MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani - Episode 376

Episode Date: April 10, 2017

Ariel Helwani speaks to Daniel Cormier (00:03:11), Urijah Faber (00:28:16), Henri Hooft (00:48:25), Patrick Cote (01:13:34), Michelle Waterson (01:27:16), Matt Riddle (01:42:30), and then recaps the weekend in MMA (02:20:34) with NewYorkRic. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The meeting will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly concerned by your gambling or that if someone close, you call 18665330 or visit Comex Ontario.ca. It's the mixed martial arts hour with a mixed martial arts hour back in your life on this Monday, April 10th, 2017. Well, good everyone. I'm Ariel Hawani back inside our New York City studio. Back from beautiful Buffalo. You know, the last time the UFC was in Buffalo, September of 1995, they dubbed that event, UFC 7, the brawl in Buffalo.

Well, I'm dubbing UFC 210 Bazaar in Buffalo, because that's just what it was. On Saturday and Friday, all kinds of bizarre, all kinds of entertainment, all kinds of drama, all kinds of chaos. But overall, I thought it was a successful night for the UFC, of course, $2 million gate, $17,000 plus, sellout crowd, highest gate for a sporting event at the Key Bank Center. But there's a lot to talk about today. By now you know that Daniel Corme has retained the UFC Light Heavyweight title. He defeated Rumble Johnson via submission in the second round. You know that Gagher Musassi won a controversial TKO over Chris Wyman. Very controversial.

We'll talk about that, of course, what happened with Dan Miragliata, the commission, all that stuff and more. And you know that Cynthia Calvillo defeated Pearl Gonzalez. And you know about the controversy there with Pearl Gonzalez. I mean, the New York Athletic Commission had a hand in some kind of weird way in the Maine, Comane and Tri-Main, if you will, or a third to last fight. You know, Patrick Cote retired after his loss to Tiago Alves. You know about Charles Olivera defeating Will Brooks in very impressed fashion and saying he's going back down to 1.45.

It was just that kind of night in Buffalo. I enjoyed it, though, my first time there, and I got to take in some sights and sounds, went to a Sabres game, a Bison's game, didn't go to a Bill's game, they're not playing, didn't get to see the stadium or the Niagara Falls, but I enjoyed it very much. always exciting to be there. So we don't have a lot of time to waste. We're going to do things differently this time. We're going to save my thoughts, New York Rick's thoughts for the end of the show. So around the 3 o'clock hour, I also have some breaking news regarding UFC on Fox 24. I'm going to give that to you then. I'll run down the lineup and then we're going to get to our first

guest right away because we have no time to waste. 245. Matt Riddle will stop by, talk about his budding pro wrestling career. Michelle Waterson, 225. She fights this weekend. Patrick Cote, he'll talk about his retirement at 205, 145, Henry Hooft, the coach of one Anthony Johnson will stop by, and at 125, we'll talk to Uriah Faber about his induction into the UFC Hall of Fame this summer, this July, to be exact. But first, let us go to the phone lines. We're going to the Chicago airport right now where the reigning, defending UFC light heavyweight champion, Daniel Cormier, is standing by.

He has made the connection from Buffalo to Chicago about to board another flight back home to the Bay Area, but he is kind enough, I do believe, to check in with us. D.C., are you there? I'm here, man. I'm here. I'm in Chicago about to head home, but it's tradition. It's rinse, wash, repeat. When, MMA hour.

Go home, spend some time at home, come back, win again, MMA hour. Rinse wash, repeat. I appreciate that. get you, you know, topless in your, in your kitchen or living room, but I'll take this. I'll take this. Straight ball. I am. I took my shirt off in the Chicago airport. I'm just sitting here. People looking at me kind of weird. I like it. Tradition is tradition. Okay. No time to waste. So let's get into it. I actually want to start around Wednesday, Thursday. At what point, Daniel, did you know that this was going to be, you talked about it afterwards, but that this was going to be a bit of a tougher cut. You had been out for

some time that you were in for something. At what point did you recognize that? Oh, I knew on Wednesday. You know, my weight was good. You know, I was like 200 and, I guess, Wednesday morning. I think I was like 218. But I could just feel like I wasn't losing as much as I would lose normally. You know, so whereas I would go and work out for an hour and lose eight pounds, I was losing five and a half pounds. So I was like, ah, it's going to be a little bit of a tougher cut.

So I know Thursday is going to be rough. And then comparing it to your other cuts at 205 in terms of the, the strength. on your body. Was this the toughest one? Oh yeah, 100%. This is the hardest one by far. I think the beginning of my career at 205 pounds, the beginning of my 2005-pound career was easier because I was fighting so often. Like you remember, I fought Patrick Cummins, and I fought Dan Henderson, and then I fought Jones, and I fought Gustafin'Rumb. They were all within like the first year and a half. So every three, four months, was fighting. Whereas now, you know, after Gusterson, it was like nine months. And then this time again,

it was like eight months. So it was like, it's just a lot of time in between fights. So just I need to be a little more active so that my weight doesn't get as high. And also, my body gets used to the weight cut again. You've talked in the past about not loving the early way in. What time did you have to wake up on Friday morning to try to make that 205 limit and what kind of state were you in when you came downstairs? When you came downstairs to weigh in, did you think in your your mind that you were going to still hit that 205 even though it was a rough journey to get there? Yes, I did. You know, I was tired, man.

I got up at 5.30 because I was still seven pounds overweight on Friday morning, which is more than I would normally cut on a day of weigh-ins. You know, I prefer to, I prefer to late-wayans. I prefer having the morning to just rest and relax, get up at my time and go and do it. Or if I need to, if I have a 4-clock weigh-in, get up at 9, work out for an hour, go home and rest for a few hours, go back and do the rest. Whereas this time it felt like a crunch, even though I got up super early to start getting it done.

But yeah, when I went down, my scale in the room said I was on weight, so I figured I was good, but I was tired. I was tired. I was exhausted. If you watch as I walk onto the scale, I was kind of almost staggering because the way cut was a little harder than I anticipated it be it. When they announced that you're 206.2 and then you walk to the back, what's going through your mind?

Oh, my goodness, what is happening? Like, how could this possibly be happening? How am I going to lose this championship on the scale? That type of stuff. And at what point does someone tell you you can actually go back? None of us knew, and I suspect the UFC didn't know that you had an extra two hours. Did you have any idea that you had an extra two hours? Well, you know, the commission, I was complaining.

Like, the scale's not right. I was like, this is BS. I want a reweigh. I was like, and even, you know, I was like, this is some BS. You know, my scale said it was 205. I said, also, I've been checking all week. I don't understand what the issue is. And then they said, well, you can go re-way, but you also have two hours because it's a championship fight.

So go re-weigh. And if I didn't make it, then go back and lose the extra pound. So they informed me in the back while I was complaining, but I didn't know it at the time. My issue mostly was with feeling like my scale was right because I paid $600 for a brand new scale. Did you consider, you know, actually going to try to lose weight or did you know in your mind, okay, you know, my last check. I was on weight. I was like, I know I'm on weight. Let's just go back and check again.

Okay. So you went back and checked again and then you weigh in and then you hit 205. What's going through your mind when that actually happens? Thank goodness. That's why you saw the reaction. Yeah. The reaction was pure joy. Like, okay, justification.

I know, I knew that I weighed the weight that I was supposed to. to wait after my weight cut. I mean, I had gotten a sauna. I worked out and rode the bike, and I also had sat in that stupid hot bath thing that people are doing nowadays that Dan convinced me to do and lost another three pounds. I was like, I don't want to get in another

bath with 108 degree water, you know? But so good, knowing I didn't have to go back. Now, let's address the elephant. I was, I've never been hit up by more people in the sport than after you wait in a second time the towel, touching the towel and giving me all kinds of theories.

as to how that can help you when you weigh in. Why did you touch the towel? Well, when I got off the scale the first time, I walked away, and they didn't cover me, you know, so obviously, you know, a guy thinks that he's losing everything that he's worked for on the scale, and you just walk back off the scale, and they don't even, nobody's worried about protecting me.

So I was like, you know what, I'm going to hold the towel up a little bit myself to make sure that I, uh, I, uh, I'm covered. Reality is, I didn't even realize I was doing that until I saw pictures, honestly. I got to be completely honest with you. I didn't even realize I was doing that. You know, I was tired. I was, you know, very discouraged and upset being that, you know, everything that had just happened.

So I didn't even realize that I was doing it. Did you have any idea that Rumble had not weighed in yet? And there was some talk that he was overweight as well? Well, honestly, you know, like my team, standing, my team was standing with Anthony's team in the back, and they spoke to a couple of his coaches, and they said that he had been working out and not losing weight. They said that Rumble had worked out for, like, a power and lost 0.8 pounds, and they were thinking, this dude ain't going to make weight either, but then he goes in, and he's one, and he's the

exact amount of weight under, as I was, the second step on the scale. So I don't know what was happening with that scale. But yeah, they were concerned that he wasn't going to, he said it himself. He's like, man, I'm in the same situation as you. So obviously, we both had some issues with our skills. Our skills are at a scale, the commission had a scale issue. I don't know.

In the next 24 to 36 hours leading up to the fight, are you worried that you may have taken too much out of yourself? Were you worried about your performance because of the tough journey to get to the scale? No. I mean, Dan is, Dan Leif is the best in the business, man. The guy has a, he has a process to rehydrate me, uh, even without the IV, you know, uh, he has a process to rehydrate me and get me back to feeling 100% and honestly, I, uh, I did, you know.

Okay. When I, the next day when I was at the thing, they wanted to put me back, they want to, they, like, put us back on the scale. And I was like, what? I was like, no, please. I was like, I don't want to know what I was at. on fight night. Why, why'd they want to do that?

They just reweigh this. They reweigh us. I don't know. They just reweigh this on fight night. How much did you weigh? I'm not going to tell you. All right. You would not believe how much I weighed.

Really? More than 20 pounds? Yeah. Oh, yeah. For sure. More than 40? Yeah. No, no, no.

Not more than 40. All right. But I was more than 20 pounds every, yeah. In hindsight, how much did it annoy you that John Jones was so much a part of the discussion all week and then he shows up, he does that press conference. He says that what you did was dirty, and he's taking little jabs of you. He was sitting in the front row next to Rockhold,

and you must have seen him when you embraced Rockhold. Did it bother you that his presence was there, or did that sort of up your game a bit? You know, early in the week, I was like, man, I don't know why he's hanging around. You know, I said it, you know, multiple times. You know, it seems desperate. You know, like, what do you, you're not even,

you can't even do anything about what you're talking about at this point right now. You just finished like a, another round of community service. Like, you can't do anything, but he'll talk to me. You can't do anything, you know? So it's, you know, he didn't know me. But my whole thought was I really kind of didn't want to see him in the arena.

I was like, man, if I don't have to see this guy, it'd be good. And then he's standing right next to Luke. And before every fight, I hugged Luke. So I was like, oh, there he is. He's got a really bad haircut. So that was good. I said, oh, there he is. And he looks like shit.

how are we doing on time here no we're fine okay okay and let me know whenever I mean we're not going to go too long but just just a few more minutes okay then the actual fight happens can you compare what rumble did to you in the first fight as opposed to the second

you know there's that famous moment in the first where it seems like he rocked you and there's the kick in the second where some thought you may have broken your nose did he hurt you more in the second fight than the first or vice versa No, you know, honestly, man, like when I'm, when I look back on these two fights, I never was really truly, truly hurt. Like, okay, so to kick hurt, like, obviously, you get kicked in the face by someone's chin, it hurts. Yeah. But I was never like fuzzy or I was never like dizzy, like, oh my God, I'm about to fall down.

Even in the first fight, when he knocked me down, I wasn't really hurt. You know, I just kind of fell off balance. So, I don't know, I wasn't really hurting either one of them. The only time I was really truly hurt Was when I was trying to gustus need me Is your nose broken? I'm going to the doctor The day when we get back to California

But right now it's just swollen It just swollen up real bad That's why I reached up and I touched it Because I was trying to see If it started bleeding all over the place, you know Because I broke my nose before And the blood just went everywhere Why do you think he tried to engage in wrestling with you so much?

Well, I think that whenever we started striking, we had a good game plan. You know, every time he circled, he got conventional. If you watch carefully, I would circle to my left. Yeah, to my right, to my right, I'm sorry. You get away from his power, so then he tried to switch south part of trap me. And soon as he switched, I just went in the opposite direction. And then he kind of could never, he couldn't really trap me. and then I threw like a big right hand at him

I kind of stood up to him like okay and that's when he started wrestling you know he was like okay obviously he knows I'm not afraid of him and before you know I was more tentative you know I was kind of backing up whereas this time I kind of went after him and I just if we're going to swing we're going to swing

and when people start to panic they go back to what they know and Anthony Russis that's what he is even in a fight with Phil Davis you know and he beat him so bad for two rounds and in the third round when Phil just was still there Anthony started wrestling again you know it's what he knows

it's what he does and that's what he went back to I was like okay thank you I'll crap all day you know clenching and fighting like that I love clinch fighting that's where I make my money at it's amazing how you called it

you said weather the storm seven minutes and then I'll get him and you got him around eight and a half minutes in once you got him to the ground did you recognize did you realize it would be you know seconds until he tapped

It happened a little bit faster than we envisioned. Okay. We thought it was going to be a little bit later in the flight. But, you know, when there's a gap like that, you know, it doesn't matter how hard they work. It's really hard to make up that difference. Really hard to make up the difference in that short of time. It's only been two years. And, you know, I like Anthony, you know, so it's hard to say stuff in hindsight.

But, like, I've always said what I felt about him in terms. terms of heart in tough situations. And also, I kind of knew what I was going to do to him if I got him and made him fight in positions that I wanted him to fight in. Because once we were on the ground, once I took him down and put my hooks in, he really was struggling to move at all. So I was like, wow, this is not, this is not, not, not, not that difficult. Then I just kind of beat him and lifted his face up and stuck my arm under the choke and

and it was crazy. I thought that was your best performance as far as post-fight talk is concerned. And my only sort of critique was, wow, you should have spoke first because it's hard to follow up someone retiring. But then I learned he actually told you he was going to retire and that's why you let him speak first. Is that accurate? Yes, he did. When he came up to me afterwards, after they put the belt back on me, he said to me, D.C. this is my last fight. He was like, I'm going to retire.

I said, well, you go first, you know, because I feel like out of respect for him and everything that he's done, I wanted to give him the floor. You know, let him stay his part and then do my thing. You know, I didn't have anything prepared. I kind of was going to, I was kind of just going to see how the crowd was going to play, you know? Yeah. I played it like that. So that's how I play. Screw him.

You want to boo me, then have fun. Enjoy yourselves. You can't get rid of me. I'm still here winning. So, who all you. you want. Do you really think he's done? What you want? I ain't going. I don't, I don't, I hope not, honestly.

I hope not. I don't think he's, I don't think he should be done. But, um, okay, it makes everybody, it makes it all sad to think that he could be finished. I hope he's not. I think he's got a lot to offer to sport. You know, he's a phenomenal fighter. And he's turned out to be a really good guy, you know? Yeah. in the past, but he hasn't shown that he's changed,

so it's tough that he would, uh, it sucks if he is gone. If the UFC said to you, Daniel, what do you want? What is your ideal scenario? Month opponent. What are you saying to them? Uh, you know, right now, I don't know. I can't make that decision, but opponent, I know, Jones.

Okay. This is what I've wanted since the day we walked out of the octagon of January, 2015. I've never made any, uh, secrets about it. I've always said I want to fight him again. But if he for some reason wants to fight someone else, maybe get his sea legs back, you know, because if he goes in there with me right now, he's walking like, you know, you know, when Bambi comes out, Bambi got those little baby legs, he's got his little sea legs. He's having a sea leg.

Right. Jones comes back in the oxygen with those baby legs like he had against Ovent. St. Fruit, and I'm going to smash him. They might want to get his sea legs back under him. He better not come in there with those baby legs. Do you really believe Dana when he says he won't put him in the main event? We do. So it can have to be a really, really big fight. It's going to have to be a really, really, really big fight to beat the main event over us. You know, so if we're fighting, then we're fighting, if we're fighting, it's going to have to be a really, real big fight that goes to ball, him and I. And just curious, Daniel, do you, but, like, he met with us

on Friday, and he talked about, you know, learning lessons and things like that. But if I'm being honest, there was a little spin involved as well. He was saying, you know, I was proven innocent. I wasn't given the maximum penalty. He was given the maximum penalty. He was proved negligent. There was a lot of contradictions there. Do you believe that this is a changed man?

Like, you actually, it's sort of like the Ferguson-Khabib thing. Like, are you, because he kind of in some ways brings the worst out in you, too, the most competitive side of you. Are you willing to go through that roller coaster again with this guy? Do you think that you will actually end up fighting him if you go through this whole thing again? first and foremost, he will never change completely because he never truly had to take full responsibility for what he's done.

He's saying he didn't get the maximum penalty. That's not true. That is 100% not true. He got the math that you thought he could give him for what he did. We all know it. That's what I don't understand about people. You know, how do you turn and look in the opposite direction when the truth is just literally staring you right in the face?

It's very simple. he got the max penalty don't lie and now I didn't even hear his press conference so if he was up there trying to do some some span and trying to be a politician

he's trying to politic up there then no he may not change you know you know who he is when he was on Joe's show and they asked him about the drug the pills and he made the joke

to kind of hey it's like a classic like look over here while I look at my left hand while I do something with my right hand type of scenario if he did that, then he's just showing you the same traits that he had before. So his terrible-ass media training that he had before.

So that lady, I don't know if she's fired or she actually worked and just made him worse at his job. But you feel like you need to get this, like the career will not, the legacy, because people every time they talk about you, but you didn't beat Jones. So you have to do this for yourself, right? Competitively, I do. Right. But I've gotten to a point in my life now where I'm just like, this guy has no control over me, Ariel. He has no control of me anymore.

Like if he can't never go back and fight him, then that's on him. I've got three gold UFC titles. I've got everything else. I've got my family. I've got my money. I've got everything. I've got my jobs for the future. I don't need that guy.

Like, that guy needs to fight. That guy needs to come back and fight me. He needs to, because this thing doesn't define who. I am as a human being. You know, like, I think John Jones, he needs to be John Jones a fighter because there's nothing else. If you take away

John Jones, the fighter, what is there? John Jones, the college drop-off. John Jones is the guy that actually ran over some chicken or vehicle. Like, who is he? He needs this to define him. When you strip away everything else, there's layers to who I am.

You know, so he needs this more than me. I don't need him anymore. Two last quick things I know you kind of relish the wrestling stuff, heel and all that what happened on Friday with the towel and now people comparing that to PD usage or any kind of

Does a part of you chuckle Like it's like okay if you want to use this to boo me Like at this point are you just going to embrace it Sort of like Costcheck did After trying to fight the booze for so long? I'm not going to fight anything People are going to feel how they want to feel But the more

If they booing that's fine I don't care but just know they can't get rid of me. I'm going to be here. Ariel, I'm one of the best fighters to ever, ever step put in the oxygen. Not many people have ever done it at a better, higher level than I have. So boo me all you want, but you're going to respect me and respect my skills. And you're going to respect that every time you boo me as I walk out, you cheer me walking.

As I walk out to the oxygen, on you boo me. As I leave, you will be cheering me or booing me, but I'm still going to keep my hand raised. I'm still going to walk out with that title, you'll walk out with a whole bunch of money in my life. Still, do whatever you want. It really does not affect me. The people that know me and matter, they don't boo me.

And finally, are you still sticking to the idea that there are two fights left at this point? You got this one number 20 out. Is it the Jones 2 and Jones 3, and then do you think you'll really be done? I don't know. I'm not exactly sure. You know, I got to figure it out. man, because, you know, first off, I got to get through Jones or Jimmy Manawar, who has somehow managed to kind of maneuver his way in there with his Gucci jumpsuit.

Look at that guy. Who's the guy in the Gucci jumpsuit sitting in the front row speaking gibberish? It's Jimmy Manaw. You know, one of those, somebody's got to get their ass kick soon. I don't know which one it is. Okay. Oh, by the way, what was it like seeing Thurman? What a great clip that was, right before the fight?

Oh man, right as I walked in, just champ style. Walking through the security, right to the right is Thurman Thomas, one of the greatest running backs of all time. I walk out, extend my hand like the president, give Thurman hug, Oklahoma State boys together. It was nothing. And then I leave today and I'm going into the airport and I hear D.C. And it's loud.

You know, so I'm thinking, wow, someone in Buffalo still recognizes me. I look back in his Thurman Thomas and his family off the South Beach. Again. Tell me in the airport, so I got to talk to the tournament today for 20, 30 minutes. Wow. It was awesome, man. I'm telling you, my life could not be better. So boo me, please.

Keep on booing. Last thing, I promise. Last thing. Summer time, like August, you think there's a chance, you're getting married. By the way, muzzle top on the marriage. That's great. To you and your future wife, Selena, beautiful family. I'm so happy for you guys.

Do you think you're probably going after August, or do you think there's a chance they might try to get you before August? I don't know. I don't know what they're going to try to do. Okay. But once again, I'm not on Jones' time. I've been eligible to fight that fight for the last two years since we fought. Now that he's going to be back in business, he will want to get in the outgun as soon as he can.

I don't have to. That's going to be up to me. I'm going to decide how I feel. You're the man, D.C. Thank you so much. I can't thank you enough for doing this, squeezing us in. I know it's hectic with the kids. Safe travels to you and the family.

