

You were very combative. And now you seem very, you seem different. You seem to be in a different place. Is this accurate, what I'm saying? Yes, you're correct, because, you know, someone the other day, they said, you know, they called me the black prince of MMA, and I thought, what a strange nickname, you know? And I said, why would you call me the black prince of MMA? I mean, I thought it was a strange nickname.

And he said, Mark, because the only, the prince of the prince of the prince of the prince of the Prince is always frustrated because the only way he could become king if the king dies, right? And the prince could take that spot. And I thought, that's an interesting analogy. Listen, I have the utmost respect for the UFC. I have a great deal of respect for Dana White. We've been off the record together, you know, like we were on the show together. He was very polite, very respectful with me.

At the same time as going back to the same theory of waking up every morning, knowing you're playing for second place, is very frustrating. Any other business I've ever had in the past, I was never number one, but I became number one in all those businesses. And this seems like the only business I've ever been in where you really don't have a realistic shot at being number one. So that's where my frustration builds.

But at no time, you know, I made jokes about it in the past. I really don't joke about it anymore. I realize, you know, that they're really good. I had great relations with Joe Silva in the past as well. I have great relation with Joe Rogan now too as well. You know, so it's very comical. I mean, I know he's got me lots of Twitter followers because he made funny jokes before in the past

about wanting to see me in a reality show that would be funny. And all of a sudden I got 5,000 new Twitter followers, right? So, you know, Joe's came to where I live in my city and he's always been very respectful with me. And, you know, so it's nothing like that at all. It's just, I have to admit for the first time in my life there would be an element of jealousy, you know,

not jealousy, but this envy that, you know, I don't want to be like them. I just want them to acknowledge the fact, you know, and that's not their job to do that either, right? So that's my own, my own problem. Any plans to sell? No, I would, no, I never sell nothing, right? Say I've had other businesses and people go, why don't you sell it? I'm like, nah, they'll wreck it.

Right. And it's the same thing with MFC. It's like, you know, people call to be investors and things like that. I'm not interested in that. I'm interested in bigger corporate sponsors. And, you know, I bugged Mark Cuban about that in the past about putting me in the big room with bigger guys. I think I can sell

MMA better than most people and I can present it in a way where it's more like a professional sport and not like an MMA organization. And that's one thing that I think that we lack in sometimes. I think we think of ourselves as that's why you don't see the Nike's involved

yet with organizations. You don't see Reebok. You don't see, you know, those kind of brands. And I think that there will come a time when they will get involved. But would they have to feel more comfortable with the people running those organizations? You know, Mark, I really enjoyed this.

I really want to thank you for coming on. I'm happy we finally got to talk. I'm happy I finally got a chance to interview you on the show, and I must thank Scott, sir, for coming up to me in Las Vegas and talking to me and trying to bridge the gap, because, as I mentioned, 2013, the year of peace, and us Canadians, we need to stick together. We're dead if we don't, you know.

I talked to George from the tragically hip one time, and he told me the same thing. He said, Mark, why don't Canadians? we all stick together somehow, you know? And I said, yeah, I'm a proud Canadian, man. I wave my Canadian flag in my backyard, so. Well, that's great. I wish you the best of luck on February 15th.

We'll be watching and looking forward to having you on the show for many years to come. Really appreciate the time. Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it. There he is. Shalom. There he is. The president of the Maximum Fighting Championship, Mark Pavlach, joining us from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

And I must admit, you love. look back, and again, I know that some people, oh, they're making it too much. Oh, I think my, okay, I thought my microphone just went out. It's making it too much about you, and this thing is like, all right, there's like a weird thing going on with my, my headphone here, but I think I got it. It's just like a weird.

Yes, that one was going to be about me because the man would actually spam my Twitter account, and I had to defriend him, unfriend him. This is the president of an MMA promotion saying that I'm up Dana White's ass, that I'm biased, all this craziness. I remember him doing that one video, which I tried to find, to be honest, to play, because it was so ridiculous. And you look at this guy here, a completely different person. Yeah, he's quirky, he's colorful, all that stuff, he's Canadian, but a very different person. And I enjoyed that very much, and I want to thank Scott over at the Maximum Fighting Championship for setting this up. this thing keeps popping in and out

and I don't know, you can still hear me even if it's pop though, right? Okay, so it's just weird for me because I can't hear myself and then it sounds like my ears are blocked like they are right now. All right, so thank you very much to Mark. Check them out. February 15th, Access TV, MFC 36. And if you're in the Edmonton area,

it's at the Shaw Conference Center, February 15th the day before, UFC on Fuel TV 7. Now, one more thing about regional MMA, if you will, Some big news just came through the wire Right as we were about to start the show And we'll get to the phone calls in a second It's not so much regional It's actually a very big deal in our sport

Got a press release, World Series of Fighting and NBC Sports Network Signed multi-year partnership To deliver live World Championship mixed martial arts programming They signed a three-year deal And from what I understand This isn't a time by like the first event back in November.

The next event, WSOF2, will be held at the Revel Resorts at Casino in Atlantic City. You may recall UFC on FX4 was held there. Saturday, March 23rd, 10 p.m. Eastern. The agreement calls for a minimum of six live events annually on the national television platform that reaches over 80 million homes. Additionally, later this year, NBCSports.com

will live stream World Series of Fighting Events via TV Everywhere. Well, that's big news. WSOF, you may have heard. They've signed some guys like Palophilio. They've signed some guys like Dan Lozahn. They have guys like Andre Arlowski and Rumble Johnson and Tyrone Spung. Three-year deal with NBC Sports Network. Hopefully it's a good one financially for them. And they did pretty, and you got around 200,000 viewers, their first event with zero promotion.

I mean, zero promotion. That was a time by. Todd Harris, Boss Rudin. We're on the mic. It was a nice little show, and I look forward to seeing. what they do in the future, and I wish them congrats on the New Deal. Very good. Okay, so let us move along now. Before we get to the Ricks Picks Challenge, let us go to the phone calls and welcome in all the way from Australia. And I think it is like 6 a.m. or something there. We've got Lawrence in Australia.

Lawrence, are you there? Yes, can you hear me? Yes. Where are you calling from? Darwin, Australia now. It's 5.m. in the morning. Geez, Louise, what are you doing up? Well, I'm a big fan of the show, and I'd rarely get to, well, just the first time I've ever watched it live, so I thought I'd make the efforts and call up and see how you're going. Well, which part of Australia are you calling from? Darwin.

Oh, okay. It's one of the smallest, smaller cities. It's sort of right in the middle of the country, right the top. Now, you're not actually calling from Boston, and you're just an Australian living in Boston, right? No, no, Darwin, Australia. I'm making a joke. It was a joke just because you have the accent. People would...

But no, I love Australia. I was blown away by it when I was there for UFC 127, blown away by the people. Actually, you reminded me a lot of Canadians, like my home country. So I appreciate the call. What's on your mind? Well, first off, you know, I'm a little disappointed that you didn't make it out for either the UFC on FX's.

I'm sorry. That's right. But I was just calling up about Frankie. Edgar versus Aldo. And just wondering how you scored the fight. Well, I scored it 48 to 47 for Aldo. Again, I thought it was close. I can understand why two of the judges gave it 49 to 46 for Aldo.

I think 48, 47 is more accurate. It was close. I don't think it was controversial. I think, you know, Edgar had his moments, but I don't think you can walk away from that and say that Edgar was robbed. or deserves an immediate rematch. How did you score it?

