MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour - Episode 173

Episode Date: August 14, 2014

Featuring Andrei Arlovski, Cesar Gracie, Firas Zahabi, Braulio Estima, Aaron Simpson, and Mike Chiappetta. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Look at here. We are in a new studio, my friends, and guys, I think I can hear you guys back there. So if you want to turn off that microphone, that would be swell. Of course, we have been through many iterations of the MMA hour, many versions, many studios. Now this, I think, is our fifth or sixth. And here we are in a new... news studio across the street from Bryant Park in New York City. And yeah, this is it. It's a bit of a temporary studio. In fact, it's not going to look like this. I'm told this is a bit of a temporary

set, but it's a bit of a newsroom type set, and I dig that very much. So let us know what you think. Of course, we've been through this before. Our last temporary set lasted a year and a half, so hopefully this one's a little more temporary than that one. But let us know via Twitter or via the website how we're looking, how we're sounding, because as you know, these things sometimes we can get off to a rough start. But hopefully so far, so good. We appreciate you stopping by for the next three plus hour. We'll be talking about everything involving the world of mixed martial arts.

Of course, on Saturday night, it was UFC 158. George St. Pierre dominated Nick Diaz. Five rounds to nothing. it went as expected or did it because I thought Nick Diaz had his moments and was unable to capitalize on them. We'll talk about those fights

and all the fights really that went down at UFC 158, especially the ones that are main man New York Rick bet on with the Rick's picks challenge. I heard he had a pretty good night. Now, another weird thing about this studio is that I cannot see Mr. New York Rick

or the rest of the team anymore. They're in a whole different place. It's just me in this room alone with you guys. So it will take some getting used to join in the back somewhere by, we're joined by New York Rick, Buzzkill Brendan's here, Will's here, and a bunch of other people as well. So we appreciate you stopping by. Hit us up on Twitter using the hashtag DMMA hour or leave us a question, a comment in the comment section below in the third hour. We will get to those. We'll talk about UFC 158 and whatever else is on your mind.

Now, what else is going on in this show? Well, lots to get to. In the second hour, we'll talk to Aaron Simpson. he'll be making his World Series of Fighting debut that is happening this weekend Atlantic City Revel Resorting Casino

he's fighting Josh Berkman and we have a pair of tickets to give away actually four tickets to give away so two pairs and this time we want you to hit us up with your best Nick Diaz face not even face just Nick Diaz pose best Nick Diaz pose

best version of the Nick Diaz pose or even the Nate Diaz pose Use the hashtag Diaz Pose. Third hour, New York, Rick, will go through them like we did last week with the Fitch Face. We'll give the winners if you're in the area two tickets. All right? Diaz pose on Twitter. Also in the second hour, we'll talk to Andrea Arlowski.

He fights Anthony Rumble Johnson, World Series of Fighting 2. Farah Zahabi, the coach of GSP, he'll be stopping by. Bralio Estima, he had some drama on Saturday night. We'll talk to him, the BJJ star. Caesar Gracie stops by in around 20 minutes or so to talk about Nick Diaz's loss. First, let us get to the phone lines and welcome in MMAFighting.com's own Mike Chiapetta. Mike, are you there? I am.

How are you? I'm honored to be the first guest in the new studio, but we're starting late, and your intro is way too long. You're robbing me of some valuable time. Well, first off, I had to just kind of make sense of all of this because it's a little jarring. You come to a place and it's all new. And all of a sudden, I feel like I'm Brian Williams doing the nightly news. I feel like in a real newsroom here. I don't know if you can see this, but it's pretty spectacular stuff.

I am. It looks nice. It looks nice. You don't say that with a lot of conviction. I don't really believe you when you say it looks nice. I'm still a little angry. I got robbed of a few minutes there. I mean, you've had at least two hours sleep since you came home.

Get your stuff together, man. I'm sorry. Okay, let's get right into it. Saturday night, George St. Pierre dominated Nick Diaz. Were you impressed with his performance? I don't know. He did what he had to do. You know, it was a typical George St. Pierre performance as of his recent fights. Not as action-packed as his fight with Carlos Condit.

I think part of the issue was Nick Diaz was somewhat lackluster in the first couple rounds. He didn't force George into the fight that I thought he might force him into. you know, he did come on a little bit later, made it more of a fight in the last couple of rounds, but by that time George was so far ahead, he could sort of cruise. And I think that's sort of been the complaint about George is that the fact that he's cruising,

you know, there were certain times in the fight where I felt that, you know, he could push more to, you know, to land more blows on the ground or whatever. And, you know, at least he did stand with Nick for some periods of time. I mean, he gave Nick some chances. But Nick wasn't able to capitalize it. I thought Nick was flat.

It wasn't really George's greatest performance either, but, you know, this thing happened. These things happen in MMA. I thought Nick had his moments, particularly in the third, fourth, fifth round. As the fight went on, I thought he had his moments. He didn't capitalize for whatever reason. George looked like he was getting tired. And George's takedowns were not as explosive in the last few rounds. I don't know if he just was tired himself or what the case may be.

But usually when he commits to a take down, he completely drives through it. Really in the last couple rounds, he was, you know, he did not have that dynamic takedown. And I think that's one of the reasons Nick was able to stop a few and give himself a chance to strike more. But ultimately, you know, George was able to secure takedowns at some point in the round in each, you know, in every round. And Nick had trouble getting back to his feet. So he wasn't the threat on the ground that we thought he might be. There was a couple spots where he looked for some submissions, but by and large, George is pretty controlling there.

I'm going to jump around here. I'm going to go to the co-main event and then come back to the main event. Based on what you saw from GSP on Saturday night, are you in the camp that believes Johnny Hendricks has a legitimate chance to beat him? If he has a legitimate chance, just, you know, when you look at what he does well, those are two things that could give George's problems. I mean, he is a heavy, heavy striker. Carlos Condon has a great chin. George is a good chin.

I mean, people talk about, you know, the fact that he's been knocked out in the past. It was one time. You know, he hasn't been hurt in a lot of other fights, and he's fought some very good strikers. You know, Carlos Condon had him in trouble. He recovered well. George has a good chin. So I'm not 100% convinced Johnny Henners can not come out, but I think he could hurt George, obviously.

The wrestling is a bigger part of it to me, and can he stop George's takedowns? Now, if George's takedowns look like they looked in the last three rounds against Nick Diaz, I don't think Johnny Henners is going to have too much of the problem stopping him and keeping a fight standing. The problem is I do believe that even standing, I think George has a much more diverse striking game. He can do things that can give Johnny a problem.

is kind of a straight-ahead guy he likes to move forward with that big left hand. He doesn't often set it up in a lot of different ways, and George is very good at preparing for guys who have simple game plan. So I think George would probably out-stratage him. That's my initial thought. Now, obviously, Johnny has a lot. We'll have some time to prepare for this. I'm sure he'll try to come with some different setups,

But that's my original thought is that George has more weapons and he's probably be able to out-stratage him. Do you believe Nick Diaz when he says he's going to retire? I mean, he pretty much took it off the table like 20 minutes later when he spoke to me

and then he spoke to the press at the press conference but it seemed like he was saying if I get the rematch, I'll come back if not, I'll retire. Of course, he said this before. Do you believe him? You know, trying to get inside Nick Diaz's head I mean, I'd probably have a better chance of winning the lottery.

So, you know, I can't pretend to know what he'll do in the future. I do believe him when he says that, you know, there's only – it seems like what he's saying is there's only a couple of challenges that he would want to get up for. Because from what he's saying, you know, Nick does not like to fight. Nick doesn't want to fight anymore. He doesn't want to go through the whole gruel in the grind. and only a couple of things will make it worthwhile for him. And one of those would be a rematch with George and maybe the possibility of a rematch with Carlos Condit,

but there's really just a handful of things that could excite him enough to say, I'll do this one more time. Aside from that, you know, it sounds like, you know, kind of being knocked down a few pegs in trying to work his way back up. It's not something that interests him. And I get it. I mean, he's been around a long time. You know, his life has been one challenge after another since the time with a kid.

I can't blame him for saying, you know, I want to have some peace and quiet now. And if he does, you know, I think it's MMA's loss. You know, he's an individual of the highest order. You know, good for him if he goes out on this. I mean, I hope he gets his financial situation in order because that was something, you know, you don't like hearing that this guy could be in that kind of trouble after making some money. but aside from that, I think if he's able to retire and do some things that he wants to do instead of being forced to fight again, good for him.

You know, it's funny that you mentioned that because that was my next question. We have a tendency at these press conferences, which Nick is at, to laugh, to giggle at some of the things he's saying his rants. But I found Saturday night's press conference to be particularly sad. I mean, when he's talking about his financial issues that he may go to jail, he put out this tweet that apparently was deleted. I mean, I saw it on the UG. Some people were bringing it up that he's sitting next to a cop car.

I mean, I don't know if the tweet actually happened, but clearly there's a picture of Nick next to a cop car, not sure when it was taken, but the hair looks the same from Saturday night. We'll get to that with Caesar. My point is it felt sad. It was sad being there and hearing this from him. He needs a lot of help. And it's just like you almost feel guilty being there and listening to this,

and there's no one around, it seems, who's helping him. Doesn't your heart go out to him a little bit? I know we're supposed to be neutral, unbiased, we're journalists. But it feels like a sad story, and I feel like it's not going to end well. Yeah, I completely agree with that. I mean, I think there's, you know, there's parts, as a journalist, it's hard to completely be neutral in the sense that, you know, these are humans that we're covering.

They have lives. They have families. They have, you know, goals and dreams that they're, want to accomplish your life. And it's hard not to identify with things like that as a person. And certainly, you know, you don't want to see people that you cover, get in trouble. I mean, that's not something we root for or anything. You want to see people have good lives and be productive humans and accomplish the things

that they set out to do. And, of course, I mean, you don't want to have guys who, you know, these are guys that they put their well-being on the line to entertain us. And, you know, for him to be having these issues, yeah, you just kind of wonder. where are the people around him. Now, obviously, you have to have some personal responsibility as well. At the end of the day, it's his financial livelihood and potentially him getting in trouble. I mean, these are things he should be trying to figure out, but, you know, everyone needs to surround themselves with the people to help them.

I'm not a tax professional, but, you know, I get someone to help me when I have to file my taxes. Nick is smart enough to do that. I know he always says, you know, I didn't go to school for this or that. And, you know, yes, he dropped out of high school. He started fighting early. He has had a support system around him for a long time. He's a Gracie team. And you figure that they would be able to surround him with others that can help him in other areas.

Now, Caesar Gracie is obviously a great trainer. He's had a lot of success. You know, I don't think he's a accounting whiz or anything. So, you know, you kind of hope that he, he's a great trainer. he would help Nick and some of his other guys with situations where they need that sort of thing. From the sounds of it, that's not the case, and you just hope that it doesn't come back to bite him. But, yeah, I mean, you know, I just hope that he end up in a situation where he has to fight again because he needs the money to stay out of jail.

You know, he's made some money now. That's not the right reason to fight again. You can't do it when your heart's not in that. I asked in a way afterwards, as long as he's ever been around the fight game, have you ever seen a case where a fighter who's talked so much about retiring has ever come back with like a true passion and fire? Because I personally don't, you know, I don't remember a situation like that. It's hard to have one foot out the door and then still compete well.

And, you know, that sort of worries me about this whole situation with Nick. And even on Saturday, I mean, he, you know, he said, you know, I wasn't in it early on, And I wonder if that's a piece of it as well, that his heart's just not completely there. Very good point. And that's what we talked about when we were talking about Rashad going into 156. The second you start to talk about retirement, the second it feels like your foot is out the door, at least one of your feet is out the door, then it just kind of starts to feel like you don't have that same motivation, that same fire, that same drive to be the fighter that you once were.

So it'll be interesting to see what Nick does. I think there are still some interesting fights out there for him. we're talking before we started the show. Robbie Lawler, that'd be a fun rematch. And there's a bunch of other guys. Even like a Martin Capman. Kostech, his name has been thrown out there, although I'm not sure I want to see him against a wrestler like Kostech.

At this point in his career, but you get the point. Ellenberger looked really good, Mike. Before we go, other guys like Jordan Mien looked really good. There were some nice performances on Saturday night, other than the top two big winners. Who impressed you the most? Yeah, Ellenberger, obviously, great. I actually would want to throw out a lot of credit to Carlos Condit.

You know, the guy's lost his last two fights. I can't think of another fighter who has probably raised his stock more and gained more respect from losing fights than Carlos Condit in the last two fights. I mean, this guy is a guy. When you talk about having your heart in it, he fights tooth and nail from the second he gets in the cage to the final bell, no matter what's going on. I mean, he forces his opponent to dig down deep.

And in order to beat Carlos Condet, you have to be in it from beginning to end. That's the thing, like, I felt like the Condit St. Pierfight was so different from the DS, the DS St. Pierfight, because Condit really brought hell for the entire 25 minutes. He just would not surrender. He kept trying to get up, kept trying to submit him off the back. He hurt St. Pear standing. He was able to do all these things to frustrate him, even when he was on. the ground.

And the same thing against Hendricks. I mean, he got taken down 12 times in the fight, I think it was, and just kept getting up, kept challenging Johnny. He heard him several times. I mean, he hit him with big right hand. He did everything that you want to see from a mixed martial arts. And it, you know, it's unfortunate that he lost both these fights because to me it's like, it's hard to look at him and say, hey, you're a loser for, you know, you came out

on the wrong end of the judge's scorecards, yes, but he's not a loser. I mean, he encompassed everything about mixed martial arts in both of those losses. So to me, my hat's off to Carlos Condit. I appreciate that. That is a very good point, and he handles it so well afterwards. I mean, he has really turned into one of the true sportsmen in our sport. Like, professional, he just, I don't know, just the way he handled the loss. He kept bowing over and over again.

There is something I agree with you 100% about Carlos that is very likable. I would agree with that 100%. I'm not just saying that because he's my mom's favorite fighter. One more thing before I let you go, Mike, I think the biggest news, forget about UFC 158, but how about the bombshell that Dana dropped, that he was offered a fight by Vince McMahon himself, challenged to a fight, either in a WWE venue, WrestleMania, et cetera, or a UFC fight? Come on. I mean, how much would you pay for this?

Personally, I would pay $200 to see this. I would pay four times the regular pay-per-view to see Dana versus Vince in a shoot, not a work, in a shoot. Are you as interested in it as I am? You know, no. What? That's a fascinating matchup. Vince is, how old is Vince now? It's like 67 years old or something.

I don't even know how old he is. And you know what? It tells you how bad that Dana White feels these days, like, physically, that he turned down for him to fight Vince. You know, it's probably a no-win proposition for Dana because he's supposed to win. He's younger.

and so he should win, but the fact that he's turning down to fight, man, he must really feel crappy physically. So, yeah, I mean, I would actually pick Vince to win just because I know Vince will do anything to win. He'll cheat. He'll definitely cheat. He'll definitely cheat and find a way to win. I don't know what he'd find a way. Yeah, that would be interesting. Look, I want to see Vince in his black jeans, his cut off black sweatshirt, just,

no holds barred against Dana. I think I just saw that Dana White versus Tito Ortiz special again, someone posted it online and after seeing that, I feel like this would be an interesting matchup. I would give Dana the edge, given the age factor and whatnot, but still, hopefully they can revisit it after all this buzz that it received. Mike,

appreciate the time. Sorry for taking away some of your time. We'll make it up to you at some point. We're sorry we moved. We're sorry we're trying to make your life better. We're going to tape the MMA beat here. A lot of exciting things happen. So hopefully you'll forgive us at some point. No shoes on Saturday. I am not sorry about that, Mike.

Thank you very much for the time. Talk to you soon. There is Mike Chiapetta of MMAFighting.com. Okay, let's move along. Obviously, we talked about Nick Diaz and what he did on Saturday night. Let's welcome in once again, second week in a row, manager-trainer to Nick Diaz and many others,

Cesar Gracie. Caesar, how are you? Good, man, how are you done? Good to see you, Caesar, good to hear from you. First off, I got to ask you at the top. There seems to have been some sort of talk about a tweet that Nick put out and took away. Did he get in trouble with the police yesterday?

Not that I know. I think maybe someone picking him up at the airport or something that pulled over, but he's fine. Okay, so because what he said on Saturday then led people to believe that something really bad happened last night, he's okay right now, right? Yeah, that I know. You know, I didn't talk to him directly,

but I talked to someone else. It just looks like someone got pulled over. It's not a big deal. Why were... I don't know. You got bad to him. Okay. Why weren't you in Montreal? I was in Montreal.

Oh, you were? But were you in his corner? No, I was front row. What happened was I got there kind of late the day before. I missed the, what you might call at, the meeting with the commission, I guess, out there or something. And they wanted everybody there. And so they were kind of sweating Nick and those guys about me. I put my paperwork in much earlier, obviously. and I've never done with the deal dealt with the

my proclamation before so all of a sudden they said they've got to be here to do this this and that I you know to have a picture or something like that so unfortunately for us Nathan had brought my cousin out there Ron Gracie

and for training you know because he can't really take the time off he's got a fight coming up so he needed to train while he was out there so he brought him out there and they were just going to watch because Nate doesn't really like the corner his brother that much. And they said,

oh, shoot, so they switched it up real quick. So that's what happened. So for you, I mean, this is Nick's first UFC title fight. I know you fought for the interim belt, but this was the big one, GSP, you've been around him, you've been a part of his life for so long. How hard was it to not be in his corner?

Um, you know, more of like it's like I want to support. That's why I went to Montreal. You know, it was kind of dabbing a really tough cold going out there. That's why I had to not go the day that I was going to go, but I had to wait an extra day because I was like in bed.

I was pretty sick. So it was more like, man, I got to be there for this guy's support thing. But, you know, ultimately, I wasn't thinking, oh my God, I can't be in his corner. He's going to lose now or something like that. I never entered my mind. What did you think

of his performance? I thought that he he did good. you know, he, uh, there's some stuff he could have done better, I think, obviously, to win that fight. Almost like with him he has to prove something. And I think at the last couple rounds, whatever, he could kind of try to show he could stop a takedown and everything. But a lot of, uh, didn't really care about that guy job, but I think what he felt was, well, this guy's not hitting me hard, but it doesn't look good for the judges.

And, and, you know, so. I think he could have stepped that up a little bit in the later rounds and throw more punches and get more punches in that same Pierce's face and body, obviously. And I had a baby a lower stance so he wouldn't get taken down while he'd just throw in punches. But it's been more active because it looked like GSP was slowing things down, was slowing down himself. And I thought if Nick really pushed it, he might be able to get the TKM or something. Nick said he fell flat.

When you saw him the first two rounds or so, could you notice that this wasn't the best Nick out there? Well, no, I mean, physically very strong for this fight. Nick was very strong. And, I mean, in the later round, that's what surprised me. Usually he really starts both the deals, they'll start throwing more punches and so forth. And why the other guys retire around, that's when they usually pick it up. So that's the part I saw about being flat.

Okay. And after the fight, again, he said he wants to retire. but then he said he wants a rematch. So it sounds like he'll take the rematch if he can get it, if not he's done. What's going on? Do you believe that he's really done? Well, here's the thing.

I never listen to anybody after a fight. I just don't. I mean, I've been in the sport for so many years before it was a sport, and the emotional level was so high after a fight. And there's so many things. You're thinking in a different way that you're going to think a day after the fight,

a week after a fight. you're going to think differently. I hear people, that's why I think these fighters should never retire in the ring. They should retire before a fight. They can retire after a fight, but you never retire or say this is it. You know, because at the emotional level, I remember that fight with Diaz and DJ Penn, where, you know, we went to the press conference, and Nick started, we kind of went into a little bit of a rant, and I almost left the press conference feeling like we lost the fight.

against BJ Penn because, you know, these guys cut out wait for weeks, sometimes months. They train like crazy. It's such a, and then the emotional highlight, the fight night comes. It's, you know, right after a fight, they do a press conference. They say things. They shouldn't have said. They do things. You know, it's just not their normal selves.