Again, congrats on the win. Congrats on the nuptials. And thank you for all the entertainment this past weekend. It was a memorable one in Buffalo. No doubt about it. Enjoy it. Oh, man. One night in Buffalo.

That's what I'm going with. That one night in Buffalo. It was awesome. Thank you, D.C. Appreciate it. Later. There he is. The reigning, defending UFC light heavyweight champion.

Daniel Cormier, sorry if I sounded a bit exasperated at times throughout that interview. I knew we only had. We literally only had like 45 minutes in between both flights and what a guy DC is a real mensch if you will squeezing us in and if you've ever traveled with kids he's got two of them and a bit of a posse as well you know he's got his his his coaches he's got his striking coach I mean he's got a group he's got he's got a crew if you will it's hectic and I appreciate that very much I really do so thank you so much to

him for squeezing us in congrats on the win and we'll talk more about what happened during the fight weigh in all that stuff and more rumble we've got a lot to talk about but it was great to squeeze them in now let me remind you that today's episode of the m-may hour is brought you by our good friends over at the marines. Check them out at marines.com and here's a little word from them as well roll the clip. For a place, a people, means a fight to win. See all the battles Marines fight to win at Marines.com. We appreciate their support very much. Remember the Marines are the fighting spirit of our entire nation and that fighting spirit is what separates them from all other service members.

Marines view every challenge as a battle and Marines fight to win, whether it's a literal, physical battle or a figurative one. Again, check them out. Marines.com can't thank them enough for their support. One man who knows a hell of a lot about winning, our next guest, one of the greatest lower weight fighters of all time, a pioneer at 145, 135, he put a promotion on his back at one time. Many people consider him to be the greatest in the sport, pound for pound king. And on Saturday, we found out that he is going into the UFC Hall of Fame. And it's notable because he just retired four months ago. And I believe on July 6th, they'll be having a ceremony for him and others will find out about the other inductees in the coming weeks. But for now,

we know that Uriah Faber is the first member of the 2017 UFC Hall of Fame. class and he is kind enough to join us right now via the phone. Hiya, how are you? What's up, dude? Mazeltov. Yes. Mazel tov. What are you up to you, man?

Oh, you know, just doing my show, just another Monday. We have a lot to talk about. Congratulations. We have a lot to talk about not only about you, but others who are representing your team very proudly, especially this past weekend. But first let me ask you, when did you find out that you were being inducted into the Hall of Fame? You know, it was, I don't know, maybe a week before they inducted me.

I was out at the UFC headquarters in Vegas having a meeting. And Dana basically stopped me and asked me to go talk to someone and kind of spill the bean. So I was definitely surprised and honored at the same time. So what a cool, what a cool honor, really. I mean, to put your heart into a sport and be recognized like, that, you know, alongside people that you looked up to and that you've watched until you're a kid. It's pretty amazing. Were you surprised that it came so soon?

You just retired four months ago? You know, I hadn't thought about it, but yeah, I guess I was. I, uh, you know, I don't know how that stuff works. So, you know, I'm, I was definitely surprised, yeah. Cynthia wasn't surprised this weekend. That's right. We'll get to her in a second. Don't worry.

I want to talk about you for a second. I know you're not the emotional type, but did you get emotional when you find out about this? Like, did you take a second to reflect on your career, the journey? You know, early when you started, the Hall of Fame wasn't really a thing, and it's only really become more of a thing over the last few years, but it's still cool. People can now call you a Hall of Famer. Did that choke you up at all? No, it didn't choke me up.

You know, I mean, not that I'm not a sentimental guy, I'm definitely a sentimental guy, but, you know, context I found out. I didn't get to watch the countdown or the little tribute they did. I didn't realize they were doing that. And I was in Vegas and trying to scurry to get to a TV to watch Cynthia and I just barely missed it. Oh, it was great. I hope you do find it because they really did a fantastic job with it. And I'm wondering, when you do get inducted, will we be wearing shoes or no shoes? Are we going flip-flops and suit? What are we going to wear? If I can go without wearing shoes, I'll be found, I'll be for me. But I don't know.

We'll see if they have some sort of requirements. But if it's my little celebration, I should be able to do what I want. So I'd like to say probably in my purpose world, some nice jeans, some rainbow sandals, and a college shirt. That'll work. Okay. And do you know who will induct you? Like usually you have to pick someone to kind of induct you and introduce you, say a few nice things about you. Any idea yet?

You know, they had some ideas of who they wanted to have, do my induction and give me the award. But I haven't found out too many details about that. But I've got some really great friends that I have in mine for sure. Okay. I was thinking it was going to come down to two people, either your dad, a long time, obviously fan of yours, but more importantly, fan of this show, or my mom.

I mean, I really feel like it really comes down to them too. What do you think? They're both big supporters, that's for sure. Or Rosie.

Or Rosie. Rosie's, she's definitely a candidate. We love Rosie. Okay. So that's all well and good. You're happy. You're inducted.

Does this in your mind close the door on your fighting career? Like, does this seal it in your mind? Well, I retired. That was kind of the closing the door. But, no, I mean, you know me, dude. I'm not huge on planning and never count out an opportunity.

But, I mean, I'm retired. So closing the door, I'm doing a competition on May 14th, a jihitsu competition against a five-time world champ and still competing and stuff like that. So I've still got an itch. but not the MMA itch No not right now Did you feel for Brad Pickett I mean he was your last opponent

He tries to do the same in his hometown And loses in heartbreaking fashion Did you watch that and did you feel for him That he couldn't experience what you experienced in December You know I I was actually had an obligation so I miss it But you know I'm always rooting for Brad And to what I heard he was killing the guy

And just got caught man and it is unfortunately. I definitely feel for him, you know, what an awesome guy. And, you know, he's got a skill set, but, you know, live by the sword, die by the sword, kind of, you know. And I think it was still, I'm sure, a great experience for him. We got a lot of love, and he was in his hometown or at least in his home country. And, you know, this is the fight game, so it can't always be a fairy tale, but yeah, I did feel for him.

Okay, let's talk about Cynthia Calvio. Two and O now, two wins, two straight months, two straight pay-per-view main cards. Very rare, especially for a straw weight. This time she defeats Pearl Gonzalez. When did you first meet her? Geez, it's been years. Really? Cynthia has been a silent soldier in our gym for years,

like beating up the guys that are coming from out of town and, you know, doing our best to get her some pub, I don't know if you remember, but Paige at our hometown in Sacramento, brought her up on stage and gave her a little intro and let her get in the limelight because it's hard to break into these fights. I mean, I can tell these matchmakers all day that I've got to kill her in the gym, but, you know, it's real hard to get that opportunity. So she's been with the team, I don't know, four or five years, something like that.

Did you think, I mean, when you first started seeing her in the gym, Did you think that this would happen? I mean, here she is not only winning, but she's at the press conference with Dana on Saturday night, and he's comparing how he feels about her to how he initially felt about Conn McGregor and Ioannia on Jaycheck. I mean, he's putting her in some high category, and you know that when Dana is into someone, he's going to start pushing them. I mean, we've seen this time and again, he's clearly into her. Did you expect this? Well, absolutely.

I mean, this girl is a killer. I mean, we've all known that in the gym. She broke her arm, I think, three times in the same place. So she was out for like a very long time when she shouldn't have. And she also had this thing about wanting to get an amateur title before she went pro. And then she had her arm breaks and all these different things. But Cynthia's a killer. I mean, I'm talking like, you know, one of the girls, I mean, she goes with a guy.

and just puts it on dudes all the time. And on top of that, she was a 125 pounder. So it took her a little while and just the final going to push through and do it to make 115 pounds. But she's big for the weight class. So she was always fighting 125s. I was told that when you guys are on the mats, like she goes in the middle and is like essentially begging anyone to come at her. when she spars even with the guys,

there's no fear. She's going, like, like you guys have to sometimes reel her back in. Is that true? That's absolutely right. I mean, I,

so it's funny. I told the story about T.J. Dilloshat. He was one of those guys that, that we had to, like, you know, take their intensity level down. Yeah. And,

you know, and have a different kind of edge in the room. Luckily, Cynthia is, is one of the smaller folks in the gym, but she's someone I talk about after practice that these people have to, like, there's always an odd man out, right?

Somebody's left without a partner, and she'll throw a fit. Come on, no one's a squirrel. She's just a rough and tumult. We talk about two different personalities. You've got Paige me and Santinthia, and they're very close, and you've got one who's,

a little soft-spoken and one that's just kind of a gangster. You know, it's a nice contrast in the gym. Can you explain what's going on with Paige? I mean, we see pictures all day of her on her social media. She's clearly living in Oregon, and I don't see her training much with the team. Is she still a part of the team? She's a part of the team as far as I'm concerned. If, you know, the truth is I'm not going to get into what's going on in her life.

you have to ask her about that, but she's got her priority straight. She's just about a house in Oregon. She's more than welcome to come and train with us whenever she wants. She's in the meantime getting a lot of great work in wherever she is and waiting for an assignment. And I don't know if you understand how our team works, but we've got guys that come in from all over the world to do camps and, you know, satellite parts of the team,

guys from Japan and guys from the UK and Australia. and, you know, and on and on. So we haven't really got her assignment yet, but she's more than welcome, and, you know, we're all on great terms. Okay. And back to Cynthia. I mean, do you think that she is ready to really get pushed against top 10 talent? I mean, she's fighting on pay-per-view main cards, but she's not fighting top 10 talent.

Do you think she's ready for that, or do you want to move her a little slower like she is now? I would say she's absolutely ready. I mean, we'd have to ask her on that, but. I mean, she's only, look, that opportunity came in short, short fashion. She took two short notice fights within a month and a half, and she's two and oh with dominant performances. And we all knew what was going on. And we all, you know, that's same with guys that we've had in the past.

We see these killers in the gym. You've got to see a couple of other other of our guys that have been around for nine and ten years that are going to be stepping into the UFC, and you're going to be like, holy smokes. our team is deep. We have so many good guys, guys that you haven't heard of and girls that you haven't heard of. So, yeah, we knew

it was going to happen. The Ultimate Fighter starts next week, next Wednesday, April 19th. I know you can't talk about them much, but, you know, seeing stuff on social media and some clips and whatnot. Was it awkward? Like, did you not enjoy the time that you were around there

because of what it represents with TJ and all that stuff? Were you uncomfortable with it all? I'm always trying to have a good. time, especially in, you know, I got all my buddies and hanging out in Vegas, filming a TV show. We had a good time. It was, I mean, there was some awkward moments, I guess, but it was funny. The whole dynamic was so strange.

Yeah. But, you know, it is what it is. How big of a part are you going to play in Cody's training camp? They just announced it's going to be the home main event for the July 8th card, UFC 213, no main event just yet, but you know TJ as well as anyone, are you going to play a larger role in this particular fight camp because of who he's fighting? You know, I mean, I'm going to play a large role in general for have been in the future with Cody and his training and everything else, but not in particular.

I mean, those guys have fought each other a bunch of times. Yeah. I remember all sorts of times where these guys are going out. at the gym. So, you know, it's going to be more the same. It's hard to take someone like Cody or someone like TJ and do stuff that's a whole lot different for a camp because they're already training like champions. You know what I mean? They already approach, approach every fight with the same intensity. And so we'll be doing, you know, the best training in the world over here at Team Alpha Hill and be bringing home that strap. What's your early prediction?

for the fight. I know you're going to pick Cody, but in terms of the finish. I think it'll probably be a knockout just because Cody hits hard. I mean, we've seen it in his fights. We've seen it in the room. He's got a history. And TJ's also, you know, a heavy hitter, but not like Cody. Okay. Early? They're going to be in a gunfight. Early or late? I don't think it'll be that early. Okay.

I don't know when, you know, you can't predict that kind of stuff, but I know it's going to be a very tough fight. I know TJ, I've seen TJ some of his stuff. He's, you know, he's already freaking out, training like a wild man. He tends to do. And it's going to be a competitive fight. And Cody's going to get it. And before you go, if possible, can you tell us how many things you got going on right now?

Because, again, follow you on social media. Your Instagram stories are as entertaining. as any out there. But it always seems like you're going from like a meeting to something going on at your gym, construction, to getting your haircut in front of like 50 people. I mean, who gets a haircut in front of like a camera crew like you did? I love that guy that you go to, by the way, the older guy, 50 years in sack. I love that stuff.

And then you're going to like some sort of seminar where you're talking to people. I mean, it's amazing how much you pack in in the span of 24 hours. How many things do you have going on right now? Oh, man. It's a lot. I, you know, the retired life, I, I've had to talk to explain to people who want my time. The retired life has nothing to do with like sitting around being retired. It's extremely busy.

So, you know, I've been doing a lot of speaking engagements and, and obviously we've got the businesses that I'm part of that I'm, you know, trying to build stronger. And we've got our brand new gym going and some entertainment stuff. And, you know, we've got some big operations. opportunities for Team Alpha male that are coming to fruition, that they could be a game changer for us. And, you know, it's just a million, million miles a minute. What kind of game-changing stuff were we talking about? Well, I can't really get into all the details, but some international stuff where we're going to be most likely, you know, doing some expansion into international waters. and then we've got some big supporters that are going to get on board

and try to make our team unique to where we can offer things that no one else does. This new facility, which is going to be a host to the best team in the world, but also one of the coolest spots is going to have a real good vibe in there and offer all sorts of things. So there's a lot of different stuff. Wow. That's great. I love it.

I love the Instagram stories as well. Last thing, Uriah, before we go, I have a message, a special message from your longtime friend and manager Mike Roberts. He wanted to pass this along to you. Quote, I couldn't be more proud of Uriah and his accomplishments. He is the hardest worker and most dedicated person I know. He's also a great human being. From the first day I met him, I knew he would have a lasting impact on not just the sport of MMA, but the world in general. Congratulations, Your Aya, you deserve it.

End quote. That, of course, regarding your induction. Are you crying now? Oh, that's awesome, man. Yeah, I'm crying. Yes. Shed in just one tier, though. We did it.

One tier. We did it. Hey, that's awesome. Thanks, Mike. Appreciate that. Thanks, Jeff, and Shulman and all the guys that help me get to where I am. Congratulations, Jari. I'm looking forward to it.

It's going to be a great night, and it is very well deserved, and I'm happy they did it this soon. So enjoy the ride to becoming a Hall of Fame the next three months or so as they kind of prep you for that. And congrats on everything that's going on with the team. And congrats on Cynthia as well. She is killing it. And let me just say this publicly before I let you go. I know sometimes he gets upset that he doesn't get the attention he deserves. But I do think it's time we start recognizing Justin Buckles as one of the great head coaches in this sport.

Because, you know, the results speak for themselves at this point. And I saw the way he was handling Cynthia, especially when that whole thing was going on on Friday with Pearl in and out of the fight, out, back in, all that stuff. And it was really impressive the maturity that he showed. So kudos to him as well. Yeah, man, Justin's been stepping up and, and I mean, the thing with being a coach is you have to have a passion for it. And it's almost like an obsession, right? These guys that are in here coaching this team, they love it so much. And, you know, one of the reasons why I think Justin is so great is he's been doing this for years before he was the coach.

He was stepping up as a fighter and in his own career and being a lead guy for guys like Chad, Mendez and the guys like T.J. Dilloshah, you know, on his own down. So that's always a good indicator that somebody's going to be great when they're doing things for free. And now he's definitely, you know, one of the top coaches in the world, if he can not be top coach, alongside the rest of the staff that we have here. So we're pumped to have them. And you're right, the results are speaking for themselves. Thank you, I appreciate it. Good luck. You got it. Thanks. All right, there he is. The California Kid, the first inductee into the

2017 UFC Hall of Fame class and it's important to note that this year they're actually they initially planned on doing three straight night of events the six seventh and eighth international fight week but they're now going with two nights seventh and eighth and then on the six they're doing the Hall of Fame at night which I think is a fantastic idea and I've been lobbying for this for quite some time both publicly and privately because they would in the past do it either Saturday afternoon or Sunday, and it was an afterthought. Now you give it the attention it deserves. You make it into a big night. You sell some tickets. You build it up like they did on Saturday. I thought phenomenally well. And you get some big names. Fans are going to go to this. Just look at WWE. There is nothing wrong with

copying that blueprint. Look at what they do. The tickets they sell, how important it is, not just for the fans, but for the athletes themselves. Why not recreate the same thing? There is no Hall of Fame in the sport. make the UFC Hall of Fame be Hall of Fame and if you want to legitimize it bring in non-UFC guys people who have helped shape MMA and we know there are a lot out there who haven't gotten that recognition just yet

so I thought at UFC 210 they should have brought people who fought at two uh excuse me at seven at UFC 7 bring back Ken Shamrock you know bring Taktarov bring Harold Howard you know bring these guys

start honoring the past a little better this is a good sign though okay let's move along very excited to talk to next guest. He was in Anthony Johnson's corner on Saturday night. He has been with him for quite some time. He is the headman over in South Florida Combat Club, if you will. That's not the official name of the team, but one of the top coaches in the sport right now, he is Henry Hooft, and he joins us right now via the phone. Henry, are you there?

I'm here, Arnaud. Thank you very much for joining us, Henry. I really appreciate it. I know, you know, things didn't go your way on Saturday. So, of course, we want to talk about the main event. First things first, though, did you know that win or lose Anthony was going to retire on Saturday? No, not that he would retire on Saturday, but we talked about retiring and the end of the career for some time. And I know he had an interest in other things he wants to do in life. We talked about it a lot. And we had an idea of we talked about of getting that belt, getting the belt and probably drop it in the middle. you know, there was like an idea that we had

that he had and that we talked about, but I didn't really knew that on Saturday that he would retire and Saturday, but I knew about his feelings and I'm not surprised, you know? Okay, so that was my next question. Are you surprised he actually went ahead with it? I mean, it's one thing to talk about,

it's another thing to actually do it when you heard that he actually did it in the cage. Did that kind of surprise you? Well, I was, I was, right after the fight I was on the cage and he came to me, speaker, and he said, I fucked up, you know, something. And I said, come on, man, I know it's just hard, but keep your head up.

It's already done. It's what the coach had to say after a lot. You cannot just at that moment talk about stuff. And I was at the cage and he said, keep your head up, you know. Let's go on. Let's go. Then I stepped off and it was very busy in the cage. I walked back to put another shirt on.

I wanted to wait him at the doctor's place. And when I was in the back, I heard that he was like saying that he was retiring and looking for me and looking for other people. was like, oh shit, and I was on the way back, then I saw him at the curtain, and then when he was with me and he cried with me and he talked to me and everything, then I really, it really fell through, but I'm not surprised because, again, we talked about it. I'm already six years with Anthony. I know him for so long, and this last couple of months, it's been difficult to all of us with all the stuff that happened. It was a crazy time. We're getting better waters now,

and we were just hoping that it was like... next thing for us and also beginning, six years going and ending with the title and it was just hard. Like he was very disappointed. I was very disappointed too as a coach. It was strange for me to hear

that he did it there, but that was his moment and it's an end in his moment. So he did it when he thought it was good and I think we all need to respect and I respect it and I had my moment with him alone and I think that's very important because before everybody start asking, talking about it.

I got a lot of bad shit over me and everything. You know how it goes on the social media when everything is good, everything is good. Like, I leave in my fighter as well. I never left anybody, especially me and AJ. We are very good together. And there's all unimportant, you know. It's just people just start spreading out stupid stuff

and like him quitting the fight and just throwing the fight and all kind of stuff. Man, there's all bullshit, you know. That has nothing to do with our sport, you know. So I just feel bummed because I wanted to end this one with the title. And he was, Anthony has all the qualities to do it, but he didn't do it. And we'll get to that stuff in a second, but I'm just curious. Could you tell us what he has planned for the future?

What's this job that he's talking about? Well, first of all, I'm not going to go into details because I don't know the real details, but everybody sees his pages and it has to do with football. I don't know. I didn't really discuss the details, but he seems to be busy with this for a while and enjoying it. And so it has something to do. They're totally different with the M&A. And I think if you really want to stop fighting, you really need to step away from it. Because if you keep hanging in there, you probably get lured back in there. Ender he's 32 years old. You never know what happens in the future.

But if you want to step away from it, you really need to step away from it. or you need to become a coach like I did after my fight career. But it's totally different than the MMA. And I think it has something to do with football. And you look at his Twitter and look at his... That's familiar. Oh, we lost you there for a second. Are you still there, Henry?

I'm here. Okay, yeah. We lost you. You said if you look at his Twitter and then we lost that last part of your answer. Oh, no. I said if you look at his Twitter and his social media, people will find out sooner or later what is really going on. but I don't know the details,

but he's going to rest up and going to enjoy because it was six years of hard work. Anthony's a hard worker, you know. So it is something with the L.A. Rams? I think so. Listen, I'm a European guy. I know everything about soccer, but not about the NFL.

Sorry about that. Okay, fair enough. Now let's go to the fight. What was the game plan, Henry? What was the game plan? Did we see the game plan in the fight? Come on, man. First of all, you know me.

I always talk about game plans. I was a fighter myself. If you, the game plan, it was very simple. There's only one game plan that you need to do. It's not wrestle or not come close to D.C. And AJ is a guy who normally does that. He doesn't want to wrestle because his strength is in striking. He stand up and everything.

