MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour - Episode 214

Episode Date: August 29, 2014

Featuring Chris Weidman, Tarec Saffiedine, Matt Serra, Luke Rockhold, Siyar Bahadurzada, Ali Abdel-Aziz, and Reed Kuhn. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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On this Monday, January 6th, 2014. Hello again, everyone. I'm Ariel Hawani inside our New York City studio. A great show planned for all of you. Of course, we're going three plus hours on today's episode of the MMA hour. We're coming off a weekend that featured the UFC's debut on UFC Fight Pass, that new online digital network service that they're providing. at least now in the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand.

A lot of you actually got to watch it on TV, so no big deal there. Tarek Safedin picking up his very first UFC win in his very first UFC fight. And now we are approaching a very rare quiet weekend in the world that makes martial arts, but no shortage of things to discuss. So let us get right into it. Of course, we're being joined in the back by New York Rick. Alfred Will the Kill? I think we're discussing that new nickname for him right now.

And Brendan is off in, I just called him Brendan for the first time, Buzz Kill Brendan. Excuse me. He is off in Las Vegas for the big CES convention, whatever the hell that is. A lot of you wondering, I'm sure, why I'm wearing this amazing sweater, not my typical plaid shirts. Well, actually, my father got me this sweater. I believe it was like over a year ago, and I just stumbled upon it yesterday, and I said, you know what? This feels like sweater weather. And I'm liking it. It feels good wearing a sweater. And I've been getting a lot of compliments, some weird looks, but overall it seems like people like it.

So maybe it's a new thing for me. Anyway, we got a big show plan for all of you in the third hour. We're going to take your questions and comments. Same deal as always. Hit us up using the hashtag the MMA hour or leave a question or a comment in the comment section below. Now, prior to the questions and comments section of the show, we're going to be talking to Tarak Safedee. He just returned from Singapore. Talk to him about his first UFC win and where he goes from here.

Looking forward to that very much, that goes down at 3.20 p.m. Eastern time. At 250, we're going to talk to Matt the Terra Sarah. Of course, he was in Chris Wyman's corner back at UFC 168. We'll talk to him about that and about the recent, not really retirement of George St. Pierre. You know what I'm saying. Walked away. This, by the way, Matt Serra, the last man, at least for now, to ever defeat GSP officially. Reid Kuhn is the author of Fightnomics.

You can see the book right over here. He'll stop by at 2.30 to talk about this. People are calling it MMA's version of Moneyball. So looking forward to talking to him to 10 p.m. We'll be talking to Chris Wyden, the UFC middleweight champion. You may have heard of him about, of course, the Anderson Silva fight and his upcoming fight sometime in 2014 against Vitor Belfort. At 150, Luke Rockold, he'll be stopping by. He faces Costas Philippa at UFC Fight Night 35.

That's not this Wednesday, next Wednesday in Georgia. And Sierra Bar-Dazada, who just lost to John Howard. Now, I have to ask him about this because I always thought it was Sierra Baja Dersata. I was just told that UFC 168 that he prefers Seer Bahadurzada. So I want to find out what exactly is the case there. Anyway, we'll talk to him about the loss and where he goes from here. But first, in studio, joining us right now, the matchmaker for World Series of fighting, also the executive vice president for that organization.

My good friend, Ali Abdelaziz, there he is. It's a very good looking sweater. You like that sweater? Yes, I like it. Much better. Much better? Yeah. It fits you better.

Oh, thank you. With the shirts. Fits me better. I don't know how to take that. But anyway, I'll take the compliment. You're a bit under the weather. A little bit, little bit. Not feeling good.

But I'm here, samurai style. Yeah. This is a big deal for you. You've been wanting to be on the show quietly campaigning for a very long time. If you say so, yes. No problem. It's an honor for me to be here.

Thank you for having me. Well, it's great to have you. Of course, World Series of Fighting Returns to NBC Sports Network. Not this Saturday night, next Saturday night, with your 8th show. And I heard actually, If I'm wrong, 10 to 12 shows in 2014, is that accurate? Maybe more.

Maybe more? Maybe more. Why more? Stay tuned. Really? Really? Yes. Is that a lot, though?

I mean, for your organization, you're growing, you had a good 2013. Why so many shows? We have a lot of international plan, show, and we're going to add a couple more for, you know, Brazil and Japan. Right. Is your plan to buy up all these organizations? We're not buying them up. Okay.

It's a partnership. It's, you know, to grow the sport, like I said, the UFC always put the blueprint. Right. But, you know, UFC have a lot of money to put the blueprint. And we'll go, we'll pick up the most successful companies out there and we talk to them. And we'll do a partnership, you know, and become partners. So you have a partnership with pancreas in Japan, right? Yeah, in the way, yes.

But pancreas is still pancreas, but we have worse faith in Japan. When are you going in Japan? I'm not sure yet, but sometime in the summer. You have a partnership with a group in Canada, right? Yes. They became World Series of Fighting Canada. You know, it's worse as a fighting Canada for sure, yeah. And what's going on in Brazil?

I'm working on it hard, you know, just for the last couple of weeks, personally, and me and Sean and Ray just working on it. And it's almost done. What's it like trying to get this thing off the ground? Because, you know, you made your debut as a big gamble on NBC Sports Network. It was a time by. Good ratings. And now here you are eight show.

You say you're going to do maybe more than 10 or 12 in 2014. How hard is it in this day and age with the UFC planning on doing 40 to 50 shows in 2014? Belator has their shows. You know, you're trying to get your footprint. You're competing against the Invictas or whatever the world. I mean, is it tough to find your little place in the MMA world? Do you find it?

Who will compete against again? Well, I mean, right now everyone would agree. You would agree the UFC is number one. 100%. Right. Yeah. And we are number two, strong number two. You're strong number two.

Yeah. You strongly believe that you're, okay, I'll put aside a Victor more than you're a stronger number two than Bellator. Yes, because I believe right now we have, we sign, the UFC signed all the fighters. And secondly, like I said before, we signed arrested the fighters because I think Belator have a little problem signing some guys. And listen, a lot of people said Bellator number two, we number two. And a lot of the media said Bellator number two. but I believe it's all about winning. And if we're running up nine of our guys and nine of their guys, I believe we win.

And I have later on in the show, maybe we can talk about it. Sure. I have an idea how we can do that. Well, why waste time? Let's talk about it right now. Let's just set this up. You called me up. You said you have an idea.

You want to lay down the challenge. Listen, at the end of the days about the fighters. a fan. We're in an entertainment business. We're here to entertain people. And I, you know, I'm just, honestly, I'm getting a lot of people said, sometime we even number four. And I was like, how we're

number four? Whatever. Some people put invicted before us. And you know what? I understand, but I can prove everyone wrong by doing something. By officially a new show, I would challenge Bill a Tour, life on pay-per-view, 10 fights, nine fight a challenge,

one super fight. And I got the You got the card right here. I got the card too. We have the card. Let's pull up the card while I'll lead. You know, I got to say, when I saw this, I got a little giddy. I got a little giddy. I got very excited.

Here's the card right now. I love this kind of thing. Now, I don't know, honestly, if they'll accept. I don't think they will, but we will. 100%. I talked to my team. Like, a lot of people want to see the UFC versus pride. It never happened.

Strike force against the UFC. It never happened. But why not get the fan excited and give the fans something they want? And I have nothing but respect for all this Belator fighter. I think Belator have some great fighters. But I think like they have, but they don't get enough exposure. You know, when the last time you see a Belator guy doing an interview or on your show, when they only come on your show when they have problems with Bilator.

But we're willing to give them the exposure. Right. We'll be live on pay-per-view, winner to take all. Okay, so this is the card right now. Winner take all. Winner take all. What does that mean, by the way? I'm talking about life on pay per view.

We pay our fighter. They pay their fighters. You'll pay your fighter's purse. Yeah. They pay theirs. Winner take all, the gate and all that. The winner gets that. Yeah, it's entertainment.

And the winner gets the pay-per-view money as well. Yeah. And if some of the fighter, they want to jump over after this fight, they can come over too. Okay, this is the car. This is the car right here. Tarwin-Sung v. Rampage Jackson. That's the super fight.

This is a super fight. But that's Belator. versus World Trade Fighting. Why not add that into the whole thing? Because it's 10. It has to be... Oh, are there 10 here? It's 10, yes. Okay, let's count. One, two, ten. Ten?

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Yes, ten. Okay, so you need an odd number. Then an odd number, yes. Or maybe just add an 11th fight. No, I would like to give it out ten. Okay, okay, fair enough. So Tyrone Spung, Quentin Jackson, Tyrone, obviously, your guy, you think he beats Quinton. Let me make this clear. Yeah, yeah.

This is not... I'm not trying to get attention. This is real. This is real. Do you not like Bellator? I like Belator, but I don't like certain people in Belator. Like who? You know, you know who I don't like. Okay.

You know, but they recently did something too was very disgusting and very dirty. What? You know, they try to take something that's not theirs. Like what? Who? I'm not really to tell you that, but I'm going to let everybody know soon what they try to do. Really? Yeah.

You can't drop a hint like that and not tell us? Just try to take something they're not theirs. Okay. In a big way. It bothered you? And honestly, I don't know if even Spike knew about it. But is this a TV situation? Leave it at that?

Yeah, leave it like. But you're upset. You're fired up. I'm very upset. Is that where this comes from? This whole idea, is that where it comes from? Yeah, honestly, I talk about it. Me and Sean and Ray, we talked about it for a long time.

Sean Lattman, who worked there, Ray Sefo, right? He's the engine. Sean is the engine. Right. And we thought about it. I was like, you know what, if you really put, want to entertain the fan is all about the fan

because if the fan tuning in you have a successful business you know and let's give some Belator fighter some attention and some media and RAS2

I'm serious man and given your contract with NBC right now NBC Sports Network can you do something like this are you allowed to do something like this we can do some stuff

on pay-per-view okay it's in our contract so Tyrone versus Rampage Tyrone versus Rampage you feel good about that fight I can break it down I think it's a great fight and for those that don't

no, Ali used to fight professionally. Not very good. And we actually have a picture of Ali. Can we pull that up back in his ring of fire days, being cornered by one Greg Jackson? You were part of that team. You were roommates with Rashad Evans, right? Me and Rashad used to live in Greg's house. There it is.

Look at you. Coming out like a pharaoh. It's entertainment. Is that a real snake? Yeah. And I fought caro-a-old in Japan. I put on the same alpha of every show. Where were you born?

Cairo, Egypt. You know, my dad's from Alexandria. We're cousins. That's fine, yeah. Salama al-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a. There you go. So this guy is a showman, but he knows, I mean, you've trained with, obviously, George St. Pierre, the Tri-Star guys, the Gracie family for many, many years.

So you know how to break it down. You know, a little bit. You know, I'm not an expert, but, you know, I try, you know. Why does Tyrone win this fight? I think Taron won this fight because Tarone trained was a great camp. He got probably is the best striker in the business by far. the only way Rampage would beat him just to take him down and submit him.

Last time Rampage submitted somebody who was on a local show in 2001. Rampage became very much a striker. And, you know, Tarun's too fast, great athlete. It's very hard to get a hold of. And I think, you know, I have nothing by respect for Rampage, by the way.

I think it's an awesome way. But, you know, Tarun is young, strong, powerful. And I think if he starts touching Rampage, page, it can give him some problems. Okay, so then you got, now, now it starts to count. Now it's the count. Okay. Anthony Johnson versus their, I guess, yeah, he is their, their light heavyweight champion at Tila Vague.

You like this fight? I like this fight for you. I'd be honest with you. Yeah. Right now, I was talking to a shot the other day. Yeah. And he said, Anthony Johnson, it's not a human. He's a beast.

He becomes a beast. He's, of course, let's give the plug. World Series of Fighting 8. Anthony Johnson versus Mike Kyle. going down, not this weekend next in Florida. Yes. So his kind of backyard now, he trains with the Blacksvillians. Yeah, they have a great camp.

They have, you know, a lot of good things going for them. And Anthony Johnson is just improving, improving. He's a young guy. He's not cutting weight anymore. He's comfortable and he's happy we're here, you know. And I'll be honest with you, I don't think this fight, I can't predict the future, but I'll be surprised if this fight go to a distant.

I like that fight. Okay. Andre Rolofsky, he's been around with you guys for for essentially the beginning, right? He's had a few fights with you, versus Vatali Menakov, who is, of course, their Belator heavyweight champion.

He is undefeated. How much do you know about Vatali? I like that you have also the records and the team that they fight out. Gotta be professional. This is pro right here. Yeah. This is a card that I really strongly

I want to put together. I really do. If Belator come on board, we'll be at, you know, we see who number. I don't know if a Spike while allowed it, but we can. Yeah.

I think it would be good for Belator's. Now, I will say, without trying to get too crazier, I don't think they're going to agree to this. That's my prediction. Because if they don't agree. Not that they're scared. It just doesn't see. I would be shocked.

It would be fantastic. Why not? Why not? If you really want to entertain a fan. And after that, listen, when the last time you see a Belator Farage again an interview, it's good for them for the fire to get attention. It's a media attention, you know? And I think it's a great for, you know,

It's great for everybody. If we really want to grow the sport, I don't like the bellator guys. I don't. I'm keeping clear right now. Because I don't like the way they treat their fighters. I don't like their behave. You know, and I think if they play nice with everybody else, we can grow the sport and everybody can make money. Listen, the UFC put a blueprint for everybody to make money.

I have a job. You have a job. Everybody have a job because the UFC started this thing. And we don't have to be an Emmy who can be friends. We have a great relationship with the UFC. And I have an open arm to everybody to work with everybody. If we can put on a mega show like that and the fan be the winner, why not? Let's talk about this fight because I think this guy could be a future champion.

In your organization and any other organization, obviously, of course, the UFC, Marlon Morais, who is one of the breakout stars of World Series of Fighting, you gave him that platform versus Eduardo Dantes, who's their champion. Listen, I think Eduardo, it's, it's, Taunton is a very talented guy. Yeah. But Marlon is too fast, too strong, too powerful. And you see what Marlon did, the Tyson name.

You see Marlon with the baby. He did everybody. And honestly, you know, just Marlon is too good, man. He really took it. This is a guy before he fought and were a serious of fighting. I worked out with him. And I tried to convince Ray and Sean be like, listen, this guy, he's going to get killed by my guilt, I said, trust me.

he's going to put on a great performance. Yeah. You know, and Miguel was tough, but Marlon come and he showed the world what he made of. And it's just, Marlon right now is on a different level of everybody else. He really is. And you know what's interesting. You look at this card from your perspective, all the guys that you've put on here have either recently fought or are about the fight.

So the timing would work out if they are going to fight in like, you know, six months or so. Absolutely. And like I said, the fan who went. The media win. Let's move along. Yushan Okami versus Alexander Shlameko. You just signed Yushin Okami. No fight yet, book for you guys.

That's an interesting fight. It's a very interesting fight stylistically. I'll give Shalemenko an edge a little bit of striking. Oh, so you're being honest here. I like that. Yeah, I'll give him an edge a little bit of striking. Yeah. But honestly, Okami, he have a great clinch, great ground game.

He's going to put you on your back and he's going to, you know, I think it's to holistically. It's a very bad... I'm not saying he's better. He's ranked top 10 in the world too also. But I think it's just a very bad match up from Alexander. This might be the most fascinating fan on the entire card. Hussimar Paul Harris versus Douglas Lima.

Man, I'm a big Douglas Lima fan. I am. I think he's phenomenal. But I will not see this fight going on a fresh round. Really? Not the first round. Huh? Submission?

Yeah. I think the only way to beat Baharis, the way Alan Burture beat him. But I do not think Lima have this, you know, he's a brown belt now. I don't think he have the ground game to, to he did what Andre Galval did to him or Alan Biltcher did to him and defend his leg locks. I think Paharis, if he would have probably stayed in the UFC, he would have given a lot of people problems. This is the best part of the entire card. This is my favorite part of the entire card. I said that was my favorite fight, but this right here is my favorite part. Justin Gaci, who of course is fighting for the belt, World Series of Fighting 8, not this Saturday, next Saturday. on NBC Sports Network versus Michael Chandler.

But next to Michael Chandler, you have Eddie Alvarez hostage. Let's try to say it here. First, I don't, Eddie's my friend. Okay. I have nothing by respect for Eddie. But honestly, one of the things we will never do, we will never keep a guy in where he says of fighting, don't want to be in where he says fighting.

And for example, if you go to, like, to war, and you get caught in crossfire, you know, you can be torturing and fighting people because prison of war, you have to go by the rules. And I believe any of ours is a hostage. Really? You know, I don't think, I don't, you know. He doesn't want to be there.

He don't want to be there. And this is real. And I think single-handedly, he really hurt this promotion. I actually think he helped them because he got them the rematch, which did very well, highest ratings ever. They're going to get a third fight,

which is going to do well. So everyone kind of won, no? But can I ask you a question? Yeah. How Eddie failed? How Eddie family didn't, I know he didn't have money for a year or he struggled, you know? And a lot of people, and it put a lot of questions and fighters in mind. Did I really want to sign with this promotion?

It really makes a lot of people scared. Like, listen, we have a lot more recognized names than Bellator. They've been around for a long time. but I think Eddie Alvarez was the reason of that. I love the hostage there. And the actual fight is a very interesting one. Justin Gachie 10 and O versus Michael Chandler, 12 and 1. That's a great fight.

Gachi, in my opinion, I said this last week on the show. This guy has everything as far as, you know, qualities, abilities, all that stuff. He can be a major player. I'm a big Mike Chandler fan. But I think this is honestly, that's probably, I'm going to be honest. It's a toss-up.

Because Justin Gish is, I think, credential is wrestling. actually is better than Mike Chandler. He doesn't care. He come forward. And it's going to be a slug fast. And I think the winner is going to be the fan also. Georgie Carcanian was recently named your new featherweight champion, first ever, against Daniel Strauss, who became their featherweight champion.

Georgie's a guy, is interesting because he fought in Bellator. Yes, and he lost? He lost. Yeah. But Gus, how long ago was that? Yeah. And how many, he, I think he won his last eight fights. Yeah.

He was a kid when he fought it. He wasn't even a man yet, you know. But this kid have such a pride future. I don't call him a kid, this man, you know, because he is a man. He is. And we see Lance Palmer, I think, is one of the toughest guys we have also. And he was losing and he thought like a good wrestler. He come back.

And I think Stroud, this matchup, I think it's an easy matchup for Georgia Karakani. I don't think it's hard because Strauss, he comfort. forward, puts a lot of pressure, but the way George Caracani move and hit angles, and he's very dangerous on his back, and he has a great, one of the busy guillotine I ever seen, he have an amazing guillotine, and he finished

Whalen Low's guillotine, he finished Lance Pummel's guillotine. I think this is the easiest fight on the card for us to win. I really think that's. And listen, I think Strauss, it's just stylistically the matchups. I think Strouds, I love how this guy fight. I think he's also... Now you're giving them a reason

to say no, because you keep saying the fights are easy, for you. This one, I think this one, George should have no problem. You know, forgetting about World Series of Fighting versus Belator,

it's just a, it's a fun, it's a fun fight card. You know, you look at these names. Next one, John Fitch versus Rick Hahn.

That's an interesting fight. See, that was a very difficult fight to put because Rick is my friend and I love this. I love Rick. Yeah, you're giving him a shot.

But you know what? Why not? It's fighting. Why not? Can Fitch still cut it? You still feel confident that he's one of the top 10

best guys at 170? Listen, fish it's fish, man like he just he can discount him yeah you know he's fighting have a big fight next and and see what happened but I think this is a very

judoverse wrestling you know you know what's interesting I just realized why know Steve Carl on this card it's just honestly because I just want to it's matchups matchups okay because you could put Steve Carl in this fight against Rick Han

he's your champ yeah but you know it's just matchups yeah you know listen as me as a matchmaker or as a You're trying to. Which, you know, listen, Fitch, I'm not saying Steve Carr doesn't have a big name. He's Finnish Berkman and he's, he has big plan in the future for him. But at this moment, I think fan would tune in. Because, listen, this is not about me.

This is about the fan. What's the fan I want to see? If you was a fan, would you tune in for Fitch, Rick Hahn or, you know, people are going to do him for Fitch? He got 100,000 followers on Twitter. That's right. David Branch versus Brett Cooper rounds it out. Branch is going to fight for your middle-white title. Cooper's a tough guy.

Very tough guy. Yeah, very tough. Branch, what do you think he's going to do? Just take him down? Yeah, probably. Take him down, three rounds and suffocate him. And he's a very good friend of mine, too, but that's his style. So honestly, how confident are you that this actually happens?

Well, is this your first? I want this happen to two reasons, because I want people to stop saying we're not number two because I very believe we are number two because look, our fight card, you know. They have great fighters, but you can bring in America as Brazilian and Russian fighters to try to mark him in America.

I think we have a lot more marking him. And they criticize us, they said, we don't sign bill to reject. But Tito, Rampage, Chakango, Karo Parisian, guys, their record was like three and they lost like 20 out of the last five fights. Is this the first?

first time that you put this out there? Like, have you called them up and asked them if they're interested in this? I'm not going to call up. They can contact me. We're interested. We're 100% interested. Life on pay-per-view, 9-verse-9. Winners take all.

Even if we can put some contract in there. They can jump over if they lose. I love it. I love it. And I'm not just, it's not like I want to get some attention. I really mean it. And I think the winner, the fan, and the fighters. Do you agree with me switching topics here because we're running out of time?

do you agree with me that if Dana White never said Ben Ascran go sign with World Series of Fighting he would have signed with you guys Did that hurt you? You know, honestly it didn't hurt me at all Are you mad you didn't sign him? No, because, listen, our 1-70 division can you imagine if Ben Ascran

It was on this card? I would probably put him versus Lima that would have been off. Just for all the time's sake. I think Ben Ascran is a very smart guy. And, you know, I don't think whatever then, I say little egos involved a little bit, but he's smart because why I have to go to worse sense of fighting.

It's not the UFC. And I'll fight a guy like Paharis. And that was his first fight, to be honest. And I was being very clear. That would be a first fight. I'll fight Paharis. And it's, Paharis is a very dangerous fight for anybody. And I might lose.

he had one fc's great guys they're going to treat him well they like those guys yeah I think they're I think listen I like anybody put on fights and fan like right even I don't you know I like these guys personally I think they're great guys but that I you know I like Belator on a personal level of great guys no I don't I don't like him right but as a promotion

that I watch a Belator fight yeah I watch every almost you know try as a fan but I think he just played it you know we listen I know why he's got paid, and I believe our offer was bigger than anybody, by anybody. But if I was him and I would make a right decision for me and my family, I would have went to an F.C. Because why I got to go to World Sets of Fighting and compete with guys, I can lose, and I was still lost in worse seriously fighting, and I'm not saying he was going to lose. Because I really believe he's, I personally think he's top 10.

I do. I don't, you know, that's what I think. Because the guy's underfeet is a world champion. But he made the big decision for him and his family, and I can not come for it. Last event didn't do great in the ratings, your lowest. Are you feeling the pressure going into this one on, was it January the 18th? My brother, where will come from? January 19th.

This is easy life. We live in America. Where we come from is pressure. This is no pressure. We was against college football, four games, and we still put on a great show. And our next show is even going to be greater. And we're going to do a better and better show every time. You're feeling good with NBC?

Yeah, you know, I feel good. You know, and I think... They need to show you more love. Listen, it's always more for improvement. Right. And like, why Bellator get this great rating? Because it's spike. Right.

They know this part, you know? That's the card. I wasn't looking away. I just wanted to take a look at the card one more time. Sometimes it's hard to look up. for too long. It is true. World Series of Fighting 8, Justin Gachi versus Richard Patashnik. It's a tough name. Don't feel bad. Sometimes I have a hard time with it. I love to hear you say it, but I won't ask you to say. It's for the inaugural lightweight title. Also, Anthony Johnson versus Mike Kyle. Jessica Aguilar is fighting.

