MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani - Episode 291

Episode Date: July 20, 2015

Ariel Helwani speaks to Vadim Finkelchtein, Demetrious Johnson, Johny Hendricks, Holly Holm, Stevie Ray, Robert Whiteford, Ricky Lundell, and Tony McGregor. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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On this Monday, July 20th, 2015, that was a little weird how I said, The Mixed. It's almost like I went through puberty all over again there. What was up with that? The Mixed Martial Arts Hour back in your life. That was a lot better. That felt better.

I felt it here. It's probably because I'm schvitzing here. I never used the term schvitzing, but it is boiling outside. And you know, I always talk about how I hate the cold weather, which might be a surprise to some who know that I'm from Canada and you think that I'm used to this thing. I love it, that I grew up with it. It's interesting. Perhaps that is true.

But I am so tired of the cold weather. I welcome the boiling temperatures that we're experiencing right now here in New York City. It is the peak of summer. And I couldn't be happier. I was schfitzing yesterday. I was dripping. My kids were dripping. My wife was dripping.

Everyone was sweating like a man. Madman on Marty Gras, and I was as happy as can be. But I will say it is nice to be here on a Monday afternoon. It's nice to be here in a cool studio here at our SB Nation studios in New York City, and we have a lot to talk about my friends, because when we said goodbye last Tuesday afternoon, we were about to embark on a very busy six-day stretch in the world of mixed martial arts, and it proved to be and then some. like what like 60 events excuse me

60 fights happened it was it was it was pretty intense it was pretty jam-packed a lot happened and we have a lot to recap and a lot to discuss because the fun never stops it's another busy weekend coming up in the world of MMA and of course the highlight

of the last week was the UFC's debut in Scotland Glasgow to be exact I know a lot of you appreciate the fact that I finally got that name right it was it was a very special event it was It was an emotional one. It was unique.

And it reminded me that when the UFC books their events the right way, no one does it better than them. It's the same reason why Dublin was so special. It's the same reason why UFC 129 was so special. UFC 83. Certain events are special when the event, the location, the arena is part of the draw, is part of the appeal. UFC 188 had the same thing. And on the flip side, it's why events like UFC 186 don't feel. special. You can't go to Montreal with a guy from Washington State and a guy from Japan headlining.

And it's the same reason why this show in Chicago, a very good one, won't have the same emotion involved as Scotland did on Saturday. Because when the UFC books events where, you know, the top draw is from the area, Michael Bisping from the UK, where the rest of the card is filled with fighters either from the country itself or nearby, everything just feels a whole lot more special. Everything feels different. And it doesn't have to be the greatest card of all time, top to bottom. But when you book an event specific to that market, tailoring to that market, it changes everything. That's how it used to be all the time back in the day. Oh, we got these fighters, this fight, let's go there. Now it's a little different. Well, we got this location. Let's fill up the

card. Saturday's card in Scotland was not the greatest card of all time on paper, but it felt it felt so unique, it felt refreshing, it felt like a lot of fun. It made you want to be there. It made those who were not there like myself wish they were there because of that emotion involved. Kudos to that crowd. They were singing three little birds. They were going nuts for their fellow countrymen. Kudos to the fighters who showed up. It was pretty great. It was pretty great to witness. And it reminded me that when they do it that way, no one's better. All right. So what are we talking about on today's show? Well, of course, the UFC returned to San Diego on Wednesday. We had Frank Meir versus Todd Duffy, Frank Meir continuing to reinvent himself in 2015. We counted him out,

and now here he is. Two-fight winning streak and really looking good. And that was a bit of a crazy fight and kind of all over the place. But Frank Meir, a guy who we thought was done back at UFC 169 after losing to Alastair Overeem look lifeless. All of a sudden he's won two in a row. How about that? So at around 3.30, we're going to take your questions and comments. A lot going on. A lot coming up.

T.J. Dilleshaw versus Hennon Burroughs coming up on Saturday on Fox. That is in Chicago. Finally, the UFC going to Chicago when it's not freezing cold, which is nice. So we'll talk about all of that. Beltor was also back. They crown the new Welterweight champion. So much going on. Forget about the dog days of summer.

that's when MMA really gets going. So like I said, 330, we'll take your questions and comments. 325, we are going to go inside the vault. This one pertains to this weekend in Chicago, so looking forward to that. 305, we'll talk to, excuse me, 325, we'll talk to Robert Whiteford. 335 will go inside the vault. 325 will talk to Robert Whiteford, who was one of the big winners on Saturday in Scotland, Scotland's own. Jumped into the crowd a la Josealdo.

That was awesome. 305 will talk to Holly Holme, who picked up a big win on 1,000. Wednesday, although she was criticized for it, so I'm looking forward to hearing her take on it all. 245. We'll talk to Johnny Hendricks. He is campaigning for a title shot. Will he get it? We'll talk to him about that and the big Welchway title fight of a little over a week ago. Tony McGregor, Connor McGregor's father, if you don't know Tony, he is a very unique character, a very fun guy. Looking forward to talking to him at 225, 205. Vadim Finkelstein, who is the manager of one Fyodor Emilianenko. Remember on this show last week, it kind of broke in the middle of the show that

Fodor had announced that he is coming back. Want to talk to Vadim about that. He's also the M1 global president, much to discuss with Vadim, who will be calling in from St. Petersburg, Russia. 145 will talk to Frank Mear, excuse me, his head coach, Ricky Lundell, about the win for Frank Meir on Wednesday and how he's turned things around for him. And at 125, we'll talk to Demetrius Johnson about headlining UFC 191, September 5th in Las Vegas. Before we go to our first guests of the day, let me remind you that the National Academy of Sports Medicine is looking for people who want an exciting career in the fitness industry, where you wake up every day doing something you love.

NASM trainers improve people's lives by helping them reach their health and fitness goals. Don't miss this opportunity to start a career where you get to stay active and change people's lives. It doesn't get any better than this. NASM guarantees you you'll land the job within 60 days of earning your CPT certification or your money back. Get a 14-day free trial of fun online program at my USATrainer.com. MyUSA trainer.com. Restrictions apply. See my USATrainer.com for details. All right. Let's go to the Skype machine now. Welcome in our first guest of the day. He was one of those Scottish fighters who came up big on Saturday. in front of his home people.

A lot of emotion involved, as I said, he was on the main card. In fact, he really got that main card going. I thought with a fantastic win, I'm talking about Stevie Ray, who joins us right now via the magic of Skype. There he is. Stevie, how are you? Yeah, I'm good, mate. How are you? It's a pleasure to have you on the show.

Congratulations on the win. You know, you were very emotional, and I appreciated that. I want to talk about that. But now, less than 48 hours later, does it still feel like a dream for you what happened on Saturday? yeah i mean it still feels surreal um i don't even think it's properly sunk in yet um it's just crazy how did you uh my microphone here is falling off how did you uh digest the whole thing how did you how did you come down from that cloud nine if if you have come down yet that's what i mean i don't even think i have came down wow you're still buzzing yeah yeah still just can't can't believe the

whole experience i mean it's like Even when I woke up this morning, I'm scared I'm going to wake up and it's just all been a dream. Well, it's good to hear you use that word dream because you talked about your training camp being a nightmare. How bad was it? Let's detail just how bad of a training camp this was leading up to, you know, the most special moment of your career. I mean, the fight camp started good. I went over to TriStar in Montreal. I trained there for a month.

I didn't really have any major injuries. I mean, I had a little bit of a sore shoulder. But everything was going good. I was getting great training. I came back home to Scotland to finish my camp and do four weeks at home before the fight. And the day I got back to Sunday, the next day I had a bike course,

so a motorcycle course for the day that had been booked for a while where I was basically learning to drive one and it was raining that day I was driving down a road 40 miles per hour and there was tailbacks because there was temporary traffic lights and yeah I just I don't know if I was daydreaming or I don't know maybe an experience but around the corner there was tailback so you couldn't see it and I just noticed that the few people in front of me a couple of bikes and cars in front of me

brake really hard so I slammed the brakes on and came basically slid straight away and still going about 40 miles an hour came flying right right off the bike. Wow. So I just remember sliding down the road. My left knee took most of the impact. And yeah, I'm flying 40 miles per hour. There's cars behind me.

There's cars coming towards me because I'm sliding on the other side of the road. It was kind of one of the feelings I thought I was going to die. Oh, my gosh. What were you wearing? I was wearing a pair of jeans. I was wearing a helmet and a pair of Timberland boots because the people that I was doing the course with

they provide the helmet and the yellow vest and stuff but they didn't provide knee pads or leather so yeah my knee took quite a lot of impact I jump up from the bike my whole left leg was dead I had to hop to the side of the road before I got ran over. Jeez.

And yeah, and straight away, I was just thinking, shit, I'm going to be, I'm injured, oh no, what, you know, four weeks to my fight,

what have I done? Oh, should have cancelled this? Shouldn't I came and done that? Just, oh, there was a million things going through my head. I could feel, like, really excruciating pain in my knee. It felt all cold, so I knew it was bleeding.

My finger was gushing with blood because I had scraped my hands. And yeah, and then I had to go to the hospital. Luckily, nothing was tore or any ligament damage. And yeah, it was just really badly swollen. So this is four weeks out from the fight. I basically couldn't do any jihitsu or wrestling for a week. So a week solid I didn't do any wrestling

Jiu-Jitsu I just tried to even hitting pads it was sore because I had this really deep cut on my finger so that was difficult and then the week after

I started trying to wrestle and do Jiu-Jitsu again but it was just painful every time I was rolling or my knee would open I couldn't

commit to the takedown because it was sore. Then, yeah, it was pretty much like that. For two or three weeks, they started getting better. And then on my strength condition, and I hurt my hands from doing deadlift. It scraped all my hands. And then a week out from the fight, I hurt my lower back.

Jeez. How'd you do that? I'm not even sure. I think it was from doing tire flipping. my last strength and conditioning session I wasn't doing any any weights sort of a week out it was more for explosiveness and getting my last session

and yeah I just felt like tightening up the next day I went to training on the Sunday it was boxing and wrestling and I couldn't even I couldn't even do the boxing my lower back was sore every time I was trying to bounce in and out I was just so pain

I couldn't get my rhythm so yeah I had to sit the session out and then luckily that was kind of the last session I was doing anyway it's all just about making weight now but my back was getting worse as the week went on and that was just resting

sitting up on the couch just started getting these pains in my back so yeah and then even before I went out and fought I couldn't get warmed up because my back had tightened up. So were you just, by the way, why are you holding a credit card? Is there any reason for that? Oh, that is just because I was, well, yeah, there was paying for something earlier.

Okay. I keep swiping, I keep getting loads of messages on my phone, so I keep swiping it up. People are very excited that you're on the show, I would imagine. Yeah, probably that as well. My phone's been going crazy. Okay, so when you say you couldn't warm up, what were you doing in the locker room? You were just sitting there? Well, no, I was trying to warm up, but I don't know, just because, I mean, I was shadow boxing.

My coach was putting me all through it, but just everything I'd done, it was hurting me. Yeah. Sorry. But I couldn't just not do anything. So when I was throwing kicks, I couldn't really kick properly because I felt this sort of tightening in my back. I couldn't Pummel, practice my takedowns, just basically trying to get a sweat going

and mentally drilling some stuff as you do before you go out and fight. And then it was really starting to bother me mentally as well. I'm saying, oh, I hope my back is going to hold up. Trust this to happen. And, yeah, I was the whole way walking out, I'm thinking about it. but once I get in the cage

I don't know the crowd the crowd kind of made me forget about it I got me pumped up so if this card wasn't in Scotland would you have pulled out

I've never ever pulled out a fight much would but I've never I've heard loads of niggles before like in small injuries where I think

you're right yeah okay sorry yeah where you know I've been a little bit sore but I would never pull out the fight unless I broke my leg or something

I just try and keep it quiet and do what I can but I just kept saying it myself throughout this whole camp even with a knee I'll just need to work around it which I did done everything that I could

and on fighting night I'll not feel it. I'll just the adrenaline I'll hide the pain. When you saw your teammate Robert Whiteford who will be talking to later come up big and he was very emotional as well did that give you some you know a bit of a jolt

some extra motivation did that once you saw what he did and then Joanne was after you you were kind of in the middle there where you think okay I can't let these people down I have to keep this going yeah yeah well in a way it kind of makes you a little bit more nervous sure sure he's one right oh now it's my turn yeah so makes you a little bit more nervous and it's

but obviously at the same time i was delighted for him and it was the start to to a good night and um yeah just really nervous going out um i kept i don't know i was net a lot of negative thoughts in my head but just trying to push them off you always get them sort of thoughts coming in your head and telling you like I've not had the best camp and I'm half injured at the moment and I hope I'm going to be able to throw a kick properly because I wasn't able to warm it up well but yeah and then and then I just kind of it worked out still and then in the post-fight interview you you said to Dana White you know change your life you want to of the 50 Gs and I read that

not that long ago you were on welfare is that accurate yeah I've been yeah on welfare I mean how long how long ago not right before the fight but I've been on welfare like on and off for the past few years

I mean because I've worked and I've had loads of different kind of jobs and then I've tried to train full time I've tried to secure sponsorships But obviously I've got my own house, I've got three kids, and I live with my fiancé. So to try and not work and just live off fighter pay

just wasn't ever going to work, but I tried every now and again. And then vice versa, I can't really be working full-time and trying to train to defend. I was Cage Warriors World Champion at the time. So I was not. I was not wanting to just, you know, I had to basically try and train like a champion. So to try and mix that up, and it was just a lot of stress throughout the years.

Just before my fight, I had just got a sort of full-time job that I enjoyed doing. I was a fitness instructor. Right. So I had just started that, maybe six weeks I had been working. and that was just really tough going. I mean, I was waking up at 5 a.m., working at 6 a.m. until 2 p.m. And then I've got the whole day to pretty much just sit about.

And then I've not got training until 7 o'clock at night until 10 p.m. I get home at 11 p.m. Because I have to drive an hour to training and drive an hour back. And then I'm pretty much going straight to sleep, waking up for work. and doing it all over again. So I've done that for roughly six weeks, tried to train as much as I can. But I'm not sure if I would have been able to keep going

because I had my third child on the way. She was due April 15th, four days after my UFC debut. So, yeah, I didn't know what would I have done, but everything that happened worked out perfect. So what was your reaction when you were told that you were winning the bonus and what are you going to do with that money? Well, I had it in my head

that I was maybe going to get so I was really nervous sitting down when they started saying it you know, the fighter bonuses and then said it and it's just like absolutely overwhelmed and couldn't believe it and sometimes I think it's still not even

sunk in the fact that I've won $50,000 I've probably never made that in my entire work career if I had to add up every single piece of money I've ever made from I started working I've not made that so it's just unbelievable I'm still not sure I think I'm scared to spend it I didn't want to go and buy anything because then it's going to be away but I just bought a car in my last fight so I've got a nice new car

which I've never ever had I was glad to buy that and then I think I'm currently renting we rent a house so I think we're maybe going to look into getting our own house and getting a mortgage potentially getting married I'm not sure if we're going to use this money

or use this in the house but there's a few like really good things that we're looking to do. I go on holiday on Friday. I go to Tennerife for a week. Wow. The possibilities are endless. Yeah, but extra spending money there.

So, yeah, it's just not sure what to do with it. Yeah, I'll probably be scared to spend it. Yeah, well, you know, it's not the worst idea to save a little bit. But I love the vibe that you're giving off here because you clearly still are a little, you're still a little over. overwhelmed by everything that's happened in the last 48 hours. It was a really special thing. And, you know, I love these moments when the UFC comes to a market for the first time. And in particular, a market like Scotland, where you know the people have been just, they've been starving for the UFC to come there.

I know that the fans have been bothering Dana White to bring a show to Scotland for a long time on Twitter and whatnot. Do you think this will, this will spawn a whole new generation of fighters? Because we hear this. Like, look at UFC 93 when it went to Dublin and then you see what it did for those guys. Do you think, are you sensing that already that the virus has spread or do you think we'll only know in a few years' time? Yeah, I think, I mean, I think there's, that's kind of shot a lot of the uneducated people out there that there's maybe, I reckon after that show, there's a lot of people that's saying, I'm going to start trying an MMA. So that fact, but even it's given people, like even me, Jojo and Rob getting signed to the UFC, I think that's gave a lot of the other fighters encouraging. because I mean we have I've got a lot of pro fighters in our gym that some of them kick my ass and they're not in the UFC so I think over the next few years you're going to see a lot more Scottish fighters in the UFC and then we've got a lot of prospects and stuff as well I think it's just purely because we've got a really good gym at higher level MMA and my coach what's James Dooling, he's kind of been at full time for over 10 years now.

So it's took a lot of time to build up what he's, his reputation. And we've got some guys maybe start training six months, and you'd think they're pro compared to some other people out there. So, yeah, I think it's going to explode. It just feels unbelievable and amazing. to be part of it. I've heard you say that you're interested in a fight with Norman Park yet this was before your fight.

After the win now, is that still what you want next? And why? Just really, I mean, the UK rankings, I'm sitting at a third in the UK rankings. So Norman Park's number two, Ross Pearson's number one. And I'm knowing this game to be anywhere but number one. so I just I don't know I've not got anything against Norman seems like a nice guy

just I can't remember how it came about where we started talking I think maybe I mentioned a few of my friends had mentioned that would be a good fight with us before before I was even in the UFC but yeah I mean I think

I got asked how do I think the fight would go in the post media stuff after the UFC Scotland and obviously I believe that if I did fight him I would beat him, I would submit him or knock him out but yeah I've not got anything against him. I'll fight anyone. Perhaps in Dublin. That would be a cool scene, right? Yeah, yeah, that's what people were saying.

Fighting him in Dublin. I did it. To be honest, I didn't think he would won that. Why is that? well he's I'm not sure what his record is lately but I think he's lost two in a row I've won two in a row kind of came on in it's in Dublin he'd be nervous as hell

and he said someone said would you like that fight and he says I'd rather fight a Brazilian I don't know why he wants to fight a Brazilian but I understand I mean I wouldn't I wouldn't want to fight me if I was him nothing that is because I'm way better than I'm or just I'm on a streak. He's on a bit of the other end.

But yeah. Well, Stevie, it is great to talk to you for the first time. I'm very happy for you. You had a fantastic moment inside the cage. One of those great moments of the year. I love the emotion. I love everything that you did in the cage. And then what you said afterwards, as I said, one of the more fun events of 2015.

And really happy for both you, your team and your kind of. It was a great moment for Scotland. I loved witnessing it. So congratulations. Thank you for the time. Get better soon. Heal up and enjoy that vacation. Yeah, thank you.

I mean, apart from my back, everything's healed up now. Okay, good. It was just a bit of a nightmare. Yeah, I'll probably be looking to get back in there fairly soon. I hope the dream continues for you, my friend. Thank you, Ariel, and thanks for having me on the show. My pleasure. It feels unbelievable.

even speaking to you, I'm overwhelmed to everything. Well, I appreciate that, and you can thank your fans as well. A lot of your friends have asked for you to come on the show for quite some time. You have very loyal fans, and I'm sure you appreciate that as well. Thank you for the time, Stevie, and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. See you later.

Bye. There he is. Stevie Ray, 2 and O in the UFC, look very good on Saturday, defeating Leandro Mafra. A nice win for him, as you just heard. He's a guy who was in a lot. a lot of pain was kind of all out of whack leading up to the fight. And then one of those strange things where you actually get into the fight and you're able to put it all together. It's amazing

what being on that kind of stage and having the adrenaline running through your body can do for an athlete. And he's certainly exemplified that very well on Saturday. A huge night for both him and his team and his country. And we'll be talking to a teammate of his Robert Whiteford later on in the show as we continue to recap UFC Glasgow. For now, let us. Let us. move along on Wednesday during the San Diego broadcast. The UFC officially announced the main event for UFC 191. That's taking place September 5th. MGM Grand Garden Arena. It's a rematch that we've been talking and anticipating for quite some time. It's John Dotson versus Demetrius Johnson 2 for the UFC Flyway title. Right now we're talking to the aforementioned Demetrius Johnson

about that and a whole lot more. One of our favorites, Mighty Mouse. How are you, my friend? I'm doing great, Ariel. How are you, buddy? I'm doing great. Are you watch shopping right now? I am not. I am not, unfortunately. I'm headed the agenda of putting that work.

How obsessed are you with watches these days? You know, it's not about the obsession of them. It's almost like an accessory for our fans. You know, it's like women in diamonds. You know, you're always going to love them. So for me, you know, I kind of put it behind me now. I got my fight ahead of me. and I'll focus on that as right now.

But, you know, sometimes that night when I've done training, I'll blame them when the wife and the kids are sleeping. And I just do research on watches and learn about the movements and the different types of watch that are out there. And we can blame Tyrone Woodley for this, I guess, this curiosity. Damn, me, he blamed him in his black ass with that. He brought me into it. And now every time I look at watch, I always show him at it,

and I always give him the brief of getting me into watches. Well, I love it. I love to see you guys expanding your. horizons and you know you're the champ so you should have some accessories you should have a little bit of bling bling so as i said you're you're uh you're you're on deck for ufc 191 september 5th las vegas and this was an event it took them a long time to announce this main event you have any idea why you know i think for the ufc uh they're trying to see what happened with uh henry si hudu and chico can't be on it um i think they're waiting to see how about five was

one, you know, brand of John Bopje's just by Zach McCaffey. And, you know, all cards shift depending on, you know, who would have won against Chapman and Homer Breger. I mean, you just never know. For me, I don't look at that. I just look at it as, you know, the date I want to fight is September 5th. I let Sean Shelby get all I know that. And then they could grant me that wish.

But regardless, you know, me and my team, we started training, you know, when I was out in Vegas, before they announce a fight, I'm already five weeks into my My training camp has already got my speed, agility, my speed and power working, and now I'm transitioning over to a fight specific step, and then when I was in Las Vegas International Fight Week, I was in my cardio phase. So we've had our eye on this state for a long time.

Were you disappointed when you didn't get to Hudo? I know you've liked this idea of fighting, you know, new challenges, new opponents. Now you're fighting a guy who you have already defeated. Some people like myself seem to think that he kind of gets under your skin just the mere mention of his name. So are you disappointed that you have to go through him again?