So I take everything set and done with a grain of salt during fight then. You know, when he was preparing for the fight training for it, did he ever say? that if things don't go his way, this could be it for him? I mean, based on, I know you don't believe him in the moment, but when you heard him say that, you're like, okay, this time it kind of makes sense. He didn't win the fight against GSP. Going to be hard to get that rematch right away. Does he still have it in him?

You know, everything is pretty much up to Nick. We can have that discussion a week from now or something like that. The way I look at it is I kind of understand his mentality that I look at, you know, a lot of times with the U.S. they've got guys. Okay, now you've got to fight this kid who's coming up, he's 2-0 in the UFC. There's absolutely no motivation to do stuff like that.

So, and I think with Nick, that's what he's thinking, that if he has to fight some of these young guys that really haven't put their time in the UFC and in the NBA in general, it's just not a motivational thing for you. I'd rather see him something like, you know, like Sanderlake Sova. It's like big fights, you know.

They don't really do lose 10 fights in a row, and they're going to put them in a big fight. fight. That's how they feel about that, and Vitor Bellford. Vita will win a fight, and he's fighting for the title next. I mean, just because there's the respect level given to these guys that have been doing this for so many years and put on so many fights, I think Nick, you know, he's not as old as those guys, but he wants that kind of respect, and he wants big fights. He would like to fight probably Johnny Hendricks.

I mean, I know Johnny Hendricks is fighting GSP. I get that, but that's the kind of, you know, and hundreds of thousand been around either but he wants big fights like okay this guy's in the news he's big you know big time fighter

what people are talking about he wants big fights to motivate himself so so you think if he fights gsp again do you think he can actually beat him do you believe that

based on what we saw on Saturday I think there'd have to be a complete game plan switch on what happened and shining a little bit different and everything um there was some stuff

like it's almost like CSP really knew the moves that Nick was going to do from bottom and it was kind of interesting Nick alluded to that in my interview with him for fuel that Jeff Sherwood of Sherwood of Sherdog.com was there and what was he insinuating there?

Is that what you were insinuating? That's my idea watching the fight. It was really weird because Nick does stuff that's very unique and that he has even he does it in grappling but he doesn't necessarily do it in fighting and he was doing it more in fighting, and it was just kind of like, wait a minute, this guy is like one step

ahead, like you know, exactly. It was kind of odd, almost like someone from somewhere from our team or something. It was not a current number, but, you know, I don't know. It was one of the things, but that's whatever. I don't want to make that an issue at all. Who are you thinking of, though? I don't want to, I don't know. Without all the fact, I don't, you know. So, all right, So now here we stand, and obviously Nick showed up to the press conference, and, you know, again, he stole the show as he did on Thursday, as he kind of did on Wednesday when he missed the media workouts. But he said, you know, and I just said this in our previous interview before you, it wasn't the typical where people are chuckling, and it's like, okay, Nick's, you know, kind of telling it like it is from his POV. You know, he's talking about his taxes situation and all that. That's sad stuff.

Is he being, I mean, is that the truth? Has he never paid taxes? And is he in trouble with the law? It's kind of weird for me to speak about stuff like that because when we talk about fighting, it's fighting. But when you talk about taxes, I'm not an accountant, obviously. And that's a man's personal business. But since he alluded to it, I know people have been texting me, kind of worried about it and everything,

it's like he has paid taxes. This is the weird thing. I think he misspoke. It's about filing. The deal do is, like, when I talked to Nick a couple years ago, it was like, Nick, he's got a, you know, he said, well, I've got to do, we have some tax issues he was having. And, like, for example, Nate, he has, you know, he's got a tax guy, and he does his stuff, and it's all under control, and everything is, this works out great. So we tried to send Nick to different accountants and everything. He's had girlfriends and everything.

He's had meetings with accountants. So I wasn't privy to those meetings and everything, so I don't know what his status was. But as far as paying taxes, it was more of he would pay the tax and probably even more than he heard, I think, in the last few years and do an extension, I think it is. So he's paid hundreds of thousands of taxes. and he's not in a James Tony situation or Wesley Snipes, you know, they want paying taxes.

I think his issue is he needs to properly file. So it's one of those things. So he's got to get together with a good accountant and just get his stuff in order like everybody else has and kind of go from there. But he has paid a lot of money in taxes. So you don't think he's in trouble with the IRS? arrest, the law, et cetera? He's not in any trouble that we're aware of.

We haven't gotten any other issues or anything like that. And again, I have to be very careful with what I say because I'm not an accountant. However, I know fact that I've seen them hundreds of thousands and dollars in tax payments. So it's kind of, I think he either misspoke or didn't. I don't know what the confusion was. Like I said, you know, for him to even bring that up after a flight and just kind of off the wall. It's like, huh?

What the hell? You're talking about tax problems? Like, what? Dude? You're here to talk about the fight, you know? And how do you feel, how do you feel, Cesar, when he says, like, I'm just a kid, I've never been taught any of this stuff?

I went from fighting, from, you know, being a teenager to fighting. And then, you know, he also has said stuff. And I want to play this one clip of what he said, I want to get you to respond. Just stuff about his preparation and whatnot. We'll play the clip right now, and then I'll get your response. A very short clip. Here we go.

Okay. I feel like everybody knew I had it coming. like Caesar knew I had it come, every knew I had it coming. And then as soon as I had it coming, nobody was around to help me. You know, the only ones that came to help me was my SOMBO coach,

Gil Castillo. You know, Jake and Gil, they're off, they're on their, they can't train hard right now. They've got, they have fights coming up, you know? They've got stuff going on. And they needed to have their downtime when it's downtime. I can't go roughing those guys up, just because I need training.

So it seems like he's saying he's not prepared, not only for the fight, but for, life. And you are the sort of father figure. You're the manager, the trainer. Does that bother you? Well, yeah, it bothers me. But I think what he was alluding to, like, as far as being there, I was there for every single practice that I ever knew about. So I don't think he meant it that way. Like, I'm not training with him. I think it was maybe other people. I'm not sure. I'd have to talk to him. Like I said, there's a lot of contradictions and a lot of things and everything. You know, like all the practices that he's mentioning, I was there at every single practice. I would leave my house and get a babysitter or whatever and go out there and be at every single practice that he was in. I brought in his spying partners, professional boxers.

I brought in pretty much everybody you could bring in. You know, that's what I do. And so I don't know. You know, like I said, I have that conversation with him. Nick he literally I've kind of mentioned this it's like

he doesn't really have a filter from his it's in his heart to his mouth you know and he'll just he'll say something and then the next

very the very next line will be something that kind of contradiction a little bit it's almost like he's thinking out loud

you know so I don't really get insulted it's no no man I meant this you know but it's almost

just like he's thinking and filling it out there and kind of putting it all together, and it's a weird form of communication, but, you know, so yeah. How's your relationship with him now, like this training camp leading up to today? Are you guys as close, as tight as you were when you started? Well, obviously, it's, I think, tighter. I mean, it's when we started, you know, he was a kid, you know, 16 and everything from Stockton. And I think, without the bad, with all the, oh, I'm not prepared for this and everything.

I mean, bottom line is this has been a great thing for him in his life. You know, a lot of his friends that he had ended up, someone to jail, someone to, you know, broke or broke over this or that. And I think Nick has said that in interviews that he's lucky, you know, in a sense, because here he is. He's the main event. He's getting paid very good money. He's, you know, got all these opportunities in life that your average person.

and just doesn't help. So we've got to get, you know, we've got to get, I don't know, I just think it's, it's like we have to focus on positive things. And, you know, look at that. He just had two title fights. He's just, he's got all these people behind them. He's loved by so many people. People know his name.

That's just things that other people don't get. And I mean, so sometimes we need to just, hey, you know, I'm going to have that discussion with him. You've got to accept a lot of responses. You know, people need to man up. They need to go to accountant and pay your taxes. I'm certainly not an accountant. I can never do someone's taxes.

I'd be a go to jail for that problem here. I don't know what I'm doing with that. And everything, and we've got to just look at life. And, you know, we've got to thank God that we're alive and that we've got our limbs and, you know, all this other stuff is just, it's just like, really? Let's say, hey, man, let's just keep on the positive. It's easy to get negative, a lot of stuff.

But I believe that we need to be more thankful in life. And that's how I feel about it. And I think with Nick, I think he's learning. He got a late start with learning things in life maybe like he talked about. But that's what I'd like to push him to. Like, hey, man, you're still young. You've got the future in front of you. You can fight big fights.

You can make money once you get married, have kids, you know, do whatever, man. Life is good. And I'm sure you knew I was going to ask about this, and I know you've heard it, but just for those that didn't hear about it, Dana White had some very critical things to say about you on Thursday. I want to play a quick clip from Dana and then get your response. Here we go. I think Caesar's a dick. That's what I think. I think Caesar does some stuff that's just bullshit.

You know what I mean? I don't think it's an act or a stick or anything else. So this now has led people to believe that you are not the best man to be leading and managing Nick Diaz and his brother. Did that surprise you when Dana said that about you? It kind of did. It came from left field, which is kind of weird because I've always had a pretty good working relationship with Dana White. And he's someone that I consider has done a lot for the sport. You know, a lot of it was good.

Some of it is not so good. But as a person, you know, we're all going to be able to speak our minds. I think he was, what he was alluding to, by the way, if people don't know, was that I had tweeted that I thought the fighters, like, if you're fighting in a main event, you should maybe get business class or something. Nick was scheduled to go to Montreal and coach. And by the way, I just did that flight and it was brutal. I'm like, oh, my God, I got there. I felt like I had a hangover. You know, it was like, and all the fighters have to go through that, you know, and everything, and it sucks.

but I'm just thinking if it's a main event maybe for you to perform at your best maybe you know give you a little but you know I wasn't a big deal just like I just do it out there like hey what do you guys think about this and and I think there was one other thing what was it was about the countdown stuff

the countdown stuff well Nick Nick had given his reasons about countdown and me as a manager that's my job to put my clients stuff out there and said well this is Mike, this is his thinking. And that's pretty much it. You know, we're here these countdown people.

I think Dana had said that, I contradicted him. He said that Nick hadn't showed up for countdown. And I said, actually, he did. He said, Dana had said that cost us $50,000. And he's shown up for countdown. And there was some miscommunication. And me and Dana would have talked about that. You know, sometimes people will quote you, like, hey, this is what Dan said. Hey, this is what Caesar said. And some stuff is a little bit out of context. It's going to create a, it's going to instigated a worse situation. I fully understand he spent a lot of money on countdown, but I just don't think they were over budget.

$50,000 is my point. It's like, wait a minute. Yeah, he missed this day here because you have to go do this or whatever, two days. But that didn't just $50,000. It's just I didn't think that was the case, you know. And that's what Nick thought also. So I'm just putting my client's thing out there.

And then, you know, Dana doesn't like to get contradictory or anything. But, you know, we can't just all tow the line, and we're not going to have different opinions. That's what makes the country great. For him to kind of come out, I would love to have a talk with him. I thought, you know, him saying that about me being the words he used and everything. It was a little bit. I thought it was childish, and if you have a problem with someone, maybe he should say that to my face, and we can resolve it as two men any way he wants to resolve it.

But to say it in the media and to use high school language, and it was kind of silly. But it's kind of like that thing where I was with that, do you remember with the BJ Penn fight? I'm going, oh, MF, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. All that MF were out to Nick. Well, even that, you know, and I've apologized because the whole thing, it's not that we can't use language,

but when you do that in public, it's kind of childish. But I didn't know my mic was on, and I didn't know anybody was going to hear it. I was trying to motivate Nick, and I kind of spur of the moment. It wasn't a shot at George St. Pierre. I certainly didn't want to come off on TV swearing, and like I said, I apologize for that. And I think that Dana should start to maybe apologize for some other things he says, and he'll be a better man for it.

Did you know that he had this issue with you? Not about that. I think he actually, I talked to him on the phone. He had called me about something else, and he discussed about the treat that I put out there with the, what was it, about the Twitter thing, and I tweeted out there, and he said, hey, about the, the plane maybe giving them, you know, business classes and their coach to Montreal. And he said, oh, at this point, you're lucky.

I don't take him on a Greyhound boss, blah, blah, blah. And I kind of laughed about it. I go, right on, man, I'm not trying to bust your balls, because I'm just, you know, and I thought it was over. And then that happened. It was kind of disappointing, you know, but I didn't think that me and him had an issue like that. Final question, Caesar, I'll ask you point blank.

in your opinion, tell us why you're the best man to be the manager and the trainer for Nick Diaz and Nate Diaz at this point because, you know, just getting a lot of people here and it's been said since Steyneth sort of put it out there that you aren't the best man to be doing this. Yeah, well, maybe I'm not. You know, that's the thing. As far as as trainers, it's just I try to be the best that I can be. There's nothing more that I can do. Trust me, every day I'm doing something. I spend more time

with like a lot of these guys that I deal with my own kids and the amount of time and effort I put to it. It's almost not worth of stress sometimes. It's like it's so hard. But as a trainer, you know, this is what I did with my life. It's like, you know, the whole crazy jiu-su,

I tried to do the best I could. As management is concerned, the whole way that that happened was like, okay, well, if you hire a trainer, it's this much percentage. You hire a manager, it's this much, you hire this. All of a sudden, it's like these guys, percentage of their money keeps going down.

So what I did was I just said, this is a, I'm basically not really making money as a manager, you know, this is just here. This would be a lot cheaper if I do it. This one would be just a lot less money for these guys to have to shell out of their own pockets and everything.

And sometimes I have to think about it. I go, man, the amount of stress and everything that just puts out on me and you get the criticism. And you know what? A lot of the criticism, I don't even listen to it, because I'm thinking,

let me get this straight. You've got, you know, Nate Deere's just had a title shot. Nick just had two. Really? I mean, how many managers would say? Do you really? I don't understand. It's like, and what's someone else going to do for him?

Get him a title shot? Do you want to keep managing them? I'm going to have that discussion with, like, especially with Nick and everything, because sometimes I need to make sure that we're out on the same page about everything. And like I said, sometimes the stress of doing stuff is just it's just a little bit crazy and I do the best I can,

but it's kind of stressful. It's kind of, you know, I have to go as just worth it to even do this and you know, and maybe maybe if, you know, there was somebody that could do this job that maybe like Nick or or may, if they want to go,

they could really trust and they could, that might be a good thing. But, you know, again, That's a personal thing between us. And you'd be okay with that? Well, yeah, I mean, I've got people on my team that I don't manage. You know, it's like on my team, you know, I'm not going to, it's not a, you know, it's like, okay. That's a whole different business thing.

It's like, I don't have to be your trainer slash manager and, you know, some people want me to be a CPA officer or something. So I don't have to do all that stuff. I just do the best I can The more in you in the public eye, the more people are going to hate you. This is never an issue when, you know, these guys or other people I've managed. Trust me, a lot of people have done a lot of managing,

managed all kinds of people. And when you're small time manager, no one looks at you, no, and criticizes you. But when you're in the huge fights, you're going to get criticism. When you're part of something big, people are going to critique you.

just life. And, you know, with all that said, it's stressful and everything, but at the day, I'm lucky to be where I'm at and to know so many great people and, you know, and have a great gym and everything. So that's a great person. Caesar, as always, appreciate the time, the candor. Really appreciate you coming on after the fight. And good luck to you guys. Hopefully everything works out for everyone involved in the team. and, of course, we'll be talking to you very soon. Okay, though. Thanks for having me on. Take care. There he is. Caesar Gracie, the head of, of course,

Caesar Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, Nick, Nate Diaz, all those guys, giving us good stuff there, just 48 hours removed from UFC 158. Now, let us move along now. Let us welcome in via the magic of Skype, a man who is at UFC 158. Good friend of George St. Pierre. A man who knows a lot about Nick Diaz. There he is, the BJJ legend himself. Brallo Estima. Brailio, how are you?

How's going, Ariel? Very good. I'm very glad to be here. It's always a big pleasure talking to you guys. Always shoes, by the... Thank you very much. Got to meet you in person for the first time on Saturday. And of course, it was a good night for you guys, George Wan, but some disappointment as well for you. Because first you had an issue with Nick Diaz, then Kron Gracie, which Caesar just spoke about. Let's talk about Nick first. What happened between you and Nick? Basically, you know, after the fight, you know, when I saw, you know, everyone, you know, hugging it to your order, everyone talking to each other, you know what I mean? I felt as a sportsman, it was my duty, as always we do, to send our respect, because, you know what I mean? Like, both warriors there, both, like, put so much time into it, you know, and went there to do a big fight for the fans. Nick Diaz actually fought very good.

and I never met him before ever in my life. It was the first time that I actually saw him, and I had shaken the cornerman's hands, and when he was coming in my direction, I stepped forward to shake his hand, and he kind of pushed me on the side. You know, well, I can't control that. I can only do my part.

I can only go there and try to show my respect. And he pushed me away. You know, it's his way. What can I do? You know, like afterwards, Dana even said to me, thanks for not pushing back, but how even there I do that, you know, like to ruin the whole night of the beautiful night that was here for GSP, you know, his hometown, you know, everyone would be talking about that thing instead of actually the great victory that he had.

Were you surprised he did that? Well, I, not really. I mean, at that time, I was surprised and disappointed myself because I just thought myself, why the hell even a step before to give my hand, you know? But at the mood, you know, because after the whole trash talking, and I thought it was something like, you know, Charleston a level, you know, talk, talk, talk. After that, it's a fight and being professional afterwards.

And I just felt like, you know, I'm just going to send my respect. Because, you know what I mean? I do respect him as a fighter, you know, and he's a great fighter. He's not there for trash talking. He's there for, you know, for his achievement. and he proved that. What happened between you and Crong, Gracie? Well, we've grown, to be honest,

that was my biggest disappointment, you know. Like, you know, Crohn is a, I consider him a friend of mine, like beyond anything. We're both representative of the BJJ. We, you know, we've been hanged out a lot together, you know. You know, he stayed in my academy. We trained together. You know, we all joke around.

We all laughing at each other, you know, beyond any circumstances, you know. Like, he fought my brother before. He has beaten my brother. My brother has beaten him and then back in force. And then still being always good to each other. He always being friends. He coached Nick Diaz against the fight that's supposed to happen

in the World Jiu-Jitsu Expo last year. And then we're still talking, laughing after all this stuff. So I did feel that. that he was very kind of, you know, pushed back, you know, like, just get out of here, just go away, you know. I felt kind of down, let down, because I'm very, I admire him as a fighter and as a friend as well. And then I just got intrigued for why, you know. And then when I was going to the locker room, that was a little bit of a, I tried to kind of try to it for the second time, you know, Crombrough, listen, what's going on, man, we're friends, you know, we should just like,

And then Nate Diaz was beside him, and then, you know, and then I felt the pressure that was kind of, you know, their friends and Nick Diaz was doing the urine test, and then Nate Diaz was there. And then I felt like I just said, this, bro, listen, just to get out of here to don't get things worse. And then I just left, and I respect that. And then this is not the problem.

I said, okay, you know what I mean? He's cornering two guys that must hate me for some reason, you know, that I already let it go, everything that happened. pass, you know. And, um, but the problem was that after the post-conference, when I already accepted the situation, I stayed by and backside on my, with my team. And, um, you know, and then they passed, and then they start, like, threaten me, you know, and then, and they crow himself, start talking actually in Portuguese, you know, tell me, man, you got to watch out, you're going to get that kick, you're your motherfucker, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, what the hell? You know, that, that was

a very disappointing time for me, you know, I am, uh, he knew, he knew, he knew, he knew, he knew, he knew, Of course, he knew me, he knows me, and he knew that I would never step forward to a possible street fight with none of them. They know that, you know, especially there, you know, don't you think Ariel, man, we are here in Montreal. There is about over a hundred fighters of the TriStar around me. If I step forward, do you think what would happen? You know what I mean? I'm actually Nowadays, you know, I'm a

father Of two, I have a beautiful family You know, I think a lot on the Consequency right now, you know, if I do step forward and that's something happened And I know there will be always A revenge at some point And I'll never be calm

Being to California to do some BJJ fights, you know, and that's what's my frustration to be honest, you know, and I didn't I didn't really expect that That was very surprisingly, you know, and after all, when you come from the Jiu-Jitsu, you know, like 12 years ago when I was back in Brazil, that was so bad, well associated with street fighting. We fought so hard to get back to where we are now with like a BJJ lifestyle, you know, and associated things to anti-bullying for the kids in the program.