Yeah, she's fighting. Somebody people doesn't know. Yeah. But she's a 1996 Olympic alternate in Judo. And you know how tough Judo girls is. And I believe if you're, if you're going to, watch on YouTube how she noggers out. I think it's going to be a great fight. I think it's going to be a stand-up war. Because I think Jessica, I don't know, I think it's just going to be one of the best fight. It's interesting that you're getting into the strawweight business with the UFC getting into that business as well. Like I said, it's for the fan. Yeah. This is about the fan. She's fighting, of course, Alita Gray. Cody Bollinger from the Ultimate Fighter past season, season 18, fighting Tyson NAM. And this is an interesting one. Jorge Patino, who is, of course, very famous

Over in Brazil, right? Macaco. Macaco. This is going to air on global? No, sport intertivo. It's going to be on. Sport Intrito. And this fight is, honestly,

I put on the main card for Brazilian fan. We make a plan in 2014 to be in Brazil, and I want us to, you know, a huge fan, and I want to make sure they have somebody there they want to watch. He's going to fight Pele, right? Yes, this fight has happened.

When lose, draw for his next fight. No matter what. In Brazil? It will be happening in Brazil. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Interesting. And then, of course, there's the preliminary card that's at 630 and some good fights, Freddie Sunsao, who used to fight in the UFC. And my boy, Tyler Stinson. I like him. I like him, too. This is taking place, of course, at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel in Casino in Hollywood, Florida. We have run out of time, but I appreciate you coming on here, especially under the weather, to make this challenge. I hope that they respond in some fashion, and I hope it happens. You know, and I want to say something here.

I have nothing but respect for all this Billetool fighter. I'm not asking, you know, I think they're talented. But I think that as a fighters, they like challenges, you know. And if you want to fight different promotion, it's going to be a super mega fight. And listen, I'm not doing this because I like the Biltura guys. I'm doing this for two reasons. To just know we are number two and just the media give us more credit. He is Ali Abdelaziz.

He is the executive vice president. President of World Series of Fighting, also their matchmaker. They return to NBC Sports Network on January 18th at 9 p.m. Eastern Time in Hollywood, Florida. It is World Series of Fighting A. We're going to take a break here to reset. Say goodbye to Ali. In a minute, we'll be joined by Mr. Bahadrza. And for now, check out this clip from Dr. Stephen Sanders.

This kind of flew under the radar last week. He was the doctor that performed the surgery on Anderson Silva after that fight against Chris Wyman. He explains everything that went on during that surgery. fascinating stuff from the UFC. I'm happy they put this out there. So there he is. Dr. Stephen Sanders, during our break, we say goodbye to Ali. Thank you so much for the time. And we'll be back with Ciar the Great. My name is Dr. Stephen Sanders. I'm an orthopedic surgeon here in Las Vegas. I am part of the medical team affiliated with UFC and was in attendance on

Saturday night, December 28th at the MGM Grand Garden Arena for UFC 168. During that fight, Anderson Silva suffered a fracture involving his left leg in an area above the ankle and below the knee. He was transported to University Medical Center. He underwent surgery that night and fixating his fracture. His surgery involved stabilization of his tibia bone with an intramedillary device that was placed into the bone beginning up at the knee and then advancing down toward the ankle. Sawbones model shows the tibia and the fibula. intact, Anderson's fracture occurred roughly at about this level, more or less horizontal

in nature. Both bones were displaced or moved out from their normal alignment and required fixation to stabilize as to protect the bone and the soft tissues around the bone. The technique by which the nail is placed into the tibia bone is by beginning with a opening or a hole made up at the top of the tibia bone at the level of the knee joint, and then through that hole, the nail is advanced down toward the ankle and at that time stabilizing the fracture. The device in question is known as an intramedulary rod. This is a titanium rod made by the Smith Nephew Company. This rod was 40 centimeters in length and 11.5 millimeters. in diameter. Once this rod was successfully

placed across the level of the fracture into the bone below, it was then further stabilized by placing what we call crossing or locking screws. This screw is an example of how it would go from the outside, an incision is made, a drill hole is then made, through the bone, the drill passes through this opening in the nail, and then goes out the the other side of the bone. Once the drilling is complete, a measurement is taken and the correct length screw is then inserted and screwed into place, engaging the bone here and the bone here

and of course going through the nail. Anderson has two screws at the distal end or the lower end of the nail. As I said, the fracture would be somewhere at about this level. Higher up at the knee, a single screw is also placed in order to help prevent any type of rotation at the broken bone site. Lastly, in order to aid removal of this rod, if ever necessary, a cap was placed on top to prevent bone from getting inside the nail and making removal more difficult.

The entry port would be at the very top of the knee. It is in an area away from the meniscus of the knee, and it's away from the cruciate ligaments of the knee, and it's away from the articular cartilage of the knee. So there's this small safe zone that we exploit in order to enter into the tibia. Once the nail or rod is entered into that port, it's advanced down inside,

and at the level of the fracture, I'm manually holding the fracture lined up under X-ray guidance, and then the nail is then further, advanced to its final resting level. This is a generic off-the-shelf sawbones for model purposes. This is, however, the actual length nail that went into Anderson. He was a little bit bigger than our sawbones model. So his nail is not sticking up three inches into his knee joint, but rather is just below

the surface so that you cannot feel it if you were to run your hand across here. Obviously, the nail in his body, his ankle joint is where my finger is. So obviously, this is not felt in the ankle joint either. The only thing that a patient might feel from this device are the... All right, back on the MMA hour. We thank Ali Abdallahsiz very much for stopping by. And curious to hear your take on that proposed fight card. World Series of Fighting versus Bellator.

Obviously, like I said to him, while sitting here, I don't expect Bellator to agree to this because, and I'm not saying it because I think that they're afraid or anything like that. You know, it's very hard in this business to co-promote. We saw that with Lidixie and Strike Force back in the day. It's just tough. You know, you're bringing in two organizations. They have their own interests. They want to get, you know, different things out of it. They have matchups in mind that they may, like or not like. I just, I don't see it happening, but I think it's a smart move, get people talking, get yourself out there. You have an event coming up on January 18th. I'm not opposed to it, and that's why we had him in studio, like the guy very much, and it was great, and hopefully we can get a response from the good folks over at Bellator. So don't forget, by the way, to check

out World Series of Fighting on January 18th on NBC Sports Network. So later on in the show, we're going to be joined by Chris Wyman, the UFC middleweight champion, Luke Rockhold stopping by, Matt Serra stopping by, Tarrick Safedine stopping by, and the UFC launched their new fight pass digital network on Saturday morning. It was, as Chuck Mindenhall put it, it was breakfast while watching fights. And this is, of course, not the first time that the UFC has put on a fight card

this early in the morning. There was a card in Macau, China, in November of 2012. and they've had other fight cards, but this is going to be the norm. They're returning to China on March 1st. There's actually an amazing stretch from February 15th to March 15th, where there's a fight card for the UFC every weekend. That's why I say this weekend coming up, January the 11th, that's the Saturday, a very rare quiet weekend in the world of mixed martial arts for 2014. Get ready. There are going to be a crap load of events.

come this year from the 45 or so UFC events. Ali's saying that they're going to put on 10 to 12, more than 10 to 12 in 2014. Bellator is usually good for what, you know, 20 something, 25 or so events a year. That's a lot of events just from those guys. And then you have Invicta, they'll put on, you know, hopefully for them, they're 4 to 6.

And then there's the other smaller promotions out there. there. So it is going to be an amazingly busy 2014. And that's what makes this weekend so special. I mean, there's not one big, of those big ones that I mentioned, the Invictas, the World Series of Fightings, the UFCs, of course, Bellator, all that stuff, none of them putting on an event. It's a very rare. Take a breather, go outside, beautiful weather here on the Northeast or in the Northeast and maybe it's smart with with uh and and i and i wonder it's probably it's probably done on purpose with the NFL uh having a Saturday night game don't want to go up against that especially this week which i believe is uh new england versus indie you don't want to go up against that anyway

let's go to the uh Skype machine and welcome in our next guest there he is uh at least his torso uh we don't really see you my friend and i want to ask you right off the bat there you go put it up a look there you go so i always used to call you CR but then i always used to call you CR but then i was told last week in Las Vegas that it's actually pronounced Sear. Which is it? True. It's Sear, actually. Sear, so why didn't you correct me all these years when I kept calling you CR and everyone

else kept calling you CR? Yeah, I've been tired of correcting people, man. At some point, I'm like, all right, man, call me, whatever you call me. But it's a lot of people who pronounce my name differently. All right. Well, Sear, it's great to have you back on the show. Of course, we last saw you in action at UFC 168 against John Howard. The fight did not go your way.

Why is that? Thanks for having, Ariel. Yeah, that's true. My fight that you see 168 didn't really go the way it should have or the way I wanted to actually because ever since like the end of 2012, I have been victim of a lot of injuries, like a ton of injuries. And I broke my right hand three times. I had an operation on my right hand. And then I was supposed to fight in June 2013. I was supposed to fight, supposed to fight Robby Lawler.

Then I injured my back. And after that, I got sick for like four months, couldn't train. And then I came to Miami again to train for my last fight, UFC 168. And six weeks out, I got really sick. I had for a week long, I had fever, couldn't train. and then after that I was sick for a week and a half more

when that was over I started training so of course you want to train hard three weeks out because I couldn't train the entire camp and then I dislocated my right shoulder and two days later I dislocated my left shoulder

geez yeah it was a series of tough injuries but I still because I already told you I already canceled a few fights. And there were Afghans who were traveling nationally and internationally, diplomats, entrepreneurs, actors. Yeah, they don't know about the UFC much, but they just fly to come see me or support me.

Because I'm the only Afghan fighter, and they travel from all over the world to come show their support. Because I am fighting for them. I don't have any other motives. I just want to be representing Afghanistan and Afghans in the UFC and put them on a map. So they give something back by actually coming to support me from all over the world. And that's why I couldn't really cancel the fight. And I took two cortisone shots in both shoulders. And I went to fight.

And the fight showed that I was gassing. And I would like to apologize to the UFC. all the fans, I never gasped before in a fight, but in my last fight, after a minute and a half, I felt like I was shot in my shoulders and my lungs were burning. I never had this feeling before in training or in a fight. So, yeah, it was a pretty tough fight for me, but I still fought through it, and I promise I will never, ever fight again if I'm injured or I am not in my best shape, because it's a bad, it makes U.C. look bad.

It makes me look bad, and the fans don't get what they expect, and it's a loss, loss for everybody. Do you think you'll get another chance in the UFC? Well, I think I will get another chance, but I have to perform this time really well. Right. Because we discussed with the UFC that I was injured, My shoulders were injured, but I would still take a cortis and shot and fight because, like I said, a lot of Afghans bought tickets, and their hotel was booked.

Flights were booked, so I didn't want to disappoint them. And I've already actually disappointed them a few times by canceling fights because of injuries. But this time, I was like, man, whatever, I just go fight and see what happens. And unfortunately, I gas in a fight. I didn't perform well, but I still fought through the fight, and here we are. Do you have any idea why it feels like for the last year and a half, two years, you've been hit with so many injuries, and it kind of coincides with your run in the UFC. Do you have any idea? Do you think you're not doing something right in training?

You're not treating your body well. Why are you being hit with so many injuries? The thing is Ariel, I train really, really hard. if I in the morning and in the evening I train both like I really need somebody that tells me to

not to train hard like go home have rest I'm automatically I have this motivation to push myself to the limit every practice

and human body like I realize that like in a year and a half last year and a half I've been training much much harder than I used to train before because I am in the UFC

and in the UFC only the best fighters on the planet compete in the UFC. So in order to be able to compete with those fighters, you have to be able to you have to train harder, of course, than before. And that's what I did, and that's why

I was victim of a lot of injuries. And on top of it, because of those injuries with broken hand and being sick, I didn't actually have enough time to work on my wrestling or on my jiu-jitsu, because I was sidelined for a long time every time, and every time I was out of my rhythm.

But now I'm going to take my time. I'm going to bring a lot of changes. I have some personal stuff that I have to take care of, and I'll take care of everything, and train hard and train smarter this time, and work on my wrestling in Jitsu, and come back stronger. How long do you think you'll be out for?

I'm not sure, but I think it will be between three to six months. Oh, wow. Do you need surgery? That's what I'm going to find out. End of this week, I'll find out if I will end of this week or begin next week, beginning of next week. I'll find out if I need surgery on my shoulders or one of them. And from there, we'll see from there. Have you thought about going back to CR the killer?

Maybe that, or Sierra the killer, excuse me, it's an old habit. Maybe that's the problem here. Once you switched over to the grate, maybe the injury started to come your way. I don't think that's the reason. But the thing is, I'll always remember, I will always be remembered as Sierra the killer. Right. Because that's my style and that's how I am. I mean, I have a fight to kill.

But Sierra the Great was given to me by my friend, Ryan Parsons. He gave me his nickname because he thought that was a great person. It doesn't say anything about my fighting. He just liked me and he was like, you're a great person. I'm going to call you Sierra the Great. So maybe I will change my Twitter name back to Sierra the Killer. I don't know. Maybe a lot of people like it, actually.

They still call me Sear the Killer. I know. It fits. Why did you get rid of it? You didn't like the connotation killer? You didn't like that word? Well, it's being an Afghan and fighting in the U.C. and the U.S. and being the killer, it doesn't, it doesn't, it's not really marketable.

Not in the beginning at least. Yeah, I know, Tjane. And by the way, I noticed on Twitter you don't follow a single person. Ariel, the reason I don't follow people is because sometimes you're in a camp and you're a strict diet. And people tweet about their food and actually seduces you and actually makes you good eat things or do things. And because you don't like those treats, you unfollow people. Even you're friends with them, you unfollow them. And then they're like, oh, man, they're not friends anymore.

Yeah. No, it's just Twitter. It's social media. If I unfollow you on Twitter, I don't like your tweets. It doesn't mean you're not my friend. Right. But that's why people got offended by being unfollowed, and they were like, oh, you're not my friend anymore? Man, I am your friend, but I'm just, I don't like your tweets right now because you tweet about your food.

And I'm in a camp. I'm in a strict diet. I don't like your tweets. So, yeah, I haven't followed everybody, actually. It's nothing personal against anybody, but I just figured out if I don't follow anybody, nobody will be angry at me. So that's fine. I got to ask you this question on a lighter note. Did either you or John Howard break wind in the middle of the fight?

Because there's a clip going out there. It sounded very loud. It sounded like a, let's be honest, it sounded like a fart. Did it actually happen? True, true. It does. I didn't hear it during the fight, but after the fight, some fans were tweeting at me.

They were like, man, did you fart? Did John Howard fart? fart. First of all, I kept quiet because I thought if it's John Howard, I'm not going to dismantle the guy and say that he fought it because you lose your face the entire world heard that part. So I didn't say anything. And then John Howard went out there and said it was me.

Yeah. That I was it. So then I was like, man, you're not sure that it was me. Why are you saying this? but then the UFC and BJPEN.com tweeted that it was cameraman number four who followed during the broadcast

but how would they hear it? Come on. I mean, if the cameraman did it, it just seems like honestly, it was so loud that I didn't believe

it was actually a fart. Yeah, exactly. It was way close to the camera. It was way close to the microphone. Like,

it couldn't have been us. You know? Yeah. So what you're saying is it wasn't you. No, no, no, no.

It wasn't me or John. It was cameraman number four. This is like the JFK assassination. There's all kinds of rumors out there, theories, conspiracy theories. But it wasn't you, and I'm happy to hear that. By the way, I want to ask you something. I was doing some research on you, obviously going into the fight for the broadcast.

And I stumbled upon a game that I believe is pronounced Bouskashi. Yes. This is an unbelievable game that they play in Afghanistan. It's like polo, but instead of the ball, it's a headless goat. It's the carcass. It's actually heavier. It's a headless calf. Jesus.

But it's called goat. But it's actually nowadays it's a kind of bigger. Is this on TV? Do they show this on TV? Is this like a big deal over there? Yeah. It's our national game. Okay.

Explain it for people that don't know. It's actually a game that the dead calf or like a headless calf. Yeah. You have to take the calf. and bring it over the line. And on the way, bringing it there, people, people try to snatch it out of your hand and they head you. You have to be really strong to be able to do this sport, first place. How do you get the calf, though?

Like, let's say I have it and I'm on my horse. How do you get it away from me if you're on the other team? They hit you. They hit you with something on your hands and the drop, you have to, yeah. It's pretty tough. And why does it have to be a headless calf? Why can it just be like a ball or something? Why does it have to be an actual dead calf?

Well, that's a good question. I have to find out myself why it should be a dead calf. But actually, it's from long before. Yeah. It's from long before. And I don't really know the history behind it, but, well, it's something to talk about it next time. Yeah. Is there actual blood spewing everywhere?

Do they clean up the calf? No, the calf is clean. No bloods. Well, look, if they can play that game over in Afghanistan, and you could be called the killer, in my opinion. Excuse me? If they can play that game in Afghanistan, your nickname should be the killer.

Like, it's okay. You know what I'm saying? I think it'll be, yeah. It'll be soothing, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I want to thank you for stopping by, Sierre, and I'm happy that we cleared up the name controversy and the fart controversy.

A lot of controversies that we cleared up. And please keep us... We cleared a lot of controversy. Yes. Yeah, that's why... Thank you for having me, Ariel, giving me the chance to apologize to the UFC and the fans for my last two fights that I couldn't really perform at best of my ability

and I'm looking forward to the future and next time you see me, you'll see a well-conditioned, well-prepared Sierra. I know that no one is more bothered than you, and I wish you the best of luck. I hope you get healthy soon and you can return to form very soon inside the Octagon. Best of luck to you, my friend. Thank you so much. There he is.

Seir the Killer, aka Sear the Great, Mr. Baja Der Zata. He recently fought against John Howard at UFC 168 and looking to get back on track. Good to hear, at least from his perspective, that he will get at least one more fight inside the Octagon to prove. Because remember this guy, this is a guy who, when he made his UFC debut against Palo Tiago in Sweden, their first event in Sweden in April of 2012. That was a vicious knockout. If you've watched him throughout his career outside of the U.S. UFC, there's a reason why they used to calm the killer. He is one of the more, the more technical strikers and powerful strikers in the Walter 8 Division. A guy who used to fight at

205, and went down to 185 now 170, so someone who has not lived up to his potential inside the octagon, but hopefully for him, he can figure out the injuries and get back on track inside the octagon. Okay, so the next UFC event is UFC Fight Night 35. They just had Fight Night 34 in Singapore on Saturday. Fight Night 35 airs on Fox Sports One. It's a Wednesday night show, and it's in Duluth, Georgia. And the headlining act is Costas Philippe versus our guest at this time, joining us via the Skype machine.

The man himself, Luke, Rackold, there he is. Luke, how are you? Hey, good. How are you guys doing? Doing great. Thank you so much for stopping by. A lot to get to with you here. I know I was talking to you before this fight was announced,

and you were talking about maybe a Francie's Carmont fight that you wanted, some other options. Philippa, when you got that name, were you happy with it? Yeah, I think I'd mention that to you. The Carmont fight would have been interesting, but, you know, Philippeu is a tough guy and top ten opponents, so I'm looking forward to it. So you pulled out of the Tim Boch fight at UFC 166.

What exactly happened and any effects now? Are you dealing with anything now? I tore my MCL, my knee, basically sparring. I was in the pocket throwing like a right hook, and I don't know, my leg got, the guy stepped behind my leg, and I turned in and ended up just popping my knee, and I immediately fell to the ground and knew something happened. So from then on it, just tightened up the whole weekend. I could barely walk for the next couple weeks, so I was pretty obvious the next week. I talked to Joe, and he's like, I need an answer, and I can't walk.

And so it was easy to pull out. And, you know, about six weeks later, I started boxing and then, you know, gradually eight weeks, I think I started kicking. And now I'm back and I don't have any thought of the knee. And, you know, I'm just, you know, I don't feel anything. I'm focused on fighting. I feel good. No surgery, right? No surgery.

They gave me like a four to six week recovery, but it was more like six to eight, maybe even to ten. So I really felt good. You one of those guys who was really happy to see 2013 go away? Yeah, it wasn't my best year. You know, I'm definitely excited for 2014 and it started off right for, you know, myself and our team. I know, you know, last time you were on our show was prior to the Vitor fight,

and you were supremely confident going into that fight. You went into enemy territory. You're in Brazil, fighting him. You know, are you over the fight? I know you take, you know, everyone takes losses hard and whatnot, and it didn't go your way, and it was your UFC debut, something you had been waiting for for a very long time. Do you feel like you're over it,

or are you using that? motivation going into this next fight? There's definitely motivation. You know, obviously coming off a loss, I'm not used to losing, and it just motivates me even more. And this is a bad position for Philippa just because I'm more motivated than I've ever been. It's, you know, it's safe to say I'm somewhat over it, but I don't think I'll be completely over it until I get my rematch and return the favor.

And you say you're more motivated than you've ever been. Why? Because you've had big fights in the past. You were fighting for the strike force belt when a lot of people didn't think you deserve to be fighting for it. And, you know, you shocked a lot of people by beating Jacques-Rae. Why more motivated now? Obviously, it's the first time I've lost since my second fight back in 2007. And this is the UFC.

And this is, you know, it's like I want to get things started off on the right foot. And, man, I'm just, losses don't sit well with me. And so I really sat back and then looked at what I can improve upon. and my diet, my nutrition, and everything. So I believe I came at this camp a lot smarter, and I really controlled my diet and my nutrition. I've really done my homework, and I feel good. My body feels healthy, and just trying to stay healthy, of course.

And, you know, I'm turning 29. I turn 29. I'm 29 now, and 30's around the corner, so I realize my window can close at any time in the sport, and I want to stack some cash and try to build a retirement. So when you say, obviously, it's fascinating that you hadn't lost since your second fight, like it's so foreign to you. How did you deal with it?

It's tough. You know, especially given the circumstances of where it was, who I fought and how it went down. It's a tough one to swallow. But, you know, what can you do but move on? I've lost in my career in many of sports, and I've always became a better person and a better competitor because of it and I expect nothing different in this circumstance. I'm going to go out there and prove myself and put myself right back into a contender status. Obviously, Vitor are a very hot topic. A lot of people thought he should be the fighter of the year last year. What do you

think? I said it was, it should go to Chris Wyman for beating Anderson Silva twice, but other people saying defeating you and Michael Bisping and Dan Henderson in the fashion that he did, it should go to him. What do you think? I mean, Vitor had a good year. No doubt. 2013 was good. to be tour. But I tend to agree with you. I'd say, I'd say, Wiedman beating Anderson Silva twice is unheard of. The guy had never lost in his whole UFC career dominated everyone. And a guy like Wydenman goes in there and knocks him out and then stops him, you know, and just pretty much dominated him the second time around. And, you know, he used a legitimate technique and caught him, you know, and broke his leg. I mean, it was a crazy ending.

But, I mean, the guy dominated, you know, both fights. should we view everything that Vitor does with an asterisk? Whatever. You guys can think whatever you think, but I'm not the biggest fan of it all. Are you interested in seeing what Chris does to him, and do you think he beats him? I think Chris beats him. Of course, I'm interested in the fight, but I think Chris is just, like he'll get the takedown, and I think he'll control him.

Chris is a smart guy, and he sticks to the game playing. and he's a tough wrestler. So I think he can, you know, you get that early take down. It's a different world for Vitor. And people just haven't really gotten to that point. I strayed from the game plan. And obviously I got caught with some crazy stuff. But I think Chris will stick to it and he'll be the one to break him.

I know. And in Vegas wouldn't hurt either. Yeah, with a little more strict conditions. Why you think Vitor looks different there? I have no idea. I mean, is he even granted as TRT use there? Yeah, that's a very, very, a good question. He's going to have to go in front of the commission

and explain why he does it and they're going to be the ones to decide ultimately. I mean, he has fought in Vegas against Anderson, but it's still a little unclear if he was on it back then. Yeah, I think everything's a little unclear at this point. I know you know Chris, you know him from just MMA circles.

Are you surprised that he beat him twice, that he beat Anderson twice? No, I was surprised he beat him the first way in the fashion he did, but the second time around. No. And controlled top position. It was looking so good.

The connection was so clear. And then we just lost it. That happened sometimes. I think we're going to have to call. Oh. I think we're going to have to call them back. We're reconnecting here. Luke, are you there?

You're back. But we don't see you. Hey. Do you see me? You hear me? I see you. I don't see you. Oh.