So this is nothing to do with the game plan. Nothing to do with training because in training, he didn't really do much different then he normally does so the game plan was not to wrestle anybody and or it wasn't his own mind that he wanted to do that

but it was not the game plan and if you look at some guy just sent me this morning the corner of the corner stuff that they read out in the corner what happened and you see that we nobody really wanted him to wrestle

nobody wanted him to come closer to D.C. because there's going to be like playing the other guys' game although I always said the whole time that D.C. not has bad hands I think Anthony's strength is always there. And me as a striker, I'm always prefer the fight to start standing up.

I always prefer the knockouts and stand up. So my gameplay is always to stand up, take a distance, take your time for every fight, and just try to look where your strengths are. And, of course, there's not grappling and wrestling against the cage, you know. So why do you think he did that? That's another thing. If you ever fought before, again,

And it's just in general to everybody that listened here. If you were a fighter, you ever had five before, and especially a couple of fights, especially at the level. And sometimes stuff happens, and sometimes you can explain. Only the fighter can explain. Not the trainer, not the audience, nobody. Only the fighter himself knows what at that moment makes him make these mistakes or do stuff that's wrong.

But also the stuff that goes good and he knocks people out at the strangest moment or with a strange kick or whatever. Sometimes stuff goes on in the fighters' mind. People don't understand. It's not so easy to explain. And again, you can be the best coach in the world. You can have the best training partners. But when you go in the cage and closes,

it's you that has to do what he has to do and where he's good at. And if you don't do it, for what kind of reason? Anthony knows, and he will figure out the next couple of days. You can't right after the fight say, this was wrong, that was wrong, this was wrong. Oh, he didn't follow the game plan. And blame everything on him alone or whatever.

there's nothing to do with the game plan stuff. It happens at that moment when you're alone with your opponent and you make decisions at the wrong moment, wrong time. And the only fighters that fought themselves before really has these moments before. They know what it is. Sometimes stuff just happens and sometimes stuff just blocks. And maybe he was more busy with retiring than not. We don't know.

People are talking about it. We don't know what is going on in his mind at that moment. But I know one thing. If the normal AJ would show up at that night, it would be a total different fight. So that's all I know as a coach. And I was really surprised what happened there, like all of us. We were really surprised what happened there.

And only AJ knows because he can do so much better than what he did Saturday. But again, the fight of fights, he knows better than everybody, you know. So I've read the transcript of what you in the rest of the corner were saying, and it's clear that you were getting very frustrated. What was going through your mind? And did you at some point just say, you know what? I'm done shouting instructions here. I have no way to justify what is happening in this fight.

Yeah, but that's true. At one moment, I was just like, I don't even need to talk anymore because it's already too far away. You know, I mean, the grip of a, have a coach. Sometimes I have these good moments that you can pull somebody through at the last moment at the last round with Eddie, with his eye, with Gilbert, some fight you can say to your final. Let's go, man, you see the other guy's tight.

You can still pull it up. off. But if three people are screaming in the corner and everybody's saying the same stuff and you don't do it, then at one moment, you need to leave it and let the fighter figure it out, you know? And if he doesn't figure it out, then what can you do? And again, I tell you not because I want to say that the fighters don't know what they're doing. I've been knocked out. I lost fights too. I know it. I know what it is sometimes. You're head is just not there. You listen to the voice. You hear the corners. You know what you need to do, but it's just not there. And that was happening and I recognize that and then I can scream even more but it doesn't help anymore and

then you can just sit back you just need to sit back and and hopefully let him figure it out and then when you see a new moment you can jump in there but to scream with four or five people and and Anthony's not listening again I know him for six years and then I just bet better to be quiet you know because it doesn't help did you talk to him after about that did you ask him why he did that did he give you a proper explanation Well, at the moment when the fire was done, he was on the cage, and I went through the case, and you came up to me, you said, fuck, man, I made a mistake. And I said, you made a mistake, Anthony, but now it's already done, you know, that's the explanation. Because, again, at that moment, there's so much emotions going through your head.

You can say whatever, and ask him stuff, and you will never get the straight answer, the good answer, or the answer you want to hear. You need to, that needs to be, that needs to go through his head for a couple of days. And then in a relaxed moment, as a trainer and the fighter, then you talk about it, and then you figure it out what's going to happen or what happened that night. But it's the worst thing for a coach is when you fight a loser, together you sit in the dressing room.

You don't know really what you need to say. Even the next day when you fly back, you sit next to each other, you feel bad because he gave him a goal, and you didn't win the fight. Sometimes you're hurt, you're injured, and you fight back, and it's just like it's painful. When you win, it's beautiful, when you lose that. then it doesn't make any sense to right after the fight tell him what he was doing wrong or why he did this or why he did that that doesn't help anymore the fight is already done you'll you lost a chance to win a belt and again then there is no need for you to talk you go to the dress room change up go back take a drink relax and the next couple of days you figure it out that's it the only problem is that this was what he said his last fight and it was for the title the second time we were so

close to getting it. And I know he has all the abilities and that's the worst thing for a trainer, that you see his abilities, you see the qualities, and it doesn't work. It doesn't work at the moment that it needs to work. That's very hard for a trainer. But also for the fighter. Don't believe that he doesn't want to win the title, you know? And again, I speak as a fighter myself.

I knew how it was. I knew I was a champion. I lost my belt. It's all very, very difficult. Fighters know how lonely it is, you know, winning and losing. So again, It's a very difficult moment, Ari. It's very difficult to explain that moment right after the fight or right before the fight.

It's very difficult to explain. Considering your relationship with Anthony and how highly you think of him and how close you were to finally getting that belt with him, would it be fair to call this maybe one of your more frustrating nights as a coach to see it unfold that way and that wasn't what you worked on? I think for both of us, yeah. Yeah, for both of us, for sure. for sure for both of us

he had a chance I mean I mean again I have all the respect for D.C. And he's great and he beat AJ two times and there are a lot of people who can say that remember AJ lost only to D.C. He didn't lose to nobody else. He knocks everybody out.

So D.C. is great. He did a really good thing. But I saw this evening was the evening. Everything was good. He had the chance to do it and then you don't do it. For him it's more frustrating for me even But also for me as a trainer, we do this work six years together.

We travel together. We work hard together. We work to a point where we think now it's going to be the chance that we can get it. And again, I don't need to have a belt to make me look like I'm a good trainer or nothing. My result speaks for himself, and I had a belt myself as a fighter. So I don't need that belt hanging in my closet to show everybody I'm a good trainer. But we work so hard and he was so close and he has all the chance. And he didn't get really beat.

he got beat by himself, not by an opponent, like really, this fight. He got beat by himself. He made a mistake. He did something that was wrong to do, and everybody makes mistakes, but he did it himself. So he got beat by himself, and that's all a shit to see. And again, I had the same problems. If you got beat by yourself, that's very, very difficult to handle, and it's also very difficult to describe as a coach.

If the other guy is just better, Ariel, what's the problem if somebody's better and he beat you. You're in this business. One guy's going to win. Two guys fighting. One guy, you win and you lose. Not a problem. If four thousand, it was, of course, totally different. But you can always win. But if you lose because you didn't do what you can do, then you feel frustrated. And again, he feels more frustrated than me and a lot of other people are talking about him. Sure, he's frustrated. But as a coach, of course, he's frustrated. It's your student, you know. Six years, we work together. So I wanted him to end with this crown, you know? I wanted it. Is that why Henry

You walked to the back In other words Do you typically not do that And were you frustrated And said, oh you know I don't want to be here For the crowning of D.C. again And then in hindsight

It may have looked weird To some people When he called for you And you weren't there Yes, it was Listen First of all I spoke with him already Right after the fight

It was the first guy Was on the cage And that in the case Because in the case Two people can coincide And there was already People from the corner From our team

Was already in there So he came to me and we talked a little bit and said, take it easy. When I walked back, the cage was already full. But of course you pissed. I was pissed too.

At that moment, I'm not going to stay here waiting around the same shit. And last time when he beat Glover Tashira, he knocked him out. I was in the case. And when everybody came in

and I was celebrating, winning, I walked out and was already packing my suitcase in the back and it was already on my way to the hotel and I didn't make the team photo too. That's just the way I am. But I went through the back

just to wait him over there, have the moment at the doctors because I knew he was going to get crazy. And then that looked weird to other people. But if I know that he's going to make his end over there in the cage, I wouldn't go away. You know, it looks maybe strange to people, but I'm not a guy who

let somebody else there because he lost. That's the stupid thing ever. When he lost to Belfort, I was in Brazil with him, when he lost to D.C. when he didn't make weight in Kansas City, when he didn't make weight, I was the guy always protecting him. I was always there for him. I don't even need to explain this for two other

everybody else. But people who think that I leave my fighter there, I didn't want to be there because he lost. They're just dumb people. I don't even need to explain to these people. But of course it was frustrated. Like everybody else was frustrated. So that was that moment that I walked away. And when he came to the back, we had a talk, we had an emotional moment. We talked. We cried a little bit and that's it. And him and me text it the whole night and the next morning. And I didn't respond on these people on social media because I don't want to do that because it doesn't help it anyway, it's between me and Anthony, and we don't have any problems. I'm just disappointed like he was, too.

We were so close. We worked so hard for it. Like, you just, you had your left guest, and they talked about Justin, like, who's doing a really, really good job, that team all familiar, you know? But we, all the trainers, we do a lot of stuff. People think we have a luxury life. We fly everywhere, we make a lot of money, and we do it because we love it. We put all our passion in there.

We put everything in there with the fighters, too. We fly with them. We leave our families behind. We do whatever we do for the fighters. So of course you want some juice back. Of course you want to win. Is that a bad thing? That's not a bad thing.

You know? So we do it with all our passion. So if something doesn't happen, you're frustrated. You are at that moment. And a couple hours later or a day later, you get back to it. You think about it. Okay, maybe it did something wrong or not. But you just get frustrated.

But believe me, I was Monday, this Monday. This morning I was already trained. 20 people again, 10 people in the UFC. The next fight is already lined up again. So people have to understand. Our trainers, it's not like a luxury life and everything is good. We work hard and we put our heart in there. So sometimes we are frustrated, but we're also very, very happy for the fighters.

And again, I can't say nothing bad about AJ, all the moments that he gave, gave a lot of people, especially me, silencing the crowd in Sweden, all the stuff that he did, all the beautiful knockouts, the striking stuff that he showed him. And also as a person, he's a really. really, really, really good person, a real good person. So hopefully one day he gets a little bit bored for the other stuff he does. He comes back in 32 years, we can do it at heavyweight. I would not see that.

But a little frustration is not bad for a trainer, Ariel. And you know me yourself, too. I'm not a bad guy. I'm not a big man. Do you, that's actually my next question. Do you believe this is really his last fight, or do you think deep down a couple years he comes back? that's another thing

I was a fighter probably not the best in the world that was a fighter you never as a fighter you can never really quit

and saw this week at John Wayne Parr at 40 years old knocking a guy out with a head kick and just getting it I just I don't know

what he's going to do and he's going to do his thing but my door's always open for him and I hope hopefully maybe one day

it happens and you never know in this game you know but he's a smart guy if he does it he does for a reason he doesn't just

to do it because he wants to be in there. But I'll be crazy enough not to like it. But at this moment, we just, we have to rinse this off. Again, we're already working with the other guys. We're working, but in my head, yesterday I thought about it this morning. I thought about before this interview. Because first of all, I didn't really want to do any interviews because I think we're going to talk only about this problem between me

and what happened there, I walked away. I need to defend myself. And you know what? at the same evening we had Kamaro Usman who fought a great fight who was getting better and better Desmond did his debut. It's all snow under all the negative shit that we have. We have good people and good stuff going on.

But I need to say this, so everybody kind of have my side of the story, and that's why I want to do it, and that's why I'm here on the radio, you know? I appreciate you coming on very much. By the way, in hindsight, do you regret

not making a bigger deal about the way-in? because you guys, you know, you didn't, you know, cry foul or anything like that, and some have, do you think that you should have? No, man, what is that? I mean, that's typically all the death drama for nothing. Listen, you fight, you fight. If it's one pound or two pounds or whatever, come on, man,

you just fight each other. At that moment, you just want to fight. If you want to fight, you fight. Again, we were happy that the fight was on. And you want to fight for the tithe and you're happy, If he was 10 pounds over, okay, that's a little bit different. And it was a little bit funny. And another thing was everybody was at the way in.

I was still packing everything upstairs because we did the weight club with Anthony. We waited to the last moment. But it doesn't matter to cry about it when it's already done. And again, yes, I saw it at the fight. I saw this he wasn't looking like he was normally looking. So that's why I thought that was the right moment, you know. So don't cry about it at the wayings. Don't make problems the way.

Make him pay for it in the fight. that didn't happen, you know, but you can always blame other people for everything. The only thing you need to do as a fighter is take control of it. Don't wait for the judges, knock them out. Don't look at weight classes, just beat them. If they're too heavy, you're too fast. It doesn't really, really matter, you know, a couple of pounds. Come on, man, we've grown up, man.

Come on. As you mentioned, other than what happened in the main event, some very good things happened for the team, and you have other fighters who are doing good things as well, and, of course, well-documented, the split, black suns and all that, Are you happy with where things are right now for you as a coach? I know you're doing the work over at Combat Club, and a lot of big names are there, and a lot have followed you.

Are you content with where things are in your life as a coach? Yes, I am. I am, of course. I am very happy now to do stuff together. I'm together with Greg Jones, you know, and we have Jack Bonacci, and we got Corey, we got the guys that were with one of us all together, and we moved over, and now it's like an open-minded thing. have any drama and we want to keep it through the small group of coaches that we have now and just

enjoy training with each other get the people that want to train and also the people that we want to train not people just got signed up and we have to train everybody and so it's a very comfortable situation to do it it's just like I would have done it rather than have would have done it with the UFC title there of course but we got some new kids coming some really up-and-coming guys and again some some names that are trained with us now because we're not a real, we are a team we're training with each other, but we're not put a team name on it because I think

it needs to go about the fighters more, it's more team Anthony or more team Michael Johnson or more team Bobbi Lola or more team, whoever is there, it's about the fighter more than just a name because otherwise you're going to get team against, team against that and all kind of drama. When fighters

just fight each other, it's much more easy. And you see nowadays a lot of fighters train with other coaches because they think they're the best coaches for them, you know? So I think it's a great thing and the only thing I love coaching, my passion is with fighting I hate to lose and

everything but still my passion is with fighting so it's going to be all good from here, you know? Last thing and again, Henry, really appreciate you coming on. I can't thank you enough. If and when we see Robbie Lawler fight in the summertime, will you be in his corner? Well, the best possibility is there, yeah.

Yeah, the possibility is there. I mean, I'm doing some striking work with him, so If he thinks I'm good enough to be in his corner, then I will do it. I like Roblova. He likes to bang. He's excited. So if you ask me to corner him, I'll be there. But he hasn't asked you yet.

He hasn't ever fight yet, Ariel. But he is training with you, right? He's training with me. People see it on videos. They're not a big secret. We're just training. We have a good thing going on. So, yeah, we're just training.

It's nice. It's good time in there. Yeah. I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with him. Again, thank you so much, Henry. I'm sorry things didn't work out in the main event, but again, congrats on the other two wins on Saturday. Do you have anyone on the car off top of my head this weekend in Kansas City?

No, we got the first one, the real first big event is Chescali at Dallas. And then again, we got a couple of guys that are coming up under Suventi, he's going to fight tonight. And again, Kamar Huzma, what's the guy, one seven-pounder. he's going to be something. So what's the guy? All right. Thank you, Henry. Appreciate it.

Okay. See you guys. All right. There he is. Henry Hooft. And yes, I do echo what he said about Kamar Usman. Very impressive. Now, five wins at Walterway calling out Neil Magny said he wanted to fight Neil Magny in Dallas.

I don't think that that is going to happen a little too soon. But certainly a fight I'd love to see. He's been calling big names. Time to step him up. And he's backing up his words. Very dominant performance on Saturday night in Buffalo. Also on Saturday, Tiago Alves beat Patrick Cote,

but that wasn't necessarily the story. The story was that right afterwards, Patrick Cote took off his gloves, put him in the middle of the cage, and announced his retirement from the sport. A great career, a Canadian MMA pioneer, fought for the belt against Anderson Silva,

has had many great moments in the UFC and out, and we wanted to talk to him about that decision and where he goes from here. He joins us on the phone right now. Patrick, how are you? Hey, I'm pretty good, thanks. Appreciate you. coming on Patrick, when did you know that that was going to be your last fight?

I'll say like a couple of months ago, maybe two or three months, not two months ago, you know, during the training camp. I've been injured a couple of times and I get a little tired about it. You know, I get a little bit tired to go to the gym, you know, fire training with pain and all those things. And, you know, I always said that I didn't want that to want to make the one too many fights. And, you know, before it's too late, I think that was a smart move to retire now. You know, still giving good performance. And with the last performance, even if I didn't win, you know, I gave a good show.

So people will remember that as my style like the last 15 years. What would have happened if you knocked them out in 60 seconds? Do you still think you would have retired? Yeah, yeah. The decision was made before. You know, that's what I say. You know, I didn't take the decision on emotion about the loss. You know, I knew it two months before that that would be my last fight, you know,

because, you know, I'm tired. You know, 15 years of doing that, you know, I was a little bit tired. And I always say that when I will wake up one day and I don't want to go in the gym anymore or something like that or it's hard for me to go to the gym to train for a fight, I will stop because it's not, it doesn't, it's not, supported and I did happen to me and maybe a couple of times during that training camp so that was a that was a wake-up call for me we've seen recently you're i favor brad picket guys say before the fight this is my last fight you didn't say that you were keeping your cards very close to your

vest in fact even on wednesday when i spoke to you i was talking to you about some of the fighters that you have fought in the past who retired and you're still around fighting and and thriving you never mentioned it why did you decide to keep this a secret Because I didn't want it to make a big story about it. I wanted to focus about that fight. I wanted people to watch that fight just because I was another fight. I didn't want to, even my wife didn't know. And I did that on purpose because I wanted to do that for myself.

You know, that was the first fight. I was very selfish about it. And, you know, I gave 15 years of my life in this sport. And that was only Fabio. My head coach, he knew it. And that's it. My other two of the corner men didn't know. And, you know, that was, I did that on purpose because I didn't want it to make some interviews before about my last fight and doing some big deals before.

I wanted to go there and do, then fight and just fight like another fight. And for me, just, you know, live the moment alone, you know, just live the moment with myself. And I knew that it that it would be my last walking. I knew that it would be my last entrance song. my last introduction by Bruce Buffer. And, you know, I have no regret about it. You know, I did that for myself, and it's good, man. So even, you know, you're lying down at the end of a hard training camp or training day,

you know, a few weeks ago, you're with your wife, you're relaxing at home. You were never tempted to tell her what was on your mind? Oh, for sure. I wanted to tell to kind of like everybody one day, but at one time. But no, you know what, I didn't want it to talk about it. You know, I knew it that it will come, but I didn't want it to talk about it. I didn't want it to have big discussion about it. I didn't want it to be, you know, out of focus just talking about that.

So, you know, I kept that for myself. I just say it to my head coach because, you know, I'm here. I'm with him since more than 10 years. So I wanted to live that with him. but that's it. You know, he's been very respectful about it. He didn't talk to anybody about it, too. And like I said, I have no regrets.

I think I did the right thing. And as far as the week went in Buffalo, were you a little more, you know, sentimental, nostalgic? I mean, I saw you at the Canadian Sabres game, so it seemed like you were trying to take it in, but were you thinking like, oh, man, this is my last win? Did you feel like you were getting a little emotional about it all? And maybe that's why you didn't want to talk about it

so that those emotions weren't even greater. going into the fight. Not really seriously. This is, no, because I took that decision a long time ago. So I was just enjoying the fight week. And the fight week was one of the most easier of me, the entire career. You know, the weekend was very, very easy. And, you know, everything went so well and that's that week.

And just the only thing got wrong that I love the fight. but, you know, I did enjoy it every day of that last fight week, and that was great. In a nutshell, why do you think you lost the fight? Man, I lost speed. You know, he got more accurate. It was faster than me. I don't know, man. You know, I thought I had advantage about the power and had a better boxing, but, you know what?

The speed is not there anymore. And, you know, I've been dropped in my last two fight. something didn't happen in my last 15 years of career. So that's another way I'm called to, you know, just to leave before getting injured seriously. And, you know, I have to be smarter than the sport. And that's it, you know. It's, there's a time that you have to realize that, all right, it's, you have to do, to put your pride on the side and just be a realistic about yourself. And I'm okay with that.

I'm in peace with that decision. and like I said, you know, I prepare my third career for a couple of years now. So it's not easy, but it's easier to pass to another chapter. You have been a part of the UFC for quite some time, 12 and a half years, to be exact. Of course, famously you fought Tito Ortiz in your debut back in 2004, and you've been a big part of the sport, especially in Canada, for so long. Afterwards, did anyone from the UFC, perhaps even Dana White speak to you? Did you talk to anyone?

and thank you, anything like that? Oh, yeah, almost everybody came to me after my fight to shook my hand. And a lot of people from Fox, too, a lot of people from television, a lot of people from the organization too. I receive a text message from Joe Silva, too. So that's, you know, that's awesome. And the thing is, too, it's the crowd over there. You know, the crowd just gave me a stand-up evasion when I left the Octagon.