I scored it was at 47, 47, 46. 47, 46? I gave Aldo the first three to Aldo and the last two to Frankie. Yeah, but... Sorry, 48, 47. Yeah, 4847, right, right, right. Yeah, that seems to be the third round, seems to be the questionable round, right?

And kind of funny, the third round between Dotson and Demetrius Johnson last week was the questionable one. And Anthony Pettus, I think it was Anthony who said it on this show. Maybe it was Duke Rufus. Aldo got a little slower as the fight went on. Maybe it was the way cut, I don't know. But my question to you is, since we agree, do you like Frankie Edgar better at 145 or 155? I'd have to say, you know, I probably prefer them better at 145. but, you know, I think he's going to be, he's unlucky.

I don't think he's, he's always going to be in that top tier. He could probably beat most of the other guys in the division, but whenever he comes up against the Benson-Hendisons and Jose Aldo is where he has his trouble in these close decisions. So I feel sorry for him, you know, after coming so close so many times and having so many title shots in a row. But, yeah, so I think I prefer him at 1.45, but I think he's still, you know, top three in both, you know?

Yeah, I agree. I mean, it's amazing for a guy to lose three in a row, and still it feels like his stock. Like, you'd put him top three, top two in lightweight and featherweight now. Oh, definitely, yeah. Now, also I was going to ask about the heavyweight division. When you were just talking on previous shows about how you really want Velazquez and Cormier, and I sort of wasn't really,

I was sort of interested in that fight, but wasn't really thinking much of it because of, you They're the same, their training partners and everything, and Alistair Overeem was in the background. What do you see now happening at heavyweight now that Overeem obviously has been beaten? You know, it's very tough. I mean, as I said on fuel, that was an expensive loss for the UFC, and it really was the same kind of situation as the Michael Bissping lost to Vitor Belfort because it's weird.

And someone brought this up to me on Saturday. It feels like we keep getting these fights where a guy is like one win away from getting a title shot, almost overlooked the fight, and then they lose. I mean, it's happened in the middleweight division. It happened now in the heavyweight division. It's, it's now, I mean, there's no clear-cut guy. Do you do the trilogy fight with Junior Dos Santos? You're still there, right, Lawrence?

Yep, yeah. You do you do the trilogy fight with Junio Santos? I would like to see JDS fight one more time, at least, to build himself back up, create some buzz for that, then throwing him right back in there. I think JDS versus Overeem, I mean, that's the fight that everyone wanted to see when JDS was still the champion. It was supposed to happen at 146 before Overeem didn't get licensed. Or JDS versus Josh Barnett, I think, would make a hell of a lot of sense as well. So I found the culprit.

Just one second. Okay, sorry about that. So you still hear me, right? Yep, definitely. So I think JDS versus Barnett would make sense as well. Then you look at the rest of the contenders. Well, I think if Fabriceo Verduin wasn't fighting Bignog in Brazil in June, Verdun versus Kane Velasquez makes a lot of sense.

It's a fun fight stylistically, but he's booked. Who else is there? Roy Nelson's booked. I mean, who else is there? There's only one guy that's there that I think truly makes sense. D.C., he's fighting Frank Mirre. They keep saying they keep getting mad at me for bringing it up. But stylistically, you can't tell me that's not the most interesting fight out there

for Kane. They say it's not going to happen. Other than that, I'm lost. No one comes to mind. How about you? Yeah, well, I'll have to say the same thing. You know, there's not really anyone there, so it's either Kane sits out for a while on waits

or saying a while, you know, makes it worth their while to fight each other, I guess, you know? Well, it seems like it's either Kane waits or they do the JDS fight because here's like a random top 10, right? Kane, okay, JDS, who we talked to, about Fabricio, who's fighting Big Nog in June. Cormier is fighting Frank Mear in April. Bigfoot just won, and he was annihilated by Kane back in May of last year.

Frank Mears fighting D.C., and I think if Frank wins, I don't think a lot of people want to see him fight for the belt again. Overeem just lost. Big Nog is fighting Verdum, as we said. Nelson is fighting Congo, April 27th. And then there's the sort of X-factor. heavyweight fight out there. Stefan Struve versus Mark Hunt,

but does a win over Struve or does a win over Hunt equal a title shot? I'm not sure. So they're in a tough spot. Yeah, no, I completely agree, but I definitely have to say that I prefer rather JDS and Overeem fight each other. I think that's a great fight.

I'd love to watch that. But if you do that one, I suppose, it takes out a couple of the guys. So, yeah, like you said, either Velasquez weights or they get one of these other wildcars in to fighting. And I don't know if, I mean, they don't have UFC tonight over in Australia, but I will have an interview

with Kane Velasquez. I did speak to him after the fight on Saturday. You'll hear some of his thoughts. I think the clip will be online afterwards, so look out for that. Definitely. Now, I've just got one last question for you. Sure. Just about the UFC and stuff coming into Australia. Now, after the success, the first couple they had here, like the UFC 1-10 and

I can't remember what the second one was. They had those record 127, that's it. They had all the record ticket sales, and they sold out so quickly, and they followed it up with two sort of smaller FX cards, which didn't do as well. I think the Sydney one had about 7,000 people, and the one of the Gold Coast had, I think,

4,500. Do you think we'll see another big card, another main event UFC over here? Or do you think it's the time difference that might stop them from doing it? Or what's the... I think you were starting to see... I think this is what you're starting to see from the UFC.

The pay-per-views, I think they want to keep them domestic. For whatever reason, I don't really understand this, but it seems like when they put on a pay-per-view from an international venue, far away, big time difference, for whatever reason, people get confused and they don't buy the show. I don't know why. So I think what you're starting to see is

the fuel cards. I mean, look at the first two fuel cards of the year. Actually, the first three, London, Japan, Sweden. The first FX card of the year, Brazil. I think what you're going to start to see is pay-per-views in North America, U.S., Canada, FX fuel cards overseas. That's a little disappointing, I guess, because, you know, especially after watching, I went and watched the first two UFC's live and just the names and stuff you saw and just watching the cards after that.

They were still good cars. I still enjoyed them, but, you know, you just should have... Did you go to all of them? Were you at all the... No, no, not... I didn't go to one... I didn't go to 110. I went to 127 in the...

the Alves versus Campman and also Soteropolis Pearson. Sure. I didn't go to the first one. Alves? Excuse me. It just seemed as though the... Go ahead, go ahead. But I was just saying that UFC 110,

the atmosphere and the, you know, the crowd was just, because he had a sold-out stadium and stuff. It was just way more electric, and I enjoyed myself a lot more than the other two cards, which was sort of a little bit quieter and not quite as rowdy, and, you know, it didn't have quite as bigger names, you know? Yeah, no, I know what you mean. I was at 127.

I've been to over 50 UFCs now and covering them, and 127 is up there, top five, I mean, maybe even top three as far as the most electric crowds that I've ever experienced, and it took place on a Sunday morning at like 11 a.m. It was crazy. I love that crowd. I love the experience. I mean, being in Australia, one of the highlights of my life getting to go there. So I do agree. I hope they come back often. I hope they bring you guys big fights. They are expanding so rapidly and all over the place that it's hard to give everyone what they want. But, you know, look at this fuel TV

card coming up in less than two weeks in London. That is an amazing card. That is an amazing card coming up in London. And I think if you get cards like that, it's hard to complain. Yeah, definitely. You know, I'm just happy that at least it's coming to the country, I guess. Sure. Well, I appreciate the call, my man, especially so early in the morning. Are you going to go back to bed or are you just going to start your day now? I'm fascinated by this. Well, actually, well, I'm...