Oh, it says, your video's turned off? No? Okay, we're going to recall you back and do whatever you did the first time. All right. We're obviously going to get into the Costa Philip who fight in a second here, but just curious

to get his take on all that stuff, of course, because he does fight in the middleweight division, and he's coming off that Vitor fight. Luke, are you there? Mr. Rockhold. All right. One second, we're going to call him back. The rest of that card, in case you're wondering,

it's a Wednesday night card, Lorenz Larkin versus Brad Tavares. Love the fact that Charlie, oh, there he is. Luke. Hey. Hey. Honestly, I don't even remember

what we were talking about there. I know, oh, Chris, were you surprised? So you said you were surprised the first time, but the second time not. No, the second time, I was surprised that he finished it

on the feet the way he did. Yeah, of course, the first time, but I knew called the Jiu-Jitsu game. How are we doing? Yeah, we're doing good. What's it like being an MMA fighter and seeing a guy, you know, throw a kick like that, get a check, his leg breaks.

I mean, the next day that you go to the gym, do you think twice about throwing like kicks? I've always thought twice about throwing. Inside leg kicks, tell you the truth. I don't like them. Being a south paw, you know, throwing one on an orthodox fighter, it's so easy to turn your knee in and check. And you have to, like, fully commit with, man, that hurts. We're going to say, it's not going to throw. We're going to call you on your phone because it keeps breaking up, and I want to hear your full answers, okay?

Okay. All right. We're going to get Luke back here in a second. T.J. Dillishaw against Mike Easton, Derek Brunson versus Yel Romero, is a very good fight. And Cole Miller versus Sam Cecilia rounds out the main car. I was saying Charlie Brennan getting another shot back in the UFC. Jason High had appendicitis and had to have emergency surgery. they had to wait a day or so to drain the pus out of his system,

but he ended up having the surgery late last week in Florida. He was supposed to fight on the card. But Brennamen, which is interesting because Brennamen actually beat Jason High in his UFC debut around 2010 or so, and now he gets back into the UFC as a lightweight due to an injury suffered by Jason High. And it's not all that serious. He's going to be out for 30 days or so, and we wish him the best. He said it was the first time he's ever brought. pulled out of a fight in his

MMA career. But good to see that Charlie gets another chance. This is a guy who stepped up on short notice to fight Rick's story when that whole Nate Marquart thing happened back in Pittsburgh and that versus card. And now reinventing himself going 4 and 0 as a lightweight. So a very

good story happy for Charlie, one of the good guys. And I thought it was a little premature when they let go of him. That was during that time when they were letting go of a lot more guys. And he last fought against Kyle Noak at UFC 155. and now getting another chance to fight in the UFC prelims. Justin Edwards versus Ramsey Nidjim.

Elias Silvario versus Isaac Valley Flagg. John Moraga versus Justin Ortiz, Brian Houston versus Trevor Smith, Vince Pichel versus Garrett Whitley and or Whiteley. And Alptechen, Osklich versus Luis Smolka. That's the full fight card. and actually the prelims going to air on the FightPass outlet, not the Facebook outlet. Do we have Luke?

Are we having a tough time tracking him down? What's going on? Really? On the phone? That's bizarre. So right after Luke, we're actually going to be talking to the aforementioned Mr. Chris Weidman, and it was obviously announced right after his win over Anderson Silva that he is going to be fighting.

fighting Vitor Belford and Lorenzo Fertita, the UFC CEO, told ESPN.com that they're shooting for between May to July for that fight. Luke, are you there? Yep, right here. All right. Good to have you back. Just a few more minutes with you. We appreciate it. Okay, let's move along. Do you feel as though, you know, this fight, you know, you look at the middleweight division, and there's obviously those guys fighting in February. There's Machita fighting Gagamussasi and Jacare fighting Franciscarame. You win this, in my opinion. You're right back in there. Is that the way you're viewing it?

Yeah, you know, I think so as long as I go out there and perform and have a dominant performance for sure. You feeling the pressure going into this one? It's always a great camp. You know, I made the most of the holidays with got my training partners in, so it's tough, but I feel good. I feel real good about this fight. How tough is that to get? guys to come train with you during the holidays? It's, you know, it's hard sometimes when no one has a fight.

You know, me and Josh Thompson, and now that D.C. is back in the mix, so we all been kind of trying to help push each other. I mean, me and Thompson or so the full time, but now D.C.'s in the fold. And, you know, I've been brabbing my training partners, no doubt, with gas money and all the, clear out my closet and all the freaking extra pads and gear I got pretty much. Really? You have to actually bribe them? I mean, a little incentive never hurts, you know.

But a lot of people paid, you know, top dollars for their training partners. But, you know, at AK, we got a lot of tough guys around. So, you know, usually I can get by with, you know, paying the guys, cast money, and hooking them up. By the way, over the weekend, over the weekend on the side, we had a story about this kid, Aaron Pico, which Zinkin signed, and Bob Cook said it was the biggest prospect he's ever seen. Do you know anything about this kid? No, I saw the article, but I looked, you know, I decided to check him out because of it, and he looks like a really tough wrestler, you know, a hard-nosed wrestler, the kind of guy that

could make a transition. So, I don't know, I watched a couple of his matches, I'm not going to lie, and he looked tough, he wears guys down, but it's a different world, and not everyone can transfer, but we'll see how he can fight. interesting obviously that he has great boxing and wrestling background but man zinkin over there they're uh they're signing up the high schoolers how about that i had no idea that they were that they were going you know that deep into the school system i i didn't really have that you know i didn't know about that either i know i know dwayne's got you know connections in the wrestling world and uh that's where he gets a lot of you know that's where they sign dc and kane and a few guys so dwayne being an all-american himself so uh i mean the zinken have contact in the wrestling world. So they're always trying to pull that, those top-breeded wrestlers out. So Philip, who's coming off that loss to Karmal,

and he was pretty much, you know, smothered on the ground, and, you know, that has always been the big question mark about him. I mean, what do you think of his ground game? Obviously, we know about a striking background, former amateur boxer, but ground game-wise, what do you think? He doesn't look the sharpest, of course. Right. It must be a good grappler, but, you know, he definitely,

he didn't get submitted, so. defense seems all right, but I think he just sits around a little too much, and my ground games, I guarantee it's above Carmont, and I'm just a different style. I'm not your average jih Tjitsu guy. I practice legit, too. Yeah. And so it's going to be health for him if it hits the ground. Trust me, it's not going to be a smother fest.

He's going to be going to be a lot of fire on his face and submissions. if you try to turn away. I'm happy you mention that because I've heard you talk about this before, the legitzitsu. What exactly is that? It's legit. It's a legit version of Jiu-Tzu. Really? Okay. Did you make it up?

It's pretty much my own style. I'm telling you, I don't have really a style like anybody else. You can talk to anybody at any of my coaches. Anybody that's really trained with me, I just, I'm a funky bunch of good So I don't know I just have a different style

I just do Green Supreme Most of the past When did you come up with this? Over the years People just gave me crap About my style And what I do

And you know I stopped trying to conform To what they want And just be my own person I just I think myself through A lot of positions And I just feel my body

And I've always had a different style So I just came up My own brand but you recently became a brown belt right in the real jiu jit-too yeah Luke are you there I think Luke's up in the mountains in Santa Cruz and he's a bad connection there Luke are you in the mountains in Santa Cruz is that what's going on no not quite there okay I'm driving up practice so you recently became a brown belt in Jiu-jitsu right

a black belt? You became a black belt. That's right. You became a black belt. On UFC.com, it says that you're a brown belt, by the way. Someone needs to get that fax straight. Yeah, UFC. Huh, get your facts straight.

Anyway, why do you accept that black belt if you're not a practitioner of the traditional jiu-jitsu? Because I'm a black belt. I mean, in jiu-jitsu doesn't mean I can have my own style at the same time. So, my jiu-sitza is good, but my leg jih-tis is better. Does anyone else practice this or is it just you? I shared a couple of my techniques with some guys and there's definitely some guys. You still there?

Yeah. Also on the website it says that your biggest accomplishment in pro competition is that you've never sat on the stool. Is that true? Never once? I mean, they need to update everything. I said that before I found John Gray because I I've never been past the first round. Because when I was reading that, I was like, really? I mean, he's gone five rounds.

He's never sat on the stool. Come on. No, no, that was definitely before the jockey. I thought I was just joking and how that long. Wow. They need to update there. It's almost kind of embarrassing for the UFC right now. Careless.

I'm not going to touch on that subject. Do you want to take? him to the ground? Do you want to take Costa to the ground? Is that the plan? It might be part of the plan. I mean, I'm definitely going to... Every fight starts my seat and I feel good. I feel good. I catch them early. It might make this stay there, but I don't know. I mean, obviously the ground game is an area that I'm looking to expose for cost. It doesn't look like it's too comfortable. And if I get an opportunity, I will take it, but I'm not going to force it.

And will Daniel Cormier make 205? Yeah, eventually. Eventually. Doesn't sound too... Right? He called me this morning about... Hello? Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah, he called me this morning about a vitamin mixture. So he's definitely... He's on his mind every day all day, so I think at this point, given him seven weeks out now, so he's been thinking about the non-stop. So he'll be on point.

Are you going to help him? I'll be sure I'll help him. I've been putting my two cents in, and after the fight, I'm sure I can help both not a little more. Okay, last thing before we go, you know, the middleweight division is so interesting right now with Wyman, New King. We don't know if Anderson's going to be back. By the way, side note, do you think Anderson will be back? Sure, it sounds like I heard some things that he wants to come back, but I have 38 years old, and that was a bad break, so who knows. Yeah.

How fast he yields and how it feels when he gets back at the year. off or it probably be out for at least 15, I don't know, a year and a half maybe, right? Something like that. Yeah, it's, it's, you know, my thoughts can change in that time, and who knows what he feels, but, you know, I would say I'd probably want to get back in and finish off. I have better enough. Not that he has anything left to prove. Sure.

Sure. I mean, I like to go out on not breaking, my, shattering my leg. Here's my question. Do you feel like your, you're, you're. you're kind of forgotten right now. People are talking about Musassi. He hasn't even fought at 185. They're talking about Machita one fight at 185.

Jacques-Carré, Carmon, they talk about Wyman, of course. But, you know, it almost feels like, you know, six months ago. Everyone was talking about Rockhold, one win away from fighting for the belt. Now all of a sudden, you're somewhat forgotten. Do you hear this? Do you feel this? And does it bother you? It is what it is.

Yeah, people have short-term memories in MMA. But I know I'm capable of. Obviously, I beat Jacques. I beat Tim Kennedy and Lushatis, he's a tough guy, but I put away Jardine right after he couldn't put a boy. So there's a lot of things I've done. Yeah. But I need to refresh people's memories, and I need to go have a good performance. So I focused entirely on this fight.

I go out there and do my job. People will wake up and can't do that. Does it bother you to see all the love that Kennedy and Jacaray get now? No, it doesn't bother me. But I'm definitely ready to get my share of it. and I just want to get back in the contendership and put myself back in the next. I don't like this coming off a loss.

It's really kind of getting under my skin. I just want to get back on the winning track. Yeah, and I bet you know you had to sit on it for longer than expected due to the injury. So to put it mildly, I'm sure you're very happy 2013 is done. Yeah. Or to 2014. I mean, it's my year. I'm going to come out and dominate.

All right. Well, I'm looking forward to it. always exciting to watch you fight. Looking forward to the fight. It's on Fox Sports 1 Wednesday, January 15th. Luke Rockhold versus Costas Phillip, who a big fight at 185 pounds. We appreciate it very much.

Thank you, Luke for stopping by. Thank you. All right, there he is. Luke Rockhold, aka's own main eventing that show, not this Wednesday, next Wednesday, excuse me, on Fox Sports 1. In a minute, we're going to be joined by Chris Wyman, who at first told us he was going to come on

via the phone. Now he's saying Skype, giving us all kinds of problems here, but he should be joining us in a matter of moments. And after that, we're going to be joined by Reid Kuhn, who is the author of this book that is actually on sale right now. It is the hidden numbers and science and mixed martial arts. It's called Fightnomics. And why there's no such thing as a fair fight. Reed Kuhn with Kelly Krigger. Just came out on the back. It says, MMA just got its money ball. How do MMA fights really go down? The numbers don't lie. Hacking the tail of the tape, how is it lying to you?

Yeah, he's big into the whole the Uber tail of the tape. And a lot of people, this is a good quote here from Chale Sennon about the book. The more I look at the stuff, the more I'm impressed. Fightnomics is the fifth cornerman for any serious athlete. Champions handle their careers like CEOs by the numbers. How about that? The most interesting thing about this guy, Reid Kuhn, which we will obviously get into, in the interviews that he has a lot more credibility than you may think.

He's not just some guy who crunched the numbers and wrote a book. He's actually very much involved in the world of mixed martial arts, and I think that's what he has done for some fighters. Very fascinating. And I'm looking forward to talking to him in a few minutes here on the show. Last week on the show, a lot of you were, some of you, I should say, were very bothered by the fact that I, A, pick Chris Wyman as my fighter of the year, And B, picked Ray Longo as my coach of the year.

The Ray Longo won. Some of you said, yeah, the Wyman one, I could see that. The Longo one just pissed you off. And unanimously, everyone thought that it should have gone to Bang Ludwig. And Bang is a great guy, and he deserves it. And I won't argue that. I just thought, you know, to recap that you win twice against the supposed best of all time. And you finish him twice.

and you dominate all four rounds. And I know the second rounds didn't really, didn't really, you know, come to their end. But still, you dominate all four of them that you fought against a guy, and you do other stuff with other fighters, and you deserve the coach of the year award, in my opinion. The fight of the year, the fighter of the year award

is a no-brainer, if you ask me. But everyone's, you know, entitled to their opinion and certainly bang would deserve it. I bet this guy has a say on the matter. We go to the Skype machine. There he is. The UFC middleweight champion, Chris Wyman, who I've noticed lately is wearing a lot more of these Bieber-esque winter hats. You know, showing a little hair, a little back.

What's going on here? Are you going Hollywood on us? Now his Skype isn't working. We got a glimpse. What? Oh, there he is. I hear you. What's wrong with your Skype?

I don't know. It's my first time doing it. What's wrong? Now it's working. Now I see you. Now I see you. It froze for a second. Explain the hat to me.

Um, hmm. I can't tell you where I got this app. Okay. This is brutal. We might have to go to the phone. I have a big head. What's wrong? It keeps freezing.

It's very frustrating for me. Do you have bad internet connection over there? I hope not. This is the new gym. I hope it's not bad, we're going to call you on your phone right now. We're live right now. Unbelievable.

Unbelievable. After all that. It's a nice plaid shirt, by the way. Skype. I got my new computer. Yeah. Scott, but now I can't do it. I want to hear you.

Okay, we're going to call you right now, okay? Actually, let's fight through it one more time because I think something just changed. Yeah, I think you're the blurry one now. Okay, so what were you saying about the hat? I don't know. I don't want to talk about the hat. What do you want me to talk about the hat for? There's nothing to talk about.

Hat, I'm trying, I've got a new style. My manager, he's got a really good style. He's good looking kid. He told me that you're supposed to cover the ears and then a little bit. A little bit. A little bit. Show a little hair. Yeah.

And you're good to go. Just kidding. I don't know. You want me to take over that? No, I liked it. I liked it. I liked it. You're making me all self-conscious.

I'm sorry. Well, we appreciate you stopping by. In the last week or so, how many times have people come up to you and ask you about the kick? I haven't been around that many people that, you know, I tell you what, how many people came on Twitter and was asking me about the kick. Yeah. Are they trying to discredit you? Are you still not? Because here, here's the funny thing about it.

You kept saying that you have to beat this guy twice to get the respect, and I don't think you got the respect because of how it ended. I think you need to win one more to get that respect. Yeah, you know what? I realize that the respect is overrated. I'm never going to win over the respect of certain people, and I could tell you one thing. I mean, after the first fight, I felt like I needed to even prove it to myself that I'm better than him. You know, he started showboarding, even though he's done that before for me to knock him out. I surprised myself.

But after both fights now being in the past, I could for sure tell you that I believe I'm the better fighter, so I'm completely comfortable knowing that I won both fights. I just really feel like there's nothing he could do to me in those fights where he was going to beat me, to be honest with you. But going into the second fight... The floor, I felt very comfortable. I don't know which is the best way to sit.

No, you're good, you're good, geez. You're fine, you're fine, we see you. It's very nice. It's a nice white background. It's very clean. The connection now is great. I just jinxed it probably, but it's great. But here's the thing.

You, like, right after the first fight, you're like, oh, yeah, I have to rematch him, even if you didn't want the rematch. But now it seems like you're not, it's almost like you don't, even though right now you seem to care very much what we think about your attire. You don't care what people think about you as a fighter anymore. Only my style. Only my style I'm so uncomfortable with, you know, it's new to me. Right.

But as far as my fighting style and me being champion, I'm pretty comfortable with myself with that after these last two fights. How often did you train that specific leg check move? A lot. And not even just practicing physically, also visualizing. I mean, after the last fight we had, you know, I was having trouble walking for a week. Wow. And I didn't want that to happen again.

And the one thing that he really hit me with the whole fight was leg kicks. And then everybody's saying, you know, Aniston was just getting going. He was going to start tearing Chris apart with leg kicks. and, you know, and Chris was going to lose. So one thing that I really wanted to focus on was leg kicks, and we did that. And we, I worked, I put down actually maybe one or two guys down in sparring with checking leg kicks. Man, how, when you say put them down, like, what do you mean? You broke their legs?

Like, no. Okay. So it's with shin pads on, number one. Okay. Just had to take a couple seconds off, maybe a minute. One of them was like a minute, too. Others usually just a couple seconds. Their job was to try to light kick me

That was their job I was very prepared for light kicks And I think luck I did get lucky Do you know why? Why? Because using my meaning of luck It's fine

I could say I got lucky and I'm good Luck is when preparation Meets opportunity So I prepared And an opportunity arose And I got lucky Very well said A job well done

who's coming in now? Who are you somebody? Okay, okay. So that must be the most... Oh, wow. See me? Yes. That's the best you get.

Mrs. Wyman. How are you? She's not wearing clothes. Whatever. We're at the gym. We're in the gym running. We're done working out. The new Chris Wyman Gym, right?

Your name is on the marquee. That's Ray Longo and Chris Wythman, how I'm in my gym? It's really my gym. Garden City, New York. Is it open to anyone? Like, if I walk in as a Joe Schmo, I can train alongside you?

you could i don't mean me personally if i'm just some random guy can i train alongside the pros or is it blocked off oh no no you can really any welcome in you training like right now we got a bunch of uh joe schmodes like you yeah hanging around i beat up every day you know and they're training with me these are the guys these are the guys that you put down with the like kicks right you just call up an 18 year old kid working out on the side no i usually for andison i did over 70 um um so how you're Have you watched the fight? Have you watched that moment? Mm-hmm. You have. Is it weird to watch?

Yeah, it's weird. I like watching the first round, and then I like watching the beginning of the second until his light breaks, and I don't really like watching anymore. What did you think of your reaction? Because anyone in that moment you realize, you know, you won, you're going to react, but you were getting some heat. Oh, you're celebrating when he's badly injured. I mean, did you have any idea the severity of his injury?

No. To be honest, I didn't really understand the severity. severity of his injury until maybe even the next day it didn't really click. Wow. You know, I just realized the one I knew he got hurt. I've checked leg kicks. I know guys get hurt when you check the kicks the right way, especially the way he throws him very hard and with the lower part of his shin on my knee. So at the time, I just thought he got hurt.

I just thought he's hurt. I thought I knew something happened where he fell. I don't know if his ankle got hurt or what it was, but I didn't know his leg snapped him two pieces, that's for sure. Did you feel it when it happened? Like, I know it's in the moment and a lot going on, but can you actually feel that happening? I just saw him throwing the leg kick, and I just went to check it, and I knew I checked it good because, you know, you just, when you check a good light, when you check a leg kick the right way, you don't feel anything. You know, you just, you know, so I just knew I checked it good, and I knew if he was, if you were, it actually before that even happened, I checked one of his other leg kicks.

Yeah. I had to hurt him, to be honest with you. And I thought he might be a little less, I'm a little bit more hesitant throwing the kicks at me and then he went through that kick as hard as he could. So I wouldn't be surprised that the first check actually

heard him a little bit to where the second one it fractured it the way it did. It's interesting you say that because Dana White told us after the fight that his corner told him that they think that he kind of injured it beforehand

on the earlier. I think you checked two leading up to that point in that second round and that something happened before that where he was injured and it just made it worse. So you may be right there. Yeah, and that probably shows how tough he is that, you know, it's almost like an FU, baby.

Like, you hurt me that time, but I'm not going to let you know you hurt me and I'm going to kick you anyway type thing. And you know what's funny, I've actually done that before. When I first started sparring, I was really into stopping everybody with leg kicks. You know, I'd just kill their legs until they'd stop and I just felt like that was me winning sparring. And I remember kicking, actually, Luke Kumo. He's a littler guy, and I went to kick him as hard as I can and he checked it right on his knee. and the only thing I wanted to do was roll on the floor and start crying, but, you know, I'm too tough for that. And instead of just not kicking him again and, like, trying to circle it up, I went to kick him as hard as I possibly can another time, and I landed right on his knee again.

And I actually didn't fall down, but up to this point, it was the worst pain I've ever fought through, whether it was wrestling or kickboxing, whatever it is. And that was a couple years ago, there's nothing worse than getting your leg checked, your leg kicks checked by a knee. Especially twice in a row. It's miserable. Do you think he'll come back? I hope so, man. I do want to see him come back, but I'll be honest. It would be a very hard transition. Not really, physically it's going to be tough,

but it's more about the mental thing where I think might be the biggest struggle for him. If you put yourself in his shoes, you know, he was knocked out by, he was known as a great civil time. I still think he should be known as a great single time. By the way, how is that possible? I don't understand when you keep saying that.

How does that make any sense? You beat him, So how could he still be the greatest of all time? Because of everything he's accomplished. Mahama Ali, he's not doing too good right now. What are we calling? Right. Are you smart?

No, but why? Look, I'm trying to say that you beat the guy twice. Why shouldn't you call yourself the greatest of all time? This is called marketing. This is called putting yourself out there. Listen, I'm not that guy. I have a lot to prove before I consider myself the greatest all time. That is one of my goals, my long-term goals for myself.

But I have a lot of guys to beat before I'm that. even if I beat the greatest of all the time doesn't make me the greatest of the time I have to improve my resume I'm only 11 fights in I got a lot of work to do Have you heard about this country? Where was I going to? What was I saying? You were talking about that you want to see him come back

But it's going to be a long road Yeah, I just think it's you know He got knocked out the first fight by me He's never been knocked out before he'd never lost And the second fight he goes in He got dropped in the first round And then he breaks his leg on me When he's known as a kicker

I mean how does he It's going to be tough for him to come back I wish him the best. I really want him to come back and do great things. But I just think mentally, does he have much to prove? No. And what's he going to, like, I don't know. It's just a tough situation for him, unfortunately.

Do you, have you heard anything about this controversy about someone in your corner saying F him? Yeah. Do you have anything to say about that? Who is the man in question? Well, I think you have, I don't want to ruin other people. Okay, all right, all right. Yeah. I just wanted to get your take on it.

Do you have anything to say about it? Are you bothered by it? Are we, are we, I don't want to be the one who comes out. Okay, fine, fine, fine. But were you bothered by it? Well, was that bothered by it? Yeah. If I was just like a fan listening and seeing an article written on that or listen to the sound, yeah, I'd be bothered by it.

But I didn't take it like that. You know, I know I know how this this game works. And I know it wasn't meant in a harmful way. I know all my cornered men. And first of all, I didn't even know if it was a problem. a cornerman not could be someone in the background. I heard it once. And I know it couldn't have been anybody miced up.

So it could have been someone, I didn't know if it was authentic or not. Someone could have put the voice in there. Was it really even a cornerman? Was it someone else shouting? I didn't know. So I gave it benefit of the doubt. But even that being said, I know that any of my cornermen, they don't, they're not, they don't want to see anybody get hurt like that.