And that wasn't unexpected. You know, that wasn't in Canada. That wasn't in the U.S. And, you know, the fan gave me a stand-up ovation. That was very, very nice. And after that, I just, man, I'm still answering some message on my social media. I receive so many messages. A very nice message.

And, you know, I just want to say, thank you to everybody for the support. That was an amazing 15 years, like I said. And I have no regrets. And, you know, I'm happy that I took that decision at the right time. What did Dana say to you? Oh, you just say, you just say that good luck with the future. He always respect me. And that's it.

You know, that wasn't a big discussion. But you know what? It is where it is. You know, it is my bus. You know, he's not my friend. Right. He was. So he was my boss.

He's not my friend. But, you know, at the same time, I have no shot. about my career. I always try to give the best performance as possible, the good show as possible, and you know what, maybe except one fight I have no regrets at all about my

entire UFC career. So you say no regrets, how about the best moment? When you look back, is there a moment that sticks out above the rest? I have so many moments in that case, you know? My first fight in the UFC is, you know, I don't think it can be better.

bigger than that. It's my first fight in the UFC main event against C. Doort his, a poor with a poster boy. You know, even after 13 years in that business, they're still talking about it when they present myself. So this is,

this is pretty crazy. And of course, you know, my title fight. You know, that's the dream of every, every MMA fighters, I think so,

to fight for the UFC title fight. And, and, you know, this is, this is, this is the thing that I'm very proud of it. You know, nobody will be never able to take that out of me.

So this is, you know, I had a nice run, and I'm really happy about my career. But now it's time to pass to another thing. But when I ask you about two best moments, you mentioned two losses. No wins? Oh, the wins, yeah, for sure, you know, Kenneigh-Grenge, Drew McFerjee's, you know, all those, all those things, you know, the win against Ben Sunder was really nice to. because I was able to show that I was improving a lot of my game.

I wasn't just a brother anymore, and I was more a Gigi-2 guy and something like that. But you know what? For me, it's not about the win or the loss. You know, it's always about, you know, what I was feeling in that fight and in those fights. And unfortunately, you know, my two best moment, it's a loss. But you know what? that was the best thing happened to me to loss against Cito Ortiz like that

because I don't think if I was winning in Stito at that time I will have that the career that I had. Wow, that is interesting. So now I know that you do TV work for LDS in Quebec. Is that what you're going to focus on and or do you have other plans post-fighting now? I'm working a lot in media here on my LDS and on radio. I have a couple of other TV projects.

on the table to a real estate company. I'm working a lot on that too. And working with the Canadian Army about putting a program about teaching the close combat fighting. And I'm working with the Canadian Olympic organization too about helping the new athletes to grow. Wow. I'm pretty busy, I'm pretty busy guy.

Like I said, it's like that since a couple of years. And now I'm looking back and I'm still, I still have a hard time to believe that I was able to train full time to fight at that level. But now I will focus all my energy to all those projects. Wow, that is great. And also you're a new father so you can spend some time with your daughter as well, right? That's the best thing ever. Yeah, I know. That is the best.

Thank you for everything, Patrick. You've always been so great to me personally and you've been such a big part of Canadian MMA. If you're wondering, my favorite Patrick Cote moment, that happened back at UFC 86. I remember that was a big card. You fought Ricardo Almeida, and we all thought you win this fight, you'll get a title shot. And this was before I was an MMA journalist. And I remember being so proud that someone from Montreal was going to then fight for the belt, not named George St. Pierre, of course.

So that was a really cool moment. I remember watching it with a bunch of friends, and we were all very, very excited for you. So thank you for everything. Thank you for being such a class act and for representing the country so well. And congratulations on a phenomenal career. I'm happy you have no regrets because I don't think you should have any. Thank you very, very much. And to everybody who listened to you,

thank you for the support for all those years. And, you know, I had an amazing carrier, and I'm really happy that I did it. But now I'm in peace with my decision. Great stuff. Thank you, Patrick. We'll talk to you soon. All the best.

And congrats again. Thank you. Bye-bye. All right. There he is. The predator, Patrick Cote, of Montreal, Quebec, Canada, calling it quits. After a tremendous career,

he leaves with a 23 and 11 professional record debuted. Way back when in 2002 made his UFC debut at UFC 50, October of 2004. And on Saturday, April 8th, 2017 against Tiago Alves, he says goodbye, but he is going to be around in the sport of MMA for quite some time, as you heard. And if you're a fan in Quebec, you can hear him doing a great work on television.

He is the guy as far as color analysts are concerned for French Canadian television. So phenomenal stuff there and really a great ambassador for the Great White North. Thank you very much to Patrick Cote. Okay, let's move along. We've been focusing on UFC 210. But lest we forget, Saturday, the UFC is making its debut in Kansas City. And this is a fantastic card, my friends. This is one of the best Fox cards in quite some time.

It's UFC on Fox 24. It's headlined by Demetrius Johnson v. Wilson Hayes. course, if Demetrius wins, he ties Anderson Silva's record of most consecutive title defenses. That's 10. But arguably, one of the most important fights on the card is Rose Namibunis versus Michelle Waterson. And Michelle Waterson is kind enough to squeeze us in her busy Hollywood Media Day right now to talk to us on the phone.

She is there standing by, so let's go to the phones right now. Michelle, are you there? I'm here. Such a big superstar all over Hollywood, staying in fancy hotels. I'm shocked that you have some time for us little people back here in New York. Oh, yeah, right. You always made time for me, and I'm not any bigger than I was before. I'm actually...

All right, fair enough. Certainly not physically, but I understand what you're saying. Can I ask you, Michelle, it is rare, at least last couple years in your career. I mean, you go back to 2014 the last time this happened, where you've had this quick of a turnaround. You fought in December, you come back in April. What does it feel like? Do you like this sort of thing, or does your boss,

prefer a little more time off? I feel great. You know, my fight with Paige was a quick fight. We had a great camp. There were no injuries during the camp. There were no injuries during the fight. And, you know, I had time afterwards to enjoy my family. We did a lot of traveling.

But I continued to stay in the gym. I had other teammates getting ready for fights and stuff. And so I felt like I had been able to, you know, get a little rest in my brain, but then continue to get better physically and just grow off of the momentum that I have coming off of the victory with Page. This has been almost, I think, at least from my perspective, a dizzying four months for you. You come out with this documentary, LeBron James's website. Then you go on, main event on Fox, and you beat Paige in her adopted hometown.

And then all of a sudden, you know, UFC is really behind you. Brooklyn, they're putting you out your own media day. You don't even have a fight booked yet. And then they put you right back on Fox. Is this kind of all surreal how all this is happening? Because let's all forget, when you were going into the page fight, it almost felt like they were trying to boost Page up having your fight in the main event in Sacramento, and then you ruin those plans rather quickly.

And now let's, you know, I mean, let's just see where you are here. It's just unbelievable the amount of attention you're getting. How do you feel about all of this? It's all the same to me. I think that it's just something that you have to expect coming along with the territory. And it's just something that we knew that was probably going to happen, you know, when I beat page. But it's just,

it's, it's, it's whatever comes with the territory. And I'm excited. I think it's great. It's a very exciting time in my journey. And I'm just enjoying the moment,

continuing to train and, and trying to figure out, um, this, this new life of mine and, and how it all fits together. Has that been challenging at times? No,

it's just, um, it's, the challenging part is trying to find the time for everything and making sure that my priorities are straight. Obviously, my fight is the number one priority outside of my family and taking care of my daughter. And so once all my training sessions are done and I have that already checked off my list of things to do, then everything comes secondary. And so as long as I keep it that way, then I have a clear conscience as far as knowing that I've done everything that I could to get ready for this fight.

You've been fighting professionally since 2007. So you just celebrated, if you will, your 10-year anniversary back in February in MMA. Is there a part of you that's thinking, where have you guys been all this time? I mean, you're no rookie. Why now are you paying so much attention to me? No, you know, I just, I've come to the realization that everybody has, own journey and this is my journey and I'm grateful to have had the experience in the shadows because it's it's made me into the fighter that I am today. Were you hoping, were you thinking given how

much interest they've shown in you that you were going to get a title shot after the page when there were some rumors of this, some talk, of course it didn't happen, you're now fighting Rose, but was that what you were hoping for? You know, we had talked about it and we were up for it if it happened, but I'm excited for whatever the UFC decides to give me. I think Rose is an excellent matchup coming off of the Virtuation Page. Both of us fought page, and Rose is ranked higher than me. So if there is anybody that I need to fight in order to show the UFC that I'm ready for the title shot, I think Rose is a great opponent. Have you been told that if you win this fight, you will fight for the belt? No, but I'd like for that to happen. That's what you want.

want? Yeah. Will you come out and say that on the mic? You know how people get excited about that, especially on Fox. Is that what your plan is? We'll see. I mean, you're saying it on this show. That's even bigger. This is bigger than Fox. You don't really have to say it again, but, you know, sometimes for people that miss the show. Yeah. No, that's my goal. That has my goal for 2017 is to fight for the title. Are you hoping Yowana is keeping the belt next month so that you fight her? Do you want her to be

the one that you fight for the belt? I would like to. I would like to be the first. The first one to beat her in the UFC? Yes. Okay. And as far as Rose is concerned, she was very vocal right after your win over page. She wanted to fight you. How do you digest that?

Like, are you the kind of person that says, oh, you wanted to fight me? Okay, let's go. Let me prove you wrong. Are you kind of, does that sort of thing get under your skin? Are you flattered? How do you take that? No, I don't think I am the type of person to take those things personally. I actually have a lot of respect for Rose.

and out of all the girls in the division. She's probably one of my favorite. But, you know, at the end of the day, it is what it is. We're all going to end up having to fight each other eventually. And it's refreshing just to hear my name come out of somebody's mouth because it shows me that I'm on their radar. It shows me that they know that I'm climbing up the ranks and that I'm a threat. You mentioned that Rose is one of your favorites.

Given the push that you're getting, have you sensed some jealousy from your fellow straw whites? I don't know. I guess I don't pay too much attention to all of that because it's just energy that I don't have in time that I don't have to be paying attention to that stuff. How as far as like the stuff that's happened to fashion week, I see you, you know, in New York and all this, what's the coolest thing that's happened to since, you know, you've become this big star? There's just been so many great memories, really. I, you know, even just being able to headline that event in Sacramento and to hear of the huge success that it was, I was really taken back. But, you know, I got to go to Golden Glove party. I got to go to a fashion week party.

I got to go. I met Des Bryant in the VIP lounge. We hung out with his family at one of a Cowboys game. but probably my favorite moment since my fight with page was right after the fight and we were in the back and they were taking the post-fight pictures and my husband told us that we got the performance in the night bonus and that was a great feeling to me just because it had been so long since I hadn't been able to, like, earn any type of money from my family, that, you know, that I went out there and I earned it from my family and that we can kind of just take a side

of relief and pay a bunch of stuff off and have some money to enjoy life a little bit, you know? I remember talking to you on the Monday after that fight, and your pay had been disclosed and everyone was very upset for you. Do you feel more comfortable now? Have they done right by you? Yeah. You know, the UFC has my back and we're making it happen. So it's onwarded upward from here.

Okay, so you have a new deal, right? I believe so. I haven't signed anything yet, but I do believe I have a new deal. Probably we'll sign it before this fight. Yes. You are also a very hot commodity after the fight. I know many managers were trying to get in touch with you, wanting to represent you. What was that experience like?

Yeah, it was, it was strange because, like, kind of like you said, you know, I've been fighting for 10 years. We've been trying to, like, and get people to see, like, you know, how much I thought that I could be marketed and that, you know, I was able to do these things that I'm a mom that, you know, I have a military family background and that I'm, you know, a female fighter. I've been doing martial arts or 20 years. All these things that we thought would be appealing, but all it took was this one win. And we knew that it had to be that way And we just So we just had to get it done We just had to put the work in and get it done

Do you feel like this one Like it's almost a sort of de facto title shop Because there's all this attention on you Again on Fox You know UFC behind you Like you feel a little more pressure Going into this one I probably could feel that there was pressure

But if I did then it would disdifle my My ability to perform And so I'm just going into it Like I do with every other fight And and you know Like I said, I left no stone and turned when I trained for this fight. You know, I do want to be the champion of the UFC and champions prepare to win. And so that's what I've been doing.

For a while, we thought you'd be the main event in Kansas City, but that's obviously not the case. Were you disappointed when you didn't end up becoming the main event? Yeah, 100%. I was looking forward to main eventing a five-round fight with Rosamune. This seems a lot more fun to me than the three-round, but I'll take what I can get. And do you know why they didn't keep you as the main event? Did you ask?

I don't know. But, you know, when there's a champion that's going to headline it, I'm not going to argue with them. Demetrius Johnson definitely deserves to take that seat ahead of me. Fair enough. Two last quick things. I remember talking to you a couple days after Holly won the belt and you were dealing with the knee injury and you were emotional for both her and yourself.

And now it almost feels like in a weird way, Like now you're enjoying a lot of success and she isn't. How do you deal with that as far as, you know, the reversal of roles, especially with someone who's so close to your friends, you've been through so much together? It's strange, how much has happened in the span of a year for both of you? I never really ever looked at it as a reversal of roles, I guess. To me, like Holly's always in Holly, whether she's victorious or not. She's my friend before she's a fighter before.

I'm a fan of hers. And I know that she looks at me the same way. You know, when we, I see her in the gym every day, and she works just as hard, you know, as a champ as she does as a contender. So that's all I look at it as. And I think that's what continues to make her better and to make me better and to make me inspired to push harder because whatever events unravel, we still continue to be the same people. and we do it because we love it and because we want to to improve ourselves personally, you know?

And last thing for you, Michelle, a couple of weeks ago, there was this famous clip that exploded everywhere of someone doing an interview for the BBC over in Korea and their kids, you know, burst it through the doors

and the wife comes in and I don't know if you saw this interview and it reminded me of the times I've interviewed you and your daughter interrupted the interview. Did you see this clip? And as a mother, did you enjoy it? Did you find some kind of connection to it.

I get it to the clip. I would love to see it. Are you serious? You're the one person on Earth that has not seen this clip. Are you serious? It has like millions of, maybe billions of views.

Really? Oh my gosh. You have to shoot it over. I've been, when I get into camp, I just, you know, I kind of just do my own thing

and just whatever I have time to do, you know? When the clip came out, and I'm not joking, I mean, this was on the New York Times, it was insane. So many people tweeted to me

and said, this is exactly what happens in your interviews with Michelle, I'd even put it out. I mean, as a mother, I know you will love it. So I'm sure someone will send it to you now or I'll text it to you after, but you have to take 30 seconds to watch this because I'm sure you will relate to it. Okay.

Yes, I would love to. All right. I mean, yeah, I just think all of that stuff just brings things back to perspective. Like, you know, like we are all still living our lives while we continue to pursue the things that we want, you know, in our dreams. And as big as you get, your kids still. don't care. They just want mommy or daddy, right? Yeah.

Yeah, for sure. Enjoy the ride, Michelle. Best of luck to you on Saturday. Can't wait for the fight. And again, I appreciate you squeezing us in this morning. Thank you so much for having me. All right, there she is. Michelle Waterson, karate-hadi. Loved how sort of sure of herself she was there. She wanted the main event, was disappointed. She didn't get the main event. Wants the title shot.

After Rose, our young Michelle is all growns up here. I like it. That was great stuff. And that's one of the big fights on Saturday. Main event, as I said, Demetrius Johnson versus Wilson Hayes. Also of note, Jacques-Raisosa, going up against Robert Whitaker, a very important fight at 185 pounds. And in around 30 minutes or so, I'll tell you something very interesting about this card. Some breaking news we have regarding UFC on Fox 24, the card on Saturday.

So do stay tuned for that. but for now, let's go to our next guest. And a lot of fans have been asking me to have this man on the show for quite some time. He has been on the program before, but sort of in a different life, if you will. We all remember Matt Riddle. At the time, four or so years ago, considered one of the best welterweights in the world, considered one of the rising stars in the UFC's welterweight division, former cast member on the Ultimate Fighter Season 4.

and he was rolling around 2013 or so. Of course, as you may know, left the UFC after a couple of positive marijuana tests, fought one fight for Titan FC, and then sort of fell off the radar. He is no longer off the radar. If you are even a casual fan of professional wrestling, you have surely heard of Matt Riddle and his story.

He is one of the darlings of the indie wrestling scene. some very smart people, including our own Dave Meltzer, believe that he is a future megastar in the making and everyone just absolutely glowing. People that I know, the likes of John Pollock, Meltzer, many others, only good things, only praise for what Matt Riddle is doing as a professional wrestler. And it seems as though it is just a matter of time

before he is wrestling in front of a very, very large audience. And that, of course, would be the WWE audience. So before he actually truly blew up and got too big for this little show, wanted to have him on to talk about his amazing rise in professional wrestling, and he is kind enough to join us right now via the magic of Skype, the super king of bros. There he is himself. Matt Riddle. How are you, sir?

What's up, bro? What's up, bro? Great to talk to you, Matt. Thanks for the introduction, man. That was good. You like that? I loved it. Oh, I appreciate that.

It was rich. Thank you. All off the cuff, but it was true. And everyone, I mean, I've been hit up for so many weeks now, get mad on, get mad on. Every time you do something, every time Meltzer writes about you, people send it to me. The MMA community is behind you here, and it seems as though you have really endeared yourself to the pro wrestling community. You haven't been doing this for that long. Are you surprised by how quickly everything has happened to you in the wrestling world? You know, it's funny because when I did MMA, I got to the UFC so quick. I assumed when I did pro wrestling, I'd get to the W.W.E. or to a super high level quick, and it's actually taking me longer to do it, you know, in pro wrestling because I did it so quick in the MMA. But no, you know, I'm not too surprised. You know, it took about a couple years, you know, wrestling, gaining the people's respect, you know, their trust and, you know, and then, you know, becoming a character for them and letting them get behind me, you know?

So is it fair to say that you're actually disappointed by your progress or lack thereof? Oh, I'm definitely not disappointed, you know? It's just, you know, I think it's better this way for professional wrestling to come up slowly and kind of build your way up and earn your respect rather than like MMA, if you go right to the UFC and you win fights, you're the man, you know? I feel like in pro wrestling, you can't just get that push. Right. You know? Yep, yep.

I know all about that. Okay. When did you first start watching pro wrestling? Oh, I've been watching pro wrestling since I was probably like seven years old. Okay. You know, growing up, we didn't, like, my family didn't watch any sports. And one day I saw pro wrestling on TV randomly. and I was hooked

and it was the only sport that was probably watched in our household is because of me. Wow, and who was your guy or guys? Like, did you have some favorites? Yeah, you know, I had some favorites.

You know, I like Sean Michaels, Rob Bandam, Randy Orton was good, it's still good. He's still, you know, they're all still good. Right. RVD, Jerry Lynn.

You know, I liked a lot of wrestling, but I liked a really competitive, like, sport wrestling, guys like Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit, stuff like that, where it's, you know, it's pro wrestling, but it's very physical. Like, if any other man was in there, they'd be hurt, you know? And of course, you had a career as an amateur wrestler, and then you moved over to mixed martial arts, and we know about the ultimate fighter and all that stuff. Why did you go down the MMA path? Did you ever consider pro wrestling as opposed to MMA?

You know, I definitely did, but I felt like especially, you know, in high school going to college, I was like probably like 200 pounds, 205. And I felt like at that point to be a pro wrestler to be a high level pro wrestler and get paid big money, you had to be pretty big. You know, there's only a couple guys, a handful of guys that were smaller and able to make a really good living at that time in pro wrestling, you know? And then I feel like, you know, because this is probably, what, 2005. So, like, you know, like the landscape has changed drastically over the last 10 years. And I knew in M.M.A. and Jiu-Jitsu and all that, there's weight classes and there's a spot for me.

And, of course, I did absolute divisions as well. But you know what I'm saying? It was just I knew there was a spot for me to make money in pro-MMA because there's weight classes. And it was just official while pro wrestling. And, you know, it's kind of like you need more than just ability. Sure. You know? When the UFC said goodbye to you, and I love the fact that you tout that you're the only fighter

to have been released from the UFC on a four-fight winning streak, when they said goodbye and it was somewhat controversial because of the marijuana test, how soon after did the thought of trying to become a pro wrestler enter your mind? You know, it came, you know, it came to my mind pretty quick. But I didn't go right after it just because I just built up such a career and reputation in mixed martial arts and I wanted to continue to pursue it, you know, to go that far and just kind of let it go to pick up a different sport. You know, I didn't want to do that right away.

And then just dealing with Bellator and Legacy and then, you know, Titan at the end. It was just, I felt like fights just kept falling out, injuries kept happening, the weight, cut was just getting to me because, you know, I was a really big welterway, you know, and that's where everybody wanted me to fight at. And just too, too many things like that happened where I was like, you know what? I had to, I have to give pro wrestling a try. I have to give this a shot. Like, I'll hate myself if I don't. And MMA, even though I put all this time into it, just isn't paying me back, like the way it should be. And maybe I sound spoiled in that sense, but I did start in the UFC and I did start off getting paid a decent amount at least,

which still isn't that much, but it was decent for, you know, an amateur or a professional mixed martial, you know, pro-MMA fighter at the time. So I don't know. And even now. So it's like it's hard to make money in professional MMA. It really is, you know. Do you recall the day that you decided, okay, I'm going to do this, I'm going to pursue an

MMA, excuse me, a pro wrestling career? And if so, what did you do? What's the first step? What was the first thing that you did to get rolling? I actually, it's funny, the WWE started this thing, the network. Okay. And they charged $9.99. And it was super cheap. And I occasionally watch the pay-per-views and stuff. But like, you know, they're pretty expensive. But the network, I was like, oh, I can watch it more often. So I got the network and I watched WrestleMania. And it was that WrestleMania where, I don't know, I feel like it clicked that day. where like, I saw a guy, like, smaller guys like Daniel Bryan, and he won everything.