I have many schools back in the UK and I'm very good reference for them. want to keep up with this reference. Nowadays, I have people from the government back in Brazil calling me to sponsor me, you know, for a fight that's going to happen in Brazil when before they wouldn't even want to have a meeting with me because I did be a DJJ. So, you know, we fought so hard together as a team,

as a Brazilian jiu-jitsu community, to get to a certain level that, you know, I don't want to go back to that low level again, you know? Last time you saw Kron, you guys were cool? Yeah. Wow. Yes. We are laughing, we are joking, and as always have been, you know.

And that's why I got intrigued, you know. I said, oh, man, how can you just flip from a point like that when, you know, maybe it's being, I don't know, in mature or being, how I'd say, his personality maybe being taken over from, you know. Well, I always learn how to choose my friendship, you know, and I never had this kind of problem. So when he said that to you, what'd you do? You just walked away? When he said that, I just opened my hands and why? You know, and then I'll stay where I hand and they pass over. Of course they didn't want to go.

Otherwise, they would come back, you know? Right. You know, like Nick Diaz. He always said like, you're a motherfucker bitch. Everyone is my bitch for him. So when he told me that, I brought you a motherfucker bitch, okay, that's fine, cool. Nate, give me fingers, watch his knee on this, you know?

But Crohn, you know, following up, and as you're passing forward to tell me, you know, you're fagget, you know, you're going to get you ass kicked and so this like, you know, it's not cool. It's not cool for me because I did really respect. Actually, I have, because I'm in Montreal right now, I still have a souvenir of him that was a fighting shorts that I treasured as a gift. and I know and it's with me that fighting short crone gracy one man when I get home

this is gonna go to the bean you know because that is not such a respect that I can never even see his name around me you know all my students that when he was in my academy that has autographed t-shirts

autographed hats all right did the same without me asking you know you don't do that you know it doesn't matter what you do I have I know I know Kyle Tela

I know he's been fight with Jake Shield, sorry, Carlos Kahnit, yeah. And it doesn't matter. Fight is what happens on that cage. That's where both professions should go and do the best to win. After that, we're still doing our job as our instructors, as a BJJ instructors. And then we are good and happy that we spread the BJJ around the UFC level.

So you can see that there's always Brazilian jiu-jit-to coaches. on the come so can improve their fighting in all scenario and stuff and that's all about this we bring everything up everyone up so you think he got some Diaz in him

it could be you know I don't know maybe he wants to just show off you know and then he kneel that I wouldn't step forward you know he knows me he I wouldn't step forward so he just like took advantage of it and I just tried to look cool and then afterwards go

hang out of the guy I don't know You want to fight him now? Do you want to fight him in a real match? No? No. No. You know, no, I don't feel. No, it's, you know, if it happens in the competition, we fight,

but it's not going to be with angry. It's just like, you know, I just cut relations, you know, because that shows what the real face of people are in those kind of situations, you know. I'm a guy, Ariel, that, you know, we talk before the fight, like after the fight, I was very sad for what happened in the world. the Jiu Jitsu Expo last year because of all the sacrifice that I made to happen and it was a lot of a misunderstanding and then I did get upset you know and then I said things that a lot of people misunderstand what I said you know because I didn't mean that I wanted to challenge

Nick this to a MMA match a MMM fight you know because that is no even a question that he's a better MMA fighter than me no even a question about that but what I meant was um If as I gave him the chance to fight me, you know, as me being like one of the top guys in the BJJ and giving the option to fight him to promote a good BJJ to the world, you know, for the environment, you know, and he dropped out. That was my issue. And I said that if it was all the way around, if he's being one of the top ones in the MMA, if I had agreed to go and fight him, I would have backed up. That's what I meant. Not that I was challenging now when I fucking fight him to the NBA. I was on the thing, and then my English is not that good,

and then I just got away with the heat of the moment. Speaking of the World Jiu-Jitsu Expo, it returns October 19th and 20th, Saturday, Sunday in Long Beach, California, the Long Beach Convention Center. You can learn more about it online. Now, Bralia, I got to ask you, you made your MMA debut last year, and now we haven't seen you fight since.

What's going on? Oh, we lost your video. Well, the BJJ, I took a... Sorry, guys. We lost your... I got... I'm someone... I'm someone...

Okay. Because someone called me. Oh, okay. So, basically, I haven't... Since then, I did my MMA debut in August, and then I was going through the transition to the MMA and stuff, and I got a lot of offers now to fight in the Brazilian jiu-jitsu. You know, I'm going to be fighting Shandi Ribeiro on the...

Oh. Man, someone called me again. You're so popular. Maybe it's Kron. He wants to make peace. Well, it would be good to hear from him in that circumstance. Anyway, I have some fight coming up in the Coppa podium. It's going to be like a fight against Chandar Ribeiro.

It's going to be live, you know. And on May 5th, that will be Brazilian jihad. So then I have some, I might fight in the summer super fight in June. I can't say about that yet. And I have the ADCC in October in Shanghai, and also the World Jiu-Gitro Expo. We're still dealing with Hansel Gracie about all that. It's going to be an awesome event. I really want to be part of it.

So it's been busy for the BJJ. So I'm just getting the flow, you know. Do you think you'll fight again this year? In BJJ or MM. No, MMA. MMA. It's all going to depends on the distance between the super fights. I'm pretty much, I would say I'm fairly booked.

now until October. But I still training. I was still training every week. I have a good camp back home, and I come all the time helping up GSP. And now as GSP is going to have a break. I'm going to be going to Florida and come back and train with my team with the Black Zions.

By the way, what do you think of GSP's performance in the fight? I mean, obviously, the wrestling looked good early. And then Nick was trying to use his jiu-jitsu. GSP did a good job of. defending himself overall what do you think of GSP's performance on the mat look I think

GSP he managed he dealt well with the unexpected which was good you know from from my point of view we had a great plan you know I think GSP he went very excited on

the first and second round wanted to push the fight he tried to ignore a little bit Nick and then Nick was very clever on the beginning because he wasn't spending no energy on this position turning the back blocking GSP's wrists and then trying to roll him over you know he did a very good job you know he make a put the him in a situation that he was kind of safe saving energy when GSP was spending a lot of energy

that's why it makes the fight on this on the third round where it will be to the benefit of Dias because GSP was on it on a spend too much energy and Nick Diaz out and then when on the third round he kind of got a little bit of titles put so much pressure putting down taking down for no really reason then and then um jsp got caught in a few times but then on the fourth and fifth he recomposed himself you know and managed to put the the game plan but i think jispy did a great job you know he made he kept he kept dealing with the knee bars and controlling the guys' hips all the time which makes him always safe which is a very good point.

And, you know, he managed to jab out well, you know, the distance, you know, from, from, from, uh, uh, because the idea was not being in the boxing range, you know, we wanted to be either in a Thai boxing range or in the grappling range, you know, and he managed to do pretty good. And on the third round, he tried to do a little bit of the boxing range, which was when he got the last other bit and I think was towards the end. And, you know, overall, I think he's, he's, he's, he's, he's. performance was amazing. It was impeccable. He won all the rounds, on my opinion, and he controlled the fight well, and he used the whole fighting towards his benefit, and I'm very proud

of being part of this camp and help out somehow. Bralio, always a pleasure, my friend. Thank you so much for stopping by, clearing everything up with us. Good luck in your super fights, your BJA matches coming up, and we'd like to see you back in MMA, so don't forget about us, all right? For good, man. Ariel, it's been always a pleasure to be with you guys, you know what I mean? If you guys have any questions, just send us, you know, and I'll see you guys very soon, and especially the World of Jujitsu Expo,

will be there for hopefully to fight this time. All right, great. There he is. Bralia Estima, thank you so much to him. Again, the World Jujitsu Expo returns October 19th and 20th in Long Beach, California, the Long Beach Convention Center. All right, we talk about GSP. We're still talking about UFC 158.

It was that big. Let us bring in the brains behind GSP, the head coach over at TriStar. in Montreal. Faraz Zahabi stopping by now. Faraz, how are you? Great, guys. How are you guys? How are you? It's just one of me here, but I know I'm almost bigger than just one is what you're trying to say, Faris.

I never know how many of your guys are talking to at once. I appreciate it. You stopping by very much. Okay, so what did you think of Georgia's performance? Were you happy with it? Oh, yeah, you did a fantastic job, you know? It didn't look easy because it wasn't an easy fight. It was a hard fight. You know, people are like telling me, you look a little tired

into round three. Man, he's fighting the highest, the heaviest pressure guy you can find. I mean, Diaz breaks guys with pressure, and that was my biggest concern was how much pressure Diaz makes from the table. And it's not an easy thing to weather. I think your connection is getting

a little muffled for us. Do you hear us okay? I hear you guys okay. Okay, cool, now you sound a lot better. So do you agree that he got tired as the fight went on? Yeah, of course. You got fatigued at one point.

but then he got his second wind, and he came back really strong. He was a little bit sick. He had a little fever, and he had some headache. He wasn't feeling very easy. But, you know, I don't think it had much to do with the fight, because, you know, when you have that adrenaline, it doesn't factor in too much, you know. So it's more about the fact that in the third round,

he really got into a lot of deep exchanges in the boxing. And I think, yeah, you know, if you're going to box with them, you're going to end up, you know, either tired or busted up, you know. So I think he drifted a little bit away from the game plan too much, and it cost him a bit. In an interview with TVA sports right after the fight, George insinuated that it was very slippery during the fight. What was he talking about?

I don't know. He just felt that Diaz was difficult to hold on to. I didn't really talk to him too much about it with all the stuff going on after the fight, but he did mention to me that Diaz was very slippery. Do you think Diaz was cheating? I have no idea. You know, I didn't touch him.

I didn't check him. They check you before you go into the octagon, so I'm not worried about that. I don't think it makes a difference anyway. I think if you're wrestling is, you know, technically sound, it does make a difference, but not enough to stop George from taking it down. And speaking of controversies, there was talk online, especially from Jake Shields, about George's handwraps. What was going on there?

Were they coming into the locker room to check and then wanted to come back and check on it some more? I was outside with Richie. Richie was fighting, so right when I came in, I saw Jake Shield waiting outside the door. I said a load of him. I didn't know what he was doing there. And then when I walked into the locker room, they're like, hey, you know,

they're not letting us warming up. They're interrupting the warm up. I was more than happy to let them check the hand wrap, more than happy. But they told me they already did. Jake already came in and checked the handraps. I said, you know what? Not more than that, because it'll never end.

Then it's going to be checking his cup. Then it's going to be check his shorts. Then it's going to be check his... You know, what else are going to check? We're warming up here. We don't have infinite time to warm up. We're going to go through our routine. It's not going to be interrupted.

The commission came in. I said, please do check it again. The referee came and checked the gloves. I said, you know what? Bring NASA. NASA's out there. Somebody from the NASA office. Bring them and let them check.

Anybody wants to check anything. You can have the handraps after the fight. You can have the gloves. Send them to any laboratory you want. Bring VADA in here right after before, during, whatever you want. But I don't want them to call the shots. Right. I want them to tell me when we're warming up and we're not warming up.

And I'm going to do that. Do you think they were trying to mess? with George? Yeah, I think so. You know, I think they're trying to break his routine. They're trying to make him think about the drama, you know, get his mind in a different, you know, thinking about, you know, what controversies are going to be popping up instead of what he has to do for the fight, you know. We didn't let, we don't want any distractions.

We went through the routine. We rehearsed the game plan. We rehearsed what he's going to do. And did a good warm up and we didn't let them get in the way. I think that's very important. In that same interview with TVA, George also mentioned that he was feeling sick. that morning. How sick was he going into the fight? He was sick, you know, he had a bit of a start of a fever.

Like he was a bit warm, but, you know, what are you going to do? You're not always going to have a perfect fight, you know. Everybody's a little bit injured. Everybody's a little busted up. He wasn't sick enough to pull the puck on the fight, but he did have the start of a fever. You know, like it seemed like he was warm and he was feeling a little uneasy, you know, he's feeling a little sick. You know, GSP also mentioned that he wants a break. had two fights back to back.

Were you feeling that he was getting worn out? I think mentally, you know, I think he just needs to take a little bit of break because it's just too much. You know, the training camps are very difficult. And the preparations, George goes all out when he prepares. It's a really tedious training camp that we just been through. And for sure he needs a break. You know, all these guys, all my guys that fight, they need some break, you know.

But Georgia's training camps are extreme. You know, they're far more difficult than any other guy in training right now. Were you expecting more out of Nick Diaz? Well, you know, it's hard to say. You know, you never know how the fight's going to go. But I thought it was a great fight. I thought Nick was, you know, he did really well. You know, I think he did very well.

He scrambled really well on the ground. George didn't pass on the ground once. I know George was a great guard passing. He didn't even get close, and I was really impressed with Diaz's ability to avoid the ground on. I keep scrambling, you know, even though the ground upon was successful, in my opinion, I was expecting he was going to be able to run upon him even worse. again your uh your your phone seems a little like robotic how's it now it gives okay now it's better

weird yeah it's probably on our side and and and obviously we talked about you know maybe gSP getting tired the takedowns weren't as effective later on do you think that was because gSP was getting tired or nick was figuring them out a little bit of both you know i think the timing i think george was doing he wasn't doing the right kind of kickdowns you know and it was costing me more energy, and that caused more of a problem after. And Diaz was seeing them come in,

come even more because they were slower, obviously. You know, when you get tired, you're not shooting as fast. So he was able to successfully stop a few. But you know what? When you take somebody down, you expect to be stuffed a few times. You know, expect to have your take down this stop. They're not always going to score.

You know, it's part of the game. You're going to throw punches, you're going to miss punches. And, you know, you're not going to be disappointed because you miss a punch. You're going to try again. And that's just the game. GSP said all the right things going into the fight, but you could tell he was getting a little annoyed, the accusations, what Diaz was saying and whatnot.

As someone who was with him, behind the scenes, can you tell us now how annoyed compared to other fights was GSP with everything that Nick was doing and saying? He was annoyed. You know, I won't lie, he was annoyed, but then that annoyance turned to laughter. We started kind of making fun of the whole situation and kind of laughing at the whole, you know,

the dialogue. because both of them didn't understand each other. We just basically cried jokes and make fun of, like, you know, what a crazy chasmuchess what all was, and he kind of lightened up the mood, and, you know, he got centered again. You know, at the end of the day, I really believe they just don't understand what the other guy is saying. You know, it's just a mind-boggling conversation. And, you know, one guy's talking street, and the other guy's talking French-Canadian English, and you need a really unique interpreter to explain to them both what their expressions mean.

You know, and it's just incredible. To me, when I hear both sides, it's like, you guys, I'm not talking about the same topic with Twitter. I got the sense that GSP really sort of felt for him and wanted to squash the beef, went to embrace him, even afterwards when he found out that Nick said he hit like a woman and that he wanted the rematch. It almost bummed him out. Like, I think Nick almost, or GSP in a way, felt bad for Nick. Even when he was trying to explain to him in the press conference, did you get that sense from him? Yeah, George is a very sweet guy.

You know, he's a very, very sweet guy. He's forgiving. He's a very forgiving guy. You know, we have, you know, a problem sometimes in the camp, and guys make, you know, mistakes, things that are not so good. And George's a very forgiving guy. He lets it go, and he's one of those guys where he doesn't like to hold a grudge. He doesn't like negativity.

And even if Nick called him whatever names, George is the kind of guy after the fight is done, Barry the Hatchett starts new. He has a tremendous respect for anybody who gets in there, you know, and made it that far. George has a respect for everybody, but if you're going to make it that far, you know, You didn't get there by, it wasn't easy getting there.

And Georgia, I think I have a lot of respect for the guys who trained that hard and make it that far. Of course, this was his six straight decision win. And again, people saying, oh, he's not flashy. He's boring. He's not going for the finish. What do you say to those people? You try to finish Nick Diaz. I mean, when was he finished the last time?

When was he finished? When was Carlos Condit ever finished? Hendricks is a great finisher. He couldn't finish Condit, you know. Don't get me wrong. he won the fight, but he couldn't finish him, and neither could George. I'm not saying George could have in the next time or anything like that.

These guys are hard to finish, you know, and are they finishable? Yes. Is it easy to do? No, it's extremely hard. And, you know, just sometimes it's not within your capacity. George was not able to finish him. He's going to go back to the drawing board. We're all going to try to adjust things to make sure, you know,

to do our best for the next fight. But at the end of the day, if you can finish a guy and not let it go to the judges, you do it. This is not hyperbole. truly what I believe. I want to get your true thoughts on this. I truly believe that as champion, Johnny Hendricks will be George's toughest test, given what he

brings to the table. Do you agree? I think so. You know, it's hard to see. You know, five-round fights are different than three-round fights, and Hendrix does really well, you know, and with his left hand, it does beautiful. If George can neutralize that, I think he can do well with him. It's all

a matter of style, you know, and I don't know. I think it could be. It could be George's toughest fight. I always consider the next fight, the toughest fight. You know, until it happens, I'll tell you after. But so far, I think for now, Jake Shields was the toughest fight, and let's see if Hendricks could do better than Jake. Why Jake?

I think Jake just, he had just a way about him to get inside George's striking. You know, I know there was the swipes, you know. Like, George, I believe, won the striking, but it was difficult because Jake has an awkward type of striking as well. You know, he has a kind of a jerky. type movement that I think kind of through George's timing off. Next time, I'm sure we're going to do a better job for preparing.

But I think he did the best. I think he did the best for everybody. When do you think we'll see George again? I don't know. I don't know. I know he has to shoot a movie and he has to do because now's his downtime. After he's done that, we'll see what his schedule looks like. You know, I have no

idea. I don't, I don't, after the training camp is done, I don't even, I don't really talk to him too much because he's on vacation time. I got other guys fighting. So I'm planning with them, but, you know, in training camp, of course, I know everything he's doing. Right now, it's just about the other guys that are fighting. George, I'm not even sure what he's doing right now. I don't even know where he is.

I'm sure he got on a plane somewhere and went. I don't know. He'll probably call me during the week next week, but we've seen enough of each other for the last two months now. So if I don't hear from him for a couple of days, it won't be the worst thing, you know? What kind of movie is he doing? I can't talk about that. I don't know. I don't know.

I just know he's got projects coming up, and I think he's going to do that. And, you know, he's going to be training the whole time. You're going to be training the whole time, but not serious training. You know, just regular maintenance and just enjoyment, training. But it will enjoy it. You know, not pushing the envelope in anyway. By the way, these guys always say, oh, I want to get on a plane. I'm going to go to an island, a beach somewhere after a fight.

I need to relax. But you're back in the gym. You've got other guys coming up with fights. When do you get to relax? You know, Georgia is telling me, let's go on a plane tomorrow. I couldn't. I said, I got plenty of guys fighting. And I got a vacation plan this time.

summer. And, you know, my wife's been winning five years for honeymoon. I'm planning on taking it this summer, a fight or no fights. And just once in a while, I'll try to get away, you know, but there's always another guy fighting, you know, and I've got to be in the gym to make sure practices run correctly and that everything is organized. What did you think of Ritchie's performance? I thought Ritchie did a very good job. He was fighting an awkward guy, you know, a guy with very tall and lanky and those guys are always troublesome, you know, because you don't have a lot of guys like that in the gym. So once you're in there with them, it's like you got to adjust to the new distances.

You saw the first hook he threw. You know, he missed he missed by significant margin. You know, but usually you would hit a guy from that range. But he was so tall and lanky and far away, you know, he leans back. And he's just such a tall guy. Ritchie had to find his range. I had to readjust his distance. And, you know, obviously Ritchie, good friend,

Roy McDonald's he said last week that he re-agravated his neck injury. How serious is this? I think it's serious enough. I'm planning on dealing with that today. During the fight week of Georgia's fight, I wasn't able to really address it. And this week, I want to sit down and talk to him and talk to his healthcare professionals

and see where we're at and how we can make this go away. I haven't had a gutter report myself. I've been told about it. I talk to worry about it briefly, but I haven't had time yet to really sit down and talk to his therapist. Do you know how long he'll be out for?