I don't have internet. I've just moved to house. I don't have anything at my house. So I actually had to come into work. Jesus. I've been sitting at work since 4 a.m. So, yeah, so... This is... I've been getting a little bit of stuff done.

You are... I mean, I'm touched by this. I'm blown away. I wish, I don't know what I could do for you, but I really truly appreciate that. That means so much to me. Thank you so much. That's right. Thanks for putting me on.

And, yeah, I like what you do. And I'm also a bit of a New York fan as well. Get out of here. Give him some props for me. Get out of here with that. All right. Well, now I don't like you anymore. Thanks, man.

I appreciate the call. Good morning to you. And have a good Tuesday. All right. Thanks, Ariel. There he is. Lawrence from Australia. That's amazing. Great stuff there. And a nice little segue to the Ricks Picks Challenge. And I know, I mean, I've been thinking about this. I've been wondering where to go. And I guess I'll just come out and say it.

You know, should we cancel this thing? I mean, are you not able to rise? I mean, there was a challenge. Honestly, I'm being honest. I mean, you look at the records, you look at the amount of money being lost at this point. Should we just go back to the old way when people weren't really paying attention? Is the spotlight too much for you? Not bright enough.

Bring it on. Yeah, really? No, I mean... Are you playing possum? No, no, no. Definitely not playing possum. That was a terrible night. That's the type of thing that can happen embedding.

And that's the type of thing that happens with heavy favorites. it's really, you have to bet a lot to win a significant amount of money on heavy favorites. Are we, I mean, I don't know. I'll ask the people here, you let me know on Twitter, are we even interested in this? I mean, it's like every week we hear more and more these long, drawn out theories as to how to bet. Yet this is coming from a guy who went what? What did you go on Saturday? I got to think.

One and four? That might be right, yeah. How much money did you lose? 30 total. Now, if you were a real gambler, you probably would have lost a couple hundred. I would have lost a lot more than that. Sure. But you only bet like five bucks.

Right. Well, that's the reason I only lost that amount is because I'm not going like everybody else is saying I should and, you know, betting it all on something stupid and then losing it. That's the reason. Even though, you know, you can be as confident as you are, anything can happen in this sport. It's a cliche, but it's actually true as evidenced by. Saturday night. So you don't want to put down all your money and this is, I mean, everything I've been saying, if there's not proof of it, this is, this was the proof that you don't want to put down more than you, than you really should. The reality is that he's being too

conservative. It would be more exciting if he'd go all out, all out. That's from Aliza. I mean, I've been saying it for a while. So, so do you not agree that let's say I hadn't been as conservative on Saturday night? What would have ended up happening probably? Well, I mean, we got to start with making the right picks. Granted, tush. We have given you the forum, the platform to show what you got, I gave you the opportunity. You know how many people would like to be on the MMA beat? And sure, it's not over.

You know, it's only... It ain't over. It's February 4th. There's only been three UFCs. But, you know, when I got people here, like my man, WD, Dan, C, D.N., saying Ariel Hawani's mom making the picks would be far more entertaining. You know, Perm Logic saying this is a typical Rick's struggle of an explanation. I mean, how do, you know, I'm here once a week.

Am I not giving the people what they want? Rick is babbling. He won't stop unless you make him. Kill this bit. I mean, what do I do? I mean, that's up to you. You might have to shut it down, but I'm still rolling. Oh, really?

I'm ready. I'm ready. So you're not giving up? No, no. I would never give up. I mean, until there's zero in the account, I'm not giving up. I mean, the difference is I'm going to have to make it exciting for the people. I'm going to have to start laying a bigger number down.

I'm going to have to pick. I think what's going to happen for this next one is I'm going to have to pick one fight, and I'm going to have to put it all on it. Wow. Are we talking fuel? Are we talking 157? I was thinking 157, but if I see something for fuel, then it might be fuel. See, the initial plan was you build up the bankroll slowly.

You make smart bats and you build up the bankroll slowly, but I just ran into, I ran into insurmountable odds. right now and I got a I gotta dig myself out what do we at $63.8. So is there a chance we could be you know broke come 157 158? There's a chance we could be broke by the next fight if I... Wow. But that that's the chance I was trying to avoid initially but Saturday night definitely did not help. Was Saturday night almost like

your Clay Guida Anthony Pettis and in a way it might be a good thing for you? No, zero percent chance that it was a good thing. Why? It was one of those nights where a lot of people lost their shirt. But there were some people who, you know, bet on some underdogs and made a lot of money, I'm sure. This was just one that you can't, I couldn't have seen it coming. But that's not an excuse. That's still a loss.

You know what I mean? It's one of those that happens every once in a while. And there's nothing else to say about it. Someone saying it's fun seeing New York Rick keep losing fake money. Keep Rick. You've got to give New York Rick a break. This sport is full of craziness. Give New York Rick a chance. Make it $250, not $400. Well, that's the other thing. I saw people, you know, saying that the number should be lower. At this point, it doesn't really matter because I'm going nowhere but down right now. So even if it was a more realistic goal, you know, that's not, I got to get back on the winning track. That's the first thing. Spraw 135 comparing you to Frankie Edgar with your never say die attitude. So it's almost like, This adversity is making you, much like Frankie Edgar, a little more likable to the people. I like it. I love being compared to it. But then we have the mole brow saying your excuses are worse than Tito and Rampage put together.

So, I mean, it seems like the people are split. I don't remember making an excuse, but that might be, you know, his view on it. I feel a rocky story happening. Lay off my man, New York, Rick. Wow. There we go. The people. They've spoken.

So explain to us just so for the record. How did you go one and four on Saturday? I started off well. I picked Cisco Rivera to beat... Who was it? Figueroa. Right. And then I had a parlay that ended real early because I had Volkman in there.

There was a parlay. I had Volkman, Overeem, and Evans. And not a single one of those guys won. So it's not like, you know, I lost... At first I was pissed because I thought Volkman was a lock. And I just blew this parlay. Bobby Green blew this parlay for me. By the way, Bobby Green, that was incredible.

That was incredible. And then it turns out none of those guys won anyway. So that was, there was 15 on that. I lost that. I had 10 down on Fitch. That one, I have no, you know, there's nothing to say about that one. I was completely wrong. Maya came out offensively, took BJ Penn strategy against Fitch, and dominated him.

And there were people who were picking that. So that one, all I can say. is I was completely wrong on that one. That's not one of those where I was like, oh, I couldn't have seen this coming. That one was, I picked the wrong dog in that fight and Maya completely dominated Fitch. Then I also put down five on Overeem and Bigfoot ending in the first round. And then all of a sudden, Overeem comes out and is clinching with him against the cage. It was just the weird, it was the craziest night of fights I've ever seen.

and I think the last five I had down was another prop bet oh it was Volkman by decision which got completely blown out anyway right thus the one in four yep so at this point do you almost have to I have to I have to put it down but like do you have to start betting random like Bellator MFC fights I mean and you just have to start because it is till April 27th you don't have to to just stick to UFC, you know. Oh no, I won a bet on Bellator. What was it? Two weeks ago. Right. It comes down to I have to finally do what the people have wanted me to do, which has put it all down and just nut up. Change Rick's picks to Rick's rationalizations. I don't know. I think I did a pretty good job explaining myself. I'll let the people decide. Let Rick continue to burn all the money up so he will learn his lesson and not quit his day job. I don't even know what his day job is.