Oh, Dodgers? No, no, no, no. You know, obviously I would love to fight with him. If you get that gold medalist Olympics, because I would love to test myself against that. I never beat a gold medalist before. Ah, yes. I've been Dodson before.

So for me, it's rematch, and I like my odds of rematches. And it's not that I don't want to say he gets under my skin at all. I think a lot of people just keep irritated with him. And that's true much it. So he returned after a bit of a layoff against Zach McCovsky. You don't even think he won that fight, right? I did it.

You know, I was there. I saw the fighting. You know, it's hard where the judges are looking for. You know, I kind of scored a fight a little bit different. You know, I felt that his class landed more. He was a more efficient fighter. He tried to finish a fight with the heel hook. So he was trying to go with a finish.

and it was such like, you know, not taking anything away from Dodson or Zach. It was a great fight between both those guys, and, you know, they're old training partners. I guess for me, when somebody's talking up all this hype and they're going to do all this and blah, blah, blah, blah, and then they go out there and they just lay a big egg and they don't deliver.

It's kind of like, well, I just get a sour taste on my mom. So that's why, you know, I'm a type of fighter where I've never gone out there and say, I'm going to do this and that. I just go out there and do it. and that's the way I go about doing things. So when I see something, he does that, and I'm expecting to go out there and do all this shit, and I don't do it.

It's like, so what happened out there? Tell me, please. Teach you? So that's how I thought about it. And I thought that looked good there, and the dots come out the long way off. So it's a tough fight to, you know, talk about. Do you feel like you're catching him at the right time, though?

Because he's, you know, only one fight removed from that serious knee injury, and he needed to shake off the, Cobwebs, maybe his confidence is a little low. He wasn't a huge fan of his own performance. He was actually quite honest about that. Is this the perfect time to rematch John Dotson if you have to? Like, you know, I don't look at that way. I feel, you know, at my standpoint, I feel 100% good right now.

I'm in a good place. I came off a great performance. And I told people earlier day, you know, are you chapped for the rematch? Absolutely. You know, I'm ready to get there and it worked my half. I'm actually going there and, you know, fight, fight like it's my last fight, just like the first time we fought, you know.

I got trouble in the beginning of the fight a couple of times, but after that, I kept coming forward against the opposite. And every guy I'm going into the training show, I'm like, I'm really with my fucking ass off. I'm still bad, and then I push it. If you guys catch the, you know, do you see one in a new one? You know, you could see me back as far.

I think you can see that little combo between a student and master. both part this Saturday. So they were, you know, they were talking to Wyman Rockhold, they were talking to D.C., they were talking, or at least maybe interested in having Verdume on that card. None of those fighters were able to, you know, come back on a relatively short notice, I suppose, to headline. And now you're bumped to the headlining act. And I know this is something you want to.

You told me that you really wanted to fight on this card, but in a dream world, you'd be the co-main event to Wyman Rockhold. And I think that's a perfect scenario for you because you, you can kind of fly under the radar a little bit, but be a nice little appetizer or a nice little, you know, companion piece to a title fight that is obviously much anticipated as well. Now you're the main event. Are you annoyed that you have to go through this whole process again

because I can guarantee you, you know it, as well as I do. You're going to be asked these questions about your drawing power and blah, blah, blah, it's going to be the same. It's going to be a groundhog day. Now, you have a better dance partner this time around, a guy who can actually talk and sell a fight, but still, this is coming. Are you annoyed that you're going to have to go through this again?

I'm not to know what it's my job. It's more obligations. And I've been able to take the media a little bit different now. As I see other fighters go to the media obligations, and I see how they approach it. You know, I approach the place. Granted, they don't have the same questions I do about obviously the star power, the draw power and all that.

But if I continue to go, I can say, you know, what more do you want for me? You know, I have finished what my last four or five kind of fight. I've knocked guys out. I'm not the best guy in the world. I've admitted guys who've never been finished before in our whole entire life. I just don't know what else they want. So those are my questions that I answered back, you know, the analysts,

the people out there. You know, people are like, dude, you're just fucking short. I don't like watching for real life. I can't help you there, bro. This is how God made me, and I hope you enjoy watching bigger. It does seem, though, that you're maybe opening up a little more, and I'm wondering where that came from. Was it a talk with someone?

just you being more comfortable in front of us. You know, even hearing you drop some F-bombs actually excites me, and I'm not a huge F-bomb guy, but I get giddy when I hear you do it for some reason. You know, I think going through this sport, you know, I've always tried to be the person who's been respectful when I see guys getting a cop or drugs and doing stuff, crashing in cars, just getting in top for stupid stuff,

and they're still making multi-million-dollar contracts and running big deals, and I was like, holy hell, so if I drop, But if I'm here, after I'm there, you know, I can change work. And these guys out here doing drag, that's going to get big-ass day days. So I think that's where it came from. I mean, I've always been this type of person where I kind of have a laid-back, nonchamont. I don't really care about things that that affect me and my family.

But other than that, that's where it comes from. You know, I'm on my Twitter, and I find a very big Twitter person because it's almost like a new high story. Everybody's talking crap and people are reaching what this person said, trying to get the feathers wild. And I was like, this is like, fucking high school, man. Everybody's sitting here just talking about everybody. Blah, blah, blah, blah. So I'm just saying, like, these guys are your fucking life. We had Dodson on the show in April after your win over Horaguchi in Montreal,

and he said that you, quote, do enough in the fight, but you don't do enough for the fans to actually care about you. What do you think he means by that? I don't know. I honestly don't know. Because it has been said before. Like, you don't have this connection with the people for whatever reason. think it's just a small person thing, or do you think it's something else?

Like, why does, you know, why does some, you know, fighter out there, Fighter X get this connection? And is it just one of those things that we can't explain? Well, I think some things you can't explain, you know, when I was in International Fight Week, I had a great turnout. People were giving you the love. Oh, people were giving you love from left and right for the mama to their grandma, to the grandpa, and everybody would love me out there. I just think, you know, when it comes to certain things, people want to, you know, spend their afternoon or whatever it is,

I honestly don't know the remedy to that problem yet. Obviously, what I do inside the Octagon, you know, they come to watch me to fight. You know, I'm not going to meet the guys going to go out there and swing and walk out of the Octagon, let it up. That's not what I'm going to do. I'm going there to showcase my skills

to show you how much I can do, how much I can display. Like, I think it champions to be well dynamic. Like, if I get put on my back, I should be okay there to go over the show, If somebody is doing good work on their feet, if they're in mind, I'm going to pick it down and try to drown their ass in the ground game. That's what mixed martial arts is about.

If they want to see me to straight box, you know, wait until my career is done a mixed martial arts. Maybe I'll go into a mixed martial arts or straight box. My stand-in-boggling is a mixed martial arts. That being said, I understand I wasn't there, but I want you to confirm this. I understand that when you went on that recent trip to Japan, and you were also, I believe, in the Philippines. You were getting all kinds of love. It feels like, for whatever reason,

those countries, that part of the world, appreciates you more. Did you feel the same way? Oh, absolutely. And I go and I was watching the U.S.C. Glasgow. Between... It's actually pronounced... By the way, it's pronounced Glasgow.

I learned the hard way. I pronounced a Glasgow on the show, and then I got a lot of hate mail, so I don't want you to get the same Glasgow. Well, I would tell him this in America. We'd like to announce it all our letters in there. So I see G-L-A-D. So that's why I turn out to that way.

But when I watched that fight card, you know, I watched Tavi-Hulu again and Von Lee fighting. And when they were doing the basic transition on the ground, the grappling exchanges, the crowd was silent. And after they got up and exchanges over, they clapped. When I was at the Uriya-Faber and Frankie Ager in the Philippines, everybody was silent. It's beautiful.

Even when Gagor Musashi and I put back that point, I can't remember who he fought. It was silent, and that's how I like it. Those fans are educated, their nose are talking about, and, you know, puts and rampage Jackson came out, said it. A long time, he was here. So the Japanese fans are the best fans in the world, and I didn't know what he meant by that.

And so I actually went over there and sat in a chair and watched the fight and just sat there and listen. He went on with the Conner-Dregor and Chadman in this fight. They were booing that fight because Chai kept picking him down and floating down. I was like, hey, this is fucking mixed martial arts.

It's wrestling. If you can't get up, don't, don't boo because, you know, he can get up. Granted, you know,

Conrader got up and then put it right on a chat in it, but it's just irritating when I hear people, I've been in a fight before, and a Brazilian was sitting right next to me and he started bullying because Chris Wyman took down with the year

and he had to do. Don't fucking boo on right next to you. And it was come on and I said, no, do not boo. If you don't know what the hell's going on, shut your mouth and lost the fight. And I was like,

I was like, I was like, shut up. It's like, do you don't know what you're talking about? If you want to go watch a bar play, we can go there, I'll go to pop can at somebody's head, and then you can turn out and say, hey, I do that. You can't do that. You can't fight yourself. So that being said, why did you want to fight in Vegas?

Why not fight, you know, on the Japan card or one of the other international shows coming out? Oh, man, I know. Wow. Vegas, I love it. It's just like three hours. You know, the same time zone. You know, and I fought in Montreal,

I had a whole bunch of media obligations before that while sticking to my diet. I got sick on the way over there. I was going to keep anything down. And I was just like shaking my head. And I was like, why am I fighting at midnight? I was like, there's only two types of people who fight at midnight. Drung people and people who beat their wives.

And I'm not either of those people. So why am I fighting at midnight? So I love Vegas. There's something about, you know, 8 o'clock at night. Being done 9.30, you're at the press conference. When you find the East Coast, you're fighting at midnight. Then you're at the press conference at 1.30, 2 o'clock. and you got to go for something to get some of the heat.

There's a lot more that goes into it than, you know, travel. If I fight in Manila or Japan, it's a lot of things that go into it. Sure, that's true. But sometimes if you fight in Japan, you can fight like in the morning. You can fight Sunday morning, which seems very enjoyable, I think. You know, have a nice little brunch afterwards. Yeah, I've done that before, and I fight in Australia. Yeah.

I remember we're in the locker room, and they're like, Sean Jordan, you need to be in the locker room at 3.15 a. I was like, holy shit. and they're like, Jesus, you know what I'm at 8 o'clock, and I was like, damn, I ain't even out of bed at this time on a normal day. That is true. I'm excited, though, about this. I'm excited about this buildup, and you know you and I talk about this a lot. I think Dotson brings out a different side of you, and you're going to deny this, and that's cool.

But it's nice to finally see you have a dance partner. You know what I mean? Because I feel like you fought a lot of guys recently who have done nothing, absolutely zero to promote the fights. Bagotinov, Karyaso, Horaguchi. That's tough. I think he's going to take some of the burden away from you, and I'm excited to see what happens. Well, I think, you know, two of those guys you mentioned

didn't speak English at all. Yeah, still. You can't really give them any backlash. And Chris Tarioppo, it's, of course, the thing that goes about the respect issue, and great, you know, I'm just going to be blatant, honest about it. When, you know, when people ask any questions about any John Docton's first fight and the fight I'm over towards now,

I'm a totally different fighter. I've developed in so many different ways and I'm able to showcase it. I'm not the type of person who says, oh, I've got better on my ground game, I've got better at this, I got better at that. I go out there and I approve it each time I fight. I get the feeling, though, that every time someone says,

oh, Dotson beat you in the first two rounds, and he had you, and then he got tired and blah, I get the feeling that really bothers you. And you're looking to make a huge statement on September 5th. Like this, for whatever reason you can expand, if you'd like, this talk about him having your number, potentially or giving you your toughest fight as champion. You find this to be crazy talk.

It's, one, I'm working my ass off and Jim, so I go out there, and I can stay in the September I said. Two, it's baffled me because it's a fight. You know, you look at Frankie Ager and was a great manor, and Frankie Ager was all in sorts of shit trouble in the first round. He came back on the champion and took it to Green Manor, and Green Manor got tired. It's a fight that's going to happen.

One of the things I love about Conor-Renor, what he said is that there is no time limit. Like, if there was no time limit at all, like, it's like, all right, run one. Go around. Are you ready to fight? Do you ready to fight? Go. It's going to be the more efficient fighter that prevails. Not the person who has the one-punch top of that power.

It's going to be a person that could be able to fight wherever the fight goes, and I am that fighter. If the fight goes in the clinch, I will prevail. If a fight goes around, I will win. and fight for defeat, I will win. It's just a matter. If you go back and watch the first fight, I spend almost all the time in that fight trying to get to him.

Me and that and the U.C. campback who sat there and watched the fight, and I'm like, even though John doesn't drop me, he's still back it up. I'm coming forward. I'm still trying to get to him. I'm still trying to get to him. And he ended up catching me when I'm trying to

overfitting against him, but the op-ed on sodium big to where I have to really chase him down. You watch a Horrooucci fight. I'm chasing him down. I'm always chasing my points down. So we'll see what happens September 5th. I look forward to it.

By the way, I want to get your prediction before I let you go here. I know you're not in the same way class, but it's close enough and you have a history with, you know, talking about TJ, blah, blah, blah, I think you said it on this show, the $2 million. Aren't you said that went nuts, right? Remember when you said that you would fight it for $2 million? I feel like you were asked about that for like three months afterwards.

And I kind of felt like you were sort of joking, right? Were you not? For $2 million? Two million dollars, absolutely. me and him would fight me. No, but that was a comment that you kind of threw out there on the side and then people ran with it

for the next two to three months in any event. That's the beautiful thing about the internet or interviews. You say something, people around with it. I saw, hey, my wife's pregnant with eight kids. They're like, holy shit,

and he's Johnson. Destiny Johnson is pregnant with eight kids and nerd, what are you going to do? But yeah, it was a comment I made, and me and Tia doshah were great buddies. And I'm pretty sure, you know, like he said,

fight anybody for that much money and I'm up down, I'm trying to get paid. So, and I'm pretty sure you're going to ask my predictions for T.J. And Brown. Yes, that was my question. I can reach him on Ariel. I appreciate it. I got T.J.

those shots when, I got T.J. winning that fight. I think T.J. is the fight and I have to fight everywhere. He's fast. He has great things. He's well-rounded. And I think it's going to show in the fight. Is he going to finish him? I think he's going to finish him.

Oh. DJ is one of those guys that, he's like me. When I talked to him, when I met someone, I can train. I can tell he's the guy who works hard to jump. His boss to push the pace. He's not the guy who's dancing around. He has footwork, like I do, but he's also the same guy that I see. He's like me who pushes the pace when we fight.

Like, we're not the guys just sit back in the lap and try to catch your back. We're like, no, we're going to fight. I'm going to be in their face. So that's why I think if we ever end up fighting, which I don't. ever see it happening. I make for a big fight because we both pushed it. Nice. That's a good

breakdown. Let's see what happens on Saturday. I will go on record before I say goodbye to you that Demetrius Johnson, the man I'm speaking to right now, the most underappreciated athlete in our entire sport, Reebok needs to call this man. We need to see commercials of him flying through the air. We really need to get this guy

some blue chip sponsors because they're missing the boat on Demetrius Johnson. I always love watching you fight. I think that you're incredibly entertaining. You might be, who is it? Is it Daniel Cormey that says, or maybe it's Chelsea? I don't remember who said that you're the best athlete in the sport.

Who said that? Oh, no, it's John Anick. John Anick says that all the time, right? There you go. John Anick. John Anick. Yeah, and that's true. He's 100% right. Is Reebok calling you? Are they showing you the love or not yet? No, not yet. Not yet. You know, I had a couple words with

Rebock died in Vegas, and I think he appreciated him, but I can't seem because they're a little inappropriate for the radio show. But other than that, I appreciate all the love you, give me aerial, and I'm just a man trying to work hard. And, yeah, we're going to see what's going to happen September 5th. I'm working my ass off, and I'm going to go out there and fight for everything I own, and we'll see what time to happen.

I look forward to it. Thank you for the time, Demetrius, September 5th, UFC191, MGM Grand. It's the rematch we've been talking about. Dotson versus Johnson, too. It's going to be a good one. and I think this is going to bring out the best in Demetrius Johnson. He doesn't want to admit it, but I know he knows we all know. DJ, thank you for the time.

Good luck in training. Thanks, brother. There he is, Mighty Mouse. He doesn't want to admit it, but remember these words. It will bring out the best in him, and that's kind of a scary thought, because we have seen the best of Demetrius, in my opinion. Again, completely underappreciated. It's almost criminal.

It's promotional malpractice to steal a phrase from my colleague, Luke Thomas the way this man has been handled. Defeating Ian McCall, defeating Joseph Benavides, defeating John Dodson, defeating John Maraga, defeating Joseph Benavides, defeating Alibaghoutinav, who's using EPO, Karyaso and Horaguchi, a bunch of finishes as of late, four out of his last five fights, and the one decision was Bagu Tinov, show this man some love. It's high time. All right, let's move along. So, on Wednesday in San Diego, Frank Mir, once again, continued his winning ways, making a very strong case for a comeback fighter of the year. This is a guy who, like I said, last year against Alster Overeem in Newark, we thought was kind of done. I mean, we really thought

that it was time for Frank to take a break, to say goodbye to MMA. He was not showing any, you know, any improvements. He was really getting dominated. And it was one of those weird times because he wasn't really, you know, eager to say goodbye. So he takes a break. He shuts us up. He knocks out Bigfoot, Sullivan, then he comes back and knocks out Todd Duffy in a very fun fight, a very quick one, but a fun one in San Diego last Wednesday. So the man responsible for a lot of this is his head coach, Ricky Lundell, and he joins us right now. Via the magic of Skype, there he is right now, sporting his Bishop Gorman hat as usual. You didn't get to wear it on Wednesday. Was that weird for you because you have become synonymous with that brand?

Ariel, it was a little weird for me not to have the hat on. I mean, it's been in the Octagon for quite a while, so to not have it in there, I almost think that is also a little promotional malpractice being done to the Bishop Gorman Room, just stealing something off of your book right there. Yes, and I know Lorenza Fertita is a big fan of that brand as well, so he'd probably agree with you, although he's also a fan of Reebok, so, you know, you got to do what you got to do. First off, welcome to the show. Congratulations on the win. How have you turned things around for Frank Mir? This is a wonderful story. Well, well, Ariel, you know, a lot of it's been,

the fact that I've been able to put together a dream team coaching staff. I mean, we got together and we found individuals that believed in Frank Meir. They know what he's capable of. We put heavy structure into his camp. And I went out and handpicked several individuals to be a part of this. Angelo Reyes, we have my wife Holly Lundell actually does his conditioning. Then we have James Horn, Black Belt and Jiu-Jitsu. Todd Prace, one of the coaches over at wrestling. of Gorman wrestling. So we have a dream team of coaches. But that being said, a lot of it's come down to rehabilitation, you know, and a lot of these fighters out here, they're not rehabbing their bodies correctly, and they just keep doing a breakdown phase all the time. They keep going in,

they break down their body, they break down their body, they break down their body. And eventually what happens is they run into injury after injury, and then we end up seeing them fighting when really they shouldn't be fighting, and people end up getting hurt. And this is across the whole board of M&MN, not just Frank Mir. I mean, there's a lot of guys out there. And as they age, you know, sometimes it's more about making sure your body is rehabilitated than anything else. Then getting Frank back in the right frame of mind, that's very important. You can understand a guy who's who, like you said before, I mean, everybody's saying, hey, you're down and out. It's over. You should pack it up, head out. It's not just one person

saying it. It was everybody. And for Frank to overcome that kind of of adversity late in his career. I mean, you're right. It's a very strong case for comeback of the year, if not the strongest case, as of right now. It's a big deal. Did you sit down with Frank after UFC 169 and say, all right, this is what we're doing wrong? This is the kind of time off that we need to take right now. This is how we're going to change things.

I mean, did you have like that heart-to-heart moment with him? It sounds like you were there from the back room. I mean, we had a complete talk about taking a year off. It wasn't just me. It was me. It was his wife. We sat down with him and we said, hey, Frank, right now, it's time to take some time off. It's time to rehabilitate your body.

And it's time to take time out where we're not in an eight-week mode where you're just focusing on one individual. We need to focus on where you have some weaknesses. And I'll tell you where it was, Ariel. It wasn't hard to see. It was his striking. There's not one person out there that said, hey, man, Frank, you want to beat Todd Duffy. What's the plan? Dude, you better go in there and you better take him to the ground.

And why are they saying that? Well, because they don't think his hands are going to be able to stand in there with Todd Duffy. Now, that being said, he was able to shock the world once again because his hands have come up drastically in a short amount of time. He's sparring with guys like Bermaine Stevern, who's WBO champion. And those kinds of individuals being able to get in there with those kinds of veterans at that type of game, that builds you over time. And you know, I mean, you know, you speak to so many who do the same. thing. But those are the kinds of things you need. Those are the kind of training partners you need. And you need time where you're not focused on just one person. There's a lot of times where you need

time where you can focus inward and look at yourself and go, man, what is it about me that's not winning? Why am I not getting it done the way that I should be? And I think we've answered those questions. And also, you know, the job of the head coach is to work with the athlete in terms of rebuilding his confidence at times. And I would imagine, after losing the way he did to Alistair Overein, hearing everyone under the sun say that he's done. I mean, that takes a blow. I mean, your ego is now kind of hurting. How did you rebuild his confidence?

Because it feels like now he's got his swagger back. Well, I'll tell you, Ariel, it was, it's, Frank Mears is a very strong individual. But like anybody else, it's very difficult to lose. I mean, if I lose in a game of checkers, I'm upset, let alone losing back-to-back fights inside the UFC when you were the UFC champion. and then being put all over social media, every single news site, like, hey, man, it's over. You should be done.