And so if they did say something like that, they didn't know the severity of the, of the, of the leg being broken. On top of that, I mean, if you know Ray Longo, Matt and these guys, I mean, my game plan was basically what they were said on the thing, was eff him. Right. Not him as a person, not try to hurt him, but F his mystique and everything, you know, and the doubters out there. You know, go out there confidence about you. It's not about how good he is or what he's accomplishing the past, you know? So it was almost like a mantra going in there. So they didn't mean it if they, you know, you'll get, you'll get another list.

Another guy on here talking about this in a little bit, so I don't want to ruin it. But trust me, no one from our camp would have ever wanted something bad to happen to the Anderson Civil like it did. So I'm very confident in that. So no matter what you said, I'm good. Are you happy that you're done with him, though? Are you happy you don't have to think about this guy? Because it's been, you know, like a year and change. I know you said you were thinking about him from day one.

But you have a new opponent to think about just to be done with that chapter of your life. Does it feel good? It was fun. It's one of those things I look back and enjoy thinking about it. I think it's going to go down on history as a good match and a two-fight thing against a guy who I looked up to for a long time. So I was relishing the moment. I wasn't trying to just get through it. After the first one, you went on a victory tour.

They put you all over the place. Does this one feel the same, or is this, okay, this is what it's like to defend the title? It's not the same as winning the title. Oh yeah, I know my manager and all of them Again, I'm hit by old media and stuff like that But they kind of gave me some time Some time away But again, like yeah, last time I won it

I knocked them out and I was right at ESPN Studios And then I was in the city doing stuff So hasn't been as crazy as far as traveling right away To do media So I don't know what I know I was at ESPN more than any other athlete of any sport this year in studio. I did more in studio interviews than any other athlete.

So maybe they're just tired of having me over there. And I don't know what else they could ask me to have anything exciting to say. So I don't know. Are you the two? And I know you only like to come on one show and it's very nice for you to take some time out of your day to join us here. But are you the 2013 fighter of the year? I didn't think about it until after my fight when people are. telling me I'm getting nominated.

And I honestly don't know all the accomplishments of everybody else who's up for. But I think beating the grades of all the time twice, a guy that no one could even be beaten twice is definitely 2013, Friday of the year worthy. At the press conference, Vitor Belfort asked a sort of question slash statement. How much did that bother you? Oh, I don't care. Listen, I'm a very happy girl like you guys.

He could bang on his chest. He could do whatever he wants. If Anderson Silva can't get to me mentally, I don't know when these guys are going to give up. If they're actually trying to get to me mentally, good luck. Do you think he's trying? I don't know. I don't know.

You're making it seem like, I don't know. It looked like you were a little bothered by it. Oh, no. What am I going to say? I just got done winning my fight. I wasn't prepared to just start talking. Hey, Vitora, let's fight next. I can't wait.

I wasn't, it just wasn't in that mindset. I was kind of just, I was starving. I wanted to go, I wanted to go get some food, to be honest with you. So that's what I was thinking about. So Vitor standing up, I don't even know what he said. I know me and Dana said cool. He said cool, I said cool, but I can't even tell you what he said, to be honest with you. Well, Lorenzo Fertita said last week that he's hoping this fight happens around May, July-ish,

either the Memorial Day card or the July card. Will you be healthy enough because you said you're going to have to have your knee checked out? So what's the status there? so bad i gotta get to the doctor to get checked out but i think i'm i'm supposed to go today actually but the weather has been crazy out here so anybody listening it's uh it's been tough to get out but i i'm gonna get to a doctor tomorrow actually i'm going to the city tomorrow so i'm gonna go see a doctor tomorrow get an MRI double check my knee but to be honest to you i feel my knee feels a hundred percent i just got done training uh if i was to have to get a surgery it would be uh like a

two-week off type thing and i'd still be good to fight you in May, which is the earliest I heard he said, which would be awesome for me. I'd actually rather fight in May than July. Why? Because I haven't enjoyed a summer, man. I want to hang out. You live in New York. You know, we don't have times of the year where it's nice to hang outside with your kids and go to the swimming pools.

So I want to kind of enjoy a summer for once, if possible. You know, who knows? I'll probably be fighting in July. Who knows? It's not to the UFC. I actually didn't even talk to the UFC, Lorenzo or Dana, yet about my next fight. hasn't even came up yet. I haven't thought to.

Yeah, it's interesting because you did fight Mark Munoz the previous July, so you're right. The last couple of July's you've been booked, but you don't think it's anything serious, though, right? No, honestly, it's during the camp, it was bothering me a little bit. Just an annoyance, you know, and so I just told myself after this fight, just wanted to get checked out.

During the fight, no issues. Even the day of the fight is probably better than ever. After the fight, no issues at all. So, but just during the camp, I felt as if I needed to get my, my knee checked out. So I'm just trying to do the due diligence that I told myself to do. That makes sense.

Absolutely. Now, he also said that he wants the fight to happen in Las Vegas. And both you and Ray Longo have been very outspoken about this. I know that you're happy about it. Do you think he's going to have to go in front of the commission to try to get that TUE for the TRT? Do you think he should not be allowed to be on TRT? Well, I just think, first of all, I don't like TRT to begin with it. I don't think TRT belongs in a sport.

where it's a combat sport, where strength is in addition to how you could hurt somebody. So I think if you have low testosterone, which my testosterone is not very high at all, that's just part of your life. That's who you are. Now you're going to a doctor to get it up so you feel younger, you're stronger, putting more muscle on, you don't get hurt as much, you could train better, you have more energy. That's a huge advantage, especially when, how old is Vitor, like 36? Yeah, he's up there. He's in his late 30s. So now he's allowed to have like 17-year-old person testosterone.

I would love to do a test, let him see my testosterone, and he's allowed to have his levels at my levels. Is that possible? I don't know if it's possible to switch bodies like that, but it would be... No, just like, let's say my levels is 300. Now he's allowed to have his level at 300. Oh, in that sense. Equally, you're allowed to have it at 1,000 or something, right? Well, wait, say it again. You broke up there. What was the question?

I said legally you're allowed to have your testosterone up. like a thousand, right? Well, I know it's one to one, but the Nevada's the Athletic Commission allows it to be up to, I believe, one to four now. There was a time it was one to six. But the average person like myself, not even like a pro athlete, is around one to one. Yeah, I don't even know what that means. Yeah. I know that's epitestrone.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Testosterone to epitestosterone. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know what is going to happen with this stuff. Are you bothered that this is going to come up in every single interview leading up to the fight? This is the cloud hanging over this fight. I mean, it's more of a cloud for him.

He got caught cheating once, and now he's taking TRT, it's publicized, and I don't think it's right, you know. And I did hear recently from other TRT users, not to mention names, that TRT is a good way to cover up other things. And I don't know much about the business that these guys. guys are in. But that doesn't seem cool to me for a guy who is not taking anything. So when you look at, you look at what you did this past year, he beat Michael Bissping, he beat Luke Rockhold, he beat Dan Henderson, beat them all in the first round, was doing things that typically in his career he wasn't doing, spinning back kicks. I mean, there's no doubt about it. He looks different. I mean, as a pro athlete, you know, you look at what happened to Bisping and

Rockhold, we were just talking to him, how he's been dealing with his loss. Doesn't that bother you? This is not like you're going in there to, uh, You know, to do a, like, a batting contest against the guy. You know, you're not going to throw footballs against the guy. You're going to punch him, and he's going to punch you. Does he concern you? I feel like I'm on another level. I really think it's a great fight for me.

I think I could beat him no matter what he's on. I actually take more privilege if I'm beating up a juice head. That's what you would consider him. I mean, do you think it's right that he's taking, that he's doing this stuff? I don't think so. I don't think he should be allowed. I think if you have that history, if you, if you think TRT should be allowed in general. Absolutely not. Zero.

No way. Absolutely. I think it's cheating. I think it's cheating. Didn't they say that they're going to get rid of it somewhere? Like no more TOT? Well, the UFC said that if you are on TRT, they're going to test you leading up to the fights to make sure, because a lot of guys will take TRT to not only, you know, they'll boost their levels up and then

bring them back down before the fight. But then you say, okay, during training camp, you're boost. boosting it up so that you can recover, you can trade harder, faster, all that stuff. It helps you, even if you're down for the fight, if you're up during training camp, you're gaining an advantage of sorts. Yes. So are they going to still do that? They do it with him.

Okay, so now what if he doesn't get the approval for TRT in Vegas? That's the big question. Does he still get tested during the year? No, because he won't be on it. But here's the thing. Here's the thing. Josh Barnett just fought in Las Vegas, right? He fought on the same card as you.

and to get his license to fight in Las Vegas, he had to agree to be tested out of competition, which means during training, surprise testing, both him and Travis Brown had to do this because he has a history with this. And it was one of the... So that would be something that might come up when he comes to them say,

hey, they could very well say to Vitor Belford, we're not going to give you the TUE, and we're going to make you take these extra out of competition tests. You'll probably have to do it as well leading up to the fight. I think, you know what, I like that. Why not do that?

And then it's good for Vitor. If he's not cheating, if his things aren't that high, it clears his name a lot. I think if I was him, I'd like to do that. So I think it's good for the sport, and that would be good. And I know GSP had to pay money to do that, and that's free. So we get to do it for free, right? Yeah. So is this something you're going to campaign for?

You're going to ask the commission to do this? You know, I'm going to do whatever the UFC thinks is right. I don't know how this works, man. I don't know. You got to tell me. So I have to campaign. I have to do a... When I say campaign, I mean, you know, say this in other interviews.

Get the word out there. You know what I mean? I have to start picketing. Yeah, you got to go to his house and stand outside and put up signs and whatnot. Oh, yeah, I don't have the energy for that, man. At that point, if I have to do all that stuff, I'm just going to stay in the gym and work out hard. I'd rather just do that and fight him while he's... Whatever he's on T-R-T or whatever.

Okay, and let me ask you this in just a couple of minutes with you, and we appreciate the time. The calendar opens up again this year. It's 2014. we've got between January and June for MMA in New York. Honestly, because I think that would be the big key to raising your stardom. You getting a chance to fight

because John Jones is from New York, but he's not from New York City, essentially. You are as champion. Do you think this is something that could really help you? And do you think it could happen this year? Because I know this is something you care about. You've been to Albany a few times. Yeah, why don't we, why don't you, like,

can we try to get this fight in New York? That would be something, right? This was my prediction. I don't know if it could happen. in time, but let's say something crazy happens in the next couple months. Because if the sport gets legalized, let's say today, they still have to do a whole bunch of stuff as far as the commission is concerned. Like, they can't just have a fight tomorrow.

But could you imagine if they get it legalized in the next few months and then say July 4th weekend, it's going to happen in New York, or even in August, just to debut with you as champion, a local boy, I think the UFC would try to do it. what if they have it set up already in Vegas for 4th of July weekend can they switch it they could switch I mean they've done that before Anderson was supposed to fight chale in Brazil and they moved it to Vegas you remember a couple years ago man that would be awesome I would I always wanted to fight Anderson and you know in Madison Square Garden but Vitor is Vitor is just as good well

to a degree to a degree but but would you give up your summer for that Yeah, unfortunately, I'd be a tough... Doesn't sound like you're all that excited about it. No, I want, I'd give up my summer for that. But the summer thing is really bothering me, man. I don't get to... I want to go outside. I just got this new house.

I got an in-ground pool in the backyard. I haven't been able to even look at it yet. I want to be outside of my kids. How are you going to celebrate all this? Are you taking some time off? I'm actually, yeah. Well, I worked out... I talked last week off eight, eight like crazy.

and still, I only weigh it 200 pounds, though. I don't know what's wrong. I'm not gaining weight. You're trying to gain weight. No, I wasn't trying to gain weight, but, you know, you just try to get out of your system. You haven't been able to eat unhealthy for a while, so I was like, you know, I didn't, I just, I had a couple parties, you know, my, my, I had a family Christmas party at a wedding, so I'm just naturally just eating bed and still not gaining weight. But this week, I was like, I don't want to be, you know, a fat skinny kid because I'm not, I think I'm losing muscle and just putting on fat. So that's why I'm not getting weight.

But I think I'm going to this week work out, and then I'm going to Turks and Kekos on Friday. Oh, wow. Ready to take out of kids. And then I'm going straight from there to South Carolina to help out Wonder Boy, since he's helped me out a bunch of times. Well, I'll work with him for a week, come back to Long Island, and then we got the February, and then we got Super Bowl weekend, I think. You'll have to do stuff for that. And I'm doing a grand opening at my gym during Super Bowl weekend.

So if you're coming in for the fights, make sure to stop by. When is that? Super Bowl weekend. I think it's the Saturday of the fights, Super Bowl weekend. Where is the gym? Tell people if they want to stop by. Where exactly is it? It's in Garden City, Long Island. If anybody listens to this show, if anybody stopped by from listening to this show. Okay, okay. What do for them, Ariel, tell me. Yeah, let's do something. Let's see. I bet you're going to get a lot of people.

Yeah, something good. Do they get a month off, something? A month? You know what? Anybody that comes to the gym in the next, uh, The next two days. Two days? That's not enough. Give them at least two weeks. People are out of town. People are on vacation, things like that.

You can't give them just two days. This deal is going to be on penny savers and coupons, and it's not going to truly come from your show, from true listeners. Okay, one week. Give them a week. Some people like to listen to the show throughout the whole week.

All right. From, what's the date? Monday. Oh, January 6th to January 13th. January 6th to January 13th. I'm going to have to go tell my wife. She's going to rip my head off. January 6th to January 13, if you come in and say that you heard me on at the hour, you get one free month with your sign-up at our gym.

Wow. That's pretty cool. That's a good deal? That's a great deal. I think that's pretty good. I think it's worth it for everyone involved. One commercial avenue in Garden City, New York. Just come in and tell them, I'll make sure the front desk people know right now the deal and you'll be welcomed with a hero's welcome that you actually listen to this terrible show.

Wow. And the keyword is the MMA hour. You'll be rewarded for your waste of time. The keyword is the MMA hour. Keyword, secret password is MMA hour. Wow, the MMA hour. All right, secret password, the MMA hour. All right, there you have it.

That's great. I might even take you up on that offer. Who knows? Probably not. Can I write down the, what is it, January 6th to the 13th? So you're not going to remember this? Now you're trying. Text me our secret password and the date, so I don't mess up.

All right. Well, congratulations. Enjoy it. Have fun. And don't forget where it all started. Right here with John Volante. Not this studio. Another studio. Looked like that. I was so nervous for that show. You were, right? I was calling you... Just a big time, you don't really matter to me. You know, you're just like a little... Right before we went on the air, I was like, how do you pronounce your name? Is it Wiedman? I know. I was just so, so amazed to be in your presence that didn't matter. Look at us now. But let me just, anybody out there that has been supporting me Before this fight, after this fight, I really appreciate it.

It does mean a lot since there are a lot of daders out there. Everybody's support does mean a lot, so I just want to thank you. I know all you data's out there. I love you too. Thank my sponsors, bad boy in capital, American ethanol. Ooh, monster milk. And it might be forgetting some others. But I love you all.

Chris Wyden.com. Follow me on Twitter, Chris Wyden, UFC. Facebook, Chris Wythman, I think. and thanks a lot I really appreciate for having me and Matt Sarah's on the line Yeah he's coming He's coming very shortly

And good luck to your Denver Broncos this weekend I've been so out of the football loop I don't even know what's going on You don't even know who they're playing I just had a big fight I just had a big fight Well they're in the playoffs In case you didn't know

Do that they clinched a while ago right They're playing the San Diego Chargers All right so yeah we're And charges are actually not bad man They're gonna beat him Yeah we're gonna beat him Yeah we're gonna beat him Yeah, we're going to beat.

Yeah. Oh, you go with the Wii. Very nice. Philip Lerge play live at North Carolina State. He's a stud, and I've been telling him that for people for years when he's, you know, everyone's kind of writing him off, and I always said, Philibor is good, man. He's good. And now he's proven it.

He is. So good for. Good for you. Congratulations, Chris. Thank you for stopping by and enjoy the spoils of beating Anderson Silver for the second time. All right. Did we have a good interview? Did you like this?

I don't know. It was okay. I'd say it was like a B. A little boring. I can tell it was boring for you when you were putting your hand, your fist on your face. Like you're like,

is this thing over yet? Yeah, I'm just falling asleep over here. I mean, with the tuk, you're wearing the plaid shirt, I'm not wearing a plaid shirt, it's all very weird.

And this is like, this has like, you see that? Yeah, some lining in there. I get the sense, I get the sense you don't want to leave.

I do feel comfortable in the studio. I'm pissing everybody over and everybody wants to hear somebody else. You're going to start, you're going to get old. I'm like, wow,

what did you do you? Actually, for being a due said. Matt Serra just told me he, he needs an extra 10 minutes. How about that? You got 10 minutes? You got 10 minutes? Really want me on here? What are we going to talk about?

You got 10 minutes to kill or what? Dude, I'm bored right now. I got, actually, Michael Chandler's in the building, so I want to go hang out of him. What's he doing? What's he doing in New York? Doing some stuff for Spike, some stuff for Bellator. So he just came in and trained with Long Island. go for a little bit.

But you can't, you can't, you can't fraternize with those guys? Listen, I don't respect to the fighter. And Michael Chan was a tough dude. I'll be the first to tell you, really tough.

And, uh, am I promoted to or no? No, I know. Have you talked to GSP recently? No, I actually haven't. I haven't spoke.

Why was, I think he's, I think he's untouchable. Why, why wasn't John Danher in your corner? Oh, you know, my dad, Matt was in the corner. Matt Sarah, who's my original Jiu-Jitsu coach, my head judjitsu coach.

He was sick last time, so this time we brought him Matt. The usual corner. It was my usual corner. But Dan Hurr was a big part of the first camp. Yeah, you know, and I worked with him. I worked with him for this camp. Why are you giving me that smile? You know, I could see you right now. There's an actual camera there. What kind of computer did you get? A MacBook? It seems like it's breaking up. Yeah, I got a MacBook.

The MacBook Air. Wow. That's what happens when you're champion. I never shop for myself ever. I don't shop for anybody, to be honest with you. But when I was in Vegas, I went nuts. I hate, if I'm in the mall, yes, John Volante, we go shopping. Well, I go shopping with him in the mall, and I just go to somewhere and eat while he's shopping

and buying all these clothes. And my strength coach and Ma, they love shopping. They love their fashion. I'm cheap, man. I don't like to buy things, and I just kind of sit outside the store and wait from them to be out of there. But when I was in Vegas, I shopped for like five, six hours. I bought my wife all types of stuff that I would never ever buy for her. You were feeling good.

Talking about some serious stuff, some heavy, heavy-duty bags. Wow. I bought myself clothes. I bought myself Tumi bags. That MacBook. I was just going crazy. It felt good. You know, when you're going to a fight, you just feel like your world's ending.

So I was just going to town. And who's the, who's the, the, Cool. Do you have something to talk to you about? No, I'm actually, this is interesting. But I want to know who's the interesting. They're probably tweeting you right now.

Get this guy out there. Sarah's coming up in two minutes, so then we'll say goodbye to you. The coolest celebrity to give you props, because now you're, you know, you're hanging out with the ESPN guys. There are people reaching out to you on Twitter. Do you get some cool celebrities giving you props? You got some fresh cauliflower here. Oh, yeah.

How about that? Right before the fun of it. I haven't had Pollyflower in years. But yeah, coolest celebrities. Kevin James actually, we've been going back and forth on text messages. Great offense.

Huge fan. Yeah. He's awesome. He's awesome. Good dude. He came out and trained with us a little bit. Really? Yeah, well, he actually does my champ challenge

on champchallenge.com. Okay. He heard about that. But he loves it, and he's doing a great job. I think he's losing some weight doing it. Long Island guy, right? Long Island guy. I actually didn't realize how Long Island he is. What does that even mean?

You know, he's been out of Long Island for a while now, you know, making all the money he made, he had to go, you know, when you're a movie star and so he got moved to L.A. Sure. So he's out of Long Island for a while, so a lot of people don't know that he's from Long Island. Okay. This guy, no, he's real Long Island. He knows some of the stuff I know, which makes him real long out. Okay. He used to be on H.

He used to be on Hully's high school wrestling team. Did you know that? Yeah. I'm just started learning all this stuff So it's pretty cool that he's doing so good for himself And he's from Long Island So I'd like to see that But yeah

So Kevin James Stone Cold Steve Austin He direct messages me on Twitter Before and after every one of my fights Which I think is awesome What does he say? This gives me some advice Really?

I can tell you want me to read him to you? Yeah, yeah, please This is great You're a Stone Cold Steve Austin fan? Of course he was on our 200th episode he's a huge MMA fan It's not even a big deal You're like oh who cares

This is the rattlesnake It's a huge deal See I've never I don't know much about WWE or WWDA I never was like a crazy fan How do you go to direct messages Oh gosh

Hang on you don't want to see some of my direct messages I'll have them about you actually Really One of them is But I defended you Who's direct messaging you crap about me All right here we go You guys just like show it to you

Well I don't know Is it personal Hey man No Can't be that perfect It feels personal So I don't know I'm more interested

In the people Talking smack about me I can't tell you that stuff All right I'll be watching the fight He'll be full on for this fight Go out there and do what you do Good luck

I said thanks man Really appreciate your support And he said You guys Keep your head straight Stay focused And have a good 2014 Wow

I haven't wrote back yet Should I do a smiley face Yeah do a smiley face LOL LMFAO Hey, is it true that you tried to get rid of the Tom Petty song? What do you mean? I tried to get rid of it.

Is it true that you didn't want to come out to the song but the UFC said they wanted you to come out to it? Hey, I'm typing back to Steve Austin. I said, thanks, man, you too. Rividing. Creato because you haven't figured that out. But I'm going with that. Is that true?

Is that true? What? Is it true you tried to get rid of the song? No. What do you mean? What do you mean? Who told you had tried to get rid of the stories? That's what I heard.

Someone told me, I didn't know if it was true that you didn't want to come out to that song because now you're the champion. But the UFC said they liked the song. I like the song. I was surprised that you wanted to get rid of it, but I wanted to know if it was true. I had sources that were legit. All right. So it's not true. No.

All right. No, I... Now your Skype is all acting up. What? Your Skype's all acting up. I think it's a sign from above. Try to get rid of me? Well, I don't know.

The thing keeps cutting out. Well, can you hear me? Can you? Yeah. No, I can't even hear you. It's cutting out. I think it, uh, it, I don't even know based on your Skype right now whether or not you tried to get rid of the song. I bet it's good now.

I saw something click. Yeah. Are we good now? All right. Hey, uh, hey, Matt Sarah, are you there? Dude, I'm here. What's up, man. With Chris, we can't get rid of this guy.

He doesn't want to get up. Oh, man. Listen, those Long Islanders, they like to talk. Forget about Longo. Let's try to hide up my spot. Matt, get out of here, man. He's going to try to kill you. Run away now.

Why he can't. Oh, man. You know what? I missed it. I got to kiss to rerun later. Is this an ambush? What's going on here? It's not an ambush.

Don't worry. Chris, we'll say goodbye to you. He's a busy man. He's champion of the world. By the way, have you noticed Chris's his fashion, his style has changed a lot? He's wearing the Bieber hat. He's got the plaid shirt. You know, hey, listen.

Why me? Did I not mention up before that you have style? He did. He did. What was it? Jamal? hooks you up. Yep.

I get full credit to no one else, but Jamal and Blonde. I have no style at all. That's good to say. Man, let me tell you something. It gets worse. As you get old, I do not dress myself.

But man has great style. His wife has great style, so he has good style. He's good. Yeah, my wife. Get your finger out of her mouth. Wow. I'm sorry.

I'm saying goodbye to my kids because I was two different costs. We had to go to the doctors. Dude, go, talk to the most yourself. Chris, I'll talk you later, buddy. Wait, wait.

I want to say one thing. I want to say one thing before we let Chris go. That moment on that video blog. Oh, my mom. Let me cut you off for one second, though. Don't do what you did last time. In Reardon. How old was it?

When he got a phone with phone, when you won the ballot, he's like, don't you want to say congratulations? I mean, Ariel, what are you turning to open? I just don't relax with that stuff. I agree. All right, all right. It was a miserable moment.

But listen, I can understand where you were going on it. It was nice. We know why? We're not, you know, we're emotional. but we don't do that. Like, for you on your show. It was a nice moment on the video blog. You introduced him to the world,

and now there you were. You weren't able to be there in Las Vegas. I was trying to tie it all together. It's true. It's true. Hold on, hold on. I'm going to go on the way. You appreciated the moment, right, Chris?