Tell New York Rick to put all his money on Rousey winning via Arm Bar. Can you even do that? You can do that, but... That's obvious, right? No one's going to... The line on that is not going to pay anything. Yeah, that's a silly one. Carmouch via Arm Bar would be nuts.

Yes, it would, but I wouldn't bet on that. Yeah. Wait, here's another guy saying Rick needs to put it all on Rousy via first round arm bar. Why are people saying this? Because it's a pretty safe bet, but... Yeah, but you can make money. right? The odds are so

The odds are going to be very Is it possible that people don't know what's going on as well? I don't want to say that because our fans are very smart and they know exactly what's going on. This one guy just said keep this segment going like listening to Rick it helped me make some cheta this weekend. How do you make some cheta off you?

I don't know. It's possible that he didn't do a parlay like me because when I try to break down these fights I don't try to just say oh Fitch wins that's it. I'm trying to give you as much information as I possibly can. And if you, you know, hear something that you disagree with or, you know, something that might not make somebody your pick

but might influence your decision, then, you know, you can go with it. VT703 nails it. Rick's betting style is like a fighter fighting not to lose instead of fighting to win. Boring the people. That's a good style to have. Oh, this is great. I love it.

King Ying 90 says Tell him to put all Put it all on my man Michael McDonald What's the line there? Is it out yet? Are you making any picks this week? I don't think the lines out

But I I mean, I'm making picks as soon as I can So Should the resident gambler Of the show know Whether or not the lines are out? Are you asking me that?

Yeah, you should know I mean, that's like your one job on the show It's not out, I just said Well, you said you don't think Oh, I'm sorry. Ariel, it's not out Okay Nothing's out?

No, not for that event. So what? Are we taking a break to gather our thoughts here or what? No. Once that line comes out, there will be... No, but I'm saying for this weekend. What are we looking at? Are we looking at anything?

Is there anything that's tickling your fancy? People want to know. Oh, out of the fights? Yeah, no. Out of the cooking show that you're watching. Well, I mean, there's no odds on it, so I can't really do that, but I would say... But there's still MMA to be had this weekend or this week. Are we looking at it?

Is there anything that we should be looking out for? Is this a buy week for you? No, this is not a buy week. Oh. So exactly what I'm asking. What are you looking at? We've done this segment before. Is this the first time you've actually paid attention?

Apparently, I mean, after Saturday. That's true. You know, there's Belator this weekend. Schlomenko against Michael Falcow that doesn't be... Yeah, I don't think I'm hitting Bellator this weekend. Really? Marlon Sandro. Even though it's not on the weekend.

But... But you know, it's the same thing. All right, let's look at the fight card, and we'll see if there's anything that's playable. Okay, fine. We've got main event, Henan Burrow, versus Michael McDonald. Oh, we're talking about that. No, we'll do that next week.

So we're just talking about Bellator now. I'm just asking about it. I just want to know if I'm listening to this show right now, should I look out for your tweet on Friday or Thursday or Wednesday making picks? Or are you not making any picks this week? That's what I'm asking. I mean, I don't want to tip my hand. If there's something I see that's nice, then there will be a pick.

Okay, so Okay, so you're saying There's a chance that you may... There's a high chance. Now, when my man, Aliso says Rick is the Ben Ascreen of betting, is that a compliment or is that an insult? I full...

Everybody who says that I'm point fighting or whatever the analogy is for the betting, I would not disagree with them. Sorry, I have to interrupt, but then he follows up in the next tweet except Ben Ascreen keeps winning. Right.

That is the goal. The goal is to... is to minimize risk. Just like somebody who is a fighter. You don't want to maximize your risk by standing with somebody who could knock you out. You want to take them down. So it's the same strategy for betting.

You don't go for broke unless you have to. Well, this man, Justin 2R says, LOLA people saying that New York Rick is playing it safe. His betting style is very aggressive, given his bank rule. It's true. I bet, I lost $30 by betting, I believe it was $40. Betting, I bet almost 50% of what I had.

That's a lot of your bankroll. There's no two ways about it. You're getting people that support you. This guy says, I'm a line manager, whatever that means, and I could tell you that Rick's picks are good. He's a smart guy. Yeah, some people agree, some people disagree. It's going to be a mixed bag, and I welcome all of it.

I welcome the haters, the lovers, anything. Yeah. Then you have another guy who says, I'd rather listen to Vitor Belford talk about God than listen to Rick's betting. I want to thank my buddy, Jesus. All right, so there we are. Nick Rick is the Clay Grida of betting.

Who would have thought that'd be an insult? Wow, look at this guy. Five for five, Woodley, Aldo Green, Benavides, Maya, on a $10 wager, paid $2.270. If somebody had put that down, then congratulations to them, they are way better. Those seem like legit bets. Woodley, Aldo. Yeah, but that's a parlay, meaning you had to be confident all five of those guys winning and you had to put your $10 down.

Hendo inside the distance plus $400. Little preview. I do not like Hendo in that fight. Oh, okay. He says, please. So does this mean you're going more parleyes? No, there will not be another parlay after that last debacle. Really?

There'll be small parleyes, but nothing heavy like I did on this one. I mean parlay is where you can actually like... See, that's what betting odds make you think is, oh, I can win so much money. And that's what I feel like the misconception is out there that a lot of people think, oh, he's not betting enough because he's not winning enough, but that's not really how it works. You have to think of what you're wagering in order to win. Betting parlay is too risky because anything can happen.

Anything can happen. That's true. As we learned on Saturday. Exactly. Saturday was the perfect example of what I've been talking about, which is you don't want to bet too much and you don't want to put it all on huge parleyes. So to end, we're at how much? 63.08, I believe it was.

So we are $340 away from our goal. We're quite far. Yeah, but you know what? There's still a lot of events. Seven UFCs left. And a whole bunch of Bellator's and whatever else he wants to bet on,

he could do it. You find a line out there, bet it. It's not over. Still two and a half months away. Something to address as well was a lot of people were saying, you know, why don't you bet during the night of fights.

Why don't you live bet? That's something I had been thinking about, which would possibly be a help, would be... Would you like to make that request? You know, we could take it under... See, here's the thing. I was thinking that before Saturday.

Then on Saturday, I realized if I had been live betting on Saturday, I would have pressed hard on Rashad and... What is live bet mean? Betting during the night of fights, betting up to the moment. Because I lock in my...

Right now, as it is, I lock in my picks on Friday after weigh-ins. Right. By live betting, let's say Volkman loses that parlay for me. I realized that I just lost 15, so I put some more money down in order to compensate for that, to make up that money. Okay. It just gives you more opportunities to win your money back.

For example, let's say I just saw Overeem lose, and I just had like a gut feeling that maybe Little Nag was going to pull this upset off just because of how crazy the night's been going. Obviously, you know, that's not based on. some kind of statistical analysis, but just a feeling, then I could have put down something on Little Knock during the night of fights. I understand now.

Okay, well, if you want to make that... I think I do just because it would be helpful. I can't make that decision right now. I have to talk to the people and whatnot. Speaking of the people, it's time to start thinking about, you know, the person who will go up against you if you do lose this challenge. Toronto MMA says he's a big fan of New York Rick, but he'd like to throw his hat to go up against him if he loses.

We have to think about how we're going to accept these challenges. I haven't thought about that yet. I've seen a lot of people calling for my head. So I don't know how we're going to do it. We're going to have to set some kind of order because there's going to be a lot of people coming. All right. But, I mean, it won't matter in the end because I'm not going to lose. Wow.