That being said, how do we rebuild from there? Number one, we started trying to refocus in on what made him the best, what made him feel good, what made him enjoy the sport. That's number one. Now, number two, after that, he has to start believing he's the best again. And that takes visualization. You have to sit back. You have to get with partners.

where you can rebuild yourself. And then we brought in top-rank sparring partners to make sure that he was going against guys that were very, very, very good. And then if you can beat them, guys that are in the UFC right now, guys that push inside the top 10, if you can hang with them and beat them

and you can actually put them down, Ariel, that means you're ready to rock and roll. But it wasn't easy. You know, there were days where it was like, hey, man, we got to pull you out of the house. then from there with a combined effort between obviously family and coaching staff we took the steps necessary to get him where he was i mean you saw him when he i mean just him when he was heading to the cage you could see the excitement in him he wasn't walking to the cage

he was ready to go yeah he was ready to get down by the way how old are you are you 30 yet i'm not 30 yet aerial i'm not 30 i have a i i'm i have a baby face yeah number one so everybody thinks I'm some fan walking behind all these fighters into the cage. They're like, who's the, who's the 14-year-old that's always standing behind these guys walking into the cage with a high school wrestling hat-off? I'm sure that that's what's being said. But I am. I'm 29 years old. Amazing. I've been, I've been coaching MMA since the days of Kevin Burns and Sean Shirk inside the cage. So it's been quite a while. And I'm probably the youngest head coach in the game that I can imagine that's at least in this, at this level right now. That being said, I'm probably

the youngest looking guy in the game walking around there. Your story fascinates me because being a prodigy child, if you will, is nothing new for you, right? I mean, BGJ BlackBelt, you get recruited by Kail Sanderson with no real, you know, folk style wrestling background. and you're kind of this, I mean, like, that doesn't happen. This stuff doesn't happen. And you kind of come up, as you said, you are one of the youngest coaches out there. And I've heard you say that you want to be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame for kind of changing the game, for bringing something different to the table. What do you mean by that?

And how are you doing it? You know, as I build my career and build different aspects of the game, number one, I want to help bring more structure to coaching. I want to help the coaches out there. As fighting gets more involved, fighters are doing a great job. But coaching, there's a lot of guys out there that are just slinging mud at the wall, and they're not really focusing in on the level that they could be, where they're looking at statistics, they're looking at the numbers. They understand the game in those aspects.

And from there, they start to play off statistics. They look at, for instance, look at an example like Frank Mear. when Frank Mier was going to fight Todd Duffy, we looked at Todd Duffy and we said, hey, you know, there's a lot of guys out there that we were just watching tape. When we looked at, when we looked at Todd Duffy, we said, hey, look, the fact is, Frank,

the longer this fight goes, the better your chance is a winning. That's number one with Todd Duffy. So knowing that, we're going to play into that game, we're going to look to push this fight down the road. But the other thing we've seen from Todd Duffy is he loses inside of the, the first two minutes if he is going to lose by knockout because he likes to front and he likes

to come in there and he's very powerful and he gets right in your face however he gets a little wild right off the bat and he seems to be a little nervous so if you look at the numbers and you look at the statistics that's why frank meir came out the way he did everybody was like well maybe we should run in and just grab him our game plan wasn't that we were going to outbox him hard for the first two minutes then from there we were going to take a step back push through the end of the first round because we know that Todd Duffy's Octagon experience won't play in. Frank has a much more veteran game. Then as you move through to the later rounds,

Todd Duffy, we know nervousness will play into the game, and he'll start to wither with time. Now, if you start to look at the numbers, that doesn't play in for one guy. You can do that with any number of fighters across the board. I think there's so many guys out there inside the world of coaching that they're not doing that kind of stuff. Instead, what they're doing is,

I watch some tape. Yeah, I watched it with my coach. you know what I think he'll probably do? Ariel, this isn't really a game of thinking anymore, man. We know what he's going to do. We can watch it over and over, and there's statistics, there's numbers. Why do you think people can come up with betting odds? Because they know what's going to happen in the fight. And guys like you, Ariel, you guys are the experts at this.

You know what's going to go down. That's why you guys can rank people. You know where they should play out. And so right now coaching is behind in that aspect. And I hope to help fix that area of the game. The sport is evolving. You are definitely a product of that, and I love it. I love everything that you're saying. At what point did you say to yourself, I want to become a Hall of Fame level coach? This is something that I want to do in my life. Because I would imagine it was probably at a pretty young age. It was at a pretty young age.

So I was on Team USA in 2007 and 2008, and then I won the world for our country. And then from there, In 2010, I won the Pancration Worlds. After that, I became the smallest guy to win King of Pancration by 115 pounds. And at that time, I was like 149 pounds. I felt so accomplished that when I actually came back, I felt like, Ariel, I have to make a new goal. I have to find things that I really want to do. And when I look at coaching, you know what it is?

It's like it's the next level to me. I was able to become a world champion in my own right, but I want to make world champions. I want to know that it's not just me. It's not just something that I was able to do. I want to know that I can help others accomplish those things and accomplish their dreams, accomplish their goals.

But I don't just want to be a coach. I want to be the best coach. I want to be the best in the game. And I've been lucky enough to coach alongside great guys. I mean, like the best guys. You got guys like Greg Jackson and Mike Winklejohn. I've coached right alongside them, and it's been such an honor to be in there with men like that. They can help me along the way.

Help me to become as good as any other coach out there in the game. And someday, I mean, you know, if it all goes according to plan and I keep putting together results and I get bids from experts like you on my side, I'll be up for coach of the year someday. And that's the goal. I would not be surprised to see that. happen in the very near future. Do you have an inspiration or two when you were coming up saying, I want to be like this man, like this coach, but better than him? Like who do you consider to be the best of all time and that you want to surpass? Oh, that's difficult. Inside of this world,

there's such incredible coaches that are out there. I mean, I remember when I was younger watching guys like Pat Militage. You know, when it comes to the world of wrestling, there's guys like Kale Sanderson, who just are phenomenal coaches, guys like Dan Gable, who were phenomenal coaches. And I feel like those guys really, you know, from the wrestling standpoint, they really understood the game, and they took a step back, and they took a different approach to the game that a lot of other people weren't taking. A lot of guys just thought it was just about wrestling. Just like in MMA, a lot of guys think it's just about moves, and it's not. It's about tactics.

There's a lot of tactics inside this game. Not only are the techniques important. I mean, the techniques, obviously you don't have bullets for the guns. It doesn't really matter, but we learned inside of war. The truth is, tactics are everything. How you play the game is everything inside the cage. And guys like Greg Jackson, he understands tactics. Those are men that understand them.

Guys like Raphael Cordero, they understand tactics. Dwayne Ludwig, they understand. And I really look up to those guys. And I hope to be said in the same breath as those guys in the few. future. So who's a part of your stable now? Who do you coach? Who are you the head coach for? So right now I'm the head coach for Frank Mear. Then I come in and I do the coaching for Travis Brown. I'm part of Carlos Conditz camp right now. Hopefully he'll be up for a title shop. Cross the fingers. I'm hoping he's right there. We'll get Frank Meir up for a title shot soon enough.

It's going to happen. He's turning around and he should be up for comeback of the year in no time. And those are the main guys I'm focused on at this particular second. Those are guys inside the top ten. Can you give us any kind of update on Travis, obviously going through some personal issues right now? Where does he stand? Where is he at? Yeah, so Travis right now,

I know that he's trying to work out whatever went down inside his relationship. That being said, you know, it's tough for him. When anything like this inside of what should be, be kept personal comes to light, it's really tough to, uh, it's really tough to know where his head's at right now. Uh, we, we're trying to get him, get him back in the gym and get him involved and just find out where he's at, but he's trying to take care of whatever, whatever's going on. You know, I'm, I'm, I'm on his side. I hope for him. I love him, you know, and, uh, I'm there for him. But, uh, I don't, I don't know much more than that, Ariel. Okay. And, uh, as far as

Bishop Gorman is concerned, are you a coach there as well now? You, are you, are you balancing both worlds? I am. Yeah, I am. I've been the head coach over at Bishop Borman for the last couple years. We've gone from a team that was dead last in the state to now having nationally ranked kids that are just dominating all over the place. That's a byproduct of having great coaches as well. I have another phenomenal coaching staff that I put together there.

And a lot of the head coaching, you know, as you know, Ariel, It's about management, getting the right team together, putting together the right mechanics to make the machine work. And over at Bishop Gorman, we have those in place. We just have some phenomenal mechanics. World champs, veteran freestyle national champs, state champs at every level. And I'm lucky to have them underneath me, especially to be so young. And having some of these guys are like, you know, they were back in the Mark Schultz, Dave Schultz, era. actually on the world team with them.

I have a guy who was on the world team with Dave Schultz back in the 80s. Wow. And it's a weird phenomenon. Okay, let me ask you as Frank Mears head coach, what's the perfect scenario for you next? Who does he fight and when? Okay, so there's a couple that I could see being great right now. I think Ben Rothwell would be a phenomenal fight. He's inside the top 10 right now.

looking for a higher ranked opponent, or not higher ranked, but high profile. He wants to get his face out there and he wants to get on the map, you know, and I think he's, I think he's a great matchup. I think that it's somebody that we haven't faced yet. And Ben Rothwell, he's got a lot of, he's got a lot of hype behind him right now. People, I don't know if that's because of his fight or because of his, his WWE pop out at the end. I love him either way, but I think he'd be a great fight for Frank. I think that's one. I think Mark Hunt would be another one that would be a fan favorite, something that the fans would love to see. He's a warrior, true and true. So for Frank to be inside there with somebody like a Mark Hunt or a Ben Rothwell right now, man, I think those would be

great fights. Love the Rothwell idea. I said the same, so we think alike. Keep doing you, my friend, because I'm loving the tweets as well and the selfie stick and all that you brought inside the I thought it was the first time. In fact, it was the second time. You're doing things a little differently, and I appreciate that very much. And I love the fact that we got to have you on the show and talk to you because I think this sport needs sometimes a shot in the arm, some new life, some youth, and, you know, some evolution.

And you're proving to bring all of that to the table. So congratulations on your early success. I'm assuming a lot more is to come. And good luck with all your guys coming up. And I'm sure you're going to be adding guys to that stable as well, because your profile continues to grow in the sport. Ariel, thank you so much, man. It's a pleasure to be on your show.

You're the best in the business, and I really appreciate your time. Thank you, Ricky. All the best. There he is. Ricky Lundell, the head coach for Frank Mier, Travis Brown, as he said, also working with Carlos Condett.

A very bright man, as you just heard, and one with a lot of knowledge about this game. And what I love most is that he is bringing a fresh perspective. And that's sometimes missing these. days. Great to have him a part of the sport and of course a part of this show enjoyed that very much. All right, let's move along now. Very much looking forward to our next guest because, as I told you last week on the program, we were in the middle of the show and then out of nowhere, news broke that one of the greatest of all time, the man who many consider still to be the greatest

of all time, greatest heavyweight of all time, the legendary Fyodor Romilienenko has decided that he wants to fight again. Wow. What big news. news. Unbelievable. The entire MMA world lost its mind, started going crazy, the possibilities, endless, the scenarios, endless, very exciting stuff. So we wanted to talk to the man who knows him best, Vadim Finkelstein, his manager, also the M1 Global President, to speak about what this all means, where do we go from here, how did this happen, and then some. So he actually joins us right now via St. Petersburg, and we're also being joined by a very nice translator named Vladislav, who's joining us from New York, who's on the line as well to help us translate, and he was very

kind to take out some time out of his day to do this. Vadim, are you there? Yeah, yeah, I'm here. Thank you for the time. Vladislav, are you there? Yes, I'm here. Okay, great. I appreciate your time very much as well. Vadim, let me ask you this first. When did Fioraro tell you that he wanted to come back to fighting, that he wanted to end his retirement? Hello? Well, he asked you, when I told him, when he told him that he wanted to return to in the war, without him?

You know, in fact, I know, in fact, I was, you know, he said, he was not about it, he said, he said, he was going to, he said, maybe, maybe I'll I was going to return. And for me it was also, how to say, shock, you know, because, uh, the last few years ago, when,

I, I've always, I've always tried him to him talk to him, he was going to go back he was, for me, it was also,

I was surprised. I learned about it about a month ago and Farrer did not say that he definitely is coming back. He just mentioned that he might. And I was completely shocked because for the

last couple years, two to three years, I've been trying to convince him to come back, and he was categorically against it. So I was quite shocked. So what was the reason that he gave you for his change of mind? And what was the reason he was his return of his return? What's the reason he was? You know, I can only say, I don't know what I'm just, I don't know, I don't know, I'm not just, Fyodor

went to by the Ministry of Sport. He was Soviet Minister of Russia in sports. And,

maybe, can, like, maybe, maybe maybe I'll put you. If there's

a big paragraph, I just can't I just can't tell you exactly why I will only

tell you my opinion why it happened. A few years ago, he was offered administrative

position, he was help of minister of sports. in Russia. Da'i, is a question

pressure. Vadim? Vadim? Are you still there? Oh, did we lose him? Vladislav, are you there? Yeah, I'm here.

Okay, we're going to call him right back. Was he mid-answer there? Did you finish what he had said? Yes, I just asked him to, not to give me the entire paragraph, so don't forget what he said. Okay. I ask him, I haven't liked to speak in small an increment,

and what he told me that, yes, that's a sadder. was offered a position, which he took, he was the helper, advisor for a minister of sports, which is, you know, which is position in Russia, and then he got cut out. Okay, we're going to get him right back. Great job so far. Do we have him there? Vadim, are you there?

Okay, one second. Mm-hmm. Okay, just one second. We are getting him. Of course, this is massive news because Fyodor Emilienenko, as I said, one of the greatest of all the time. The last time he fought was three years ago. fought against Pedro Hizzo in June of 2012 knocked him out after a bit of a rough patch in his

career where he lost three in a row to Verdume, Bigfoot Silva, Dan Henderson. He came back to defeat Jeff Munson, Satoshi Ishi, and then Pedro Hizzo. And after that win, on June 21st of 2012, he announced his retirement. And as of late, he's been relatively present in the sport. Beltor has brought him out. Beltor's had him do some some some some some PR stuff some autograph signings what do they call those things fan access type of things at Dave and Busters and whatnot so he's been present and then we get this news Vadim are you back

yeah yeah okay alright so the the question that I wanted to ask you was what was the reason you said that you can't tell us in his words but your opinion why he's coming back so I wanted to give you the opportunity to finish your answer. And,

you know, we were, we per raced, but you started on the question, and you said you know the real reason,

you can't only do your opinion. Well, yeah, you know, he just categorically

had been always all over all the so it, and it was it was something,

it's, it's, it, something, maybe, sort, sort of, psychologically

kind of , because, this decision was, it was, it was,

was not just a new-jur-me-for-me-to-me-or-for-me-o-oge. I don't know quite what happened. I guess he was psychologically already again. I just one of those things. I can't quite put my finger on it. So since this news came out last Tuesday, can you tell us which organizations have reached out to you about trying to sign Fyodor? This news We've heard of

We've heard of We've seen in the past And can't, Or did you know You can't even tell Who to you About him About him

To sign him Fordra, on contract On the organization You know, This, you know, This news was actually

than we We've been We've We've done not with many organizations have talked, but we know that very much

interest from from all organizations. Okay, well, actually, the business kind of leaked out prematurely, we're going to announce

a little bit later, so we're still not quite ready to commit to anybody, but the interest is there. Quite few organizations have expressed interest in signing federal.

Are you the one, Vadim, who is fielding these offers? Are you working actively still as his manager? You have to still active manager

Fydera? You know, you know, on the same really it will be based now, because three

years ago, we've finished the work in the management, and Fodor went to

the minister and now now, we're just just friends, I think, I'm, I think,

he's, I think, he's, I'm, probably, But it's his right. He has no no obligations

before me or from him as of now we just friends our professional relationship kind of ended when he retired

I hope he will hire me as his manager again but as of now he's not obligated and I will have no hard feelings

shall he decide to go with somebody else as far as managing goes when Fodor was a free agent not that long ago a big

sticking point, if you will, was that the promotion had to co-promote with M1 Global. Do you know if that is still an issue for him? Does that need to happen in order for a promotion to sign Fyodor? I'm sorry. I'm not quite with that. I heard what you said, but I do not understand the question. Sure. When Fjura was a free agent, not that long ago, one of the stipulations was that a promotion that signed them had to do a co-promotion sort of, you know, be in conjunction with, say also this is an M1 Global show as well, with M1 Global. That had to happen. So that was a sticking point with the

UFC. That is what happened with Strike Force as well. So I want to know if that is still an issue for Fioro, or is he okay with just being signed by, you know, X promotion and just going in there and being a part of the roster and that's it. No co-promotion, no logo on his glove, no logos on TV, etc. Do you get what I'm saying? Yes, like exclusive contracts. Not so much exclusive. Not so much exclusive without attachment to M1. Exactly, yes, yes.

Well, I'm trying to put down to pervary. A few years ago, there was a moment, that where he would be propaganda, promote him, and one, there's, there's,

logan and purgastra, and, that's, and, whatever. will it have been after his return to the ring or in the cletco?

No, I understand what you mean to the lead to, no, no, no, no, no problem no reason, no one

because of one of one of the one of the top-ofer's companies in Europe, and if I

would work with shhout of co-promotion, it's very big problems for contracts with TV and with

many, you, kind of very It's not very difficult. Now, in any of the conversation, no. Shortly saying, no, there's

absolutely not talk about co-promotion. It's not an issue. Okay. Do you know if he is open to even thinking about signing with the UFC, there have been issues for a very long time between you and Dana White, him and Dana White, and Dana has said time and again that he wanted this to happen,

that it's a dream of his, that he's obsessed with it, but for various reasons, it never happened. Is he even open to looking at the UFC as a possibility, or have they been crossed out? Well, if he has interested to be to be a U.S.

In the past, Dana White, President of EFSI, he said, I'd like to be to say Dr. But for a lot of reason, it never happened. If he had a interest

to participate in the Fis today or the interest is probably? Of course, yes. I don't know, I know that Fodor no problem with UFC, if UFC if he wants and will be the UFC, he'll probably be UFC.

I'm going to be a UFC. I'm also, from the side, I'm a manager, on the other side of my other side of my also one of the group of M1 Global. And I also will try to, maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe one time to provide his boy here, maybe, in Russia. I also will,

I also would, I'll just would, like, say, He's in this tender, as they say. He's a свободly agent, I'll

try to try. It's a free agent and he's absolutely interested in contract in fighting for

the U.S. It all depends on a guilty offered. Me, as a promoter of the largest European

organization and won, I'd like to get him as well at least once to fight in Russia or Europe.

But as of now yes, he's definitely not looking fast for you. Could you tell as far as you know whether or not the UFC has actually offered him a contract. Batim, I don't know, UFSI,

did he have a contract? No, no, no, no, no, because this is it a new thing. Well, no, because this was a few days ago. I think that there are still a deal with U.S.C. with other promoter's organizations. And, Fyodor, it's important, and he's going to return to, and he's going to return to one boy, but he's going to return to, so I think he'll be able to,

Also, a big chance to get Chodor. As of now, none, but he's hoping it's going to come in soon. He's an announcement is fairly fresh only with all or whatnot. So Fetter hopes that the offer from the UFC does come his way. What about Belator? Have they offered him a contract? How about Belator? Belator did he do that he said.

You know, the last year of Fyodor, Belator, it was, it was, I don't know, a little bit more a few years ago, I don't know I, I'd have, I'd

know, I'd say, because, you know, Fyodor interests, it's not a secret, so, maybe,

were, there's a question, but I just me don't know exactly, I would imagine that just like

any, it's self-respecting promotion, Bellator is interested, but I do not know for a fact. Did he tell you when he would like to return, like any particular month this year, next year.

Did he give you a timetable as to when he'd like to fight again? Do you do you, if you'd like to fight again? In terms of, in terms of, when he wants to return? In fact, he'll give you me a window, he said he needs to prepare. But, you know, he's not three years, he won't have to be. So he'll, maybe, on it will go to some time. Maybe it'll take from four to six, maybe more months. No, he did not mention any time slots, any time windows.

He's been out of the game for three years. So I would imagine with his regimen, it would take up to four or perhaps six months. Okay. And as you mentioned earlier, you are no longer, I guess, actively as manager because he really didn't need a fight manager. So if a promotion is trying to reach Fedor to give him a contract or at least, you know, make him an offer, how do they go about doing that? Who do they contact?

Bartim, as you said, you're not being a security manager because he was in the air of the game of the game, he, he didn't beat. If he's to go to the organization, who they will talk to. Who will be an agent in the now? for now. I think that it will be Sam Fodor.

We, we, we with him, we were, we're staying with big friends, and just

our deal was done three years ago last, that we, he, he quit to be

to work in the Ministry of Sport, and here my work as my manager

has been and it now, he's he was he was he was he

He has right, you know, like to if he wants, he will be if he will

go to another, in this there's not I'm not any of the I'm not no, I'm

no, that's not any of his right, but he's he's about him he's

on any question. I don't know who he's going to go with management wise, like I said,

I have absolutely zero issues with him not choosing me. I still advise him he telephones me

quite frequently regarding different subjects. So to enter a question, I do not know who he's going to go with. Okay. I'm also wondering if you can confirm something for us. A couple of years ago, Dana White said to the media that they were close to booking Brock Lesnar versus Fyodor at Cowboy Stadium in Arlington, Texas, a huge football stadium. But then he said because of Fyodor's father passing away, he decided to walk away from the sport. Was that deal very close to being done? Not we could have to be

some of the few years ago, there were some of the couple of years, that Fodor would be beat with Brock and Leznor

in the time champion of UC on a heavy weight. It was at the stadium in Cahe and in the

big of the big of the stadiums, in the football of stadiums. But, in the

unfortunately of Fodor was ummer Papa and, because he was because he was

he was It was not, is it? Is it, is it? No, not really. It's not really. It's really, that I – I was in New York. I met with Denny White, and with

Lorenzo, and with Epstein, though, an advocate. And I, I personally very wanted, that Fyodor, that's after he had won't his career. But, Fyodor,

like, he, he sort of, he sort of would have been he decided, but he decided he decided to not, you know, he's

not to start it. It was two years ago last. I tried this boy, like,

but, but he didn't do not much was that was after his first he was

he was he was he's partially true. It's partially true, I did speak to Lorenzo

and me personally, I wanted this fight to happen, but Ferro refused. and Rakeem did not clarify whether it was due to Ferro's death pass in a way or not because of Federal refuse.