Yep. You remember that moment on the video blog? What's your question that you want to do when we're both in the phone? I'm sorry, guys. You can't kiss not kiss the other one. Let me just say goodbye really quick. Hey, okay.

Let us say, no, that's a great idea, Chris, by the way. That's a great idea. I like where your head's at. The question. Hey, guys, I'm free now. I took two different cards. You said you wanted to ask us a question. What's the question? No, no, no. I'm going to ask the question right now. Hey, Matt. What's up? So we were talking to Chris earlier. Now you're free to talk?

Yeah, yeah. I'm getting the old... You said there was a moment on a video blog. Yeah, the moment. The moment where he introduced you to the world. Oh, yeah. Oh, my goodness. What about that? That's a great moment. That's a great moment. That is a great moment. I'm trying to give you guys props. He just got some pushing the car.

He's looking all beautiful. Yeah. Yeah, I looked Jack. I had ads going. I had a little black eye. I looked tough. Oh, it was a great moment. You did have the black guy.

That's good. I'm surprised they didn't play up that moment more. I'm surprised they don't play up that moment more. Matt Sarah is the one who told us this was going to happen. Yeah. That was 2009, I think, too, right? Yeah, it was before the UFC. He's Mr. Leo.

You're the only guy who does actually bring that up, but that's awesome, man. because you got a freaking big mouth, and you reach a lot of people. Hey, Ray Longo was on this show a couple weeks ago. I said, I still think it's a travesty that you didn't get a third fight against GSP. I thought, you know what you did? This is what he does.

He buddies you up, so you lower you. My wife was still ran over. Just because we had the New York accent, it doesn't mean we're dumb. All right. You know what he does? He buddies. He buddies you up because he said, oh, I'm not.

Now we lost. Matt. I don't know what's going on with Chris's thing. Ribs. You're better BSers than you, okay? Okay, all right, all right. Are we done, Chris? Matt, are you there?

Is anyone there? Yeah, I'm here. Okay, Chris, all the best here. Chris says all the best. He'll talk to you later. He has a bit of a wonky Skype connection over there at the new gym. Yeah, I guess we will. Oh, you guys Skype.

You're so fancy. Yeah, oh, there he is, checking himself out. See you later, Chris. All the best. All right, bye. There he is. Okay, Matt, now we talk to you. We move on from the,

the middleweight champion to the former wealthyweight champion honestly though you don't think that I mean I really do believe you beat him once he beat you twice

why didn't you get a rubber match probably because you know it wasn't a very great rematch and then I don't think that's fair what's going on

good I mean you know they said I lost to use how do you want to score that but you know

listen I'm not losing sweepover let's talk about the first one I'm only kidding it's not about me Hey, what did you think when he retired? Because to me, the first thing I thought was,

Matt Sarah goes down as the last person to beat him. And I should say he didn't officially retire, but right now he walked away. That's a big feather in your cap. That's a big coup for you. You want him to stay retired, right? Oh, no, no, I do not. I want what's best for him, whatever he wants to do.

I mean, I think guys should lay off St. Pierre, man. I mean, everybody with that way he's fine. Oh, man, what are the way he fought? Like, now you deal with him. a guy that he couldn't just kick down and do his thing to, but yet he went to war, man. He had a...

And he's still getting, like, people still look at him because so whatever, I don't know. You think he comes back? Matt, Sarah, what's going on with your phone connection? This guy. It's not the Skype connection. Matt, are you there? Let's calm back.

I think we actually officially lost them. And he's on a cell phone, not even Skype. By the way, I want to mention, in case you're wondering, Reed Coon was supposed to be on the show at 2.30, but because we got backed up with Luke and then with Chris, we had to push him to 340. So he'll be joining us after the Tarek Safedine interview. So have no fear, we will be talking about the book. We just had to move things around.

But I want to get Matt Serra on the phone. He could tell if you were paying attention to the Weidman interview that he dropped some hints about Mr. Sarah. So I want to get him on the the phone to clear things up and talk about what happened in Las Vegas at UFC 168. But I really do believe that. I'm not actually just saying that to butter him up. I never understood the second fight was great. You could say the same thing. Look, Junior Dos Santos beat Cane Velasquez in a very quick fashion, right? And then they had a rematch where, okay, he wasn't finished, but JDS was dominated for essentially five rounds, right? They still did a third fight. They still had one more. same outcome, but it was big.

I still think the third fight versus GSP would have been big, and I think we were robbed of it. I think it would have been an interesting fight, a lot of buzz, and I think Matt would have sold it well. You could have said, oh, the second fight. Remember, Longo was on the show

telling us that Matt was very injured going into that second fight, so you could play back. I never understood why they didn't do it a third time. Usually, okay, someone beats the champ, they become champion, the champ gets into the crack, but if the first fight was interesting enough,

I think you can go for it a third time. Matt, are you there? Yes. I'm still trying to make the case that you should have gone the third fight against GSP. But anyway, I want to ask you... That ship has sailed, my friend.

I just never understood. Anyway, I just want to ask you one more thing about him. Do you think he'll be back? You know, I think so. I really do. Because he's still so young, and I think he'll come back. It'll come back just...

In phenomenal fashion, I think he's a little layoff, whatever it is. He gets some stuff straight, whatever he needs to get straight. And then, you know, he'll feel like, oh, you know, now I can go back in for how many more fights I want or whatever. Can you, you know, I think he'll be back. Can you at least say that you changed him as a fighter? You turned him into a different fighter, right? Well, I mean, I think that's a given, but if it wasn't me, it would have been someone else, I'm sure. So I'm glad I did it first.

You know, I did it I'm glad that Because that worked out great for me You know what I mean But, you know All I know is there was a lot of comparisons Or whatever But now

Now, you know, let's let's move on to Chris Because don't get me wrong I'll call you back And we'll talk about me The whole freaking three hours All right, all right I'm very vain But, you know

I still don't think Chris I mean This guy, I mean, What do you got to do to get some Some recognition, right? Trying to finish this. right thing. Right.

First round could have been a 10-A round yet. The phone. Guy, people just love Anderson

so much, which is awesome, that it's almost like, oh, no, there's another, he didn't really do it or whatever. I don't know.

Honestly, I think that other than a loss, that was the worst ending possible for Chris Wyman because people are still not giving him the respect that he deserves.

And, you know what? And each, you know, the only thing good about that is you never truly satisfied. fight and then

sorry I had to go in front of a truck here you never you know you're not gonna it's not like he's gonna just uh

he's constantly looking to improve anyway so I mean if that you know the next fight you know it's another chance to even

you know show more of his show more of what he's got but I don't know man I mean just based on the first round of alone anybody else is is in that clinch

Look what happens when they're in that clinch. I mean, he dropped them in the clinch. I mean, that's a straight. That was a body head, boom. So you were in his corner. You weren't in his corner for the first fight. You were in his corner for the second fight, of course. We were just talking to Chris about...

You were not feeling well, right? I had the details. Well, I mean, I had to get my rib cut out from me. How are you feeling now? I'm good, dude. I'm good. I mean, I'm back to rolling. Don't even more.

I had a rough week as far as with the eating goes. I'm like a chick with that. But, like, it's, I mean, because you know what you do? Like, you know, it's Christmas Eve, and then from there. And then you're like, I know the week, it'll be New Year's. I might as well just coast this week and go a little bit off the low-carb stuff, you know. And then you get back. See, right now today, I feel good.

Had protein shake. I had a little science in the morning. Are you still sponsored by Zion? Because I notice you mentioned them a lot still. Yes, they're great. They've always been great to me, science, you know? and I'm always going to be a big fan and even after I retired

do you still like, listen, come do stuff for us, we like you and it's cool, man, I'm a big fan of science thing. You can be a monster drink, I will throw them on the floor and step on it. I don't want to touch that stuff. Big science fan over here. It's good to hear that you're doing well. What are you walking around at?

Like 170, 175? You seem like... Dude, what is? You know what? You are. You too much, buddy. Because I swear, if it was anybody else, They're like, oh, sorry, I'm feeling good.

I'm feeling good. Dude, listen to me. I can't wait. I can't wait. I can't wait. I did you train because I seen you on the treadmill before. I seen your, and that's good. It's good you know how to run.

Yeah. You should know how to run because I think that's the best course to go. If ever you just finally, you know, that straw that breaks the lemons back. Sure. And you finally just have to get out of there because, because there's the area that's really, I really think you're a good-hearted guy and you're a good dude. But then there's the other guy. He's not a bad guy.

I guess it's a profession. You're a good journalist. Like, and you, you know, but, and it's one thing with the breaking story, but then is the other guy, the guy that brings up the hoist about what Hendo said. Hey, what's your response? Yeah. That's the guy that guys want to smack. And I'm not saying, I want to, I'm just saying that's, I'm just letting you know that's the guy that people have a problem with.

Not you breaking the latest story about something. That's not a big deal. Yeah, of course. The shit stir. Of course. The guy that's the jacket holder. I guess that's part of your job, but that is a shitty. it's almost like, like, for that little part of your job,

you go from being a cool guy to being like, you know, like a fighter would take that as being like, uh, instigating. Like a jacket holder, like you call it back in high school, where it's like, hey, you can probably play this over from our old fucking interviews. We can just move on. But nobody here.

I just want to say, I think we go over this every interview. I just want to say that. That's me being, that's me being a responsible journalist. If you say something about someone, I'm going to go get their response. That's not being a weasel.

being a weasel You know what It's a big line Between that Because you always have to use tact Like so in other words Henzel said something Now you go into his cousins

And say, Oh what do you say about that But he said that you don't know What you're talking about So I mean Yes you're right I guess somebody's got to get a response But the fact that it's you

It's just I don't know I listen I don't see the way Me and you We got a thing Listen I think that the The best part of this

conversation is the fact that you even watched those interviews, so I appreciate it very much. Let me ask you the question. Oh, dude, I told you. Who's the biggest fan? I'm not saying, listen, I'm not responsible to your success. I'm not saying that. I'm just saying I was one of the first guys

who thought, you know, put it over to loudspeakers. You know what I mean? So you were in Chris's Corner and there was some controversy that came out, and I want to know if you can clear this up for me. A video. And let's face it, that's why we're talking.

Right, right, right. I'll talk to you about anything. Yes, we love having you on. You're one of our most... Who do I contact to let this get out? That way you should even, you know, I mean, who did I said? And I gave you a tax, didn't I? You did.

And it was very... I did, because I want to clear it up. Because this is a deal. Anybody watching that, I saw the video clip of... And go, go, you want to make clear what you're talking about? I want to set it up first in case people don't know. So, so... Good.

If you watch the fight online on UFC.tv, you can listen to different corners. and one of the corner men in your corner, Wyman's corner, the red corner, I believe it was Ray Longo, was miced up. So you can hear, if you're interested in that, you can hear the corners in between rounds. Well, someone put out a video clip a couple of days after the victory of the finish, and it sounds like someone in the corner as Anderson Silva's on the ground in very much pain says, F him. And a lot of people were very mad and said this is an indication that Wyatman's corner are bad people. They don't know who said it, but people were a upset about this. Can you clear the air? Was that said? Do you have any idea who said it?

A hundred percent. But listen, can I... You said it up... There's nothing funny about what's going on. I just... If you ever see that guy that's like, that's like, like snickering out of... Sorry, listen, let me set this up for you. I do, yes, I know. The first time I heard that, I said, oh man, that big guy got himself in trouble, you know? Because then I'm like, and then I shore it. And I know how it looks. Like when you see it, and you see that when you're watching it, you're seeing, like, you're hearing the commentary as the fight's going on. So you have a clear view of what's going on.

Well, let me just put it out there. I heard the thing. And at first I'm like, oh, what did Longo say that? I'm like, oh, man, fuck, I go, that was me. It was me. There we go. Oh, no. You're the one.

Yes. Yes. No, it's not good. It's not good at all. But let me, let me. Please explain it. I totally forgot what, you know, that I even said that. The thing is this, when you're in that corner, man, let me try to paint the picture.

This is why I couldn't put this on Twitter, because you've got to kind of explain the situation here. That the circumstances, I don't have a, I did not see none of us saw what happened. We saw him just drop, you know, and I didn't see Chris throw a strike. You know, Patrick Otee that time when he put, Eric. He didn't fight Ariol. Ariel, I don't fucking fight. But he put Anderson in his leg seized up and he dropped. Like, everything happened so fast.

And you got to understand, we are in battle mode. You're a friend and student in there. And, you know, we're a tight group, man. Everybody cares about each other, you know? Sure. When he, and you're fighting Anderson Silva. The guy could do a fun kick out of nowhere and the fight could, you know, be over for two months. That was the worst one.

Matt? And we have that attitude. What's going on with your phone, Matt? Why does it keep cutting out? Did you hear me now? I can hear you, but at like every minute or so, you drop for a second, then you come back. All right, what about now? Well, now it's fine.

All right, maybe I'm... Listen, first of all, you shouldn't drive and be on the phone anyway. I tried the park, and that's when we had problems. I thought for my balls. Okay, okay. But listen, you can't cut me. Don't you know I got an ADD? I'm sorry.

What's the matter with you? I'm trying to make this a better interview. I'm trying to get the actual explanation, the perhaps apology. out there. Okay. So listen, so for two months. Me and Longmore talk it every night. All right, listen, man, this is, he does this, he does this, he does this, he does this. He does this way he's going to fuck him. This is the way he's going to fuck him. This is where

Chris is going to get him. If he gets him here on the floor, but we're working with it, I swear, this is the way he's going to fuck the guy. I mean, this is how we talk. I hate to say, I mean, I'm being honest with you. This is just, this is off-cork and getting ready for a fight. It's like, all right, this guy's got to speak, and this is not something we say in the, in interviews or

we're leading up going, ah, fuck here. We're not, I think, I believe we're, you know, we're very respectful. I mean, I get along with every single guy, maybe not every single guy, but everybody but one, I get along with everybody I ever fought, man. I'm very cool with them. Like I, and I think me and Longo are some of the most respectful guys out there, man, where we really are. But when you are in that cage, and I know it's a sport, but let's, let's be honest, man.

You're getting your guy ready to go and put the hurt on somebody and take this guy. guy out, taking him down, you're beating him, or you're looking to take a limb. That's the business we're in. Right. And as far as Chris, we even tell him the mentality, dude, all the guy, all the mystique, and it's that, no, fuck him, dude. He's stepping in the cage with you. That's the kind of thing.

That's the approach we have. And I have the same approach when I went to go fight George, and it's got that kind of attitude, but it's never disrespectful. By the time we get into that case with different people as far as afterwards, and, you know, when this happened, when he dropped, we did not know that we didn't see what you guys saw at home. We didn't saw him drop. So I've seen, I've seen, man, a thousand sparring sessions where,

or the guy kicks an elbow, a guy kicks a knee, and he drops that sparring sessions over, and if the fight, that's fight's over. But I'm not thinking the guy's legs in half. So, like, when that happened, there was a, gosh, it felt like in a turn. Cutting out again. It's really very fast, but it's all in the moment. So I'm like, wait, wait, like, basically, did we win? Oh, yeah, fuck it.

Oh, good. but it came out. Oh, good, fuck him. He won. But, man, listen, Anderson's not only these are legends, anybody, I don't want to, it wasn't me watching that thing break.

I didn't see it until the next day how that thing broke his leg. And we're not heartless pricks. We're not bad sportsmen. You know, he has kids. You know what I mean? He's got people that love him. The first thing I did when I knew it was me

is I got, you know, I'm cool with Ed Soros and them guys, we're always, you know, I mean, we're, you know, friendly acquaintances, you know, I got a good relationship with everybody, and, uh, you know, I got, I got his, I got, Ed Sour's his number, you know, and I gave him a call and, uh, and I basically am telling him what I'm telling you, you know, and I go,

look, man, because the thing is this, man, I'm not a fake guy, I see these guys and I'm all friendly, and then they're thinking that the guys, I mean, if Chris got his, like, broken in half, and I hear somebody say, oh, fuck him, I think the guy's a prick. And I'm, it's not that I'm, I'm a big, like, I got to get on a mountain top and worry about, you know, scream out with how I am. and worry about what people think to me.

It's not even like that. But the fact of the matter is it is that this is how it went down. You know what I mean? So, you know, I did, you know, I don't wish that injury on anybody. That's a, and who would have thought it's that? You know, that happened one other time with Cory Hill. And I was talking to it with Ed Sor. He said that happened to pay leg.

I didn't see that one. But, I mean, it's nasty. I see me kickboxing. I mean, I wouldn't wish that all the worst enemy. You know what I mean? Did this really bother you? If I heard anybody's feelings that are close to Anderson, like, if kids is wife or anything, I do apologize. I definitely, it did not come out of a bad place and negative play.

It was more of like, oh, fuck it, it's all good, fuck it, it's over, like that type of thing. But again, man, that's how it went down, you know? So it, and Kirkney's... I don't know if I explained it. I don't know if people can even understand what it's like to be in the corner. That's why I try to explain it, like, and again, you know, after a two-month camp or, just figuring out how to take this guy out. You know what I mean?

And, you know, you're emotional, and that's it, man. It wasn't meant to be disrespectful, believe it or not. Well, I think a lot of people would understand it. In the heat of the moment, things are said and whatnot. And obviously, from your vantage point, you can't see everything that's going on. It seems to me, though, and correct me from wrong, that this really bothered you, because no one really pointed the finger at you. No one knew who said it, and the story had died down a little bit, but you feel the need to come

out and say this. You want the people to know that you can feel this way. I'm listening. I'm thinking what you're thinking, and the first thing I thought it was, listen, let's play Longo, you know? And, you know, he was Mike up, and I could say, listen, let's, let's throw that guy into the bus. But then I said, I thought about it. Now, listen, there's Longo, there's all joking around. I was a good guy. But there's Longgo, and then I'm in there with Mr. Weidman, Charlie Wyden, who's an awesome person. And then there's Vladda, who probably is up there with Chris Laiven. as far as the nicest guy ever in the U.S.

you know? So, you know, I mean, it is what it is. I said it. So why would the whole corner, like, you know, get blamed? I mean, I'm telling you where it came from. Like, that's where it came from. There was definitely no... Like, I know it sounds awful,

but there's no way I saw that guy's like in half and we're saying, good, fuck, it wasn't even like that. It was... And then you've got people trying to harp on it, guys that don't like me, like that big, fat, slob, Tim Silvia. I want to ask you about that.

I wanted to ask you about that. What do you want to ask? He was all over Twitter calling you, you know, on sportsmen like and all the stuff. Where did this come from? Who knew that you had this beef with Tim Sylvia? No, you know, Sylvia's a death of a listen.

The guy, do you ever talk to the guy? Yes. A moron. A total moron. You know what's funny about him? He's so retarded. He never thought, he never knew. Even when he was a champion

and wearing his golf out to the clubs, he never knew why he wasn't the face of the UFC. You have a thing I mean Listen I'm no I'm no George St. Pierre when it comes to looks But listen it's one thing if he was He looked the way he did like that big

Gorky retard But the thing is this It's what thing if you look like that And he had like a heart of gold But he was a piece of shit man But where'd this come from? He was attacking you He was attacking you where to come from

Where's the history I saw that After I got back from Whiteman's after party You know So I might have had one too many goose and a club soda with a splash of cranberry

that's my drink I'm not much of a bad drink you ever try that I'm not much of a drinker but it sounds good oh dude you're such a oh listen

what I up to the thing is this Tim Sylvia I mean way that guy come from some you know I check on the Twitter and I hear this I hear that

I block well I used to go back of people it took me a while to get this whole Twitter thing down right because I used to think a lot of stuff to heart and then I'm like all right man

I'm arguing with this guy with 20 followers. I'm like, what am I doing? I'm going to be 40 soon. I can't do this. It's almost as bad when I would argue with people with the headset on during Xbox. I never did that. I'm only kidding it.

But where was I, Ariel? Tim Sylvia. Oh, God. Tim Sylvia. So where did that guy come from, man? All of him I see, what's what he said something where it's bad enough. Anderson got the injury, but it was really disgusting. And mind you, disgusting, was D-I-S-C-U-S-T-I-N-G.

Really disgusting Matt Serra celebrating when, you know, it's like, dude, first of all, I'm not going to explain myself to you, you ugly moron. Oh, God, that guy's such a card. Okay. That's it. That's it. I'm not enough to say. You just felt like you wanted to say something after that, but that's, that's, that's, that's,

No, no, I just, there's nothing else. I can't even attack the guy. I even mentioned his name. I'm giving the guy more precedent he had in years. I shouldn't even do it. Do you think Anderson will be back? You know, I don't know, man. I mean, if the guy walked away today, obviously, people aren't going to wonder what he could have done.

You know what I mean? The guy is the guy's done everything, man. I mean, look at him. I mean, he's a living legend in the sport, you know? So, okay, so let me ask. And I'm such a huge fan. I really am. I mean, that's why, you know, that's why it upset me also.

So, like, man, I'm not that guy. I mean, I, nobody enjoyed that guy who's like more than me, you know. But, you know, in battle load, too much just training, man, we're going to fuck this guy. And then that thing just flew out when, you know, the bizarre circumstances, you know, him just dropping and not knowing what the hell just happened. You know, there's no contest. Is it a, is it a stop? Why do you just fall down? Right.

And then Ray, when Ray said the leg broke, like, Ray one time checked the guy, or my buddy of my man, he's guy who was sparrow along the long ago. And Lago checked the kick with him, he broke his leg, but when he said it, I didn't expect the gruesome spectacle that we saw. Right. I just was, you know what I mean? Like the guy's leg was broke, but he went, he got a fix, but it wasn't like not in half. And you know what I mean?

So all I knew was Ariol. Oh, right, we won. That's how it went down. Hey, let me ask you one last thing before I let you. go, how do you feel about Vitor Belfort, given his past, the TRT stuff, Ray has been very vocal, Chris has been very vocal, what do you think?

You think you're going in there at a disadvantage because he's doing this? You know, I mean, listen, I mean, that whole argument with the TRT thing is, it's interesting, you know? I mean, because, listen, I'm one of these guys that were older and I could have started doing that

and said, hey, I could prolong my career or whatever. It's kind of weird, man. You know, I mean, my thing is this. I don't think it's going to... I don't think anything's going to help him in this next fight. I'll just say that. I think that it's a great matchup for Chris, and I see Chris finishing him,

and I think it's going to be a great fight, and I'm looking forward to the camp. And how do you see him finishing him? Because you're the one who predicts all this stuff. Well, I didn't predict the last one, that's for sure. Of how that went down. I'm actually surprised he had you in the corner. Listen, Ariel, not that...

to be, not to be that guy, but, you know, back to really, Chris, really quick, the guy did the right thing, though, I mean, if he would have ate one of those leg kicks, then people are going to criticize, look, he did not work, he learned from that worst fight. There should be a lot of talk of the improvement. He, people, sometimes fighters, they never make the corrections. He made a huge correction. The guy's main weapon last time, what he was landing, with those leg kicks. So he took that away, and I think that's being overlooked. and overshadowed by just this, this, this debacle of what happened to his leg.

You know what I mean? And it's not fair. It's not fair to critics. You're right. You're right. I think he'll get it in due time. I think a win over Vitor Belfort will silence those critics. If he can beat Vitor,

given how Vitor is fighting at this juncture. But does it surprise you that he's doing so well at this point in his career? I mean, he's been around longer than you. Who's a... Thanks a way to make you feel old. You prick. I'm just saying. Did you ever think, hey, did you ever think about doing TRT to keep your career going?

No. I did not. Think of that. There you go. You know why, man? I mean, the difference is this. Didn't that guy get busted before for, uh... He's had a history.

What's that? He's had a history, yes. I mean, he's got a history, so I think that's the reason why someone's got to go on it. You know what I mean? And that's that's, I think, Longo's point, man. Like, this guy got busted before for steroids. and whatnot. So now he needs it because, you know, he was basically getting court cheating, and that's where this whole thing stems from. You know, if he just had a natural,

but if he had like an issue like Dennis Hallman has, where he's got some kind of issues, and he needs it. I think that's a totally different thing, you know? So I guess it goes like a person-to-person like circumstance, you know? It's going to be interesting to talk about leading up to the fight, but for now, we appreciate you coming on, Matt, to clear the air, class act, as always, and it was good. For the record, you never said hello to me. You never even acknowledged my presence in Las Vegas. It seemed to me like you were avoiding me.