See, for a second there, I thought I sensed some lack of confidence. See, I don't talk about the R word. I don't mention that. No, the other one. That means you're giving up or you're quitting. Oh, retire. Yeah, I don't mention that one. All right, all right.

Well, we like his resolve. We like his determination. We'll have to wait and see. But it was not a good night for New York Rick on Saturday. And I thought, I mean, I gave him the option. I thought he wanted to quit. I thought he wanted to retire. I thought he wanted to tap out to steal a phrase from our sport.

But he is fighting. He continues to fight and a reminder that the challenge ends April 28th. So he still has a lot of time. Still has a lot of time. All right, let's move along now and answer some questions and then get the heck out of here. Oh, before I answer some questions, I just want to mention my good friends at Fight Metric, they give me a lot of good stats. And by the way, I wanted to have someone at Fight Metric to talk about the UFC rankings,

which I hope someone asked me a question about because I'd like to briefly touch on them. Fight Metric is behind them. Unfortunately, due to a scheduling conflict, not able to happen this week, maybe next week. But a couple interesting stats as I've been giving out over the last couple of weeks here on the show, courtesy of Fight Metric. Damien Maia versus John Fitch featured zero takedown attempts from Fitch. It's the first fight to go the distance in Fitch's UFC career that didn't include at least one takedown attempt from Fitch. Maya scored seven takedowns of his own against Fitch, matching the most Fitch had ever given up in a UFC fight.

He tied GSP's seven takedowns against Fitch that were earned in a five, round fight. That's amazing. You want to say something? Nope. Okay. I just wanted to give you one more. There was one about Frankie Edgar

that he scored two takedowns against Aldo, which was a record. That was very interesting. But where's the one that I wanted to give? He gave me a lot. I'm not going to read through all of them. I'll give you Bobby Green since he looks so amazing. Bobby Green's Rear-Naked Choke victory

over Jacob Vokman at 425 in the third round was the third latest stoppage in a three-round fight, in UFC lightweight history. The second latest was Cole Miller's sub of George Griselle at UFC 86. The latest was BJ Penn's finish of Sean Shirk at the five-minute mark of round three of UFC 84. How the hell do they know that kind of thing? That's just crazy.

Anyway, Bobby Green was amazing. Dana White was loving him. He was doing the Triple H spit. He was flying into the cage. He was talking to Joe Rogan in the middle of the fight. A virtuoso performance by the king, Bobby Green. Blew up on Twitter. Great job by him.

congratulations on the win, and we never got to find out what Jacob Vogman's post-fight interview was going to be about. So I guess we'll have to wait and see. Let's go to the questions. Okay, our first question from the website. First four are from the website. Oh, nice. Considering how easily Demi and Maya seem to be able to disable the wrestling of John Fitch,

what should stop us from thinking that he, based on the stylistic matchup, can be seen as the number one guy in the Walterweight division to possibly dethrone GSP in the near future. Well, I'll throw this to you. You said to me before the show that he, in your opinion, is the most interesting, toughest opponent for GSP at 170, right? I think most interesting for sure. And I think that there's two ways that fight could play out.

It could either be Demi and Maya is the cream of the crop at 170 and is going to present something that GSP has not seen before, or it could turn out to be similar to the Shields fight where it just turns into a boxing match. and GSP ultimately wins a decision on his feet. But I think that Maya is just the way, his, his attitude, his aggressive streak that he's shown at 170 makes him the most interesting fight for GSP because he can bring the fight to GSP and try and take him down with those trips that

are incredibly effective. He's pretty much taken down everybody he's faced in the UFC. and the other thing is if GSP gets on top of him, we obviously know that Maya's guard is incredible and he'll be able to attack from the bottom. But the thing that I will say is that it could turn into a boxing match and I would favor GSP heavily in that. But I think that he's definitely the most interesting matchup for GSP at 170,

closely followed by Johnny Hendricks. I was blown away. I was blown away by his performance to do that against John Fitch. By the way, and I hate usually. saying this, but top five nicest guy is in the sport. I mean, Damien Maya is, I mean, you don't even know how nice this guy is. He's just such a nice, sweet guy. Always a pleasure to see him and watch him fight. And he has looked great at 170, 3 and 0 since going down to 170 since, you know, July when he had that freak fight against Kim, beat Story, now Fitch.

I would like to see him fight the winner of Condit versus McDonald. And I think if he wins that fight, he's the number one contender. If Hendrix beats Ellenberger, he should fight for the belt. And then I think Maya is right there. He's, you know, he kept bringing up in an interview and even off camera, Tarek Safedin, that seemed to interest him. But I think he's past Safedin. And that's no disrespect to Safedin. I just think, you know, Safedin maybe needs to win one or two after a great performance over Nate Marquard to fight a guy like Damien Maez. So I think he's past Safedine, but I was blown away by him. To do that against John Fitch, to outfitch John Fitch, he has looked great at 170. So I don't know if we could say he's the guy just yet

to dethrone GSP, but he is a new, interesting player at 170. And again, I really don't think that Damien Maia gets the respect that he deserves. I mean, look what he did to Chelle Sunnan. You know, he went the distance with Anderson. I know it was a freak fight. He's being some tough guys, now beating guys at 170. He's very good. He's a very good guy. Very good fighter. He took out stun gun, chale, Fitch. These are some of the best wrestlers in the sport.

And he completely just controlled them. Incredible. And just a correction from Fight Metric regarding Bobby Green. It's actually the second, not the third latest, a lightweight fight has ended. So there you go. Even more impressive for Bobby Green. Thank you to Fight Metric for that. All right. Let's move along.

Our next question, which you semi-addressed already, did you ever find out what Jacob Volkman would have said if he won against Bobby Green? I didn't. I didn't get to see Jacob. And by the way, I noticed for the first time and a long time, no Jacob Vokman's shirt on the desk here. Why not? Let's just say I'm not too pleased with Jacob Vulkman.

So now I'm starting to think that you're sending messages by what you do on the desk here. Like last week, no Ariani. I mean, Ariani has been no. to be found over the last couple of weeks. I'm noticing more toys, which I like, but no Jacob Vokman here. This is your way of telling people that you're not happy with them, right? Not quite, but in this case,

it'll be back next week, but this week, I think I need a morning period before he returns. And we see the Halwani Nose shirt over there. I'm being told February 20th-ish, Halwani Nose coming to a closet near you. So there you have it. We don't know about what Jacob wanted to say. I guess we'll have to wait for his next fight.

Our next question. Ariel, will you be getting a vote as a media member as far? Okay, no, no. As far as the new UFC rankings are concerned. And if so, or not, strangely worded, could you talk on the process which media will be voting? Hopefully it's the MMA journalists we all follow. Well, there are 90 MMA journalists a part of this new UFC rankings committee, if you will.

they announced it on Thursday. And yes, I am proud to say that I was invited, and I will be taking part in it. I have to give rankings anyway for SB Nation's rankings. I had to do it for many years with versus at NBCSports.com. And I would always say that I don't really like rankings. I feel weird ranking people. I mean, just look at the light heavyweight rankings. Light heavyweight rankings are a mess.