Okay, and my final question for you, Vadim, and we appreciate the time. As someone who has known Fodor for a very long time and you've been around him, you've been a part of his story, is there a part of you, and I know you said you want him to fight for M1 once or twice, but is there a part of you who would like to see him fight in the UFC to sort of complete his legacy? It's the only promotion really that he hasn't fought for or at least promoter, No, Beltaur is young, but he has fought for Scott Coker. Would you like to see him fight against the very best in the UFC, or do you not care? Valdim, I know that you have a story,

previous with you, with you, and you were his manager, and you want to be able to fight against your organization in Europe or in Russia, but as a friend and as a fan of sport, we want to him to see him to see, to him to fight against big events of the modern-day? Today, I would say, I would have I, I, obviously, I'd like I'd have been, but I'm going to say, but I'm

saying, that many fans want to see it, with other boys, in other organizations, and I don't have anything against this. I, I, I, I, same, organizer of the There's 18 years There's M1

And he's also There's very many There's very many of There's still big boys But I'd want to Hefielder He was also in other organization

Like a friend He was Yes, of course I would like him to fight for me But as he's And M won, by the way, does have great fighters

to match your Fier fighters but I understand fans want to see him, and me, as a friend, I would like to see him fighting the best people in the UFC as well. All right. Thank you very much for the time. Spasiba, Vadim.

We appreciate... Thank you for you. Okay. All the best to you, and we'll talk to you soon. And Vladislav, great job. I appreciate your time as well. Thank you. My pleasure.

Thank you. All right. There he is. Vadim Finkelstein. Interesting stuff there about the future of Fyodor Rominoenko's story that I don't think will end any time. soon, but certainly one that the entire MMA world is going to follow. This is a huge deal, especially in 2015, where you have these older heavyweights doing so well. Fabrice

Redoom, Frank Meir, Ben Rothwell to a degree, Andre Arlowski, Barnett coming back. What is old as young again in the UFC, especially in their heavyweight division. That was cool stuff. All right. Before we get to our next guest, let me pass along this word from a great sponsor. shaving can be a pain. It can be uncomfortable, cause razor burn, nicks, and on top of that, it can be outrageously expensive. About half the price of the other big branded blades, and they ship for free to your front doorstep. Who am I talking about? I'm talking about Harries. They're better, too. The first blades were made in Germany, and they liked them so much. Harry's just bought the entire factory there. Bought the whole damn thing. Why pay $32 for an eight pack of blades? It's half the price at Harries, and with Harries, you'll get a better shave that respects your skin,

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coupon code MMA with your first purchase. That's harries.com and enter the coupon code MMA at checkout for a $5 off gift. Start shaving better today. All right, let's move along and welcome in our next guest. Very excited to talk to this man. He is the man. man responsible for everything we're seeing out of Ireland right now, everything we're seeing from the great Connor McGregor. He is the man that set him down this path. If it wasn't for this man, there would be no Connor McGregor. There would be no interim UFC featherway champion. He is a proud father. And I can't wait to hear his perspective. What a great character he is. So happy and so excited that Mr. Tony McGregor, Connor McGregor's father is joining us on the line right now.

Tony, how are you? I'm very well. Thank you, Ariel. How are you? I am great. What a pleasure this is. So we are, what, nine days removed from a great moment for your family. Your son became... What an occasion. Tell us.

Tell us. Tell us about it. What was it like seeing your son raise gold? Well, it was an awesome, awesome sight to see him witness, to witness them. They're lifting that gold belt. But before that, it was a terrible shock to the family. And it was a big shock to the Irish fans as well. We had never seen Connor been taken to the ground.

around like that before. You know, anytime you witness Connor in the octagon, it was always with decisiveness and, you know, the decision came

with that barrage of, uh, left and, you know, the barrage of blows. But before that happened, I must say, I was quite worried.

I went into shock when I saw him getting tossed around the ring around the octagon, uh, by Chad. Um, you know,

we didn't expect that at all. It was completely new to us. It was completely new to the fans as well. out. I was speaking to fans after, and they told me that they cried during that, you know. They just, nobody was expecting it whatsoever. But I didn't realize it was in the game plan. You know, when I was witnessing this, I went into shock.

My wife, Margaret, she panicked and fled the arena, and she ran into the vac. Wow. And I called it to a security man to chase her and follow her and make sure she's okay. Her two sisters were huddled. his two sisters were huddled into each other hysterical and D, I think D, was rooted to the spot crying as well and this is all in the first round.

This sounds like a horrible experience. Well, we had so much emotions going through, you know, we had shock, dismay, disbelief and then in the second round we saw it again and then, you know, prior to the fight, when we were converging, just our members of the family were converging,

converge in one of the lobby bars in the MGM Hotel. And one of our party, a relation of mine, turned to me and says, look, Tony, I'm a bit nervous today. I'm a bit nervous on this. I told him, I made a little poem some fights ago, actually the Brandel fight,

where I said, there's no need to worry because tonight, let there be no worried faces, because tonight, as happened, it was in the O2, in Dublin, in the O2, Dublin, we hold all the Aces. So I said that to my party

on the evening, just before we went into the arena, I said to them, let there be no worried faces because tonight in the MGM Grand we hold all the aces. So I just saw the aces just disappearing from the hand, you know? And in the first round

I saw no aces left. The second round, I didn't see the aces appearing. And then out of nowhere, he freed himself from the rest of, full maneuver. He made it to

his feet, and then unleashed that deadly blow. So I just saw the ace coming back into the pack, and then the barrage of blows out. So all the aces were back in the pack, and we were back on top. I knew then that we had it. So the emotions were so many emotions going through

through each other in such a short time. It was an amazing experience. It really was an amazing experience. You know, it's very interesting to hear you say this, and I appreciate the honesty, because Connor comes off as so confident, supremely confident, as does his coach. How come you didn't share that same confidence that he would get up that the wrestling would be no problem? Is that just the father talking?

No, yeah, it is just the father talking. And the fans talking about because you must remember this is a game of two halves. You know, before, none of us had witnessed this before. No fan had witnessed him being tossed around like this from such a capable opponent. I mean, Chad is a wonderful wrestler, probably the best wrestler in the division. We just didn't see that. It wasn't an air mental picture. After the celebrations in the octagon when he was given his belt

and we had the lovely celebration in the octagon. Then we all removed ourselves from the octagon. I went into the back arena where Conner was attended to in the medical tent and he had some official things to do in there as well. And his team, his corner men were outside the tent waiting on Conner to emerge. And I said to his cornerman, I said, look, I said, were you not worried, you know, about this? And Roddy is cornerman, step forward and says, no, we were never worried. We knew he could take that, and we knew he would come back.

Wow. I said, well, why the hell didn't you tell someone else? So it really was an amazing and amazing mix of emotions, from shock, dismay, disbelief, the pure euphoria and elation. What is it like for you to see your son accomplishing this? on the grandest stage possible. He is an Uber star. In my opinion, he is the biggest star

in our sport, period. No ifs, ands or butts. He's collecting a very nice paycheck two years ago. He was on welfare, and he has taken the sport by storm. This is your son.

This is not your nephew. This is not your cousin. This is your son, your little boy. What's that like for you? I mean, it's an amazing feeling. It's very proud for us. You know, I also actually,

you know, I've thought about this long and how and I can't claim any credit for it, to be honest with you. I think if anybody can claim credit, it would be his mother because his mother pushed him. I had to be the hard case and try and put them into an alternative occupation, you know, because I didn't see the career in.

So I really can't claim any credit there. But having said that, I mean, I've been on board for years now, you know, and I think the fans know that. But, you know, it's an amazing story to unfold. I mean, it's worthy of a movie, you know? Absolutely. So, so Connor has told us time and again about, you know, these drives that he used to make when he was working as a plumber. And then one day he said, I'm done. And as the story goes, and I want you to give me your side, you guys actually came to blows because you didn't want him to quit. You thought it was a big mistake to follow this dream of being an MMA fighter. Is that correct? Yeah, it was a big mistake. In my eyes, at the time, I thought it was a big mistake because I didn't see the career. We actually never came to blows on it anyway. We never physically attacked each other. No, it was just more verbal. and disagreements and, you know, walk out of the room

and discuss sort of thing. We had, it was very difficult to get him to get to the job. The distance of the location, it was at the foot of a mountain, it was wintertime, you know, we spent a lot of, you know, we spent a whole winter there in that building site, very cold and miserable. And, you know, we had to arrange lifts for him to get out to work. We had, I used to stay out some nights,

bring him in in the morning. His mother used to bring him in other mornings. We used to black lifts off of colleagues to get him into work. So it was a real ordeal. And I lasted for about a year and say two months. And I thought then after a while he might be getting into the frame of working in the trade.

But remember one Monday morning when I was knocking him up and I says, right, Conner, let's go, man, it's 7 o'clock in the morning, get him on the road. And he just peaked his head up from the duvet and said, no, he says, it's not for me. I'm not doing it anymore. So he knew at that point There was no point in pushing it

There was absolutely no point Now he was completely gone You know He had no more interest in it So I just closed the door behind me And went into the our bedroom Mark said as he getting up I said no he's finished with that job now

That's it He won't be going back to that job So you know He just threw himself into his new career His new dream Which he knew he was going to be a champion one day So You know

I got off his back Might have been on his case for the first few once. But once I saw him progressing through the ranks in his divisions and in the various promotions he was in, I just got off his case then and left him to his own devices. So it's great to see a young man who can defy convention and defy his family and come through in such a short time

to realize his dream. It's an amazing story. What was he like? Sorry, what was he like as a kid? You know, as a teenager, as a youngster in grade school, What was he like? Same way? Yeah, we had determination about him,

but I mean, the remarkable thing about it, Ariel, is he was unremarkable, if you know what I mean? That's the remarkable thing about it. What do you mean by that? I didn't know he was going to, well, I didn't know, well, you know, he's a normal kid. He would, you know, going to school and junior high school, he would just come home to do his homework. You know, team up with his buddies after homework and kick a ball about

and Mike got down to the gym. He took up boxing in his early teens. He liked that. And from the boxing, he found his way into the kickboxing gym. So that's where he discovered MMA. And around the same time, we had moved location to a suburb outside Dublin,

in County Dublin. So we had to change school. And it must have been very upsetting for a young boy to, you know, at 14, 13 and 14, to lose all his buddies, go to a new school, try and fit in into the new school. And as it happened in the new school, he found Tom Egan. And Tom Egan had a love of MMA, and the two of them just instantly. You know, it was just an instant attraction then.

It was two, two same interests, similar interests. Do you recall the first time that he told you and your wife that he wants to be a UFC champion? Yeah, I do recall. Well, he was on a, he was on the circuit here and some smaller promotions. And, you know, he said it was that he was going full on with this. So we just had to let him go ahead with it, you know. He had his own plans. I was hoping, I was hoping he would make it.

But to be honest with it, in the back of my mind, I didn't think much of it as a career. I didn't see money there, you know, I didn't see it as a career. But then again, I didn't know about the UFC. I didn't know about this wonderful organization called the ultimate fighting championship. you know and the first time I crossed came across the UFC was actually

you know I watched it with Connor a few times I'd come in working nights Connor and D would be sitting up in the living room looking at UFC on TV

and I just thought then that that would the UFC was a very professional and organized organization so I just eased up then and just let him go his own path

you know but wasn't there a point where he kind of gave up on his dream of being a fighter as well and your wife had to get John Kavanaugh, his head coach now, to sort of convince him to come back to the gym. Didn't he almost give up on this dream as well? Yeah, well, he gave up on the dream solely because there was tickets issues, there was the issue with tickets. He had sold tickets and didn't give them money over and just a few quills involved, you know, when he sort of stepped back from the gym then and he didn't get involved in it, you know.

so he was a bit morose at home at the time, a bit down in the dumps. So we sort of twig something was up, you know. So we rang John, so what's the story to John Cabin? John says, look, you know, we have no problem here. And we'd like to see him back in the gym. So Margaret called John up to the house, and the two of them made it up then in the house, you know, and he was invited back to the gym then. And the deal was, incidentally, at that time, was when he wins the UFC championship.

And this is a deal. a verbal deal that went back maybe six years or seven years ago. The verbal deal was that when it was a verbal deal between John and Margaret, that when he wins the UFC championship, that Margot would be in the ring when he's accepting the belt. So that pledge was honored on the 11th of July of this year. So it was really an amazing, very poignant moment for the whole family, you know? That's wonderful. Yeah, we saw it all play out in front of our eyes. What was the moment where you became a believer because you keep saying that you know you didn't think he'd make money

was there a fight? Yeah obviously on the local scene maybe not maybe it had to be you know when he won a fighter to and you know there was there was a defining moment for me and I've said this before it was one of the previous promotions before he was signed to UFC okay it was in the basketball arena you know you must remember he was only a boy to me at the time

you know and I remember he was fighting some guy and his opponent dropped out for some reason or other And on the night, there was this big Eastern European guy put in his place. So when they announced him, the Eastern European guy came out to the lights and the music, you know. And I just saw this guy. It was, oh, my goodness, this is some opponent.

I couldn't see Connor go through this guy. So then they called Connor out, and he came out to the lights and the music. And he was equally as big. And Connor dispatched him in minutes in the room. ring. So I knew that that was the defining moment. There was never a defining moment. That was it for me. Incidentally, it was also the moment in my eyes when he became a man. So, you know, so from boy to man. And that was, that was a defining moment for me. From then on I knew then. I actually knew then he had a million dollar left hook. And I used to say that when I was driving around my taxi. You know,

Connor was unheard of at the time. He was unknown outside the immediate sort of MMA circle. and I used to say, you know, a men a nice guy, you know, bring them home in the taxi, you know, and he had an interest in sport. I used to tell him about my son to remember the name, Connor O'Gregor, he has a million-dollar left hook.

And then we all saw that million-dollar left hook in action with the Bushinger fight in the Cage Warriors' promotion when he unleashed that devastating left hook. I mean, I knew then that was this guy, he hasn't made, Connor hasn't made now, you know. So I'd be on board for it. years. Wow. That gave me goosebumps when you have this vision of a father telling random strangers that his son has a million-dollar left hook. Do you still work as a taxi driver?

No, I'm retired now, Ariel. I'm just taking life easy at the moment. I've done a lot of work. I couldn't go back to any time I like. You know, I still have the license is active. When did you stop? At the moment, I'm just taking things handy. A year ago, a year ago, last August. So last August was after the Dublin show. Were you still? starting to get recognized? Yeah, I was getting recognized. It was getting actually more difficult

when I was driving. Particularly when I had about three or four three or four Dublin boys that were well-longed on going to a nightclub. I couldn't get the mail of the taxi once they realized who it was. I used to wear a baseball hat and glasses, but of course my name

and photograph was on display in the cab. But once they realized who I was, it was very difficult to get them out. They'd invite me into the clubs or into the late bars. You know, it was getting hard and harder. You know, What a way to...

I was a good taxi driver. I was a good taxi driver in the sense that my motorist operandi was get them in and get them out as quick as possible, in, out, in out. But I was getting guys in and I couldn't get them out. I couldn't get anyone else in. So I wasn't making less money. But I think if I went out now, I've got anybody in, I wouldn't get them out at all. I wouldn't make a penny, so I just took it easy.

You know, I'm taking it easy on the moment. So what's it like for you on a day-to-day basis? Because, you know, you're Tony McGregor. I've got to be honest, I don't know if I've ever had a father. on my show before. And we've been doing this for quite some time. And you were a big star from that notorious documentary that has aired on RT and here in the United States

on Fox Sports One. So when you walk around the streets, what's it like for you? I do get recognized, but, you know, not as much as, I mean, I don't think Connor would be able to walk down the streets here anymore. You know, I do get recognized before I went to the States last, the Friday before I went to the States,

was in the post office. And this random girl come up and said, I don't believe it. you with Gregor, can I have a photograph? I just took a photograph. I do get it okay, but I sort of tend to keep me a head down and not make eye contact with anybody, you know? But that was solely from

the documentary, and we had great fun doing the documentary, you know? Yeah, we had really good fun. So the people, actually, the viewership on that was an amazing viewership for Irish national television, you know?

And there was quite a following on it every week. the first documentary was an hour long and then they decided to do a six part half hour series and that was two and a half hours in total of film footage you know and

so I was getting recognized around the place yeah you enjoy that well I just roll with it you know it's a bit of fun it's a bit of laugh sure I just roll with it Ariel

what's it like you know when you found out about your son's knee injury were you worried did you want him to pull out of the fight Oh man, when I found The ACL The ACL? No, no, the current one

The ACL was a while ago now I mean, the one leading up to this fight Well, actually, when I first heard about the ACL, I nearly died, I nearly died in the bed when I heard that as well Because when that news broke after the Holloway fight EFA, our daughter, the middle daughter, she's the introvert, shy one,

she doesn't like TV, she doesn't like camera, she came in She doesn't live with her boyfriend She's 30 you know Okay So when that Hallaway After the Holloway fight Broke

The news broke that he He tore his ACL I mean that nearly killed me as well That just devastated me But he bounced back from that remarkably quick I mean it was amazing Within a year he had a fight on You know

Within say six months of that Injury he already had a fight Counseled in You know what I mean within the 10-month period. So that was an amazing recovery. I thought I didn't know much about this recent situation. I knew he was having niggly, niggly things, you know,

but I didn't really know much about it. We don't get involved when he's in his camp. We keep well away from it, you know. He has his professionals with him. He knows who he wants to have with him, and anybody who's there is serving a purpose. So we're better off not knowing that. You know, we let him get on with this professional business,

which he does extremely well. and his team also do extremely well. You know, we have Roddy, we have Artham, we have Surgy, we have his masseuse, John Cavillard, the main coach. He has guys coming in and out sparring partners, so on and so forth. So he knows exactly who he wants to have in his camp. We just leave him there. We don't get involved in it, you know.

Do you think... Actually, just during his camp, we're fans solely fans, and the only time we would... He would obviously Facebook occasionally, you know, but once we know, there's nothing. serious. You know, if there was anything serious, we'd hear about it, obviously, personally, through him. But by and large, during his fight camp, we are just fans. And so we're watching

the internet, we're watching Twitter and Facebook, and news of the breaks like that for us, you know? Do you think José Aldo is afraid of your son? Personally, I don't think he's afraid of him. I don't know why he won't face him. I just don't know why he won't face him. I just don't know why he won't face him. I'd hate to think a champion afraid of any fighter, you know. I'd have to have respect for all fighters.

Anyone who steps into the octagon, I have respect for him. I don't know why he'll know all this. But the fact of the matter is he did. But when it was confirmed that he wasn't fighting Conner, it was a big disappointment for us fans and us Irish fans

all over the world. By the way, he has amazing fans all over the world. Irish people travelled from Australia. as Australia. You know, Irish people living in Australia, New Zealand. I spoke to people from Irish people working in Dubai, engineers working in Dubai, who came over to Vegas to see him.

So he has a huge following right across the globe, not just Irish fans, but right across the globe, he has a huge following of fans. But when we heard, when it was confirmed, Aldo pulled out, the Irish fans were just solely disappointed. But I knew actually when Chad Mendes was put forward, I know it was a win-win situation for the fans, because once Connor had dispatched Mendez,

the Aldo fight was back on again. The second that Mendez was beaten, the Aldo fight was on. So, you know, really it's a win-win situation for those Irish fans. We have the Aldo fight back on. And it's even bigger now. You can make a very strong case for it. It's even bigger now.

I can't see the world promo thing going ahead. Sure. I mean, I couldn't say, I'm going to speak for them. But I couldn't see how they're going to another world proleture, I think. I think he just had enough. Yeah. You know. Two more things for you, and I've really enjoyed this.

Thank you so much for the time. Why do you think people have this immense connection, unbelievable connection with your son? I mean, we don't see this often, where, as you mentioned, people are flying in from Dubai, Australia. I mean, the way I heard them and listened to them speak about them in Dublin last year, it's not something we often see. Why do you think that connection exists? Well, I think it's his persona really. I mean, he has that cheeky, chippy, chippy, cocky, arrogant persona.

People love that. You know, he has that show business side to him as well that people love, you know, people aspire to. And it's also people have seen the success. People have seen the dream lived out. So people just love the story, love the whole lot, you know. Plus his persona, he has a great persona. He has a great showbiz persona.

You know, he can command an audience, you know. Sure. Yes, he's done that. And then some, I think there's an authenticity there to him as well. I think people kind of relate to him. He came from, you know, the streets, if you will. He's a guy who sounds like them, looks like them. And now look what he's doing.

He's living the dream. And from what I heard from people, and correct me from wrong, Irish people don't tend to be so confident in themselves, so cocky, you know, cocky and prediction and whatnot. And they kind of love the fact that he steps outside that shadow and is a little different. You know what I mean? Yeah, exactly, yeah. I was feeling not so confident, actually, yeah. Maybe for all our years of being subserved into other nations, you know? Right. And I'm wondering, and because I'm somewhat, you know, in awe of this relationship, you know, as a new father, I can't even imagine what it would be like to see my son doing what your son is doing on a global stage. So I'm just wondering, in this process, it may have happened last year, it may have happened after the Dublin show. Did you have a moment quiet with your son where are you able to, you know, share with him?

him how special this is to you and how much, how proud you are of him and how much this means to you. I mean, do you recall a moment that, you know, when this journey is all said and done that you'll think back a real special moment that just you and your son shared. Does anything come to mind? Nothing brings to mind at the moment, but I mean, he knows how much, how special this is, you know, he knows how special the whole, whole thing is to us, to me as well, yeah. Okay. Nothing to terms. I've had a few special moments with a few special war, after his fight, you know. Yeah.

And what did you say to him after this fight? After this, I mean, he was so drained of emotions and so drained physically. You could just see that everything was on the table with him after this fight, you know. So just as a family, we just put our arms around and said, well, torn, you know, congratulations. This is amazing. We were all just shaken with joy. Is he still the same kid that he was way back when? It was still the same kid, yeah.

Still the same kid. We had, we went up to the Mac Mansion. two days after. Incidentally, before the fight, before, when we landed in Vegas on the Thursday, pre, the day before the way, and he called us up to the Mac Mansion. And it was

just chilled out, it was relaxed, it was tranquil, it was just in a way to have some tranquility up there, actually, you know, so, so he just breezes about himself. We had a barbecue on his birthday, that was two days after the fight. He just breezes down, he's in his dressing gown, and

just breathing around the crowd, just, you nice and cool and all relaxed, you know. We had a good couple of days up in the McMansion. Well, you guys certainly deserve it. Very happy for you. It's been great getting to see, you know, your family and, of course, yourself at all the events. It's a very tight-knit team, and I love the fact that you guys are so openly proud of your son. You don't get to see the family so close by that he's obviously very comfortable with you being around.