I have no idea. I'm planning having a meeting with his doctor. this week. I know he's very busy. He does surgery all day, but I'm planning on talking to him today or tomorrow. And I'm going to call his therapist to see what they think is he getting better or whatnot. I only saw Rory very briefly Saturday night

at fight night, but I haven't had a time to talk to him yet. Last question for you. Jean-Claude Van Damme, Steven Segal. Who do you think wins in a fight? Van Damme, 100%. But you're biased. You're friends with him, right? No, regardless. I'm going to tell you, the guy can move, man.

The guy sparred with George. I mean, the guy can move. Really? Yeah, he can move, man. Believe it or not, this guy can still move. He moves very well. And he's a great kicker. Believe it or not, man, he's a phenomenal kicker.

We're talking like live sparring here, you can kick. But do you think in an MMA mad, what kind of match, or do you think in any kind of match he beats Sensei to go? Any match he wins. Wow, you don't have a lot of respect for the Sensei. I'll be honest with you. I haven't seen the Sensei in action. Oh, okay.

sure he's good, but I'll tell you one thing. Van Dam is fast, man, like lightning. Wow. Like, I'm telling him, he is fast. I was very impressed with him. He was doing some touch sparring with George, and, man, this guy's kicks, lightning fast.

All right. Well, now we heard it. Faraz picks J.C.V.D. Let's make it out. Let me tell you something. John Claude would do it. I guarantee you. He would do it.

Wow. You're putting out the challenge on behalf of Jean-Claude. I'm not putting out no challenge. I'm not putting out a challenge. All I'm saying is Jean-Clo and Van Damme, he's the kind of guy he would like to do something like that. Really? Okay, so I'm going to call up the Sensei and I'll see if I can put it together, all right? All right, man.

Faraz, congratulations on a big night for you. Also, John McDessie looking very good on Saturday night in Montreal, your hometown. Congratulations on all the success, and we'll talk to you very soon. Thanks, Ariel. All right, there he is. Farah Zahabi head coach over at the TriStar Gym in Montreal. A huge night for those guys, Mike Ritchie picking up a win, John McDessie picking up a win, George St. Pierre, of course, picking up a win.

Montrealers successful on Saturday night. Patrick Cote picking up a win. Jordan Meehan, looking fantastic, not from Montreal, but Canadian, and he looked great, defeating Dan Miller in the first round. All right, so that's our UFC 158 talk, at least for now. We'll return to UFC 158 when we check in with Mr. New York, Rick, wherever he is in this building. And I hope, again, let me know, are we sounding okay? Are we looking okay? Seems like it. but let me know via Twitter. We'll also check in to give away those two tickets to World Series of Fighting 2. Diaz Pose.

Hashtag Diaz Pose, let us know. We'll take your questions and comments in the third hour. Speaking of World Series of Fighting 2, it goes down this Saturday night, live on NBC Sports Network, main event, Anthony Rumble Johnson fighting as a heavyweight against our guests right now at this time. Andre the Pitbull Arlofsky. Andre, how are you, my friend? How are you?

Thank you for having me. Great to have you on the show, and I think this is the first time in the three-year history of my show that you've been on, which is pretty amazing, so honored to have you on. Thank you very much for the time, Andre.

No problem, thank you. What did you think when they called you up and said you're fighting Anthony Johnson at heavyweight? What was your reaction initially? First of all, it was. They asked me to, like, drop my weight to $2.30,

and this way I'm going to fight Anthony Ramble Johnson and said, man, if he wants to fight on hair weight, if he has limited to 65, I'm not going to cut weight, especially for Antonio Ramble Johnson. If he want to fight heavyweight,

let's fight like, well, I'm going to wait on that knife. So I think I'm going to be around 245, to 40. And I said, yeah, if you want to fight Antonio and Ball Jensen, I will fight. That's it. It's how I'm supposed to

how I was supposed to be, and I'm going to fight him in a highway division, and much when I heard. How much do you think heelway? I'm telling you, when I flew out for press conference on MMX, but three weeks ago to New York, he was big. He was about 245, lean, muscle, you know, muscular guy. I have no idea. He might wait 265.

On this Friday, he might wait to 40, I don't know, but I'm telling you he gained some weight. I think he has a really good diet and a very good nutritionist, you know. But do you think it's the good kind of weight? Because, you know, this is a guy who two years ago was fighting at Walterweight, moves up, you know, he couldn't make 185. Do you think it's the good kind of weight? I have no idea.

I have no idea. No, see Friday. I'm sorry. Does he present any problems for you? Do you believe that he's the kind of guy that you really have to worry about? Definitely he's a great wrestler He has a good hands He's good striker

He has powerful left High kick And I'm fighting for World Series Of fighting right now If they want to fight me Anthony Johnson I'm going to be a fighter I'm going to fight Anthony Johnson

But from my last Four or five fights I would say probably He's the most Dangerous and more experience Fighter I'm going to face now so So, yeah, I think it's going to be a good match for me.

Do you think it's smart for someone of his size and stature to fight at heavyweight? In other words, do you think that you will be seeing the best Anthony Johnson on Saturday night? I don't think so. And I ask, I think I ask Ali, matchmaker for World Series of fighting, and he told me, he just will go and go heavy division just for one fight, fight me, and I guess he'll go back down. because, well, a light-heavy division or 185, I have no idea. How do you like it over there at World Series of Fighting?

Obviously, you fought in their debut. You look great in that fight. How do you like it? No, so far, it did me good. Second time, I'm going to be a main event. And, yeah, I really appreciate work serious for fighting. That a game is an opportunity to rebuild my own and my career, and I will appreciate it.

So far, so good. What kind of a contract do you have with them? Because in between your first fight for them, you fought in Russia against Mike Hayes. I'm sorry I can discuss my contract. Oh. If you have some questions, you can ask what to this or fight. I'm sorry.

Okay, but is this your last fight for them, or do you have more on the contract? No, no, I have more. I want to ask you, I know you tweeted about this, Twitter.com slash Andree Alovsky. As you know, Dana White spoke about this fight. and I know maybe one day you'd like to get back into the UFC. I want to play that clip for you and get your response.

Here's Dana White talking about Anthony Johnson versus Andre Arlowski this Saturday night. One second. One second, Andre. I just want to play the clip for the people who missed it, and then we're going to get your response, okay? All right. Let's restart the clip there. I like Andrea Olavski. And, you know, when he left the UFC, there was no. issues whatsoever. I mean, we respect him, his management, the way that they handled everything,

you know, back then, you know, there's a lot of guys who will leave and do it the wrong way and burn the bridges and do stuff like that, like Tim Sylvia. Lots of people talk about Tim Sylvia. Tim Sylvia couldn't have been a worst fucking guy when he was here and how he left and how he did it and everything else. Then you look at a guy like Gerlowski who couldn't have left the company in a better way, just because you leave, doesn't mean you have to leave. on bad terms. It's just, I just don't know if Arlofsky's at that level and a fight against Rumble Johnson is it going to make us go, holy shit, you know, Arlowski should be back in the UFC. So what do you make of that?

First of all, I respect what Dana White said, because he's in this business so a very long time. Everybody has his own opinion. Be honest, I don't know, it's a really good match for me. I'm not, but like I mentioned before, I'm fighting for World Series of fighting, and they decided to put me against an honorable Johnson. I hope it's going to be a good match for me. Yeah, you'll never know. One day I might come back to UFC.

Is that your goal? Are you going to fight until you get that opportunity? Do you not want to retire until you get one more chance to make a run at it in the UFC? Yeah, I mentioned before in some interview. I don't want to, I don't need any favors from anybody. Not from Mr. Dana White, from other people from UFC. If I'm going to earn that opportunity to fight in the UFC, yeah, I will fight in UFC again. But I don't need some favor.

I don't want to be in the UFC because I was a champion in the U.S. a few years ago. This and that. If I'm going to earn that opportunity with my pleasure, of course. Now I'm fighting for World Series of fighting, period. My shortest goal is face Anthony Raubal Jad on March 23rd, and I will do everything possible to beat him. You'll see what's going to happen after when I'm going to be done with the work serious of fighting. We'll see.

Do you regret leaving the UFC? Huh? Do you regret leaving the UFC? I let UFC at that time when I left UFC. I think it was a smart business decision for me. And, yeah, I want to be a champion again. I want to be on the top again, and I will do everything possible to be a champion again. If I will have a war-25 in the UFC, I will fight against the UFC again.

You know, since going on that losing streak, you're undefeated. You've won four, you have won no contest against Tim Sylvia. What has been the difference for you? Why have you gone on this winning streak after that rough patch in your career? After four losses, beyond this year, I was miserable. I was on the button of my life, and I gave a call Greg Jackson after my loss of Horitone on Grand Prix and Strike Force. And I asked him, what do you think?

I should retire. This is that because some of my trainers told me all. Donner-Lavski, this and that. He told me absolutely not. Just come to Albuquerque. Come to my clinic. We're going to start everything from beginning. And I'm very happy that he gave me that hope that I listened to him.

Only one thing that I worried about that I didn't move to Albuquerque right after the Yanukkah fight. It might be a different story right now, but everything I guess happened for reason. And I'm very happy wherever right now. So I need to beat another. Yeah. You think that if you would have moved to Jackson's camp in New Mexico after the Fedor fight, the Brett Rogers fight doesn't happen.

Antonio Silva, Karitanov, you think that things would have been different had you gone there sooner? You know what? I'm not sure for 100 percent, but for 90 percent, yeah, I'm sure. Because in Albuquerque, right now, I have a great team-mates, a great sparring partner. Especially this camp, it was so amazing because it was... like a lot of people with squack and spite. My friend, Premis Brown, John Jones, Frank Mir. A couple of local hairways, you know,

nothing to do, no, but I think, except training. Training hard and be focused on a thing what you're doing. And, yeah, we'll see. We'll see. It was going to be a few years, but I'm very happy right now about everything. How many more years do you want to do this for? You're 34 right now. I hope so until 40.

Wow. if my body let me fight. You know what? I have a lot of energy right now. I still want to fight. And more important, I still want to win all my fights, you know. And Greg Jackson, he's very polite and he's like spent a lot of time with me, Mr. Winkle-John.

I just like, it's a great place to train. I have a lot of energy. And I'm still young for a heavyweight. It's 34 years old. It's nothing. 35, 36. It's prime usually for heavy weight. At least I have for a few years.

By the way, what's it been like training with Frank Mir? That's a pairing we probably never thought we'd be able to see. That's fun. First of all, we're a good for a good. It's a great guy. Yeah, it's definitely very good for me, to have him especially in Jiu Jensen. But for this, especially for this fight, my main, my spark partners, where it's Paris Brown and John Jones.

I get the sense, Andre. You know, I remember they showed you after your fight in November, your first fight for World Series of Fighting. You seem to be in a very good place. I believe you kissed, I think it was your wife or your fiancé. Is it your wife or your fiancé? Yeah, at that time she was my fiancé, now she's my wife. Yeah, you just seem to be in a very good place. I've seen some interviews with you that they're going to air for World Series of Fighting,

talking about your life now and how happy you are. Is this accurate? I mean, are you more happy now than you have been in maybe the last 10 or so? years because I get that sense from reading and listening to your interviews. Absolutely. And first of all, I became older. I guess I became smart, you know, and I chose what's more important at this period of time for me.

For me, it's more important right now. If we're talking about business, of course, it would be a champion again, be on top of the world again because I work there. I remember the taste, you know, the taste of glory. And right now, right, people from me, not. that bullshit who was like big and Russia around to me like 20, 30 people I brought every time for my

fights, you know? Now it's like still four or five people, but it's like real friends and my wife support me, my parents, like I'm very happy. Do you think in maybe your UFC days you made some wrong choices as far as who you surrounded yourself with?

Absolutely. But at the time, at the same time, I don't worry about it because, you know, it was it was a kind of experience for me life experience for me I think I as a supposed to went through all this you know and everything happened for a reason like my manager likes to repeat all and all over everything happened for reasons

I hope I smart the person I took lessons from that experience from fighting experience from life experience and I'm very happy where I'm on right now by the way I also remember during that fight that you were wearing a t-shirt in honor of Ruslan Saleh, the hockey player, who perished in the plane crash, right? Back then it was several months ago. Did you know him personally? Yeah.

Yeah, he was my friend, and he has family now, three kids and wife. And they live in California, and after this fight I'm going to go to LA to visit them. Oh, so did you know anyone else on that flight as well? It was some couple guys more from Belarus, but I didn't have friends with them. I just was really close friends with Ruslan. But I feel bad for all players for their family who died on that playing crash. And this is like, it's like, it was a tragedy for me. A major tragedy.

My friend, at that time at the time, my friend, my friend, When plane crash in Russia, he sent a text message, and he said, you know, this and that, it's all over and news in Russia. The plane crash, I start calling him, I start calling his brother, you know, and I found out a couple of hours that, yeah, it really happened. And we still had a hope because somebody said he drove back to Minsk, he did fight his whole team, so, you know, it's a couple more days. It was kind of rough time for that.

for us, but when I spoke with his brother, but his brother told no, he was on a plane, this and that, and he's dead now, so it was

a big, great tension for us. And the team was locomotive. It happened September of 2011. I saw a report after that, that the planes that they use in Russia for the sports teams are very old,

and that was maybe part of the reason why this happened, and they haven't upgraded them. Do you have any idea if they have changed this since that terrible tragedy? I have no idea and I don't understand why they use so old airplanes because obviously they have a big, big, everybody has every hockey team and Russia has a lot of money to buy a new plane for the teams or like, I don't know, to rent some, I have no idea. Also, at that time it was some big forum in Russia. It was also, it was a president over there. They gave it.

then deserve wine, you know, for departure. So I have no, I have no idea what it's happened, but yeah, pretty much in Russia,

they use old airplanes everywhere, not only for hockey teams, like in every city, every country, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, like,

they use, like, pretty much old the airplanes and this is horrible. That is horrible. That is horrible. When I flew, when I flew to Dagestan from my arresting camp, you know,

So I had really, really good feeling about my flight because it was a really old plane, and it was scary, be honest with you. Final thing, Andre. You have to be drunk if you fly in Russia, you know. Well, that's horrible. I never want to go to Russia. Now, hopefully that changes very soon because it's a great country, and I'd love to visit it one day. Last thing, Andre, before I let you go,

So I don't know if you know this, but I am a great lover of beards. And I said recently that I think pound for pound, you have the best beard in MMA. Not because it's bushy, not because it's very eccentric, but it's just so perfect. It's just so strong. It's so neat. It's so thick. It's just one of the nicest beards I've ever seen. Forget about MMA, just in life in general.

What is your secret? How can I get this? Because I strive every day to reach the beard status that you have been rocking for all these years. Can you repeat your question, please? I said I'm so impressed by your beard. It's an amazing beard that you have. Your beard is just so spectacular. How do you make it look so great?

Because once in a while I dream and, you know, my wife, now I have an agreement with you. I have to shave every two weeks. What? Not before my fight. Yeah, not before my fight. I don't know, just, you know, it's some. She told me I look old and this and that.

And also my family when I have a beer so I have to like shave every two weeks now That is, I mean Anyway, thank you She sounds like a great lady I saw the love in your eyes

When you kissed her after the fight But you should not be shaving that thing By the way This is a major problem That you guys have to address That thing should be put in a museum somewhere I mean it's It's one of the most amazing

Will you be rocking it At the fight on Saturday? Yes Okay very nice How's it looking? Do you feel good about it? Yes Okay

Great. Andre, I appreciate it. Good luck against Anthony Johnson on Saturday Night, NBC Sports Network. It is the main event of World Series of Fighting 2. Looking forward to the fight, looking forward to seeing how you do out there, and always good to talk to you, Andre. Thank you for having me. Don't forget to follow me on Twitter at Arlofki. At Andrea Arlowski on my website, Arlowski.com.

I'm going to put some video blocks and some pictures from my camp and from my trip to Atlantic City. Thank you very much for having me. is. Andre the Pitbull Arlofsky is stopping by. He fights Anthony Rumble Johnson on Saturday night, NBC Sports Network. It's World Series of Fighting 2. It is the main event, and it's an interesting fight. You know, Dana wasn't interested in it, but it's probably the most interesting fight that they could give both Anthony Johnson and Andrei Arlowski at this time, given their roster, they are putting it together. John Fitch recently signed. They signed Vogueman, Santiago recently signed. They've got some guys. And in other guy that they recently signed joins us right now. He faces Josh Berkman on Saturday night at the Revel Resort and Casino. He is former UFC veteran, now a member of the World Series of Fighting Team. He is Aaron Simpson.

Aaron, how are you? Aaron, are you there? Sorry, sorry. I had you on mute. Oh. I'm good, man. Thanks for having me on. For a second, I was going to lay the Smackdown on our team here, but it's your problem.

So now I have to lay the smack down on you. I'm sorry I apologize You know A lot of people were surprised Aaron When they found out You signed with World Series of fighting

Because they never knew you left the UFC What happened there with the UFC Yeah It was kind of a crazy thing You know That last fight with Mike Pierce Who were left on On both

Our contracts At the end of our contracts And it was kind of a Hill where I think it was You had to go out and win But at the same time I felt like there was no question I wasn't going to win. You know, I felt amazing in the fight.

I felt like I could do anything to him and really, you know, ran into a punch there. And that was the end of it, you know. It was kind of hard to stomach. You know, we talked to Joe after and tried to get him in. But there's so many, you know, UFC has taken on so many 70-pounders with a couple of ultimate fighter shows, you know, in different places. And with taking on the Strike Force guys. You know, that was not, that there was a lot more guys they brought over there from strike force who haven't fought in forever.

So, you know, it's just a matter of getting guys fights, and it was, you know, I needed to fight here before too long. So World Series stepped up, and we've got a good deal with them now. I'm pretty excited to be going, moving forward. It's been a while since you fought outside the UFC looking at your record now. And, wow, outside of Zufa, it's been since 2008 when you, of course, made your debut in WC then moved over to UFC. Is it weird to say you're not a UFC fighter anymore? Yeah, yeah, definitely a little shot to the ego. But it's because that's what everyone knows, you know,

and it's all I've known. It's like you say, I haven't fought in any other organizations in 2008. Those were just kind of small little shows just to kind of get my feet wet. But I don't know, man. It was definitely hard to stomach. But like I said, I'm moving forward. I've got a fight on my hands with Josh Burr. and he's a tough dude.

And so I've been training hard to go out there and put on a show. 38 years old, once you found out you wouldn't be coming back to the UFC, did you think about retiring? Not really. You know, I felt like I still had more to offer. I definitely wouldn't want to go out on a loss, you know, wouldn't want to go out the way I did because I made the drop to $170 for a reason and felt great doing it.

I want to, you know, I want to give this a go. I probably should have been at 170 a while ago. I was fighting guys that were just way bigger than me and having to fight them maybe to a boring decisions because of the size difference more than anything. You know, I just wouldn't willing to go out there and throw my hands like crazy just to put on a show, which, you know, it ended up costing me, I think, in a way,

but it should have been at 170. And retirement is not something I've really been thinking about. You know, at the point I'm like, God, it sucks, you know, maybe I'm done, but I didn't really consider it very long, you know, much more than just a thought. So, you know, right now is the goal, obviously, you want to win these fights

coming up and whatnot, but is the goal just to get back into the UFC? Is that where you want to be? It would be, it would obviously be nice to be back in the UFC, but, you know, at this point, we'll see what's going on with World Series and see how far they, they can take their company. I think they have great people, great people that are behind the scenes and getting things done.

And, you know, their three-year deal with NBC sports, I think is the big thing. And, you know, I may just be happy fighting for them. You know, I feel like I can put on an exciting show, especially at Walthaway, like I was talking about. I mean, if you watch my first round with Mike Pierce, I was dominating them, and it was fun to watch, you know, and I feel like I can put that on, you know, to anybody in the Walthaway Division. The fact I won't necessarily would be able to fight

the best guys that are fighting in the UFC, having John Fitch come over is a big one, and you ever know if the future holds. You know, and things really got interesting for you when they signed Fitch because that was a fight that was supposed to happen last July.