As I mentioned to Phil Davis. I mean, he beat Alexander Gustafson, beat Nogara. Nogara beats Evans. Evans beat Davis. Gustafson beats Shogun. Bader beat Rampage, lost to Tito Ortiz. I mean, it's all weird. So it's very hard. They mean nothing at the end of the day. But the UFC's doing it. And I was shocked that people were so up in arms, fellow media members, just like, you know, and even fans, conflict of interest. You know, some deciding not to do it. I thought about it. I mean, I take that stuff very seriously. And if someone's going to ask my rankings. My UFC rankings, we're not pretending these are the MMA rankings. So of course, guys in Belator Michael Chandler, Pat Curran, they won't be ranked. They're UFC rankings. UFC's going out to Fight Metric, who I trust and I think are very professional and ethical and all that stuff. They're the third party. They're putting it all together. And you have to be kidding yourself if you don't think this is coming from Fox. You know, people get rankings, people understand rankings.

This is what they can show on the broadcast. I think, what it does is it creates a headache for the Joe Silvas and Sean Shelby's of the world because now, let's say you have a guy like, I don't know, Ryan Bader, and he's above Gagar Musassi, and Musassi beats Gustafson, and then he's the number one contender, let's say, and then you get into contract negotiations, hey, I'm five, and this guy's seven, and he's fighting this, Chil Sunnan's fighting the champion, he's not ranked, blah, blah, blah. It will be used against them in the future, no doubt about it. But I think it's a nice little thing that people have been asking for from the UFC, but again,

these aren't the UFC's rankings. These aren't the UFC's rankings. This is not Joe Silva and Dana White and Sean Shelby telling you who's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. This is the media coming together, the UFC facilitating it, fight metric facilitating it, and this is who 90 people think.

Now, I would love to know who these 90 people are. We don't know. But I looked at the FAQ on their website. And one of the statements was, or one of the questions, I don't know why it disappeared here, but I wrote it down somewhere because I wanted to make sure that I answered this because a lot of people were asking me about it

essentially said that will the public be able to see my individual rankings? Yes, the fan community will be able to view rankings belonging to each individual panelists. So that makes me think that you will eventually get to see who's on the committee and who's ranking who. The first poll, if you will, was open after 156, and it closed at 3 a.m. this morning. I was traveling Super Bowl. I actually

missed it, to be honest with you. And it will be open again after the next event, Fuel 7. I kind of like, give us a little more time, I think, but whatever. And I think they will be made available to the public at some point. I see some rankings up here, but I don't know if those are public just yet. I have no problem with it. No one's paying us to do this. The UFC said, Dana said, you know, he may not even look at it. They'll still do whatever they want. It's just a way for people to go online and see, okay, this is what the media says. No different, in my opinion, the BCS, way less influential than the BCS. You know, these guys aren't going to fight each other based on what we rank. So I think people, in my

opinion, are whoever is, you know, hating on it. I think they're making it out to be way too big of a deal. But if they don't want to do it, they don't want to do it. I'm happy to do it. I have to do it anyway. So I just have to send it to someone else. This is our last one. Word on the street is that the Helwani, oh, I'm sorry, the Helweeney ran loose on the basketball court over the weekend and was taking it to some fools. Let's hear your picks for most valuable player other than yourself

and least valuable player of the game. Listen, I'm not the kind of guy who's going to pat himself on the back or start talking about his own skills. Sure, you know, and I don't know if you guys know this, but New York, Rick, is on my intraming. Murrell, I guess you can call it, basketball team here in New York. Sure, I hit a four-point play last week and, you know, maybe single-handedly brought us back. And, you know, my back was hurting after because I carried the team and whatnot and hit

the five or six-threes. But it's not my nature to talk about things like that. You know, we did have a basketball game in Vegas with MMA media. And it was fun. We lost. The East lost. We lost two games to one. I was the captain, I guess, of the East team.

The West team, which was, you know, a bunch of Vegas. Vegas media, guys like Adam Hill, Brett Akamoto, Lazy the Savage, Matt Radmanovich of the UFC. Who else was on the West team? Drawing some blanks here. Case Kiefer. So anyway, there were some Vegas or West Coast media, and they were talking some serious smack after the game. Oh, Eric Fontanez talking some smack after the game, like they had just done something spectacular. If I knew that we were going to talk so much smack, I would have taken the game

a lot more serious, as would have my team. My team featured Dave Debert from Canada. Who else did we have Randy Harris, Jeff Wagenheim, Chuck Mindenhall. So, you know, we had a nice little team. You know, we faltered down the stretch. I think Dave played fantastic from Saskatchewan. He was great in the post. And I think that I guarantee if we play next time we would win. We were just having fun out there I don't know We might have to re-evaluate this It sounds like you're making excuses

No no I'm not making excuses I'm just saying that You know it was just a nice little run On a Friday morning and I sweat And we were just having fun Now I can't confirm nor deny Your report of me breaking ankles I'm just going to say that we lost

That's it Tough We could have maybe used you But you're not an MMA media members I don't even know if Yeah You could have been Well, you could be if you win the challenge.

That's true. Yeah. All right. Now we're moving on to our Twitter questions. Okay. This is for the John Jones Round 5 figurine. Okay, here we go. What is this?

Your Rick's picks. They can't see that. Relax. Oh, okay. I mean, now it's just pouring salt in your own wounds. Our first question. Who do you think Maya should fight next? Condit McDonald or Hendricks Ellenberger winner?

Well, you haven't been paying. attention because I said, I think Maya should fight the winner of Condit McDonald. I'll have you know that these questions are selected before. Well, you know, then you got to go with the flow. You got to recognize. I said that maybe 20 minutes ago. Maya, if, no, it doesn't matter. Condon McDonald, I wanted to fight Maya.

And Hendricks, if he wins, he should fight for the title. Our next question. Maya made a good point that the judges should use 10-7 and 10-8 scores. Do you think this would make for better decisions or worse decisions? I mean, I like it. I mean, come on. There had to have been, by the way, is this like 500 days of summer of this background here? Looks that way.

Weird. I did like that movie very much. There was a stretch where it was always on TV and I watched it over and over again. I mean, there had to have been at least a 10-8 in there. You know, people don't, the judges don't give out enough 10-8s. And then sometimes they give out weird ones when it doesn't really feel like it's 10-8. They never give out 10-7s. I remember Dana saying after the Gray-Maynard versus Frankie Edgar fight that it was like a unicorn.

A 10-7 was like a unicorn in our sport. So, yeah, I think they should give them out more, but, you know, if they are warranted, not just for the sake of giving them out. Again, I'll say it. I don't think the 10-point must system makes any sense for MMA. It's not clear what a 10-8 is as opposed to boxing. It doesn't work in my opinion. But, hey, I'll say this about Nevada. other than the wacky Bobby Green stand-up,

they had a pretty good night. They rebounded nicely from 155, so at least they got it right. It shouldn't be us celebrating when judges do their job correctly, but they did correctly and I celebrated. I think that 10-8 and 10-7 should be used more, obviously, for sure. But I think that the problem is just the judges don't know how to do much of anything, right?

They don't do anything. You're right. I mean, Kim, come on. standing up Bobby Green. If it was up to me, put Herb and Big John and just rotate them every fight. Our next question? After Bigfoot's upset, where does he go from here? Is he destined to be a gatekeeper? Or who's next?

JDS, Josh Barnett? Well, I don't think JDS is next coming off a win like that. Again, I'd like to see the JDS over-reem fight. Josh Barnett's interesting. I said on Fuel Barnett versus JDS, but now I think it makes more sense JDS over him. So Bigfoot, Josh Barnett, I like that. I actually like that a lot.