So congratulations on everything that has happened thus far. And I look forward to seeing all of you. at the Aldo fight. Hopefully sooner rather than later. I would love that. Tony, what a pleasure this has been. Thank you for the time. It's a pleasure for me.

Enjoy it. Enjoy everything. Thank you very much, Aaron. I really enjoyed this. Okay, there he is. There he is. Mr. Tony McGregor, joining us from Dublin, Ireland.

Very nice to hear from him. A proud father who has seen his son come from essentially nothing to on top of the MMA world, a beautiful story. All right, let's move along. We have to get to our next guest now.

This is a man who has been working very hard to get another shot at the UFC Welterweight title. He was there July 11th. He was there in attendance when Robbie Lawler and Roy McDonald engaged in one of the greatest fights of all time, a bloody war which was ultimately won by Mr. Robbie Lawler. He won it in the fifth round, and now Johnny Hendricks wants his third crack at the ruthless one.

Let's talk to Johnny about all that and more. Johnny, how are you? Doing great, you? I'm doing great. Thank you for the time. You were in attendance at UFC 189, right? Oh, yeah. What's going through your mind when you're watching what Robbie Loller and

Roy McDonald are doing to each other? An amazing display of heart, determination, grit, but also a pretty brutal and bloody fight. What's going through your mind? You're so close to getting that next title shot. You know, realistically, seeing what they're doing to each other, what they're doing to each other, you know, what's working and what's not working.

You know, we saw from Roy McDonald's the straight punches were working. Then we saw Robbie in the second round come back with his straight punches. I mean, that's sort of what really realistically started the bloody mess. Then we saw Roy McDonald, he was able to land that head kick. You know what I mean? It didn't seem like the one-twos they were there, but they were just sort of keeping them at bay, right? then you saw the head kick Waddled him

you know maybe maybe Brough McDonald should have tried for a takedown instead of trying to finish him on the feet you know what I'm saying get some takedown

you know try to finish him on top you mean I don't know you know when you're in that situation you've got to trust your body and what either if it's right or wrong

you never know I mean it's all high in sight now. But, you know, you look at that fight and you're like, yeah, he did a good job. And I want my, again, I want my belt back. You know what I mean? Whenever I look at that fight, I'm like, that's all I can think about.

You know what I mean? So there's never a point where you're like, these are crazy people. I don't want to go through this. I don't want to get bloody like this. I mean, that's what I think a normal person like myself would say. but I feel like all of you are cut from a different cloth. Yeah, you know, you've got to think, too, is that, you know, I've been in two fights with him,

and it's turned out well, you know what I mean? And, you know, if he wants to get in that kind of battle, you know, there's other ways around that. You know what I'm saying? I know that, and I've been in there with him. So to sit there and think that it's going to be a bloody war, you never know until the moment comes. Does that make sense? But when the moment comes, do you rise to it or do you fold?

Right. Does that make sense? Sure, yeah, of course. So that fight happened nine days ago, and you've been pretty vocal about what you want next. You told us before the fight. You've been saying it leading up to the fight. Where do we stand now? What have they told you?

I haven't talked to anybody yet. Why? I don't know what's going on. I have not a clue. I figured it makes perfect sense. You know, same timeline as always before. You know, he's going to get some time to read, you know what I mean, relax, let his body heal, and, you know, let's do it.

You know what I mean? But other than that, I don't know why. I really don't. All I can do is keep training what I need to do. But hopefully, hopefully I get that call soon, and they tell me it's going to happen. So it appeared as though, obviously, I mean, he was pretty banged up, and then one would think that he would need some time off.

Does that screw with your plans? Are you willing to wait? No, you know, because realistic, look at my last couple of years. I fight in March. It's either the 14th, 15th, or the 16th, right? And I always fight either late November or early December. So realistically, it's playing perfect with my timeline, because there's things I can get better on.

Yeah, my weight cut went well. There's just some more things. I'm making tweaks. And now that I know, you know, in my eyes, it's going to be Robbie Lawler, so we're already training for that. Does that make sense? Yeah. And that's sort of what makes me happy is that, you know,

I'm starting to train for him. And, yeah, he's got to take some time to recover. which, you know, in my mind, I'm like, hey, let him take the time, let him recover. We're going to probably fight in early December or late November, which is fine with me. It just gives me more time to get my weight under control and get my skills a little bit better prepared for the fight. So, of course, after your second fight against Robbie, you know, you were told, and we were told that you were fighting him next. Then you take that fight against Matt Brown, you win that fight. When you accepted that fight, did they say, if you were.

you win this fight, you're going to get the shot, like, you don't even need to campaign and stuff. Because it feels like, just based on what you were saying, you're still in the dark, there's still a possibility. It may not go as planned. Yeah, you know, MMA is a crazy thing. You know what I'm saying? And you're right. I was told that I could wait. You know what I mean?

I could wait for the belt. But, you know, like I told you before, you know, Roy McDonald and Hector Lombar fight was going on. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, and he's right behind me. So if he has a good performance, and he, you know what I mean? And he beat, he'll love, what he does? He jump me. So, yeah, I had to take that fight, and that's why I made sure that the fight went a certain way,

so that way I could solidify and continue my number one ranking. You know what I mean? That I'm the number one contender. You have to do that. I did that, and now the only thing that's, the only thing that's, sense is me and Robbie, let's get this over with and move forward. Are you surprised to see Robbie

turn into the fighter that he has become? Not that long ago, he was kind of a mid-tier, middleweight, and strike force. And now, he truly looks to be in the best form of his career, like a world beater. I mean, what he did against Rory, nothing short of remarkable. Does this surprise you?

No, because, you know, realistically, when you look at somebody who has power, stuff like that can come true. You know what I mean? And if you look at it, if Roy McDonald makes it to the fifth round, it's a different story. Does that make sense? And so when you look at that, yeah, you know, realistically, I thought that's how my car should have

went whenever I was fighting. You know what I mean? I was up three to one going into the fifth round and he had to knock me out. That was the only way he was going to win. it didn't go my way, right? So you just take it with a grain of salt and you prepare yourself better and make sure that the next time it doesn't happen.

Does that make sense? Yeah. After the fight, not after the fight, well, kind of after the fight, a week later or so just a couple days ago, you put out this picture, make no mistake, Johnny Hendrix with your wins, your losses, your finishes. Why did you feel the need to put this out there

and do a bit of campaigning? Well, I guess people don't think that I mean, I know that I'm the number one contender. I know that this fight makes sense, but there's always other things that go on. You know what I mean? And, you know, I always let my fighting do the talking, but maybe the day has come where you can't do that. Does that make sense? Is that frustrating? It is in a sense because, you know, I don't want to, you know, I never want to degrade somebody or do those kind of things because it's not my style.

But if I have to, you know, it's pretty easy to do that. Does that make sense? But I've always been the person that wants to let my fighting do it. And, you know, I have kids. Now, if I have to, I don't want to turn that way, and I probably won't. because I want my kids to grow up, knowing that, hey, no matter what happened, I stay true to myself.

How annoying is Tyrone Woodley these days? You know what? I talk to him. I'm actually, you know, I like him a lot. He's a really good guy. And I get where he's coming from. I'm in the same boat. Does that make sense?

I'm in the exact same boat. I'm sitting here, hey, I want my title. I want to fight for that title again. And, you know, he's wanting to get to it. So I get where he's coming from. It's just that I want the title. You know what I mean? And that's the only play that makes sense is me and Robbie three.

Realistically, that's all that makes sense. Then, because right now we're a one and one. Boom. Win or lose. Then we can move on and start venturing out there. and leading different chapters. Did you stick around for the tough finale? I did not.

I had to, I ended up leaving. I heard a, um, tomorrow won. Yeah, and Wonderboy. Yeah, and Wonderboy. Uh, you know, both of those guys won. I, I saw the Wonderboy fight. Uh, it was a good fight. Yeah, I mean, and, uh, you know, those,

are guys that I'm probably going to have to face soon. Yeah, kind of a new... I was wondering if you watched him live and what you thought of him because I feel like he's a real new face, new player in this division right now. Yeah, you know, he is, and he can mix it up. You know what I mean? He might do what I did. You know what I mean?

Remember whenever I started coming through, the top five were the top five for how long? You know, I mean, like two or three years. Yeah. And I mixed up the division. then, you know, and he has the same potential to do the same thing. You know what I mean? Tyrone Woodley could do the same thing. Yeah, Carlos Conant who could do the same thing.

You have Roy McDonald when he comes back. He could do the same thing. I mean, so this division is starting to really go different ways. And that's sort of what makes, I think, our weight class exciting is that, you know, you don't know who could hold the belt and how long could they hold the belt for. I saw you cooking, hanging out, pool parties, really living the life over there in Las Vegas

during international fight week. What was the best part of the whole thing? You know, realistically, probably, you know, I'm not a big pool party guy. I thought you would be. You strike me as the type. Yeah, you know, I avoid the sun at all costs. I'm dark-natured, so I don't need a lot of sun to get dark.

But realistically, that's sort of the week that you can really let the fans be, see who you are, and hang out with you. Does that make sense? Yeah. You know, sometimes, you know, at Fight Week, you really don't have time. And even in, you know, even though they want it, it's hard for them to get it. And so that's sort of, I like it because you can get everybody at one. I mean, doing the signings, doing that stuff, even though, you know, don't get me wrong.

Signing for, you know, five hours a day and six hours a day is hard, but it's also, it's better than having to cut weight. You know what I mean? Yeah. And go that route. So I look at it as a positive. There was a report last week that the UFC is considering AT&T Stadium, Cowboys Stadium for Aldo McGo. Gregor. That would make a hell

of a lot of sense for you, right? That's in your backyard. Yeah, yeah. You know, I've been there, seen it. I doubt anybody's

going to be watching the fight because they're going to be watching the screen. Right. You know what I mean? And that's what, that's what I think would be awesome.

It'd be awesome to be there. And to have that. And, you know, realistically, you know, that could be, I've always talked about, I love to have it

in Cowboy Stadium because I think right now it is Canada who holds the world record, right, for the U.S.C. Yep. And it's like 51,000 something. 55, 55. 55. Holy cow. You know what I mean?

And how, how sweet would that be if we could hold the record? You know what I mean? If the Texans could come out and, you know, try to shoot for 60,000 tickets. I mean, I think that would be amazing. If you win the belt again, when you win the belt again, will you change your stance on letting people touch it? Because you received a little bit of flack for that. Now, the first one, you know what I mean? That's the first one.

After that, no problem. Oh, okay. Yeah, I guess. Because the first one was so hard to get. That makes sense? Sure. You know, for me, it was just so hard. It was a grind.

Now, if I win it again, it'll be different. Does that make sense? Because I've been there, done that. And yes, it was hard to get to it, but it still doesn't, the first one. You know what I mean? It's like, you wouldn't let anybody touch your first car. You know what I'm saying? Somebody would be like, can I drive your car?

You're like, can you turn 16? Did you ever let somebody drive your car? No, you're like, no, I got to do it. I'll drive. And it's the same thing. It's the same principle. You know what I mean? Fair enough.

I understand. Hey, can I ask you a bit of a personal question if you don't mind? I notice sometimes, you know, you partake in chewing tobacco, correct? Yeah. Is this something that you wish you can stop doing? Because we've seen the effects. I mean, in other sports baseball, it has, you know, really, it has affected a lot of people. I mean, you don't need me to tell you this.

do you feel like this is something you wish you'd stop doing or do you have no problem doing it? Okay, so I'm going to quit. I'm going to quit. It's whenever I quit cutting weight, I'm going to quit. So as soon as I retire, I'm done. It's a nasty habit. I wish whenever I was younger, I never started.

I mean, that's why I tell everybody. It's just something that I wish I would have never started in the first place. And it is a bad habit. The way that I look at it is that, you know, if you smoke, you're killing other people. I am, I'm only killing myself. Does that make sense? Yeah. And I do know that.

But right now, with the way that dipping works, okay, I'll give you a little rundown. It sort of like it suppresses your hunger. So whenever you're cutting weight or if you're doing stuff and you can, throw a dip in and it'll sort of make the hunger go away. And another thing is you're also spitting so you're not really want to drink a lot of water, stuff like that, right? So whenever I retire, I'm going to have to do it slowly. I told my, and I told my wife this too, I'm going to do one year.

Within one year, I'm going to quit. And there's ways that you can do it where you never want to do it again. And that's the way I'm going to do it. So that way I can be done with it, be rid of it, and then, you know, just live your life normally. Ah, that is great news. I'm very happy to hear that. How do you feel, final question for you? How do you feel about this potential ban of IVs come October?

Is this a big problem for you? No, it's not. You know, I wrestles all my life. I know how to rehydrate back in a good way. You know, I don't mind telling people this. There's packets out there. They're like electrolytes, salt, and something else is in them. That's all legal.

You know what you do and what we did in wrestling, I would put that in my water. Okay? So right after Wands, I would shake it up in a water and then it gives it a little flavor where it doesn't taste like water. So whenever you drink it, it's actually putting the... the minerals and the electrolytes and the salt that you need back in your body. And, you know, I'll tell you this right now. There's been times where I've taken an IV and I've only taken half of it. Or that I take the whole IV and I don't feel that good with it.

Does that make sense? Yeah. And this makes you feel great? No problem? Yeah, I'm not worried about it at all because, okay. So what an IV does is if you have a back. weight cut, it'll help you bounce back a little bit better. That makes sense?

Now what you need to do is what is going to happen. It's going to make people keep their weight and check a little bit better. So like me, I can't bump up to 220 anymore. I have to make sure that I stay at right around, you know, like this, this time I'm at 205. Right now I'm walking around at 205. And within like two weeks, I'm hoping to be under 200. Wow.

That makes sense. Wow. So I know that I have to take different steps to make sure that so I don't have to rely on an I-D. I can rely on my old ways and the wrestler way to rehydrate back. All right. Well, that is great to hear as well. Some great insight there. Johnny, always a pleasure.

Most importantly, good luck getting that title fight. I know you've been working hard at it. I hope that, you know, Dana White loves listening to the show. It's his favorite show. he puts it on his iPhone, so I'm assuming he's listening to you right now. Hopefully they give you what you want, and you can get another crack at that title. We appreciate the time very much, Johnny. Good luck. Hey, thank you, and you have a great day.

There is, Johnny Hendricks, the former UFC Walterway champion Big Rig, they call him. Great stuff from him, as always. All right, let's move along. On Wednesday in San Diego, one of the big winners was Holly Holmes. She defeated Marion Reno. Marion had nothing for her. no answers to her questions. It was a very one-sided performance.

She is now 2-0, and the UFC wanted to talk to her about that and where she goes from here. So we welcome in Holly home right now to the MMA hour. Holly, how are you? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm great. Congratulations on the win. You know, when I was watching you, and not even in the actual fight prior to the fight,

walking to the cage when you were pacing around as they were announcing your name, all that stuff, you appear to be a completely different person. than the one who made her UFC debut back in February. A lot more relaxed, calm, cool, collected, but just at ease. Was that an accurate description of the way you were feeling as opposed to February in L.A.? You know, I think that absolutely it was, you know, a little more comfortable in a lot of ways.

Obviously, everybody saw the hype before the first one, but I said it, you know, a lot already. I'm sure people are sick of hearing it, But, you know, coming off of two really big injuries was really a lot of my nerves for the last fight. And then, of course, it being my first UFC fight, and then they bumped into the Komein, and then they, you know, kind of just kept getting bigger and bigger. Of course, there were a lot of nerves. But for me personally, I'd say a lot of it was I was coming off of, you know,

having my broken arm and a herniated disc in my neck. And I had fought since then. And it just happened to be, you know, on the biggest stage I had ever fought in. And my first UFC fight after all this hype and anticipation and expectation. So, yeah, the first fight had a lot more nerves behind it. But, you know, I'm always nervous for a fight, so I still had nerves to this fight. But definitely it was more relaxed and, you know, a little more. more comfortable in there.

What a pleasure for you must have been to be after UFC 189, because I felt like your fight, and this card in particular, really flew under the radar, sandwiched in between the Scotland show and the Big 189 show. I feel like you had to do less media. Those are just less attention on you, and you probably liked that. I loved it. You know, in L.A., I was doing interviews from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. some days, you know, between the interviews and the photo shoots and all the media, and this was, you know, I was, you know,

I had like three things a day, and so I could actually get up and go for a run. We were staying by the bay, so I just went and ran by the water and kind of had a little bit of mental time for myself, and it was great. I loved it, and it was sandwiched between some really big fights, which, I don't know, some people feel like maybe they don't, they didn't get enough attention for it, but me personally, I think I just really want to go out there and fight. I don't really want to do it for all these other reasons. So it was a perfect time for me to fight in a perfect way it all panned out.

I really had a good week last week. Have you watched the fight on television? I did. Were you happy with your performance, your entire body of work? No. Why? I'm happier with my performance this time than last time, But I'm a little upset with myself for not going forward a little sooner.

Because I think it could have stopped her early. Why do you think you didn't? Well, you know, I think that part of it, I mean, there's always this and that. I mean, who knows if I would have rushed something and ran into something dumb, you know? So it's always, part of our game plans is kind of to fill her out and see what she was going to be doing. You know, we always assume that they're going to be kind of trying to shoot or kick me down or clenched to take me down. And so we knew that. She had a lot more forward pressure in all of her past fights.

So our plan was to kind of, you know, keep her at a kicking range and go when I wanted to. So, yes, our game plan tanned out perfectly to what we had planned for in the fight, you know, to kind of fill her out. And then when I got her timing and knew what she was doing, and then to kind of just go when I wanted to go, I just wish I would have pulled the trigger a little sooner. But, you know, she's just coming off of a big win off of Jessica Andrage, and she's, you know, got some great ground game, and we were able to stuff that on her side.

And so, you know, there's a lot of things that we did. You know, in the post-site press conference, they said, you know, are you surprised that she didn't try to take you down? And it's like, well, we kind of, that was our plan, that keep her at her range to her she couldn't. And I know that. I know that our plan worked to shut down her game plan. So a lot of things that worked in this fight,

I'm very happy with, you know, knowing what our game plan was and going in there. But I feel like I was, I was more comfortable in there the whole fight than I thought I would be. I thought she'd kind of be with a little, like I said, a little more forward pressure. And maybe I was kind of waiting, expecting that. And then it never really came. But I shouldn't have really been worrying so much about her game plan and just kind of doing what I do best and just go, you know.

You know, it was very interesting watching the fight from my perspective at home because initially I was watching. I was like, oh, yeah, she's a lot more comfortable. She seems on point. You know, this is the holly that maybe we've seen in. in previous fights outside of the UFC. And then I went on Twitter, and to be honest, you were being criticized a lot

for not being aggressive. And I was surprised that I made some comments here or there that I think people were a little off base with theirs. But, I mean, were you aware of this? And when you were made aware of this, did you feel like the criticism was a little off base, was a little unfair?

You know, people are always going to be negative. And I honestly feel like The people that write the negative things on Twitter, Internet and all that are people that don't do our job. So it doesn't really ever bother me. I don't really care. I know what was put in. I know what's behind the scenes. I know what game plan was put together.

And one thing for me that is a positive thing I take away from this fight is she's never been dominated like that in a fight before. And so I take that as a positive thing for myself, and I know our hard work paid off. sometimes the easiest fight when I look at it's like oh that was a you know I felt like that fight was pretty simple I wish I would have done more but maybe that's because all the hard work in training made it an easy fight you know there's a lot of ways to look at it from the outside that a lot of people don't understand and I really don't let it bother me because I don't I don't want to get in there and think oh my gosh I've really got to you know show what I'm worth all these people who are sitting behind a computer on Twitter you know I don't I don't think about that for a fight. I think about a victory. I want to win and what do I need to do to get a win. And each fight, I definitely want to improve. You know, the first fight in the UFC,

if I would have had, you know, the best knockout of my entire life that night, that would have been worse because then it would have been like, well, what, you know, then it would have been let down after. I'm glad that I keep improving and I'm glad that I keep, you know, showing a little bit more each fight. Do I want it to be more impressive? Yes, but that's what keeps me striving to go to the gym. and to just get in there and have confidence in myself and just go forward.

So it's a work in progress, and I'm definitely learning as I go and getting better as I go. So that's my plan is to just keep showing a little bit more each fight, and eventually maybe they'll be happy with it, but not everybody will ever be 100% happy. But I fight for me. I fight for my team, my friends and family, and, you know, the negative comments,

stuff, they don't affect my mood. That is great to hear. I'm wondering if you think that the general MMA fan, the community, doesn't appreciate the finer points of striking like they do in boxing, because you know how it is, MMA. You've been to a show. They start booing when, really, I mean, it's like they're these bloodthirsty. They just want to see Rockham Sockham Robots. They want to see, they prefer to see, you know, sometimes no technique, but if there's a lot

of action, punches being landed, blood and all that stuff, they honestly respond to that a lot better than, you know, just, Demetrius Johnson can talk about this, and we spoke about this with him earlier, that for whatever reason people sometimes don't appreciate what he does. Do you feel like that's the case with you here that people just aren't getting what you're doing over there because you're so technical? You know, there's always going to be critics, and even the whole time in my boxing career, you know, I always have done a lot of footwork and a lot of movement, and that is part of my style. Everybody has their own style.

And even in boxing, you know, sometimes they would call me a runner because I wasn't there to get hit. But yet, I was landing all the punches, and that is the whole point of a boxing fight is to hit and not get hit. So, I mean, Floyd Mayweather doesn't necessarily have a ton of knockouts on his record, but he is known for hitting and not getting hit. You know, he's a very good defensive fighter, and he throws, you know, high percentage, you know, throw a lot of combos more speeds than, power. But he has power still in his shot when he wants to throw them. So it just kind of depends on

what, I mean, every fighter has a different style, and that's just been a style that's worked for me, but I feel like in boxing or MMA, regardless of what I have done, I feel like I've been able to have a good successful career because

you kind of take a gamble when you go in there and just bang with them. And some it feels good because you're hitting them and always feels good to hit them, but you're taking chop in return. And I feel like

a lot of people are just wanting fight of the night. I tell people all the time, I don't ever want fight of the night because that means I took too many shots. I want performance of the night. I want knockout of the night or submission of the night, but I do not want fight of the night because that means you don't even know who won.