That's fine. You came on the show. You made amends, and I appreciate that. I'm a text away, bro. You can go, yeah, I'm in the lobby or something like that. I mean, I avoided you. What are you talking about? But listen, you know, you're up there, buddy.

We're close. And next time I will soon, I'll be into that theater. What's fucking theater? I'll be into your studio. We're still waiting for it. You promise? Yeah, one day. Maybe I'll follow Chris, and I'll do something.

I don't know, but I'll come in. All right. Congratulations on the win. All right, buddy. Listen to me. Just try to, I mean, I guess, is this been live? It is live, yes. I guess you can't even clean it up, make me sound better.

I don't know. Did I explain myself, okay? What do you think? You did? You did. You know I'm not a bad guy. I know I'm not a bad guy. Quite frankly, I thought it was actually John Volante who said it.

I expect that kind of talk out of him, not out of you. Yeah. I know you're not bad guy. I really should have threw that guy under the bus. I should, I never should have owned up to this. All the best, Matt B.J.com. Matt's her, UFC, on Twitter. I'm out.

Peace. There he is. The one and only Matt the Terra Sarah is stopping by. All right. Thank you so much to him. Thank you so much to Chris Wyman earlier for stopping by. Now let us welcome in our next guest to on Saturday. You, of course, heard me talking about this earlier in the show,

and I'm sure if you're watching this show, you tuned in over at the UFC Fight Pass. If you're watching this, of course, in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, or the United States, in Canada, actually, it aired on television, on SportsNet 360. It was all over television, all over the world. It was Tariq Safedine's long-awaited-awaited UFC debut, finally getting inside the Octagon a year after his win over Nate Marquard. He picked up a win. One of the more excited, I was going to say one of the best fights of the year,

but it's 2014. It was the first UFC card of the year. But I think we'll be talking about it come December of this year. I'm talking about Tariq Safedine. He joins us right now via The Magic of Skype without a mark on his face. How about that? Not a single mark. She looked closer. I have to have some left.

Wow, from a five-round fight. How about that? Well, thank you so much for stopping by, and congratulations on the win. I say, I mean, it felt, I couldn't believe it, that your win over Nate Marquart was a year ago. It felt like 10 years ago that Strike Force was still around. Going into the fight, how anxious were you to finally just get back, you know, in the swing of things? And on top of that, your UFC debut, you were the last Strike Force guy to finally fight in the UFC. Yeah, first, thanks for having me, Ariel. It's good to be back. Yes.

Yeah, you know, I was really anxious, but excited at the same time. I wasn't lining the fight, you know, I was the main event, so it was even more exciting, you know, for me. And, yeah, it's been a year, man, it's been a long time to wait, and I was really excited to be back. The year started amazingly for you last year with that win over Marquart, and it opened a lot of people's eyes, and then you didn't fight again. What were you dealing with? What kind of bumps in the road did you deal with? You know, I had two surgeries in the middle of the year, you know, that, you know, kind of keep me away from being able to train.

I had one injury that occurred when I was supposed to fight Robbie Lawler. And then, so I had to do one to, I had to go through surgery to, you know, to healed up. And then at the same time, I had a naggy injury that, you know, I wanted to take care. of the same time so I went through two surgeries and and so you know it was kind of a bump on the road I did a pretty good recovery with the physical therapy after that and and then I went straight to to training camp for this fight from Saturday so it was a you know it was surgery recovery then training camp right away and then I just I just had the fight were you 100% going into the fight Yes, I was

I wouldn't have to take the fight if I wasn't You know obviously You know I did a pretty good Good recovery With the physical therapy And I'm 100% right now And originally you were supposed to fight Jake Ellenberger And then he got injured

So they bring in Hian Guilim Who had a great performance at UFC 164 But not the biggest name How much did you know about the Korean I didn't know much I knew it was tough he was tall, you know, big 170, and you know he had a lot of knockout.

But as far as that's all I knew. And before we get to the actual fight, you know, originally when this fight was announced, we thought it was just going to be one of those cards that airs on Fox Sports or whatever here in the U.S. But it was on the new fight pass here in the United States. Did that, did that bother you at all, that it wasn't going to be on TV? Like at first, were you a little concerned about, you know, who's going to actually see this thing? Yeah, you know, I wanted to be on TV. That would have been pretty cool, you know, being on Fox for my first fight.

But I think also, you know, I knew that a lot of people back home for me in Belgium, you know, when it's on Fox, I think they have kind of hard time to watch the fight. So I think that was a good thing, you know, to be on Fight Pass, UFC Fight Pass. So I think for the people outside the U.S., I think it's a great thing. but as far as, you know, being in the U.S., you know, I think people were, you know, a little bit wondering what, you know, why I wasn't on TV. But, you know, it's another great way to, you know, go mainstream internationally. And in Belgium, is this on TV yet or do they have to watch it on the internet? Okay, there's no UFC on TV over there. No, no, that's the thing, you know.

Every time there is a UFC, either they watch it the day after or, You know, they kind of have, I don't know how they do it, you know, but it's kind of hard to watch the fight, especially UFC fight, you know. So I think that they were pretty happy about that. So the fight starts, and in my opinion, he won the first round. It seemed like you were figuring out his style, his size. I mean, looking at you and him in the cage, it looks like he's like a light heavyweight and you're a welterweight. Was that the case?

Were you maybe a little surprised at how much bigger he was during the fight? Yeah, yeah, it was pretty big, man. It was pretty tall, pretty big, long reach. Yeah, yeah, when I saw him at the way, he was pretty big. But when I saw him in the fight, I was like, damn, this guy is pretty big. So, yeah, like you said, the first one, I was kind of figured out. I wasn't really too worried about losing or winning the fight, the run, sorry. But then I was able to, you know, figure it out even more as the fight went on.

And between the first and second rounds, I mean, what did your corner tell you? Or what did you figure out about how to, because it seemed like, you know, once the second round started, you really figured out his style and how to, you know, how to use his kind of size and strength and all that to your advantage. You totally picked him apart. How did you figure that out? You know, I knew it was a good, you know, I knew he was coming with, you know, more of his hands. He's not a good, really kicker. good knees. So my coach just told me, just, you know, just try to keep it standing. If you

need to take him down, just take him down. But, you know, try to keep standing. He's not going to, he's not going to be, you know, really effective, and which he was. But at the same time, you know, I knew I was a little bit more technical than him. So I just have to keep my, you know, moving, you know, my head moving. And just don't worry too much. Just do what I needed to do. And put a little bit more pressure, counter him, and try to break his reach as well, you know. So that's what I tried to do in the second round,

and then as well as the fight went on. And then early we were wondering, okay, where are the leg kicks? When are they going to come out? Because they worked for you so much and so well against Ney Markhard. And then we finally saw them and they worked again brilliantly

and he looked very injured. And I kept wondering, I mean, there was one time when you dropped him where it seemed like, you know, he was close to giving up because he seemed to be in a lot of pain. But early on, you were going down to the ground with him.

You weren't telling him to stand up. Why did you do that? That's a good question. I still ask myself why I did that. I don't know. I think it was just in the moment. I saw him on the floor and I try maybe to, you know, ground and pound him and try to finish the fight this way,

but it wasn't a smart move. And I won't do that again. You know, I think I should have just, you know, waited for the ref to stand him up and try to finish the fight like that. But I guess it was just a mistake. Did your corner tell you later on, if you drop him, don't engage him on the ground, let him back up? Because it seemed like later in the fight, you started to do that more.

You were telling him to stand back up. Probably, I don't remember, you know, what my corner told me. I got to fight again. But, yeah, I think they told me something like that. But, and also I saw him, it was so much in pain that, you know, I just figured out myself, I guess, as well. Are you surprised that he lasted 25 minutes? Because I would have bet, you know, my house, I don't even own a house, but you know what I'm saying.

I would have bet anything that he would have at some point wilted under that pressure. Yeah, I heard he wanted to quit in the fourth, and his corner just told him to just keep going. They didn't want to hear it. Yeah. So, yeah, I don't know how I did it, man. He has a lot of heart, man. He's brought to him. He's just a tough fighter.

And then amazingly, in the fifth round, it looked like. he seriously rocked you towards the end of the round. How hurt were you? I see by your face you were pretty hurt. You know, man, I don't know how he got his strength back on the first round. He just came like really strong, really powerfully. It just, yeah, he rocked me pretty well, but I was conscious the old time. You know, he rocked me.

I was dizzy, but I was able to see whatever it was coming. That's why I covered up pretty well when he threw that flying knee. and yeah I was rock pretty badly but I was able to recover pretty fast and I think I ended up in his back at the end of something like that so I was able to clinch a little bit but man he came back strong do you think if the fight you know if there would have been an extra minute that you could have been in trouble um probably probably probably not I don't know like I said I was conscious you know I was conscious that everything was going on I was just a you know, dizzy out of balance. But, um,

yeah, man, I don't know, I guess we'll never find out. Yeah, but did you, did you open yourself up for that? Because did you think he was essentially done and the fight was just going to,

like, did he surprise you that he was able to have that kind of power left in him? Uh, you know what? Before the fight, all my coach, they told me, never sleep on this guy.

Never sleep, ever, you know, don't, at no point under, underestimate. And that's what I did. I never underestimated until the end.

He got me pretty well. You know, at the end, I don't know where he got this power from, but he just kept punching me. I was a little tired as well. And he got me pretty good, you know. So, no, I wasn't surprised. He obviously doesn't speak English, but in the interviews that they put out,

it seemed like he was taking subtle jabs at you, like, oh, if Tarek's not going to run away from me and things like that, did you feel like he respected you? No, I don't think, you know, I don't know if he underestimated me, but it definitely didn't respect me, which is okay with me. You know, I don't have any problem with that. It's his way of, you know, you know, hyping himself, you know, motivates himself. So I don't have any issue with that. No, no issue.

What do you think of those glasses that he were? They were, at the way, they weren't straight. They were like that. That bothered you. Yeah, no, yeah. No, I don't mind if you... And how did you feel? I mean, 25 minutes after not fighting for a year, how was your cardio?

You know what? I felt pretty good. I think I would have been... I could have been in a little bit better shape, I'd say. But I felt pretty good, you know. Pretty good after a year off. So I cannot complain about that. I had a good camp.

No injuries. I was healthy. and I learn a lot from that fight, so I'm going to come back a better, even better fighter for the next fight. What's the biggest thing you learn? I think the biggest thing I learned is, you know, I can exchange with people, I say. Can take a punch. I hit a little bit harder, I believe. My leg, I still believe, you know, my leg kicks, you know, were pretty effective, so I got to stick on that.

and I can last 25 round with a really tough guy, you know. Sorry, 25 minutes. Right. Pretty tough guy. So, you know, but I got to still watch the fight again with my coaches and analyze what were my mistakes and what I did good as well. By the way, as a fighter, seeing what happened to Anderson Silva when he landed a leg kick and the injury that he sustained, does that make you ever think twice about it? it? No. No. No. I mean, no, you know, there's things that happen, you know, injuries happened. What Anderson happened is unfortunate, but, you know, that's far of the game.

But I'm not going to lend less leg kick because of that. What was the scene like in Singapore? It looked from all the pictures and stuff, the hotel, the venue was just spectacular. How were the fans? How did you feel out there, a first event for the UFC in Singapore? What did it feel like? Felt awesome. I met a lot of fans and they were awesome. Actually, a lot of people were cheering for me, which I wasn't really expecting it. And, you know, it was a great atmosphere, great feeling. And from fighting in Japan before to Singapore, it was a total, you know, even if it's still Asia.

Yeah. It was a total different atmosphere. Really? It was a great... How so? Yeah, I mean, the fans, I mean, the fans, I remember exactly the fans in Japan, you know, or they are quiet they can be, you know. I don't think it was the dream or because, you know, it's a UFC, but the fans were really, really quiet.

And they were just, wow, maybe if they saw one nice technique or something, they were really quiet the entire fight. But then, and after the fight as well. But the Singaporean fans were really exciting during the entire fight and after the fight. even before the fight. So it was a total different fan base, and it was awesome. Does it feel, I mean, explain to me how it feels to finally get that UFC win, to finally get that fight under your belt, to now be able to call yourself a UFC fighter?

Does it feel different now? Like you can finally feel like you belong. After all your strike force, you know, co-workers, so to speak, finally got that chance last year and you didn't. Yeah, it's unbelievable. You know, I wanted to be the first UFC Belgium fighter, you know, the first UFC, sorry, the first Belgian fighter to go inside the UFC and win inside the UFC. And, you know, I made that dream, you know, reality.

And it's unbelievable to represent my country in the very first time inside the UFC. It's a great feeling being the last strike force champion as well. So all those, you know, all those things together is just amazing to me. It's a dream come through. It's a long road. You know, I've been training really hard for the past few years. And to get where I'm at today, and it's really, it's a great, great feeling. It can really explain, but it's great.

By the way, where is the Strike Force belt? Do you still have it? It's right. Right there. I don't see it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I do see it. So you do have it.

That's great. Yeah, yeah. My wife made that shelf, you know, to all those pictures and the belt, and it's pretty neat. That is great. And so now where do you put yourself in the division? because all of a sudden here you are, you're back. They had big clients for you. You were supposed to fight Robbie Lala.

There was at one time some talk that you were going to fight Matt Brown. Where do you put yourself in the division? Especially now with George St. Pierre gone. It's wide open. I believe I'm back in the top 10. Yeah. I believe so. I hope.

And yeah, you know, I believe I'm back there. And I can wait to fight, you know, anybody in the top five, top 10. Anyone that interests you? You know, talking about exciting matchup and, you know, exciting fight for the fans, I think, you know, a couple names, you know, will ring my bell like maybe Martin Capman, obviously. Jake Lemberger would be exciting matchup for the fans. And also maybe the winner of Carlos Condit versus Woodley.

I think all those guys, you know, would be a great fight for fans. You want to get another crack at Woodley? Uh, if he wins, why not? Yeah. Yeah. Because I'm assuming you feel like you've changed a lot as a fighter since when you, when you fought him in Strike Force, right? Yeah, yeah.

I'm a total different fighter. I've improved. He's also a total different fighter. And, you know, I believe, you know, we would put on a good fight. All those fighters that I note, you know, sorry, I told you, I think we would be a great, great fight. for the fans. One that I also think would be a lot of fun is Matt Brown. What do you think of that one? Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. Matt Brown looked really good lately and he's a great fighter,

exciting. And yeah, I agree. Now here's the big question. How's your son doing? Because you're a very good fighter, but he might be the most exciting Safedian out there. Is he still, I mean those videos are fantastic. Yeah, yeah. Is he still training? He is a little bit still training. And I can maybe put another video online. You have to. You have to. Your son, I've watched that video a thousand times. I love little kids.

I have a son of my own and just seeing him with the kicks and the punches and the combinations and how good he is effective. His precision is really amazing for a little kid like that. And that video was, he was two years old or something when you put out that video? Yeah. So what is he now? Like almost four? Almost three. Almost three.

Okay. Wow. It feels like it's been two years. You got to put out a new one. Especially now that you're back on the scene and everyone's talking about you, you've got to put out a new video. Does he have any new tricks?

No, I mean, he's a little bit faster, I would say. The last video I put, I mean, I record. It was funny because he wasn't doing it for a long time and then at some point it was just, you restarted doing on his own and because he's natural. I never brought him to the gym to do it. Wow.

It's just to be natural. No, I promise. I never trained him. I never, he just come to the gym and watch me and then at home he just punched the couch. What I did at the gym, I guess. So it's just a natural.

Would you be okay with him being a fighter one day? I don't know. I don't know. It's a tough question. Would you like your son to be a fighter one day? Never. But I'm not a fighter myself. So it's easy.

for me to say. But, I mean, it's not because I'm a fighter that I would love to him to be a fighter. I'd say that, I don't know. We'll see. I wouldn't want him to do it, but if he likes it, you know, I'll support him. I guess we always want the best for our kids and support whatever they like to do. So I think I'll support whatever he likes to do. But I don't think I would like him to get punch for a living.

Yeah. I don't blame you. And by the way, speaking of support, I saw a great. great video about you and your family on Ultimate Insider when you went to Belgium. And I noticed your hair was a little longer. And I was like, wow, this is cool. This is the new tarik. He's been out for a year.

But then you shaved the head again. What happened to the longer hair? I like to shave my head for a fight. I don't blame you. So do I. And I heard also that you're Lebanese. Is there some Lebanese in your background? My father is Lebanese.

Wow. I didn't know that. My mother. My mother is Belgium. and my father is Lebanese. My mother is Lebanese. So look at that. We have a connection.

There you go. That's great. All right. Well, I'm very happy for you. Congratulations. It's great to see you back, really. I was so impressed with that performance against Nate Marquard

and for you to be out for so long, it was a long time coming and you had a tremendous performance this past weekend in Singapore. So looking forward to what's next for you. Enjoy the victory. Enjoy being back home. And good luck in your next fight in the UFC.

Can't wait for it. We appreciate it, Ariel. Thank you very much for your time as well. Thank you. There he is. Tariq Safedine, who had a fantastic performance in his UFC debut on Saturday getting a phone call right over there. The final Strike Force Welterweight champion, great guy. And really looking forward.

I mean, you know, we talk about the top dogs at 170 pounds from Johnny Hendricks, of course, to Robbie Lawler, Carlos Condit, who's fighting Tyrone Woodley. Don't forget about Hector Lombard and his fight against Jake Shields. Matt Brown is out there. I mean, 170 is a very interesting division, even without Mr. George St. Pierre. And for a while, we kind of forgot about Tarek Safedine. Well, he is back, and I'm curious to see what he does at 170 now in the UFC. And it was one of those stories where you kind of wanted to put strike force to bed, but you couldn't put them to bed because he hadn't fought yet.

And finally, he gets a chance to fight, picks up a win, and kudos and credit to Hian Guilim, because he showed a lot of heart, a lot of perseverance, did not give him. up and even had a chance there in the fifth round. Really impressive stuff. So congratulations to both men on a great performance and Lim taking the fight on short notice. So that is definitely notable as well. And Kawajiri, how about that? Tatuya Karajiri picking up his first UFC win. I'm sure there'll be some questions about that in our last segment of the day. But we have one more interview to go before we get to the question. So sit tight

if you ask questions. I was talking about this book earlier in the show. It is called Fightnomics, the hidden numbers and science and mixed martial arts and why there is no such thing as a fair fight. We have the author of this here book joining us via the magic of Skype. There he is. The dapper Reed Coon. How are you, Reed?

I'm doing well. How are you? You know, I would expect nothing less from someone of your intelligence and stature that you'd come in with the suit with the books in the background. I feel very smart right now, basically. But you're literally in my office. us right now. So this is the mind cave.

We get to see where the magic happens. The mind cave. I've never even heard of that as well. Thank you for joining us. I know we had to switch things around, so I very much appreciate you being flexible with us, and if you want to take it up with anyone, take it up with Luke Rockhold and Chris Weidman, you can point your

finger into their chest. I want to talk about this book, but I want to get into how you even got to this book. What was your first introduction to mixed martial arts? Actually, it was just a random fight. A friend of mine from grad school was Nick Palm Shano, founder of Ranger Up, and he took me to a UFC event. It was just a random Tuesday night, and I did what any fan would normally do. It was soaking in the experience, but also asking a lot of questions. And no one really

had the answers that I was asking, because I'm a management consultant. I have a very particular way of asking questions, and no one knew how often fights by submission versus knockout, or how often certain maneuvers take place. So I was hang out with fighters and hang out with their trainers and ask these questions. No one had the answer. And so I went to the internet, looked up data, and started cranking out analysis and coming up with ideas. And so that kicked off a process of getting involved with Fight Metric.

And then that led to consulting to individual fighters. And then eventually I realized I have way too much material here to hoard it. I need to share it. And write a book was the best way to do that. You just skipped over like 85 questions right there in that story. So I'm going to backtrack. By the way, you went to a UFC event on a Tuesday night? Which event was on a Tuesday night?

It was in Nashville. It was a fight night. This is probably 2009. Okay. Oh, was this the Martin Catman-Carlis-Condit fight? Exactly. I think that was on a Wednesday, but maybe it was on a Tuesday. Maybe it was a Wednesday, yeah.

I flew out on a Tuesday. Right, there you go. That makes sense. We came in right after Way-ins, met up with Jorge Rivera and his camp. Yep. And the rest is history. So what was your connection? You weren't even an MMA fan at that time?

Oh, I was a fan. I was watching the fights. I was actually changing consulting firms at the time. So I had some time off. My wife and I went on our honeymoon to Australia. And I had some time to kill. And I got a phone call from Ranger Up basically saying, hey, we're sponsoring this guy tomorrow.

Or day after tomorrow, get on a plane to Nashville, and we'll take you to the fight, and it'll be fun. It was just sort of a last minute, let's go have fun, and watch the fights kind of thing. But it just got me interested in the sport, having gone behind the scenes a little bit. And so that just got me looking and researching. And eventually a UFC producer was in a taxi cab with me one time at another event. And I was suggesting certain trends and patterns in the sport.

And he said, okay, smart guy, I go figure it out. I dare you. And I went and looked up data and I tried to prove my point. And that led me to fight metric. And so then I became a research fellow there. And why did this interest you so much? Like, why were you even thinking about, you know, because I watch fights and I watch it, but I never think to myself, you know, why does this happen?

How many times does this happen? Like, is there something about you? Is it something about your past employment? I mean, why were you even thinking about this stuff instead of just sitting there and watching the fights and joining the action like most people? Yeah, I think my background in science, I started in physics, but then migrated more into analytics and decision sciences. and a long time ago was actually a scientific consultant to the military,

the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency. So that's the mad science division of the military. And the program I was associated with was peak performance in soldiers. So we did a lot of weird experiments with special forces. How do you drive peak performance? How do you turn around people in an optimal way? Because these guys go out and they come back and they're 20 pounds lighter and sick and injured and they're a valuable asset.

So how do we maximize the time in the field for these guys? So I was thinking about peak performance and what makes a soldier tick. And when I went to a cage fight, I was watching these athletes in a very highly competitive dynamic environment. And it just seemed like a natural parallel to me. I just wanted to understand what they were going through, how it worked, how they perform. And then as a management consultant, immediately I'm thinking, how do I optimize this towards some objective, which is winning for my client? So prior to actually getting into writing the book and even the idea, you would actually be hired by some of these fighters to prepare them for the fight to do research on their opponent, things like that, correct? Yes, that's right. I did a few reports pro bono, and basically, at the time, Jorge Rivera's manager, Alex McMahon, from Alchemist Management, they were just founding that group at the very beginning. This is when MC Hammer came into the sport. They got a hold of that report, and I think they enjoyed what it looked like. They gave me an audition. They brought me out to Vegas for a UFC event, and I was asked to game a matchup and predict what was going to happen. And I think the results were very successful.

The fight went exactly how I said it would. And so they signed me on and basically said, please don't ever consult against us and do what you can to help out our guys. So I was doing what I could to help out people at different levels of strike force and the UFC. And then more recently, I've been contacted by other managers that want a real consultation for a big-time fight, including a few championship fights. That is fascinating. Do you remember what the fight was in Vegas, the audition?

Yeah, it was Rashad Evans versus Rampage Jackson. Wow, and did they tell you that's the fight that they want you to audition? Or did they kind of spring that upon you right then and there? No, it was in advance because this is a report, you know, a 35-page powerpoint report full of tables and analysis. So I had a couple weeks to do it. And so when you say like a 35-page, like I can't even imagine what goes into this. Explain to me what goes into it and why you thought eventually Rashad Evans won the fight, right? Why you thought he was going to win the fight based on what you had found out?

If I remember correctly, I was very concerned with Rampage gassing later on. And both guys have power, but they're pretty good with avoiding strikes. And so that one was going to turn into more of a dirty boxing and wrestling match. Rashad actually scored an early knockdown in that one, if I remember correctly. And as the fight went on, he was also at risk. But Rampage turned into more of a one-punch threat. He just didn't have the gas tank to control him. and his prior fights, he always did worse when he had a long layoff.