And he beat guys like Batista and Randy Orr and other guys that are like 6-6 and monsters. And he had more of an M.M.A. style and stuff like that. And I even saw a lot of the wrestlers were using more M.M.A. techniques. And they weren't as big. You know, they're doing more athletic moves. And in my mind, I was like, you know what? I think I can do this and do it better. I'm like in my prime. You know, I feel like nothing's working out in MMA. And I just, you know, I just felt like I need to do this.

And I called up my buddy Nick Massington, who I trained with at the Rat Pack. And I asked him, what do you think, you know, like if I tried being a pro wrestling. He goes, I think it'd be stupid if he didn't. Wow. And I sold my house in Vegas, moved out to Pennsylvania because I have family out here, and started training at the Monster Factory. EasyW and Ring of Honor. You know, they have a dojo out here and started just wrestling like full time.

I sold my house, so I had money from that. I bought a cheaper house in Pennsylvania, and I just started training full time. And initially, you know, you often hear from guys who make the transition to pro wrestling from other sports. They say they underestimated how difficult it was, blown away by the stress it puts on your body, especially, you know, the early stages. What was your experience like? Were you also kind of surprised just how difficult this sort of quote unquote fake stuff is?

Well, I knew it was difficult. I've always had, and especially the kind of pro wrestling I wanted to do, you know. The one thing I had to take into consideration, there's a lot more psychology in pro wrestling than in mixed martial arts. You know, in MMA, you go out there, you get the job done. You don't work with people. You work against them, you know. While I'm pro wrestling, you have to work with people, and you have to end. entertain a crowd. Like, you could go out there and not entertain a crowd, but your goal is to make

that crowd stand up and cheer or stand up and boo and just go crazy one way or another. You need a reaction from the crowd. That's what makes you valuable, you know? So, like, that, you know, a lot of wrestler, you know, MMA guys will probably go to pro wrestling and think they can do some cool moves and that would be good enough. But there's a lot that goes in between just the little mannerisms and the way you carry yourself and the way you execute your moves. There's a lot that goes into it for sure. So now how long have you been doing it for? I've been doing about a little over two years now.

When did it start to click for you? And if it hasn't, then I would be shocked if you say so, but please do tell us. When did you start to feel like, okay, I'm getting the psychology, I'm getting, you know, comfortable, I'm developing my character, I'm getting into a groove? When did that start to happen for you? When did you feel that? I would say when I started working for Evolve. How long ago was that?

And that was a little over a year ago. Okay. So it took you a year to find your groove. I first started with, yeah. So I was already wrestling for about a year, almost a year. Started working with Evolve. And then once I started working with them, you know, they kind of, because when I first started doing wrestling,

they wanted me to do more of a pro wrestling. style, you know, like doing clotheslines and certain like drop kicks and stuff like that that I can do, but I'm not a pro wrestler. I'm an MMA guy doing a drop kick, you know? And then, and it's not really what I wanted to do, but it's like, you know, I had to learn everything, you know. And then once I started working with Evald, they didn't want me to do clotheslines, drop kicks, cross-bodies, nothing. They were like, no, go out there and do MMA, do fight, you know, and I was like, sweet. So, That's why I started incorporating the open palm strikes, the kicks, the hard forearms, even the European uppercuts I give are hard.

Everything I do is hard, you know. Every time I hit somebody, it's not soft. It's not a work. Every time I hit somebody, I hit somebody, you know. And I pride myself on that. I don't consider what I do pro wrestling. I consider what I do sport wrestling. Because when I slam you, I slam you.

When I hit you, I hit you where I won't kill you. but I'll hit you, you know? And how do your opponents feel about that? You know, my opponents, like, most of them respect me, and most of them know if they do what, you know, if they do that kind of style, wrestling, strong style wrestling, it gets a great reaction. Now, don't get me wrong, when I kick somebody in the head,

I am not kicking them in the head, you know? Like, I hold back on certain strikes and knees, and people, you know, work with it and go with the motion. and stuff like that. You know, but when it comes to body hits and body slams and stuff like that, everything's real. Was that something that you had to almost educate yourself on because for so long, you were taught, you know, go full force, punch, spar, things like that. And now at times you have to protect that guy that you're in the ring with.

Did you feel initially like this was almost like a re-education of your brain? Not at all, because when I would train for fights, I'd do a lot of times. that I didn't want to injure sparring partners or myself, and we'd do a lot of touch sparring, where it would be full speed, but just not full impact, you know, where, like, you'll land shots, but you're not trying to, like, kill somebody with it, you know what I'm saying? Okay.

So, and even the grappling, like, flow grappling. You know, so I consider when I wrestle, I basically flow fight, and then, you know, I go into spots and do other things like that, you know? I had the privilege of attending one of your matches, back in September the night before UFC 203 in Cleveland. And I was with the guys from live audio wrestling and they told me that you were competing and Shane and Bazelor as well.

And I said, oh man, I'd love to see this. I have an appreciation for pro wrestling even though I don't follow it as much as I did as a youngster. And I was just blown away by A, how good you were. I loved the style of wearing the MMA shorts, barefoot, all that. You were Matt Riddle, but also how quote unquote over you were with the fans. And this wasn't, you know, 10,000 people. but the bro stuff, they're chanting for you.

I mean, there was a whole thing that they were taking part in. Who came up with this whole character that you're doing now? And how long did it take for that to get over with the fans? You know, the best part about, you know, coming from an MMA background and being me is I really, I didn't come over to pro wrestling and be some over-the-top character. I just came over and I was myself.

And if you talk to anybody in pro wrestling, especially in teaching students or anything, the one thing they teach everybody is be yourself just turn it up a little bit so the whole bro thing just came about me just saying bro a lot and I call people bro and one time I went to the ring and William Regal was talking to somebody you know and I was like where's my job bro I was like I'm a stallion you know like look at me look at me look at me and it's like you got this stallion here and you're not going to hire me, bro. So people then start chanting, bro, you know, when I'd come out and wrestle. And at first, I was a bad guy because people didn't like me. They're like, they thought it was

kind of bullshit. Yeah. That I'd come from M.MA and I was just wrestling at, you know, the best indie promotions in the world. And then, you know, eventually they saw how good I was and I earned their respect. And now it's, it's crazy. Now everywhere I go, they chant bro. I was in Chicago, go Saturday they're chanting bro. I'm in Germany the other day they're chanting bro. They chant bro everywhere I go. It's insane. So you're

a baby face now. You know, I don't like to look at pro wrestling like that. I know that's like an older mindset like baby face, heel, good guy, bad guy. But I look at it like this. Like I can do things

during any match and if I work one place, I can be a bad guy. There's some places where I'm nasty to the people I wrestle and I'll win by cheating, I'll do whatever. And yeah, I'm a bad guy there. But then there's other places where like they've only seen

like five star matches, me just win great matches and they love me, you know? But I'll still like, I'll do whatever it takes to win. Like I'll kick somebody in the back of the head. I feel like the era of wrestling a good style or a good way or a bad way is kind of over. I think it's like who do you like, whose personality do you like, who do you like more in the ring? And it's a fight. Everybody should

be trying to win, you know, even if you know, whatever it is by hook or by crook, it's like you've got to win. You know, you got to respect the hustle. Sort of like an MMA. There's no good guy, bad guy. You just have your guy and you follow that guy for better or worse. So now, now that you're super hard, in demand, have this strong following. How many matches are you working a month? Average month, how many matches and how many places are you traveling to? I usually work four times a week. Okay. Wow.

So I'll wrestle four times a week. So I'd say like what? That's like 16 times. Wow. Maybe 16 times a month. And is that usually Thursday, Friday, Saturday? Yeah, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or I'll do multiple matches in one day

or we'll do tournaments or I'll do seminars because when I travel to these other places I'll go to Ireland and England and Germany and stuff and even MMA, they don't have the same level of MMA even there. So just me teaching pro wrestling style MMA and then kickboxing and everything else is, you know, it's a little different, you know.

And are you exclusive to one promotion? I'm not exclusive to one promotion. I work, I am under contract with WWN, but they have a plethora promotions. Okay. And, uh, but they don't hold me back from, you know, matches. I think if I'm like, hey guys, I got this sweet match in Japan or this sweet match here and I really want to wrestle this guy is going to get good attention,

they'll be like, cool, you know. Do you have a manager or agent? You know what's best for business. Right, right, right. How does that work in terms of getting the matches, getting the gigs? Oh, man, just hit me up on Twitter. That's it. Hit me up on Twitter or Facebook or if you get my email or number from another promoter.

Honestly, that's how it's worked. Like, even like when I've seen matches I've wanted to get, I've followed other promotions on Twitter and then, tagged them and been like, I want this matchup. Wow. And then like a bunch of fans will, you know, hop on the bandwagon being like, we want this matchup. And then the promoter would like hit me up and be like, hey, do you want to wrestle here? And I'm like, yeah. Yeah, obviously. For a guy who used to fight in front of thousands of people, what has it been like sometimes competing in front of 100 in a gym?

Oh, man. Oh, man. You know what? It's at first, sometimes I was. like this is, you know, kind of crazy, you know? But at the same time, it's, like, once you get in there and you start going, you're going, you know? Like, at least that's for me. Like, even when it comes to, like, training or anything, it's very easy for me to just, like, flip that switch. It doesn't mean I get crazy, but it just means, like, I'm in that mode.

I'm in the zone. I'm ready to go, you know? So, for wrestling, it doesn't matter if there's 20 people or 25,000. 500 people or 10,000 people, you know. Granted, do I like it when there's a lot of people? Of course. But, like, I've been in front of, like, 300 people, and they've been better than, like, thousands of people.

Really? Wow. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Well, just because, like, if you're, like, I've wrestled in England where the stadium maybe or, like, the building only holds, like, 700 people, and it's, like, a concert hall. Like, it's meant for concerts. And acoustics are insane.

and the crowd's red hot, everybody's stacked on top of each other, kind of like PWG or anything else. And, you know, it's just, it's a different environment. I kind of like to, like, bringing it,

like, it's almost like fight club, you know, because it's like, you know, it's usually like just dark and hot and everybody's going crazy and,

you know, feels like there's no rules. Right, right, right. Are you making more now as an indie wrestler than you were as a, UFC fighter? You know what?

I am on a steady in the sense like the UFC was great when you would fight, but I only fought like three times a year, you know, max. And and just there's just usually when you only

make money that often, you have like gaps, you know? So like there might be like a couple weeks or a month where I can't like pay bills and then yeah, I accumulate debt. And then when I fight, I get money, but then I had to reimburse and pay back everybody or everything, you know? So now you're more comfortable.

So I feel like now, like, right now I'm doing very well. I don't want to be like I'm killing it too crazy, but I'm doing extremely well. I'm doing better than I was when I was fighting in MMA for sure. Wow. And that's only on an indie level. Wow. From merchandise to booking fees to everything else. I have my own website and I do extremely well all the time.

And you do all the merch yourself. I saw you actually, you come out and I even bought one of the shirts. We put it out on the show. That's all you. You're doing all of that yourself. Yeah, well, I don't print the shirts. I got a buddy who sponsors me that prints my shirts up and stuff like that and my gear. But I do everything myself.

I don't do like a pro wrestling tea or any other kind of wrestling t-shirt. If you want one of my shirts, you have to. go through my website. Just because I'm not big into the big business. Okay. Small business guy over here. The quote unquote boys in the back, you know, the politics of wrestling, how have they been towards you?

Have you felt well received or did you feel like you had to earn that trust? I think I, people get to know me. Wrestling's a very personal business in that sense. Like you just don't make these decisions. Bookers don't book people for no. reason. They talk to people. They get to know people and stuff like that. You build relationships.

And I mean, I don't think I have one single bad relationship in pro wrestling, really, other than, honestly, with that company you saw me at AWRA. Really? What happened? Yeah. They booked me without asking me, and then I was like, I asked them to, like,

stop advertising me, and then things went sour. And I tried to keep it just between us and personal, but they brought it to social media. You know how it goes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it was, it's very fine.

They're doing well. I'm doing well. It's all good. Okay. Now, everyone talks about when are you going to go to WW. I know you've had the tryout. I've heard Triple H talk about you and almost say, like, look, you're on our radar. We kind of nudged him along.

We gave him the path, but that respect needs to be earned and things like that. Where are we at? What's the update? How close are you to actually signing with WWE? You know what? I think, I don't know what they're doing. And that's pretty fun. Right now, they got a lot of talent to deal with. They really do. And they got a lot of people and they got their stories. And they got NXT, WWE, Smackdown Raw. They got a lot. But like, I think right now, I think they're just letting me build steam. You know, they're letting me build street credit. you know like the more often i work shows like pwg and a w and beyond wrestling and progress and evolve and the more i work all around the world in germany and spain and it it's just it's good you know like the bigger i get just at this level because i'm not even on tv yet yeah i'm not even on tv and i'll

walk into bill i walked into nxte a couple weeks ago like at a show like at a big one, a takeover at the Royal Rumble, and the crowd literally started chanting, bro. You know what I'm saying? There's guys on their roster that they don't get chants for, and I've never even stepped foot, you know, like on their canvas, really, other than the tryout. So, you know, I think it's just a matter of time,

and I'm in no rush. Like I said, I'm doing very well. I have a very loose schedule. You know, I get to see my family every week for the most part, You know, like if I was working for the WWE, I might literally go like, I might see him like, it would be rough. Yeah, yeah. Well, my schedule is very, my schedule is very relaxed and I do very well. But you do want to get there, right?

Yeah, well, yeah, of course. Okay. But there's also things I want to do first. Like, there's certain things you can't do in WWE. Like, I would really like to go wrestle in Japan. I'd like to work a lot of new Japan talent, you know. And right now in the Indies, there's. great thing about the indies is like

I can wrestle guys like Shabada and like Suzuki and other high level New Japan guys and I can wrestle them in Europe you know or I can go to Japan or I can go to other places you know so it's like that's like the really good part about like

wrestling indies is you can wrestle anyone any time especially at this stage unless you sign with like the WWE is there a timeline in your mind like is there a period where you like okay if this time next year I'm not there. I'll be disappointed. No.

Okay. I'm really happy. You seem like you're happy. You seem really happy. Yeah. Yeah, I wrestle all the time. Like I said, I'm wrestling four times a week before I was only fighting three times a year. So I get to entertain and be in front of a crowd at least like three to four times a week. And I make good money. I get to see my family. You know, like it's good. Just staying busy. I know a couple weekends ago was WrestleMania and you were a big part.

I mean, it's become a thing where all these promotions come and there's just so much to do. And I think you were, I read that you were trying to get eight matches. You had seven. Did you get the eighth? Well, I had seven, but I also did a seminar. Okay, fair enough. I did not want eight. Seven was enough.

Okay. The seminar was enough as well, you know. But yeah, you know, it was good. WrestleMania is a great weekend. It's just, there's just so much wrestling, so much going on. And, you know, the wrestling fans, you know, the first night they're on fire. And then by the last show, the last night, they're just like, oh, just dragging ass, you know. But it's good stuff.

It's a lot of fun. It's poetic in a sense, because you said you were watching WrestleMania just a couple years ago. It clicks. And now here you are, you know, one of the main attractions. and you competed against Dan Severn. Was that a shoot? Was that legit? Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, we talked. We were friendly about it, but... You went hard. We didn't kill each. And like I said, like, I keep it like, I told him, we'll, like, you know, we'll do, like, pancreas rules, you know? Like, open palm strikes, kicks, stuff like that, you know? Okay.

And we went out. I don't know if you've seen the match, but, uh, I thought, I, I thought, I, enjoyed myself thoroughly. It was good. Was a turning point for you when Dave Meltzer started to praise you? Because everyone points to that when they talked to me about you. Like Meltzer gave him... You know, Dave

Melzer's the man. I feel like if Meltzer speaks highly of anybody, they, you know, people turn heads and look because they know Dave knows what he's talking about. Right, right. So I think, I think they know when Meltzer says something about somebody, if he says about the young bucks or Kurt Angle or me or whoever he's talking about,

they know to listen because he, you know, he's very educated in the field, you know? Just a couple more things. Who's your dream match? Do you have a dream opponent? I mean, there's so many wrestlers out there and so many opportunities, you know. I mean, there's dream matches on different levels, you know, but I don't know. I don't know. Right now, I'd really like to wrestle like Suzuki.

He's in New Japan. He's really good. He's aggressive. But for the most part, I get most of the matches I want. Okay. I get to wrestle guys like Kyle Riley and Jeff Cobb and, you know, and others like that. You know, Chris Hero. Well, I can't wrestle Chris Hero now because he's in the WWA.

Right. But wrestling cash is, oh, no. If there's a fan who watches this show as an MMA fan, remembers you, of course, from the UFC. and is now just learning about you as a pro wrestler, is there a match on YouTube or wherever that you're really proud of, your favorite right now,

and that you can recommend for people to go watch? I'll be honest, if you want to look up some Matt Riddle wrestling footage, there's tons, just look up Matt Riddle wrestling. Okay. There's tons of matches. Most of them I'm proud of. You know, most of the stuff that they put up is pretty good.

Like, you know, if you're like pro wrestling and MMA, and you see one of my pro wrestling matches, you won't be disappointed. You'll see I'm kicking people. You'll see the sweat flying off fools and me like slamming them on their head, you know? And it's like you'll see in the crowds.

It's a raw experience. Like the biggest thing is like even if you're not the biggest wrestling fan, but you want to go out and have like a couple drinks, indie wrestling is a really good time. You know, you can go out and the crowds are usually crazy hot and it's nice. I have to say like you have something like I'm talking to you and I'm being honest I felt like I had to get you on the show before you exploded. Not to say you haven't exploded yet, but like I feel like I'm talking to the second coming of Kerry von Eric here. Like just your hair, your look, your style, the way you speak, your demeanor. Do you get that a lot? Like you just ooze that. I do. I do. I get it a lot. Especially that I wrestle barefoot and everything else. So, you know, I get it a lot. But then I bring it a lot. But then I bring it a lot. I bring it a lot. break out the MMA stuff, but you know.

Hey. Okay. Last thing for you, Matt, I remember when you left the UFC, you know, you said a few things about how much you were making and whatnot. And I remember Dana White going on UFC tonight and somewhat, you know, dressing you down and saying like, look, you can't get it together with the smoking the weed, you know, all this stuff. And it felt like here's Matt Riddle, so much potential.

And they're just kind of like chewing him and spitting him out like so many others. And what I love about your story so much is that you've, essentially, I know you didn't want to do this maybe, but like you've stuck it back to them. You are more popular now. You're more successful now than you've ever been as a UFC fighter. You're not even in the big leagues, but yet on the indie scene, you're doing, you know, bigger things than you were in the big leagues of MMA. When you heard all that stuff, did you use that as motivation? Did you say, all right, I'm going to prove this guy wrong. I'm going to prove these people wrong. And is that part of, you know, your success here? you know that definitely didn't hurt you know it didn't hurt me from trying but you know with that you know i was just more disappointed because you know i i spilled a lot of blood you know and broke some bones you know for that company and just if you talked to about like just talk down to like that that was disappointing but uh you know for me it was more the fact that he said i would never be able to

to earn money being a loser, you know, and this and the other thing. And I can honestly say I'm making more money than I was ever in the UFC, and I'm doing it on my terms of my way and loving my life. So, you know, like, you know, granted, I'll never be Dana White Rich. Yeah, you never know. I don't think I, but, but, but I don't want to be. Like, I'm not that kind of guy. How do you feel about the MMA, the MMA world? Like, do you watch it or do you feel like, you know, is it too, is it this open wound that you don't want anything to do with right now? Definitely not an open wound. I love M.A.

It's one of the, it's like the greatest sport ever. You know, there's, there's only one sport where you can actually test yourself against another man or woman or whoever and go out there and give 100% like, no, you can't even tape your ankles, you know, like, all you have is gloves. You can't wear knee pads, nothing. It's, that's why, like, even when I. wrestle. I don't wear anything but my shorts. I feel like that's like real man shit. Like that's real stuff. Like,

that's real stuff. Like, no support, no help. I support myself, you know, and I fight, you know. And like, you can't, like, that's why MMA's one of the greatest, it's the best, you know. But, but at the same time, it's, uh, I just, I don't have that desire. Like, after being part of it and seeing how it works behind the scenes

and then seeing how I was treated and then seeing how other fighters have been treated. in the past and just how the politics of MMA I'm not a really big fan of and I know people are like you probably don't like the politics of pro wrestling but that's probably why I wrestle on the Indies because I love

the politics of indie wrestling because as long as you're a good guy and a nice person and a good wrestler it's like there's it's great it's awesome. Do you think you'll ever fight again? You think you'll ever have an MMA fight again? You know, probably

not. Okay. I just like, and the thing is I would love to fight again. Like, I love fighting. But at the same time, I just, I just don't have that desire. And at the same token, I've seen so many guys go from MMA, you know, leave it, then come back after a couple of years and get beat up. So I don't want to do that either. So, you know, now, you know, don't get me wrong.