That means that's too close to tell. I want a dominating performance. That is me personally. I would rather, I mean, obviously, I would rather have knock out of the night. When people want a bonus, I don't ever want fight of the night bonus. I want knock out of the night, or performance of the night, but not fight of the night.

Fight of the night means it could have gone either way. I don't want to be that close. I want to have a domination. As someone who had almost 40 pro boxing matches under her belt, what's it like for you to now have less than 10 MMA fights in? Almost have to, you kind of

strike me as someone who, you know, was the coolest kid at school up until like 10th grade. And now you have to go to a new school for, you know, 11th and 12th grade. And you have to prove yourself all over again, make new friends, tell people how cool you are. It feels like you really have to start, you know, from scratch. Is that a frustrating process for you? Not at all. I feel like it's been something kind of liberating, kind of new. It's a little scary, but definitely exciting.

And what are we doing in this world? You know, I don't, I grew up as a preacher's kid, and we always, my parents always threw us in the mix with everything. And I always appreciated that because I feel like a lot of people, I have a very strong belief, you know, in Christ and in the Bible. But I feel like it's worth no good. If you, you know, there's a lot of people that are like that if they only, like, go to their church functions and hang out with people that they're comfortable hanging out with. But that's really not even what God wants to do. He wants this throughout in the world and be thrown in a mix. And I feel like you're always going to kind of be maybe in an uncomfortable position,

throw yourself in different personalities and different groups and things like that. And I feel like that helped me kind of even with my career as a fighter, is to kind of throw yourself out there. And even in boxing, just being comfortable, being uncomfortable. A fighting game is mentally and physically very, very straining, but you have to kind of be okay with everybody watching you, what you're doing, and still kind of be comfortable in an uncomfortable situation. And I feel like that's the way to live.

I don't want to just sit at home in a comfortable setting and never really put myself out there because then I feel like life has no excitement. You know, I like to experience things. I like to meet different people. I like to be thrown in the mix with different personalities and going from boxing into MMA was just this new challenge, and I think that's what I loved about it. And I actually got a ton of criticism from the boxing world

from like a diehard boxing followers, which I'm not even upset at them for that because there's only one way that I was able to have a boxing career as a female is because of those diehard female boxing fans. So I appreciate them to the end. They were really upset when I went to MMA and saying, oh, Holly's taking the easy ride. out, she didn't want to finish fighting this fighter or that fighter.

And it's like, if you think this is the easy route to start all over in a new world of fighting, then you've got it all wrong, you know. But it's been, like I said, kind of liberating, kind of, it's just kind of, it's just a whole new excitement. And I feel like a little kid again, learning so much. You know, every day is just something new. And the more I learn, the more I realize, I don't know. keep wanting to learn more, you know. So it's definitely been exciting.

So it's been a challenging transition, but I love it. Is your family behind you? Do they support your career? 100%. Okay. You know, according to Fight Metric, they had you outlanding Marion Reno's 65 to 26 in significant strikes. You outlanded her 27 to 5 in significant strikes to the head.

you landed 27 to the head in total, 25 to the body, 13 to the leg. So obviously, you know, a very well-rounded attack. Yet, it seemed at times you were having a hard time judging the distance. You were coming at her. And I mean, in the end, that was pushing her back. And it was a form in some ways of offense and defense. But there were times where you were having trouble, it appeared to be the case. Why do you think that was and how are you going to fix that problem?

You know, I think I was expecting her to shoot, and so I was kind of giving a little too much range. I was respecting her space too much, and I should have imposed more on it. My wrestling coach, Izzy, he was laughing up to the side. He goes, the first round, you're like this far away in the second round. He puts his hands like a little closer. He goes like this far away in the third round. It was like right there if we were just started there in the first round. Okay.

I said, I know, I know. But, you know, it's one of those things to learn from. And that's what I love about this site. I feel like I have learned a lot. And I have things that I want to get back in the gym and better myself for it, you know. I just felt like I was controlling the cage, controlling the pace. And I had her back on the cage a lot, but I wasn't using that. advantage to kind of go forward and put the pressure on her. So absolutely, a little bit too much

range in there, but something to work on. Okay. Final thing, do you have any idea? I feel like I know what you're going to say here, but I have to ask it anyway. When do you want to return, and more importantly, against who? You've now cracked the top 10? Who's next in your mind? You know, I never pick a fight. I know. I knew you were going to say that. The way it goes. Everybody says that, and that's fine. I don't mind the question. It doesn't bother me.

So I definitely don't mind who they want me to fight. Whoever they say is what I'm just going to take and go with. However, I do know that I would like to fight sooner than later. Okay. You know, last year I had pretty much a year off because of my injuries. So my first flight back with all this anticipation, it had been a year. year, but I'm not going to lie. I, like, needed a month to decompress on that fight.

Just so much build-up, it was nice. It was not to stress about it. But this fight, I'm ready to just turn right around and fight right away. I have no injuries from the fight. I have no sore anywhere. I feel great. It's so healthy. I could go in and train today if I wanted to.

I didn't. I just went for a jog because I wanted to kind of hang out at the house and just got home last night. So I'm ready to take a fight as soon as possible I'm going to be filming like a fight scene And it'll only be like five days But it'll be in the middle of August

So obviously I wouldn't want to fight You know within a couple weeks after that Because I don't really be able to train But you know if that could at least be like Five, six weeks before a fight I would love that fight sometime maybe in September. Oh, wow.

I don't know. Okay. I'd be ready to batting. So now that we're 2 and 0, how many more wins will you feel 100% comfortable in taking the title shot? How many more do you feel like you need in there? You know, I don't really want to map it out.

Okay. I feel like, I mean, I feel like a different person and a different fighter right now than I was before my first fight in the UFC. I feel like a different fighter between my first and second fight. So who knows? I would never want to shy away from the title fight, but I don't ever want to rush something.

You know, I feel like everything just kind of falls in the place in due time. So whatever path, I mean, obviously I need to win to get there. So that's just my goal is just to win. And then whenever they say the title bout is up and ready, then I'm just going to jump in 100%. Fair enough. Holly, congratulations. Thank you very much for the time.

I know you don't love doing these interviews, so I appreciate you coming on and talking about the fight. And for whatever it's worth, I was very impressed. I thought it was a great dominant performance, and I think a lot of people forgot how good Marion Reno looked in her first two UFC fights, and you completely nullified her. So congratulations, and I look forward to your next fight very much.

And I appreciate your time. I actually don't mind doing the interviews. I just never know. know when to commit to them because it's so bad of being by my phone. I appreciate your time a lot. I really do. Thank you very much, Holly. We'll talk soon. Take care. Thank you. Talk to you soon. And thank you very much to her manager, Lenny Freskes, for helping us track down Holly, a tough one at times to get in touch with. All right, one more interview to go, and we've saved a fun one for last. This man, way back when, was the very

first Scottish fighter to fight inside the octagon. That was October of 2013. took a fight on short notice against Jimmy Hedes. Unfortunately, he did not win that fight, but since then he has won two in a row, defeated Daniel Paneda at UFC 171, and then came back on Saturday in Glasgow, Scotland, to defeat Paul Redmond via knockout. He got the party started in many ways on Saturday in Scotland because his win completely made the crowd erupt. I mean, the crowd went ballistic when he won, and even more so when he jumped into the crowd to celebrate, them. He has been hounding me and asking me to come on this show for quite some time. And after he won, I knew right then and there that we needed to get him on the show. I'm talking about Robert Whiteford,

who joins us right now. Via the magic of Skype, there he is in all his glory. Robert, how are you? Congratulations on the win. How you doing, son? About the time I was on that show. I know. I was waiting for the right moment, and I think Saturday was the right moment. So congratulations on it. And by the way, I like this new look for you. Longer hair, the beer. Where's this coming from? Hey, I just got sponsored by a beard company, and my girlfriend takes it, and I told her this morning, I said, if they're paying, it's staying. That's what I told her. She's not happy.

She can't match the payment of those guys, so I told her it's staying. Did that sponsorship come as a result of Saturday? They'd sponsored me previous to the fight, and then they just got in contact with my manager this morning, and I offered more money for another six months of the beard. Wow, well, I love it. I love it as well and I love the money. Exactly. So, you know, at the top of the show, we had your teammate Stevie Ray on,

and he told us that he's still on a high. He still can't really process what happened on Saturday. How about you? I'm always in a fucking high. I'm in high in life, you know? And that just made it even more better than Saturday. I landed on the moon on Saturday night, and I'm still not back down. But, you know, I'm always high in life anyway.

I fucking love it. I heard from a lot of people that your walkout was something special. Unfortunately, we couldn't see it. What was the song that you choose? Yeah, we couldn't see it. You never heard that? I didn't see it. I couldn't, I can't find it anywhere.

Oh, fuck it's special. You'll get it on my Facebook page. Okay. On my fan page. I come out to the National Anthem, the Flower of Scotland. Oh, wow. I knew as soon as I walked out to that in my national arena, the home crowd would go nuts. You know, I've been to the football matches and the national rugby matches.

And when the fans sing that song, it's something special. and it took the roof off the place. You know, I had my head coach there, Conan Silver from an American top team. And he's not wanting to get emotional, you know. And just before I turned at the checkpoint, he had tears in his eyes. He was filled up, you know, it had the full place going. Wow. I wish I could see that.

So I can see it on your Facebook page. I'm going to check that out after the show. That sounds fantastic. And you've got to get back to me and tell me if it doesn't give you goosebumps. I'm telling you fucking give you goosebumps. Did you feel any kind of responsibility? Because you were the first of the Scottish fighters to fight on the car. that you had to set the tone, you had to get things going?

I mean, I'm pretty good at blocking things out. You know, I'm like Dexter, professional during the day, serial killer by night. And I just flicked the switch when it was time to go. But I knew it was a big moment. I knew it was a big moment for me, and I knew it was a big moment for the crowd. So I didn't feel any pressure. Grinney, I was bringing the pressure. You know, Redmond had to come in there in front of 11,000 my home fans

and deal with me and another end of it. I was lucky. It was just me getting my hands on them not there. to the support as well. So you finish him early in the fight and then right away you don't even think twice you jump over the cage and into the crowd. Were you always planning on doing that

or was that a spur of the moment thing? Fuck, I lost my mind. I don't know what the fuck happened. I was, I fuck knows what happened. One minute I was on top of the cage and the next minute I was fucking in the crowd or having a clue what happened. Didn't even know who the people were or nothing.

The next minute I was in the middle of it. Wow. because, you know, I was actually thinking, oh, maybe that's his family, his friends. You had no idea who those people were. I hadn't a fucking clue. And if they weren't there, I would imagine you were going to run up the entire arena. I mean, it just seemed like you were a man on a mission. I was off.

I was off. As soon as I got over that fence, I was off. You know, it was like when I was a kid doing the gardens, I don't know if you have ever, you'd do that in America. But as young children, you've got the backguards, what would you call it, the yards? Yes, yes. Yeah. So you jump the fences, you know, and you just keep going until you keep going until there's no more fences to go.

And that's what it was like as soon as I jumped that first fence I was looking for the next. How old are you? Let me see. You're 33. I'm 32, but I feel like I'm fucking 13. Well, actually, I wanted to ask you. So, you know, in your time, 32 years here in our great world, was that the greatest moment of your life right then and there?

Fuck by far You know If you were going to write a Hollywood movie That would be the fucking ending right You couldn't fucking script that shit It was fucking unbelievable And I was just fortunate enough It was me

You know If it wasn't me I'd been in the crowd watching Somebody else doing it I was fucking tremendous Is that something you dreamed of Like when you started Did you say you know Because we hear from Connor a lot

Oh I wanted to bring the UFC to Dublin You were the first Scottish fighter Did you dream of having that moment Was that part of your dreams? Hey hey listen This started in a small hall and Soki and Alawa. It's a very small town in the top of Scotland, right, the countryside.

It started off there in my local judo hall. It just so happened there was an MMA session after my judo class. And I thought, fuck it, I'll give that a shot, I'll see where it's like, you know, and the next minute I was hooked. But I knew right then there and then I wasn't wanting to be

just fighting on the local scenes, you know, like Scotland and the UK. You know, I'd watch the UFC. Always in my head I had the bigger picture, you know, I wanted to fucking get there. and people maybe called me crazy at the time but the crazy people are the ones that make the fucking difference, right? That's the way I look at it.

I don't like to follow the trend. I like to be myself and be different and I knew back then that I wanted to get to the UFC and I knew I could do it and when I'd done it I thought right away I'm going to bring this fucking show back to my home country and a lot of people were going nuts

because I was the third fight on the card they were saying whitefoot should be higher up but honestly you could have put me out first fight I wouldn't have give a fuck you know I was just delighted. I was delighted to fucking get that show there. But the first Scott out, you know, and show my people what we made it.

It was amazing. It seemed somewhat fitting that you would start things. So prior to that session, of course we know about your judo background. You're an accomplished judoka, and your Twitter name is Flying Judoka. Did you know anything about MMA? Was that on your radar at all?

Well, I'd watched it as a kid, you know. Me and one of my best friends, Dad used to have it in VHS, and when he used to leave the house we used to sneak into his room and get the VHS videos and watch him thinking we were watching a legal fighting, you know, like,

back, we better not get caught watching this shit. It was bare knuckle back in the time that's when Tank Abbott used to throw down guys like that and that was my first taste of it but I'd never really paid attention that, I participated in judo and I thought that was the toughest fucking sport in the planet

until I got punched in the face participating in this, you know, and that changed my fucking mind instantly. So that was my first taste of it. But you didn't spend this fight week in Scotland, right? You were at ATT in Florida. Well, I've been doing at ATT in Florida. Yeah, fight camp I was there for eight weeks.

I was away from my cat Olly for eight weeks. You know, I fucking miss the wee guy. It's terrible. My girlfriend as well, better put that in there because she'll go nuts if I don't say I miss her. And I was back one week before the fight. And I was unfortunate enough I could spend it in my own bed. You know what, fight week?

That was fucking tremendous. Yeah, I bet. But what was it like coming? back for the beginning of fight week, you know, in your home country and then seeing this sort of buzz start to build, build, the wayans were great and then the fight. I mean, the atmosphere was fantastic. So now you're living it because you had been away. You were in Florida. I mean, you couldn't have been farther, right? I mean, you weren't experiencing the buildup. What was that like for you? I knew that shit was going to go crazy. You know, you couldn't tell me I'm

one of, I'm Mr. Crazy here, you know, and the Scottish people are just as fucking crazy as me, and I knew it was going to kick off like this. I knew, I knew that. You know, you know, you know, I, Even though I never seen it happening, I was away in Florida, I fucking knew it would be going nuts, you know. And when I came home and I seen it, and I made that way, and I was just so pleased that the Scottish support got behind us, you know. The show was sold out in under 25 minutes.

The weigh-ins were sold out as well. There were a thousand odd people there, and that was during a working day. You know, the working class people took time off work to come and support us at that event. It was just tremendous, you know. Us Scottish love a fight, you know, we're fucking crazy. And you put your, especially,

You're going to view your own guys in that octagon, you know, you're going to get them their numbers, and I knew that would happen. I knew it. How popular is the sport, and what has the aftermath been after Saturday, in the national media? I mean, are they treating this like a big deal? Have they caught on? Have they understood what transpired on Saturday? Errol, you know, I was struggling again, the local fucking paper back here.

You know, the local paper that I think they sell maybe 500 copies or something to the small villages that I live in, and they wouldn't even fucking put me in. thing. And I just got a message from one of the UFC guys' office with a picture. And I'm in every single fucking paper you can get national paper in Scotland. So you can't beat that. The local paper can show up their arse because I'm in every single national paper. So they understood because, you know, sometimes it feels like the first show kind of flies under the radar as far as the media is concerned. And then the second show gets to be a big deal. But it appears as though in Scotland they have recognized that you guys are a big deal. And I'm happy to hear that.

fuck we've been fighting for centuries you know all you need is a whisper a small whisper of a bit of violence going down and you'll get the fucking Scottish crowd there you know it doesn't matter how small or how big it is we will fill those halls and you come back again we will fill it again and again you know we love to fucking fight and we just prove that Irish people are pretty the same we're pretty pretty

alike you know and you've seen the kickoff it's happened there and I'm just wanting to spur on for the rest of the people here me and Steve and Joanne but we've been training in the hall in Glasgow when it rains the fucking water comes in the ceiling you know that's how fucking poor we are out here

so I want this to kick off get my gym funded get more money into that get the guys funded you know Steve's still pedaling these bikes to training I think I think he can go and buy a new car now he's got that 50 Gs

Joanne gets the bust his training you know we're all fucking skin out here so it's good I want the money to come and I want us to get better from it you know and the gym and everybody what's your situation like? Because it seems like often when we talk to these these European fighters

a lot of you guys are struggling and that's often the case with a young MMA fighter. Stevie just told us he was on welfare. You know, again, not to keep comparing everyone to him, but Connor was also on welfare not that long ago and look how he's doing now. What's your situation like?

It's 10 times as well. Fucking beat that. On welfare and 10 kids. You can't get any better. Wait, say that again. It froze up. What did you say? What was your, the beginning of that response? I couldn't hear you. Stevie is on welfare and has 10 children to 10 different girls.

You cannot beat that, you know. So fucking that 50 G is going a long way for him. What about you? I'm lucky enough I've not got any kids. Thank you. And I haven't fought in a year. That's the other thing, you know. It's been fucking tough. It's been tough. And I've just been lucky I've had the local support back here with the small businesses supporting me up until this. And even during fight camp, and I went away to America, they were sending money over to me to pay my building stuff, you know, because I still have a house back here.

I still have my girlfriend. I still have shit I need to pay. So I was fortunate enough to get these small companies sponsor me and send them in my money. Otherwise, it would be impossible, you know? So obviously you've enjoyed success training with ATT. Any chance you move to Florida, so you don't have to go back and forth? I love my people too much, Ariel, you know.

See, when I stepped off the plane and fight week, I smell that fresh Scottish air. You cannot beat that. That is priceless. You go over to Florida, it's 110 degrees. It's 100% humidity. You fucking sweat walking from the car to the gym. No, thank you.

No, thank you. I love it here. It's been raining since I got back. I think we've had two days of sun and bring on the rain. That's what I say. I'm pleased for this cold weather in the fresh air.

I fucking hate the heat. How do they feel about your accent over there in Florida? They can't fucking under understand the word I say. I'm sick of repeat myself to those guys. It's fucking ridiculous. Ridiculous. And then and then when I try and change it up so that they can understand me a bit, I sound like an absolute prick. Like, what do you do at? What's the difference? Let's say you're talking to a guy in a grocery store in Florida. How do you sound? How are you doing, sir? Can you understand me very well? You see the difference? I sound like a fucking asshole. I saw this video that

the UFC put out, I think it's some kind of comedian and he's talking to... Oh, classic. Who's that guy? And what is that language that he was speaking? Scottish comedian and he's speaking how could you put it slang Scottish?

Wow. You know, any of these small villages you travel to like mining, there's maybe 500 in this small village, you know, it's a small mining village. And we all speak the same, you know, we either speak fast or we speak gibberish. That's the only way to describe it.

But it's only the Scottish it can get it. I don't know if you've seen Markish Brimidge trying to understand some of it. He was fucking downfunded by it, man, downfunded. So you speak like that as well with your friend? Of course. Wow. So let me ask you a question. I just want to see you respond in that...

Well, let me ask you a question and see how you respond. Okay, fair enough, fair enough. If I say to you, get yaldi, what does that mean? Get rowdy? Nope. I have no idea. Give it everything. Oh my gosh.

It's kind of the same, right? I guess now in hindsight. Tell me like a sentence about your experience and something that happened to this past week and I'll see if I understand what you're talking about. Let me see that some of the messages I was getting from Facebook from the girls that were saying I was looking off a bra on Saturday night.

Oh gosh. I'm guessing since it was from a girl, you were looking sexy? Of course. What does your girlfriend think about that? What does your girlfriend think about that? Fuck, she hates it. Fucking hell. The price she's no fucking down here to try to stab me with a fork in my right now for saying that.

How long have you been together? Three years. Wow, so she saw you before you became a UFC fighter. She was there from the beginning. She's been there from the beginning, you know, and she still fucking hates me as much now as she did then. Why does she hate you? Because I'm a typical guy, typical Scottish guy.

typical Scottish guy a prick Hey by the way what was it like when you got the call that you were going to be the first Scottish fighter in the UFC

is that something that you were striving for did you want that distinction What sorry Did you want to be the first Scottish fighter Is that something that you were striving for Of course I did Of course I did

You know the only person It was coming close to me Well the only person It was close to me at the time Was John Calderwood You know we're training the same gym And I used to tell her every day there's no way that a fucking chick is beating me

getting to the UFC. You know, I used to tell that every day you might beat me in sparring, but you're no beating me getting to the fucking UFC. So I wanted that level above her, you know, just to keep it on a place that I made it before her,

so I was happy at that. Well, that is a great distinction, but you did lose that UFC debut. How much does that bother you? I feel like you're the kind of guy that is still kind of bothered by this. Only when people bring it up. As I say, I can switch off and forget,

things very easily. That is a fucking surer topic. He got me in my worst day and I got him in his best day. That's the only way I can put it. He was fucking lucky, put it that way. When I got the phone call, I was actually sitting with my girlfriend, right? I was in a Chinese

buffet and I was on my six plate. My six plate and I was looking at the puddings thinking, I'm going to tackle that right now. And my manager called me saying, can you make 146 pounds on Saturday? and I looked at the buffet and I looked back at my phone

and I said, fuck it, take the cake away, you know, I'm going to make it and I made it in five days notice, 30 pounds, 32 pounds in five days. It was fucking horrendous. But you better believe that fucking pisses me off to the highest order.

You know, it's a fight I would love to get back. Jimmy's a nice kid, you know, and I'm sure he would love that fight as well and an even playing field, you know, the both of us at are best. So what do you want next? any of them put them up and I will knock them fucking down it was unfortunate that I got injured

heading into the siever fight or he would have been in the receiving end of that fucking left hand on Saturday night you know that was a fucking huge blow for me it was one of those camps that nothing went right I blew my knee out I blew my back out you name it it was getting fucking blew out you know and he was so lucky that I never made it to Stockholm so lucky so even that seaver fight even though he's coming off a loss bring him to Dublin

I would love to go on that is it October card I believe it's 24th bring him over to Dublin and I will smash him into the ground all right mark my words you want to fight on the Dublin card

of course I want to find the Dublin card I'm healthy I'm ready to go Redmond didn't lay a fucking gloving me on Saturday night I'm ready to go I want to get in there and make that money you know and get back out fresh and good looking collect that money for this beard well so we're going to

going to let the beard grow all the way to your next fight? Of course, this is going nowhere. I love it. As I said before, if they pay it stays, Ariel. They pay it stays. What a pleasure this has been. A great debut, Robert. Hey, yes?