Looking at the heavyweight, you know, the list of contenders, again, Ferdume busy, Cormier busy, Frank Mear busy, Big Gnog busy, Roy Nelson busy, Struve busy, Mark Hunt busy. I mean, he can wait for those guys, of course. You know, Hunt, Struv, that's coming up. You know, okay, final answer. If Barnett's science, I'll take it. If not,

winner of Strue of Hunt. Interesting. Yeah. And you know, Roy Nelson versus Bigfoot would be my number one choice, but he's busy fighting Congo. It's an okay fight,

but Roy Nelson, Bigfoot, gets me more excited. Our next question, would the ending of Silva Overeem have gone horribly wrong if somebody else was refereeing? I think Joe Rogan said it himself. Imagine Kim Winslow was in there,

and I would have put a pass Nevada. Imagine Kim, Kim Winslow was in there. as Bigfoot is on an unconscious Overeem on top of him, yelling at him. I mean, that was an unbelievable sight. To have a guy like that yelling at him. And then that tweet after, I must admit, was quite clever as he said,

who's the king of Miami, Overeem's the alligator, and he's the master. Yeah, I mean, didn't Kim Winslow ref Barry del Rosario? Pretty sure she did. Maybe. Pretty sure she did. And we were wondering why she ref. I'm pretty sure. I'm almost 100% sure she did. Someone let me know if I'm right, but I'm

pretty sure. Yeah. I mean, this has nothing to do with sexes. I mean, if it was a small guy shouldn't be in there, but it was the right call to have Herb Dean in there because that was pretty intense. So it could have gone wrong for sure. Is Bigfoot's CO of Overeem the best example of karma for overlooking your opponent slash eating horse meat in UFC history? You know, I was talking at someone about horse meat this weekend. I believe it is legal to eat it to cook it and all that stuff in Canada. So I can't, I don't want to be hypocritical with my Canadian flag here over my left shoulder. But yeah, it did seem, look, a lot of people were mad at me that I interjected myself, excuse me, in the Overeem interview. You know, he wasn't very friendly,

and his people around me were confirming this. All week long, he was just a little, I don't know if it was cocky. I don't know if it was just in the zone or whatever, but it was a different over-aim this week. And people going into the cage, they said he looked cocky, he had his hand up. I mean, I think that's over-im. I think it was not the smartest move to have your hands down against someone like Bigfoot and the game plan Rick talked about.

I mean, that's his game plan, whatever. But yeah, it did seem like he was not quite himself. So I don't know if it's karma or whatnot, but it was an amazing fight. It was an amazing moment. That was a, I mean, to see Overeem get roughed up like that is, you know, after what he's done as of late, is quite surreal. So, I mean, after that, I felt like you needed a nap. I felt like I wanted to curl up in a ball and just like eat chips.

Unfortunately, we had two more fights ago, and I had to do a lot more work. But it was exhausting watching that. Our next question. Hi, Ariel. I'm not sure people want to talk about this, but I do. Did Joe Rogan coach Bobby Green to victory at UFC 156? I don't think so. I mean, Rogan was doing his job, and Bobby Green heard him.

It was an interesting moment. He was saying what Bobby needs to do, and that's what's brilliant about Joe Rogan. I was actually talking to a friend of mine yesterday who said that Joe Rogan was one of the stars of 156. I can't hear all the commentary, but he was saying that Rogan was just on point, almost predicting what was going to happen before it happened. and he was just saying what Bobby needed to do. And Bobby heard him, and it was a great moment where he was like, okay, Mr. Rogan, I'll do that. If you didn't watch our interviews, the one on M.M.A.fighting.com,

and even the one for Fuel where it was a lot shorter, but he talked about retiring the hood fighting style, and now it's poetry in motion. Bobby Green is a great character. I'm very happy that he's finally getting the respect that he deserves and the attention that he deserves. It seemed like he was fighting on the non-televised prelims of strike force, for so long, which you know is kind of like a black hole.

And now to do that, it seems like he's Dana's new, you know, new Brad Pickett, his new favorite fighter, the way he was glowing about him. So back to the question, I don't think anything, you know, naughty was done. He just overheard him. It was quiet. It was a slow arriving crowd, and who knows if it helped him, but it was a fun moment. Nothing fishy, though. Next question.

Do you think Rashad Evans should consider retirement after this weekend? I feel he's lost the drive to fight. You know, when he told me earlier this week, or last week, earlier last week that after the Jones fight, he was thinking about retirement, that always scares me when I hear that from a fighter or any kind of athlete, anyone in general, when you have one foot out the door and you bring it back in, it's scary. I mean, you wonder, is the fire there? Are you doing everything that you can do in training and all that? Are you pushing yourself? I don't think he's going to retire. I think there are still some fights out there for him.

But, you know, he lost a big opportunity. even if you would have won that fight. I don't think he would have gone the Anderson fight. He lost the fight. Again, back to the rankings, I mean, where do you put him? I think I had him down to like nine or ten after that. A very uninspired performance. And I still think there's a place for Rashad.

I still think he's very exciting. But his last two losses, Jones and this one. So, you know, everyone's losing to Jones now. And I still would like to see him fight the Musassies and the, you know, the Gustavsons. All those guys. I mean, he's up there. Maybe a Shogun. How about a Shogun fight next?

That makes sense, right? They're both coming off losses. That's a great fight. I'm going to go with Shogun. Let's see. If that doesn't bring it out in him, I don't know what would. So I still think there's a place for Rashad.

He hasn't taken big shots. You know, he's not that old, but maybe some time off will help him. And it's coming off a long break for him. So maybe another long break. That'd be a good fight, Shogun and Rashad. That's a great fight.

It would bring it full circle. That was the title fight that he had to pull out of, that John Jones stepped in. That is closer. You're right. You're right. Five weeks notice or so. That would be great.

That would be great. Our next question. Should the UFC eliminate these number one contender fights where only one fighter is eligible for a title shot if he wins? Not really, because it happens. I think what's happening in this day and age in the UFC, there are so many shows. And again, I thought the Bispink fight didn't need to happen. I think people would have bought the idea of Bisping as a number one contender.

you know, after the stand win, even though he was just coming off a loss. And I think people would have bought the idea of Overeem as a contender without having to fight Bigfoot Silva. There are a lot of shows. You need big names. This is going to happen. It's going to happen a lot. Get used to it. And it's a roll of the dice for the UFC. And that's just the bottom line. It's a roll of the dice. And it's not working out. But it makes things interesting. It throws things up in the air and it lets us play matchmaker. So they'll be all right. of the day things will work out. We don't get Overeign cane. Guess what? In my opinion,

Overeign JDS is a way more interesting, intriguing fight. So maybe it all works out. This one's a little bit of a comment, but also a question. Yes, I like comments. Ricardo Lama says won four straight fights. Two were the former number one contenders, the people that he beat, and he finished them. That has to be considered. I suppose, you know, this is about the Pettis situation. By the way, I love this. You just, you know, tagged Lamas, had that. hashtag not sent to you or I very nice very nicely done here and a nice job finding it as well Ricardo Lama's tweeted on Saturday night you know what am I a mirage and I can sympathize with them

I feel bad for guys this is happening a lot someone in another division is coming down and getting the shot before you know Lamas is up there I think right now you'd have to say Edgar is number two Mendes number three Lamas actually just gave in my rankings do you want to hear them I just sent them in to SB Nation. Do people care about this? I'm not sure, but I'll read them anyway. Here they are. I had Aldo 1, Edgar 2, Mendes 3, Ricardo Lama's 4, Korean Zombie 5, Porier 6, Pat Curran 7,

Eric Coke 8, Cupswanson, 9, Denisiever 10. Guida Hioki off the list. So, yeah. I think Korean zombie if it's not Pettis will get the title shot despite the fact

that I have Lamas above him and maybe we'll see Lamas versus the winner of Mendes Gamburian coming up maybe we'll see Lama Sever there's also the Porier Swanson fight coming up very interesting time

in the featherweight division but yes if I'm Lamas I'd be pissed next question why is the Struve Hunt winner not involved in the discussion for Kane's next opponent I see a lot of people

are upset at me for not mentioning Struve earlier. I did mention that. I said, well, at least for Bigfoot, I just, I'm not sure, you know, Struve is coming off Stepe win, and prior to that, you know, he beat LeVar Johnson.