If the matchup was right and it was worth it, like, you know, if it was a big, name and big money, of course I would take it because it's like even if I lose, who cares, you know? But at the same time, it's like right now I'm having a lot of fun doing what I'm doing. I get to wrestle all the time and it's amazing. Before I let you go, this weekend, next weekend, you know, again, fans who are just finding out about you, fans of yours, where are you going to be? Where are you competing? I actually, I took this weekend's off Easter. Oh, yes, of course.

I took this weekend off. But the following weekend, I'll be in New York City. All right. Wrestling like five times. I'll be in California the night before. I'll be in California, I think the 21st for PWG. Then I'll be in New York City for Tier 1 wrestling, wrestling Pentagon, and wrestling for Evolve. Doing a whole bunch.

wrestling like four times in New York the next two days. And then, yeah. And you can find me on Twitter at Super King of Rose. Yes. I like that you... Rose.com. I like you change the Twitter handle. No more Riddle tough seven.

Yeah, I got, you know, I had to evolve. I got to get verified now. Okay. I mean, I got enough followers. I should be able to pull something out. Well, this has been a real treat. I really, really enjoyed this. And thank you for giving us so much time, Matt.

just wanted to know about the whole journey here and it's great. I mean, it's just amazing to see how well you're doing and how much fun you're having and you're a real success story as far as a guy who, you know, was a little young to stop fighting, but here you are reinventing yourself in a really cool way. So kudos to you, my man, keep it up, continued success. And I hope that someday soon we'll be seeing you on either Ra or Smackdown killing people and I'll say, I knew him when. I knew when he was just a little young buck, if you will, pardon the pun, in the world of mixed martial arts. No worries, bro. Thank you, Matt. Appreciate it.

All the best. Thanks. Thanks for having me, man. Pleasure. We'll talk to you soon. Sounds good. There he is. Matt Riddle.

How about that? So much fun. That was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed that. Great, great story there. A lot of people have been talking to me, hitting me up. And when I saw his match in Cleveland, the night before 203, I was just blown away. I mean, it was really a fun ston.

I think I even talked about it on this show, how much fun it was to watch him, A, in this setting, still kind of the same guy. I mean, if you remember Matt Riddle, I remember we were in, I think, Calgary. He had a great post-fight interview. The press conference was just incredibly entertaining. And, you know, you can see, you can see right there.

I mean, he's just, he's, he's infectious. I mean, he's got an illuminating personality, and it's really cool to see how well he's doing after I saw him in Cleveland. I got it. I understood after everyone had told me that he was so over with the fans. And our own Chuck Minnhal wrote a great story about him. So I do suggest you check that out.

A lot of cool stuff on Matt Riddle. And there's a lot of great matches out there for you to see. So good to support a former MMA fighter now doing good in a different sport. Okay. Great stuff there. Again, I want to thank the Marines. We're not saying goodbye, but this is a good time to thank them. Marines.com.

We appreciate their support. As you know, every value tradition. and lesson learned from battle are imbued into every Marine. It's what they are all made of and how the Marine Corps develops quality citizens. Marines, they don't fight for glory. They fight for honor. They live by a code that isn't written or spoken. It is just lived.

Go to Marines.com for more. We appreciate their support. Got the hat over there, the mug over there, all good things from the Marines. And we like having the Marines on our side because they tend to kick butt. So thank you very much to them. Okay. We have a lot to discuss, my friends. 210.

UFC on Fox 24. How about this? I just saw something here. Something from Larry Hazard of the New Jersey, New Jersey State Athletic Control Board. This is in regards to instant replay. So a nice little transition for us. This is the memo that he just sent out. He is the commissioner in New Jersey.

The New Jersey State Athletic Control Board was the first regulatory agency to approve the use of instant replay for professional boxing MMA and kickboxing contest. This policy went into effect on January 3rd, 2007. With specific regard to MMA, instant replay was available and in place for use at CFFC event held on January 19, 2007. This was the first MMA event that instant replay was available for use by officials and regulators. The actual use of instant replay to reverse the decision of a referee occurred at a new breed fighters event held on November 26, 2008. This was the first MMA event

where instant replay was used to overturn an official's call. Given recent events, New Jersey, as it has since 2007, encourages other regulatory bodies to consider implementing the use of instant replay. As we have previously stated,

in numerous articles, we should embrace all available technology to help ensure a more fair and equitable outcome. Now, I agree with everything he said there. This does sort of feel like New Jersey kind of sticking it to New York. New York now getting a lot more

big-time MMA events than New Jersey has because of the lifting of the ban. But I do agree with the sentiment. It is 2017. To not use instant replay is ludicrous to me. To not allow yourself to get the right call by any means necessary, and especially in this day and age with the technology that we have, is archaic. Witness the fact that baseball, which is perhaps the most archaic of all the sport, has finally accepted replay. They use instant replay. Why wouldn't any MMA sanctioning body not? Why wouldn't any state, province, athletic commission not want to use it?

Now, important to note that even though it says, nowhere in the New York state guidelines does it say you can't use replay? It just doesn't say that you can. And they used it in the Wydenman fight. it doesn't expressly say that you can. So they're going to point to a, I have it here actually, they're going to point to a clause in their statute that says jurisdiction of the commission. The commission shall have and is hereby vested with the sole direction, management,

control, and jurisdiction over one all authorized combative sports. They're going to point to that and say, look, at the end of the day, it doesn't say that we can't look at replay, even though it doesn't say that we should or can look at replay, and they're going to say that's why we made the call. But this thing, the Wydenman Musasi thing, was, okay, let's just say this. Ever since the law was passed to lift the ban in New York for mixed martial arts events, essentially a year ago, there have been five major mixed martial arts events that have taken place in this state. And they only were able to start promoting events here in September of last year.

And those events were 205 Madison Square Garden, the event in Albany in early December, the Brooklyn event, 208, this weekend's event, 210 in Buffalo. And then, of course, the World Series of Fighting event on New Year's Eve at the Madison Square Garden Theater. And why is this important to know? because I actually feel for the New York Athletic Commission. I believe that they have the best interests of the athletes in mind. They want to be the best commission they can possibly be.

The problem is they aren't getting enough reps. They don't get the experience that they need on off weeks to then be at their best for UFC events. Or Bell Tour events, of course, there's one coming up, 24th. There's another UFC coming up on Long Island on July 22nd. And so every time they're under this massive UFC microscope and the one World Series of Fighting Event was on NBC got over, or close to a million viewers, so it was a big deal for them. They're forced to kind of figure it all out in front of us when they should be able to have, you know, a CFFC, a ring of combat, some other small MMA promotion, wild bills, TKO, King of the K.

whatever it is, every single Friday, Saturday, Thursday, every single week leading up to these events so that they can get more comfortable with way-ins, with regulation, with officiating, with judging, with, you know, doctor protocol. But they're not doing that. And why are they not doing that? Because it is essentially for promoters the most expensive place in the world to put on events. Just a few months ago, New York raised the minimum coverage for a boxing card. from 10,000 to 50,000.

This is all combat sports. That's for general medical coverage per fighter on the card. Also, in addition to that, they required a new and unprecedented $1 million minimum requirement for each fighter in the event the fighter suffers a life-threatening brain injury. This is unprecedented, as I said. And the reason for this is that just a couple of years ago, a boxer, I had his name.

Oh, here it is. Magomed Abdul Salamov suffered devastating brain injuries and now they have been extremely cautious and they want to err on the side of caution and that's essentially what we saw that's essentially what we saw

on Saturday night. Someone texted me that they just joined the Marines as a result of my read that's why it made me laugh. That's what we saw on Saturday night. We saw a commission, we saw a doctor, a group of doctors, a group of officials who are erring on the side of caution when it pertain to the Chris Wyman situation. And it goes back to the fact that they don't have enough experience.

There aren't as many boxing events going on here. There aren't as many MMA events going on here. And it's only the ones who could truly afford that, you know, $50,000 coverage policy and the potential $1 million, dollar minimum requirement for each fighter in the event of a serious brain injury. You think CFFC, you think ring of combat, you think all these other people can put on events, you know, with that on the line, forget about the million dollars, just paying up front. In California, Nevada, for example, it's less than 4,000 a fighter.

So we're talking about what? Almost 35 times or something? What is it? I'm bad at math, but... 30 times more? No, it's not 30 times more. What's the, what's, what's 50 divided by four? Anyone? Anyone? Near Creek, where are you when? I need you. You get my point though, right? 4, 8, 12, 16, 20, 24, 28, 32, 36, 40, 10 times more? Yeah, that's right. I was, I was the worst that math. 10 times more. That's a lot. And there's a reason why these promotions aren't coming here. That's the reason.

So when you see them not know what's going on at the Wayans, when you see this mass confusion, with Daniel Cormier, with Pearl Gonzalez, with Chris Wyman, it's because it's, and I'm not breaking news here, but we have to remember this. So I feel for them, but they're kind of doing it to themselves. They have been scarred by what happened to that boxer, and they are airing on the side of extreme caution. That's the problem here.

So now let's go back, let's go back to the Chris Widman situation. Chris Weidman thinks that he has four points down. He thinks that he has his two hands down and his two feet on the ground. That's the new rule. It's no longer three. It's the two palms, the two souls of your feet. He thinks that he has that. He gets need a couple times. The referee, Dan Mergliazza, reacts to his reaction and calls a stop to the fight. So now Wyman is gathering himself. And Mergliazza is informed via the use of replay that the shots were actually legal. And so now there's even confusion. You can hear it, he's saying, okay, they're legal, but you still have a few more minutes. And you see the doctor's talking to Wyman and you see them asking him questions. And you see him then starting to gather himself more and more. And you see him trying to campaign for the fight to continue.

But in the end, they err on the side of extreme caution. They call off the fight. They say that the doctor says that he is not fit to continue. At the end of the day, the doctor has, you know, the final say here. And the doctor, as you can see in the clip, is the one who calls it off. I don't think that this was handled well. Let's just say they don't look at the replay. Let's just say they called a stop to the fight because they being Merglaata,

because he thought, based on what he saw, any legal knee was landed, right? He can't look at replay. Let's just say that replay is not involved, which, by the way, I think replay should be involved. I think you should be able to look at it. Just look at the clip like they do in the NBA, the NFL, major league baseball, all these places and more.

So once they determine that the knee is either legal or illegal, there's only two things that can happen. If it's legal, the fight should just restart. Just put them back in the same position and keep going. Now, of course, if Widman said to them, I can't keep going, and I've heard there's some transcripts of the corner, but you never hear Wyatman actually say, I can't keep going. Show me that. I have not seen that. I've looked for it.

I've never seen or heard any transcript, any. the audio of Wyman saying, I'm not fit to fight. I want out. I actually hear him say I want to keep fighting. I don't hear the opposite. So if they determine from whatever way possible that the fight, excuse me, that the knee was legal and Wydenman is saying I'm good to go, why didn't restart? Now, if they think, based on their discussions, that the fight was, the knee was illegal, then he should have gone the five minutes and then they determine if he can't continue or not. So I don't understand how we got to the idea that Wydenen lost the fight. Unless he told him that he couldn't fight, that he was too out of it.

Now, you may have seen that yesterday I promoted that Chris Wydenman was going to be on the show. I really wanted to have him on the show. Unfortunately, he hit me up this morning and he said, you know, I'm, I just, I need some more time to digest this. He's devastated. He's upset. I mean, he was winning that first round. he was clearly losing the second, a very important fight for him. You heard him talk about it on Wednesday with us that he considered moving back into his

parents' basement. He was watching Rocky 3. He related. He saw the mansion. He saw the good life. And he said, what's happened to me? Have I gone soft, essentially? Have I forgotten where I came from?

Have I lost the fire? Have I lost the motivation? I need to go back to the basics. I need to move back in with my parents. And then at the 11th hour, he decided he couldn't leave his family. So he stayed with his family. He lived in a sort of guest room, read a lot. And he seemed to be in a great place.

I mean, we had an opportunity to film his weight cut. As you saw, it was, as far as weight cuts are concerned, a very good one, a pretty smooth one. Still a lot of stress on your body, but he seemed to handle it very well. I mean, he got there at around 9.30, left at 1130, and he was done the night before. This was a big fight for Chris Wyman. He was at the crossroads of his career. He needed this one. And so you feel for him.

At worst, in my opinion, this should have been a no contest. If they ruled that this knee was unintentional and the initial call was that it was illegal because again, replay, not in play here. And then they also ruled. rule that Chris Wyman can't fight, if they say that he said that to them, then that should be a no contest because it wasn't the third round, it was the second round, and if the guy can't continue, it doesn't go to the scorecards. So I think at worst it should be a no contest. Now, he has said,

and he confirmed this to me this morning, that he is going to appeal it. He's going to appeal the decision. We'll see what happens there. I'm not that confident something will happen if I'm being honest. But we'll see what happens. I've also tried to reach out to Dan Merglietta. I also reached out to John McCarthy, who was Cajside, and they say they can't speak right now because they are awaiting the appeal. Now, one thing that a lot of people have brought up is his reaction to the knee. I have no doubt that the knee rocked him. I have no doubt that he was hurt.

Some people said he was selling it, and that hurt him. And that's possible. I think that if you're going to go ahead and try to gain an advantage, sell something, whatever, you got to go ahead and do it. But did he say he could not fight? You can't say, oh, he was selling it. He had his hands on his head. He was sitting on his butt, and thus the doctors determined he couldn't fight.

Did he actually say, I can't continue? Because you saw them talking to him a lot, what was said? That's why when Bob Bennett showed up to that press conference after 209 and faced the music and talked about, you know, the scorecards for Woodley Wonderboy. And a lot of my colleagues were like, oh, why is he saying that they? UFC as a client or, you know, why did he say this about that judge who scored it a 10-8 and we're nitpicking and we're saying like, ah, that's hogwash. I was like, no, no, no, no, no. We want the commissioners to show up to the press conferences. We want to have someone answer

for these sometimes baffling decisions. They are going to continue to be baffling decisions from here until the end of time. But we want someone to answer for those decisions. Dana White's not that guy. Musassi's not that guy. Wiedman's not that guy. How could we talk to every single person involved. How could we talk to the coaches, the fighters, the promoter, stay till 4 a.m. at the arena and not have one member of the commission at least address us and say this is why we came to that conclusion. Now here we are on this Monday morning, Monday afternoon, speculating, trying to figure out, trying to play expert, going through their guidelines, their rule books. Just come out and talk. We don't have to agree with it, but I want to hear your explanation.

Someone on your behalf. Put out a statement, something. So the next time an Andy Foster or a Bob Bennett or a Larry Hazard does an interview and you think that their explanation is hogwash, remember New York and some other commissions who don't talk to us. Now, I'll give them credit on Friday. They did talk to us about the Daniel Cormier situation, but they really needed to talk to us about the Widman situation because someone lost. It was ruled a loss. There needs to be instant replay. And if they looked at the instant replay, they would have realized it was a legal knee. And then they have to ask him, hey, you don't have time.

You don't have time to recover. Right? So can you go or can you not go? We looked at it. It was legal. It was our bad. Can you go or can you not go? If you can't go, the fights off.

You've just been knocked out by a legal knee. If you can't go, let's go. And hopefully not enough time has passed. But things happen. You know, people, their mouthpieces fly off. They got to clean it. Whatever. Lo-blow.

Things happen where there's a minute and a guy gets sometimes an unexpected advantage where he gets to recover. But to rule that a loss, if in fact he did not say he can't continue, to me seems a little too drastic. Doesn't seem like that was the right call. I believe New York Rick disagrees with me, right? Viently. Viently.

Whoa. Tell me why. Because you've only outlined a scenario where Chris Widman is the one dictating that he can't continue, where that's up to the doctors. You've said he has to explicitly say I can't continue. In fact, he doesn't have to say that at all. If the doctors deem he can't continue, then that's for them to decide, not him.

And therefore, the scenario that you just laid out at the end is actually exactly what happened. They stopped the fight incorrectly for an illegal knee. The replay showed that it was legal. He was overselling the damage that it had done. I take umbrage with the word overselling because he obviously was rocked by it. I mean, he was losing that round.

You know what I mean? So let's assume that he was that hurt by it then. He's not going to start doing jumping jacks. He's going to sit down and take the time if people are out there talking to each other, right? It's actually more beneficial to my point. Okay. If he was that hurt by it. And then based on the corner audio that we've heard, apparently he was asked, you know, what date it was.

Now, people say this to me, but is there the audio? I mean, I'm okay with saying that, oh, there's audio, but I just haven't heard it. So let's assume that we don't have the audio of that. clearly based on their conversation, that conversation was had, where he was asked the date and couldn't relay it. And therefore, they determined the doctors that he was unable to continue. And it's not up to Chris Wyman to say, I can't continue. It's up to him to prove that he can and the doctors deemed that he could not. Now, the real linchpin in that is whether they're allowed to look at replay or not.

And in this case, based on what you're saying now, it seems like they are. Not that they're not prohibited. No, what I'm saying is from people I've talked to, they have guessed that this is what they will say. That it doesn't say we can't, even though it doesn't say we can. Do you get what I'm saying? Sure. So they're going to use that out because, look, I mean, you have Mark Ratner going on there. And who better than Mark Ratner to know about the rules of these commissions when he helped, you know, legalize the sport essentially in the entire world, certainly here in North America?

first thing he said was there's no replay in New York. And by the way, in California, there's no replay as well. It doesn't say, now the commission could go out and essentially Trump itself, I suppose, and they can also come in and say, he told me this, he told me that. I mean, we're the doctor, we have the end of, you know, we have the final say here. But it doesn't expressly say that you can use it. Sure. I understand that.

In a case where a fight is going to be stopped for what is called an illegal knee at the time and then in replay to be legal, there's always going to be a party that's upset with that. If the person on the receiving end of the knee can continue, they just got arrest on a legal knee. There's never going to be a situation that we come out of this thinking, well, that was handled appropriately and the fight will resume as if nothing happened. Because that's just not, it's not a realistic scenario. There's no way if the incorrect call is made by the referee, that it will resume as if nothing happened. Just not possible.

So in this case, it resumed after looking at a replay. Clearly, the knee was legal. They deemed Wydenne unable to continue, and it was granted a TKO. As far as whatever spun from what happened after the stoppage of action, I have no problem with it. It seems like that would be the proper string of events. That seems like the right sequence. the issue is always going to stem from an improper stoppage. But after that, I don't really have much of an issue what happened.

It's unfortunate that the stoppage happened just because if you're asking me, I don't think Chris Wydenman was done. And I think Gaygard could have continued and closed that fight himself. But I don't think that was the finishing blow. I don't think Chris Widman was done. But stemming from when it was stopped, unfortunately it was stopped, stemming from when it was stopped, I think that the proper order of events happened.

I don't have much of an issue with it. Yeah, I just kind of wish that they would have said to themselves again, I'm now assuming that there is, because I know there are some people sending me this link to Widman's corner saying, oh, he said this and that, but I want to hear it from Chris himself. Sure. I want to hear from Chris himself.

That's fair and valid. So if I'm saying, if I'm thinking to myself, okay, that didn't happen, that conversation didn't happen, that answer didn't come out of his mouth like the wrong month or I don't know where I am. Or most importantly, I don't want to keep fighting. I don't understand why it wasn't just restarted or called a no contest. And oh, by the way, this all starts with the mistake, right? The mistake of stopping the fight. 100%. Fighters can cry foul. We see this in all kinds of fights. We see this in all kinds of sports. People try to flop. People. People. try to draw a charge, people try to call a goaltending or traveling or off-sides, whatever the case may be, the referee has to see things with their own eyes. And look, we saw in the national

championship game just last Monday. The referees botched a bunch of calls, including one that really sealed the deal as far as Gonzaga is concerned. And so, mistakes are going to happen. These are human beings. But look, Dammer Glouadda, great guy. That was botched. Yeah. The action should have never halted.

Now, action doesn't halt. Wyman could have been knocked out five seconds later. There's no controversy here. Unfortunately, now there's controversy. And it's unfortunate. Yeah, I think we all agree that it was in improper stoppage, obviously. After everybody's looked at the videotape, it's legal. But as I said before, once that happens, that's where, you know, the proper order has to be taken.

And I don't have much of an issue with what happened. Now, I'm going based on the assumption. That's the problem. That's an assumption. I can't assume here. I'm going with what I've seen evidence. Right, but it's not up to us to make the call. No, no, I'm just weighing in on it.

And I can reasonably weigh in on it. And I can reasonably assume that that conversation took place. Otherwise, they wouldn't be discussing it in his corner. So as somebody who is just following that logic, then I can make that assumption. Now, if it was presented as a case and I was the arbiter, then there's no evidence, clearly. Yeah. But somebody who's weighing in from afar, very easy for me. to make that assumption and it makes sense.

I'll say this, and Casey, our videographer, can attest to it. When I was watching it live, I didn't think for a second, even before the replays, that they were illegal knees. Right. I was surprised it was stopped. Now, I don't think, I mean, at times it's tough. I don't think this was a tough one, even in the heat of the action. I mean, they were replaying them over and over again.