Before we go, let me show you this. Have you ever tasted one of these bad boys, Ariel? No. What is that? Chocolate? Tunnich tea cake. Wow. This is a Scottish biscuit.

Oh. I am on my 24th box since Saturday. I cannot stop eating these things. Let me show you this fucking things. Please, please, please. So it is a small biscuit with... Oh my gosh. Mars Mal on the inside of it.

Yes. It is the fucking best biscuit in the planet. Really? 21 boxes? 21 boxes is these, mother. Wow, how many and six in each? Wow, I can't even do the math. Six and eight.

A hundred and twenty years. I don't fuck a box. I don't know if you have heard my slogan before. I am not here to fuck about, whether it's fighting or eating fucking biscuits. How much you weigh right now? How much you weigh? Probably 175.

Wow. Honest? You think so? What are we two days? Wow, Jesus. That's a lot. I was 164 going back into the octagon and Saturday night. Oh, okay.

Not too bad. 20 pounds you gained. So, Sansein, 21 boxes of these, five haggis suppers I don't know if you've ever heard of haggis I've heard of haggis never had the pleasure though that is another that is another tremendous Scottish dish

I've had six six supple have you heard of a chippy before you know what a chip is no chip shop hmm please tell me you know what a chip shop is no clue tell me

have you ever had fish and chips oh yes yes have you seen a traditional Scottish fish and chip shop negative where they batter everything. You know what batter is? Sure.

When they deep grill it, yeah. Fry it. So from Mars bars to Snickers to Hageus to fish, everything goes in that fucking friar. And it is the best taste in the fucking water. So they get Hageus and they fry it. And it comes out to chip shop with brown sauce on it.

It is absolutely amazing. Haggis is a meat? You've never heard of haggis. No, I've heard of it from, so I married an axe murderer. Have you ever seen that film? Yep. They talk about haggis, but I don't know what it is.

What exactly is it? Right, let me explain to you what it is. Please. Haggis is a small Scottish animal, okay? And it has four legs, and two of them are smaller than the other. Okay? Okay. So this is the leg, so they have one here like this.

They walk like this. And they can only go from side to side on the hillside. They cannot go up and down because one leg is short or another. Okay. So what you do to catch? these little guys, your friend goes to one side of the hill and you start at the other side. You scare them along the hill. They cannot go up and down. They can only go in straight lines and you catch them in the bag at the other side. And that is supper. Wow, what do they look like?

Like small hedgehogs. Gosh. Only in Scotland? You do your homework aerial. Yes. You do your homework cereal son and get back to me about that. Okay. Have you ever worn a kilt before? Fuck. I wore a cult to my last fight aerial. Which one? On Saturday? UFC 171 in Dallas. Yeah. My walkout, I had my quilt on and my spawn. And it was unfortunate with the Reebok deal this time.

I couldn't wear my quilt to the octagon, you know, that's the only thing. I mean, the Reebok deal, it's good for us right now. But as in taking my identity away with my quilt, you know, it's... It wasn't a good thing. It went down very, very harshly. Let me tell you that. I told the UFC officials what I fucking thought right away. But, yeah, I wear a kill all the time.

You know what? A traditional Scotsman does not wear underwear under his kilt. Yes, I have heard that. You know that, right? I know that, yes. Are you the same? So, uh? Are you the same?

Are you a traditional Scotsman? I'm 100% Scottish. So when I go out wearing my kilt, I do not wear underwear, Aero. I love it. Have you ever played the bagpipes before? I haven't got the long capacity

for those fuckers. Ariel, you can imagine going out on a Saturday night in Scotland with your coat on. The girls know that you do not have underwear on. Oh my Lord.

It makes for a fun night, believe me. When's the proper time to wear the kilt? I mean, is it more for formal occasions or you can wear it any time? Weddings and stuff. Weddings.

So why would you wear it out on a Saturday night? Some crazy mothers like to do that, you know. If you're brave enough, you brave the Scottish weather, the cold, the rain, and you've got no kilken, you've got no pants on. Some of us like to do it, and I'm one of those guys. I would imagine it feels good, you know, the breeze. Oh, tremendous. You have no idea. Listen, when you go home, try your girlfriend skit on

and open the fridge door, open the freezer door and stand in front of it and letting me know how that feels. All right. It's a deal. This is amazing. I really enjoyed this. We're going to do it again soon, Robert. I appreciate the time.

Best of luck to you in your next fight, but more importantly, congratulations on this big win on Saturday. It was a great moment, and I know it meant the world to you. You really came up big, and you made it a memorable one with the jumping out of the cage and all that.

So kudos to you. Thank you very much. I was an emotional wreck that night, and it will not happen again. I appreciate it. by the way, and I'm happy we finally were able to get you on the show that you were able to carve out some time for us because you've been hard to get in touch with. Really? No, I'm kidding.

I've been holding you for fucking a year aerial, so don't give me that shit. All the best to you. We'll talk to you soon. Thank you, Robert. Take easy, my man. Cheers. There he is. Robert Whiteford.

Great stuff from him joining us from Scotland. Learned a lot. Learned a lot there. a nice young man who came up big as I said was very emotional and jumped out of the cage and it was really a fantastic

afternoon for the UFC and their debut event in Scotland. All right, that does it for today's interviews. We went a little longer. Mr. New York, Rick, are you there? Okay.

What could he possibly be doing at four o'clock? Oh, okay, so let's go inside the vault. I'm being told that he is, yeah, do we want to go inside the vault? Nah, I don't know. I feel like we've ran out of time. How long is that clip anyway?

The clip that I wanted to show, yeah, it's like a five-minute clip, the clip that I wanted to show, but I feel like because it's already four o'clock, we need to capitalize on this. What's going on here? I hear an echo now. I'm here.

Oh, there he is. Sorry to disturb you. Where were you? You know, I'm prepping for inside the vlog. What is there to prep? It's a clip to play. Yeah, it's that easy. It just happens. It's just magic.

Should I play it or not? I feel like we've run out of time here. Yeah, let's try and move faster than if you don't feel it's a must-se. By the way, I love this interview. This interview, I'll set it up, and then you can go look it up yourself. How about that? That's perfect. This week's Inside the Vault was going to be a post-fight interview with Jim Miller.

After UFC 124 in Montreal, he defeated Charles Olivera. And he had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. Interestingly enough, he also was on the same card as his brother Dan. and they both won. And, you know, as we saw very recently, Dan lost, and it might be the end of his UFC run. He fought on the tough finale. But the reason I wanted to play this clip was because Jim was annoyed

about the influx of WEC fighters coming to the UFC, and he was saying that he thought that they would all get weeded out rather quickly. Boy, was he wrong about that one. Holy moly. Benson Henderson. Anthony Pettis, of course, Donald Cironi getting the next title shot. If Donald Cironi wins, the top three lightweights that came over will all have been UFC champions since coming over to WC. So he had a big chip on his shoulder and he was saying that they were going to get weeded out. This is prior to UFC 125 when Pettus fought, excuse me, when Maynard fought Edgar for the second time,

Pettus was getting the title shot. And, you know, actually, if memory serves me correct, this was a couple of days before Pettus Bendo and the final WC. Pettis won that fight, showtime kick and all, but we knew what the stipulation was going to be. So Miller was a little annoyed. He was on this great winning streak. Didn't end up getting his title shot, of course. He ended up losing after beating Kamal Shaloros.

He ended up losing to Benson himself. So anyway, I thought it would have been fun to look back at that interview, especially because Jim is fighting. He's on a two-fight losing streak. He needs a big win. He's fighting this weekend in Chicago against Danny Castillo. So if you want to relive that interview, type in Jim Miller, Ariel Hawani, UFC 124.

It will come up on YouTube. It's just funny to look. look back and see just how wrong Jim Miller. Great guy, not trying to rub it in his face, but boy, did he call that one wrong. Way wrong. Anyway, let's look at the questions and comments of the day. Before we do that, let's talk about two things we got sent to us. My first thing that I wanted to bring up, yes, good point. My good friend, Andy Foster of the California State Athletic Commission, the executive director,

sent me this poster that I wanted to highlight quickly. There it is. Mr. New York Rick is holding it. You can, if you're a gym owner, a fighter, whatever, you want to showcase this in your gym, show it off to the people, teach the people a thing or two. You can do so by emailing Andy, and he will hook you up. What exactly is this poster?

So, I mean, you know, I don't think it's going to be anything that somebody's not aware of in the sense that, like, the fighters in the gym, perhaps, you know, the lower level guys, but the guys that, you know, that we discuss on a daily basis, the higher level guys in MMA who are used to this kind of gym atmosphere. this is not going to be like breaking news to them. But I think what it is going to do is just remind them every day that they're in the gym

the kind of consequences of, you know, making a proper cut. And even, you know, in some cases not making a cut at all, fighting at a weight that's more appropriate for yourself. So it has, you know, all kinds of tips and tricks just and recommendations, just basically, you know, fight at a weight that your body can respond properly to. And not only will, you know, it benefit your. your long-term health, but it'll just help you in the cage. Like it talks about the types of things that, you know, that happened when you do treat your

body in this way that's so severe. When you make your body, you know, go into shock, when you're doing these drastic weight cuts and dehydrating yourself, the consequences are not only long-term, but almost immediate in terms of your performance in the cage. So I don't think this is anything anybody doesn't know. I think we kind of all assume, you know, the negative side effects, but people still kind of take the risk. What I think this will do is if you're training in the gym and you see this poster out of the corner of your eye, you may think twice about, you know, what you're

doing to prepare for that weight cut down the line. It may be just a reminder of what could potentially be in line for you. Yes, and Andy has been on the show before saying that bad weight cuts more detrimental to the sport and its athletes than PDs. That's what he believes. So he wanted to share that. His email address, Andy.foster at dc.c.c.com.com. Now, Why are people telling me that Mr. Whiteford was jerking the old chain about his... About the haggis? Yeah. It's not a small Scottish hedgehog?

No, no, no. It's... Did you know that? I did because there's a guy named Jeff Gallo, who I know, who, you know, discussed with me haggis one time. And I've come to find that it's the giblets of like a sheep. So essentially, you know, the organs, the... the liver, the kidneys and all that, in the stomach lining and prepared. So it's a dish prepared from sheep's guts, essentially.

Honestly, I would... You bit it, hook-line-and-sinker, though. No, because a little hamster with uneven legs, it all sounded very weird. Listen, he spends a good tale, I'll tell you that. But who am I mean, he said it was such conviction. And he seemed... Now, can we for a moment digress away? I feel like that was an all-time debut right there.

That was up there. That was a big one. So Robert really brought it. But yeah, he got you. So he trolled me, huh? Just, you know, take the L on that one. You got caught. Yeah.

All right. Well done, Robert. I'll get you back. One more thing we got sent. Yes. We got sent this shirt from our buddy, Tyler Ransom. Yes. Who was on the show, I think, in October 2012.

So quite a while ago. And we want to thank him for checking in. The website where you can, you know, learn about Tyler. he was dealing with, I believe it was a kidney disease, is HealingTyler.com. So you can check in on his progress there, see what's up. I think he has a Facebook page. I believe the Facebook page is Facebook.com slash healing dash Tyler. I think that's correct.

That is it. Good people there. We appreciate them sending us some swag. Shag. What do they call it? Shwag. Swag. Swag.

Swag. Swag. Yeah. Swag. Thank you. On a related note, shout out to Ash. I know she's at the, well, she's going through some stuff, and we want to send our best wishes to her.

I thought she sent us some swag as well. No, no, she didn't send us any swag. But I am wearing, I'm wearing that earring from, this is at least two to three years ago when we did one of the first iterations of Rick's picks, and I lost, and, you know, people were supposed to send earrings for me to wear. I'm rocking the one that she made. Shout out to Ash. She's the best.

She's the best. All right. All right. Let's hit these Twitter questions. Rapid Fire. Oh, actually, no, I'm sorry. We're going website first, as usual. Okay.

Hold on. Let me do one thing here. Okay. First question for you, Mr. Helwani. Will the UFC return soon? Ariel, do you think the Glasgow event and the crowd was enough to have them come back again? Or will it be like UFC 72 in Belfast where it hasn't returned? Well, this is me replying with zero insider knowledge on this particular

topic. I would be shocked if they didn't come back sooner rather than later. Now, is it, you know, within the next 365 days, who knows? But that was A, a very successful event from the incage action, which you can't really predict, but, you know, sometimes events when there's a great crowd, everyone seems

to rise to the occasion, but more importantly, they sold out in a matter of minutes, as Robert pointed out, unless he was lying about that as well. But no, I know that for a fact. So they sold out, they finally got a nice new stadium there, and it's big, it's like 11,000 people. It's perfect for a fight night. yeah, I would be shocked if they're not back soon rather than later. And also on top of all that, which is important, they have some draws now coming out of there. I mean, they have Joanne Calderwood, they have Stevie Ray, they have Robert Whiteford, more coming up as well. And that's an important thing to know.

Michael Bisbing. After a win on Saturday, how far do you think Bisbing realistically is from a title shot? It feels like he's never far away and has been a top talent in division for a long time. He seemed keen on the idea of a Vitor or Henderson rematch next. Would you be in favor of this? And would a win in one of those fights? be enough to justify a title shot. Okay, so this is what I said on Saturday, and I'd like to reiterate it right now. Michael Bisping is now 2 and 0 since the Rockhold fight. He defeated C.B. Dulloey, defeated Toslady's. I thought two solid wins. One more win against the top five, top eight guy, he should get a title shot. He's long overdue. He's been around long enough. I believe he has the most or second most UFC wins without ever getting a title shot. This is a guy who has been screwed because he's been put in there with guys who were, in my opinion, cheating the system to a degree. Yeah, sure, maybe what they were doing at the time, you know, flew under the

radar, it was kosher, whatever you want to say. In hindsight, the guy got screwed. And I think that a lot, a lot of other fighters, less deserving fighters, have received title shots over him. And I don't mean to, you know, harp on this, but I'll bring it up. Alexander Augustin's getting a title shot coming off of a knockout loss. If Michael Bispe goes on a three-fight winning streak against top opponents, all in or around the top 10, he deserves it. Finally, and I saw some people say, well, this isn't, you know, the Hall of Fame where you're being rewarded for body work.

You know what? Enough people have gone to tell shots off of losses. And I'm not even talking about Gustavsson. In the last two, three years, I'm okay with Bispin getting it. Now, I will say this. Rocco deserves it. And then the winner of Romero, Jacre, which they should do, they haven't announced, but I'm assuming they will do because it makes sense.

That person should get it. So if he fights, let's say, December, January, and wins, keep him on the sidelines, let him wait after those two fights, and give him that damn title shot because he deserves it, and he's done enough. And I think it would be a great story. It would be a crime, as I've said time and again, if Michael Bisping retires without ever fighting for the belt. This is a man who has, he's answered the bell. Look who he's fought. He's fought a who's who. You can make the case that he's fought some of the tough, I mean, look at that body of work.

And yes, he stumbled in that big fight. but I honestly sincerely feel like if he wins three in a row against top competition, they should give it to him. Well, two things on that. Absolutely. Bisbing's body of work is incredible. And also the idea, you know, he admitted on the show that, you know, he's faltered in those moments where he had the opportunity to fight for that title.

He, you know, he was on the cusp of it so many times. So I think, you know, nobody realizes, you know, where he truly stands as much as Bisbing. He seems very self-aware in that regard. And then another thing I found interesting is in this question, it feels like he is never far away and has been a top talent in division for a long time. If he had lost this, I guarantee, I can guarantee you, we would have been hearing,

is this the last shot for Michael Bisping? And we hear it every single time. But the truth of the matter is he's always a few wins away because, A, he knows how to sell a fight, and B, he's fighting the toughest guys in the world, and he remains relevant. I think he will eventually get this title shot, but it wouldn't even...

I wouldn't even... It wouldn't even surprise me if this is not the time. Could be the next time. He's always going to be around. And especially with the way he conditions himself. He's not one of these guys who seems to be fading. Maybe he's not in his prime anymore, but he's not far from it. And his conditioning is never an issue.

And to tie back to this question, sure, give him Vitor. Vitor's ranked fourth. If you beat Vitor Belfort at four, even if he's not the same guy, and can you imagine the emotion leading up to that fight? You know, that's something that Michael has been missing in his last couple of fights. No one's really engaged with him, and that's fine. He's able to do it for the both of them. You see him at the win.

But could you imagine that? So, yeah, give him Vitor. And if he beats Vitor, let's do it. A win over number four, that shouldn't get you a title shot in this day and age. When Romero is three, Jokre is two, they're going to fight, and then Rockhold is one. Give him the damn title shot if he wins that next fight. Now, I'm not saying for him to fight, you know, an unranked guy. He has to earn it.

But if he wins that next fight, I say give it to him. Okay, this next one's pandering from our buddy Ashley. I'm just going to read it. I don't even want your response. Ladies' entrance. Just for fun, what did you think of Talas' latest's entrance? I was watching it and thinking somewhere Ariel Hawani's head is exploding. I don't even want your thoughts.

Next question. I just want to tell you one quick thing. One quick thing. All right, all right. On Friday, this is a bit of a left field thing here, but I just wanted to share it. On Friday, I always put my kids to sleep at around 8 o'clock, but I was a little jonesing to get out, so I took them for a walk to put them to bed Friday night. And then I was realizing being a loser that I am, oh my, it's,

it's almost nine. I'm going to miss Bell Tor. Yep. This is my life. Um, so I try to, I try to, uh, record it on my phone by going to the Time Warner app. Do you have Time Warner? Yeah, I do. You have the, I don't know if you have a, I don't utilize that, but I, I'm aware of what, what it is. Yeah. It's a great function. Well, I couldn't figure out how to, uh, I couldn't figure out how to, uh, I couldn't figure out how to record it. Little did I know. I guess I forgot. I have it on like a season thing, so it just recorded it anyway. So I ran back for no reason, and I kind of cut short a very enjoyable evening with my wife walking around with my kids sleeping in the stroller. But what I did realize while I was playing around with this app was that there are certain channels that I can watch if I'm not home, like out and about, and I'm not even using, you know, if I'm not even using Wi-Fi.

So I realized that Fox Sports One is one of those channels. So on Saturday, I actually wasn't home for the fight. I was watching it on my phone. Now it completely murdered my data, but I did get to watch the afternoon card from parts unknown out and about. So I wasn't able to hear everything perfectly, and I was kind of picking my spots. Like if there was a break in the action and we know those breaks can be sometimes a little much, I would shut it off and then go back when the fight started. So I saw and experienced the walkout, but I couldn't tell that the entire crowd was singing it until later that night

when I re-watch it from my television, via my television, and when I saw that, I got to admit, I mean, I know you're kind of playing around with me here, but that was a very emotional thing. To hear an entire crowd sing along with a walkout song doesn't happen, regardless of the song, regardless of the arena. So I thought that that was a pretty,

I don't know if that song means something to the Scottish people. I don't know if they, you know, they were just a happy mood or if it's an easy song to recite. But think about that. The Brazilian was walking out to that song against a fellow UK fighter, and yet they couldn't care less. They were actually singing along.

I think that speaks volume to the song and to what that song means to a lot of people and the feelings that it brings out in a lot of people. So I know that you make fun about it. No, I'm being really honest. I'm being really honest here. And I heard from a lot of people who said, this is the kind of song that I would play for my kids

when they were born. That's why it means so much to me. So I can understand why a simpleton like you who has never had kids before doesn't get where I'm coming from. But you know who understands where I'm coming from? from Tony McGregor. That's a man who understands. So anyway, kudos to the Scottish people. They came out big and in that moment was really special. I can watch it over and over again.

It sounds like Roberts' walkout was worth catching too, so go to his Facebook page, people. Okay. What do you think the UFC, sorry, should do with Joseph Duffy? He looked magnificent in victory at Fight Night 72. Who would like to see him matched up against M. Why? He is obviously a fantastic and a highly talented fighter and should do really well. I'm excited for him. Yes, as am I. Can I just say something about Joseph that I find very refreshing and really a lot of fun to watch is that he's completely different than Connor and even the rest of the SBG guys. Like the rest of the SBG guys, this might be just a coincidence, but they have a little,

you know, they're a little confident, cocky, all that stuff. They're outspoken. Duffy's the complete opposite. And he fights, he fights different to a degree as well. I mean, he's a lot more calm, cool, and collected. He's a lot more technical. I mean, we know that he was a former boxer. He left him and made to go to boxing, came back.

to MMA. But I really enjoy watching him fight because at first glance, you would say, oh, this is kind of a, this is more of a striker. He doesn't really know what he's doing on the ground. And then you see what happens on the ground. And that triangle that he slapped on, incredibly impressive stuff, especially against the guy like George. I've been really truly impressed with just, you know, his demeanor, his composure. You know what I'm saying? Like in the cage, he really seems to be like the master of his domain and incredibly composed out there. So I think he has been a really nice addition to that lightweight division. As for who's next, I saw some people throw out Dustin Porre.

I think that would be tremendous in Dublin. Porier told me that he wanted to fight in Dublin. And I think the fans there have really taken to him, and he's kind of done a 180 on them. They really like him. I think that would be a lot of fun. So Pori, sign me up. I like that one.

Okay. After his knockout win against Hans Stringer in Glasgow, what is next for Alir Latifie? Feels like he deserves a ranked opponent by now. Would be nice to see him in a war with someone like Littlenog, Maldonado or Cummins, and also any news about Rampage's next opponent or when he can fight again. Been quite a while now since we heard something Izzy-injured, Izzy sideline due to the issues of Bel-Tor. No update there because that trial, that legal process is still unfolding, so no real update on Rampage.

As for Latifie, yeah, I mean, the guy is like the definition of a sledgehammer. It just feels like it's really painful when he hits you. And then what's next for him? It's a good question. I'll throw this one out. How about the winner of Fajiao versus Cummins or the winner of Volante versus Tom Lawler?