And this is right after the 18th filming. So Ring Rust is something I actually analyze in my book, and I show that if you've been out for a year, it doesn't matter why, but your win percentage drops precipitously after a one-year cutoff. And so what do you actually put in 35 pages? Like, you just told it to me in five minutes, and obviously there's more that goes into it,

but what is actually in this data that a fighter can sit and actually utilize and preparing for a fight? Yeah, the fight metric. system is very robust. I mean, they quantify literally every MMA maneuver and output that happens per round per fighter for every fight in UFC history. So there's about 60 discrete variables, or almost 70, I think, discrete variables per round. Every type of strike that's thrown, whether it's a light kick, whether it's a body jab, is it on the ground in the clinch standing at a distance, does it result in a knockdown? Does it land? Is it, you know, all of these variables are

are laid out, and each one I have on a per round basis per guy. So I can look at how often they attempt certain strikes over others, what happens when they're in the clinch, how do they tend to perform on the ground? And then there's all the grappling stats and the wrestling stats. So there's three different types of takedowns I can look at. Do they prefer to shoot for takedowns? Are they successful when they do that? What about in the clinch against the fence?

Are they more dangerous there? So a lot of these nuances that pop out require that level of detail because the stats that you see on UFC Tonight, for example, significant strike accuracy, that's a roll-up of over a dozen other variables. So those variables each have their own flavor, and depending on the mix of where fights go, if a guy's primarily a ground fighter, his statistics are going to be very skewed for that reason. So in order to tell someone truly are they above or below average in a certain aspect of the game, I have to isolate that data. And I also have to consider who they were up against, how that fight went. So that's why I think these reports get longer and longer is because I'm trying to consider everything. And it has proven to be very valuable.

I've done a lot of pro bono reports for fighters here and there just to test my craft and improve my ability to do this. And so far it's been good. Who has contacted you? Like, who have you done this for? Well, in terms of the more casual clients, more recently, Joe Lozahn and Tom Waller, and there have been some paid clients, so I'd rather not say who their names are. Okay. But there have been, in the last year, there's been champion caliber clients. Any championship fights?

Yes. And what's your record? Like, when you work with a fighter, you combine all those records, you know, how do you do? Well, in terms of how I think they're going to end, it's very high in terms of my accuracy rate. But in terms of, you're talking about the success rate? Let's say 10 fighters have contacted you and asked for your services. What's their record at the end of the day? It's a winning record.

For the last year, 2013, I actually don't know. You don't know the number, Mr. Numbers himself? You don't know the actual number? That's an important number. I'm less concerned about assessing that kind of thing. More importantly, it's to serve the client well and actually provide something meaningful and actionable. And when you show someone, when there's that much data available

on champion caliber fighters, there's usually a long history of 10 or so fights that you can look at. You'd be surprised what pops out of the data. I mean, every fighter has a strength and a weakness, and to be able to very definitive point to that and say, here is where he is most dangerous and here's why, and here is also where he is most vulnerable and here's what you should be exploiting.

Ultimately, the game plan is up to the coaches. So, you know, the Greg Jackson's of the world, they get a report like this, and they use it, they look at it, and they make their determination and how best to use it. And are, you know, for the most part, are people receptive to this?

Because, you know, we still, you know, cover a sport here that people say, oh, I didn't watch any footage on my opponent, which, you know, blows my mind. So for the most part, the people you've come across, they receptive to it. like if a manager says, I want you to do this, is the coach down to read this stuff? For the most part, yes.

There are the naysayers, people that don't think that numbers belong in a sport like this. I think that group of individuals is definitely in the minority. I mean, most coaches, if they're good at their job, want every possible advantage, and that's what analytics are. Every other sport uses analytics for the competitive advantage. That's why they use it. So this isn't just a distraction. I'm not there just to get a seat in the office.

audience, usually I don't even go to the fight. There is occasionally a bit of an ace air that says, I don't want to look at this. I think most of them are very receptive, though, because most of the top trainers are smart guys, and they're looking for stuff like this. So I'm looking at Rivera's record, and you say you saw him that first night back in April of 2009, so he won that fight, so I don't know if I could chalk that up to you, but then won his next two and arguably had his best performance ever against Nate Corey. Can I say that you're the reason why this happened?

No, well, obviously the reason why was George Rivera was a hardworking fighter and a skilled guy. That is the report that actually ended up in the hands of management. It was the quarry fight, and it was at dinner the night before. I think Jorge was a very slight underdog in that fight, and one of the UFC producers said, put me on the spot, said, okay, smart guy, what's going to happen tomorrow? And I said, TKO second round, upset for Rivera. Wow. And there were a few people at that table that heard that and followed up with it, followed up with me after that.

So, and you, you took this opportunity to work for a fight metric, right? This fellowship. What did you, like, why was that? That seems to me, based on what I've read about you, the kind of turning point that led you to want to write something like this. What did you get your hands on that made you really interested in really, you know, taking that next step and putting out a book? Yeah, that's the data that enables all of this. So I applied for a research fellowship. I went through an audition process.

We had to run test analysis, blinded, and provide results. And as far as I know, it was myself and I think three or four professors that earned access to this. And I think, several years later, I think I'm the only guy still using the data of that original group. But it was a research fellowship. I had a full-time career. I was a full-time management consultant at the time. I was doing this on nights and on the weekends. and that was the data set that allows all of this

because you can't look at the level of detail in an MMA fight just based on win-loss records or even types of victory or layoffs, things like that. I mean, the level of detail, we have every second of every UFC fight coded by what position they're in. So I can determine how often a fighter is in half-guard before he passes guard. What submissions does he tend to use and how successful are they.

So all of that data, it's overwhelming. But when I try to boil it down to the most important metrics, it's very valuable. And so part of this book is actually that process of helping boil down a very large data set into a more manageable data set so we can actually look at the tail of the tape correctly and not be misled because this is the first time anybody's ever put numbers behind that. So I hope that it allows us to look at the sport and actually appreciate what's going on a lot better. How long did it take to write the book? I left my job back in January, February, and it took me all the way through October to finish it, and we were a little bit rushed at the end. We were trying to get it out for the holiday season. We missed it by a little bit, unfortunately, due to a printing error, but it was most of a year.

And was it tougher or perhaps easier than you thought it would be? I mean, this is not just any kind of book. This is heavy-duty stuff. A lot of research goes into it. Yeah, yeah. There's 150 images. of some kind in this book. We had to, when you pick it up, it's actually four times the weight of a normal book, simply because we had to use special paper, very heavy paper, thick paper, because every page is in color. So it was easier in the sense of the research, because I do exactly the same type of research I would do on a private equity client,

due diligence. You know, I'm making graphs, I'm proving my points, and I'm trying to solve a problem that hasn't been solved before. So that part was easy to me, and it was fun. Doing the research was a lot of fun. getting a book to market was difficult. I had help. Kelly Krueger is an experienced author, New York Times bestselling author, so he was able to walk me through the process. But it was frustrating to go into a dark zone where my book is done, hands off, and now it's going to be

several months that I have to sit here and total my thumbs before it actually gets to market. And finally, it's out there, so I'm relieved. And so, okay, so for someone, you know, you talk about the graphs, and you tell someone, fightnomics. What are you learning if you pick up this book? Why should an MMA fan, well, let's be honest. I mean, they have a, some MMA fans have, I guess, the stigma attached them with the affliction where I mean, we're evolving and that's a good thing, but why should an MMA fan be interested in what's in these pages? Well, every question that I've ever seen on a message board, I've tried to attack in this book. So when you look at the tail of the tape,

quite honestly, we've been misusing it. There are certain variables that are more important. and we realize there are other ones that are not. There are other ones that we've been calling an advantage that are not an advantage. It's actually a disadvantage. So in terms of if you want to enjoy the sport of MMA, appreciating the nuances of the grappling game, for example, the book explains all of that. But then we also go deeper. We look at competitive advantages. How do things work?

So all these questions, octagon jitters, is that a real thing? Ring rust. Is that a real thing? can you look at numbers and actually predict the outcomes, how good are betting odds? And historically they're very good, but there are a number of situations where they actually are not good. They become inaccurate. Like what? So that's interesting.

When does that happen? When does that happen? Well, main events, for one, and secondly, when people misvalued the tail of the tape. So when I've quantified the tail of the tape, I go back in history and say, were betting odds accurate? when there were competitive imbalances according to the tail of the tape. So the answer is no. And so that's fortunately how I paid

for my recent trip to Vegas. That is actually pretty impressive. But when you say main events, what does that mean? Why do people get the main events wrong? Well, because of hype. Hype is profitable. Because the UFC needs to promote challengers.

And so betting lines are a market prediction of the outcome of the two fighters. And the more you hype, the challenger, the more people will believe that they have a chance to win. Usually the challenge was the underdog. Actually, this last weekend was a rare instance where the champion was the underdog, and that was a very profitable situation. But historically, if you have the incumbent champion or whoever the clear favorite is in the main event,

they tend to outperform betting lines, whereas markets irrationally overpriced challengers. And I talk about how that works, I spell it out and quantify it. But generally speaking, favorites tend to outperform the market in main events. Would you say that our own New York, Rick, is the worst prognosticator in the sport just based on how he looks at? Do you have any idea about his skills as far as doing that stuff? I haven't followed him closely enough. Oh, well, you're missing out. The bits I've seen have been impressive.

He's a good handicapper. He looks at it the proper way, which is not who's my favorite fighter, but evaluating who's likely to win. So the small pieces I've seen is pretty good. And you, and I guess that's good to hear. Makes me feel better about myself and having him on the show. Now you have this thing called the Uber Tail the Tape. You've been talking about the Tail the Tape and how we misuse it. Any chance the UFC starts getting behind this?

Have you pitched it to them to, and I know you talk to this producer? I mean, why don't they evolve a little bit and use your Uber Tail the Tape? I'd like that. I think they should. I have not heard from them, although if you read the very last sentence, of the acknowledgments at the very last page of the book before the bios. There's a sentence that is directly to Dana Lorenzo and Joe at the UFC to pick this up and use it and then to give me a call.

But I don't know if they're going to get there. That's a lot of data to put on screen. I tweet these things and whenever I do a detailed matchup breakdown, I will include that graphic. It's basically combining the traditional tail of the tape. with all these performance metrics. So you can actually look at someone striking accuracy or pace or knockdown power, as well as defensive metrics, and the wrestling stats, their grappling stats.

So it's an attempt to boil it down into a single graphic, and you can really line two guys up and understand who has the advantages and where. So I've been using it to do my work, and our work, you know, lately I've been consulting to MMA oddsbreaker, which is hosted by Nick Kalikas. He's the guy who basically makes the MMA odds that are used by most casinos. And then they actually provide betting advice after the market floats the betting line. So they've been extraordinarily accurate over the last couple months. And so hopefully the numbers are helping that.

Is that a conflict of interest, though, to put out the line and then give advice about the line? I thought so, but that's not how the line works. The line, once it floats, it's a market. It's like a stock price. You know, the market will bet on one side and they will push it. usually they will push it one way or the other. And so once it closes, that's when these guys make their recommendation based on their own perception of who they think is going to win. So, yeah, any casino can change their line, but they don't all have to use the same guy.

Very true. So now the book is out there. What do you do now? Are you still working with fighters? Are you done with MMA? Obviously, you've got to get the word out there and hope it does very well, but what's next for you? It's a good question. I'm not sure. I'm still in the mode of promoting the book since it's only about a couple weeks and even on print less than that. So we'll see if the MMA audience uptakes it. There were definitely some people that told me this was a bad idea that MMA fans are, they like cage fighting, and a book like this is not going to help. But I disagree.

I think most MMA fans do appreciate the nuances of the sport. And if anybody does, you know, just claim that this is a Stone Age sport, we don't have to leave it there. And analytics like this are helping bring it mainstream, and I think it's going to just improve the way we watch this sport. So hopefully, hopefully it elevates the game for everybody. And as for me, I don't know. I'd like to keep analyzing this stuff.

I think there's more research I would like to do, and we're just scratching the surface, but we do have to make sure that the concept holds that people are interested in this before I invest another year in it. Based on what you know, and I'm putting you on the spot, I didn't tell you about this before, who wins? Johnny Hendricks or Robbie Lawler? Oh, boy, I could have brought the numbers up on my spreadsheet.

I wanted to put you on the spot. But I don't think with my gut. Like Carl Sagan says, I think with my head and I go by the numbers. I'd have to look at the numbers before... Do you know anyone off the top of your head? I know like Luke Rockhold's fighting next against Costa's... I wanted to give one that was a little out there, but just... That's interesting. I did look at that one.

Luke Rockhold actually has a tail of... the tape sweep. What does that mean? He's younger. He has a reach advantage. He's a south pole. And traditionally, those characteristics translate very well. So he's actually very, he has a very long reach for his division, for the middleweight division.

Average reach is 75 inches. Loop Rockhold is 77, whereas Costa Filipu is only 73. So that's a 4-inch reach advantage, which generally translates into about a 60-40 win rate. Then you layer on top of that, the fact that Rockhold is a south paw. generally Southpaws, devoid of any other advantages, win 57% of the time. So that's another factor that favors him. Luke is still in his prime. I think he's 29. Costa is now 33.

So Costa is now in the danger category for knockdown resiliency and a few other things. So just looking at the tail of the tape, I would expect Rockhold to come out as a betting favorite. And then in terms of infight metrics, I've looked at Rockhold before. he's a very high-paced cage control fighter because of that range. Fighters who have a long reach that are successful do so because they use that to their advantage. They control the cage. He tends to outwork his opponents by 80% standing. So I know he talked about, I was watching the show earlier, he talked about taking it to the mat.

I don't know who has the advantage there. I need to look closer at the details. But in terms of stand-up striking, to see a guy who's that rangey and knows how to use it is a tough. sell to beat a guy like that if you're coming in at a range disadvantage. So that's just off the top my head. Well, let me tell you, that answer alone, that answer alone made me into a believer. I'm not saying that I wasn't before, but you're throwing out those percentages. I don't even know if they're true, but you said it with a lot of belief and conviction that that was impressive, my friend. That's one of the most impressive answers. You were breaking out 57% this, 80% that was amazing. You knew the average

reach in the middleweight division. Did you just do this? Is it fresh off the top of your head? Yeah, I was looking at that. I actually submitted a paper to MIT just this morning. The big Super Bowl of Sports Analytics, the MIT Sloan Conference is coming up. So I submitted a paper called Hacking the Tail of the Tape in MMA.

And MMA has not ever been represented at the conference in terms of the research papers. Fight Metric did speak there a couple years ago. and last year they had a panel, but no one has ever submitted a research paper to them before. So I submitted one where I took every factor in the tail of the tape, quantified it, talked about which ones were better than others and how important they are, and also why betting lines are sometimes irrational. And so we'll see if they bite. Wow, that's amazing.

Some people are asking me about where they can follow you, obviously Twitter, Twitter.com slash Fightnomics, that's Fight, and then N-O-M-I-C-S. You have a website too that's a very good website. It's very thorough. It's Fightnomics.com. You say that you contribute to MMA oddsbreaker, right? Yes, that's right. When it comes to doing picks, I'm part of their premium team.

They have a premium odds cast and it's been very profitable. I'll be posting analysis of how profitable they've been over the last six months. They've actually significantly outperformed the NASDAQ and Dow. Really? So in terms of where do you want to invest your money and amazingly, an interesting answer for the risk-seeking individuals in the world might be gambling on MMA. And are you actually making these bets as well? Are you making yourself money? I don't live in Vegas, so it's a little bit harder for me. It's interesting. I actually went

to UFC 168, and I had not planned to, but there were a couple of interviews I needed to do, and so having invested all my money into printing a lot of books, I didn't have the budget for it. So I had to calculate in advance what bets I had to make to pay for the trip. And so while I was there, I made those bets and was able to pay for the trip because I got them all right. Wow. Which ones did you get right? Wyden by TKO was a plus 400 return. Wow.

Not Rousey in round one was actually plus money. I expected Misha to make it out of the first round, but I did expect Rousey eventually to win by submission, which was a separate bet. I think we got upset picks on Michael Johnson, Macario. Jim Miller, Dustin Poirier was a parlay, and Brown inside the distance, I think, was also a good one. I try to spread it around on higher probability outcomes. So fortunately, it all went my way that weekend. And these premium picks, do people have to pay to listen to this? The premium picks, yes.

Although I do usually pick one or two matchups and share those and do a write-up with the UberTale of the tape. but when it comes to where do you really want to put your money in at the last minute. For example, Brando missed weight badly. And fighters who miss weight and don't make it within that hour tend to only win, I think, 38, 39% of the time. So seeing that one, and that was a close call because he had upset potential. He was the underdog, but he had upset potential. And after that, it was a very clear shift to go back towards Poirier as the favorite. it. And so as long as they were standing,

Poirier had the crisper striking, he had a reach advantage. So he made a more intelligent bet. But that was knowledge that came late in the game. That's why Premium Pitzer posted the day of the fights not, you know, the week before, because things can't happen during way and week. Okay, final question, and it's the most important one. It comes from Lee

Jansen on Twitter. He asks, are there any beard-related stats in the book? If a guy has a beard like Travis Brown did, also, Josh Barnett, is there any data that shows that if you have a beard, you're going to be more successful. It's a great question.

I've heard it several times this morning, actually, since I announced that I was going to be on the show. I don't have a firm step for you, but I would point out that facial hair is indicative of testosterone levels. And so the thicker the beard, the higher testosterone the guy is. And so if you're trying to visually assess two competitors and one of them looks physically dominant, all things considered that's probably a smarter play than otherwise.

You'll look at some of the posturing. that goes on, the fighter who smiles first tends to lose. So some of this is very primal assessment. And I do the test, whenever I'm having dinner with fighters, I have them hold up their hand. The digit ratio test of the index finger to the ring finger is indicative of prenatal testosterone exposure. So fighters tend to have short index fingers. Wow.

And I always do that test whenever I have at dinner with these guys. And without fail, you go around the table and every one of these guys is a high testosterone. guy. That's just inherent. If someone goes into a career in professional cage fighting, chances are they're a height of stucer on guy. Wow. The beard could be another clue to that. I'd like to think so.

Well, fantastic stuff. Really impressive stuff. The book is Fightnomics. It is the hidden numbers in science and mixed martial arts and why there is no such thing as a fair fight. It is written by Reid Coon with Kelly Krigger, as you mentioned, a great guy as well, and great background

in writing, as you mentioned, New York times bestseller. And it is fascinating stuff. And I'm glad that there are people like you around to make us all a little smarter in this meathead sport of mixed martial arts. So pick it up and follow him on Twitter, Fightnomics. And good luck with the book. It was great having you on. Thanks a lot. There he is. Reed Coon. I'm sure we'll be hearing more. I actually think we should have him on the show to make the picks. I mean, forget about New York Rick. Forget about Mama knows. This guy knows what he's talking about. That was impressive. What do you think of Reed Coon, Mr. New York, Rick? I was just waiting for the speaker to go down.

impressive. He knows his stuff. Did you know about him beforehand? Yeah. Do you think maybe you need to read this book to, you know? I think I need to read the book regardless. Or I'd like to read the book regardless. Well, it's very interesting. I agree. And he brought it today.

Yeah, he did. That whole thing when he was breaking down the Luke Rockhold fight, holy moly. 57% this, 80% that, 76%. Well, I think you're a little more impressed. Why? Why? He knew that off the top of his head. He knew that lefties win 57%.

Yeah. I mean, that's something he's stated before. It's not like he just, yeah, but I didn't tell him I was going to hold it. No, I know, but I didn't tell him that I was going to ask him that question. To know the average reach of a middleweight? Oh, make no mistake about it. He knows his stuff. Look at you.

I think you're a little more. Why are you trying to poo him? Not at all. Sound like you're trying to poo him. Not even in the slightest. As I said, impressed. He brought it today. And he's one of the people who I look.

to, um, oh, he's on your radar. Oh, yeah, yeah, for sure. Because nobody, as his Uber tail of the tape, nobody breaks it down like that. Um, so he's definitely one of the resources I use, um, when I'm, when I'm, when I'm thinking about, you know, how I think a fight's going to play out. All right. Well, great stuff there. Um, let me got here. Uh, okay, uh, right now, uh, it is 4.22 p.m. 4. 4.23 p.m. or 4. Who the hell knows. Anyway, uh, it is being, uh, uh, it is being, uh, advertised that at 4.30 on ESPN, Dana White, the UFC president, is going to be making a quote-unquote big announcement. So this kind of works out pretty well with us. Let's answer some questions. I mean, I haven't had a chance to obviously, you know, look into this. I'm doing the show.

But is, is Twitter saying anything? Where are we at? Seven minutes in here. Just that the announcement is coming. I haven't seen anything. You have your finger on the pulse, though? Definitive. Yeah. Yeah. So Dana White going to be on ESPN. Yeah. I see the ESPN. I see Todd Grisham who will be hosting it. That's good. He knows the stuff. It's actually going to be on ESPN news. It's going to be on ESPN news on SportsCenter. So that is an interesting. It's not the big ESPN, but sometimes they don't make that distinction. And Brett Akamato is saying major news. So no one's telling us what it is, but we'll be here. It's definitely going to be announced in the next six minutes or so. So we'll be here to react to it. For now, let's answer. some questions, and then we'll get to react to the news. That'll be fun. Okay, let's start with the website questions, as usual. Okay. Nice sweater, by the way. Yeah, what'd you think? I mean, it seemed like at first you weren't into it, but maybe you've warmed up to it.

No. No, not into it at all. Nothing. I mean, my dad got it for me, just so you know. I mean, what don't you like about it? Do you just not like the sweater, period? Or is it, specific design on the sweater. I don't know. It's a great sweater. All right. I mean, I can take it. What is Twitter saying about the sweater, more importantly?

I mean, has there been a lot of talk about it? Is this a big piece of news? It's trending. It's trending. Wow. I don't know if any questions, just before we get into it, any questions regarding what Ali had to say on the show, or was that too late in the game? No, it was more commentary than questions regarding that.

What was the feedback? I'm just curious. I mean, just in general, people were very excited about the fights and wanted to see him. Okay. Nothing specifically about a lot of people doubting that it'll happen, like you. Yeah. But people just wanting to see the fights. All right.

And excited about the matchups that Ali had laid out. All right. Let's go to the questions. Okay, first question. Five round fights. Do you think the UFC needs to reconsider about all main event fights being five rounds? As the UFC is expanding globally, we will see slightly lower tier guys, ranked 10 through 15, headlined certain cards.

do you think it is fair that a fight like Hathaway versus Kim is going five rounds, yet a fight like Condit versus Woodley is not? You know, that's a very good question. And initially, I was not a fan of the whole five-round fight idea. I didn't like it at all. And quite honestly, I've been proven wrong. I mean, look at Bigfoot and Mark Hunt. If that was just a three-round fight,

it would not have been as good as it was. Look at Lim and Safedin. We wouldn't have had that great moment in the fifth round. Guys are rising to the occasion. There have been some that have been some that have. haven't been great. I think of the Davis-Rashad Evans fight, UFC on Fox 2. But for the most part, these five-round fights have delivered. And guys are stepping up and it's giving them a chance, you know, they're before maybe fighting for a title shot or something. You're getting a chance

to fight five rounds. A lot of these guys don't get that opportunity. And for the most part, guys aren't crapping the bed. So I like it. You know, I have no problem. Kim versus Hathaway is a very important fight at 170. Now, is it your typical main event? No, but this is a different age. People need to understand where we are in 2014 in the UFC. It's a different time. 40-something events, international expansion, TV deals all over the place. I mean, the standards are different of what makes a card. And then you're going to get cards where Woodley and Condit is a co-mean event.

It kind of sucks that it's not five rounds. But that's just the way the cards are going to be constructed. So I really have no problem with it. I think the guys, for the most part, have stepped up, and they're doing it time and again. I mean, what was, there was 33. Shildemaya wasn't that bad. So, no, I'm a fan of it. Aren't you a fan of it?