Unfortunately, he got injured. And it seems like, based on what they're saying, the winner of this fight, could very well main event against Fitch in June. Is that what you want? Yeah, I don't even, I'm sure. I think I was, in a way, I think I'm out of a fight with bitch.

You know, he pulled out of that fight with an injury. You know, that was my first, my first fight at 170, and he pulled out, and so I had a replacement in Kenny Robertson. And then, you know, we asked for the fight then. I'm like, all right, well, now we're good. And he wouldn't fight. He wouldn't fight. He wouldn't fight with Eric Sova.

Instead, he had an amazing fight with Eric Silva down in Brazil. And it was probably a smart fight on him because, you know, I'd beat John, and I think he knows that. You know, I don't think he's going to get away with taking me down and doing what he did does to a lot of people. And so, but it is what it is, and we'll see, you know, I've got to get this one with Josh Berkman first before I can start really talking about John or anything else.

And suppose I thought he maybe did some where he's fighting Gerald Harrison, June. No, that's not happening. That was Gerald. Gerald tweeted that, but according to World Series of Fighting, It sounds like what they're looking at is, if the winner of this fight looks good and is healthy, your fight, I mean, that's who will fight. You know, because Josh beat Gerald Harris at the first World Series of fighting events. So that's kind of where they're coming from. Right, right.

I got you. Now, were you surprised at the UFC released John Fitch? Ah, it blew my mind. You know, John's one of the best fighters in the world right now at the World War Division. and it's kind of like in my world. It's all he's known is fighting for the UFC, and he had, you know, a 15-and-2 record in the UFC, and he just, it's an amazing fighter,

and he does, you know, the way he attacks, especially after that Eric Silva fight. You know, he was fight at a night, and it was super exciting, and he had a rough one with Damien Maya, but Damien Maya can do that to most anybody, you know. He didn't get submitted by him, which is pretty big,

should submit everybody. So, you know, I don't know. I think that was a bad move on the UFC sport. I really don't think that was cool. And, you know, hopefully I hope the best for John because I think he deserves it. It's different in World Series of fighting. There are no belts right now.

It just seems like they're putting together the most fun fights that they could put together without worrying about rankings and belts, et cetera. You know, they've got Andrei Alofsky versus Rumble Johnson in the main event. And I think there is a place for that. Do you feel like this could be maybe the organization where Beltaur is worried about the tournaments and all that stuff? UFC has their thing going and it's going very well.

But this could be the organization that puts together just the most fun fights possible? Yeah, I mean, definitely. Maybe there is a call for that. I know that it makes it more fun. It makes it more exciting to just be able to do that, you know, and there's not necessarily the stress of having Belton line or whatever it may be, having to appease certain things that have to happen. So it could be that way.

I mean, they're going to have to sign more guys and get more guys, you know, with maybe some bigger names and to keep it moving forward. But I'm excited. I'm trying to see how it goes. And what do you think you have to worry about with Josh Berkman? Of course, fans may know him from the UFC days. He's looked pretty good since leaving the UFC. Only one lost that was to Jordan.

And, of course, that's nothing to scoff at. Jordan looking very good in the UFC on Saturday. And A, what do you have to worry about when it comes to Josh? You know, I think he's pretty well-rounded. I think he can attack you from, obviously, his wrestling's pretty good, and I think he's a pretty good athlete, and he'll attack you. And, you know, I don't know, I think he's, like I said, pretty well-rounded in the mixed martial arts. So as far as I don't know that I necessarily have to worry,

but I will take into account that he's that he will fight me at every position. And that being said, you know, it could be a three-round war. I plan to go out and trying to take him out early, but we'll see. Are you still doing the vegan thing? I am. How's it working? Is it working out for you? Do you feel like it's the right move for a fighter?

Yeah, I think it's the right move for a human. Okay. even more so than a fighter. But yeah, I feel amazing. And I don't know. It's, I would never go back to eating an animal just, you know, out of my own conscience. But, yeah, it's great, man. I take care of it.

I eat healthier now than I ever did when I was, you know, eating meat and consuming that crap. But as far as strength and all that stuff, no change, right? No, no, no, no change at all. Wow. And as far as strength, I mean, MMA is a sport where you have to be strong. And I train with Johnny Hendricks, and the dude is really strong. But that being said, you also have to, your strength has to endure. You know, it has to be able to go for 15 minutes, or 25 minutes of it sometimes.

And so just being able, I mean, I know a lot of strong guys that can't go longer than 30 seconds. And so that being said, there's more of an art to have an athleticism that can endure a long, you know, a long, cardiovascular type training type fight. By the way, what's going on over in Arizona? Are you in Bader doing some kind of radio show? Are you, like, isn't it enough that you guys fight? Do you really have to start taking our jobs as well? Well, that's just it.

I mean, we started this show because we realized. There's really nothing out there that's very good that people want to listen to. So we figured we need to start the best show and take it worldwide because shows like yours are just not, you know, they're just not doing it for anybody. All right. How's that going for you? It's cool. No, yeah, we got a local radio show here with a huge radio station,

the biggest station in the Valley of Phoenix, sports talk radio. It's been here for 30 years probably, Tom, you know, KTAR 620. So we started a radio show. We do it once a week and talk to M.A. But, you know, we're trying to branch out. We've had some NFL guys. And Martin Miller, of course, is a co-owner with us at Miami Heat, co-owner in our gym, and he's been on.

I don't know. It's a cool thing. I've got a broadcasting degree, so I want to eventually use it. Oh, really? I didn't know that. From where? From Arizona State? Yeah, oh, yeah, Cronkite School of Journalism.

Whoa, Walter Cronkite. I've heard of him. So you want to make that transition into the... the booth or the studio, so to speak, in MMA after you're done? Maybe, maybe. You know, my doors are always open to new things and trying things. And definitely, I enjoy talking and getting out there. And, you know, I'll still be a part of the sport, you know, when I step away.

So this would be a way to continue that. Yeah, but here's the thing. Are you guys unbiased? I mean, if something needs to be said about the team, your teammates, are you going to say it? I'm pretty vocal with my opinion, so I don't, I really don't care. But, yeah, maybe some things would be off limits, but for the most part, yeah, I don't, I don't know, I don't pull a point conscious. How's the team going?

Now you have a head coach. It seems like things are really going the right way for you guys. Bader looked great in his last fight. Unfortunately, he got injured recently, so he's not going to be fighting Glover to share. But overall, how's the team going? Good, man. It's good. We're excited for everyone's fights on the horizon.

He just signed his deal. He's got to fight down in Brazil with the Ultimate Fighter champ. He's going back to Brazil to fight that ultimate fighter Brazil champ, which I couldn't tell you his name. But he's excited. He's actually having a little girl here before too long. He just found out that he's having a girl. So I just got married, and he's doing well. Seth Zanzki just got a fight.

Got some other guys that are just signed with Wilters of fighting. Kiko France is training with us and uh and uh jake porter another guy and we're trying to grow our team darryan coldwell is uh ncahs champ for north carolina state now he's with us training he's got a couple wins already it's pro and it's pro nick smart charlieg with legacy that legacy fighting so it's growing tom bond's doing great things for us just excited to uh for the future really how serious was ryan's injury serious enough for for our doctor to say you're not going to good for about six weeks. And I could be 100% for about six weeks.

And that would have given Ryan maybe, I don't know, four, four or five weeks to train, maybe four weeks to train with maybe a healthy knee. And that's not doing it. You know, that's kind of for six weeks teetering around. But it was given out on him, you know. And Bader's on the tight. He's a type that pretty much push through injuries. And the fact that he was walking, his leg gave out on him and was all swollen up.

it wasn't a smart thing to take a fight with Glover because that dude's a beast and you know Bader's got to put in a good eight eight to 10 league training camp to uh to figure this one out final thing Aaron before we let you go appreciate the time you know I I truly believe that all this stuff about supporting Olympic wrestling is great but I don't think at the end of the day that this is actually going to happen that Olympic wrestling is going to be taken away from the Olympic games come the 2020 games what do you think now that the dust has settled a bit on the the breaking news about this being recommended for removal and all that stuff. Do you think it's actually going to happen?

Well, as of now, it is happening. It's still going to come to vote here pretty soon, but I think, you know, they've got to change their mind still. And the fact that we have Russia and Iran involved is really going to, could vote well for wrestling because, you know, they're powerful countries. And they, you know, not to put it. out there too much, but a lot of Russian wrestling is kind of mafia run. I mean, they have some pretty hardcore dudes over there with some power,

and I think that they'll get some things taken care of it, you know, that need to be. It's not just the United States that's pissed off about this thing. And we were, we've just competed in the World Cup in Iran maybe, I don't know, maybe two, three weeks ago and had some great meetings. And really, wrestling, politically, wrestling brings. these countries together. I don't know that people realize that, but Iran, you know, they don't have meetings with the United States on very many, very many things. You know, we're not necessarily friendly countries, but these guys were embracing and together and talking about moving forward

with the sport of wrestling. And here, you know, Iran is a, could be a nuclear power, a nuclear threat to us, and yet wrestling is bringing us together. And same with Russia, you know, former Soviet Union, and we're all in a way friends and can agree on one thing that wrestling should be in the Olympics. And that's very powerful. That's very powerful internationally and worldwide. And you've got countries like Japan and China that also have something to say about this. So it would be a huge mistake to take it out in 2020, and hopefully we'll be able to make that change

because sports like modern pentafron and trampolining and stuff. are not necessarily the backbone of the Olympics, in my opinion. Again, I'll say it. I don't believe it's actually going to happen. I don't think it will come to pass. You bring up great points, and I think everyone agrees, at least in our sport, that it should stick around.

We'll have to wait and see. Aaron, always great catching up. Good luck in your World Series of Fighting debut. It goes down Saturday night, Atlantic City, New Jersey, Aaron Simpson versus Josh Berkman. Again, the main event, Andrei Arlofski versus Anthony Rumble Johnson. and looking forward to seeing you back in action

and maybe seeing that Fitch fight once and for all. Again, congratulations on the new deal, Aaron. Good luck in the fight. We'll talk to you soon. Thanks, man. I appreciate you. I'll talk to you later. There he is.

Aaron Simpson's stopping by, and he returns to action on Saturday, as I said. It's a World Series of Fighting 2, and it's a fun card. It's on Saturday night, as I've mentioned a couple of times. The main card is at 9.30 p.m. Eastern time. J.Z. is on the card. Dave Branch. Palofilio, that's interesting. It's always interesting to see what kind of shape Palofilio will show up in

mental state. I mean, again, let's not forget, not too long ago, Palophilio was considered by many top three, some even top two, top four, top five, best middle weights in the world. Of course, he's fallen on hard times. But I think that's, it's interesting in itself to see, you know, what Palo Filio can do at this point in his career, especially on a stage like this. We haven't really seen him on a stage like this in America since he fought for W.C. Birkman Simpson. And then a big fight that's been sort of flying under the radar, Marlon Morais, who defeated Miguel Torres, the first World Series of Fighting Card against Tyson Nam.

We haven't seen Tyson Nam since he knocked out Eduardo Dantes, the Bellator Bantamomwe champion over the summer. He knocked him out in that Shudo event. And this was the event that, or the fight that Belator doesn't want you to talk about, doesn't want you to remember. Knocked him out, wasn't supposed to win, was brought there as kind of an opponent. And after that, Tyson Nam was involved

in a bit of a contract war. Bellator was claiming his rights. He was signed to Belator never fought for them. UFC was inquiring World Series of fighting won out. And they had Marlon win. They brought Tyson into the cage. And this is what I talk about. I'm curious to see second time around how they do

because they brought Tyson into the cage, but they didn't really build them up. They didn't have a good confrontation. I appreciated the fact that they did it, that they wanted to go that route to build up for the next fight, but it wasn't executed as best as it could be. Still, it's a good fight at 135. Curious to see how that one goes.

Marlon Morais, training with Frankie Edgar and Ricardo Almeida and those guys over in New Jersey as well. So that's interesting. And then, of course, the main event, Andre Arlofsk v. Anthony Johnson. and then some interesting fights on the undercard as well, which you can watch online. I believe they're going to be on Sherdog.com.

7 p.m. Eastern, it kicks off. Chris McCrae versus Danilo, Villaford, Igor Gracie, fighting on the card, Waylon Lowe, a former UFC fighter against Cameron Dollar. So there are some interesting names on the second World Series of Fighting Card. And I can also tell you that, according to the people at World Series of Fighting,

they texted me this while we were doing the show, they have signed a deal with Univision. And as a result, World Series of Fighting 2 will air live on Univision Deportes on Saturday night. So they've signed a Spanish language deal with Univision. That's big for them. Of course, Univision is part of the NBC Sports family, Comcast, all that stuff. So a natural fit for them. Curious to see what they do, they already have their third show lined up for June 14th in Las Vegas.

Before we get to the ticket giveaway, again, it feels so weird. I can't see any of the guys. Usually I see them behind the cameras in this glass area, but it just feels like I'm sitting in a room talking. I hope you like it. I like the look. I think it looks cool. I've been checking in on it.

It seems like it's been working well. People have not been complaining about the sound, the video quality. I understand there are not that many people behind me, so it doesn't look like a newsroom per se, but I can guarantee there are people back there working. And again, this is a temporary studio. I'll tell you that.

There is no show next week. We're off next week because it's Passover. I'll be back in Montreal celebrating Passover. So happy holidays to everyone out there who celebrates Passover. Early happy Easter to you as well. So there's no show next week. We return the following week. So next week is the fifth.

I believe the following week is what the 30, 31st, 30th? What is the following week? Let me get this right. I think it's already April by then. April 1st April Fool's Day I'm told we'll have our real set but I gotta admit

I'm kind of digging this right now I don't know we have a real cool custom set being built for us let us know what you think as well I don't know I kind of like it it's different it's different but it's alive

it feels like we're actually doing something important at least that's the way I like to think okay one more thing before we get to the tickets you see here the Halwani nose shirt a cut out of it went on to sale last week. We put them out there, MMAWarehouse.com. And amazingly, we had three colors.

All right, we had three colors. We had yellow and red, black, silver, white, red. And in a little over a day, small to double XL for yellow. So we're talking small, medium, large, XL, DxL for yellow sold out. Small to double XL, small, medium, large, XL, DxL for black and silver sold out. sold out. Now, I checked this morning, there are no more X-Ls, I believe, in white, and then there's the rest, small, medium, large, and double X-L. But that's it. What do we got here? Yeah, there's small, medium, large, double-xel. Very limited quantity left. There's maybe a couple in each size. Appreciated so much, and I want to give props to my man, Brenton King. Follow him on Twitter.

Great guy. Good with the Photoshop stuff. Brenton, B-R-E-N-T-O-N-K-I-I-N-G. He's the one that came up with the Halwani Nose Look, and I appreciate him very much doing that. And all the proceeds, remember, go to the Colorectal Cancer Association of Canada. You can follow them on Twitter.

Twitter.com slash colon Canada. And what's interesting about it is I was informed yesterday that this month is actually colorectal cancer, Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. So what timing? So the fact that we were late is actually a good thing. And their website, by the way, is colorectal.cancer.ca. If you want to learn more about them,

my father-in-law is the head of that charity. So it is a charity that is near and dear to my heart. The website, by the way, is colorectal-cancer.ca. That's where you can learn more about the charity that all the proceeds are going to. I appreciate all the support. Appreciate everyone buying them and people have been tweeting me pictures. Anytime you tweet me a picture of you wearing that shirt, I will retweet it, and I will thank you so much. I really do appreciate it.

So that's that. Now, earlier in the show, we said that we have four more tickets to give away, two pairs, to World Series of Fighting Two, and we asked you all to tweet us your best Diaz pose. Nick or Nate, hashtag Diaz pose, and Newark Rick was going to gather those, and we would give out, like we did last week with the fitch face, give the two pairs out to the two best. Now, I can't see you, as I said, but New York, Rick, are you there somewhere? Can you hear me? I'm somewhere. Oh, wow. Hello, my friend. How you doing?

It's been a while. We haven't talked in a while. Do you miss me? Can't say, you know what? I would have said yes, but you're talking about these t-shirts and you know who doesn't have one. Oh, that's right. I don't. Yeah, did you buy one? They're on the website.

Well, that's a good point. Goes to charity, my friend. What have you been waiting for? It's a good point. Yeah. Were you trying to get a freebie, not pay in the charity? You know, one of the perks, maybe. The perks.

So you don't want to support the charities, is what you're saying. Yeah, this was a bad road to go down. Yeah, that was a bad road to go down. Now, what's going on back there? What's the vibe like? I feel like I'm missing out. Well, as you can see, I look like I'm in like a space shuttle. Okay.

I look like I'm kind of just floating around here. I can't really see. we're on a bit of a delay, so I can't really see. But there's a lot more space. It feels better ventilated. We're having a good time back here. We can actually leave to use the bathroom now. I mean, I've walked behind you three times during this show alone.

Really? Yeah. What have you been doing? Went to the bathroom, grabbed a drink. Are you serious? Had to get some paper. Really? Aren't you supposed to be?

What if I asked you a question in the middle of an interview? I was only gone for like 30 seconds. All right. I'll answer. Okay. Yeah. Brendan's got it a lot. Yeah, Buzzkill's really going to step up to the plate.

So is that it? Is that all you have to say about back there? I'm very curious. This is a big deal. Let's go through the history of the MAAR studios. I think people would appreciate this. We started off in essentially what was like a broom closet at AOL. They told me you can't go more than 20 minutes.

20 minutes. My intro wasn't even 20 minutes long. They said, you can't go more than 20 minutes. I said, just give me an hour. And let's call it Fight House radio, because back then it was Fan House, right? AOL Fan House. Fight House Radio. Then we found out after episode three that the name Fight House was actually taken in Jim here in New York, so we had to turn it into the MMA hour, which worked because we

were actually a one-hour show. I remember one of our highlights in the early days was we did a show. We taped it. We weren't live at that time. We did a show with Mike Chiapetta and Michael David Smith. And at the end of the show, I thought I was unplugging my computer, my plug. I actually unplugged the main computer where the show was recorded and everything was lost, and we had to do the show all over again. Those were the dark days of the MMA hour. Then they upgraded the studio, and it was pretty good. It was nice.

We had a nice team there. Then SB Nation, Vox Media, purchased MMAFighting.com, so we moved. And remember we had that one studio show, that one in that weird place we were in a control room. I don't know what the heck we were doing there, but it was an epic nightmare. I mean, it was one of the worst days in my life, honestly. It was horrible. I was sweating. It was very awkward, the whole thing.

It just didn't look right. And that's actually where I met Isaac. and I'll get to him in a second. And thankfully we never went back there. A bit of a hiatus. We actually went back to the AOL studio, even though we weren't there anymore. Then we went to that studio next to Madison Square Garden. The other kind of bloom closet, it was a bit of a makeshift studio.

But we kind of grew into it. We had some issues at first, but it sort of felt like home. Now, here we are the final resting place, at least for now, for the entire Vox Media team here in New York. And we have the studio here where they're going to be doing a bunch of a podcast will also be doing the MMA beat here, a bunch of exciting things, but the custom set isn't there yet. So we did this because obviously we wanted a show big, big Monday, UFC 158. So we did this. And I'm feeling it. How do you feel about it? I mean, are you feeling this or do you want to see how the custom set looks? I mean, I want to see the custom set, but I like this for sure.

Yeah. This looks great. Looks nice. All right. We just saw Robbie dancing in the back. I mean, we've got good stuff going on. Awesome. All right. Let's look at the DS poses. We have some good ones, right? I have to tell you, I thought the fitch was great last week. This topped it. Really? This destroyed it. How many did we get?

At least like 10. We've got some amazing submissions. Okay. So you say at least 10. I was expecting a better number than that. It's more than that. I don't know the numbers. I don't want to give a high estimate.