Prior to that, he beat Dave Herman. And he's on a nice run. You know, he still has the loss to Travis Brown, which, you know, is out there, Brown lost to Bigfoot. I mean, that's the weird thing about these rankings these days. Hunt, you know, I love watching Mark Hunt,

but is that a good style? match it for him, Hunt versus Kane? I don't know. I think the winner of that fight could be one or two away, and that's a great fight. I love that card in Japan. Fuel TV 8. I'd like to see the winner of this fight fight fight Bigfoot if they don't sign Josh Barnett. That's pretty much where I stand on that. This is an interesting one. I didn't verify this, so maybe you can help me out. Wow, weird. Wow. The last 14 title fights at 170 and lighter have been decisions. Is this why the heavier divisions are more popular. And he has a hashtag that says,

Fight and Two Safe. Okay, well, we don't know. We're just throwing out stats here, but we're not verifying them. That's how we do it on the show. Wait, wait. Aldo Mendez, 1.45, this off the top of my head,

was a knockout. Have there been 14 title fights below 170 since last January? I'm not sure about that. I mean, there's no way, right? Right. So this is wrong. Next.

This is a wrong stat. It'd be funny if it was right. But it's not amazing that I was able to go into the memory bank that quickly and pull that out? Well, I mean, you could also just get your hookup at Fight Metric over there. You could just get a sent over. If my buddy at Fight Metric is listening, let me know what's the gap there. Is it really 14 fights or less? Surely there have been a lot in a row, but I don't know if it's 14.

This is our last question. All right. Recently, Dana White said that all fight camps are a business. Do you agree with this? It's a very interesting comment, and I asked him about the Black Zillion thing because Bigfoot brought it up in the press conference saying that the Blacksillians are just a business. They're not a family like ATT. And I asked Dana in the Post-Fite Scrum, do you agree with this?

And he said, don't kid yourself. All the camps are a business. You know, it's a business in Albuquerque with Greg Jackson and Mike Winklejohn. It's a business at TriStar, et cetera, et cetera. Are they a business? Yes. I mean, technically they are a business because, you know, they're making money. They support their families and they make a living this way.

But it could still be a family as well. I mean, you can't tell me that Duke Rufus, who was on this show right here just an hour ago, telling me about, you know, crying after Eric Koch was knocked out and having to go back and the conflict of emotions and whatnot. So it's a business, yes, but the UFC is a business and Dana cares about it. I think what he's trying to say is don't get so caught up in this teammate versus teammate and family stuff. At the end of the day, these guys want to win. they want to be champions, they want to have legacies,

they want to make the most that they can. This is prize fighting. And maybe that, you know, plays into Kane versus D.C., although they keep saying no. Although Dana keeps saying that no one has told him no, so it's a little confusing. But I think we will start to see an evolution in MMA fight camps. And, you know, maybe it'll be more like boxing,

where it's just one guy and he surrounds himself with the people he needs for that camp as opposed to just being sort of a cog in the wheel and just being surrounded by, you know, a bunch of other guys fighting for an upcoming fight and maybe you get injured, et cetera, et cetera. So fight camps like media, like the sport in general, it's all evolving. But yeah, it is a business.

They make money. You know, Greg Jackson has his own sponsor. Forrest Ahabee has his own sponsor, personal sponsor. These guys are making money. They're doing it to survive. I'm not, you know, begrudging them for that. But it is what it is, as Dana White likes to say. Let's call it like we see it.

So there you have it. those are the questions, who wins the prize? By your reaction, you liked the Maya 108 or 107. You liked that one. You liked Josh Barnett versus Bigfoot, whoever suggested that. You liked that one. And I'm in agreement. I thought that those two were pretty good.

So do you have a preference out of those two? Can I see them again quickly? You cannot. Okay. Let's go with the, you know what? Speaking very highly of Mr. Maya this week, let's go with him with his question. Okay, that's it.

Mr. Maya wins. One of the nice guy, and a big fan of Halwani knows he wants a shirt as well. So the person who asked that question wins this. John Jones Championship Edition, figurine, courtesy of our good friends over at round five. Thank you so much to them.

Follow them on Twitter.com slash round five. Let's see if anyone... this guy oh oh here he is you gotta love my my boy over at Fight Metrick

I was about to out him Aldo versus Mendez was eight 170 or less championship fights ago so that guy is wrong let this be a lesson to your break

you can't just throw out stats without verifying them what is that you know in the TV business that would get you fired on the spot not only did you lose 30 or so dollars

you're giving us wrong stats on the show. I didn't give you any wrong stats. You threw it out there. This guy is ripping on the lighterweight fighters, and it's not even right. It was eight fights ago. It's not even right.

This is unbelievable. It is unbelievable. We should mute your mic right now. Done. Okay. Isaac, you hit my music. Well, it was a very fun show. It was a little slow out of the block, as they say,

but we rebounded very nicely. getting Anthony Pettus on the show. I really liked what he had to say. It seems a little conflicted that young Anthony Pettus. He's got two interesting options at his feet. I still think you've got to go with a 155 belt. And then Duke Rufus setting it up, kind of saying Benton Henderson tripping on his feet and all that stuff,

very interesting stuff going on to the UFC these days. And as I mentioned earlier, and I don't want to jinx. Should I say it? Nah, I won't say it. If you know what I'm going to say about jinxing and whatnot, You know what I was going to say. In any event, it's been a very good stretch. We get a break this week, and then next week it's Fuel TV 7.

Following week, it's UFC 157 history will be made Ronderasi versus Liz Carmich. We'll talk a lot about that in the weeks to come. I want to thank Anthony Pettis for stopping by. Good luck to him. And well done on that suit on Saturday night. I want to thank Phil Davis for stopping by. And Vinnie Magalesh may or may not have been trying to get on while we were talking to Phil. but for some reason the phones were busy

and we couldn't make that magic happen, but maybe another time. Duke Rufus, thank you so much to him. Great insight from him. I want to thank Mike Chandler. Amazing stuff out of Mike. Good luck in his next fight. Melvin Manhoff.

Appreciate the time very much. Good luck with the Black Zillions. And my good friend, my new good friend, Mark Pavlach, want to thank him for stopping by and good luck with MFC 36. We will be back next week, same time and place. I want to thank all of you for listening, watching all your questions, comments.

So appreciate it on this side of the table. We will see you next. week. Same month time and place, check it out, Switcher, iTunes, all the replays, that make fun, find.com, we'll see you next week. Peace. I'm out here. Sacks 5th Avenue makes it easy to holiday your way, whether it's finding the right gift or the right outfit. Sacks is where you can find everything. From the perfect Chloe bag for your hard-to-shop for a sister to a prodig jacket for a fancy holiday dinner. And if you don't know where to start, Sacks.com is customized to your personal style so you can save time

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