I don't think it's a question of reducing the number of five-round fights, maybe increasing the number. Maybe just hand-picking potential fights that could be five rounds as well. for example a fight like Condon and Woodley making co-main events automatically five rounds. I'm not sure what the answer is. I don't think the answer is to reduce the number of five round fights though. So I mean and then you can't say oh, could you imagine if they said okay Kim versus Hathaway

it's not worthy of being five rounds? Then you're crapping all over the main event. Right. If you have this this rule that all main events are five rounds period you have to go with it. You know and and you have to trust that the guys that you're putting in, and let's not forget, you know, Hathaway's been out for a while, so he might be, you know, flying into the radar, but only one loss and he's fought some very good guys and being some very good guys. You can't say this fight isn't worthy of being five rounds. It just, it just, it makes you seem silly. And I don't think necessarily, why would this not be worthy of a five-round fight? I think it's going to be fine. What's your problem with

Kim and Hathaway? Hey, before we get to the next question, we need to get props to the pictures in the studio. That's true. Let's do that. Right over there you see Carlos Condit. Right over here you see Danny Outlaw Hardy. Right over here you see Connor Mac. Connor McGregor. Are we looking at this camera right here? Tilted a little.

Yep, now we are. Connor McGregor. Who did this work? Scott Cohn. Scott Cone. MMA. Is it MMA bloodlines or just bloodlines? This is just bloodlines.

These are variations of the Tops cards that are coming out. And he brought these by the studio for us. He brought them by the studio. Great guy, fantastic guy. Donated them essentially to us to have them in the studio. Sign them. They're amazing. He also gave us a Bigfoot and a Katzengano.

I love the Connor one. I love the Dan Hardy one. The Carlos one is great. The other ones are great as well. He is on Twitter. His Twitter feed is... Scott underscore... Yeah.

C-O-H-N-U-U-H-N-U-R. And you can also go to his website there. and Cohn, by the way, is C-O-H-N, as he said. You could go to his own website with all the stuff. He does fantastic work. We really appreciate him stopping by, and I wanted to give him props. So thank you very much to Scott.

Did we lose the stream, by the way, just now? Or is that just me? Just you. All right. According to Will. Will the kill? Yeah, Will the kill. So anyway, are you sure about that?

I think we did. I just see the MMA Hour logo now. So it wasn't just me. So the next question. Perfect timing at 4.30. Okay. Anyway, thank you very much to Scott. Our next question is,

could the cancellation of Nirmagamadov and Melendez have anything to do with the UFC debut in Russia? Seems like it would get the headlining slot if Russia is on the list for Europe, for the European tour later this year. Yeah, I mean, Russia is not on that list right now. Oh, let's see here.

You know how this bugs me. Oh, it's back. Russia is not on that list right now, so I don't think that's going to happen. But yeah, Nirmagamadov who's looking for a fight. There's Habilov. There's a bunch of guys that I think they're kind of gathering these eggs and these big names, these fighters,

to fight on an upcoming Russian card. But I just don't think it's happening in 2014. Could be wrong, but they announced those six fights in Europe, and Poland was there. Sweden was there, but not Russia. No, it's not. It's down. Anyway, we'll keep going. Dana White about to break some major news.

Oh, okay. Refresh the page, just in time for the big news. I don't see it working now. But anyway, let's keep going with the questions. Okay, our next question is, correct me if I'm wrong, but the UFC is in charge of selecting the refs for most overseas shows.

It seems every show overseas has a refereft who clearly has no business officiating a U.S. fight. Steve Percival was brutal Saturday morning, first with a two-point deduction for 12 to six elbows, and then for missing Soriano's tap and letting him go to sleep. Dana is always tough on the refs post-fight, so why is the UFC assigning subpar referees to these shows? Shouldn't they be looking for the best of the best? Yeah, man, that Percival, that was weird. The guy, which fight was it? Was it the Kawajiri fight, Soriano? Yeah, he was out cold, he was right there, he taps, and he doesn't

he doesn't acknowledge it. It's just unbelievable. And then he's out cold. It's just unconscious. I mean, it's crazy. And this guy just was a referee in Australia. UFC does pick these refs. They were the commission over there.

And I think it goes to show that, A, there aren't a lot of good referees. B, you know, they're taking a lot of these guys from overseas and these aren't the best guys. The best guys are here in the United States and Canada. And it's just cheaper to have those guys referee the shows. I mean, the end of the day, you pay for what you get, essentially.

Sorry, I was just refreshing to see if this news is out there yet. It's 431. But they need to, you know, Herb Dean, Big John, all those guys, they need to be the ones out there. But you're doing these shows all over the world now. There are going to be some bad refs. That's the unfortunate part. And it truly is unfortunate because they have a very important job, and they just haven't had enough opportunities to referee big time

MMA and they're being put on the spot here. And Percival just had a horrendous, a horrendous evening morning here in the United States. They really need to, you know, I know they can't pay to have Herb and these guys ref all these shows, but they need to figure out a system if they're going to do these shows overseas and have, you know, these refs, rep these shows. And they're the ones in charge. There needs to be a system in place where they're actually developing these refs and judges. because they're just plucking these guys

who are just not ready to be doing this. Here's our next question. Which middleweight contender do you think is the best chance of beating Weidman? Vitor Belfort, Leodomachita, Gagar Mosasi, Jacqueray Sousa, or somebody who was not listed. Well, I know your pick.

You know my pick. Now, are you going on the record and saying that he will beat Weidman? It might not be Weidman who he faces. That's true. You don't think he beats Carmel? I don't think who beats Carmel. Oh, wait, wait.

Oh, you think Belfort beats Wythman? Is that what you're saying? It's possible. Well, I'm asking your opinion. If I had to pick somebody in that fight right now, I might go Belfort. Really? Wow. Why?

Why not? Look at how he's looked lately. Okay. Just because I think that Vitor's kind of shed that first round only reputation at this point. He's shown that he can, you know, hang in there. with guys later in the fight and and, you know, not be completely out of it. He almost armed barred. It was an arm bar, right?

John Jones. Yep. And I think that he shed the, if you get past the first, you know, round with me that you're safe. But that might be underselling Wyman. At this point, I wouldn't know who to pick in that one. I wouldn't want to bet on it and I wouldn't know who to pick in that one. Of those guys, I mean, Musassi is interesting. sorry, Machita is interesting.

I'm not trying to describe Musassi at all. It just does just my reaction there. I meant to say Machita, given his style, and typically wrestlers don't have the best performances against them. I think Chris is evolving. I thought his striking was a lot better in the second Anderson in Silva fight. I don't think he's just a wrestler who's going to get, you know, anxious and do something stupid run in or whatever and forget about his game plan.

Of those guys, though, I mean, you have to give the nod to to Bellford just because he looks so good. And look who he's defeated this past year. I mean, he's really defeated three of the best middleweights. And I know the Henderson fight was at 205, but three of the best fighters in the UFC. So right now I'd give the nod to Belfort. I'd say it's probably Belfort, Machita, Jokure, and then Musassi. And only saying Musassi last, we haven't seen him at 185.

He's been out for a long time. So there's some questions there. Jokere would beat all those guys, in my opinion. Including Widman? Everybody here, including Wideman. You're nuts. Why? What is, what, what, what, what, what hole does Jacaree have in his game?

Um, what hole? Mm-hmm. I don't know, I don't think it has anything to do with holes. I just think, I, I, I really do think, uh, Wyman's going to be a champion for a long time. I think he, obviously, his wrestling is great. His jiu-jitsu is great. His striking is evolving. I just, I don't see, okay, so where is, and anything could happen?

Where is, where's jacca-are going to beat him? Yeah. Everywhere. Everywhere. He's just that much better than him. He is the best middle weight on the planet. He has the best tools. He can stand up and he can knock you out, which he's been showing lately.

Or he can take you to the ground and submit you, which he's also been showing lately. He finishes fights. He's aggressive. And he doesn't have holes in his game. To beat him, you have to have a performance like Luke Rockhold had. And I've been on the record. I don't think he won that fight. I think Jokre won that fight.

You have to have a performance where you kind of pick him apart. And Jokre just doesn't decide to do anything else. Wait, who do not think won't? that fight. I don't think Rockhold won that fight. Okay, okay, okay. I think Jokuree won that fight. Sure. He knocked him down numerous times and he just, you know, fell in love with, with that knockout power and sat on it rather than, you know, doing something else. I think it has to be a performance like that. If Jokkeray comes focused and decides that he wants to finish the fight, he will. I think he has the best toolbox in the MMA in the

middleweight division right now. And I think he's the best middleweight. And I love that this guy MMA can I just stepped on something here and now like it's like my ears are blah oh there we go uh I love this guy MMA canada his quote at the end of his thing is uh is a chale sudden quote about aryani that's the quote that you chose bizarre okay let's move along 12 to six elbows should 12 to six elbows be made legal it's good question it's come up a lot I know as of late I know it uh it obviously gave john Jones his only loss You know, honestly, I would like to ask one of these kind of commissioners, the Nicolumbos of the world, why it was made illegal illegal in the first place.

Obviously, it had to do with some kind of safety issue. And I'd like to think that there was a valid reason for it. I honestly can say right here, I don't know the exact reason why the 12th. Do you have any idea why? You pick the question. I'm not sure why specifically those elbows are chosen to be illegal. As far as I know, the last time there was a big outroar about this, uproar. Outroar.

The last time there was a big uproar about this, it was kind of just unveiled that it was an arbitrary decision that those elbows specifically were. I have to think that it's... No, I mean, it seems like there's a lot of rules that are very arbitrary like that. But for all intents and purposes, in my opinion, 12 to 6 elbows are illegal. Just you have to change the angle. You have to change the plane. Travis Brown is using his elbows to slam directly into the side of somebody's head. Even though it's going 9 to 3 or 3 to 9, whatever the case may be, it's the exact same elbow,

regardless of whether the clock is facing upward or downward, whatever the orientation is, The plane is still straight and the angle of the elbow isn't changed. He's not arcing that elbow. He's slamming it directly sideways. So for all intents and purposes, that elbow is legal in every possible scenario, except for one where you're directly above the guy slamming it straight downward. So just use it a different way. Use it the way Travis Brown uses it.

Elbow to the side. It's the exact same elbow. And you're going to be just as effective. So that's what also leads me to believe that it's arbitrary because the exact same elbow used in a different plane is legal. So I think it should be legal. The downward elbow, I believe, should be legal. And I don't think it'll be illegal for much longer, honestly. So a couple of people are telling me, and by the way, in the three hour and 40 minute, you can't ask me these complicated questions.

mind is much. But thankfully we have smart people on Twitter. One guy, D. Mo, says to me that 12-6 elbows were, are almost impossible to block, therefore looked at as unfair from what I've read. Peter over at Pet Z-Z-K-U-1-1 says there wasn't a valid reason. Big John said they banned it because of karate shows. They broke, because of in karate, they broke bricks. Yeah, I believe Rogan had said something similar at the time. It's arbitrary. Yeah, they were deemed illegal. Rogan said because of the ice breaking.

I mean, if that's, if, yeah, if that's the reason, then I guess it's kind of silly. Really? That's the reason? They broke bricks with an ice with it. Well, remember that these rules were established at a time when it probably wasn't as relevant. I know, but back in, guys like John Jones and guys like Travis Brown weren't coming on it. That long ago, 2000, 2001. For MMA?

That's, that's. a lifetime. Yeah. Think of who was fighting in 2001 and compare them to the athletes of now. I don't think that this will last much longer, honestly. I think that that will be changed. All right, fair enough. I feel good about it.

Okay. So far, no announcement yet. Yeah, no announcement. We're going to go to the Twitter questions. I can only think that they're waiting for us to finish the show because they wouldn't dare counter-program this very show. so let's just try to delay this as long as possible and see how long they delay it. How about that?

Our next question. By the way, I just wanted to say one quick thing about Travis Brown. I don't know if I said this last week and the interview never was posted or aired. He told me he's only tried that twice. Did I say this last week? Yes, he did. Crazy. Incredible. I mean, I would hope so.

I wouldn't want to be his training partner and be on the other end of one of those. But even like actual talking about it, he never even talked about it. It never even like tried to game plan it. And that's kind of why I feel like guys like him and jen me. John Jones are able to do what they do. Because they don't think, they're not trapped in a box of this is what I can do. They think outside and they're able to deliver effective blows. Okay, our next question.

From Andy, who should Tarrick Safedian fight next? He looked like a class apart. So should he get a top five or top 10 or next? How about Ellenberger? You know, Ellenberger is going to be ready and that was the original fight. So I like that. Camden's been out for a long time. Remember the last time Martin Camden fought, he was knocked out by Johnny Hendricks last

November, not this past November, the last November of 2012 in Montreal. It's been a while and I feel like he needs a fight to get back in there. A lot of people asking about Tiago Alves, he's going to be ready, you know, March, April or so. I like that fight. There are a lot of interesting fights for Tarek Safedine in his style. I like the Matt Brown fight. It might be a little longer before Brown is healthy. He might need a few extra months, especially if Safedine wants to stay busy. So, you know, coming to mind, you know, the Ellenberger fight makes a lot of since that's the fight that they originally booked. Alves, I like that fight.

Campman, two degree, Matt Brown, those are the ones that come to mind. Because the other guys are all booked. Hendricks, Robbie Lawler, Lombard, Shields, Woodley, Condit, all of them are booked. So that's a,

that kind of, you know, obviously cancel that. Those guys, I'm assuming he'll have a fight book by March 15th when all those guys fight. Our next question. Karajiri says he wants to fight Aldo next. do you think he deserves it? And is he good enough to beat Aldo?

I don't think he deserves it to answer your first question. And I know he's 5-0 now as a featherweight, but you need to build yourself up. You know, Sean Soriano is not a top 10 guy, not a top 15 guy. You know, there were some very good options thrown out. I'm an idiot. See what I talking about?

Campman's last fight was against freaking Carlos Condet. Of course, in August. Why did I think it's been that long? I need you here to correct me when I make these mistakes. Where were you on that one? Looking out for your announcement. All right. Of course.

My apologies. Mark Kampman last fought against Carl's Konda back in August in Indianapolis. I was there. I'm sorry. Four hours. My mind. Anyway, Kawajiri, not quite names like Dennis Siever were thrown around. Maybe the winner of the Jeremy Stevens, Darren Elkins' fight.

that was thrown around. There was another good one that was thrown around. What was it? There was another good one. There was one that I really like. Let me just look at the rankings here. Oh, Porier. I like that one a lot.

How about that? Porier. I think that one makes... Oh, Dennis Bermudas. I like that one. Anyway, point being, I don't think he's there. I think he needs at least two or three wins. That division is very stacked.

That's a very good division right now. All of a sudden, the featherweight division is very exciting. a lot of great players. People are bringing up Conne McGregor. I think he'll probably fight before McGregor comes back, but those names come to mind. Bermudez, Siever, I like those a lot. Yeah, I don't think he earned the title shot yet. There's so many guys who have been lined up for that already. Yeah. But it was an impressive post-fight plead. Oh, it was great. If he fell to his knees, it would have been GSP. And then he said, when he said, give me the touchdown. Then he said, can I have a bonus please? I like how he said, please.

Okay, next question. Did you feel any of the fighters on the Singapore card were not quite ready for the UFC level of competition? I mean, there were obviously some guys there who actually said going into it that they were surprised they got the nod. Again, this is what I was saying. This is a different time for the UFC, these cards, China, Singapore, they're going all over the world now, literally, and guys are going to get chances. You know, it was funny. Last year, they're telling us they had to trim the roster. Guys are going to get chances now. And I was talking to Brian Stan yesterday via text, and he was saying that it reminded. reminded him of the early WEC days that they were, you know, they were actually more nervous than usual. He felt those jitters coming out of the fighters and reminded him of those early WEC days when guys were just trying to make a name for themselves. So it's interesting to watch guys move up the ranks, but yeah, I mean, this is not, you can't compare this card to UFC 168 and the main card there.

You just can't do that. And so to answer your question, are these guys UFC caliber fighters that we've been, you know, a custom, to seeing over the last few years, absolutely not. The times have changed. And the UFC's going out there to develop fighters. They want to pick up one and oh, two and no fighters, guys who haven't been all that active, because they fit in the market,

because they need these faces out there for many different reasons. And this was an interesting card, only the fourth card in UFC history to not feature a fight above 170 pounds. And the third one was just last month in Sacramento. So yes, did I think a lot of these guys, you know, weren't top top.

20, absolutely. But at the time, it was fine. It was a fun card, and I think we just need to view and understand and digest these cards differently. It's a different era now. By the way, it's beeping. Do you hear that? Yeah, the card ran out of space. Oh, is that bad?

No. Okay. We're fine. Actually, the camera's going to explode. Is it? Because they're all, like, flashing on me. It's freaking me out. Yeah, well, we're fine back here.

Okay, perfect. No, we're okay, so. Oh, here's the news. Dana White just announced on ESPN that Dominic Cruz. is out of UFC 169. That is horrible. That is just horrible. Dana White on ESPN News,

Oh, Dominic Cruz, out of UFC 169 with the groin tear, will vacate the title. That is from MMAFighting.com's Twitter. More people tweeting Dominic Cruz out of UFC 169 with the groin tear per Dana White Cruz

vacates the title. Uriah Faber now steps in to rematch Hennon Burrell. Wow. Horrible. unfortunate man after everything that that guy has been through over the last two and a half years

to get injured via groin tear thank God it's not his knee that is that is devastating and now favor gets another crack he was 4 and 0 in 2013 one of the candidates for fight of for fighter of the year and getting a chance that's the card

UFC 169 in Newark New Jersey but that is just devastating news that is horrible my heart goes out to dominic cruz a really great guy a smart guy a young guy in his prime for this to happen to him very unfortunate any thoughts just i mean what do you what do you say he had to he held out this long had his title and now something else and has to vacate it i mean you have to feel for him yeah bummer all right there's really nothing to say yeah uh next question what did you think of ufc fight pass seems like there's a lot of teething issues that need to be sorted out. I mean, did you watch it?

Yeah, I watched it live. I didn't think that there. The only issue that I had was the audio was a little crackly. It was a little hollow. At times, that might have been my connection, which has been somewhat suspect recently. I didn't have. What issues? What issues were there?

Well, some that, you know, I just came upon organically were maybe not issues, but the red and blue corners were not. live for the event. You're supposed to be able to watch different camera angles. The red and blue corners weren't available for this event. That might just be because they don't place priority on the card. It was a fight night card rather than like a bigger card. So you weren't able to use those different camera angles.

Another thing was it wasn't it wasn't as intuitive as it should have been to find the fight card, the live. Now, there were people who were acting like it was buried deep somewhere. It wasn't. You can just click live events and find it, but it should be the first thing that just opens up. When it's a fight night and there's a live card on, it should be right on the homepage. First thing you click, you click it and you see fights. And the prelims didn't naturally stream into the main card. You had to switch to a different stream.

That should be the same stream. It should just transfer over if you're watching that stream. There was probably something else off the top of my. head but um i just say that uh for me fight pass isn't something that i i must purchase at this point um the the library is not as extensive as i thought it would be i had i just signed up for it um that morning to to check it out right before the live card um the library wasn't as extensive as i was hoping it would be based on what people were saying um and it wasn't as intuitive as as I would have liked, but to be able to see, you know, a UFC card for $999 a month doesn't seem

so bad if you can guarantee one a month. I wasn't as down on the card. I thought it was, you know, I thought it was what it was promised to be. It's not like, you know, they promised this was the best card that you're ever going to see. So I wasn't too unsatisfied with that. But at this point, it's not a must purchase. But if they can improve the archive, if they can increase the library to what I hope it would be. I think fight pass is worth a look for sure. And I agree with all of that. I don't think that it is as extensive, as they said.

I do trust that it will happen. Having a hard time focusing here, because I do feel very bad. You know, another thing that I didn't mention was Hennon Borrow is now the new UFC Bantamway champion. Or maybe I did mention that Cruz has been stripped. Another interesting thing from our friend, Facewap, it's not a huge deal,

but is that still the main event? not a massive deal. They're both five-round fights, but we were told the main event is the bantamweight fight because it was a unification bout now because it is no longer that. And usually they go with the higher weight. Does Jose Aldo Riccara Lama's become the main event? Some questions that I don't have the answer to

because I'm doing the show right this second. But yeah, I actually just texted while you were talking, I just texted your eye favor. if he wanted to come on, but he hasn't responded to me. This is our last question. All right. Mark Fisher touched on the idea of having a Japan versus Korea International Fight Night card, like UFC 158.

Are you a fan of these? I don't know if the talent is there. You know, I'm a fan of these cards. I remember that one. It was Canada versus the U.S. I remembered very well. I liked it a lot. David Loazzo and all that stuff, George St. Pierre, BJ Penn.

And I don't think the UFC needs that, per se. But I like it. I like it with a heavyweight card. I like those gimmick cards. It's fun. That one in particular, Japan v. Korea, I'm not sure if they're there quite yet. But I'm sure they could pull it off.

They could certainly pull off U.S. versus Brazil, Canada, all that stuff. But that one in particular, I don't think they could pull off. But yes, if you're asking, like the heavyweight card, loved it. I love when they did that. 58, Canada, U.S. loved it. They haven't really done many since. They've had U.S. versus U. tough and all that stuff.

But yeah, why not? So many events, switch it up. That's it. Should I reach out to Dominic or give him a space? I don't think it's... I don't like to ask you these questions because your instincts are always different. My instincts are different.

Your instincts are always different. Like that time that you told me not to call King Moe during the whole Emmanuel Noon thing. Or no, it was... It was the other way around. Yeah, not to call Manuel Noon. All right.

Well, that's a bummer. After a good show, Unfortune news, if you just joined us after watching the Dana White announcement, Dominic Cruz out of UFC 169, tearing his groin. He has now been stripped as UFC Bantamweight champion. The new champion is obviously Hennon Burau, and he'll be facing Uriah Faber for the second time. Remember, they fought each other at UFC 149 in Calgary,

Burau defeating Faber, favor, injuring his ribs in the fight. It was a fight somewhat reminiscent of the fight. the Aldo Faber fight at WC. 48, and since then, Uriah Faber has gone 4-0. He defeated Ivan Menjavar. He then defeated Scott Jorgensen, then picked up a win over Yuri Alcantara, and most recently defeated Michael McDonnell won 4-0 this past year, and just so devastating for Dominic Cruz, who has been out for so long in the UFC standing behind him

and not stripping him of the belt. And then at the 11th hour now, three weeks before, four-fight, main eventing a show, a big title unification bout. They unfortunately have to do what they have to do and strip them. It's a very unfortunate story. Hopefully we can find out more about it, and hopefully that we'll find out that this is not something that will set him back too long and not something related to that knee, which he, of course, had to have surgery on twice, and that's why he's been out.

He hasn't fought since October of 2010 when he defeated Demetrius Johnson on versus, UFC on versus 6. It has been that long for Dominic Cruz. We wish him our best. And it is unfortunate that he had to pull out. All right, you can hit my music. No more questions, right? Done.

All right. A lot of you asking me questions right now, if this is career ending for Dominic Cruz, I mean, it's just way too soon to speculate. I mean, we just found out the news now. Don't want to guess anything. Who am I to say that? But we do wish him our best,

and we'll try to reach out to him and get more in this situation. But for now, the new main event right across the river here in Newark, New Jersey for UFC 169 is Hennon-Ber-Varro. I should say the main event TBD depends on if they bump up Jose Aldo and Ricardo Lamas. We Shall See, it doesn't really affect it all that much. They're both five-round fights. Anyhow, a fun show. We appreciate you stopping by.

Back on track here on the MMA hour with our regular packed shows. as far as guests are concerned. I want to thank everyone who stopped by. I want to thank everyone who sent in questions and comments. Enjoyed it very much. I want to thank Ali Abdel Aziz for coming in, of course, under the weather and dropping a little bombshell on us. We'll see if Bellator responds to that.

Thank you very much to Sear. Baja Darzada for stopping by and get well soon and looking forward to seeing him get another crack inside the octagon. Luke Rockhold, he makes his return at UFC Fight Night 35 against Kastas Filipu. good luck to him. Chris Wyman, great to having him on for an extended period, the reigning and defending UFC Middoway Champion. Great stuff out of Reid Kuhn. Pick up his book, Fightnomics. It is here, and you can follow him on Twitter and ask him all those kinds of questions.

Matt Serra, great stuff out of him. And Tarek Safranin, congratulations on picking up your very first UFC win. Thank you so much to everyone who checked out the show. We'll be back next week. Same time and place. If you missed anything, iTunes, to try all that good stuff. We'll see you, peace. Samaria.

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