Okay. Let's look at them. Okay. We got the first one coming up right here. Now, we're starting off with a bang here. Okay. This is actually from a real fight. This is from a fight.

He's doing the, he's doing the, where you at. Okay. In the fight. Who's this? This is Luke P. Noel. Okay. Not bad. Yeah, that's, I mean, that is a Diaz pose.

And that's a great way to start it off. I mean, in an actual fight, doesn't get much better than that. What else we got? Our next one is the junior division. That is amazing. Now, are we sure these people live in the area, right? We're not closing these so we can go back through. But if they submitted, we'll be able to tell if they lived in the area.

Okay, okay. And most of the people who didn't that I'm still going to feature indicated, like, oh, we don't live around, but just wanted to send it in. Fair enough, fair enough. So that's our second one. This one, he's going for the meme mug. This guy, I remember this guy from last week. He wants some tickets, man. He wants to.

All right. I mean, I got to give props to him for that. He really wants the tickets. Now, I've kind of grouped these together. There's mean mugs, and there's different things. So we'll see what's next after this one. Oh, okay, this one's... Oh, wow.

Expletive. Wow. But another mean mugger. Taxes. He says, F, taxes. Let me get them tickets. I don't pay taxes either. That is great.

Nice hair, by the way. Yeah, incredible. This one's a little bit weird. Okay, you know why I like this one? And I was noticing this. I think I know what he's doing. Did you notice when Nick went on the scale on Friday? Did you notice what he did with his hands?

I didn't. He went like this. I don't know. Can you see me? Yeah, we got you. He went like this. He put his hands like this and then he went and then he went. And then he flexed it.

And then he formed it into a flex. And it was just, I've never seen anything. So I think that's what he's doing, right? I don't think that's what he's doing. But if it is, that's great. Oh, what is he doing then? Is that an ET hand or what? I don't know what.

I don't know what's going on here. He went like, and then he was so funny the way he did. It was so interesting. Anyways, I hope that's what he's doing. If he's not, I don't know what the heck he's doing. Yeah, this one might be that. This one might be that. People are doing it.

People notice. What was that? It was very strange. This is a good one. I respect this one as well. And if you notice on the, it's kind of tiny, his icon is actually Dias mean mugging. Oh wow. It's a cartoon.

Yeah. I know this guy. I remember this guy. That's a good one. Now this is the group that I like to call the middle finger group. Okay. We're starting to get into this section. Okay.

All right. So that that looks like a typical Nick Diaz blog. video blog where he's in his car right yeah but I want to know how do people I guess maybe they see it on Twitter because how do they know that we're talking about this our show isn't on the radio what do you mean well how do they know that we asked for Diaz poses if he if he's in the car he tweeted it oh in the car I don't know maybe he might have had it on yeah that's true and he thought finally finally I have a reason to share this with the world and and we're happy he did what else we got this one's interesting I'm

Wow. Oh my God. He put a lot of effort into this one. Press conferences for dummies. Wow. Lodi soccer mom suck. Is that his face? It has to be right. It looks like it, judging by his Twitter avatar.

Bill Steinmetz, that is impressive. To go that far, put that kind of effort into it is very impressive. This one, you really got the mean mug. That is amazing. This guy's name's Nico. giving us the face, the chin, the mouth, and the fists are very much Diaz-like. Yeah, this one's good. Now, this is where we get a little more interesting.

All right, what is he doing there? Huka. Yeah, yeah, that's got to be it. Yeah. No shirt also. Well, he has another one. Same guy. Same guy.

Next question. Jeez, okay. Flip and smoking whatever he's smoking. All right. It looks kind of like Charles McCarthy. you remember him. Former UFC fighter. Here's our next one.

Wow, look at this guy. Now, he's got all the poses. This guy has a whole, like, he has a whole series. So this one's very impressive. The many faces. I've got to say this one's my top pick so far. Really? Because of all the different poses, I really like it.

He wanted it. He did want it. And you had to go through the trouble putting it all together. It looks like he's at work in front of the office bathroom. And he had to get someone to do this for him, who obviously thought, he was a weirdo. Why the hell are you doing this? Because he didn't do it himself, clearly. Here's our next one.

Okay, this one is it? This one's not oriented properly. It's not, but I could still see it. He's wearing the hood. Trying to replicate, so I also appreciate that. I do appreciate that much like the Fitch one last week. A female submission. Wow, I like that.

Those are some massive gloves? Are those the real gloves? They're probably just too big, but they're also close to camera. A female submission. Wow. What does she say? Morningside Heights. WSOF. D.S. Face. She didn't, hey, by the way, she didn't tag it D.S. Pose. How did you find it? Because she sent it to you?

There were some that were showing up on the M.MA hour Twitter tag, so I just ported them over. Man, people can't follow instructions. Should we dock points for that? Yeah, you should. Well, okay. This one's great. Oh, my gosh. This one is incredible.

Oh, my gosh. He has the IRS bill. God. In hand. Nothing illegal going on. That might be the best one. So this one's my new number one so far. Okay, okay, okay.

Mr. Dutton. Oh my gosh. Flipping the double, right. Herm. There you go. At work. With a massive ring. Those are big knuckles.

Wow. Some Shane Carwin hands. Yeah, those are Shane Carwins. Wow. That's impressive. I like it. I like the look. Another double bird.

Wow. Didn't have too much time, LOL, Chris Avery MMA. A lot of double birds. Although Nick didn't pull it out in his last fight, so maybe we got to dock a few points for that. No, I'm not. All right. Now this one, watching the MMA hour.

Oh, wow. Oh, wow. Chris Mardelli. That's plus points in my book. That is a long finger right there. Holy moly, that is long. That is incredibly long. That is a pointer, if I've ever seen one.

Yeah, that's impressive. That is impressive. Now here's our friend again. He doesn't want to win. He just, he's just bringing out the picks again. First off, last week, his hair was much longer. Remember? Yeah, that's right.

He must have gotten a haircut. Did he get a haircut? Tell us on Twitter. Sean Sheehan B.A. This guy is incredible. But the hair was longer last week. Always a pleasure to hear from him. He's amazing, this guy.

Now, these are guys who aren't in the contest. they're just tweeting pictures because they live too far away, including our buddy Sean. This next one as well. In a dark room. Yeah, he's in GSP's dark place. That's what it looks like. Yes.

And another female submission. Oh, yes, we know this girl. This is the catfish. No, well, I think she's proven at this point. The supposed catfish. A girly MMA, I don't live nearby, but couldn't resist the Nick Diaz pose. Now, what is she holding there? Lanyard?

I don't even know. what that is. What is that? That looks like the, you know, those beads that, are those beads? Is that a necklace or what? It looks like a lanyard, honestly. What do you mean lanyard? Like what you put a credential? Well, that's one type of lanyard, but the one, the plastic stuff that people used to weave together in summer camp to make, like, all kinds of, oh, what does that have to do with Nick Diaz? I don't know. But it's very girly, by the way. See what I mean? Like, how it's all presented? Well, we'll find out what it is. Okay. That was it. That was it. That was it. That was it. That was impressive.

Yeah, these were great, huh? Okay, all right. So we got to go with that one guy with the IRS thing. For sure. We'll put that one back up right now. We're giving way two pairs. All right, this guy wins. That's an automatic.

Yeah, that's an automatic. David, Mr. Dunn, you win a pair. And then who else wins? Well, I like the collage. That one was pretty good. Oh, the collage was nice. Could you go back to the beginning quickly? Yep.

We'll go all the way back. That was the collage. We also do have a child involved. Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. Go back to the kid. Okay. This is our second one.

Man. But do you think they took it right now? Maybe not. But maybe so. What do you think? I mean, it looks like there's a lot of grass out there, and I feel like, well, maybe. And the kid's wearing a t-shirt outside.

You know what I mean? All right. You sleuthed it. We'll move on from that one. This guy, you know what? try twice. This is our only repeat guy other than Sean, but legitimately, right? I think we might have had some other repeats, maybe, though. Really? Who made it at least this far?

We got this guy. We got this guy. Hit the sign. But we went to taxes route. I'm going to give it to my boy the previous one. Yeah? He did it twice. All right. There it is. Steve wins. Steve wins. So there you have it. Two tickets to World Series of Fighting this weekend, Reville Resort and Casino, and our other friends. friend the F Taxes guy got them as well. So congratulations and thank you to World Series of Fighting for hugging us up with tickets. That's great.

So I guess New York, Rick, we'll contact you via Twitter to let you know how you can pick them up. Is that what we're doing? Yep. All right, cool. What do you want to do now? Questions or Rick's picks? Why don't we do Rick's picks? All right. So, UFC 158, we are, what day is it today? March 18th, We are a month and 10 days or so away from the deadline. The big deadline. Last week you had a good week.

No, two weeks ago you had a good week. Wait, what was that? What was the last event? 157. So two weeks ago, you had a good week. How'd you do on Saturday? I was up 20 total. Okay.

I put, I think, around 65 on the line. I put six. The first thing I actually bet was $6 on Nick Diaz by submission. because it was paying 12 to 1 and I was like, I assumed that this fight would take place on the ground for about 25 minutes and if Diaz was going to win,

it was going to be by submission. I didn't think he was going to stand with George long enough to get a knockout or a decision. So that was what I thought for that one and I thought 12 to 1 was decent odds. So I threw $6 down, almost expecting to lose on that one. So that was the first bet I made.

And then later I got into the bets that I was confident in and not, you know, just taking the odds. I took, I put $20 on GSP minus nine and a half and conned it plus three and a half a parley of those two. Now, let me explain what the handicap numbers mean because people were asking me about this. I have no idea what it meant. Minus nine and a half means that GSP has to win on the judge's scorecards by at least 10 points. So for example, a unanimous 5045 decision is five. is 15 points because three judges, there's a five-point difference on all three of their cards. So that's 15 points.

Gosh, that's so confusing. I think it's not confusing. Okay. So that's the way you went? Well, that's because you get better odds. I got GSP minus 9 and a half. With who, though? What do you mean?

How'd you get that? Like, where do you see that? That's on the betting sites. Oh, really? Wow. You didn't just make this up. No. Okay.

No, I did not make it up. You get better odds because you're handicapping yourself. Okay. And I got Condit. Now, Condit lost, but you'll see the math here. I got Condit plus three and a half. Even though he was an underdog, I took slightly less money, but I got points. So what that does is even though Condit lost, he only lost by three points because 29, 28 is one point and there's three judges.

Wow. That means he lost by three points total. but I get three and a half points. So even though Condit lost, all I needed was for him to steal one round on every judge's card, and then I would win, even though he lost the fight.

So that's why you want to sometimes play the numbers and the handicap game, because I thought Hendricks could use his wrestling, which it proved that he would, to defeat Condit, but I thought that Condit would steal at least one round on three cards. So that turned out to be a while.

wise choice and that cashed. So then the next one was just a $15 straight bet on Nick Ring, which did not go well. I don't know what his game plan was going in. I don't know who he was trying to emulate. He was trying to pull an Anderson Silver or something. I don't know what was going on there. So I lost that one. And then the last one I had was just a straight parlay on GSP and Jordan Mien.

$25 to win 15. And then you obviously won that. So I won that, yeah. Wow. So I won most of my bets except the flyer on Diaz by submission, and then Nick Ring decided to fight like not Nick Ring. But I appreciate you going Diaz, but the Rick of a month ago, wouldn't have done that? It depends on the odds, but possibly not. And by the way, I just want to let you know, as I like to do backstage with my producers and whatnot of the people we work with, I went, I think there were five, nine, three, 12 fights, I went 10 for two.

perfect on the main card. The ones I got wrong, McDessie, Crookshank. I picked Crookshank, I picked also Duran overroop. The rest, I got them all right. What do you think of that? I think that it's very easy to pick fights when the betting game is involved. Well, would you have picked Nickering had there been no line involved? Yeah, absolutely. Well, I honestly think he won that fight. That's a separate thing. I think that he won the first two rounds. But I definitely don't think it was a robbery or I have no problem with that, judge's decision. I think that he looked terrible in the third round. He fought a poor strategy, and if he lost, he lost. I do think he won, but I have no problem with the judge's decision

on that one. All right. So right now you're up. What's your final? I'm at 136. You're at 136. So you're all the way back. Now you're over. Now you're in the money. You're in the black, as they say. And you told me something very interesting before the show about where you stand right now. Well, at this point, mathematically, if I was to bet all of it on a two to one underdog right now, I would make the 400. And obviously, he has to win. But if I was to bet on any two to one dog right now, I would make enough to win. That's incredible. What a turn of events.

Well, it speaks to what I was saying before, which was you want to just put yourself in better position every week. And then when you see something that is lucrative, when you see something that's worth the betting on a two to one underdog, That's when you put it all on the line. So we'll see how it goes. I might see something this week. I might see something right before 159. We'll see. So, of course, this week there's World Trees of Fighting.

There's Bellator. But as far as UFC goes, you still have four more UFCs. You've got fuel, what is it, fuel eight, then you've got, no, fuel nine, then you've got tough finale, then you've got Fox 7, and then you have 159. you've got a lot to play with here. Yeah, I do. Now, are you going to bet on World Series or Bellator? I haven't looked at the lines for those yet, but I imagine if there's something decent.

I'd be interested in the Arlovski-Johnson line. I have to see it, though. So there are no lines out yet for that? There might be. I haven't looked yet. Geez. What are you doing back there? It's Monday.

Relax. It's been very hectic. Oh, today? Yeah. Today's been a rough one. Oh, I see a tweet here from a girly MMA, our friend ad. She's saying it was a bracelet that Nick himself ripped off at the way. That was incredible.

Did you notice that? Right before they faced off, Nick had like the bracelet that he had to get into the arena. And for some reason, he just ripped it off. And let me tell you, it's hard to rip those things off. I mean, they're on pretty tight. And for some reason, he just ripped it off and then they had their little tete-a-tete, their melee. So, yeah, it didn't really come across that way. But I appreciate the detail.

That's impressive. Yep. Okay, so that's it for Rick's picks. All right, so you're up, you're feeling good, you're feeling confident now. You're one bed away from winning this damn thing. Well, I was always confident. I just had a rough picking stretch, that's for sure. I wasn't doing myself any favors early on.

By the way, see our friend Sean also writing on Twitter. Last week's picture was taken a few months ago, finally got a use for it. Ha ha. So he cheated. Still great. Still great to hear from him. Oh, getting a phone call. All right, we're going to go to questions now.

Is that true? Are we doing questions? Yes, well, before we get to the questions, let me just read a few things, courtesy of our friends over at Fight Metric. They gave me a few interesting stats from Saturday night. I think you'll appreciate these. Darren Elkins' win versus Antonio Carvalo was his fifth as a featherweight in the UFC. He tied Dustin Porier for the lead in the division, and that's his fifth straight.

Impressive. Another one. Ellenberger's knockout of Marquart tied him for the second most in Walterweight history with five. Ellenberger has knocked out his opponents down eight times in the UFC tie with GSP for second most in Walterweight history. First is Tiago Alves with nine. This is an interesting one. Johnny Hendrix's 12 landed takedowns of Carlos Condit were the third most ever landed in a UFC bout ever. UFC record belongs to Sean Shirk for his 16 takedowns of Hermes Franca at UFC 73. Hendricks is now the most active takedown artist in Walter Wade history among fighters with at least five UFC fights. He averages 5.47 takedowns per 15 minutes of fighting the previous high mark

in the division was Carl Peresian. He had an average of 5.27. This among many reasons is why I think Hendrik versus GSP is such an interesting fight. I love it. I love everything that Hendricks has been doing. I even loved his promo after he won that fight saying he was going to go to GSP's house with a ref and just do the fight there. And he, He's handled everything so well. I'm really looking forward to this fight. Now, one more. GSP earned his 18th victory inside the Octagon,

tying Matt Hughes' record on Saturday night. He also passed Hughes' record for total welterweight title defenses with nine. So there you have it. History made on Saturday night. Let us go to the questions. You left some on the website, also Twitter via the hashtag the MMA hour. What do we got? This is our first question.

This is one that a lot of people wanted to know about. So if I didn't pick your version of the question, please forgive me. But everybody wanted to know about this. Hi, Ariel. I found the reaction toward you at the pre-fight press conference very harsh. He's referring to Dana White. He was annoyed and very cold and blamed you for the question about missing the workout thing. And cut short with a, do you have a question about the fight?

And then 99% of the other journalists questions were about the missing workout thing. I know you have a love-hate relationship, but that was very not cool. Did that bum you out and did he apologize afterwards? I wasn't bummed out by it. I was a little bit surprised, but I understood it. You see, the way I took it was Dana is sticking up for his guy. You know, he probably had to talk with him. You know, they just wanted to get to Saturday night.

At that point, 48 hours away, just get to the fight. You know, he showed up to the press conference in their eyes all as well. but I'll be honest with you. And Dana's right about two things. Yes, he knew what I was going to ask, and he was proud of that, and I took it as a compliment. I was, you know, the way I took that was, of course you knew what I was going to ask, because you respect me as a journalist, because you know I'm not going to ask some hack question about what he had for breakfast, or if he was excited or ready for the fight, what his game plan was.

Of course you knew because I was about to ask the question, and you know the kind of questions that I asked, that's the way I took it. And then the other thing was, well, you know, he was like, you don't like to ask questions early on. And I have. I remember the Ronda Rousey question. Remember when he brought the belt to the podium in Seattle? I asked that one first. I asked why he had a belt.

And then I asked another one as well. The way I felt was if anyone else got that mic first and asked another question, 24 hours removed from Diaz missing the workout, saying what he said on Twitter, this is not something that happens often. It would have been an embarrassment to MMA media. And quite frankly, I was afraid that was going to happen. Everyone was watching that press conference. I know from my Twitter, I know from people texting me afterwards.

That press conference was must-see TV. And usually pre-fight press conferences, let's be honest, sometimes they can get a little dull. Sometimes they're great. When they're involving Nick Diaz, they're great. Other guys as well, Chelle Bisping, those guys, great. And if someone else would have taken that mic and asked something, to either Diaz or someone else, it would have been, in my opinion,

embarrassment to MMA media. So yes, I asked for the first question. Thankfully, I got it, and I thought there were valid questions. No hard feelings. You know, like I said, I don't think he insulted me. I don't think, you know, he was out of line.

That's his show. He could say whatever he wants. Would I have liked Nick to at least respond? Because I didn't think Nick was bothered by the question. And I think it sort of conjured up all those instigator, antagonizer, all that stuff. I think it brought that back and I was getting that on Twitter and whatnot.

But I don't think Nick was bothered. And Nick was the one that brought up the flight. That was my third and final question. And I just wanted to know, was your flight delayed? Did you miss your flight? Did they book you too late? Did you have an issue with that? And then we could find out and then we can move on.

But yeah, as my friend here says, Thomas, people ask about marijuana. People ask the same question that I asked later. There was no issue with it. But maybe off the bat, they didn't want that and whatever is what it is, as Dana White says. Then in the scrum, you know, the whole thing about the drug testing, what was interesting about that was I never said, you know,

there are guys out there that I know for a fact that we need to catch. I said there are whispers. There are whispers about everyone. We're going to sit here and pretend like you haven't thought or heard whispers about or heard rumors about or felt like these guys were cheating. I mean, again, one prominent MMA fighter told me one time, and this was the most. He said 90% of guys in MMA cheat.

And that's just not in our sport here. I mean, we know they cheat in baseball. People have been caught in football, in basketball, in hockey. They've been caught in all sports. They've been caught in golf. And so my question was, if you're going to go out and be, you know, and really take that next step and test guys and monitor them if they're asking for the TUE for TRT, then why not just test for everything?

And then, you know, the whole thing happened with, well, tell me who, and then don't bring that up if you're not going to say who. But then by the end of it all, Dana agreed with me in a sense. He didn't agree with me, but he just said the answer that he should have said from the top, in my opinion. It's too expensive right now. It's impossible to test 400 guys randomly because that's the key. Random testing. When they randomly test guys, they've caught a lot of guys. When guys know what's coming, when they could cycle, they're able to beat the system.