I didn't think this was a tough one. You have to remember, like, now, this is me just going off the top of my head, but the angle he's looking from. I don't think he was in a great position. he's he's on he's above it wideman and emu sassi are closer to the ground so if he's looking down at it he could there's there's a way you could see chris's hand still being on the mat if you're looking down at it versus you know our angle where we see it much closer to the floor um make no mistake about it it was the wrong call i'm not i'm not trying to argue against that but i'm i'm seeing a a way that could happen i'm seeing a very likely path that that could happen um but no it was the wrong it was the wrong call and it's not fair to to anybody involved. And so here once again is the bottom line. We can crack jokes about New York

all we want. We could say, oh, let's ban New York, all that kinds of stuff. But they are airing on the side of extreme caution. They are doing this essentially maybe to protect themselves, to not face the same situation that they faced with that boxer, because that was horrific and tragic. But this is all in the best interest of the fighters. And unfortunately, they aren't a well-oiled, enough machine to get it right when the lights are on, when everyone's watching. It's one thing to have the pressure of, say, a local show, if you will, pick the event. It's another pay-per-view audience, and you're going to get hammered from all sides. And that's unfortunate. And they have to find that balance. They have to maybe reconsider this insurance policy. They have to reconsider all these

things because enough time has passed now to where there's just been too many mistakes and they're becoming the butt of a joke and New York is New York. The UFC has had a lot of success in New York this far. 205. Beat the record as far as Gate is concerned at MSG. That's insane when you consider what MSG has put on there. Brooklyn, huge crowd, huge gate. We know the numbers for Buffalo. I expect the same Nassau Coliseum in July. They need to get a right. They need more experience. they just need more experience and that's a problem and if you're a fighter right now

and if they're not going to change their ways and if you're Chris Wyman and you're staring at lost number four potentially at NASA in July you might want to think twice about fighting here and that's no knock on them

they just need more experience what other commission legalizes MMA and then gets all these massive events in less than a year right dating back to let's just start with September when things were actually open for business

it's what's September three seven months It's been seven months. It's just too tough. And so we're seeing that happen. In the Wyman fight, it's unfortunate. Weidman's calling for a rematch. Musassi says, yeah, maybe rematch, but he's a free agent now.

Maybe he never gets that rematch, right? He may go off and sign with someone else. And then let's go back. So now, while we're talking about this, let's talk about the other two controversial things, because there were three, and it was really the story of the week, once again in Buffalo. We had the Waynes with Daniel Cormier.

So you heard it from him. Cormier comes down. He weighs two. 206.2. And no one tells him that he has two more hours only in championship fights. You heard it from the commissioner. He spoke to us afterwards. He had two more hours after weighing in at 11 a.m. essentially. This is not something that the UFC does with their early weigh-ins. It's not something that California does. And they were the standard bear. But in New York, it says it. I tweeted it. In their guidelines, you have two more hours if you're in a championship fight. How does

no one tell Daniel Cormier this? How does no one in the UFC tell Daniel Cormier this? How does no one in the commission at any point when he comes down, tell him this. He goes to the back, he's upset, and then someone says, oh, hey, by the way, you have another two hours, let me do this again? How is that happen? How is that possible? The unfortunate thing about this sport right now is that there's no universal commission. There's no a universal set of rules. So the UFC is in Kansas City this weekend, and then they're in Nashville, and last weekend they were in Buffalo, and then they're going to Dallas, and the list goes on and on, and it's different. In every, state. There needs to be a one sheet that you hand out to the fighters when they check in on

Tuesday and say, hey, oh, by the way, these are some things that you need to know. If you have breast implants, you might have some issues. If you're in a championship fight, you get an extra two hours. Those are the rules. That's the way the sport is. Commission by commission, state by state. So I think, I blame New York for that. I blame the UFC for that. Daniel's management should have known about that. How do you not know about that? And so maybe he would have, you know, in the spur of the moment, he's like, oh, snap, I'm going back out there. I'm going back out there to weigh in. I think I'm 205, and then the whole thing happens with the towel. And I'm not here to defend Daniel Cormier and the towel trick, towel tactic, if you will. But let's just say this. There were commissioners all

around him. Why didn't any of him stop what Daniel Cormier was doing? Why didn't anyone say get off the towel? Is it because they don't have a lot of experience doing this sort of thing? They're a relatively new commission. But at the end of the day, a guy is fighting for his life here. He's fighting for his career. If he doesn't make weight, he's going to get stripped. And I saw him firsthand, my friends. I saw the state that he was in. He walked in there. I have seen all of Daniel Cormier at this point. Let me just put it that way. I have seen it all as far as he is concerned physically. He had no idea what was going on. He was out of it. He was stumbling. He was walking there holding his pants. It was not a pretty sight. It was an uncomfortable site,

if I'm being honest. I was not calling that stuff, you know, tongue and cheek like some other times. That was, that was legit emotion. That was, that was amazing to watch. The whole thing unfold in front of us. That's part of why I like the early wands, because before, make no mistake about it, this stuff used to happen behind a curtain. And there's music and there's Joe Rogan yelling and we're several feet away. You're trying to tell me that in the past, you're, that in the past, you know, discussions weren't had. I mean, we saw it with the Nick Diaz thing in Montreal, or they're using that analog scale. Yeah, you're close enough to 205. You know, come on, let's not be foolish here. Let's not kid ourselves. This is, we are humans, human nature. But now what's so

fascinating about the early wands is that the entire nipple of the sport has been exposed. Pardon the pun, but it's true. It's all happening in front of us. That's what's so amazing. There's a countdown clock. There's people freaking out. They're anxious. What is going on? Is he going to come? Is he going to show up? What state is he going to be in? Is he going to make the wait? No one knows. And we're all just witnessing it. It's all happening in front of us. It's fascinating. I hope it never goes away. But it also exposes a lot. And it was exposed on Friday morning. He didn't know he had a second chance. He comes out holding onto the towel and did it help him? We have seen some people put out stuff where it clearly does help you.

I've not tried it myself, but I've seen enough pictures and enough people have reached out to me. I've never heard from so many fighters. Fighters who do not respond to my text ever telling me, hey, great job Daniel. Hey, that was dirty. Hey, he tried to, you know, do an old wrestling trick and a work. Kudos to him. You know, did you see that? I mean, it was just amazing how many times people hit me up on Friday afternoon about that.

He had caught everyone's attention. Rumble's team didn't complain. You heard Henry Hooft. They didn't complain. Even though, and this was somewhat of an unprecedented situation, Daniel would, have been stripped had he missed weight, but Rumble could have still fought for the belt. The belt still would have been on the line for Rumble. See, I was thinking of the Travis Luter situation.

Luter Challenger misses weight, belt no longer on the line. But this was more like the Brandon Halsey Bellator situation, champion Mrs. Weight, Bell's still on the line for the challenger. And Rumble's team didn't fight it. So what can you say? They didn't have a problem with it. Even though the belt still would have been on the line for them. commission was looking right at it.

They didn't do anything. You're going to do whatever by any means necessary to make it to that title fight. If you're going to compare that towel thing to PED usage, which people have to me, to, you know, failing a drug test, to an illegal foul, come on, what are we talking about here? We're talking about 1.2 pounds. You think that that's the reason why Daniel Cormier won that fight? You're kidding yourself. Come on now.

It's not even in the same discussion. And I love John Jones saying that it was the dirtiest move he's ever seen in sports. The notorious eye poker kick to the knees, and we won't talk about the other stuff. It's funny. To me, I like that. That's part of the rivalry. It's great. But let's not kid ourselves here.

And then we get to Pearl Gonzalez. And after she weighs in, she's been there since Tuesday. She goes to the back. And they tell her, oh, it says here on your questionnaire that you have breast implants. You can't fight here in New York. It's there. We found it. It says it.

But why did it take until Friday at 11 o'clock a.m.? After she had been there all week, after she weighed in, weight cut, all that stuff? Why did it take that long for them to tell her that? And please, make no mistake about it. She was told the fight was off. Cynthia Calvillo was told the fight was off. The UFC was told the fight was off. The UFC was told the fight was off.

off. Everyone for around two or three hours knew the fight was off. I was there. This wasn't one of those situations where I can call someone up and tell me like, okay, what's going on. Can you give me the scoop? What's happening? No, no, no. I was there. It was all happening again in front of our eyes. I saw Cynthia Calvillo cry because she was told after weighing in that the fight was off. I spoke to her coaches. I mean, it was all happening in front of us. And then Pearl Gonzalez shows up after the ceremonial wands and tells us words coming out of her mouth, she was told by the commission that the fight was off. Now, how did they get it back on? Well, apparently they spoke to her doctor. He provided them with medical information and all of a sudden they deemed that it was safe and

healthy for her to fight. This was a very unfortunate situation. I don't regret as a site reporting it because that was the fact. It was off because of this rule. We've seen if you're a wrestling guy, you know that this can be dangerous and there have been some accidents in the past. But they deemed the fight was off. I saw everyone react to it. And then they fought to get it back on. Great. Fight saved. Calvio wins. Gonzalez gets her first UFC fight. But this was very unfortunate for a couple of reasons. A, I think Pro Gonzalez was embarrassed. People are talking about her and her body when it's none of our business. It was just a very irresponsible thing to. to wait till Friday and say that the fight is off and then allow this thing to get out in the public and be reported on.

We got to report the news, but it should never have gone to that point. And also, let's address Misha Tate. Let's address Misha Tate. I had all these people write to me, what about Misha, what about Misha? Misha Tate has never publicly talked about anything she's done to her body. She has no business to be a part of this story. It is absolutely disrespectful in my opinion to talk about Misha, to try to bring her up. You know, reporters mentioning her, no, Misha Tate has nothing to do it.

Yes, I know she fought at MSG. I've seen her before. She has never talked openly about anything that you are implying. No. You can't bring her up. You can't. It's completely inappropriate and disrespectful. You cannot do that.

And then, of course, Dana White, who I was very happy. answered some of my questions at the press conference, and it's all very cordial and nice, and I appreciate that. I truly do. But to come out and say, don't look at websites or don't believe websites that are reporting this and only trust us when we say something, that's when you know it's true. I mean, the public is smart enough now to know what that really means. That is disingenuous, at best. The commission said it to her. We saw it. We saw it. We saw it. We saw, have you cry. We saw Pro Gonzalez react. She told us herself. They told her the fight was off. Come on now. The only thing that tweet was missing was hashtag fake news. Come on now. I'm not going to

reveal my sources as to who told me the fight was officially off. But trust me, they were right. And I don't regret it. Come out and say, oh, only trust us. Yeah, Brock Lesnar isn't fighting at 200 and we're not for sale by the way. Come on now. Hey, you got to protect your property. I get it. But no one who reported the fight was off was wrong. And oh, by the way, I also reported that they were fighting shortly thereafter to save it. And they did. So all is well, that ends well. But it should never even gone to that point. Never have even gone to that point. That was very unfortunate. And I really felt for Pearl, here's someone who is about to make her UFC debut and has to do a press conference on Friday afternoon when you should be getting ready, you know, mentally,

physically for the debut in 24 hours. You're talking to the media. A lot of them have never talked to you before. It's our first time really speaking to her. And this is what you're talking about. In the span of one hour, Friday afternoon, and by the way, I also want to say, I give so much credit to the UFCPR staff for bringing her there. Not a very comfortable topic, not a pleasant one, but in the past, not that long ago, I have to say it, she's not showing up to a press conference. She's not coming to talk to us. That is swept under the rug. Look at Dana's tweet and that's all we're going to talk about. And they made a point to bring her there. So real big kudos to them. I think the PR staff has really come a long way. I mean, they are treating this like a real professional sport and they deserve

a lot of credit for that. But to sit there and do a press conference about this should have never come to that. But I was really impressed with how she dealt with it, like a season vet. like a real professional. So kudos to her. It didn't work out in her debut, but I was impressed. I was really impressed. Big story, New York Commission.

I think that they have the right intentions. They just don't have the experience. Need more events there. Okay. I've been talking about UFC on Fox 24. I have a few other things I want to say about 210, but let me talk about 24 for a second year. So it's this Saturday.

It's in Kansas City, Sprint Center, DJ, Wilson Hayes. You know about it, right? What's this news that I'm talking about? Well, my own pal back there, New York, Rick, is going to be very interested in this piece of news, I do believe, because I have confirmed with, there he is, I have confirmed with Jacques Soza's manager, I have confirmed with Jacques Re Soza's manager, Gilberto Faria, that this fight on Saturday, Jacques Re's fight against Robert Whitaker is the last fight

on his current UFC contract. This has not been reported before. This has been kept very quiet but I've confirmed with Giobardo Ferrea the manager of Jacques Re Soza that this is his last fight on his current UFC contract.

Now this, to me, explains a whole lot about the last few months for Jacques-Rae Soza. How does it explain where he's been, what he's been doing, what kind of fights he's been taking?

Tim Boch, Whitaker. These aren't the fights that we were expecting for Jacare, but now it all makes sense. Get the fights, knock off the fights off the contract, and when the time is right, you negotiate a new deal, and you're on a winning streak, and you're looking good and you're hot and you're fighting on Fox. So I think this was actually a really brilliant move in hindsight, a move that we didn't quite understand. Why is he fighting? Tim Boch? Oh, well, now it kind of makes sense. This is the statement from Faria. We've been going back and forth with UFC officials for a while.

we still have not reached an agreement on his value, but we will continue to talk after the fight. Our goal is to reach a new agreement shortly. The UFC middleweight belt is Jacques-Rae's goal. With a good contract in place, we will keep fighting the best middle-way talents out there and earn the title shot. Jacaray is the only guy out there

who's been vocal about fighting either Luke Rockhold or Yuel Romero. Nobody else is looking for his level of trouble, especially current UFC middleweight paper champion, his words, Michael Bisping. Jacques-Gre has a tough challenge ahead of him against Robert Whitaker on Saturday, and this fight is what matters now, end quote.

That's from Gilberto Faria, the manager for one, Jacaray Soza. So he is fighting out his contract. And let's not forget, he's a former Strike Force middleweight champion. Scott Hooker and crew very high on him. And let's not forget that he has two fights against Gagra Musasi. They're one and one.

This time next year, are we looking at a Musassi? Jacare, Belator, middleweight title fight? Let's not forget about what someone at Viacom told me not that long ago. We are building the 27 Yankees. Musassi, Jacre, do they fall under that idea? That umbrella? This past weekend, Belator had a middleweight title fight. Hapel Carvalio defeated Melvin Manhuff, knocked them out. Impressive. Carvalio has 500 followers on Twitter. Solid fighter, but just isn't a big name. do they go after Jacques Rae and Musassi now

especially if Jacer wins New Rick what do you think of this? Are you nervous? You want to see him fight for the belt. Yeah. If this if you know let's say he fights out his contract UFC and he can't come to terms

he goes to another promotion this will have been in my opinion the best fighter to never fight for a UFC title. I'm trying to think not only to not win to not even fight for a UFC title.

Yeah. For the longest time... I'd have to say that's true. That was Michael Bisping, in my opinion. Yeah, Kenny Florian is also in... Oh, no, sorry, Kenny for the title. Kenny never won the title. Yeah.

You can make a very, very, very valid argument in your favor here. Yeah, this would be very disappointing from that standpoint, but I mean, look, the guy, you know, there's no secret about how good I think he is. I think he would make the middleweight division in any competition in any organization stronger, including the UFC.

To bring him back would be huge. But he is, you know, he's getting older. He entered the sport, you know, at an older age. I think, I think at this point, even, you know, taking, I understand the thought process between taking those fights and getting to the free agency more quickly and getting those fights down. but him having never gotten a title shot seems ludicrous. It seems like he's not been steered in the right direction during his career. You didn't like the idea. You were like, what?

Why are you fighting Tim Boch? Yeah, it doesn't make sense. I think when they announced, correct me from wrong, Whitaker, you were like, eh, well. That one I understand more at least. I mean, but let's be honest, this explains a lot now. Certainly does. I mean, it explains, you know, why you would want to take those.

fights and in short succession. At the same time, the next one could have been a title shot or maybe one more. Okay, now when you consider the middleweight division and the log jam and when you consider the fact that he has been open about it, right? I mean, this was a quote from him to, well, our own Guillermo Cruz wrote about this. He did a scrum. This is Jacques-Rae talking about GSP Bispang. Quote, I want them to suffer a double knockout.

I want them to FUCK themselves, man. That's the reality. I don't care about this fight. That's the same thing I said when Bisp being fought Dan Henderson. I don't care. I won't even watch this crap.

Yeah. He's frustrated. Are you worried as a Jacquet guy, as a guy who you really admire as a fighter and you want to see him reach the top? That's the UFC middleweight title. Are you worried he's done after Saturday?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's a very high possibility if that's the mentality he had. Now, we're making assumptions here too that those are the reasons that he would take the fight, that that makes more sense. And I don't think it's too much of a stretch to assume that.

If that's his mentality, I don't know. I mean, I think he's good enough that it would make sense for the UFC to keep him around and throw it. Oh, yeah, he's good enough. He's more than good enough. But at the same time,

that middleweight division isn't a logjam. I think what you have to account for, though, is that the UFC's not, opposed to creating interim belts. They're not opposed to keeping divisions moving in creative ways at this point. And they've shown that in the past. I think there's an opportunity for Jokeree somewhere in there.

But I also understand, you know, if he gets a better offer somewhere else and can instantly become a contender there, hard to pass up. But as I said, he will be up there. And if there's somebody else that somebody can think of, let me know.

but he will be one of the best fighters to never fight for a UFC title who was in the organization for that long especially. Not only just not even win the title, but not compete for the title, that's shocking to me. Also, the interim belts are usually brought in. I know there's no real rhyme or reason for them,

but when they either foresee a fighter will not be active for quite some time or he hasn't been active, they want Bisping to fight in July. So I don't see, like, I know Romero wants it, I don't see them doing that at 185 just yet. Yeah, I agree with you. But, I mean, potentially, if Bisping, you know, gets tied up with GSP and it's, and it's a while, then it could have happened. But it's all, the entire thing is murky.

The entire division is murky at this point. Yeah. What a fascinating story. It's interesting. Now all of a sudden, I'm really looking forward to that fight on Saturday, him versus Robert Woodaker. And let's not look past Whitaker. I mean, he's looking amazing at one. 85, great win over Brunson.

This is a step up, but man, oh man. I mean, you talk about those three fights right now. Bisping, excuse me, DJ on the verge of tying history, Waterson and now saying, you know, she wants the title shot, and I'm sure Rose will say the same if she wins. And what's at stake here for Jacaree? That's Foxworthy right there. Yeah.

It is Foxworthy. I mean, come on, Jacaray's box office. Yeah, yeah, sure. Well, you know, you say that with a smile. But has he heard himself? Yes. He has not made an effort to speak English. And I know when I see him, he understands English.

I'm not saying he knows how to speak English, but should he have tried to learn how to speak English earlier to connect with the fans here in America? Even if it's not English. Yeah. Think of Jose Aldo. Yeah. Think of how his level of transparency has increased. Think of the way people view Jose Aldo when he speaks now versus when.

he was quiet. Think about Gagard Musassi in the same division. And think about the noise he makes about where he belongs, his status. I deserve this, I deserve that.

If Jok-Rae has said these things, they've been relatively quiet under the radar. I think he's missed opportunities to demand a title shot. If I was Jok-Rae, after the Yol-Romero fight, I would have made a big stink.

Because I thought he won that I'm sure he thought he won that fight. I would have made a big deal out of that. Instead, he comes out, take some more fights against guys that really don't belong in the cage with him. And it's just continued from there. So I understand the idea and the thought process between getting toward free agency,

but I don't understand not really staking the claim for what you deserve. And I think he's not, him and his extended team have not really done a good job at that. over his career. And we can't ignore the fact that, again, both Musassi and Jacaree have connections to Scott Koker. Yeah. Former champions, both of them. Interesting times. Certainly interesting times at 185 pounds. Okay, let's go back to 210 here for a second. Sure. Are you going to give us a full rundown of Daniel Cormié's physique? Is that? What do you mean? Where are we going? In terms of what I saw?

I think, you know, it was nice to him to give us a shout out at the press conference. It's funny. website. I would have gone for MMAfighting.com, but it was still kind of him. Obviously, it was an impressive win, right? I mean, you can't take anything away. Was that, and I mean, I keep getting hate for this, but how is this guy not the pound for pound king?

And do you agree with me when I say he's the most underappreciated champion U.S. history? Everyone said DJ. I love DJ. No one likes DJ more than me. I have been talking to him for so long, and I think we have a great relationship. But we cannot compare the level of competition that Demetrius Johnson has fought to the level of competition that Daniel Cormier has fought at 205 in heavyweight. And let's not forget,

Daniel Cormier was undefeated at heavyweight. Let's not forget DJ has lost twice at 135 and won a pretty controversial one against Miguel Torres as well. How is this even a discussion? Because he has one loss to John Jones, who's ineligible right now. If Jones was active, he would obviously be the guy. But I'm not considering him right now. How is Daniel Cormier not the guy? A. And B, why doesn't the UFC promote him as such. If they don't promote John Jones versus Daniel Cormier as one of the few times in UFC history that the number one pound for pound fighter is fighting the number

two pound for pound fighter, they I mean, now all hope is lost. Yeah. All hope is lost. He submitted Rumble twice? Yeah, if you discount John Jones, which you can easily do, it's hard to argue against it. I think the thought process, and I think

part of what's happening is until this point, DJ's been very active. DJ has continued to rack up win, after win after win after win, done it on a very frequent basis, built up that win streak in incredibly fast fashion to the point where it's hard to not think about him

in that context as an all-time great because of how quickly and frequently he was able to do it. Whereas Cormié's wins have been less frequent, just from the sense of some fights have been cancelled and make no mistake about it, not by no fault of his own.