That's happening this weekend in Chicago or the Fajiao Cummins fight is happening the following weekend in Rio. I'd like to see that kind of step up. Man, Fajau versus Latifie would be something. Two fire hydrants just slinging at each other. Both of those work and the timing works out as well. But I agree it would be nice to see him take a little bit of a step up.

I mean, remember, not that long. ago he lost, so it's not like he's on some crazy winning streak, but it's always fun to see a guy, you know, take, look at Jan Blockowitz. I don't know if this comes up. He's fighting Anthony Johnson, number one versus number 12. Holy moly. I loved what Anthony said about that. He's like, when I, you know, I was down in the rankings when I got my shot, and now it's my turn to pay the favorite back. I really like that a lot. Yeah. How would you rate Jojo Calderwood's performance last Saturday? She's a very marketable and fan favorite fighter, but since joining the USC, she isn't performing up to her potential and expectations.

Maybe she needs to change camps, stop surrounding herself with amateurs, and yes, man, have focused more on something mental, this is very, I guess, they know more about her camp than we do. What's next for her, and how do you see her future unfold? Well, by the way, she changed camps last time, and maybe that was part of the problem. She went to All-Stars, which, you know, it didn't work out for her. And, of course, as she talked about on this show, she was in a completely different space, and she clearly was going through some personal problems.

now she goes back to Scotland she's part of that team the dinky ninja fight team if I got that correct and it started out a little rocky for her it was pretty clear to me that she was rocked early on but what was impressive was the way that she rebounded and obviously won the

second and third round and I think most of the judges had it for her in the first round as well so I don't know I think that there was maybe a lot of pressure on her shoulders early on and she was undefeated coming into the UFC she didn't win on the show obviously but saw a debut and I think a lot of people were kind of penciling her in for a title shot in 2015.

Things happen. Life happens. And I want to see her get through this. I also think she probably came back a little sooner than she, you know, in a perfect world would have liked because of this Scotland show. So I'd like to see her figure everything out, get in the right space. Obviously, she looked a lot more comfortable. And you remember the look on her face? We were talking about that against Morose.

It was BJ Penn, UFC 118-esque. She seemed completely different. She was smiling. She seemed happy. She was even smiling in the middle of the first. fight, but I don't know if she's shown her complete game thus far in the UFC. I agree with you on everything you broke my heart mentioning BJ Pan. Courtney Casey Sanchez on what?

Less than two weeks notice was very impressive. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I don't think a lot of people knew who she was prior to this fight. She showed a lot of hard and will as well. I mean, she was game. Yeah. You know, that first round was something. I think that won fight of the night and deservedly so.

Who's next for Tony Ferguson, the crazy somersaulting, elbow-throwing wild man? is the lightweight division? Oh, and then separately, is the lightweight division evolving too fast for Josh Thompson? I don't know about that. I think Josh has been around the game a long time. I mean, I think it's interesting that you would give so much credit to Tony Ferguson and then say, oh, well, is Josh Thompson done? I mean, he's just faced... Who me or this guy? No, the question itself. Yeah, exactly. But, so what's next for Ferguson, though? Okay, so this has been thrown around. I mean, let's see him go against a guy like an Eddie Albrez. Why not? What do you think? I listen I've been riding the El Cuckooie bandwagon Have you? For quite a little.

Oh yeah. I don't remember that. He's my guy. What? Go back to my tweets from the days that he fights every time. He's my guy. But I'm into that. I'm into that.

I mean, I think, you know, for Eddie Alvarez, I think his aspirations are a little bit higher there. Yeah. But I love that fight on paper. Habib. Wow. Too soon? Why is he only 11? Like, why is Bobby Green ranked ahead of him?

Habib is a prospect killer. I guess I'm looking at the old rankings here because there's no way Josh Thompson is ahead of him, right? Yeah, I mean... Maybe. Who knows with these rankings? Yeah. Anyway, I'd put him...

If not, how about the winner of Barbosa Felder this weekend? That's a great one. Because I think it's more realistic, but, you know, if Eddie was... See, the thing about Eddie is, you know, he says, I never picked my fights, and... Sure. If they gave it to him, I'm sure he'd be game.

and I think that would be an incredible fight. Okay, Josie Aldo's claim, what about it, to continue using IVs? Yeah. Does that throw any doubt over his future in the UFC? Is he looking for a way not to fight, or is he justified in taking the stance? So back in February, I was on Fox Sports Live, and we were talking about this new rule that they were going to put in baseball, where they were going to find guys if they took too long in between pitches, right?

And David Ortiz, of the Boston Red Sox, went on this, this, this profanity-laced tirade where he said that this was BS and that he was not going to take any fines and he would take as long as he want. And what I said on the Fox Sports Live show was, just do it. Don't say it. Don't tell the world what you're going to do, especially if it's going against what you're supposed to be doing. And that's what I would say to Jose Aldo. In a case like this, if you are going to try to beat the system, don't tell the world you're going to do that. It's like, you know what?

I found out that TRT is illegal. Well, guess what? F all of you, I'm still going to do it. Well, that's kind of dumb. Now you're just telling them, you know, you're telling them that you're going to try to break the rules. I still think a lot has to work itself out as far as this IV situation is concerned. Quite frankly, I'm not sure if they knew that it was banned from the WADA code when they put all of this into play. I don't think this is something that they were shooting for.

So I think they need to figure it all out. I don't want this comment to take anything away from that press conference that he had because I thought it was a pretty damn impressive press conference and agree with him or not. You got to give the guy a lot of credit for speaking his mind when you know, it's going to ruffle some feathers in Las Vegas. I just wish when it comes to things like this, if he really is going to, you know, do it, and he thinks it's necessary for him to be 100% when he fights,

just do it. Don't tell anyone. But, hey, here I am kind of telling him to lie. So I would hope everyone is honest, and I appreciate when honesty is used in these press conferences and these interviews. It just kind of struck me as, well, why are you telling everyone this? Well, so then the natural follow-up to that is,

do you think that Aldo's disregard for the new IV band, coupled with the recent testing fiasco in Brazil, calls into question his integrity when it comes to this type of style? No, because I don't think that this stuff is... Look, I think Aldo's in a spot now where he's very vocal, he's a champion, and I think he's actually, you know, in a refreshing way, he is actually taking this role as being this sort of ambassador to heart. I mean, I think he's actually going out there and saying,

look, at this stage of my career, I need to speak up when I think I'm being, wrong. Now, is he in fact being wrong? Does he have a gripe? I mean, only him and the UFC knows this, because only they know how much he's getting paid and all this stuff. I do think that it's important for a champion and someone of his stature when he thinks something isn't going to plan to speak up. And I think he's doing that, you know, quite consistently. And especially when it's these touchy subjects that might get him in hot water, at least not put him, you know, in the right kind of favor with the UFC. So kudos to the guy. I think it's great. Do you see a parallel here between himself and George St. Pierre toward the end of his career?

No, he's way more outspoken. He's definitely way more outspoken, but I get the feeling that like this is, this is leading to something and that he might not believe. Oh, leave? Yeah. I don't know. I mean, he has, I think he might be getting run down and it's possible. It's certainly possible because he wasn't like this at the beginning of his career. Exactly. This, this, I feel like I'm seeing similar signs. Now definitely George was a little less, you know, forthcoming with exactly. what he was feeling, but he was certainly making it known that there was something there. Well, that would be unfortunate because George made a hell of a lot more money than Jose Aldo did up until this point. So, you know, you get the feeling that if things goes away

in the next two, three years, he's going to be making more money in the next two or three years than he did his entire career. So it would be a shame to leave now. I've never gotten the feeling until right this moment that he has a foot out the door. It just feels like, for whatever reason he's not seeing eye to eye with the UFC. He doesn't seem to be on the same page as them. And for whatever reason, he doesn't give an F anymore. He's just speaking up. It makes for fascinating viewing for us, right, when we're watching a champion talking about, it's one thing for a lower-level guy to speak like this. It's another thing for a champion to criticize the Reebok deal, this new drug testing procedure to, you know, talk about McGregor and all this

stuff and the way they treat him, to not even watch UFC 189. It's a very interesting thing. I don't think this is bad per se. I don't think everyone needs to be on the same page as UFC as long as they can do business and get to the fight. But for him to speak up like this is great. And by the way, it goes back to what I was saying earlier. If he spoke English and was able to communicate with the general population, I think it would do him wonders.

I think it really would. Okay, Fador. Which promotion would benefit the most if they were to sign Fador? UFC, Bellator, WSOF. Oh, which would... Probably Bellator. because their big stars are few and far between. They probably have to pay them a lot.

I guess, based off this question, I would say Beltor. But let me be the last to say that I really do want to see him in the UFC. And that's no knock on Beltoe. And that's not me being a nut hugger or whatever. Who doesn't want to see Fador fight the best? Who doesn't want to finally see him in that octagon being announced by Bruce Buffer, fighting, you know, whether it's Verduem or Frank Meir or Kane Velasquez, if he really does want to come back at this point, the only reason to come back is to fight in the UFC. Now, he may need money,

he may have some issues. We don't know about that. But from a pure competition standpoint, athletic standpoint, who wants to see him fight, you know, any of the heavyweights that are in Bellator? Right? We want to see him fight the best. We want to finally see one of the greatest, if not the greatest of all time, the fight in the UFC. Who doesn't want to see that? Right now, Scott Koker would be completely lying to us

if he told us that the heavyweight division in Beltaur was the same as the UFC. It's not even close. It might be their weakest division of all. Let's see him in the UFC. Okay, let's see how quickly we can get through these Twitter ones. This is it. No.

What was the y'all must have forgot moment from Glasgow? Alira Latifi. Glasgow. Glasgow. My apologies. Yes. I don't listen to what you say. Alir Latifie?

You see the y'all must have forgot moment? No. What's the y'all must have forgot? That's a good question. Is it possible that it was Michael Bisping? No, my point was we've never forgotten. And I feel like we have never forgotten. About Michael in particular?

Yeah. Really? You don't think people are kind of down on him for a second? Yeah, for two. It's the pattern with Michael Bisming is consistent. It's the same. Every single time. I talk about it every time.

Because it gives me the opportunity because it's always the same. Is it possible was Evan Dunham? I like that. Because he was coming in and most people didn't think he was going to take that one and he looked pretty damn good doing it. Or, dare I say, was it Dr. Neville herself, Joanne Calderwood? I'm going to give it to Dunham, but I'm okay with that nomination as well. It wasn't Latifie.

No. Sorry to say. Dunham. But I mean, that was a pretty big stinker in Poland. And she came back and overcame at her. adversity to come back as well. I mean, I don't know. That one was more impactful. They can split it. I'm going to go with Goldwood. They'll split it. Any updates on Anderson Silva? Could it be possible that the matchup with Michael Bisbin could finally happen?

No updates. This is a tricky one. It seems like it's going to take some time to play out and there's many layers to it. But as far as when he's going to return, I have no updates. I would love to see Anderson Silver versus Michael Bisbing, though. That would be something, yeah. With the UFC in Chicago this weekend, will you be doing your yearly sit-down interview with CM-Pon? No comment. Okay. Last thing, thoughts on the upcoming Bellator MMA dynamite event,

do you think it will bring more attention to glory kickboxing? This is the last question of the day. They just sent us a picture of how it's going to look inside the arena. Did you see it? I did. Now, my question about this picture is there appears to be action inside both fighting services. Yeah, that's not how it's going to go down. Yeah.

I do think it's going to be important and beneficial for Glory to be linked with an MMA promotion number two because perhaps there's going to be some MMA fan out there. It was like, ooh, I never heard about this. It's a lot of fun knockouts. Big blow that Joe Schilling isn't a part of it. Sure. I think they should put Pat Barry on the card because he has that connection between MMA and kickboxing. It would be perfect for that card.

Do we know any of the fights yet? We know Paul Daly, right? Who won? Yeah, we know Paul Daly's going to be in it. you know, Joe Schilling was previously. Yeah, there's going to be three, right? I believe there's more than three. I believe there's four.

But we're going to hear some news soon, that I know. All right. So there will be some news soon on the upcoming dynamite card. But obviously, you know, both of those, you know, brands are doing well on spike. And if, you know, Glory can convert some MMA fans and, you know, who knows, maybe some kickboxing fans, haven't been watching Bellator, but, you know, see the new product and also jump on that way. So I think it's a win-win situation.

And most importantly for Belator, they need to figure out how to be different than the UFC, as we've talked about before. Back in the day, Scott Coker could throw out, you know, cyborg and Gina, things of that nature. You can't do that anymore.

There are women's fights all over the UFC, so you have to be different. You have to switch it up, and this is a way of doing that. Something special, something unique that the UFC doesn't do doesn't think of doing, wow, we put on hybrid shows. We put on kickball.

We put two rings in the middle of the dam marina. You have to do that. And that's why I'm okay with them doing things like Kimbo Slice and all that. It's their way of trying to be different. Because if they're the same, no one's going to watch them. Because we get that with UFC. There's enough UFC out there. You know what I mean?

Well, I mean, you know, Belator did put on a good traditional show this week. I'm happy you brought that up because I was going to bring that up in the things that we missed. Michael Venham Page? Well, they were criticized for a lot of one-sided fights, squash matches, if you will. Do you have a problem with this? No, I don't. Look, they were on the Sports Center top 10? Twice.

Two fights were on. I believe Ward and Page. So that means that they're doing something, right? I mean, if every time somebody gets knocked out quickly in the UFC and any organization, you know, we're a squash match, I'm sick of it. If the guy signed on the contract, it's a fight, that's it. Yeah, but let's be honest. Those were squash matches. 100%.

Those were one side. The blueprint thus far has been name fighter versus lesser known fighter to a large degree. That's been the blueprint. And look, this is going to work for a short amount of time. It's going to work for a year or two maybe.

But after some time, I'd like to see some more competitive matchups. For now, it's a way of putting over your talent, getting knockouts, getting people talking. Clearly, the MMA fan is attracted to these things. They love knockouts more so than any decision or even a hard fight. Like a classic war back and forth, three-round fight, they prefer a first-round knockout. They want to see what Brennan Ward did on Friday.

So this is going to work. This is going to get people talking. It's going to get people excited. But you can't do it forever. I'll give them a pass for a year or two, but I don't want to see the whole promotion built on this. That's weird, right? I mean, I think there's a balance. You find, you know, ways to build.

There hasn't been much of a balance. It's been very clear what they're trying to do, I think. That's fine. think it'll fall into a groove. You put on the competitive fights, you put on the fights that build your stars. You know, you can't have everybody going through a grinder all the time. And the truth of the matter is, you know, the divisions in Bellator are not going to be as deep as the UFCs. So, you know, those competitive matchups are not going to be as readily available. So I have no problem with, you know, the matchmaking there. And I enjoyed the card greatly.

I thought it was a fun card. So they have a new Walterway champion. His name is Andre Koreshkov. He defeated Douglas Lima. Yeah, I mean, how about that? I don't think people saw it coming in that manner. Even if, you know, they thought he would win. That was a competitive fight, I thought. I don't think they saw it happening that way. I think that's a bit of a blow promotionally for Belator because he was completely dominated by Ben

Ascran. So it feels a bit weird that he's the champion now. But also Lima versus Daley was a big fight that I think a lot of people want to see. He's just not as popular, right? I mean, it feels it feels like it's a bit of a step backwards for them, right? it's tough but I think he'll be back and I think you know in my in my very in expert opinion I think you know something looked off and I'm sure yes we might see that one again sometime down the line

but MVP is must-see TV for sure absolutely I love the dance moves daily got on track as well went for him and he continues his talk with Josh Josh Kostak although I'm told that don't bank on that being next which is someone what surprising I would do it next because unless they give, you know, Josh, complete cupcake, that might be playing with fire. And Brennan Ward is an interesting character as well. Very boisterous. That was also one-sided, but you got to give him a pass there. That was a fight that was put together in less than a week. Other things that happened, going back to Scotland, our man Patty Houlehan had a very nice win over Vaughn Lee. Von Lee is styling and profile these days with those shades and that beard

and that knit hat. What happened to him? It's like he just, uh, he just discovered Bob Marley or something. If you Google image search him, you would think you got the wrong person. Yeah, it's unbelievable. I fired off some tweets about him. Yes, I saw the one about the girl, taking the girl. Oh, he was still your girlfriend, no doubt about it.

Some real failing marks for the French translator for Mikhail LeBou. I saw that. How bad was it? I saw that on Twitter. Maybe the worst translation I've ever heard. And, you know, we're not used to, I'm not usually privy to this kind of stuff because it's usually Portuguese, Japanese, whatever, so I don't get to see the French side of things. That was horrendous, and I hope all the translators aren't like that.

That guy had a great outfit, and it was almost like they were like, okay, who's the most French-looking translator we can find? They found that guy. The most French-looking. Miquel LeBou deserved better than that. Cormier-Gustisin is official for UFC 192, also official for UFC 199. By the way, 192 in Texas in Houston, early October.

also official for 191 PVZ versus Alex Chambers, Blakowitz versus Rumbos, we said, and John Linnaker making his 135-pound debut against Francisco Rivera. That's a tough one, right? I like that. I like that fight a lot. Yeah, I kind of wish he was staying at Flyweight. I mean, we all wish that, but that was up to him. That one's not on the matchmaking. Ronda Rousey dropped the bomb on Floyd Mayweather,

and I hope she never has to talk about him again. Just walk away from that. That's it. It's done. after that comment at the SB's no more. And then Mike, by the way, very quickly, do you have a problem with her dropping a bomb on Floyd and then hanging with Tyson and all that? Nope. Why?

Because, I mean, that's going to happen. You can't, you know, nobody's perfect, so everybody's going to have some demons, whether, you know, she, she, first of all, I don't think that it was purely a statement about Floyd Mayweather's, you know, activities. And it was more, you know, an attention-grabbing thing. But at the same time, I think everybody's going to have, you know, friends who have done something that or, you know, people they admire and respect and look up to that, you know, have done something that they're not proud of in their past.

You know, if it's as closely tied in this case as Mike Tyson's is to Floyd Mayweather's, then that's, you know, a different story and something for Rhonda to kind of figure out on her own. But I have no problem with that. I mean, Floyd Mayweather is not Mike Tyson. It's not, they're not the same person. So you can't really, you can't really make it apples to. apples because different life experiences, different things have gone on. Mike Tyson served, you know, a debt for what he was alleged to have done, or rather convicted. So I don't, I see why people would, you know, make that, draw that comparison and feel that way. And I have no problem with them doing that. I don't begrudge them.

I don't view them differently. But personally, I don't have a problem with that. Daniel Cormier just broke some big news. He is the man responsible for those witty Luke Rockhold tweets towards Chris Wyden, which is not very surprising, but I would have kept it a little closer to the vest on that one. Josh Barnett is in the new Shark Nato that is this Wednesday. And by the way, shout out to that surfer that beat up a shark in the water. That was awesome. Punched him in the face. Not since Brock Lesnar running into the water on the SummerSlam commercial and F-5ing a shark. Have we seen that kind of display? Yes, good point.

And happy trails finally to the great Mike Swick, who announces retirement on Thursday. Unfortunately, Lawson has returned to the UFC, but a great guy always enjoyed covering him. talking to him and his early run in the UFC with the Swiketeen. That was a lot of fun as well. So good luck to him over at AKA Thailand as he really gets that dream gym off the ground. All right, the UFC is back on Saturday. It's UFC on Fox, Dilleshaw, Barow 2. By the way, who's the favorite of that one?

You'd have to think T.J. Dillishaw would be the favorite. Is he? Are you sure about that? Misha Tate versus Jessica I and the Komen. Edson Barbosa versus Paul Felder and Joe Lozon versus Takenori Gomi He rounds out the main card. Valante versus Lawler, Castillo Miller, Kenny Robertson versus Ben Saunders.

Eddie Wineland returns after a long layoff versus Brian Carraway. Crookshank versus Krause. Nijam versus Hobbrook, Duke, Jessamine Duke versus Elizabeth Phillips, and Steele versus Zach Cummings. He is the favorite. Minus 2.01 plus 186.

So we finally get that rematch. Hopefully nothing crazy happens to you now and then. This is Dilashaw-Burow 2.75. and your main man, Halwani. 2.75. Yeah, because we had to... I like that. I like that. Never happened.

We had 2.5 much all never happens. This is 2.75. Your main man, Halwani will be hosting in Shaitown, the Wayan show, the pre-fight show, and the post-fight show. So how about that? I'll be watching. B-S. I'll be watching. I don't believe you.

Also, Glasgow. Glasgow. Haggis, not a hamster. Not a hamster. Or an even legs. Or a hedgehog. All right. That's it for us.

We're out of time. The cameras are flashing, they're blinking. I don't know what's going on over here, so let's go. You can hit my music. Bill Steinmetz just informed me that it's New York Rick's birthday. Is that today? Say your birthday after all that?

When's your damn birthday? No, isn't it early, August? Can you answer me? Where are you? Sorry, they cut my mic. August 1st. All right, we have some time. UFC 190.

I won't be here for that, but I'll be celebrating. In Rio de Janeiro, I'll have an assayible for you. How about that? My good man, Gilead, Cruz. All right, the show is done. What a show it was. Four hours, almost. A lot of talking, no breaks, but I enjoyed it all. I want to thank Stevie Ray for stopping by. Congratulations to him.

Thank you very much to Demetri's Johnson, who continues to bring it. Make no mistake about it, DJ is on fire as of late. Open your eyes, open your ears. Thank you very much to Ricky Lundell. Great stuff from him. The future. as it pertains to MMA coaching. Thank you very much to Vadim Finklstein, who joined us all the way from St. Petersburg, Russia, and to Vladislav for his translation as well. The great Tony McGregor stopped by,

and we appreciated very much. Congratulations to him and his entire family over the success of their son, brother, cousin, nephew, Connor, Johnny Hendricks, we appreciate the time very much. Good luck in getting that title shot. Congratulations to Holly Holme. Thank you very much to that cheeky little bugger, Robert Whiteford.

Congratulations to him on his big win Saturday in Glasgow. UFC back on Saturday. We're back on Monday. Until then, I say peace. Support for this show comes from Odu. Running a business is hard enough. So why make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other? Introducing Odu.

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