They could do what they need to do. and that was my question. Why don't you do that? Well, if you would have said right off the bat, listen, we have 400 guys, we can't just go around randomly testing everyone. Okay, that's your answer. That's valid.

Who might have said it's not? But the whole back and forth was like, really, I felt like we kind of were on the same page, but I don't know. I don't know. Maybe I did piss him off. Maybe it was the Tom Wright tweet when I said he's pound for pound,

the best press conferences. But Dana agreed with me. As did Tom Wright? Well, kind of. He appreciated it. I don't know if he agreed with me. But I do think. Tom Wright's great.

Anyway, it's water under the bridge because I saw him on Saturday night and we were cool. Did the interview with me, talked to him at the scrum and all that. So it happens. We can't always be on the same side. We can't always be best buds. And, you know, I have my motives and my job and he has his job and what he needs to accomplish. And that's going to happen. I was not offended.

I thought it was crazy. What I loved about it was the reaction of people. People say, oh, Dana laid the smackdown on you, a whole bunch of other names. And then what was funny was some of my haters online were finally giving me props. Like, finally, and I didn't even do anything. Like, all it took was Dana White, you know, being hostile, I guess, towards me. And then all of a sudden I'm cool. Oh, now I'm not a shill.

Now I'm not, you know, a Zufa zombie. Now, okay, now I'm okay. Same guy. I've been asking those questions from the beginning. you all know it. If you don't want to believe it, that's cool with me. But I'm the same guy I haven't changed. And as far as I'm concerned, everything's cool with us.

Was that a long enough answer for you? I had to get it out there. Geez. Oh, was that a... Oh, no, that was only the first one. All right. And wait, one more thing. This is the second question.

Okay. Canadian crafts. crowd noise is the title. Even in my humble home, I had goosebumps with the various Canadian crowd's reactions when GSP fought. Just how noisy was that crowd? And is it the loudest you have ever heard for a UFC fight, even Brazil? It wasn't the loudest. Brazil was the loudest UFC 134, but there's nothing like hearing 20,000 or so fans in unison chanting FU Diaz in the middle of a fight. I could tell you two people who weren't, my mom and my sister who were in attendance, they were not pleased with that chant. But for the most part,

it seemed like a lot of people were into that chant. And that was something. I did go out. Very few times, you know, I'm in the back of doing the interviews. Very few times do I get to go out into the crowd and take it all in, soak it all up. I did it for the rousy fight, and that was awesome. And I did it for this one because that was a moment right there. And credit to Bruce Buffer, by the way, he really brings something. I mean, without him, it would be totally different. He really amps that moment up and he makes it what it is, especially before the fight starts.

I thought that the GSP Diaz call from Buffer was his best ever. When he introduced GSP, it was incredible. That was his best. I mean, obviously the Buffer 360 gets a nod, but his introduction of GSP was

one of the best ever, one of his best ever by far. Did he say in the co-main event that it was the main event? He did. He was so amp because, I mean, look, that fight ended up being an all-timer. Well, yeah, I mean, it was worthy of a main event spot. But yeah, it was loud, not as loud as Brazil, but the crowd brought it. And I still don't understand why people say, oh, GSB always fights at Canada.

Oh, it's not fair. That's why they put him there. He sells the place out. And that is a massive arena. I think it's one of the biggest in the NHL. That's why Dana White said afterwards they're going to bring him back to Vegas. It's overdue. So we'll see about that.

Our next question, this is a good one. Nice and big. Question of the day. Did you go to McDonald's with Mike Ritchie? I did not. Mike Ritchie was calling me out on Twitter. He was pretty much saying, where are you at, George?

Except my name is not George. It's Ariel, but he was calling me out while eating, I believe, a fish filet. But no, I did not go. Quite frankly, I'm not sure if I can get behind that. By the way, our own New York Rick is a big lover. I mean, this is a guy.

How many times do you eat McDonald's a week? Well, since moving, I've been pretty good in terms of eating right. But, I mean, I can put down. McDonald's every day if I had to. Me and Mike Reachie should meet up. And it's funny, your physique is also very similar. I don't know about that. But he makes the list for one of my favorite fighters now just because of his diet.

It's funny. I mentioned last week, I can't forget, why did someone ask me this? Did someone ask me about this? I don't know where I even. Oh, yes, he asked me what my food was. And I said it was pizza with green olives and maybe some pineapple. And people give it. It's so funny how people just follow what you say.

And then when GSP was eating the pizza in our interview, I can't, I mean, I may have missed a few nuggets in there because I was just focused. It was just looked so good. It was like, what was it, like 1 a.m. I'm starving. He's eating pizza, not even listening to my question, has a mouth full of pizza and it was just Montreal pizza. I was very jealous. Our last question? From the site.

Yeah, from the site. Based on their respected skill sets, I suppose that's respective skillsets. who has a better chance of beating GSP, Hendricks or Silva? Man, that's a tough question. I mean, Silva is just a whole other cat. I mean, either 185 or sometimes fights at 205. I mean, I'm going to respectfully decline answering that question because I don't think it's a fair question.

At 170, I think Hendricks has the best shot right now. I'll tell you what, though, it's not just Hendricks, and that's it for GSP. I don't want to see GSP move from 170 anytime soon. What about Ellenberger? You know, one more win, he's in the mix. Ellenberger versus Maya next, I think makes a lot of sense. And then the big one, the one I really want to see, Roy McDonald. I still think it's going to happen.

I still think Roy would take the fight. Not so sure about GSP, but I want to see where they go with that. Of course, we have to see Roy back in action. I think he'll fight Carlos next. Hopefully he gets back soon. But there are still some intriguing fights out there for GSP. So I don't want to jump off the GSP 170 bandwagon just yet. Hendricks has a very, very interesting skill set

when it comes to matching it up against GSP, the wrestling, the boxing, the striking, you know, his cardio is good. Although it looked like if that fight would have maybe went five rounds, Carlos could have turned it around. Still, I'm very interested in that fight. I don't know. I don't think that's a fair question.

Do you agree with you? You know what I'm saying? I mean, you pick the question, so you probably like it. Well, I don't think it's unfair. Well, who would it be unfair to? if you picked one. Well, it's just, it's like apples and oranges. I suppose.

I mean, I think that there's an answer, and I think the answer is Anderson Silva. Of course, but I mean, it's Anderson Silva. I mean, he's a tough matchup for any, he's pound for pound the best. I mean, Hendrix is a tough matchup for anybody. Yeah, but if Anderson Silva fought Johnny Hendricks, who would you pick, honestly?

I'd pick Anderson Silva. Right. If Anderson Silva fought Junio Dos Santos, Kane Velasquez, who would you pick? Pound for pound, right? What do you mean pound for pound? No, if they fought, I would pick. In a fake world, in a fake world, if they could fight each other, and it would be fair with the weight, who would you pick?

I mean, in a fake world, then Anderson Silva kills everybody, but... That's what I'm time. In the real world, I would not pick Anderson Silva over Junior Dos Santos or Kane-Belazquez. Really? I think I would. What? No, I'm just kidding. Well, I mean, other than the weight difference, skill set, he should win the fight.

I mean other than 100 pounds. Well, that's what I'm talking about. Other than that? Fake world. Fake world. Okay. I mean, I think that it's a legitimate question. I think that Hendricks doesn't pose as many problems for GSP as Silva does.

But I think Hendricks is the guy who poses the most problems for him at 170. Although Rory and Damien Maya might be also up there. I think right now Hendricks has a better shot and what I love about, I'm curious to see how this fight does. on pay-per-view and all that, because Hendricks isn't the biggest name, but he's really coming into his own and it really worked out for him that he got to fight Carlos. Really curious to see how this show did on pay-per-view. Dana said it was trending to be on par with Anderson v. Chil 2, which was a great card for them at UFC 148.

So I mean, and I know we're going to get to this question right here, but the GSP business is still very much thriving, in my opinion. And let's not take anything away from Nick. He, in my opinion, may have added 100 to $200,000. thousand pay-for-view buys on his own. He carried that promotion, in my opinion. He deserves a ton of credit. I hope he gets a cut of the pay-per-view. He deserves it. Absolutely agree. Here's our first question from Twitter. Now, we have a lot of these, so let's try and, you know, speed it up a little bit. Okay, geez. What are you trying to say? I'm getting it.

I'm feeling it here. I'm enjoying myself. This is a fun, this is a fun thing for me. It's the new studio. No show next week. That's a good point. This new studio, it's invigorating you. Yeah, what's up with your, I'm not sure. how much I'm loving, you know, you went from too close, the other camera shot to now too far. We had some issues set out of the camera. All right, all right, all right. But I mean, it works. It works. Yeah. Here's our first question from Bill Conway, whose Twitter name is I hate Bill Conway. GSP now has six decisions in a row. Will his inability to finish his opponents

hurt his legacy? I don't think so. I mean, one finish and, you know, everyone forgets that. I remember Machita, everyone was saying, oh, he's boring, he doesn't finish fights. And yes, his last fight wasn't very exciting, but you get the point. Look, is GSP's Q rating right now as far as flashiness and excitement and all that, you know, as high as guys like John Jones and Anderson's, of course not. I don't think, I think when GSP fights, you're strapping yourself in for 25 minutes of fighting. But look, I'm really curious to see what Johnny Hendricks does, what he brings to the table, and GSP's fighting guys.

I mean, like I said last week, you know, he tried to finish Dan Hardy. I get what Nick was saying wasn't passing guard away. But maybe that was because of him. Maybe that's why he wasn't passing guard. So I don't think it hurts his legacy. I think he's as popular as he's ever been. And I just think he's fighting guys that he can't finish. but I don't think it's because he's not trying to finish.

I'm not one of those people who, you know, hates decisions or anything like that. And by no means would I ever, you know, question GSP's resume. But let's say Anderson Silva and GSP have the same resume. You have to look at who's finishing guys. You have to look at who does it more impressively. It's about style points. So your Machita example, Machita is not in the conversation for best of all, one of the best of all time. GSP is.

And if you're going to be in that conversation with it, Anderson Silva and even John Jones, you're going to have to put up some finishes. Now, I think GSP is a dominant champion. No question about it. But I do think it hurts his legacy in the long run. And by the way, by the way, that's why I have GSP number three in the pound for pound rankings right now. You do go for style points. That's why John is number two and Anderson's number one.

So I agree. And that's why, you know, Jose Aldo's, you know, kind of nipping at his heels. but not quite. There's still some distance there. It would be nice for him to maybe put himself out there a bit, but that's who he is. If you don't like it,

don't buy his pay-per-views. I don't think it hurts his legacy. He's still very dominant. Our next question. This comes from Marco Solis Martinez. With Zahabies guys taking a clean sweep at UFC 158, is team TriStar the best camp in MMA right now?

They're doing well. They're doing very well. GSP put them on the map. Faraz is a great coach. They've got great guys like Braleo Estima stopping by. I mean, they're doing very well. And they develop guys well. I don't know if I could say they're the best.

I mean, I think A.K.A. is still up there. Particularly how good, you know, Kane look. You got Daniel coming up. Daniel Cormier. They're in my top three. Off the top of my head. I mean, of course, Jackson's team is always there. Tri-Star is there.

A.K.A. is there. I'd say that's the top three, right? Definitely agree. And I think this question's a little like the best team could flip, you know, week to week based on who wins a fight. And I think at that level, these camps are all, you know, at that highest level. I don't think there's one who's necessarily ahead of the other. They're all great. And TriStar is definitely up there with Jackson's, with AKA, and some of the other super camps.

Kind of like the pound for pound rankings. One guy fights and you feel like he's number one after that. Definitely agree. here's our next question from fleek Diaz went after GSP twice after the horn at 158 a lunge and a swing should he be fined, released, why or why not? Well, certainly I don't think he should be released

but you know it is funny because Paul Daly because he connected, got released and kind of banished from the UFC I do think that at times Nick Diaz gets away with things because he is Nick Diaz I think if GSP would have done that there would have been outrage. But that's, I mean, no one's talking about this, right? No one's talking about this.

And after the second one, you could have made a case for him losing a point there because it was blatant. But it was funny because like when he, when he swung at him when he was on his back, immediately afterwards he said, I'm sorry. So maybe he just kind of, I don't know, he reacted a little late to the bell. I think it was one. I think I honestly believe Diaz's explanation where it was one of those things where he was just trying to like get in his head like a major.

you made you flinch type thing. Really? He was not trying to punch him, in my opinion. It looked like one of those. He saw George was getting up, and he threw something that wasn't going to connect. But you can't do that. Oh, no, I don't.

I'm not saying he should do it. I'm just saying I believe him when he says he wasn't trying to actually punch George. You know, because GSP was so dominant, didn't turn out to be a big deal. But obviously it's unsportsmanlike. Obviously, if you would have connected, that's horrible.

I mean, GSP is gar. artist down in between rounds. And that's maybe why it was surprising when they embraced afterwards. And I didn't mind it. I know a lot of people were mad about that. Sell the fight, sell the feud. But quite frankly, it felt to me again, as I mentioned

with, you know, I mentioned to Faras. George, it seems like he actually feels bad for Nick. Like, he really was bummed out when I told him about Nick calling, saying that he hits like a woman and that he wants to rematch and all that. It really felt like he was bummed out. and just the way he talks to him,

it feels like he kind of feels bad for him. So I think that he never really truly hated him. Like the hatred, it went from extreme hatred to actually sort of sympathizing as the fight approached. And I don't think that Nick really has a lot of respect for George. And he's telling him right to his face, sitting right next to him. It was kind of funny that GSP, Johnny, and Nick, were all sitting on the same side of the podium there.

but shouldn't be released. Can't be fine, I think, because he didn't hit. He didn't connect, but obviously on sportsmanlike. And I do think that people kind of look away because it is Nick Diaz. Our next question comes from Josh Dupuis? How would you say that? DuPui. Okay, Josh Dupuis, is Diaz the easiest interview to have?

It seems like you ask him one question and he answers five and talks for 20 minutes. I don't like that. Honestly, I mean, it's somewhat entertaining, but I want to ask him questions. You know, I had so many questions that I wanted to ask him. And the difference doing it on TV as opposed to for the Internet, internet, there are no time constraints. TV, there are time constraints, and we went way too long. It's very tough just asking Nick Diaz two questions. You're just warming up.

And I asked him two questions in five and a half minutes. It was unbelievable. I don't think I've ever had that with him. So I love talking to him. I find him fascinating. Again, I would love to go to Stockton, Lodi, any of those places, spend some time with them, walk and talk interviews, all that stuff. I think it would be beyond fascinating, and I know a lot of you agree as well.

But it's tough to only get, you know, three, four minutes, and he goes that long. And I should apologize because in the interview, at the end of the interview, I said, you know, he said, you know, he's talking about getting cut and I was like, they're telling me to cut this short. Of course, I was referring to, you know, there are people in my ear, there are people around. There are time constraints, people who have followed these things. And I shouldn't have said that kind of throwing them under the bus. So I do apologize for that. But it was sort of tense because he kept talking, talking, talking, talking.

And I was trying to find a way to cut him off, but not being disrespectful or rude. And I just sort of used his, him using the word cut, cut, it just sort of came out. Should have just said I had to wrap it up. But it is a very tough thing. So I wouldn't call it easy. I would actually call it tough, not because of what he's doing per se, but just because I want to ask so much and I only have so much time. especially during those fuel interviews. I feel like we're really learning a lot about the interview process with Ariel Hawani today.

Is that good or bad? I mean, I'm trying to be open here. I think people want to know about it. The first question we really got into it in this one as well. By the way, I'm not, I love, someone saying, you know, our friend, Irrelevant Ant, saying he knew Ariel gets annoyed when interviewing Nick. I love it. Again, I want to do it for many hours, but it's tough fitting that into three, four minutes. Don't be such an ass, all right?

I'm trying to pour my heart out here. Talking to me? Yes. I'm saying I love it. You're being facetious. Zero percent. All right. Our next question comes from Jamie Hicks.

Do you see Nick Diaz's point about him being unfairly portrayed as a villain and the UFC selling wolf tickets? Wolf Tickets was a great line. Have you ever heard of Wolf Tickets? I had. You had? I had, but I didn't know exactly what it was, but I had heard it before. And he nailed it, by the way. He used it perfectly.

I don't think so. I mean, I think he does a lot of it himself. Let's be honest here. You know, the pose, they didn't create that pose. He may have not liked it because it was old. And I think he gets Photoshopped. In fact, the other picture that they had was almost too Photoshopped. Look, the fingers, all that stuff, the posing.

That's who he is. And naturally, it's hard to sell that guy as the angel, right? that's just the way it's like stone cold cave austin he wasn't the good guy he was gray and i think that's the way nick is i don't think people montreal truly hated nick i think in the moment that chant got out but he was getting a lot of love in montreal couldn't be any further from stockton california um so there was an interesting video um on the m m m fiding dot com morning report from uh shawna al shawrani yes um where it had nick dyes backstage um talking to somebody from the u s about the photoshopping and all that wasn't cool that wasn't cool though um that was that i mean

that was a PR person for the ufc and they were filming him unbeknownst to him that's that's not a cool thing to do i definitely agree it was it wasn't um supposed to be taken but if if it's still up uh it's an interesting look why are you telling people to to to watch something that was taken illegally that's not cool that's a breach of someone's trust i didn't take you do you want to go around and have people filming you while you're talking supposedly in private? Would I want that? Of course not. By the way, you know it was funny. When I was at the airport yesterday, I'm going to my gate, and, you know, like, those

old carts that they drive people around in, you know, like if, you know, not the car, old carts, old people. I mean, those carts at beep, like little, little motorized carts. Oh, yeah, yeah, like the rascal scooter or whatever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm walking, and who do I see Nick and Nate getting driven to their gate? And I couldn't help but think if that was pampering or not. Was that them being pampered? But the funny thing was, was Nick, like, drives by me as I'm walking, and just gives me a high five and just keeps on going. Doesn't say hello, doesn't say anything, just a high five.

It was just like, yeah, we were supposed to meet here. That's the way to do it. That is the way to do it. Anyway, I think a lot of people like Nick. I think a lot of people support him. Even today, they still support him. I don't know if they're portraying him as a villain, but they're putting out what he does. And it's hard to, you know, GSP is so clean cut and so perfect in a lot.

away package that naturally he's going to come off that way. Our next question from Chanpreet Purba. Caesar Gracie guys are zero and three in UFC title fights. Shields, Nate, Nick. Will it be 0 and 4 with Gilbert? Well, aren't you Rick's picks? I say it will be 0.4. I don't see him beating Benson.

Tough styles match up. Well, I don't think it's necessarily about style. I think they have a very similar style. They're guys who can really wrestle, but don't go to it too much, to the point where nobody calls them boring or anything when they do wrestle. Very exciting fighters, like to stand, have good hands, but I think that Benson's just a little bit better everywhere. So I say yes, it will be 0 and 4.

I could see Benson going on a bit of a GSP run here, like a dominant run. I said after the fight where I picked against him, I picked Nate. If he keeps that aggressive streak, if he fights the same way he fought Nate, there's nobody at 155 who can touch him. Yeah, that's a tough matchup. Looking forward to it, I think it's fun. Strike Force champ, UFC champ. But you know what?

I stopped making picks on this show because everyone got all sensitive about them. It's not easy. People coming up to me, you know, I have to face these guys, you know, and they're, oh, you picked against me. At least you'll stay in your broom closet and no one will see you, you know? Ouch. I'm just being honest here. You know, it's tough to make picks when people get all mad about it.

I'll plead the fifth on that one. I don't blame you. Our next question comes from Nick. Condit took some big shots, but it didn't seem to hurt him. How do you think GSP would fare against those same punches? It's hard to say. Again, I really truly think Johnny Hendrix is the toughest opponent out there for GSP. Very well could be his toughest test as champion thus far.

Hendricks has really developed into a solid mixed martial artist. It's almost like we forgot that he lost to Rick's story. Remember he lost to Rick's story way back when, improved dramatically since then. And I think he brings the most difficult test to the table against GSP. Curious to see how it turns out. And I've seen some people already picking Hendricks in the fight, and I don't think they're crazy. I don't think they're crazy either. All right.