But he's not been as active as DJ. And so it's easier to forget how good a career he had at heavyweight before dropping to light heavyweight. It's easy to forget how good his run at light heavyweight has now been just because it seems to have been moving at a slower pace. Whereas DJ, that number of title defenses has crept on us very, very quickly, whereas Anderson-Sylvis took, seemed like a much longer time.

the answer is you're right yes I agree a guy who got it done that well at heavyweight and that well at light heavyweight belongs in that conversation if not at the top clearly it wasn't too long ago you know four years ago I was predicting this three years ago I was predicted yeah but you kind of jumped off the bandwagon let's be honest no I'm not off the bandwagon

Janukor Mier is still as good as I thought he was I think he's better I think John maybe possible especially at his age But I don't think he's going to beat John Jones. That's all I have to. Just turn 38. John Jones is still the guy. Until he proves otherwise,

John Jones is still the guy. Okay, can I say this about Jones now? I'm now in the camp of, you know, actions speak louder. And I appreciated the fact that he was in Buffalo, and I feel like that rivalry has now gotten a real shot in the arm. I feel like it has been revitalized.

I am so looking forward to that fight now. I think Cormier had some, great quotes this past week. I think Jones had some great quotes. I think it was awesome seeing him in the front row and the interaction and all that stuff. I thought Cormier's post-fight interview, everything he said to Manoa, everything he said to Jones was money, his best ever. But when I'm sitting there listening to him say that, you know, I was proven innocent, that I'm a change man, hey guys, you know, try sex pills. The guy who five years ago, you know, was talking about Jesus and saving lives and stuff like that, you need, you need, you.

You now need, at least for me, I'm talking about just for me. I'm not saying MMA community on the whole. I need to be convinced that you are the best ever, that you are deserving of that title. I'm no longer going to sit on this chair and say that John Jones is the best ever. I can't anymore. I can't. I don't buy it. I don't buy that he's changed. I want to see it. I bought it before. I believed it. And it didn't happen. He's been gone. it's almost been a year since his last fight I liked that he talked to us I liked some of the things

there were other things that kind of rubbed me the wrong way and I didn't feel like I was seeing a different guy I just didn't feel it this is the perfect time for that fight there's so many curious things about it was the John who fought OSP the new John DC active

does he have his numbers is he in his head or is John Jones to Daniel what Daniel is to Rumble Johnson? You get what I'm saying? Is John Jones the Mike Brown to Daniel Cormier's your eye of favor? I don't know.

I can't wait for the fight. All I'm saying is, I'm not going to be, when that suspension is up July 7th, I'm not saying that he's back. No, you got to prove it to me. As a fan, as a journalist, I am not believing it

because I wasn't necessarily buying what he was selling on Friday. I don't. I don't disagree with anything you said there. I think to me, though, when he's back, he's back. I'm happy to jump back on the train. I mean, there's a lot. It almost kind of, and this has nothing to do with my relationship with Daniel,

working at Fox and things like that. And clearly we have a good relationship. He comes on the show and he squeezes us in and all that stuff. And I appreciate that. I mean, I can't ignore that. But I feel like I have a very good relationship with John Jones, too. And this is nothing that I wouldn't say to him. It boggles my mind that when they do a press conference,

whenever that time comes, he will get cheered, loudly, passionately, and Cormia will get booed. And I get why nostalgia, great fighter, always delivers, and people kind of long for what they don't have and they miss them and all that stuff. But, I mean, he's had a lot of things, you know, on that resume that have piled up that aren't very, you know, they're not very positive. and they're not things that you should be really proud of. And Cormey has very few. And if you want to put the towel grabbing on par with some of these other things, come on now. And so what does it say about us as a fan base?

What does it say about us as human beings? If we're really going... And I know Cormey is now inviting it and that will lead to more booze, but that kind of boggles my mind. I can't quite wrap my head around that. You know what I'm saying? I do, but I think it's like as close to pro wrestling. It is.

It is. They can't force who you like down your throat. Sometimes the guy is just the guy and you can't, you can't really predict that. You can't really force that. You can't say, Cormié is our guy now. This is who you should love. No, no, you can't do that. That's the worst thing you can do.

That's the absolute worst. I mean, it's happened to the Rock. It's happened to Roman Reins as, as Cormeier brought up. I know that that's the worst that you can do. I'm more questioning why people don't see what I'm seeing. How do you not see what I'm seeing? I think they see it, but I think to this point, Cormi has been almost a little too squeak.

sneaky clean. In the sense that like you're saying, John Jones is not a role model. So? People don't want a role model in their fighter, in their championship fighter. They don't want a role model. Maybe.

I don't look to, I don't look to cage fighting for inspiration in terms of how to live my life. I look for the best fighters. And John Jones is that. And Cormier is damn good as well. But there's just something that's disconnecting between the fans

who identify with John. Jones and Cormier. I don't think it's predictable. I don't think it's the thing, you know? I, in the past, I've said, John, be yourself. If it's the bad guy, be the bad guy. But that's before all this stuff happened, you know? That's before the 200 thing. That's before the hit and run. It's different now. I almost feel like now you have to work to try to be the good guy again in the sense that I feel like you have to show us that you are at least, I don't know, a little remorseful. I mean, to say that, you know, I was proven innocent, that's not proven innocent. You were given maximum penalty. Now, now, they're saying you're negligent. Okay, fine. That's still not innocent.

Right. That's still not innocent. You are a multi-million dollar athlete. And I'm not going to compare myself to you and what your body goes through. But when I give my kids Flintstone vitamins, I look at the ingredients. You're telling me that you just pop some sex pills in your mouth and don't know what was in them? Really? With all that at stake, with that payday at stake, with that fight at stake, 200 at stake, with your legacy at stake, with you being so outspoken about PDs in the past at stake, you're just popping sex pills without any idea of what's in them? A few things on that. One, he said he's been using them for a while.

And if he hadn't got a negative reaction from that or a positive test, then I think it's okay to assume that, you know, you continue that. so I think the fact that this one happened if the story is to be but clearly first of all random drug testing hasn't been around forever

and B they tested the other supplements and those are tainted as well so my point is if you were using them for a while you weren't using those because those would have come up that's fair and then

I think it's hard unless John Jones is getting a negative feedback loop from the people who are supported. I mean, clearly the fans are behind him. It's hard. They miss them. I get it. If I'm John Jones, I can't wait for him to come back. I wouldn't necessarily be in a rush to be that good guy, to be that changed man.

I just felt like it didn't feel authentic. And that's, should he? If you're asking for it, maybe the people, the other. people around him or not. Maybe the people, maybe he's getting people who are saying, yeah, we support you. Now, I tweeted out something about John Jones. I don't even remember what. And I got maybe a handful of replies, five replies.

And they were all, F that guy, he's a cheater. So you're not alone in this sentiment. But I'm guessing all those cheers and, you know, every time he's shown the reaction to him is encouraging. encouraging that. And I wouldn't necessarily, if I was him and getting that feedback, be in a rush to show that remorse if it's working. Whatever he's doing is working. That I know. People are caring. People are paying attention. And I don't know. I'll be clear because I know people are going to try to twist these words. There has been no bigger supporter fan, I think, of John Jones and me. And I can't wait for him to come back. This is my most excited. as far as what I'm looking forward to in 2017. I can't wait for it.

I love the dynamic and I think that the rivalry has now been shot through the roof. It felt a little stale going into 200 and certainly post. And I wondered, even on this show, if they could even do the rematch upon his return. Build it back up, right? Build it back up. Get him a tune-up fight. I campaign for him to fight Gustafson. Remember that?

Yep. I don't want to see that anymore. I want to see this fight now. July 8th. I want to see it whenever they're ready. Yep. I can't wait for it. I just want to, and I don't think this is a crazy ask,

I want to believe that he has changed, that he is remorseful, that this isn't going to happen again. This is one thing that I think Dana White and I agree on. Now, I will disagree with the fact he should be in the main event. This is the biggest fight I think that WMEe. What is a bigger fight?

This or Bisping GSP? I actually think this does, this does bigger. Bisping GSP has no history. There's no story to it. It's the fight that I think they think people want, but I'm not sure that people do. I think it'll do well, but I wasn't clamoring

for Bisping GSP. John Jones and Daniel Cormia has enough story for a lifetime, and they've only fought once. It's no doubt that that's the fight. That division, it seems like now there's a list of contenders that you can clearly identify in John Jones,

Jimmy Manoa. has it ever been weaker? We just lost Rumble from it. Yeah. Do you believe that this is his last fight? Somebody asked a question about this. Bader? Yeah.

That division is getting very, very weak, quickly. It's an odd position because the contenders are clear, and then everybody else, there's a big drop-off. Do you believe this is Rumble's last fight? Man, I mean, MMA retirement is like, it's not even worth discussing, to be honest. Now, if the opportunities that people think he's getting are real, I would say, yeah.

If it has anything to do with pro football, sure. It was weird that he was so adamant that it had nothing to do with the pro football, and then Henry Hoof said that it does have something to do the pro football. I was told that he had some kind of relationship with someone who works at the Rams, and this was discussed around the table, but I was never told that, A, he's going to play, or be that it was a done deal.

Well, I don't think he's going to play. I know, but that actually came out. Remember that? But you know what was interesting about his tweet about the Rams? He specifically said, I'm not playing for the Rams. Yeah. So he used the word playing, as opposed to working or, you know, something like that. If he's entering the pro football world, I don't think we'll see him again.

As far as management or training or things like that are concerned. You know, maybe he comes back. for a heavyweight fight, but I think he's okay. I think he's okay with being done. He seemed like he knew. Yeah, he seemed at peace. He seemed like he knew where he was going with it.

So I think he's gone, but at the same time, MMA retirement means nothing. It means literally nothing. Because what is the process? I'm done. You say I'm done, that's it. That's the entirety of the retirement process in MMA.

and you know what it takes to come back from that? I'm back. It's too easy. There's nothing. I'd love to know, although now that he says he's retired, then he has to go through the whole USADA thing again. And if you announce your retirement, then you have to go through the pool, blah, blah, blah. But I'd love to know what would have happened, like sliding doors had he won.

Would you really have retired with that John Jones fight coming up? And by the way, kudos to Jimmy Manoa for actually going out there and sitting in the, you know, the front row cage side and just inserting himself into that discussion. I thought that was very, I mean, the presence of mind to do that. And of course, you know, he has something to gain here, but, you know, he doesn't live in Buffalo. He doesn't live near Buffalo. He lives across the pond. That's what you got to do.

That's what, you know, we were telling Megan Anderson to do. Go to Brooklyn, be in the front row. Get yourself in there. I think the UFC appreciates that. James Tony did way back when. Unfortunately, Cormié cut the promo of the year on him because he was sitting there. That's fine. He's now, again, like I said on Saturday, that's Sun in 101.

Cormier is happy that he was there. Cormier wants some challenges at 205. Cormier wants to spray you like an oozy. Cormier wants to be able to hit you, and now he's going to hit him back. The line about the jumpsuit was actually kind of funny, but that was actually good for Cormier and for Jimmy Manow, I thought,

even though he didn't have a mic, because... That's unfortunate. I can assure you Jimmy Manoa is not being talked about by Daniel Cormier after winning the belt if he's not sitting there. No. It's only John Jones.

So how is it bad? They'll use that in some promo, somewhere down the line. Yep. Right? I think so. Now, what about, okay, so Calvio beats Gonzalez. They're all very high on her. Yeah. And Dana's sitting next to her, and he's talking about Yowana and Connor.

Great star. Let's see what happens next. Let's see what happens when she fights someone a bit above her. Taguelva's beats Patrick Cote, and, you know, he seems to be somewhat back on track, spoke very highly of perfecting athletes and happy with the way they've treated him and the attention that he's received from them. That's great. Charles O'O'Overa wins at 155, submits Will Brooks, and then says he wants to go back to 145,

I can't wrap my head around this. This makes no sense. He's actually better and healthier at 155. Is it that Kelvin Gasolum wants to do the same thing? Yeah, you're right. Is it that rare? I mean, it seems to happen all the time. They can't wait to go back down.

John Lineker. Success at 135, can't wait, couldn't wait to go back down to flyway. Like, I just don't think, I think there's a risk and a gamble and a reward to the entirety of this weight cutting process. And some people think that they're too small for the division up and just want to fight down below. And it's not going to change. Now, he did come in light on the scale, which is a good statement at least. But, yeah, I don't think his mind's going to change on that. Yeah.

Well, Brooks, took less money to go to the UFC. And thus far, it hasn't worked down, right? Yeah. And now you have Michael Chandler who he beat twice, right? And now he's fighting at MSG. Sometimes I have no doubt that he can bounce back, that he will bounce back. Sometimes it pays to be the bigger fish in the smaller pond. You really have to feel for him.

So he won Olivera, that is, Kamar Usman with a very nice win. Miles Jury had some great things to say about dealing with the media and that balance there. I suggest you check that out on our website. Gregor Gillespie with a nice win, Desmond Green with a nice win, Caitlin Chukagin with a nice victory over Irenae, Aldana. All in all, a fun night in Buffalo, I thought. Also of note, Dana White saying that he didn't want to talk about the 145-pound women's division because it will make his head explode, essentially, so that I thought that was very interesting.

And there doesn't appear to be a fight with Cyborg and Germain Durandumie. I've tried to reach out to Germain to find out about her hand, but no. word from her just yet. There are no plans to start a women's 125 pound division, which I think is unfortunate. Shukagian would be perfect for that, as would many others. Joanne Calderwood comes to mind. Yawanna has talked about it, but he said in the press conference that that's not happening. He also spoke about the Floyd Mayweather, Kahn McGrathar fight, said that he has been talking

to Conner's people for quite some time, and now he does believe it's going to happen. So we're seeing him get more and more warm to the idea. each and every time. But I appreciated him showing up and talking to us. It was great to have Dana back in the mix. I enjoyed that. A few more things before we go.

Kelvin Gaslam, as you just mentioned, he's been looking good at 185. He was on our show recently. Supposed to fight Anderson Silva. He is no longer fighting Anderson Silva. He is out of the fight after testing positive for marijuana

following his win over Vitor Belford, a very unfortunate situation. I hate the fact that this is happening. I wish it was a fine 100,000, something like that. I know it's in competition, but to take away an opportunity because of marijuana, just...

I mean, it breaks my heart. Think about... We had Matt Riddle on today. His career was affected by this type of thing. Just something needs to change there, clearly, in terms of regulation and testing on this. Yeah, what a bummer. And so now they're talking...

They approached Luke Rockhold, but what I was told, they're interested in Uriah Hall right now. Romero said he would fight Anderson if it's for the interim title, but there's no interim title right now. And they still don't have a date for Bispying and GSP. What would you prefer? Uriah Hall, Anderson, or Rockhold Anderson? Uriah Hall Anderson. Yeah. No interest in Rockhold Anderson.

Why? That's not a... You don't think it's a fair fight? Yeah, it's not a competitive fight. Wow. Okay. I mean, from a name value, which is more intriguing on a poster? Probably Anderson and Rockhold.

No, definitely Anderson and Rockhold, but I have no interest in seeing Anderson solo fight Luke Rockhold. I know how that fight goes. Nate Diaz is having a rehearing later on this week, so we expect his punishment, his fine for the bottle thing is going to come down, and hopefully we could put 202 to bed fine. finally, what, eight months later? Crazy. When we finished the show last week,

Brett Akamoto, VSPN put out a report about Robbie Loller and Donald Soroni and them fighting at 213. As of right now, I'm told it's not official. Still a couple things, but that's what they're targeting. Also targeting Travis Brown versus Alexi Olinic. We know about Garbrand Dillishaw. I think that that weekend is coming together.

And I love the fact that there are only two shows and not three shows, and they're doing the Hall of Fame on Thursday, as I said earlier. Our good friend, Amil Mech, is fighting Nordine Teleb that was added to the Stockholm cards. So good to see Amel Meck back. And how about Sage Northcutt, getting his tonsils removed? And I was kind of disgusted. I have to be honest. I report this.

The guys had issues with, what is it? Not bronchitis. Arondritis? No. What's the? Strap throat. strep throat we know about what happened with barbarina um i'm told by his dad multiple issues with it holes in his um in in in his tonsils and developing bacteria i mean this is serious stuff you're a pro

athlete and i report this news and everyone's joking about it why i don't get it because it's tonsils because it's sage doesn't make sense to me a lot of jealousy out there it's kind of gross What does this kid ever done to you? Why? Because he makes a little more money. You got to hate on him? It doesn't make sense. It really doesn't. Bugs me.

And UFC on Fox 24, like I said, is coming up. Best fight this weekend? What do you got? Anything? Definitely interested in Jacare a little more now. Yeah, that is it. Top three fights are fantastic. I will not be there, by the way. I do appreciate everyone checking out our coverage at 210 or 4-2-10.

That was a really fun week. especially being in Buffalo and with Wyden on Thursday and just all the madness and the wayans and all this craziness. But I won't be in Kansas City because it is Passover. I'm actually going to Montreal tomorrow morning for Passover, so I won't be there. But I do love the card. It's a great card. I mean, Al Jermaine Sterling is on the fight past prelims. Yeah.

It's a great fight. Super great card. Some of the names. I mean, Roy Nelson is fighting on the prelims. It's on Fox, but it's still technically the prelims. Bobby Green is back. Bobby Green. King Bobby Green.

Against Rashid Mago Medov. Tim Elliott is back, fighting in his backyard against Louis Smolka. That's a huge fight at 125. Patrick Williams against the Fire Kid himself, making his debut. Tom Dukenwa. He's great. The former Bama champion. This is a really good card.

As I mentioned, Sterling against Augusto Mendez. this is a really good card on Saturday. This is one of the best cards. And I really feel like things are starting to change for the UFC. Like momentum is building. You know, with this card, 211, Eddie Alvarez is on the prelims of 211. I asked him if he knew that.

He said no, but he doesn't mind it. He understands more people watch the prelims. Yeah, that's fine. But I just feel like that card, you know, international fight week, you know, Jones coming back, the GSP Bisp Bing fight. I just feel like there's more momentum now.

It was a tough first half of the year, but I feel like we're about to start to get some big fights and big cards. Beltor also back... Knocking on every... Yes. On Friday. They had a show last Saturday.

It was live. It was in Torino, Italy. And the major news was Carvalio beating Melvin Manhuff, also Anasté Jancova winning, failing to make weight once again. She really needs to fight at 135. But they don't have that division.

So they made a catch rate at 130, and she also missed that. but Eduardo Dantes is fighting Leandro Higo and Higo is a huge prospect out of Brazil teammate of the Pitbull Brothers definitely a fight to go out of your way

and watch. That's a really good fight. Bantamweight title fight that's taking place in Budapest Hungary. Anything else? I think we covered it all. We've done it all, we've said it all. Yeah.

I think John Jones's team is mad at me. Uh-oh. tweets, texts, they're mad at me. What did I say that was so unfair? No, I don't think you were unfair. Look, I think that we've been very fair. More fair, other people have said that we haven't been, we haven't been critical enough.

And I'm not trying to kick a man while he's down. All I'm saying is, and by the way, he said it himself at the press conference. Talk is cheap at this point. We've had chances, we've had incidents. Let's show up. Let's get back to our old look. Let's get back to our old skill. Let's get back to our old performances.

And let's prove everyone wrong. And against, you know, who better than Daniel Cormier? This is fantastic. But please don't compare holding on to a towel to, you know, being negligent. Come on. In that regard. People telling me they should reverse the decision, things like that. Come on.

The commission was right there in front of them. They could have stopped it. What did Eddie Guerrero once say? Remember? I don't know. I know something about cheating, but I don't know what the line is. I don't remember it either.

But no. I mean, oh my God, reverse the decision. Are you kidding me? All right. Again, fun weekend in Buffalo. And I think it's going to be a really good one in Kansas City. I really like this card. So we will talk about that and many more things next week on the show.

But this has been fun. And we're even finishing at 4.30. I told you guys it would be a shorter show. This is actually a normal show. I couldn't help myself you can't my music Thank you very much A little lower

It's just a little high There we go Thank you very much Once against the To the Marines Marines.com Check them out We appreciate their support

As always Bazaar in Buffalo It was bizarre I think we'll get there with New York Don't give up on New York just yet. They just need more reps. And maybe they need to change a few things along the way.

But this sport, it's still what? 24 years young. It is going to get a whole lot crazier, a whole lot weirder, a whole lot wackier as time goes on. I can assure you of that. And hopefully the calls are more right than wrong. That's really it. There were a few weird ones this past week in a bit.

Buffalo. And I feel for Wyman, I feel for Musasi, I feel for everyone involved. Anyhow, thank you to everyone who tuned in. Thank you to everyone who was on the show today. Thank you very much, you Daniel Korme for squeezing us in. Congratulations to him on the Big Victory. Thank you very much to Uri of Faber. Congratulations to him on the induction into the Hall of Fame. Thank you very much. I'm trying to do this off the top of my head, but all of a sudden I forgotten the rest of the people who are on the show. Thank you very much to Michelle Waterson, Matt Riddle, Patrick Cote,

and Henry Hooft. Thank you very much to him as well. Back next week, same time and place to tell us a piece. Somebody.