Our next question from our friend, Robert S. Pearson. Okay. Oh, our good bud. Yeah. Oh, yeah. He gave us a great present. last week, which will debut soon in this studio. His question is, is Ellenberger Maya the next logical bout to determine a number one contender?

If so, who do you pick? I do agree. I think Ellenberger, Maya makes total sense. I like that fight a lot. Ellenberger's wrestling. Maya's Jiu-Jitsu. Maya improved as a striker. Ellenberger obviously hits very hard.

And I think, you know, Safedine has kind of fallen out of the mix a little bit. there was talk of him maybe fighting Maya so that could happen but I feel like he's I don't know he's not as hot right now as he was back in January you know the other ones out there that you have to keep an eye out for Safferdeen Loller is creeping in some people's top tens but obviously he's a few fights away but you know what

you beat Josh Kostchak and things get very interesting Rory's still obviously in the mix but I want to see Rory fight Carlos Kondit and then there's Tyron Woodley who's fighting Jake Shields in June So that's kind of the way I see the welterweight division right now. I love the welterweight division. All of a sudden, it got super interesting, really quickly. It was always really interesting just because I thought it was always really talent-rich.

But now all these guys are really putting on their best performances and bringing it every time. Yeah. This is exciting. It's sexy. Moving on. Our next question comes from Jimmy Phillips. Oh, yeah. Were you surprised me and became the...

first man to stop Dan Miller on Saturday. And do you think he can make it to the top one day? I wasn't surprised. I mean, that's obviously a huge feather in his cap. Surprising the way it started and he was almost caught with the arm bar and then he turned things around, scrambled greatly and then he was able to finish Dan Miller. If you've been watching Jordan Meen, either in Strike Force, what he did to people like Cyborg and the local Canadian circuit, this kid, that was his 35th pro fight.

He's 23 years old. 23 years old, 35 fights. He had a great fight for the score of fighting series against Forrest Pets recently. I mean, the guy is a true talent. I think he is also in the mix as well. I should have mentioned him. A fight between him and Rory is very intriguing, but I think Rory is a bit up there right now.

But I want to see them bring him along. You know, Eric Silva has a fight coming up against John Hathaway. Maybe the winner of that. That could be very interesting. But he wants to fight in June in Winnipeg. But he also said he'd fight anywhere else. So I'm not going to peg him to that. But yeah, I'm very impressed with Jordan Meehan.

I'm not sure if he could go to the top, top, top. You know, it's a little maybe too early for that, at least in the UFC. But that's a great start against, you know, a true veteran, tough guy and Dan Miller. So very impressed in his father, of course, an M.M.A. fighter and active M.M.A. fighter, Leamian. Jordan obviously doing much better in his career these days. But, yeah, I'm very high on him. Our next question from He sang, she sung. That probably isn't a real name.

if it is? Yeah, it's a great name. It's a great name. If Silva loses to Wydenman, do you think the UFC would have interest in an Anderson Silva versus Nick Diaz fight? Versus Nick Diaz fight? That is a great question. That is a great question. Didn't really think of that.

What do you think? I said it before on the show. I think that Diaz versus Silva is a better fight than Diaz versus GSP. Just because I didn't expect anything differently than what happened on Saturday night. whereas Anderson Silva is obviously not going to be shooting for takedowns on him.

So I think that if they made that fight, it would be, it would sell. No doubt about it. It would be huge. And I love it stylistically. Oh, yeah. And there are still some interesting fights, like I said for Diaz, at 170 Lawler, you know, Safedine is interesting, Campman, et cetera. But yeah, wow, I didn't think of that.

And of course, Wyden has to beat Silva. But that's certainly a fight that Nick Diaz would come back for. So, hell yeah. They'll have interest. I'll have interest. We'll all have interest in that. This next one's a twit longer question. Wow, TMI.

Chad Mendes is ranked number one for featherweights, yet he's only beaten two guys in the top ten. And his opponent in the UFC, his opponents in the UFC include Metsa, Yaha, and Omaha. Yaya. Oh, Yaya. Honey Yaya, you never heard of him?

I've heard of him. All right. Isn't the number one guy supposed to have beat mostly everyone ranked. Why not just give him Lamas or Edgar? Is Mendez's ranking justified? Well, here's the thing.

Mendez was supposed to fight Mani Gamburian at UFC 157. Gambrian injured. They move him to Fox 7. He's supposed to fight Clay Guida. Guida's injured. Now he's left with no opponent. So those were two pretty big names.

Only loss was to Aldo and I think that has something to do with it. He is very talented. I mean, he's fought some guy, you know, he fought being, I should have been, I said beaten. and beaten Eric Koch back in the WC days.

I mean, he's legit. In my opinion, he's number three right now behind Edgar, just because Edgar gave Aldo a tougher test. But there aren't that many top guys at 145. You know, he was supposed to fight in December against someone got injured at the last minute, and that's why he fought Metsa. Remember that? Who's he supposed to fight?

Chad Mendes. Let's see here. he was supposed to fight hakron Diaz at UFC on FX 6 in December supposed to fight some top guys I think it's justified he's had some bad luck with injuries

as far as his opponents go but I think Mendez is very talented and I just don't think 145 is as deep as other divisions I agree I think I think it's justified there you know sometimes he may not be facing

opponents that are considered top guys but you can see the talent you can see what he would do against top guys. But I think he needs to fight a top guy before, you know, it's time for another title shot. Curious to see who they get for him because, I mean, that's a tough test in a month's notice to fight him. He doesn't want to move again, so that's tough.

Our next question comes from James Hawkins. Thoughts on Misha Tate being a possible tough coach after her recent coasting cornering advice. Would she make a good coach? Well, here's my take on that, first off, the whole idea. I think it's brilliant. You know, I've been down on tough. You know, I think the bells and whistles are nice now.

Still not really captivated by it, honestly. But I will say that this is interesting. If you missed it, eight women, 135, eight men, 135. In the same house, Ronda Rousey coach and the winner of Katzenegano versus Misha Tate. Now, what I don't like about it is the fact that we're not going to see Ronda Rousey fight now until December, December, January, that kind of thing, because this series probably will start in September, then it will go to the finale in December, probably Rhonda will fight New Year's Eve, that show, New Year's weekend, right? That kind of sucks. February, December,

that's a long time for her to be out. That's what I don't like about the tough thing. It keeps top guys on the shelf for a very long time. Also, if you were going to go this route, why even have Misha Tate fight Katzenegano? Misha versus Ronda is the rivalry that they want for tough. That's the rivalry people want to see on tough. Cat is not known as much. Of course, if she does something spectacular on April 13th, it's interesting, but she doesn't have that personal beef with Rhonda that Misha has, that would make for good TV. So why even risk it? Why even make that fight? Have cat fight someone like Alexis Davis, someone like that. So that's why I think it's a little funny. But you know how these things go. It's kind of hard to plan in advance. Will Misha be a good

coach? I think she's been around the sport long enough. Of course, that wasn't the best advice. But, hey, We've all given bad advice. It'll be funny to see how she tries to do the damage control and not, you know, and live that down, so to speak, and not live up to this kind of coach that we're talking about here. But it will be very interesting to see will the fighters listen to Misha Tate. She's not known to be a coach. I mean, Ronda has her background. She trains with guys.

You know, all that stuff. And so does Misha. But I think they'll be more inclined to listen to Ronda as they are. to Misha, it'll be interesting to see if they give both women the respect they deserve. And of course, they have their coaches as well. You know, Brock wasn't really the head coach when he was there and other guys as well. So it's an interesting wrinkle. Curious to see how it plays out.

Still hate the fact that Rhonda's going to be out for so long. Hold on one second. What's going on? Just fixing something up. All right. Make it look nice. Our next question comes from Gavin Devlin. Is it not a conflict of interest to have Rousey?

coach 135 pound women. Normally tough coaches and competitors are different weights. I don't think so. I mean, we've had guys off the top of my head. Can't recall. I mean, no. I don't think. Well, a conflict of interest, how?

It's going to teach them bad things? I don't think it's a conflict of interest. Yeah, no, I agree. But I definitely see the reason it might, you know, rub people the wrong way or, you know, just make them raise an eyebrow just because they'll know these other people so well. You know,

they're, they're, they're coaching them through an important time in their, in their training and in their careers. Um, as they're on the, as they're on the show. Um,

and eventually they may have to fight. So I, I definitely see where they're coming from. Yeah, but come on. For the show, it's not going to be a big deal. It's going to be interesting.

Do you like it? Men and women in the same house? I'm not a fan of, of the drama on tough. I would, I would watch tough. Honestly, most of the time,

I just watch the fights. I don't really even care about. But you need the drama to build the characters. You need to get interested in them. I have no interest in it. You need both. Well, if it's just Joe B versus Joe A, then it's not that interesting.

What do you care about them? You need to be emotionally invested. I want to see who's a good fighter. Why are you interested in Nick Diaz versus GSP? Why was the world interesting? No, that's a completely different story. Why? Ultimate Fighter, these guys are guys I'm watching as prospects to come into the UFC.

I don't consider the tough fights, anything of interest. I just, I'm watching them to learn more. about them for when they do come into the UFC. Then when they come into the UFC, then the story matters to me. But until then, I have no interest in any of the drama that happens in the house. And I only care about the fights. I disagree. You need to be emotionally invested.

You need to care. You need to know their backstory, who they are. Why do guys like Chris Leibon and other guys like that do well? Because they have some sort of not a gimmick, but you're interested in them. You can't just be bland. You've got to care about them. That's just my thing. Okay.

Just my opinion. I don't begrudge anybody who likes the drama. Save it for your mama. Yeah. Our next question comes from Robert Brown. Yes. Do you like the idea of having division-based cards? Do you think it's something the UFC should continue when possible?

I mean, it's nice because it kind of clears things up and you're excited about future matchups at the end, but I don't really care. I mean, I don't think they should do it, the heavyweights, the welterweights. It sort of feels like a tournament. yeah, but if it works, it works. If not, I don't think they should try to force it. Our next question comes from Jacob.

Do you think either Orlovsky or Johnson would get the call back to the UFC should they win Saturday night at WSOF2? Honestly, I mean, first off, you have to look at their contracts. Can they do it? And B, and Andre didn't want to talk about his contract. And B, it doesn't sound like Dana White's all that interested in this fight and would be all that impressed.

He thinks that, you know, he talked about Rumbles, issues, making weight and whatnot. I mean, winning at heavyweight doesn't say much about him making weight. Sounds like, you know, he's best suited at 205 and he can make that, but it doesn't sound like the UFC's all that excited about this matchup. So to answer your question, no. Ariel, what did you think of, oh, I'm sorry, this is from Mr. McGrath, Paul McGrath. What, Ariel, what did you think of Vince McMahon wanting to fight Dana?

Do you think it would be beneficial for either sport or show? Do we have 30 minutes? No. Honestly, I kind of talked about it with Mike. No, I think it's crazy, and I don't really understand the challenge. WW match, UFC fight, two different things. Why would Vince McMahon, a 60-something-year-old guy, want to challenge Dana to any kind of competition? Why would Dana do it to lose-lose?

It was a lose-lose-lose in many ways for the business, the Tito thing. This is even stranger. It just speaks to how wacky Vince McMahon is. I mean, would I watch it? Hell yeah, I would watch it. I would pay $200 for it, but I don't think it makes any sense. And I don't think it's beneficial for the UFC. And that's the perspective I'm coming from for WW.

Sure, why not? What do they have to lose? Older guy, you know, UFC's coming. It's sort of legitimizing them. It would get some press. WWI, I get it. Throw it out there. But what it makes me think is, does Vince have a legit beef with Dana?

I asked him that he shot it down, but it's just a weird thing. And I know this was happening a couple years ago with the Brock thing. They were trying to get him over. But yeah, just bizarre. Very bizarre. Not saying I wouldn't watch it and pay good money to see it, but very bizarre. And just so bizarre the way Dana dropped it, notchalantly in an interview with RDS, a French sports channel in Quebec. Our next question comes from Paul V. Better Rocky Inspiring comeback story. Mark Hunt getting the title shot or Nickel Rick hitting $400. It is pretty amazing, although, I mean, you got to go with Mark Hunt, you know, from, are you going to say something?

No, it's Mark Hunt. It is Mark Hunt. But, I mean, in your own right, you know, this is a pretty nice story of redemption. But what it does is, it's tricky now because now you're feeling good and this is what they want, right? This is what the system wants. They want you to feel good. So you drop that big money on the two to one and then you lose. So how do you beat the system?

Things are getting interesting now. Very interesting. Now, this is a great question. Oh, yeah. thing. Gotta ask, what was with Ariel Hohani's pink poodle shoes on Saturday? Are you jealous? I mean, he's giving me props. He's saying, how did you pull it off? How did you have the testicular fortitude, the confidence, the bravado to pull off this? I mean, I don't know where he's coming from. I'm assuming that's where he's coming from. Let me tell you something about those

shoes. Incredibly comfortable. I mean, you could tell right then and there. I mean, just look at that material. Comfortable. They're pink. Looks like he's wearing the brink. It looks like he's wearing the red heart glasses or she's where, I don't know what the sexes of the poodle, I guess. I thought they were wolf shoes, to be honest. So, yeah, I mean, I'm assuming Skip to My J's is giving me props there, but I think he's asking you a question as well. What did you think of them? They were horrific.

Come on. What is that? Explain it to me. Explain it to me what's great about them. You know, the problem is that I broke out the wings in Chicago, and now when I'm just wearing my normal SBs, people are like, where are the wings, where the shoes, where the colors.

It's like, now I've created this monster. Well, the follow-up question to that is, what's next? If this is the step after the wings, I got next. Then I don't even want to see it, honestly. But you know what's great about this? At the end of the day, honestly,

you know, I didn't tweet it out. I retweeted it, but I didn't initially tell anyone about it. It's only for the live viewing audience only, right? I'm not talking, you know, people mentioned in their interviews, I can't stop them. But I'm not wearing a shirt. I'm not getting all crazy like Craig Sager.

This is below. Business on top, party on the bottom. This is just for my comfort. I'm standing there for 10 hours doing these interviews. I need to be comfortable. Hence the shoes. Party on the bottom indeed. Yes.

This is our last one. All right. Getting dropped off had to be cool. What was inside the packed lunch your mom made you? And did she like your shoes? This is from Mick Marvel. Yes. Okay, it was incredible.

The whole week was incredible. was so much fun. On Wednesday, my flight got in late, but I made it to the workouts. Went to the workouts with my mom. She enjoyed it. She was there for like four hours, loved it, got to meet Carlos Condit, her favorite fighter. It was a very exciting thing. She was very into it. She loved the whole experience. Didn't attend the press conference. Attended the way-ins by herself. My mother, bless her, attended the wayans by herself, my partner in crime this week in Montreal. And then attended the fight with my sister but prior to that i was dropped off like a youngster going to uh going to the mall to see a film on a saturday night i was dropped off had the lunch i had uh chala bread familiar with that

from friday night dinner with some cheese just very just very um very casual but what was great about it was it was cut up into four pieces so you know it's a very long night you know we have our meal at like six o'clock and then this thing ends at like four i'm very hungry so i had one at around one at around 9, 11, and then my last one was at around two during the Dana White scrum. I just broke it out. I was just eating my chala sandwich packed by my mom, swacked, sealed with a kiss, and it was great. If I could get then to somehow make every second show a much of, I'm not going to say every show, but second show, it would be fantastic. It would be a beautiful thing.

One thing before we get out of here, we got a caller. Oh, yeah. From Missouri. Oh, wait. What about this? Are we're not going to this? We'll show that at the end. Okay.

After the call. Matt from Missouri. Are you there? Yes, I'm here. All right. The phones work. I'm doing well. How are you?

I'm doing pretty good. Kind of answered my question on the... I'll ask you about the Walterway Division. But how about I just ask you about some matches I think and then get your idea on it? Shoot. Okay. I'll think in like, obviously Hendricks's number, again, get the title shot. I was thinking more like maybe

Ellenberger versus McDonald, Connett versus Diaz, Camden versus Lawler, and then Damien Maya versus Saffidane, I think of Maya saying one to fight Safferineen.

I like Damien versus Ellenberger. I like Condit versus Rory. There's just that heat there that I like. I like Loller Safidine. So I'm going to poo-poo on all your choices. You know poop on my choices? Yeah. That's all right.

But I don't know. The one I want to see most, the one I want to see McDonald's. I think that's just an interesting matchup. It is, but don't you want to see Condit McDonald 2 first? Condit's come off two losses now, though. Yeah, but they have that... But come on.

I mean, once the GSP, once the Hendricks, one and two, I still think Rory's missing that big win against a top contender. It's a very dangerous fight for Conduct, by the way. And I agree with Mike. His stock has risen so much in my books. I just love the way he handles himself and the way he fights. I mean, really, I hope we get to see him for many years to come. But yeah, I want to see that Roy conned fight, you know,

sort of see if Roy can get over that hump. Yeah, true, true. Well, thanks for taking my call, Earl. Oh, yes. My pleasure, man. Thanks for calling. All right. Let's just throw this up on the screen real quick.

My man. We've got Chris in his Helwani notes. a shirt. Now he took it in the mirror, it appears, because it's backwards. It's very nice. His Twitter handles C-J-G-N-T-X. Does this shirt make my nose look big? That is awesome. Look at that. Howani knows. It's very weird, by the way, to see people wearing a t-shirt with your last name on it. And it's not, and by the way, when I started, someone once told me that I had to change my last name because it wasn't very, you know, media friendly. Look at me now. It's on T-shirts. Howani knows. You should send them a shirt.

I should. I should. And me, by the way. Not sure about you, but I am sending my good pal, Brenton King, a whole pack of them because he came up with it, and I respect them very much for that. And I appreciate it very much. Twitter.com slash Brenton, K-I-I-N-G, he's the brains behind it. Are we done? That's it.

Anything else? I just want to stay here all day. I'm just having so much fun in this studio, all by myself. But I think we have to wrap it up. Oh, I forgot to mention about Isaac. Thank you so much to Isaac for his time. He has moved on. the bigger and better things, but he was there, that first show in the weird studio,

and was with us throughout that whole time in the other temporary studio. So I really appreciate everything that he did for us, and I wish him the best of luck in his new gig. And hopefully he'll stop by one of these days. So who do I say, who do I tell to hit the music? Is it Will or Brendan? Today it's Will. It's Will, you get my music, my friend. There it is.

Well, this was fun. amazingly, no tech issues. Started a little late. I heard the guys in the back at the top. Kind of rattled me a bit. But then we sort of settled in, smooth sailing. Skype was working. Questions.

Diaz poses. Very nice. Very happy. Got the newsroom behind us. Of course, we'll be tinkering a bit. And we have two weeks to do so. So I'll remind you again. Next week, no show due to Passover.

Huxameach, tell all my good friends. out there celebrating. We return April 1st. Hopefully everything will be settled by then. But we're doing pretty well. Congratulations to everyone involved in the new studio. It's not just this thing right here. There's a lot going on. And it's pretty exciting stuff. Speaking of exciting stuff, fun show today, want to thank Mike Chiapeta for stopping by. Cesar Gracie for stopping by. I really appreciate his time. I want to thank Bralio Estima for stopping by. And again, check out the World Jiu Jitsu Expo, October 19th and 20th, Long Beach, California. Long Beach Convention Center.

Congratulations to Farazza Habi. TriStar did great on Saturday, highlighted by George St. Pierre's big win. Andre Arlofsky, good luck, World Series of Fighting 2 this Saturday. Revel Resort and Casino, Atlantic City, New Jersey. Looking forward to that one. He is fighting Anthony Rumble Johnson,

and good luck to Aaron Simpson in his fight against Josh Berkman. Really appreciate everyone sending in their questions, comments, the poses. Thank you very much to World Series of Fighting for the tickets. And appreciate very much all the people who purchased the Halwani Nose t-shirts, MMA Warehouse.com.

There are still a few left, so get them while you can. We'll see you in two weeks. Love you all. Thank you so much. Peace. I'm out of here. Sacks Fifth Avenue makes it easy to holiday your way. Whether it's finding the right gift or the right outfit.

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